This one's been a long time coming, but here are my final thoughts on Tales of the Abyss 3DS. For those who might be new to the blog and this series, my RPG Retrospective is a look at RPG's of prior generations (or, as in this case, ported over to newer consoles/handhelds) to see how well they hold up today. When we left off, things weren't looking great for Tales of the Abyss. Despite some pretty good combat and downright beautiful graphics, the list of annoyances was piling up fast. Will the game pull through in the end, or will it continue with its downward trend? Only reading on (or possibly playing the gam) will tell.

RPG Cheese

This section is devoted briefly to the amount of cheesy RPG cliches you'll find in each game I feature here. Practically a fault of nearly every RPG throughout the years has been certain cliches that pop up time and time again. Other genres have their own, but in a genre wherein you'll likely spend dozens of hours with each game, it's good to know this in advance.

This game is one great big souffle of JRPG cheese. There's nary a trace of manliness or beards to be found on any of the male characters. There's a typical high-pitched annoying little shit that some developer or producer thought was "cute" (I'm calling it the Jar-Jar Binks Effect). There are teenagers fighting wars practicallly single-handed. Every anime character cliche you can think of is here in spades. It can be a little overwhelming at times, but in a sense, this is exactly what some people might want out of a JRPG. It's comfort food for anyone who wants a safe, familiar actiony-JRPG. Personally, I was hoping for a little bit more than that, but to each their own.

I should note here that about halfway through the game, Tales of the Abyss does its damnedest to turn some of the character cliches on their heads. It's not entirely effective, but they do get points for trying. And while I never quite care for the protagonists, they do develop into more fleshed-out, evolving characters as time goes on. Some of the plot elements as well are a little heavier than I expected, a pleasant surprise to say the least. While the political and religious intrigue isn't exactly Shakespearean, it's definitely welcome. Although there is a liberal sprinkling of RPG cheese throughout the individual moments and characters, at least the overall plot genuinely has some great thought behind it and feels quite unique.

Replayabilty

One of the biggest attractions of a great RPG is in its replayabilty. Are there lots of hidden items, fights, or additional goodies to find that could significantly alter a playthrough? Is there a New Game+? Is the story great enough to revisit, or is it hell to trudge through?

One thing I love about the Tales series is that there's a ton of stuff to do and see outside of the main quest. Abyss is no different. To start, the world is huge, with lots of locations and dungeons to explore. There's a fascinating economics system that allows prices of town goods to rise and fall depending on certain subquests as well as your progress through the game. And those subquests? Plentiful, sometimes interesting, sometimes not.

There's a cool feature of the series making a return here called the Grade Shop. Each battle in the game nets you a certain amount of points dependant on how well you do in that battle. Those grade points are tallied up, and upon completion of the game and loading up a cleared save file, you can access the Grade Shop before the new game begins. This allows you to purchase all manner of game altering conditions, such as double gold (or gald) or grade earned. Alternately, you can purchase conditions that allow you to transfer over elements of your old game, such as consumable items or your battle data. The trick is that you're not generally going to be able to purchase everything in your first go-around. It's a neat little feature for those who want more of the game for their buck.

As to whether or not you'd actually want to go back through Abyss is really the question. As mentioned, the overarching story is pretty great, and the game world really does have some great intrigue and places to explore. But if you're at all turned off by anime cliches and some pretty atrociously bad dialogue, replaying this game is going to be hell. Personally, I started up a New Game Plus and I look forward to revisiting the world eventually. I've got many other RPGs on my plate, but I think I can look past the initial character inadequacies and eventually come back to the game for a longer, more thorough exploration of everything Abyss has to offer.

Overall Quality, Then and Now

I didn't play Tales of the Abyss when it was first released on the PS2, but I have played other Tales games before. I think it soundly trumps Tales of Symphonia on all possible levels, and it feels like a natural, evolved version of that game. I don't quite like it as much as I liked Tales of Vesperia (which was released years after Abyss), but I honestly think I prefer Abyss's visual style to Vesperia, which is pretty amazing when you consider that Abyss was a PS2 game and Vesperia was released on modern consoles. There's also something to be said for Abyss's additional content and the way it's more evenly spread out than Vesperia's. However, I'd say Vesperia has the better characters and has far fewer cringe-inducing moments.

As it stands, this is a great handheld game regardless of its brethren. I know most people want something they can pick up and play for just a few moments on their handheld, but if you're looking for something more, something meatier? This is a truly quality game despite it doing its damnedest to annoy the piss out of me.

Total Value Versus Accessibility

Amazon has the game currently listed at $39.99 for the 3DS. I picked up my copy for about ten bucks less than that, but $40 seems like it's been the game's median price since its release. Given that it's a relatively obscure title, I can't imagine the game receiving multiple prints, but I might be wrong. As it stands, $40 is a good entry point for this game. According to the game clock, I put in about 70 hours into it, which equates to a nice hours-to-cost ratio.

That said, the hours you put into Abyss won't mean a damn thing if you don't enjoy them. While the game might initially discourage players with its stubborn adherence to both JRPG and anime cliches, in the end, I'd say the game is worth a look at the very least. I enjoyed it and thought it was one of the best handheld RPG's I've played. Even if you don't enjoy the action-RPG genre, you might at least have some fun inventing a drinking game for every time some random, eye-rollinglyJapanese moment occurs.

Hey gang, just letting you know that my laptop has been out of commission and in for repairs over the last few weeks. I will be online over the next few days, but will be lurking only. I expect to be fully back and blogging/commenting/creating general mayhem in a few weeks. Until then, keep it classy.

Tales of the Abyss - RPG Retrospective

The Basics

I don't have much of a history with the Tales series. I originally played Tales of Symphonia during a brief period of time when I owned a Gamecube, but didn't play it to completion. I have thoroughly played and enjoyed Tales of Vesperia on the 360, but I wouldn't exactly say I was an expert at it. They were both enjoyable action-RPG's, with some distinct Japanese-ness to their style and plot along with some great-looking anime-styled graphics.

Tales of the Abyss is very similar to those two titles. Having originally been released on the PS2, it saw a re-release on the 3DS recently, which is the system I've been using to play it. Put simply, the Tales series has changed very little in its iterations, which can be both good and bad.

If you've never heard of or played the series, Tales of... features party-based combat in a real-time action RPG field. Enemies are seen on the field, and as such, can usually be avoided or fought as the player wishes. The screen then shifts into a combat field, wherein you control a character in real-time. Combat in Tales games usually revolves around building chains of attacks through regular strikes and your teammates' Artes (essentially magic or abilities). When not in combat, the game is very much a huge, sprawling JRPG epic, containing all manner of towns, countries, dungeons, and other areas to explore.

The characters are anime-inspired, as are the environments and general story elements. Small scenes (called skits) between party members play out at different moments by pressing the start button when prompted. These skits play out through static pictures and written text, and can add surprising layers of depth to the individual characters. It seems like a small thing, but when you're playing a game as huge as this, it's neat to have some smaller moments with the party's thoughts.

