Monday, October 19, 2009

More Troubles for Niche Games Localizations


NIS recently opened pre-orders for a UMD version of Holy Invasion of Privacy, Badman! They say that pre-orders need to meet 1,000 or it won't happen, but I'm not entirely sure of that - they'll charge you right out the gate, not when it ships, so it seems to be a reasonably done deal. (Unless it's some kind of restriction with their e-commerce site - NIS hasn't exactly had the best track record with not screwing up lately.) I'm definitely going for this, because I immediately lost interest in the localized version once it was revelead to be DD only, but it more or less brings up another concern that I suspected - NIS had problems with retailers stocking the game, and going for PSN-only was the only way to get it published.


This isn't technically the first time this has happened. Nintendo published Elektroplankton as mail-order only for awhile, although it was eventually released in limited quantities to Gamestop. Same thing with the Korg DS synthesizer. Agetec also released a party game called LOL, only available through its website, although since it's essentially a glorified Pictochat.


But these are all "non-games", more or less. A couple of other published games have had troubles penetrating into retail. Atlus' Steal Princess, for example. You won't find it at Gamestop - the only place you'll find it is likely on Amazon. Same deal with Aksys's republication of Jake Hunter. Its original release was famously botched, with cut content and a lousy translation. Aksys reconciled by releasing it again, with a new translation and everything restored - except Gamestop won't stock it either, especially since they still have new copies of the original release rotting on the shelves for $15. Why did Gamestop have so little faith in these titles in particular? Jake Hunter is easy to understand, but why Steal Princess? It certainly didn't get great reviews, but it's no worse than any other middling RPG that's come out lately. Maybe they got burned on stocking The Dark Spire?


Not knowing the ins and outs of video game retail buying, I don't know if this has been a persistent problem throughout the ages. Most of the time the blame for games not getting localized falls either on the publisher, or the console manufacturer not approving them. Now with the possibility of retailers not stocking games, there's a third wrench in the works. Given that we're already seeing excellent titles like 7th Dragon (as of current) passed over for localization, it's fairly troubling. If nothing else, it's probably time to break out the Japanese coursebooks once again.
Posted by Discoalucard at 4:38 PM 5 comments
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Sunday, October 18, 2009

Well, my PS3 died

Yup, just as soon as I'm actually getting into Uncharted 2, my PS3 up and suffers one of those Yellow Light of Death issues. For some reason I hadn't really heard of these very much, unlike the Xbox 360's RRODs, which were all over the gaming news sites for months. My own 360 red ringed about two years ago when Bioshock came out, which was annoying, but at least getting it repaired was free. Not so with Sony, who charges you the indignity of a $150 repair fee to get "refurbished" model, which could just as very well break again. Mine's not even that old - it's a 40 GB I bought a few weeks before MGS4 came out back in June 2008 or so.

Again, it's funny that this hasn't been publicized to nearly the extent as Microsoft's blunder. The closest I could ever find - the only time I'd heard of it in the first place - was in this Gamesindustry.biz article in which Sony preemptively blasted a BBC report about their inadequacy in fixing it. And that was only for the United Kingdom. It's clearly a widespread issue, as this thread on Sony's own forums can attest.

This isn't a "real" post so much as griping, but hey! Know that you have a Playstation 3, you're probably on borrowed time! Enjoy!

Interestingly enough, there are some lawyers looking into a class action lawsuit: PS3 YLOD: Lawyer Seek.
Posted by Discoalucard at 10:10 PM 18 comments
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Saturday, October 17, 2009

Half-minute Hero - PSP


There have been a lot of great games released recently: Uncharted 2, Katamari Forever, Way of the Samurai 3, Demon’s Souls, Brutal Legend, and no doubt others. Unfortunately, this all means that one of this year’s most interesting games will probably be overlooked. Released apparently last week, I’d totally forgotten about Half-minute Hero. I’ve only played for about half-an-hour, but already I love it.


The game starts with a blazing electric guitar intro which sets the tone for the rest of the excellent soundtrack (featuring Yuzo Koshiro as one of the composers), and you’re then given a choice of three main modes. While the game models itself on being a 30-second RPG, it actually encompasses several genres, including shmups and RTS. As you progress, further modes are unlocked. At its most basic, it’s like a hyper-micromanagement sim moulded by the specified genre – you’re constantly juggling things in rapid succession to achieve your goal in under 30 seconds (actually more than 30 seconds, since you can buy more time from the Time Goddess).




