Review #513: Musashi Samurai Legend

 I think the word 'Samurai' is a very loose fit for this game.

Musashi looks very, very different.

 Remember Brave Fencer Musashi? It was a pretty neat Adventure game on the PS1, with a few experimental ideas, like an in-game day and night cycle, added to a traditional adventure formula in which you gathered new equipment to access new areas. While a few things had aged, it's still a great game by today's standards. Enter Musashi - Samurai Legend, one of the more obscure releases from Square Enix as well as a pseudo-sequel to that charming little PS1 game.

 This Musashi is hinted to be the same one, albeit older, as the one from the first game... even if they look nothing alike. Long story short, Musashi gets summoned to another land, and once again he must gather the five elemental swords, this time requiring the aid of each of the blade's maidens to unlock their power, in order to defeat the big bad that plagues the land. The story is serviceable, but nothing to write home about, and the art direction is.... weird, it's pretty distinctive, but not all that appealing. Musashi looks like a dork, but oh well! The game tried a bit too much to be like the previous game, the same five swords, a forest level with a little islet surrounded with water, a forest that requires specific directions not to get lost in, a mine stage... a lot of the game feels very familiar, and the franchise hasn't earned the right to have recurring themes yet.

The ninjas look mean, but the combat is so slow.

 You'll be surprised at how little the game has changed. That said, the game is no longer a fully inter-connected world, but rather, it's divided in about five different stages as well as a town hub in which you can interact with NPCs... NPCs that must be rescued, just like in Musashi 1, except that your rewards aren't, well, as rewarding. That said, civilians are much easier to find this time around, you probably have to try very hard to avoid finding them, and they'll offer their services, like letting you purchase food, appraise items or temper your Katana to make it stronger. 

 When exploring other lands, Musashi will come across various enemies, and once again he has access to two different swords. Square is your weak Katana, while triangle uses your equipped elemental sword. Your triangle attack is slow and useless, so you'll never, ever press the triangle button, save to save citizens from their sphere-cages. Combat is a very simple affair: Hold R1 to target them and just mash the square button. Just like before you can steal powers from your enemies, by targeting them until a gauge fills up, and then countering with the square button just as they hit you with their ability. Abilities are kept for ever now, so you can just pick the one you want and use it with circle... but combat is so bland that you'll only use them on bosses... not because you need them to, but because they deal damage faster. At least, defeating enemies earn you experience points, and you can choose which stat to favor with bonus stat points each time you level up

The Arena features a few exclusive enemies.

 There're a few novelty vehicle stages thrown in, in which you'll just travel forward and have to defeat enemies or break obstacles... they are rather lame and boring, but at least they aren't annoying. There's also a weird carrying mechanics... Each of the five chapters have at least one moment in which you'll have to carry the chapter's elemental maiden on your arms, and you can attack while holding them, while being slowed down. I've no idea why these sequences are in, they are not fun, they are not funny, and even if they are not annoying they add absolutely nothing to the game.

 As you advance through the game you'll earn the aforementioned elemental blades, each one has a spell that can be used in battle or to solve very, very simple puzzles. They are more like obstacles than anything else, really. See fire? Use the Water sword to put it out or freeze magma to use as a platform. See a Switch or a cracked rock? Use the Earth sword. It's very mechanical, and there's very little thinking involved. You probably won't get stuck at any moment... albeit when the game does a poor job at telling you where to go next. Like the moment you rescue the Earth Maiden, the game tells you to rescue her... but you're not supposed to get her out of the forest, rather, take her deeper into the forest.

Get ready to fight a lot of robots and a lot of ninjas.

 Musashi - Samurai Legend is more disappointing than anything else. Exploration is very limited and somewhat unrewarding, combat can be rather dull, and it has some very lame ideas thrown into the mix. That said, it's not a bad game, everything does work, even if it's nothing special. Truly, the worst part about the game is being a sequel to a great game, so you come at the game with certain expectations that it just can't match up to. They should've made puzzles more interesting, make the combat, heck, the entire game faster and get rid of the dumb carrying sequences. Exploration too should've been better, this is an Adventure game after all, hide the NPCs better and make them more rewarding to find, make me actually want to rescue them.

 When it's al said and done, at least the game isn't a total blunder. There's a lot of squandered potential, there're a lot of things that could've been worse, but what we've got is a passable little game that makes your wish you were playing the PS1 original instead.

 6.5 out of 10

Now Playing: Musashi - Samurai Legend

 I thought it was called Samurai Legend - Musashi for the longest time....

