Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest: Jib Jig

Jib Jig is one of the many great songs from the Donkey Kong Country 2 soundtrack. Its main melody is a catchy jig that feels perfect for the lighthearted pirate setting that defines the game’s early stages. I can easily imagine a group of pirates gathering on deck for such a tune, and the added wind and rain effects only add to the atmosphere. I’ve always loved this soundtrack for featuring a wide variety of songs that do a great job at matching each level’s distinct setting, and Jib Jig remains a personal favorite among them.

Aquaria: The Traveller

I have a huge appreciation for Aquaria as a game about exploration as much as anything else, and its beautiful soundtrack couldn’t support this goal any better. Songs like The Traveller really showcase what the game is all about, with its low key nature, steady drums and peaceful flutes and horns it seems to embrace the mystery and wonder that comes with venturing into the unknown. In addition, something about the notes and chords make me think, appropriately, of the ocean. It’s just a great example of a game with a singular vision being supported by an equally dedicated soundtrack.

Mass Effect 2: Suicide Mission

Mass Effect 2’s final mission is one of my favorite closing acts of any game out there, and I love that it has such a bombastic song to accompany it. Like the rest of the game’s soundtrack, the sci-fi vibe is awesome, and I’ve always been a sucker for drums, horns and vocals. Suicide Mission has all three in spades, and they combine in highly epic fashion. The pacing of the song also does a wonderful job at building up to a well timed climax before trailing off, rising and falling at all the right moments. I can’t think of a better punctuation to one of gaming’s most intense final missions, making Suicide Mission one of my most memorable video game songs.

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A claim I’ve heard a lot in the past few years is that video games are too short now. I’m not sure what games those people have been playing; the video games I play are, on average, much longer than they’ve ever been. In the past year alone I’ve played Deus Ex: Human Revolution, Dark Souls, The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword, Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning, Mass Effect 3 and Xenoblade Chronicles. Each of these games can last dozens, if not hundreds of hours. There have always been games of comparable length, but not with this frequency, and especially not from names as big and popular as these. When I think of the hundreds of games I played during the 1990s and the early 2000s, I can’t think of many that lasted more than 40 hours or so. Much less 7 such games within a single 12 month span.

That almost begs the opposite question: are games too long now? Certainly not, but they aren’t too short either. I’ve always felt that the appropriate length of a game is not merely derived from some weird hour per dollar ratio; quality has to play some part in a game’s value. We all know this, even if we don’t accurately vocalize it, because we do actually pay for games in a world where there are countless free ones out there. There are good and bad games of all shapes and sizes, and you can’t make sweeping generalizations about things such as a game’s length. That leads to the real question: is it possible for a single game to be too short or too long? I think most people would agree that it is possible for a game to be too short. The interesting question, however, is whether a game can be too long.

I would argue that a game can indeed be too long. I know there are people who scoff at the idea, arguing that more “content” can never be a bad thing. But every game has its own unique set of gameplay systems and ideas, ones that have varying amounts of depth and longevity to them. Those ideas can only remain interesting for so long, and after a certain point you’re not seeing anything new, thus diluting the overall product. Words like “padding” and “filler” exist for a reason, and the situations where I can accurately use them are the only ones where I feel I am wasting my time playing a game. Unfortunately, that has been my experience with a handful of games over the past year or two, most recently Xenoblade Chronicles. By the time I was 20 hours into the game, I had already encountered multiple areas that prompted me to exclaim “Great, more grinding”. Its combat is the definition of repetitive, and also comprises a large percentage of your play time. The idea of spending 50 more hours with the game was a depressing one, and ultimately led to me putting the game down. If it had a well paced story arc that wrapped up in 30 or 40 hours instead of 70, I might have stuck with it. I can’t think of a better example of a game being too long.

Xenoblade isn’t the only offender though; it was merely the latest and biggest one, the final blow in a series of games that wore out their welcome well before their end. Final Fantasy XIII, Red Dead Redemption, L.A. Noire, The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword and Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning are all examples of recent games that I got tired of (to varying degrees) before I finished them. Unlike Xenoblade, however, I did actually finish all of those games. Xenoblade was the proverbial “straw that broke the camel’s back”. Though in this case it was a brick rather than a straw. I just couldn’t take it anymore, and decided once and for all to simply let go.

