Damage Control

What Mega Man Universe Looks Like

By Geoffrey Barnes on September 2, 2010 6:05 PM | No Comments

Despite being announced a little before the Comic Con in mid-July, and despite the Comic Con passing with Capcom attending the event, we finally received our first look at Mega Man Universe today, on the advent of this year's Penny Arcade Expo. Actually, that should be "looks," because Capcom cleverly sent different gameplay videos to various websites, namely IGN, Gamespot, and 1up. They're all prefaced by an introduction by Keiji Inafune and tease Ryu (from Street Fighter), but contain different gameplay with different iterations of Mega Man. And the game looks...well, it's something, to put it lightly.

The game resembles what a lot of people feared Mega Man 9 was going to look like prior to its unveil: a cheap, low budget 2.5D platformer with mediocre animation. That's not to say I think the game will turn out bad, of course. Mega Man Powered Up for PSP had a similarly repelling art style with mechanics that weren't quite as tight as the original, but it was nonetheless a pretty enjoyable game with a great level editor. In fact, this game's art style is the complete antithesis of MMPU's. People made some good levels with that, and if this game is a spiritual successor to that game, then more power to it.

The Mega Man's used are the most hilarious aspects of the trailer. The Gamespot version uses "Bad Box Art Mega Man," an SD version of the dude shown on this cover. He's pretty hideous, yeah, but that's intentional. He could be a fun novelty to have as a playable character. 1up's version uses "Rockman" which is the Mega Man (Rockman in Japan) you've come to know and love. The IGN one uses "Mega Man" which I guess is the western interpretation of what Mega Man looks like, as evinced by Mega Man 3 and 4's NES covers, i.e. not taken to the extreme like Mega Man 1 and 2's covers. He also has some big eyebrows, which make him look pissed. Angry Kirby Syndrome lives on!

The appearance of Ryu (No way) is likely a hint that there will be plenty of selectable characters. How many there could potentially be is unknown, but Capcom has themselves a guaranteed sale of Morrigan makes it in. Heck, maybe they'll let you make your own characters.

Capcom's still being awfully secretive about what MMU actually is, so maybe they'll elaborate on it more either over the weekend or at the Tokyo Game Show, which begins in precisely two weeks. The first look here makes me a little pessimistic as to how it'll turn out, but I'd like to think Inafune has our best interests in mind. Then again, sometimes I don't know about him.

Image stolen from NeoGAF.

Vanquish Demo Impressions

By Geoffrey Barnes on September 1, 2010 7:05 PM | 2 Comments

Quick answer: it's utterly fantastic. Download it immediately if it's available in your territory.

Anyone who's a little tired of the usual third-person shooter doldrums might be looking forward to Vanquish, Platinum Games and Shinji Mikami's next title. The result, at least thus far, is pretty much what you would expect from a team that's clearly done their homework. It's a game whose style represents the best of what goes into western-developed cover system-laden TPSs and Japanese action games, culminating in something that's completely wild and fantastic.

There isn't much to the demo. It runs through the third part of the first mission, providing a taste of battling with normal enemies -- some of which are using assorted machinery and turrets -- one bigger enemy, and a boss. It's also pretty tough, but not hard enough to be too overbearing. It's certainly not as esoteric as games like God Hand and P.N. 03 were initially, and it doesn't seem as niche audience-aimed as those either, based purely on its aesthetics. Finishing the demo should take you no more than 20 minutes.

Your protagonist, Sam Gideon, has a lot of techniques. Thankfully there's a training section that will help you become acclimated to the controls; and more importantly, it's separate from the demo level. It's one of the most interactive, well-paced training modes I've played in a while, and it makes the training sessions in a lot of other games look amateurish in comparison. It's also packed with plenty of hilariously corny dialogue. Having a lot of techniques at your disposal means you'll have plenty of options to dispatch enemies. If you like the game, you'll likely replay it plenty of times to see how many different ways you can approach it.

There are plenty of weapons at your disposal, too. Four, in fact: heavy machine gun, assault rifle, shotgun, and sniper rifle, the last of which can be located in the first stage. (There are five if you want to include the rocket launcher and disc launcher, but you only get to play with those in a short training session.) The first two weapons there use rapid fire, so you'll likely run out of ammo on at least one of them. If you do, there are crates around that contain extra weapons, and it only takes picking up one to fully replenish your ammo. If you already have full ammo for that weapon, you'll enhance the weapon itself.

The "so bad it's good" dialogue seems to be a trademark of Mikami and his team. The storyline isn't even a tertiary concern in a game like this, but having dialogue and characters that parody other works that involve the tough guy attitude is swell.

Demos are in no way an indicator of what the entire game will contain, so I hope the final version of Vanquish will have as much variety as what was on display here. It releases in October. Look forward to it.

