Some remodeling be goin on.

Hey, I've gone and started a Youtube account if you hadn't noticed the brand spankin' new links page off to the right. Assuming of course you've been to this page beforehand, which would make you perhaps 0.0000000000000000000000000000000000001% of the world's population that actually has, so congratulations, give yourself a pat on the back, you've earned it. I'll be sure to add a few more links as time goes on so be sure and check it out. Do it!!!.......*shakes fist angrily*

Anyways, I don't plan to be on here much in the next coming months as unfortunately schooltime has once again reared its ugly head and most of the time I'm actually away from work for once will likely be spent doing silly things like classwork in the hopes that I don't you know, fail. So between my future or updating a blog that barely a dozen people read daily, I'm pretty sure you can figure out which one takes priority.

Micro$oft

You know, ever since Game Informer printed that survey about console failure rates I've been somewhat annoyed by most of the major gaming publications. It's almost like everyone is surprised that out of the 5,000 people surveyed that 54% of them have had their Xbox 360s die on them. Most of those mags sat there and suckled at the teat of Microsoft for some 3 years or so simply because they looked at numbers and declared that obviously the Xbox 360 is the best because it makes more sales. That to me doesn't necessarily point to Microsoft having the best console or is doing the right marketing, it just means they're the best con artists. You know damn good and well Microsoft was lying about those failure rate numbers for years and you know damn good and well they knew about that RROD before they even released the system. Every single person amongst my personal friends and family has had the RROD problem. I even know a guy who's had four 360s die on him. Microsoft knew this crap so they released their console before anybody else and everyone bought it because they wanted to be the first on the block to have a next gen console and once the few intelligent people caught wind of what Microsoft was doing it was already too late and they were stuck with sending their piece of shit console back for "repairs". I promise you that the total failure rate of that console is higher than 54%. I promise you.

But really, is it Microsoft's fault everyone bought into the bullshit? They played a smart con and even still there are people dumb enough out there to defend this crap and say that they only surveyed 5,000 people, that's just a small group ironically not realizing that because it is a small group having over half of that group with a failed console makes Microsoft look even worse. It's just flat frustrating to see how so many excused many of Microsoft's constant failures over the past few years and all of a sudden turn around and state that perhaps, maybe Microsoft conducted bad buisness this console generation. Gee, ya think!?

I'm not really a Sony or Nintendo fanboy or anything like that. I mean, I can't stand the Wii personally but I don't particularly say too many bad things about it because at least people who buy a Wii don't have to send it back for repairs. At least Nintendo makes products with quality. I may not care for Wii games but at least they work. I'm just against bloated companies who become too arrogant for their own good and I'm equally against people excusing bad buisness practice or writing it off like it's no big thing.

Persona 3 for PSP

So it looks like another version of Persona 3 is making its way over to the PSP. Oh man, come on Atlus, how can ya just skip over P2 like that? Originally the whole reason I threatened everyone I personally knew who owned a PSP bodily harm if they didn't preorder the upcoming P1 remake was so that Atlus could take a look at it and say, "Hmm...ya know what? This game sold very well, perhaps we could finally officially localize both versions of P2 on the PSP as well." Alas, but no, this game will be the 3rd release of a game whose original version has barely been out for 3 years. I mean, I know that P3 pretty much put the company on the map in terms of worldwide appeal, but how many re-releases of this game do we need? I sadly haven't even finished "The Answer" portion of FES yet. This game is starting to turn into Ys I and II if they keep re-releasing it. Heck, they may as well just remake LUNAR for the PSP while they're at it....oh wait.

Mahhhhvul vs. Capcuuum Tew

So I've decided to go ahead and download Marvel vs. Capcom 2 off of the PS store and take it "fo' a riiide" and I have to say, I'm actually playing it a lot more than I anticipated. It's aged a lot better than I figured it would have. I didn't care for it too much back when it released. Sure, it's broken all to heck with the Marvel characters winning the top tier bracket easily over the Capcom ones and the music is just as grating and irritating as ever and the basic gameplay has been dumbed down to super move, super move, super move, super move, super move as opposed to utilizing actual combat strategy, but I guess since I know these things going into it this time I'm not disappointed. That and it's a heck of a lot cheaper than what it was back on the DC or PS2.

