Month Overview: January 2018

 Tally:
 Shadow of Rome 8.0
 Rise of the Argonauts 7.5
 God Hand 9.0
 Musashi - Samurai Legend 6.5
 Spec Ops - The Line 8.0
 Fear Effect 4.0
 Fear Effect 2 - Retro Helix 5.0
 Prince of Persia - The Sands of Time 9.0


 It's 2018 baby! Even though I started working and a programming course, meaning I'm out from 9 AM 'till 10 PM, I still managed to play a fair amount of games. Chiefly, I finally played the Fear Effect franchise!.... but I was not impressed, I can appreciate how mature and original its plot and characters were for its time, but it has aged very, very badly. I also got around God Hand and was pleasantly surprised, about how good it was, and surprisingly relieved at how overrated its difficulty was.
 I also started the PoP franchise, because Grandia Xtreme was so dull, and I was surprised at hot... lame I'm finding Warrior Within, considering how much I used to love it. And it has nothing to do with the tone shift, I'm quite OK with it actually. On the flip side, I absolutely adored the Sands of Time, despite its shortcomings.


 Runner-up:

 God Hand was bloody phenomenal. The humor was great, and funny if a bit offensive. The characters where interesting, ridiculously so. But the gameplay was weird... but amazing at the same time. It's a surprisingly deep game, albeit one that can only appeal to fans of beat'em up games.

 Game of January 2018:

 Alright, so it was a hard choice between God Hand and Prince of Persia, but PoP won the premise that it did so much more. God Hand excelled at the one thing it did: Beating up thugs, but Prince of Persia gave us an engaging adventure, fantastic platforming and OK combat, alongside some pretty unique mechanics. As far as I'm concerned, The Sands of Time is every bit as good as it once was.

Now Playing: Prince of Persia - Warrior Within

 The Prince's teenage rebel phase.

Alright, now the Prince is even MORE serious.

 I'll always wonder why people automatically assume that dark and gritty means that it's bad. Alright, so Warrior Within tries hard to be dark and edgy, with buxom babes, cursing and maiming... but that doesn't make it bad, particularly when it polishes and expands upon the first game.

 The Sands of Time? Excellent, but with passable combat. Warrior Within has the same parkour, but with a few new tricks, has better combat, I'd call it good, and expands on the sands powers. Sure, the story is not as good, although the set-up is more original, and yes, its portrayal of women seems as if straight out of a 12 year old's mind... but the gameplay is more of the same but better.

 Regardless, I used to love Warrior Withing when I was younger, I played this game over and over and over again. Even though on my first playthrough I was victim to the Sand Wraith bug, which turned me into the Sand Wraith way before it should've and it meant that I could advance through the game... at to a certain point. Just in case I'm playing with two savefiles this time around! Still, as soon as I found out that I was stuck for good, and I kept playing as the Sand Wraith because I didn't notice I wasn't the Prince any more before it was too late, on the off chance that I would be able to finish the game... and I couldn't. But I didn't care, I immediately started the game again and got to the end. And I loved it. Hopefully I'll be as in love now as I was back then by the time I finish it.

Review #517: Prince of Persia - The Sands of Time

 As if time hadn't passed at all....

The Prince's shirt gets torn to shred as the story advances.

 The original Prince of Persia was a bit of a landmark as far as videogames are concerned, yet its first jump to 3D was pretty much terrible. A few years later Ubisoft would acquire the IP and deliver The Sands of Time, a game that continues to influence other games to this day with its then-unique blend of combat and parkour.

 You play as the Prince, victim of the Vizier's treachery, having unleashed the Sands of Time on the Sultan's abode. The sands have turned everyone but him, the Vizier and the captive Farah into sand demons, so now he and Farah team up to stop the Vizier. Luckily, he is armed with the Dagger of Time, a weapon that allows him to manipulate time to his will... as long as he has enough sand stored. The story is pretty cookie-cutter, but the interactions between the Prince and Farah are pretty adorable. Plus, even though the story is nothing special, it's still well told and it's an enjoyable trip. The story is told to us by the Prince, so every time you die he'll exclaim that 'that's not what happened!', which surprisingly doesn't grow old. A simple, but enjoyable tale that runs about 6 hours long... which would be an acceptable length if only the game wasn't so good that you just want more.

Heavy enemies require block-and-counterattacking to be defeated.

 Prince of Persia is the precursor to Assassin's Creed, as a matter of fact, the first Assassin's Creed began life as Prince of Persia: Assassins. But I digress, what I meant to tell was that this game did the parkour thing before any other game. This is a linear game, so you'll constantly be moving forwards and only forwards, although it's in your best interest to explore a little so that you can increase the maximum amount of health and sand you can have. Heck, you can also unlock the very dated first Prince of Persia game, although you'll need a guide to do that, since the wall you must break is pretty well hidden.

 The platforming in this game is pretty much fantastic, the Prince remains one of the most nimble characters out there, he can run on walls as long as momentum allows him, jump from wall to wall, cling to ledges, spin on bars and a few other nifty tricks. The game puzzles come in the form of figuring out how to traverse the environment, as you pull trick after trick to get to where you need to go. If you mess up, which you will every now and then, you can spend a sand tank to rewind time with L2 to before you screwed up that jump and save yourself. The game is pretty lenient with this mechanic, if you die there's ample time to press L2 before the retry screen pops up. Word of warning, as great as the time rewind is, don't grow to dependent on it, as the last few stretches of the game part the Prince with said ability.

The game could've used less enemies and more jumping instead.

