Review #480: Resident Evil 6

 It only took me, what? About a year?

That's the ugliest 6 I've ever seen.

 Resident Evil 6 was very polarizing to say the least. Back when it first released, it was subject to either very high scores or very low scores, Destructoid's Jim Sterling even gave it a brutal 3 out of 10. After playing through the game.. I think it's high time people realized that Resident Evil was always about the action first and stop being so harsh on 4, 5 and 6!

 The story... is divided into 4 interwoven, 5-chapter campaigns. First we've got Chris and Piers', who you are told is the most action based... which is a lie, it's got as many chase sequences and vehicle sequences as the rest, and it even has its slow, horrory moments. Then there're Sherry and Jake's, who's campaign follows Resident Evil 3 scheme... except not, the Ustanak, this game's 'Nemesis', is just another element of a bigger setpiece, always appearing when the script says so, and there's always one way of taking him out or avoiding him. There're chase and vehicle sequences too. Leon and Helena have the next campaign, touted as the one focused on horror... which is not true either, the first two chapters are glorious, yes, but the next three feature just as many vehicle and chase sequences as the rest. The final campaign is unlocked after finishing the other three and is the plot dump campaign in which the 'why' and 'how's are explained. There're vehicle and chase sequences too. What I mean to say is... the idea that all four campaigns are focused on different themes or gameplays is a lie, all four campaigns are pretty much the same. As for the overall story.. it's pretty silly, although it tries to take itself more seriously than ever before, there're no crazy scientists, mad dragqueens or weird, pale midgets. Overall, the story was entertaining enough, but not something that moved me or hooked me.

The chaos had never been this much wide-spread before. The stakes are higher than they've ever been in REvil.

 I think that dividing the game into four campaigns was a mistake though. I would've much preferred a more focused campaign, and one that didn't move in a breakneck speed. Y'see, something that will probably turn off quite a few is the fact that the game advances in a set-piece to set-piece fashion. There's never a dull moment, and if the action slows down is because something is about to happen soon. Even Leon's first two chapters, which are rather slow-paced, are like this. Sidenote, the first two chapters in Leon's campaign are exactly what a story-driven Zombie game should be like. Overall, the game is rather lengthy, chapters take about an hour to complete, Leon having the longest chapters(Some going as far as 1:30) while Ada has the shortest(Most shouldn't break an hour).

 As far as gameplay goes, it's pretty much an evolved version of Resident Evil 5's over-the-should third-person shooting mechanics. There're a ton of new maneuvers, not only can you move while aiming, you can also dodge to the sides or even jump back. You can lay on the floor or roll on the floor as you aim and shoot! While characters are as heavy to turn and as agile as a sack of sand, the new abilities do make for more frantic action. Melee can now be performed at will by tapping R1, although the really strong melee moves are reserved for dazed enemies, by hitting their limbs. There's a new stamina gauge that governs how much you can use your melee attacks, so you can't just spam them. Overall, I adored the new additions to the gameplay.

For as many complaints as the camera received, I felt it was just fine.

 One thing I really liked were the new enemies, the J'Avo. These monsters will mutate in different ways depending on where you harm them. Hit their torsos? They might develop an armored body. Hit their legs? Now they turn into half-man-half-flesh-grasshopper-thing. While there's not a huge amount of variety, there was enough to keep things interesting. Leon and Helena get exclusive enemies in the form of zombies, which may mutate into red zombies, as well as fat and screaming zombies, but I didn't care too much about them, same old, same old.

 There's a new Skill system in place too, sometimes enemies or boxes may drop skill points when felled, which can then be used on different passive skills. While you can only have three at a time, finishing the game lets you have up to eight different, three-skill sets to switch around mid-gameplay. A ton of people disliked the new system since 'you may be running out of ammo or health and get skill points instead', but... how the hell did you run out of ammo? Health is restored to full upon dying and restarting on a checkpoint, so being low on life is no excuse, and as for ammo... if you are using your melee attacks, which if you've been playing REvil since 4 you should know how strong and useful they are, you shouldn't be hurting for ammo. I will admit that ammo is limited, but I never, EVER found myself without ammo. EVER.

