NindyIndy
Every now and then, I like to have a yearly tradition, normally taking place around Christmas. For a while, it was an Aladdin movie every year. Next round it was Hunchback. Next round, it was to read a Star Wars book. Last year I finished the Thrawn trilogy but I also started Donkey Kong Country. I've played the games sparingly and I wasn't really a fan but I always appreciated what they did for gaming. I couldn't say that I ever beat the game and thought maybe the first was different from the rest, so I finished it last year and thought it was good but nothing to write home about unless you were there when it released hence why there's no review.
This year, I decided to keep the tradition and play DKC2 and I've always known that this was everyone's favorite but I've always found it to be the hardest and what's the point when Donkey Kong isn't even in it? Well, I understand now.
Let's start with the setting. Pirates. An easy concept to grab from especially since we had themes of it in the original, King K even being on a pirate ship of his own but we take it to a whole new level. The beginning of the first game had it very simply put, the bananas are gone, go get them back. This one, Donkey Kong has been kidnapped…I did not know that, that explains it then. So he enlists the help of Dixie Kong, which I also know is a fan favorite but I never understood why. She is though. When you switch characters in DKC, it was usually through a cool high five, this one, Dixie kicks Diddy out of the way and says "It's my turn." (At least in my head she says that) She glides with her hair which you already know I have a thing for if you saw me talking about Conker. Her idle animations are blowing gum and drinking a juice box. She plays the guitar at the end of a level. I like Diddy's precision but I can't say I used him all that much in comparison.
The bosses are better this time around (though a few are fairly similar). Overall, it's the better DK game. So what's wrong with it? Why did I dislike it?
You can run. I learned this last year in the original but it didn't hit me until now that I didn't know that as a kid and would try making these sloped jumps with no luck or speed behind them, that's partially why it was so hard. But it's still hard, mind you, especially when you're playing legit with lives and stuff. There are instances where it just doesn't seem plausible to do some of these things reasonably like the ghost ropes or the King Zing Sting boss, they're a bit too precise and-
THIS STUPID! THIS FRICKIN STUPID SNAKE LEVEL WITH THE TOXIC WASTE COMING AFTER YOU IN A TIMED MANNER BUT YOU HAVE TO WAIT FOR HIM TO JACK HIMSELF OFF TO JUMP HIGHER. I WAS YELLING AND SCREAMING "WHAT DO YOU WANT ME TO DO?!" AND MY PARENTS EVEN GOT CONCERNED "WHO ARE YOU TALKING TO?" I WAS PREPARED TO GO OFF ON THEM GETTING IN MY WAY OF THE FIGHT BETWEEN ME AND…RATTLY. THEY MAKE HIM OUT TO BE A HERO BUT THIS GAME ISN'T DANTE'S INFERNO, IT'S ABOUT APES! I HOPE I NEVER SEE A SNAKE AGAIN. I DROPPED THIS GAME AND DIDN'T COME BACK WITH JUST A FEW LEVELS LEFT. GOOD RIDDANCE GREEN SLIME.
This year, I decided to keep the tradition and play DKC2 and I've always known that this was everyone's favorite but I've always found it to be the hardest and what's the point when Donkey Kong isn't even in it? Well, I understand now.
Let's start with the setting. Pirates. An easy concept to grab from especially since we had themes of it in the original, King K even being on a pirate ship of his own but we take it to a whole new level. The beginning of the first game had it very simply put, the bananas are gone, go get them back. This one, Donkey Kong has been kidnapped…I did not know that, that explains it then. So he enlists the help of Dixie Kong, which I also know is a fan favorite but I never understood why. She is though. When you switch characters in DKC, it was usually through a cool high five, this one, Dixie kicks Diddy out of the way and says "It's my turn." (At least in my head she says that) She glides with her hair which you already know I have a thing for if you saw me talking about Conker. Her idle animations are blowing gum and drinking a juice box. She plays the guitar at the end of a level. I like Diddy's precision but I can't say I used him all that much in comparison.
The bosses are better this time around (though a few are fairly similar). Overall, it's the better DK game. So what's wrong with it? Why did I dislike it?
You can run. I learned this last year in the original but it didn't hit me until now that I didn't know that as a kid and would try making these sloped jumps with no luck or speed behind them, that's partially why it was so hard. But it's still hard, mind you, especially when you're playing legit with lives and stuff. There are instances where it just doesn't seem plausible to do some of these things reasonably like the ghost ropes or the King Zing Sting boss, they're a bit too precise and-
THIS STUPID! THIS FRICKIN STUPID SNAKE LEVEL WITH THE TOXIC WASTE COMING AFTER YOU IN A TIMED MANNER BUT YOU HAVE TO WAIT FOR HIM TO JACK HIMSELF OFF TO JUMP HIGHER. I WAS YELLING AND SCREAMING "WHAT DO YOU WANT ME TO DO?!" AND MY PARENTS EVEN GOT CONCERNED "WHO ARE YOU TALKING TO?" I WAS PREPARED TO GO OFF ON THEM GETTING IN MY WAY OF THE FIGHT BETWEEN ME AND…RATTLY. THEY MAKE HIM OUT TO BE A HERO BUT THIS GAME ISN'T DANTE'S INFERNO, IT'S ABOUT APES! I HOPE I NEVER SEE A SNAKE AGAIN. I DROPPED THIS GAME AND DIDN'T COME BACK WITH JUST A FEW LEVELS LEFT. GOOD RIDDANCE GREEN SLIME.
This review contains spoilers
Hugh. Not Hugh as in Hue or Hugh Neutron but Huh-gah, as in a sigh.
So, where do I start? Every now and then, I'll get an FPS where the mouse just does not gel right with the game, whether it be sensitivity or mouse smoothing or what, but for some reason I've had so many games seem so misoptimized and apparently I'm not the only one with this problem but I'm putting it all down here. Vertical sync. Vsync. Turn it off. It worked, that's all I can say.
My dad is someone that plays with his mouse set up an unbearable sensitivity anyway so this might fit him. You know what else my dad plays? Wolfenstein. At least, the older ones. I remember when we moved and he decided it was time to update his gaming catalog since most of his were 5+ years old with classics like the Quake trilogy, Doom 3 and Unreal but one of the games he picked up was Wolfenstein 2009. And oh boy do I have just as fond memories playing that game as he does. It's not the best reviewed game either, heck, I didn't even play it for myself but you better believe that every time he loaded up that game I was right there next to him. I'd pull up a chair, sit on the floor, heck I'd even stand and watch him play, I loved it.
I remember one time I heard him booting up the game and the pitter patter of the gunplay while I was in the shower. I can't say that I've taken a faster shower in my lifetime because I believe that might've been around the time he finally beat the game. Everyone talks about how Bioshock made this and that with all these neat powers and stuff but- you know what, this review isn't for that game, let's skip a little bit ahead. Of course, I was excited when New Order dropped except…my dad found a new game. I bought him the game around release and he still hasn't played it to this day and that was kind of our thing and I wasn't interested in the game he was playing (still playing actually, it's an MMO) anyways, I decided to carry it on anyway because from what I've seen of trailers and pictures, you get a laser gun. That's all I needed to know.
I'm familiar with id's style of gameplay with Doom and such, in fact, I've played the demo of New Colossus and may even recall the mouse problems to be apparent in that as well but I saw this for free on Epic and practically jumped for joy. One of the things that sets this game apart from the others in its franchise is that it tries to lean more into the futuristic stuff as well as Blazkowicz' character.
It's nifty to have the enemies with blue electric coming out of their helmets every now and then, it makes for a good symbol when shooting from a long distance.