The Story

I'm honestly not sure how close I am to finishing Tales of the Abyss, but I'm about twenty-five hours into it and it still feels as though I've got a great deal more to experience. That said, the story in Tales of the Abyss starts off as a convoluted mess. The main character, Luke, is a bratty, antagonistic, mouthy punk. He's the nephew to a powerful lord, and has been restricted to staying inside a manor due to being kidnapped years ago by a neighboring country. Luke has no memory of life before the kidnapping. Thus, he is also fairly ignorant of the world around him, which gives the game plenty of excuses to explain arbitrary details about the world.

And that's part of this game's problem. In the initial five or six hours, the game pretty much defines the term "info dump." In rapid succession, Luke's trainer is attacked by a mysterious woman, so Luke defends his trainer.. A flash of light appears, and Luke and the woman (called Tear) are whisked away to a neighboring country by some sort of pillar of magic. Instead of tearing apart the snobbish kid, Tear feels a great deal of guilt about what has transpired and agrees to escort Luke home.

Tear and Luke get arrested by a group of individuals trying to formulate peace between the two rival nations. Led by Jade, an effiminate master warrior, this group is escorting Ion, the head of some group called the Order of Lorelai, in an attempt to broker peace. The ship is attacked by individuals called the God-Generals, who appear to be great forces of evil in the service of Maestro Mohs.

All of this sound overly complicated to any of you? Literally all of this is presented to the player in mere hours. None of the organizations are explained in any great detail. Characters come and go so rapidly that it's hard to keep track of who is who, who serves what, and what the hell any of these organizations and countries stand for. It's a blur of information. The game does get better about slowing things down and explaining the plot details a little more thoroughly, but holy shit, that initial five hour period or so is dense.

The characters themselves range from bland to mind-bleedingly irritating. Luke has some pretty funny moments of douchebaggery. An annoying creature called Mieu comes into his service early on, and Luke finds time around every other minute or so to heap abuse upon him. While I'm finding Luke to be annoyingly whiny, I'll admit to laughing when he punts the screeching Mieu a good country mile during one cutscene. But that's all that's likable about Luke. He never comes across as anything more than a brat, and when the plot starts trying to make him likable and relatable, the damage has been done.

Mieu is the absolute worst, though. He's a little rabbit-ish creature called a cheagle, and I have no idea if he's supposed to be either comic relief, the adorable pet, or the character everyone in the world was meant to hate. Anytime I can predict a Mieu scene coming up, I turn the sound all the way off. He's that annoying.

The Graphical Style

Good grief, this game looks good. The visuals have this hand-drawn cartoonish appeal to them. But interestingly, the color palette almost seems to be centered around pastels. You wouldn't think that'd look good, but oh holy crap, does it ever. Everything has this soft, appealing feel to it, giving the entire game's aesthetic this warm, fuzzy blanket feel to it. The style holds up remarkably well too, as do most Tales games. The characters look good, are animated very fluidly, and there's a lot of emotion packed into the in-engine cutscenes.

Combat looks great, too. The Artes have plenty of visual flair, there's a lot of punch to attacks, and there's a respectable amount of enemy types, so it's fairly light on palette-swapping enemies. The towns look good too, with plenty of distinctive places to visit and a very lived-in feel to everything. This is a world someone very lovingly crafted, and the art team realized it. The characters can look a little generic, but for the most part, they're fine.

If I have one complaint, it's with the font size, but that's more a problem with me playing it on a 3DS than anything else. Still, a slightly bolder font for text would have gone a long ways.

I tried to find a Youtube video that could show both some overworld exploration, a town, and some combat to show you the beautiful graphics, but many spoil essential plot points. Instead, here's a video of some combat, which will show you some of that delightful color palette and the visual effects of the combat.

Sound

This is really a mixed bag. The score is pretty good, but heavily inspired by anime, which means you'll get some neat orchestral moments ruined by J-pop-like beats and moments. At its best, the music is unobtrusive. At worst, it's mildly irritating. It never strays too far into great or bad territory. The characters are much the same way. If you've seen any anime or anime-inspired game, you'll know what I mean when I say it's merely tolerable. There's about as much actual emotion put into the voicework as, say, an early 90's cartoon. That's not to say that it's bad - it's just merely serviceable.

What really grabs my goat though is the incessant shouting in combat. You'll here the same phrases over and over, and in a game of this length, that's really not good. Characters do that stupidly irritating Japanese thing where they shout whatever move they're using. Every. Single. Time. It's easily the worst part of the Tales series as a whole, and here, it's no better.

And whoever thought up Mieu deserves to be shot. It's almost as annoying as Limle from Star Ocean: The Last Hope.

Part 2?

All this sounds sort of bleak, I know. I don't know when the second and final part of Abyss's retrospective will be let loose, but I suspect a few points in the game's favor when I look at such things as my overall enjoyment and the value of the game. Because, despite everything I have said here today, Tales of the Abyss is actually pretty good. Maybe not great, but there are plenty of redeeming qualities to it that might turn things around for the game. Until then, I hope you've enjoyed reading.

After a week's hiatus, it's the return of the only gaming update ribbed for her pleasure. Yeah, you know it and you love it. It's Sparky's Update.

I'm super exhausted and frazzled this week. I'm running on about two hours of sleep and several cups of tea, so this update is going to be relatively short and probably incoherent. Er... more incoherent than normal, I suppose. The Retrospective is on a longer hiatus - I've only just hardly scratched the surface of Tales of the Abyss. I can tell you this much though - that is without question the prettiest handheld game I've ever played. Also? The hero? Kind of a dick.

Today, though, I'm going to drop some final thoughts on Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning and Jolly Rover. Now, longtime readers might remember I've mentioned Jolly Rover before. I decided to go back through it due to Steam achievements being added and for my own desire to play through a traditional point-and-clicker again. Why I didn't play one of the many other adventure games still on my Pile of Shame, I have no idea.

Anyways, on with it.

Oh God, Make the Good Man Stop

I need to preface everything I'm about to say about Kingdoms of Amalur with a statement - I really liked it as a whole and think it's one hell of a fine start to a new IP. There. Now that I've said that, you're about to read a hell of a lot of complaints.

It's not that Kingdoms of Amalur is bad in any regard. It really isn't. The combat and leveling mechanics are straight-up awesome. Being able to respec my character at the drop of a meager handful of gold means I can constantly try new playstyles and tactics. The world is straight-up gorgeous, for the most part. It's a colorful, vast world with lots of neat little touches. There's a ton of quests and NPC's to interact with as well, which is great - in theory. But somewhere around the midpoint of the game, I realized Kingdoms of Amalur had lost a great deal of its charm.

I don't want to say that there's too much - that's not quite entirely right. I actually love the sheer amount of quests and places to visit. But there's never a really great reason to see those quests through. Most of the quests feel drab and cliched in nature and in writing. There are a few exceptions, most notably those quests dealing with the Summer Fae, a group of ancient magical beings who have lived, died, and been reborn as specific characters in roles they must fulfill in their lifetime. Except that with world events happening the way they are, the Summer Fae are slowly fading, much like the elves of Tolkien's fantasy. These quests are given early in the game, and show some tantalizing promise of things to come... except that the rest of the game never quite lives up to those particular quests.

Some quests do offer up some neat, tangible rewards in the form of Twists of Fate, which are essentially permanent bonuses to your character's stats in such things as damage taken or received, resistances to magic, and damage to specific types of creatures. Sadly, though, the quest lines offering these neat rewards are very, very few. You can also scope out lorestones scattered throughout the various regions for more permanent stat boosts. The lorestones also offer up some backstory for the world, but none of it is very intriguing.

