So last night I gave in and purchased Metroid: Other M for the Wii. It actually came out at 12:01 AM today, so I had to go back out to Meijer to get... I love 24 hour Meijers. Before I begin on said game, I should at least discuss the lesser interesting details of my gaming. Since my last blog post, I finished Castlevania: Harmony of Despair. Great game, loved playing through it, and playing online with a friend was a blast. I'm really looking forward to download content, though I hope it's more than just one level and two characters (which is what it is rumored to be at the moment). As I said in that post, HD got me in the mood for other Castlevania games, so I'm still slowly working my way through Symphony of the Night. Maybe when I finish a few more games I'll put some serious time and effort into that game.
Also since my last blog post, I started playing and entirely beat 100%, with all achievements (ugh, did not like the grinding though), Lego Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures. I don't know why I love the Lego games (made by Traveler's Tales, I haven't played any of the many other Lego games), but they're just fun for me. Maybe it's because they're pretty easy and relaxing to play. It's fun for me to collect stuff in games. And on the topic of collecting items in games, I found Banjo-Kazooie: Grunty's Revenge for $4.50 at a GameStop last week, so I snatched that up. Not really a rare game, but definitely hard to find on store shelves. I remember it received so-so reviews when it came out, but I'm enjoying it so far. I haven't looked at any old reviews, but I can say that my biggest complaint is with the camera. It's a fixed position (which leads to pretty nice graphics for a GBA, without a moving camera), so it can be very difficult to determine where a platform is in comparison with Banjo. Other than that I wasn't expecting much, so I'm happier than I thought I was going to be. Great music, a funny, lovable, typical Banjo-Kazooie story, and otherwise great play mechanics make for a decent game. A little short, but that's not surprising. I need 7 more Jiggies, 14 more Notes, one more Jinjo and one more Honeycomb and I'll have collected every item in the game, and will then move on to defeat Grunty.
Finally, I'm playing Pure on the side, and I'm loving it! It feels like a mix between Excitebike 64 and SSX Tricky, which is a good thing. I'm not normally a fan of racing games, but this one is pretty fun. I'll blog more on it later as I put more time into it.
Okay, Metroid time. I actually bought it partially because it received mixed reviews. That piqued my curiosity further than what I originally felt about the game. What I got was actually pretty close to what many reviewers have already stated. And for those worried, I will avoid spoilers as much as possible. Anything stated in here is either a) in the manual or b) obvious.
I'll start with the story. Other M takes place directly after Super Metroid, with Samus recovering from the events that had just taken place. She receives a distress call from a space station and goes to investigate...surprise! But seriously, I actually don't mind that cliche plotline, it's what makes a Metroid game. The Galactic Federation has already mysteriously arrived, and Samus runs into a platoon of familiar faces. Supposedly Samus was part of the Federation as a soldier before she became a bounty hunter of her own free will. I don't know, I'm okay with that story so far... Anyways, most of the faces are random people who get fleshed out a little as the story progresses, but two stand out. One is a friend of Samus's from when she was still a part of the Federation, and the other is her old commanding officer, Adam.
Adam plays a HUGE role in this game, and at times it really, really pisses me off at Nintendo for letting Tecmo/Team Ninja change common Metroid traits. First off is that Adam was like a father figure to Samus after her parents passed away...wait, after her parents passed away?! I'm sorry, I thought Samus was born with and raised by the Chozo? Whatever, maybe Samus did have parents that she was raised by at some point. I mean, Nintendo DID leave some plot holes in the series about Samus's past, specifically during the Metroid Prime stories. As long as the Chozo get mentioned, or Tecmo/Team Ninja leave more plot holes in her past, then I'll be okay. The other qualm I have with the story is that Samus is portrayed as weak and fragile, and almost confused on life. That Adam was once there for her, and now he's around again, and she's not sure how to feel? Once again, whatever, I still have plenty of story to go through, so I'll see what happens. Oh, and the cinematics during the cutscenes are pretty sweet. Those were well done, especially the opening cutscene.