If you’ve not played the PSN demos for HMH, then the above description might sound dull or unintuitive, but the game is actually hugely fun and easy to pick up. It’s very streamlined, with minimal button presses (outside of towns you only need the directions and Square to use a healing item) and combat is automatic. And yet despite this apparent minimalism, there’s a level of depth as you debate whether to save a forest, level up, buy items, or simply head for the boss. New equipment is constantly being acquired, level-specific ranks are earned depending on your style of play, thereby encouraging you to replay each level, and there are also secret levels to unlock. So from what I’ve seen so far, there’s a lot of meat to this game.


Special mention must also go to the dialogue and localisation, which is absolutely perfect. It reminds me a little bit of Holy invasion of privacy, in that there’s a lot of send-ups based on RPG archetypes, and even some 4th wall breaking stuff. For anyone who has grown up on RPGs, it should be a delight, whether it’s the Time Goddess chastising you for selecting the “no” option (“How many RPGs allow you to progress by choosing no? Just choose yes already”), to the spoiled princess who in less than 30 seconds goes from damsel in distress to cross-wielding hell-vixen (“I don’t need no ******* tutorial!”). Genuine laugh-out-loud moments.

And as you can see from the visuals, it has a beautiful 8-bit styling – something which is coming in to vogue, and which I’m pleased about. Megaman 9, Holy Invasion of privacy and now Half-minute Hero, I hope are simply the first in a long line of such pixelicious games.


Anyway, those are my first impressions. Slick, wonderful, beautifully localised, unlike anything else I’ve ever played (maybe Outrun, there’s definitely a hint of Outrun’s race-to-goal style in there somewhere), showing great promise in terms of depth and stuff to unlock, incredibly ornate 8-bit visuals, a rocking soundtrack by known composers, and... sadly overlooked due to bigger releases. And this is sad, because XSeed might see the low sales, and figure it due to the game not appealing to audiences. And if that happens, we'll be less likely to such games in the future.

I say leave Uncharted 2 and Brutal Legend on the shelf for a week or two, they’ll sell well enough through mainstream appeal and will still be there, and maybe give Half-minute Hero for the PSP a chance. Check out the demos first, if needs be, they're ace! Otherwise I don’t think this is going to receive the attention it deserves...
Posted by Sketcz at 4:27 PM 10 comments

Friday, October 16, 2009

Five Great (and Three Not-So-Great) Things about Tales of Monkey Island

A few months back, I picked up an adventure game called Jack Keane. "Just like Monkey Island!" it proclaimed on the cover, more or less. I played it for fifteen minutes, at which point I decided, why not just play Monkey Island? I'd beaten the first two in my youth, but only got maybe a 1/3rd of the way through the later games, and the recent Tales Of Monkey Island series got me in the mood again.


I finished those up during the summer, and while I love Curse, I'd have to agree with the general opinion that Escape is the weakest. The general theme of over-commercialization feels a bit too out there, and Monkey Kombat is by far one of the worst things in the series. It seems that some people are lumping the Tales of Monkey Island series with this one, which I don't really agree with. So, having just played through the first three episodes, here are five things I really dig about them:



Elaine Marley

Guybrush's romance with Elaine was always kind of a joke in the first three games...until they ended up married by the end of it. By the time the fourth game rolled around, Guybrush was clearly henpecked, and Elaine was kinda bitchy, and that's such an worn out theme that it's just not funny. Elaine's more restrained, less mean than more of a capable woman who can clearly take care of herself, as evidenced in the first game. And she's actually pretty charming too, as evidenced by the one scene where you can make Guybrush try to say "no" in a dozen different ways, only to end up conceding after exhausting all of them. It also helps that her British voice actress from Curse is back.