P.S. For a fun little Easter egg, press L2 or LB (depending on which system you have) while you're in cover mode.

Recommended Soundtracks: Castlevania: The Adventure Rebirth

By Geoffrey Barnes on August 31, 2010 4:59 PM | No Comments

Oh look, I'm breaking my "don't discuss newer soundtracks" clause, and I almost feel bad about it!

But that's mainly because this isn't the usual Recommended Soundtracks entry. Castlevania: The Adventure Rebirth has some quality tunes, all of which use older technology that sounds like it's coming from a Genesis cartridge (though it admittedly sounds slightly better than that). It's a great way to pay homage to older games, especially if games in that genre aren't being made anymore. In that way, I'm recommending the soundtrack; and it's pretty easy to digest since it's a small soundtrack.

It's packaged together with Contra Rebirth's soundtrack.

I also want to discuss the game's soundtrack because it does something many Castlevania games don't do: remix lesser known tracks. The developers behind the upcoming Castlevania: Lords of Shadow have expressed interest in providing orchestral remixes of older tracks that fans are particularly fond of. That sounds fine on the surface, until you realize it probably means remixing "Vampire Killer," "Bloody Tears," and "Beginning" for the 10th time (a figurative guesstimate, but I wouldn't be surprised if that was literally accurate). They're all perfectly quality tracks, but does anyone really need another remix of these?

(And yes, I know this game also has a remix of "Vampire Killer." I guess it's a prerequisite.)

The fine folks responsible for Rebirth's soundtrack apparently realized this and decided to remix some tracks that weren't fan favorites, with the main job of remixing them being left to Manabu Namiki. They're redone versions of tracks that were (and are, really) woefully underappreciated but every bit as good as those aforementioned classics, and clearly someone thought they deserved another look.

Of course, the preferable alternative would be to have compositions of new music that's every bit as good as the older material. Nothing wrong with throwing in a few remixes, though.

"Reincarnated Soul" plays during the game's first stage, and originally comes from Castlevania: Bloodlines for Genesis, where it was also used for the first stage. It's almost remarkable to see how similar they sound, but that's not surprising. There's no problem with that either. Usually the best tracks from older console games are the first to be remixed, so who knows why this one hasn't been remixed yet. I would have loved to hear it in Portrait of Ruin, given that it's a sequel to Bloodlines. That's not a complaint, though, since PoR is chock full of fine tunes:

"New Messiah" is used for the third stage, and is originally pulled from Castlevania II: Belmont's Revenge for Game Boy, the only good Castlevania game on that system. The Adventure Rebirth is a reimagining of the original Game Boy game Castlevania: The Adventure, so it's fitting that it should include a track from another older portable title. Rebirth wasn't any good, so it desperately needed a remake. Both older Game Boy games have some excellent-though-woefully unappreciated tracks, so don't be surprised to see them pop up in a future entry:

"Aquarius" is used for the game's fifth stage, the final full stage, and originally hails from Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse for NES. This is one of my favorite Castlevania tracks ever, and I'm glad to see it get remixed. Again. It was also featured in Castlevania: Circle of the Moon for GBA. That version is noticeably mellower, and I prefer the version with more of a beat:

For how brief the game is, it sure has a nice variety of remixed tracks. The irony here is that's also precisely the main problem with the soundtrack. Castlevania: The Adventure still has a bunch of tracks clamoring for a remix, and this game would have been the perfect opportunity to showcase them. Hoping the LoS team considered some unappreciated tracks as viable candidates for remixing is admittedly a pipe dream, so I hope they decide to use them if there are more "Rebirth" games.

Geek News Roundup for 08/22/2010 - Life, Liberty, and Blog Taxes

By Angela Moseley on August 30, 2010 9:02 AM | 1 Comment

First of all I want to apologize in advance. I won't actually be mentioning anything about Scott Pilgrim vs. The World in these first few paragraphs. At the very least I will mention some Scott Pilgrim news so the picture above isn't a complete bait and switch.

In a bit of local flavor an article printed in Philadelphia Citypaper on August 18th got quite a bit of traction. The story centered around how two Philadelphia bloggers reported the meager advertising revenue their blogs brought in when they filed their income taxes and were promptly sent a letter by the city. The city considered their blogs to be a business operating within Philadelphia and demanded they pony up either $50 per year for a business privilege license or $300 for a lifetime license. Philadelphia, among other cities requires anyone running a business (including freelance work) to apply for a business privilege license in order to do business within the city and to pay taxes on income earned. Somehow the story was misinterpreted as a brand new tax on all blogs even ones that don't earn income and the story went national. Many people likened it to an attempt by the government to stifle freedom of speech via taxation.