But once again, we come back to Adam...oh it's all about Adam. Samus actually arrives at the space station with her full arsenal. Every weapon and upgrade that she could acquire (we're talking almost every upgrade found in the Metroid series), she already has equipped and primed to go. Sounds pretty cool and a little different for a Metroid game, huh? Oh, but of course, being a Metroid game, she has to lose all of those abilities. No surprise, finding them again makes the games interesting. It's how she loses them, that pisses off a TON of people out there, and I can't blame them. She...wait for it...wait for it...just wait for it a little longer... ... ... isn't allowed to use them. I'll let that sink in for a moment. Has it sunk in yet? No? Okay I'll repeat that again - Samus can't use all of her abilities and upgrades because she's not allowed to. And who told her that she can't? Oh right, Adam of course. *Sigh* Adam basically rules the plot of this game. Now here's the thing. Part of that plotline actually makes sense. Samus lands on a volatile ship that's basically falling apart, and self-destructing in some sectors (ha, sectors in a Metroid game, typical). Adam explains that missiles are not allowed, too powerful and could tear the station apart. Power bombs cause extreme heat and explosions to a wide radius, and could easily obliterate any humans within range - way to dangerous for a recon mission. The writing for that plot piece was actually brilliant. I started to wonder why Samus was allowed to do whatever she wanted on other planets and space stations, even for being a bounty hunter.
Ironically enough, the example I'm about to use is the exact same example that one review online gave, and damn it makes people HATE Tecmo/Team Ninja. I was moving from one sector to another, just trying to find out where to go next. I laughed at first, wondering why the reviewer had such a hard time with this scene (I had a feeling it was the same spot, which it turned out it was). The player must run through a lava filled room, jumping from platform to platform, which is very easy (it's impossible to fall off most ledges or platforms, and it makes sense and works while playing). I had 297 health total, three full bars, slowly decreasing from the heat. Of course there were enemies at every other platform, and stopping to just try to fight them is chaos, no point when I know that all I have to do is get to the other side of this long room. But then I get to another giant round room, and the lava at the bottom begins to rise! So I hurry up to the top, and what happens when I finally reach the top? A giant monster boss appears from the lava! Honestly, it could have been the brother or cousin from the lava boss in Super Mario Galaxy, I swear the scene is identical. Anyways, the battle is HARD. I mean it's TOUGH. I'll get more into the fighting and enemies in a minute, but let me tell you one has to be almost perfect to beat this boss, and this is still pretty early in the game. Mind you, health is still slowly depleating while fighting it. After about five or six long tries, I defeat him. Adam chimes in. Close to what he actually says: "Samus, I've determined that the area you're in is dangerous, so I'm allowing you to use your Varia suit." Really Adam? Really Tecmo/Team Ninja?! FUCK YOU. That makes absolutely NO FUCKING SENSE. I'll forgive the powerful weapons until it's determined it's okay and needed to use them. But SERIOUSLY?! Please developers, Samus may be confused in this story, but she should not be an ignorant idiot. If it's hot, then yes, you should use your varia suit. Oh and Samus, back in the area with the water, you should just ignore Adam and turn on your gravity suit, since I now know you have it...idiot.
