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Persona 3 FES's main story may seem like your typical "group of teenagers with special powers band together to save the world" ordeal, but the depth and development in both its main protagonists and side characters are what make this PS2 JRPG shine.

It took me months to beat this game and 70 hours(on the lower side for this game) in total, and I do not regret any part of it. Persona 3 has a fairly basic looking premise at first. You are an orphan who has the "potential", a power that lets you summon a Persona. You join a group called SEES, made up of other students at your new high school who have this ability as well. Over the course of the year, you work together to defeat the evil demons known as Shadows. What sets this game apart from other JRPGs isn't the combat, or the modern setting, but rather a mechanic referred to as Social Links. These Social Links bridge the gap between the two sides of gameplay; in Tartarus, the main dungeon, and in the real world in day to day life.

In P3, as cheesy as it may sound, friendship is power. After school or on weekends, you can choose how to spend your time. The thing that you will be doing most is making bonds and talking to people. Through this unique conversations, you build with them what is known as a "Social Link". This mechanic directly ties in to the combat and provides some of the best side stories I have ever seen in games. Some of my personal favorites were Akinari, a teenage boy who is dying of a rare genetic disease and writes a story, and Maiko, an elementary schooler whose parents are about to divorce. Though these stories aren't necessarily the main focus of the games, the conversations and interactions can make up some of the most emotional moments in a very emotional game.

The plot takes numerous twists and turn but for the first few months is very slow. While the plot does not pick up until around August(the game starts in April), oh boy does it pick up. Even with the pacing issues, the plot remains engaging and allows you to see the flaws and true personalities of the numerous great characters in this game.

In the evening, you have the choice to go to Tartarus, which is what becomes of Gekkoukan High School during the dark hour, a hidden thirteenth hour that only Persona-users experience. The combat is the typical JRPG fare, where you have your choice of weapons and Personas. Personas are sort of like Pokemon, as they learn new skills but in contrast, you do not become good friends and buddies with these Personas. To get new Personas, you can fuse multiple together or find them in post battle rewards. Every Persona, is associated with a Major Arcana of the tarot that corresponds to the Arcana of a Social Link. If you have a higher Social LInk lever, more XP is gained when fusing the persona. One downside in the combat is that it is not possible to directly control your party members, of which you can have 3 at a time. These is remedied by a system in which you can give general tactics to the AI however. The combat revolves around fighting and exploiting your opponents weaknesses while avoiding getting hit by your own weaknesses, in in typical Megami Tensei fashion. If all of your enemies are downed, your party can perform an All-Out Attack complete with comic-book esque bangs and pows. Each Persona has their own skillset and is activated by shooting a gun-like object called the "Evoker" to your head.

This game soundtrack, to put it lightly, slaps. The blend of J-Pop, depressing piano melodies, and jazz sets the mood and tone for the game and perfectly fits each situation. "Living With Determination" gets me choked up while "Iwatodai Dorm" is uplifting and very swanky. Anime cut scenes appear before major plot points, and though the proportions of the characters are very strange and inconsistent they add a lot to the characters and relating to them. The games has consistent themes throughout, that of the fact that death and loss is inevitable and it is a fact that should be accepted. Rather than dreading death and spending your life fearing it, accept it and spend your life working towards a goal and making the most out of life. Characters that seem one-dimensional at first such as Junpei, the lazy less-than-intelligent womanizer, goes through major events that transform him and making one of the most interesting characters in the game. SEES, who at first came together just because of their common ability form an unbreakable bond over the course of the game.

Persona 3, despite its age and its annoyances, remains a hallmark of JRPG history with its Social Links and emotional storytelling, laying the groundwork for its sequels, two of the most critically acclaimed RPGs in recent memory. An extremely accessible RPG, I reccomend it to people even if RPGs "aren't your thing"

I played the Remastered edition for the PS4

Naughty Dog has been known to constantly reinvent themselves from generation to generation. From the Crash series on the PlayStation, to Not Ratchet and a Weasel on the PS2, and Illinois Jones on the PS3. The Last of Us shares the most similarities to the Uncharted franchise, inheriting third person shooter mechanics, cinematic style, and hellish motion blur from the series. The Last of Us is an epic emotional tale about the relationship and journey of Joel and Ellie, set in an all-too familiar setting with consistently solid stealth-action gameplay that can end up feeling repetitive by the end.

