Now Playing: Tomb Raider & Naruto Ultimate Ninja Storm 4 - Road to Boruto

 A beauty and a beast.

She's got a big pair of guns.

 I'm loving what little I've played so far, and this can't be nostalgia speaking since I never played much of this one! I first started with Tomb Raider 2 and got all the way up to the Last Revelation before I finally came across TR 1... and it was a DOS game that was having trouble running on my then-modern PC. And when I finally got it running it looked like garbage, so it never manage to arrest my attention.
 But I got to the third level already and I'm enjoying it quite a bit, despite its clunky controls. It's fun, environments are interesting and the game manages to rope you into the adventure quite strongly

Ugh, what an ugly cover.

 What a disappointment. I'm about 25% through the Story Mode and... I can't help but feel like this is the laziest game CC2 has ever made. The story is, at least so far, told through horrible anime stills, a lot that feature characters looking off-model. As for new characters, there's mostly new forms of Naruto, Sasuke, Obito and Madara, while we are still missing a bunch of characters like the mist swordsmen. As a matter of fact, just like Ultimate ninja Storm 3, this game has a ton of unplayable NPCs that should've been playable. The Road to Boruto additions are even worse, who needed 2 Saradas and three Borutos? Give me the villains, please.
 This is a horrible way to end the series.

Now Playing: Uncharted 4 - A Thief's End

 At least Elena and Nate didn't break up again.

Don't look sad, you can join Crash and Jak on the 'Characters Naughty Dog forgot about' club.

 Well... Uncharted has seen worse retcons. Remember how careless Sully was in Uncharted 1 yet became Nate's father figure in 3? Well, now we've got to believe that Nate had this long thought dead brother that he loved oh so much, yet never, EVER mentioned in previous games. Also, he was a pro at using the rope yet never used it before this game. Whatever, we've seen worse in the franchise.

 What can I say? It's the same Uncharted as always. I'm liking the framerate, which is very smooth and while I'm sure it's above 30 fps... something tells me it doesn't reach 60. Still, some scenes, under certain lightning, felt quite photorealistic, so kudos on that. Melee combat has been redesigned AGAIN and it's quite decent, probably the best one since 2.

 All in all, the game's very promising.

Review #537: Nightmare Creatures II

 A nightmarish sequel nobody wanted.

Wallace is one ugly freak. I love it.

 Nightmare Creatures was a mediocre game that I think nobody wanted a sequel to. Heck, even when I was younger and enjoyed it quite a deal more I didn't even wish for a sequel. But it didn't matter, Nightmare Creatures II was made, and for every step forward it takes a stumble backwards.

 You're Wallace, a disfigured, bandaged freak that was abducted while young by Adam Crowley, who for one reason or another revived, and experimented upon. And sometime before getting abducted it seems he was also part of 'The Circle', whatever that was. What little story there is doesn't make much sense, but credit where credit is due: Character design is fantastic, Wallace stands out among other protagonists because of how ugly he is, while the rest of the monsters are no slouches either, looking very creepy and nasty.

Remember these guys? Of course they had to return!

 The game is made up of two different components: Combat and exploration, which will inevitably remind people of Spawn the Eternal, which is not good. Exploration can be reduced to running around dull-looking levels, searching for key items(Dynamite, Keys, Pliers) and then the barrier on which to use them. There're a few scary platforming sections too, scary because it feels as if you can't trust Wallace jump arc, but I never died to a bottomless pit. There're a few sparse Save Points peppered throughout every stage to make your life easier, although a few more of these would've been welcome. Thankfully, the dumb 'adrenaline' mechanic is gone in this game.

 Eventually you'll run into monsters and Wallace will enter combat mode. Square is a horizontal slash and X is a vertical slash. Remember how many combos Nadia and Ignatius had in the first game? Wallace has... less than either of them. XX ,Square Square, X Square Square and Square X X are the only combos in the game. Weapon upgrades are gone too, but you can find items to help Wallace in combat, like a fiery axe or explore gun ammo. There're new fatalities to kill enemies faster, but... they are cute at first, but overstay their welcome pretty fast. There's a single fatality type for each enemy time, so they grow repetitive, and they are so slow that you'll just want to move on. Plus, the game repositions Wallace and the enemy when you execute this... which can potentially ruin your game. On stage 2 a fatality got me through an invisible wall, which got me stuck and forced me to reset the game.

