"First" Archimpressions: Robotech Battlecry

 It's oh so good.

 I remembered this game being fun, and fun it is. Just cleared the first chapter, and it was a lot of fun... except that boss, jesus. To be fair, when I went to lower the difficulty to easy I found out that I was playing on hard all along, not cute, not cute at all.
 For the first time ever I get to watch the story! And my god is it a borefest, I'm ever tempted to just skip them, but I won't, I'm better than that. Well, there isn't much more left to say, it's as good as I remembered it, so I'm expecting a favorable outcome, ranging from 7-8, just how bad could it get?(In before the next missions are repetitive shooting galleries, god no).

Archview #30: Dead or Alive 2 Hardcore

 That was fast.

 The game that made bouncy breasts popular! Even though DoA 1 had it too, it didn't become so hilariously obcene 'till DoA 2, but I digress. This is a 3D fighting game that relies less on finesse, but pretends to give a more... entertaining experience. That's why it's such a fast-paced game, with emphasis on flashy moves and pretty graphics that still hold up to this day!.
 DoA 1 had it's roots with Virtua Fighter, and it holds true for DoA 2, however, it's a much faster game. You've one punch button and one kick button, pressing various combinations of both provides strings, just like Virtua Fighter. There's also a "Free" button, which is used for free movement, guarding and holding. By stanging still when you press it, the character will guard. By pressing Guard+Back(Upback or downback for higher and lower attacks), your character will initiate a hold, time it right and you will counter your opponent's attack You can use Hold commands even while being subject to an attack string, which is why Juggling is so important in this game, if your oponent's feet are on the air, they can't try to hold your moves. Characters also have access to grabs by pressing Free+Punch.

 DoA 2 was one of the, if not the first, fighters to include "Transitions". Using a knockback move on an opponent against a wall will send them flying through it into another part of the stage. Some stages also have "Danger Zones", knock an enemy onto one and you'll deal loads of damage. The game has Story Mode, which is an Arcade mode with the ocassional in-game engine cutscene every now and then, there's no loading times between battles, which is quite awesome. Then there's Versus, Time Attack, Survival and Tag Mode. Surprisingly, Tag Mode is nicely fleshed out, with special Tag throws, some character duos even get special tag moves.
 Graphicwise, while not incredibly detailed, the character models are pretty good and smooth. The faces are a bit weird, but not too jarring. The attack animations are incredibly fluid, specially when moves are countered, strangely, some of the Win Poses feel a bit... stiff, different animators maybe? Voice Acting is passable, both on the English and the Japanese dub, but the soundtrack is fantastic. Each of the 14 characters have their own moveset(Well, Bayman and Leon are clones) and they are pretty long. There are about 6 costumes per character too, and most of them must be unlocked, so there's plenty of replay value.

 DoA 2 is not the most technical of fighters, but it's a fun pick-up-and-play alternative to Tekken, you can just grab the controller and start pulling of 5-hit combos from the get go, and the Hold mechanic is a fun gimmick, if a bit casual.

 8 out of 10.

New adquisitions!

 Eh... lots of them

 Let's see....

 DoA 2: Hardcore: Actually a replacement disc, but I will play it again and review it. The copy I have was a used copy from Gamestop, came with the console. It actuall runs quite fine, but it's incredibly scratched and won't run the CG gallery. Besides, no Instruction Booklet... 'till now!

 Robotech: Battlecry: I loved this game. I never watched Macross nor Robotech nor anything, but I loved this game, and I'm not into airplane shooting games either, guess morphing into a Mech helps!

 Rival Schools: I knew about this game, but I was never interested in it.... 'till I played it's demo included in Pocket Fighter. I think I had more fun with that demo than with the game itself. It was insane, all this ground recoveries, and it was so fast! And it looked nice, albet blocky. Ah well, I got the Rival Schools 2 game, japanese only, and I loved it. And I guess I won't be missing Eiji and Ran(I think those were their names? The Swimmer and the Camera girl).

