Fun(?) fact: The Japanese word for "nerve" is 神経, formed from the kanji for "god" and a kanji for "pathway" or "meridian." So I think "Nerve Tower" is a play on this.
@@keithklassen5320 nah, that's unlikely. the structure of NGE's research/paramilitary is made up of three german words: NERV (nerve), GEHIRN (brain) and SEELE (soul). It's spelled in English and pronounced as ネルフ [nerufu]. They're basically depicting themselves as the ingredients of consciousness that control the shared body of humanity and lead it into the new age of, uh, whatever SEELE's idea of the 3rd Impact scenario looks like (I don't think we ever get to see it because of incessant Ikari-Ayanami meddling?)
Baroque is also a type of pearl, which explains why the crystals/idea sephira look the way they do! "A baroque pearl is a pearl with an irregular shape. The term “baroque” comes from either the French word ‘baroque’ meaning “irregular shape” or the Portuguese word ‘barroco’ meaning “irregular pearl""
Amateur folklorist here, the Tarantella Melody is called that because of Tarantrism- a culture-bound syndrome in Southern Italy where people bitten by a local wolf spider called the *Lycosa Tarantula* (yes, the more famous Tarantula's named after this one) would suffer from extreme paroxysms of anger, crying, puking, and maniacal laughter, which could supposedly only be cured by hours or days of frenzied dancing to music (with the tarantella style supposedly having originally developed to cure tarantism). There's speculation that the myth developed from Dionysian/Bacchanal rituals that survived Christianization in the region of Taranto, where the spider and musical style both come from. So the term has an association with madness, violent spasming and twisting (the "distortion" of the body), and the underworld, rebirth, and transformation through Dionysus.
Personally I always loved the final message of the game, which essentially seemed to boil down to 'imperfection is divine'. Imperfection is human. God was itself, an imperfect being, crushed under the weight of its aspirations. Very human. Very...Baroque, in fact. The fusion, in a way, was about forging some kind of emotional support connection with...God. You give God a hug and tell each other it'll be alright, and you hope for the best as long as you have each other. Through all the nightmare aesthetic and cosmic horror and nigh-inscrutable storytelling, it's a very simple, but very moving tale, with some similarly simple but moving themes.
@@WobblesandBean My interpretation was the world couldn't be 'fixed' because 'God' realised it was never truly perfect, and couldn't ever be. Before it all went bananas, God already had the spheres constantly trying to 'correct' flaws, but couldn't ever truly stop or prevent them. Flaws were natural. The crazycult nearly brought everything to ruin, but I think my take away was that the PC and God realised the best they could do was try to build a new, if imperfect and flawed, future.
In the game's terms God _was_ perfect, and any attempts to change things by feeding bad info into her senses was immediately corrected, because it hurt. They had to remove God's ability to feel pain before they could manipulate her, because pain is an indication things aren't as they should be, and need to be corrected. The game kinda uses that to argue how pain can be a good thing.
I've seen the dev logs, I've been on the indie teams. Baroque isn't just ahead of it's time, it's the *direct* inspiration for those jank indie games hahaha
Eh, it sums up to 'mad scientist gets to experiment on God, destroys most of the world in the process, you can either help him finish it off or or save what you can'. The broad strokes aren't complex, but they sure made it an ordeal to get there, both in story and gameplay.
Humans discover God. They manipulate God into a suicidal state of destruction. The humans go mad. The meddling of the humans cause a world wide apocalypse. The main character goes on a journey of self discovery. We find out that the world is unsavable and the only solution is to start a new.
I absolutely love the weirdness and creativity of 90s RPGs. Games have progressed a lot since then, both technically and design-wise, but for some reason that magic is very rarely captured.
I do think the Souls games brought a much needed dose of Weird Shit back to the modern gaming landscape, even if by now the mechanical side of them is no longer as novel as it once was.
Baroque as a title actually makes a whole lot of sense and I really appreciate that they chose the name and then used the more typical meaning of the word in the aesthetics of the name. the little white drops you get from killing an enemy? a misshapen pearl, which in itself was one of the original meanings of the word "baroque". the way god is depicted is how (catholic) god is depicted in baroque churches, with long golden spikes representing his divine light et cetera. the grotesques are a strange mix of baroque ornamentation and h. r. giger. the visuals of this game are impeccable and definitely lean into a very baroque depiction of the apocalypse. it's brilliant
@@Kydino Typically most Japanese accents would read the short a in baroque as u. The japanese a is mostly long a. So, baroku would be putting too much emphasis on the a. Either way. They're going to be shockingly close, and I have to imagine the similarity isn't accidental.
I think what is so cool about this game is the depth of all the characters and the amount of mystery in the story. Not too many games have this kind of depth anymore and I miss that.
The Saturn version quickly became one of my favorite games of all time. The game has a remarkably intuitive system that does cool things other modern roguelikes don't. Taking say, an Antiseptic that cures my poison, and throwing it at an enemy to reverse the effect, poisoning it instead. Or an item that inverts the damage I and the surrounding enemies have taken, ingesting it as I'm about to die, making me almost full health while an entire room full of Grotesques suddenly drop dead. For a first-person 3d dungeon crawler on the Saturn in 1995, it plays very well.
True ending made me cry! How beautiful! I should have listened and stopped watching but I was so curious and honestly I still wanna play and experience this sometime.
good old "pain is how you tell if you're being damaged" "remake the world in your image by hijacking a god" is (by now) a kind of cliche, but going into the "okay, *how* are you gonna hijack a god" is usually glossed over so I can at least appreciate "just make the god happy to do whatever by making them insensate to pain/not realize something is wrong"
The connection of the tarantella to insanity is the (possible) origin of the dance - it was created in response to tarantism, a form of mental illness endemic to the area of Taranto in medieval times, which manifested as uncontrollable dancing. (It was believed to be caused by spider-bites, which is where the word 'tarantula' comes from.)
I'm just going to quote the other guy who is more accurate; "the Tarantella Melody is called that because of Tarantrism- a culture-bound syndrome in Southern Italy where people bitten by a local wolf spider called the Lycosa Tarantula (yes, the more famous Tarantula's named after this one) would suffer from extreme paroxysms of anger, crying, puking, and maniacal laughter, which could supposedly only be cured by hours or days of frenzied dancing to music (with the tarantella style supposedly having originally developed to cure tarantism). There's speculation that the myth developed from Dionysian/Bacchanal rituals that survived Christianization in the region of Taranto, where the spider and musical style both come from. So the term has an association with madness, violent spasming and twisting (the "distortion" of the body), and the underworld, rebirth, and transformation through Dionysus."
27:50 Quick insight on the name: it kinda makes sense. "Tarantella" is a type of folk dance from south Italy that use songs that specifically narrate how a girl gets bitten by a spider(a tarantula, hence the name) and becomes mad, being infected by melanchony. To cure it, the girl (and the people performing the dance) have to "move wildly" until the venom gets out of their system, curing the participants
Hey just a quick note, baroque has another meaning in the English lexicon. Merriam Webster gives the definitition "characterized by grotesqueness, extravagance, complexity, or flamboyance" which seems to be a bit more thematic.
Wait IS THAT why Crocodile's evil organization in the first half of One Piece is called Baroque Works? It is certainly filled with grotesque, flamboyant, extravagant, and complex characters.