Some setpieces are shared between campaigns, if you play online, you can have four different players together at times!

 I've heard horror tales about AI Sheva's uselessness in REvil 5, but I found AI allies to be pretty darn useful. They've removed their inventories, so the will never pick up stuff, which is good news for people that play in Single Player, although the real-time menu remains, which is kinda annoying in my opinion. They've tweaked how herbs work, and you must now store them in your pellet case and then eat them as individual pellets? It's kinda cumbersome, since it involves going through a second inventory(Directional pads switches weapons, triangle is your entire inventory) just to put them inside the case. It also doesn't make much sense what your maximum capacity of pellets is, since sometimes it wouldn't let me store them even though I shouldn't be hitting the max. Weird.

 Still, the worst returning offender is, or rather, are... the QTEs. There're way too many QTEs, and they are incredibly annoying, as per usual. And you CAN turn them off... if you set the difficulty to amateur. Seriously??? I read some complaints about the camera, and while it is true that I felt that your character took up way too much screen time, it never got in my way. I always knew what was going on and didn't have issues figuring out where to go, and no, I didn't have the patch that let you zoom-out the camera. My only issue with the camera is during the way too frequent chase-sequences. which have you and your partner escaping from different things while the camera does its best to disorient you. Speaking of disorienting, Capcom thought it'd be cute to give all four couples a different HUD, which can be a bit of a shock until you get used to them.

The game looks amazing, and the framerate is pretty stable to boot.

 Mercenaries return, although there are only 3 scenarios. Mercenaries is a mini-game, unlocked from the start, that has you trying to defeat as many enemies that you can while under a time limit, which can be extended in various ways. There're unlockable costumes for every character, but the guys get stupid, joke costumes and the girls get fetishistic slutty cop costumes, basically, none are worth it. There's a new, online-only, mode, 'Agent Hunt', in which you can invade other people's campaigns and play as the monsters, trying to kill the players. I didn't get to try it out, but it sounds amusing.

 In an era where games had already started to be released incomplete, Resident Evil 6 is quite the package, featuring a very lengthy campaign, with a few neat extras. Look, if you're a die-hard Classic Resident evil fan, this game won't sway you, and the new setpiece-to-setpiece pace will probably alienate a few, but as someone who likes this brand of third person shooters, with heavy and slow characters and the horror elements.... I can't help but like the game a lot. That said, I think I prefer Resident Evil 5 for the simple fact that it had a more focused campaign, and one that had much better pacing. Look, the setpiece-to-setpiece approach makes for a very exciting game, but there's not much build up, and as such, these epic, semi-scripted moments lose a lot of their impact. And as much as I adored the new gameplay elements, the campaigns get very repetitive with the multiple tacked-on vehicle and chase sequences. And the QTEs need to follow in the way of the dinosaurs.
 8.0 out of 10

Review #479: Corpse Party - Blood Drive

 This game is a corpse, but there's no party to be had playing it.

Damned, tempting extras at a low price!

 So there I was, browsing Play-Asia for a new purchase and I came across Corpse Party Blood Drive's Everafter Edition at 20 bucks. 20 bucks. It came with a fancy box, an artbook and a soundtrack CD, of course I had to buy it. I had to. Plus, it was a franchise I was looking to get into, even the 3DS re-release of the first game was on my sights. Was. After playing through Blood Drive I've no intention of ever dabbling in it again. Ever.