As a stubborn gamer who is also somewhat of a completionist, that idea of letting go can be a tough one for me. Typically, when I start a game I do so with the intent of finishing it, and putting a game down before seeing the credits roll can be extremely difficult. This has led to me pushing through numerous games that I was no longer enjoying simply for the sake of finishing them. I can’t really explain why; I imagine it’s some combination of hoping the game gets better and resisting the idea that the game has “beaten” me, so to speak. Perhaps it took an extreme case like Xenoblade to break me of my stubborn ways, but I'm finally realizing that it’s sometimes just not worth it. There are too many good games out there that are more worth my precious time. Since abandoning Xenoblade a few weeks ago, I’ve played Fez, Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP and The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings, all games I really enjoyed. What’s more, if I had put the time I put into those three games into Xenoblade instead, I still wouldn’t be done with it. Probably not even close. And I would have enjoyed that time infinitely less.

I felt pretty crummy for a bit after putting Xenoblade down, but I’ve realized that it was the right choice, and I think the whole episode will be beneficial in the long run. I still like playing long games if they can hold my interest from start to finish (Dark Souls comes to mind), but I can also let go of the ones that don’t; the ones that are too long.

I finished The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings yesterday. That game is great. After playing one too many overly long and grindy RPGs, it’s nice to play one that actually knows how to pace itself and cover ground in a timely manner. The game wisely uses its narrative to propel the action, rather than the promise of more loot and/or experience, making it a lot more engaging to me. I expanded on why I like The Witcher 2’s narrative aspects a lot last week, but I do want to add one last thought to that. A handful of the late game choices I had to make were expertly done. It did a great job at presenting two equally dire choices, and forcing me to choose between them. They left me seriously debating their consequences, and even once I had committed to one choice I was never convinced that it was the “right” or the “wrong” one. The Witcher 2 effectively lives in that realm of pure grey that so many games fail to reach.

Anyway, the gameplay side of things is the focus for today, as I didn’t cover that much last week. As I already mentioned, the game paces itself really well, which I appreciate. The rest of it is kind of up and down, beginning with the combat. On the surface combat is very action heavy, but in practice it’s more methodical than that. You have a lot of tools at your disposal, and success comes from making the most of as many of them as you can. Potions, bombs, traps, spells and your general sword fighting abilities are all necessary, and I like that the game demands more than pure button mashing. What does bug me though is that some of your abilities, mainly potions, have to be prepared before battle. And since they come with a timer, you ideally want to use them pretty soon before a big battle, which requires some knowledge of what’s coming up. This led to a handful of moments where a tough encounter snuck up on me without warning, and after failing I had to reload a few saves back to prepare. That kind of sucks.

Still, I appreciated the demanding nature of the combat, but that surprisingly became less of a factor as the game went on. It didn’t feel like the enemies were keeping up with me as I kept leveling and putting points in my various abilities. The game got substantially easier as it went, and I feel like it could have been much better balanced in that regard. It could also use more enemy variety, as I felt like I only fought about half a dozen or so different kinds of enemies (excluding bosses) during my entire 25 hour playthrough. Perhaps part of that is due to the fact that the vast majority of that time is spent in dialogue, which doesn’t leave as much time for combat as you would expect. I’d actually be curious to see a breakdown of exactly how those 25 hours were spent between dialogue, combat, roaming towns and fields, etc. The dialogue was engaging and all, especially since you get to interact with it, but I probably could have done with a little less of it at times. There were a few moments where I was ready to just get on with it.

