Leveling Down

Even though I’ve been busy on the 360 with three separate games I’m currently juggling between (Pure, BlazBlue, and Battlefield 1943), I’ve been jonesin’ for a game I could get fully sucked into for hours. I was curious about Little King’s Story because it was getting great reviews and after having sunk in seven hours already, I have to say that this game will most likely be the second game I will finish on the Wii after Super Mario Galaxy. It’s awesome!

The game takes the charming gameplay of Pikmin, but adds in a different theme this time around: you’re a king that has citizens that will follow you anywhere, and take on any occupations you want them to become. You can have footmen, hunters, farmers, etc. all in your growing “posse”, and as you travel the land you instruct them to perform tasks such as attacking enemies, digging holes, clearing the path, etc. As you explore the world, your goal is to conquer/kill bad guys (cutesy enemies) that are ruling/infesting your neighboring regions and by beating them, you can expand your empire further, allowing your towns to grow, new occupations to be learned, and more upgrades to be had. There is also a human element to the game as well, since each of your citizens has a name, can fall in love, marry and have children, and can be killed in battle.

Little King’s Story appears to be a 20+ hour game, and it contains sound story and gameplay progression not unlike the artificial “keys” in a Castlevania/Metroid/Zelda game where you learn new abilities or find new items to explore a new part of the castle or overworld map. In Little King’s Story, there is a huge world map, but you’re only limited to exploring certain areas until your empire grows large enough that you can learn new occupations for your citizens that allow you to get past the obstacles, such as lumberjacks to take out trees in your path and carpenters to construct bridges over rivers.

As you preside over your empire, you get letters from your citizens that are either fanmail or quest requests. Besides the general exploration you are allowed to do in the game, there is a main quest chain as well as various side quests that give you a more focused approach while also allowing you to amass treasure and gear (how else could you afford upgrading your empire?). This was just the type of game I needed!

Of course, there are some niggling issues such as pathing for your followers (they get caught on random obstacles if you make too tight a turn, but eventually respawn behind you if you travel far enough), and the lack of an easy way to hotkey your class groups or actual characters. I also didn’t appreciate that some of the quests I received were timed (3 days usually), since I tend to like playing through a game like this at my own leisure. But, besides those small issues, I have to recommend this game for any fan of Pikmin, or really, anyone that just wants to play a recently released deep and enjoyable game on the Wii.

The other day my wife and I had about 20 minutes to kill before we had to go out and she asked if I wanted to play a few songs in Rock Band to kill the time. For some reason, I hesitated to take her up on her offer, which is crazy because a) how often is she going to SUGGEST we play video games together, and b) I’m supposed to be a huge music game fan. That got me thinking, have music games possibly reached their saturation point?

Adding fuel to my speculative fire is the news that came out while I was away, namely, that Guitar Hero and Rock Band sales are both down (34 and 67 percent, respectively). Even though Rock Band didn’t have a new game this year, perhaps in this down economy people aren’t as willing to shell out the money for all these plastic instruments.

Personally, I’m not as excited anymore about Rock Band Beatles and Guitar Hero 5, which seems strange to me considering the amount of time I’ve put into Guitar Hero 2, World Tour, and Rock Band 1 & 2. I wonder if I’m going to put as much time into those games as I have in previous iterations. Or maybe DJ Hero is going to be the next big thing, it certainly looks interesting. Regardless, it’ll be interesting to see what happens to music games in the next year or so.

Am I alone in this, or do others feel the same way?

Infinity Ward recently released a trailer highlighting some of the multiplayer gameplay in Modern Warfare 2, and for many Call of Duty 4 fans (myself definitely included), it’s looking great. I’ve already pre-ordered the game, and I’m guessing the trailer probably got some more pre-orders going.

Things I noted from the trailer:

1. Customized Killstreaks
This is an interesting idea, since it adds on even more to the perks in customizing how you want to play. Looks like there’s a grid  of 15 unlocks for that killstreak screen, so I would imagine that you would have a choice from three different killstreak rewards per killstreak. And wow, the AC130 one is for a Killstreak of 11. From the grid, it seems like each row could correspond to 3, 5, 7, 9, and finally, 11. So maybe the top row for 3 kills could be UAV, cloaking yourself for 15 seconds, or heatvision, but you would only be able to use one per row for the round. That of course begs the question why the player already has an 11 killstreak unlocked, but nothing before that.