 I came at Blood Drive knowing NOTHING about the previous games... which is a big mistake. Blood Drives assumes you've played previous games, even the ones that never made it outside Japan, and if you want to get the full experience, it's better if you've dabbled in side material too. Still, while I got half the plot, what little I got I despised. Where should I start? There're overly long drawn-out descriptions of things that happen all the time, which are so boring to read. And this comes from someone who adores visual-novel styled games like Phoenix Wright, Danganronpa and Lux Pain, to name a few. The dialogue and script are very poorly written, it's hard to take anything that's happening seriously when everything sounds so... like it's trying so hard to be 'cool' using profanity and expletives, which has the offset of coming out as very cringey since the game uses a super-deformed style for the 3-D graphics, and the 2-D art is so childish and looks like your average, generic anime. And it tries so hard when it comes to describing gory stuff, it tries SO hard, but it's so hard to take seriously. And the characters? Every single character is a walking anime trope. You've even got Magari who represents everything wrong about anime, walking in a glorified string bikini while inside a zombie infested, decrepit and rundown school. It makes no sense and looks so stupid that makes it impossible to take anything that's going on seriously. As for the plot itself, EVEN if I knew the series' background I would have found it boring and cliched, ending with the characters having to save the entire world. I'm not kidding.

Ayumi is an idiot, coming back to Heavenly Host was a big mistake, and so was joining her in her quest.

 And when the game isn't boring you to tears, you'll be walking around the Heavenly Host high, a rundown highschool filled with zombies, ghosts, fleshy red things on the walls and broken floors. The entire gameplay portions of the game takes place in here, and all you'll be doing is running around, collecting items, solving puzzles(all of them are of the 'put the correct item in here' variety) while avoiding pursuers and traps on the ground. But nothing works well, nothing.

 Let's start with exploration: You've no map and everything looks the same. Seriously, there's no way to know where you are because there're no unique landmarks or what have you to guide you. And you have to go round and round and round searching for objects that need to be used in different places in order to proceed. The game is divided in 10 chapters, and every single time you'll have to retread old ground since for whatever reason objects appear out of thin air from chapter to chapter. It doesn't make sense. It's particularly egregious in a few chapters that after triggering something, new stuff appears in rooms you've already been to, with no hint whatsoever, so you are expected to go round and round and round and round again, examining every single room, again. It's so boring.

It looks scary, but it isn't. Trust me, I was deceived too.

 You are given a flashlight, which runs on batteries, but.... by pressing Select you can make batteries unlimited. Just like that. Your character also seems to run out of stamina pretty fast, which is supposed to make it so that you simply can't run away from pursuers, but... it makes exploration a drag, since you walk oh, so slowly. Plus, every now and then you'll be given choices 'enter the hole or 'do nothing', 'trust her' or 'ignore her', and if you choose the wrong answer... you lose. Just because. It's not fun, these 'bad endings' are interesting either since you don't even get a CG, just a boring, over-drawn description of what murdered you. Hopefully you saved earlier, because it's always fun to lose because of a random event that has a 50-50 chance of survival.

 As mentioned before, there're pursuers in the game, usually black ghosts. Once one tracks you, it will pursue you until you die or you run an absurdly long amount of time. You can hide in closets, but every single time I tried it I got caught, or... you can run towards a save spot, save and reload. Bang, the pursuer is gone. That's what I did, once I figured it out, since pursuers are relentless and once one spawns there's basically nothing else you can do, unless you have a Talisman which will instantly kill it. It's particularly bad because you also lose health from various traps laid on the floor, such as broken glass or splinters, which are hard to avoid when you're running away... which is probably why save spots heal you completely.

As dangerous as a super-deformed mannequin can be.

 Alright, so the exploration is boring, the chases are a drag and the visual novel parts put you to sleep, what else could the game screw up? Well, it runs like hot garbage. There're load screens everywhere: Open the menu? Loading screen. Use an item? Loading screen. Enter a room? Loading screen. And these are pretty long, 4-5 seconds affairs(Sometimes more) and they pile up because they are so frequent. The framerate is particularly pathetic, but once you turn on the flashlight, oh boy, does it get bad, hopefully you like playing as if your characters were underwater. Pro-tip, turn Flight Mode On, it makes it run a tiny bit better. I heard that the game was also prone to freezing, but I didn't come across any, albeit I did use Flight Mode most of the time I played the game.