Shiny!

 Musashi on the PS1 was great, yet it took quite a few years before Square felt it was time for a sequel. Not much has changed, for good or bad. You still have two blades, you still have to rescue civilians and still get to copy enemy abilities.

 The game feels slightly... low budget? Movement is rather slow, and some things don't look quite right, like falling in water, when Musashi kinda.... drops down without any special sinking animation. The bike segments, the only segment I played anyways, was kinda lame and unexciting, hopefully they get better down the line.

 All in all, I'm slightly unimpressed.

Review #512: God Hand

Blistered hand.

The cover.... eugh.

 You've heard of God Hand, one of the toughest games out there. That's... a bit of a lie. I'm here to tell you about God Hand, one of the best beat'em ups out there and one that's challenging, but not impossibly hard.

 The story is absolutely ridiculous and makes little sense, but what you need to know is that the story follows Gene and Olivia, Gene is a bit indebted to Olivia since she gave him the God Hand, an arm with awesome power. Gene doesn't care much about other people, but Olivia does, so she kinda forces him to help out. As it turns out, there's an interested party in the God Hand, and they'll stop at nothing to get it. You don't play the game for its plot, but for how ridiculous everything is. It's got a very weird, ridiculous and Suda 51-esque sense of humor, so if you're into that, the game delivers in spades. The art direction is pretty badass too, taking more than a few pages from Hokuto no Ken's book, so not only does Gene look cool... the enemies look fantastic too. It's also set in a pseudo wasteland, so even the environments are varied and appealing.

Context-sensitive special moves are... weird, to say the least.

 The game is a very linear beat'em up game, so you go from stage to stage, spanking butts and taking names. The first thing that will throw you off is that the game has a third person-shooter camera, with tank controls and you've no control over the camera. It's almost like playing Resident Evil 4, only that you've only got a knife. It sounds clunky, it IS clunky and a bit stiff, but you can get used to it, and the claustrophobic camera angle helps make your blows seem harder and heavier, which is always cool in my book. That said, there's definitely a learning curve before you get comfy with it, but if you aid yourself with the enemy radar on the top on the screen you'll be able to keep tabs on what's around you... even if you can't look at it.

 Square is your basic combo string, triangle and X perform different attacks, plus, back plus any of the three attack buttons produce even more attacks. That sounds neat, but every single move in Gene's arsenal can be changed. Don't like your vanilla 4-punch button? Buy some kick moves and add some juggles. Think you can do without a guard break attack? You'd be nuts to, but you can do it if you want. But you shouldn't, seriously, breaking an enemy's guard makes your next attacks do more damage. Take a guard break move, trust me. The circle button is a context-sensitive button, it can be used to pick up weapons or boxes, stomp on enemies or perform powerful special moves when they are dizzy. R2 is used to unleash the God Hand, when the gauge is full, which makes you invulnerable and makes your moves unblockable for a short while. Lastly, R1 is used to perform stock-consuming super moves. Gene can't block attacks, but you can use the right analog stick to dodge in four different directions.... and you'll have to.

The game doesn't shy away from being ridiculous... and it's all the better for it.

 The combat is very satisfying, but it does have a few shortcomings. There're a couple of enemies that can take way too much punishment before they go down, so a few fights with normal enemies can drag for a bit longer than they should. One of the most important things you'll have to learn in the game is to divide and spread out your enemies so that you can comfortably take them down without getting suckerpunched, but it can be a bit of a pain when you've these damage sponges coming back for more over and over again. Another annoyance is how much mashing this game requires, your powerful context-sensitive circle special moves always requires you to punch that circle button like there's no tomorrow... and you'll have to do this a lot if you want to maximize your damage potential.

 The game's most notorious feature is its dynamic difficulty: the longer you go defeating enemies without taking damage, the harder the game will get, with enemies getting stronger and more attacks, but, if you get hurt the difficulty will go down. Why would you want to keep the difficulty high? More and better rewards. Money is very important in the game, to buy health and God Hand gauge upgrades and to buy new moves, since your attacks grow obsolete pretty fast, and the more enemies you defeat on higher difficulties the more money you'll earn at the end of the stage. The game has a new game plus feature, but sadly none of your purchases are kept, which is a huge bummer since more freedom to experiment with combo set-ups would've been very welcome. At least you get bonus costumes!

Weapons break fast, but they can be quite useful at times.