Otherwise, The Witcher 2’s remaining gameplay systems, such as item and weapon crafting, were fine. Collecting crafting materials and managing inventory was somewhat of an annoyance, but otherwise I didn’t really feel like that stuff had a huge impact on the game one way or the other. It was just kind of there, something to occasionally dabble in if I wanted to try and make a powerful potion or a better sword. The game wasn’t very focused on gear in general though, and I found that what I got from completing quests was more than good enough to get me through the game. And that’s about it for The Witcher 2. It may have had a few bumps here and there, but overall I really enjoyed it, and think anyone who likes getting absorbed in a rich fictional universe would appreciate what the game has to offer. That’s definitely the highlight, and the gameplay backs it up well enough.

Moving on, some friends and I played a little bit of Magicka this week. I’ll just come out and say it: that game is completely insane. For the most part it’s a pretty straightforward action RPG, but it removes the focus on loot, leveling up and skill trees, and replaces them with a surprisingly robust system that allows you to mix and match different elements to create spells. It’s pretty fun to just experiment with stuff and see what you can conjure up, though it remains to be seen how long that will remain interesting. What makes the game crazy, however, is that friendly fire is always on. And given the loose nature of casting spells, you’re constantly hitting your allies with random shit all the time; it’s just going to happen. It’s kind of like New Super Mario Bros. Wii in that regard, as the more players you have in the game the crazier it gets. Sometimes it can get a little frustrating, but it’s also kind of the main charm of the game so far.

The other hilarious part of the game is the voice acting, which is described as some weird mix of Swedish, English and gibberish. Whatever it is, it cracks me up. I have no idea how far we are in that, but we’ll keep going. Otherwise, the next game I’m looking at playing is Enslaved: Odyssey to the West. That’s something I was always interested in but never got around to, and this recent lull in interesting releases has been a boon for making some (small) progress on my backlog. Anyway, that’s all for now, until next time!

Currently playing: Magicka, Enslaved: Odyssey to the West

This past week began with Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP. I don’t own an iOS device, so its recent Steam release was an opportunity to play a game that I’ve been interested in for a while. And man, that game is a trip. I mean that in the best possible way too; S:S&S EP is a game that walks its own path, and is infinitely more interesting for it. It has such a unique vibe and aesthetic that I really enjoyed, though it’s also kind of hard to describe. Perhaps that’s because it’s just kind of weird. When your starting point is a dapper, cigar smoking gentleman addressing you directly as the player, and goes on to feature oddities such as singing bears, you know you’re in for an interesting experience. The game’s lively art style and catchy soundtrack are perhaps the highlights of the whole thing, and everything comes together to create an oddly personal adventure that will stick with me in its own way. I’m certainly glad I signed on for this one.

The actual gameplay is pretty simplistic. Most of it is just pointing and clicking your way around the dozen or so screens in the game, and seeing what there is to see. Otherwise there’s some extremely simple combat, which was easily my least favorite part of the game. The regular fights were a joke, and the “boss” fights were just kind of annoying. Then again, there are only a handful of fights in the game, and I do feel that combat of some sort was a necessary part to the game. Given that they were limited to the iOS interface at the time, they did a relatively fine job, but I still wish the combat could have been more interesting.

S:S&S EP isn’t a long game. It took me somewhere between three and four hours to finish, which felt appropriate given not only the $6 I paid for it, but also the kind of game it is. I don’t think there was enough meat at its core to stretch it any more than that, and I appreciate the game’s ability to recognize when its cards are played. After that, I moved on to The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings, another game that came out last year that I always had my eye on. Despite it just coming out on the Xbox 360, I actually grabbed the PC release. I’m lucky enough to have a PC that can run the game well enough to be worth it (the game looks and sounds incredible by the way), and took advantage of the PC version’s temporary sale price of $42. I am playing it with a 360 controller though, it just feels more natural to me.

Anyway, I’m really liking The Witcher 2 so far. I haven’t read any of the books, nor have I played the first game, but I can already tell that this is a rich fictional universe. I have a feeling there’s a ton of history and background to everything that’s going on, and while I’m sure I’m missing some context from not having any prior experience with the franchise, I like the idea that there’s a lot more to this world than meets the eye. It makes it feel more real, like I’m stepping into a well established universe with its own well defined timeline of big, important events. The Witcher 2 is but one segment of those events, its own nicely contained story arc that nevertheless fits into a much bigger picture. It’s neat, and lends a lot more gravitas to everything that happens.

