The Legend of Zelda: The Skyward Sword

Skyward Sword takes place largely above the clouds.

Skyward Sword represents the first Zelda title for the Wii (as Twilight Princess was simultaneously released for both the Wii and Gamecube).  It also boasts itself as the first game in the chronology of over-arching Legend of Zelda story.

The game begins in Skyloft, a floating island town of bird-riding humans who are giving the bountiful land above the clouds as a gift from the goddess after her banishing of an ancient evil.  If you've played a Zelda game before you will not be surprised to discover that the banishment of that ancient evil has become slightly tenuous.  Luckily, you - Link - are the hero chosen by the goddess to protect the realm.

The titular sword, held skyward.

But before you go can do that, you have to visit some temples, pass trials, and otherwise prove your worth.  It's almost as if the entirety of the game is to complete quests to justify being selected as the chosen hero.  First you follow Zelda around, then you have to charge your sword with sacred flames, and complete some song.

Unfortunately, the variety of things to do doesn't correlate with an extensive world.  Outside of the above-clouds world of fractured, floating islands, only three worlds exist: a forest world, a fire world, and a desert world.  It feels very claustrophobic compared to Twilight Princess or even A Link to the Past.  Frequently, you are given reasons to revisit previous environments, sometimes under very thin pretenses.

The design of the game is a perfect blend of Twilight Princess' realism and Wind Waker's cell-shading.  Each world has a unique feel, especially musically.  

However, the design cannot cover up some of the game's biggest shortfalls.  I wish the worst I could say was that I was mesmerized into stupidity by Zelda's bangs, but it was far worse...

The first game flaw is the flavor of the month assistant, Fi.  While I have to accept the fact that Nintendo insists that its players are idiots and need an assistant to give guidance on every single facet of the game, I am greatly disturbed by the intense level of assistance that is constantly offered.  After learning about Zelda's next location, I can barely breathe before Fi errupts from the sword and says: "I'm 80% certain that Zelda is in this location, we should go there."

There are a lot of missed opportunities in Skyward Sword to establish some components of the overarching universe.  Story-wise, the game stands steady, but I'm disappointed at missed opportunities to add depth and explain the origins of long-standing Zelda characters.  At times, it almost felt like a game that was not designed to be a Zelda game, but was turned in to one.  Not that Nintendo hasn't done that before...

A Stalfos battle, requiring a specific Wiimote swing.

And finally, my misgivings couldn't be complete without commenting on the Wii MotionPlus motion controls.  The game boasts the use of MotionPlus in combat and solving puzzles, but in reality, it is an incredibly painful addition.  The Wiimote is critical seconds behind during combat situations, wherein almost every enemy has a motion-based defense, encouraging forcing the player to swing the Wiimote one direction or the other.

But if combat is clunky, it seems next to graceful compared to the Wiimote motion controls of the game's various mini-games.  Mini-games, and subsequent cursing at the world while playing them, are a staple of the Zelda world; however, these mini-games are rage inducing.  Not only must you contend with achieving scores that are nigh undoable, but you must also achieve those scores by using frustrating and inaccurate controls.

In spite of these shortcomings, the game is a lot of fun, albeit frustrating at times.  If you haven't grabbed it, check it out!

Link to purchase from Amazon.com: The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword with Music CD.

Zeldas

I've recently been playing and enjoying Skyward Sword, the latest entrant in the Legend of Zelda franchise. And while the gameplay and story and all deserves its own writeup, this review looks at the titular sometimes heroine/sometimes captive that is Zelda.  This look back is spurred by one very noticeable distinction of the newest Zelda.

BANGS.

BANGS.  BANGS.  BANGS.

It isn't as though she is ugly per se - in fact, the half-Twilight Princess/half-Wind Waker blend of realism and cell shading really comes off nicely.  But it's hard to take her seriously with the yellow bangs threatening to suddenly transpose this kindly spirit maiden into a hanger-on for an 80s rock band called The Gorons, singing along to their one-hit-wonder power ballad: You Hookshot My Heart.

The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess

Zelda, half of the titular princesses.

Released in 2006, The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess was a desperate chance to save the dying Nintendo Gamecube.  While available for purchase on the 'cube, TP found its primary success on the newly arrived Nintendo Wii.

Zelda games are on par with with the Mario Bros. franchise for the well over-used, but I'm happy to report that TP is heads and tails one of the best Zelda games released.

