Review #181: Pursuit Force - Extreme Justice

 Doling out high speed Justice on the street!

 Pursuit Force was nothing short of amazing, which is why I needed to try the sequel. To be honest, there's little I would've changed about Pursuit Force, and I would've been content with the same game over a new coat of paint. bigBIG studios didn't try to reinvent the wheel, but they added and tweaked stuff, but was it for the best?

 The first game's story was a joke, and that was alright, and I praised how the story was never the driving force behind the game, not so this time around. The moment you press X on that "Story" button, you are presented with a cutscene in which the Commander, you, is getting married to Sarah(The first game's sole heroine), but things go awry and the Commander must take flight and capture the escapees. Yes, the story is now a major focus in the game, Story Mode progresses in a very linear manner, you can't replay missions in this mode, and if you get to choose between missions, you only get two choices at most. It certainly is a rather different approach, the story is as cliched as ever, which works on its favor, letting you take part in the most generic of action movies, and I say that in a good way. The story takes pretty predictable and rather dark turns, but they fit so well into the kind of flick it's trying to ape that it's hard to hold it against it.

  Story Mode also saw some changes of which I'm rather fond of. The first game could get rather challenging, enough to make some people complain on the net, so this game lets you pick from three different difficulty settings, which you can change any time you want. I had not major trouble with the first game, and I had an easier time on this one on the default setting, but allowing people lower or increase the difficulty according to their wants or needs is very neat. Story Mode also changed how you earn your upgrades, instead of getting them as you completed sets of missions, you now earn coins after each stage which you can then spend on various upgrades, so you can actually get enhancements that suit how you play, or want to play, over whatever the game wanted to throw your way.

 As for the gameplay itself, there's been a lot of changes, some bad, most good. Firstly, now you keep subweapons you take from captured cards and can switch between weapons with the directional pad, what's more, different weapons have different strengths, some are good against vehicles, some are good against people. The Car segments feel much tighter than before, jumping from car to car is as seamless as before, as is engaging in firefights. Speedboats now handle a bit differently, much looser than before, I'm not sure if it's necessarily worse, but it's different and it took me a little while to get used to it. The on-foot sections saw the most changes, the first game made the most of the PSP limitations, it knew that it shouldn't ask for precision, so it didn't, this game now retooled the aiming system so that by holding the Shooting button you'll deal little damage, but holding the L button allows you to aim with the analog stick, while you strafe with the Square and Circle buttons. I appreciate the idea, now you can even perform headshots, but... aiming with the PSP's analog isn't very precise, I spent more time than I would've wanted trying to aim at a head while taking damage. Melee attacks have also been changed, so that now it tapping R near an enemy will produce a QTE, which I didn't like.

 They also added a new Segment, Sniping, which I felt was pretty OK, the same aiming issues from the on-foot stages are present, but it's in a more... controlled environment, so even if you miss 3-4 shots, it isn't as punishing. Getting back to the good changes, the Pursuit Force is now, actually, a Force, you get 4 different team mates who will aid you in some missions, each having a different specialty, it's a small touch, but it really adds to the game, it's really cool having an ally jumping from car to car alongside you. The Justice Bar also saw some changes, it behaves pretty much as it did on the first game, giving you fire power bonuses while maxed, but you can now spend it to heal yourself at any time, and any amount, it probably helps make the game easier, but just as before, it's in your best interest to fill it and keep it filled for the extra damage. The game boasts a total of 30 missions, and they get longer, tougher and more exciting later in the game, there's some new boss scenarios in which you infiltrate giant vehicles, like planes, trains and a moving fortress, which are really cool.

 Races and Time Trials are gone, in its place are Bounty Mode and Challenge Mode. Bounty Mode allows you to pick any missions and replay it on any of the three(or four...) difficulties to earn stars and spend them in the shop, for things like cheats or Multiplayer characters. Why they don't net you stars on the story mode, when it's the exact same level is beyond me. Challenge Mode has you playing specific segments of each mission while you attempt to complete a challenge, truthfully, these could've very well been implemented on the main game as well. Honestly, these modes felt very throwaway, little thought was put into them, but at least they'll get more mileage from me than the Races and Time Trials. There's also a Multiplayer component, but since you can't play it with CPUS, I couldn't try them, bummer.

 The game looks just as good as the first game, but there's less variety on the environments, for example, no more Snow levels. However, levels now boast a higher level of detail, and more distinctive structures, which I think is a fair trade off. Just as with the first game, it has a very steady frame rate, which I feel is worth praising, particularly on the PSP. The Soundtrack is as good as the first game's, sure, they are not complex beats, not even memorable, but they fit the game and they get you hyped for high-octane action you are about to partake in.

 Pursuit Force 2 made a ton of great enhancements, but it also took some steps back. Luckily, the core gameplay remains more or less the same, hijacking cars while on highspeed vehicle fire fights is as exhilarating as ever, although I really could've done without the QTEs when engaging in melee. I still think the first game is a smidge better, but both games are must haves.
 9.0 out of 10

Review #180: Project X Zone

 Thank you based Namco. I think...

 Oh, Project X Zone, how I had longed for thee. There were so many fan favorite characters from Capcom, Namco and... some from Sega(Really, they could've made better picks. Shinobi(Joe/Hotsuma/Hibana/Jiro)? Kiryu? Sonic?), all joint together in one game. It seemed like a dream come true. Seemed.  Project X Zone is a game I'm glad we got, but I doubt it's the game many of us wanted....

 Project X Zone is an Strategy RPG in which you battle. And only do battle. Quite literally, it's the only thing you do in the game, have a battle, go to the preparation menu, engage in another battle, rinse and repeat. There's a story that ties everything together, but it's really, really stupid. Firstly, it focuses on Monolith's original characters, which are terrible. The three males are disgustingly overdone, and the three females were made just for fanservice sake, I don't care about these cardboard characters, so stop shoving them to the forefront. There's also the fact that you'll battle the same 15-20 bosses throughout the entire game, and every time you defeat them "Gee whiz, look at the time, got to go". "I bought them enough time.", "Everything is going according to plan, gotta go" and the such. The story is terrible, it has a misguided focus on the original characters that nobody bought the game for and the villains are as corny, cliched and stupid as the get. All we needed was so dumb thread connecting the characters we know and love, if the story is so dumb, you don't need to bring it up on every friggin' chapter.

 As previously mentioned, there's nothing in the game to do but battling. The game also flows in a strictly linear fashion, you can't replay older stages or train for levels or items, which I guess means you could potentially get yourself in a unwinnable scenario with no items, even though the game is pretty generous with them. The game has 41 stages or 'chapters', and each chapter is a battle. Initially battles are pretty short, but after stage 12, every chapter will last between an hour and half an hour. You are allowed one Interim Save in case you really need to go, or want to abuse the RNG. At the start, I liked stages being swarming with enemies and lasting so long, but the game is very repetitive and gets pretty boring after a while, making these hour-long chapters very unwelcome. Speaking of enemies, you always have control of up to 21 units(Some chapters will separate the party) and will face up to 90 enemies, sometimes in waves. As tedious as it is, I admit at first it feels pretty... epic, huge battles against huge numbers. Regardless of the daunting numbers, the game is pretty easy overall, bosses will attack and counter with attacks that will take about 2/3 of your life bar, but you get many opportunities to heal, and healing items are plentiful, so it evens out.