2. Levels
In the trailer, there seems to be several levels shown: a dusty rooftops level that has some construction going on, an abandoned city setting, and an outdoor urban setting that looks to take place in Brazil since the Christ the Redeemer statue is rising up in the background. The AC130 footage briefly shows footage of a desert level, and this looks to be a small fighting area that may not be much bigger than Call of Duty 4′s Shipment level. We also see a level where the player is going through a greenhouse on a mountain - the snow-capped mountains in the background may indicate that it’s set in Europe, or even the United States. And finally, the last level shows an indoor level taking place in an office – which should please fans of Counter-Strike’s cs_office, Call of Duty 4′s Vacant, or even Rainbow Six players in general.

3. New Gear
From seconds 36-45 in the trailer, you may notice several interesting weaponry. The obvious one is the rocket launcher, which now seems to get a lockon for easier targetting. It’s about time, is all I can say. And notice that the plane is also deploying countermeasures against that rocket! Did you also see the attachment on the rifle itself? It’s a heat sensor-like thing right out of Aliens! If that thing is just a regular unlock for a weapon, I don’t know how it’s going to be possible for opposing players to be stealthy, unless there’s a perk that negates it. I think the heat/heartbeat sensor kind of made Rainbow Six games too easy, since you knew where all the terrorists were, but maybe this will be handled a bit more fairly. And of course the last section of the trailer appears to be some sort of sticky grenade. While the segment was amusing, the verdict is still out for me as to whether or not it will actually be better than a regular grenade, because for balance sake the explosion radius of the sticky grenade is probably reduced.

Monkey Island is still funny, challenging, and unique. The updated graphics are just a bonus

I first played The Secret of Monkey Island at a very different point in my life, when I was 10 years old and had all the free time in the world. A couple of weeks ago, a special edition of Monkey Island was released with updated graphics, soundtrack, and voice overs, and for better or for worse, it’s incredibly faithful to the original (you can switch between versions at the touch of a button).

For the record, my favorite 3 point and click adventure games ever are Full Throttle, Monkey Island 2, and Monkey Island, in that order. Point and click adventures seem to be having a bit of a resurgence, LucasArts and Sierra are both putting out their old games on Steam, which I think is a great thing. For those of you who may have missed the point and click craze, these adventure games are conquered by exhausting a bunch of dialog trees and combining items in your inventory in unique and creative ways.

The Secret of Monkey Island puts you in the shoes of Guybrush Threepwood, a wanna-be pirate who gets caught up in a complicated love triangle with Elaine Marley, governor of Melee Island, and her ghost pirate stalker, the evil LeChuck. It is a zany story that is moved along with even zanier gameplay and wacky humor. For example, early on in the story you pick up a chicken attached to a pulley. What could you possibly use that for? You’ll have to play the game to find out.

Monkey Island’s gameplay holds up for the most part even though it was first released 19 years ago. The special edition’s graphics look excellent (except for Guybrush’s weird hair-do), and the voice work is okay (but turn on the subtitles to get the full effects of some of the jokes). The jokes are a little less funny than when I was 10 years old, but there are still some laugh out loud moments. The game has implemented a progressive hint system, which is a blessing and a curse (I recommend staying away from it, the majority of the puzzles are fair and just require out of the box thinking). For fans of the original, I think the game is a must-buy. I still love this game and am hoping they give Monkey Island 2 the same treatment. If you’ve never played Monkey Island, I still highly recommend checking it out – it only costs 10 bucks, which is well worth it (think of it as a history lesson). After all, if Monkey Island taught me anything, it was this: “Never pay more than 20 dollars for a computer game”. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to dig up my old Monkey Island 2 CD-ROM.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDSRdp6Ar3M]

This game has been on my radar for a while now, but with new footage coming out lately, I’m more excited than before. I’ve always been a big Diablo fan, and after playing games like Sacred, Titan’s Quest, and even Hellgate: London, I’ve never played another loot-based game that’s nearly as good. Phantasy Star Online comes close, but it was ruined by hacking and had a monthly fee.

Borderlands is apparently inventing a new genre the development team is dubbing “RPS”, mashing FPS mechanics with action/rpg lootwhoring. Throw in 4-player online co-op, and it has the potential to play like a combination of Fallout 3 + Left 4 Dead (without the zombies) - two of the biggest games of last year. If this game is as good as I hope it turns out, I will end up nagging my buddies to all get it like I always do.

