Quarterly Update!

I play quite a few games. There's no denying that. I may not put in as much time per game as others may (especially those who play online), but I have a problem with creating a backlog. A backlog of unfinished games. Sure, I create a blog post about what I played the past year, but are my thoughts really that clear? Are the highs and lows of each game well represented? Do I ultimately understand why I put down a certain game and started another one? These are questions that have lead me to thinking that a quarterly update on what I'm playing and finished may be a better idea. My end-of-year post won't go away, and not all games I've played recently will be included in quarterly updates. Ultimately, I just need to post more often, and not just about Final Fantasy.

Yes, I finished Final Fantasy V. This deserves its own post, which will be the next one coming. I have yet to get my thoughts in order though, since I'm torn on how I feel. It's a great game. But I've gotten to the point where comparing Final Fantasy games has become difficult.

I should mention that the blog post I mentioned in my 2013 Games Recap, regarding my opinion on the open-world genre, is still something I'd like to do. The most recent game I've been playing (outside of Final Fantasy V) is Saints Row IV. This is yet another game that shows what new ideas a developer can bring to the open-world genre, and I'm really enjoying it. It uses the same world from Saints Row: The Third, but due to another crazy plot, the player now has superpowers. This game feels like a mashup of Crackdown 2 and Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. However, it just feels unpolished when compared against Saints Row: The Third. This is likely due to Volition's previous parent company, THQ, going bankrupt and then being pickup up by Deep Silver (who is in turn owned by Koch Media), all in the midst of SRIV game development. Volition has a long ways towards catching up to Rockstar, but I believe they've become the biggest contender.

Changing subjects, Microsoft had some great sales on Xbox Live Arcade games from October through December this past year. I ended up buying thirteen games from those sales, not including two full Games on Demand games. Many I haven't even started, but I've given others a shot. None have had the lasting power of Spelunky though. Every few weeks I play it again, trying to get just a bit further. The game only has five worlds, each with four stages, but it is not an easy game. I have died a lot. Not on the scale of Super Meat Boy or even The Binding of Isaac, but it sure feels like a lot. Yet, it never phases me. Every time, I understand why I died, and know full-well that it was absolutely my fault. The game is programmed very well, and the controls are fluent and fit perfectly. Two things stand out to me as to why I enjoy the game so much. First, the levels are always random, including difficulty. Take the Jungle for example, the game's second world. Typically, stages start as normal, random levels. Sometimes, "The dead are restless", and are populated by zombies. Sometimes, "You hear water running", and the bottom of the stage, where the exit will be, is an ocean full of deadly piranha. Or worst of all, the level will be nearly pitch black, save for a torch which must be carried around to see. The game won't care if you just had a great or poor run, the levels and difficulty will be random. The player just needs to adjust and learn about how to avoid making any mistakes (health is very low, and spikes are instant death). This leads to my second enjoyment: the ghost. Take too long exploring a stage, and an invulnerable ghost will appear and slowly drift towards the player for a one-hit death. The player must move quickly through the stage, knowing the ghost appearing is absolute. It may take me years, but I will eventually beat Spelunky.

The other XBLA games are good, but not on the same level as Spelunky. I beat Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons. It's not as good as others have claimed, but it presented gameplay that I can't recall seeing throughout an entire game. The player controls both brothers, each with a controller stick. Their actions are initiate via the left and right triggers, respective to the character and also the controller sticks. Puzzles are simple, but revolve around treating each player's hand as one of the characters, and separating them. It can be hard to grasp at first, especially when the brothers cross paths, leaving the player's hands controlling opposite of what they see on the screen. The game was short and had a strange story, but was worth the few dollars I paid for the unique experience.

I've tried multiple times, but I just cannot get into Outland. The Metroidvania genre typically appeals greatly to me, but something about this game just doesn't "click". Maybe it's the feeling of the sparse and large areas, making it feel slower than it actually plays. It could be that the combat feels slow and clunky, when compared to its vastly superior fathers, the 2D Metroid and Castlevania games. I'm not sure but I'm disappointed with the game so far. Which is too bad, because the Ikaruga-esque color switching premise in a Metroidvania game still sounds awesome.

Dust: An Elysian Tale, on the other hand, is a Metroidvania game done right. At least for the most part. Dust is a complete 180 from Outland. The world has small stages, combat is quick and feels fresh every time, and the graphics are vibrant. Yet, why did I quit playing the game? It could have been that the game was too non-linear. The amount of side-quests was overwhelming, and I wasn't even sure if I was heading toward the story-progressing goal. The answer, is Spelunky. I returned to the more enticing game. I would rather take a beating and have my ass handed to me by a tiny bat or clearly visable spikes, than be drawn into the world of Dust.