I can with confidence say I definitely made the right decision to get rid of my copy of KOF XII condsidering I'm having more fun playing a game that's nearly 10 years old for a fraction of the cost. I preordered my copy of KOF XII picked it up that Friday and quickly figured out after a few hours of play that it totally wasn't worth a purchase, but I actually held out over the weekend for the infamous patch that really did nothing and that was pretty much the final straw. Even if they do inevitably fix the online or add some decent DLC, the online community for the game at this point has dwindled to nothing except the SNK Nazis who practically burn you at the stake for not liking the game and dare to express something as crazy as a negative opinion and wish to continue to live in a fantasy world where Arc System Works totally doesn't exist and you're not a real fan for being angry with your purchase, shame on you for not supporting SNK for not buying their subpar effort because they totally work hard and stuff and to hell with those reviewers like Famitsu, they don't know what they're talking about even though they're a well respected magazine with a 20 year history from the country of the game's origin and several other well respected US publications agree with them as well, they don't know what they're talking about and they're all paid off every one of them and SNK IS GOD please allow me to throw more money at you guys I will pay full price no matter what the rest of the world says and oh my God a new patch is coming soon when will Mai get here?

Needless to say, I'll stick with MvC.

King of Fighters XII Review

"The future is now" SNK? Oh man if this is the future you had in mind then I want no part of it. This is yet another review I had written up for a long time yet didn't publish for two distinct reasons. The first reason was because I planned on doing a BlazBlue vs. King of Fighters XII comparison and essentially review both titles at the same time since they both literally released within weeks of one another. The second reason was I wanted to hold out and see if SNK would fix the atrocious online mode. By this point if it hasn't been fixed I seriously doubt that it will ever be up to par and BlazBlue pretty much trumps KOF XII in literally every category effectively negating any need for a comparison type review. However, I will still give KOF XII a standalone review because quite frankly I'm angry that I lost $60 and I feel compelled to state the reasons exactly why I think this is a terrible game and I wasted my money and stuff on a stupid blog as if SNK would care about my opinion or something.

King of Fighters XII has to be one of the few games that has actually angered me upon my purchase. I’ve bought worse games over the years of course, but KOF XII is one of those rare times where I’ve actually become physically frustrated with the developers and everyone involved with its release because SNK can do better and quite frankly the KOF franchise deserves better. This game is an absolute slap in the face to anyone who has ever followed the series for any length of time. Actually, the KOF franchise hasn’t been the level of quality it once was in the 90s, but all the same none of the newer releases displayed such a level of sheer ineptitude and laziness as this title either. This game has no business being called King of Fighters.

Presentation wise, at first, the game looks okay. They have gone and finally re-drawn the sprites and initially everything looks great. Unfortunately the sprites look very pixilated on a HD screen, even with the smoothing filter option cranked to max. There is just no saving the sheer amount of pixilation. While most of the cast looks okay from the redesign, some characters look downright terrible. Ralf and Clark got not only bigger sprites, but bigger stomachs as well. Seriously, what did these guys eat to grow so huge? Athena Asamiya what did they do to you? She looks like a pink, anorexic bug. The character animations are decent, but not quite up to par with what they should be. Backgrounds aren’t much better, while they’re infinitely better animated than the characters themselves; there is entirely too much going on most of the time. The menus are boring and forgettable, much like the music. A much better choice would have been to give each character a theme from an older title that plays whenever that person jumps in a la Marvel vs. Capcom simply due to the lack of not only forgettable tracks, but very little tracks, period.

From this....

...to this.

Thus do we come to the next problem regarding KOF XII.; the lack of everything. This game offers very little modes and features and gives players only the most barebones of options. The game only includes 22 characters and some character exclusions are head scratching. (Mai Shiranui, K’) This would be fine if the game offered something. Give us a story mode, or at least more stages or more gameplay modes. You know, something to justify the $60 price tag. There is an Arcade mode where you can replay to try to get the best time possible by playing through a whopping five stages with no bosses. There isn’t even an option to do a single player run in Arcade mode. Amazing! Seriously, guys, would a Survival Mode have been asking too much? Other than that, there’s a Versus mode which contains the same amount of whopping five stages and a Training mode and of course, online.