Ooooh I get it, to heal from any past trauma you have to reckon with both your feelings/pain and the reality (or your perceived reality) and then move forward with the knowledge that you may never be the same, or even at peace, again. I guess the archangel is the part of the world (if not you) that just wants to eliminate that pain, and since you can read it as metaphorical, then the repeated attempts to tear out the part of you that's hurting is like a mental spiral, the kind of thing that really does drive people insane. That being said, the gritty nature of the rouge-like offers a fascinating read of "You can try as many times as you like, you can always get up after you fall, even if you have nothing, you can still make it" which is bizarrely hopeful given the setting nbvhjdfks (tho... given "making it" is an ending that's more open than a restaurant at lunch rush...)
Broke: Kill God. Woke: Embrace God. Bespoke: Restore God’s ability to feel pain while restoring your memory and then make out with God while She wraps you with her tentacles.
Oh man, I remember playing the updated version of this game and not liking it because of the art. The original has a much better art style and looks the perfect for me. All in all i'm wanting to give this another shot.
When I found out that there's a rather sneaky way you can actually equip 3 worms at the same time. This game opened up to me and I discovered it by accident too.
27:56 tarantella is referring to St. Vitus' dance (dancing mania) 29:45 The name Baroque is not random. The music term came around in the sense of irregularly shaped PEARLS. (The name applied to baroque music at the time was one of derision). and the game is full of those white sphere things! Did I crack the code?
This is a truly great video. You give these Saturn classics the respect and admiration they deserve, far more than Sega does. You could have easily just mentioned the original version and played something more modern, like everyone else on RUclips does. Much respect to you. Thanks for making this. I will dungeon and chill for years to come.
@@willfoltzI had that game in my collection and was too dumb to get anywhere in it as a teenager. Now I doubt I'll ever have it again 😢 my gamecube has constant memory issues. I may try and find a good let's play of it because RPGs just aren't for me I guess.
Just wanted to say that your channel (along with Majuular's) has finally convinced me to dig into the Sega Saturn library after years of being curious about that console. And holy hell, have I been missing out! Stumbling my way through that library has reignited my waning passion for videogames like nothing else. So thank you for that!
Baroque also pertains to literature and poetry of the late 16th century. It’s very complex and full of symbolism and imagery and hard to understand if you’re not familiar with classical Greek mythology. So the story of this game might be a reference to its complexity.
@@gersonlopez9134 sure, check out anything from Gongora or Quevedo, both poets were from rival schools of thought, or even John Donne. I typically refer to the Spanish poets because I had to study those when I was in college.
Baroque fascinates me. It is such a weird game, even as just a roguelike. I really love the music and atmosphere. I've played both the remake and original one thanks to translation, it is honestly such a cool game man...
I do like me some Illbleed, but I do feel like there's enough people who are effectively saying the same things about it for me to be a bit burnt out. Most reviewers seem to be focused on the jokes and the weirdness of the mechanics, but they don't really discuss it in a way that really thinks about them from a design standpoint. It does feel a bit surface level and misses the connections it has to more conventional design sensibilities, as the stranger aspects of play are just typical RPG mechanics that have been remixed to promote replaying the same levels whilst never letting the player lose sight of the critical path. Instead of having a maze like dungeon layout, the game uses randomised seeds to place the traps and enemy encounters in an attempt to keep the levels fresh despite them all basically being a linear hallway. I'd also be interested to see someone attempt to interpret the game as a bit of a character study on the type of person Michael Reynolds is within the fiction of the game. His 'films' have a lot of consistent themes about parents (or in one case, a toy) being separated from their children, mirroring his separation from his family. There's also some commentary on consumerism and industrialisation with both the mall level and the sawmill level, where going through the factory requires you to have your identity stripped from you as you become a mindless automaton, going from a real person, to a wooden puppet, and back. There's also some themes of childhood being corrupted, with the Cork Goes to Hell level, the haunted doll character who appears in several levels, and the giant, demonic Sonic the Hedgehog who attacks you. Even the murder mystery level is interesting on a thematic level because the level begins with you seeing the reality of what Illbleed actually is, with piles and piles of corpses piled on top of one another who have been put through this industrial death factory because they wanted to win the cash prize, then you're distracted by the mystery of Killerman and it turns out that there was no clever twist to it, Killerman was Killerman all along. I think that you could even argue that the NG+ run has bearing on the type of person Michael is, given that he's literally a big penis with a condom applied wearing a business suit whose boss fight involves him growing and forcing his way in through the floor (it's a really awkward tonal shift and I don't think it works, but it makes sense). Michael Reynolds is the most horrible monster in Illbleed, but in every other respect he's put on this pedestal as a creative genius and has become a billionaire by profiting immensely from a media empire that he built off the back of abusing his daughter for other people's entertainment and gratification. Why is nobody digging into those aspects of the game instead of making the same basic observations about it being rough around the edges and showing silly clips?
@@casanovafunkenstein5090I think you oughta make that video. Of all the illbleed videos that have popped up, no one has thought this creatively about it. You could at least write the essay if you don’t have the comfort with videos and editing. I’d read it. But you’re right, while I usually like the creators who have put out illbleed content kind of recently, they’re all regurgitating the same surface level stuff. It’s not super interesting.
@@casanovafunkenstein5090 finally, more people examining ILLBLEED unironically. I wrote my own about the ending myself on SGF's playthrough of that game. I don't think Reynolds is meant to look like a condom, Michael Reynold's character design is meant to resemble the Zettons from Ultraman.
despite not having touched this game in 20 years, your thumbnail woke a core childhood memory in my brain that knew this video would be about baroque. thank you for letting me relive a very wild ride of a hidden gem through a really well made video!
Aww man, I loved the Wii version of this game, so cool to stumble on this video! I fondly remember purposely dying like 50 times in a row, specifically on the first level of the tower, to get a ton of unique dialog from the Archangel. He gets progressively more angry and disappointed in you every time you come back. Getting all the voicelines is basically the achievement system of this game, and there are so many unique ways to obtain dialog lines. You have a mute MC and an NPC that says your thoughts outloud, like there's so much you can do just with that. Such an incredible game, I'd highly recommend it to anyone who likes spooky games and achievement hunting! :)
It's potentially thematically relevant that `baroque' is a description commonly used for church architecture and that 'grotesques' are also associated with churches, being ornamental statues of demons and other monsters built into the walls as an artistic flourish. One could argue that the use of those words is a deliberate allusion to organised religion in much the same way as it is with the antagonists all cosplaying as angels whilst attempting to pervert God's will and ultimately wrestle control away from them in order to reshape humanity and the universe at large into something centred around fulfilling their own desires and lust for power
Tarantella the dance draws its origins to Tarantism, a supposed disease caused by a spider biting you which would make you dance hysterically until death
Ya, there was "dancing plagues" that went off in the middle ages of europe, where a bunch of people ran fevers and danced frantically in the streets, until they passed out from exhaustion and either died or woke up with no memory of what they had just done. They thought it was demons or spider bites, but in modern research it was probably Ergot poisoning.
Okay, regarding the meaning of the "Tarantella" Melody: There's a ritual called "tarantism" that was used to treat the bite caused by a then-mythical spider called a tarantula, or Tarantella in Italian. The spider bite was said to cause hysteria and convulsions that could only be cured by calming music used in the ritual. So, the Tarantella melody simultaneously served two functions, inflicting madness like the spider bite, and curing madness like the ritual. Before you ask, the Tarantula spider we know today was given that name long after the myth was made. Real life tarantula bites are no more harmful than a bee sting.
It's a blessing this one got translated. The soundtrack is awesome and the visuals add to the ambience a lot. The randomness of generated floors add to the game's plot, too. The 100 floor dungeon needs a lot of preparation, luck or abuse of savestates. Good thing there's some gigachads out there that documented this game a lot, making the preparation to bring a good weapon/armor down there easier. Hopefully more people will play this gem after your video. The feeling of isolation and dread in this game is very hard to match imo. Good content!