 The game is not all that much harder than, say, Devil May Cry. There're plenty of checkpoints, and restarting from one refills your entire health bar and lowers the difficulty, so even if you get surprised by Demons, super tough enemies that randomly spawn when you defeat enemies, you won't be set back too much. And even without that, the game gives you a ton of advantages to make your life easier, the God Hand makes you invulnerable for a short while so that you can thin out the enemy lines and the God Reel attacks are very powerful. And for how useful the God Hand is, the gauge refills surprisingly fast, so even if you get to a boss without the gauge full you'll be filling it in no time. No, God Hand is not an easy game... but it's nowhere near as hard as people will tell you it is, so don't be afraid to approach it.

 God Hand is a fantastic little game that remains a bit obscure due to erroneous claims about its difficulty. It's incredibly fun thanks to its mixture of satisfying combat and hilarious characters that keeps tedium from setting in. Now, if you'll excuse me, I've more butts to spank.
 9.0 out of 10

Now Playing: God Hand

 Blister hand after I'm done punchin' all these buttons!

The cover does the game no justice.

 First I took to Rome with Gladiator... then I took to Greece, with God o' War, then back to Rome with Shadow of Rome and then back to Greece with Rise of the Argonauts, but now... I'm back with the gods, with God Hand. And that sentence made little to no sense, but I'm trying so hard to be funny right now.

 So I finished the first stage, turned on the console and was about to write this... but the game is SO good that I turned it on and just finished the triple boss on stage II. The game is tough, yes, but it's also a blast. The bit about customizing Gene's moveset is kinda neat, but it's too much of a hassle, so I'm going with what works and what's simple: PUNCHES GALORE, BABY.

 My one complaint is that I feel like some enemies have a bit too much HP, but maybe I'm supposed to use the Godhand more often? I like saving it for surprise demons and bosses, but maybe I'm underestimating just how fast I can fill the gauge? I dunno. Regardless, the game is a blast.

Review #511: Rise of the Argonauts

 The world needed yet another retelling of the Argonauts story.

They could've had better covers...

 Welcome to Rise of the Argonauts, yet another retelling of Jason's myth. This is a very weird, yet oddly entertaining, beat'em up/RPG hybrid that works quite well even if it doesn't do anything too spectacular.

 The moment the game starts is the moment the story begins deviating from the most important, and most consistent, plot device: Jason is about to get married to newcomer Alceme, descended from Ares, before she is murdered by the Blacktongue clan, and it is the gods, Ares, Hermes, Apollo and Athena, who tell him that in order to revive his love he must recover the Golden Fleece. And thus, Jason and his best friend Hercules embark the Argo, and soon he'll be recruiting people, the Argonauts, to join him in his journey. As you'd know there's varying records of who were the Argonauts, but this game, man, this game wanted to have anyone you'd recognize. Hercules? In most versions that include him only have him for a short while, here he stays with Jason all the way through. Medea? Of course. Achiles? You're pushing it, considering it was his father that boarded the Argo. Medusa? Why not! Suffice to say, they added a few characters just because they were recognizable... not that that's necessarily a bad thing. As for the story itself... it's pretty interesting, dialogue goes from cheesy to badass at a moment's notice, but on the whole, it's alright. Many times you'll be allowed to pick different choices(Up to four!), but most of the time the outcome is the same. And when it's not, it's merely a different cutscene. Some characters definitely get more exposure and development than others though, but the important Argonauts get to showcase their personality if you bring them along with you, so there's that.

It's bloody, yet somehow not gratifying.

 The game is structured like a RPG, albeit a very linear one. There're four major islands you'll visit, but a total of six(sevenish...) areas total that you'll visit. The first Island is Iolcus, where you start the journey, and afterwards you can tackle the next three island in whichever order you prefer. I recommend going after the Ares descendant first, since that island nets you Achilles, and you'll want that prick in your party to offer his... insight. Anyways, each of this Islands is only visited once(Kindaish) and each has its own set of sidequests, so you'll want to finish everything before you finish each island's main quest. A tiny little gripe with the game is that you can only check your objective log by going into the Map screen... which isn't tied to a button, which was a bit shortsighted of them since Select has no use, and requires going into the pause menu. Another bad idea was the fact that the battle HUD, which means your health bar, is turned off by default, but it only takes a trip to the options screen to fix it.