The game opens with a prologue taking place on the day of the fungal outbreak. This introduces us to Joel, the player character, who lives with his daughter Sarah. Sarah is shot by a member of the military, striking Joel with grief that will stay with him for the rest of the game. Fast forward twenty years later, and the world is in ruins and Joel is a completely different man. Now a cynical, harsh, smuggler, he works with his partner Tess to get by. They end up getting a job to smuggle a 14 year old girl Ellie to the anti-military militia group known as the Fireflies. The world is your typical zombie fare, with ruins of buildings and graffiti on walls a plenty. This game was released at the height of the zombie craze, so it is expected that they would try and cash in on that but it it is what this game does with the zombie apocalyptic setting that is special.

I'm sure that it has been said many times before, but this game is not what most would consider a "fun" game. Ever situation is tense, always wary of the fact that there could be Infected(zombies) or even human enemies around the corner or in the next area. Especially in the beginning of the game when Joel has a limited supply of guns, every bullet means something. Though I was swimming in resources by the end of the game(I played on normal difficulty), resources are often scarce. Health is extremely valuable, as there is no automatic regeneration and you have to either find your own health kits or craft them. Exploring is usually rewarded with a trove of supplies, though you do have to go far out of your way and increase your risk of being caught. These supplies are used for crafting different resources like bombs or shivs, though each item needs different resources and often if you want one, you can't have the other, meaning you often need to choose very wisely as to what you think you will need. Also, around 40% of the game is setting up ladders and climbing them.

Most of the combat sequences revolve around stealth, waiting for an enemy to walk near you, giving you the opportunity to strangle them or shiv them in the ear, nose, and throat area. Joel, experienced in 20 years of survival has extraordinary awareness, expressed in gameplay through Listen Mode, in which holding down a button allows you to see outline of enemies that you have heard. Bricks and bottles are everywhere in the game, used to distract enemies or to stun them. This improvisational-style combat is a perfect choice in conjunction with the rough, tough world. By the later stages of the game however, I felt as if I had been in these sequences before and I was doing some of the same things over and over again.

Over the course of the entire game, you get a little over 10 different guns in Joel's arsenal. Some, like the revolver, come very early on in the game while the assault rifle comes in the last 15 minutes of the game. I enjoyed how each of the weapons were used for different situations and it is often necessary to change your load-out to adapt to the environment. But if you ever get pinned against a wall, there's always someone to stab your assailant in the back; Ellie.

Ellie and other NPCs that accompany you over the course of the game act as friendly AI during fights. Usually the AI works as intended, but multiple times I had my partners just start walking around during a fight as if nothing was happening. Also, during encounters with the "Clickers", Infected who see you through noise, Ellie would run around and start talking. Thankfully, the zombies don't react to Ellie, only to Joel. During the winter season, you control Ellie in a sequence of events showing her vulnerability but also her badassery that I'm sure we'll see much more of in the upcoming sequel.

Over the course of the two main characters' journey from Boston to the Rockies, their relationship changes dramatically. When Joel first receives his assignment, he is reluctant and wants to do anything but babysit a bratty little girl. But through their life-threatening experiences, Joel is less bitter towards her, unable to see anything but his daughter. He goes from barely acknowledging her to calling her "baby girl", and this relationship in my opinion is the crux of the story, one that just happens to be set in a world post-zombie apocalypse. The experience is packed with emotional moments. Some of the ones that hit me the most were Henry and Sam's deaths and the end of the fight with David. The morally ambiguous ending is one that is tonally perfect, neither good or bad, making me question Joel's ethics. Blinded by grief and a desire for revenge, he slaughters everyone in the hospital and takes Ellie, saving her from a surgery that could have killed her but could have created a vaccine saving many other lives. Afterwards Joel lies to Ellie saying that there were many more like her that they could make a cure from. The ending could perfectly stand alone without a sequel, but I am still glad that we get to see more of Ellie and the story that Naughty Dog will tell in the next game.

The Last of Us was definitely the best story that I have ever seen in a video game and I am eager to see more of it. I still have not played the Left Behind DLC, but I will for sure get to that before Part 2 releases. Giant Bomb gave this one game of the year in 2013, a year packed with heavy hitters like GTA V, Bioshock Infinite, and Tomb Raider but I think it is deserving. The storytelling is top notch and something that I think will only be topped by The Last of Us Part 2.

Beyond Good and Evil is a 2003 action-adventure stealth racing photography air hockey game developed and published by Ubisoft and directed by Michel Ancel, creator of the Rayman series and noted Dasani enthusiast. This Zelda-style game puts you in the green clothes of Jade, a woman who looks over orphaned children in her lighthouse and loves the color green. Green headband, green lipstick, green eyes, the whole green enchilada. Living with her is her uncle Pey'j, a mechanic and engineer who also happens to be a pig.