 There's a bunch of extras to collect, like extra chapters, which are entirely in visual-novel form, and 'Name Tags', from dead alumni, and each tag comes with a colorful description of how the person died. And that's about it.

The game is probably more enjoyable if you can't understand the drivel they are spewing.

 Corpse Party - Blood Drive is a bad game. It is. Even, even if you liked the story, maybe you've never watched anime before so everything seems new to you, or maybe you're a hardcore anime nut and don't care that anime recycles tropes and cliches, even then... the game runs so poorly, it's an absolute dredge to play through. There's not a single redeeming quality in Corpse Party, and I usually like to find redeeming qualities. But there's none here. This game should've stayed in Japan, alongside the other games in the franchise that never made it through.
 0.5 out of 10

Review #478: Galerians - Ash

 Pretty Psychic Boys return, now with more Aliens and less Friday the 13th.

Now with more sci-fi and less horror.

 Remember Galerians? You probably don't, it was this obscure PS1 survival horror game featuring kids with psychic powers. But that's OK, the game uses footage from the movie, Galerians - Rion, to provide a lengthy recap... or you could read the game's instruction booklet for an even lengthier recap. The game spoils the original, so I will do so as well.

 Six years have passed since Rion gave up his life in order to stop the evil super computer Dorothy, however, Rion, being an AI, got stuck in a loop fighting her inside the data world. Lillia accesses the data world and managed to pluck Rion right out of it and download his conscience into his body, which she preserved after that faithful fight. Everything would be honky-dory, but the last remaining humans are now trapped in a building as the Last Galerians are making their way up, and guess what, only Rion can stop them. Remember how creepily eerie the first game could be? That's done, Galerians - Ash went towards the sci-fi route, specifically, Aliens. You're still fighting psychic loons and the such, but the ambiance and setting have much less horror in them, and it's more about surviving alongside the group of soldiers that distrust Rion. As for the plot itself... try not to think too hard about it.

Even the monsters lack a je ne se quoi that made the menagerie so much more creepy in the first game.

 Much has changed, but much also remains the same. Let's go over combat first: Rion now has 180 degrees of freedom when it comes to fighting, tank controls are gone, you can lock-on enemies, strafe around them, dodge around them(Circle button) and even guard by holding R1. Whereas in the previous game you had different levels of charge for your attacks, in here you have to charge the entire gauge before attacking, Nalcon being the only power that can be used with a single tap(But it's better if you charge), which takes a while getting used to if you come directly after finishing Galerians. Nalcon, Red and D-Felon, you psychic powers, return, but there're two new drugs, Bustanor, homing energy boomerangs of sorts, and Breakaron, devastating lightning. Bustanor is incredibly useful and Breakaron is incredibly powerful but you'll rarely get to use them since they come in very small supply. Also, I think you can accidentally skip them if you don't talk to the right NPC when they become available. Speaking of skipping, the Skip drug returns and now it can permanently boost any five of your powers and your shield, up to level 3, you usually get them after finishing a boss, but there's four hidden ones.

 The combat is much more fun than before, that's for sure. Each power takes a different time to charge, and you get rooted to your place when charging, but you can cancel it at any time by dodging. It's faster, and you gotta consider that every enemy is particularly susceptible to different powers: Bio-Plants fall faster to Red, human-like enemies get wrecked by D-Felon and robots can't do a thing about Bustaron(But you'd better save it up for the final bosses), and while Nalcon isn't particularly effective against anything, a few enemies resist it rather well, a tradeoff for being so plentiful I guess. There're RPG elements in place here too, every single enemy you defeat will drop a supply item or a permanent upgrade, either to your HP, AP or your maximum capacity for every drug, which means that the more you kill, the more each drug refill will last you and the more damage you'll be able to resist. Nalcon, Red and D-Felon are plentiful enough so that you can take a break to grind for stat upgrades or hope for recovery items and don't be too concerned about running out of ammo, just don't take it for granted. And the game sorta wants you to do it, enemies will respawn for a long, long while before stopping, heck, one of the hidden Skips requires defeating 600 enemies in a particular room. Yes, this means that the game went Resident Evil 4(Focusing on Action, and making ammo more plentiful) before Resident Evil 4, fancy that eh!

