Review #119: Dark Cloud 2

 Over 50 hours to finish this one!

 Dark Cloud 2 is one of the PS2's most criminally forgotten gems. While most people mistake this game for an RPG, this is a Rogue-like through and through, but a bit more forgiving than most!

 As Max, son of the wealthiest man in Palm Springs, you are to traverse 8 different dungeons, 1 per chapter, as you right the time-line that is being destroyed by Griffon, an evil being that aims for world destruction. Pretty early on his adventure, Max comes across Monica, a girl from the future who's father was killed by one of Griffon's henchmen. The story is fairly cliched at times, but it's told fairly well, even if there were some characters that were too easily forgiven....

 Each of the eight Chapter features one dungeon, usually, alongside a town that you must rebuild. While it sounds short, the game is quite extensive. Each dungeon is fairly long(Except the first one, which is quite short, and the bonus one from the eight chapter that it's the longest dungeon in the game) featuring a decent amount of floors. While the game is a Rogue like, it's a bit easier than most, for instance, you don't go from floor to floor, instead, after clearing a floor you can exit the dungeon, do your business, and when you return you can pick up from where you left, or just go back to any of the previous floors.

 When you play, you take both Max and Monica, but you only take control of one at a time. You can switch at the touch of a button, or when one of them dies. Max can also pilot Steve, a fully customizable Robot, however, in order to expand the mount of Capacity points it has, you must earn experience for it(Which means neglecting experience for Monica or Max), while Monica can transform into monsters by acquiring their "Monster Coins". Both Monica and Max have different weapons and movesets, Max wields a Gun(That can be evolved into a laser gun, Grenade Launcher or a Machine gun) and a Wrench(That can be turned into a Hammer or, well, a bigger Wrench) and Monica gets a Sword(That can be turned into a heavy sword or a lighter, faster sword) and a Bracelet.

 Each floor is randomly generated each time you visit it, and each one possesses enemies and chests, sometimes trapped, and if you are lucky enough, a healing fountain with unlimited uses. Defeating enemies makes them drop experience gems for the weapon that dealt the last blow, when you level up you weapon, it earns points that are used to evolve them. Keep in mind that weapons break, so taking Repair powder in your inventory is a must! Enemies will also, sometimes, drop items, these can be healing or weapon repairing items, but most of the time, they will be either Georama Items or elemental items. Elemental Items can be "spectrumized" and then fused to a weapon  to raise its stats. Depending on how you raise your weapon is how it will evolve(The game shows you all the evolution branches that your weapon can take, and on which stats you must raise in order to take that branch). You can spectrumize any item in the game, but it's the elemental orbs that will give you the most point on each stat, at least until you find the very rare precious stones.

 Now then, what are Georama items? These are items that are used to build Georama Parts in order to reconstruct towns. Reconstructing towns consists of creating buildings, trying to achieve certain goals(Like "X amount of Y placed") in order to rebuild these towns in the future. While you can take your time to rebuild each town, you will need to do it in order to advance through the game, triggering certain scenes in the future are usually a necessity to get the item needed to reach the chapter's boss. If you don't like these construction aspect of the game, you are out of luck, but at least they are not too involved. Items are also used in order to build items(Projectile tools, healing items, Robot parts, weapons), but you need to photograph ideas first, and then mix these ideas in order to find out what items you need to build it. There's also some NPCs that can be recruited on Palm Springs, by doing small sidequests, and you can then move them into each town(Many a times, having a specific NPC on a Town is one of the Town's goals). These NPCs can also be taken with you on each dungeon for various passive effects, or even allowing you to repair your weapons or baking bread for you. Finally, there's an Spheda minigame on each of the randomly generated floors, Spheda is basically golf with a color twist, Portals(Holes) are either blue or red, and in order to clear it, you must hit it with a ball of the other color, in order to change the color of the ball, you must hit it against something... but you must also keep in mind that you only get a limited amount of swings!

 I found the combat to be quite simple, but it's fairly fun. You also need to keep in mind that the game can get quite challenging, and it's usually advisable to keep both Max's and Monica's weapons up to date. The optional boss requires a set amount of damage to be done by both characters. And if you want your robot not to be a hindrance, you'll have to spend time on it as well. Basically, this is a game that demands a lot of your time, you have to grind for money if you need to buy items in order to rebuild towns(What you find in dungeons will not be enough most of the time) or upgrade your weapons or even to buy healing items, and you also need to at least keep both character with updated weapons. If both characters die, it's game over, no continues, and if the one that had all the upgrades died, you are screwed unless you can find the key to the next floor, and then find the exit.