The one thing drawing me back to the game is the fighting, which is awesome. I too was wondering how the hell fighting could be performed with just the Wiimote held sideways, or sometimes pointed at the screen. But wow, I'm impressed. Just like the reviewers said, it's surprisingly complex for basically just four buttons. The d-pad moves Samus around, 2 jumps, 1 shoots, and A turns her into her morphball. In morphball form 2 hops and 1 lays a bomb. While pointed at the screen, it is true that movement is disabled, but B locks onto a target or moves the screen around, and A fires her cannon, or missiles if she's locked on. A charged shot is done so by just holding the 1/A button (sideways/pointed), and the same for the morphball power bombs. It works extremely well while in combat, and it's fluent, fast, and intense. What makes things even more intense, is that all pick-ups have been removed from the game. Upgrades still exist and are hidden well just like all other Metroid games, and have even added Health bar "parts" - collect four to form an extra Health bar... Zelda anyone? But no more dropping health balls or missiles. Missiles can actually be recharged by holding the Wiimote upwards and holding A for a few seconds. Health? Good luck, because besides one small option, the health on Samus is the only health she has until she gets to another save station. That one small option exists only when her health reaches dangerously low levels, around 30 health left on her last bar. At that point the health bar blinks red, and Samus can recharge her health (back up to 99 health, so to one bar) by once again holding the Wiimote upwards and holding down the A button. This takes a few seconds, which are very tense, since getting hit by an enemy or attack interrupts the charging. Luckily, her health will never go from 10 to 0, 30 to 0, or even 50 to 0 (yes, some common enemies can do 50 damage hits, ugh). It hits 0, but flickers between 0 and 1, which basically gives the player that once last chance to charge her health back up. A nice touch, considering even the most basic enemies can be brutally difficult.
But that difficulty makes the game so much fun to play. Yes, I've gotten very frustrated at this difficulty, but it makes me try that much harder to figure out the enemies patterns. I can't even explain the fighting, but I can say that multiple ways to kill enemies exist, with just a few buttons. It can change a basic common enemy battle from 3 minutes to 10 seconds, and that comes from personal experience. The other control option I must add is dodging. Samus can dodge by either a) pressing on a direction on the d-pad just before an attack hits her, or b) switching back from pointer view to sideways view, automatically triggering a dodge. The dodge is the most important thing to learn in the game, since health is always critically low, even with full health. The one problem I have with the dodge is that during intense battles (which is often), I'm not holding down on the d-pad to move, but rather quickly pressing the d-pad in directions I want to move, to trigger a dodge if an attack gets close. With lasers flying everywhere and enemies attacking from all sides, she's dodging all the time. Just holding down on the d-pad will not trigger a dodge, one must tap the d-pad, which is much easier than it sounds. But my hand and thumb actually start getting sore during these battles, from tapping so much, and not just in one place (like tapping the 1 button repeatedly, it's in the same spot so the right hand isn't moving). It's like tapping up up up up down right left left left left right up down down... and so on, times a 1000 or so times. And there's no letdown, these enemies will not back off until Samus is dead.
But besides my issues with the game, I'm enjoying it so far. If I had to give it a score like on websites, right now I'd give it about a B+ or a 8.0, somewhere in that range. Who knows, that score might go up as I proceed through the game, but there's just a high of a chance that the score could drop.
Tuesday, August 31, 2010
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
You Too, Shall Be My Puppet!
Oh man, have I been addicted to Castlevania this past week! I was kinda excited for Harmony of Despair to come out, but I didn't think I'd be playing it this much! I mean, I'm on the fence on Castlevania games, just finding that they can be unforgiving in difficulty and don't offer a whole lot of options. Like being able to level up or choose a whole lot of ways to traverse the castle, like how Metroid games are developed (not including sequence-breaking).
But both Harmony of Despair and Symphony of the Night have opened my eyes, each in different ways. HD has shown me that you can "level up" without having to actually level up, and that collectibles and other items across the areas can work out to be the same, as they continually alter the players' stats. I'm not going to assume that the alternate paths are like all Castlevania games, since this one was designed with multiplayer in mind. Different players should take different paths. SotN on the other hand though, has opened up more now that I have defeated the most recent boss. I now have the option to take different paths through the castle, though obviously only to an extent, before I obtain the next best item and reach the next boss. It's still much better than many extremely linear games out there. So yeah, I'm definitely enjoying both of these games.
