Games that drive people to insanity.

By Video_Game_King July 20, 2009 38 Comments

Takeshi's Challenge

(This game has driven me inSAAAANNNNEEEE!!!!) *lets out an insane chortle* Did you hear that, electric coconut giraffes!? *dementedly giggles* INSAAAANNNNEEEE!!!!!! *laughs self into perceived alternate dimension*...............OK, he's out. Looks like it won't go away soon, like that Romancing SaGa 2 thing. *sigh* I' guess I'll have to type up the review for him. Oh, wait, I haven't even introduced myself. I'm the Queen, married to my currently-insane husband since 1844. That said, this is seriously the weirdest thing I've seen him do.

Moving on, I'm going to have to write his review based on the notes he wrote and the Wikipedia articles on it. According to Wikipedia, this game was made by a Japanese comic Takeshi Kitano. It says he hated video games, but unlike Jack Thompson, who spent his entire life (and afterlife (very long story)) trying to destroy video games, Kitano put his ire to good use. Somewhat. What he did was make a video game that satirized 1980s video games and, from what I've seen, make hard games of the time (Metroid, Zelda, Dragon Quest) look like your last acts before your sex change.

In his challenge, you play as...well, actually, I don't know. I assume Takeshi, but none of the Wikis on it ever said much. I guess the objective is to collect treasure, since the King won't stop muttering the word "treasure." How exactly you achieve this goal seems to be a mystery to both of us. According to what he has written down, progressing through the game is random and very hard to decipher. I'm looking at the Wiki, and even if you understand Japanese, some of these steps need a walkthrough. Then again, that's probably what he meant by "challenge", and to his credit, he was rather creative with some of these challenges. Reading off both this site's Wiki and the only walkthrough I could find, you apparently have to yell into a controller, leave a controller alone for an hour, and taping down the turbo B button on a controller.

I know what you're thinking, because I can read minds. You are thinking that this next paragraph will talk about the controls of the game. I'm not a professional video game reviewer, so the best I can do is follow your suggestions. Anyway, one of his notes says, "controls like cat anus." Underneath that, it goes into more detail, like how you can only jump straight up or straight forward. It also says something about not being able to attack while jumping, but I remember seeing him shoot monkeys while jumping. There's also something here about doors and entrances requiring incredibly specific placement in order to enter, yet unlike the jumping/attacking thing I mentioned earlier, there's no way for me to soften this. Nothing I can think of or find disproves this or lessens it severity.

So does any of the following make the game bad? Well, the King would probably just end the review here with an award that highlights

what he perceives to be the poo r quality of the game, but I'd like to give it more thought. After all, can I call a game bad when it was designed to be bad on purpose? Sure, the music is grating and the ability to beat up anybody is made less fun by the lack of satisfaction, but all that was probably intentional. Something my husband probably didn't consider was that this game was satirical of video games of the time, making fun of their illogical nature and obscure advancement methods. No, wait, I was wrong; he did, and it seems another one of his notes is "one of first arts." Oh, Christ, this must be where he lost his mind. He even wrote a sentence for this review. "Yes, that's right, before games like Ico and Panzer Dragoon were doing the whole art thing, Takeshi was making an ironic game that can be viewed as an artistic endeavor." Wow, he wrote that? Usually, he spends his time writing up superfluous awards...which I should probably end this review with, if I want to stay true to the rest of his works. My first thought is Hardest Game Award, but I think he has already done that. I'll have to be more creative. Let's see what else he has in his notes....*rummages through notes*...hmmm, this looks good. I'll end this with the Heath Ledger Award for Jocular Attitude.

Review Synopsis

• The game isn't translated, but even if it was, you'd have a hard time figuring out what to do.
  
• Seeing that our TV now looks like it angered a Famicom controller cannon, I think the controls aren't that good.
  
• The game is difficult, but I don't need to tell you that. It's in the title and it drove my husband to insanity...that he's still suffering from.
  

Oh boy, he's still trying to eat his tongue. He should probably return to sanity when this video is done. I'd include the second part, but that would risk making him even more insane.

  

Run Saber

(Well, I am no longer insane.) More accurately, I'm not as insane as I was twelve minutes ago. I am now in perfect condition to review video games. However, because the Queen just wrote my entire Takeshi's Challenge review and Saints Row 2 has yet to be beaten, I'm stuck with an obscure SNES game. Yea, I'm not that excited either, even though this isn't anything new to me.

The game in question is Run Saber, an action game for the SNES. In it, demons have taken over the Earth, and it is up to you to save it. Who you are is up to you, since you can be either a boy or girl ninja-cyborg. I picked the girl cyborg.......because I was still insane at the time! *nervous chuckle* (That should do it. Wait...they can hear me, can't they? Damnit!) If you're hoping for more story, prepare for disappointment, because that's all you get. Then again, you probably shouldn't be looking towards action games for deep storylines.

Then again AGAIN, I can understand why you'd be looking towards this game for story. After all, it was made by Atlus, something that remains incredibly obvious throughout the experience. The Atlus feel here is so strong that after playing the first two levels, I developed the urge to release demons into the nearest high school just so I could see teenagers beat them up. I've heard that this game also feels a lot like Strider, and I can see where people get that. Like Strider, gameplay consists of walking/climbing in some direction and slashing the shit out of whatever crosses your path (and then slashing that shit into smaller shits). However, there is a bit more to it than that in Run Saber. You have a wider variety of attacks, but they're mostly one-time moves; the only ones I actually did use multiple times were "shit slashing sword slash" and "Sonic-esque spike ball of obliteration."

Oh, you also get a special attack, as pictured in that...picture....I'm not sure if it's the same for both characters, but the girl unleashed a swirling ice attack that eviscerated any poor fool on screen at the time. There's nothing wrong with that, as many games should (and do) have special attacks like this. However, Run Saber gives you too much of a good thing. I never really encountered a shortage of special attacks, so quite a few boss battles became well timed special attack blitzes. Hmm...do I have anything else to say about this game?

No, I don't think I do. I guess I owe that to its shallow-yet-fun nature and the short (it's only 5 stages long) length of it all. In fact, the only other thing I have to say about the game is that the bosses are easy and consist of the same strategy. You usually just wave your sword at them like you're swatting giant flies, the background music taunting you as you do so. Other than that, though, there's not much I can say about this game. Seriously, I'm at a loss for opinions. Whatever, I'll just give it the Atlusliest Game I've Beaten Award and call it a day.

Review Synopsis

• As I've already said twice, this is an Atlus game.
  
• Kinda short with little replay value.
  
• Gameplay is shallow, Strider-esque, and decent.
  

38 Comments

Marriage, mutants, and this notion that fate despises me.

By Video_Game_King July 16, 2009 6 Comments

Dragon Quest V: Hand of the Heavenly Bride

(As gamers, I think we can all agree on one thing: the number 4 is awesome.) Look at all the great games in history, and you'll notice that the recurring motif is 4. Grand Theft Auto, Resident Evil, Phantasy Star, Dragon Quest, Legend of Zelda 4, Call of Duty, Panzer Dragoon, Final Fantasy, F-yea. But look at all of those games for me. Don't most of them have sequels? Yea, the number 5 isn't usually as good as 4, but whatever, it's still pretty good, just in its own way. The best example I can think of that fits this is Dragon Quest V: Hand of the Heavenly Bride.

You guys should already know (but don't, because you never read my first blog) that I consider Dragon Quest IV to be one of the best games ever; what you probably don't know is that when I first played Dragon Quest V, I considered it not as good as its predecessor. I still think that, but it doesn't mean the game isn't good; again, it's good, but in a different way than Dragon Quest IV. For lack of better phrasing, DQ5 is less an epic adventure to save the world and more a personal quest for your own purposes. It all begins when you, the player, are born to a mustached king named Pankraz. The game then picks up about 8 years later, when you and your dad embark on a quest to look for your mom.

That's what I meant by personal: the game focuses a lot on the major, broadly encompassing events of the protagonist's life. Everything is there, from marriage, parental death, and your first pet to having kids, teen pregnancy, and even your own death. It's a very unique way to tell the story, and it makes the game yet another in the series that will make you cry. Also like the other games, it has its own major "thing": the marriage system. In the original version, you were given a very tough choice about 40% through the game, explained here. In this reiteration, the choice is made a bit harder with a third option: a tomboy bitch who probably only marries you because she has nothing better to do. Yea, that part seemed a bit weird, especially how I've seen her explained. I've heard that she's supposed to be the wife for people who want combat-focused kids, but Bianca was fulfilling that role long before the new girl gothed her way into the game.

For those paying attention, you may have noticed that the marriage system has an actual (albeit subtle) effect on gameplay. It's not just something the developers threw in for story purposes; no, it has an effect on your battles in the late parts of the game. Speaking of battles, the battle system in Dragon Quest V is just like that of its forerunner. You know, turn based combat with a set of very general commands you can issue to either individual members or the entire team. So then why should you play this game and not Chapters of the Chosen? Or, phrased a bit more fairly, what sets this apart from its predecessor? The monster system. The basic idea is that you can recruit monsters for use in your own party. Don't be fooled, though, it's not like Pokemon or Dragon Warrior Monsters. There's no way to influence whether or not a given monster will join your party, it's mostly luck. Also, the abilities the monsters learn aren't better than that of your own party members, so the whole thing comes off as a bit superfluous. It's nice to see that some of my original complaints are still totally right.

However, some of my original complaints, like those linked to the fact that it was a very early SNES RPG, have been addressed in this

remake. The graphics have received an excellent overhaul, and the music isn't as trumpety-flutey-violiny as before. So at least from a technical point of view, the game no longer feels like a very early SNES RPG. However, with this comes several new complaints I couldn't make about the SNES version, like the new board game thing. Here's how it works: you roll a die. That's it. Since there's only one path to follow, there's not really any strategy to it, making it a game of luck. You'd think that because it's not a necessary part of the game, I wouldn't criticize it so much. Yet like the friend feature of GTA4, DQ5 seems a bit too eager about this feature. About half the items you stumble across are tickets to play the game, and you can even win tickets to play the game while playing the game. If I were to compare that to something from GTA4, I'd probably say the TV thing I didn't like.

You know what, I'm already on the GTA4 analogies, so why not continue the trend? Next up are the highly annoying accents. Yes, they were in the previous game, but your allies didn't talk as much. However, your friends in this game speak quite a bit, bringing up several problems. The best I can think of is your kids. Shortly after they're born, you and your wife are frozen as stone statues. For ten years, a man with a Spanish accent thicker than your dad's mustache raises your children. When they eventually come to your aid, the first thing you discover is that they speak perfect English without so much as an abbreviated word, let alone Spanish accents of any kind. How the hell did the translators resolve this, especially since (I imagine) it's kinda hard to add accents in Japanese?