The following week Citypaper ended up printing a clarification covering some of the original article's misconstrued facts and even a Philadelphia-based Wired.com contributor worked to dispel a few myths. In short, only bloggers who actually earn income on their blogs and report it on their taxes would need to pay for a business license for technically running a business. If the said blogger doesn't bring in revenue from a blog then there is no need to ever pay the fee. (Or the blogger could simply not report earnings at tax time especially if it is a paltry amount of money.) Is a $50 dollar per year or $300 dollar lifetime fee high for a blogger who brings in a tiny amount of revenue-- perhaps just a dozen dollars a year, unfair? Yes, and regressively so. For example, a media giant such as The Philadelphia Inquirer would have to pay the same license fee as the small-time blogger despite the huge differences in profits. If the fee was progressive the small-time blogger (and other very small businesses) would either pay a much smaller fee or the fee would be waived. In the end the story seems to be less about unprofitable blogs having to pay for a business privilege license and more about outdated city laws that aren't keeping pace with reality. (Damage Control doesn't run advertising and I do not claim the blog as a business on my tax returns.)

If you're a frequent Gmail user you probably noticed Google Voice, the newest feature to be added to the e-mail service. The service allows Gmail users in North America to make free calls anywhere in the United States and Canada and international calls are fairly cheap. Many people naturally made the assumption Google was going after Skype. Google's real target may actually be Facebook. In the meantime Facebook is happy to sue anyone who uses the "book" ending on their social networking sites. Gotta protect that brand recognition! And one more recognizable brand may be headed for bankruptcy. Blockbuster has made plans to file for bankruptcy. As expected the company's downfall lies in popular services such as Netflix, Redbox, iTunes, and various internet video sites. While brick and mortar video rental services continue to falter the movie industry itself is still chugging along. Although the quality of movies over the years have become questionable the occasional gem comes along. Scott Pilgrim vs. The World is one such gem and the BBC highlighted some of the comic book to film adaptations. Amusingly enough, the film has been covered more by the British media than the U.S. media. Perhaps because Edgar Wright directed this film? Anyway, Scott Pilgrim is destined to become more of a geek cult classic. Also, if you haven't seen the film I do recommend it as a strange but fantastic video game movie.

If you frequently buy Xbox Live Arcade codes from Amazon.com you might be in for a surprise. The practice has come to an end and the reason is unclear, yet Amazon still sells MS points cards, Wiiware game codes, and PSN game codes. To further add to the confusion GameStop is now beginning to sell XBLA game codes in its stores. In less confusing Microsoft news anyone who illegally downloaded a leaked copy of Halo: Reach and played it while connected to Xbox Live now faces a permanent ban. If you can't stop gamers from pirating a game you can at least inconvenience them with a ban. In Sony news, the company wants to focus the PSP brand on a younger audience. Such a move is mildly amusing given the PSP's original target audience. Going for a younger demographic works for Nintendo and it could work for Sony, though Nintendo has always had a lock on younger gamers. If this is Sony's way of proving the PSP isn't dead yet (which is isn't) I'm all for it, besides JRPG fans can only do so much for sales. And who says Life-sized Gundams could never do anything for charity?

Image shamelessly stolen from the BBC website.

Late to the Nanomachine Tomfoolery -- Metal Gear Solid 4

By Geoffrey Barnes on August 29, 2010 1:07 PM | No Comments

If someone were to ask me what my succinct opinion was after playing Metal Gear Solid 4, I wouldn't be able to give them a straight answer. It's not that I can't put together precisely what I thought of the game, but it's impossible to answer that question as quick as someone would like.

That hesitation arises because MGS4 is a very uneven game. It has plenty of good parts; heck, some of it is actually pretty damned brilliant, with some of the best sequences I've ever seen in a game -- interactive or not. The problem, then, is that it falls flat on its face just as often, with the game itself taking a backseat to the excess narrative and exposition. Basically, it doesn't play to its inherent strengths as often as it should.

The battlefield is something we've never had in an MGS game. It's a welcome and fun edition.

MGS4 features a much older Solid Snake in appearance despite taking place in 2014, a mere five years after Metal Gear Solid 2. Snake has been aging rapidly due to a seemingly unknown genetic defect, and he doesn't have much longer to live. Despite that, he's still undertaking a mission he received from Colonel Campbell: kill Liquid Ocelot. Liquid's taken residence in the Middle East, and Snake will have to wade through the opposition and rebels to make it to him. Good thing you can make it easier by siding with the rebels.

And siding with them is pretty fun too. It not only makes progressing through areas easier, but gives a new dynamic to a Metal Gear game. The controls have been overhauled to make the game feel more like a shooter as well. You can tell that series creator and director Hideo Kojima, along with Kojima Productions, paid attention to specific criticisms from the previous games, and it shows with the controls. The main problem before was that it was impossible to jump out and firefight someone in the older games if you were spotted; this is now possible. It's not as easy as it would be in your average third-person shooter (you have to hold L1 to shoot), but it's fine for a game and franchise that encourages stealth.