@@kakizakichannel A dungeon crawler with heavy atmosphere and many times religious undertones that can give you a feeling of dread. I just described all three series.
If there is one lesson I have learned from video games, it is: Don't talk to any gods. That aside, I find it so fascinating how video games have become the modern versions of myths. You could put most contemporary stories (barring technological advances) into a book that was written hundreds of years ago. It would probably seem somewhat fitting. Thanks for the great videos! ^_^
Hmmm. Spoilers for the later part of the video discussing the plot. 45:59 The "Owaa" and "The head of of this household is ill" is, I believe, a reference to a poem by Sakutaro Hagiwara simply called Cat: Two jet-black cats On a melancholy night roof: From the tips of their taut tails A threadlike crescent moon hangs hazily. “Owaa, good evening.” “Owaa, good evening.” “Owaaa, the master of this house is sick" (Donald Keene translation) The "owaa" presumably being an onomatopoeia for a cat sound (Yes, I know the typical Japanese word is different). So is God our own Neko-Chan?
the "owaa" is more like baby "o-- waah" sound though I haven't played the saturn one, but the remake has many baby sounds in the ost. Also, the "angelic insect" or for the remakes are called "littles" are baby with wings
@@squelchotron8259 more like symbolize innocence? The "Littles" are God's extracted pain that is made into angelic rifle's bullet. In the final ending, these babies return to God during fusion hence the "O-waah" sound. The soundtrack for PS2 is also called "Innocence" ruclips.net/video/H0jSxeyyAqI/видео.html but this presentation is from remake ones and have different lore (especially about Archangel's past) so... yeah. may be the "O-waah" sound in the original Saturn is a cat, or the god and protagonist doing something else that makes that kind of sound lol
Holy shit, never would I have thought I'd be seeing a recent video popup on this hidden gem. Absolutely love the lore & artwork of this game. For anyone wondering, Sting, to this day releases new art/wallpapers every May 14 (Day of the Great Heat) on their official website which are shortly removed. There is also a manga titled "Baroque - Ketsuraku no Paradigm" which fleshes out the backstory of the main character and the goals of the Order of Malkuth. Also if anyone is curious about the "Tarantella Melody", there is a track in the game called "Melody of Tarantella" that plays when viewing log entries. I'm surprised that I didn't hear it once throughout the video as it is probably my favorite track from the game.
I've been playing the remake of Baroque recently. While it doesn't compare to the Saturn and PlayStation 1 version I love it. I had a pretty lucky run with the Lucky Sword and the Experience Wings, but didn't get far thankfully I had at least one of the 'Me' brands which can spawn an item that is branded with it to the first floor of the Nerve tower. Also occasionally Archangel will troll you and not give you the Angelic Rifle.
As someone who used to play the accordion for weddings and stuff and played the Tarantella endlessly, it being mentioned at 27:50 both caught me off-guard and fucked me up. Makes sense listening to that would make the world go mad. It certainly made me crazy.
I'm feeling frustrated as it seems like I won't be able to complete the video I had planned for this game. However, I'm determined to finish it eventually. This game holds a special place in my heart as it's an underrated gem. I even went the extra mile and translated the entire Nerve Tower website into Brazilian Portuguese.
That initial frame where you are standing there in an alley, looking towards the strange and imposing tower staonrd in red light has stuck with me after seeing it years and years ago. I forgot the name of this game, but this video reminded that memory.
In musical terms, the baroque period was notable for increasingly elaborate and intricate compositions. You can certainly say the same things about the story of this game.
A reminder that many Japanese games are Lyrical. Things are made or said b/c "they felt right". Not everything is explained and even the developers haven't though of explanations. "Terranigma" [snes], Fragile Dreams [wii], Shadow of the Colossus [ps2] are other games where concrete timelines and explanations are secondary or even tertiary.
Is there any resource I can go to that will help me understand this "lyrical" philosophy... I have always struggled to comprehend the stories in Japanese games like Dark Souls, Final Fantasy, Kingdom Hearts, Bayonetta, Metal Gear Solid etc.
@@three_seashellsyou kind of just have to explore a couple of games like that and get used to that style. Then you’ll be more comfortable navigating that style of production generally when you come across it. You can watch RUclips videos like this that break down these games. Find other creators who focus on this type of content, and go into depth about the kind of story telling the utilize and rely on. Learning from other people who discuss it is the best way to understand it yourself. And then be able to discuss it yourself from there.
So basically, something like, sometimes the curtains are red because the author liked the colour, rather than 'they are red because X and Y reason?' That sometimes you might not find a clear explanation of something and it was written more because it seemed 'fitting' or cool, or etc, rather than lore?. I recall another youtube video where a commenter was like 'if the literature you are reading doesn't have hidden meanings to every little detail, find better literature' using the example that 'the curtains are X colour because it represents the emotional state of Y character', if not, find a better thing to read. And I kind of feel that is going a bit silly at times, trying to derive perfect sense and meaning of every dumb tiniest detail.
I certainly prefer that over 'every minuscule detail must have a concrete and clear meaning and change the light of the narrative and explain everything by the end or you are reading it wrong (or the narrative is trash). Like the people over analyzing every tiny bit of 'random popular game' going even to 'and the pixels here are X colour instead of Y, which must mean Y'. rather than 'hey... perhaps the author thought it was a nice colour for that background spot unrelated to the plot'
@@Aldenfenris The way I take this style is having the plot/backstory of the game be more dedicated to connecting with the underlying themes and message the creators want to explore rather than following a fully logical sequence of events in which everything has a direct/explained cause and effect. Though I also think no two people are going to walk away from the same story in that style with the same take on what those themes/message are.
The Nintendo Wii version of Baroque is very underrated. There's a lot of extra content and storylines that are added to it. Hard to find a copy, though.
I picked it up a couple months ago from eBay. Worth every penny. No motion controls, which is a huge plus, and much better visuals than the PS2 version.
@@nandanthonyYou aren't missing much. The creators don't seem to be really keen on the added content themselves and the Saturn/PSX versions are just generally seen as the better.
I love how you incorporate your sources in your narrative, I'm really excited to check out the nerve tower and finally figure out what the hell this bizarre game i gave up on after half an hour on the wii is actually about. :)
The PS2 version is one of those games that I always saw on the shelves while working at EB games, and now is in the collection when my partner and I combined them. It was always something that blended into the background. Until you mentioned there was a PS2 version, I had completely forgotten. Look to my right, and there it is. Huh. Amazing video. I loooove the janky world of first person old school RPGs like Kings Field. The aesthetic is so good.
Baroque as a style was made in response to the reformations in order to bring people back to the glory of god by showing them their divine beauty. In this context, Baroque people have been taken away from the light of god and distorted, sometimes by the voice(read as: glory) of god.
The original art style is amazing. Also, I love the fragmented weird stories that come out of mid-90s Japan, even if they are all variations on "we should kill a manifestation of God".
Oh yeah, this is one of those "hidden treasure" channels, and i just found it and subscribed. Best thing is, now i have a huge backlog of videos to watch :D
lionheart legacy of a crusader is my most painful rpgs I've ever played. To this day music from that game plays in my head whenever I fail at something. The scars are deep, and will never heal.
I really wish they would remake Baroque again, i feel like it'll go better nowadays with how popular scattered lore storytelling is today like in Dark Souls and other Fromsoft games.
