Even if TGS isn't a particularly relevant event anymore even for Japanese games, it was always on my to-do list as a purveyor of video games if I were ever in Japan at the right time just so that I could witness the sheer spectacle of it. Considering my major, it was something that was bound to happen eventually and it turned out to be this year. As such, here's a list of the (few) games I got to play there, as well as some brief impressions.
My friend and I got in line for this game more or less first thing once we managed to actually get onto the show floor. One and a half-plus hours later (the ArcSys rep claimed a thirty-minute wait!), I finally got in a match as your (rightfully) favorite character and mine, Chie. Here are the fundamental points I got about actually playing the game first-hand:<br><br>
-The game runs more smoothly than the trailers might indicate. This is more due to conventional limitations of YouTube on frame rates and whatnot, but I was pleased to see the game running at a crisp 60 frames per second.<br>
-This plays like an ArcSys fighter through and through. Of course, there are definitely mechanics present that set it apart from their previous work, especially with regards to Persona usage, but you probably won't be surprised at how it fundamentally handles if you've spent some time with their games previously.<br>
-No idea if it's shown up in the official gameplay footage shown thus far, but one of Yosuke's alternate color schemes makes him deeply resemble Persona 2's Michelle. I found that delightful.<br>
-No more Free Pray. It was already gone in some screenshots, but it was completely eradicated from the TGS build.<br><br>
I'm by no means an expert on the fighting game genre, but I really enjoyed my short time with it, as well as just watching other people play it. The arcade units seemed to have extremely sensitive sticks, but my own nervousness of playing the game in front of hordes of other people probably played a role as well. Ultimately, all that matters is that I got God Hand to connect in one round and that I won the match overall against another Chie player. Also got some stickers out of the deal, including one of T. Bearson, but that's pretty inconsequential. In the end, I'm thoroughly biased about the game to begin with, but gameplay-wise, I now know it's in the right hands and look forward to playing it in a proper arcade next spring.
It's not well-publicized, but The Behemoth tends to make regular appearances at TGS and this year they were out in force, albeit in probably the tiniest booth on the entire show floor. (But with a giant balloon version of their chicken mascot up top!) Having known about this ahead of time, I wanted to make sure to give them some love since Alien Hominid and Castle Crashers are both games I have a deep fondness for. By sheer virtue of the booth size, there was no line whatsoever, as there was enough space for four TVs, two for BattleBlock Theater and two for Castle Crashers (not entirely sure why it was there, since it's been nearly a year after its Japanese localization for PSN), corresponding sets of chairs, and a table with one American representative manning it. The border wound as close to all of those things as possible. Giant balloon aside, it was as low-key as you could hope to get at TGS.<br><br>
BattleBlock Theater wound up being the second game I played at the show after P4U, having spent significant stretches of time wandering the show floor for games with lines that weren't an hour long or more. There were virtually no others that fit that criteria aside from Uncharted 3, which I planned to play later anyway, so I trekked back to The Behemoth, in search of instant validation. That turned out to not quite be the case since there were two young Japanese kids playing before me, but otherwise, as I said earlier, there were no lines to speak of.<br><br>
Like The Behemoth's other works, it's charming as all hell and has a great sense of humor. You can customize both your avatar's looks and the unique weapon that it carries, both of which tend to lead to laughs abound. The weapons in particular are obtuse, but with readily apparent applications, such as frisbee-like(?) landmines, an electric fan, and sticky Nerf gun bullets. I didn't get to play or see all of them first hand, but all of the ones I did witness seemed to have good, unique potential, especially in the context of co-op.<br><br>
On that note, the demo was specifically designed to played by two people and it's easy to understand why: multiplayer is the game's bread and butter. Gameplay differences aside, BattleBlock Theater's approach to co-op is much like that of Super Mario Bros. Wii, where the potential is always present to be a gigantic dick to your friend. Unlike Nintendo's game, however, BattleBlock Theater all but goes out of its way to make you naturally be a jackass while still trying to be nice enough to finish the level with your companion. This is thanks to both your arsenal of physical attacks and the properties of your weapon, as it's very humorously satisfying to land an otherwise entirely unproductive hit on your suspecting teammate that leads to your doom. Compound this with the fact that the game doesn't seem to punish you for dying repeatedly aside from checkpoint regression and you have a hate-filled, but wonderfully fun formula. I came away from the TGS demo deeply charmed, a sentiment which was shared by the Japanese players I saw, and now will certainly buy the game when given the chance. I also made sure to drop by The Behemoth's even tinier store in the merchandise area and picked up a phone charm of their mascot. It cost too much, but it was worth it nonetheless.