Paradoxically, I also hated when recurring characters had these stupid accents. The major villains of the game all speak in fractured Engrish the translators laughably deemed a "Russian accent." If you thought Chapter 2 in Chapters of the Chosen was annoying, spread that frustration out over the entire game. Now make the final boss speak in an ancient tongue resmebling Wingdings and give one of the characters a Ned Flanders speech impediment, and you have the stupid accents of Dragon Quest V. Yes, I'm aware that it's extremely petty to criticize a good game for something as trivial as this, but it's just something that bothered me while playing the game. I'm aware I could criticize it for worse transgressions, like short length or high random encounter rate, or laud it for the excellent story or decent animations, but I'm pretty sure I've already done most of that. In fact, I'm sure I've already said everything I wanted to say about this game. Why am I still typing this? Oh, right, the award-thing. I guess I'll give it the McCafé Award for Crapé Accénts. I can't be the only one who hates those commercials, right....é?

Review Synopsis

• The story is unique and emotional.
  
• Just ignore the underdeveloped monster recruitment system.
  
• When the hell are we getting Dragon Quest VI DS?
  

Since we're talking about Dragon Quest, I thought I'd post this video. It's a Dragon Quest VI ROM hack meant to be DQ4, only with a few "changes" (hint: errors) to the story.

  

Fallout 3

(Does anybody remember what I said back in my GTA4 review?) You know, about how I'm an expert at reviewing RPGs? Well, time to admit something: that only applies to JRPGs. It's not that I don't like WRPGs, it's just that I've never been able to get into them. The ones I've played were either incredibly confusing or just plain bad. Which one of these categories does Fallout 3...fall...into? Well, I suggest you actually read the review to find out.

It seems fate has something against me, since this blog also features a JRPG review, guaranteeing this will quickly turn into a flame war between the two sides. The WRPG side will decry the JRPG side for using the term RPG; they'll say that the fact that you don't create your own characters means that they're not RPGs. A crap argument, but whatever, I kept this in mind while playing Fallout 3, and decided to play as a character of my own creation. Not me, though, since I'm already a fictional persona. So who did I play as? From my mind came the character Bushwald Sexyface, world's sexiest albino. He's got a gruff Cockney accent, his theme song is this, and I have made a rough approximation of what he looks like:

Another complaint I kept in mind was that NPC dialogue in JRPGs kinda sucks (so I've heard), which is why I decided that Bushwald would specialize in speech. However, I soon found this to be a grave mistake, since the game is more combat-oriented than I thought it would be. Part of the problem is the apocalyptic theme, and a bigger part of the problem is that Bethesda didn't think ahead; a lot of the time, there's vast expanses of land where you won't see a soul (mutants have no souls, mind you), and Bushwald only had about three or four opportunities to seduce women. Even then, though, the dialogue isn't as open ended as I thought it'd be. Most of the dialogue choices were either inconsequential or the exact same thing as something else. The only difference was that one was what Robin would say, and the other was incredibly dickish. Bushwald would've been better off studying things like science, lockpicking, or guns.  Especially guns, as another thing I soon discovered was that this game was very gun-oriented. But before I get into that, let me add this little disclaimer: the melee weapons are decent, fun to use, and there for people to use. Fisticuffs suck, but hammers and chain-hacksaws are good.

That said, the game tends to focus quite a bit on the guns. Most of the weapons in the game are guns, and most of the enemies you encounter use guns, meaning you should, too, if you don't want to become the Swiss cheese in some Super Mutant Brute's sandwich. Of course, with guns comes an added benefit: targetting specific body parts. In enters the VATS system, the game's primary battle system. In VATS, you target a specific body part a number of times, depending on how many action points you have. Then you get to watch some kickass cinematics of Bushwald missing half the time. What I like about it is that it's as strategic as you want it to be; I usually aimed for the head (for reasons mentioned later), but I can see how somebdoy could use the system strategically. However, for this to work, you have to have action points. What happens when you run out of action points? Well, you can manually aim your weapon and pretend you're playing a first person shooter.

I'm not even kidding here, it really plays a lot like a first person shooter. Circle strafing actually works better than it does in most FPSes, and you can even take cover from the enemies until you recover AP. No, not in the good "Gears of War, we actually acknowledge it" way; more in the bad, "I'm not gonna mention that game, but you know which one I'm talking about" way. I shouldn't criticize Fallout 3 too much for it, though, since you can recover AP while circle strafing, as well. Sure, the chance of being hit is larger, and it's a somewhat weird combat dance, but you still have the option.

Also, it's unfair to review Fallout 3 as if it were an FPS. This game is an RPG, and it must be treated as such, which makes it all the more amazing that I've gone several paragraphs without once mentioning anything about the story. Well, the story follows thusly: it's the year 2277, and the world has suffered a massive, crippling nuclear apocalypse. Because of it, the surface world is an irradiated hellhole, and culturally, everything froze at around 1955. You are born to Oskar Schindler, and the first hour or so of the game comprises several key moments of your life mixed with gameplay aspects like skill selection and combat. On your 19th birthday, everybody in your Vault decides to kill each other. Your dad, being the smart man that he is, decides to leave the Vault for the relatively safer nuclear hellscape of the outside world. Your duty is to find out where he went and what he plans on doing. OK, so it's already ripping off both Dragon Quest V and The Venture Bros., but the story itself is quite decent. There's a goal for the protagonist, several obstacles along the way, a few villains, and some allies along the way.

It's just a shame you can't recruit any of them. I know it's a minor issue, but why are there so few characters to recruit in the game? During my experiences, I found quite a few who you'd think would join you on your quest, but I guess they had better things to do with their time. I was only able to recruit one guy in the entire game, and it was so incredibly late in the game that I don't see why I should have bothered. Again, let me say this was a minor issue; a larger problem I found was the karma system. Like many games out there, you can choose whether to be good or evil, but it's too damn easy to be good. I was breaking into people's rooms and rummaging through their underwear more than I should have, and I still never ranked below "Good." Hell, one time I was even ranked "Very Good", represented by a picture of Pip Boy Jesus. I even managed to kill off a recurring character in the ending, and the game still found a way to make me out as the hero. Kinda like the Republicans who stuck by Bush, no matter what he did.

So what the hell is my opinion on this game? Well, it wasn't as good as I expected, but there are several reasons for that. The flaws are an obvious one, but there's also the possibility that I set my expectations too high for my first WRPG, or that I played it incorrectly. I have all this anger because of this game, but I can't exactly use it on the game. I guess I'll just insult the PC gamers who insulted JRPGs, therefore building up my expectations for their beloved WRPGs. Yea, you guys suck! What did Fallout 3 offer that made TWEWY look bad, Yahtzee? OK, I'm done with my angrying. Regardless of my overall opinion, I saw it as a good start to my foray into WRPGs. All I need are a few more transition games (some SaGa here, Septerra Core there), and I'll be speeding through games like Planescape and Baldur's Gate in no time. For this reason and one more, I give it the Great Beginnings Award. The other reason is that I now have one more game left in my Xbox 360 Marathon Rush Thing! (I consider it a beginning, somewhat.) Celebrations are in order! Let's p-what's that? I still have Dead Rising? And the two Skates? And a few guitar games? Eh, fuck 'em.

Review Synopsis

• A bit too focused on combat and guns.
  
• The story's OK. I've seen better, and I've seen worse.
  
• Say hello to Bushwald Sexyface. You will see more of him in the future.
  

6 Comments

Odd. I love this game, but not because it's good.

By Video_Game_King July 13, 2009 16 Comments

Resident Evil 5

(*looks at header* Not to say the game is bad or anything.) I actually liked Resident Evil 5, despite the numerous flaws. What I like about gaming is when I blog about really big games, because I can make really funny jokes that people can actually understand. That in mind, Resident Evil 5 gave me a treasure trove of material for quirky jokes, and, like any good Resident Evil game, it all begins with the story.

It's been some time since Umbrella has died (but not really), and at some point before the beginning of this game, Wesker became a Nobody, changed his name to Wrexesk, and decided to conquer Kingdom Hearts with yet another variation of the Progenitor Virus. Obviously, Chris and Jill cannot have this, so they thought the best idea was to kill Wrexesk. This somehow gets Jill dead and sends Chris to Africa years later. OK, this is all a complete load, but it's better than the story this game has to offer. (Plus it let me play The 13th Struggle during Wesker fights :P.) Again, like any good Resident Evil game, it's overflowing with clichés and logical fallacies, like ancient underground ruins with sunbeam lasers of death.

I'd have said that the game is racist, too, but that's common knowledge by now. We all know that a large part of the game is playing a white man ordering a black woman to pick nearby plants for him. What I found more interesting is what people didn't discuss: how the game tries to explain the racism away. According to RE5, Tricell (the new Umbrella) invented a virus that makes black men dress in warrior garb, jump 12 feet in the air, and chuck spears in your general direction for a large part of the game. Not only is it kinda funny how they slapped this on to justify the racism, but unfortunately, a bit unoriginal; I've seen it done both in Aqua Teen and Drawn Together before RE5.

Also unfortunately, the game tends to take a lot from its predecessor. I know this is a Capcom game and everything, but tell me which game each is from: driving into an infected town, commenting on the fall of Umbrella; fighting off chainsaw maniacs and huge giants; a boss battle against an annoying villain who has become the tongue of a monster thing; an ending wherein you ride the ocean into the sunset. *waits for response* That's what I thought. OK, to be fair, what RE4 did was really good, and RE5 also carries over most of that game's gameplay mechanics. The shooting and boss battles are still as awesome as ever, and RE5 has expanded on both a little bit. It also tries out its own ideas, but a lot of them are either weird or counter-intuitive to something else in the game. The best example I can think of for both is the new melee attacks.

These aren't survival horror melee moves like, "clumsily slap the enemy", but rather things like uppercut, hook, crotch headlock, etc. Once you allow Chuck Norris to design your game, it's no longer survival horror. Fine, so RE5 isn't survival horror, it's a shooter. I can handle that, especially since it makes the cover system make sense in this game. Yes, there's a cover system in this game, but (fortunately) it doesn't make up a large portion of the experience. I wish it did, so I could comment on it further, but seeing as how it didn't, I really can't say much. I'll limit it to "this is RE5 following trends again."