 State of Emergency: True, I was part of the million of suckers who read "Rockstar" and thought, for the longest time, that it was developed by them. REGARDLESS, I enjoyed the game for what it was. I even had the PC version.

 Bushido Blade 2: I can't wait to play this one. Which is why I will probably leave it for later. I loved this game, like most of the games I purchased this time, heh.

 The Legend of Dragoon: I actually didn't like this game very much. Surprsing, as it has a red-associated main character, who controls flame, wields a sword, is related to Dragons and has an alternate form. That's like my recipie for Love. I always felt the game was a bit of a drag as it made you re-treck through dungeons, if they were on your way. Also, I think I found some of the bosses a bit hard. However, a Man's gotta do what a Man's gotta do, and if that means beating LoD and finally reach a final judgement, then so be it.

 I will probably tackle these games in this order:
DoA 2, Robotech, State of Emergency, Rival Schools, Bushido Blade 2 and then... Legend of Dragoon.

Archview #29: Dynasty Warriors

 So underwhelming...

 Set in ancient China, around 1800 years ago, Dynasty Warriors presents itself as a 3D one on one weapon-based fighting game. The game is pretty different from other games of it's ilk, however. The game is played with four buttons, two buttons do the attacking(Thrusting and Slashing) and the other two provide the defense, parry and deflect. Slashes are to be parried, and thrusts deflected, do it right, and you'll open up your enemy for an attack, time it wrong or choose the wrong counter and you'll be open for attack. There's also blocking, done by inputing nothing or holding back, like other fighters.
 There are other functions, like grabbing, by pressing both attack buttons and sidestepping, by pressing both defense buttons. By attacking at the same time as your opponent, you'll initiate a clash, however mashes the most buttons wins and opens up the enemy for a counterattack. There's also Chi bars on the bottom of the screen for both fighters. It charges steadily as you stay on the offense and hit your opponent, getting blocked or backing away makes it decrease. Once it's filled, a green light turns red, and you are allowed to use a Musou Attack, the bar will decrease steadily, so it's a use it or lose it situation. If you are on the last 30% of your HP bar, the Musou Attack will be enhanced. Musou Attacks are performed the same way for every character, and there's two of them per character.

 The presentations is pretty lackluster, models are very blocky and the animations are merely serviceable. The character themselves look bland and lack any sort of personality, heck, they only have one win pose. And their movesets? Disappointingly short. To add insult to injury, the stages are boring. They consist of a infinite floor and a low res background image, sometimes it's hard to tell what that image is supposed to be. On the other hand, the soundtrack is pretty engaging, it's not the kind of music that would be used in future Dynasty Warriors games, but it's pretty good nontheless.
 As for modes, they played it safe with the usual "Arcade, Versus, Time Attack, Team Battle, Survival", y'know, the classics. There's a total of 16 characters, 10 default characters, 3 unlockable characters(Via beating the game with the default characters) and 3 bonus characters. The bonus characters are clones from other characters and are unlocked via button presses.
 All in all, Dynasty Warriors is a pretty mediocre game, it tries to do it's own thing, and while it gets commended for it, originality doesn't make up for fun.
 5 out of 10.

First Archimpressions: Dynasty Warriors

 Oooooh boy...

 As I read the instruction booklet, and saw how it only had two attack buttons, but two defense buttons, I expected to find a really good and original, but forgotten, fighting game. I'm afraid that won't be the case. So I just finished the Arcade mode twice, with Zhao Yun and Guan Yu and... golly. For starters, each characters has such a small movelist, and the only way to access it is the... instruction booklet. Movement is very clunky, feels like Toshinden(And Toshinden is the definition of clunky).
 The character designs are really lame. They lack personality and some of them looks so generic... It's astounding how this game fathered the Dynasty Warriors game. Ah well, I'ma keep on keeping on, maybe as I get more comfortable with the game, it might turn out to be fun, but I can't see it happening.