It's still possible to play stealthy, though. It's just going to be a little harder.

The camouflage system is back from Metal Gear Solid 3, and its fine tuning is further proof of Kojima paying attention to criticism. The introduction of the camo system added a new sense of veracity then, but it became tiresome going into the menu to keep changing it by the end of the game. Now, it's streamlined with Old Snake outfitted with an Octocamo suit that changes automatically to blend with the environment to keep your camo index up. It sure wouldn't have had a place during the Cold War (when MGS3 takes place), but it does in the near future.

MGS4 also finally deals with the problem of enemies having ID locked weapons that you couldn't take when you either K.O'd or killed them, something you couldn't deal with in the first two MGS games. Now you can! For a price. There's a guy named Drebin (one of many, but this one has a thing for you) who can remove the IDs for you by paying him Drebin Points (DP). He'll also sell you weapons and ammo, though the former can be very expensive. You accrue DP by collecting weapons you already have, though you empty out the ammo first. It's true that it makes the game a little too firefight friendly, but it's a blessing when you're fighting alone. I loved it when I was in need of some tranquilizer ammo.

The instruction booklet also spends pages describing how to survive in the battlefield. A shame that setting is dropped one-third of the way in. The biggest problem with MGS4 is the glaringly obvious cut scene to gameplay ratio. Anyone who's played a Metal Gear Solid title before knows they can be unbelievably talky and preachy, but the cut scenes mostly weren't too unnecessarily long. MGS3 has the best of the aforementioned ratios -- among one of the reasons why that game is hailed as the best game in the series. This is one strength MGS4 does not play to in the least.

I was thrilled to see the briefings come back from MGS1. I wasn't thrilled to see that a couple of them are excessively lengthy.

MGS4 has plenty of cut scenes that are unnecessarily long. In what was Kojima's way of making the game more cinematic and movie-like, the character models have excessive gesticulations during many of its scenes, most of which only serve to lengthen them. It gave me flashbacks to Star Ocean: Till the End of Time, which had the same problem - though it's honestly not as bad as that game's. This is the answer to people who complained about too many Codec scenes before, and if you did I hope you're feeling sorry for yourself. I kind of dinged the comic book-style cut scenes that popped up in some of the PSP titles in lieu of CG ones before, and that's something I need to apologize for. After playing this game, I welcome them wholeheartedly.

The dialogue could also be a problem. No, not because it's full of cheesy moments, which is a series staple at this point. The truth behind some of the plot holes induced by MGS2, especially in the crazy last two hours, are unveiled in this game. Quite a few of them are confounding, with explanations that are either mind-boggling or, worse, retcon events from the last three games. Those explanations make the actions of some characters in the older games completely bizarre.

There are quite a few familiar faces here. But there are a lot of new ones too.

But wait, there's more! Another sticking problem is in how frequent cut scenes are, especially in the last three Acts. It's heartbreaking to see only Acts 1 and 2 follow in the footsteps of what MGS3 (and MGS1 before that) established, because the rest of the game doesn't have as much, well, game. You'll be watching more than playing, witnessing the bulk of the game's nine hours of cut scenes. Yes, NINE hours. To put that in perspective, that's more than Xenosaga: Episode I, which had seven-and-a-half. Most of the scenes and story revelations near the end are enough to make anyone who bashed MGS2's zany finale feel bad.

And man does Kojima know how to play to his fanbase. This game was supposed to be the series grand finale, the all-encompassing Metal Gear Solid title. As such, it's pack to the brim with homages and fan service. Quite a bit of it is lovely, and many of them are very clever for a video game. And all of the boss battles are homages to the first MGS game, down to having similar names. Some of it can become a little overbearing and fall flat a few times.

The robots aren't quite as fun to fight as humans, but they would be if you were playing this guy.

You can't deny how top-notch the presentation is, however. It may be a two-year-old game, and a game may have come to knock it off its throne as the best-looking PS3 exclusive since then, but it still looks fantastic. The voice acting is also as good as you'd expect from an MGS title. Everyone from the older games returns to reprise their role, and this is definitely David Hayter's best performance of Snake in the series. The music is also good, but I was disappointed to see that Norihiko Hibino didn't compose a single track. He only served as the soundtrack's director. I like Harry Gregson-Williams' material just fine, but I usually like Hibino's contributions the most. On the whole, the OST isn't quite as memorable as the last few games in the series. And you can tell there are many points where the Metal Gear theme would have played, but couldn't thanks to copyright issues.