The game's plot revolves around a conspiracy regarding the DomZ, an alien species that are invading Hillys, Jade's homeworld, and the Alpha Sections, the "defenders of Hillys" that are supposed to be fighting off the DomZ. Jade joins the IRIS Network, an underground organization that publishes news exposing the connection between the DomZ and the Alpha Section. Much of the game is spent infiltrating the Alpha Sections' various bases, taking pictures of the nefarious things that they are up to with your most important tool: your camera. Money is earned in this game buy taking pictures of different species which is a neat mechanic as it encourages you to take time to look around at the wacky character designs and environments that this game has to offer.

While inside the strongholds that house the evidence that you take the pictures of, you must solve puzzles that could vary from combat rooms to stealth or even traditional puzzles such as in a Zelda game. Sneaking around the Alpha Sections can be frustrating, but it is just a matter of learning their patterns or attacking their weak point, the air tank on their backs. You are almost always with a companion, either Pey'j or Double H, The Duke of Dukes, The Contest, The Intellectual Killer..., you get the point(Triple H). They are controlled with one button that tells them what to do and are hardly ever frustrating. The puzzles are never too complicated and neither is much in this game, but the joy comes from the cinematic plot and the fleshed-out and personality-filled characters.

Hillys is a beautiful European-inspired world that you travel around using your hovercraft which is a joy to control. There is something to do in almost every corner of the admittedly small world, but each area is densely populated with characters and a great soundtrack. Ship upgrades are bought from Mammagos, a black market shop run by Carribean rhinos. These upgrades are bought with pearls, a currency that you will get from photographing a certain amount of animals or completing side quests throughout the world. Just running and rolling around feels good to do, though I have gotten stuck in very awkward camera angles that I couldn't get out of.

For a game released in 2003 that I played on the PS2, this game looks surprisingly decent. The cartoonish aesthetic and colorful world make the game pop in a way that makes it memorable. Lighting, shadows, and reflective water all add up to a pretty great-looking game. The music can range from a Carribean-themed tune to a grand, epic symphony that plays while you are being chased by the Alpha Sections. Composed by Christophe Heral, I was never turned off by the music or any of the sound design, including the voice acting at all.

Now, you can't talk about Beyond Good and Evil without bringing up it's upcoming(hopefully) prequel, who seems to be enjoying their stay in development hell. We have had trailers shown at two of the past three E3s and streams about the game every few months, but I do not believe that this will come out even in the next two years. It has constantly been delayed due to the development of games like Rayman Legends which is fine with me, but at this rate, it feels like the follow-up will never release. All gameplay shown has been very barebones and the streams are heavily comprised of concept art. And the thing is since it's a prequel, we most likely will not get a satisfying resolution to the ending, where it is shown that Pey'j gets a DomZ growth on his hand.

Jade's journey from a freelance photographer and an orphan caretaker is one filled with emotion. Jade's character is always expressive. Cutscenes with her are never bland, as her facial expression is always dynamic and reflective of what is going on in the story. Beyond Good and Evil is known for being a commercial flop, but it was a hit with critics and those who played it and was the best Zelda game on the PlayStation 2 until Okami(or so I've heard). Throughout my entire journey, I played ten hours, in which I played Active Time Battle eight puck air hockey with a seal and saved my kidnapped "Sus sapiens" uncle from the moon. Any fan of the Zelda series or games similar to that should try this game out.

four outta five

After I completed Donkey Kong Country, I resumed playing a game that I hadn't touched for a while: Persona 3 FES. I've since played this work of art every opportunity that I’ve had, sprinkling in a little bit of Mario World(review coming in the near future). I’m not usually a fan of turn based combat, but Persona 3 FES makes it interesting by mixing it with a life simulation aspect that ties in to the dungeon crawling. This is definitely one of the best games I have ever played an I’m only about less than a quarter of the way in.

You play as the main character, a teenage boy who has transferred to Gekkoukan High School but quickly finds out that things are not normal. Each night between midnight and the next day something called the Dark Hour occurs, where most people are turned into coffins and Gekkoukan is turned into a giant twisting tower called Tartarus. Monsters called Shadows appear in Tartarus and prey upon the people who are still conscious.