Fortunately, the other major part of the shooting aspect, the partner system, is a much larger part of the game and one for which I have many comments. As I alluded to in the third paragraph, a large part of the game is shooting zombies with your new partner, Sheva. Other than (unsuccessfully) trying to make the game less racist, her purpose is to aid you on your quest to destroy Wrexesk. In that regard, she's actually too successful. Sure, she'll heal you and give you ammo/protection when you need it, but she'll also heal you/swipe nearby items/perform context sensitive actions when you don't need her to. I noticed that I could slightly influence her by switching her modes, but I feel like the game didn't want me to do that. Whenever I switched her to attack mode (again, totally not racist to issue commands to your partner), the only thing that happened was that Sheva would slowly pelt the enemy with a more powerful weapon for a few seconds before returning to cover mode.

Speaking of cover, another th....oh, wait, I already did that. What haven't I done yet? Oh, of course, the inventory system. Despite ripping

off RE4 and distancing itself from the survival horror genre (or maybe because of this), Capcom felt they had to relate it to the other Resident Evil games. In enters the old inventory system, where guns take up equal space as first aid sprays, healing items don't stack, and discarding an item sends it through a wormhole to the other side of oblivion. Obviously, this a system with many flaws, several of which Yahtzee described in his review, several of which he didn't. For example, let's say you find some ammo, but your inventory's full. "But my weapon isn't full of ammo", you think to yourself, adding, "I can just pick up the ammo and shove it into my weapon without any hassle, right?" You, sir, are WRONG!!! No, instead you have to trade something to your partner, reload, and then trade back the item you gave to her. Imagine if you combined Tetris with juggling.

Oh, and while I'm on the subject of ammo, why the hell can't I directly buy any ammo!? OK, I can buy it for one weapon, but that doesn't solve the problem, especially when that one weapon does widely varying amounts of damage depending on what type of ammo you use. For every other weapon, you have to upgrade them, which comes with several problems. First, this obviously comes with a cap, since you can only upgrade a revolver so many times, and with each upgrade, the cost increases. Combine this with the lack of a health refill between levels, and you have a game that failed Remedial Video Game Design in high school.

OK, to be fair, the game still does a lot of things right. As I said before, the shooting is intact, the boss battles are awesome, and Wrexesk is worthy of The 13th Struggle. But again, to be fair, this game also does quite a few things wrong. The game is short (although that's probably a good thing, given the circumstances), several of the new characters are one-note, and the enemy animation is...weird. Whenever you shoot them, they do this very embellished, enthusiastic jump, almost as if they are jumping for joy over the fact that you shot the racism out of their grayed bodies. So what do I think of this game? Is it a decent follow-up to Resident Evil 4, or a mess that you should avoid like...well, like the Africa of this game? *flips coin, calls tails, gets heads* It's a good game. I give it the Sephiroth Award for Sheer Defiance of Death. The game starts off by saying Umbrella is no more, but dispels th...hold on. *checks coin* I called tails on a double-headed coin. I am a supreme idiot.

Review Synopsis

• Yes, it's racist, but do I really have to say that?
  
• For better and for worse, quite a bit has been ripped straight from its predecessor.
  
• Of all the things to rip from Resident Evil 4, why wasn't the inventory system one of them?
  

The Onion is great, and what I post is proof of that.

  

Mazin Saga Mutant Fighter

(OK, this game is a bit weird, too, but in terms of quality.) Again, this is a good game, but unlike RE5, it isn't a consistent quality. At certain times (that I'll explain later), it can be a really good game, and the next minute, it's an unplayable mess. What makes it weirder is that it's a very noticeable pattern of good at one moment, utter crap the next. Imagine it as the Jekyll & Hyde of video games, only, you know, not that.

Well, that introduction certainly was confusing, so allow me to explain: MSMF is a beat em up based on the old Mazinger-Z anime. I haven't watched it, but if the game is accurate, it was about a robot man from Mars who spent his time beating up Godzilla knock-offs. In the game itself, that only makes up a small portion of the experience; the rest of the time is spent getting to the actual monster, slicing through any poor robot that happens to walk down the street. This part of the game (also known as "the majority of it") is actually really good. You have a variety of moves you can pull off, a variety of enemies to beat up, and one or two scenarios that differ from the usual "ram your sword into the living" that this game does quite a bit. It's really fun, easy to play, and I don't have many complaints about it. In fact, I guess the only flaw I found was that you needed to be quite specific with your vertical alignment, but that's not enough to actually destroy the game.

However, the Hyde portion of this game is. The simple beat em up portions are the kindly Dr. Jekyll of Mazin Saga; at night, this

innocent beat em up transforms into a clunky mess of a fighting game. After every regular boss battle, you have to fight the bastard again, fighting game style. I don't know why they included it, since you can't choose a character, all the bosses kinda fight the same (save for one move), and you can't pull off any special moves. Trust me, I actually downloaded the manual to this game (it's legal, don't worry) only to confirm that I couldn't perform any special moves. The bosses, however, actually do have special moves, and all two of them are capable of chip-damaging you into the grave.

That's the major flaw behind this fighting game thing: it's really unfair. As I said, the enemies have long range chip damage moves, but they also have a longer range than you; I could swat at them for no damage, and they'd be able to knock off a large portion of my HP from the same distance. This happened with every boss, and what makes it especially confusing is that the final two bosses are clones of you to whom this still applies. It's almost as if the developers actually went out of their way to make it incredibly cheap. Yea, I'll just state that as fact, since the collision detection also seems somewhat biased. Most of my time was spent unsuccessfully slicing their knees, hoping to Black Knight them to death, but I've seen instances where they somehow uppercut me while I'm crouching. I am not kidding.

So again, why did they include this part of the game? My best guess is that they were insecure and wanted their game to stand out amongst all the Final Fights, Double Dragons, and Battletoads. Unfortunately, that's probably as far ahead as they thought, since it's clunky, controls like crap, and, as I spent the last paragraph discussing, is incredibly cheap. So again, what's the overall quality of this game? Well, that depends on how much you loved Streets of Rage, and how much you can tolerate bad fighting games. I liked the former and haven't played the latter, so I gave it a decent score of 7.3 out of 10 and a superfluous award called the Ultraman Award. Why? I think you can figure it out.

Review Synopsis

• Excellent beat em up sections of the game.
  
• The fighting sections are cheap, clunky, and crap.
  
• The game seems to favor the enemies over the player in a fight.
  

16 Comments

Two video game plots that make absolutely no sense to me.

By Video_Game_King July 9, 2009 1 Comments

Rocket: Robot on Wheels

(When will I get to review a game that isn't really weird?) As of late, it seems that I've been reviewing nothing but weird games. Let's take a look, shall we? A Japanese beat em up with a nonsensical title; a fast food themed bumper car game; and now, a Super Mario 64 rip-off starring a computerized unicycle. Wait, why am I complaining? At least this game is decent, unlike the other game I'm reviewing.

But just like the next game, Rocket's plot confuses the crap out of me. Here's how it works: a Cow and Chicken-esque professor has just opened up an amusement park with more explosives than rides. The professor then leaves, giving Rocket the responsibility of watching the park while he's gone. Within a minute of this, Jojo, the park's raccoon, takes the park's walrus hostage in a plan to conquer the place. Already, nothing makes sense, but the good thing is that this is the most nonsensical thing about the game. Everything else is actually kinda normal, probably due to the fact that it's one of the many Super Mario 64 knock-offs made at the time.

However, it's one of the few good SM64 rip-offs out there. One of the problems I found with the last one was the lack of consistency in collection, a problem Rocket doesn't have. You unlock new levels by collecting tickets and gain new moves by gathering tokens. Granted, the latter becomes moot halfway through the game, since there are only a few moves to learn, but it's the consistency that counts. You also have certain goals to meet in each level in order to get the tickets, making it better than Spyro in just about every way. Of course, it doesn't mean much if you're good compared to a generally mediocre game; luckily, RROW is a decent game on its own.

Part of what makes it good is just how creative it is. I've played a few crap SM64 rip offs where you just collect the "stars" without any goal or puzzle or anything, but fortunately, RROW doesn't do that. Instead, there are some pretty creative obstacles you have to get around, like constructing your own roller coaster or swapping worlds to get one of the tickets. OK, fine, it often repeats some of the goals throughout levels (race through rings, gather a bunch of screws in one place, etc.), but overall, it manages a healthy level of creativity throughout the experience.

Part of what makes it creative is the vehicle selection. Oddly enough, for a character already on a wheel, Rocket feels the need to jump into a lot of vehicles. In every level, there's a properly-themed vehicle (water level gets dolphin, Aladdin one gets magic carpet, etc.) put there to help you get more tickets. They're gimmicky and tend to have some weird control problem (the flying motorcycle flies poorly, the carpet descends when stationary, etc.), but again, I don't see much wrong with them. They're fun to use, are creatively utilized, and usually fit the theme park...theme of each....park really well. That's another thing this game does well: the theme park thing. Unlike some other games, which use their theme merely as a set-up without any regard to gameplay or anything like that, Rocket actually commits to the amusement park motif. The levels actually feel like something I might see at a severely broken down Disney World, and need I say again that one of the levels lets you create your own roller coaster? That you can ride?

Well, seeing as how tehre aren't any other major flaws with the game, I guess I c-OH WAIT. Unfortunately, Rocket: Robot on Wheels falls into the "100% or die" category of games I don't like. What do I mean by this? Well, unlike some games, which give you one ending for completing the game and another for beating it with 100% completion, 100% or die games withold ANY ending from you until you 100% it. Games like Jet Force Gemini, Blast Corps, and Earthworm Jim 3D all demand no less than perfection from the player, along with Robot on Wheels. Granted, this game doesn't do it as bad as those other games, but it does it, and that's what counts. Why do games keep endings from me until I collect all the Ewoks or scientists or whatevers? Is it to artificially lengthen the game? Or is it that they genuinely believe this is good game design? And while I'm on the subject, why are most of them N64 games? And why haven't I given this game an award? Misleading Title Award. *ends review*

Review Synopsis

• Creative levels that use the amusement park thing well.
  
• OK, the protagonist uses many vehicles, but for the most part, they're properly executed.
  
• A plot that makes no sense, punctuated with an ending that will aggravate many.
  

While searching for my favorite game in Google Images, I stumbled upon this comic. Trust me, it's funny. (Credit goes to this guy.)