As for story, I just raved about 2009's game but I couldn't read you back the story, just what you do in the gameplay and I feel like this might be a similar thing, the opening isn't all that great, it's kind of average war game material, not much of an opener in my opinion and if you really wanted me to dive in why, I actually played the beginning twice.
So it's pretty linear, there are things here and there that you can go off track and collect but the first level is the most linear part of the game in my opinion. If it was story driven or had a setpiece or something that would tie it all together, it'd be fine but it felt stagnant to me, nothing impressed me and had this not had the name attached then I might not have picked it up based on that alone. The plane wasn't much to me.
The game itself is split into two depending on who you choose to keep from dying at the beginning but that decision doesn't feel earned, it's kind of an all or nothing kind of deal, don't give me lame half excuses to pick one character over the other, that's just not fair. So what I jumped out of a plane and this guy happened to be there? So what the other guy threw a grenade one time and I tried to calm him down? Either build them up to make the decision that much more painful or don't give me any context at all. That's from a narrative point of view.
You see, it seemed like it was banking on its gameplay being good enough that you'd give it a pass like for the reason Blazko gets knocked out, a piece of shrapnel blows out of the hole, cuts the back of his head in the funkiest groove imaginable then lets him float out at sea, what is that? And I mean, I expect silly as well as seriousness, it's a game about cyborg nazis and one of the most over exaggerated nazi hunters but I feel the silliness is misplaced here and there.
But it picks up, the scenario they give to you afterwards is actually pretty cool. Someone who ends up injured and in a hospital/asylum, seeing these guys who put him here but not being able to do anything and stuck that way until you're pushed to the brink to either break out or die, then team up with a nurse. I just find that so cool, it's one of the reasons I look up to MGS5's intro so much.
Characters become meaningful (for a while), some even a little more so than others, like Caroline. She was actually introduced in 2009's game and she was carried over so if you didn't know her story, you get the gist here but it's a lot more meaningful if you played 2009 despite being a separate canon (but for some reason just isn't available on any storefronts...)
You can dual wield, I know I mentioned the laser gun and how that was all you needed to sell me on this game and yeah, it is fun when you use it, but it's still limited to certain areas and certain things. I also had a bit of trouble towards the end with getting the wires to line up so it'd actually cut the fence but it was still pretty cool.
There are actually a few side missions here and there but I can't help but feel that there should have been more, like maybe one after every mission. I mean they're mainly just fetch quests inside the base but that's just it, as an overall product, it teases its potential but didn't quite hit the bar for me. It would've been really cool to expand on that asylum idea and have him involuntarily kill, like seeing a nazi will trigger it and kick off the rest but no. Then they have these interesting side characters like Bombate who's there…but that's it. Or in my case, J (it depends on which playthrough you're on) but he gets introduced and you don't get to talk to him until later to which he explains that he doesn't even like America and explains why and how he just hates Nazis more, challenging Blaskowicz' pro American ideals but then the next time we see him he plays the Star Spangled Banner as if "Yeah, he got over that." there was no growth or anything there (there didn't need to be) but it just seemed rushed or shoved aside. You can have those types of things where they're shorter but what then when you don't go too deep into any of it? I was kind of disappointed by that ending because it all sounds so cool when you put it on paper but then in action, it just seemed like another level, like "That's it? Oh well", it didn't feel like a proper end for any of the characters. So it didn't win me over with playing the other later entries but maybe I'll give RTCW a try some time.
So, where do I start? Every now and then, I'll get an FPS where the mouse just does not gel right with the game, whether it be sensitivity or mouse smoothing or what, but for some reason I've had so many games seem so misoptimized and apparently I'm not the only one with this problem but I'm putting it all down here. Vertical sync. Vsync. Turn it off. It worked, that's all I can say.
My dad is someone that plays with his mouse set up an unbearable sensitivity anyway so this might fit him. You know what else my dad plays? Wolfenstein. At least, the older ones. I remember when we moved and he decided it was time to update his gaming catalog since most of his were 5+ years old with classics like the Quake trilogy, Doom 3 and Unreal but one of the games he picked up was Wolfenstein 2009. And oh boy do I have just as fond memories playing that game as he does. It's not the best reviewed game either, heck, I didn't even play it for myself but you better believe that every time he loaded up that game I was right there next to him. I'd pull up a chair, sit on the floor, heck I'd even stand and watch him play, I loved it.
I remember one time I heard him booting up the game and the pitter patter of the gunplay while I was in the shower. I can't say that I've taken a faster shower in my lifetime because I believe that might've been around the time he finally beat the game. Everyone talks about how Bioshock made this and that with all these neat powers and stuff but- you know what, this review isn't for that game, let's skip a little bit ahead. Of course, I was excited when New Order dropped except…my dad found a new game. I bought him the game around release and he still hasn't played it to this day and that was kind of our thing and I wasn't interested in the game he was playing (still playing actually, it's an MMO) anyways, I decided to carry it on anyway because from what I've seen of trailers and pictures, you get a laser gun. That's all I needed to know.
I'm familiar with id's style of gameplay with Doom and such, in fact, I've played the demo of New Colossus and may even recall the mouse problems to be apparent in that as well but I saw this for free on Epic and practically jumped for joy. One of the things that sets this game apart from the others in its franchise is that it tries to lean more into the futuristic stuff as well as Blazkowicz' character.
It's nifty to have the enemies with blue electric coming out of their helmets every now and then, it makes for a good symbol when shooting from a long distance.
As for story, I just raved about 2009's game but I couldn't read you back the story, just what you do in the gameplay and I feel like this might be a similar thing, the opening isn't all that great, it's kind of average war game material, not much of an opener in my opinion and if you really wanted me to dive in why, I actually played the beginning twice.
So it's pretty linear, there are things here and there that you can go off track and collect but the first level is the most linear part of the game in my opinion. If it was story driven or had a setpiece or something that would tie it all together, it'd be fine but it felt stagnant to me, nothing impressed me and had this not had the name attached then I might not have picked it up based on that alone. The plane wasn't much to me.
The game itself is split into two depending on who you choose to keep from dying at the beginning but that decision doesn't feel earned, it's kind of an all or nothing kind of deal, don't give me lame half excuses to pick one character over the other, that's just not fair. So what I jumped out of a plane and this guy happened to be there? So what the other guy threw a grenade one time and I tried to calm him down? Either build them up to make the decision that much more painful or don't give me any context at all. That's from a narrative point of view.
You see, it seemed like it was banking on its gameplay being good enough that you'd give it a pass like for the reason Blazko gets knocked out, a piece of shrapnel blows out of the hole, cuts the back of his head in the funkiest groove imaginable then lets him float out at sea, what is that? And I mean, I expect silly as well as seriousness, it's a game about cyborg nazis and one of the most over exaggerated nazi hunters but I feel the silliness is misplaced here and there.
But it picks up, the scenario they give to you afterwards is actually pretty cool. Someone who ends up injured and in a hospital/asylum, seeing these guys who put him here but not being able to do anything and stuck that way until you're pushed to the brink to either break out or die, then team up with a nurse. I just find that so cool, it's one of the reasons I look up to MGS5's intro so much.
Characters become meaningful (for a while), some even a little more so than others, like Caroline. She was actually introduced in 2009's game and she was carried over so if you didn't know her story, you get the gist here but it's a lot more meaningful if you played 2009 despite being a separate canon (but for some reason just isn't available on any storefronts...)