@@mathinho1237 I use FromSoft games as an example no need to be so aggressive buddy, plus it doesn't matter if the story of those games are good or not that's not the point i'm making. What i'm saying is that the concept of scattered lore storytelling is alien to a lot of people before games like Dark Souls hit mainstream and discussion on lore content become popular on the internet. People will be able to appreciate the obtuse way Baroque story is told more easily TODAY and a new remake could pull in a lot more new fans.
I think if there's a new remake, it needs to return the game to its root before later releases added and changes stuffs. I never play any of these games, but I heard how downgrade the experience of ports and remakes are. They need to bring back film noir aesthetic, first-person gameplay, ambient and haunting music and sound designs. The story need to bring retained what was established in the Saturn era and added things that isn't contradictory.
It wasn't until this year that I even knew that there was a version prior to the Wii/PS2 versions. With recent games like Kowloon's Curse, Psychopomp, and They Speak from the Abyss, and Oneiro sparking a genuine love for the nightmarish surrealism of this style of dungeon crawler, though, I absolutely intend on going back to this and trying it. There is something so absolutely fucking phenomenal and intriguing about it
I find this very twisted Mix of Judeo-Christian and Buddhist Themes very intriguing! Hidden underneath all the Weirdness, I think there actually might be quite a Bit of good Theology.
As an italian, the fact that the voice of god recording is called Tarantella is impossibly funny,i swear. Great work,amazing video and super interesting game and intriguing way of talking about it,you rock 😁
You’re doing God’s work keeping the memories of these old games alive. I mean, you’d hope God was interested in backwards compatibility at least 🤔 I dunno, I’m no theologian. But in all seriousness this highlights why keeping the original version of a game alongside a remake is important. Different tech gives off different vibes, hence a different experience
I wish more games were like this. The esoteric strangeness resonates with my soul. It feels outlandish, but also not so far outlandish where it becomes a parody of itself.
I remember playing the Wii version a long time ago. I picked it up because the art style gave me SMT vibes and I love that style. The controls were not good, even with my awful third-party pro controller, and I ended up selling it (biggest mistake of my life). I wish I had played the PS2 version instead, because it had better controls than the Wii.
The Wii version seemed to compensate for the jank controls by being just plain easier. At higher levels with a good sword, you could consistantlymake every enemy flinch on hit, making nearly every fight possible to escape unharmed
It’s interesting that the protagonist’s “true form”, being a conjoined twin, would be seen as distorted by most people, but being “fixed” by being separated from his brother is the greatest source of his pain. To be distorted is just part of living.
I would say the mechanics put this more into the mystery dungeon subcategory of rogue like - granted Rogue like and Rogue-lite are very broad terms that cover a lot of different mechanics but I might just be an old stickler XD great video either way!
As soon as the throwing mechanic came up my brain immediately flipped the switch from "baseline roguelike" to "this is a biopunk mystery dungeon" so you're on the money!
I'm so happy to see a high quality video about this game in 2024, and even more happy to see the amount of people that watched it, thank you so much for the hard work!
You awaken in a desert, a tower looms in the distance. An angel hands you a gun
Peak fiction
“Somewhere in Nevada…” vibes are strong
@amergingiles HAAAAAAAANNNNKK! HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANNNNNKKKKKK!!!
I GOT SPURS.....
Sunny Smiles: the angel we don't deserve.
Dark tower vibes
Fun(?) fact: The Japanese word for "nerve" is 神経, formed from the kanji for "god" and a kanji for "pathway" or "meridian." So I think "Nerve Tower" is a play on this.
Which also helps explain NERV in Neon Genesis Evangelion.
@@keithklassen5320 nah, that's unlikely. the structure of NGE's research/paramilitary is made up of three german words: NERV (nerve), GEHIRN (brain) and SEELE (soul). It's spelled in English and pronounced as ネルフ [nerufu]. They're basically depicting themselves as the ingredients of consciousness that control the shared body of humanity and lead it into the new age of, uh, whatever SEELE's idea of the 3rd Impact scenario looks like (I don't think we ever get to see it because of incessant Ikari-Ayanami meddling?)
@@keithklassen5320 mental illness: the anime
Or, perhaps, it's a bad translation and it's supposed to literally mean God's Pathway or something like that
@@stunlord No, it definitely means "nerve," you just lose that potential double entendre in English.
Last time an angel told me to pick up a rifle, I got in trouble with the Feds and now I have to wear this ankle monitor.
At least we won't find you in our child's playset
Did the angel glow in the dark?
What is this country coming too?
@@Andrewexploded The cult and demonic pandemic definitely fucked this country up 🤣
@@criss3619 It was already fucked up. The pandemic was the deathblow.
The visual of the impaled archangel is strangely fascinating to me.
Me too. I love it. Iconic imagery
I never imagined I ever encounter a Japanese game, where shooting God in the face isn't the true ending.
I know. I couldn’t believe it either.
Not to mention with a chainsaw
you get to make out with god, even better.
@@bodhidaruma2824 Considering the amount of s there were, I have a feeling you do more than just make out
disappointed i wish i could side with the archangel because the message the game sent was terrible
Baroque is also a type of pearl, which explains why the crystals/idea sephira look the way they do!
"A baroque pearl is a pearl with an irregular shape. The term “baroque” comes from either the French word ‘baroque’ meaning “irregular shape” or the Portuguese word ‘barroco’ meaning “irregular pearl""
also the fact that "Baroque" sounds eerily similar to the word Broke.
Amateur folklorist here, the Tarantella Melody is called that because of Tarantrism- a culture-bound syndrome in Southern Italy where people bitten by a local wolf spider called the *Lycosa Tarantula* (yes, the more famous Tarantula's named after this one) would suffer from extreme paroxysms of anger, crying, puking, and maniacal laughter, which could supposedly only be cured by hours or days of frenzied dancing to music (with the tarantella style supposedly having originally developed to cure tarantism). There's speculation that the myth developed from Dionysian/Bacchanal rituals that survived Christianization in the region of Taranto, where the spider and musical style both come from. So the term has an association with madness, violent spasming and twisting (the "distortion" of the body), and the underworld, rebirth, and transformation through Dionysus.
Damn, that's sick! Thanks!
I came here to make the same point, bravo!
I only know about this because of the Tarantella monster in D&D lol
This is very interesting, thanks!
That is some awesome lore.
Thank you!
Personally I always loved the final message of the game, which essentially seemed to boil down to 'imperfection is divine'. Imperfection is human. God was itself, an imperfect being, crushed under the weight of its aspirations. Very human. Very...Baroque, in fact.
The fusion, in a way, was about forging some kind of emotional support connection with...God. You give God a hug and tell each other it'll be alright, and you hope for the best as long as you have each other.
Through all the nightmare aesthetic and cosmic horror and nigh-inscrutable storytelling, it's a very simple, but very moving tale, with some similarly simple but moving themes.
"You give God a hug..."
[Penetrate through here]
I think that was more than a hug
I was kind of confused by that. So did they create a new world in the end, or not? Did this broken place just persist forever, never being cleansed?
@@WobblesandBean My interpretation was the world couldn't be 'fixed' because 'God' realised it was never truly perfect, and couldn't ever be. Before it all went bananas, God already had the spheres constantly trying to 'correct' flaws, but couldn't ever truly stop or prevent them. Flaws were natural.
The crazycult nearly brought everything to ruin, but I think my take away was that the PC and God realised the best they could do was try to build a new, if imperfect and flawed, future.
In the game's terms God _was_ perfect, and any attempts to change things by feeding bad info into her senses was immediately corrected, because it hurt.
They had to remove God's ability to feel pain before they could manipulate her, because pain is an indication things aren't as they should be, and need to be corrected. The game kinda uses that to argue how pain can be a good thing.