 It's also not without its flaws, the lock on mechanic will sometimes have trouble with some enemies, getting the camera to try to jerk its way to the enemy, usually failing, so you are better of cancelling the lock, moving the camera yourself, and then locking on again. Another issue is with the items that upgrade Max and Monica's Health and Defense, these spawn after certain floors are cleared, but you are never told when they spawn, or when on the future timeline they are, and even then, they spawn on very small chests that are easy to miss. These are a must-have or enemies will destroy you very easily, so it's a bit annoying, you are better of finding a guide of when and where they spawn. Then there's also the fact that each Floor of each respective dungeon shares a common tileset with the other floors of the dungeon, so every dungeon looks exactly the same, even if the layout and enemies are different, coupled with the fact that you may need to grind for experience or gold, repetition can set in pretty soon.

 I dare say that Dark Cloud 2 is one of the better looking PS2 games out there. The animation is a bit lacking, but the overall visual style is gorgeous. It's a colorful game, with equally colorful and often times weird NPCs. Monster design is also fairly creative, even if there are more palette swaps than I would've liked. Music is excellent, very whimsical or dark according to the moment. There's a particularly peppy song that plays on every second-to-last floor that's really, really good. I would compare the quality of the soundtrack to a Nintendo game, and that's a good thing. Voice acting is really good for the most part, but there's a couple that aren't quite up to snuff.

 Dark Cloud 2 is a game that is not for everyone. You must be willing to dedicate time to it, you'll have to tough up to the challenge. But in the end, it will be worth it.
 9.0 out of 10.

Now Playing: Bleach - Heat the Soul 7

 This is... my Bankai!

 I used to be a huge Bleach fan, the Soul Society/Rescue Rukia arcs remains one of my favorite story arcs in Shonen manga... sadly, the manga has fallen from grace, ever since the last parts of Las Noches. It has now become a trite, cliched, dumb and baffling shadow of what it used to be. Bleach, what happened to you? During the DS/PSP era, I was a DS owner and I was graced with some amazing 2D fighters, the first one that remains a fantastic fighting game and a fantastic Bleach game(The second one is plagued with glitches and joke characters which makes it suffer a lot). But as much as I loved the DS games, I always kept an eye on the Heat the Soul Series, and while the DS games stopped at the early stages of the Arrancar saga, the PSP games kept on going, needless to say, I've longed for this game for so long!

 I'm up to the 10th stage of the Story Mode, and I've mixed feelings about it. The combat system gets a while to get used to, but it plays akin to the Naruto: Clash of the Ninja series, not surprisingly since it was developed by the same people! Character roster is huge, there's a nice amount of modes, but there's something, a certain something that I can't quite put my finger on that is missing. I suppose after logging a bit more play time I'll be able to pinpoint it or get fully accustomed to the gameplay.

Archile's Grab Bag: Bleached edition

  Mandatory package photo.

 Bleach - Heat the Soul 7: While I was pretty happy with the DS Bleach games, they were great fighters(Especially the first one), but Heat the Soul always piqued my curiosity. Particularly because while the DS Fighters stopped at Soul Society(with Ikkaku's Bankai for good measure), the PSP fighters kept on going. While the Bleach manga has worsened into a steaming pile of junk, I still like the characters, and most of Las Noches was pretty decent... until after Grimmjow VS Ichigo anyways.

Review #118: Samurai Warriors - Chronicles

 It was high time I got another Samurai Warriors into my blog.

 Samurai Warriors Chronicles was Koei's first, and in America's case only, Warriors game on the 3DS. Since I've gone over how Warriors games work over and over in my blog, I'll just get into the differences and its unique mechanics.

 As with the rest of the Samurai Warriors games, it follows the story behind Japan's unification, from the early wars between Hojo, Takeda and Uesugi clans and goes beyond Hideyasu's unification. For this installment, they opted to do away with individual story modes, instead, you now take control of a Mercenary that goes from faction to faction waging war and winning battles. It's a very different take, and I actually liked the new angle a whole lot. It's kinda funny how your character switches sides just because, but it's nice to get the canonical development of the story. Actually, there are 5 different chapters, the first three are very straight forward, but the fourth one allows you to play on either side at will. The fifth chapter is reserved for miscellaneous battles and downloadable spot-pass levels(Which can still be gotten to this day!). The "Free Mode" that most Warriors games contain is now "included" in Story Mode(Which is the only mode in the game), as you can just replay stages by selecting them on the list.