You can dual wield, I know I mentioned the laser gun and how that was all you needed to sell me on this game and yeah, it is fun when you use it, but it's still limited to certain areas and certain things. I also had a bit of trouble towards the end with getting the wires to line up so it'd actually cut the fence but it was still pretty cool.
There are actually a few side missions here and there but I can't help but feel that there should have been more, like maybe one after every mission. I mean they're mainly just fetch quests inside the base but that's just it, as an overall product, it teases its potential but didn't quite hit the bar for me. It would've been really cool to expand on that asylum idea and have him involuntarily kill, like seeing a nazi will trigger it and kick off the rest but no. Then they have these interesting side characters like Bombate who's there…but that's it. Or in my case, J (it depends on which playthrough you're on) but he gets introduced and you don't get to talk to him until later to which he explains that he doesn't even like America and explains why and how he just hates Nazis more, challenging Blaskowicz' pro American ideals but then the next time we see him he plays the Star Spangled Banner as if "Yeah, he got over that." there was no growth or anything there (there didn't need to be) but it just seemed rushed or shoved aside. You can have those types of things where they're shorter but what then when you don't go too deep into any of it? I was kind of disappointed by that ending because it all sounds so cool when you put it on paper but then in action, it just seemed like another level, like "That's it? Oh well", it didn't feel like a proper end for any of the characters. So it didn't win me over with playing the other later entries but maybe I'll give RTCW a try some time.
2008
I've always heard good things about this game, even seeing playthroughs of it made it intriguing because it looks like a quality platformer. Strange for a licensed game but then I saw the opening logos and realized. This is Deep Iron Studios, I knew I heard that name before and yeah they made Battle for Bikini Bottom, The Spongebob Movie game, Night of 100 Frights, The Incredibles games! So you know these people actually care what they're putting out and even if they lose a deadline, they're going to at least try.
So that's what they did, the opening segment (aka tutorial) gives you pretty much everything from momentum based speed and jumping to going into "box mode" which you can "box dash" with to destroy crates. This isn't a game where you fight enemies mind you (at least for most of it) but one where you explore the area, collect and solve little puzzles both environmental and mini-game like. It's also brimming with personality giving me some reasonable cutscenes before the events of the movie before converging. Not only that but I mentioned collectibles, there are the boxes which contain various power sources to open doors and laser capsules, that's right, you can shoot a laser. But there are also artifacts which glimmer in the sunlight and when inspected, a little cutscene will play out where Wall-E digs up an item like say an umbrella and then proceed to play with said umbrella. It'd be cool if these optional rewards were usable but hey, they're still fun to watch the animations, they fit right in.
Think of playing as a skateboard for most of the game. That's how this is. There are ramps (not really moves you can perform) but it comes up with some pretty cool traversal methods. Now all these things are great but I might complain just a little bit. Some things can be finicky or precise like sometimes you're not as fast as you should be going down a hill and when certain jumps can or cannot be jumped off of or landed on. Your jump isn't very high to start out with and you can't change direction in the air, once you're up, you're locked.
I think one way to solve this might be to just throw out the jump button for certain sections because there will be a stretch of obstacles and jumps that you need to make but if you don't have enough speed or momentum then you won't make them, I'd rather just have him smooth glide off the ramp so I know when and where to jump but that's me being picky. I'm sure lots of these things were known and they just didn't have enough time to iron them out but it's a solid game.
What you wanted more? Ok, well you can also play as Eve so there are 'racing' where you can fly around like an on rails shooter. I 100%'d this game guys and I never do that, sure it wasn't hard but I went the extra mile because I enjoyed it and was having fun.
So that's what they did, the opening segment (aka tutorial) gives you pretty much everything from momentum based speed and jumping to going into "box mode" which you can "box dash" with to destroy crates. This isn't a game where you fight enemies mind you (at least for most of it) but one where you explore the area, collect and solve little puzzles both environmental and mini-game like. It's also brimming with personality giving me some reasonable cutscenes before the events of the movie before converging. Not only that but I mentioned collectibles, there are the boxes which contain various power sources to open doors and laser capsules, that's right, you can shoot a laser. But there are also artifacts which glimmer in the sunlight and when inspected, a little cutscene will play out where Wall-E digs up an item like say an umbrella and then proceed to play with said umbrella. It'd be cool if these optional rewards were usable but hey, they're still fun to watch the animations, they fit right in.
Think of playing as a skateboard for most of the game. That's how this is. There are ramps (not really moves you can perform) but it comes up with some pretty cool traversal methods. Now all these things are great but I might complain just a little bit. Some things can be finicky or precise like sometimes you're not as fast as you should be going down a hill and when certain jumps can or cannot be jumped off of or landed on. Your jump isn't very high to start out with and you can't change direction in the air, once you're up, you're locked.
I think one way to solve this might be to just throw out the jump button for certain sections because there will be a stretch of obstacles and jumps that you need to make but if you don't have enough speed or momentum then you won't make them, I'd rather just have him smooth glide off the ramp so I know when and where to jump but that's me being picky. I'm sure lots of these things were known and they just didn't have enough time to iron them out but it's a solid game.
What you wanted more? Ok, well you can also play as Eve so there are 'racing' where you can fly around like an on rails shooter. I 100%'d this game guys and I never do that, sure it wasn't hard but I went the extra mile because I enjoyed it and was having fun.
Zombies. It sounds silly but it can be done. Most of everyone is a zombie now so streets can be mayhem, cars blowing up every now and then and more people chasing you but for the most part, it just seems like a reskin to me.
And the bosses are…yeesh. They have you fight this thing but he's untouchable so you have to go into flame mode or insatiable or whatever by defeating enemies that keep spawning around him. Now it's the same boss copy and pasted and it wasn't even good the first time. Any other time, it's fighting off a round of zombies and throwing them into this light to plug it up so no more can spawn. Well the expansion itself is a big bigger than that so there are side missions and most of them are just your run of the mill "fight these thugs" or in this case, zombies, no real connection. Not really worth doing because once you've done one, it feels like you've done them all, you do however get a usable sword that lasts as long as a knife and a costume for the ones you do. It would've been cool to have to run away from hordes of zombies or a mission to run over so many but no.
The story is pretty basic too, they could've done something cool like maybe all the people that died int he main game come back as zombies and haunt Wei who pretty much got a lot of them killed and to see him struggle with that. In fact, they do have a few here and there but it's not viewed that way. Other than Vincent, who is just a companion that feeds you exposition and wants to eat all the time, the others don't talk, they're just there as minions so you can fight them and Wei doesn't struggle with that at all. So to fight these guys doesn't hold any weight, especially when I don't remember half of them because no time was given to give them any character in the real game.
And the villain is this Smiley Cat who apparently got screwed over by the Sun On Yee so he's back for revenge, which is fine enough but they could've made it like a murder mystery and actually have Wei use his detective/police skills to unravel how this guy died or who did it but nope! It's all just a passing thing. Fight, fight, fight, that's the name of the game I suppose.
And the bosses are…yeesh. They have you fight this thing but he's untouchable so you have to go into flame mode or insatiable or whatever by defeating enemies that keep spawning around him. Now it's the same boss copy and pasted and it wasn't even good the first time. Any other time, it's fighting off a round of zombies and throwing them into this light to plug it up so no more can spawn. Well the expansion itself is a big bigger than that so there are side missions and most of them are just your run of the mill "fight these thugs" or in this case, zombies, no real connection. Not really worth doing because once you've done one, it feels like you've done them all, you do however get a usable sword that lasts as long as a knife and a costume for the ones you do. It would've been cool to have to run away from hordes of zombies or a mission to run over so many but no.