It's super frustrating that of the hundreds of quests (and I do mean hundreds), there are only ten or so that offer these permanent rewards. The experience given for quests is nice, and sometimes you're given a decent piece of equipment, but in a game where new weapons and armor are always a few levels away, it seems sort of pointless to worry over finishing every last quest. And speaking of armor sets, there's a disappointing lack of variety in the designs offered. For each character class, there are a handful of general styles of armor with slight variations in color. What's there looks really good, but I wish more time had been put into variations of costumes for characters.

The quests not only point out the limited scope of working with someone like R.A. Salvatore (who makes his bread and butter writing generic-ass fantasy, and it shows here), but the limited creativeness of RPG sidequests in general. You'll fetch. You'll kill X monster for hapless villagers aplenty. I don't really know what the solution here is, but holy hell, someone needs to find it soon. Mini-games of some sort, certainly - but not the same three or four mini-games repeated endlessly.

Simply put, a game as good as Kingdoms of Amalur deserves content worthy of its breadth and scope. I am genuinely excited to see what Curt Schilling's company is up to next.

Good Ol' Guilty Pleasures

I'm an unabashed adventure game fan. If games were food, adventure games would be my comfort food. Sam and mac & cheese, to make a bad pun. And this week, I've needed a bit of gaming comfort food. That need was nicely met by Jolly Rover, a modern point-and-click RPG with the backbone of games like Monkey Island.

Actually, Jolly Rover pretty much is a complete and total homage to the first two Monkey Island games, and that's not a bad thing. The visuals have a nice, clean id-90's adventure game flavor to them, with 2D cartoon graphics and basic animations. The gameplay is ripped straight from the mid-90's too, but with the addition of a neat little hint system to help more modern gamers who might not be familiar with moon logic (thanks, ArbitraryWater, for reminding me of the term). Sometimes it devolves into a bit of a pixel hunt, which is highly annoying. For those not familiar with the term, old adventure games often had you scanning for minutia in order to find items to interact with. That's front and center in several parts of the game, unfortunately, but the game is ridiculously good about holding your hand when you want it and pointing you in the right direction.

The game's inspirations don't just come from its mechanics or looks, either. The game follows James Gaius Rover, who seeks reperations for the pirating of his ship. Along the way, he must fight and join up with pirates, fall in with a piratey woman, and fend off voodoo-powered beings. Sound familiar, LucasArts fans? It should. It's never as sharp or funny as the Monkey Island games, but it's charming in its own right. In any case, it was just what the doctor ordered this week, and since I hadn't played the game through with achievements, it made for a nice distraction.

Other Crapola

-I've finished up my run on YA novels. In the past couple of months, I've read Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy (well written, but ultimately flawed as he shoves his own atheistic agenda down the readers' throats) and the Hunger Games trilogy (fluffy mind candy with a surprisingly solid finale and a whole lotta annoying YA love triangle bullshit). I've gotta catch up on some research (namely, the Life in a Medieval... series), and then.... well, I'm not sure. Something definitely not YA.

-Finished up the first season of Game of Thrones. The TV show draws to mind a complete reflection of my thoughts on the novels. I like Tyrion and most of the Stark stuff, and speed my way through the Targaryen stuff. Good stuff, though. Very shiny. Sean Bean is one of my favorite actors, so it's cool to see him in such a high-profile TV role.

And that's it for this week. Thanks as always for reading. Now enjoy the sweet, sweet dulcets of Mark Wahlberg.

After last week's relatively quiet Update, I've come to some preliminary ideas and conclusions about the RPG Retrospective moving forward. From now on out, each game will be covered in two different parts. I won't be covering the story elements beyond what I feel is necessary for a basic introduction of each game. That said, I'd still like to complete each game, and will throw in some posthumous story notes if needed.

This week, I'm going to wrap up my thoughts on Vagrant Story, as I've finished it. Not gonna lie - I was pretty damn underprepared at spots, but I finished the tale of Ashley Riot late Monday evening. Also this week, I'll briefly be talking about Amalur, again.

RPG Retrospective - Vagrant Story: Part 3

RPG Cheese

This section is devoted briefly to the amount of cheesy RPG cliches you'll find in each game I feature here. Practically a fault of nearly every RPG throughout the years has been certain cliches that pop up time and time again. Other genres have their own, but in a genre wherein you'll likely spend dozens of hours with each game, it's good to know this in advance.

Surprisingly, there's little of note in Vagrant Story. The enemy types are fairly cliched, but the novel approach of the weapons and weaknesses systems makes fighting each of them less of a grind. Speaking of grinds, there are some spots where grinding is almost necessary, though with the proper preperation, the grind should be minimal for experienced RPG players. Some of the Japanese-ness of the characters peeks through the blinders, such as with the character designs and the taunting nature of Sydney. However, there's nothing really aggravating about any of this, and as a whole, the game does a great job of reining in the cheese.

Replayabilty

One of the biggest attractions of a great RPG is in its replayabilty. Are there lots of hidden items, fights, or additional goodies to find that could significantly alter a playthrough? Is there a New Game+? Is the story great enough to revisit, or is it hell to trudge through?

Vagrant Story has a New Game+ that essentially carries over all your items and stats. According to Wikipedia, it doesn't alter any story elements, but offers up the potential for some further exploration. Readers of the blog have also pointed out that there are weapons accessible only through the New Game+, so there's that as well.

The story is great enough to warrant another playthrough. Honestly, I probably will play this through at least one more time at some point, slowly and with an eye towards exploration. I feel like I rushed certain sections of the game, and I'd like to get in and explore more of Lea Monde. The gameplay should lend itself to multiple playthroughs without any real frustration further on down the line, as there's nothing quite like it, and therefore, nobody's refined it.

Overall Quality, Then and Now

Since I didn't play Vagrant Story back in the day, I can't give you a comparison of my experiences of the game. But in comparison to some of its peers, including its cousin Final Fantasy Tactics, I can say that it holds up incredibly well. The action-focused gameplay, narrow dungeons, and elimination of random encounters should get a cheer from many a new player. The story is superb, with a lengthy ending, deep characters, and a dark tone. Ashley Riot, though by nature a haunted man, is no emo punk parading as a leading man, and is an intellectually satisfying main character. I'm honestly shocked we haven't seen more of him in games - although with the assless chaps, perhaps that's a good thing.

Again, of particular note is that gorgeous score. Even if you don't play the game, do yourself a favor and check out the music.

Total Value Versus Accessibility

This is a bit of an awkward title for the section. Basically, it's where I'll put down my thoughts on whether or not the game is worth playing based on how easy it is to find and the price it's commonly available at. This is also a catch-all for who should pick up the game and any thoughts that might relate to your enjoyment of it.

In regards to Vagrant Story, the value is staggering. The game is easily accessible through PSN, and at a mere $7, I cannot recommend it more to just about anyone save graphics-whores (and if you're one of those, you're reading the wrong blog). This game is begging for some sort of revisiting somewhere down the line, be it a real or spiritual sequel.

Play this game. It's not perfect, but I couldn't have asked for a better game to kickstart this RPG Retrospective.