One of the potential issues I have with the game right now is that Gearbox is claiming that Borderlands can randomly generate thousands of different weapon drops. While that may sound interesting for some, what I care about most (and what will give the game “Diablo” like longevity) is for there to be a healthy amount of unique and set weapons that are not randomly generated along with a marketplace for trading them. For the Diablo players out there, I want the gold and green items to exist in this game and not just thousands of yellow ones! The second potential issue I see is how will multiplayer be handled? Will all of our characters and their info be kept on the server, and if so, how will that be done without incurring a monthly fee? I don’t want to have to play off of some guy’s savefile like Marvel Ultimate Alliance. Gearbox will have an exciting game on their hands if everything is done right. Please don’t mess up!

On my honeymoon in Europe, I did find some time to play some games (DS and Solitaire), mostly on planes and trains and the like. I learned three valuable lessons that I thought I’d pass on…in case anyone ever plans to travel.

Lesson 1
A week into the trip, I was humming along in the final chapter of Phoenix Wright, ready to expose the greatest conspiracy ever. I was on the last leg of the case, ready to scream OBJECTION and close the case, when *BLIP* my DS ran out of batteries. No problem, right? I’ll plug in my Nintendo issued dual voltage plug. Woops, Nintendo’s American DS charge is only 110 V. For some reason I thought it was dual voltage (like my cell phone charger, and my laptop, and EVERYTHING these days) but I was wrong. I ended up buying a European charger for 10 euros (~$15) that I can use in Asia as well. But man, this is the 21st century! Anyway, I should have just brought my transformer. Lesson learned: Don’t forget about voltage differences!

Lesson 2
After I finally charged my DS, it was time to finish Phoenix Wright! I was waiting for the subway in Barcelona with my luggage and about to finish the game. The subway pulled up, so I slipped the DS into my pocket and got ready to board the train. My wife got on ahead of me, but as I walked into the subway I found myself surrounded. All I remember is staring into the chest of a blue shirt. What’s going on here!? Then I suddenly felt something moving in my right pocket. I turned my head to the right and saw two fingers subtly pulling my DS out of my pocket. Ahh! My left hand was holding my luggage, so I only had one hand to fend off this would be attacker. I took my two fingers and gently pushed the DS out of his fingers and back into my pocket! SUCCESS! So I was close to getting foiled in my attempt to finish Phoenix Wright again, but once again I prevailed. Lesson learned: Don’t keep valuables in your pocket!

Lesson 3
Finally, I finished Phoenix Wright, so I went to the local electronics store to see what prices were like. Everything gaming related in Europe is EXPENSIVE. Almost everything I saw cost the same amount in euros as it did in USD, meaning everything is basically 50% more expensive. Seems like kind of a rip off. Anyway, I’m glad to be an American gamer. I ended up not buying anything, not only was it expensive, I also think it was all in Spanish! Lesson learned: Be thankful to game in America

Anyway, if you take the time to learn these valuable lessons, I think a trip to Europe is well worth it. We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves, but it’s good to be back! Monkey Island and 1943 time…the summer of arcade begins!

I’ve been playing Pure on and off for the last week or so now and ready to give my impressions on the game. Pure revolves around racing with an off-road quad bike with many jumps that allow you to do stunts. Depending on your hangtime, you can do more stunts or advanced ones that fill your turbo boost meter. Use the turbo boost and you’ll go faster, but your turbo boost meter will decrease. Thus, the game revolves around pulling off successful stunts in the air so that you can boost when you’re on the ground. Mess up a stunt in the air and landing on your face will result in a good chunk of your boost meter decreased. This is the game in a nutshell, and there are varied tracks around the world to race through.

The game also has a relatively strong focus on customizing your quad-bike with various parts that affect stats such as max speed, acceleration, handling, etc. I wasn’t a big fan of the parts interface, as it made replacing and upgrading parts a bit confusing so I often used the option of “quick-building” my quad-bike whenever I felt there were new parts to choose from. From what I hope, the quick-building feature automatically puts a quad-bike together and uses the best parts.

I haven’t gotten around to online yet, and most likely never will since I’m not exactly an online racing game fan, but for the most part I’ll say that Pure is a good game if you are a fan of the genre. I’m not a big racing game fan, so the minimal gameplay features had me a bit bored after a while. After I played the first couple of races, I wondered, “Why bother playing through to the rest of the races if the gameplay is the same but it’s just a different track?” I guess one can make that argument about any game, but for a racing game, it’s different because you’re not exactly gaining new gameplay depth or storyline from continuing. There’s nothing really enticing you to go through Pure except if you just like racing. And if you do, you will most likely enjoy the game.