Bosses are strangely static in this game.

 Despite how boring and clunky everything in the game is, its biggest setback is its unfair difficulty level, even on the lowest difficulty setting. You start out with 5 continues and no way to get more. You'll lose most of them figuring out that you have to wait until the big yellow monster growls before you can hurt him or to wait for the knife-beast to lick his knife else he will break your combo, and then you'll lose the rest of your continues trying to dodge attacks in cramped environments with crappy camera angles you can't rotate. Combos feel somewhat unresponsive, sometimes Wallace takes too long to enter combat mode and monsters are boring to engage.... it's not a fun game.

 It's also buggy, the item wheel got stuck twice on my playthrough, forcing me to restart the game. Then there was also that time I got through an invisible barrier... Don't even let me get started on how finicky the game is to decide when Wallace will climb a wall, turns out sometimes you simply must jump, or press Square, on juuuust the right angle.

Dismembering foes doesn't feel half as great as it did in the previous game.

 Sloppy, buggy, boring... the game has a fantastic art-direction, and looks great... but falls apart on anything that matters. If you liked Nightmare Creatures you might want to give this one a look since you're already used to mediocrity, everyone else just avoid it.
 3.0 out of 10

Archile's Grab-bag> Final Package o' 2018 Edition

 Another box meant another opening.

  Maybe one of them wasn't a box.

 Gotta grab ye trusty ole knife...

 Rime: Um... I don't know much about it, and I was kinda convinced into purchasing it, so... yeah...

 Mortal Kombat XL: Of course I had to try Mortal Kombat XL at some point, since I've followed the series ever since I can remember.

 Gundam Versus: It's not Maxi Boost, it's got even less mobile suits than Maxi Boost... but it'll have to do for the time being.

 Infamous Second Son: While I wasn't the biggest fan of Infamous 1, Infamous 2 quickly became one of my favorite games on the PS3. Hopefully Second Son is just as good.

 Samurai Shodown Anthology: I do own this game on the Wii, but fighting games are a better fit on the PS2. For whatever reason the game has jumped in price, but Amazon's got it on the cheap.

 Battle Chasers Nightwar: Joe Madureira is one of my favorite artists out there, and hopefully this game does justice to his art.

 King of Fighters XIV: I love King of Fighters, and this one has been on my radar for a long, looooooong while. It's a bit sad that they did away with their phenomenal 2-D sprites, but it's understandable, since this way they can churn out even more characters.

 Doom: Classic FPS are dope, and Doom should be no exception. What I know of Doom is that it's one of those games that refuse to sport a subtitle and thus became one of those annoying games that are named exactly the same as another game of the same franchise and the fact that melee-kills look repetitive. Not a good first impression.

 Rise of the Tomb Raider: I adored the PS3 reboot and was bummed out that the sequel, while having being released on the X360, wouldn't make it to the PS3. But it matters no longer!

 The Evil Within 2: The Evil Within is one of my favorite videogames ever, and might just be my favorite survival horror game ever. I know little to nothing about the sequel, so this October I might be in for a treat.

 Life is Strange: Few games are as overhyped as this one, so naturally I fell victim to the hype and here I am.

 The Order 1886: I've loved this game ever since it was revealed to the public and was utterly disappointed when reviews came out. I will give it a chance, though, since I want to believe that I can enjoy this game. And if its length is its major weak point... that might not be too bad.

 Tekken 7: While Lucky Chloe is the worst thing to happen to this series, after Tekken Revolution and their new focus on fanservice which extends to the horrible designs of characters like Josie Rizal, I'm a huge Tekken nut and couldn't miss out on the latest installment. Tekken 7 seems like a major shift, which left the fanbase a bit divided... So I'm a bit hopeful about it, considering I enjoyed Tekken 4 so much because of how much it changed.