Morgan LeFlay

Morgan LeFlay is a bounty hunter - one of the best in the business - who is also somewhat struck with a case of hero worship for Guybrush. As such, she's constantly conflicted between her pride for her job, and her pretty obvious crush on the mostly oblivious Guybrush, which leads to a surprisingly heartfelt speech using ravenous manatees as a metaphor. But it's mostly her demeanor, carried through the outstanding animation and charming voice acting, that really make the character. I actually really loved the moment where you pretend you're married, and need to answer a bunch of intimate questions based on some random things she mumbled when passed out.


LeChuck's Puzzle Solving Conundrum

LeChuck's gone good? Probably not, but in the first few chapters he's actually a fairly reasonable guy, who seems to want to atone for all of the evil he's put the Carribean through. The best part with him pops up in the second chapter, where Guybrush gives him a lesson in adventure puzzle logic, slowly walking him through all of the steps to figure out what to do. ("If I stick this in there, then it looks like a cow. Do I need a cow?") LeChuck is voiced by a different guy this time around - Earl Boen was great, but the new guy doesn't need the same growling sense of menace, so he works out pretty great too.


Murray

Who doesn't love Murray? He pops here again, and serve more of a useful function than his gratutious (but still funny) cameo back in Escape from Monkey Island. While in the belly of the manatee, you come across a stranded crew who've used the opportunity to take a nice, relaxing vacation. The three of them are so contently deluded that they somehow refuse to believe that the fourth, a guy named Santino, actually died a long time ago and is now a mere skeleton. You'll need to switch his skull with Murray, in an attempt to get him to do you a favor...until he double crosses you, anyway. It's also amusing how you later learn that Santino actually was a pretty awesome dude - it makes me wonder if you'll somehow meet him later on, even though it'd probably ruin the mystery.


Stupid Face Contest

In order to get initiated with the crew, you need to best one of the men by making scary (more like stupid) faces. Functionally, it's a very easy puzzle, since you just need to walk around and look at other things (and talk to other people) to get inspired, and all you need to do is not use the same expressions more than once to win. It's remarkably dumb, but watching it all play out is gleefully ludicruous. It's even better when you need to scare one of the other crew members by mimicing the expression of the person he fears most - Sister Agnes, Director of Discipline.

It's not all great - there are a few things that kinda fall flat, or otherwise disappoint.


Manatee Flirting

So, you've made it to the manatee breeding grounds, but you need to lure the female manatee out of her cave. The male manatee is too frightened to do anything, so you need to teach yourself their language to get them hooked up. However, the only guide you have is a travel book, filled with stock phrases. The female manatee will say something threatening - you need to pick one of those fairly neutral sentences to make it sound like you're being coy and funny. It's a great idea in concept, and a nice skewering of the sword-fighting insult stuff that Telltale sweared they wouldn't do...except in practice, it just kinda falls flat.


Le Singe

Ozzie Mandrill, the villain of Escape from Monkey Island, was one of the game's weaker links. His only major characteristic, despite being evil and cranky, was randomly sticking the names of Australian animals into his speech, which also wasn't very funny. Le Singe is set up to be one of the antagonists in Tales of Monkey Island, a mad scientist who wants to experiment on Guybrush due to his condition ("For science!") Except, like Mandrill, he's just another ethnic stereotype, this time a super gay Frenchman. Still, I can't hate him too much - the part where you need to coerce a monkey to free you from his operation table is pretty inspired, and his squeaky/shrill voice acting is slightly funny.


Reused Locations/Character Models

The first chapter features not one, but TWO puzzles where you need to navigate through a jungle maze, similar to the Treasure Trial from the first game. In the second chapter...you come across an almost identical looking maze! Thankfully there's no more puzzle to solve, but you still need to wander around. The reuse of locations - and character models for nearly all of the NPCs - is one of Tales of Monkey Island's biggest weakness.
Posted by Discoalucard at 4:44 PM 3 comments
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Thursday, October 15, 2009

Racketboy has a new podcast...

...and I'm a guest on it!



Famed retro website Racketboy just put up their first podcast, which includes interviews with myself, Nick (Racketboy himself) and the Video Game Critic (from Videogamecritic.net, naturally.) My segment deals with some of the background with the site, how it's evolved, and IGN/Gamespy's treatment during our move (confusing, at best.) Please check it out!
Posted by Discoalucard at 8:04 PM 0 comments
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Wednesday, October 14, 2009

Huh? What? Uncharted 2 is Actually Really Good

I was planning on spending this holiday season cooped up in my room, playing fifteen year old PC games (I just bought a new joystick and Wing Commander II is SO BEAUTIFUL) while complaining about dearth of reasonably interesting titles, since most of them got delayed until 2010. I was in for Demon's Souls and Brutal Legend based on forum hype and pedigree, but I really wasn't expecting much from Uncharted 2. I only got it because of the Toys R Us B2G1 free sale, and the hype from all around made it too much to pass on.