 Conversations with options usually involve four different 'personalities', you can answer in a courageous manner(Ares), a just one(Athena), a playful/witty one(Hermes) or a more serious one(Apollo). As you probably inferred from the parenthesis, each answer type favors a god which in turns grants you bonus experience points with that god. Actually, there aren't experience points in the game. At all. Instead, you accumulate deeds. These can be earned by completing sidequests, defeating X amount of enemies, defeating X amount of enemies with Y weapon, selecting X amount of a certain god's answer, etc and then you trade these deeds for experience points on any of the four gods. Each god has their own skill tree: Ares favors the mace and power, Apollo favors the shield and protecting your allies and making Jason more sturdy, Hermes favors the sword and making Jason more agile while Athena favors the spear and making your allies stronger. You can probably earn enough experience points to at least max two trees, but you can build Jason at your leisure, give him a little bit of everything if you so please.

Did I mention that every piece of equipment has its own look?

 There's also no money involved in the game. No money and no experience points... why would you want to do sidequests? Well, besides the possibility to score answers of a specific god, there's also the option of obtaining new equipment. Every armor, sword, spear and mace has a unique look to it as well as a different passive ability. You can bring a sword that's stronger than the others, or one that deals more damage if you attack an enemy's back... or maybe one that deals damage to enemies even if they block. The game is easy enough so that you can bring any equipment set that you like, so just wear what looks cool. Or wield weapons that compliment each other. Or focus on making Jason good at one thing and one thing only. It's up to you, anything will work. As for me, I loved the fact that everything looked different, in an era where costumes are a privilege and not a treat... it's great getting to equip Jason with so many different, cool looking armors.

 Combat is... janky, to say the least. There's a weak attack, a strong attack, a shield bash, blocking, dodging and using god spells. You can switch weapons at any time by pressing R1 and L1, but... sometimes the game won't let you switch just because. Sometimes the collision between attacks won't feel quite right. Nothing feels quite right when fighting. However, nothing is quite broken. Combat is a clunky, but passable, barebones element to the game. There's no fancy combos to be made, no skillful dodging and blocking required, there's no substance and no style... but it's not broken. Compared to the walking and talking you'll be doing, the combat is but just another small piece of a bigger system, so there's not so much combat as to overstay its welcome.

Hercules is a total beefcake... literally.

 And lastly... the game runs like butt. Graphics are ugly, animations are stiff and there's a noticeable lack of... well, attention to detail. Walking up or down stairs looks... janky to say the least. And the framerate? The framerate is horrible, at times it struggles to maintain 30 FPS. On the other hand, the art direction seemed great, but the in-game graphics doesn't do it justice.

 It's got a dialogue wheel... with no real consequences. It's got a lot of combat... that's very shallow and somewhat clunky. It has a decent art direction... but poor graphics. Rise of the Argonauts is a great example of a jack of all trades, master of none. It does a lot of things, some better than others, but it doesn't have any real strong points to its name. That said, it's also better than the sum of its parts, because as clear as it is that the game is a bit clunky... it's can be quite fun at times. You can tell that a lot of love was put into the game, the story is interesting, the characters are interesting and while there're next to no consequences to your choices.... you can tell that they had fun coming up with different alternatives for Jason to speak. The people involved wanted to make a great game, that much is clear, but while the end result isn't fantastic... it's still a remarkably fun time as long as you temper your expectations.
 7.5 out of 10

Now Playing: Rise of the Argonauts

 And now, we travel from Ancient Rome towards Ancient Greece...

Both NA and PAL covers are equally bad, but I got my hands on the European version.

 Upon first booting up the game you're treated to a wonky framerate adoring an assault on your Palace. But you defeat them and then... discover that the game feels wonky as a whole, just try to go down stairs and watch Jason hop as he goes downwards. Oh, and just try to get out of the Palace, which is no easy task, who designed that thing!? And then I kept playing and I noticed that I had no health bar. Maybe the screen would turn grey as I lost health? Dunno, I was taking damage but nothing was happening. And then, after finishing the Challenge of Ares I went into options and.. the Battle HUD is off by default, who knows why, turns out there actually is a healthbar, even if it took me two hours to figure it out. Well, I hopped on to Argo ready to set sail for the Cave of the Oracles.

 Rise of the Argonauts is alright. It looks mediocre, the framerate sucks buuut the combat is relatively fun. Engaging in conversation with other NPCs is made worth it thanks to the possibility to earn Aspect points or even new equipment pieces. Despite how hard the game tried to turn me off with its lackluster presentation... the game is quite fun. That said, I've played about 2 hours and the combat is already getting a bit dull, so hopefully it picks up once I set foot on a new location.

Review #510: Shadow of Rome

 Without a shadow of a doubt... one of Capcom's most ambitious offerings.

Art direction in the game is phenomenal.