And you thought the Arabesques from the first game were tough!

 The AP gauge returns, for the uninitiated, AP is a gauge that once full will make Rion go berserk('Short'), he becomes invincible and every non-boss enemy dies by just looking at him funny... but it constantly saps your HP, you're reduced to a very slow walk and can only get out of it by taking a Delmetor or getting to one of the very rare, only two in the entire game, 'glowing lights' that restore your HP and AP. The system has changed a bit, for instance, you AP threshold can be extended by defeating enemies and how fast your AP rises depends on the 'radiation' of the zone you're in, other factors that make it rise higher is taking or receiving damage, shielding and dodging. While you'd think that Shorting would be beneficial for grinding, enemies defeated while Shorted drop smaller stat buffs.

 By now you probably think that the game is a banger, since the combat system is so much better. But it's not. The exploration aspect of the game is absolutely horrid. Let me tell you how the game works: You're stuck inside the top floors of a building, you are briefed at the top of the building(Floor 4) and must now find your way to floor 1(Lots o' walking and loading screens) to do whatever you need to do, many times you'll have to travel between floors doing busywork before being allowed into floor 1, afterwards you complete the mission and... must go all the way back to floor 4 and be told of some new development which has you... going down to floor 1 again, but probably taking a new route since the previous one is now blocked because reasons. That's the entire game. Well, there's another area, the Uranium Depository which must be visited twice, and the Data World which must be visited three times, and you have to repeat the same puzzles all three times because you're interrupted the previous two. But of course, you have to reach the place that you were at during your last visit and then do some more busywork. LAME. It's incredible how the got away with that one.

You make their head spin right round and round like a record baby, ro....

 Not that the puzzles are any good either, let me show you how the first 'big' puzzle in the game goes. You start off on floor 4(of course) and must get to a Warehouse. You try to open the door and it's a no go, of course, so you need to turn on the Power Generator. The next thing you have to figure out is that you have to interact with a door's button and not the door itself, otherwise it will appear as 'locked' in the map and you won't be able to open it. Fun. Now you are in floor 1, and there's no explanation as to why. Well, maybe you came across a certain key when you first came here, but since you didn't need it the game didn't let you pick it up, so hopefully you remember where it was. Alright, whatever, you're a psychic so you figure out that you need a key and that the key is here. you fetch it and go back to Floor 2, which isn't as simple as climbing a stair, you have to go from floor 1 to Laboratory 2 to Floor 3 to Floor 2. Fun times, I tell ya. Alright, you get to the generator, you enter the Start menu go to the Item label and use the key. You think you're done so you go back to the warehouse and... still no power. You go all the way back to the generator, but now you spot a broken cable. Maybe you came across a spare cable that the game didn't let you pick up because you didn't need it back then, but you remember where it was, somehow, so you go fetch it and... nothing. You actually have to examine the goddamn broken cable, because even though you aren't blind, Rion is, so unless you interacted with the broken cable you can't pick up the new spare cable. Alright, you interacted with it, got the spare cable and now you go into the menu and.... you can't use it. You have to turn off the generator, use the cable and then turn it on. You think you are done, you really think so, but... nope, now someone is standing in your way towards lab 2. So now you have to figure out that you have to talk to the dude guarding the stairs to floor 1 because NOW he feels like letting you in. I wouldn't blame you if you gave up during this entire waste of time.