I should say that I wouldn't be playing SotN if it weren't for HD, and I wouldn't be playing HD if it weren't for the multiplayer. Playing it online with a friend is a blast. Originally I thought that having only six levels would be a very short game, even knowing that one must play through the levels multiple times to beat them (and have a time limit of just 30 minutes). But I've probably played all the levels combined around 30 to 40 times, not including the first level another five times on hard mode. And being able to play with different characters from different Castlevania games with each other is pretty cool. Each players' powers lend a hand to defeating enemies. I just wish there were certain areas of levels that are only accessible to certain characters, but I can let that one go. I'm playing as Shanoa, who's special power is basically a magnet that lets her attach to and fling around to other magnets. Pretty cool, but her magic powers are awesome. It wasn't until I acquired her other powers besides fire that the gameplay opened up for me. I now have her fire at level 6, electricity at level 6, ice at level 5 and beam at level 4. She is extremely powerful. Luckily the game is pretty tough on hard mode, and is brutally fun. Definitely worth the $15 purchase, and I can't wait to play more online, hopefully completing hard mode within the next week.
As for Symphony of the Night, it became more enjoyable after playing HD, as I saw that it's really not as difficult as I once thought. It really just plays like a Metroid game, except that more thinking and jumping is required, and less attacking. All enemies must be studied and known how they attack, and health is critical and hard to find, unlike most Metroid games. And different items are great for different enemies and situations. You can't just run into a fight with a sword swinging, and backing down from a fight is not a bad idea. In a Metroid game, once you see an enemy, you usually don't back down until the fight is finished. I don't know which I'll finish first, but right now all I'm playing are Castlevania games. Hell, if I enjoy both of these this much, I might just have to borrow some other Castlevania games, and put those on top of my playlist before a bunch of other games. And to be clear, I think I can count at least six unplayed games I have on that list, not including two or so being played at the moment, so that'd be a pretty big feat to put something else first. But that has yet to happen, and won't be for a while, so we'll see.
But both Harmony of Despair and Symphony of the Night have opened my eyes, each in different ways. HD has shown me that you can "level up" without having to actually level up, and that collectibles and other items across the areas can work out to be the same, as they continually alter the players' stats. I'm not going to assume that the alternate paths are like all Castlevania games, since this one was designed with multiplayer in mind. Different players should take different paths. SotN on the other hand though, has opened up more now that I have defeated the most recent boss. I now have the option to take different paths through the castle, though obviously only to an extent, before I obtain the next best item and reach the next boss. It's still much better than many extremely linear games out there. So yeah, I'm definitely enjoying both of these games.
I should say that I wouldn't be playing SotN if it weren't for HD, and I wouldn't be playing HD if it weren't for the multiplayer. Playing it online with a friend is a blast. Originally I thought that having only six levels would be a very short game, even knowing that one must play through the levels multiple times to beat them (and have a time limit of just 30 minutes). But I've probably played all the levels combined around 30 to 40 times, not including the first level another five times on hard mode. And being able to play with different characters from different Castlevania games with each other is pretty cool. Each players' powers lend a hand to defeating enemies. I just wish there were certain areas of levels that are only accessible to certain characters, but I can let that one go. I'm playing as Shanoa, who's special power is basically a magnet that lets her attach to and fling around to other magnets. Pretty cool, but her magic powers are awesome. It wasn't until I acquired her other powers besides fire that the gameplay opened up for me. I now have her fire at level 6, electricity at level 6, ice at level 5 and beam at level 4. She is extremely powerful. Luckily the game is pretty tough on hard mode, and is brutally fun. Definitely worth the $15 purchase, and I can't wait to play more online, hopefully completing hard mode within the next week.
As for Symphony of the Night, it became more enjoyable after playing HD, as I saw that it's really not as difficult as I once thought. It really just plays like a Metroid game, except that more thinking and jumping is required, and less attacking. All enemies must be studied and known how they attack, and health is critical and hard to find, unlike most Metroid games. And different items are great for different enemies and situations. You can't just run into a fight with a sword swinging, and backing down from a fight is not a bad idea. In a Metroid game, once you see an enemy, you usually don't back down until the fight is finished. I don't know which I'll finish first, but right now all I'm playing are Castlevania games. Hell, if I enjoy both of these this much, I might just have to borrow some other Castlevania games, and put those on top of my playlist before a bunch of other games. And to be clear, I think I can count at least six unplayed games I have on that list, not including two or so being played at the moment, so that'd be a pretty big feat to put something else first. But that has yet to happen, and won't be for a while, so we'll see.