When you think about it, Kojima tends to pump out his best work when he doesn't pay attention to his fan base. MGS4 is a game whose mere existence is living proof of how there is such a thing as too much fanservice, in a non-sexual way (though if you like the sexual kind, there's plenty of that too). There's an utterly brilliant game in here, but it's drowned deeply into the recesses of a river rife with excess pandering. That's precisely what's so upsetting about the end result of this game, and it's a crying shame that it's from a person...well, people capable of putting out much better work.

Puzzle Quest 2 - Yet More Bejeweled Battles

By Joseph Daniels on August 28, 2010 2:54 AM | No Comments

Note: this is a review of the PC version that was released on Steam earlier this month

Lo and behold, as soon as the world was starting to get sick of Konami's Puzzle Chronicles, Namco has released Puzzle Quest 2 onto Xbox 360, DS, and now Steam. It seems the world has fallen in love with games where you match three icons together to tell a story.

This entry in the genre is probably the first that I've seen that qualifies as a sequel, and yet it's more a sequel in the Final Fantasy way than in the God of War way, especially if you consider it's actually the third Puzzle Quest game and not the second.

First of all, Puzzle Quest 2 navigates very differently than the first one. In the first Puzzle Quest, characters wandered around a world map that resembled a Final Fantasy Tactics map: there were set paths around the world that your character had to follow, and they occasionally ran into monsters that they had to kill by swapping gems around and matching them. In Puzzle Quest 2, the original system was thrown out in favour of a Torchlight-style isometric view of the world. There is only one city in Puzzle Quest 2, as opposed to the number of cities in the first game, and instead of selecting options from a menu (which seems to be a staple in games these days), your character can actually navigate around the city manually. Thanks to this system, the world feels more open and explorable than in the first game.

As for the battle system, thy couldn't call it Puzzle Quest and change the battle system, could they? So in Puzzle Quest 2, the battle system returns. Players match three coloured gems to build their mana pool up, and when they have enough power saved up, they can then unleash a spell to attack their opponent or increase their own defense, etc. The board also contains skulls, which inflict damage upon the opponent when matched, and new action gems which build up action points just like coloured gems build up mana points and can be used to inflict physical damage when enough of them are saved up. The big difference between physical damage and magical damage is that it's possible for physical damage to become critical if you're lucky enough for the game's random number generator to roll in your favour. If four gems are matched, the player is granted an extra turn and if five are matched, an extra turn is awarded and a wild gem is added to the board. If the player is lucky and enough of a chain reaction is triggered, it becomes a Heroic Effort, which grants bonus experience and an extra turn, and places a wild gem on the board.

OMGWTFPOLARBEAR!

But speaking of the random number generator, it seems like some of the enemies curry favour with it. It's like supernatural luck is a racial bonus for the Imp, for example. How I hated them with a passion. Sometimes, they seemed to know exactly what they had to do to set a Heroic Effort in motion, and they would do it each time. But: while other reviewers seem to think that the computer is a cheating bastard (they claim it knows what gems are coming next and can plan ahead), I think that the AI programmed into the game is supernaturally lucky and at the same time dumb as a sack of doorknobs. I cannot count how many times the AI was able to pull an awesome move out of its ass and find a way to dominate the board far longer than it should've, only for it to ignore some of the more obvious moves and do something stupid and futile in the very next turn. Certain enemies had healing abilities that required pieces drawn from the board, and I actually saw them try to use it when none of the gems it needed were present to be taken. Quite obviously, they healed themselves for 0 HP.

Also, I found that I couldn't always trust the helpful hint that the game automatically provides. Oh, I could trust it when it was pointing out where I could match four or five gems, but when it was suggesting a regular three gem match, I found that more often than not, it was suggesting a move that would set the enemy up for something nice. It's as if the game only hinted the four and five gem matches because it was obligated to, not because it wanted to, and got revenge by hindering me whenever possible. At one point, I tried setting the hint to wait a while before showing up, just because I felt the game was too easy with it, but short of turning it off completely, it seems to show up whenever it wants to, no matter if you asked it to show up right away or after some time has passed.

I don't know what the appeal is in PC RPGs to completely randomize what equipment shows up in shops and in treasure chests. I didn't even visit the weapon and armour shops in this game, and didn't try shopping at the blacksmith's, either. If I happened to pick up a piece of equipment that was better than what I previously had, then I equipped it and sold the old piece. That's about it. The only money I spent was when I went to improve my equipment at the aforementioned blacksmith's.