The creators of this franchise are really dedicated to bring weirdness to absolutely unattainable levels.
The creator of this franchise made the puyo puyo series
@@sumirekanzaki
Well... it makes sense.
basedness of COSMIC proportions
Gnawing on bones to discover their abilities is something you'd see in a jank indie game from the last 3 years. This was way ahead of its time
It is just their spin on rogue-like potions and randomized effects
Legit issac and pills
I've seen the dev logs, I've been on the indie teams. Baroque isn't just ahead of it's time, it's the *direct* inspiration for those jank indie games hahaha
Sounds like a Fear & Hunger item
"The story is not THAT confusing" *Proceed to tell a completely unintelligible and bizarre story about dudes with fake angel wings and Italian music.*
Eh, it sums up to 'mad scientist gets to experiment on God, destroys most of the world in the process, you can either help him finish it off or or save what you can'. The broad strokes aren't complex, but they sure made it an ordeal to get there, both in story and gameplay.
Humans discover God.
They manipulate God into a suicidal state of destruction.
The humans go mad.
The meddling of the humans cause a world wide apocalypse.
The main character goes on a journey of self discovery.
We find out that the world is unsavable and the only solution is to start a new.
i promise you this is nothing compared to the other shit ive read
@@zombie_catgirl
IKR?
*glances at the other games covered on the channel*
It's just typical 90s anime.
I absolutely love the weirdness and creativity of 90s RPGs. Games have progressed a lot since then, both technically and design-wise, but for some reason that magic is very rarely captured.
Back then it was about creativity and passion, these days it's about money and money..
@@vinceb8123 And sexy characters. It's also about sexy characters today.
I do think the Souls games brought a much needed dose of Weird Shit back to the modern gaming landscape, even if by now the mechanical side of them is no longer as novel as it once was.
You should check out Hylics and Hylics 2
@@Jigardo I have, they're great!
Baroque as a title actually makes a whole lot of sense and I really appreciate that they chose the name and then used the more typical meaning of the word in the aesthetics of the name. the little white drops you get from killing an enemy? a misshapen pearl, which in itself was one of the original meanings of the word "baroque". the way god is depicted is how (catholic) god is depicted in baroque churches, with long golden spikes representing his divine light et cetera. the grotesques are a strange mix of baroque ornamentation and h. r. giger. the visuals of this game are impeccable and definitely lean into a very baroque depiction of the apocalypse. it's brilliant
It's brilliant, but most americans wouldn't have a clue. Such as the author of this video and several comments here.
Baroque and Broke are also completely identical sounding in Japanese. So, it fits with the themes of personal trauma manifesting on the outside.
@@DairunCates wouldn't it be バロケ (baroke) and ブロケ (buroke)?
@@Kydino Typically most Japanese accents would read the short a in baroque as u. The japanese a is mostly long a. So, baroku would be putting too much emphasis on the a.
Either way. They're going to be shockingly close, and I have to imagine the similarity isn't accidental.
Baroque is also a style of tarot deck. There's others ofc
I think what is so cool about this game is the depth of all the characters and the amount of mystery in the story. Not too many games have this kind of depth anymore and I miss that.
I guess the moral of this story is: If it ain't baroque, don't fix it.
Boooooo
So does that mean baroque should be fixed?
Best comment ever.
more like: it is baroque, you can't fix it
Im going to baroque you for this joke
The Saturn version quickly became one of my favorite games of all time. The game has a remarkably intuitive system that does cool things other modern roguelikes don't. Taking say, an Antiseptic that cures my poison, and throwing it at an enemy to reverse the effect, poisoning it instead. Or an item that inverts the damage I and the surrounding enemies have taken, ingesting it as I'm about to die, making me almost full health while an entire room full of Grotesques suddenly drop dead.
For a first-person 3d dungeon crawler on the Saturn in 1995, it plays very well.
The Nerve Tower is one of the best supplementary fan sites for Baroque a lot of effort has gone into it over time.
It really feels like something the own creators would made, capturing perfectly the vibe
it kinda reminds me of the Marathon Story Page for Bungie's Marathon games which had convoluted plots and backstories kinda on par with this one 😂
One of the best? There are potentially better ones??
Plz comment so I can save this
True ending made me cry! How beautiful! I should have listened and stopped watching but I was so curious and honestly I still wanna play and experience this sometime.
Ohh "imitation wings" makes a lot more sense than "imitation wigs" as an equitable item.
EQUIPPABLE
XD
good old "pain is how you tell if you're being damaged"
"remake the world in your image by hijacking a god" is (by now) a kind of cliche, but going into the "okay, *how* are you gonna hijack a god" is usually glossed over
so I can at least appreciate "just make the god happy to do whatever by making them insensate to pain/not realize something is wrong"
The connection of the tarantella to insanity is the (possible) origin of the dance - it was created in response to tarantism, a form of mental illness endemic to the area of Taranto in medieval times, which manifested as uncontrollable dancing. (It was believed to be caused by spider-bites, which is where the word 'tarantula' comes from.)
I'm just going to quote the other guy who is more accurate;
"the Tarantella Melody is called that because of Tarantrism- a culture-bound syndrome in Southern Italy where people bitten by a local wolf spider called the Lycosa Tarantula (yes, the more famous Tarantula's named after this one) would suffer from extreme paroxysms of anger, crying, puking, and maniacal laughter, which could supposedly only be cured by hours or days of frenzied dancing to music (with the tarantella style supposedly having originally developed to cure tarantism). There's speculation that the myth developed from Dionysian/Bacchanal rituals that survived Christianization in the region of Taranto, where the spider and musical style both come from. So the term has an association with madness, violent spasming and twisting (the "distortion" of the body), and the underworld, rebirth, and transformation through Dionysus."
27:50 Quick insight on the name: it kinda makes sense. "Tarantella" is a type of folk dance from south Italy that use songs that specifically narrate how a girl gets bitten by a spider(a tarantula, hence the name) and becomes mad, being infected by melanchony. To cure it, the girl (and the people performing the dance) have to "move wildly" until the venom gets out of their system, curing the participants
Hey just a quick note, baroque has another meaning in the English lexicon. Merriam Webster gives the definitition "characterized by grotesqueness, extravagance, complexity, or flamboyance" which seems to be a bit more thematic.
that must be some very old literature
28:43
Yeah, he does mention this, and it’s definitely what was intended.
i was about to say this myself! thank you
Wait IS THAT why Crocodile's evil organization in the first half of One Piece is called Baroque Works?
It is certainly filled with grotesque, flamboyant, extravagant, and complex characters.
Ooooh I get it, to heal from any past trauma you have to reckon with both your feelings/pain and the reality (or your perceived reality) and then move forward with the knowledge that you may never be the same, or even at peace, again. I guess the archangel is the part of the world (if not you) that just wants to eliminate that pain, and since you can read it as metaphorical, then the repeated attempts to tear out the part of you that's hurting is like a mental spiral, the kind of thing that really does drive people insane.
That being said, the gritty nature of the rouge-like offers a fascinating read of "You can try as many times as you like, you can always get up after you fall, even if you have nothing, you can still make it" which is bizarrely hopeful given the setting nbvhjdfks (tho... given "making it" is an ending that's more open than a restaurant at lunch rush...)
Broke: Kill God.
Woke: Embrace God.
Bespoke: Restore God’s ability to feel pain while restoring your memory and then make out with God while She wraps you with her tentacles.
Ah yes, the truest of FMK. Kill God, Marry God, Fuck God.