It’s time to kick the dead horse, kids. Yes, the online is atrocious. Purchase the game and players will find themselves already having to download a near hour long patch just to work out some of the kinks with the online. While the patch helps somewhat, the online is still a horrible laggy mess. The fact that a patch was released only a few days after launch is indicative of the fact that SNK released an unpolished, unfinished mess of a game that has no business having a $60 price tag attached to it. Ultimately, that’s just one example of the real issue with KOF XII. It’s not so much what the designers didn’t include, honestly, I knew that this game had very little modes and stages; it’s more or less what little they did include isn’t even acceptable. The gameplay, while not horrible, isn’t even up to par with past titles. The gains and improvements made to previous installments were promptly ignored by the developers. Many characters have had moves taken away for some inexplicable reason. The ability to switch members in the battle is gone. Why make so many improvements in the gameplay over the years and utterly ignore them in the newest installment? The A.I. is broken and stupid. Even on the hardest difficulty often times they play like button mashing newbie. Many times the computer falls for the same moves over and over from the player. I’ve literally won matches by using the same move throughout.

How in the world could SNK charge full retail price for a game this unpolished and unfinished? SNK will have to do better than this if they want to enjoy further success with this franchise. There is absolutely nothing here of merit. The only positive marks I can give it is that the gameplay is actually okay if you play versus mode locally with a friend. But even with that praise, past KOF titles are vastly superior in that regard anyway and a bit lighter on your wallet as well. There is absolutely no reason to purchase this game. Let it waste away in obscurity in the bargain bin and spend your $60 elsewhere. SNK has not earned it with this one.

Hands off the panda! It's time to read the BlazBlue Review!

It's time kids. Another game review. This time its the fighting game chock full of complete and utter badassness, BlazBlue Calamity Trigger. I know I've already given this thing the veritable thumbs up from initial impressions, but this is the review proper. I waited so long for the review despite having typed it up weeks ago largely because I wanted to see if my opinion would sway once the initial "wow" factor wore off.

From a pure technical standpoint, BlazBlue is the best 2D fighter in years. Anyone who is a fan of Arc System Works’ previous installments of Guilty Gear absolutely must pick up this game if they haven’t yet done so. It is simply the fighter of the decade, no bones about it. However, Guilty Gear fans are not just the ones that should be convinced. Those of you that don’t particularly care for 2D fighters, or even fighters in general; now is the time to become a fan and BlazBlue may be the game to convert you.

Obviously, the presentation for the game is awesome. This game is presented in a widescreen HD format and it looks simply amazing. Animations are crisp and smooth. The backgrounds are rendered beautifully and have incredible depth. If you’re not particularly a huge fan of anime or the Guilty Gear series, the character designs may be a little off putting at first however. A black blob with a mask that utters disjointed speech against a little boy with shorts, a top hat and glasses that commands a robot doll that he claims to be his sister is just one of your possible matches. Suffice to say, every character is definitely unique and each has their own little quirks and eventually they will grow on you. A nice little touch in particular is in regards to the speech during battles. Often times, different characters will say different things depending on who they’re fighting. It’s a nice little touch that helps to make each of the characters a little more distinct. Fighting games tend to have bad English voiceovers at times, but BlazBlue’s English voice cast is actually pretty decent. Many of the characters sound just like their Japanese counterparts although if English V.A.s aren’t your thing there is still the option to switch to the original Japanese voices. Daisuke Ishiwatari returns to compose excellent up tempo rock pieces that are easily on par, or perhaps even better than Guilty Gear. All in all everything about the presentation in this game draws you in and supplements the intensity of every battle.

That’s where the brilliance of this game truly shines. This game is the culmination of the errors and corrections that have been made to fighting games for the past 20 years. The developers at ASW have taken the mistakes learned from the past over previous fighting game design and have crafted the most balanced fighter to date. This game has an answer for everything. Simply put, button mashing is not an option. Turtling is not an option. You will learn the moves and you will learn to play as the character chosen properly, or you will pay. Sure you have your basic weak, medium and strong attacks just like any other fighter, but the drive button is where the differences really come into play. Each character plays so differently from one another because of this. One character drains life. One character controls the wind. One uses the awesome power of magnetism to draw his opponents closer to him. Every character’s special moves and abilities center on this fundamental concept that they each have an ability to exploit. You could easily spend hours in the training room perfecting moves and combos trying to learn the different characters. Now I told you button mashers out there don’t do it because there’s an instant block technique that speeds up the characters recovery time which means they will counter you and make you pay dearly. Oh and it also charges up a little bit of their special move meter. Do not turtle. I mean it. There is a meter called the Guard Libra. If you block too much, it will stun you for a brief period of time and you’ll be open for a punishing combo. These aren’t concepts that haven’t existed in fighting games before, but that’s the brilliance of BlazBlue. The developers took concepts from various other fighting games, including their own and have balanced everything out beautifully. This game forces you to play strategically, not spam cheap tricks.