Sure enough, my favorite parts of the game so far are its setting, characters, dialogue, etc. This is a game that has a lot of exposition, and takes its time conveying most of it. It’s fortunate then, that the dialogue is as sharply written and as well acted as it is. There is a ton of quality voicework in the game, and it’s all entertaining in a way that fits very well into the established universe. This isn’t your average Tolkien style fantasy world; this is a hard fantasy setting. Everything is grim and gritty in a no nonsense sort of way, and there are no real “good guys” to root for. Everyone operates in the greyest shades of grey possible, and I really like that the game lets you make decisions without assigning them an arbitrary morality system. You’re constantly having to make decisions between two choices that appear equally dire, and it’s refreshing to be able to make those choices based off of your own gut rather than feel like you have to commit one way or the other for the sake of some contrived rewards system. Interacting in a story is gameplay in and of itself, it doesn’t need to give you bonuses elsewhere to be justified.

As for the quests and combat, it’s fairly standard RPG stuff for the most part. You go on quests to fight bandits and monsters, or retrieve items for anyone and everyone. I actually really like their pacing though. Quests feel like they move at a pretty snappy clip, and enough story stuff happens in them to make them feel engaging. This is a nice change from the grindy, meaningless quests of recent RPGs I’ve played such as Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning and Xenoblade Chronicles, whose quests were as boilerplate as they come. I’m still getting used to the combat in some ways, which can be a little wonky at times. I’ll talk more about that next week, along with the various other gameplay systems. I’ve gone on long enough today, and there will be plenty more Witcher 2 playing coming up. So that will do it for now, until next time!

Currently playing: The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings

BioShock: The Ocean on His Shoulders

One of the best things about BioShock is how it fully commits to its engrossing setting and atmosphere, and its soundtrack blends in wonderfully. I just love the violin usage usage throughout the whole game, especially in this main theme, The Ocean on His Shoulders. Something about it fits BioShock’s mood incredibly well, and seems to facilitate the idea of a failed utopia undone by its own ambition. It certainly doesn’t hurt that it’s a lovely piece on its own merits.

Bastion: Spike in a Rail

I love every song on Bastion’s acclaimed soundtrack, and Spike in a Rail has to be one of my favorites among them. I love the energy to it; it’s perfect for Bastion’s lively action, and the instrumentation is well suited to the game’s dusty, wild west vibe. The basic beat has a hard edge to it that makes me think of the American frontier, and yet there’s also something fantastical about the whole thing that gives it its own unique flavor. The composer, Darren Korb, describes this combination as “acoustic frontier trip hop”. I can see what he’s getting at, and I like it a lot.

Final Fantasy VII: Cid’s Theme

In a game full of great moments with great songs, Cid’s Theme stands out as one of the most memorable to me. It punctuates the oddly touching tale of a man who wants nothing more than to be the first person into outer space, and has sacrificed everything to get there. When a twist sees him finally make it, this triumphant theme accompanies him. The marching beat and empowering trumpets combine to suggest that dreams can come true, and the chords they produce resonate in a way that makes all his sacrifices seem worth it. It’s a moment that brings a lot of personality to this rich world, and Cid’s Theme is a big part of what makes it so special.

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I played some more Xenoblade Chronicles last week, but I ultimately had to just stop. After spending many hours grinding through yet another zone full of boring, repetitive quests and enemies, I had another, stronger moment where I wondered why I was playing this game. I’m not a fan of MMO style combat in the slightest, and that’s where the vast majority of Xenoblade’s game time is spent. And honestly, I think Xenoblade’s combat is, in a number of ways, even duller than most MMOs. It’s hard to implement interesting strategies without full party control, none of your moves are that exciting on their own, and the pace of combat is incredibly slow... almost as slow as the character progression, both of which are equally unfulfilling.

