One of these games kinda feel like a distant memory because of what I'm playing now, but they're still significant enough for me to write in depth thoughts. Kind of a downside to doing this blog bi-weekly, I guess. Also hey, first blog entry on the new site!

GAMES!!!!

During the period inbetween playing DmC and waiting for Rising, I decided to check out Ninja Gaiden Sigma. It had been several years since I had last played the first Ninja Gaiden in any form. I remember playing Black with a friend and the game just severely kicking our asses. My friend was able to get past Murai, but none of us could beat Dynamo at the end of chapter 3. While I wish I had a means to play Ninja Gaiden Black, I figured Sigma wouldn't be bad to settle on for now, because any version of Ninja Gaiden would still be a good game.

Several years after not playing a Ninja Gaiden game, and with the increase in my video game skills, I held my own surprisingly well through my time with the game. You're finger is almost always on that block button and provides a very strong defense from all directions. Combat still felt very satisfying, and controlling Ryu with his different acrobatic feats are incredibly slick and fun to use. While I did not complete the game as I needed to send the game back to Gamefly in time for Rising, I did beat Alma, who is one of the most notorious bosses in the game. I definitely felt like there wasn't anything in this game I couldn't handle. Challenging for sure, but never felt unmanageable or cheap, aside from the occasional off hand explosive projectile perhaps.

There are things that definitely felt out of place and not as polished as the base game. There are some minor tweaks like extra enemy encounters (the game starts with you being immediately assaulted by a ninja), but major stuff includes an extra segment at the end of chapter 2, and missions where you play as Rachel. Playing as Rachel wasn't especially fun. She obviously is not the same as Ryu, but playing as a much slower and heavier character isn't the sort of thing I want when playing this game. Especially since those missions are required and can't be skipped. It clashes with the pace and feel unnecessary as part of the main game.

The game does look pretty good. It's not the most detailed looking game this gen for sure, but it's certainly not ugly. I look at images and video of the game on the original Xbox and it still holds up pretty well there. Sigma definitely looks prettier than Black, and it runs at consistently at 60 FPS which is always important for this kind of game. I very much enjoyed my brief time with Sigma, and while I still wish I could have the definitive version of the game, playing this version wasn't a bad choice. Again, any version of Ninja Gaiden is still a good game.

I tend to think of myself as a huge MegaTen fan, although I really haven’t played a whole lot of the games. I played all the way through Persona 3 FES and Digital Devil Saga and loved them a lot, but I haven’t really given that much time to other games in the franchise (I keep reminding myself I need to play DDS 2). The other game I tried in the franchise was Persona on PSP, and that was kinda rough to go through. Even so, what those games are doing I can admire as someone who is more interested in the western approach to RPGs. The games have had really dark and interesting themes, and the stories and characters have actually been really good. I got into Persona 3 because of watching the P4 Endurance Run, and Digital Devil Saga was basically a standard JRPG but with a fantastic setting and characters, not to mention the excellent Press Turn combat system.

I love the games I’ve played in the franchise, but they were all spin offs of the main line games. Just out of the blue I decided to try out the original Shin Megami Tensei with the Aeon Genesis English translation. To be fair, I was struggling to think of what other game I’d write about this week besides Ninja Gaiden, so I guess this came out of that. Anyway, the game is rather interesting, as it’s sort of the best thing I can say in regards to an old game that has clearly been surpassed by later entries. It’s certainly not a terrible game, as I’ve already made more progress than I expected, and the design does not feel like a sort of unrefined mash up of game concepts like Persona 1. The game is always in first person except when on the world map, you persuade demons to join your party, you fuse demons to make more powerful demons, you take turns in battle, and you have random encounters up the ass. It may be hard to play through, difficulty and age wise, but at least it focuses on a few key concepts and doesn’t make them more complicated than they need to be.

I generally dislike random encounters in RPGs, while I have tolerated them in DDS because of the combat system making them quick & fun, not to mention everything else in that game driving me forward. This rate of random encounters in SMT 1 is still very high, but the part that makes it somewhat tolerable for me is that the game doesn’t transition to a separate battle screen. It all takes place in the same first person view you are in when exploring a dungeon. Of course the exception is on the world map which is an overhead 2D view. At that point, the view switches to first person in order to fight the enemies.

One of the defining game mechanics of SMT people know is demon negotiation. This wasn’t present in DDS or Persona 3, but it did exist in Persona 1, though instead of the demon in the party you got its card. That negation system works mostly the same as the one in SMT 1, and that is it being a lot of trial and error. There really isn’t anything in the way of tells in order to gain favor with the demons, and analyzing the demon doesn’t really give you much other than stats and alignment. More often than not…actually I’d say pretty much all successful demon negotiations I felt were a result of being lucky. Especially when they start bargaining you for stuff to convinced them to join your side. They just might ask for an item you don’t have in your inventory, and at that point you’ve lost.

In terms of difficulty, the game hasn’t been too bad in that regard. Persona 1 got frustrating at a point because of how that battle system was designed and how you were pretty much dead if your party got ambushed from behind. There isn’t really anything of that sort, no positioning party members and all that nonsense. If anything, the difficulty is manageable for a period of time and then spikes up considerably. Happened once when I made it to Shinjuku, and then again after the Great Destruction. Difficulty ramps up, but it doesn’t feel like a smooth, gradual increase.

At this point I might as well keep playing, assuming I don’t forget it and get side tracked by other titles. It gets brutal, as there’s always the chance of some random battle being unwinnable due to your whole party being frozen or afflicted by some horrible status ailment. But it’s interesting to play from an academic standpoint, and the English translation is pretty decent. Favorite part about it has been the American soldiers and ambassadors speaking terrible English, no doubt the original version being they spoke horrible Japanese, being foreigners and all. Very intriguing game.

And the Rest

Metal Gear Rising Revengeance

I probably could've swapped out Ninja Gaiden Sigma for this as I've now completed two playthroughs, but I wanna try and wring out every last bit of content I possibly can before doing a full write. Game has been extremely fun, the boss fights especially.

Other Things

I have been making progress towards applying to DigiPen. Transcripts requested, letters of recommendation sent to previous employers and academic advisers, whole lot of stuff. All that's left now is to put together an art portfolio, and hopefully jumping through all these different hopes will get me accepted.

Classes are doing well for me, with the exception of Physics. It's been way harder than I expected, and very time consuming. I can't just drop the class because I'm on a scholarship that requires me to have 12 credits this semester, and I don't know what I'd replace that class with if I were to drop. Just stick with it to the end, I guess.

Conclusion

And that's it for this week. Next blog will be a double dose of Platinum games, not just because I'm playing and loving the hell out of Rising, but also Vanquish became free on Playstation Plus this week. Last time I played the game I couldn't proceed to Act 3 because the disc would keep locking up. Now I can finally see the whole thing. Should be tons of fun.

Also, one thing I like about making blogs on the new site is that I no longer have to do this in order to center my banners.

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Peace.