 And then comes the game's weakest link: Combat. You use square to slash with your sword, R1 to block, X to vault over enemies(Or roll around) and triangle to use the dagger, and you can spend a secondary sand gauge to turn enemies into sand and do quick work of them. The combat is very simple and rather dull, the game throws waves upon waves upon waves of enemies and combat never gets too interesting. Enemies must be hit with the dagger when they are downed in order to finish them off completely, which also refills a sand tank in the process. The thing is... the vault move is so good that it downs pretty much any enemy that can't counter it instantly, so there's no reason not to use it... unless you want to slowly hit an enemy's guard until they decide to counterattack so that you can block their move and counterattack yourself. Heavy enemies later in the game grow immune to your vault so you'll have to resort to counterattacks to win. You've also got the Mega Freeze move, called Haste in the instruction booklet, which requires your full sand reservoir to use, as well as the secondary sand gauge, and turns every enemy into sand for a short while, so you just mash square and easily wipe them out. Mind you, the combat can get a bit dull, but it's not bad by any stretch of the imagination.

 Prince of Persia - The Sands of Time hasn't aged a single day, it's every bit as good as it once was. The combat can grow a bit stale, but the parkour is fantastic, and exploring the palace while the Prince and Farah banter is great. This game is one of the finest adventure games out there, and it won't be going obsolete any time soon.
 9.0 out of 10

Now Playing: Prince of Persia - The Sands of Time

 More like 'Almost done: Prince of Persia - The Sands of Time'

Why so serious?

 So, I got bored with Grandia Xtreme, since 'Xtreme' is the last thing that game is, so I decided to take the Prince fo a spin. I was only gonna play until I hit 20%. But then until I hit 25%.... until I got over 60% of the game done!

 As far as the Prince goes, I had a very brief stint with the original PC game, which I never liked, and I played a little bit of The Sands of Time, I can't remember why I stopped playing it, must've been by the time my PS2 was already dying? That said, I did play Warrior Within, on my PC, and... I kinda loved it.

 Yeah, yeah, the Prince was turned emo, edgy and angsty... but why is that bad? Why are edgy makeovers necesarilly bad? You can have your kid-friendly games, but what's so bad about games that try to appeal to an older demographic?... even if they do it by being as immature as they can with breasts and blood. But alas, this is about Sands of Time and not Warrior Within!

 ....but I think I needn't say anymore, I played way, WAY more than I intended to. The combat is kinda mediocre, but the platforming is ace, even to this day.

Review #516: Fear Effect 2 - Retro Helix

 It's called Retro because it's a prequel, get it?

Some things never change. Like Eidos' penchant for unnecessary fanscervice.

 My experience with Fear Effect 1 was a bit disappointing, but I wasn't done with the franchise, oh no, there's a sequel/prequel left for me to play. Actually, there was one, because I'm just done with it and... it's more of the same, for better or worse. Mostly for the worse.

 Remember how the cast of main characters was easily the best part about the first game? Wouldn't it be nice to get to know them better? Well, the game delivers... a bit. The first half of the game has you playing as Hana and her lover, newcomer Rain Qin, as both girls get embroiled in far more than they bargained for. If you liked Deke or Glas... you're for a disappointment, since, as previously stated, you're stuck with Rain for half of the game, and she's kinda bland. Both Deke and Glas make their official appearance halfway through the game, but you only get to play as Deke on the first half of a single disc, which is completely ridiculous. On the whole, we get to learn more about Hana as a character, we learn Glas' past, we learn a tiny bit more about Deke and we're introduced to Rain. As for the plot itself, it's the same pseudo futuristic modern day era meets Chinese mysticism. And it works well. The game is longer than the first one, and there're many more cutscenes, as well as more, well, plot, than in the previous game. As far as how good the story is... it's about as good as the first one, but it feels like they should've done more with Glas and Deke... or at least make Rain half as interesting as any of the other three.

Hana is as great a character as you remember her.

 The game plays exactly like the first one: Fixed camera angles, tank controls, stiff movement and unreliable dodging, clunky real-time inventory, passable auto-aim and the 'fear gauge' doubling as health bar that goes up or down depending on things like doing well in combat or being around enemies for too long. It's practically the same game, but now with new environments. I will grant them that they made the collision detection much better, there were fewer times, albeit it still happened rarely, in which my shots would hit an invisible wall as opposed to my target. There's a new option for '3D movement' but it's very clunky, so just stick with the tank controls.

 The game feels much fairer too, don't get me wrong, some encounters still feel like luck-based affairs, but they are rarer, since your characters seem to be able to take more punishment, and there're more weapons available. Dying and retrying was a pain in the rear in the previous game since there were long loading times, but that's a thing of the past, retrying is now instantaneous. The game is quite longer too, each disc has two 'parts'... although the game will have you shuffling discs all the time, you go from disc 1 to disc 3(!!!) to disc 2 to disc 1 again to disc 4 to disc 2 again... you'll have to swap discs at least 8 times, so don't get too comfortable on your chair!

Rain, the new addition, is such a boring character... and you're stuck with her for half the entire game.

 The game has more than double the amount of puzzles the first game had, but... they have aged horribly, requiring almost Sierra Adventure Games-ridiculous levels of thought processing to solve them. Just a tip, play the game with a guide at hand. it makes for a much more enjoyable experience rather than running around trying to use every single item on every single interactive object you can find. Some don't even make sense, like why would you try to fix your shovel by melting the goblet and then pouring it on top...? Argh! Trust me, don't bother trying to solve them, just keep a guide close by.

