Final Fantasy XIII

To say that I was excited about Final Fantasy XIII is a bit of an understatement.  One of my favorite series had been constantly reinventing itself for years, and now had the opportunity to do so on the PS3, which was the best processor to date!  I nearly wet myself in anticipation of a complicated storyline, detailed characterization, menu-driven combat, and angst!  Bring on the angst!

Instead, what I got was a 40 hour life magnet.  You know, because it sucked 40 hours of life away from me like a magnet would for a metalic object.  In this example, my life is the the metalic object.  Nevermind.  Bad analogy.  Fucking magnets...

Remember that thing that Westley was strapped to in The Princess Bride?  You can't tell because of all the bells and whistles, but actually it was Final Fantasy XIII.

And look, there's Count Rugen mashing the X button.

The game starts off with a disenfranchised soldier and a stereotypical black character on a train, preparing to commit a well-meaning act of terrorism against an imperialist force.  Seriously?  I have no problem reusing story material, but this was a little too copy-paste for even me.  At least the soldier is a powerful female pressence?  Wrong.

Listen, "Lightning," if that is your real name (spoilers!  It's not)...  You have a fold-up gunblade thing, and you clearly went to Cloud Strife's School for Jumping Higher Than is Reasonable for your Musculature and Height, but you are no where near the woman I was hoping you'd be.  Celes would waste your puny ass.  Ashe not only played the part, but looked so much better while doing so!  Even Yuna grew a pair in her dress-changing sequel.  Also, can we please comb your hair?  It's driving me batshit crazy.

Straight on the top, wavy at the bottom.  Why?  WHY?

I had hoped the game would become redeeming, but (spoilers!) it didn't.  The game eventually lets you develop your characters, in a Final Fantasy X sort of sphere grid that was designed by people who were deathly afraid of decision making.  You can pretty much only go one direction, so character customization is pretty lame.

The battles, though, that was the heart and soul of all this.  Who cares how I advanced my characters, just so long as I could tactically and strategically... oh?  What's that?  Auto-battle?  You mean, I don't have to do anything?  I literally just mash the X button and hope that the AI is smart enough to beat ... well, itself, I guess?  If Final Fantasy XII's gambit system was like watching a game masturbating, than this battle system was like watching a game trying to swallow its own tongue. 

If I held out any hope for an engaging story, that was deftly bashed against the rocky walls of inanity like so much else in this game.  To even understand half of the shit going on, I had to constantly stop action and read the obviously detailed Compendium of who was who, what was what, and why I cared.  Except, here's the thing: I didn't care!

I guess I finished it.  It's hard to remember, because I've gone through intensive therapy to forget most of what happened.  The thought of playing the game long enough to get every trophy is beyond insipid.  In an attempt to appeal to what was left of the faith I had in the game, there was an ability to continue playing after you beat the game, pretending that your final boss fight was a figment of your imagination, and now with the ability to fully develop each character's roles.  It was like a New Game + that sucked, and I almost never hate that idea.

I recently put FFXIII back in the PS3 to have another go, but found myself quitting in disgust.  I couldn't even bring myself to a second playthrough.  And, I play through every game, at the absolute least, twice.

So, in short, Final Fantasy XIII certainly broke the conventions (as has been the style of FF games), I've come to know, but not in a good way: in fact, in a bad, bad way.

Re: Puzzle Quest

Being colorblind absolutely sucks when you are trying to play puzzle games.

Staying Old School: GBA Metroid Platformers

I've spent the last week or so replaying games in the Metroid series.  In addition to being an absolute nostalgia-fest, I have been delighted that these games have held up so well.  The games have long held a place in my heart for being easy to learn, but difficult to master: collectible upgrades are hidden in the most unlikely (but fun to find) places, and simple, power-up based puzzles.

Also, your main enemy is a brain in a jar.  How cool is that?

Metroid: Zero Mission is a revamped telling of Samus Aran's first adventure to the planet Zebes, upgraded with Super Metroid-esque power-ups.  The game really shines in its execution of the original Metroid game with the new power-ups.  I was impressed particularly by a sections towards the end of the game that stripped you of many of your power-ups and forced you to rely on stealth.  It was excellently done.

Complete with traditional opening area!

The controls are greatly intuitive, which is excellent considering the Gameboy Advance's limited buttons.  And, given the GBA's capacities, the game is brilliant looking.