The zones and quests are also a huge drag. Areas are big, which in some ways is kind of neat, but also makes grinding through them take forever. I have no interest in spending three or four hours in a single area fighting the same monsters over and over, only to move on to another similar, equally large zone. It’s just tiresome. All in all, I came to the realization that Xenoblade really is a single player MMO, and not in the ways I would hope. It take the mundane repetition that causes me to lose interest in MMOs, and stretches it across a 70 hour adventure that, 20 hours in, has yet to grab me with its story and/or characters. That makes the prospect of spending 50+ more hours with the game difficult to stomach. I’m not entirely sure exactly what I’ll do with Xenoblade in the long run, but for now I’m setting it aside. I have much better things I can do with my time, and there are countless better games I could be playing than this.

One last thought on Xenoblade though, which is perhaps the most frustrating part of this whole process. The reception this game has gotten has me completely baffled. Not the fact that people are enjoying it; I get that people have their tastes, and that’s all fine. But I genuinely don’t understand all the talk of Xenoblade being such a revolution. Kotaku’s review of the game sums it up rather nicely:

Fans and reviewers have slapped the game with hyperbolic labels like "the best JRPG of this generation" and "an evolution point for JRPGs," which makes me question whether any of those people actually play JRPGs.

Indeed, who are the people making these claims, and what is their JRPG background? First, Xenoblade is not even a JRPG (much less the best one of this, or any, generation); it’s a single player MMO. Secondly, it’s not an evolution of either JRPGs or MMOs. It’s all stuff that’s been done many times before, and it’s often been done better. Xenoblade is merely a game for people who want to spend 70+ hours grinding in a decent looking setting. Which is fine enough I guess, but it’s not for me at all. Granted, some of the blame is on me on this one; I should have done my research and figured out exactly what this game was before buying it. But as someone who generally likes JRPGs better than MMOs, it’s disheartening to see this game’s reputation be so misleading.

Anyway, after setting Xenoblade aside, I both started and finished Fez during the week. Yes, that includes diving down the rabbit hole to “solve” all of its ridiculous mysteries. I put “solve” in quotes, because I did have to look a few things up. Some of these things (the word “puzzle” is too limiting) were just too abstract to the point where I genuinely don’t think I would have ever figured them out on my own, and certainly not without hours of aimless wandering through the game’s world. The meta nature of some of its logic can be pretty annoying at times, and that’s the worst part about Fez to me. Well, that and its technical problems. Bad frame rate, lockups and potentially faulty achievements are among the issues I’ve encountered, and I’m sure the game has other issues as well.

Otherwise, I really liked Fez. The early parts of the game made great use of its perspective shifting mechanic to introduce some really clever scenarios (something I really liked in Super Paper Mario, and it’s even cooler here). It’s a great combination of platforming and puzzling, and the semi open world map structure is pretty appealing to me. I had a ton of fun just navigating and exploring all the game’s areas during my first run. Then when you get into the new game+, that’s where you realize just how bonkers this game is. There’s an entire layer underneath the basic platforming and puzzle solving that goes in every single direction you wouldn’t expect. You could probably spend a lot longer than I did trying to piece together every single bit of the game’s lore, and I’ve probably spent 10-15 hours with the game already. Not too shabby for a $10 download.

I won’t dive much more into what makes Fez so weird, as seeing that stuff for yourself is a big part of what makes it so unique and interesting. If you have any interest in either a fun platformer and/or puzzle game, or if you just have a soft spot for something completely out there, I would highly recommend giving Fez a shot. I’ve never played anything quite like it, and it was certainly a worthwhile experience. Oh, I also absolutely love its art and music, which is something indie games in general have been nailing lately. Speaking of, the next game I’m looking at playing is Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP; I’ll probably start that later today or tomorrow. And that’s pretty much it for this week, until next time!

Currently playing: Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP

StarCraft II: Wings of Liberty: Theme

There’s a lot to like about the soundtracks of both StarCraft games, and in many ways the titular Wings of Liberty theme from StarCraft II brings it all together under one banner track. This is a lengthy song that hits all sorts of different, exciting notes. It has bold, bombastic action segments, complete with blaring horns and chanting vocals. It has its quieter moments, with a soft piano and violins taking the lead. It also has some suspenseful sections, and the way it opens with the classic StarCraft menu music is just too good. Wings of Liberty has it all, and is a fittingly epic piece for an equally epic franchise.