To be fair, I pick up Pure and play a few tracks every once in a while when I have limited gameplaying time because it’s fun in short bursts, but I can’t see myself sitting through a whole afternoon of it.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9fWvub_WBho]

After recently picking up BlazBlue, I decided to go check out the Achievements available for the game. While I’ve sort of given up on trying to earn Achievements hardcore, I like to see how the developers envision we should play the game. And look at one of the Achievements I found for BlazBlue:

Pretty amusing reference to the Karate Kid and definitely one of my favorite songs from the era. Of course, it’s only really good when paired with the Karate Kid movie footage of the tournament – which I have conveniently included here. Keep your sound on to experience the full power of the video!

My initial thoughts on hearing about Battlefield 1943 were not quite positive. I wondered, “Are people really that interested in returning back to WWII when we’ve gotten so used to modern warfare and especially so in the Battlefield series? And why pay $15 for this title, when we can buy Battlefield Bad Company for only a couple dollars more?”

After playing it for a couple hours, I know now. Bad Company’s main gameplay mode was Gold Rush, a new mode that had one side attacking and one side defending for lengthy periods of time as the attackers tried to blow up the gold crates and push the defenders back. Battlefield fans complained about the mode, as the mode that we are so used to is Conquest: capturing and holding five flags all over a map and killing the enemy enough to reduce their tickets to zero with the more flags you hold, the greater the significance of each death from the enemy team. The developer DICE agreed, and put together a free DLC pack of the Conquest mode for Bad Company, but it was honestly a poor shell of what it could have been.

Fortunately, 1943 is straight up Conquest and is a true return to why we fell in love with the Battlefield series in the first place. For what the game is, it does everything right: three classes that are unique and effective, covering the spectrum in how you want to play: up close with an SMG, midrange with a rifle, or long range with a scoped rifle. Each class has a secondary weapon and function: the rifle class has a grenade launcher for assaulting areas, the SMG class has a rocket launcher for attacking vehicles, and the sniper has C4 to lay traps to destroy bridges, walls, and vehicles. Kills are quick (a few shots from a rifle, and also two-three shots from a sniper rifle, unless it’s a headshot), vehicles and airplanes are effective, and there is persistent stat tracking and leveling.

Plus, the game allows you to join games with friends as a squad, although it’s limited to 4 players per squad just like in Bad Company. It’s also running on the Bad Company engine, so it really feels like you’re playing a simplified, yet still engaging Bad Company. Whether that’s a good thing or not really comes down to the player. I liked Bad Company so I’m finding 1943 quite good, and to be honest, I can’t think of anything bad about the game: it’s solid, balanced, and enjoyable. Maybe a few more maps would have me playing longer, but if you’re on the fence, I’d say go for it.

After having pretty much sold off most of the mediocre games in my backlog, I proceeded to replay BioShock. Having beaten that, I honestly didn’t know where to turn to next. Part of me was thinking, maybe I can replay Oblivion, since I just picked up the Game of the Year edition with the extra content that I never got to see when I played the original release. I got a bit nervous though about really getting into that timesink, so I decided to tear off the shrinkwrap on Pure and give that a spin. It’s a decent game, but whether it has enough for me to beat the entire game I’m not sure.

At the same time, I started playing the Survival modes in my recently reacquired copy of Left 4 Dead on the 360, and have had a great time there and want to keep continuing it until I can get the Gold time on all the levels. In contrast to my enthusiasm for Survival, the Versus mode is just terrible. While there’s new maps to play Versus on, I tried playing with a buddy and the lack of any sort of matchmaking or stat tracking really drags it down.

The amount of time it takes to even join a Versus game with your friend(s) can be like 15 minutes, as each of you frantically tries to join a game in the lobby and invite the other before the room fills up and you both can be on the same team. And if you’re playing with randoms, it’s definitely not fair at all when you get paired with split screen teammates that don’t even use mics. If it’s one thing that I wish for in the sequel this fall, it’s a Halo/Call of Duty like matchmaking and stat-tracking system that allows you to play on the same teams as your friends and also level up so that when you play in random public games, the teams are more balanced. There isn’t even functionality to start a Public Versus game so you can invite your friends right away before the room fills up – instead it’s all on the server side whether you are forced to create a new game or join an existing one.

On a brighter note though, I tried out the Battlefield 1943 demo and liked it so much that I ended up buying it. I guess I’ll be playing that for my adversarial online gaming and stick with just Survival in Left 4 Dead. And finally, of course there’s BlazBlue, the game that I thought I would devote the next couple of months to getting competitive at before Left 4 Dead’s Survival mode and Battlefield 1943 started crowding my gaming time. But after the drought for the past couple of months, I guess this is only a good thing…