If you aren't one of the few lucky people who got Tekken Tag Tournament 2
early before its official release next week or one of the many lousy
guys who snatched the torrent of the Xbox360 version, this might still
be news to you. Nina finally got the Hollywood action movie type ending
cinematic she deserves. Not that I don't like the more quiet (Tekken 2)
or personal (Tekken 3) endings, or those with a humorous touch (Tekken
1, 5, 6), but I've always wondered why the Tekken games so rarely depict
her in action heavy scenes. You know, the obvious standard assassin
stuff: sniper guns, melee combat, acrobatics, stealth, an actual
assassination for once... Well, we get all of that in her Tag 2 ending
movie. I say it's been long overdue. It's an action packed look at the
job that pays her bills and with a running time of 1:47 it's one of the
longer endings in the game.
What's also interesting is that Namco
seems to have used a high-poly version of her in-game model for the
scene and not the Blood Vengeance model used in the game's intro movie.
So I guess the character ending FMV's were created and rendered in-house
at Namco, unlike the intro which has been created by Digital Frontier,
the studio behind Tekken Blood Vengeance. Probably to cut costs. The
in-game model works very well with the setting, though.
Get spoiled after the jump...
Since I finally - FINALLY! - got my copy (or two) of the game in, I'm all caught up on this ending, and certainly, it made up for the sheer hair-tearing frustration of battling past Unknown. Thank heaven the other endings can be unlocked in Ghost Battle mode, so I can spare myself more of that kind of pain...
ReplyDeleteBut anyways: hell yes. Love love love this scene. It wouldn't hurt to make it a little brighter somehow; some of the animation is lost in the murk of the dark alleyway, but I concede the darkness is apt for the content, character and tone. Also, though it's a weird thing to say, I do like that one of the G-Corp soldiers actually does land a hit on Nina; it helps sell how badass she is, that someone can crack her in the face with the butt of a rifle and she'll just go "Oh, screw you" then kill them. More effective than if she'd just dodged it to begin with.
P.S. I'd like to put my vote down in favour of in-game Nina over intro-cutscene Nina. Digital Frontier do make her look gorgeous, yes, but the skinny supermodel body they gave her is quite generic. By comparison, in-game Nina has a curvaceous but muscular physique that's all her own and immediately sets her apart from the other girls. Every girl in Tekken may be able to kick your ass, but only one of them LOOKS like she could. And that's part of the reason why she's our girl.
Happy to hear!
DeleteAll that talk about how she's much too buff, some people even calling her fat, is just... I don't know, kind of shows how much people are influenced by the media, expecting all their female game characters to be looking like size-zero high fashion models and still be perfectly able to fight like the T-X. You have extremely skinny people like Angelina Jolie playing major action characters and all these other women jumping around, doing their backflips and bare-handedly killing every man in their way. It's stylish action, but it's also a bit "yeah,... sure"
And then there's brawny (and beautiful) Gina Carano playing an assassin in 'Haywire' and it's totally believable, not least because she actually is a real mixed martial artist with the proper shape/body to perform in this field.
I see Nina, as I saw Gina in Haywire, as a more realistic portrayal of the female action hero type and I really like that about her.
Yeah, I've encountered that attitude before, it's...ugh.
ReplyDeleteIt's mostly coming from the same people who complain that Nina is "just a bitch" or "doesn't have any personality" - because apparently you have to be constantly cheerful and smiling and squee-ing to qualify for one of those, I guess. >_< What these people don't seem to get is, Nina is a 'deep' character, especially by fighting game standards. There is actual thought put into how she behaves, rather than just some horny echhi otaku pondering what would be most cute. No, she doesn't smile, because she murders people for a living and that's not something ANYONE should smile about. No, she doesn't have many friends, because she has little in common with the rest of the Tekken cast, and would likely prefer not to build a friendship or bond of trust with anyone whom she may be contracted to kill in the near future. And no, she doesn't let her guarded, icy demeanour drop very often, because emotion and sentimentality lead to second-guessing and hesitation, which in her line of work could get her killed. This is simple logic I'm applying here.
But hey, I'm absolutely sure Nina would be much more popular if she wore a micro-skirt and frilly knickers, and spent all her win poses bending over and giggling. Which tells you all you need to know about gamers in general, really.