The World Ends With You: Calling

One of my favorite things about The World Ends With You was how it absolutely nailed its setting, and its soundtrack was no small contributor to its vividly realised world. Shibuya is an eccentric setting highly in tune with pop culture and modern trends, and in that sense the game’s radical mix of J-pop and techno style tracks couldn’t be more perfect. If there’s one downside it’s that it’s hard to pick a single standout track, but Calling illustrates my point as well as any. It just sounds like the kind of thing a city of young, “hip”, culturally focused people would listen to, and goes a long way towards selling this engrossing world.

Super Metroid: Lower Norfair

Lower Norfair from Super Metroid is one of the most iconic Metroid themes. After spending hours exploring Zebes, fighting all sorts of tough foes and overcoming tricky challenges, it’s finally time to head down into the fiery depths of Norfair to confront your nemesis, Ridley. As you descend the elevator, this bold theme starts to slowly fade in. I’ve nicknamed it the “Deathmarch”, as the steady beat that drives the song seems to propel you forward through this incredibly hazardous area. It’s the perfect theme to accompany a soldier embarking on a deadly but critical mission, and helped create one of my most memorable gaming moments.

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As I mentioned two weeks ago, a bunch of friends and family came up to visit last weekend. It was good times; we played a new board game I recently got (Small World, really fun), saw The Art of Video Games exhibition at the Smithsonian, and capped it all off with a Video Games Live concert. The concert was fantastic, and I think the consensus favorites for our group were the God of War suite, Liberi Fatali from Final Fantasy VIII, and Time’s Scar from Chrono Cross. I also really liked the Mega Man and Shadow of the Colossus arrangements they did. Hard to go wrong with any of those, and the National Philharmonic did an awesome job. VGL can often be about celebrating video game culture as much as anything, but the musicians are the ones that make it work. Special shout out to those talented folks.

Anyway, past a little StarCraft I didn’t play any games at all that week (hence no post last weekend), but on Monday I dove headfirst into Xenoblade Chronicles, and have sunk a dozen hours or so into it during the week. I’ll just come out and say it upfront; I don’t understand the hype this game got. I like a good JRPG as much as anyone, but after constantly hearing people say for a year that it “is a revolution for the genre”, “drags the genre into the 21st century”, and “is the best JRPG this generation”, it’s hard not to have impossible standards for the game. Xenoblade is by no means bad, but I find none of those claims to be true. I’m glad people are liking this game, especially given its troubled localization process, but that’s taking it a little far.

More surprising is that I’m not even sure I’d call Xenoblade a JRPG. Sure, it’s a RPG made in Japan (so were the Souls games, and I wouldn’t call them JRPGs either), and its story is very much classic JRPG melodrama. In terms of gameplay, however, Xenoblade is much more World of Warcraft than Final Fantasy. You go from zone to zone, each one containing mobs that you can kill for experience and loot. Each zone has a town of sorts, containing a bunch of NPCs with exclamation points above their heads ready to give you quests of the “kill 5 wolves” variety. Taking the comparison further, characters in your party fill classic MMO roles such as tanks and healers. In fact, a lot of abilities deal specifically with the concept of “aggro” by name, with certain characters clearly designed to draw aggro, while others are designed to avoid it. All of these abilities are also on cooldown timers, just like a MMO. Really, the combat and quests make for purely standard MMO gameplay. Turning JRPGs into a different genre is not quite the same as “revolutionizing” them.

In fact, so far the game feels like a lesser version of Final Fantasy XII to me in a number of ways, which was a game I really liked. FFXII had a lot of similar MMO style mechanics, but didn’t take them quite as far as Xenoblade does (and also did a lot of them better). FFXII felt more like a JRPG/MMO hybrid, where Xenoblade feels more like a pure single player MMO. Initially, this was pretty off putting to me. I generally enjoy standard JRPG gameplay much more than standard MMO gameplay (hence why I'm not a big fan of MMOs), and I definitely had a moment during Xenoblade’s early hours where I questioned if I should even stick with it. I ultimately did decide to keep at it, so hopefully it will pay off.