The story is pretty basic too, they could've done something cool like maybe all the people that died int he main game come back as zombies and haunt Wei who pretty much got a lot of them killed and to see him struggle with that. In fact, they do have a few here and there but it's not viewed that way. Other than Vincent, who is just a companion that feeds you exposition and wants to eat all the time, the others don't talk, they're just there as minions so you can fight them and Wei doesn't struggle with that at all. So to fight these guys doesn't hold any weight, especially when I don't remember half of them because no time was given to give them any character in the real game.
And the villain is this Smiley Cat who apparently got screwed over by the Sun On Yee so he's back for revenge, which is fine enough but they could've made it like a murder mystery and actually have Wei use his detective/police skills to unravel how this guy died or who did it but nope! It's all just a passing thing. Fight, fight, fight, that's the name of the game I suppose.
1991
Forgive me if I compare this to Metroid.
Since I revisited Metroid and it becoming one of my favorite franchises, I figured I'd do the same with Castlevania. I think this is another one of those instances where you need to start with the right game, I guess mine just so happened to be Super Castlevania 4. Why so specific? Because I didn't want to go too early with the original 1-3 on NES and this was closer to a remake of the first one.
Now I've tried Castlevania 64 and it seemed different but just not my thing, everything placed felt deliberate. Then I tried Aria of Sorrow and I had no idea what I was doing, I still kind of don't but at least with this game, I don't really have to worry about taking the wrong path. Why? Because this game is split into stages.
I think this is a cool decision because it allows for a variety of different scenarios. Now this is a harder game so enemies can pop up out of nowhere. Imagine a rushing river that's slowly pushing you wherever it wants or maybe a cave where the stalagmite falls on you or a mansion with creaky stairs, a graveyard with hands that grab you so spiders can shoot their babies at you. That's just so cool. In this game, atmosphere is everything and it nails it pretty well. I never really felt like I was doing the same things, I felt like I was progressing to whatever was ahead except I had no idea what was ahead, there was no way to tell because a book could fly off the shelf and attack you for all I know, it challenged what I thought I knew. Normally I wouldn't like that but I found it a lot more digestible with this entry and would snicker at what I ended up finding. Now, I never could've played this on a console because I'd be all screwed up redoing stages with a set amount of lives, losing too much health and whatnot, still a baby on that front.
As far as gameplay, there isn't a separate button to aim diagonally, it's just built into the stick so that threw me off at first but you can control the whip pretty good. There really isn't an upgrade system which isn't necessarily a bad thing either, you can get the metal whip frequently from one of the candles which works a bit better but that's about it, nothing's permanent so it feels like you're actually scavenging for the treasure.
Items aren't carried per say, candles hold most of the items like an axe, a boomerang, a knife, health items and so on but those weapons can only be carried one at a time so be cautious of what you pick up. You can also pick up money which gives you a better score and sort of makes you feel like a treasure hunter in Drac's mansion. Yes, there's a score which is measured by your time, enemy kills and so on but it isn't indicative of an ending, in fact, there's only one with this game specifically.
A few things I didn't like are that you can't jump or crouch on stairs. Something I hated about the original Metroid as well is that the end level is a gauntlet, well same applies here. But I will say that I learned a ton of new tricks just from that level alone, I just wish it would've come sooner (it's not the game's fault, but it didn't exactly make it obvious). But yeah, really solid title, I look forward to branching out to other entries even if this is a little bit of a lone wolf in its category.
Since I revisited Metroid and it becoming one of my favorite franchises, I figured I'd do the same with Castlevania. I think this is another one of those instances where you need to start with the right game, I guess mine just so happened to be Super Castlevania 4. Why so specific? Because I didn't want to go too early with the original 1-3 on NES and this was closer to a remake of the first one.
Now I've tried Castlevania 64 and it seemed different but just not my thing, everything placed felt deliberate. Then I tried Aria of Sorrow and I had no idea what I was doing, I still kind of don't but at least with this game, I don't really have to worry about taking the wrong path. Why? Because this game is split into stages.
I think this is a cool decision because it allows for a variety of different scenarios. Now this is a harder game so enemies can pop up out of nowhere. Imagine a rushing river that's slowly pushing you wherever it wants or maybe a cave where the stalagmite falls on you or a mansion with creaky stairs, a graveyard with hands that grab you so spiders can shoot their babies at you. That's just so cool. In this game, atmosphere is everything and it nails it pretty well. I never really felt like I was doing the same things, I felt like I was progressing to whatever was ahead except I had no idea what was ahead, there was no way to tell because a book could fly off the shelf and attack you for all I know, it challenged what I thought I knew. Normally I wouldn't like that but I found it a lot more digestible with this entry and would snicker at what I ended up finding. Now, I never could've played this on a console because I'd be all screwed up redoing stages with a set amount of lives, losing too much health and whatnot, still a baby on that front.
As far as gameplay, there isn't a separate button to aim diagonally, it's just built into the stick so that threw me off at first but you can control the whip pretty good. There really isn't an upgrade system which isn't necessarily a bad thing either, you can get the metal whip frequently from one of the candles which works a bit better but that's about it, nothing's permanent so it feels like you're actually scavenging for the treasure.
Items aren't carried per say, candles hold most of the items like an axe, a boomerang, a knife, health items and so on but those weapons can only be carried one at a time so be cautious of what you pick up. You can also pick up money which gives you a better score and sort of makes you feel like a treasure hunter in Drac's mansion. Yes, there's a score which is measured by your time, enemy kills and so on but it isn't indicative of an ending, in fact, there's only one with this game specifically.
A few things I didn't like are that you can't jump or crouch on stairs. Something I hated about the original Metroid as well is that the end level is a gauntlet, well same applies here. But I will say that I learned a ton of new tricks just from that level alone, I just wish it would've come sooner (it's not the game's fault, but it didn't exactly make it obvious). But yeah, really solid title, I look forward to branching out to other entries even if this is a little bit of a lone wolf in its category.
2010
I wanted to start with my score of 7/10 to show that this isn't such a bad game, I actually had a lot of fun with it but it doesn't come without its flaws and I think I can pinpoint where people may have had problems with it. When I see people saying "You're better off not playing it." I think that's kind of unearned because it's not as bad as people say, the fanbase is a bit whack though, has made them bitter.
I know this is sometimes considered a prequel of sorts but you need to know Super Metroid to get it, it actually takes place afterwards but then has Samus lamenting on her past in the cutscenes.
This has a lot of previous material but one trope that I didn't really see were Space Pirates, I was actually quite relieved because they're considered extinct after Super and I feel like they should remain that way. It also doesn't pay homage to the Chozo in much way at all.
In some ways, I do believe this should've been a prequel to all the games and then maybe I wouldn't hold as much problem with it but other than the little differences, it plays out like an Americanized version. It has the formula of a Hollywood sci-fi movie.
I also felt it necessary to urge you to stick around until after the credits because that ending beforehand is barely even an ending, it left kind of a bad enough taste in my mouth to sour the whole game. There IS another boss. There is another ending so be patient. All in all the story ends up kind of plain and average, a 5/10.
It was quite unexpected the way it plays because you DON'T use the nunchuck, you hold the remote sideways. Now this actually came across pretty good in translation but there are times where you have to have the remote upright to do certain things. But there are separate low-pressure sections where you don't have to be quick about it so you don't have to flip-flop all the time. The one exception are missiles and while it is annoying to switch just for that, I didn't find it that bad.