Monday, August 2, 2010
More Persona
Okay, so I need to get back to the Persona topic. I apologize if my last post seemed brief when discussing the game, as I was just dead tired after running, and couldn't stay awake for the life of me. But I didn't want to have a complete post talking about GameStop without covering any actual gameplay. Tonight's full post will be completely about gameplay in games, and no buying or stores.
I want to go into more detail about my Persona 3 FES goings. I find it refreshing to be playing an RPG that has two types of gameplay. On one hand, it has actual RPG elements, such as turn-based combat, leveling up, grinding (when needed), and other common RPG themes. And then on the other hand, a completely different social aspect to the game, such as making friends, hanging out with different people, and just doing things like a normal teenager would do. It's nice being able to do one if the other becomes a little boring. And just when that gets boring, it's time to switch back to doing the other aspect of the game. Fighting at night, and being social during the day.
While there's only one dungeon, I find that to be okay. Normally I like to have very different dungeons to explore, to keep things changing and interesting. Maybe it's the fact that every floor is a different layout every time one enters the dungeon. I'm on the 38th floor right now (I believe?), though I cannot progress any further due to another barrier. So it looks as though I've only beaten one story boss, with the next one coming up in about 8 days.
That's another part that's interesting, that the story automatically progresses, no matter how far along one has leveled up the characters. I was very nervous at first that I wouldn't level them up enough to be able to beat the boss/story scene, and would get stuck on that day of the month. But I've learned how to level up my characters enough, when it's normal to grind a bit, and when my characters are probably strong enough for that cutscene. Either way, I go to Tartarus almost every night to level up at least a little bit. Plus I've got to consider my Personae (?) alongside my characters, which are just as if not more important than the main characters. Oh the Personae!
The Persona fusing becomes much more fun as the game progresses, since with higher character levels means more Personae are available to use. And with more Personae, more fusing options become available. I would almost say that using and fusing the Personae is more fun than Pokemon leveling. Yeah leveling Pokemon is addicting, trying to gain more abilities and evolving them, but Pokemon can't be fused. It would be awesome if one could fuse Pokemon to gain abilities from each other, and change forms. But until then, Persona does this in a more unique way. So they each have their addicting gameplays. I'd put down what Personae I'm currently using, but I honestly can't remember, and they switch every few days or week in the game. So by next post, I'll already be using different Personae...which is awesome, totally different from every RPG I've played. I can say, however, that between all my Personae that I'm actively using in battles (which is actually only like 3 or 4 right now), I have Zio, Agi, Bufu, Garu, Mabufu, Hami (my only light skill, kinda sucks), among other non-magical or non-fighting skills. So I've been making sure that when I fuse, I keep the four main magical skills somewhere within my active Personae, which has been extremely helpful. About a week ago game-time wise I didn't have Zio, which was very frustrating, because I didn't have Akihiko yet, and when I did, he didn't always use Zio at the best times. Oh and before I switch subjects, I also love being able to knock down enemies, a very fun and strategic battle consideration.
I don't take the social gameplay very seriously, but it can be a fun distraction when I get bored of fighting. Plus fighting still gets stressful when I have teammates who get tired. Happens less often, but it's still there. But anyways, I think I have found 7 or 8 different social links, and leveled each of those up to level 2. I have leveled three of them up to level 3, being the Fool, Justice and one other Arcana. It can become addictive, however, on those days when I spend quite a bit of time looking at Personae and fusing possibilities. Then I start to think of who I should be hanging out within the next week, to level up the social link. I'll continue to blog about Persona 3, though I doubt the posts will be this in depth. This one was long because I haven't really posted about the game yet.
I also popped in NCAA Football 08 yesterday, just to play something different for an hour. Wasn't in the mood for Persona or Futurama, and c'mon, it's almost football season! I played as Michigan State (obviously) at a home game against Central Michigan. Ya know, kinda like a rematch from last year. While nothing will ever change the embarrassing home loss against Central Michigan last season, it felt good to win a rematch 70-10. Even the commentators were saying such things as "This coach should really start acting like he's been here before," as I ran up the score in the final minutes. Well you know what, it was a well deserved beating, those fake commentators have no idea. Last year was just painful.