The first game made you play mini-games to do everything. And I mean everything. If I wanted to use the blacksmith's, I had to play a match-three mini-game. If I wanted to learn a spell from a captured enemy, I had to play a pre-set match-three mini-game. Etc. This time around, the blacksmith does his thing automatically. I still learn spells in a pre-set match-three mini-game, but the puzzles seem easier this time around. Or maybe I was just more patient when I solved them all. I don't know. New match-three mini-games involve picking locks, bashing down doors, magically unlocking doors, and searching the room for hidden traps, gold, or ambushes. It's like the developers realized that the original mini-games were too much of a hassle to play and came up with some better ones instead. Not only that, but they're more forgiving this time around. Winning or losing a mini-game is now determined by whether or not you run out of turns before your objective is met. In the first game, if you reached a position on the board where you could no longer make a move, you lost the mini-game. The one exception is the treasure mini-game. If you run out of moves, then you've taken all the treasure you can get, and the mini-game is declared over.

Lies!

Most of the 50-60 hours it takes to finish the game will be taken up with gem matching, and that's quite a long time to spend in any one battle system, especially when it takes about five to ten minutes to kill enemies late in the game. If the music gets boring, and it's bound to get boring, it's probably a good idea to turn it off and listen to something else for a while. The boss music is kinda epic, but more like LARPer epic rather than Sephiroth epic, so you're not missing much if you do decide you'd much rather match gems with Guns & Roses playing in the background. I'm just happy that the game isn't ugly, too, even if the story is a basic bad guys doing bad things story. Music, you can turn off. Graphics... not so much.

I won't spend much time on the multiplayer aspects, but will mention that there are some. Unfortunately, and I really should address this one of these days, I can be quite the antisocial gamer. I rarely play so-called "party" games, I've Wii Bowled a grand total of three times, and my last foray into MMORPGland lasted one day. I stopped going to Yahoo! Games years ago, same with Pogo after they got rid of my favourite game there, and I've recently turned down an invitation to download and play Left 4 Dead 2 with some of my very best friends. If you're wondering whether the multiplayer mode in Puzzle Quest 2 is any good, I would advise you to try it yourself.

Would I recommend this game? Maybe. If you're a die-hard fan of the match three genre and love playing through games with stories attached to them, then this game will keep you happy until the next company puts out their own version. But if you've grown sick and tired of the genre and just wish it would roll over and die already, the new Kingdom Hearts prequel drops in about a week and a half, and I can guarantee, you won't be matching gems to power the keyblade.

Gaming Harmony

By Angela Moseley on August 27, 2010 6:37 AM | 2 Comments

For the last couple of months I've been collecting video games. Some games are in the form of collector's editions and others are Xbox Live Arcade games. Finding the time to actually play the games has been something of an issue lately. Fortunately I did make time to try out one new game and found it interesting enough to share my first impressions.

To be completely honest if Geoff still had an Xbox 360 he would have either wrote about his first impressions of Castlevania: Harmony of Despair or had a review up by now. After all, he's a pretty big Castlevania fan. I've only played Symphony of the Night (which Geoff introduced me to) and a small amount of Castlevania: The Adventure ReBirth. Despite my lack of serious experience I found Harmony of Despair too intriguing to pass up, so I downloaded the game and played it for a few hours. I started out with Soma Cruz and familiarized myself with the controls. (Given my previous experience with SotN Alucard might have been a smarter choice.) I found the game to play pretty similar to SotN instead of ReBirth which I'm thankful for-- as ReBirth's controls are a constant struggle for me. Soma started out with an unwieldy axe and the ability to toss skeleton bones. Honestly, I found the ability to gather enemy skills and summons more useful than Soma's default weapon. After making it to the boss and losing I tried again the following night.

It was at this point a friend of mine logged on to Live and sent me a game invite. We struggled to get a co-op session going at first but found success in setting up a private two player game. He played as Shanoa and I kept Soma. I knew he'd played the game several times before over the past few nights but the difference in our abilities and character levels became clear very quickly. As my Soma awkwardly slashed at enemies with a recently acquired sword, his Shanoa easily blasted them with magic and the rest were efficiently put down with melee attacks. He then began to use mounts in the wall to propel himself up while I was stuck platforming. Finally I asked him "How the hell are you doing that?!" and he replied, "She has magnets." With a mental sigh and feeling terribly underpowered I continued on. We eventually made it the boss where I was killed but he was able to beat it. At the very least I was able to hit the boss with bones in skeleton form until I was revived. After the fight I took a moment to equip the items I'd found before we played the first chapter again. As we played he explained some of the more obscure controls to me. Eventually we made our way to the boss again and on our second go I was able to help slay it without dying.

