Review #335: 3DS Download Kid Icarus - Of Myths and Monsters

 It hasn't aged very well.

 Kid Icarus is one of Nintendo's oldest franchises, yet one that has been severely underutilized. 'Of Myths and Monsters' was the second entry on the series, released exclusively on the Gameboy, and while, at the time, it was praised for smoothing over some of the first games rough edges, I'd venture to say it hasn't aged very well at all.

 The plot is a bit silly and entirely inconsequential to the game itself; basically, Goddess Palutena has a dream about Orcos invading the heavens, so she sends out Pit through a series of training challenges. And, spoiler alert, as soon as you finish the training, Orcos attacks and it's up to Pit to save Palutena. The game is divided in 4 stages, the first three with four sub-stages each. The first three stages would be Pit's training, and and on the fourth sub-stage you are thrust upon an annoying maze-like environment that concludes with a boss fight.

 Most levels are relatively linear affairs, either go from left to right or get to the top of the stage in order to beat it. But you'd better not, as spread throughout them are different doors that will take you to stores, healing springs or bonus stages. Currency is earned by killing enemies, and you will need to go out of your way to grind for enemy kills, which spawn infinitely, if you want to buy anything, as everything is plenty expensive. Among the bonus stages are 'survival' type affairs, in which clearing them awards you with one of three weapons. These weapons only work when you have a determinate amount of health on your health bar, but you'll need two levels at least to use the first one of this weapons. Your health gauge is increased by amassing a certain amount of points, and after clearing a level, if you managed to get enough points, Zeus will upgrade your health to a maximum of five. 

 Honestly, I thought the entire game was a waste of time. You are expected to sit near enemy spawners and kill them ad nauseaum to amass currency and so properly equip Pit for the different stages. However, to say that the game was devoid of any fun would be wrong, as some of the platforming in the latter levels was decidedly enjoyable, and seeing Pit get stronger as you get more life upgrades and weapon upgrades felt pretty satisfying. Once you are fully equipped, it becomes even more enjoyable, as you try to avoid damage in order to keep your upgrades activated.

 Bottom-line is, I think Kid Icarus is a victim of age. And while the game starts off very boring, once you've amassed a small fortune and are well on your way upgrading Pit, it becomes relatively enjoyable.

 4.5 out of 10

Now Playing; 3DS Download Kid Icarus - Of Myths and Monsters

 Blegh

 When playing older games one has to take into account that back when they were released, it was a different time. Games were made artificially harder in order to extend the game's life and either incite multiple rentals or directly purchases. I grew up with a joystick in my hands, so I can put up with a lot of archaic mechanics, if the game is good.

 Kid Icarus of Myths and Monsters is a drag. You jump and shoot on the most boring of stages. 'But it was a different time! They only had two buttons at the time! And the gameboy's screen was small!' Yeah, well, look at Mario Bros classic, that game is even less complex than this one, and it's still a lot more fun. Look at Megaman, you jump and shoot, except that it's fun in those games.

 But what makes it so boring? The fact that it's a grindfest. Climbing to the top of each level is relatively easier, but if you want to buy power ups, you are gonna have to abuse the endlessly spawning enemies to make a fortune. Which takes time. And stuff is expensive. Heck, the only way to increase your life bar is to finish a level with a high score, which means... going out of your way to kill as many enemies as you can. It's not fun, it's a waste of time.

 I just defeated the first boss, and man was that boring. It wasn't even hard, it was simply boring, I had level 3 fire arrows, and kept pumping and pumping arrows but the thing wouldn't go down.

 And that's my initial impressions with the game: It's a waste of time. I don't like it.

Review #334: Liberation Maiden

 Because Suda 51 is god.

 And here we have another small, semi-experimentational game part of the 'guild' series that, for whatever reason, wasn't deemed worthy of a full, physical release over seas. In Liberation Maiden case, it's a 3D shooter by Suda 51 in collaboration with Level 5.

 The game doesn't do a good job of explaining the setting, but what you need to know is that you play as Shoko, new Japan's president, who must protect her country from invading enemies by piloting her humongous mecha. It's Suda 51 alright. The game is divided into 5 stages, which mostly consist of doing three missions and a sub missions before tackling the boss. It lasts about 1 hour on the Normal difficulty setting, but there's also an easy and hard mode, as well as an Stage Attack mode, if you care about any of those.