I want to go into more detail about my Persona 3 FES goings. I find it refreshing to be playing an RPG that has two types of gameplay. On one hand, it has actual RPG elements, such as turn-based combat, leveling up, grinding (when needed), and other common RPG themes. And then on the other hand, a completely different social aspect to the game, such as making friends, hanging out with different people, and just doing things like a normal teenager would do. It's nice being able to do one if the other becomes a little boring. And just when that gets boring, it's time to switch back to doing the other aspect of the game. Fighting at night, and being social during the day.
While there's only one dungeon, I find that to be okay. Normally I like to have very different dungeons to explore, to keep things changing and interesting. Maybe it's the fact that every floor is a different layout every time one enters the dungeon. I'm on the 38th floor right now (I believe?), though I cannot progress any further due to another barrier. So it looks as though I've only beaten one story boss, with the next one coming up in about 8 days.
That's another part that's interesting, that the story automatically progresses, no matter how far along one has leveled up the characters. I was very nervous at first that I wouldn't level them up enough to be able to beat the boss/story scene, and would get stuck on that day of the month. But I've learned how to level up my characters enough, when it's normal to grind a bit, and when my characters are probably strong enough for that cutscene. Either way, I go to Tartarus almost every night to level up at least a little bit. Plus I've got to consider my Personae (?) alongside my characters, which are just as if not more important than the main characters. Oh the Personae!
The Persona fusing becomes much more fun as the game progresses, since with higher character levels means more Personae are available to use. And with more Personae, more fusing options become available. I would almost say that using and fusing the Personae is more fun than Pokemon leveling. Yeah leveling Pokemon is addicting, trying to gain more abilities and evolving them, but Pokemon can't be fused. It would be awesome if one could fuse Pokemon to gain abilities from each other, and change forms. But until then, Persona does this in a more unique way. So they each have their addicting gameplays. I'd put down what Personae I'm currently using, but I honestly can't remember, and they switch every few days or week in the game. So by next post, I'll already be using different Personae...which is awesome, totally different from every RPG I've played. I can say, however, that between all my Personae that I'm actively using in battles (which is actually only like 3 or 4 right now), I have Zio, Agi, Bufu, Garu, Mabufu, Hami (my only light skill, kinda sucks), among other non-magical or non-fighting skills. So I've been making sure that when I fuse, I keep the four main magical skills somewhere within my active Personae, which has been extremely helpful. About a week ago game-time wise I didn't have Zio, which was very frustrating, because I didn't have Akihiko yet, and when I did, he didn't always use Zio at the best times. Oh and before I switch subjects, I also love being able to knock down enemies, a very fun and strategic battle consideration.
I don't take the social gameplay very seriously, but it can be a fun distraction when I get bored of fighting. Plus fighting still gets stressful when I have teammates who get tired. Happens less often, but it's still there. But anyways, I think I have found 7 or 8 different social links, and leveled each of those up to level 2. I have leveled three of them up to level 3, being the Fool, Justice and one other Arcana. It can become addictive, however, on those days when I spend quite a bit of time looking at Personae and fusing possibilities. Then I start to think of who I should be hanging out within the next week, to level up the social link. I'll continue to blog about Persona 3, though I doubt the posts will be this in depth. This one was long because I haven't really posted about the game yet.
I also popped in NCAA Football 08 yesterday, just to play something different for an hour. Wasn't in the mood for Persona or Futurama, and c'mon, it's almost football season! I played as Michigan State (obviously) at a home game against Central Michigan. Ya know, kinda like a rematch from last year. While nothing will ever change the embarrassing home loss against Central Michigan last season, it felt good to win a rematch 70-10. Even the commentators were saying such things as "This coach should really start acting like he's been here before," as I ran up the score in the final minutes. Well you know what, it was a well deserved beating, those fake commentators have no idea. Last year was just painful.
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