Now I’m not trying to scare anyone new to fighting games or anything. This game is a bit more advanced than your average fighter and if you can’t perform a simple down to forward and attack to pull off a special move, then you’ll probably be in for a pretty steep learning curve going in. Before you decide to go online and show off your amazing prowess with your favorite character, BlazBlue offers lots of single player options and modes to keep you busy as well as help you learn the game. Besides your usual Arcade and Versus modes there’s a Score Attack mode where you fight every opponent in the game to try and get a top score, plus your exploits will unlock various movies and character art in the Gallery mode. But most likely the bulk of your offline excursions will be spent in the game’s Story Mode.

I’ll say one thing first; the story for this game is….ok. Compared to other fighting games, it’s not that bad. It may feel a little overwhelming to see so many characters and so much terminology thrown at you initially, but eventually playing through every characters story will unravel more of the games plot as you go and eventually everything will indeed come together. The fault of the plot is that everything comes together in a very convoluted, disjointed way. Though the game designers did add a special bonus section called “Teach Me, Miss Litchi” that helps explain some of the terms and character backgrounds, (and is absolutely hilarious by the way) the very need for something such as this is indicative of a rather poorly told plot to begin with. Oh well, at least it wasn’t Street Fighter 4.

But it’s a fighting game. Let’s face it; plot is merely a façade for two people to beat each other up until one’s life bar is completely drained. You’re sick of things like character development. You want to show your “mad skills” online! Well, good. The online net code for this game is probably the best for a fighter yet. There is sometimes a bit of lag particularly during the opening animations before a fight, but once the action gets underway, everything is smooth and fast as if your opponent were right there with you. The game keeps track of your win loss record as well as how many incomplete matches someone has had. While this doesn’t particularly avoid the issue of someone rage quitting in the middle of the fight, it does help alleviate the problem somewhat. Unfortunately, this is also recorded for the other person as well.

Offline or online, BlazBlue is an amazing fighter and Arc System Works has once again outdone themselves. They have proven themselves to be the company to beat when it comes to 2D fighters, now if only some of its competition would stand up and notice what they’ve been doing with the 2D fighter for the past 10 years or so and catch up; fighting game fans will be a lot better off. And to anyone who isn’t a fan of fighting games, you should at least give BlazBlue a whirl and see what one of the finest examples of the genre to date has to offer.

Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor Review

What? A game review he does? What is this world coming to? Actually, I've got plenty in the can just haven't posted them yet. I plan to rectify that oversight in the next coming weeks. Anyway, as if you couldn't tell by my layout, I'm a pretty big fan of the MegaTen games. No way am I gonna let this one slip through my fingers unreviewed.

If you’re a fan of strategy RPGs or the Shin Megami Tensei line of games, then Devil Survivor is a game that absolutely cannot be missed. It’s one of the best offerings the Nintendo DS has to offer. With its modern day setting, unique rock soundtrack and gameplay that is both fun and challenging, this game breathes fresh life into what can often become a fairly stagnant genre and immediately hooks you in.

The premise of Devil Survivor is simple. In traditional SMT fashion, you play as a nameless main character that has come to visit your cousin, a talented computer programmer in Tokyo. After you and your friends arrive to meet up with him, he’s mysteriously disappeared and soon all of Tokyo is on lockdown, where no one can get in, or out. Food is scarce and all power is out in the city, hence the word “survivor” in the title. Luckily, your cousin left small portable computer devices known as COMPs for short (and strangely also happen to resemble DS Lite’s, hmmm…..) to be able to communicate. Unfortunately, demons begin pouring out of the COMPs and you come to find that you aren’t the only ones with this ability to summon demons as many others who plan to use the demons for harm instead of good exist as well, hence the government lockdown. Your initial task is to stop those individuals and discover the mystery of the lockdown eventually revealing a much larger purpose. The plot is revealed at the player’s pace as storyline events are marked on the map and various branches and alternative paths are opened up depending on where you go, who you visit and what time you visit them. Your actions could even change who potentially joins your party, which makes for great replay value.

I wonder if COMPs have useless Pictochats as well?

This game at its core plays like a typical strategy RPG much like a Final Fantasy Tactics or Disgaea, for those familiar with those games, while combining elements from various other more popular MegaTen franchises like Persona or Digital Devil Saga. Even though this game is part of the “Shin Megami Tensei” line, this story takes place all in its own universe and is pretty much a stand alone story outside of technical terms like spell names and the like. While prior knowledge of previous SMT games is not a requirement, not knowing that “Zio” means “thunder” or that “Agi” means “fire” could initially confuse some casual players, rest assured that the game spends quite a few hours walking any newcomers through a few battles and making sure that you get the gist of it before deciding to just throw you out there.