I wasn't really a fan of the first Uncharted. It was the first PS3 game I bought while I waited a few weeks for MGS4 to be released, and my feelings were roughly the same as Yahtzee's - a well made game, but remarkably bland. I actually thought it was a long running joke amongst PS3 fans that such a dull game was somehow championed as one of the best games on the console...then I realized a year and a half later that they weren't kidding.

The nature of sequels usually assumes that if the first game sold well, then there was nothing wrong with it, and may as well just write a new "script", make a few new levels and call it a day. (As much as I like the atmosphere and general feel of Halo,they still really haven't learned much about level design.) Thankfully, it's not the case with Uncharted 2 - it's a rare case, like with Zone of the Enders and Dark Cloud from the PS2 generation, that actually builds substantially on the last game. I don't know if the actual engine was improved, but the visual direction is nothing short of outstanding - and if the snow in the first chapter doesn't convince you, the Turkish landscape in the second one will. I think that's the big thing that's impressed me - instead of just being a dude running around a jungle shooting other dudes, it's really come up with some interesting setpieces, right within the first hour. Even the (fairly easy) stealth section at the beginning is pretty smooth.

Anyway, you've probably heard all of the fantastic stuff about this already, and I'd say that yeah, for the most part, it's actually true and not just overblown fluff. So let's take a bit of time to discuss where (so far) it's failing.

The plot's not great. Well, no, I haven't seen enough the plot to really say that, so let's say this - the writing's a bit subpar. Anytime anyone says "I have a bad feeling about this", then immediately cuts to a bad thing happening...there should be some kind of punishment for that. Yes, we understand what irony is, please don't do this ever again.

I'm not sure what the appeal of Nathan Drake is, but apparently he's the model of the New Action Hero - gelled hair and jeans, looking like an Abercrombie and Fitch model without the overtly homosexual overtones, with a laid back attitude and scruffy facial hair that suggests a slacker everyman who can do pretty much anything the Old Action Hero can do, except with irritating smarminess replacing cheesy catchphrases. The constant praise I see heaped on it is even weirder. I actually heard someone say that the dialogue gets better later on, and compared it to Monkey Island in its cleverness. Oh? Was this the same person that called the cringeworthy Grand Theft Auto IV script "Oscar-worthy"? I'm not very far so there's always hope for improvement, but somehow I think these people have a substantially different concept of "good writing" than I do.


Then there's Chloe. Chloe rubs me the wrong way. She reminds me a lot of Zoe from Dreamfall - black hair with slightly dark skin, somewhat racially ambiguous, with skimpy tops and a British accent. Zoe was a real character after my own heart, but Chloe's something of a negaverse version of the same basic idea, completely lacking in both charm and depth. And there's something about the way the eyes are modeled that makes her look suspiciously glassy. It's distracting. I still think it would be hilarious if Drake ended up with some fat chick as "the best driver in the business" - are female criminals all wannabe models? - but I don't really think being subversive is Naughty Dog's MO.

This criticism might sound like it's being a bit tough, and it definitely is. The writing is still several steps up from GTA4, and certainly better than the Gears of Wars of the world. But "blockbuster Hollywood movie" and "good writing" aren't mutually exclusive. That's something not even the actual movie industry has figured out consistently, though, so I guess it's a bit premature that a video game could possibly do the same thing. At least it's not a jumbled mess a la Transformers 2, so it does have that going for it. But it does seem awfully weak when compared to something like Brutal Legend. I wouldn't want Tim Schafer to waste his talents working on a summer popcorn action flick, but at some point the developers should strive to be more than just adequate.
Posted by Discoalucard at 2:46 PM 0 comments
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Sunday, October 11, 2009

.... My head hurts



So I decided to impulse buy a copy of A Witch's Tale for the DS because the atmosphere for the trailers I saw of it were very enticing. And then I ran into this Japanese trailer for the game that had a little surprise near the end of the video:



What shocked me wasn't the fact that the game had some vocal song that was most likely removed from the copy I'm going to be getting (which will probably have me seething in anger later if I find this to be true), but from the fact that Momoi Haruko... produced it. Apparently she started a record label while I was offline or something.