 The game is very obtuse in telling you where it wants you to go next, or how to get there, so if you want to use a guide feel free to, the game loves to waste your time, be it having you retread old ground in the Data World, having you go up and down the same four floors or having incredibly annoying puzzles. Scratch that, use a guide and don't waste your time.... which is not to say that the game is devoid of fun ideas, there's a very fun mindscrew 3/4ths into the game, and it features a very WTF ending, although, all things considered, the ending is rather unfulfilling. And don't try to think too hard about some of the things that happen, or you'll find out that they make no sense or aren't properly explained. And as an added note, the game loves to be cheeky, so items only appear when you get annoyingly close to them, forcing you to comb areas if you want to find supplies.

These psychic-plants reminded me of REvil 2's zombie-plants.

 Galerians - Ash is a bit of a mess, but a mess I liked. Kinda liked? Sorta-somewhat liked at times. I liked having a bunch of new Galerians to fight and I somewhat liked a few of the characters, like Cas and grown-up Rion. Combat was fun too, thanks to the audiovisual feedback, it feels so good to shoot giant waves of fire, or have your enemies spinning up on the air. That said, Galerians Ash is for hardcore fans of the original only, and even then I'm sure that the it won't satisfy everyone, a lot of the horror elements are entirely gone, and the plot will be very hit or miss depending on your sensibilities(Yaoi fangirls rejoice), finishing the game I was left feeling unfulfilled, and the more I thought about the plot... the less I liked it.
 4.5 out of 10

Now Playing: Galerians - Ash

 Pretty Psychic Boys the Sequel.

 Remember how Rion sacrificed himself at the end of Galerians? Don't worry, he gets better and he got a sequel too. I've already sunk 20 minutes into the game and boy, have things changed!

 For instance, enemies now respawn for a long, loooong while. They do stop respawning, but after a while. While resources are limited, you are encouraged to spend them, since enemies drop permanent upgrades as well as supplies! Rion is much more mobile too, with targeting and dodging. It's interesting how it makes you fight Dorothy again, since the game starts in a truncated version of the last game's final moments. It's too early to have better thought-out opinions, but I think the game seems good. Seems.

 Lastly, I used to play this game when I was younger too, even though I hadn't even finished Galerians 1! I don't remember how far I got, but I do know I got to play as adult Rion.

Review #477: Galerians

 Drugs, exploding heads, clones, psychic powers.... it's 90s anime alright.

3 discs, 4 hours. Those pre-rendered backgrounds must be heavy, eh!

 Welcome to Galerians, a survival horror game that trades guns for psychic powers and monsters for psychic loons. It's an interesting angle, and makes resource management even more taxing on the player thanks to the constant threat of 'Shorting'. It's also really short, the game's backcover boasts about 50 hours but I got through in under 5!

 It's a bit tough to make heads or tails from the plot, but what you need to know is that you play as Rion, a kid who's been experimented on and developed psychic powers. As you explore the Michelangelo Hospital you'll start regaining your memories and learning about Dorothy, a super computer that grew sentient and wants to replace humanity with her own psychic loons, the Galerians. Now Rion must find Lillia, a girl with a virus implanted on her that can destroy Dorothy. The story is a bit cliched, the dialogue is stilted and the voice acting is horrible, but the setting is very interesting and the whole psychic powers thingie makes it very different from other games of its ilk.

That oughta hurt.

 If you've ever played a Survival Horror before, you know the deal, tank-controls, pre-rendered backgrounds and fixed camera angles, having to scavenge the environments for supplies as well as key items to solve puzzles, etc. The most important thing in the game is learning to manage your resources: Energy for your psychic powers is limited, restorative items are limited, inventory space is limited(although key items don't occupy any space) and some monsters respawn. So you'll need to learn when it's best to avoid encounters or kill enemies, or maybe it's better to trade a bit of health, avoiding enemies, and save up your energy.