Kane & Lynch: Dead Men

(This can't end well, can it?) Nothing good has ever come from this game, especially for the guy who reviewed it. He played a crap game, insulted it in spite of the circumstances, caused a lot of controversy, I've been there. And as an amateur reviewer, I know that the best thing to do in these situations is just shut the fuck up about it. So then why the hell did I type this? Well, this game was just another step in the aforementioned Whack a Mole, and I have an obligation to review ALL games I beat. Besides, as you guys should know, all the other games on my LOOOOOONNNGGG To Do List are mostly RPGs, so I take what I can get when it comes to short games.

Now remember earlier, when I said that I was confused by raccoons piloting giant clown heads? Well, it only gets worse, as I never really understood the plot of this game. From what I could decipher, you play as Kane, who is on a mission to retrieve a briefcase for The7 (I assume the Seven Penis Plowers of SaGa fame) and then kill them. Why? Well, I can't answer that regarding the briefcase, but Kane wants to kill The7 because they have his wife and daughter hostage. I would have cared if the characters were even barely likable, but that wasn't the case (no pun intended). It's very hard to like any of the characters in this game, and part of the problem is the swearing. Everybody in the game swears more than an amputee lumberjack with Tourette's, and from what I saw, they have no reason to swear other than for the fun of it.

And the game has the temerity to try to make the player sympathize with Kane! Sorry, Eidos, but you just can't do that. The reason games like Fire Emblem and Dragon Quest and "He Manages to Tie These into All These Blogs, Doesn't He" make gamers worldwide sob torrential downpours is because I don't hate the protagonists; in reality, they're actually likable characters who don't deserve the crap that is constantly thrown at them. Compare this to Kane, who not only comes off as unlikeable himself, but so do his wife, daughter, psychopath of a friend, and pretty much anybody he knows. But unlike his wife and daughter, his friends have a much more valid reason for earning my hatred: they're all thick-headed idiots. No, not in the story, but in the game itself.

A large part of this game seems to be ordering your pals to do your bidding, but I'm not sure it can work that well when your AI pals are so stupid. For example, a favorite trick of theirs is to die, forcing you (AND ONLY YOU (apparently, the AI can revive you, but not each other)) to come to their aid and bring them back to life. This is when you find out why they were dying: the idiots were out in the open. Now they're skipping away to cover (or the open again, just to repeat the joke) while you suddenly become target practice for nearby enemies. Even if you are lucky enough to come back to life, the game does so begrudgingly; somebody will come over, inject you with steroids, and then say, "I knew you'd fuck this up, Kane", as if you're the idiot on the team. I know I could have ordered them to not chase squirrels, but I've seen them blatantly ignore orders at times just to mess with me. Understandably, all of my commands were "the game is telling me to do this" or "stand over there so you don't get me killed."

But even with that last one, I still ended up dying more times than necessary. Why? Cheap enemy placement. Remember how in my GTA4 blog, I complained about how you couldn't see your enemies until they were shooting at you? Well, in Kane & Lynch, you can't see your enemies even while they're shooting at you. The enemies often blend into the environments, and the only way to find out where they are is by having them shoot at you. Even then, it's only approximate, since the game doesn't have that directional damage thing that FPSes have had for years. So again, this means enemies have an unfair advantage over you that the game seems to condone.

It appears the major theme of this game is how unfair it is, a theme that permeates into everything from your friends to the enemies and the bosses. Speaking of which, the bosses in this game, although few in number, seem to have been made only to show what the word "cheap" means. In the few boss battles in this game, you're expected to hit a very small, often moving target a high number of times. "What's wrong with that?", you might ask. Well, the boss itself has a wide range of attack that allows him to hit his goal with 900% accuracy.

So naturally, you're going to become very good friends with Death. This is where another one of the game's features comes into play (again, no pun intended): reviving. Like in Gears, if a character comes near death, another character will come to their aid and inject them with enough adrenaline to keep them living. But unlike in Gears, your allies are very unwilling to let you live. Wait, I already said that. What I meant to say was, "there is a limit to how much you can be revived within a given period of time." I'd actually like this if it were in any other game, but keep in mind this is Kane & Lynch. Because of this, you'll often find yourself in situations where you somehow get killed twice, turning this feature into an instant game over button.

OK, so it's pretty obvious by now that the game has a lot of flaws, but does it have any redeeming qualities? Well, no, at least not any I noticed. As I've already stated, the story is confusing, your partners are hateable idiots who insult you for dying because you helped them, and the game prides itself in cheap enemy placement. But besides all that, it doesn't even work from a technical perspective. The graphics are too dark and tend to conceal enemies, yes, but it doesn't end there. It ends with the explosions, which look less like explosions and more like somebody overinflated a bag of Cheetos. So what about the voice acting, that has to be good, right? First, if you think voice acting can redeem a game for several flaws, then you need to seriously re-evaluate your standards. Second, even the voice acting manages to screw up in this game, as enemies and allies alike tend to speak after death. This isn't something that happened once; it happens a lot in this game. Surprisingly, their post-final words aren't insults thrown at you. I think.

Also surprisingly, I can't call this the worst game ever. I've encountered tons of games that have no major flaws but can't be declared perfect, yet I think this is the first time I've encountered a game that can't be called the worst game ever, despite having no redeeming qualities whatsoever. I am seriously unable to think of any other game that does this. Yea, games like Pac Man, Paladin's Quest, and Super Thunder Blade weren't the worst games ever, but they were close enough; Kane & Lynch, on the other hand, doesn't even come close to the crap factor other games produce. I guess it instead falls into that category of games that you play because you know you'll get a laugh out of how bad it is. Therefore, I award it the Resident Evil Award for Laughably Poor Quality. (This award was named after the original Resident Evil, not the series itself.)

Review Synopsis

• The characters are unlikeable idiots, just like most of your friends.
  
• Enemies and anything associated with them are incredibly cheap.
  
• The plot makes no sense to me.
  

1 Comments

Another weird subject that makes absolutely no sense.

By Video_Game_King July 5, 2009 9 Comments

Panzer Bandit

(And it all begins with a Japanese beat-em-up that means nothing.) I don't speak Japanese or German, but I do know enough of both to know that this title makes no sense in either language. Panzer is a tank, German word for armor, and the first word in an awesome video game series; bandit, on the other hand, is German for...bandit. So I guess it means, "Armor Thief" or "Tank Bandit," both of which mean absolutely nothing, especially when you discover that there are no tanks, armor, or thievery in this game.

Then again, as I said in the second sentence, I don't speak Japanese, so I had no idea what was going on. It didn't help that the very 90s anime intro featured robotic sky whales blowing up villages. But this did not stop me from playing the game or finding out how to play it. After all, I've played RPGs in Japanese, so a beat-em-up shouldn't be any problem for me. In fact, even if you aren't me, it shouldn't be a problem for you, because this game is actually very easy to figure out. Like Guardian Heroes and Fatal Fury (mostly like Fatal Fury, judging by the screenshots), you have two planes to switch between in lieu of full 3D navigation. But unlike those two games, I don't feel Panzer Bandit made the most of its features. Very rarely did I find myself switching planes, and when I did, it was usually because there was health or something on the other side. It was never to avoid enemies or set up cool attacks, it was always to break some random box.

Moving on, you also get to choose between a few characters, each with the their own easy to build up combos. When I say "easy to build up", I really mean "easy to build up." Often times, I found myself building up 10-20 hit combos on large groups of enemies. Naturally, this means that the game is really fun to play. Again, it's very easy to control and incredibly fun to just beat the hell out of enemies. On the surface, there aren't any major flaws. But keep in mind that this is a beat-em-up, and as such, it falls prey to the various flaws of the genre. One of the most obvious examples is the paltry enemy selection. No matter where you're fighting (random cave, port town, space), you'll always face the same enemy: a robot. Every enemy that suffers at your hand will be robotic.

Even the bosses/mini-bosses suffer from this. Again, most of them are either robots or people in robots. The only major exception is the final boss, who is just you with a different color scheme. So obviously, combat is going to be repetitive, the extent to which depending on how much you like beat em ups. I enjoyed the combat, but I will admit my main strategies were "hadouken a crowd of robots" and "use that electric sword move." I had other strategies (mostly for bosses), but since you face the same enemy 300 times throughout the game, I didn't find much reason to change. Throw in a length of about a day, and you have a really good game that'd be worth a rental if there was some place where you could rent imports. However, such a place does not exist, and even if it did, how the hell would you play this? You'd probably have to buy a Japanese PS1 and several tools to get it working on your American TV. Sorry, I got distracted. The point of these four paragraphs is that Panzer Bandit is a decent beat em up with a very weird title. I only see it fitting that it deserves a weird award. This thought in mind, I bestow upon Panzer Bandit the Italian Turd Award. Now if you'll excuse me, I must prepare myself for the horribleness of the next game. While you post, please prepare for the horribleness of this particular part of the blog.

Review Synopsis

• The title has no meaning in any language at all.
• Very easy to control and fun to play.
• It doesn't really use the dual-plane thing that much.

Since the theme of this blog is "crap that makes no sense," I thought I'd add a video about a very nonsensical game.

  

Big Bumpin'

(I think we can all name things that simply don't work with video games.) But for whatever reason, people make games out of them. Sex is obviously one of them, but other than that, I can't name any ideas that don't work as games. Fortunately, though, the people at Burger King released Big Bumpin' to serve as an example of that. This game was actually part of a three game campaign a few years ago, and I really wish it was Sneak King. Why? Well, then I could relate it to my own stealth thing featuring the King: Metal Gear ELF.

However, I got stuck with Big Bumpin', so I just have to accept it and move on. Fortunately, though, regular bumper cars is not the only mode. You also have hot potato, hockey, keep away, and some weird variant of basketball on a half court (that's seriously the closest thing that comes to mind). I have nothing against any of this; in fact, it's probably one of the few things that kept this game from making my top 10 worst games ever. Keep in mind that what I just said means almost nothing else about the game is good; most of what makes up this game is crap.

It all begins where it always begins with really bad games: the controls. You use the left analog stick to move, and the A button to charge, making this game simple enough to be mapped to an Atari controller. How do you fuck this up? Well, Burger King found a way: a third dimension. I realize that it sounds weird, but it means you can't just turn wherever you want. No, you have to arc your turns, which feels somewhat awkward. Try to turn naturally, and things will get...weird. It's hard to explain, and the best way I can explain it is that your controls spin around a bit and you have to get re-oriented to the controls.