Anyway, if you don't know who Momoi Haruko is, she's awesome.
Posted by dai jou bu at 10:12 AM 3 comments
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Thursday, October 8, 2009

In Defense of: Bionic Commando (The New One)

It's not technically up on the main page yet, since I'm still working on editing/formatting a few more pieces, but Sotenga's review of the new Bionic Commando is now part of the full article. He gives it a favorable review, despite a detailed deconstruction about how awful the plotline truly is, and his overall assessment is pretty spot on.



I actually really enjoyed this game a lot, although it's easy to spot where the issues are. It made the famous mistake of trying to appeal to everyone and completely failed in the process. Retro fans disliked the complete change in atmosphere and tone, while modern fans were somehow under the assumption that this was an open-ended game, and disliked its linearity, as well as its difficulty. I think two things caused this: GRIN shot themselves in the foot by making Bionic Commando Rearmed (unofficial HG101 Game of 2008) so awesome, so the change was made incredibly apparent, and it had the unfortunate situation of releasing next to Infamous and Prototype, two other games that satiated action gamers in ways that Bionic Commando didn't.

Personally, I'd like to think of this as this generation's PS2 Shinobi, another 3D revival from about six years back that also emerged to middling reception. Both have their own fair set of issues - the pits and checkpoints in Shinobi, the load times in Bionic Commando, the repetitive level designs in both of them - but the core mechanics are just so damned fantastic that, for me, at least, it completely overshadowed any of its other issues. For Shinobi, it was the air dashing and wall running; for Bionic Commando, it's (obviously) the swinging. It doesn't really feel like the older games, but there was never any way it could in 3D. So much of the platform swinging is automatic that it loses that aspect, but it more than makes up for it with its application in combat.


Any of the major battles are made much more exciting when you're surrounded and start getting pelted up bullets, when you can leap off the nearest cliff, turn around in mid-air, latch on to something (hopefully) and slowly regain some health while firing what few enemies you can see. It is, in practice, a variation of the cover system that's been popularized by Gears of War, but infinitely more interesting because it can be used almost anywhere, without having to duck behind designer-placed obstacles. It also makes important use of vertical space and the ability to traverse it quickly, greatly enhancing any strategic combat options.

And for me, latching onto an enemy, reeling in so I slam into them and send myself flying backwards into the air, while spraying fire towards any other enemies - well, that's just as awesome as the first time you launched an enemy into the air and juggled them with bullets in Devil May Cry. It has the same exact impact as not only looking cool, but serving a important function in the game itself.

A few weeks after its release, Gamestop dropped the price to $20, although it's back hovering about the $40 mark now. That'll probably drop again come the holidays, which hopefully will convince more people to give it a go. I know this is another one of those games that's going to be showing up in "LTTP" threads for years to come, and maybe it's only in time that it'll get the respect it deserves.

Posted by Discoalucard at 4:50 PM 8 comments
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Monday, October 5, 2009

The Internet Reacts - New Rocket Knight

So 1up revealed (and confirmed a rumor from awhile back) that Konami and Climax, the same guys who did Silent Hill Origins, are working on a 2.5D resurrection of Rocket Knight Adventures, AKA Sparkster.


"The funny thing about Rocket Knight is that when you look for information on the Internet -- if you can find it -- you never see anything bad about him," says Konami producer Tomm Hulett.

Well, this NeoGAF thread sure put an end to that.

The gist of this is that people aren't very happy about how it looks. The same thing happened with Konami's Rebirth line of games for the Wii, strangely enough. I never understood the hate for Gradius, because it looks exactly as it should. Contra Rebirth, admittedly, did not look great in stills due to some lousy background artwork, but it looked fantastic in motion, and it played astonishingly well.