 Fear Effect 2 is definitely better than the first game: Environments aren't as pixelated, the shooting has been tightened, the difficulty is more balanced and it's a longer game... but the game is still horribly dated, it still looks ugly and grainy, the shooting is still janky at worst and passable at best, some moments still feel as if they require more luck than skill and the game might be longer, but you have to swap discs all the time! If you're not too sure if you'd like the franchise, I'd suggest starting with this one, it's a prequel so it makes sense to play it first and you don't need to have played the first one and it's not as unfair as the first one. And, if you end up not liking it, at least you played the game at its best, so you won't have to endure the age-induced sloppiness of the first!
 5.0 out of 10

Now Playing: Fear Effect 2 - Retro Helix

 Retro Helix? The hell does that mean?!

Yeah... there seems to be even more fanservice this time around. Me no likey.

 Fear Effect 1 was probably good at its time, but as of now? It's very, very dated. Fear Effect 2 is almost exactly the same... but seems like it'll be a better game.

 The game plays exactly the same as Fear Effect 1, but it feels... tighter. I still shot at invisible walls a few times, which was annoying, but the game seems more lenient. Hana can definitely take more punishment than before. It also seems to have cut back on instant deaths, coupled it with removing load-times whenever you die and restart, which is a godsend. This first disc took me an entire hour, so this game might be longer than the first one.

 The instructon booklet, as well as the intro cinematic, promised me Glas and Deke, but they seem conspicuously absent from the game's boxart and backside, and considering they weren't playable on this first disc... I think they might be NPCs this time around, which kinda sucks since their replacement, Rain, kinda sucks. At least Hana still kicks butt.

  It might be too early to tell, but this one seems to have aged better. Hopefully.

Review #515: Fear Effect

 It's scary how dated this game is.

Meet your (anti)heroes. They're a loveable bunch.

 Fear Effect is an interesting game, published by Eidos after their hit series Tomb Raider was ending its run on the PS1, it's quite a different beast altogether. Mixing full motion backgrounds, with a dark, mature storyline as well as very stiff gameplay making for something that feels like Resident Evil but is anything but.

 The game follows a ensemble cast made up of three no-good amigos: Hana, Glas and Deke, who team up to rescue a kidnapped girl... so that they can ransom her instead. What begins as a crime story about murderers and low-lives soon turns into the supernatural, turns out this girl might be more trouble than she's worth. The story isn't fantastic by any means, but the cast of characters is an interesting bunch. The story focuses mostly on Hana, as she gets the most background information and development, and she's quite an interesting anti-heroine. That said, throughout each chapter, or disc, the game will periodically change your playable character between all three. They play exactly the same, although Deke gets access to dual shotgun-guns, that neither Hana or Glas get to wield. All in all, it's a decent, but unremarkable, story featuring good characters.

The game... is very cheesy in how fanservicey it can get.

 The game has full-motion video backgrounds, think pre-rendered backgrounds but animated, and they... haven't aged very well. They look like a pixelated mess. The game has fixed camera angles as well as tank controls, like Resident Evil, but this game has a bit more action... which works to the game's detriment. The controls are abysmal. Firstly, your inventory runs in real time, so you must scramble with Square and Circle to select the appropriate item, in the heat of battle, and press triangle to equip or use it. It's particularly annoying when the game, as it often does, puts you directly into a gunfight with nothing equipped. There's no way to avoid getting damaged at times. Plus, there's a dodge mechanic, by holding L2 and pressing a direction, but the rolls never come out in the direction you want, and characters often times get stuck on invisible barriers. Which also happens to bullets, sometimes it looks like your bullets will hit, only to hit invisible walls. It's very wonky. The controls are so bad, and the shooting is so mediocre that some encounters and boss fights feel like luck-based affairs.

 You'll die in the game. A lot. It spans four discs, but it's very, very short, each disc should last about 30 minutes, if only it wasn't filled with cheap deaths. To be fair, the developers came up with a few interesting cinematics when your characters bite the dust, but upon death you have to endure a rather lengthy loading screen. It can get pretty bad when you have to deal with pattern-based bosses or situations, since every failed attempt will result in a loading screen. Pro-tip: Try to sneak up on human enemies, stealth kills are one-hit kills and allows you to save your ammo for the supernatural. On another note, whenever you aren't shooting at stuff you'll be solving puzzle, and they can get rather challenging, y'know, gotta sell those Prima Gameguides.

Don't run! Stealth is your friend, particularly in the early going.

 The last gameplay element worth talking about is the Fear Gauge, y'see, the game was too good for traditional life bars, instead you have a fear gauge, which decreases when you are too close to your enemies, taking damage, running out of ammo and a few other things. It goes from green to red, and afterwards... you die. There're no health packs, instead, you recover health, or fear gauge, by doing well in battle, solving puzzles or, sometimes, the game will completely restore you after triggering a certain scene. I was not a fan of this system.

 Fear Effect is... a very dated game. You can have fun with the game, the characters are engaging and there's a certain charm to the gameplay that keeps you coming back for more. However, you'll have to contend with dated gameplay that seems to involve luck more than anything, a very unfair amount of instadeath traps and some dated, obscure puzzles to solve. It's a game best appreciated if you're into late 90s games and their sometimes unfair shenanigans.
 4.0 out of 10

Now Playing: Fear Effect

 .... I am scared alright, scared of how bad the controls are.

Hana and her entourage seem like an interesting bunch.

 Alright, so I was kinda in the middle of Grandia Xtreme, but... Fear Effect 2 arrived and I think that one of the discs might be busted, so I decided to play the Fear Effect duology asap. I've never been much interested in the franchise 'till until a few months ago, and my first impressions are less than positive.