 Character customization is fairly limited, at first you can only pick either a female or a male warrior, but as you go through Chapters you unlock a few customization options for the costume. While very few in number, your character will look like a badass regardless of how you outfit him or her! The game uses a very similar, and annoying, friendship system to Dynasty Warriors Gundam 2. By battling alongside generals, your friendship with them will increase, and after each battle you can choose to speak to certain generals to increase, or decrease if you chose the wrong answers, your friendship with them. You must also keep in mind that defeating them in battle will decrease your friendship with them. And you want to increase your friendship with them to unlock them for use when replaying stages and to unlock their weapon styles for your character to use.

 The game borrows a lot from Samurai Warriors 3, characters use their SW 3 renditions and most movesets are identical. A lot of stages are borrowed as well. Basic gameplay is the same, but with a few, and very interesting, new mechanics. For instance, you can now take up to four Generals to each stage, and can issue them to move by tapping on the touch screen. You can also freely change between all four of them, and when you are not in control, the CPU takes over them. This is something that could only be done this smoothly with the Touch screen, and it's a very fun and engaging new mechanics. The Mission system from SW 3 was altered, for worse, missions now pop up during gameplay, and now a window pops up telling you of what to do. It's not as intrusive as it sounds, but it's a bit disappointing how it brings the game to a halt. Completing missions is not mandatory, but succeeding in them lowers enemy morale, but failing them raises it. Morale affects certain areas of the map, when the morale is high, enemies get buffs while on red terrain. As great as I think the touch screen mechanics were, the mission system is more of a pain than anything.

 Samurai Warriors Chronicles looks fairly good for the amount of characters that can be on screen at the same time. The framerate is fairly consistent, even with the 3D turned on, there are instances when the Framerate will suffer a bit, but it's not too bad. Music is taken straight from SW 3, I didn't like it too much but it does fit the game. The English dub was ignored altogether, so we get the Japanese voice overs, while much higher in quality, you gotta love the campiness that English dubbed Warriors games bring us! Rounding up the presentation we have the introductory sequences before each stage, in which you get some very dull and dry looking cut-scenes which narrates the context for each battle. These get old very soon, are annoyingly long, and you can't skip them until you have beaten the stages! If they had more flavor maybe they wouldn't have been such a hindrance, but at the end of the day, they get in the way of the player bashing skulls!

 For an early 3DS game, and the first installment on the console, Samurai Warriors Chronicles fared admirably. The use they gave the touch-screen was a fantastic addition that wouldn't have worked so well on the consoles, and it's nice that they tried something different with the Story Mode, and it's a very interesting take as well. My grips with the game are few, I had fun with it, much more than I expected.
 8.0 out of 10.

Month Overview: May

Games completed in May:
 Hexyz Force                                                                                                   7.5
 Mobile Suit Gundam: Gundam VS Gundam Next Plus                                      9.5
 Dexter's Laboratory  Robot Rampage                                                              6.0
 Jojo's Bizarre Adventure: All Star Battle                                                           8.0

 Very, very slow month, I was busy with mid-terms and other academic-related stuff, which seriously cut-off my game time. At least, the few games I played were great.



Game of March:

 Not my highest rated game this month, but the one I had the most fun with. I wish I could've rated it higher, but it barely has any modes, Campaign Mode is terrible(Microtransactions on a game with a $50 entry fee!?) and the story mode was so bare bones.... But the gameplay made up for everything, the attention to detail was glorious, there simply isn't a better JoJo game out there.

Runner-up:

 You know how awesome would it be to have Extreme Vs on the go? This is the next best thing. Next Plus plays a bit more like the older VS games, like Federation VS Zeon, which means it's a bit slower, it's not a bad thing, but it does feel different. Regardless, there's a rather different roster(Even if each update to Extreme Vs adds more and more returning Mobile Suits from Next Plus) and some play pretty different, so it's worth it.

Review #117: JoJo's Bizarre Adventure - All Star Battle

 MUDA MUDA MUDA MUDA MUDA MUDA MUDA DA!

 JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: All Star Battle is a bit hard to review, y'see, while it looks and plays like a fighting game, it's a JoJo game first, and a fighting game second. CyberConnect 2 did an amazing job in creating a game from fans for fans, but does that mean that they made a good game?