@@felixader Yeah and penetration talk
@@felixader god is taking full thrust back shots. horny god
Baroke: Bone god.
28:43
:)
Thank you for making this video. I'm sorry it got age restricted. I'm rewatching and commenting to help.
I started playing Baroque because of this video and so far it is a treat of a game!
Oh man, I remember playing the updated version of this game and not liking it because of the art. The original has a much better art style and looks the perfect for me. All in all i'm wanting to give this another shot.
I really enjoying it. I went back and played a bit more even after I got the true ending.
Play the Playstation version.
When I found out that there's a rather sneaky way you can actually equip 3 worms at the same time. This game opened up to me and I discovered it by accident too.
Please tell more…
I knew from the video's title that it had to be Baroque.
IYKYK
I didn't know that from the videos title. bring back putting the videos subject in the title
Or Fear and Hunger, though I'm excited to try this one out
I assumed it would be Lisa: A Painful RPG.
Was honestly expecting Pathologic
27:56 tarantella is referring to St. Vitus' dance (dancing mania)
29:45 The name Baroque is not random. The music term came around in the sense of irregularly shaped PEARLS. (The name applied to baroque music at the time was one of derision). and the game is full of those white sphere things! Did I crack the code?
This is the best channel for finding absolutely unique and strange games that have this particular quality.
Absolutely. I would have never played cosmology of Kyoto or Kuon without this channel and his impeccable taste.
Same
This has to be up there with Evangelion in terms of balancing complete mind screw with an underlying message, and I love it.
This is a truly great video. You give these Saturn classics the respect and admiration they deserve, far more than Sega does. You could have easily just mentioned the original version and played something more modern, like everyone else on RUclips does. Much respect to you.
Thanks for making this. I will dungeon and chill for years to come.
It sucks that RUclips tried to kill this cause it's what came up in my recommends and introduced me to your channel, enjoying the backlog😊
I love how this channel constantly introduces me to new games I’ve never even heard of. Thanks for another great video.
I would love a fear and hunger video like this
I'm impressed you got through this without mentioning Evangelion. Or Tales of Symphonia, although I guess that came later.
I forgot about the fake wings. That tales game dude
is that Tales game good? is it not just another shounen anime game?
@@erickschusterdeoliveira2662 Tales of Symphonia is a masterpiece. Truly a hidden gem of the GameCube era.
@@willfoltzI had that game in my collection and was too dumb to get anywhere in it as a teenager. Now I doubt I'll ever have it again 😢 my gamecube has constant memory issues. I may try and find a good let's play of it because RPGs just aren't for me I guess.
Just wanted to say that your channel (along with Majuular's) has finally convinced me to dig into the Sega Saturn library after years of being curious about that console. And holy hell, have I been missing out! Stumbling my way through that library has reignited my waning passion for videogames like nothing else. So thank you for that!
Baroque also pertains to literature and poetry of the late 16th century. It’s very complex and full of symbolism and imagery and hard to understand if you’re not familiar with classical Greek mythology. So the story of this game might be a reference to its complexity.
Do you know an example of this kind of literature?
@@gersonlopez9134 sure, check out anything from Gongora or Quevedo, both poets were from rival schools of thought, or even John Donne. I typically refer to the Spanish poets because I had to study those when I was in college.
Baroque fascinates me. It is such a weird game, even as just a roguelike. I really love the music and atmosphere. I've played both the remake and original one thanks to translation, it is honestly such a cool game man...
Kinda hoping at some point you might cover “illbleed”, definitely right up your alley. Nice to see more content from you!
I do like me some Illbleed, but I do feel like there's enough people who are effectively saying the same things about it for me to be a bit burnt out.
Most reviewers seem to be focused on the jokes and the weirdness of the mechanics, but they don't really discuss it in a way that really thinks about them from a design standpoint.
It does feel a bit surface level and misses the connections it has to more conventional design sensibilities, as the stranger aspects of play are just typical RPG mechanics that have been remixed to promote replaying the same levels whilst never letting the player lose sight of the critical path. Instead of having a maze like dungeon layout, the game uses randomised seeds to place the traps and enemy encounters in an attempt to keep the levels fresh despite them all basically being a linear hallway.
I'd also be interested to see someone attempt to interpret the game as a bit of a character study on the type of person Michael Reynolds is within the fiction of the game.
His 'films' have a lot of consistent themes about parents (or in one case, a toy) being separated from their children, mirroring his separation from his family. There's also some commentary on consumerism and industrialisation with both the mall level and the sawmill level, where going through the factory requires you to have your identity stripped from you as you become a mindless automaton, going from a real person, to a wooden puppet, and back.
There's also some themes of childhood being corrupted, with the Cork Goes to Hell level, the haunted doll character who appears in several levels, and the giant, demonic Sonic the Hedgehog who attacks you.
Even the murder mystery level is interesting on a thematic level because the level begins with you seeing the reality of what Illbleed actually is, with piles and piles of corpses piled on top of one another who have been put through this industrial death factory because they wanted to win the cash prize, then you're distracted by the mystery of Killerman and it turns out that there was no clever twist to it, Killerman was Killerman all along.
I think that you could even argue that the NG+ run has bearing on the type of person Michael is, given that he's literally a big penis with a condom applied wearing a business suit whose boss fight involves him growing and forcing his way in through the floor (it's a really awkward tonal shift and I don't think it works, but it makes sense).
Michael Reynolds is the most horrible monster in Illbleed, but in every other respect he's put on this pedestal as a creative genius and has become a billionaire by profiting immensely from a media empire that he built off the back of abusing his daughter for other people's entertainment and gratification.
Why is nobody digging into those aspects of the game instead of making the same basic observations about it being rough around the edges and showing silly clips?
@@casanovafunkenstein5090start making video essays wtf
@@casanovafunkenstein5090 how did you type all of that one handed
@@casanovafunkenstein5090I think you oughta make that video. Of all the illbleed videos that have popped up, no one has thought this creatively about it.
You could at least write the essay if you don’t have the comfort with videos and editing. I’d read it.
But you’re right, while I usually like the creators who have put out illbleed content kind of recently, they’re all regurgitating the same surface level stuff. It’s not super interesting.
@@casanovafunkenstein5090 finally, more people examining ILLBLEED unironically. I wrote my own about the ending myself on SGF's playthrough of that game.
I don't think Reynolds is meant to look like a condom, Michael Reynold's character design is meant to resemble the Zettons from Ultraman.
despite not having touched this game in 20 years, your thumbnail woke a core childhood memory in my brain that knew this video would be about baroque. thank you for letting me relive a very wild ride of a hidden gem through a really well made video!
Ah yes, true message from devs. "Perfection is Imperfection and Imperfection is Perfection."
Well, it's true. Experience teaches that.
Aww man, I loved the Wii version of this game, so cool to stumble on this video! I fondly remember purposely dying like 50 times in a row, specifically on the first level of the tower, to get a ton of unique dialog from the Archangel. He gets progressively more angry and disappointed in you every time you come back. Getting all the voicelines is basically the achievement system of this game, and there are so many unique ways to obtain dialog lines. You have a mute MC and an NPC that says your thoughts outloud, like there's so much you can do just with that. Such an incredible game, I'd highly recommend it to anyone who likes spooky games and achievement hunting! :)
It's potentially thematically relevant that `baroque' is a description commonly used for church architecture and that 'grotesques' are also associated with churches, being ornamental statues of demons and other monsters built into the walls as an artistic flourish.