Speaking of combat, it's quite different, shooting auto-locks enemies so obviously that comes with a few misfires here and there but it still has a lot that the series is known for. You can dodge attacks similar to the parry system in SR/Dread and have finishing melee moves that have these crisp and unique animations. The wall kick is back and I can actually do it this time, you only have to hold the direction towards one wall. So believe it or not, I think there are some things that originated here that carried over into the later games because they were so good.
Beating enemies doesn't give you health but save points do so it's a trade off. You do slowly gain your items back but not for the reasons you might imagine. You see because you're with the federation, you need to follow orders, which means that you have your weapons but they're not authorized to be used by your officer yet. Sometimes it's kind of dumb though because you have this whole section of extreme heat to get through before the commander's like "Oh, yeah, you can activate your Varia suit. I'll allow it." It's a defense, I don't see why that wouldn't be allowed. Since there's no collecting random bits from enemies, you can just reload your missiles anytime, the expansions are just for as much you can hold which is really cool.
The art is pretty good too, seeing Samus clash against these white matte backgrounds and contrast the bright colors of her armor to the dark environments, all the little pieces glow. Sometimes lush. The plasma beam is really satisfying with its green lightning approach. It pushes the Wii to its limit, I had times where it seemed like it couldn't keep up and pop a loading banner at the bottom. That was really only when I was moving faster than it wanted so it wasn't detrimental to the experience, in fact, I was proud. It might not mean anything for today's standards but it still looks pretty good today especially for being a little over 12 years old already.
What I didn't like are the "investigate sections" where it forces you into a first person pov and you have to spot what it is that you're supposed to be looking at. The thing is, there's no real clue most of the time, even the very first one is this little red emblem on the spaceship that shows the federation logo but I never would've guessed that unless I looked it up.
In fact, that was where most of my difficulty came from, just figuring out "what" to do rather than where to do because it shows you where to go a lot more than the other games in my personal opinion. A stark contrast to Super Metroid with doors in your way that you just can't get through. Some people will like that, some people won't. Backtracking is interesting because it's not traditional. In Prime 2, they had those main sections and then a hub connecting them all. This kind of has that with "Sectors", a lot of the time you're not expected to go through the same corridors to get back though, there's usually a new route that just circles around. I didn't collect all the items (missile and health etc) though because it tends to limit where you can't return to. You can't just wander around at any given time, you're normally closed off to just that sector until you finish it. You do revisit sectors but I never felt like I got the chance to collect EVERYTHING until after the game but I didn't really feel I needed to because I felt like I had quite enough already to thrive. So what happens if you do collect everything then? Secret ending? Nope, just a hard mode unlock.
I suppose I was expecting more crazy arcade shooter moments like Prime 3 and while there are a few, I want more! I think there's still an untapped 3rd person Metroid with a 3D environment. But this is a perfectly good game, it has some of the best bosses, some of the best use of its mechanics, it's polished, it doesn't deserve quite as much flack as people make out.
I know this is sometimes considered a prequel of sorts but you need to know Super Metroid to get it, it actually takes place afterwards but then has Samus lamenting on her past in the cutscenes.
This has a lot of previous material but one trope that I didn't really see were Space Pirates, I was actually quite relieved because they're considered extinct after Super and I feel like they should remain that way. It also doesn't pay homage to the Chozo in much way at all.
In some ways, I do believe this should've been a prequel to all the games and then maybe I wouldn't hold as much problem with it but other than the little differences, it plays out like an Americanized version. It has the formula of a Hollywood sci-fi movie.
I also felt it necessary to urge you to stick around until after the credits because that ending beforehand is barely even an ending, it left kind of a bad enough taste in my mouth to sour the whole game. There IS another boss. There is another ending so be patient. All in all the story ends up kind of plain and average, a 5/10.
It was quite unexpected the way it plays because you DON'T use the nunchuck, you hold the remote sideways. Now this actually came across pretty good in translation but there are times where you have to have the remote upright to do certain things. But there are separate low-pressure sections where you don't have to be quick about it so you don't have to flip-flop all the time. The one exception are missiles and while it is annoying to switch just for that, I didn't find it that bad.
Speaking of combat, it's quite different, shooting auto-locks enemies so obviously that comes with a few misfires here and there but it still has a lot that the series is known for. You can dodge attacks similar to the parry system in SR/Dread and have finishing melee moves that have these crisp and unique animations. The wall kick is back and I can actually do it this time, you only have to hold the direction towards one wall. So believe it or not, I think there are some things that originated here that carried over into the later games because they were so good.
Beating enemies doesn't give you health but save points do so it's a trade off. You do slowly gain your items back but not for the reasons you might imagine. You see because you're with the federation, you need to follow orders, which means that you have your weapons but they're not authorized to be used by your officer yet. Sometimes it's kind of dumb though because you have this whole section of extreme heat to get through before the commander's like "Oh, yeah, you can activate your Varia suit. I'll allow it." It's a defense, I don't see why that wouldn't be allowed. Since there's no collecting random bits from enemies, you can just reload your missiles anytime, the expansions are just for as much you can hold which is really cool.
The art is pretty good too, seeing Samus clash against these white matte backgrounds and contrast the bright colors of her armor to the dark environments, all the little pieces glow. Sometimes lush. The plasma beam is really satisfying with its green lightning approach. It pushes the Wii to its limit, I had times where it seemed like it couldn't keep up and pop a loading banner at the bottom. That was really only when I was moving faster than it wanted so it wasn't detrimental to the experience, in fact, I was proud. It might not mean anything for today's standards but it still looks pretty good today especially for being a little over 12 years old already.
What I didn't like are the "investigate sections" where it forces you into a first person pov and you have to spot what it is that you're supposed to be looking at. The thing is, there's no real clue most of the time, even the very first one is this little red emblem on the spaceship that shows the federation logo but I never would've guessed that unless I looked it up.
In fact, that was where most of my difficulty came from, just figuring out "what" to do rather than where to do because it shows you where to go a lot more than the other games in my personal opinion. A stark contrast to Super Metroid with doors in your way that you just can't get through. Some people will like that, some people won't. Backtracking is interesting because it's not traditional. In Prime 2, they had those main sections and then a hub connecting them all. This kind of has that with "Sectors", a lot of the time you're not expected to go through the same corridors to get back though, there's usually a new route that just circles around. I didn't collect all the items (missile and health etc) though because it tends to limit where you can't return to. You can't just wander around at any given time, you're normally closed off to just that sector until you finish it. You do revisit sectors but I never felt like I got the chance to collect EVERYTHING until after the game but I didn't really feel I needed to because I felt like I had quite enough already to thrive. So what happens if you do collect everything then? Secret ending? Nope, just a hard mode unlock.
I suppose I was expecting more crazy arcade shooter moments like Prime 3 and while there are a few, I want more! I think there's still an untapped 3rd person Metroid with a 3D environment. But this is a perfectly good game, it has some of the best bosses, some of the best use of its mechanics, it's polished, it doesn't deserve quite as much flack as people make out.
2002
This review contains spoilers
So extinguishing the Metroids had a consequence, that consequence being that they were a predator, they kept the X-Parasites from out-staying their welcome but now that they're gone, the X-Parasites are here. Samus doesn't get injured from Mother Brain, she gets infected by one of these X-Boyfriends and it nearly kills her, what saves her is the Federation having a spare bit of Metroid DNA in their back pocket because why not? (If you played Other M, you'd know why) and that cures it, well mostly.
They send her back to SR-388 to combat these Parasites before they get out of hand, to extinguish yet another specimen. Well these ones can...wait am I explaining the plot? Didn't I say this was spoilers and that you should know what its about? Ok, well, whatever, let me focus more on my thoughts and differences with my expectations.
