Gatchapon Time Travelling Spartans (and other fantastic uses of time and money)

Hey everyone, it’s me, ArbitraryWater. I’m not as busy with school as I was last semester, and as a result I’ve had more opportunities to make poor choices with my free time and disposable income in the form of video games. 2017 has already been a surprisingly good year for that stuff, and I’ve already gone back to Resident Evil 7 to speedrun it in under 3 hours (very doable) and start a playthrough on Madhouse difficulty and am still occasionally putting some time here and there into Yakuza 0 (which definitely seems like it’ll be a slow burn for me.) I even played some of that other thing too. But I’m not here to talk about those games, I’m here to talk about a trio of disparate titles that I spent my time with because I don’t have anything better to do with my life.

That stupid Fire Emblem mobile game

Aside from a brief flirtation with Hearthstone (one that ended the moment I realized how much I’d have to pay or grind to be even remotely competitive) I’ve never been the biggest fan of Free-to-Play mobile games. However, I’m a sucker and an idiot, and it turns out all it took to snag me was to slap the name of something I cherish deeply on an insidious Japanese gatchapon-style game, give it a Nintendo level of polish, and make the core gameplay short and disposable enough that I can briefly engage in it whenever I’m doing other junk with my cell phone. Fire Emblem Heroes is not so much a game I enjoy so much as it’s an easy thing to fill time when I’m waiting for water to boil or class to start that reminds me of games I enjoy. Certainly, it’s well-made, has some great art, and requires a basic level of strategy, but… maybe I should just play those DLC challenge maps for Fates instead. Right after I get a 5-star draw better than Marth.

If nothing else, FE Heroes should be commended for successfully translating the core gameplay of that series into a bite-sized, watered-down mobile game that still remains recognizable as intrinsically Fire Emblem. Perma-death and waifu-ing are out, but square grids, skill triggers and the weapon triangle are intact and squeezed onto a single-screen map. I’m legitimately impressed by how many of the tactics I use in regular Fire Emblem games still apply, but the loss of depth is still apparent in the way stuff often boils down to simple rock-paper-scissors and numerical advantages far more than the main series does. This becomes nakedly obvious in the arena, where you fight other players’ (AI controlled) teams, and can lose your winning streak if you run up against a team accidentally suited to taking your dudes out… especially when it’s filled with overpowered 5-star characters. In a game where very few units have 1-2 range, Takumi stands out as broken for that reason alone.

There’s a vapid, borderline unnecessary story as an excuse to have all of these Fire Emblem characters fight together, but you will miss exactly nothing of value should you just slam your finger on the skip button every time it appears. Indeed, the main story chapters released thus far do the slightly underhanded thing of being absurdly easy until the last set of levels, at which point things got serious and I actually had to grind up my team. It’s to be expected, I guess, but it’s worth emphasizing that Heroes is structured and paced like a mobile game. Once you finish with all of the levels on Normal difficulty, the stamina costs noticeably increase. It doesn’t seem as sleazy or egregious as it could be, (which is probably why I’ve stuck with it as long as I have) though the cost of upgrading a 4-star character to a 5-star one is ridiculous enough that I doubt I’ll be playing Fire Emblem Heroes for much longer… well, that’ll probably happen if I say it enough times, right? I need to save my Fire Emblem-ing this year for that Gaiden remake.

Halo: Combat Evolved

In a fit of madness, my brother-in-law and I decided to play through most of the Halo campaigns cooperatively over the course of this year via his copy of The Master Chief Collection. While it’s quite possible that I’ll be sick of Microsoft’s slightly-faded flagship series by the time we reach Halo 4, my experience with Combat Evolved was a promising enough start to an objectively questionable idea. It’s worth mentioning, though, that before this playthrough I had never gotten especially far in Halo 1’s campaign. My nostalgia has always been more for Halo 2 and 3 than the original… and after playing through it I think I understand why. Don’t take that the wrong way, Halo CE holds up remarkably well for a game that is now more than 15 years old, but it also betrays its age and status as an unproven launch game for an unproven console in a way that made me very excited to move onto Halo 2.