One could argue that the use of those words is a deliberate allusion to organised religion in much the same way as it is with the antagonists all cosplaying as angels whilst attempting to pervert God's will and ultimately wrestle control away from them in order to reshape humanity and the universe at large into something centred around fulfilling their own desires and lust for power
Like @Majuular, @DungeonChill videos are an immediate must-watch. Thanks for exploring the unusual side of retro gaming.
I had a Saturn as a kid. You've covered several games including Baroque that I wish I could've played back then. Thanks for finding these gems!
I'm delighted that you even looked up how to pronounce "Malkuth" correctly for this; most people wouldn't even think to look it up.
Thank you! There are some comments giving me crap for not pronouncing it “Mal-kooth” and I just shake my head.
Tarantella the dance draws its origins to Tarantism, a supposed disease caused by a spider biting you which would make you dance hysterically until death
Ya, there was "dancing plagues" that went off in the middle ages of europe, where a bunch of people ran fevers and danced frantically in the streets, until they passed out from exhaustion and either died or woke up with no memory of what they had just done. They thought it was demons or spider bites, but in modern research it was probably Ergot poisoning.
Okay, regarding the meaning of the "Tarantella" Melody: There's a ritual called "tarantism" that was used to treat the bite caused by a then-mythical spider called a tarantula, or Tarantella in Italian. The spider bite was said to cause hysteria and convulsions that could only be cured by calming music used in the ritual. So, the Tarantella melody simultaneously served two functions, inflicting madness like the spider bite, and curing madness like the ritual.
Before you ask, the Tarantula spider we know today was given that name long after the myth was made. Real life tarantula bites are no more harmful than a bee sting.
It's a blessing this one got translated. The soundtrack is awesome and the visuals add to the ambience a lot. The randomness of generated floors add to the game's plot, too. The 100 floor dungeon needs a lot of preparation, luck or abuse of savestates. Good thing there's some gigachads out there that documented this game a lot, making the preparation to bring a good weapon/armor down there easier.
Hopefully more people will play this gem after your video. The feeling of isolation and dread in this game is very hard to match imo. Good content!
well, not super hard to match as its a lot like classic SMT , Wizardry and Kingsfield.
@@j.2512 i don't see the similarities
“Gigachad” smh lol
@@joearnold6881lol Ikr? I keep hoping that’s something that will just die out on its own.
Only gigachads don’t use the word gigachad, for real.
@@kakizakichannel A dungeon crawler with heavy atmosphere and many times religious undertones that can give you a feeling of dread. I just described all three series.
"In the timeline of Baroque, at the end of the 2020s..."
Me: "Ah shit here we go again."
This game was such an emotional experience, you could say that it really... baroque me
:)
> most painful rpg
> not lisa: the painful rpg
scammed again by algorithm robot
I was rewatching the cosmology of Kyoto video, and this happened to be uploaded
That video is an instant classic. Instantly subscribed after that and have watched dungeon chill every time ever since.
If there is one lesson I have learned from video games, it is: Don't talk to any gods.
That aside, I find it so fascinating how video games have become the modern versions of myths. You could put most contemporary stories (barring technological advances) into a book that was written hundreds of years ago. It would probably seem somewhat fitting.
Thanks for the great videos! ^_^
Hmmm.
Spoilers for the later part of the video discussing the plot.
45:59 The "Owaa" and "The head of of this household is ill" is, I believe, a reference to a poem by Sakutaro Hagiwara simply called Cat:
Two jet-black cats
On a melancholy night roof:
From the tips of their taut tails
A threadlike crescent moon hangs hazily.
“Owaa, good evening.”
“Owaa, good evening.”
“Owaaa, the master of this house is sick"
(Donald Keene translation)
The "owaa" presumably being an onomatopoeia for a cat sound (Yes, I know the typical Japanese word is different). So is God our own Neko-Chan?
the "owaa" is more like baby "o-- waah" sound though
I haven't played the saturn one, but the remake has many baby sounds in the ost. Also, the "angelic insect" or for the remakes are called "littles" are baby with wings
@@krszm Are the baby sounds to symbolize rebirth, then?
@@squelchotron8259 more like symbolize innocence? The "Littles" are God's extracted pain that is made into angelic rifle's bullet. In the final ending, these babies return to God during fusion hence the "O-waah" sound. The soundtrack for PS2 is also called "Innocence"
ruclips.net/video/H0jSxeyyAqI/видео.html
but this presentation is from remake ones and have different lore (especially about Archangel's past) so... yeah. may be the "O-waah" sound in the original Saturn is a cat, or the god and protagonist doing something else that makes that kind of sound lol
Considering that the poem is in printed in full in the game at 24:25, I'd say this is a really solid guess
So, I’m the only one who heard Down With The Sickness every time “Owaa” came on screen then?
Holy shit, never would I have thought I'd be seeing a recent video popup on this hidden gem. Absolutely love the lore & artwork of this game. For anyone wondering, Sting, to this day releases new art/wallpapers every May 14 (Day of the Great Heat) on their official website which are shortly removed. There is also a manga titled "Baroque - Ketsuraku no Paradigm" which fleshes out the backstory of the main character and the goals of the Order of Malkuth.
Also if anyone is curious about the "Tarantella Melody", there is a track in the game called "Melody of Tarantella" that plays when viewing log entries. I'm surprised that I didn't hear it once throughout the video as it is probably my favorite track from the game.
I've been playing the remake of Baroque recently. While it doesn't compare to the Saturn and PlayStation 1 version I love it. I had a pretty lucky run with the Lucky Sword and the Experience Wings, but didn't get far thankfully I had at least one of the 'Me' brands which can spawn an item that is branded with it to the first floor of the Nerve tower. Also occasionally Archangel will troll you and not give you the Angelic Rifle.
As someone who used to play the accordion for weddings and stuff and played the Tarantella endlessly, it being mentioned at 27:50 both caught me off-guard and fucked me up. Makes sense listening to that would make the world go mad. It certainly made me crazy.
This has quickly become my favorite channel on RUclips. Good shit Mr. Chill, looking forward to the next one.
I can always count on Japan to give me mysterious towers, mangled Christian themes, and Tarot cards.
Baroque is actually how I found your channel. Watching another video about it and I saw one of your videos in the recommendations.
Great video! This game is crazy. I love that the story has so many levels to it. It’s so bold to commit to a concept like this so completely.
just another day at the office!
I'm feeling frustrated as it seems like I won't be able to complete the video I had planned for this game. However, I'm determined to finish it eventually. This game holds a special place in my heart as it's an underrated gem. I even went the extra mile and translated the entire Nerve Tower website into Brazilian Portuguese.
Sorry for not finishing the video, but I saw ten minutes and knew I gotta experience this one for myself first.
That initial frame where you are standing there in an alley, looking towards the strange and imposing tower staonrd in red light has stuck with me after seeing it years and years ago. I forgot the name of this game, but this video reminded that memory.
Really glad to see that you can finish through baroque, greatness recognize greatness
In musical terms, the baroque period was notable for increasingly elaborate and intricate compositions. You can certainly say the same things about the story of this game.
A reminder that many Japanese games are Lyrical. Things are made or said b/c "they felt right". Not everything is explained and even the developers haven't though of explanations. "Terranigma" [snes], Fragile Dreams [wii], Shadow of the Colossus [ps2] are other games where concrete timelines and explanations are secondary or even tertiary.
Is there any resource I can go to that will help me understand this "lyrical" philosophy... I have always struggled to comprehend the stories in Japanese games like Dark Souls, Final Fantasy, Kingdom Hearts, Bayonetta, Metal Gear Solid etc.
@@three_seashellsyou kind of just have to explore a couple of games like that and get used to that style. Then you’ll be more comfortable navigating that style of production generally when you come across it.