For a big departure from Zero Mission, I gave Metroid Fusion a try.  The same Super Metroid mechanics apply, but in this game, Samus is infected with X parasites and it greatly changes some gameplay aspects.  Enemies dispatched release their X parasites which recharge energy and missiles/bombs.  Power-ups are obtained by beating bosses who release specialized X parasites and grant Samus the abilities she once had.

If you are craving a stroll through platform-ville, give either of these GBA games a shot.  Good fun without much commitment whatsoever, you could easily blast through these games within a couple hours.

Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow

One day, I'd like to host a conference about conferences.  A meta-conference, if you will.  One of the sections will be named: "Naming Your Conference Sessions: Using Colons to Extend Your Thoughts Way Beyond a Simple Title."

Konami knows something of the use of the colon.  In its (many) series, the brand name is followed by a colon, in order to create a sub-brand using marketing witchcraft.  While it does cause there to be endless amounts of confusion, the method will seem genius once Pokemon runs out of colors (or valuable minerals), or Super Mario Transdimensionalism is released.  Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow is the focus of my colon related scorn (go on, giggle, you know you want to), which I recently got to play through again.  The game was released for the 32-bit Gameboy advance, which so far as you know is how I played it (and not at all on a downloaded "copy" of the game).

Can you feel the 32-bit love?

If you haven't played a Castlevania game before now, you really ought to, and Aria of Sorrow is a good a place as any.  The series is mired in mythos, but the essential storyline involves you (sometimes you're no one in particular, and sometimes you're a Belmont) and the famous Count Dracula and his castle of undead minions.  Very few titles attempt to go much deeper into things, though they go much, much deeper.  However, Aria of Sorrow (and its sequel, for there must always be a sequel, Dawn of Sorrow) are set at the end of a shit-ton of events that occured over several centuries.

You needn't understand any of this of course.  Jump with one button, thrust or swing weapon with another.  Hold up and use your weapon button for a special ability.  Side scrolling, platformer-RPG, and beuaty considering the 32-bit restriction. 

The fun of the game lies in its Soulset system, which allows you collect souls of fallen foes and equip them to your character, Soma Cruz.  Souls don't always appear, but appear with enough frequency to make collecting them fun, challenging, but not hair-pulling.  The game also features New Game Plus, which is like discovering a remaining Oatmeal Cream Pie when you had expected that you'd eaten all of them, but one remains, glistening, waiting for you sumptiously eat it.

No, serious, I love Oatmeal Cream Pies New Game Plus features, especially when they handicap me just a little bit, so the second (third, fourth, eighty-third) play-through continues to be enjoyable.  Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow acheives this in the same way most RPGs do with New Game Plus: by resetting your level.  You keep your uber equipment, all your souls, but you start back at the bottom, and must climb your way back up.  Except this time you've got a huge glowing white sword and the climb is easier, but still enjoyable.

All in all, since I clearly own this game and was able to find it, and did not in any way have to do anything that is questionably illegal to play it, this was worth the ten hours I spooged into it, and will probably serve me good for a few more on a couple extra playthroughs.  Now, I really must look intro procuring its offspring for the Nintendo DS...

Objection! Ace Attorney Titles

"Objection!"  The famous pointer finger thrust!

This past week, I got to spend a good amount of time playing the most recent Ace Attorney title, Ace Attorney Investigations: Miles Edgeworth.  The series focuses on titular attorney, Phoenix Wright (featured above), and his experiences (which, per its Japanese origins, unsurprising involve a half dozen under-age girls) in defending the innocent from vindictive, perfectionist, whip-happy, coffee-addled prosecutors.

The first three titles, Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney, Ace Attorney: Justice for All, and Ace Attorney: Trials and Tribulations, start with a crash in the murder of Phoenix's mentor, Mia.  Phoenix defends her younger sister, Maya, who is framed as the murderer.  Framing is an intense motif with the series, whether it be Phoenix's best friend, Larry Butz, or even his rival (or friend?), Miles Edgeworth.

Detective Gumshoe, the cutest detective ever.

The series also greatly utilizes the notion of spirit mediums, particularly Maya and her young cousin, Pearl.  This fun supernaturalism really completes the overall un-seriousness of the series.  It's goofy fun at its best, especially when Maya channels her dead sister to enhance her bust in order to get a witness to spill the beans.  A story mechanism, the Magatama, also allows you to "unlock" the secrets of people's hearts to better find the truth.

The end of the initial trilogy is some of the best interactive fiction I've had the opportunity to play through.  The conclusion of each episode is incredibly dramatic and heart-warming.

Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney follows the series with Apollo Justice, a young new attorney who ends up working for the now unemployed Wright and his "daughter" Trudy.  Justice has an ability to sense people's lies using a special bracelet.  The story only briefly keeps with the original trilogy, but continues to be good fun.  This game in particular makes great use of the DS touchscreen by completing scientific tasks (finger print analysis, luminol testing, etc.).

Apollo Justice, a.k.a. Herr Forehead.

Another joy of the series is the music and sound effects.  During pivotal court scenes, the music becomes incredibly dramatic to the point of raising my heart rate, and both your character and current prosecutor will shout out "Objection!" to indicate a turnabout in the case.  The "voice acting," such as it is (the few one word shouts) is actually brilliant.

Finally, the most recent title released (and why I started this epic review in the first place) focuses on Miles Edgeworth, Phoenix's first rival prosecutor.  This game is a significant departure from the original games as you actually move Miles through third person crime scenes.  Also unlike the other games, there is no courtroom drama, instead rebuttals about Edgeworth's logic play out, requiring you to use evidence in order to find the truth.

Edgeworth, and his weird ruffle thing.

All in all, the series is a blast, especially if you're into interactive fiction.  The first three games are incredibly difficult to find, even at GameStop, but they are available on Virtual Console for the Wii.

Minecraft

Oh yeah, I'm back from vacation.

No Flash Game feature today, but I thought you might want to know about Minecraft.

It's not a game so much as an awesome Lego emulator with skeletons and zombies and creepers that attempt to kill you when night falls, so my god you better build yourself a fortification to protect yourself, oh my god they're here, they're here, run, run!

Ssssssssssss....

Flash Game Friday: Achievement Unlocked

Yes, I am on an airplane right now, but I'm writing this in advance, because you need a little diversion on Fridays.  After my rant last weekend on trophies and achievements, I figured Achievement Unlocked and Achievement Unlocked 2 would be the perfect games to feature. 

Here's the deal.  You are an elephant.  Why?  Who can say?  You are in a room.  The room has spikes and blocks and everything you do or interact with (essentially) triggers an achievement.  You fell into a pit?  Achievement unlocked!  You stood still?  Achievement unlocked!  You quit playing the game?  Achievement unlocked!

Hey look!  I achieved things!

What starts as a humorous exercise in the ridiculousness of trophies/achievements quickly turns into an obsession to figure out how to achieve every single one.  There's a list for you to see what you need to do, with hints that border on puzzling, but nothing too challenging.

The real shining point is the sequel, which adds additional rooms to your gameplay insanity, lets you panic (exploding yourself), and gives you the ability to poop out pastries (because, why not?).  It also adds a keyboard, teleporting devices, a slot machine, and a big button!

While the gameplay is sheer platforming, plain and simple, the real fun is in the bizarre achievements the game has set.  If you're a gamer, you should get a few laughs out of it.  And if you're not a gamer, it's still an easy to pick up flash game that has you controling a cute little elephant.

Wii Fit

 
We plugged in the Wii Fit, and it's great and we're gonna work out every day and stuff, but two quick things:

1. I highly resent being told that I cannot Hula Hoop.  I hate you Hula Hoop mini-game.  I hate you and your demands that I rotate my pelvis* better.  Screw you!
2. I apologize for ever insinuating to anyone I've ever known that yoga is a loser exercise for lazy people.  Please don't make me do a half-moon crescent thing again.

*Every time my Wii Fit trainer says "pelvis" I giggle.  I'm eight years old.

Dragon Age: Origins

When I first got into Dragon Age: Origins, I had hoped it would be more hack-and-slash than it is.  Don't get me wrong, you hack and you slash, but I was hoping for a button-masher.  Nevertheless, this fantasy title from Bioware did certainly get my attention and keep it!

This RPG (or role playing game) is set in Fereldan, a fictional continent populated with all sorts of mystical, Tolkein-fantasy somesuch: Dwarves who like to drink, mages who are feared for their power, and gay elves.  The story starts in the titular Dragon Age, with a threat looming on the horizon that only you and a band of oddities can conquer.  In writing this review, I'm shocked to find how stereotypical this whole thing sounds.  It's as if the developers just got out of Fantasy Stories 101.