The Rest!

- I love Kingdoms of Amalur. This is one insanely big game, held back only by a lack of imagination. It borrows story and plot elements from tons of fantasy novels, especially Tolkien, Robert Jordan, and especially Salvatore's own previous work. At parts, that lack of originality really hampers the game, but overall, I feel like this is one of the best new IP's of this generation.

-Really bummed to hear Bulletstorm 2 got canned. I hope the "kill with skill" stuff makes it into other games.

-The next game to be featured in the RPG Retrospective, you ask (or not)? I don't know when the first entry will be, but that game is none other than.... Tales of the Abyss! Well, technically, Tales of the Abyss 3DS. Stay tuned, intrepid reader. This one should be colorful.

"Is this heaven?"

"No. It's Sparky's Update." - Field of Dreams

Not gonna lie, folks. I'm pretty stoked about this week's update. The mirth! The merriment! The lamentations of the women! Good times, broskies and sisterlies. Good times. This week, I'm gonna talk a smidgen more about Vagrant Story. Quick housekeeping note - last week, I said I was at about thirty percent, I was reading the numbers wrong (I'm using my PSP to play and the numbers are freakin' tiny). I was only at about 15-18% completion, but am now well past that mark.

Other games I'll be talking about this week include Sonic Generations and Kingdoms of Amalur. Today's update will likely be much more brief than usual, so you may all breathe a collective sigh of relief.

RPG Retrospective - Vagrant Story, Part 2

After last week's complaint of the unvarying look of Lea Monde, I immediately have to eat crow because not three minutes after I loaded my last save, the environments change to an outdoors area with all sorts of greenery. It's immensely better looking than the dreary underground areas, though it also showcases the age of the graphics quite a bit more. The land appears blocky and ill-fitted. In a dungeon area, that look can be masked by the architecture, but in an outdoors area, it's much more noticeable. That said, the graphics are nothing gamebreaking by any stretch of the imagination, and is reminiscent (again) of Final Fantasy Tactics. Also readers, thank you for pointing out to me that the world of Vagrant Story is indeed the same as in Final Fantasy Tactics.

Actually, I think the graphical quality of the outdoors area lends the game a breath of fresh air. The crisp, brighter colors give a great contrast to the advancement of the plot, as our man Ashley stumbles upon a group called the Crimson Blades, who are also hunting down the nefarious, eternally shirtless Sydney. Lead by the fervent Grissom, the contemplative Guildenstern, and the quiet Samantha. Guildenstern seems to be seeking out immortality, but not the undeath that seems to be plaguing the cultists and soldiers Ashley's been encountering. Samantha seems to be something more than just a simple soldier - dying, or at least seeking some sort of refuge from death. Now here's where the plot begins to really get good. These three characters introduce a section of the game that notches up the plot and gameplay. Sydney and his right hand man Hardin are also aware of the Blades' presence, as Hardin has what appears to be psychic powers.

After a couple of battles, it's also become readily apparent to me that I should heed the warnings sent by readers last week about the necessity of crafting. I'm only scraping by battles on the skin of my teeth, so I hit up a workshop for some long overdue crafting. I've still got my incredibly useful shortsword (dubbed "Memory" - yes, fans of Tad Williams, you'll see where this is going), which has a high affinity rating against the undead and dragons. Up until this point, it's cut down nearly everything but that golem with ease, so after adding a new part or two, I decide to leave it alone. If it's not broke, and all that.

I then try fusing together some of the weapons I've found along the way. The game's save points usually have a storage chest nearby, keeping all of the items you aren't using handy. All of the items stored are accessible at any other storage chest, a nice touch. The game's weapon construction seems a bit dense at first, but honestly, it's not so bad. You've got options to disassemble weapons and armor, assemble entirely new equipment from parts, rename things, attachment of gems, and for me, the neatest option is to combine weapons.

I assembled a couple of weapons from various parts and disassembled weapons. They produce merely okay results, with low attack scores and bland affinities. Not exactly what I'm looking for, so I jumped into weapon combining - and oh holy crap, was I in crafting heaven. As dense as the system is, it's really neat. Not all weapon combinations are going to result in better weapons - in fact, quite the opposite, usually. Most of my weapon combinations usually end up with weak, no-good weapons. But through a lot of saving and loading of my game (the workshops have save points handily available), I manage to come up with some devastating looking weapons, including a battleaxe called "Sorrow," a spear called "Thorn," and a crossbow called "Dude."

Their affinities aren't great, admittedly. With the exception of Memory, which has dragon and undead affinities in the mid-twenties, the weapons have affinities in the 5-10 range. Not to worry, though, because there are plenty of targets out there for me to build up affinities.

The OG Blue Blazer

I've been playing the hell out of Sonic Generations this week. I haven't played a Sonic game since Sonic and Tails, and I went into this one worried that it was going to be a waste of time. Holy hell, was I wrong. It's a melding of the old 2D Sonic titles with the more recent 3D outings. You play as both "old" Sonic (the 2D sections) and "new" Sonic (3D - duh). Each level is comprised of two acts, with the easier one being the 2D and the harder one being 3D. Although the levels remain thematically the same, the 3D Sonic levels tend to ramp everything up a few notches, making everything just a touch more insane.

The game was quite obviously designed by a committee somewhere, but it seems to me as though quite a few people on that committee actually gave a damn about the game. The story is laughably bad, a mere means to an end to get the gamer through a bunch of classic Sonic stages such as Green Emerald Zone. It also allows for Sonic to revisit seemingly every character in the series, good or bad. But once you get past the clinical trappings of that story and the inclusion of absolutely everything, you can focus in on the superb gameplay and fanciful level design. When you've bought and assigned the two Sonics the right skill sets (braking on a dime is an absolute must, as is the added speed), 2D Sonic feels incredibly right. He's blazing fast, there are no overly complicated mechanics, and the controls feel ultra responsive and spot-on. 3D Sonic has some issues, including some generic, imprecise 3D platforming, but the sense of speed and excitement you get out of most of the gameplay offsets those moments of awkwardness.

The level design deserves heaps of praise. I was never once bored with any of the levels, as the designers constantly threw something incredibly cool at Sonic. One minute, you're racing through high-rise office buildings. The next you're coasting down some hilly city, being chased all the way by a maniac in a semi-truck. The whole thing speeds along at a thunderous clip, too, only slowed by my ineptness at the 3D platforming bits. I imagine speed-runners will absolutely love this game.

The Best of the Rest

-When I say I've "started" Kingdoms of Amalur, what I mean to say is that I'm six hours into it and still have barely scratched the surface. This really is a fantastic game, filled to the brim with tons of stuff to do and see. I've accomplished very little of the actual quests, instead focusing my efforts on exploration and scavenging. This is the game I thought Fable III would be, and I'm excited to cover it more in-depth next week.

-Justified ended its third season this week. Although not quite on the level of the stunning second season, this was still a great bunch of episodes and I cannot wait for the next season. The highlight, as always, is the dichotomy of Boyd Crowder and Raylen Givens, the show's antagonist and protagonist, respectively. The show's secondary characters are all pretty damn fantastic, with my favorite being the slimy Wynn Duffy.