These ones can take on a host, so they take over random critters and objects and once you defeat them, you have to collect them before they find a new host. Now some of these more powerful ones can just morph, no actual body necessary. So you no longer collect random little shiny purple orbs and ammo, everything is essentially biotic and organic so there's an in lore reason as to why you're restoring health/ammo, that's really cool! Yellow restores health, Green restores Missiles, Red restores both Missiles and Health to max, and Blue restore health once Samus receives the Varia Suit upgrade. Pulled straight from Google from the wiki, your welcome.
Now how is this a beginner's tale? Well there are these Navigation rooms, which some will like, some won't, I happen to think they're kind of cool and would've appreciated them as a kid. So head to one of these rooms and it'll more or less tell you where to go, voiced by who Samus says sounds like Adam Malkovich, we'll just have to take her word for it until Dread I suppose. He's not really just a hint guide, he kind of gives you your missions and you report back to him for him to report to the Federation. But in that, I feel like it makes things a little more linear, because this game actually made it click for me just how inspirational it was for the later games from Samus Returns to Other M, from wall grabbing and climbing, getting hurt and saved by something that you can now to use to your advantage like the Phazon in Prime 3, to sectors that sometimes block you out from backtracking. Both the good and quote on quote bad. For newcomers, it's great because you really don't get lost but for veterans, it must be a bit annoying. I'm a bit in between. I also think they did this because there's no real dialogue or anything in Metroid games, most are fine with that but I know the heads of this game wanted to dive into that a bit more as I mentioned extensively in my Other M review. So it's a gamechanger to have a companion.
No more Chozo statues either. Instead they have these "Cores" which act as a hive for X-Parasites, this is where a lot of those morphers/bosses come in. Then inside lies a little membrane that makes adjustments to your suit, also really cool, I like this lore. And the remains of your suit got abducted so you fight a dominant version of yourself with all the abilities that you're missing. Her name...is Sa-X
It's just so cool to see these pretenders that can adapt to their environment. Missiles are all compilative so you start out with normal and they just get replaced with super missiles when you unlock them so that's cool. And those power bombs? Yeah those suck the parasites right to you. Even the sound design is quite good with eerie tunes and particularly soothing water sounds, even just stepping on a wet floor or going down the elevator really made me appreciate it.
Love it or hate it, I feel like this game changed the series as a whole and set up those plot threads for Other M but I thoroughly enjoyed it and now feel like I understand Metroid just that much more, it did pretty good with giving more plot without feeling too overbearing for a Metroid game. Definitely unique with its styling.
They send her back to SR-388 to combat these Parasites before they get out of hand, to extinguish yet another specimen. Well these ones can...wait am I explaining the plot? Didn't I say this was spoilers and that you should know what its about? Ok, well, whatever, let me focus more on my thoughts and differences with my expectations.
These ones can take on a host, so they take over random critters and objects and once you defeat them, you have to collect them before they find a new host. Now some of these more powerful ones can just morph, no actual body necessary. So you no longer collect random little shiny purple orbs and ammo, everything is essentially biotic and organic so there's an in lore reason as to why you're restoring health/ammo, that's really cool! Yellow restores health, Green restores Missiles, Red restores both Missiles and Health to max, and Blue restore health once Samus receives the Varia Suit upgrade. Pulled straight from Google from the wiki, your welcome.
Now how is this a beginner's tale? Well there are these Navigation rooms, which some will like, some won't, I happen to think they're kind of cool and would've appreciated them as a kid. So head to one of these rooms and it'll more or less tell you where to go, voiced by who Samus says sounds like Adam Malkovich, we'll just have to take her word for it until Dread I suppose. He's not really just a hint guide, he kind of gives you your missions and you report back to him for him to report to the Federation. But in that, I feel like it makes things a little more linear, because this game actually made it click for me just how inspirational it was for the later games from Samus Returns to Other M, from wall grabbing and climbing, getting hurt and saved by something that you can now to use to your advantage like the Phazon in Prime 3, to sectors that sometimes block you out from backtracking. Both the good and quote on quote bad. For newcomers, it's great because you really don't get lost but for veterans, it must be a bit annoying. I'm a bit in between. I also think they did this because there's no real dialogue or anything in Metroid games, most are fine with that but I know the heads of this game wanted to dive into that a bit more as I mentioned extensively in my Other M review. So it's a gamechanger to have a companion.
No more Chozo statues either. Instead they have these "Cores" which act as a hive for X-Parasites, this is where a lot of those morphers/bosses come in. Then inside lies a little membrane that makes adjustments to your suit, also really cool, I like this lore. And the remains of your suit got abducted so you fight a dominant version of yourself with all the abilities that you're missing. Her name...is Sa-X
It's just so cool to see these pretenders that can adapt to their environment. Missiles are all compilative so you start out with normal and they just get replaced with super missiles when you unlock them so that's cool. And those power bombs? Yeah those suck the parasites right to you. Even the sound design is quite good with eerie tunes and particularly soothing water sounds, even just stepping on a wet floor or going down the elevator really made me appreciate it.
Love it or hate it, I feel like this game changed the series as a whole and set up those plot threads for Other M but I thoroughly enjoyed it and now feel like I understand Metroid just that much more, it did pretty good with giving more plot without feeling too overbearing for a Metroid game. Definitely unique with its styling.
Most of what I knew about this game came from Dunkey's video. I knew it was a beat-em-up sort of thing with elements from Yakuza and other open world games mixed with a Chinese flare and a decent amount of cursing but it didn't exactly break many molds that I heard of despite its audacious story premises.
One day the main menu theme came up on my YouTube theme and I've been listening to it ever since and that was enough to put it back on my radar so I put it on my Steam watchlist. I thought maybe I'd pick it up when I was done with Yakuza as a sort of side game thing but then I saw that you can drive in this game and that set me over the edge, maybe it wasn't just a Yakuza clone, I was going to play it. I bought it during one of the Steam sales for super cheap, definitive edition too so it has all the content, not as big of a fan of the remixed menu music but it's fine.
Immediately what stuck out to me was the atmosphere, everything is all warmly colored with a dark wash to it, gangs, slums, tightly packed market spaces, a variety of NPCs roaming the streets, it seemed like a good time. But let's take a shortcut to combat for a bit. The combat is very reminiscent of Yakuza with things like interact-able environments where you can throw someone through a window and stuff but it doesn't feel heavily reliant on weapons which is fine with me, it gives it a bare knuckle brawl sort of vibe that you'd see on the streets. It also adds countering though which is pretty cool, that alone can make the combat seem different and varied because you can give it more flow.
Other than that, it's your run of the mill combat system. A lot of other things are pretty reminiscent of what I've mentioned with Yakuza such as side-quests, finishers, even the karaoke but the ability tree has a little gimmick worth mentioning. It's split up into two paths because if you don't know, you play as a cop posing as a gang member so you get cop points and triad points and you use those to unlock different abilities. This doesn't affect the run as a whole because there's only one ending but there is side material where you can act as a cop and take down a quick riot in the back alleyways with a few of your other cop buddies. As well as the main quests being split between those two but any quest deals with the system where doing things lawfully rewards you more cop points and not so lawfully more triad points so there's that.
It has some cool finishing moves like you can do wall kicks and then jump kicks. There was this one part where you had to take pictures for this lady and this guy photobombs you in front of the sunset, it's really funny but the goal is to try and get him out of the way so what I chose to do is pick him up and throw him into the ocean, it's just so great the kind of comedic moments you can create.
