Remembering Oni

One of these days, I'm gonna bite the bullet, open up the gaping security hole in my firewall, and play some damn pvp.

Oni was ahead of its time. It's a pity it was caught between the squabble of its developer and publisher. Though its character design concepts lives on in the Halo series.

i grew up playing this game, and i especially love the music. what is still ingrated in my mind is that nightmarish sound effect that shows up during the nightmare stage when Shinatama is floating by and is giggling creepily. fun fact: the buildings in this game were actually designed by actual architects, hence why the buildings look like that. i think it's also awesome that you play as a non-sexualised woman who can kick ass and look good while doing it. i'm sad that there isn't a sequel, but i would have loved playing it, even if i myself think that it'd make no sense considering how the first game ended.

This game is pure legend, I've been playing for many years and i can say that it never disappoints!!!

The game has a highly sophisticated combat system and the common tactics I used weren't the same as yours. Back breaker is powerful but unreliable without a taser. My tactic involved throws and the rising dragon special to attack downed enemies. While spinning kick was great while downed and surrounded. I think Raven softwares Jedi Outcast deserves mention as a character action piece that merged player agency with combat still not seen today. It's combat system highly praised as although less choreographed and animation intensive as automated lightsaber combat games, gives player a level of control that makes them experience "who's actually more skilled"

There is no game like that or never has been with a soul so much attaching to the user that it stays for example in my mind 15 years to this day, sometimes when im just sitting in bed at night i suddenly remember the music or combat.. no other game has been this influencial to this day

Damn, great video. I hadn't thought about the connection between camera and arena design, but it makes sense as a piece of the puzzle. It's also funny to see another Bungie game with great fundamentals but poor/monotonous level design. Also w.r.t. the fighting game connection, the dev of Unsouled, another game with super solid fundamentals, also cites Tekken as a major inspiration. It makes sense, it's a genre about interaction-dense 1v1 melee-ish combat which has obvious lessons for action games even if you don't make a multiplayer game.

Great video! I remember often seeing the game in various store when I was a kid and always thinking it was a third person shooter, had no idea it was a beat em up. The focus on throws is really interesting too, I was replaying the first two God Of War recently and I was thinking how weird it is that, given the root of the genre, GOW is one of the only 3d action games that focuses on throws and using enemy as projectile. Who would have thought Oni was right there with it. The note about camera clarity inferring the arena design is something I never thought about and it actually makes a lot of sense. I also find really funny that this is yet another Bungie game where the level design is repetitive and dull.

You really did justice to one of my favorite games here! Thanks for bringing more attention to this criminally underrated classic. Also you choose some KILLER tracks for your videos, wasn't expecting Armored Core and Ridge Racer 4

"I'm impressed, your potential is almost as great as mine. Unfortunately that means you could pose a threat to me. I can't allow that." oh man I played this game over and over again and always I was sad about the cut content. I'm surprised how forgotten the game is (the Oni meaning demon does't help much in Google times for finding this game), it had one of the best 3rd person feelings, managed unarmed melee combat in 3D and had challenging and sometimes unpredictable AI. AI stealing your weapon from behind and killing you etc. AI disengaging you to roll for the gun. Really impressive, to this day too few designers learned here. Also there was a cheat to switch skins (althrough you were limited to the enemies present in that level). Other characters varied greatly in combat style (moveset being the same but the move itself wasn't), characters had even their special moves, bosses like Barabas (oh man, the Earthquaker special move), Mukade (cyber ninja, I believe his combo string was longest in entire game) and Muro (your bro) playable. It extended replayability infinitely experimenting. Heh, even if you played as Bomb Guy (enemy in TNT vest that exploded after defeat), you too exploded if you died with typical 3-2-1 countown 😁 All punches and kicks of each character had their front, left, right and back versions, also you could roll (or slide in some cases), all of that AI did during combating you also. The drawbacks were also there, levels were not physicaly active while 3D objects within had weird (none) physics, frequently being boxed invisibely, even not jumpable etc. Also the collision system of Actors and Level were not the best. And for such type of game - the resistance of this game to moddability was sad even then. Fact the game engine was very difficult to sync online, this game was born for multiplayer and multiplayer was not included, was not moddable. There were some attempts of mod ressurection (I believe it was in Max Payne engine?) but all of that was loong ago.