 The game's Combat system is both its best feature and its worst. Characters are divided into Solo and Pair units. Pair units are the ones that do the brunt of the damage, and you can pair them up with Solo Units, that you call upon with the L button to perform an attack during your turn. Pair units have 4 attacks, a Super Attack, can call a support Solo Unit and call a Support Attack from nearby friendly units, if available. There's also 'Skills' that you can use on the field, which include healing and buffing, which consume 'XP', a gauge shared between all units that is filled by dealing and receiving damage. All four normal attacks are performed with A+Directional Input, attacks are flashy and look amazing, as both units attack in tandem, using very familiar moves if you are invested in the unit's franchise. The objective is to keep an enemy unit juggled with your attacks, if they touch the ground you will lose your combo, which means losing the Experience bonus, and later in the game, even normal enemies will have "shield" gauges, which restore upon touching the ground and allows them to nullify some of your hits. It sounds awesome, and it sounds fun, but... imagine doing more or less the same combos to over 60 enemy units per battle, and animations are lengthy, particularly the once-impressive Special Moves, as fun as the combat is at the start, the battles just get tedious. After chapter 30, even most Normal enemies will be able to take more than a full round of your attacks unless you use an unskippable Special Move.

 And that's the game's problem, by chapter 20 you will have seen everything the game has to offer, except the last boss. Quite literally, the bosses you fight at the start of the game are the same bosses you will face up to Chapter 41. They will use the same attacks even. And you'll be doing the same combos over and over and over again. One thing I didn't like is that every now and then the party will split, which I don't really mind, but so will the Solo Units. Sometimes finding a Solo Unit that has good synergy with a Pair unit isn't easy, and it isn't nice when that gets shuffled around and then you have to remember how you had them paired, for when the party reunites. On the bright side, the game is very lengthy, I clocked over 46 hours, so you'll definitely get your money's worth. The most advisable thing to do is not to more than one or two chapters per day(that's 2-3 hours of gameplay!), spread your time with the game to try to avoid letting repetition sinking in.

 The game looks fantastic, sprites are detailed, and the animation is very smooth. One thing that bothered me is how much fanservice they put in the game. Whenever you use Special Moves, you get close ups of the characters, and while the guys end up looking badass, most females have the camera sliding through their thighs, or focusing on their bouncing breasts. There's also lots of lines focusing on fan service. It's funny, because most of these games aren't known for fanservice, which makes you wonder just who the intended audience for this game was? The music is phenomenal, having remixes of  well known music from throughout the involved franchises, very cool. Voice acting is pretty decent, Japanese only, and while I'm not sure if every role is reprised by the original voice actor, the franchises I'm familiar had them.

 At the end of the day, I am glad that we got the game, it sets a precedent for crossovers like these, it allows Namco(and other companies) to test the waters. However, as much as I like getting the game, it is not a very good game. It's passable, it's fun in small bursts, but it's so misguided in focused, so limited in approach and while the combat is fun, at first, it can't carry a 40+ hour game by itself.
 4.5 out of 10.

Now Playing: Pursuit Force - Extreme Justice

 Both good things and bad things to say about it.

 I loved Pursuit Force 1, it seemed like a game made just for me, which is why I got so excited and before I knew I had opened Pursuit Force 2. Right off the bat, there's things that I like and things that I don't, first, the ones that I don't(Since I'd much rather end on a positive note):

1) The game is much more story-driven than before, and I'm not sure how I feel about it. Also, while the first game let you pick from the available missions, now you are forced to progress through the story. This isn't so bad, since you can just pick any stage on Challenge and Bounty Modes.

2) Why do Challenge and Bounty Mode exist? No, really, Challenge Mode unlocks nothing and why can't you earn stars on your first run through a mission? These modes feel like an artificial way to lengthen the game, no bueno, specially since it seems there's only 26 missions to the first game's 30.

3) Multiplayer Mode. Can't be played with CPUs, which means I can't try it. What's my issue with it? They probably took resources they could've invested in the Single Player mode on this mode.

4) Speedboats don't handle as well as they did in the first game.

As for the good things:

1) You can now pick your upgrades, which you buy with money you earn from the levels, very nice.

2) Cars feel much better, I think the game moves faster?

3) It looks prettier, I think on a technical level, it's the same game, but the environments I've gone through were much more appealing.

4) You can hoard weapons and switch between them, very nice.

 But the best part? Despite all my gripes, I still love the game, the core gameplay remains intact, in fact it feels better, and I'm sure I'm gonna get used to the speedboats segments. And while Challenge and Bounty Modes feel so tacky, I'm sure I'll get more mileage outta them than the races in the first game

Review #179: Pursuit Force

 I finally found the game I've been looking for all my life!

 You've probably seen high-octane action flicks with scenes in which the hero would engage in firefights while driving at high speeds, and then jumping from his car onto a moving a truck. You probably thought it was awesome. Pursuit Force is a game that allows you to partake in action scenes like that, taking the lead in action packed chases throughout the city. This game is awesome.

 The story and characters are all kinds of silly, and it's so much better thanks to it. There's 5 different gangs that have been reigning terror on the streets, so the Government created a new police division, the Pursuit Force, a lethal squad of cops trained chase villains through populated streets. They also have a license to kill. The story never takes the center place in the game, and that's just fine, you don't need the context, but the five gangs are... they seem lifted from cheap action movies, there's the obligatory Mafia, the obligatory Yakuza, the obligatory all-female jewel-obsessed group, a mercenary group and a group of escaped convicts, a colorful cast. Each group has a couple of big wigs that are equally colorful and hilariously over the top. Even the Chief of the Pursuit Force has his moments, "If you die I can't fire you!". The story component of the game wasn't really needed, but it adds to the games flavor, it's rather charming and memorable due to how ridiculously over the top it is. And hey, you can just ignore it if you don't fancy it, you can skip the very few and brief cutscenes, or the mission overviews.

 There's three modes in the game: Career, Race and Time Trial. Race and Time Trials are basically races throughout the game's 30 stages, in Race you race against other gangs and in Time Trials against your best times. As I've mentioned over and over again in this blog, I don't like racing games, so I didn't really care about these two modes, and they don't unlock anything, but at least it gives you some extra stuff to do, and there's a fair amount of unlockable cars, speedboats and bikes. Career Mode is where the real meat of the game lies, there's 30 missions spread throughout the five different gangs(6 missions each) and you can do them more or less at your leisure, but you unlock them in 'sets'. After clearing each set of Missions you rank up and gain upgrades... but these don't carry over to older missions, which is rather disappointing. Clearing Missions with an A rank will unlock Vehicles for the other two modes and Cheats, both positive(Like invulnerability) and negative(Poisoned!), but these disable progress and ranks, which I think is fair enough, it allows you to have fun with them, without allowing you to cheese your way through the game.

 The way the game works is phenomenal, this is an Arcade game through and through, so don't expect a whole lot of depth, but you can get to the "good parts" every time you turn on the console. There's three different "segments", Driving, On-Foot and Helicopter, each mission having any combination of these, but Driving stages are in almost every mission. Driving segments are easily the best, the game is incredibly fast, and I like the way vehicles handle, however, the colliding with other cars feel kinda off, not a deal breaker. Pressing the L button produces an aiming reticule over en enemy vehicle, if there are more than once, you can cycle through targets by pressing it again, and R allows you to shoot, simple and easy. When you are not tasked with retrieving a car safely or driving someone somewhere, you can press circle to hijack enemy vehicles or civilian cars. Heck, some levels have you jumping onto trucks or speedboats! Amazing stuff. Controls work perfectly, and they allow you to do a ton of impressive stuff very easily, which lends itself to its frantic gameplay.

 Helicopter segments are simple turret levels in which you take aim, manually, and shoot a minigun that overheats, simple. On-foot segments are easily the worst, but not unmanageable. The PSP only has a single analog stick, which means the camera turns when you turn. Regardless, these are fairly short and easy, and just as with the vehicle scenes, the L button locks onto an enemy, so you can just strafe and shoot. These scenes were clearly implemented with the PSP's limitations in mind, so they aren't very taxing and they offer variety. There's another mechanic in the Justice Bar, which applies to all segments, destroying, killing or capturing enemies increases your Justice Bar, while crashing onto civilian cars, or accidentally shooting them(Happens when a civilian car gets between your target and your bullets) makes it decrease. A full Justice bar bestows you with double power, which is incredibly useful so you might want to keep it... but then again, you can use it to completely heal yourself and your vehicle or to use bullet time while hijacking an enemy vehicle, allowing you to take out the passengers without getting hit. It's a very fun mechanic, and often puts you in tough spots, should you heal? What if you need the extra fire power? Maybe it's just your car that's getting damaged, so you might not need bullet time to hijack another car and so on.