The protagonist joins a group called SEES, the Specialized Extracurricular Execution Squad, a group of high schoolers who have the ability to summon Personas during the Dark Hour to fight the Shadows. The protagonist is the only one who can have multiple Personas, and one of the main ways of progression is fusing weaker Personas to get stronger ones. You fuse Personas by going into the Velvet Room, where you are greeted by Igor, this guy with a Pinnochio looking nose. Each Persona is associated with one of the Arcana of the Tarot, such as Emperor, Sun, Devil, or Hanged Man. The concept of the Persona and the Shadow come from Jungian psychology, your persona being the mask you wear to conceal your true identity and what people see you as. The Shadow is the unknown and unacknowledged side of yourself. The characters summon their Personas by shooting themselves in the head with a gun-shaped object called an Evoker. Each character has a different way of shooting the Evoker depending on their personality, as Yukari is very nervous but Akihiko is very confident. The shadows each have an elemental weakness, and when it is attacked they will be knocked down and lose their turn. Unlike most JRPGs, you can’t control your party members but you can order general tactics. I have seen a lot of people complain about Mitsuru casting Marin Karin for the fiftieth time but if you tell her to attack she will stop. When all enemies are knocked down, you can perform an “All Out Attack’.

One half of the game is the combat, climbing through the floors of Tartarus and defeating shadows but the other half is living your normal life as a high school student. Each day, as a student, you can perform activities to upgrade one of your three stats, Charm, Courage, and Academics, or you can hang out with people to upgrade your Social Links. Each Social Link, similar to the Personas, are also correlated to one of the Arcana. Some of the Social Links have really interesting stories, like the old couple who is trying to save the persimmon tree planted in memory of their son, a teacher at Gekkoukan High, or the little girl who has to deal with her parents being divorced. Then again, some of them are really stupid like my classmate Kenji who keeps trying to date a teacher and thinks he’s gonna marry her. If you upgrade a Social Link, when you fuse a Persona of the same Arcana it will automatically level up, giving you an advantage. I personally think that this is a great way of tying the two aspects of the game together. Having two different gameplay styles makes it so that if you are tired of the combat, you don’t have to do it all the time as Tartarus is completely optional, you just have to make sure you’re a high enough level by the time the next full moon comes around which is when the boss comes.

The character models look great and the Shadow designs are always very creative. The anime cutscenes are beautifully animated but are also very dark, foreshadowing the events to come. The sound design in the combat and the cutscenes are also amazingly crafted. The music is mostly J-pop, which is what I imagine the protagonist listens to on his music player and headphones. The main battle theme never changes, but I think it fits perfectly with the theme of the game. It is a hip hop beat with a woman sing “baby baby baby baby baby” over and over again. It’s great. I also love the song played when your standing in the dorm. A horn plays a catchy melody while a guy raps in the background. This is one of my favorite soundtracks that I’ve heard in a video game. The voice acting, while usually great, can sometimes get pretty annoying in some cases.

Persona 3 deals with very dark themes like death and fear. In the intro cutscene, it has phrases like memento mori(remember that you will die) and carpe diem(seize the day). Most of the main characters have some type of loss in their life, the protagonist being and orphan and the other main characters having some loved one that has died. The main color that is present in the game is blue and the game has a very moody tone. Also there’s this weird kid in pajamas who comes to your bedroom every month and he has this really high pitched voice. His Social Link is also the Death Arcana and I’m kinda scared that he’s gonna kill me.

The only problems I have had with the game are relatively minor things that they easily could have fixed. One problem I have is I often try to walk to Yukari to talk to her, but because other party members move when I do someone else ends up getting in the way. Another problem I had is the way you scroll through the menu goes backwards, which I changed the setting in the options menu for but it didn’t change anything. These are pretty much the only problems that I have had in this game, but the rest of the game has been excellent.

I have not had to grind in this game at all, though I am playing on easy mode.

Overall I am really enjoying this game so far. I’m not usually a turn based combat guy, I’ve played a couple of the 3DS Fire Emblems, but the way this game balances it with regular life is perfect. The first few months are extremely slow in terms of plot and I’m only just finding out what is really going on but I am definitely going to see this game through to the end. It’s a great introduction to the SMT series and JRPGS in general and I recommend it to PS2 owners who like JRPGs or visual novels.

Any recommendations for other accessible JRPGs and feedback on my writing would be greatly appreciated!