 For starters, the controls are awful. Whenever you roll, which is pretty much required, you have to keep in mind that left mean's Hana's left, not the left-left that would make sense. It's so dumb. The first boss mauled me over 10 times because of poor controls and poor collision detection, even if it looks like the way is paved for your shots to arrive on target... don't trust your eyes, only trust the in-game icon that says you're locked on.

 The health system is kinda dumb too, there're no recovery items, instead, your health recovers, or lowers, depending on how you play. It makes little sense honestly. I was at full health, but oh no, the boss scared Hana so much that her health lowered to orange. It's so dumb!

 Overall? I think there's a reason people forgot about Fear Effect.

Now Playing: Grandia Xtreme

 Xtremely Boring.

What the hell is Evann wearing on his head!?

 I used to really like Grandia Xtreme, I think I even liked it more than 2. How foolish I used to be. After enduring one of the most boring introductions I've seen in recent years, featuring a CG intro that made no sense and explained nothing, followed by an absurdly long introductory shot that alternates between Evan, the protagonist, training and some random weirdo riding a bike. And then you have to stomach a ton of un-fastforwardable, unvoiced dialogue....

 Still, as soon as I got into a fight... it got fun. It is Grandia alright, and it plays pretty much just like Grandia 2, but with less framerate issues or bugs. That said,a s fun as the combat is, I wonder if it can make up for having such an uninteresting story. I'm not too hopeful.

Review #514: Spec Ops - The Line

 Will you cross the line? That line. Yes, that one.

Meet the hero of his story, Martin Walker.

 By now you've heard of Spec Ops - The Line, that game that tries its hardest to look like just another military shooter, but is anything but. It's an interesting game, one that was a bit neglected by gamers back in the day of its release, and has received the attention it deserves only years later.

 The game pits you as Martin Walker, a military captain who is joined by two soldiers under his direct command, Adams and Lugo. The three of them infiltrate a disaster-stricken Dubai in order to search for survivors. But the journey through a land covered in sand will test their mettle and their psyche. In case you haven't heard about it, hidden beneath its generic military shooter exterior lies a deconstruction of all the tropes associated with the genre. Overall? The story is pretty good, although it takes a bit of time before it gets really good-- but ya gotta respect the hustle, they had to sell you the lie so that they could begin twisting everything that felt so familiar. I'd also like to  mention just how good the scenery is, the game employs a lot of browns and oranges, befitting of a country sunk under sand, and it looks brilliant. The game has some fantastic environments for you to explore and shoot in, and you'll be looking forwards to whatever comes next.

The game has some beautiful scenery.

 As far as gameplay is concerned, well, it plays like any other modern third person shooter: You can stick in-and-out of cover, which is a must since you'll find yourself pinned out by enemy units quite often, and Walker has regenerating health too. You can only carry two weapons at a time, there're three different kinds of grenades and you can punch your enemy with the circle button. Enemies grovelling on the floor can be executed with the circle button, which rewards you with ammo for both of your equipped weapons. The game's only original mechanic is the R2 button, you can use it to direct your allies to shoot down that particular enemy, and at times you'll be prompted to press R2 so that they can throw a flash grenade, it usually happens when you're pinned down by multiple enemies. All in all, it's pretty much what you'd expect out of any other game in the genre, everything works well enough.

 The game can get pretty challenging at times. At times it's almost sadistic how little ammo and how many enemies there're to contend with. And this is when executions come into play, since you'll often find yourself tempted to break out of your cover to execute an enemy and get some ammo. Needless to say, you'll probably die quite a few times, which is extremely punishing because loading times are brutal. Yeah, the worst part about the game are the loading times, you'll try your hardest not to die because you don't want to suffer through them.

Shootout can get pretty intense, remember to direct your allies and keep your head down!

 No, Spec Ops - The Line won't make you question yourself about all those silly war games you've played, but the plot gives a very interesting look at these games. And even if you fail to understand what's implied you're left with a relatively unique tale, at least as far as military third person shooters are concerned. It's very easy to recommend Spec Ops - The Line, and even in the off chance that you hate the genre, the game is relatively short and offers multiple difficulty settings, so if you're interested in it you can be done with it in a short while.
 8.0 out of 10

Now Playing: Spec Ops - The Line

 Which line?

I hope the cover is so generic to drive their point home.

 By now everyone has heard of Spec Ops - The line, so while I could feign ignorance about it being more than just a third person shooter... I won't. I will say that what little I've played, the entire first chapter, it really was little more than just another Third Person Shooter, with not a single noteworthy thing to its name.

 I'm enjoying the imagery though, all the bright and dark oranges, and the desert landscapes... it's quite pleasing, surprisingly. I hope the story is as good as people say...

Review #513: Musashi Samurai Legend

 I think the word 'Samurai' is a very loose fit for this game.

Musashi looks very, very different.

 Remember Brave Fencer Musashi? It was a pretty neat Adventure game on the PS1, with a few experimental ideas, like an in-game day and night cycle, added to a traditional adventure formula in which you gathered new equipment to access new areas. While a few things had aged, it's still a great game by today's standards. Enter Musashi - Samurai Legend, one of the more obscure releases from Square Enix as well as a pseudo-sequel to that charming little PS1 game.

 This Musashi is hinted to be the same one, albeit older, as the one from the first game... even if they look nothing alike. Long story short, Musashi gets summoned to another land, and once again he must gather the five elemental swords, this time requiring the aid of each of the blade's maidens to unlock their power, in order to defeat the big bad that plagues the land. The story is serviceable, but nothing to write home about, and the art direction is.... weird, it's pretty distinctive, but not all that appealing. Musashi looks like a dork, but oh well! The game tried a bit too much to be like the previous game, the same five swords, a forest level with a little islet surrounded with water, a forest that requires specific directions not to get lost in, a mine stage... a lot of the game feels very familiar, and the franchise hasn't earned the right to have recurring themes yet.