For starters, Twilight Princess delivers an engaging story that is otherwise lost on other titles in the franchise.  The environs are teeming with life, and everything contributes to a well-rounded, purposefully constructed story.

But okay - yes - first we finish 3 tiny dungeons and then expand to whole world to battle our way through 5 more.  Each dungeon contains a specific item that alone can be harnessed to crush the dungeon master, freeing a sage to lock away evil, blah-blah-blah...

What sets TP apart (besides its gorgeous and detailed environment), is the clever twist it takes on the old favorite.  All of the puzzle-based delights are still there, but the robust world of Hyrule delivers opportunities to enhance outside-the-dungeon puzzles.

For the most part, external, world-based pursuits are for collectibles, which TP delivers in spades.


Firstly, with the piece of hearts now split in 5 instead of the usual quarters, there are 45 piece of heart containers to collect and enhance your life bar.

An additional 24 golden bugs can be collected for rupees and to increase the wallet size.

You can fish (which is especially interesting, considering the impending doom).

And finally, in the style since The Legend of Zelda: The Ocarina of Time, there are hidden enemies to destroy, called Poe's.  Beating one will yield one of 60 Poe's Souls.  Retrieving 20 nets you the fourth bottle, and all 60 gives you access to an endless supply of rupees.

So besides the main story, there's plenty of derping around to do.

Link atop Epona, trusty steed and world traversor.

However, the game is not without its faults.  For starters, there is my typical waggle complaint.  The sword is controlled by a shake of the Wiimote.  It's mostly responsive, but has cost us a wine glass due to my over-enthusiasm.

Using the Wiimote to aim items is also frustrating, because of how far away my couch is from the Wii-sensor.  I don't think our couch is overly far, but - apparently it IS!

All in all, the game is excellent, and makes me excited for The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword.

Statistics

If you click it, you can actually read it.  Data in the jump.

I like statistics, so when I learned that I could get some gameplay information from the Wii, I booted the old baby off to take a look at what I had played.

Donkey Kong Country Returns

You've got to feel bad for Donkey Kong.  The dude was originally cast as a barrel-chunking overlord of a world created of platforms, ladders, and sentient flame.  Later though, DK gained more independence as a go-kart racer, and had his own series of platform games on the SNES called Donkey Kong Country.

Simian miscreant, or domestic violence intervener?

Donkey Kong Country (and its two follow-up iterations) were never bad games, and in fact, represented a good deal of my childhood play-time on the SNES.  The graphics (courtesy of Rare) were crude in today's gameplace, but state of the art when the game was released.

The game focused on DK's loss of his banana stash, because he likes to eat bananas.  So, you know, there was a plot-ish.  Akin to "Save the princess."  In case you were to ask why, the game would glare at you and shout "Because I said so!" and hurtle you into a mini-game.

But games are more sophisticated now, like Donkey Kong Country Returns, which subjects you to some storyline where the volcano on Kong island is inhabited by bad mojo, and the chieftan of bad mojo steals all of your bananas.  Bad mojo chieftans, as we all know, are in constant need of a steady flow of potassium to continue their malicious operations on islands inhabited by Kong on his relatives.

Okay, so the game isn't going to win story of the year, or anything - but we didn't really expect it to.  I craved some 2D, beautifully rendered, platforming!  Donkey Kong Country, the Return of the Jedi was sure to please.  Nintendo practically wrote the book on what a 2D platformer needs to be successful.  But wait, what's this - to kill enemies, I must ... waggle?

Like a hooker clinging to the testicles of a customer who refused to pay for services rendered, Nintendo wants to force every single one of its game experiences to use the motion controls that made the Wii so famous.  Nevermind that when using the nunchuck accessory that I have like 12 buttons, only the joystick, A, and B buttons are used for moving, jumping, and grabbing respectively.  If you want to do your super-neat DK roll, you have to waggle the damn Wii-mote while pushing forward.  Didn't push forward correctly?  You'll ground-pound, or ... blow air?

If you have friends, you can play the game with them.
Then you won't have to worry about having friends anymore!

There are things to collect, which is kind of a fun part of Donkey Kong Country games, but the game play was severely wounded by the inclusion of needed waggling.  The platforming was a huge step back, as well, in my humble opinion.  There was very little strategy involved, and it just wasn't very fun to play.

Okay, it does look good.  I mean, this is exactly what I wanted in looks.  You know, Super Mario Galaxy 3, pretty much.