 Capcom has made many appeals to the Western crowd, and Shadow of Rome was, if I'm not mistaken, their first attempt. Sadly, it ended in failure, which is a bit surprising considering how good the game is.

 The game follows two friends, Octavianus and Agrippa, as they suffer through the events of Caesar's murder. Agrippa's father is accused of the murder, his mother is executed and now Agrippa is a wanted man... not that that stops him from becoming a Gladiator, for a chance to save his father. Meanwhile, Octavianus, as Caesar's family and Agrippa's friend, knows that there's more to the murder than meets the eye, and sets out to investigate the parliament and the senate on his own. The story is interesting, and having the two viewpoints makes it even more so. THe game employs a fantastic artstyle: Character designs for important NPCs are very Hokuto no Ken-esque, which means that they look badass, and the game employs an almost cell-shaded filter that makes characters pop from the background, which is surprisingly appealing. On the flip side, characters have very... weird and offputting facial expressions, take Claudia, whenever she is supposed to smile... it turns into a weird facsimile of a smirk that makes you think she's always plotting something. But she isn't. Voice acting is passable, and sometimes it goes into the melodramatic which is can get you a bit out of the experience

.'Disarmed', I see what they did there. Puny.

 Octavianus' stages consist of stealth missions. You often have to infiltrate buildings that are swarming with guards or politicians, and most of the time, being caught means being sent back to the last checkpoint, albeit sometimes it's possible to escape the guards. There's a lot of interesting things you can do as Octavianus, knocking someone down, with a rope or a jug, means you can take the clothes. But since Octavianus has a very small frame, and thus not very convincing as anything other than a maid, you may sometimes be stopped and asked questions, get the wrong answer and they'll discover you. You can also grab and throw certain objects, like rats or stones, or whistle in order to distract people. There's a very interesting mechanic in which you can walk with your hands behind your back to conceal tools. Octavianus can also come across silver and gold coins in his stages, which can then be spent at the city gates in order to decorate your room. It's utterly pointless, but it's still fun to add objects, and as you buy stuff you also get a few extra haircuts for Octavianus.

 But as Octavianus investigates, Agrippa must fight in gladiatorial events. Objectives vary: Destroy all of the opposing team's statues, defeat every enemy, accumulate a certain amount of salvo(basically, cheers), survive, chariot races or simply defeat a boss. Agrippa can pick up various different weapons: One handed swords, clubs, shields or dual handed spears, halberds and greatswords. And you'll be switching weapons constantly since they break. Enemies have access to the very same weapons, and these can be knocked off your hands or you can pry them away from your enemies, if you are unarmed... or you can un-arm your enemies, literally, some of the bigger weapons can maim enemies and thus reduce their offensive capabilities. The more varied your style is the better, as you'll be awarded salvo. For instance, cutting an enemy in half gives you the 'Red volcano' salvo worth... 2000 salvo, but if you use it again in the same event you'll be awarded less. Salvo has a bigger function in matches than that of deciding what rank you get when clearing the mission, or being the objective of the event itself, and that's to get the attention of the crowd. The higher the salvo gauge is, the better rewards you'll get from the crowd, which can be anything from massive weapons to health-restoring food.

The Gladiatorial part of the game is easily the best one.

 One thing to keep in mind when approaching this game is... that it's rather hard. Octavianus' stages can be cleared with enough ingenuity and patience... or maybe a FAQ, but you'll need skill and luck in Agrippa's stages. Inevitably there will be events that you'll like more than others, but you'll have to go through those that you don't like anyways. It would've been a good idea to let you pick in which events you wanted to compete, but I digress. Battle Royales are simple enough, and with enough luck the crowd will feed you enough food to keep you healthy, but events such as amassing Salvo can be tough since you'll need to vary your tactics as much as you can, while also looking out for your health while under a time limit or an enemy amount limit. I particularly disliked the events that had you breaking statues, since running out of weapons meant having a hard time dealing with enemy assault as you try to smash their statutes. There're plenty of cheats and a few other modes, like survival, that you can unlock... provided you can rank high in gladiatorial events under the hardest difficulty setting. Good luck!

 Shadow of Rome is a brilliant but flawed game. The gladiatorial events' difficulty can sometimes veer into the unfair, and the stealth sections can get a bit long in the tooth if what you want to do is bash skulls but you can't figure out how to evade the guards. That said, the game reeks of high production values, and the challenge can probably be tracked to a misguided attempt as appealing to the West. The game is definitely worth a look.
8.0 out of 10