 There's a nice variety of missions in the game, but they all take place in very linear courses, and each course has a 'goal', which if enemies reaches is game over for you. Objectives include escorting other vehicles, capturing specific enemy vehicles, bringing down helicopters, reaching a certain place before the time runs out, tailing enemies at a certain distance, or killing every enemy before they reach the goal. I never felt the game to be repetitive, and it helps that each Enemy gang has their own vehicles and weapons, so even similar missions feel different between each other. Bosses are also interesting, they are simple, but each boss has their own gimmicks to avoid. The game can get very tough, some stages took me over to 10 retries, but it never feels unfair, and the game is so much fun, I never felt burned out while retrying a stage. Most stages also have checkpoints when you switch between segments, so that helps.

 Pursuit Force is a very beautiful game, character models are rather simple and the animation is a bit poor, but the vehicles and environments are gorgeous. There's a lot of different locales to visit too, snowy cities, urban cities, desserts, countryside, and so on, and it also happens be very colorful. Another thing to keep in mind, is that there's barely any slowdown in the game, and when it happens, it's very hard to notice. The music is very upbeat, and really gets you in the mood for some road mayhem, it really gets you into the game and makes stages even more exciting.

 Pursuit Force is one of the best PSP games I've ever played, and one of my favorite games ever(It probably cracks top 20), it's a game made on the whole premise of being "fun". The only thing that it needed was a little more polishing on the car collisions, and maybe tightening the on-foot segments a bit more, but as a whole, it's a fantastic game.
 9.5 out of 10

Review #178: Gran Turismo

 Oh boy, is my head gonna roll for this...

 Disclaimer: This whole piece was written by someone who does not like racing games, so, y'know, that's the point of view from which I'm gonna tackle the game, because, it kinda is my point of view and there kinda isn't much I can do about that. And I have to write about it because that's the whole purpose of this blog. So... yeah.

 Gran Turismo was THE racing sim of its time, it boasted tons of details, cars, and other mumbo jumbo that car enthusiasts love. Heck, the game comes packaged with a "Reference manual" that explains all kind of techniques and types of cars and how the relate to the game and what not. Most of it is probably outdated though! Regardless, the game has two main modes: Simulation and Arcade. Arcade is where 2 Player mode is, alongside Time Trial and Single Player races against 5 other cars. There's a bunch of unlockables in this mode, but you need to clear each track on every difficulty and with each type of car. Needless to say, for someone like me, it was kind of a chore, but it's nice to have unlockables. There's over 100 cars and 8 tracks to race with and in, not too bad for the first game in the series!

 Simulation Mode is where the meat of the game is, and it's for a single player only. In this game you start off with 10.000 in cash, and you must buy cars, or parts to tweak them with, as you progress through the different cups. This mode is phenomenal, and it's a great idea, but a racing game-challenged person like me had a ton of difficulties clearing the first License and gave up on the second one! Y'see, before being able enter cups you need to earn licenses, and you do so by clearing a set of challenges. The thing is, the game doesn't properly explain you how to do it, just what you have to do. Eventually I just gave up. Regardless of how I felt about it, the premise behind the mode is genius, and I'm sure that people that like this kind of games will love it. Besides the Cups there's Special "events", but these are more challenging since rival cars won't be "scaled" down or up to your vehicle's level, so you might not stand a chance until you buy a better car or better parts.

 As for the gameplay... it's fast, it depends on the car actually, but it's fairly 'rigid' on how you must handle curves and breaking. It makes sense, as the game aims for realism, so if that's your thing, this game is right up your alley. One thing I noticed is that the game seems to employ some sort of rubber band AI, as on the very few occasions I manged to do well, they would catch up to me, and at times after I spun out, I could catch up to them without much trouble.

 There's no denying that the game looks gorgeous. Cars look amazing, for a PS1 game mind you, with tons of detail, and they managed to create some fake "reflections" on the windows that look fairly good and were probably quite impressive back in the day. The one disappointment would be that cars don't get damaged, but I think that had to do with the deals they made to get the car manufacturers in the game. As for the tracks, I felt like it could've used more variety, not in quantity or quality, but in the backdrops, guess I'm just used to more over-the-top racers. I really liked the soundtrack too, it features some licensed music, and it fits the game very well.

 I know that Gran Turismo was, and probably still is, a great game, but it isn't my kind of game. and if you aren't into Simulator Racing Games... yeah, I'd say pass on this one.

 5.0 out of 10.

Now Playing: Pursuit Force

 THIS GAME IS AWESOME

 I think I found it... the game I've been looking for my entire life. I've stated it many times already, but my favorite kind of game is, well, the arcade kind. Fast, straight to the point, pick up and play, no fuss, just action. THIS is the epitome of that. Before each mission there's some text blurb about what you have to do, and then you are thrown in the middle of a car chase, and boom, do your thing. HIJACKING ENEMY CARS WHILE ON THE MOVE IS SO AWESOME. Another thing I really like is the Justice Bar, once you fill it you can spend it to heal yourself... or don't, and make the most of your temporary enhanced firepower and the ability to shoot while jumping onto another vehicle. So. Cool. I've been having some issues with the "dodging" mechanic, as there doesn't seem to be a clear tell on when an enemy is going to shoot at you, but I can deal with that, WITH EXTREME PREJUDICE, BOOYAKASHA!

 And the music? It just pumps you up for more road rage mayhem. I love this game.

Review #177: Dragon Ball Z - Tenkaichi Tag Team

 The best Dragon Ball game on a handheld.

 Back when the PSP first launched, it promised PS2-quality games, and it failed to deliver until later in its lifespan. Dragon Ball Z Tenkaichi Tag Team was the final installment of the Tenkaichi series and it was made exclusively for the PSP. Not only does it deliver a "PS2 quality experience", it's also one of the best versions of the Tenkaichi games.

 The game offers a respectable amount of modes, Story Mode, which covers the entire series from Raditz's arrival to Buu's confrontation, witch unlockable "what if" scenarios. Story Mode is fairly interesting, as you are placed on an overworld, and you can just go straight to your objective, or travel around in search of sidequests which reward you with Capsules or Money. Whether you tackle the optional objectives or not, it's still a fairly lengthy mode. Then there's the obligatory VS CPU or Player mode, "Battle Selection" which houses Survival and 'vs 100' where you take different battles that task you with different challenges for points, Training and Customization. Customization works just like it did on Budokai Tenkaichi 3, you can equip your fighter with different Potaras to raise its stats, there's even "AI" Potaras to make the CPU fight in a certain way, or Potaras that change the color of your Aura, very cool.

 The game plays just like Budokai Tenkaichi 3 but with a twist... there can now be up to 4 fighters at the same time! Sadly, no free for all, it has to be in teams of up to two(1 vs 2 or 2 vs 2, no 3 vs 1), but it's still very cool. Obviously controls have been tweaked to fit the PSP, and they work very well. Transforming is no done with the Select button, Specials are done with L+Triangle and Stock-consuming Specials with L+Circle and R is used to switch targets. It works well, I didn't have any issues with the controls. Naturally, the character roster saw some cuts, but mostly of the side characters. The only movie characters that made the cut are Brolly(Legendary Super Saiyan only) and Gogeta, everyone else is gone, other cuts include GT charactes(Who needs them?) and Dragon Ball characters. Some minor characters are also gone, like Future Gohan, Oozaru transformations, Frieza's father and Super Buu(Gotenks absorbed, the other two are in.). Basically, everyone that matters in the Dragon Ball story is accounted for. The stage selection was also cut to ten, but it's enough stages.