Another major flaw is the AI. I know this is a multiplayer game and it shouldn't come up in a review of it, but I played Big Bumpin's single player mode, so I'll complain anyway. Like several multiplayer games I can think of, the AI in this game cheats. But unlike some of those other games, more often than not, the computer/random number generator seems to be in on the joke. For example, in that basketball thing (I'll refer to it through this from now on), the goal is to stand on a square, retrieve a score bar, and return it to a certain point only to repeat it until you can't. There are multiple squares, and the computer will always be waiting on the right square. If you try that, you'll end up being on the EXACTLY wrong one, while the computers are on the far end of the screen scoring points.

There are other examples I could name, like all the AIs teaming up against you or one computer getting the right power-up at the exact time it needs it, but I feel I've made my point. Besides, I need to move onto the other flaws of the game, like the crap power-ups. Again, it feels like this was added to flesh out the original bumper car concept, and again, it needs some serious work. The power-ups can be classified into two categories: no apparent use (mostly what you get) and "you have just won the game" (mainly given to AI players). I'm not even exaggerating for a joke; there are truly some power-ups I never figured out the use for, and others that were absolute game destroyers. I'm aware that there are many multiplayer games that do this, but they still have some sort of middle ground of items/weapons/power-ups/whatever that are properly balanced.

Normally, I reserve the end of the review for positives that redeem the crappy nature of a bad game, but there aren't that many positives to the game I can think of. The most obvious thing would be the multiplayer value, but the strip club DJ of an announcer and the improperly balanced power-ups ensure that any suffering this game creates harms as many people as possible. Price would also be a possible benefit, given that it was originally five dollars (not counting the fact that I played for free), but I've had more fun with a free Sonic the Hedgehog Game & Watch thing I got from McDonald's. (I guess that settles it: Burger King may have better fries and menu selection, but McDonald's wins with the games.) So are there any good things I can say about this game? Hold on, I'll check my notes. *analyzes notes* "Is not Cyborg Justice." Fair enough. I guess that means it deserves an award. How about the Campy Batman Villain Award for Horrible, Horrible Puns?

Review Synopsis

• The controls are simple, yet somehow manage to screw up badly.
• The AI cheats constantly.
• Overall, a very unbalanced game.

9 Comments

This blog will only garner controversy.

By Video_Game_King July 2, 2009 41 Comments

Grand Theft Auto IV

(Again, the time comes when I must review a high-profile Xbox 360 game.) A lot of you see these times as (erroneous) opportunities to call me a fanboy. Those of you who partake in this will see the rest of the summer as a day in the candy shop. I planned on spending my summer reviewing one game I have yet to finish reviewing and blazing through Okami and Panzer Dragoon Saga, but through some odd circumstances, I must now beat many Xbox 360 games in what will amount to a frantic game of Whack a Mole. My journey begins with Grand Theft Auto IV. May God have mercy on your soul.

Actually, I shouldn't be so worried about this game; after all, it is an RPG, a genre I am quite used to navigating. Oh, you're saying that you doubt me? GTA 4 is an RPG, and I will prove it. In this game, you play the role of Niko Bellic, a European immigrant who has come to America to get rich, get laid, and get more people killed than most natural disasters could hope for. Or, as GTA4 calls it, "The American Dream." A lot of the story deals with how Niko's view of TAD slowly die over the course of the game. Oh, and when I say slowly, I mean SLOWLY.  It takes quite a while for the story to build up, but when it gets there, everything increases in quality. Events happen more often, the storyline is more dramatic, and overall, it turns out to be really good when it picks up speed..

Along the slow ride that is the story, Niko meets plenty of quirky characters, almost all of whom want to go out with you A LOT. They'll call you up often, asking if you'd like to go bowling, see some tits, or get drunk. You pick them up, play a mini-game, drive them back to their place, and wait for the whole process to repeat again. I've nothing against the feature itself, but it is insistent. Sure, the mini-games are fun and you aren't required to participate, but goddamn, this game makes a big deal out of the feature. You're always getting calls and text messages inviting you to a strip club, but you don't get anything from it, and you can't turn them off.

I guess the reason behind it is because this is GTA4's "thing", like the gimmicks for previous games were things like gang warfare or buying up houses. The main feature of this game didn't work out, whatever; at least the game still manages to retain the Grand Theft Auto charm. It's diluted, sure, but it's still there. For example, the radio is still as entertaining and funny as ever, but you can't turn it off. I know it's minor, but I like to listen to music in Xbox games. Let's say I want to get on a Sanchez, turn on Crazy Motorcycle, and remind myself of how awesome that game was. Wait, I can't turn the radio off, can I? Guess my only options are to turn on some soft jazz or switch over to PLR. *glares at GTA4*

Joining the radio are Internet and TV, and while they both achieve the same level of humor the radio does, they just aren't as good as the radio. OK, at the Internet is, because I can pretend I'm reading Cracked articles, but the TV doesn't have this. You can't do anything while watching TV, so all you can do is think. Think about how weird it is that you're watching TV on a TV within your TV. This is the part where I'd make a joke about Russian dolls, but I feel that would be a bit obvious. Instead, I'll go for something that's a bit less obvious: Grand Theft Auto IV, at least to me, seems ashamed that it's Grand Theft Auto.

Before I continue, let me shoot down any hyperbolic thoughts you might have. The game is still very identifiably GTA (unlike other shame-filled games), it just seems like it doesn't want to be. For example, there's no more good citizenship, like there was in the last two games (I think). Again, I know it's minor, but I'm the type of person who really likes the little details in a game. Anyway, I discovered this the hard way, by shooting a criminal a cop was chasing and then being chased by the same cop. I guess he must have recognized my murder style. I then proceeded to find out several things (some of which I'll touch upon later), one of which was the revamped weapons and the new cover system.

Unlike previous games in the series, you can't carry all the weapons you want; instead, you have to limit yourself to certain classes of weapons (melee, incendiary, sub-machine, etc.). This, along with the new cover system, lead me to believe GTA4 is trying to be Gears 2. Why would it want to be Gears 2? GTA is a perfectly fine thing, and what works in Gears does not necessarily work in other games. I liked chainsawing enemies as much as the next guy, but allowing me to do so in Rapture isn't going to make BioShock better.

Or maybe Rockstar did this because of the missions. Most of them are simple shoot-up affairs, and most of them can be incredibly cheap. For some reason, they thought it was REAAALLLLY funny to hide enemies in places where you can't see them, devolving shoot-outs into trial and error. There's really no way to know where some of the enemies are unless you've already played the mission, since they only appear on the radar if your objective is to kill them. It makes sense, but why can't I have that feature when the objective is something else, like it is for a lot of the game?

Another annoying habit is that the game wants you to do things its way without compromising, which is kinda weird for a sandbox game. The best example I can think of is near the end of the game, where I was tasked with killing some guy. I decided to use my sniper rifle to put a bullet in his head, but immediately found out he was somehow immune to headshots. I kept plugging lead into his skull, and he didn't even notice it! Turns out I was supposed to get on a motorcycle, jump to a helicopter, and kill him on a far-off island. Why couldn't I shoot him in the head there and then, damnit!?

In fact, as I mentioned before, the sandbox feature feels a bit diluted. This may be due to my having rushed through the game (which it actually encourages), but several of the features, like GPS and taxis, seem to discourage exploration. I know you have to pay to use the taxis, but that notion gets quickly thrown out once Roman allows you to call up taxis for free. You'd think the game would encourage you to jack a vehicle and venture throughout Liberty City, but I didn't get that impression. Aside from the aforementioned taxis, the vehicle controls are in dire need of improvement. Let me explain: you accelerate with the right shoulder and reverse with the left. The automatic brake is on the right button, which sounds cluttered until you realize A does this as well. But let's say you're shooting somebody, which you do with the left button. However, you have to aim at your target with the right analog stick, even when you're locked on with B. It all seems messy and inefficient, especially when you're trying to turn your vehicle in a high speed chase (something you'll do quite often). Also, the lock on doesn't exactly lock on; it focuses the camera onto your target, which makes it very difficult to focus on steering and shooting simultaneously. Plus you still have to aim at the target, so what's the point of it?

Well, that's all I have to say on Grand Theft Auto IV. By now, most of you have already typed up your tirades, despite not reading this last paragraph. To those who did read this paragraph, you all win a tour of the castle. To those who only read this to say they did (or after hearing about the castle tour), you are also rewarded with a tour of my castle. *performs evil finger pyramid* Oh, and I reward this game the Least Favorite Four Award. Again, this is not anything against the game. I still liked it. I am just saying it can't compare to Resident Evil 4, Dragon Quest 4, or (of course) Fire Emblem 4.

Review Synopsis

• Still a good GTA game that does its own thing with mixed results.
  
• For some weird reason, the shooting is a lot like Gears 2.
  
• Driving controls need some serious revamping.
  

In case you don't wish to read my review of this game...

  

Spider-Man (N64)

(To be honest, I probably should have expected this to be crap.) After all, this is a low profile game based on an existing license, and these types of games rarely turn out to be good. However, in the grand scheme of things, comic book games are the best licensed games out there, which is why I played it. The other reason I decided to check it out is a bit more obvious: the summer gaming drought, which usually doesn't hit me. A lack of gaming...water...forces a man to make some horrible mistakes.

Now here's the part where I admit to never having read a Spider-Man comic. I've played two previous Spidey games, but that's just about it. However, I was still able to understand the plot, which follows thusly: somebody has framed Spider-Man for some sort of crime, and now he must exonerate himself and expose the true criminal. Somehow, this leads to a symbiote conspiracy that involves Carrnage and Doc Ock. I've nothing against the story itself (how can I?), but rather, how it's presented. It's either presented in typical cutscene fashion, featuring Stan Lee's enthusiastic voice acting, or through comic panels. That's the only explanation I could think of as to why they're here, since nothing else adds up. They take forever to get through, they look like crap, and the game would've been better off without them. Then again, the only difference between the panels and the in-game graphics is that they're grainier, so that can't say much about the in-game graphics. *checks that off list*

Great, now we can get to the most important part of the review: the gameplay. Here, it consists mostly of two things: platforming and fighting. A good portion of the game consists of webbing your way across rooftops and through buildings. I'd have preferred more open-world aspects, but other than that, I've no major problems with it. What does attract criticism is the combat, which can best be summarized as "button mashing." You have a variety of moves, but most enemies/bosses can be taken down with a simple kick/punch combo. However, the weird thing is that while it sounds easy, it isn't. Most enemies are able to interrupt your combos easily, forcing combat into one simple pattern: punch, punch, punch, ad infinitum.