There are other nitpicky issues I have with the game too. First and foremost, it simply needs full party control. It’s hard, if not impossible at times, to set up obvious combinations like inflicting break, then topple, then daze (effects that have to be applied in succession) when I can only control a single party member. I could also better manage aggro control and healing with full party control, a lack of which makes the game feel less strategic than it should; lacking full party control makes the outcome of battles feel much more dependant on my level and gear than my actual battle strategy, which I’m not a fan of. I also don’t care for a lot of the game’s auxiliary features, such as affinity and gem crafting. Many of these things just feel tacked on without any real substantial consequence, and make the game feel more bloated without necessarily being better. Maybe their purpose will become more apparent as I play more, who knows? Also, the areas of the game that do still feel like a JRPG, namely the story and characters, haven’t grabbed me yet. But it is still early, so I’ll withhold judgement on those for now. Finally, the tutorials are just bad. Nothing else to say about that.

It didn’t get off to the best start, but Xenoblade is slowly growing on me as I keep playing, and it does do a few things that are really neat. First and foremost is the sense of scale it has. The world is absolutely massive, and the environments are expansive and lively, and are a lot of fun to explore. The game also looks and sounds fantastic, though I’ll have to see how well that holds up in the long run; if the environments and music don’t have enough variety to last the entire game their impact could be lessened as I go. I also really like most of the character customization, from selecting and levelling up your Arts (your powers/moves) to the various skill trees. The way some quests are automatically turn in upon completion is also nice, and the fast travel is a good inclusion.

Anyway, that’s my first impression. Like I said, Xenoblade isn’t bad, but it also didn’t give me, as someone who doesn't really like MMO style gameplay, the best first impression. I’ll keep playing and see how it goes; I definitely think it’s only getting better from here. I may also play some Fez and/or Superbrothers: Sword and Sworcery EP (which comes out on PC tomorrow) over the next week or two, both of which look great. So that's all for now, until next time!

Currently playing: Xenoblade Chronicles

Okay, so I might have lied a little last time (unintentionally). After sitting down and actually listing out some songs I’d like to do, I think I’m going to shoot for an additional five entries past what I said last time. In other words, ten more total, including this one. Of course, that’s always subject to change, but I feel pretty confident that this will be the final number. Anyway, on to today’s selection of songs!

Gears of War: Locust Battle

Locust Battle really stood out to me when playing Gears of War, and I think that’s primarily due to the opening beats of the song. They’re forceful and direct, as if to say “The time is now, win this fight!” I love the instrumentation used too; those heavy beats make great use of drums and horns, and sound just as chunky as everything in the game looks. The rest of the song turns into a pretty solid action theme, but it’s those opening beats that make this song memorable to me.

The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker: The Great Sea

The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker’s soundtrack stands toe-to-toe with the best in the series, and songs like The Great Sea are a big reason why; this overworld theme just reeks of pure adventure. The steady drum beats keep the song constantly moving forward, and the various horns have that sweeping, grandiose, larger than life feel. The tempo and chords used seem to perfectly simulate life on the high seas, and makes sailing around Wind Waker’s gorgeous world constantly exciting. The Great Sea is just a wonderful theme to travel the world to, and easily one of my favorite overworld themes out there.

Chrono Trigger: Main Theme

Chrono Trigger has a special energy and enthusiasm to it that is super endearing, and perhaps nowhere is that trait more pronounced than in its soundtrack. The Main Theme is as good as any as channeling that vibe, as it’s incredibly upbeat from start to finish. It’s the kind of exciting, triumphant theme that you want to pump your fist to, which speaks a lot to the nature of Chrono Trigger on the whole. It’s a game that sends you on an epic adventure across many time periods, and sees you perform some awesome feats. The Main Theme punctuates that feeling perfectly.