  At it's core, this is a 1 on 1 3-D fighting game. You get a simple three attack buttons, a sidestep button and a Style button. As for the mechanics, it has a very basic chaining system, light attacks chain into heavy attacks which can then be cancelled into Special moves which in turn can be cancelled into Super moves(Heart Heart Attacks) or Ultra moves(Great Heart Attacks). Furthermore, while you can use the Sidestep button to sidestep at any moment, pressing back just before getting hit will instantly sidestep the attack, while performing a fabulous pose, allowing for a swift counterattack. The Style button is a fairly fun addition, as it behaves differently depending on what type of character you are using. There are Ripple Users(Style allows to charge Meter or unleash EX versions of the special moves), Stand Users(Calls forth a "Stand", a spirit of sorts, which usually changes up the whole moveset while active), Vampirism(Can restore White health after a while and suck HP to restore its own), Pillar Men(Similar to Vampirism, but instead of sapping HP, they get special modes) and Horseback(Can ride horses) still, there are exceptions, like Hol Horse who is classified as Stand but plays very different to stand users, or Old Joseph who uses a Stand and the Ripple, or Cool Ice and Dio(3) who have both Stands and Vampirism, heck, Cool Ice's Stand plays nothing like the other stands! There is a lot of variety, both in movesets and styles, almost every character of the 42 plays very differently from one another, even though the "repeated punch" special move is shared by most of the cast(It is a staple of the series after all!). Needless to say, there's bound to be at least one character that suits your style.

 Delving deeper into the mechanics, there's also an Easy Beat combo, mashing the Light Attack button will produce a small, simple combo that usually(but not always!) ends in a Heart Heart Attack if you've got the meter to spend. While I'm not a huge fan of this, since you can't turn it off, the combos are fairly simple and easy to pull off, so it's not like it gives them a huge edge, and lets you play as a character even if you don't know how to use him/her. There's also more advance mechanics, like Flash Cancel, that lets you spend meter to cancel a combo, or the Stand Rush to fight as your Stand performs an Special move. There's a bit of a comeback mechanic in the form of Resolve and Rumble modes, both modes are activated automatically after a character's health drops below a certain threshold(30% for Rumble Mode, and 20% for the few that have Resolve Mode) and offers a wide variety of buffs. It's not necessarily a game-changer, but I wasn't too fond of the mechanic. Furthermore, each stage has a different gimmick(Which can luckily be turned off!), usually some sort of telegraphed attack that deals damage to any player on its way.

 The game contains: Arcade Mode, Story Mode, Campaign Mode, Versus, Practice, Customize and Gallery. Now then, Versus, Practice and Gallery are pretty much self-explanatory, so I'll talk a bit about the others. Firstly, Arcade Mode, which is a simple ladder-style mode in which you fight 8 random opponents, with no real reward besides money which can then be spent in Gallery Mode, simple yes, but keep in mind that the Japanese version didn't have this mode. Then we get Story Mode, as I'll explain further, CC2 went the extra mile when it came to fanservice in this game, which is why it's so surprising that this mode is so barebones. While it goes from part 1 to 7(And makes up a scenario for Part 8 where Josuke faces off against the other JoJos), you do get some preface before each battle... in the form of short text snippets. There's no accompanying images, no panels from the manga, no character cut-outs, just dry, flavorless, bare text. The story rushes through events, mentions characters that aren't even featured as NPCs and does away with them in a matter of sentences, which kinda makes you wonder why even bother mentioning the character if it won't be a big deal at all when it comes to this mode. It tries to make up for it by having "Hidden Missions", the objectives usually have you use moves that were used when the fighters fought each other in the Manga, which rewards you with extra money and unlocks stuff for you to buy in the Gallery Shop.

 After you are done with the oh so very short Story Mode, you'll have unlocked every character(which is a good thing) and "Another Story Mode", which is the same mode, with the very same text snippets, but you play as the opponent this time around, superfluous at best. After getting done with this short mode, the next mode is... Campaign mode. This is where the game placed all of its Microtransactions. Yes, a full-priced game(except in the USA) has the audacity to place Microtransactions. Campaign Mode is the only place to unlock the real cool extras, like the taunts, colors and costumes. "But this is so much better than having to buy the costumes!" kinda. Y'see, in order to gain the cool extras(Colors and Costumes) you need to defeat bosses, and by defeat I don't mean "Defeat them in battle" but drop their HP to 0. Unless you spend Energy from your 10-stock battery, you'll only deal 250 damge(They have HP ranging from 1500 to 15000). Bosses are found at random(You can buy microtransactions to up the chances to find them, and if you don't find them after using an item... too bad, its gone for good(The game does give you a very few of these for free after playing a lot in this mode)), and the most damage you can do is 4000+ using an entire Battery.... This is a very, very disappointing mode, I spent more time waiting in order to milk the bosses as much as I could. I spent more time waiting than playing. And look on the bright side, after Namco closes down the servers, this mode is gonna be gone for good, alongside all the unlockables, so you better get cracking right now!