 Naruto Shippuden Ultimate Ninja Storm 4 Road to Boruto: I wasn't missing out on the final Ninja Storm game, oh no. I'm a bit disappointed that the series ended here, we were still missing a handful of characters, like some of the Mist Swordsmen or characters from the movies, but oh well!

 The King of Fighters Collection - The Orochi Saga: As much as I like King of Fighters... I wasn't much of a fan of anything pre-99, and thus, pre K'. In my opinion these first few games just can't hold a candle to what comes after it.

 Resident Evil VII Biohazard Gold Edition: No, this is not a return to their roots because Resident Evil was always an action game first and a horror game second. That said, I've grown more accepting of the first person view and am ready to give it a chance.

Review #536: Prince of Persia(2008)

 This is no prince.

This guy is not a Prince. This is the Rogue of Persia.

 Welcome to 2008's reboot of Prince of Persia, featuring a nameless character that is most definitely not a prince! Yes, Sands of Time had concluded, Prince of Persia - Assassins was rebranded and thus Ubisoft decided to reboot the franchise. The end result is... attractive, but a bit flawed.

 Our hero, whom I'll call 'the Prince', gets lost as he tries to find his donkey, Farah, but comes across Elika, a mysterious waif who's been chased by armed men. After helping her fend off the assailants they find themselves in the rotten city of Ahura, but it turns out it was not always so, as a god, Ahriman, is the cause of the pollution. Together, the Prince and Elika, they must restore life to the city, by using Elika's mystical powers and the Prince's acrobatics, in order to seal off Ahriman. The story is nothing you haven't seen before, but I will admit that I liked the Prince and Elika. It's a shame most of their interactions are buried beneath conversations, L2 button, that bring the game to a halt. But the presentation deserves special praise, since boy, oh, boy, the game is gorgeous. It looks like a moving painting that manages to capture the mystical and alluring feeling of the 'Arabian Nights'. It's a beautiful game to behold.

The game is drop-dead gorgeous.

 Much has changed since the Sands of Time trilogy, and now the game can be divided in two huge components: Exploration and Dueling. Explorations is pretty similar to how it used to be, albeit with simplified controls. X is used to jump and the Prince will automatically run against a wall when he collides with it mid-air. He can also climb ledges and ivy, as well as propel himself from rings by tapping O as he grabs it. Elika can aid the Prince here, by tapping triangle she will give you an extra boost while on the air. Lastly, there are glorified Plates of different colors that are called 'powers' but, surprisingly, are rather dull transportation methods. Red and Blue plates simply transport your from place to place, while Yellow plates initiate a dull flying minigame and Green played initiate a minigame in which you run over a wall. It's slightly more fun than the flying, but only a little. As a whole, while still fun, it fails to feel as exciting and dynamic as platforming was in the Sands of Time, albeit it makes up for that by offering beautiful landscapes to explore.

 Speaking of exploration, the game is a bit of a drag in that regard. Peppered through the open-ended world of Prince of Persia are 1001 Seeds of Light and you must collect at least 540 in order to complete the game. Problem? It's a complete waste of time. Here's the deal, the game is made up of 16 different areas, plus 4 boss rooms,  and each area has about 45 seeds in all. But in order to collect the seeds you must restore the area to life. This means exploring said area, solving puzzles, defeating the boss and then, and only then, collect the Seeds of Light. This means that you'll explore the area at least twice. At least. After you collect 80 seeds you'll be able to unlock the first plate power, you're free to choose which, which will open up four new areas for you to explore, and then you'll have to collect three different key amounts of Seeds of Light, culminating in 540. It's a total drag, while I appreciate the open-endedness, and the freedom to choose in which order you'll open-up the game, you shoul've been able to collect Seeds on your first go through an area. Worst of all, the game fails to make collecting this seeds rewarding, there are no upgrades to get, costumes to unlock(Unlesss you install a patch which nets you a pair of costumes if you gather every Seed), nothing but bragging rights and the right to continue the game. Lame.