My strongest memory of Oni (haven’t played it since it came out) is the music that plays for every load screen and ‘DEVIL SPIN KICK!’

Big props for introducing me to a game I’ve never heard of AND for using the best track from Tekken 3. Great video!

i may have to play this game

I first found out about 1:46 this classic from a trailer on a PC gamer disc.

My first discovery of ONI, Marathon, and Myth started with Halo 3 where I usually went and browsed around the bungie website to see my game data for MP. Then i found this 10th year anniversary poster in their media section, with Konoko and Soulblighter talking. I always wondered who the purple hair motoko knockoff was and what's with the guy with missing mouth area, found the titles, and bought the games on eBay AT A REASONABLY GOOD PRICE, ($3 for Fallen Lords, $5 for Soulblighter, $10 for PS2 Oni, $10 for Win Oni) except Marathon 'cause Aleph One was already released around that time. And boy, I had a blast (fuck the dwarves). Marathon's combat is fun as hell, especially 2 and Infinity with the dual wielding double barrel lever action flip cocking teleporting shell shotguns and the assault rifle. Myth's RTS style is like chess: it's more on the strategy than resource management, and I really enjoyed it. The RNG sucks but it really feels good when you beat a level with minimum casualties. That necksnap grab Konoko still makes me jerk. And the gameplay was analogous to Tekken Force for me since I played Tekken 5 and 6 before I touched Oni. What happened to Bungie nowadays is just a tragedy. Destiny started off terribly and I was a fool to buy it day 1, and those who bought the full game later on, are the lucky ones. And now they want to make MARATHON, an extraction shooter, which is a very niche style of Looter shooter or Battle Royale (the numbers don't lie when you compare combined Tarkov and Hunt Showdown active player count with the likes of PUBG, Fortnite, Warzone alone). And that GDC talk with modern bungie... oooooooof. It was at this moment, I knew the hermit was long gone from the shell. Everytime someone vocalizes against the practices of online services, counter arguments are always "it's nostalgia" and "there were bad games back then. Nowadays they can be patched out". But they always forget that recency bias is a thing and they're too accepting of the current situation. In addition, they always talk like businessmen with stuff like "gotta make a profit" or "keep the content flowing". It's true that gaming is no longer product but rather shifted to a social service, and this sentiment extends to non-AAA games, like Helldivers 2 and Lethal Company. What's gonna happen to these games that relies on current player count when no one is playing the game after 2 years? But my criticism towards these two (helldivers and lethal) is lenient, since their prices aren't ridiculous and they were actually fun to play (I was mooching off a friend's account so there's that too). I'm glad that there are people, both old and new, who appreciates and enjoys older games and I hope more younger players will expand out and find their own good titles. I recently installed the Anniversary Edition of Oni and kinda excited to replay through the game when I got time.

Great videovi want a oni reboot

I wonder what you'd think of the combat and enemies and just general gameplay of the Zeno Clash series. 1, 2 and Clash: Artifacts of Chaos.

My God.... still waiting 4 remake :D :D :D :D best game of my childhood. Pls if anyone can- recommend something similar to Oni :D Now im playing Control, but im still missing this combat system :D Cheers !!

Great video as always, knew about the game through a friend but never saw a good analysis on it. One thing I'm curious about in regards to its mechanics, diversity and such is: "how long is it"? I could see this game being a fun replayable title where experimentation is more in the fun of it, but with a 30+ hour experience that changes for me. Also, are there any notes on designers referencing this title? Lastly, seeing a game like this makes me think .wads might be a good addition. Think some quality leveldesign and enemy-setups chould make this pretty replayable/interesting in the long run.

Are you using the anniversary mod