Archview #28: War of the Monsters

 I took no notes while playing this(GG) so I hope I remember everything....

 War of the Monsters is an arena-based fighting game for up to four monsters at the same time. As your monster of choice, you are placed on a large arena, filled with climbable buildings and loads of throwables, ranging from cars to statues, heck, you can impale other monsters on antennas! As previously stated, monsters can impact the environment on many ways, almost every structure is destructible, almost every medium-sized object can be grabbed and thrown or hit the enemy with. The object of the game is to defeat the other monsters, no matter the mode you are in.
 Speaking of modes, there's not a whole lot of them, in singleplayer you have Adventure, Endurance and Free for all, while on multiplayer you have three unlockable minigames and versus. Still, the game itself is very entertaining, so the lack of modes is not a huge deal. Excepting the mini-games, the game plays the same on every mode. Each monster has a projectile attack, weak and strong attacks, jump, block, strafing, a  close-range special attack and a long range special attack. Each of them plays very different from each other as well, with different combo strings, attack speeds and damages. The only real similarity is the close/range special move which always turns into some enveloping-kind of explosion.

 Besides the interactive objects, there are power-ups spread across the stage. Some may be hidden behind buildings, some lurk at plain sight, and they respawn frequently. These range from health-restoring pick ups(In 5%, 25% and 100% varieties), stamina restoring pick ups, Special Attacks and cloaking devices. Regarding Stamina, each monster has a blue-bar that depletes as it attacks(Projectile attacks usually consume a lot of Stamina), and you can restore it by not attacking for a while, grabbing the stamina power up, throwing or attacking with items or by killing monsters. You can actually go beyond the 100% with pick ups, and if you do so, you are granted an Special attack for free.
 It has to be said, while the game itself is very fast, and feels very arcadey(Which I love), the CPU is a bit of a bastard.... frustratingly so. During Adventure Mode, whenever it gets below half HP, it will run directly towards the healing items, if it's a faster monster than you, have fun taking it's life away. Again. Even worse, on battle with more than 2 monsters, the CPU will always gang up on you, and when one goes to grab the health pick ups, the other one will do it's darnedest to hold you in place, very annoying. It's in your best interest to take the 100% and 25% health restores as soon as possible(Take some damage so as to be able to use them) so that they may not take them.

 Visually, it has an almost cartoonish look. Each monster is very different from the others, and they look fantastic. Each of them has 3 unlockable costumes, for a total of 4, and the fourth ones go crazy, some are almost entire redesigns. There's also little details, like small pedestrians running away, and if you step on them, tiny blood splatters will appear on the ground. The music pays homage to the Kaijuu genre, even the monsters shrieks and roars are very fitting. The game is a big love letter towards the Kaijuu genre, from the looks to the sounds to the monster backstories!
 There really are few bad things to be said about the game. Maybe 10 monsters is a bit small for a roster, but they are very distinct. Maybe the fact that the AI is a bastard, but on Multiplayer, the game is a blast. Maybe it could've used more modes? Sure, but the game is so much fun that you won't need more modes. All in all, War of the Monsters is a great game, criminally forgotten.
 It's an 8 out of 10.

Progress Report 6/10/13

 Status:

 Injustice: Woot! All misions finally done! They were... eh, I didn´t really care about them, but at least they are there. Now I´ma tackle Battle mode, objective? Try each mode at least once, attain all endings, get all costumes.

 War of the Monsters: Completed! Well, as much as I could. Turns out I need a Twisted Metal Black savefile to unlock Agamo´s last costume. I didn´t try the mini-games, since I need another person to try them AND who would I convince to try them out when the game itself is so much fun? Review later today or tomorrow.

 Next Gamez: SMT: DS 2? I need to finish it, dammit!. This week I should be getting a couple of PS1 games, I think I might want to replay Bushido Blade 2. Maybe. Perhaps. Mayhaps.