And that's it for this week! Whew. I suspect I'll conclude my look at Vagrant Story next week, whether I've finished or not. I don't want to ruin the plot for those interested in playing it (beyond what I've already ruined, that is), and believe me, I'm thoroughly convinced it is a game that needs to be played. I have already picked out the next game to be featured in the retrospective, but you'll have to wait two weeks to find out what it is. Until then, keep the salsa on the chips, baby!

Hey folks! Welcome to the latest Sparky's Update, wherein I try to stuff your mind full of nonsense and hullabaloo. And possibly sweet, delicious Starburst jelly beans. Ohhhhhhhhhhhhhh baby, that's the shit.

This week's going to see the implementation of a new feature here on Sparky's Update, called the RPG Retrospective. I'm essentially going to be taking a good, long look at various RPGs of all sorts, with no set pattern or focus in mind save to see how they stand the test of time. I'll also be reminiscing about the impact some of these games had in their day, so while the Retrospective aims to be informative, it won't always be as scientific as a real journalist or a blogger worth his salt might write. I'll devote however much time I feel is necessary to explain the basics of each game, but if I feel like the game warrants it, I'll play each to completion. I can't really predict how many blogs I'll devote to each game, but I'll try to at least explain the fundamentals and get in a good glimpse of the story and characters.

While I don't expect this to be a regular, timely feature on the Update, I do expect it to be semi-regular with possibly some spin-off blogs to follow, depending on my creativity. Some RPGs, frankly, are insanely long, and as such, some weeks might just see story updates. Some weeks I might not update at all. What I'm saying is that, like normal, don't expect any degree of certainty on when or if these will be published. Nor will this stop me from updating you on other games, though those updates will likely be relegated to a smaller section of the Update when a Retrospective is published.

Whew. On with the show!

Vagrant Story - RPG Retrospective

The Basics

I came into Vagrant Story completely fresh. I knew nothing about the game, its characters, or its story. When the game was released in May of 2000, I was graduating high school and preparing for college, a time when I couldn't afford the time or money to new games. Fast forward eleven years and change, and I finally pick up the game on the PSN.

The game is a straight-up dungeon crawler. There are no towns, no overworld, no NPC's to converse with (yet, at least). Instead of focusing in on experience points, the game rewards you with stat boosts when you finish certain sections of the game or defeat certain bosses. There is also a heavy focus on weapons and crafting, an aspect I'm still getting used to.

The game is set in an ancient city called Lea Monde, though you aren't actually exploring the city proper. Instead, as Ashley Riot, you traverse through the bowels of the city, going room to room, fighting monsters, and solving basic block puzzles. The combat is a great blend of action and turn-based. Enemies will attack you in real-time, but when the player attacks an enemy, the game pauses for your strikes. By hitting buttons at the precise time, Ashley can chain together rudimentary combinations. These are affected by a factor called Risk, which increases with every swing of your sword. Risk builds up over time, and starts to affect the chance you have of striking an opponent. Therefore, the player is left with two options - go for a long combo with the risk of eventually missing the opponent, or let the chain break to allow an enemy to attack and decrease the Risk amount?

Boss fights are a treat. Using only brute force won't generally work. Take, for example, a fight against a golem. At first, I tried just straight up attacking it from various angles. I quickly ran out of health and MP related items and died. But when I tried that same boss fight and relied instead upon a defensive maneuver that reflects a portion of the damage dealt by the boss, I quickly defeated him with minimal fuss. And I'm sure there were other options there too, such as using Risk-reducing items to help string together some longer combos. These boss fights are where the combat system really shines.

The Story

Judging from the map percentage stat given at the end of each section of the game, I appear to be about a third of the way through the game. With that in mind, here's the story thus far:

The game follows Ashley Riot, an agent of a group called the VKP, as he chases down the villainous Sydney. In the game's introduction, Ashley confronts Sydney, and fires a crossbow into his chest. Sydney gets on his feet and plucks out the crossbow bolt. Using a wyvern as a distraction, he makes good his escape, followed doggedly by Ashley and his companion Merlose all the way to an ancient city called Lea Monde. Ashley, full of cold confidence, enters the ruins of the city alone. Merlose is kidnapped immediately, and used as bait throughout the game to keep Ashley going.

And all that's just within the first ten minutes or so. Whew.

Most of what I've played since then has involved primarily around murky motivations for Sydney and his deep fascination with Ashley's potential and soullessness. Ashley himself is plagued by visions of his wife and child, who were killed by errant knights while on a picnic. Sydney seems to be aware of these visions and bedevils Ashley with veiled hints that Ashley can become something more. Indeed, he does, as Ashley begins to accumulate special abilities and magic.

So far, the story has been compelling. The narrow focus on only a few characters really helps propel the story forward fast. What's particularly great is how grim Ashley Riot seems to be without going over into emo territory. He's not the brooding archetype, nor is he wisecracking or happy-go-lucky. He's seemingly calm, almost emotionally distant in his pursuit of Sydney. He's really a neat character. Sydney himself seems sort of blandly evil, though his fascination with Ashley shows some promise for character development later on in the game.

The localization is fantastic. I cannot praise it enough. There's none of the usual "Japanese-ness" about the dialogue. Someone very lovingly crafted this story and saw it transferred very well into English. The effort really shows.

The Graphical Style

I'm not a graphics whore, but I can appreciate great graphical design. Be it a colorful world, great character designs, or some special kind of graphical quality that holds up well over the years, I can find a lot to love about the way a game was designed, even if it was released "in the good old days." This section will take a critical look at the RPGs I play, noting how well things have held up and what kind of an impression (if any) they had on me back in the day.

And since I didn't play Vagrant Story upon its release, that leaves me with how the game's style holds up today. First and foremost, Square's usual CGI greatness is on display here, though they seem remarkably reserved for that period of time. That's not a bad thing - the game seems to be focused on such things as speed runs as well as relying upon a lot of in-engine cutscenes. It renders the tasty CGI as something of a sparse treat - something to look forward to and to savor when you eventually get it.

The character designs are, frankly, as Japanese as they get. They're hilariously ridiculous. Sydney runs around looking like a bare-chested teenage boy. The first time I saw him, I thought, "Oh, this is what David Spade must have looked like as a young 'un." But even worse is Ashley. He's got what looks like insect antannae for hair, and even more hilariously, he's wearing assless chaps. Hoooooly shit, it's so awful it's kind of appealing. Ridiculous outfits aside, the characters look pretty good for that period of gaming. Emotions play out on their faces nicely, they animate relatively fluidly, and they don't seem at all wooden or marionette-like.

Unfortunately, the dungeons of Lea Monde don't hold up to such scrutiny. Even during their day, they must have seemed drab and repetitive. Imagine the inevitable sewer level of your favorite RPG. Now imagine that the entire game is focused arount that level. Yep, that's Lea Monde. Maybe this changes later in the game. I sure as shit hope so. I was relieved when I found running water in the game. When something as basic as a river makes you glad to see a change, you know the game's world needed a little bit more.

I should note that some of the combat-related stuff looks great. There are only a few basic enemy types so far, but again, they animate nicely. The bosses look particularly good. The in-engine cutscenes look nice, with the highlight being the speech bubbles, of all things. The text looks remarkably good.