 On each stage you are dropped on a medium-sized area filled with enemies, and then you are told your first objective. While you can go fulfill it at any time, you are free to explore and destroy enemies, although the only reward will be more points, so there's no real rewards for exploring. The left analog stick is used to move around, holding the L button allows you to strafe and the Stylus takes care of combat. If you bought Kid Icarus, you'll probably want to use the Stand it came with, since I struggled with a few hand cramps as I played along.

 Interestingly, your offensive means are also your defense! There's two weapons, the Laser and the Gun/Missile. To use the gun, you hover the reticule, with the stylus, over the enemies and then let go, it can also be charged for extra damage, while the laser fires constantly as you move the reticule around. The 'ammo' for these weapons is also your shield, so depleting your ammo, which recharges once you stop touching the screen with the stylus, will leave you open to take damage. Still, getting hit while the gauge is fully loaded will penalize you by reducing its total capacity, which means less ammo for your weapons. You can recharge this capacity by defeating enemies. I don't usually play shooters, so I don't know how original of a mechanic it is, but what I do know is that I found it rather fun.

 There's not a whole lot of story to the game, but Suda 51's flavor can be felt on the gameplay. It's hard to explain the why or how, but you can tell that Suda 51 had to something to do with it, even the HUD feels very Suda 51. Still, it's far from his best endeavors, but I think that can be attributed to the game's original nature: This is a single part of a whole package. It wasn't meant to be a 'complete' game, which explains its simple premise and very, very short duration. Still, there's something to be said about them managing to make the gameplay so engaging when it was meant to be something so simple.

 As it stands, I feel the same way about this game as I did with Attack of the Friday Monsters: It's a great, small game considering what it was meant to be, but I'm sure it would've worked much better alongside the other two games it was released with, as a compilation of multiple games from multiple directors. Still, the small fee of admission is worth it, and it does have a broader appeal than Attack of the Friday Monsters.
 7.0 out of 10

Review #333: Attack of the Friday Monsters! A Tokyo Tale

 It's so beautiful!

 Attack of the Friday Monsters! is... a bit hard to classify, but I guess 'a slice of life adventure game' fits the bill relatively well.

 You play as Sohta, the new kid on the block, who is sent by his mother on an errand to deliver the clean laundry to the baker's... something that Sohta forgets about very early and is never brought up again till the 'true ending'. Before leaving his home, his mother warns him to be careful, since Friday is the day monsters come out. And this is the game's first peculiarity, the nature of the monsters, of the town, is never made clear. Are the monsters real?  Are they partially real? Is this an elaborate prank by the adults? Is it a movie stage? The answer is left pretty ambiguous. The game is divided in 26 episodes, but they are more like 'tasks' or 'mysteries', they don't follow a numerical order, and you'll advance each at seemingly random intervals. To be honest, the story is relatively simple, but the cast of characters and the situations were incredibly charming, more often than not I found myself making the largest, dumbest grins as I advanced the plot.

 Throughout the entire ordeal you'll be doing three things: Walking from place to place, talking with NPCs and battling other kids with cards. As you walk around town, you'll come across shining spots, called 'Glims', collecting about 7 of them will grant you a card. These cards represent different Kaijuu, Japanese giant monsters like Godzilla, and they each have their own unique flavor text accompanying them, which makes collecting them a reward in itself. But cards are more than mere collector's items, they are used to play a game card game against other kids, by facing five of your cards against five of them. Initially each card has one of three symbols: Rock-Paper-Scissors, but later in the game you'll come across dual type, like Cutting Rock. After selecting your five cards, you'll be given two to three 'hints' on whether your card loses, wins or draws against the enemy card directly in front of it, and you are allowed to switch to cards. Who switches cards first depends on who's got the 'winning set up' at the start. I didn't much care for the game itself, but you'd do well to collect as many cards as you want, as there's a relatively challenging mandatory match near the end of the game.

 After you clear the game you are free to search for missing glints, complete unfinished episodes and challenge a new kid to the card game. If you want to 100% the game you are going to need to collect every card, which means challenging the new kid. Not only is she the hardest opponent in the entire game, but the chances of her dropping the glints you need are entirely random. This was the only thing I found annoying in the game, and honestly, the ending you get after getting every card isn't really worth it, so after you clear the game just finish every episode but the fourth one(The one that requires all cards). Unless you really enjoy the card game, in which case you've a reason to keep playing it!