Playing the game, thankfully, these straight-up contrivances are not as easy to spot.  The story is actually rather well put together, and I cared about the fate of Fereldan and its denizens.  There is a great deal of role-playing, as your character is completely moldable, which I enjoy, though there is limited permanency to your decision making.  You can be an outstanding citizen one second and a complete asshole the next and only a few lines of dialogue really seem to change.  There are (blessingly!) a few things you can do which really screw you over in the eyes of some allies, which is a shocking relief.  I'm tired of games that let me insult an ally's every core belief to then have them go "well, okay, I guess I'll stick around, even though you are a huge dickwad, because I know you're going to save the world and shit."

Anyway, for my first playthrough of the game, I pretty much saw an enemy and mashed the X button.  It initialized my attack sequence, but subsequent mashes did nothing, so I pretty much sat there and watched the battle unfold, occasionally quaffing a potion or using my shield to do extra damage with a quickset key.  This is the life of a Warrior in Dragon Age: Origins.  Take damage, deal damage, ho hum.

Things are more exciting as a Rogue, since it actually matters where you stand, but the game really shines if you play the Mage class.  You have a bevy of spells to interact with and it almost feels like you are micromanaging your very own character's actions in trying to achieve throwing a fireball three feet in front of yourself.

Your allies are controlled by an incredibly simplified version of Final Fantasy XII's Gambit system.  The logical parameters are so limiting, you're better off using preselected "roles" to define how they act rather than try to program them yourself.  Yes, you could tell it that when an ally is low on health they should heal that ally, but the companion A.I. is slightly retarded in actually doing anything about most things.  If you really want someone to do something, you need to take control of them and command them to do it, quickly reverting back to your original character, lest he or she run off a cliff without your guidance.

There is a fluid amount of sexuality in Fereldan, allowing you to have same-sex relations with either a female or a male, who can also both be bedded by the opposite gender.  Romance plays a big role in the adventure, which is weird since society is on the brink of civilization, but I spent more hours than a care to talking to Alistair about his daddy issues and finding obscure gifts to give him so that I could get into his pants.

Despite its downfalls, it's a fun fantasy game with solid story and enough replay value to get your money's worth.  I'd recommend picking it up used for a fraction of the cost, especially since its sequel deubts tomorrow.

On the Matter of Trophies

Nursing a slight hangover with some coffee, I began to wonder this morning: why are trophies (if I had an Xbox, they'd be called Achievements) so important to me?

I remember first thinking about this while playing through Bioshock 2, and obsessing over multi-player levels until I could achieve level 40 and finally grasp the platinum trophy for the game.  Why was I doing this?  What did the achievement matter to me?

It's possible it's narcissism.  I need the game to tell me I've done a good job and jumped over all of its defined hurdles.  But, it's more than that.

Trophies are fun to go after (if sometimes frustratingly so), and the feeling of completing them does give me happiness.  But the more comes in the fact that trophy challenges do just that: they challenge me.

The first game I made a platinum trophy in was Bioshock.  In order to obtain the coveted platinum trophy, the game asked for no less than to play it on "Survivor" difficulty, and without the use of nearby regeneration chambers.  Essentially, this meant if I died (which I did; many, many, many times), I would be forced to load from a saved game (which I notoriously bad at keeping up with).  This caused me to come at the gameplay in a completely different way.  And though sometimes I was frustrated, I'd never had more fun.

And back to Bioshock 2 for a moment.  I would never have stuck with the multi-player as long as I did without the incentive to obtain a platinum trophy.  But I loved the multi-player.  I enjoyed it completely!  Especially with my French roommate insisting that I save the girl (a type of Capture the Flag gameplay).

There are plenty of people who insist that trophies and achievements ruin gameplay.  That doing well in a game ought to be it's own reward, and that the goals set are arbitrary.  I completely disagree, and I'm stoked every single time the alert pops up that I got a trophy.  It may be narcissistic, and it may be petty, but I like the game telling me that I'm a good little boy.

Flash Game Friday: The Farplane Wars

The Farplane Wars is a Flash game I discovered via /r/WebGames on Reddit.  The developer himself submitted the game for Reddit's review, so I thought I'd give it a playthrough.

There's a lot going on in this Friday-diversion.  It's largely a resource management/space sim, with some shump (or fixed shooter) gameplay, a little platforming, and a little point and click adventuring.  It's like the developer thought: "why can't one Flash game have it all?" 

While the game is fun enough, I did start to get bored with it.  It's got a fairly good story, considering, and the art, while MS-Paint-ish, fits the mood okay, which doesn't take itself entirely seriously (even though aliens are invading known space, and blah blah blah).  If you're looking for something different, definately check this one out.