But boy, once you get out there, this game throws you to the wolves. This game starts out fairly simple, but is no cakewalk by any means. By the time you get to your first boss, if you don’t have the basic mechanics down you’ll get creamed. Unlike many other SRPGs, character building is done less with levels than with what skills you know, and equipment like armor or accessories is nonexistent. Instead, much like Pokemon or some other monster raising game, you must find and train new demons in order to, ahem, survive. This is done via a Demon Auction where you must bid cash in order to get the demon that you want. Other people may offer a better price so there’s no guarantee you’ll get the one that you want unless you buy it at the initial Hammer Price which is usually pretty steep. Your party consists of your main characters who each lead a team of demons. Each team consists of a human storyline character with the ability to control at least 2 demons on the field at once. It takes a turn, but you can recall a demon and switch them out from a stock of up to 24 that you can carry in all. Effectively swapping out your demons and using the right ones for the right situations is the key to success. Positioning on the battlefield is not as crucial as it is in many other SRPGs, you engage the enemy in a battle screen and not in the field so what direction from which you approach the enemy is a nonfactor. You can even heal HP or status effects even when not engaged with the enemy. However, proper exploitation of the battle system is extremely crucial. What demons you have in your stock can either make a battle excessively aggravating or a breeze. The Press Turn system that originated in SMT Nocturne and now seemingly a staple of SMT games once again makes its return here where if your opponent has a weakness and you exploit it, you gain an extra turn that you can use to either cause more damage or heal a dying ally. Likewise, your enemies have this ability as well, so paying attention to subtle details like that is a must. The game does a pretty good job with overlaying all of these statistics however, using the top screen to display each characters statistics and a simple press of the R button switches from allies to enemies.

Many SRPGs fall into the trap of letting you use the basic strategy of letting the enemy come to you, but Devil Survivor, particularly for its major storyline battles doesn’t let you off so easily. Many times, innocent civilians caught in a battle must be saved and the enemy will often times chase after them with ruthless efficiency, other times a powerful boss character will continue to summon demons to do his bidding until he himself is defeated. The player also has the option in combat to consider taking out the leader and thus eliminating the entire unit or instead choosing to eliminate his teammates first which lowers the leaders defense and keeps any teammates from shielding the leader and taking the blow for him, doing so also nets more experience. Finding the proper balance of the two and considering which option is best, particularly in the battles where simply putting the enemy to rout isn’t enough for victory, keeps battles entertaining.

As expected with this being an SRPG, this game requires a lot of time and commitment on your part as it can take quite a few replays of particularly some of the more unorthodox battles to figure out how best to set up your team. The game developers realize this fact and there is always a “free” battle for you to test out various demon combinations and skills in order to get the proper balance that you need. Any battle that will potentially advance the story is marked specifically so you don’t accidentally stumble onto a battle you weren’t prepared for. Unless you’re a SRPG or SMT veteran, you’ll often find yourself spending several hours in between storyline battles grinding and while it can get a little repetitive, discovering new skills and fusing, new and more powerful demons becomes incredibly satisfying and helps to alleviate the usual boredom that often associates grinding in SRPGs.

Of course, this game isn’t perfect. The soundtrack, while decent to listen to perhaps once or twice, has very little varying tracks and often times many of the more particularly repetitive ones can try your patience once you’ve heard them for the 100th time. Also, the difficulty often has a tendency to spike rather than steadily increase, again, forcing lengthy training/grinding sessions for most players, but all the same this game is well worth the time invested and serves as a great introduction to those not familiar with the SMT franchise as well as satiating already established fans.

Hmm, a busty Japanese girl with a ridiculously short skirt and loves Pocky? A Japanophile's wet dream.

On a side note....

I've also edited this header to read "movies and videogames" also because I seem to talk about movies more than videogames at least as of late. That really wasn't my intention but probably a whole 5 people read this sucker anyway, so I doubt too many people are gonna get too bent out of shape about it.

In Memoriam: John Hughes

Oh man, another childhood memory fades away. First Michael now one of my favorite directors leaves us. Et tu, Mr. Hughes? Ferris Bueller was like, the best movie ever growing up man. Well, at least he won't be around to see any inevitable, painful remakes of his 80s comedy classics years from now, if that's any consolation.