 But, that's not where resource management ends, below your health is the AP gauge, or Anger points. This gauge fills up constantly, whether you attack, move around or even breathe, the AP gauge is constantly on the rise. Once filled, if you try to attack you'll 'Short'. When you short you lose the ability to run, being force to slowly walk around, and you start losing health at a steady rate, on the flip side, anything that you look at will die(except other Galerians). The only way to heal the Short status is with a Delmetor. It's a really interesting mechanic, because Delmetor occupies inventory space and is limited, but, the Short status can be really convenient when you are swamped with enemies or must fight tough battles. I mean, it's annoying having to play, basically, under a timer, but it's a mechanic that can work in your favor too, which means it's more fun than it sounds(Except when you're about to short and there's no Delmetor around).

The final stage is brimming with supplies, so don't panic if you are short on them after Stage C.

 You've three different psychic powers: Nalcon(Force push?), Red(Fire blast!) and D-Felon(Manipulate gravity) and they are all useful in their own way. Except, maybe, D-Felon, which you obtain very late in the game and it's useless on bosses, so you get to use it very little. Each of them has their own energy gauge, so they each have their own source of ammo. The controls are very clunky, even attacking is clumsier than in other Survival Horror games, first, you have to aim, second, you have to charge with R1(You can't move while charging!) and finally you have to press X to unleash your charge. Some fights can be downright cruel, since you have to run around enemies, wait for an opening and hope that you have enough time to charge before you yourself are attacked with Nalcon. A few areas in the game almost require you to short in order to deal with how tough a few of the ambush battles can get, battles that you can't avoid.

 As for the difficulty, it's very spotty. Resource Management is the biggest obstacles from Stage A to Stage C, but the final Stage, D, gifts you with all sorts of ammo and health items so it's almost impossible for you to lose at that stage, but going from Stage A to Stage C it's very tough managing your Health, Ammo and AP. Bosses too are poorly balanced, the first boss is the easiest of the bunch, but the second one is easily the hardest, being bombarded with projectiles all over the place and a very small window to counter-attack. The next two bosses, while no run in the park, are easier and then the last two bosses are easy as pie.

Some stage, like B, have a single save-room, so you'll be visiting this place often.

 The puzzles on the other hand never get too complicated. Rion, having psychic powers, can 'Sense', by pressing triangles, an get hints on how to open locked doors or where missing items are, so it's hard to not know where to go next. That said, in Stage C there's a puzzle in which you must knock on a door with a very specific timing which is all sorts of obnoxious, since the game is very particular with your timing. Galerians also has a real-time map, which is very useful although not as detailed as it could've. You'll have to consider the Save Spots too, which are very limited, as a matter of fact, Stage B and Stage C have a single save-spot each.

 Alright, so Galerians isn't the best Survival Horror you'll ever play. Even by the genre's standards the controls are clunky, the difficulty is uneven and poorly balanced and the story could've used a bit more thought put into... but when it comes down to it, it's pretty good. The setting is interesting, the AP mechanic is entertaining and fighting with psychic powers, even if sloppy, is fun.
 7.5 out of 10

Now Playing: Galerians

 About time I played another obscure game, eh!

A leather choker, injecting psycho-drugs, heads exploding... this game is edgy alright.

 And now, in the spirit of Halloween, let's go with something more survival-ish, Galerians. It starts off brutal, I died twice after starting the game. First I went into Short-mode and died while searching for a Delmeter. Second attempt, I tried shooting my powers to no avail, shorted again BUT discovered that Delmeter was on my inventory from the get go, so I let myself die before starting again. Third attempt went swimmingly and now I'm 22 minutes into the game, on the second save spot.

 The game is original, I'll give it that, but boy oh boy, you've a limited inventory! And unless you're counting you won't know when you hit the limit! And Save points are so sparse, goddamn! And how about the fact that merely breathing increases your AP which makes you Short? And shooting your powers? You have to charge them and THEN press X, charge too little and you'll do negligible damage, charge too much and you lose the charge. It's tough, man!

 I used to play this in my youth, and I think I never got out of the hospital, my last memory of the game is when the Rabbits jump on the bottom floor and crowd Rion.

Review #476: Evil Dead - Regeneration

 And now the king is gone, baby.