Sound

Again, musical quality is a trademark of Square's RPGs, and this is no different. Music is surprisingly understated throughout the game, used mostly for full effect in cutscenes. With the aid of Wikipedia, I found out that the game is composed by Hitoshi Sakimoto, who also composed the music for one of my all-time favorites, Final Fantasy Tactics. It's no surprise then that I am really loving the music here and might even go out of my way to track down the score if it's widely available. One of my hopes with this series is to enlighten not just the reader but myself as to who does the music for RPGs. It's not something I can claim to be overly familiar with (except when it comes to Bear McCreary, my favorite composer).

There's no speech, which is to be expected of an RPG in the PS1 era. The sound effeccts are serviceable but not particularly noteworthy. All in all, the sound holds up fantastically well today. Here's a bit of that tremendous score:

The Rest

This will be a catch-all section of sorts, describing anything else I feel noteworthy that doesn't really have a home anywhere else in the Retrospective.

Vagrant Story is one of those rare old games I'm glad to be playing right now. It holds up supremely well, even to a first-time player. I shouldn't like its laser-focused dungeon crawling aspects, and yet, I do. The combat is tremendously fun and inventive, and exploring Lea Monde is quite a joy despite its drab appearance. I can't confirm this yet, but it looks like there will be some form of a New Game+ as well, which I'm looking forward to. It's the sort of game that encourages speed runs with its stat tracking, and yet, my first time through, I want to get in every nook and cranny that I can.

So yes, it's a remarkable game that holds up very well if you can get past some of the graphical design problems.

Other Games and Randomness

-I finished off Star Ocean: First Departure this week. It's a solid, mildly bland action RPG that never quite lives up to its space-agey premise. But the combat is good, the leveling system incredible, and there is an absolute ton of meat to the game. It's sort of a rainy-day RPG - not one I'd go out of my way to play again, but it's the sort of grind-rewarding goodness that I'll pick up occasionally to while away the hours.

-Also finished is Broken Sword III. The plot and the characters are a lot of fun, but it makes several boneheaded errors that made it extraordinarily unfriendly. Most notably, many sections of the game are graphically dark with no light/dark slider option. Even a fully sighted individual might have trouble with some of the puzzles. The primitive 3D camera work is also infuriating at times, hindering certain timed events. It's a pretty good game, but man, I felt like the developers were intent on making one stupid mistake after another with it.

-I started Modern Family this week, which ended up sucking up more of my free time than I'd like to admit. I should've been getting some reading done, and instead, I found myself sucked into this show. It's a fairly clever, upbeat family tale with some surprisingly good emotional moments (such as a brother admitting to his sister he just wanted to feel like they were on a team together again - sucker punched me right in the gut).

-Had a lead on a job, found out the job was way over my head. Bleh. Still, it opened up a new venue to me, so maybe something will come of that.

And that's it for this week. Long blog today. I hope you all don't mind. And I really hope you like the new RPG retrospective. Whaddya think? Am I missing any bases you'd like covered?

Smoke 'em if you got 'em, bitches. It's Sparky's Update!

Today, I'll be shootin' the shit about only a couple of games. Gaming on the 360 was a bit light as I waited on a new controller (which is cool, by the way - I bought a corded one which won't require anything to also play on the PC). And since I'm feeling a bit over-Tomb Raided, I decided to hop back into some games that really hit the spot for me - namely, Disgaea 4.

By the Power of Desco.... I Have the Power!

It's been a couple of months since I last popped in Disgaea 4, and I've gotta tell you, playing it solely for fun and not for the purpose of this blog has made it incredibly refreshing. When I last left off, I had just finished my second playthrough, with Valvatorez at level 330 and most of the party sitting at or around level 90.

My first order of business was to check out all the new DLC available for the game. NIS's DLC for Disgaea 3 & 4 is borderline shady. With D3, they released a handful of bonus characters, all of whome were priced at about $2-3 apiece. Disgaea 4 offers much of the same, with even more DLC characters. However, they've also released some extra post-game content, such as an entirely new chapter featuring Valvatorez and Fenrich's origins as a team. While the DLC characters might seem a little overpriced, I decided to splurge on some of the other stuff, such as that extra chapter. And you know what? I'm pretty glad I did. For the money (about $6), you get a challenging set of missions, one of the better told chapters in the game, and none of it is at all necessary or makes the game complete (as in Asura's Wrath). That said, I don't think it's anything that anyone but the most die-hard of Disgaea 4 fans should buy. It's brief, and some people might feel ripped off by it. Me, I enjoyed it immensely, and wound up replaying the chapter's early levels several times, as they provide extraordinary loot.

I've yet to really explore the rest of the game-enhancing DLC. I'd be lying if I said I ignored the character DLC packs entirely - I did purchase a couple - but I recognize that they're a rip-off at the price. Really, they should have been released at a buck apiece. I know I'm contributing to the problem, but damn it, I really do adore this game. I ended up buying Mao and the ninja servants of Raspberyl from Disgaea 3. Mao's a great compliment to Emizel. Emizel is an area-of-effect type character, with some light generic spells and some character specific ranged abilities. Mao is a mixture of a mage and a warrior, with some decent ranged abilities in his Star magic, but he really shines with his special abilities. They go together like peanut butter and chocolate. The two ninjas (forgive me, I forget their names off-hand and it doesn't really matter) work amazing well together, as expected, but will really shine when I unlock Raspberyl later in the game. Right now, they've both got a tremendous SPD attribute, which makes them hard to hit by most mobs up to double their level.

I spent a good chunk of the last week or so power leveling Desco and Valvatorez. When Desco hits about level 100 or so, she becomes really easy to level, as she develops a special attack called Yog Sogoth. It has the best range for an attack (so far - apparently Big Bang might be better, but I haven't unlocked that ability yet in any of my characters), and when she's combined wtih a Nekomata (an animal class in Disgaea 4, kind of a cat-like female), that range extends even further and she can wipe out an entire map (9-4, if you're interested) in one turn. The strategy therefore is simple. With the harder enemy level set at 1, 9-4's enemies become level 99. Due to a "glitch" in the Disgaea games, level 99 enemies grant the same experience as level 320 enemies. Therefore, I just set up the extra EXP and Mana blocks, fuse Desco with a Nekomata, have her hit up the enemies with Yog Sogoth, and hit execute (NOT end turn). Within a few hours, she'll be sailing north of level 600.

At this point, I'm working on finding a sweet spot for her to eliminate enemies in one turn and still gain massive EXP. I've got the Stronger Enemies bill up to about 18 or so. At this rate, I'll be able to level her to about level 1000 before reducing the Stronger Enemy bill back to zero and finding a better map to level her in. But before that happens, I'd like to unlock more of the post-game characters and explore the game a bit more. It's a nice balance.

Randomness!

-I played a bit of Mario Kart DS this week. Sadly, when playing DS games, the 3DS reverts back to the DS's wireless settings, meaning that I still can't connect my DS games to my wireless Internet. Oh well. This iteration was fun, but nowhere near as polished as Mario Kart Wii. I say all this to point out one big flaw with the 3DS. Nintendo needs to research a different shape for the handheld. Gripping it for long periods of time becomes severely uncomfortable and often leads to hand cramps, as opposed to the PSP. I know handhelds aren't meant to be held that long, but it is a big problem and needs to be addressed in any future handhelds Nintendo uses. The square, boxy approach doesn't lend to a natural grip.