 Graphics are phenomenal, character models are on par with Budokai Tenkaichi 3's, but they lack some of the details, and they don't move their mouths when they speak. The game also looks less vibrant, Tenkaichi 3 was very colorful, this game opted for a more subdued color palette, which I think doesn't look as good. The particle effects and beams don't look as good, but some of the bigger explosive attacks cause the framerate to drop, so they probably did the best they could. Music is fairly good, it suits the game. As for the voice acting... there's no dual audio, which is disappointing, but not a deal breaker, the English voices get the job done, and they are not as bad as people make it out to be. Plus, the game has a lot of voice acting, there's many voiced dialogues in the Story Mode.

 Tenkaichi Tag Team is an excellent Dragon Ball Z game and a superb handheld game. There's a ton of content that can be played in small bursts, ideal for a game on the go. The gameplay is intact from the PS2 games, and the new 4 player battles are a blast. The one thing that could be held against the game is that the tutorial is only text-based, and not very good, and I guess the controls can be a bit overwhelming for someone new to the franchise, but coming from Tekaichi 3 and Raging Blast, I had no troubles coming to grips with them. Would I recommend the game to someone who isn't a fan of DBZ? It's a toughie, as fun as the game is, I don't think it's worth learning the game to someone who isn't a fan of DBZ or hasn't dabbled into the Tenkaichi series, I can see how learning to play the game could put people off, but then again, I think it's worth the hurdle.
 8.0 out of 10.

Now Playing: Dragon Ball Z Tenkaichi Tag Team

 Another day, 'nother DBZ game.

 So, there I was, despairing and studying, I wanted something to play, to take a break. I could continue with Gran Turismo 1, but... I just wasn't feeling it. I could've continued Project X Zone, but that game is getting so boring, and each stage takes like an hour, so it was a no go. I could play my second favorite PSP game, Gundam VS Gundam Next Plus, but I wanted something new. So I picked Tenkaich Tag Team.

 It's awesome. Graphics are comparable to the PS2 version, it lacks some details, and the particles aren't as good, but overall, it's almost as good. Controls are tight, and the gameplay is basically the same... but with two other fighters on the arena. It's awesome. The story mode has some charming SD models, but I'm not feeling the "looseness" of the adaptation. Gohan falling from the Nimbus Cloud at the beginning just so that they could teach you about towns? Having a friendly spar with Krillin? Yeah, no, I'd rather have a more faithful story, but it's no biggie. There's no dual audio, which is kind of a bummer, this is the second time I'm gonna play a Dragon Ball game in English, Budokai 1 being the other, I don't really mind it, but I like the Japanese voices, oh well!

 As it stands, it looks like a great PSP game, and god knows I needed a good PSP game...

Now Playing: Gran Turismo

 IT WAS A FREE GAME

 I'm not the biggest Racing game nut out there, and the few racing games I like are of the Arcadey or Mascot-Racer variety, not the simulator style. But I kinda liked Gran Turismo 2 back when I was younger, which is why I wanted to buy it at some point in time later down the road. That time came last week, when I set out to purchase Fighting Force and Gran Turismo 2, after handing me down the games he says "Hmmm, Gran Turismo 2? Y'sure? I think I prefer GT 1.... Know what? here, it's yours" and he put GT on top of the other two, for free! So yeah, Racing isn't my favorite genre and what not... but FREE GAME. FREE GAME!

 For my first, and short, session(Since I've to study, dammit) I finished the first License challenge and finished the first cup(First place, baby!). It's alright. I admit I found myself more engrossed in the race than I'd care to admit, and a couple of the songs were badass. I also tried my luck at one of the Event Races... turns out the other racers aren't necessarily rounded up to your stats, these cars just took off and I didn't have a single chance to catch up to them, guess I gotta buy some new wheels. And that is a pun, because you can buy both cars and parts, so I could be talking about cars or wheels. I'm hilarious, I know.

 Bottom line: It is a quality game, but it ain't my kind of game. Still, Free game, baby!

Month Overview: November

Games finished in November:
 Crash - Mind over Mutant                                                   4.0
 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles                                             6.5
 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2 - Battle Nexus                  6.5
 Diablo 3 - Reaper of Souls Ultimate Evil Edition               9.0
 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 3 - Mutant Nightmare         8.0
 TMNT - Mutant Melee                                                        5.0
 Naruto Ultimate Ninja Storm Generations                          6.0
 Rampage 2 - Universal Tour                                               3.0
 Nightmare Creatures                                                           5.5
 Sonic Battle                                                                         6.0
 Dragon's Crown                                                                  5.5
 One Piece - Grand Adventure                                             8.0
 Fighting Force                                                                     6.0
 Dragon Ball Evolution                                                        3.5  
 Crimson Gem Saga                                                             1.5
 Saint Seiya Omega - Ultimate Cosmos                              1.0

 Holy mother of... over 10 games in ONE moth, and it was one of the most taxing months of the year, when the last tests and assignments took place. Hot damn. Sadly, there were a ton of blunders this month: Crash - Mind over Mutant was such a huge let down, I genuinely enjoyed Crash of the Titans, I was aching to give it a whirl... and it wound taking away CotT's best parts and building upon the worst ones, Rampage 2 was another I was wanting to play... for over 10 years, and it took away elements from the first one, what the hell!? Dragon Ball Evolution wasn't SO bad, but it pales in comparison to all the other Dragon Ball games and great fighters on the system. Crimson Gem Saga was another disappointment, the art looked so good, it was localized by Atlus and it was going up in price, it had to be good! And then there's SS Omega that has such a bad CPU that makes playing through the game a chore. It seems I finished the month on a low note, Crimson Gem Saga, Dragon Ball Evolution and Saint Seiya Omega in a row, dammit, I've no luck with PSP games! I also want to mention Dragon's Crown, for some reason it seems to have gotten mostly high scores, so it seems I'm part of the minority that didn't like it, oh well! Also, four TMNT games in one Month? November is now, officially, Turtle month.

Game of November:

 I've heard that a lot of people had issues with Diablo 3, but I don't see'em. Sure, it's not Diablo 2, the story and characters are pretty lame, personalized stat spreads are also gone... but I had a blast with the game. It also happens to have... INFINITE REPLAY VALUE. I loved this one, I liked the variety in the skills, and how they looked. The Crusader also happened to have some very badass pieces of equipment, and being able to change the look of my equipment for a small fee was a little touch that made me enjoy the game much, much more.

 Runner-up:

 Know what makes a licensed game a great game? When you could take away all the licensed stuff from it and it'd still remain entertaining. That's the case with Grand Adventure, the gameplay is spot-on, tight controls, simple but fun mechanics, great graphics, surprisingly engaging Single Player Mode... other licensed games wish they could be this good.

Review #176: Saint Seiya Omega - Ultimate Cosmos

 Lemme tell you the definition of insanity.... expecting this game's AI to change.

 Saint Seiya Omega is the highly polarizing anime-only sequel to Saint Seiya, and like any popular Shonen focused on fights between powerful characters, it got itself its very own videogame.  This is an arena-based 1-on-1 fighting game, featuring 24(Technically 18) characters from the show, and an all-new storyline.

 The game is pretty light on modes: Story, Arcade, VS and Training. Story Mode is divided in 7 different chapters, each one following the storyline of one of the six main heroes and one featuring Seiya. I... I don't understand Japanese, so I had no idea of what was going on, besides the fact that they are trying to collect 7 gems in order to get the Triton Scale(An 'armor'), and each scenario is fully voiced... and you can't fast-forward the dialogue, or skip it, so... you are in for the long haul. Something pretty neat is that they actually created an all new storyline for the game, and it features a Triton Scale armor for each of the six main characters. Sadly, the new armor is the same for all characters(The girl gets an skirt, but it's otherwise the same armor), but it looks cool and it's a neat gimmick. Arcade is your typical Arcade ladder, and the other two modes are pretty self explanatory.