Perhaps this is why I started playing Dark Souls a few weeks ago. I have been wanting to play this game for quite a long time, but every time I looked at the game sitting in my shelf, I could only think of the stories of rage. Rage and thrown controllers, of frustration of the game's difficulty. Players who had absolute hate for the game. Yet it was other stories, of perseverance and satisfaction that players would feel for continuing on and coming to terms with what the game holds, that made me want to play it. And I have, for about five hours. I have died six times, if I recall correctly. Not unlike Spelunky, every time I have died I knew that it was my fault, and what I probably should have done differently. I have yet to feel any rage during this game. Every enemy is its own battle, and while the lesser skeletons are one-hit kills, they are not to be toyed with or treated as fodder for souls. What I find interesting is that while both games sit together, known for their ruthless difficulty, they sit at opposite spectrums in terms of speed. Thanks to the ghost, Spelunky is about quick decisions and accuracy. Yet from my experience, Dark Souls pushes the player to slow down, and take time to ensure victory in each situation. I've considered the distance between fire pits (save points) in Dark Souls, and so far they're really not that far apart. When populated by smart enemies, possibly around any and every corner, the distance feels like an eternity in time.

Okay, so how about this for a transition: Dark Souls is likely the hardest RPG I've ever played. Paper Mario: Sticker Star, is likely one of the easiest. Somehow, it gives me the kind of frustration I should be feeling in Dark Souls. Not from the enemies, but from how long the game is. Sticker Star is what I played before starting Dark Souls (yes, I'd rather play Dark Souls than Sticker Star...think about that for a moment) while taking a break from Final Fantasy V, after I finished Alice: Madness Returns (more on that shortly). Sticker Star may be a ton of fun, but it just never feels like I'm making any progress. Experience points and leveling are gone, leaving the only reason to enter battles is to collect coins. Stickers are everywhere to fight with, and with the correct button timing, the most basic of stickers are pretty useful. I wouldn't care so much about coins if they didn't feel so necessary to beat bosses. More coins means more actions per turn in battles, thanks to the battle slot machine. Yes I'm just ranting, but I'm frustrated with the game. I quit for two reasons. I found out that each boss has a weakness to a particular single, special sticker. The player is given a very general hint on what it is, but won't know until they reach the boss. By then, if the player doesn't have it, it's game over and back to the save point (usually through the whole stage, a good 20-30 minutes). To further the frustration, these special stickers take up anywhere from four to nine spaces of normal stickers, so the player can't just lug them all around. The other reason I quit, which really drove me away, was finding out that I was only on the third world, and the game had at least seven. Gladly returned it to the backlog.

Okay, back down the rabbit hole. I finally finished Alice: Madness returns a few weeks ago, and boy that game did some things tremendously well...and other things not so well. As many reviewers have pointed out, the worlds are just beautiful. These are seriously some of the best worlds I have digitally stepped foot into. My only wishes are that they weren't so long, and along with that, were more of them. The game had just six worlds, or chapters. Each was one very long stage, with save points being random and automatic. Developers need to learn: unless the game is based around or built up around save points, they should either be manual or close together, or both. I understand save points intentionally being distant as a difficulty measure (see: most JRPGs or sidescrollers), but as I get older my time is more valuable and limited, so I need one of the two. This is what had me put the game away for months. The gameplay and combat brought be back though. I don't even know how to explain it, but it's a third-person action game done right. The only other games that have outdone it in the combat category would be Arkham Asylum/City (both amazing games, which reminds me that I need to finish Arkham City). Combat is very fast, weapons are varied, and chaining is fluent and fun. Another area which Alice excels at is platforming. This puts it in a very small group of 3D platformers I enjoy, along with Mario games and Banjo-Kazooie. Finally, the last reason I highly recommend Alice: Madness Returns, is its emotional plot. The original game, American McGee's Alice, was a take on the Alice in Wonderland story. This game, the direct sequel, has Alice returning to Wonderland in order to solve the mystery of her family's death from a house-fire, for which she is blamed. I won't spoil anything, but how the game plays out made me appreciate writers for games, for how well they can weave a twist throughout a story.

Last two games I want to talk about, both of which I got from those sales I mentioned. SSX and Tony Hawk's Pro Skater HD. SSX is pretty fun. That's all I can think about for that game. It could be because THPS HD is both really cool and quite disappointing, so I have more thoughts on it. The good news: classic Tony Hawk is back, with small levels, multiple goals, and tight controls. The bad: only seven levels, tight controls are not as good as I remember, and over half of the music is new, which means 90% of what is in the game now stinks. To make matters worse, there is no option in the menu to change the set list (THPS 3 onwards had this option, c'mon!). Out of all of the games I've purchased during the sale, the $7.50 on this is the most regretted, beyond even the $4.00 on Outland.

So that's the majority of what I've been playing since my 2013 recap post. I've also put a decent amount of time into Fallout 3 again, to get the remaining seven achievements (now two). Other games I've played, but not enough to warrant expansion in this post: Miner Dig Deep (always relaxing and fun), The Bridge (not very far yet), Deadlight (not very far), and Sonic Generations (not very far, and I was never the biggest Sonic fan anyways).

Next post will be about Final Fantasy V. Hopefully I can get my thoughts together soon, because the sooner I do, the sooner I can start Final Fantasy VI.