Rediscovering an old favourite at a party

I was at a houseparty last night, and out of the blue, I heard a riff from the iPod playing music at the time and practically yelled across the room "WHAT IS THAT?". It was California Soul by Marlena Shaw, and the place I'd heard the particular bit of string was sampled in Rez. Suddenly I was in level 5 rising up through the clouds and attacking the massive ship with the rotating.

Rez is a unique game. It's quite simple, with very little development or changes in the game as you advance through the levels. It just looks pretty, and sounds pretty. And that's the unique thing about it, it all lines up so that the sounds and music sync seamlessly in the game.

Today, somewhat fired up having bought the song on iTunes, I looked out the Dreamcast from the drawer, and finally plugged in the old stereo downstairs. It'd been ages since I'd played it, and even longer since playing with decent sound. Which makes the game.

I was grinning like an addict as I dived into level 5, with the lovely line art graphics and Adam Freeland music. But the thing I'd forgotten was that you're encourage to play the game "well" by the soundtrack. While you can just fire indiscriminately, and sometimes you have to, if you let it lock onto the maximum 8 targets it sounds better. So you're duped into playing nicely because it feels nicer.

Amusingly I also remembered that I tap the fire button in the quite bits to boost the rhythm.

It's a one trick pony. But it's a one trick pony I enjoy playing, and that I was reminded off by the original song that someone sampled/lifted a bit from in song.

I like this occurrence.