If you were looking for a game on the Wii that you could play as Donkey Kong for, you may as well just dust off Super Smash Bros. Brawl, which offers way more DK technique and a myriad of better control options.  Or, wait for the next go-kart, party, or olympic sporting game that Nintendo's over-used, tie-wearing mascot could be crammed into next.

Dell Drama

Strictly speaking, in the world between the glorious elite of gaming and the unfortunate slugs of console gaming (best illustrated here), I am squarely in the latter category.  Instead of a keyboard, I prefer a controller, which with 18 some buttons is confusing enough.  But let it not be said that there are games that I like to play on a PC: Minecraft, Sims 3, Civilization, Plants vs. Zombies, etc. as well as a slew of Flash games that are constantly available on the Internet.

Unfortunately, my computer (to borrow my French roommate's current favorite English idiom) has bitten the dust.  After a year of faithful service, it seems the motherboard has gone kaput. 

In most circumstances this would be a lamentable time, but my husband wisely invested in some sort of protection plan from Dell which promised "next day service."

Our experience with the warranty was not virginal.  This very computer had some sort of keyboard/monitor/I-can't-even-remember-what problem before and the issue was resolved professional and efficiently, making us happy in our decision to go with Dell for our laptop needs.

This experience has been anything but... with over ten phone calls to Dell customer support (which provides quality support like a cat would make a quality surgeon), resulting in confusion not only over when our "next day" service would account for a technician being able to fix the problem, but indeed wether or not a part was actually in stock (dissenting answers from both sides were abundant). 

So, considering all those systems in the house capable of playing video games, I really must give a shout out to Nintendo, whose products have rarely faltered (excepting in those cases wherein blowing the cartridge fixed whatever malady had presented).  Despite its apparent lack of appeal to the "mainsteam" gamer, I've never failed to put in Super Mario Galaxy and have results.

With any luck, I'll be able to explore Minecraft 1.7 (with PISTONS) before long, and hopefully with fewer crashes...

New Kirby Announced for Wii (Coming this Fall)

I don't know why I'm so interested in Kirby, since Epic Yarn (my first review) was an epic fail, but I really do love the series.  And I'm super stoked by the E3 announcement that the game is getting back to its roots of having you eat people and get their powers.  The game looks like it has all the trappings of traditional Kirby, plus some multi-player action akin to New Super Mario Bros. Wii.

If you can't wait for a Kirby fix, there are a few DS games out to help curb your craving:

• Kirby Super Star Ultra
• Kirby Squeak Squad
• Kirby Canvas Curse

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.

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.

Want!: Pokemon Black/White

Just about every so often, I remember my first experience into the world of Pokemon: the highly addictive narcotic of handheld video games.   My great friend Wyett had given me his copy of Pokemon Crystal, having accidentally destroyed his game file.  I was enraptured with raising my precious Chikorita to power and finding all sorts of other cute/creepy monsters to play by my side.

I was fortunate that it was almost time for a new iteration of the series, Ruby/Sapphire to be released for the GBA.  Since then, I've been hooked by the series, picking up a rehash of Red/Green for the GBA, and even convincing my husband to play Diamond/Pearl with me!  The fourth generation, however, seemed to be the end of me.  Despite to joy of exploring a new world (and yet more of the damned creatures), I was becoming wary of the new facade on an old game.  I didn't even beat the Final Four, bringing shame to my household.

And then HeartGold/SoulSilver came out.  It was a remake of the first Pokemon game I'd ever played, with Gen IV graphics and an exciting perephiral device that allowed my Pokemon to level as I walked around in the mortal coil!  I was instantly back into complicated breeding schedules, and IV calculations (all in time to spectacularly take 4th place in our work Pokemon tournament), like I had never left them!  A Pokemon fanatic!  Nothing could strip me of my love for my carefully raised Forretress.  Go, Lulz: use Spikes!

Shortly thereafter, Black/White was announced - a whole new, Fifth Generation.  I was incredibly disiniterested at first.  The excitement of HG/SS was more nostalgiac than anything.  I wasn't really ready for another Pokemon game.

However, as the date of March 5 approaches, the saliva in my mouth froths.  I am genetically anticipatory of a new Pokemon game.  I scour the internet for images of what might be my next companion.  And this sudden flood of interest is what qualifies me to put Pokemon Black/White in the Want! column.  At a pricetag of $35, it's not all that expensive for a new game, but I might have to settle for actually beating Diamond/Pearl before justifying a shovel out for it right now...

