I wish I could remember what it was exactly that made me want to write a rope dart-wielding character in No More Heroes in the first place. It's likely I saw it being used in some other piece of media (maybe a movie) around the time, but as far as I can tell I failed to write it down (wump womp). I definitely have a list of things that I researched for writing, but not the original thoughts that led me there – something to take into account for next time, I guess.
Anyway, one of the main things I looked up during my research/writing process was what are classified as the 'soft weapons' of Chinese Martial Arts – mid-to-long range weapons that are characterised by their fluidity and usually employed for stealth. They're pretty common in Martial Arts films, moreso Eastern than Western – probably the most famous use of a soft weapon in a Western action film would be Gogo Yubari's meteor hammer in Kill Bill Vol. 1.
Anyway, one of the main things I looked up during my research/writing process was what are classified as the 'soft weapons' of Chinese Martial Arts – mid-to-long range weapons that are characterised by their fluidity and usually employed for stealth. They're pretty common in Martial Arts films, moreso Eastern than Western – probably the most famous use of a soft weapon in a Western action film would be Gogo Yubari's meteor hammer in Kill Bill Vol. 1.
Like I alluded to in the blog title, I know Assassin's Creed has a rope dart weapon as well, but to be honest I'm not sure I'd classify it as being the same weapon, if that was its initial intention(!). There's a far more.... liberal approach, shall we say, in the things it can feasibly accomplish (haha), and the technique and implementation within the games would basically be impossible to pull off or even imitate a little bit in real life with proper rope dart technique. That being said/either way, whether it was based off the actual Chinese rope dart or not, it was neat that in the AC-verse the rope dart was canonically introduced by a Chinese assassin. Pretty cool.
yeah gurl!
From the beginning I was looking to write a rope dart over a chain whip or meteor hammer, but I had to look up the general anatomy and weapon forms for the others as well. Knowing the similarities and differences between the three of them made it easier to write the rope dart, in a way, and having movesets to cross-reference was definitely useful. Also seeing and hearing the chain dart in action was (I think) what eventually made me change the rope part of my character's rope dart into a fine chain instead, which is another (if perhaps less typical) iteration of the rope dart anyway. Also I think a chain ended up suiting the character's personality a lot better, so it all worked out pretty well in the end.
If you'd like to check out this aforementioned rope dart-wielding character of mine and witness/read them in action, feel free to check out No More Heroes for yourself! You can purchase it from this website in print or eBook format or get it from Amazon or Kobo. In the meanwhile, here's a collection of some of the videos I watched during my early research on soft weapons and rope darts. I hope you'll find them as cool and interesting as I did!
(I rotoscoped part of the above as an animation test for one of my early book trailer ideas.)
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(I had no idea rope dart was also a modern performance art until I saw this one.)
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Until next time. Have a good week, everyone.
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