The biggest thing that stuck out for me in regards to CE was that the quintessential Halo “combat puzzle” loop is entirely intact and still the biggest draw. Sure, the Halo 1 assault rifle is a ineffectual bullet hose that I switched for just about anything else, but the Halo 1 magnum lives up to its reputation as a headshot murder machine juuuuuust fine, and most of the other weapons feel appropriately powerful as well. For as much as subsequent games in the series have improved upon and refined this formula, the comparatively simple, slightly raw incarnation found in Combat Evolved has its own appeal. Grunts will flee if you kill their Elite commander, enemies with shields are more easily taken down with energy weapons, the flood are shitty and terrible, etc. If I had a true qualm with Halo 1’s version of Halo combat, it’s that everything is noticeably sluggish in a way that reminds you that first-person shooters on a console weren’t a totally tried and true thing in 2001. It’s not just Master Chief’s walking speed, it’s reload speed on a lot of weapons, it’s the recovery frames on a melee attack, it’s the time it takes for a plasma grenade to explode, and it’s the time it takes for your shield to recharge. I know Halo has always been a fairly deliberate brand of shooter, but as someone who immediately moved onto Halo 2 after this one I can confirm that the difference in speed is stark.

The structure of Halo 1’s campaign is also easily recognizable as the structure of a Halo campaign. There are levels with wide-open arenas, levels with more claustrophobic corridors, levels with the obligatory Warthog or Scorpion sequence, and terrible flood levels that are equal parts tedious and annoying. The story isn’t going to win any awards, but it’s coherent and doesn’t go up its own ass in lore, which I guess hasn’t really been the case after 343 took over. All you need to know is that Master Chief is a faceless space marine, Cortana is a sassy AI lady, The Covenant are crazy religious aliens, and the Halo is actually a superweapon made to kill weird parasite plantbugzombie things. The “Silent Cartographer” level remains a standout for the right reasons because it’s big, nonlinear and ultra-impressive for something from 2001. In contrast, the “Library” level remains a standout for the wrong reasons because it’s a never ending sequence of identical hallways where you fight the most annoying enemy type for 30 minutes straight and can only find your way thanks to glowing arrows on the floor added in the Anniversary remaster. While none of the other levels are as bad as that one, there are a few too many sequences where you walk through identical rooms for my liking. I guess it can be excused, given Halo’s status as a launch title, but… it’s fair to say that the level design improved greatly in subsequent games. Really, that captures my attitude about Halo: Combat Evolved as a whole. It was good, I enjoyed it, I understand why it’s so important, but man am I enjoying Halo 2 so much more. You can likely expect to hear about that in the near future.

Steins;Gate 0

Listen guys, Nioh was (and still is, as of this writing) sold-out on Amazon and I was bummed, so being the responsible adult that I am I instead impulse bought the sequel to that visual novel I played last month. You know, the one about Japanese teens sending text messages back in time? I think it’s worth emphasizing again that I kinda love Steins;Gate. Like, I’d consider buying a figurine of one of its characters or something, and I’m not the kind of person who buys figurines. So yeah, Steins;Gate 0 is a semi-direct sequel to that, and while it’s not quite as great, it’s still pretty great. I say semi-direct because it essentially takes place in a timeline where protagonist Okabe Rintaro fails during the original game’s true ending, which in turn means that the main plot of Steins;Gate 0 cannot be discussed in specifics without entirely spoiling Steins;Gate. I’m not willing to do that (Funimation has the entire subbed version of the Steins;Gate anime adaption on their youtube, legally. I think I might prefer the dub and I think you might have to be in the US, but just watch it already.) though if anyone wants to talk to me about the plot of this game with spoiler tags, I’d love to do so.

So instead I guess I’ll talk about generalities. Like the first one, SG0 is a visual novel where your only real form of interaction comes in the form answering or not answering phone calls and texts. Unlike the first one, which was basically a linear story with a handful of opportunities to get alternate endings, 0 branches pretty hard early on and then branches again for each of the 5 endings (with a 6th true ending acting as an epilogue to one of the other ones.) As a result, it’s not quite as cohesive, but aside from the truly unsatisfying bad ending and a couple of dangling plot threads, as a whole the story manages to justify itself quite well. Everyone from the original cast gets a moment in the spotlight at some point, and most of the new characters are likeable and fit in snugly. The translation was apparently done by a different team than the first one, so I found a couple of inconsistencies that bugged me, like how names are presented western style instead of Japanese style (it’s never not weird to read “Kurisu Makise” when the voice actors are clearly saying “Makise Kurisu”) or how “Moe” and “Kawaii” are both translated as “cute.” It’s probably also worth mentioning that the artwork, while still great, lost a bit of the first game’s unique style, something that’s plainly obvious whenever old versions of character portraits show up. Neither of those things really dampened my enjoyment, however, and if you happen to like Steins;Gate I think 0 is a worthy sequel. Honestly don’t know how they’re going to do the anime adaption though.