The ninjas look mean, but the combat is so slow.

 You'll be surprised at how little the game has changed. That said, the game is no longer a fully inter-connected world, but rather, it's divided in about five different stages as well as a town hub in which you can interact with NPCs... NPCs that must be rescued, just like in Musashi 1, except that your rewards aren't, well, as rewarding. That said, civilians are much easier to find this time around, you probably have to try very hard to avoid finding them, and they'll offer their services, like letting you purchase food, appraise items or temper your Katana to make it stronger. 

 When exploring other lands, Musashi will come across various enemies, and once again he has access to two different swords. Square is your weak Katana, while triangle uses your equipped elemental sword. Your triangle attack is slow and useless, so you'll never, ever press the triangle button, save to save citizens from their sphere-cages. Combat is a very simple affair: Hold R1 to target them and just mash the square button. Just like before you can steal powers from your enemies, by targeting them until a gauge fills up, and then countering with the square button just as they hit you with their ability. Abilities are kept for ever now, so you can just pick the one you want and use it with circle... but combat is so bland that you'll only use them on bosses... not because you need them to, but because they deal damage faster. At least, defeating enemies earn you experience points, and you can choose which stat to favor with bonus stat points each time you level up

The Arena features a few exclusive enemies.

 There're a few novelty vehicle stages thrown in, in which you'll just travel forward and have to defeat enemies or break obstacles... they are rather lame and boring, but at least they aren't annoying. There's also a weird carrying mechanics... Each of the five chapters have at least one moment in which you'll have to carry the chapter's elemental maiden on your arms, and you can attack while holding them, while being slowed down. I've no idea why these sequences are in, they are not fun, they are not funny, and even if they are not annoying they add absolutely nothing to the game.

 As you advance through the game you'll earn the aforementioned elemental blades, each one has a spell that can be used in battle or to solve very, very simple puzzles. They are more like obstacles than anything else, really. See fire? Use the Water sword to put it out or freeze magma to use as a platform. See a Switch or a cracked rock? Use the Earth sword. It's very mechanical, and there's very little thinking involved. You probably won't get stuck at any moment... albeit when the game does a poor job at telling you where to go next. Like the moment you rescue the Earth Maiden, the game tells you to rescue her... but you're not supposed to get her out of the forest, rather, take her deeper into the forest.

Get ready to fight a lot of robots and a lot of ninjas.

 Musashi - Samurai Legend is more disappointing than anything else. Exploration is very limited and somewhat unrewarding, combat can be rather dull, and it has some very lame ideas thrown into the mix. That said, it's not a bad game, everything does work, even if it's nothing special. Truly, the worst part about the game is being a sequel to a great game, so you come at the game with certain expectations that it just can't match up to. They should've made puzzles more interesting, make the combat, heck, the entire game faster and get rid of the dumb carrying sequences. Exploration too should've been better, this is an Adventure game after all, hide the NPCs better and make them more rewarding to find, make me actually want to rescue them.

 When it's al said and done, at least the game isn't a total blunder. There's a lot of squandered potential, there're a lot of things that could've been worse, but what we've got is a passable little game that makes your wish you were playing the PS1 original instead.

 6.5 out of 10

Now Playing: Musashi - Samurai Legend

 I thought it was called Samurai Legend - Musashi for the longest time....

Shiny!

 Musashi on the PS1 was great, yet it took quite a few years before Square felt it was time for a sequel. Not much has changed, for good or bad. You still have two blades, you still have to rescue civilians and still get to copy enemy abilities.

 The game feels slightly... low budget? Movement is rather slow, and some things don't look quite right, like falling in water, when Musashi kinda.... drops down without any special sinking animation. The bike segments, the only segment I played anyways, was kinda lame and unexciting, hopefully they get better down the line.

 All in all, I'm slightly unimpressed.

Review #512: God Hand

Blistered hand.

The cover.... eugh.

 You've heard of God Hand, one of the toughest games out there. That's... a bit of a lie. I'm here to tell you about God Hand, one of the best beat'em ups out there and one that's challenging, but not impossibly hard.

 The story is absolutely ridiculous and makes little sense, but what you need to know is that the story follows Gene and Olivia, Gene is a bit indebted to Olivia since she gave him the God Hand, an arm with awesome power. Gene doesn't care much about other people, but Olivia does, so she kinda forces him to help out. As it turns out, there's an interested party in the God Hand, and they'll stop at nothing to get it. You don't play the game for its plot, but for how ridiculous everything is. It's got a very weird, ridiculous and Suda 51-esque sense of humor, so if you're into that, the game delivers in spades. The art direction is pretty badass too, taking more than a few pages from Hokuto no Ken's book, so not only does Gene look cool... the enemies look fantastic too. It's also set in a pseudo wasteland, so even the environments are varied and appealing.

Context-sensitive special moves are... weird, to say the least.

 The game is a very linear beat'em up game, so you go from stage to stage, spanking butts and taking names. The first thing that will throw you off is that the game has a third person-shooter camera, with tank controls and you've no control over the camera. It's almost like playing Resident Evil 4, only that you've only got a knife. It sounds clunky, it IS clunky and a bit stiff, but you can get used to it, and the claustrophobic camera angle helps make your blows seem harder and heavier, which is always cool in my book. That said, there's definitely a learning curve before you get comfy with it, but if you aid yourself with the enemy radar on the top on the screen you'll be able to keep tabs on what's around you... even if you can't look at it.