Hell, this even carries over to the boss battles! Again, trying a combo on them usually takes off half your health, so you have to mash kick/punch without building up combos. It's repetitive and unsatisfying. However, for all the bad things I have to say about this game, it's at least functional. There are no major glitches or fuck-ups, which is more than I can say about some other games. Also, it's quite short, clocking in at about a few days. Normally, I'd criticize a game for its brevity, but for a game like this, it's actually something I liked about the game. After all, if you're playing a bad game, you want it to end as soon as possible, right?

OK, I probably shouldn't call it bad, since I haven't read any of the Spider-Man comics or seen any of the movies. To those who have, this would probably be a better game. Then again, as I've said before, truly good games are good on their own; they don't depend on other games or outside material to make them better. This game relies on outside material, so for me, it gets knocked down a few points. It also gets the Briefest Review Award, along with a 4.8/10.

Review Synopsis

• The story's OK, but it isn't presented well.
  
• Repetitive combat is repetitively repetitive.
  
• A poor camera makes navigating somewhat difficult at times.
  

41 Comments

This is a happy blog.

By Video_Game_King June 29, 2009 10 Comments

Mega Man X5

(It seems that platformers reveal the weirdest thing to me.) Various Capcom platformers have revealed to me Mickey Mouse's jerk disposition; Banjo Tooie taught me the valuable lesson that Banjo Tooie is awesome; and Mega Man is a blue, speedo-wearing hydra. Every time Capcom has tried to cut off one of the heads, not only did it grow back, but one or two heads accompanied its revival. In enters Mega Man X5, Capcom's attempt to dismember the MMX-head.

Obviously, the best place to start this review is the story. Again, Sigma wants to destroy the Maverick Hunters, but this time, he has a few new tricks. First, he's sent out a bunch of viruses that turn Hunters into Mavericks. Why he didn't invent this in X1 is never really explained. His other trick is to send a space colony crashing into the Earth. Thus begins the 16-hour gameplay mechanic: you only have 16 in-game hours to complete Mega Man X5, and each level takes up one hour. Take too long playing the game, and the colony crashes into the Earth. Finally, something that actually makes you strategically choose your levels over the course of the game! Oh, wait, that's exactly what doesn't happen. The countdown dies off at the end of the game, eliminating any reason for it to have existsed in the first place.

Like another Capcom game of the time, Mega Man X5 haphazardly attempts several new things with mixed success. For example, there's a new leveling system for bosses. I have no idea what it does, as it never really made itself known. It doesn't give the Mavericks more HP, except in one instance; it doesn't give you better items at the end, since you still get the same item anyway; so what the hell did they put it in here for? The aforementioned originality? Fortunately, there are other features that receive more success than the level thing, like the ropes and the new armor.

Yes, like always, there's some super-secret-mega-armor hidden throughout the game, but instead of one armor, it's two now (or three if you count the Ultimate Armor). One of them is still the same as ever, but the second one is nothing more than a tank that can't fire weapons appropriately. Again, this comes off as a feature that negates its own existence

I probably should have explained the normal gameplay mechanics by now, but they're common knowledge. All Mega Man games play the same: traverse a weakness circle, go to final series of levels, traverse same circle, beat final boss for now. That much hasn't changed at all, which is quite amazing after 13 games. You'd think Capcom would be desparate for new ideas, which they obviously were for this game. For instance, the Mavericks in this game were named after members of Guns N Roses. You know a company's desparate when they name their villains after the singers of the first song they heard on the radio on the way to work. Several of the Mavericks are also recycled from previous bosses, like Dark Dizzy (or maybe the bug guy) rips off a stage from X4, and Axle the Red is nothing more than Gemini Man mixed with a thin premise.

That's another thing this game does quite a bit of: references to previous games. This is one of the few things I really can't complain about, as there are no major crap-ups. They have a few bosses reminiscent of previous Mega Man games, some of the music is remixed from previous songs, what more could you want? I guess a lot more, but you aren't going to get it. You could ask for voice acting in this game instead of the copious amounts of text, but after Captain Caveman's performance in the preceding title, I'm going to regard it as some type of improvement. You could also ask for a less annoying support character with dialogue that isn't so jumpy, but then I'd have to make this review more focused so as to set a good example. But whatever, I'll take what I can get, and I got was actually a fairly decent game. Yes, it does nothing to fix the major problems with the series (piss easy bosses, easily predicted layouts), yet I can comfort myself in the knowledge that this is the last Mega Man X game they made. I'll give it the Slaying the Hydra Award, and a sc...what's that? They made another X game after this one? And several spin-off series for it? MOTHERF-*review ends abruptly*

Review Synopsis

• So many new ideas that don't do much to change the game.
  
• Why did they name the bosses after members of Guns N Roses?
  
• What's there is decent, but it's been done so many times.
  

This next video is perfect for any Internet debate. Expect me to use it a lot.

  

Romancing SaGa 2

(Like many Westerners, I have not had a good relationship with the SaGa series.) All of my experiences with the series have either been stupidly easy or frustratingly difficult. Add in the unintuitive, confusing gameplay mechanics, and you have several reasons why I'm not a fan of the SaGa games. So why the hell did I play, let alone beat Romancing SaGa 2? As I stated in a previous blog, I'm slowly running out of games to beat, so I have to play whatever I can get my hands on. What surprised me was that this game is actually quite decent, something that goes a long way for a SaGa game.

The one thing that makes this game better than the other two is the empire system. A major part of the game is ruling over an empire that directly contradicts Yahtzee, conquering lands and fighting about said lands for your people. You collect money from your conquered areas, and you can use that money for several projects. If you think this is a game within a game, prepare to be disappointed; everything about ruling this empire is only there to supplement the regular Romancing SaGa gameplay stalwarts. The "adding new territories" thing only exists to open up new side-quests, and everything else exists only for combat.

Not that the combat is bad or anything; if anything, the combat is satisfactory, but off-beat. It's a turn based system where you can see your enemies before you battle them, just like Earthbound. However, that's where the similarities end. You learn abilities through repetition, and in theory, you can customize your party members so that they can use any weapon/ability you want them to use. In practice, however, character customization is about as strict as in any other JRPG. Here's the perfect example: at one point in the game, I was trying to get my emperor to learn a certain sword ability, but to no avail. Eventually, I handed it off to somebody else, and they discovered the skill on their first try, despite never having used a sword under my watch. Can somebody explain this to me? Yes, the fact that you can distribute learned abilities to anybody somewhat alleviates the problem, but Romancing SaGa 2 still hasn't reached the level of customization it so craves.

However, it at least tries to fix the battle system. That's something Romancing SaGa 2 uses as a recurring theme: slightly fixing the conventions of the series. For example, RS2 introduces the generation system to the series. Every few missions, your empire expands (or your emperor decides he wants to fuck mermaids for the rest of his life), several years pass, and you must choose a new emperor. It's essentially a new beginning for you, another chance to form a party. That's probably why every generation, you somehow begin extremely weak. For the first hour or so of each generation, you'll get your ass handed to you by random enemies. Despite this, I wouldn't get rid of it, mainly because it fixes one major thing about this game: the side-quests.

And we come to the meat of all Romancing SaGa games, the one defining feature of the series: the side-quests. How does the generation system fit into all this? It adds structure to the game and gives you something by which to measure your progress. It also gives some direction to the game, something it really needs. You know what else this game really needs? A bit of polish. There are certain side-quests that have specific requirements you have no way of knowing about. Don't meet the requirements? Wait a few years, come back, and face much harder enemies!

Yea, this game can be very unforgiving. Romancing SaGa 2 will drive you insane; this is the type of game you will lose sleep over. I should know because both of these happened to me. Anyway, many things about this game seem to have been inserted in here just to piss off the player. Most of the bosses regenerate health, sometimes more health than the damage you did. Of course, this means you will die, but worry not! You get a certain amount of life points that allow you to be revived a certain number of times before permanent death! How do you restore these life points? There's an item that does this, but trust me, it's in VERY limited supply. Fuck up too much, and you might as well reset all the data on your cartridge.

And the final boss...let me explain it through a hypothetical. Pretend you're in a fight with a rapist. It's challenging, sure, but not impossible; it's only one person, and you have a lot of viable options. But let's also say that at random intervals, other rapists join in the fight against you. Oh, and it culminates with seven rapists. So obviously, the fight has become ludicrously one sided and your ass has now become their personal jousting target. "This has to end eventually," you think to yourself in between screams of agony. Well, it turns out the seventh rapist (we'll call him Uncle Rape) drove to the "party" in a truck, the bed of the truck filled with coolers, each cooler overflowing with Viagra, Red Bull, Captain Morgan, and several perverse sex toys. That, my friends, is the final boss of Romancing SaGa 2. Needless to say, I was sent down Buttfuck Boulevard numerous times before I was able to defeat the bastard(s). What also goes without saying is that I felt nothing but pure jubilation when it finally died. I would have risen from my seat in victory, but I beat the final boss standing up.

Wow, I can't believe I went this many paragraphs without ever once touching upon the story. And for an RPG! This must be corrected! As I mentioned previously, a major part of the game is ruling over your empire, but the empire exists for only one reason: destroying the ironically named Seven Heroes (or less ironically named Seven Noblemen, depending on the translation). However, once you do destroy them all, they somehow combine into the aforementioned Admiral Assrape in a last attempt to kill you. You'd think that a game that focuses on side-quests and contains more characters than sprites would have a crap story, right? Surprisingly, it doesn't. While it definitely does have the same problems as the other games in the series, again, it tries to fix these problems. The Seven Sodomists each have their own backstories, there are several moments that try to be emotional, and that's all I can comment on due to the fact that it was in Japanese. Yet despite the language barrier, I can still say this: have you seen the ending to the AVGN's Ghostbusters review? I can sympathize.

Holy hell! I didn't intend for this review to be this long! But can I make it longer? Probably. Hmm...what else is there to talk about?....I know! Music and graphics! The music is pretty good, especially the battle themes, and the graphics are...unique. Not good, not bad, just unique. Imagine if a few Renaissance artists got together and did acid. OK, I guess that's all that's left. That and the award. I hereby give Romancing SaGa 2 the Sodomy Award, represented by this picture of Captain Morgan. Look at him. He knows what's going on, but he does nothing to stop it. YOU ARE A SICK MAN, CAPTAIN MORGAN!!!

Review Synopsis

• The battle system is the same as always, but several fixes make it somewhat more manageable.
• The generation system gives structure to the flimsy story that is a Romancing SaGa game.
• The final boss will carve up your ass and rape it.