First and foremost playing at least one 2D Castlevania game is a prerequisite before even attempting to play Harmony of Despair. If I had not played a single Castlevania game before playing HD I would have found this already difficult game even harder to play. Secondly, playing with a friend or several friends is a much more rewarding experience than going at it alone. Actually, this game focuses so heavily on co-op that attempting to finish it alone may be nearly impossible. While some many find the 30 minute time limit to be a drag I found it to be more than enough to time to reach the boss, although I can't say the same for later levels. I do like the fact that even though death is annoying (in the single player experience anyway) all of your items and power-ups don't go away. This is definitely a game geared toward collecting items and power-ups instead of exploration. I can also understand why fans of traditional Castlevania games might be turned off by the experience. Any one up for a challenge with friends, or one hell of a challenge in single player mode will probably get some enjoyment from Harmony of Despair. However, I can't see anyone being satisfied with the lack of proper game instructions, only being able to equip items at certain check points, and the complete inability to pause the game. On a final note, having online-only co-op sounds like a crazy idea until you realize all the money Konami can potentially make by having friends persuade other friends to buy the game in order to play together.

The premium edition of Ys Seven is another game that I recently got my hands on. Unlike Castlevania HD this game quickly went into my pile of unfinished PSP JRPGs. I've never actually played an Ys game but being a sucker for collector's editions (especially from niche publishers) I couldn't pass this one up. I found the game trailers and examples of gameplay to be heartening and the first reviews are fairly positive. It's also nice to know Ys Seven can be experienced without having knowledge of prior Ys games. I might bump this one up in the queue after Persona 3: Portable and Lunar Silver Star Harmony. As for the actual premium addition I was surprised to discover how large the box itself was. The map is surprisingly nice-- nicer than the collector's map that came with Lunar Silver Star Story Complete. I have yet to listen to the soundtrack, and the art book is simply gorgeous. I just hope I find the game to be just as interesting as the collector's edition, unlike Record of Agarest War which I find to be too slow-paced at the moment. Fortunately Ys Seven looks a lot more promising.

Metroid: Other M TV Commercial

By Geoffrey Barnes on August 26, 2010 6:52 PM | No Comments

Nintendo is bringing out the big guns in publishing Metroid: Other M in America. It's not surprising either, it's a game whose content is easy to advertise outside of Japan. Metroid has never been very popular in its home country, but has been much more well received in America. It's funny, because the original Metroid for NES sold a little over a million in Japan, but no other Metroid has come close to that. If Other M sells over 100,000 copies in Japan, it will be the third best-selling Metroid game ever -- though keep in mind that no record of Metroid II or Super Metroid's sales in Japan exist. Nintendo of America definitely knows who to advertise it to here.

But they seriously outdid themselves:

This is the Other M commercial making the rounds on various television networks, and yeah, it's pretty great. It's the best video game commercial I've seen in a very long time.

Nintendo's finally begun advertising games that are aimed squarely at gamers again. There was also a pretty good Sin & Punishment 2 spot aired a while back (though it didn't prevent it from being a sales bomb, sadly), which marked the first time Nintendo advertised a core-aimed game since Advance Wars: Days of Ruin back in January '08:

Speaking of that franchise, Advance Wars is also another series that's had a better time in America than Japan, despite being Japanese. In fact, Days of Ruin never saw the light of day in Japan.

Both of these are pretty cool, so I guess I can forgive them for not publishing Last Window here and apparently passing on releasing Golden Sun: Dark Dawn by the end of the year. It is on track to release in Japan by the end of the year, however, according to its official website. You know what? Golden Sun is another franchise Japanese franchise of Nintendo's that has been more popular in America, though to a lesser extent than the aforementioned two. We seem to have quite a few of those, and they all make for interesting examples.

Metroid: Other M releases for Wii in every major territory next week.

That Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm 2 Demo...

By Geoffrey Barnes on August 25, 2010 6:49 PM | No Comments

...is the shortest, most content-lite demo I've ever played. Seriously, I'm in awe.

Perhaps it's something I should have realized upon seeing that the file size was a mere 240MB, but it still felt threadbare after playing through it. The hypothesis that compression could have been the cause of the small file may have been adequate prior to playing it, but nope. My immediate reaction afterward was wondering whether I missed something, but again, nope. And part of that file size is reserved to having the choice of both English and Japanese languages.

Otherwise, it was a fun five minutes. It consists of merely the first boss battle, which pits Naruto (with Sakura as an assist character) against Kakashi. Prior to the battle, instructions about how to control your character -- well, characters if you want to throw Sakura into the mix, but you only summon here with L1 or R1 -- are plastered all over the screen. The description makes it seem awfully daunting, but upon beginning the battle you'll see how easy it is to play. The battle overall is pretty easy as well, allowing you to easily grok the controls. Please keep in mind that I'm someone who didn't play the first game, so the game's style reminded me mostly of Power Stone.

The presentation is utterly fantastic, with some cel-shaded HD graphics the anime wished it looked like. There are also a few beautiful piano renditions of some of the music from the game. I'm sure Naruto fans are already sold on this game. I haven't been too much of a fan since the original series' descent into the void of fillerville, but I enjoyed the demo. If you're not a fan, I don't know if I can recommend it. If only the demo had more content.