 And that's all there is to say about Attack of the Friday Monsters! It's a simple, but wholly charming game, filled with entertaining moments to keep you smiling all the way through. And as with any game of this kind, it's not for everyone. The card game is almost entirely optional, there's no puzzles whatsoever, so the only thing you'll be doing is walking around and talking with NPCs, which probably doesn't sound very appealing, and it certainly will only appeal to a few. But for those few, the game is incredibly worth it. The game was originally released alongside four other games in Japan, as 'guild 02' or something like that, but all us westerners got was a digital release of each game individually. Regardless of how cheap you may get it for, if the game doesn't sound like something you'd be interested in, then chances are you probably won't like the game at all.
 8.0 out of 10

Review #332: Earth Defense Force 2025

 EDF! EDF! EDF!

 It's been, what, about four years since I played Earth Defense Force(USA) back in the day? Often lauded as the worst in the franchise, it was an american take on the series, and I liked it a lot, but then again, it was the only EDF game I had played. Earth Defense Force 2025 was the last EDF game released on last gen consoles, now left obsolete by the PS4 enhanced rerelease. Regardless, current-gen still hasn't managed to pique my interest, scummy DLC practices and incomplete games(I believed in Street Fighter V, and it failed me! DAMMIT, CAPCOM.) doesn't help, so this'll have to do.

 The game's story is as follows: Giant alien insects invade the Earth, Storm Team is the Earth's mightiest defense against these evil aliens, so they do battle with the aliens. And that's it. There's a tiny bit more to the story, which progresses through audio communication while you play the 85 missions, which last about 15 hours, but it's not meant to be taken seriously. You'd do both yourself and the game a disservice if you played it for the story, Shakespeare this is not.

 The game is a traditional third person shooter, so no fancy 'over-the shoulder' aiming, in which you have to kill giant ants. And then giant spiders. And then giant Bees. And then flying space ships. And then alien bipedal robots. And then H. G. Wells-inspired robots. And then dragons. And it's as fun, chaotic and ridiculous as it sounds, and it's amazing. Most of the missions take place in city-like arenas, filled with buildings and bridges that probably won't survive the whole ordeal. As fantastic as it sounds... the game runs like crap. The framerate in single-player is acceptable, it dips a lot, but it can be tolerated. But when playing split-screen... it's awful. But it's also when the game shines the brightest, I played the entire 85 missions in split-screen co-op, and it was a riot, so much so that it was easy to ignore how frequently the framerate went into the single digits. It's that bad. But it's also so much fun.

 There's four different classes, each one with specific weapons and attributes. Honestly, if you are gonna play by yourself, you are better off sticking with the average, all-around Ranger. The Wing Diver is fun, but it's a bit too fragile, the Fencer packs quite a punch, and the only class that wields four weapons, but it's very, very slow, unless you bring a melee weapon, that allows it to dash, so it'll be an eternity as you move from area to area, and the Air Support class is built around co-operation, which makes it a terrible character for solo play. And it's a shame, because the other classes are so much fun to play, in a co-operative environment! Each character also gets dozens upon dozens of different weapons. Sure, a ton of them are simply higher-level versions of other weapons, but there's probably 12-20 different weapon models for each different class, which translates into a lot of weapons and a lot of set-ups.

 And I bet all those weapons sound oh so appealing, don't they? It's a bit of a double edged sword. Weapons are found on green crates, randomly dropped by enemies. What weapon you get is entirely random, and it may even be a weapon you already own. This also means that if you like a particular set of weapons, you may be stuck with low-level weapons until you finally get weapons that suit your style. Since I was so fond of my Fencer's 900 damage cannon, I wound up with 3 different level 15-20 weapons and my level 10 cannon, since I couldn't find its enhanced version or a weapon that could take its role in my arsenal.

 Another issue with the game, besides the terrible framerate, are the long, looooooooooong loading times. And then there's the camera... Sometimes it tends to get stuck on debris behind you, or for whatever reason, your character itself. It's not unusual to be aiming at something only to suddenly get a close-up on your character's behind. Now couple this with single-digit framerate moments and it can get quite annoying.

 Despite being such a technical mess, the game is undeniably fun. It can get a bit repetitive, sure, but trying new weapons is always fun. That said, the game is obviously meant to be played with other players, going at it solo is decent, but when you've got different character classes co-operating with each other, there's were the game shines... and it's also when the game runs the worst! It's definitely not a game for everyone, it's a very campy game, and it knows how ridiculous it is, and it makes the most of it. It also runs like garbage, has a ton of technical issues, so it takes a special kind of person to put up with them and appreciate the game for what it really is.
 7.0 out of 10

Now Playing: Stella Glow

 Because Luminous Arc isn't dead. Kinda...ish.