 Gameplay is pretty barebones, there's an strong and a weak attack, while circle performs special moves that consume a bit of the Cosmos Gauge. Holding the L button and pressing Square or Triangle produces a Super move, but spending the three levels of the gauge allows you to enter a 'super mode' by pressing L+Circle that grants you super armor, and pressing L+Circle again lets you use an Ultimate attack. R is used to throw your opponent, and if you plan of playing this by your lonesome, you are going to be using that button a whole lot....

 Here's the deal, I had no one to play this game with, and the AI is terrible, so I have no proper way of gauging how good the combat is, lemme elaborate... The AI's sole purpose in 'life' is to block. Doesn't matter which difficulty you choose, they will block, and block, and block. Oh, I'm not saying the AI is hard to battle, not at all! Y'see, there's no way to break guards, there's no guard meter and you can only do chip damage with Super moves... or Throw them. So you have two choices when dealing with the CPU, either try to attack them and win by time out, because they will only block, or Throw them over and over and over again, doesn't matter which difficulty you are in, the Throw is always your best tool. ALWAYS. There's no way to win with this game, either get bored by time outs, or get bored by repeating the strategy all the time. The harder difficulties makes them more aggressive, which lets you score more hits, but it's still not enough. And even if I had other players to play with, the only way to unlock the characters is through Arcade and Story Modes, so you HAVE to play against the CPU. I spent 80% of my time with the game pressing the R button. I had absolutely no fun with this game at all.

 The graphics are pretty neat, the game is very colorful, the environments are pretty and the character models... are alright. For some reason, the heights are a bit off, y'see, the Wolf guy(Harute?) has a crouched-like position by default, but even while standing, he looks tiny when compared to his friends, it's very jarring. Gembu, the Libra Saint, also looks huge, while he should be closer to Seiya's height. And I've a bone to pick with the animations, there's only like three different throws in the entire game, spread out through all 24 characters, and three females out of four share the same walking animation, with their hand resting on their hips... but then again, while the fourth one(Shaina) walks a tiny bit different, she also rests her hand on her hip. Is that how women walk in Japan or something? I mean, really. At least the soundtrack is really good, and the voice acting is excellent as well.

 I'm gonna be honest here, the score I'm gonna rate it ain't how good the game was, but how much I enjoyed it. Who knows, maybe with other people to play with, this game wouldn't be such a bust. But as it stands, even if you are a die-hard fan of the show, this game is a terrible pick to play by yourself.
 1.0 out of 10

Now Playing: Saint Seiya Omega Ultimate Cosmos

 'tseems I'm on a roll with bad PSP games.

 So.. Saint Seiya is one of my most hated series ever. It's sexist, it's dumb and it lacks any semblance of logic, but love the concept. I haven't seen Saint Seiya Omega yet, but what little I've seen, it seems to top the old series. Females no longer need the mask, which probably means that they did away with that sexist "if a man sees me, I must love him or kill him", or the fact that while females had to discard their femininity, most of the male Saints were HUGE ladyboys, women without breasts, if you will. Also, it seems that they are finally applying some kind of thought into battles, like when... Gembu or Kiki berated the bronzies for having their Cloths tank all the damage. Regardless, it seems that fans of the older show hate it, but the old show was terrible, so what do they know? I mean, really. And I'm not hating on them for liking it, I LOVE Hokuto no Ken, and it's equally sexist and dumb, plus, it has a ton of plot holes, just because I love something, doesn't mean I can't criticize it.

 As for the game... it's terrible. I mean... Playing against the CPU is infuriating, they block everything, and I mean everything. So there's two ways to win: Either mash attacks and win by timeout, which is boring, or spam the R button and win by repetitious boredome, your choice. It isn't even hard, since all they do is block, all you have, and can, do is block. Because there's not way to break guards, or any kind of guard meter. You can up the difficulty, which is a good idea as it will make them more aggressive, thus making them block less. They still block a lot though, and the Throws(R button) will get net you victories all the time. So... yeah, I can't properly gauge the gameplay since the CPU is so damnedly annoying, but I can at least attest that if you don't have anybody else to play this with, you are gonna have a baaaaad time.

Review #175: Crimson Gem Saga

 Oh, this game. Man, this game. I... This game. Words falter me.

 I love JRPGs, they are my jam, my thing, mah thang. Crimson Gem Saga is one of the worst JRPGs I've played in a long, long time, getting to finish this game was a struggle in and of itself, I even had to take a 3-4 month break since it got so repetitive, so dull, so boring. But y'know me, I just have to finish games, Rune Factory and Demon's Souls not withstanding, they are happening. Sometime.

 The story puts you in the role of Killian, a Chevalier who is late to his own graduation. Killian has a habit of oversleeping, playing on the "waking up late" trope that Crono popularized, and has a bit of a complex about second places, since that's where he usually lands. Eventually he wounds up with a rag-tag group and a quest to gather all the token McGuffins, the "wicked stones", before the token bad guy does. While the story does have its moments, particularly near the end of the game, overall it was pretty boring. It tries to make fun of common JRPG tropes, but at the end of the day, it ends up swimming in them. Terms are poorly explained, characters don't get much development, and you don't even get to fight your Rival(And Killian even makes a small joke about it)... I didn't feel motivated to see the quest through due to the story... nor due the gameplay, but more on that later. Even worse, the developers, or the publishers, were so arrogant as to think that this would be a part of a franchise, which means it ends on a cliffhanger with multiple plot threads hanging loose, and questions unanswered, and the game was so bad that they will never be answered. Probably.

 The game plays like any other turn based RPG, you have items or spells, and can choose to attack, defend or try to escape from battle. The game also has spells that require other party members to cast, which for some reason they thought that it was a selling point, which it isn't, that work as any other technique, except that it costs Mana from all the characters involved. Now then, where should I start tearing this game apart? Let's see, firstly, at the beginning of the game, Killian is VERY slow, and if an enemy sees you, you are basically screwed. Y'see, there's three ways to start the battle: Initiative, Enemy initiative or normally depending on when you touch the enemy goblin sprite(All battles are represented by a goblin, go figure). You gain the initiative by touching an enemy from behind before it sees you. A battle starts out normally if you touch an enemy after it sees you. But an enemy gets the initiative if it touches you a little while after seeing you. Y'see, Killian is so slow, and the range at which an enemy can see you is so large, that you'll start most battles getting hit, and ALL your characters get hit. It's not fun, it's annoying. Later in the game you can buy Mercury Boots that make you faster and allow you to get to the goblins more efficiently, but they are really expensive, and they might as well be a necessity.

 The game is a grindfest. Really. You need to grind for Experience, Skill Points, Money, Medallions and Gems. The game even lets you explore the first floors of the game's last dungeon since the start of Chapter 2, they want you to grind, they expect you to grind. First of all, Experience points, enemies are really strong. As in really, really strong. Enemies love to gang up on one of your characters, one single critical hit can mean the death of one of your character, since it allows them to hit you more times. On the flip-side, this also works for you, if you score a Critical hit, a button prompt appears on screen, and if you press X on time, you will score 1 or 2 more hits. That's nice. Regardless, random encounters will always be a threat, the game expects you to grind up to level 40(Starting at around 20) on chapter 2 before you can, more or less, comfortably finish it. On the other hand, bosses are really, really easy. I've said this time and time again, but if the random encounters are harder than a boss, you are doing something wrong.

