Game On! And Feeling Good!

Amidst the fumes of Lemongrass + Orange essential oils, I sit and type this post, completely relaxed. I have been dreaming of this since I was in Bengaluru. Precisely since the beginning of 2024 but the situations were not very good to me.

I remember when I landed in Pune in August 2024, it had rained a little on the previous day and Pune never looked more beautiful. Still, coming back to Pune, getting adjusted to the new job with some toxic people was not easy and has taken around 6 months but now I am in a place where I can say that "things are going good".

I have noticed that I have a tendency to jinx such things so I am putting a lot on the line not just by saying it but by writing a full blog post about it.

Oh well, let's see what happens.

Unlike before, I look forward to weekends. Primary reason for this is because I go to office 5 days a week even though there are options to WFH for a few days in a month. Say what you will about this but I do like working in office as compared to working from home. This might be because I have the luxury of living very close to my office.

10 mins to be exact. With the commute time negligible, I think a lot of people might* like coming to the office. As I used to "waste" a lot of time going to the college in my first year by bus, I know the importance of saving/having less commute time. This all depends on a lot of factors though and will vary on a case to case basis.

It has been a while since I wrote last and I have been toying around with the idea of writing a novelization of a game I used to play in my childhood but it is a big project. Its something way outside of my capabilities as of now. I have been listening to another book based on a story of a different game (yes, that's where I got the idea) and I see what a fabulous job the author has done. For me to write something in that style and on that level, I need to do a lot of reading in order to familiarize myself with good writing. I wrote 4 pages, had a friend read it and understood that the ideas that I have in my mind are not being conveyed in the same way to the reader so I guess a lot of work is required for me to achieve that.

Speaking of games, I talked briefly about Tomb Raider 1-3 being remastered in my audio post last year. They were an absolute delight to play throughout the year the games were such a success that they announced the remaster of the next 3 games i.e. 4 (The Last Revelation), 5 (Chronicles), 6 (Angel of Darkness). The games were to be released on 14th February 2025 and even though I have only played them for a few days, they are looking so so good!

A major focus out of the three is on the 6th game i.e Tomb Raider and the Angel of Darkness which was released back in 2003. Sadly due to deadlines, an unfinished game was released. As a result, it was full of bugs, missing textures and awful controls. So much so that it became famous for being the worst one in the community despite having one of the best plots of the classic games. Also, in my opinion it has THE BEST version of the Tomb Raider theme of all the classic games. If you have a minute or two, I request you to visit this link and hear it.

In the remaster, not only they have fixed these things, but have also added new elements to this game which were originally cut from the main game due to multiple reasons mostly related to deadlines. As a pirate myself, when I see big name brands doing this kind of service to the fans, I happily buy the game digitally without thinking of sailing the high seas.

We have a lot to talk about remasters and not just about the TR games. Another one of the games I used to play in my childhood is in the process of being remastered. I am a part of their discord server and the devs post some small things related to the game and its an absolute delight to watch. Here is a teaser-trailer if you are interested in watching that.

They recently had a "Design a new Enemy" competition on their discord and entries that the fans submitted were marvelous. They are enough to make a sequel too.
Very very excited to play whenever the game comes out. I have already added that to my steam wish-list.

The remastering journey does not stop here. I recently watched the Ramayana - The Legend of Prince Rama which was also remastered this year. I had seen that movie countless times in my childhood. It was even available for free to watch on YouTube but I guess due to the new release, it got taken down. Although, it was a bitter sweet experience for me as I was able to see some interpolation lines on the screen, even in the theater. It's not a deal breaker though, as they were able to bring the quality up from 240p to 4K, however the audio WAS a deal breaker.

As they were not able to restore the original audio beyond a point, they decided to record new audio and while I don't have anything against the new voice actors, no-one can match the touch of character  Amrish Puri brought in as Ravan and Arun Govil as Shree-Ram in the original audio.

 

If I ever get my hands on a digital copy (which I will), I will personally take the time to clean up the original audio and embed all of these audio tracks with the 4K video in the following order:

• Original_HIN (Default Audio Track)
• Original_ENG
• Original_RUS
• New_HIN
• New ENG
• Hybrid_HIN (Yes, I will take the best parts from both audio tracks and create a new one)

This kind of work has always fascinated me. I enjoy doing it. Its pretty evident from one of my previous posts A Nostalgia Remastered where I re-created Pokemon Jenga Cards from my childhood. After more than an year, I still get emails from people to print those for them. Recently I came across a colored version of the movie "12 Angry Men" on YouTube. A classic black & white movie from 1957.

People/Companies are putting in a lot of effort in such projects and I would love to work part time on similar projects if possible.

Been diving deeper into the world of audiobooks. Recently finished the classic "Around the World in 80 Days". Then moved to "A Court of Thorns and Roses". Will be starting "A Court of Mist and Fury" in a few days. If I haven't sold you on the concept of audiobooks before, allow me to do it here. Especially the dramatized versions of certain titles where they have cast for certain lead characters, music, sound effects etc and you can create a scene in your mind based on that. In my opinion, it increases your attention span after a while.
Check out GraphicAudio if you find this interesting.
If you are into reading books, I don't have much to offer in that domain apart from a quick 5 min read of Austin Kleon's "Read like an Artist."

Its a weekend and I dont want to spend more time writing blog but jump in my bed and enjoy a nice Scooby Doo movie. Thanks to Baner hill, its not that hot where I live (yet). I have ideas for blog posts and will have them coming your way in the future.
Till then, bye!