-I may start the RPG retrospective as early as next week. I've started playing Vagrant Story, but it's early on in the game. If I do start next week, it will likely be with that game, depending on how much progress I've made. It's my first time playing it, so I'm going to take my time and write down some thoughts as I go.

And that's it for this week. What's everyone looking forward to in the months ahead, gaming or otherwise? I'm already getting stoked for E3, despite the fact that we're months out.

"You don't have to front on me, dear, so why don't you just give that bloggie here?" -The N.W.A. when asked about the latest Sparky's Update

Why, hello! I didn't see you standing there. Grab yourself some pickled pig's feet, a cold 40 ouncer, and some chaw, son. We're about to talk a little bit business. Yeah, that's right - it's the weekly Sparky's Update, brought to you this week by Golden Grahams and Pepsi Max. I don't actually have their endorsement at all, but maybe by plugging them, it'll get the ball rollin'! This week, we've got a lot to talk about, you and I. First, I'm going to discuss the two games this week that nearly caused me to punch walls (and why I suck at gaming in general). I'm also going to cover my early impressions of Castlevania: Lords of Shadow and Tomb Raider: Anniversary, final thoughts on Tomb Raider: Legend, and take an updated look at Golden Sun: Dark Dawn. If that wasn't enough, I'm also going to talk about Philip Pullman's The Golden Compass and give my (short) piece on the Whiskey Media craziness. Whew. That's a lot, so let's get started.

You're Better at Games than Me

If you're reading this blog, I can almost guarantee that one simple fact. No matter how bad you are at a game, I'm probably worse. I've been an avid gamer for nearly a quarter of a decade (holy shit!), and while I've beat a ton of games, rarely have I ever played a game on a hard difficulty or specifically set out to obtain 100% completion in a game. I'm usually the guy who plays a game on casual or normal difficulties, content to see out the story as opposed to face any real challenge.

In short, I really suck at games.

A lot of it's laziness. A smaller chunk is my eternal hatred of gaming frustration. I don't find it fun to repeatedly die in games (with certain exceptions, like the brilliant death mehanics in ZHP or Herc's Adventures - now there's a game I'll bet you haven't heard mentioned in a decade). About the only difficulty I enjoy in games comes from puzzle or adventure games, and even then, if I feel my frustration rising to a point where the game is in danger of no longer being fun, I'll happily jump on the Internet to get the solution to the puzzle. My vision problems are a topic I've talked about ad nauseam and aren't the point - even if my vision was 100%, I'd probably still attack games in the same lazy, half-assed manner.

That's not to say I won't turn the difficulty up if it'll make the game more fun. I'm always tinkering with the difficulty in Bethesda games, and I adore the later Halo games on harder difficulties because they never feel impossible. I'd even like to try Gears 3 on a harder difficulty when I get that back. It all boils down to frustration versus reward - if I'm not having fun with a game because of difficulty, then it's just not worth the hassle. Games are meant to be fun first and foremost for me.

This week held a one-two punch of insurmountable difficulty. The first game was Binding of Isaac, which I'd bought off Steam for a measly buck and a half or so. Having heard great things about it, especially that it was a rogue-type (one of my absolute favorite niche genres), I decided to give it a go. The introductory chintzy artwork and sly voiceover were pleasant. The menu screen looked great. I hopped into it and almost immediately hated it.

The difference between my favorite rogue-types and this game is simple. Games like ZHP can be difficult, to be sure, but they never feel entirely impossible. The minute I fought my very first boss in Binding of Isaac, I thought, "There's no possible way in hell I'm ever going to beat this game." It wasn't fun for me. The four directional shooting was imprecise at best, and I'm awful at room-to-room shmups anyways (I still love and hate you, Smash TV). The bosses and enemies have a full range of motion missing from the player character, and can often weasel in at weird angles that I just can't escape from. If I was a better gamer, the challenge might have appealed to me. As it is, I can't stand the shooting mechanics, the awkward movement, and the too-random room placement. Even ZHP had a little reason to its levels, damn it.

Frankly, nothing about this game said, "Play just a little longer and it'll get easier!" Instead, it screamed, "Hey, Sparky, you're going to spend hours of your life wishing you were being hit in the nuts with a 2X4 instead!" That's not a game I want to play. So I didn't.

Goodbye, Binding of Isaac. You won't be missed.

Not twenty minutes later, I found myself switching from my laptop to my 360, popping in a game I eagerly thought would be more my thing - Dark Souls. Yeah, right. I'd watched the Quick Look and thought, "Yes! It looks challenging but I can do this!" Uh, no. Not a chance in hell. Mind you, I was pretty good at first - hell, I even managed to beat the first boss after dying only once. I liked and understood the basic controls (it's all very smooth, with none of the difficulty coming from awkward controls or a bad scheme). There's this odd feeling in the game, a very pleasant one, that the controls are set up to respond as though you were controlling each hand independently. I know it's been done before in shooters and such with dual-wielding, but here, it just feels right.

And it's a good game. I'd even go so far as to call it fantastic. I wish I was better at it. But after that dragon fight, after mopping up a few loops of mobs for souls, I realized that it's a game I'm never going to beat. Hell, I'm not even going to get to the end of the second level. What was, at first, a fun challenge quickly became punishment. I'm not talking about mechanical or gameplay failures, even - it's just a fuckin' tough game. It's no fault but mine that I'm no good at it. But I know, after encountering some ghosts and skeleton warriors in the game, that I'm simply just not ever going to be good enough to get the enjoyment that some people have had. I said it late last week - this game feels like masochism in digital form. Some people are going to love that. I didn't.

Goodbye, Dark Souls. You will always be better than me.

A Castlevania Game I'm Actually Good At

I'm way late on this one, but guys? Castlevania: Lords of Shadows is pretty good! I'm not going to say it's great - there are some problems that drag the experience down just a touch. The core gameplay is that of a basic Devil May Cry-styled action game, which is perfectly fine by me. You gain points to spend on skills, leading to some great-looking combinations and special abilities. The combat is brisk, but it can be highly repetitive in spots, leading to some humdrum moments that can drag the otherwise great pacing of the game down. There are plenty of fantasy cliches, too, which is a bit unfortunate. Yep, you'll fight countless goblins and giant spiders. The environments look great, but in the parts I've played, they stick pretty closely to fantasy tropes. I'm hoping that as the game goes on, I'll see more of the crazy enemy types from prior Castlevania games and less of the generic sword fodder.

That said, the boss battles in this game are nuts. One of them, a boss fight against a titanic golem in the midst of a frozen lake, might be relatively simple in nature (you alternate from dodging his slow, cumbersome attacks, scaling his body, and attacking weak points), but it's done with such enormous scale and style that it definitely winds up being a jaw-dropping "Holy shit!" moment. While I'm still relatively early on, I'm definitely liking this game - it's worth it just to see what the hell is around the corner.

Rantin' and Raidin', A Whoopin' and a Hollerin'

A while back, I had some trouble with Tomb Raider: Legend, specifically in the Arthurian tomb level. I simply and literally could not see the solution to a relatively easy puzzle. I tried looking on Youtube, but that was no help as the video was obviously even smaller and harder to see. A few days ago, I recruited a ringer to help me out. That's right - I went to that oldest and noblest of gaming fallbacks. In other words, I got a kid to help me out. Turns out I was just missing a grappling hook spot. The usual icon was blending into the background a little too well. In any case, thanks to the kid, I managed to get past that puzzle and thankfully had no more trouble beating the game.