Imageepoch had a little franchise, Luminous Arc, on the Nintendo DS. It was a trilogy of quirky Strategy RPGs that were pretty decent. As a matter of fact, I remember getting 100% on Luminous Arc 2, which meant a lot, and I do mean a LOT of playthroughs. Sadly, we never got Luminous Arc 3 over here.

 We did get Arc Rise Fantasia, though, which was amazing, and I covered on this blog a couple of times already, and putting it over Xenoblade on my favorite Wii games. Actually, there was a fourth Luminous Arc game on the Vita, but it looks nothing like previous games and was developed by another company...

 ...'Cause, y'see, Imageepoch went bankrupt after releasing this game, and their CEO went missing(True story). So what we've got here is Imageepoch's very last game, and while it doesn't carry the 'Luminous Arc' name, it very much is in spirit.

 So, the good, the bad and the ugly:

The Good:
- Production values are through the roof. 2-D character portraits are very crisp and clear, the anime cutscenes are fantastic and the 3D in-game graphics are gorgeos.
- Gameplay is very simple, and works just like any other SRPG, but why fix what isn't broken?

The Bad:
- The story... It's as anime as it gets. Childhood friend-romantic interest-who can't cook? Check. Her food even turns purple, like 90% of every female love interest ever. The mysterious voice-power benefactor that appears mysteriously when the situation gets dire and offers the main character powers? Check.
- It also rips off from the Luminous Arc franchise itself! This Hilda witch seems to have the exact same role as the Twilight Witch from Luminous Arc 2. She's the game's 'mascot', featuring heavily on most official art pieces, wields a scimitar-like weapon, wears black and has white hair, is evil but will obviously join the good guys. Then there's the Knight Klaus, who looks almost exactly like Luminous Arc 2's token blonde spearman.
- And it's also very predictable. The fact that Lisette would discover her witch powers so early and in that manner was incredibly obvious.
- The first chapters also reminded me a lot of Jean D'Arc. Having the main characters start off as villagers, having one of the characters being accepted into the village after having been found suffering from amnesia/not knowing who he was. Even the early hunting missions and visual style, not to mention having the village attacked. And I know that it's a very common set-up seen in many games, but it reminded me of Jean D'Arc the most due to the visual style.

The ugly:
- You can't turn the camera during battles! Although to be fair I didn't really need to.

 Basically, it's really good, at least so far, with the only shortcoming being the story. Sadly, Japanese RPGs aren't just what they used to.

Month Overview: June 2016

 Tally:
999 - Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors                         7.5
Professor Layton VS Phoenix Wright - Ace Attorney            8.0
Danganronpa 2 - Goodbye Despair                                         8.5
Danganronpa Another Episode - Ultra Despair Girls             6.5
Lord of Arcana                                                                        2.0


 Now that's a lot of visual novel-style games! Not that I mind, they were pretty good. Even Danganronpa AE was good at what it wanted to be, although it wasn't too good at what it was. Anyways, 999? Pretty good, although I disagreed with a few design choices. Professor Layton VS Phoenix Wright? Now that's a crossover. Danganronpa 2? It starts of very disappointing, but it turns around on its second half and becomes amazing. All in all, I'm pretty satisfied.

 Except with Lord of Arcana, that game can burn in hell for all I care.


Game of June:

 Man, I had a tough time scoring Danganronpa 2. The first 10 hours of the game I was feeling so let down. Fanservice was rampant throughout the entire game, the cast just wasn't very likable, and while the story behind the trials was pretty good, the gameplay was even more annoyingly convoluted. And then I got into the second half, and man, does the game pick up. Most of the fanservice is gone, by this time you've invested more time into the surviving characters and you realized that they had hidden depths, and the story gets SO good. SO. GOOD. I wanted to score it above Danganronpa at times. But there was my issue: Danganronpa 1 was consistently amazing, while Danganronpa 2 does get better than Danganronpa 1, the first half is rather bland. Still, it's a solid game, but lacks the consistency that made the original so good.

Runner-up:

 Alright, so the trials weren't as in-depth as they normally are, but it was understandable considering the target audience. Besides, it made up for it with the addition of Layton's puzzles. The end result is a Phoenix Wright game AND a Professor Layton game at the same time, without one franchise overshadowing the other in terms of presence. Although, y'know, I felt kinda sad that Pheenie was the butt of the joke the entire time, while Layton got nothing but praises. Which makes sense considering that's how both characters are treated in their respective universes, but still!