 Square is your basic combo string, triangle and X perform different attacks, plus, back plus any of the three attack buttons produce even more attacks. That sounds neat, but every single move in Gene's arsenal can be changed. Don't like your vanilla 4-punch button? Buy some kick moves and add some juggles. Think you can do without a guard break attack? You'd be nuts to, but you can do it if you want. But you shouldn't, seriously, breaking an enemy's guard makes your next attacks do more damage. Take a guard break move, trust me. The circle button is a context-sensitive button, it can be used to pick up weapons or boxes, stomp on enemies or perform powerful special moves when they are dizzy. R2 is used to unleash the God Hand, when the gauge is full, which makes you invulnerable and makes your moves unblockable for a short while. Lastly, R1 is used to perform stock-consuming super moves. Gene can't block attacks, but you can use the right analog stick to dodge in four different directions.... and you'll have to.

The game doesn't shy away from being ridiculous... and it's all the better for it.

 The combat is very satisfying, but it does have a few shortcomings. There're a couple of enemies that can take way too much punishment before they go down, so a few fights with normal enemies can drag for a bit longer than they should. One of the most important things you'll have to learn in the game is to divide and spread out your enemies so that you can comfortably take them down without getting suckerpunched, but it can be a bit of a pain when you've these damage sponges coming back for more over and over again. Another annoyance is how much mashing this game requires, your powerful context-sensitive circle special moves always requires you to punch that circle button like there's no tomorrow... and you'll have to do this a lot if you want to maximize your damage potential.

 The game's most notorious feature is its dynamic difficulty: the longer you go defeating enemies without taking damage, the harder the game will get, with enemies getting stronger and more attacks, but, if you get hurt the difficulty will go down. Why would you want to keep the difficulty high? More and better rewards. Money is very important in the game, to buy health and God Hand gauge upgrades and to buy new moves, since your attacks grow obsolete pretty fast, and the more enemies you defeat on higher difficulties the more money you'll earn at the end of the stage. The game has a new game plus feature, but sadly none of your purchases are kept, which is a huge bummer since more freedom to experiment with combo set-ups would've been very welcome. At least you get bonus costumes!

Weapons break fast, but they can be quite useful at times.

 The game is not all that much harder than, say, Devil May Cry. There're plenty of checkpoints, and restarting from one refills your entire health bar and lowers the difficulty, so even if you get surprised by Demons, super tough enemies that randomly spawn when you defeat enemies, you won't be set back too much. And even without that, the game gives you a ton of advantages to make your life easier, the God Hand makes you invulnerable for a short while so that you can thin out the enemy lines and the God Reel attacks are very powerful. And for how useful the God Hand is, the gauge refills surprisingly fast, so even if you get to a boss without the gauge full you'll be filling it in no time. No, God Hand is not an easy game... but it's nowhere near as hard as people will tell you it is, so don't be afraid to approach it.

 God Hand is a fantastic little game that remains a bit obscure due to erroneous claims about its difficulty. It's incredibly fun thanks to its mixture of satisfying combat and hilarious characters that keeps tedium from setting in. Now, if you'll excuse me, I've more butts to spank.
 9.0 out of 10

Now Playing: God Hand

 Blister hand after I'm done punchin' all these buttons!

The cover does the game no justice.

 First I took to Rome with Gladiator... then I took to Greece, with God o' War, then back to Rome with Shadow of Rome and then back to Greece with Rise of the Argonauts, but now... I'm back with the gods, with God Hand. And that sentence made little to no sense, but I'm trying so hard to be funny right now.

 So I finished the first stage, turned on the console and was about to write this... but the game is SO good that I turned it on and just finished the triple boss on stage II. The game is tough, yes, but it's also a blast. The bit about customizing Gene's moveset is kinda neat, but it's too much of a hassle, so I'm going with what works and what's simple: PUNCHES GALORE, BABY.

 My one complaint is that I feel like some enemies have a bit too much HP, but maybe I'm supposed to use the Godhand more often? I like saving it for surprise demons and bosses, but maybe I'm underestimating just how fast I can fill the gauge? I dunno. Regardless, the game is a blast.

Review #511: Rise of the Argonauts

 The world needed yet another retelling of the Argonauts story.

They could've had better covers...

 Welcome to Rise of the Argonauts, yet another retelling of Jason's myth. This is a very weird, yet oddly entertaining, beat'em up/RPG hybrid that works quite well even if it doesn't do anything too spectacular.

 The moment the game starts is the moment the story begins deviating from the most important, and most consistent, plot device: Jason is about to get married to newcomer Alceme, descended from Ares, before she is murdered by the Blacktongue clan, and it is the gods, Ares, Hermes, Apollo and Athena, who tell him that in order to revive his love he must recover the Golden Fleece. And thus, Jason and his best friend Hercules embark the Argo, and soon he'll be recruiting people, the Argonauts, to join him in his journey. As you'd know there's varying records of who were the Argonauts, but this game, man, this game wanted to have anyone you'd recognize. Hercules? In most versions that include him only have him for a short while, here he stays with Jason all the way through. Medea? Of course. Achiles? You're pushing it, considering it was his father that boarded the Argo. Medusa? Why not! Suffice to say, they added a few characters just because they were recognizable... not that that's necessarily a bad thing. As for the story itself... it's pretty interesting, dialogue goes from cheesy to badass at a moment's notice, but on the whole, it's alright. Many times you'll be allowed to pick different choices(Up to four!), but most of the time the outcome is the same. And when it's not, it's merely a different cutscene. Some characters definitely get more exposure and development than others though, but the important Argonauts get to showcase their personality if you bring them along with you, so there's that.