10 Comments

This is not a happy blog.

By Video_Game_King June 26, 2009 21 Comments

Spyro the Dragon

(Mainly because both of the games I've played aren't that good.) Then again, for both of these games, I had a vague hint at one point or another. With this game, my hint was my past experiences with this series, by which I mean Enter the Dragonfly. It was a piece of crap that I played back in the days of gaming I can't really remember, so I won't dote on it too much. However, from what I remember, it shares quite a few similarities with this game, the most obvious being the story.

Spyro starts with all the dragons being unlikeable assholes who spend their time making fun of the main villain if only for the fact that he's the villain. It should come as no surprise that he ends up freezing all the dragons, except for Spyro. It is now your mission to rescue your dragon friends and defeat the main bad guy, Gnasty Gnorc (that is how they spell it). Unfortunately, Spyro isn't as big as the other dragons, so he can't just beat up Gnasty and steal his lunch money. No, he only has two options: breath deadly fire down upon his foes, or ram into them head-first.

Unfortunately, this is the first of several flaws. When facing enemies, those are literally your only two options: fire or ram. There's no, for example, "ram their backs to stun them, fire them a bit", just those two options. I guess the main reason this problem exists is because of the limited enemy range; not counting the two (yes, two) bosses, there are only a few enemies repeated about 6 times to fit the themes of each world. Speaking of themes, that's another weird thing about this game. Usually, they're pretty good, but in each world, there's one level that seems to go against the established theme entirely. For example, there was this cowboy world in the middle of the game, but one of the levels was quite clearly an ice level, as if the level designers were blatantly trying not to be cowboy.

OK, I've rambled about nothing for long enough. Now it's time to get to the meat of the game: the platforming. Having come out in the late 90s, this is a Super Mario 64 rip-off, but it's better than several others I've played. You run around each level, either collecting treasure or rescuing the dragons (and having to suffer through their lame dialogue as a result of it). Unlike Mario (and its many rip-offs), however, there really aren't any objectives in the levels other than "rescue these guys." I don't have a problem with that, per se; mindless collecting can be fun if used properly, and this game had the potential to do it properly.

However, the ambiguity of the collecting stomps on whatever potential there was in this game. Let me explain: given your knowledge of video games, you'd expect each of the aforementioned items to have their own use, like the dragons opening up new worlds and the treasure new levels, right? Well, not exactly. It seems Insomniac missed that part and instead opted to lump everything into the same category. This means that every time you want to progress in the game, you have to go back to some level and search all over for that one dragon you didn't rescue. There's a handy little status screen that tells you which levels aren't complete, but that doesn't solve the problem.

Despite all of the ranting I've done in the last 5 paragraphs, I can't fault the game too much. After all, it does have some things going for it, unlike Enter the Dragonfly. It's at least functional; the graphics are OK; and the flying levels are actually pretty decent. I'd say, "That's one thing Spyro ripped off properly", but it doesn't really feel like the flying in Super Mario 64. If this was the entire game, I'd have scored it at least three points higher, but the messy collect-a-thon gameplay and other flaws bring it down to a 5.6. A 5.6 that deserves the Second Most Unlikeable Character in a Platformer Award. Who's the first? Well...

Review Synopsis

• I am a fan of consistency. All the collecting in this game seems to be an attack on this.
  
• The combat has A LOT of room for improvement.
  
• Great flying levels. Shame they're not the whole game.
  

The only reason I am posting the following video is for your entertaiment. I am near the end of this game, and it was not until now that I realized how truly fucked I am.

  

Contra Force

(Obviously, this wasn't my first choice of game.) The game I wanted to review was Zombies Ate my Neighbors, another Konami shooter that got a shit Irate Gamer review. It was a great game, but I stopped playing when I realized one of the bosses was impossible to beat. So why did I decide to play this game? Well, I've hit a gaming rut where most of the games available to beat are RPGs. I've hit these ruts before, and during these times, I turn to whatever games I can get my hands on. This happened to be one of them.

Unfortunately, I can't begin this review with the usual story synopsis (I seem to be having that problem more often than I like), since I tried as hard as possible to blot this game from my memory. This means I'll just have to make one up: you play as one of four stupidly named mercenaries, all of them on a quest to get into a much better game. Somehow, this involves blowing things up with huge, bulky cartoon bazookas. Yea, that's the best I could come up with, but I'd like to see you/the game do any better.

As I previously mentioned, the gameplay consists mostly of shooting the hell out of anything with a pulse. You may ask yourself, "Well then, what makes it so bad when compared to other Contra games?" Two aspects: the weapons and the slowness. Oh god, is this game slow. Everything in this game is so slow, that you'd probably need an entire day off just to complete one level. I'd blame it on a high amount of sprites on screen, but I honestly don't remember a lot of sprites or flicker on screen at any given time.

Isn't Contra supposed to be about fast paced bullet action? Did something get lost in translation? Oh, wait, about that: this game was originally supposed to be released in Japan as Arc Hound, having nothing to do with Contra. However, they decided to cancel it. That's right, Contra Force is one of the very few games to NOT be released in Japan. It's also one of the few games in the Contra series to not be Contra, the other ones being those crap 3D Contras. But to my knowledge, those games at least got the weapon system right; here, it seems they were thinking of Gradius.

Like Gradius, you collect something that fills up a bar to a certain square. Whichever square you choose determines what weapon you get. I could never figure out what the difference was between many of the weapons (other than firing speed), and the only weapon that I could distinguish sucks in the overhead levels. Yes, there are overhead levels, and they're just like the rest of the game, only overhead. Anyway, the one weapon that isn't just a gun is the grenades, which work well in the side scrolling levels, but behave exactly the same in the overhead levels as they do in the side scrolling ones. This may not sound like much, but trust me, it's worse than I made it sound.

So is there any redeeming aspect to this game, anything that would justify playing this? Well, the music's pretty good, but you can get the same effect from Super C. So in a word: no. No, there's really no reason for you to play this game. Don't get me wrong, I'm not calling it the most awful thing in existence, I'm just saying that there's no real reason you should play this when there are better games out there to play. Therefore, I give it the Xzibit Award of Superfluity. If you don't understand that joke, then search Google Images.

Review Synopsis

• SOOOOOOOOOOO SLLLLLLLLLOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWWW.
  
• A little weapon bar on the bottom of the screen only works in Gradius.
  
• If you want Contra, there are many other Contra games you can choose from.
  

21 Comments

The type of party where nobody gets laid.

By Video_Game_King June 22, 2009 20 Comments

Mario Party

(Why, that would be a Mario Party, of course.) And I was invited to it. The invitation said "King +1", but I don't have any friends I could have brought to the party. See, not everybody made it to Giant Bomb during my exodus from GameSpot, and those who did really don't give a flying crap. That means no Queen, no Writey Guy, no Shiki, and (weirdest of all) no Don Mario or his Mushroom Mafia. So I had to play Mario Party alone.

What I find weird is that Don Mario wasn't available to play a game about him. Here's the plot: Mario, after having been rejected by Peach numerous times, has come up with a brilliant idea: throw the most kickass kegger in the entire Mushroom Kingdom! He's invited all his friends (and Peach), but there's one problem: Bowser somehow heard about it, and he's crashing the party! Everybody knows how much of a buzzkill he can be. Can Mario get with Peach before Bowser ruins the party?

OK, I lied, that's not the story (but it should have been). The real story is that everybody in the Mushroom Kingdom is a narcissist prick, and all of them are arguing on who's the best. They soon reach a conclusion: beat the hell out of Toad. However, Toad comes up with an idea that will keep his eyes out of his stomach: play a board game! He's organized everything, even for people like me, who don't have any friends with whom to play this. All you do is select three AI players and see how long until they conspire against you. Yes, like many other Mario games (Kart comes to mind), this game can f'ing cheat.

If you're in need of a large number, you'll get stuck with 1s and 3s for 9 turns; if you're near the star, somebody will land on a question mark and send you straight to Bowser the Buzzkill; and if you think you can get revenge on your opponents in the 1 vs. 3 mini-games, you'll get stuck in the one mini-game where the others just get to beat the shit out of you. Again and again and again. Although there are a variety of mini-games, I often found myself playing the same ones time and time again. Because of this, I discovered another flaw in the system: the mini-games aren't properly balanced. As I've already mentioned, there are some where one player gets butt-raped, but then there are ones where it's either really hard to win or everybody can win. Yea, that's not exactly a good thing to have during a multiplayer game. Oh, and let me throw this in: anything that makes you rotate the analog stick can piss off. These games will destroy your hand. I am not kidding.

Moving on, although I didn't play the game with other people, I did many years ago, so I can imagine what it'd be like. When somebody steals your star and sends you to last, at least you can punch that person in the face; you can't really do that with single player, obviously. However, late in my adventure, I discovered there was a single player mode, and it's pretty much Super Mario Bros 3 with mini-games instead of levels. That part I like, but what I didn't like is that all the games are pre-determined and you MUST beat them. If you get stuck on a really hard mini-game (like one of those hand-destroying ones previously mentioned), you're pretty much screwed. Then again, you're screwed anyway; this is a party game, not something you play alone. Therefore, I give it the Sex Award. Think about it.

Review Synopsis

• Best played with other people around, and not something you want to be caught doing alone.
  
• Not enough mini-games, and the ones that are there still need to be rebalanced.
  
• The only games that can get away with rotating the analog stick are Super Mario 64 and Conker's Bad Fur Day.
  

There's no video for this blog. Why? Well, when searching for a game to beat (I'm running out), I stumbled upon this. Go ahead, try it out and then insult me for whatever reason you choose.

Magical Pop'n

(The first thing that pops into my mind is "what a deceptively kickass game.") The second thing that I thought is "stop making these stupid puns." And the third thing is "get to the damn review." I'll go with that third thought. Now then, the first thing I thought (I promise I'll stop right here) was that this was some weird mistranslation of Mary Poppins and that this was just Whack-a-Mole with the moles swapped for chimney sweeps, but no, it isn't even close to that. Instead, it goes like this: some demon guy has conquered a kingdom while its princess was away. She returns, finds out what happened, and decides that the fate of the world rests on her 8 year old shoulders.