The NPCs and cars can be the same models and walk right next to each other but the world is so vast and there's so many variations that it's fine. Sometimes an enemy will grab you from behind and it tells you to kick which is meant to kick another enemy in front of you but sometimes there is no enemy to kick so you're left at a stalemate until the reaction command decides it wants to change to something else.
The actual Steam port itself could use a little more because I was using my PS4 controller but it only recognizes Xbox so when it says "press X" I would but where the X is on the Xbox, is the place where the square is on the Playstation, so I messed up all the time. The camera is also a bit shoddy at times, especially while driving, it made me dizzy (which is easy to do nowadays but still) you can hold back on the analog stick and it shows a reverse view. You can do U-turns a little easier though if you get the hang of pressing circle and then 180 the control stick. So yeah, I think if you don't like this game initially, give it a look up online because there's a ton of stuff that you can do that the game doesn't tell you and it made the experience that much more enjoyable for me.
But other than that, if you can see it, you can usually drive it, doing those side missions unlocks bonuses which sometimes include vehicles and clothing. There are some dumb missions sometimes though, I'll say that much. Like this bus vs bus one that took absolutely forever, basically anything you have to run them off the road and destroy their car is a really tedious mission to try and beat. You can paint them usually too but it's kind of odd for bikes especially because of how far away the camera is and how dark the lighting is, there's no way to swivel or zoom or anything, it's just static. But yes, you can run into parking meters and get money from them so I guess it evens out. It wouldn't even be too farfetched to say you can drive the Batmobile.
I'll talk about the DLC in a separate post later on but as far as a rating goes, I'm a bit mixed. Because a 7/10 seems fair but in terms of personal value, while I think it delivered better on what it was trying to do, there are games that I've given lower scores and liked more such as Resident Evil 3 Remake, Metroid Other M, Prince of Persia Warrior Within so I might bring it down to at least a 6. Is it underrated? Yes, there's nothing really wrong with it, I like it's asian representation and there's a lot of care there, but despite that I just don't feel overly passionate about the game.
One day the main menu theme came up on my YouTube theme and I've been listening to it ever since and that was enough to put it back on my radar so I put it on my Steam watchlist. I thought maybe I'd pick it up when I was done with Yakuza as a sort of side game thing but then I saw that you can drive in this game and that set me over the edge, maybe it wasn't just a Yakuza clone, I was going to play it. I bought it during one of the Steam sales for super cheap, definitive edition too so it has all the content, not as big of a fan of the remixed menu music but it's fine.
Immediately what stuck out to me was the atmosphere, everything is all warmly colored with a dark wash to it, gangs, slums, tightly packed market spaces, a variety of NPCs roaming the streets, it seemed like a good time. But let's take a shortcut to combat for a bit. The combat is very reminiscent of Yakuza with things like interact-able environments where you can throw someone through a window and stuff but it doesn't feel heavily reliant on weapons which is fine with me, it gives it a bare knuckle brawl sort of vibe that you'd see on the streets. It also adds countering though which is pretty cool, that alone can make the combat seem different and varied because you can give it more flow.
Other than that, it's your run of the mill combat system. A lot of other things are pretty reminiscent of what I've mentioned with Yakuza such as side-quests, finishers, even the karaoke but the ability tree has a little gimmick worth mentioning. It's split up into two paths because if you don't know, you play as a cop posing as a gang member so you get cop points and triad points and you use those to unlock different abilities. This doesn't affect the run as a whole because there's only one ending but there is side material where you can act as a cop and take down a quick riot in the back alleyways with a few of your other cop buddies. As well as the main quests being split between those two but any quest deals with the system where doing things lawfully rewards you more cop points and not so lawfully more triad points so there's that.
It has some cool finishing moves like you can do wall kicks and then jump kicks. There was this one part where you had to take pictures for this lady and this guy photobombs you in front of the sunset, it's really funny but the goal is to try and get him out of the way so what I chose to do is pick him up and throw him into the ocean, it's just so great the kind of comedic moments you can create.
The NPCs and cars can be the same models and walk right next to each other but the world is so vast and there's so many variations that it's fine. Sometimes an enemy will grab you from behind and it tells you to kick which is meant to kick another enemy in front of you but sometimes there is no enemy to kick so you're left at a stalemate until the reaction command decides it wants to change to something else.
The actual Steam port itself could use a little more because I was using my PS4 controller but it only recognizes Xbox so when it says "press X" I would but where the X is on the Xbox, is the place where the square is on the Playstation, so I messed up all the time. The camera is also a bit shoddy at times, especially while driving, it made me dizzy (which is easy to do nowadays but still) you can hold back on the analog stick and it shows a reverse view. You can do U-turns a little easier though if you get the hang of pressing circle and then 180 the control stick. So yeah, I think if you don't like this game initially, give it a look up online because there's a ton of stuff that you can do that the game doesn't tell you and it made the experience that much more enjoyable for me.
But other than that, if you can see it, you can usually drive it, doing those side missions unlocks bonuses which sometimes include vehicles and clothing. There are some dumb missions sometimes though, I'll say that much. Like this bus vs bus one that took absolutely forever, basically anything you have to run them off the road and destroy their car is a really tedious mission to try and beat. You can paint them usually too but it's kind of odd for bikes especially because of how far away the camera is and how dark the lighting is, there's no way to swivel or zoom or anything, it's just static. But yes, you can run into parking meters and get money from them so I guess it evens out. It wouldn't even be too farfetched to say you can drive the Batmobile.
I'll talk about the DLC in a separate post later on but as far as a rating goes, I'm a bit mixed. Because a 7/10 seems fair but in terms of personal value, while I think it delivered better on what it was trying to do, there are games that I've given lower scores and liked more such as Resident Evil 3 Remake, Metroid Other M, Prince of Persia Warrior Within so I might bring it down to at least a 6. Is it underrated? Yes, there's nothing really wrong with it, I like it's asian representation and there's a lot of care there, but despite that I just don't feel overly passionate about the game.
I remember being in Gamestop as a kid, just browsing the games to see which 3 I could get since it was buy 2 get one free. My grandma was with me and she said she thought I wanted Tomb Raider, showing me the Wii port of Underworld, which so happens to be the one with just Lara's cleavage and midriff on the cover so then I scoffed because I was like "As if I'd ever be caught dead playing a Tomb Raider game." Me still pretending to be grandma's little angel that wouldn't even imagine thirsting over a female video game character...yet...and to remain a hardcore Indiana Jones fan by saying Lara was just a cheap knockoff. And the way the games looked, I kind of can't blame my past self. I mean, they came out with what? 5/6 games and decided to reboot it. Each one after that kind of rebooted in a little bit of the sense but also acted as a sequel. Reboot/spinoff again with Lara and the Guardian of Light which switched up everything entirely, then they reboot again and make it grittier and grounded and drab, more akin to something like Uncharted. So I've always seen this series as experimental and always trying to push the next type of gameplay rather than keep a cohesive storyline that isn't about the world ending every 5 seconds. And I always felt bad that you shoot the animals.
The Wii apparently has a flashlight and some pointer puzzles...so there's that. But I mainly just wanted it because it starts out with the mansion being blown up which is pretty cool, even though I like exploring the mansion, the story behind it made me want to see why. But like I mentioned with my Anniverary review, the Xbox version is probably the best. Why? Because it runs smoother and it's the only one with the dlc, Beneath the Ashes and Lara's Shadow. But do you really want to buy two $10 dlcs from 2009? I ended up just watching them online. You also have to buy the games separately, there's no trilogy collection like PS3 (which doesn't come with the DLCs for whatever reason).
So if you did end up reading my Anniversary review, disregard most of that for this game because this one actually did pretty much everything better. There are some issues that still carry over though but I won't reiterate.