This whole scenario boggles my mind. Fifteen years ago when all of those fancy 32-bit systems came out and 3D was the new norm, retro gamers (which weren't even technically so old and cranky yet) were clamoring, hey, no, it's not about the graphics, it's about the gameplay! Fast forward to present, and as it turns out, it IS all about the graphics! I guess we were wrong all along!

This also makes me realize that while I browse NeoGAF a lot, the only time I end up posting I end up coming off like an asshole. It's not really intentional, but when people say things like "Contra Rebirth is a terrible game and I know this because I watched the whole thing on Youtube", then what exactly IS the rational way to react?

Anyway, I wrote a majority of this post when I was still behind the work filter but upon returning home, I'm not really sure why people are complaining to begin with. Oh well.
Posted by Discoalucard at 4:54 PM 18 comments
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Thursday, October 1, 2009

A Brief History of Thexder

At TGS, Square-Enix unexpectedly announced a new PSN game for the PSP - Thexder Neo, a 2.5D remake of the old Game Arts action-platformer. Even more unexpectedly, it was just released today, available for $10 even to NA gamers. Many months back I started work on a Thexder article, but never quite got around to it. And so, here's a quick history.


Thexder is a mecha who can transform into a jet, something which was obviously immediately appealing to gamers, especially computer folk who were probably getting sick of the usual adventure games. In mecha form, your laser will automatically target any foe as long as you're facing them, so there's no need to jump up and down to hit them. In jet form, the laser can only fire straight ahead, but it's necessary to travel through narrow spaces and reach higher areas. The levels consist of fairly small mazes consisting of many, many narrow corridors. It's one of those games that somewhat historically relevant - like Hydlide, it was popular during the day for being revolutionary, but the game itself hasn't exactly aged well. It's also brutally difficult.

There were two Thexder games created for Japanese computers - the original and its sequel, Firehawk. Both were ported to DOS and released in North America by Sierra, who also grabbed Silpheed, Sorcerian, and Zeliard. For the first game, the cool theme music didn't make the transition due to the awful PC speaker, and some of the special effects were removed, but otherwise it's a pretty alright port. The second game had its story cut out but actually improved the graphics a bit. Coincidentally, Square also ported the first game to the Famicom. It removed most of the stages and redesigned the ones that were left, so it's only the same four stages that repeat over and over - the original version has many more levels. Sierra also released a new Thexder game for Windows 95 somewhere around the mid-90s, which was dreadful, because the sprites were tiny, the action was choppy, and somehow the level design was even worse than ever.


Anyway, as near as I can tell, Thexder Neo is a remake of the original game. The first level is definitely almost exactly the same, although I can't say any more, because I never beat the first level of the original Thexder. (As I said, it's really hard!) This PSP version adjusts the difficulty level a bit, so it's much easier to handle. It controls much smoother too, and adds in an option to lock your direction, so you walk backwards while still firing forwards. Enemies drop various orbs, some of which will recharge your energy gauge, while others will expand its maximum capacity. You'll want to grab as many as these as possible, because not only does your energy drain when taking damage, but it'll also slowly drain as you fire. There's also a shield, although I never quite figured out its functionality nor how to recharge it.


Now, remaking games always brings up an interesting question - how faithful do you want to remain to the source material? The best, like Bionic Commando: Rearmed, take all of the good stuff and polish all of the bad stuff to make for a game that feels somewhat modern while still maintaining a retro sensibility. Thexder does not do this. The tight corridors and obnoxious enemies, many of which require several seconds of constant lasering to be killed, are still here. Navigating the mazes just isn't any fun, because, naturally, they're full of dead ends, and there's no real benefit to exploring. There's even some cases where you can get trapped and need to die to start the level over. The way to "fix" these problems would be to redesign the levels completely and rebalance the enemies further...but maybe it wouldn't be Thexder then? Game Arts already took the basic concept - the auto-aiming fire, anyway - and turned it into Alisia Dragoon for the Genesis, which would've been a much better game to remake. Of course, she doesn't carry quite the weight amongst retro nerds, and she can't transform into a jet, but she does have tits, which has to count for something.


Thexder Neo feels cheaply put together and not terribly interesting unless you're one of the few that actually has some nostalgia for this game - and if you're not Japanese, then you probably don't.
Posted by Discoalucard at 4:30 PM 6 comments
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