Asura's Wrath was the last game I played at the first public day of TGS and it was purely by chance. With less than an hour remaining, I knew that any popular games I might want to play probably already had their queues cut off so everybody already in the line could get a chance to play before the show ended for the day. As a result of that, I meandered over to the Microsoft booth, which, while relatively populated, was certainly not as dense as most of the ones for Japanese developers and publishers. I originally intended to go play Halo there, mostly out of irony, but also to see how the redux of a fondly remembered shooter was going. Despite there only being two people in the booth playing what looked to be the Reach-derived multiplayer component, it was actually shut off from newcomers. That led to me wandering around the booth in search of something I was even remotely interested in when, lo and behold, Capcom's angry game rounded the corner.<br><br>
There were two separate demos for the game being run, one of which was for the planet-sized boss shown in previous trailers and another of a fight with an Asura look-alike. Because of the length of each of the demos, people were allotted to play only one or the other. Although only two people were in front of us, my friend and I actually turned out to be among the last of the people who got to play the game for the day.<br><br>
I wound up playing the demo with the look-alike boss, which disappointed me, since it seemed to have less gameplay variety than the other one, as that contained on-rails shooting segments that I wasn't aware were in the game. Regardless, I enjoyed my time with it. While there are quick-time events a plenty in the game, they don't make up the entirety of the gameplay and they're also liberally timed. That being said, they were entertaining to watch, since it confirmed that Capcom is hell-bent on out-angering trend-setters such as God of War, a goal that, after playing it myself, I wouldn't be surprised to see come true.<br><br>
Aside from the quick time scenes, there was also a good amount of brawling to do in the fight. The mechanics behind it were nothing particularly complex, but they were competent and appropriately button-mashey, which complemented the ridiculously angry tone of Asura's Wrath well. If you've seen footage of this fight, you can probably see for yourself how complex the game will get during those segments. For me, at least, I did feel that the game made the combat feel visceral and intense, but at the end of the day, they're probably meant to garnish the more cinematic aspects that the game seems to be primarily focusing on.<br><br>
I came away from the demo satisfied and more interested in the final product than I was previously. I worry about the overall length of the game, even if, judging by the other demo, there will be some variety, so if I buy it, it almost certainly won't be at launch. One special thing to note is that the demo seemed to have significant artifacts in the pre-rendered cutscenes, which was immediately noticeable as soon as I began. I can't postulate for certain why that is, although I suspect it was either due to the system overheating from a long day or, more likely, compression onto a DVD format. While the real-time visuals looked fine and had no major issues, the artifacting was enough to ensure that if I do buy the game, it'll probably be the PS3 version by default.
The general Puyo Puyo page is being added since the specific version on display at TGS, Puyo Puyo 20th Anniversary, doesn't have its own wiki page yet, something I might resolve on my own at a different time. Regardless, choosing to go with the entire franchise page for this listing might be for the best, as it naturally turns out that 20th Anniversay, which was already released in Japan last month, is as Puyo Puyo-y as ever.<br><br>
It's incredibly difficult for me to comment on what's noticeably new in the game aside from visual changes. Not only have I not played any game in the series remotely seriously since it was known as Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine for the Genesis, but the fundamentals as I know them seem to be almost entirely the same. You still link puyos together in groups of four or more in the hopes of creating chain reactions that will cause hell to your opponents. The puyos still come in twos that can be rotated horizontally or vertically. And you can still have individual puyos land in different columns if you leave on hanging in the air. One thing I did notice that wasn't in Mean Bean Machine was a highlighting mechanism where the game would make puyo chains flash on the board if you had a color that could trigger them to go off, although I have no idea if it's an actually new feature to the franchise or just new to me. It's certainly handy, but not revelatory.<br><br>
In all honesty, I didn't even intend to play Puyo Puyo 20th Anniversary at TGS, having thought that the line for it was actually for Platinum Games' Anarchy Reigns, as it snaked right by the demo stations for that game. However, in the end, the line for that game started in an entirely different place that was disconnected for seemingly no reason other than because Sega didn't understand the concept of ergonomics in floor planning and with that, I would up playing a Puyo Puyo game and getting a bouncy balloon attached to a chain of sorts as thanks. Not the worst way to start off day two at TGS, but certainly not what I originally had in mind.