While that might sound hopeless, the reality is far from it. Over the course of the game, the princess (from now on, I'll call her Girl, for brevity's sake) finds a wide variety of weapons and tools to help her navigate the levels. There's the difficult-to-use grappling hook, the fire & ice, the spiderball thing, and several other weapons. If you've noticed several similarites between this and Metroid, congratulations, have a cookie. Like Metroid, you play as a blonde female navigating non-linear levels with a large array of weapons. But unlike Metroid, things are a bit simpler here. The game is clearly divided into levels, the areas are a bit smaller, and they're easier to navigate. Imagine Baby's First Metroid.

In fact, a lot about this game seems (quite obviously) aimed at kids. The graphics are super cute, the music sounds like it was ripped from Kirby (except for one song that reminded me of the song I put in here), and the game oozes charm from every oriface I could find. However, unlike other games that run on charm, this one doesn't really use its charm to cover up its flaws (which I will cover later). It's not like Dragon Warrior or the first Sonic game, where they used their unique style to distract you from their flaws (grindfest and focus, respectively); Pop'n just uses it to make the game better.

And as I've stated, this is already quite a good game. It has interesting gameplay mechanics and pulls them off without any major screw-ups. Oh, wait, of course there are screw ups. Traditionally, near the end of a review (especially in ones where I forget the game while reviewing it), I'll slap in whatever flaws I found so I don't automatically place it in my top 10 games ever. First off, some of the levels can be somewhat confusing to navigate; usually, you'll need one weapon to progress, but you won't have it. So you go find it and get lost trying to find the one place you couldn't pass before (or get lost finding the one place that actually moves you forward). I can't even really use a walkthrough to help me or anything.

Go look at the lone walkthrough on that page; it doesn't even reach the later levels. If it did, I assume that the person writing that would have noticed my next flaw: the lack of originality. Yea, you still get cool weapons up until the end of the game, but that's where the originality ends. Several late-game bosses are just carbon copies of previous bosses, often ones you just fought. I don't know whether or not the fact that they're easy is a bad thing. However, I did not have that problem when I encountered the final boss, who is a complete, 100% rip-off. When he's not ripping off Dracula, he's ripping off Lucifer from Ghouls 'N Ghosts (or Contra, I don't know). How could such a semi-original game end on such a bland note? I'm confused., so I give it the Lewis Carroll Award for Completely Confusing Me.

Review Synopsis

• Enough cuteness to induce rainbow vomiting.
  
• A really fun game that doesn't use its charm as a crutch.
  
• The originality suffers near the end of the game.
  

20 Comments

What do turbo buttons & fighting games share? Not what you think.

By Video_Game_King June 19, 2009 2 Comments

Final Fight Guy

(The answer is not some ultra-hate-fueled attack on the fighting game genre.) No, the right answer would be both of these games. As you will soon see, both of these have some weird tie to fighting games. Let's start with the most obvious one: Final Fight Guy, or as pretty much everybody knows it, Final Fight. (Fun fact: Final Fight 2 was actually one of the first games I blogged about here. Three cheers for nostalgia!) Here's the thing: when the original Final Fight was released, people were pissed that Guy was not playable at all. Capcom, being the old-timey-villains that they are, decided to release the game again at the same price, but with Guy playable (and Cody not). Then they let out an evil "nyahaha" and twiddled their mustache.

Anyway, given that it is the same game, FFG has the exact same plot as the original Final Fight (and all subsequent games in the series). The mob has captured the mayor's daughter in the hope that they can get more guns or something. However, what makes it weird is that they never bothered to figure out who the mayor is: a muscle-bound badass who can punch bullets out of the air. Keep in mind that this was a New York before people like Jesse Ventura or Arnold Schwarzenegger, making Haggar the most badass thing of the time.

However, I decided against playing as Haggar in favor of Guy. Why? Look at the damn title. If I'm playing Final Fight Guy, I might as well play as the titular character, even though it really makes no difference. Both characters play exactly the same; there are no extra moves or abilities or strength or anything. If that sounds bad...well, it is, but the game itself is actually sorta decent. I found myself enjoying the exeperience of easily snapping the bones of my opponents, sometimes alternating between a few of them. The game controls well and there are a variety of moves you can pull off at any given time. What could possibly go wrong?

Oh, wait, a few things. This is a very early entry in the beat em up genre, and it shows through several of its poorly aged aspects. The most noticeable is the repetitive nature of combat (a running theme I could not fit into the title). Around halfway through the game, I realized that holding down a turbo button was about as effective as deciding what move I wanted to use. Sure, there was still that amazing feeling of successfully juggling nine enemies at once, but most of the battles became a game of "what nearby object weighs the most." Another problem common to the genre (and therefore this game) is enemy rape. If you get caught in an enemy's punch, you're pretty much stuck there until they finish their combo. Good luck if you're betwixt two enemies.

However, the game is still fun, even if it hasn't aged well. Once you get past the "eh" graphics and the repetitive gameplay, you'll probably find the car demolition bonus game. Imagine Street Fighter II (these games share quite a bit), but at the end of it, you discover somebody owns that car. In other words, their sorrow makes this bonus game 10x more awesome. Hell, it earns the Kefka Palazzo Award for Schadenfreude.

Review Synopsis

• Basically just Final Fight. Again.
  
• Fun to beat the crap out of people, but repetitive.
  
• A kickass car-beating mini-game.
  

Look, I have no comment for this video, OK? If I were to say anything, I'd probably get insulted by somebody.

  

Legend of Legaia

(Tell me: what game ideas did you guys have as kids?) Come on, we've all had these ideas at one point or another. There's no shame in admitting it. Watch, I'll share

one with you guys right now. Some time after playing Soul Calibur 2, I came up with an idea for an RPG/fighting game hybrid. You'd navigate the map and everything like normal, but when the battles kicked in, you'd go into a separate arena and fight your enemies like it was Tekken or something.

Now then: why the hell did I just tell you guys all of this? Well, recently, I played a game called Legend of Legaia that was remarkably similar to what I just described. It scared me away fom the idea permanently. Imagine something like Tekken: The RPG or Lunar 3D (WHERE IS IT!? GYAGHGHYAGHAYGAYH), but much, much worse. As I've just hinted, the main thing about Legaia is the battle system. Once in battle, you have four options: attack, defend, magic, and item (obviously). Rather than attack being a simple "make damage" button, you have to input your commands fighting game style. Theoretically, you can build up all types of combos and chain certain moves together for the winning advantage.

But that's a very big "theoretically." The reality of the situation is far grimmer. Most of my non-boss battles were spent just holding down X and letting the RNG decide my moves for me. Hell, it seemed just as effective as any special move or spell I could punch in myself. Actually, I'd say that holding X was more effective than most of the spells I ever got, especially since getting spells is a tedious and unrewarding process. All your spells are acquired from enemies, but you have to be extremely lucky to get any of them. I've heard several theories on how to get them (don't use magic, make sure you kill them with Down, etc.) but none of it ever seemed to work; it's just whether or not the game hates you.

And when you get the spells, you find out that there's a levelling system. I have nothing wrong with that, but what I do find wrong is that there's not much to it. Spells don''t get much more powerful, they only get certain effects that don't change gameplay that much. Besides, there's always another, clearly more powerful spell for the one you're levelling up, so it just seems like the people at Legaia Land mixed two spell systems by mistake. The only time in the game when I didn't use just healing spells was during late-game boss battles, which, by the way, all follow the same damn strategy. One character heals, one attacks, one uses items, and you all defend when the boss unleashes a big attack.

Speaking of characters, you only get three, even though there are quite a few characters who could easily join your party, but don't want to. First, you have Vahn, the silent protagonist who is often forced into speaking (but won't). The only thing I have left to say about him is that he has meaningless dialogue choices, so I'll move onto Gala. He's a monk guy who ends up looking like Sir Spiderman by the end of the game, so again, let's talk about the final character: Noa.

Oh God, Noa. She has to be the worst female character I've seen in a JRPG, and I'm not exaggerating. Almost every line she squeals out is drenched in idiocy. One moment she's calling somebody a bad person after just having learned the concept of morality, the next she's saying something we all figured out five years ago. She doesn't even have the blind optimism of the Shikis and Rinoas; she's just stupid. Hell, even the game agrees with me at times, as several characters will call her a dumbass and she usually has the lowest intelligence of the entire group. Fortunately, though, she'll usually wave her arms about before doing saying something stupid, almost like she came equipped with an Idiot Alarm. However, there are other things about her that anger me, like how her battle figure looks like somebody wrapped bacon around a Pez dispenser, or how she's important to the plot. Spoiler alert: it turns out that she's actually the long lost princess of a far off kingdom. Fortunately, the kingdom's gone to Hell, probably because they realized she would rule them someday.

Wait a minute, it seems kinda weird that I haven't mentioned the story yet. Anyway, here it is: long ago, God created humans. Very thick headed humans. They were so weak and pathetic, he had to create Seru just so they wouldn't go extinct. But humans are a very ingenious species, and will cleverly find some way to completely fuck things up. In enters the Mist, a mysterious fog that makes Seru evil and turns people wearing them into zombies. Now a few heroes wearing Ra-Seru (the good ones) must save the world from the Mist, Sim-Seru (the bad ones), and about a billion different villains. The only villain who has any story importance is Songi, but he's more of a dickish rival than a full blown villain.

Yet near the end, the game shoves in the closest thing to a full villain: Cort, or as I like to call him, Sephiroth. Yes, this game rips off a few other games at a few instances, like (not counting the previous) a dumbed down version of Kefka's Tower, or Paladin's Quest's "were you paying attention or were you mashing your way through this scene" quizzes. OK, to be fair, Legaia also does some things of its own and some things right. For example, the music is OK, and the graphics...well, they suck, but at leas things get kinda better near the end. Plus the game, for all its flaws, is at least competent; never once did I encounter a bug or a (ridiculously) cheap gameplay tactic.

So what have I learned from this experience? Well, first off, I learned never to play a game that even the developers couldn't take seriously, but also that 3D isn't necessarily better. Allow me to explain: I only played this game because I finally grew tired of 2D. Yea, I played lots of 3D games before, but they were mostly on the side; this was to be my break-in into the extra dimension. However, all that came of it was a generic JRPG during a time and on a system flooded with much better games. Go ahead and take your pick from the various Final Fantasy's, Dragon Quests, Suikodens, Wild Armses, and other games. Meanwhile, this game will get stuck with the Worst Female Character Ever Award.

Review Synopsis

• Yea, a fighting RPG sounds good, but only if it isn't repetitive as hell.
  
• The story needs quite a bit of work.
  
• HATE NOA! HATE HATE HATE!!!
  

2 Comments

• 387 results
• 1
• ...
• 34
• 35
• 36
• 37
• 38
• 39