Note To Self

Self:

Make sure you check out this neat looking adventure game.  There's a free demo, and you watched the trailer at work and were kind of excited about it.  Also, stop drinking so much coffee, or you're never going to go to sleep. 

Love,
Self

Fallout: New Vegas

Fallout 3 had eluded me when it was first released, but now that I was on the fanboy wagon, I sure as hell wasn't getting off.  So when I heard about the next episode in the Fallout universe, I was eager to sink my teeth into its nummy, possibly irradiated flesh.  Not only would it be borrowing stealing completely reusing the engine of Fallout 3 (Fallout fans weren't really big on this, but I liked Fallout 3, and I was more than happy to be getting what some called a really big expansion pack), but it was set in Las Vegas.

Vegas and video games have a nice history about them.  Vegas Stakes, a Super Nintendo game, was my first introduction into gambling.  The game was nearly purposeless (goal: make money), but I still sank a great deal of my childhood into it.

Now I would be able to experience Vegas, set in a post-apocalyptic world!  And as the main character, I'd surely have a goal of some significance to the region (if not the world), so there would be plenty of story to accompany this game's foray into Sin City, even if my inaugural game was somewhat lacking.

The gameplay in Fallout: New Vegas was a big Ctrl-V from Fallout 3 (similar weapons, V.A.T.S., menu screens, etc.), but it did implement a few substantial changes: speech challenges increased in complexity, the small guns and big guns skills that were delineated before were merged into "Guns," and a "Survival" skill was added.  The ssurvival skill was particularly important for those playing the game on "Hardcore Mode," which would require the player to eat, drink, sleep, and recover from injuries in a more realistic way. 

During my first playthrough, I was incredibly nervous.  I still considered myself lucky to point my guns in the correct direction, and decided to play without "Hardcore Mode" engaged.  On the second (and subsequent) playthrough(s), I decided a spice of adventure was just what the game called for. 

I have had trips to the mailbox which I would classify as more hardcore than F:NV's "Hardcore Mode."

Don't get me wrong, the mode created some new complexity to the game, which may or may not have been challenging, but food, water, and places to nap are relatively frequent in the Mojave Wasteland.  But hardcore it was not.  The only substantially upsetting difference was that recruited characters could actually die when you had "Hardcore Mode" engaged, which was somewhat sad, but also somewhat of a relief as they were responsible for violating my stealth protocols to summon Cazadors to come and disembowel me.

The game gets a huge nod from me for being very, very, gay friendly - and not just in a shallow way!  A perk you can take early on, Confirmed Bachelor, gives you unique dialogue options with the same sex.  And while this could have been a token nod to LGBT fans of the series, there is actually some discourse on how gay and lesbian relationships are perceived, which heartily deepens the story.  I initially was predisposed to help the New California Republic (or NCR), which were who I perceived as the "good guys," but when I discovered that they frown on same-sex relationships, which are openly embraced by the slavers of Cesar's Legion, I thought maybe that was the way to go (the Legion transpired to be awfully patriarchal, so I went with the killing everyone strategy; let god sort 'em out).

The game also gets further nodding for its depth of story.  Fallout 3 featured a broad world, but what Fallout: New Vegas lacks in explorable square footage, it more than makes up in depth of its characters, story, and side quests.  There are four ways to beat the game, depending on to whom to pledge your allegiance, and gameplay is unique enough for each playthrough to keep me coming back.  Each faction in the Mojave has their own story to tell (or learn about from picking through the belongings on their bullet-ridden corpses).

The voice acting is pretty excellent, too.  Felicia Day voices a companion with whom I loved having close to me, mostly because it was like the real Felicia Day was sitting next to me, assuring me that everything was going to be okay, before punching the crap out of a Wasteland Raider.

The big problem with this game was glitches.  If I moved while reloading a weapon, or talked to an ally while enemies were approaching us in preparation to hack us to pieces, or I looked at my controller the wrong way, the game would freeze.  A freeze every blue moon is one thing, but it happened all the time.  And for an immersive game like Fallout: New Vegas, a sudden reminder that you are - in fact - alone on the couch and not heading towards the glitzy remnants of Las Vegas, is even more crushing.

All in all, I'd say Fallout: New Vegas is one of my favorite games, in spite of its glaringly frustrating freezes.  If you haven't picked it up and you like this sort of thing, I'd really recommend you do so.