Kirby's Epic Yarn

I remember when my co-worker Josh and I first heard about the new Kirby game planned for the Wii (it was amid a series of other announcements Nintendo made). We were fairly excited; Kirby games have always been a source of pleasant platforming. And, the title even promised great things: Kirby’s Epic Yarn. It would be epic, right?

Josh picked it up to play before me, and promptly brought it to my desk and disgustingly tossed it towards me. “You can play this, if you want,” he said, looking at the game box as if instead of Kirby’s Epic Yarn, it actually read Sing-a-long with Justin Beiber. I couldn’t figure out his revulsion, so I asked what was wrong with it.

“You don’t eat people.”

WHAT? What do you mean, you don’t eat people? You’re Kirby. That’s what you do. Making a Kirby game where you didn’t eat people is like making a Sonic game where you don’t run. I had to see it for myself, so I launched my Wii in the first time in months and it updated for three or four hours while I read the manual suspiciously.

There was no mention of not eating things, but I figured it was a lie. Written materials often lie.

The updated Wii was finally ready and I started the game. There was a story introduction – and let me go off for a second here – there are games in which story is important, and highly contributes to my love of the game. Platformers are typically not the medium for that. I don’t care about Mario saving the princess. She will get kidnapped again, and I’ll be off to find more fucking stars to save her. This isn’t Bioshock. I don’t care how coins got into these weird yellow blocks with question marks. The mechanics are designed for fun, not for an overarching purpose.

Anyway, there was a story. Its purpose was to tell us why you can’t eat people (spoiler, it’s because you are turned into yarn). So now, not only am I kind of upset that I lost a few precious minutes watching a story that I cared about, but I really hate the story because it represents a loss of the entire gameplay mechanic the name Kirby on the front of the box had promised.

The game itself is fun enough. You jump onto platforms and there are puzzle-like moments where you have to do one of three things to proceed. Each level challenges you to collect a certain number of beads, which are scattered throughout the level and also dropped by unraveling yarn enemies. However, I can’t shake the feeling that pushing the 1 button (you hold the Wiimote sideways) should cause Kirby to eat someone.

And before I continue to criticize, I will say it’s got a stunningly fun style to it. It reminds me greatly of Super Mario World 2: Yoshi’s Island. The game’s fabric motif opened a lot of design opportunities, and they were well taken care of. The Wii has a limited capacity with graphics, and this game embraces it, rather than fighting against it.

However, the game gets monotonous in its simplicity pretty quickly. As a nod to this, additional challenges are unlocked if you are able to decorate the apartments of other residents of this yarn-filled existence by collecting trickier to get items from the levels. However, the decoration concept is wasted and introduces further levels of childish gameplay. I wish it’d just give me the additional challenges.

I made it through the first few worlds, each of which culminated in a “boss battle” which involved employing one of two or three strategies. I became disenfranchised, and haven’t played it since. In the end, I just felt as though I was playing a game that was excellently designed and crafted, and then slapped with an intellectual property to garner sales. And my feeling isn’t far off from the truth; according to an article discussing conversations between the development team and Nintendo CEO, Satoru Iwata:

One of the big revelations from the column is that Kirby's Epic Yarn originally wasn't a Kirby game. Good Feel developed the game with the desire to try something new, and so they started from zero. The Japanese name for Kirby's Epic Yarn is "Keito no Kirby," or "Kirby of Yarn." Instead of this, the game was originally set to be called "Keito no Fluff," or "Fluff of Yarn" and would have starred a character named Fluff in a world known as "World of Yarn."

The greatest weakness of the game, in my opinion, is the very thing the development team felt they needed to secure a character with more recognition. How disappointing, as this likely delays having a new actual Kirby game, wherein the gameplay mechanics we love will finally return.

The Game: Kirby’s Epic Yarn

The Cost: Should be easy to find at Gamestop for around $30-$40. A new version will still set you back $50.

Worth It? For non-Kirby enthusiasts: It’s a fun platformer, and would probably be a hoot for kids (there is co-op play, which I didn’t review), but why not spend it on a better game, like Super Mario Galaxy? For Kirby-enthusiasts: purchasing this game probably has the unintended cost of weeks of therapy, buy Kirby Superstar Ultra for $25 instead.

Best Parts: Design. Collecting beads is disarmingly addictive, since the game judges you at the end of every level based on your success in doing so.

Worst Parts: Kirby not being able to eat people and have their powers.

Overall: Playing this game was like getting a chocolate éclair from the donut shop, getting home to eat it and realizing it isn’t filled with custard.