It's bloody, yet somehow not gratifying.

 The game is structured like a RPG, albeit a very linear one. There're four major islands you'll visit, but a total of six(sevenish...) areas total that you'll visit. The first Island is Iolcus, where you start the journey, and afterwards you can tackle the next three island in whichever order you prefer. I recommend going after the Ares descendant first, since that island nets you Achilles, and you'll want that prick in your party to offer his... insight. Anyways, each of this Islands is only visited once(Kindaish) and each has its own set of sidequests, so you'll want to finish everything before you finish each island's main quest. A tiny little gripe with the game is that you can only check your objective log by going into the Map screen... which isn't tied to a button, which was a bit shortsighted of them since Select has no use, and requires going into the pause menu. Another bad idea was the fact that the battle HUD, which means your health bar, is turned off by default, but it only takes a trip to the options screen to fix it.

 Conversations with options usually involve four different 'personalities', you can answer in a courageous manner(Ares), a just one(Athena), a playful/witty one(Hermes) or a more serious one(Apollo). As you probably inferred from the parenthesis, each answer type favors a god which in turns grants you bonus experience points with that god. Actually, there aren't experience points in the game. At all. Instead, you accumulate deeds. These can be earned by completing sidequests, defeating X amount of enemies, defeating X amount of enemies with Y weapon, selecting X amount of a certain god's answer, etc and then you trade these deeds for experience points on any of the four gods. Each god has their own skill tree: Ares favors the mace and power, Apollo favors the shield and protecting your allies and making Jason more sturdy, Hermes favors the sword and making Jason more agile while Athena favors the spear and making your allies stronger. You can probably earn enough experience points to at least max two trees, but you can build Jason at your leisure, give him a little bit of everything if you so please.

Did I mention that every piece of equipment has its own look?

 There's also no money involved in the game. No money and no experience points... why would you want to do sidequests? Well, besides the possibility to score answers of a specific god, there's also the option of obtaining new equipment. Every armor, sword, spear and mace has a unique look to it as well as a different passive ability. You can bring a sword that's stronger than the others, or one that deals more damage if you attack an enemy's back... or maybe one that deals damage to enemies even if they block. The game is easy enough so that you can bring any equipment set that you like, so just wear what looks cool. Or wield weapons that compliment each other. Or focus on making Jason good at one thing and one thing only. It's up to you, anything will work. As for me, I loved the fact that everything looked different, in an era where costumes are a privilege and not a treat... it's great getting to equip Jason with so many different, cool looking armors.

 Combat is... janky, to say the least. There's a weak attack, a strong attack, a shield bash, blocking, dodging and using god spells. You can switch weapons at any time by pressing R1 and L1, but... sometimes the game won't let you switch just because. Sometimes the collision between attacks won't feel quite right. Nothing feels quite right when fighting. However, nothing is quite broken. Combat is a clunky, but passable, barebones element to the game. There's no fancy combos to be made, no skillful dodging and blocking required, there's no substance and no style... but it's not broken. Compared to the walking and talking you'll be doing, the combat is but just another small piece of a bigger system, so there's not so much combat as to overstay its welcome.

Hercules is a total beefcake... literally.

 And lastly... the game runs like butt. Graphics are ugly, animations are stiff and there's a noticeable lack of... well, attention to detail. Walking up or down stairs looks... janky to say the least. And the framerate? The framerate is horrible, at times it struggles to maintain 30 FPS. On the other hand, the art direction seemed great, but the in-game graphics doesn't do it justice.

 It's got a dialogue wheel... with no real consequences. It's got a lot of combat... that's very shallow and somewhat clunky. It has a decent art direction... but poor graphics. Rise of the Argonauts is a great example of a jack of all trades, master of none. It does a lot of things, some better than others, but it doesn't have any real strong points to its name. That said, it's also better than the sum of its parts, because as clear as it is that the game is a bit clunky... it's can be quite fun at times. You can tell that a lot of love was put into the game, the story is interesting, the characters are interesting and while there're next to no consequences to your choices.... you can tell that they had fun coming up with different alternatives for Jason to speak. The people involved wanted to make a great game, that much is clear, but while the end result isn't fantastic... it's still a remarkably fun time as long as you temper your expectations.
 7.5 out of 10

Now Playing: Rise of the Argonauts

 And now, we travel from Ancient Rome towards Ancient Greece...

Both NA and PAL covers are equally bad, but I got my hands on the European version.

 Upon first booting up the game you're treated to a wonky framerate adoring an assault on your Palace. But you defeat them and then... discover that the game feels wonky as a whole, just try to go down stairs and watch Jason hop as he goes downwards. Oh, and just try to get out of the Palace, which is no easy task, who designed that thing!? And then I kept playing and I noticed that I had no health bar. Maybe the screen would turn grey as I lost health? Dunno, I was taking damage but nothing was happening. And then, after finishing the Challenge of Ares I went into options and.. the Battle HUD is off by default, who knows why, turns out there actually is a healthbar, even if it took me two hours to figure it out. Well, I hopped on to Argo ready to set sail for the Cave of the Oracles.

 Rise of the Argonauts is alright. It looks mediocre, the framerate sucks buuut the combat is relatively fun. Engaging in conversation with other NPCs is made worth it thanks to the possibility to earn Aspect points or even new equipment pieces. Despite how hard the game tried to turn me off with its lackluster presentation... the game is quite fun. That said, I've played about 2 hours and the combat is already getting a bit dull, so hopefully it picks up once I set foot on a new location.