 Then comes Skill Points, these are shared between characters, and are used to learn spells for each character. I never really had trouble with SP, but you might need to grind for these. Then comes Money, at the start of the game, it isn't really an issue, but in Chapter 2 you get your first chance to buy the Mercury Boots, and you need these, so you are gonna have to grind for money. The last chapter also gets incredibly expensive, it will take hundreds of fights to be able to buy equipment for all six characters. Oh, and you want to buy equipment for everyone, as characters leave your party at a moment's notice, and this even applies for the last dungeon. Medallions are used to level up your individual skills, and they come in four varieties: Bronze, Silver, Gold and Platinum. You need a bronze to level up a skill from level 1 to 2, a Silver to level them from 2 to 3. No skipping. Medallions are rare drops, and you need to level up your skills if you want to stand a chance during random encounters, so... yeah, get grinding. Lastly, gems are used to change the affinity of your weapons, I never really needed them, and since you are gonna be switching equipment, I never really felt the need to change the affinity of most of my weapons, only on rare occasions when they weren't dealing any damage due to resistances.

 Now then, I'm gonna tell you the secret to playing this game. First of all, these are the only skills that you need: Everyone must learn Grace of God, Killian, Gelt and Acelora must learn their Ultimate attack that hits all enemies, Spinel and Lahduk must learn their ultimate attacks that hits one enemy for massive damage, Spinel and Killian learn to need their dual technique, and Henson needs his mutli-hitting wind spells before he leaves the party, and once he returns... you don't really need him anymore. All the other skills, which there are many, you won't ever need. Except maybe the healing spells for Gelt and Killian. Now then, Spinel and Killian's dual technique deals 15-20% of the enemies current HP in damage, which you will abuse during bosses. Grace of God you will only need on the bonus bosses that have attacks that can wipe your whole party in one turn. Killian, Gelt and Acelora will spam their ultimate Attacks on random encounters so that you can grind fast, easily and safely, while Spinel and Ladhuk will be your boss killers. You can't buy mana potions, but your health and mana get refilled after each level up, and the enemies drop mana potions all the time. THIS is how they expect you to play the game. It's repetitive, it's boring, it's a waste of time. It's hilarious, because the game starts obnoxiously hard, but by the end of the game you get such strong equipment that the last bosses will have a hard time killing you. Seriously.

 Oh, I'm not done yet. Dungeons are very mazelike, with many forks that take you to different places, while at the same time having multiple exits that lead to the same places, seriously. A lot of the time they will have you going around hitting levers, switches or the such, going from one end of the dungeon to another. They aren't fun to explore, and the corridors are designed in such a way that they all look the same. And if you thought the dungeons were the only blunder, think again, during the story you will have to go from place to place for arbitrary reasons, you'll end up doing something like: Go to A, then go to B, then go to A, then go to C, then back to A and finally back to B. It's not fun, it's boring, it's repetitive, just like the battle system.

 The graphics are nice, kinda. Sprites are very colorful, and look good... sometimes. Some animations are clearly lacking frames, while others, like the Zombies, look downright beautiful. Most of the time they are pretty bad though. The music was very forgettable, and it doesn't even loop, when in dungeons or towns, the music will just stop for a few seconds before starting up again, it's hilarious, in a bad way. The voice acting is really good though, shame that the dialogue is so asinine.

 Crimson Gem Saga was a game I hated, I despised. It bored me to no end, and it'll be a day too soon if I never see this game again. I've heard that this was a massively improved sequel to 'Astonishia Story', which makes me wonder just how can a game be worse than this. This is a game that doesn't respect the player, it doesn't value their time. This is not a good game, avoid it like the plague.
 1.5 out of 10

Review #174: Dragon Ball Evolution

 Just what was I expecting?

 I'm a firm believer that if the gameplay is great, it doesn't matter how bad the game looks or sounds. Dragon Ball Evolution wants to puts that belief to the test, as it takes the gameplay from the Shin Budokai series but applies a new coat of paint based on the terrible, terrible movie. Dragon Ball Evolution is... quite a piece of work.

 Cutting to the chase, the game offers a Story Mode, Arcade Mode, Network Battling, Training, Mission and Survival. Right here, huge pet peeve of mine: No offline VS CPU mode, if you wanna battle specific CPU opponents, you gonna have to resort to the training mode. The Story Mode goes through the Movie's story, told via some very ugly traced character cut-outs that look nothing like the actors, I didn't stomach the entire movie, so I'm not sure just how faithful it is to the movie, but the script is terrible, turning Dragon Ball into an stereotypical American highschool soap opera. Getting an A or better rank on each "act" will unlock two bonus acts featuring a new storyline in which 'Neo Piccolo'(He introduces himself that way, but he is just Piccolo wearing a red cloak) comes to stir up some trouble, but is quickly offed by Goku. Again. Mission Mode works just like it did in Shin Budokai, it's a neat idea, but it doesn't explain you HOW to do what it asks you, "perform 4 dodges", but the only way to learn how to dodge is the instruction booklet. Survival is pretty self explanatory, but the roster is so small that just on my first 10 opponents I fought 5 Chi Chis and 3 Bulmas, while the next ten featured 3 Fu Lums, 2 Gokus and 2 Yamchas. Fun.

 Just as stated above, the game borrows Shin Budokai's engine, which means Aura, Aura Smash, Aura Shield, Pursuit Attacks are back and work just as well. Likewise, each character has a bunch of combos involving weak and strong attacks, alongside 3 Special moves that consume Ki and a Super Move that requires 5 Ki gauges. Gameplaywise it's just as good as Shin Budokai, the entire combo system is intact, as well as every nuance and technique. Which would be a good thing, if only the game wasn't so shamefully lazy. There's only 11 characters, and that's counting Neo Piccolo, and they had the gall to reuse animations. Off the top of my hat I can remember: Piccolo, Roshi and Gohan share one Special Move, Gohan and Roshi have the same walk animations, Piccolo and Gohan share the same square combos, Piccolo and Neo Piccolo only have a few different combos, mostly the ones that start with Square. They also pulled a Ubisoft, as it seems animating women was too expensive, which is why the three females(Mai, Chi Chi and Bulma) share the same walking animations. And did I mention they borrowed the Shin Budokai engine? This means it also borrows the long loading times.

 Graphics are... good, when looking at screenshots. I mean, character models are detailed, and they look sorta OKish when still, but every new animation, meaning not taken from Shin Budokai, is probably gonna look awkward. The female walk cycle, Yamcha's walk cycle, Goku's win pose, they all look very, very awkward. Music is alright, there wasn't a whole lot of though put behind it, but it works. As for the voices, I don't know if they got the cast from the movie, but it doesn't matter, voices can't save this game.

 Know what the saddest part about it is? They had 90% of the legwork done. All they had to do was reskin it, seriously, that was ALL they had to do to make an alright game. What, some of the original animations were too outlandish for the game? Didn't stop them from using the same dashes and Smash attacks. I understand that Shin Budokai Another Road has sorta gone up in price, but this, this isn't a good substitute. And even then, the PSP has so many other great fighting games(Darkstalkers 3, Dissidia, Street Fighter Alpha 3, Tekken, Soul Calibur, etc), why settle for this? I paid 4 bucks for game, so I don't really regret it, and technically, at its core, it ain't a terrible game, the Shin Budokai engine is really good, but when compared with the game that spawned it... it falls short in every single way.
 3.5 out of 10.

Now Playing: .... erm.... Dragon Ball...... evolution... yeah...

 I HAVE MY REASONS, OK?

 I swear I'm a dignified human being, which is why I have a perfectly fine, valid and truthful reason as to why I own this game, four of them in fact... The game was four bucks. FOUR. BUCKS. And I had heard that it borrowed its gameplay from the Shin Budokai series, so I said what the hell.

 I played a bit, finished all 'Easy' Missions and fought against Gohan in the Story Mode, and... it's a poor man's, soulless version of Shin Budokai. The gameplay is here, and there's some new Special moves, which is kinda OK, but everything else is gone. The graphics are very... inconsistent, models are passable, but some animations are really, really bad, like Bulma and Yamcha's walk cycles, they are just... eugh. Then there's also the fact that these characters are very... 'real' looking, with very common clothes, and they are pulling off these off-the-wall attacks(Seriously, Yamcha has a drill-like weapon), it just looks... weird. The music is ... alright, I expected way worse.