In recent news, looks like Atlus is publishing some Naruto games, namely Naruto Shippuden: Naruto vs. Sasuke for DS and Naruto Shippuden: Dragon Blade Chronicles for Wii. Atlus fans' reaction? Utter rage, and I'd expect nothing less from the internet. Of course, it's all silly since they're merely publishing the Naruto games being localized by Tomy. I'm all for it if this helps Atlus make some money. Besides, they've published much worse. Any company that took a chance on a game like Shiren the Wanderer, which sadly tanked so badly that it probably killed the chances of any other game getting localized in the franchise for a good while, has definitely not sold out. Heck, their name isn't even on the covers.

Cover Art Chronicles: Metal Gear Solid's Cover History, Part I

By Geoffrey Barnes on August 24, 2010 6:39 PM | No Comments

Metal Gear Solid -- and that's strictly speaking about "Solid," not any of the other games in the franchise or the spin-offs -- have had an interesting cover history. It's mostly been rather positive, standing in stark contrast to many other franchises. But in the last few years, they've taken a different turn and adopted an alternate overall style. Not for the better, unfortunately.

Many fans of the franchise, me included, love Yoji Shinkawa's art style that always accompanies the games in the direct franchise, and some of the spin-offs. His art used to be featured prominently on the covers of Metal Gear games worldwide, but for some strange reason, it's something we're not seeing much anymore. That's a shame too, because using art on the cover helps it stand out amongst the legions of generic titles that use CG (sometimes pretty badly) on their cover. The marketing execs of numerous companies seem to believe that consumers, especially in America, prefer to have their covers CG, based on the data they've supposedly obtained. Whether that data is empirical or anecdotal is unknown.

This is exactly what led to the Castlevania: Lords of Shadow cover situation. The standard edition, which most people will buy, has CG artwork for the cover. The LE, aimed at dedicated fans who are usually willing to spend more than most. An argument could be made for the LE not being worth an extra $20 (because it isn't), but that's another post (that I probably won't make). Both covers have received changes since that post, but they're only minor.

Rumor has it that Metal Gear Solid's cover wasn't originally going to be this, but the team working with the game internally fought to have this cover. Glad they did, too, because here we have something that's beautiful in its simplicity. The Japanese cover is the same. The European cover does use Shinkawa's art, but it doesn't come off as well. There's a lesson here: making a nice cover doesn't merely entail using art, but using it efficiently.

All of the covers for Metal Gear Solid 2 use Shinkawa's art, though Japan's is different from what America and Europe received. This cover comparison is actually quite hilarious for anyone who played MGS2 back in the day. The big surprise for MGS2 was that you'd actually be playing a new character named Raiden for most of the game, rather than Solid Snake; the complete opposite of what the hype and American and European cover art would imply. The Japanese cover ruins this surprise, but that's probably not a bad thing considering the negative reaction fans had to being robbed of controlling Snake.

Metal Gear Solid 3 is one of the rare cases of each territory having a different cover. Both Japan and Europe got Shinkawa's art, with the European one being a not-as-good variant of what's present on the Japanese cover. Comparing the two, the Japanese cover immediately wins for including one of the best ~~female~~ characters in video games, The Boss, on the cover. Meanwhile, the American cover takes a different approach, with Shinkawa art being at the top and CG used for the remaining aspects. It's awfully busy, and certainly the least appealing cover, though the CG use isn't quite as bad as some other covers.

Like this one! Apparently someone thought Old Snake's face was incredibly appealing for Metal Gear Solid 4's cover; so appealing that they wanted to show everyone through the cover. It's not, and it's not supposed to be either, which makes for an unappealing cover. A shame Japan's cover suffered the same fate. Surprisingly, though Europe's cover also has a close-up of Snake, it does it using Shinkawa art. It's by far the best of the covers.

In fact, MGS4 has the same situation as the aforementioned Lords of Shadow. I'm saving the LE cover for one of the next entries, though.

This is only the first entry in this series, which should be wrapped up in the next entry. Unless I find something else to talk about.

Sun	Mon	Tue	Wed	Thu	Fri	Sat
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Damage Control

A fantastic and disturbing blend of geek culture and journalism.

What Mega Man Universe Looks Like

Vanquish Demo Impressions

Recommended Soundtracks: Castlevania: The Adventure Rebirth

Geek News Roundup for 08/22/2010 - Life, Liberty, and Blog Taxes

Late to the Nanomachine Tomfoolery -- Metal Gear Solid 4

Puzzle Quest 2 - Yet More Bejeweled Battles

Gaming Harmony

Metroid: Other M TV Commercial

That Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm 2 Demo...

Cover Art Chronicles: Metal Gear Solid's Cover History, Part I

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