 As for the extras, most of the alternate costumes are merely cosmetic changes, so even if they wanted to sell them to you, they would've had trouble finding an audience that wouldn't complain! To be fair, these costumes are based off on the covers of the different volumes of the Manga, so while, most, are small variations, they are very neat references to the manga. The taunts, as well as the poses, are ripped straight from the manga, so extra points for that as well. Even the alternate colors(You start off with 2 per character, and can unlock 2 more for every character in Campaign Mode) are based off the manga. Furthermore, the art pieces in the gallery are all very high quality and look really good. Finally, there is a disappointingly 9 DLC characters, while I'm usually against this, I think the amount of work CC2 put into fanservice was very well worth it, plus, the core roster gets all the essential characters, while the DLC are merely fan-favorites or Araki favorites(Like Shigekiyo!) that aren't really needed.

 The game is drop-dead gorgeous, there's no two ways about it. Models look fantastic, and almost every move, every pose, every word they speak was taken straight from the pages of the manga(There are a ton of videos showing where moves and poses are from!). The game uses a special cell-shading that looks fantastic, the coloring is bright and colors look very liquid, it tries to look as a moving manga and it very well succeeds, there's no other game that looks like this. Keep in mind that JoJo is known for its very extravagant and flamboyant male characters, there are a lot of rather feminine poses and pink alternate colorations, so not everyone might "get" what JoJo is all about, which would be a shame. It sounds too good to be true, and it kinda is, there is a cost for such beauty.... the game, a fighting game at that, runs at 30 FPS with occasional framerate drops when it gets too hectic. Serious fighting game players might scoff at that, but remember, this is a JoJo game first and a Fighter second. The Soundtrack is fairly extensive, with a ton of very good and fitting pieces, but if you are so inclined, it possess a custom-soundtrack option. Voice-acting is Japanese only, but top-notch in quality, most characters were recast(Like Giorno, no longer voiced by Paku Romi) for the better.

 Needless to say, as a I huge JoJo fan and a huge Fighting game fan, I adored this game. The framerate drops, easy beat combos, stage hazards, long Great Heart Attack animations and flamboyant characters will probably turn off a lot of Fighting game fans, but fans of JoJo look no further, this is the game you have been waiting for. And hey, we got an even better deal than the Japanese, we actually get an Arcade Mode! which is something, as the lack of modes is fairly noticeable, and the Campaign Mode was downright disgusting, but the gameplay was so good, and the amounts of fanservice(The good kind!) were off the charts.
 8 out of 10.

Review #116: Dexter's Laboratory - Robot Rampage

 Done with it in a spell.

 Remember Dexter's Lab? It was a fantastic series, back when Cartoon Network actually showed Cartoons, and the Cartoons were actually good. Robot Rampage is, unmistakably, an Elevator Action reskin. For some reason, Bam! saw fit, when bringing Elevator Action to USA, to make it a Dexter game, which is a bit baffling as Elevator Action actually had an audience.

 There actually is a story for the game, Mandark has taken control over Dexter's lab, and Dexter must now gather the keys, discs, passwords or what have you in order to defeat Mandark and save his laboratory. There're four stages with four levels each, in each you must either climb down or up the building, while looking for red doors, which possess either the keys that you must gather, or optional weapon power ups. Levels have an assortment of elevators, which both you and the endlessly spawning enemies can use to ascend or descend through the levels, escalators and later on, gaps and alarms. Dropping from distances beyond one floor will outright kill Dexter, which is why you must make use of the elevators and escalators throughout the maze-like buildings.

 You can play as 3 different forms of Dexter, plus an unlockable character. Each character has slightly different running and jumping stats, so they allow for experimentation, although you are not allowed to change characters upon death. As for the weapons, some are more useful than others, so you might want to avoid weapon-possessing red doors once you finally get a good one! Another thing to keep in mind, is that sometimes, avoiding getting hit is impossible, but infinite continues soften the blow. As a whole, I liked the gameplay, it's a very fun Elevator Action game, the red doors being randomized on each playthrough allows replays to feel a bit different. The game can be beat in an hour or two, but there's no battery save or passwords, so you must finish it in one sitting.

 The presentation is disappointing on two fronts: the graphics themselves are unimpressive, with minimal animation and the fact that it doesn't make the most of the license. The only character from the show you'll recognize is Dexter, sure Mandark makes an appearance in cut-scene form before each Stage, but he isn't even the last boss. The enemies are simple generic robots that don't even borrow from the show's artstyle, so it ends up being a missed opportunity to make a good Dexter game. Music is... average, sorta generic, and it gets old after a while.

 All in all, as far as Elevator Action games go, this is a pretty average version. The Dexter reskin is superfluous at most. If you are looking for a Dexter game, this is not the game you want, but if you want Elevator Action on the go, this is not a bad choice.
 6.0 out of 10.