 The only reason I started this one was to help me get through the dullness of Crimson Gem Saga, I will finish that damned game and then shelve it... never to be touched again. Probably the worst game I've played this year, not even the 3-4 month break I took was enough to aid me with the grindfest.

 Right now, I can say that even, even if Shin Budokai is outside your price range, this game isn't worth it. As good as the gameplay is, if you want a Dragon Ball game this is a poor substitute, and the PSP has so many other great fighters that blow it completely out of the water. However, at four bucks, if you know what you are getting into, is an alright purchase.... so far, I think.

Review #173: Fighting Force

 I liked it more than Dragon's Crown. Just sayin'.

 If one genre hasn't aged well, it's the beat'em up genre. To be honest, I can't exactly pin-point the reason, probably because I still like the genre. The genre bloomed in the Arcades, and then the SNES received its fair share of beat'em ups, but during the next generation of consoles it started dying down, and now a days it's mostly extinct. Fighting Force was one of the first 3D beat'em ups to be developed for the PS1, and it's a decent effort that could've used a bit more fleshing out.

 The game actually has a story, not that you'd know from playing the game, which offers no insight, cut-scene, flavor text or even hints at it. The game is set "years past the millennium"(I'm quoting the instruction booklet!), and this one guy named "Dr. Dex Zeng", a supposed former Government Agent, was really confident about the world ending in the year 2000. It didn't, and now he is so angry that he brings it upon himself to bring the world to an end. I couldn't be making this up if I tried. This private investigator named Mace(Female), contacts this vigilante named Hawke and Alana, a "raver" who likes to dance but was experiment upon by Zeng(What?) and then Hawk contacts Smasher, a prisoner of sorts, and they set out to stop Zeng. Best. Story. Ever. No game will ever top this story, and it's a shame none of it permeated the game itself.

 Notice how I named four characters? They are the playable heroes of the game, with up to two players at the same time. And it's better if you do get a partner-in-arms, as these games are at their best in co-op. All four characters are basically the same, they have a two kick combo, a three(four for Alana) punch combo, a jumping kick, a 360 degree attack that costs a bit of health, a slide and a running kick(Body slam for Smasher), a back punch, and they each get three different throws when grabbing an enemy. Yes, all four characters are pretty samey, even though Hawk and Mace are the "balanced" guys, Alana is the speedster and Smasher is the slow power-house. You, and your enemies, can also pick up various items, knives, pipes, barrels, guns and shotguns for added destructive power. Overall, it's pretty simple and brain dead, but I had fun plowing down enemy after enemy. While the game is rather short, you could probably clear it in under an hour if you know what you are doing, there are different routes that you can take, with different stages, and while all stages are basically the same: Punch/Kick all enemies to death, at least they provide different backdrops, and some routes have exclusive enemies... even if they are just reskins.

 As much as I liked it, the game has a couple of problems. The punch button doubles as the pick up button. I tend to favor punching, which means that I relied mostly on punches... when you are near items and you try to punch, your character will try to pick up whatever is next to him. Particularly annoying when you are mashing the X button, out of habit, and when they hit you out of the "pick up" animation... your character instantly tries to pick it back up. So, yeah, if you are near items, resort to Kicks. The Camera isn't the greatest either, they tried to alleviate it by giving you a "zoom out" button, but it still isn't enough to give you a clear view of where enemies can and are coming from. Lastly, the game is a bit of a liar... it prompts a Save Screen after each level, and you can save your game, and it names the file like "Hawk at Bridge Level", however, you can't continue from where you left off. You are supposed to beat the game in one sitting, and it's kinda short so it isn't such a big deal, but why let you save your game after every stage if it does NOTHING?!

 Graphics are pretty darn good, characters and environments alike are very detailed and look pretty nice. I also liked the variety in the stages, it's not the most colorful of games, but it has many different backdrops, from the Park, Zeng's Building, The Bronx, the Subway... all of the genre's must-have levels are accounted for in this one. Some animations are a bit rigid though, and you can tell since the animations for attacking with the pipe doen't even get close to the smoothness of Alana's flying kick. Music is fairly good as well, and the sound effects are fairly appropriate. Overall, it looks great and sound really good.

 Fighting Force doesn't reinvent the wheel, it's just another beat'em up to add to the pile, however, what it does, it does fairly well. It is what it is, which is why it's hard to recommend to anyone but fans of the genre. Plus, I liked it more than Dragon's Crown. Just putting it out there.
 6.0 out of 10.

Now Playing: Fighting Force

 I didn't remember it being this good.

 So, I remembered Fighting Force as a somewhat... bad game. I still wanted to get it since it was one of the games I used to play when I was younger. Funny story, I actually learnt about it thanks to the N64 port and Nintendo-based magazines, but I didn't get to play it until I got a PS2.

 As for the game, it's really fun, it's decent, looks pretty nice and the soundtrack is good. I love the amount of breakables on each stage, like the time I punched next to some handles on the elevator stage... and Hawk just pulled the handle and wielded it as a Club. Badass. The combat is pretty much brain dead, with little in the way of combos, but I think it's fine, I like this kind of games after all.

 On other news, today I was planning on buying FF and Gran Turismo 2, but the dude that gave me Gran Turismo 1 for free. Today... was a good day.

Review #172: One Piece - Grand Adventure

 I'd cross the Grand Line for this game. Just sayin'

 One Piece: Grand Adventure is a 1 on 1 arena-based fighter based on the hit franchise One Piece. While Japan had the "Rumble Arena" series, westerners had to settle with Grand Battle and Grand Adventure. Grand Battle was a decent game... but had stuff taken out, Grand Adventure sets out to correct that, and it manages to be a Western-Exclusive One Piece game that is almost on par with the last Rumble Arena game.

 The game has two main modes: Adventure and Battle, the latter that houses VS Player/Cpu, Tournament and Arena(A "choose your next opponent" ladder). The adventure mode actually has five different adventures, Luffy's story that loosely tells Luffy's story up to Skypeia's arc, and then there's four what ifs: Buggy's, Crocodile's, Chaser's(Smoker) and Usopp's. What's fun about Adventure mode is that you actually level up your characters as you fight battles, and get to spread their stat points! Each character also has unlockables(Luffy unlocks costumes for the Mugiwaras and Robin, Usopp unlocks costumes for the Mugiwaras, Smoker, Crocodile and Buggy unlock characters). Surprisingly, it's a very fun and lengthy mode, however, Smoker's Adventure is a bit of a chore. Y'see, for some reason they decided that in order to unlock Smoker's characters you need to level them up to 15, that's fine, but Kuina and Zeff come with terrible stat spreads that make even the easiest of fights in Chaser's mode hard, it just wasn't fun having to grind experience with these two characters.

 Controls are responsive and well set-up, but there's a bunch of functions that may take a while to properly get a grasp of. X and Square are your two basic attacks that can be combined to produce various three hit combos, pressing them together performs a strong attack that breaks guards. Circle is used to grab boxes, barrels, chests or items around the arenas, and triangle is the jump. So far, so good. R1 is a block, but holding R1 and pressing any of the face buttons allows for Special attacks! Then there's L1, which is used to enter Accel Heat Mode when pressed with the triangle button(There's three levels of Accel Heat, depending on how many energy gauges you spend, and they provide various bonuses like unblockable attacks and faster speed), but if you press square twice while holding L1 you can call a character to assist you(There's many types of Assist Characters, which you chose before each battle). L1+X plus another button performs Super attacks, but L1+Circle+Circle plus another button produces the Secret Attack that consumes three gauges, and if it hits, engages a rock-paper-scissors minigame, which I really, really could've done without. I also disliked how Super Attack and Secret Attack's inputs are different between characters, it doesn't add depth to the game or differentiate characters, it just makes it confusing!