Overall, I really enjoyed the basic gameplay. It felt like what a modern Tomb Raider should - the controls are sleek, the gunplay is great, and the environments look good for a game that was essentially designed to work on last-gen systems. It's not entirely without fault - despite the great voicework, Lara is still disturbingly a Barbie-doll fantasy in digital format. The tombs never feel all that expansive, although truth be told, the linearity didn't bug me all that much until I played a bit of Anniversary. Then I realized just how confined Legend really is.

What's really weird is that something bugged me more than the blatantly sexualized Lara - the idiotic way Arthurian mythology is treated. One of Lara's assistants has been apparently living in a goddamn cave his entire life, because he's never heard of anything Arthurian related. Lara and the other assistant provide a fleeting, severely half-assed treatment of the myth. As a former protege of an Arthurian scholar, by the end of the game, I was decidedly pissed at the ham-handed storytelling and sheer idiocy of the way the mythology had been treated by the game's apparently twelve-year old writers. Seriously, they had to have been kids just verging on puberty for Lara's costumes alone, but add in the butchering of the Arthurian mythology and they come off as even more juvenile.

I played just a touch of Anniversary. It's not enough to really warrant a whole lot of time here, but the gameplay is ripped straight from Legend (a good thing), and the levels feel much bigger. Lara's outfits are still as ridiculous as ever, but I guess that goes with the territory.

Simply put, if Tomb Raider is to become a relevant series again, it needs to grow up.

Golden Gameplay

I've been playing Golden Sun: Dark Dawn off and on for the last week or so. I've mentioned before that it's a pretty great little RPG for the DS, combining classic turn-based RPG mechanics with a Pokemon-esque "gotta catch them all" approach to magic. You see, for your characters to gain new spells (called Psynergy) and summons, you have to find little creatures throughout the world and capture them in a fight. Most of them are easy to find and obtain, but a few are only obtainable by carefully searching environments or by solving some clever puzzles. It's an absolutely superb system that rewards exploration with genuine results.

The story itself is still sort of bland, relying far too much on fan-service in regards to the first two games. Almost every major character is either a main playeri in those games or is related to them. It leaves Dark Dawn with very little in terms of original story, which is a shame. Still, it's enough of a story to keep me gaming. I look forward to exploring more of the huge world.

Randomness!

-Upon dankempster's advice, I took up the His Dark Materials trilogy and have recently finished The Golden Compass. I'm happy to say I think it's a great book. The parallel world idea has always fascinated me, and Lyra's parallel England is no different. It's vibrant and alive, full of little nuanced touches that make me eager to see more of the world while leaving some of it to the imagination. The plot is brisk without making any sacrifices in terms of depth or character development. And speaking of the characters, with the exception of Lyra, I'm a huge fan of the way Pullman develops every character, be they big, little, or bearish. And while I'm not a huge fan of Lyra, I do think her character develops and changes enough that I want to stick with her story longer, to see this whole thing through. I'm already about a third of the way through the next novel, and am thoroughly enjoying it, too. More on that later, though - this blog is already huge.

-My dog managed to kill one of my 360 controllers. It was plugged into a Play n' Charge Kit. I'm kind of awestruck at how precisely he managed to kill it. He snagged his foot on the cord and accidentally sent the controller sailing a good three feet from the table it was resting on to his water dish. Had the controller gone a half inch left or right, it would have been fine. As it was, I awarded my dog three points and promptly ordered a new one.

-Regarding the Whiskey Media purchase and split, I'm enthusiastic about the futures of most of the WM sites. Given the openness about Gerstmann-gate and the team's enthusiasm for the move, I think Comic Vine and Giant Bomb will only go on to crazier, bigger things. Same with Tested, though for obviously different reasons. I sort of worry about the future of Screened, but Matt Rorie's a fantastic content producer and I'm sure that whatever happens, he'll land on his feet regardless. I don't buy into any of the conspiracy theory bullshit about the sale of the company, nor do I think people should be so upset or worried. This can only lead to greater things, guys.

And that's it. Whew. That's a hell of a wall of text, for which I'm truly sorry. I hope you all have a great week.

OK, I said no Sparky's Update earlier today, but I find myself with half an hour to kill while I boil the everloving shit out of these delicious looking brats. Living in the country does have its advantages, one of which is deer and elk meat made into jerky and brats. So freakin' good. Anyways, today's update will be ever so brief. Think of it as a loving caress from your pimp for bringing in an extra $100 for the evening instead of the usual beating I give you for not havin' all my damn money. Damn it, woman, don't you know daddy needs his lettuce?

Right. On with it, then.

Playing with a Flute... and Not the Skin Kind, Jackass

This week, I hardly played any games at all save for those on handhelds. I've talked a bit about Star Ocean: The First Departure and feel no need to reiterate the basics again - it's solid, good fun. Instead, I'll focus on my big purchase of the last week - a 3DS.

It wasn't costly at all, thanks in part to me busting my game trade-in cherry. That's right - your pal Sparky traded in games for the first time ever this last week. I've given them away, sold them to friends, and flat-out lost them before, but never have I traded in any games to a shop. I didn't trade in anything I'd regret later - just a bunch of old sports games, a handful of games I'll never, ever touch again (Record of Agarest War and Alpha Protocol, you won't be missed), and games that didn't work for me visually (Gears of War 1, namely). I also traded in my DS, figuring it would be fairly pointless for me to have both. All told, the 3DS (used) was about $130. With all my trade-ins, I whittled that down to a $30 purchase. Not bad at all.

None of the 3D nonsense will be used - I flipped it on to see if it would work with my eyes, and of course, that's a big "no." I do think, however, there are enough great games out for it and on the way that the purchase is warrented. I didn't buy any games for it. I have a ton of DS games I couldn't play because of a broken shoulder button on my old DS, so I figured I'd wait for some good deals on 3DS games and whittle down my To Be Played list. I did, however, borrow Ocarina of Time from a pal. I don't think there could have been a better way to enjoy the system day one. Ocarina of Time on the 3DS feels like gaming perfection. The controls are much more natural than its N64 counterpart, The graphics look cleaner without really varying too much from the charming look of the original. The gameplay is still superb. And for the three or four hours I played, it was an absolute joy to revisit. I was worried nostalgia might have affected that game's quality, but I'm happy to say that it is still one of the best games out there.

Randomness!

-I did finish off a few games of Civ V this week, mostly from old saves that I hadn't quite gotten around to beating. I played as Gandhi, Caesar, and Alexander, with Alexander being the clear-cut favorite of the three. The production boost you get from buildings already created in the capital cuts costs down by a ton and encourages rapid and militaristic expansion. It's pretty great. I adore that freakin' game.

-Do you watch Spartacus? Because that motha fucka cut a man's face off this week - and it was awesome.

Sorry for the brevity of this update. Much more to come next week, as I explore some old DS games and maybe start in on the next Tomb Raider game in the PS3 collection. We shall see. Enjoy your week, and bring daddy his goddamn money!