You can watch RUclips videos like this that break down these games. Find other creators who focus on this type of content, and go into depth about the kind of story telling the utilize and rely on.
Learning from other people who discuss it is the best way to understand it yourself. And then be able to discuss it yourself from there.
So basically, something like, sometimes the curtains are red because the author liked the colour, rather than 'they are red because X and Y reason?' That sometimes you might not find a clear explanation of something and it was written more because it seemed 'fitting' or cool, or etc, rather than lore?. I recall another youtube video where a commenter was like 'if the literature you are reading doesn't have hidden meanings to every little detail, find better literature' using the example that 'the curtains are X colour because it represents the emotional state of Y character', if not, find a better thing to read. And I kind of feel that is going a bit silly at times, trying to derive perfect sense and meaning of every dumb tiniest detail.
I certainly prefer that over 'every minuscule detail must have a concrete and clear meaning and change the light of the narrative and explain everything by the end or you are reading it wrong (or the narrative is trash). Like the people over analyzing every tiny bit of 'random popular game' going even to 'and the pixels here are X colour instead of Y, which must mean Y'. rather than 'hey... perhaps the author thought it was a nice colour for that background spot unrelated to the plot'
@@Aldenfenris The way I take this style is having the plot/backstory of the game be more dedicated to connecting with the underlying themes and message the creators want to explore rather than following a fully logical sequence of events in which everything has a direct/explained cause and effect. Though I also think no two people are going to walk away from the same story in that style with the same take on what those themes/message are.
I feel like Slay The Princess is a modern spiritual successor to Baroque in a way.
Just a few hours ago I saw a video about Baroque and now you cover it as well. Great video as always Mr Chill.
Oh cool, thank you for covering this very strange game. The strangeness in style in mechanics and setting remind me a lot of Golden Light.
The Nintendo Wii version of Baroque is very underrated. There's a lot of extra content and storylines that are added to it. Hard to find a copy, though.
I picked it up a couple months ago from eBay. Worth every penny. No motion controls, which is a huge plus, and much better visuals than the PS2 version.
aw man, ive looked at the remade versions but the newer artstyle doesnt seem as good to me
But dang.... the extra content.....
@@nandanthony agreed the new art style sucks compared to the original
@@nandanthonyYou aren't missing much. The creators don't seem to be really keen on the added content themselves and the Saturn/PSX versions are just generally seen as the better.
I love how you incorporate your sources in your narrative, I'm really excited to check out the nerve tower and finally figure out what the hell this bizarre game i gave up on after half an hour on the wii is actually about. :)
The PS2 version is one of those games that I always saw on the shelves while working at EB games, and now is in the collection when my partner and I combined them. It was always something that blended into the background. Until you mentioned there was a PS2 version, I had completely forgotten. Look to my right, and there it is. Huh.
Amazing video. I loooove the janky world of first person old school RPGs like Kings Field. The aesthetic is so good.
Baroque as a style was made in response to the reformations in order to bring people back to the glory of god by showing them their divine beauty. In this context, Baroque people have been taken away from the light of god and distorted, sometimes by the voice(read as: glory) of god.
Thanks man perfect timing, doing some Saturday morning gaming so this is great 👍
i found about this game a year ago through the manga. Awesome to see it getting more attention
Here to scream "OMG IT'S A VERFIED PERSON!"
The original art style is amazing. Also, I love the fragmented weird stories that come out of mid-90s Japan, even if they are all variations on "we should kill a manifestation of God".
Oh yeah, this is one of those "hidden treasure" channels, and i just found it and subscribed. Best thing is, now i have a huge backlog of videos to watch :D
This game was, and still is, way too cool for school
Baroque is literally a type of tarot deck btw. So it is not just using it in the literal sense but also in the connection with the baroque card deck.
*Baroqueception*
I really needed some DungeonChill today
lionheart legacy of a crusader is my most painful rpgs I've ever played. To this day music from that game plays in my head whenever I fail at something. The scars are deep, and will never heal.
I really wish they would remake Baroque again, i feel like it'll go better nowadays with how popular scattered lore storytelling is today like in Dark Souls and other Fromsoft games.
Please stop, play another game, FromSoft are not good written.
@@mathinho1237 I use FromSoft games as an example no need to be so aggressive buddy, plus it doesn't matter if the story of those games are good or not that's not the point i'm making. What i'm saying is that the concept of scattered lore storytelling is alien to a lot of people before games like Dark Souls hit mainstream and discussion on lore content become popular on the internet. People will be able to appreciate the obtuse way Baroque story is told more easily TODAY and a new remake could pull in a lot more new fans.
I think if there's a new remake, it needs to return the game to its root before later releases added and changes stuffs. I never play any of these games, but I heard how downgrade the experience of ports and remakes are. They need to bring back film noir aesthetic, first-person gameplay, ambient and haunting music and sound designs. The story need to bring retained what was established in the Saturn era and added things that isn't contradictory.
It wasn't until this year that I even knew that there was a version prior to the Wii/PS2 versions. With recent games like Kowloon's Curse, Psychopomp, and They Speak from the Abyss, and Oneiro sparking a genuine love for the nightmarish surrealism of this style of dungeon crawler, though, I absolutely intend on going back to this and trying it.
There is something so absolutely fucking phenomenal and intriguing about it
I find this very twisted Mix of Judeo-Christian and Buddhist Themes very intriguing! Hidden underneath all the Weirdness, I think there actually might be quite a Bit of good Theology.
I'm hooked on your video game essays. It's giving me similar vibes to RUclipsr The Sphere Hunter.
"most painful RPG" man, lunar: dragon song looks very diferent from what i remember...
Lunar: Dragon Song. Ooof. That is painful.
As an italian, the fact that the voice of god recording is called Tarantella is impossibly funny,i swear.
Great work,amazing video and super interesting game and intriguing way of talking about it,you rock 😁
You’re doing God’s work keeping the memories of these old games alive. I mean, you’d hope God was interested in backwards compatibility at least 🤔
I dunno, I’m no theologian. But in all seriousness this highlights why keeping the original version of a game alongside a remake is important. Different tech gives off different vibes, hence a different experience
I wish more games were like this.
The esoteric strangeness resonates with my soul. It feels outlandish, but also not so far outlandish where it becomes a parody of itself.
This Game is a Diamond Hidden right there un the Open. So obscure an weird yet so deep and rewarding
This one is blowing up for sure!Great work, well made and intriguing video
I remember playing the Wii version a long time ago. I picked it up because the art style gave me SMT vibes and I love that style. The controls were not good, even with my awful third-party pro controller, and I ended up selling it (biggest mistake of my life). I wish I had played the PS2 version instead, because it had better controls than the Wii.
The Wii version seemed to compensate for the jank controls by being just plain easier. At higher levels with a good sword, you could consistantlymake every enemy flinch on hit, making nearly every fight possible to escape unharmed
It’s interesting that the protagonist’s “true form”, being a conjoined twin, would be seen as distorted by most people, but being “fixed” by being separated from his brother is the greatest source of his pain.
To be distorted is just part of living.
I would say the mechanics put this more into the mystery dungeon subcategory of rogue like - granted Rogue like and Rogue-lite are very broad terms that cover a lot of different mechanics but I might just be an old stickler XD great video either way!
As soon as the throwing mechanic came up my brain immediately flipped the switch from "baseline roguelike" to "this is a biopunk mystery dungeon" so you're on the money!
I'm so happy to see a high quality video about this game in 2024, and even more happy to see the amount of people that watched it, thank you so much for the hard work!