The only combat in the game are various 2 on 1 fights.

 You might have guessed already that Elika is constantly by your side in this game, as a matter of fact, the game is infamous because you 'can't die'. Which is completely stupid since Elika might rescue you whenever, but you'll be sent back to a checkpoint, and some checkpoints can be rather far away from where you last failed. Regardless, they tried to make you like Elika, by giving a lot of endearing, optional animations. Stand below her when she drops down and the Prince will catch her, switch sides with her while holding on to a beam or ledge and there's a cute little animation... but it starts adding up to a lot of down time in which you have to wait until the animation finished before you can continue. It's very easy to get thrown-off your groove because Elika decided to jump right to where you where standing, forcing the Prince to move away. It's particularly egregious with the vines, since you must wait until Elika comes along and grabs onto the Prince's neck, rooting you to the spot until she does so. And crank levers? You can't operate them without her. In Puzzles that requires a lot of levers it quickly turns annoying when you have to wait for her to realize that you're friggin' waiting for her on the next lever. I won't blame you if you hate Elika by the end of the game.

 Then we've got dueling. Fighting has been reduced to multiple two-on-one fights, in which you, as the Prince and Elika, battle a single foe. Square slashes, Triangle makes Elika attack, O is a grab attack and X is used to jump around. You can mix these actions to create devastating combos. R2 is used for blocking or, by timing it right, parrying. The combat is great in small doses, which is good since it already comes in those.... although every single boss must be fought six times. SIX TIMES. I mean, boss fights and normal enemies are pretty much the same battles but with different animations for the enemies, but having to fight the same boss six times? SIX TIMES?? C'mon, Ubisoft, this isn't Megaman or Devil May Cry...

You'll be wallrunning a lot.

 Then there's the ending... not only does the game end in a cliffhanger, the true ending of the game is locked behind DLC. And if you're a schmuck and buy the DLC, you'll be happy to find out that it too ends on a cliffhanger. GREAT GOING, UBISOFT. Oh, and if you play The Fallen King, the DS sequel, you'll be happy to know that it too ends on a cliffhanger.

 There're a lot of great things to be found in Prince of Persia: Beautiful graphics, fantastic locales, same great platforming as always and a fun, even if only when used sparingly, combat system. But there're also a few small bad things, like how the game wastes your time with silly unskippable animations, disappointing obstacles and 'powers', and having to fight the same bosses numerous times. Thankfully, the good outweighs the bad by a large margin. This is the first Prince of Persia game that manages to capture the spark that Sands of Time had, feeling like a magical adventure in a surreal world... it's a shame the rest of the game falls short of what it could have been.
 8.0 out of 10

Now Playing: Nightmare Creatures II

 Ugly, sloppy... and surprisingly fun.

That's one ugly mother...

 Nightmare Creatures II doesn't have the adrenaline meter, so it's already an improvement. It also looks fantastic, it's probably one of the best looking games on the Ps1, with fantastic 3-D environment and sharp 3-D models... even if the animation isn't quite up to par.

 I've finished the first level, and the game is fun in mysterious ways. Firstly, the difficulty is unfairly hard, with enemies being able to simply go through your attacks and land their own powerful grabs. It's also weird how Wallace, our hero, has a combat mode and an exploration mode, kinda like Spawn... and we all know how 'good' that game was.

 Combat is so janky, and the severing of limbs isn't as satisfying as the first game's, but there's a weird appeal to this game that makes me want to play it even more. It probably has to do with how well they crafted the atmosphere and monster design. Wallace design is no slouch either, he is an ugly mess... which makes it one of the most original playable characters out there!

Now Playing: Prince of Persia - The Fallen King

 The fallen dimension.

No. Just... no. The DS wasn't just made for kids, yo!

 Forgotten Sands on the DS was a pleasant surprise, The Fallen King is... well, it's pretty much as bland as I expected. Think Forgotten Sands but even more imprecise, with an even less appealing art style and you get The Fallen King.

 I've not much else to say really.