Review #510: Shadow of Rome

 Without a shadow of a doubt... one of Capcom's most ambitious offerings.

Art direction in the game is phenomenal.

 Capcom has made many appeals to the Western crowd, and Shadow of Rome was, if I'm not mistaken, their first attempt. Sadly, it ended in failure, which is a bit surprising considering how good the game is.

 The game follows two friends, Octavianus and Agrippa, as they suffer through the events of Caesar's murder. Agrippa's father is accused of the murder, his mother is executed and now Agrippa is a wanted man... not that that stops him from becoming a Gladiator, for a chance to save his father. Meanwhile, Octavianus, as Caesar's family and Agrippa's friend, knows that there's more to the murder than meets the eye, and sets out to investigate the parliament and the senate on his own. The story is interesting, and having the two viewpoints makes it even more so. THe game employs a fantastic artstyle: Character designs for important NPCs are very Hokuto no Ken-esque, which means that they look badass, and the game employs an almost cell-shaded filter that makes characters pop from the background, which is surprisingly appealing. On the flip side, characters have very... weird and offputting facial expressions, take Claudia, whenever she is supposed to smile... it turns into a weird facsimile of a smirk that makes you think she's always plotting something. But she isn't. Voice acting is passable, and sometimes it goes into the melodramatic which is can get you a bit out of the experience

.'Disarmed', I see what they did there. Puny.

 Octavianus' stages consist of stealth missions. You often have to infiltrate buildings that are swarming with guards or politicians, and most of the time, being caught means being sent back to the last checkpoint, albeit sometimes it's possible to escape the guards. There's a lot of interesting things you can do as Octavianus, knocking someone down, with a rope or a jug, means you can take the clothes. But since Octavianus has a very small frame, and thus not very convincing as anything other than a maid, you may sometimes be stopped and asked questions, get the wrong answer and they'll discover you. You can also grab and throw certain objects, like rats or stones, or whistle in order to distract people. There's a very interesting mechanic in which you can walk with your hands behind your back to conceal tools. Octavianus can also come across silver and gold coins in his stages, which can then be spent at the city gates in order to decorate your room. It's utterly pointless, but it's still fun to add objects, and as you buy stuff you also get a few extra haircuts for Octavianus.

 But as Octavianus investigates, Agrippa must fight in gladiatorial events. Objectives vary: Destroy all of the opposing team's statues, defeat every enemy, accumulate a certain amount of salvo(basically, cheers), survive, chariot races or simply defeat a boss. Agrippa can pick up various different weapons: One handed swords, clubs, shields or dual handed spears, halberds and greatswords. And you'll be switching weapons constantly since they break. Enemies have access to the very same weapons, and these can be knocked off your hands or you can pry them away from your enemies, if you are unarmed... or you can un-arm your enemies, literally, some of the bigger weapons can maim enemies and thus reduce their offensive capabilities. The more varied your style is the better, as you'll be awarded salvo. For instance, cutting an enemy in half gives you the 'Red volcano' salvo worth... 2000 salvo, but if you use it again in the same event you'll be awarded less. Salvo has a bigger function in matches than that of deciding what rank you get when clearing the mission, or being the objective of the event itself, and that's to get the attention of the crowd. The higher the salvo gauge is, the better rewards you'll get from the crowd, which can be anything from massive weapons to health-restoring food.

The Gladiatorial part of the game is easily the best one.

 One thing to keep in mind when approaching this game is... that it's rather hard. Octavianus' stages can be cleared with enough ingenuity and patience... or maybe a FAQ, but you'll need skill and luck in Agrippa's stages. Inevitably there will be events that you'll like more than others, but you'll have to go through those that you don't like anyways. It would've been a good idea to let you pick in which events you wanted to compete, but I digress. Battle Royales are simple enough, and with enough luck the crowd will feed you enough food to keep you healthy, but events such as amassing Salvo can be tough since you'll need to vary your tactics as much as you can, while also looking out for your health while under a time limit or an enemy amount limit. I particularly disliked the events that had you breaking statues, since running out of weapons meant having a hard time dealing with enemy assault as you try to smash their statutes. There're plenty of cheats and a few other modes, like survival, that you can unlock... provided you can rank high in gladiatorial events under the hardest difficulty setting. Good luck!

 Shadow of Rome is a brilliant but flawed game. The gladiatorial events' difficulty can sometimes veer into the unfair, and the stealth sections can get a bit long in the tooth if what you want to do is bash skulls but you can't figure out how to evade the guards. That said, the game reeks of high production values, and the challenge can probably be tracked to a misguided attempt as appealing to the West. The game is definitely worth a look.
8.0 out of 10

Now Playing: Shadow of Rome

 Is the game using cel shaded graphics?!

 I just love Capcom's logo on PS2 games.

 It's been buggin' me for a while now, but characters are cel shaded. right? It's very slight, but I'm preeeeeeeeeettty sure it's using cel shading. I think. 90% sure.

 Aesthetics aside, I've played about 30 minutes, defeated Barca(the first boss) and... I'm impressed. It's fun! It's really flippin' hard, but it's fun. I mean, I was low on life by the time I finished the introductory gladiator event, and I had to retry the Barca fight since he defeated me on my first try.... This is gonna be a tough one. But that's alright, the gameplay is pretty good. Agrippa's movement feels a bit stiff, he is no Kratos or Dante, so combat can be tough. But I think it's worth it.

 Yeah, it's looking like a fun one. But I need to know if my mind is playing tricks on me or if it really is using cel shading!