A HOLIDAY DEAL ON SOUND AND VISION
Here are two reasons I like Microsoft’s Black Friday Xbox Live Arcade specials: one is that they’ve lowered the price on Q Entertainment’s HD remake of Dreamcast/PS2 rhythm/shooter Rez, which means there is essentially no excuse not to experience the game if you haven’t before. Inspired by, the story goes, one of his first rave experiences (this would have been the very late 90’s, mind), Sega designer Tetsuya Mizuguchi set out to create a game that could blend that light and sound and palpable pulsing rhythm as fantastically. The result was Rez, and a long series of music/puzzle games since.
The second is that it gives me an excuse to post this recent YouTube Live Genki Rockets video Q CEO Shuji Utsumi pointed to earlier today. As mentioned in the last Q-related post, Genki Rockets is Q’s music property fronted by teen pop star Lumi, the first baby born in outer space who beams her j-pop disco to Earth from 30 years in the future.
Even if the style of music isn’t your cup of euro-beats, there’s kind of nothing not amazing about the performance, from the faceless DJ-naut on the ones and twos, to Lumi’s eventual appearance on the monolithic low-res LED screen, fingers sending off glittering trails as she does her interstellar dance: all precisely the kind of synaesthetic experience that inspired Mizuguchi to create Rez in the first place.
The rest of Microsoft’s sales are at Major Nelson’s website.
See more posts about: Offworld Originals, q, Xbox 360