Random Endorsement:

Yo, just watch Steins;Gate.

I actually just finished playing Steins;Gate 0 a few hours ago. While it doesn't all come together quite as well as the original, I really enjoyed how it explored those characters in a way the first one didn't. And I'm glad you finally get to see just how much shit Okabe had to go through in that world line to achieve the true ending of the first game. The first game's ending was great, but that moment where you go from ultimate despair to having the solution handed to you without seeing how he got there always felt a little...anti-climatic. Also Maho is great.

I don't know how the anime will turn out, but it's definitely my most anticipated anime on the horizon. I hope Funimation manages a speedy dub, as I do prefer it overall. They're finally dubbing the movie next month, and although I found it kinda forgettable when I watched the subbed version awhile back, I'm still excited to get more of the dub.

Halo Combat Evolved is still one of my favorite single player shooter campaigns ever. It was just so damn good back on the original Xbox.

Maho is a fantastic character. I was a pretty big fan of the entire path where she and Moeka become BFFs because they're both antisocial weirdos who don't know how to clean.

Like you, I remember watching the subbed version of the Steins;Gate movie on some errant Youtube link and thinking it felt like a harmless but inessential fanservice thing. It's cool that it's getting dubbed though. I think the dub of the Steins;Gate anime is legitimately one of the best English dubs out there, and I think I'd enjoy seeing what that cast and localization team would do with some of the scenes in Steins;Gate 0. Of course, that gets me back to thinking what that anime adaption is even going to be. Like, are they just going to go through the True Ending route? Because there's a lot of really good stuff on that other timeline and it'd be a pity to miss it.

I keep telling myself eventually that I'm going to play through all the Halo games I can just to finally see it all. I've only ever completed Halo Wars and ODST, for some bizarre reason (despite owning 1-4 & Reach) and never went further than that. There are certain series like that which I kind of regret letting come and go as it seems Halo sort of has by now. I would've enjoyed staying current with it when it was all en vogue just to be a part of it in the moment, know what I mean? Someday I should just order a couple pizzas and play Halo until I pass out. Instead I do shit like buy Brute Force from a local flea market instead. Oh well.

@arbitrarywater: If I'm remembering correctly, there are basically two main splits in the story, one of which leading into "The Promised Rinascemento" which unlocks the ability to reach the true ending, and the other being the path to the true ending. I could see the anime following the first path for the first 12 episodes and the path to the true ending for the other 12. I'm pretty sure that would cover the vast majority of the chapters in the game, barring the ending chapters specifically related to the other endings.

There is good stuff in those endings, but I think the only other one relevant enough that might need to include in some way is the Kagari ending, since I don't they explore her sufficiently in those main paths. But I kinda hope they find a way to include that scene from the Maho ending somehow where Amadeus gains the true Kurisu's memories, because I like that scene a lot.

@marokai: My feelings on keeping up with the gaming zeitgeist via forums are weird and complicated, inasmuch as I really do enjoy talking about a thing when that thing is relevant but also I started my entire blogging "career" on Giant Bomb entirely around me playing and writing about old games that I hadn't played before in defiance of the zeitgeist. Halo's kind of a weird case for me, because I played plenty of Halo 2 and 3 when they were relevant almost a decade ago (and thought Halo 4 was "fine" when I played it almost half a decade ago,) but am very much going into Combat Evolved, ODST, and Reach mostly fresh.

@zeik: Okay yeah, I could see your idea working if they handled it right. They could definitely play with some of the plot twists in the true ending route (like the identity of the Woman in Black) if they did the "Kurisu" ending route first. Also that particular revelation doesn't really have a whole lot of impact if you don't already know what the deal is with Kagari in the first place.