As I mentioned in the Puyo Puyo entry, getting to this game was a bit of an ordeal. While in line for that game, it wasn't until I was nearly at the demo stations for it that I thought I figured out how to get into the Anarchy Reigns line, which was taking in people four at a time for the multiplayer. When I hounded the chained off area for that to happen, it turns out I was mistaken and, as I mentioned earlier, had to head to an entirely separate part of the booth to be officially in line for the game. The signage for this was so scant that it was easily missed and I know that many Japanese folks wanting to play the game were also confused by this.<br><br>
Regardless, Anarchy Reigns itself is an intriguing game whose potential depth seemed to not be properly conveyed within the context of a five-minute multiplayer match. The brawling mechanics have simple enough controls, with special attacks dedicated to one button, regular ones to two buttons, grabs to yet another, and so forth. But given how different each character seems to handle, I wouldn't be surprised if learning them took some time, especially given their special abilities. This is a game where context can very much so determine what you do in a given situation.<br><br>
The scoring system is what really enables the game to live up to its title and ensures that players probably shouldn't (thankfully) take it seriously as a competitive fighter. Wins or losses in the mode I played was determined simply based on the highest score at the end of a time limit. Increasing the score can be done in a lot of conventional ways, such as stringing kills together. However, it's when you do things such as "Kill the King," or the match's current top scorer, that make it so the match can go to anyone, as they land players massive point boosts that can make their position on the scoreboard fluctuate dramatically. To further emphasize the chaos that this creates, the map outright lets everyone know who the king is and where they are, which is naturally great if you're not that person. I personally wound up winning the match after killing two kings and retaining my position afterwards, a prospect that was harrowing but highly enjoyable, even if I hadn't come to complete grips with controlling Jack, the protagonist from MadWorld.<br><br>
I came away from the Anarchy Reigns demo with higher hopes than I originally had going into it. Having always thought that MadWorld was Platinum's weakest game by a pretty wide margin, I was worried about how some of its mechanics, which are certainly still present in Anarchy Reigns, would hold up. They seemed to have been refined based on that past experience and feedback, though, as I had significantly fewer qualms with how they were implemented this time around. While I did indeed just right that the game is set up to be so chaotic that anybody could take the crown and win a match at any given time, I also still feel that it is a game whose depth needs more time than just one multiplayer match to understand and as such, I think there will be players who get good enough to ultimately not be done in purely because of score fluctuations when they fight. I'm not sure if I'm going to buy the game at launch and will probably wait for some reviews before deciding one way or the other, but I know I had a great time playing and look forward to some online free-for-alls once I do take the time to play the full version.<br><br>
Oh, and the main menu music is very jazzy. Pleasant surprised to hear that come out of the headphones the demo came with, considering the rest of the show floor was all just a mish-mash of techno and other unrecognizable genres because everybody, Sony in particular, just wanted to be louder than everyone else.
My last game for day two and overall at TGS, Street Fighter vs Tekken wasn't on my immediate to-do list for the show, but turned out to be one I'm glad I took in for reasons I'll explain later. With one of the surprisingly shorter lines towards the end of the day, I decided I had nothing to lose in trying it out, having been intrigued by how juggle-y it looked while still retaining a lot of Street Fighter's fundamentals.<br><br>
There were 15 to 20 demo stations for the game at Capcom's booth that were naturally set up for two-player matches. People would be culled from the line two at a time and allowed to play the game to their heart's content for five minutes. I wound up playing an affable Japanese player whose skill level was thankfully much like my own, which is to say, not all that existent. The chaos coming from the rest of the show, especially with regards to Namco's Idolmaster-related concert happening next door, didn't allow either of us to concentrate very well on the fighting, but we did manage to get a full match in that lasted three rounds. The character roster was, to my surprise, opened up to include seemingly every character that had already been announced, save for the console exclusive ones. While I can't remember which specific Tekken character my opponent selected, he did also select Ryu, while I went with Ken and Poison, with the latter playing a bit more intuitively than I originally thought, having not seen her movelist at all before the match started. Despite the fact that a round ends when one character is knocked out, my opponent and I had a knack for drawing them out, cautiously bringing characters into and out of the fray when their health would get too low for comfort. In the end, he won the first and third matches, while I won the second.<br><br>We then proceeded to start a second match.This time, the only character I can remember my opponent picking was Tekken's Yoshimitsu, while I wound up with King and Guile, the latter being an accident when I didn't realize I actually confirmed my original pick, Dhalsim, because that button wasn't mapped to punch for whatever reason. I expected the match, if we actually finished it go entirely to him, since not only did I not have an inkling about how to play King, but am also generally terrible with charge characters like Guile. Indeed, that's how it seemed to pan out at first, with King being completely useless to me and Guile not being able to get out any sonic booms. Having said that, apparently my opponent was in similarly dire straights, as I still won the round just by doing some basic melee with Guile. We then started a second round, but that was when our time was up and we were ushered out of the demo by a booth lady in a traditional Japanese festival getup. Despite not really remembering to try out any of the new mechanics, I still came away pleased with my experience, especially given that my opponent was not of the stereotypically godly level that are attributed to many Japanese players just by virtue of being Japanese.<br><br>
It was what came after the demo that really put a smile on my face and ended TGS on a great note for me, though. First I was given a thoroughly amusing hand towel as a thank you gift that depicted Ryu and Kazuma in very traditional festive attire from the waist down, a photo of which can be seen <a href="http://3203.blog.so-net.ne.jp/_images/blog/_703/3203/20110915_220147.jpg">here</a>. I thought the style behind was just great, too, and it was easily my favorite of the gifts I snagged at the show. However, the thing that put my time with Street Fighter x Tekken over the top was a photo with the game's producer and Namco-Bandai USA troll extraordinaire Yoshinori Ono. Having originally spotted him while I was in line, I wasn't quite in a position at the time to get his attention and nab a shot, something which he was otherwise quite willing to do with other people in line. When my demo was over, I noticed that he was gone. But after some persisting and waiting (I wanted this photo of him to be my very last at the show to end on a high note), I finally got what I wanted and struck a pose with me and his Blanka figure. I came away from it more giddy than I had any right to be, but regardless of that, I'm glad things were able to end the way that I wanted them to. I had already intended to play his game at launch even before the TGS demo, but after seeing just how jovial he was with me and other fans who recognized him, it just feels nice knowing that the game is being made by somebody in the Japanese industry who isn't completely serious business all the time.
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