Oh, I've a bone to pick with the newest addition to the mythos...

 A Fistful of Boomstick was an alright game, it wasn't the end all be all of licensed games, but it was pretty decent and THQ wasn't about to loosen its grip on the franchise, so then came Regeneration. It's a markedly different game from its predecessor, with a tighter combat system and more emphasis on action than the loose survival horror elements from the previous game.

 A Fistful of Boomstick? Never happened. Army of the Dead? Never happened. After Evil Dead 2, Ash was imprisoned in a mental institute, society thinking him crazy... but not all is as it seems, turns out the director got his hands on the Necromicon Ex Mortis and has been experimenting with it, and when all hell breaks loose it's up to Ash, and his new sidekick, half-human half-deadite all obnoxious, Sam to save the day. The humor, setting and character design is all on point and faithful to the franchise, however, Sam turned out as trying too hard. He isn't funny, him being immortal and thus dying over and over again isn't funny, him being obnoxious isn't funny. Sam's easily the weakest element in the entire game.

If there's a hole in it, you bet you'll have to kick Sam inside.

 The game tries a lot to be like Devil May Cry: Your guns have infinite ammo, you've a small variety of chaisaw combos, a few which involve pausing your button presses, and Ash even gets a Devil Trigger in the form of Evil Ash. Sadly, it falls flat on its face. The game doesn't have a strong combo system, there's no canceling, no juggling(And I tried, even with the harpoon gun, the most you can do is shoot or perform a simple combo after shooting an enemy it into the air), no nothing. Every single combo has pretty much the same outcome, whether it ends with a slash, a jumping slash or a blast, except the five-button chainsaw combo which usually ends in an instakill so there's no reason to use any other combo but that one.

 Ash gets three different guns and three different arms. The pistol, the shotgun and the bomb-lance have their different uses, but as soon as you get the bomb-lance the other two will become a bit redundant. As for his arms, there's the chainsaw-arm, the harpoon-gun and the flamethrower-arm. The last two don't have any combos and while they can be used in combat they fall short of the chainsaw, so you'll mostly be using them to solve stupidly easy puzzles, like burning gas or harpooning doors. Kind of a waste really, and it's not like you can buy new combos for the chainsaw or anything. What it all amounts to is a ton of potential, but a very lackluster execution.

Weapons have infinite ammo now, so have fun.

 And then we've got Sam, the small midget that can't be killed. Well, he can, but he'll respawn immediately. He'll aid you in combat, and he is not half-useless, but you can also kick him towards enemies, in fact, some enemies and bosses can only be beaten by kicking him into them. You can also kick him towards objects in order to solve simple puzzles. In some instances you'll also take direct control of him to, you guessed it, solve simple puzzles in order to open up a way for Ash to proceed. These moments aren't too obtrusive, but his sections aren't particularly memorable even though they are so repetitive, usually having you searching for a monster to ride so that you can destroy a wall and they always end with Sam dying in the unfunniest of ways.

  Speaking of Sam, you know how beloved escort missions are? There's four different escort sections in the game. FOUR. And you have to repeat the procedure 3 times each. Y'see, sometimes you'll come across a cyclops that must be fed, so you must find 3 souls, 1 at time, have Sam consume it, protect Sam until he gets to the cyclops and then kick him into the mouth, because that's supposed to be funny...? The game is about 10 stages long, and four of them have these dumb sections. No bueno, no bueno at all.

Bosses are easy to figure out.

 The saddest part about Regeneration is that the developers really tried. I mean, just going over the visuals you can tell that the game had a pretty decent budget, and Bruce Campbell brought his A-game, as always, to voice Ash. Even in the game's basic gameplay you can tell that they wanted to make something Devil May Cry-ish but simply ran out of budget or time to add substance to the combat. Evil Dead - Regeneration is a bit half-cooked, but if you're into the franchise it's worth a look, provided you're willing to suffer Sam.
 5.0 out of 10