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I more or less finished three games this week, starting with Mass Effect 3 and Gears of War 3. With ME3 I finished up my insanity run and grinded out that 5,000 kills achievement. That means I have a S-Rank on it for now, though we all know there will be DLC later. The last few missions weren’t as tough as I was expecting them to be on insanity; the game overall wasn’t that hard, but maybe that’s just due to me having played a whole lot of Mass Effect at this point. Anyway, despite the promise of future DLC, there was a nice sense of closure to putting ME3 back on the shelf for now. Gears of War 3 also went back on the shelf after we finished what we wanted to do in Raam’s Shadow. That didn’t take long, but it was fun. Who knows what the future holds for Gears at this point, if anything.

After all that, I wanted a short game to play this weekend. After looking into how Blockbuster does its business these days (I haven’t rented a game in years), I ended up renting Asura’s Wrath and beating it in less than a 24 hour period. That game is absolutely ridiculous in the best ways possible. If anything, it was a loud reminder of how boringly “serious” a lot of games are (or maybe “seriously boring” would be a better phrase). I happen to like it when games just let go, chuck that dark and gritty vibe that seems to be mandatory in 90% of games, and become everything you don’t expect. That’s the main reason I liked games like No More Heroes and Bayonetta as much as I did, and Asura’s Wrath is similar in that regard.

In terms of how it “plays”, however, Asura’s Wrath doesn’t really have a close relative. The vast majority of it is pretty much quick time events matched to the most incredible action cutscenes I’ve probably ever seen. Normally I don’t like either quick time events or too many cutscenes, but when your starting point is a demigod the size of a planet poking at you from outer space, I’m on board. Asura’s Wrath puts no ceiling on anything, and constantly one-ups itself with sheer scale and audiovisual splendor. The game simply looks and sounds absolutely amazing; you know the animators and sound teams had a total blast with this game. As cliche as it is, I genuinely can’t think of another game that is consistently this epic and over-the-top, and it does it all with a level of pure energy and enthusiasm that’s super refreshing.

That’s the good about Asura’s Wrath. There are other action sections outside of the quick time events that aren’t so great. They range from God of War style character action stuff to Space Harrier style shooting sections, and none of it is interesting. It’s all pretty rote, there are constant camera annoyances and the controls don’t even feel that responsive. Still, none of these sections last that long. I always appreciate it when a game knows why you’re playing it, and Asura’s Wrath absolutely does. It does its best to get you through those action sections as fast as possible, and back to the glory of its quick time events and cutscenes. I seriously doubt the total time for the action sections comprised even a fourth of the total time I spent with the game. It’s great that these sections are so short, but it also makes me wonder why they’re in there at all.

Perhaps it’s pure padding; Asura’s Wrath is a super short game, which is part of the reason I decided to play it this weekend. I would guess it took me no more than 8 hours (maybe less), and I have no interest in playing it again. That suited my needs perfectly, but it also makes it a weird game to judge as a $60 retail item. On the one hand, that’s much less playtime than your average video game gets you per dollar. On the other hand, that’s about on par with what you’d get from buying movies. 8 hours at $60 is equivalent to 2 hours at $15, which is about what you’d pay for a new DVD release. And seeing as Asura’s Wrath is basically a long (and spectacular) movie, it makes some kind of sense. I guess it all depends on how you approach it. I rented it, so I don’t have to make that deliberation, but I could see the pricing being a serious deterrent for a lot of people.

That’s probably the main thing holding Asura’s Wrath back in all honesty. I had an absolute blast with it, and think it’s one of those games that is just worth seeing in whatever way you can. It's quite the spectacle. Whether it’s worth $60 or not, that’s going to vary from person to person. Moving on, the next thing on my plate is Xenoblade Chronicles, which comes out this Friday; I’ve been looking forward to that for a while. I won’t be playing it over the weekend though, as a bunch of friends are coming up for the weekend, which should be a lot of fun. So I may or may not have a post next week, but will certainly be up and running again two weeks from now, and should have some initial thoughts on Xenoblade by then. Anyway, that’s all for now, until next time!

Currently playing: Nothing specific until Xenoblade Chronicles comes out!