Donkey Kong Country

My experience with the Donkey Kong Country series prior to playing the SNES original was limited to only playing Donkey Kong Country Returns for the Wii. This was the first game I purchased for the Super Nintendo for my rapidly expanding collection which has now doubled. I played this game on the Super Nintendo Entertainment System and beat the game in about 3 and a half hours. It most likely took me a couple hours more due to my first save file being lost. In my time playing the game, I completed the main story and found 44% of the collectibles.

Facts

Developer: Rare

Publisher: Nintendo

Platforms: Super NES, Game Boy Color, Game Boy Advance

Release Date: 21 November 1994

Background

Donkey Kong Country is a 2D platformer that was unanimously praised upon release for its vibrant and lively environments, character animations, and groundbreaking graphics. The player controls Donkey Kong and Diddy Kong through a series of levels each with their own gimmick or theme. The characters have different advantages, as Donkey Kong can defeat stronger enemies and has his signature hand slap move, while Diddy is smaller, faster, and can jump farther. Enemies each have their own strengths and weaknesses and different ways of being killed.

The game contains six worlds and the final boss fight for the Kongs, totaling at 40 levels, to adventure through with the goal of taking back their stolen bananas. Each world has a different theme that corresponds to an environment; some of these are expected to show up such as underwater, but there are a couple of very unique worlds such as the factory. Each level has four "KONG" letters, collectibles that can give you an extra life once you collect all of them. This mechanic is very similar to the Dragon Coins found in Super Mario World. Each level also has bonus rooms where you can find bananas, the primary collectibles which act the same way as coins in Mario, or other collectibles. The only problems that I had with the gameplay were some janky hit collision and some levels being too reliant on memorization.

As a gamer who has been accustomed to modern games his whole life, I was surprised at what the Super Nintendo was able to do. The fact that Rare managed to put pre-rendered 3D models on the 16 bit system was nothing short of incredible. The graphics alone were a big selling point that helped Nintendo stay relevant against competitors with advanced technology such as the PlayStation and the Sega Saturn. Donkey Kong Country saved the Super Nintendo and for a while was their system seller. The lively backgrounds on each level gave the game its own unique personality and the models of Donkey Kong and Diddy Kong each suggested to their personalities as well. In fact, Rare's redesign of Donkey Kong has been used in every game featuring him, including the Super Smash Bros. and Mario Kart series. The lively background gave the game its own unique personality and it's not hard just to sit back and listen to some of David Wise's signature compositions such as Gangplank Galleon. Each level has a personality and its own twist on the platforming formula, whether it be being chased by Gnawtys on giant wheels or riding on a minecart.

This was my first Super Nintendo game and I was not disappointed. Although it does lack in story, it is just a platform game after all, its music, level design, and most of all its revolutionary visuals more than make up for any problems it had. The game always has a sense of adventure and constantly throws something new at you. Donkey Kong Country is one of the defining platformers for the Super NES and an essential for anyone with an interest in the console to pick up.

My final review score is: I wholeheartedly recommend this to anyone who enjoys a good platform game.

The main reason that most gamers are drawn to retro gaming is nostalgia. The feeling of when they were a kid and there wasn't a worry in there life, just playing video games. It could be for the Genesis, or the SNES, or the N64. That is not me. My first console was the Wii, and my first games were Wii Sports and Super Mario Galaxy. I only really got into gaming around 2 years ago but it quickly became my favorite hobby. This is the first installment in hopefully a series of blogs about my experience and the games I get.

Part 1: The SNES and Donkey Kong Country

When I was at Awesome Con, Washington DC's very own comic convention, my friends and I noticed a store filled with old games and consoles. We browsed for a while, went walking around the main hall for a bit, and eventually returned to the store. I was originally thinking of buying a GBA for $35 dollars, but then I noticed that they had the SNES for the price of $55 dollars. Both me and my friend bought Super Nintendos, with me buying Donkey Kong Country and my friend buying Super Mario World and Super Mario Kart. My friend told me that he felt nostalgia for these games even though he never had them as a kid, and I find that very strange but also felt it a little myself.

At the time of this writing, I have only finished the first world of the game. This game is beautiful and the soundtrack is phenomenal even today. I have only played one other game in the series before, Donkey Kong Country Returns, which I beat but not very easily. I found the first world of this game to be a breeze, but my first real roadblock was the first mine cart level. The problem with this level is that it is so far zoomed in that it is hard to see if there will be enemies coming up or you will just plummet to your doom. I understand that it needed to be like that for the purpose of the "3D" graphics, but it can really be annoying at times. Overall my experience will Donkey Kong Country has been very positive, even if I have gotten very frustrated with it even on the second world.