 Regardless, 22 out of the 24 characters are completely unique between each other, they even have unique "hold" animations. Take Buggy, when he holds an item, he crosses his arms while his hands hover above his head holding the item, while Crocodile just holds his hand over his head nonchalantly, and Zeff just lays the item over his head. There's only two clones, Kuina and Zeff, who are Tashigi and Sanji clones respectively, and even then, they have some unique attributes to themselves. Stages are very colorful and varied, with different geographies and obstacles, some even contain hazards that must be avoided. On the flip side, it seems they tried to bite more than they could chew with some stages, the framerate can get pretty bad on some of the more intense environments. As far as usable weapons go, they are pretty dull, there's a bat, a laser sword, bombs, oil canisters, poisonous shrooms among others, but I didn't really care for them. There's also some unlockable mini-games, like a 1-on-1 race or one in which you have to break all the boxes in a time-limit, they're pretty forgettable, but I didn't mind them.

 The game is absolutely beautiful, a lot of care went into the game's graphics. While the game employs a slightly deformed look for the characters, they are pretty detailed, and the animations are pretty smooth(When the framerate isn't taking a dive that is!). Not to mention the amount of unique animations per character, like the previously mentioned "holding" animations. Particularly impressive is how cloth moves, just look at how Luffy's jacket waves. The music is alright, it fits the game and it suits the fighting, the same can't be said about the voice acting sadly. The game employs the terrible, terrible 4Kids dub, so expect to see some changes on some personalities. This also means that Smoker is now named Chaser and he is missing the cigars from his mouth, and Ace was renamed Trace, for some reason. I really didn't mind it to be honest, the game is great, and most of what made the characters who they are was left intact.

 One Piece Grand Adventure is almost a perfect example on how to make a licensed game. You could take away all the One Piece imagery and it would still be a great game. There's a couple of annoyances, like how the frame-rate can go to hell on some stages, or how Secret and Super moves inputs are different from characters for no reason at all, or the edits done to the characters due to the dub, however, Grand Adventure is so good that it's easy to look past that.
 8.0 out of 10.

Review #171: Dragon's Crown

 Only took me... what, like.. a year?

 I... I really wanted to like this one. Made by Vanillaware, developers of Murasama(A game which I adored) I had nothing but high hopes for this game, even though it kinda took a while to come out. Dragon's Crown tries to mix the Beat'em up genre with some RPG elements, but the end result is... odd. Capcom did it first, and got it right, with their Dungeon and Dragons beat'em up games, but Dragon's Crown didn't get it just quite right.

 The game puts the story at the forefront, for some reason, concerning the titular Dragon's Crown and various political powers after it. You are tasked to find this crown, but it isn't as simple as it sounds, eventually getting roped into finding 9 different talismans and slaying an ancient evil. The good? I like how there's a narrator telling you what characters said, makes it seem like you are playing a tabletop game. The bad? There's TOO much story, and it isn't particularly interesting. This game prides itself in its four player couch co-op, it prides itself on being a Beat'em up, so why the hell are they making me go from point A to point B, on the town, just to advance the story? Why is the Narrator repeating the same line, telling me what to do, every time I leave a building? Seriously, the Narrator quickly wears out his welcome, I don't need to be reminded that I'm still missing X amount of Talismans every time I return to town, or enter a building to repair my weapons. He NEVER shuts ups.

 The game plays, mostly, like a traditional beat'em up game. I appreciate how they managed to cram many actions into a very few amount of buttons. Square is used to attack, and inputting different directions on the analog stick produces different attacks, however, holding square also allows you to block, and holding it while walking lets you run! It sounds like a lot, but it works fairly well. What doesn't is that picking up weapons or bones sometimes doesn't feel responsive, I think that you actually have to wait for the prompt to appear on screen, but I'm not sure, either way, it's not very responsive. Before each stage, you can also bring potions, which are used with the directional pad. Lastly, when you get hit, there's a slight chance that your weapon might drop, which is interesting, but for some reason, you can't pick it up for a few seconds, which I don't really mind, but it doesn't make sense as to why you can't pick it up! There's no rhyme or reason, the developers just chose that you can't. All in all, it works fairly well, combat is fast and frantic, even though when playing with four other players, it's easy to lose track of where you are. One of the patches added a colored circle around your characters, but it's so thin that it barely helps.

 As good as the combat mechanics are, the developers also opted to add a Rogue following the party, which you control with the right analog stick. Pointing at chests or doors and then pressing the right analog stick(R3) makes him pick their locks. My question is... Why? The Rogue adds NOTHING to the game, sending him to pick locks doesn't count as a 'puzzle', it's just something to make you think like you are doing something else, but it doesn't work, heck, it brings the game to a halt. You can also press R3 over glimmering lights to produce gold, which is... something that you'll do a couple of times before realizing that it's a waste of time. R3 is also how you activate runes, by pressing runes in the background and then coupling it with some of yours. It's a decent idea, and there's many different rune combinations for various effects, but as a whole I really disliked the whole right analog stick mechanic.

 The game has six different classes, and they all have different skills. It may be due to the fact that the Knight, the class I played, was a bit boring, but I felt most skills were pretty... dull. Sure, investing in the 'mash square to win' skill was fun, but at the end of every boss fight my hand would be in pain. My partner played with the Dwarf, and the Dwarf-exclusive skills were fairly dull as well, but at least it could grab enemies and boulders and then throw them! If you don't have friends available, you can also play online, or by finding bones and resurrecting them(for a fee) play with CPU allies. The CPUs are fairly dumb, as expected, but at least you get some diversions. The thing about the CPU allies is that they don't level up, so you have to resurrect as many as you can to keep your allies updated. The game also has a very weird difficulty curve, every now and then the boss level will just jump a couple of levels ahead of you, so you will have to sidequest a bunch in order to stand a chance. Frankly, it feels like fat, it forces you to replay levels over and over again so that you can increase your level and stand a chance.

 Ah, yes, Sidequests, you can only accept five at a time, and they all consist of playing and replaying levels. Most of the time, Sidequests are unlocked AFTER finishing a level, so they are there for replaying purposes. Later in the game you'll unlock alternate"Route B" on all 9 stages, which take you to an alternate boss, but as soon as you unlock this feature, you lose the ability to pick a stage... for free. So now you are left with two choices: Go to the gate and warp to a random level, or pay money at the stables to pick a stage. What. The. Hell? No, really, why? Why make you pay even more? You need money to: Resurrect Bones(And you need to if you are playing by yourself, as CPUs don't level up), maintain your equipment(It breaks!), used as continues(If you or your allies lose their lives during a stage), to appraise loot(Every item you find has to be appraised, and Equipment can only be FOUND not bought, and even then, you can't see the stats besides "it's a level X weapon" so it could potentially suck) and to buy items... and they also want to charge you for picking a stage? If you could at least accept all quests at all times, at least then getting warped to a random location wouldn't be SO bad, since you could have a available quest to clear. And after finishing a level, you can chose to continue adventuring... except that you get warped into a random level. Why? Just.... why?

 The graphics are beautiful. Kinda. Y'see, as I have stated many times throughout this blog, I hate fanservice. 80% of this game's art direction is fanservice. Your rewards for doing sidequests(Besides money and experience points)? Art pieces, mostly of naked or semi naked women. Women that you find in dungeons? If they are not almost naked they are on pandering positions. Two of the three playable females in the game are exploited as much as they could. Yeah, the game is pretty tasteless. However, the animation and how the sprites look is really, really good, probably some of Vanillaware's finest. The music has some outstanding pieces, but the rest of the soundtrack was pretty forgettable. And as much as I liked the Narrator, at first, eventually his voice just started annoying me to no end, if only he would shut up.

 Dragon's Crown, when it's at its finest, is really, really good. The rest of the time, it will leave you perplexed at some of the questionable design choices it employs. As a whole, I can't say I liked too much, and I love, LOVE beat'em ups. It's just that they could've done things so much better, but I guess they thought the fanservice would make up for them. It didn't.
 5.5 out of 10.