Performance wise, I had some really good framerate and some unbearable framerate, what triggered it, I have no clue but sometimes it got so bad it crashed (very rare though). It still has that lock in place camera for whatever reason too.
Moving objects can be finnicky but silly because you can place them and sometimes they'll go shooting across the room. You may accidentally bump into it and it'll stick to you and move it out of where its supposed to be. It's like a game of prop hunt.
Movement is a lot more fluid, I feel you can get a little more done in a shorter amount of time. You didn't get to ride the bike in Anni, but you could in Legend and you can in this one. There's a level where you take it with you to explore a few temples and it's not just a scripted sequence. But then it gets a bit weird because you take it with you into the tomb and you have to navigate with it in those halls and then stop and get off and do something real quick and then jump right back on. And you have to use it because there are ramps you have to jump, I thought the point of the bike was to look cool but it's just a hassle half the time.
Story is the macguffin "collect this to get that" sort of end of the world thing to find your parents but there are some cool elements incorporated, I certainly understand it more now that I've played the other two in the trilogy though. Did that scene of the mansion blowing up at least live up to my expectations? No, not really.
I actually forgot I knew about this and it bothered me then and it bothers me now but it's such a small nitpick with the design. Lara gets dirty, not muddy, just dirty. It's the sort of thing that on a detailed and technical level sounds interesting but I personally just don't really like the way it looks. Now you may not be able to turn that off but you can adjust your settings to tailor your gameplay how you want it. Enemies having too little health? You can increase it individually rather than switching to hard mode. Little stuff like that.
There aren't really fightable bosses or QTEs this time around, which I'm not going to complain about, just a strange departure. Instead we get slow mo (jump) sequences and structures you have to destroy to take the villain down.
As far as the trilogy goes, it's kind of average, even a little weak. The stories are very loosely connected and the gameplay could use an overhaul. I might rank them all one day but I don't really feel the need to yet. As far as the game itself goes, it had some cool moments like the octopus but is in no way a great game in my eyes, I'd leave it as kind of underbaked and average. Even after seeing the DLC, I don't care to see it continued.
The Wii apparently has a flashlight and some pointer puzzles...so there's that. But I mainly just wanted it because it starts out with the mansion being blown up which is pretty cool, even though I like exploring the mansion, the story behind it made me want to see why. But like I mentioned with my Anniverary review, the Xbox version is probably the best. Why? Because it runs smoother and it's the only one with the dlc, Beneath the Ashes and Lara's Shadow. But do you really want to buy two $10 dlcs from 2009? I ended up just watching them online. You also have to buy the games separately, there's no trilogy collection like PS3 (which doesn't come with the DLCs for whatever reason).
So if you did end up reading my Anniversary review, disregard most of that for this game because this one actually did pretty much everything better. There are some issues that still carry over though but I won't reiterate.
Performance wise, I had some really good framerate and some unbearable framerate, what triggered it, I have no clue but sometimes it got so bad it crashed (very rare though). It still has that lock in place camera for whatever reason too.
Moving objects can be finnicky but silly because you can place them and sometimes they'll go shooting across the room. You may accidentally bump into it and it'll stick to you and move it out of where its supposed to be. It's like a game of prop hunt.
Movement is a lot more fluid, I feel you can get a little more done in a shorter amount of time. You didn't get to ride the bike in Anni, but you could in Legend and you can in this one. There's a level where you take it with you to explore a few temples and it's not just a scripted sequence. But then it gets a bit weird because you take it with you into the tomb and you have to navigate with it in those halls and then stop and get off and do something real quick and then jump right back on. And you have to use it because there are ramps you have to jump, I thought the point of the bike was to look cool but it's just a hassle half the time.
Story is the macguffin "collect this to get that" sort of end of the world thing to find your parents but there are some cool elements incorporated, I certainly understand it more now that I've played the other two in the trilogy though. Did that scene of the mansion blowing up at least live up to my expectations? No, not really.
I actually forgot I knew about this and it bothered me then and it bothers me now but it's such a small nitpick with the design. Lara gets dirty, not muddy, just dirty. It's the sort of thing that on a detailed and technical level sounds interesting but I personally just don't really like the way it looks. Now you may not be able to turn that off but you can adjust your settings to tailor your gameplay how you want it. Enemies having too little health? You can increase it individually rather than switching to hard mode. Little stuff like that.
There aren't really fightable bosses or QTEs this time around, which I'm not going to complain about, just a strange departure. Instead we get slow mo (jump) sequences and structures you have to destroy to take the villain down.
As far as the trilogy goes, it's kind of average, even a little weak. The stories are very loosely connected and the gameplay could use an overhaul. I might rank them all one day but I don't really feel the need to yet. As far as the game itself goes, it had some cool moments like the octopus but is in no way a great game in my eyes, I'd leave it as kind of underbaked and average. Even after seeing the DLC, I don't care to see it continued.
2003
A common complaint about Pokémon is that most of the games seem the same, that it needs a breath of fresh air while also retaining all the past Pokémon. Legends started to remedy that but for me, it was this.
This was my first Pokémon game so it's nice to come back to my roots, a good bit of nostalgia.
You get Umbreon and Espeon at the beginning so I just figured that you buy more Pokémon at the store, I mean the Pokéballs are right there. And since they came in a lot, I expected them to be a surprise. My child mind came up with the gacha system.
But those aren't even Pokéballs, I just thought they were. There's a lore reason as to why they don't have any Pokéballs there though…ITS THE DESERT. Apparently there just aren't any Pokémon to catch around there so there's only one place in the game that actually sells them.
The plot revolves around the Snagems, which have the power to steal Pokémon. One of those…is you. So yes, instead of random encounters, you choose to fight trainers and you can steal their Pokemon. You automatically turn Pokéballs into Snagballs.
They used things like FF7 as inspo to create a more edgy protagonist (that doesn't talk) and shake the game since players were getting older (and they weren't experts on Pokemon in general). There's even a Sephiroth looking fellow.
But the Snatchers can lock away a Pokémon's heart so they can't feel and are just a fighting machine. These are the ones that you can catch but you can also just choose to take them out the old fashioned way. But I felt the catch rate was absurdly lower than any normal Pokémon game. But the story is really good, better than your average "Team whatever is at it again in the quest to be the best" it has some break aways from the formula.
There's no normal build up like gyms, there are stadiums and colosseums, one is fixed fights that you can gain exp from, you can choose to do those one at a time. And the other is a gauntlet of battles between different trainers, (everything is double battles in this game BTW). You also raid bases though too like your average Team Rocket. This makes it seem like battles more or less happen one right after the other in a straight line, leaving me wanting a little more variety but that may just be Pokémon in general and just be more noticeable here.
And because of the no random encounters, being in the desert and all, you don't have to trek from place to place, you just choose on the map as if you had fly, but instead you ride a bike. You don't actually get to control the bike (it had a short development schedule or I'm sure you could have).
I'd mainly play the straight battle mode as a kid because I understood that a little more with both teams getting random Pokémon. Pretty sure the back of the box said 2 players, so I just assumed you plug in another controller and the other player plays as the opposing trainer so I tricked my cousins into thinking they were actually doing something but in reality, it was the AI making all the decisions. I mean they didn't play Pokémon either, they knew what it was but they were Playstation kids. I remember one of them particularly hated Sentret because of how easy he was to beat.
For a 2004 game, it has some pretty good and unique animations like Duskull's light being snuffed out and just the grey sheet falling to the floor. Or Spoink getting all spiral eyed and fainting as the orb rolls from its head. Even some of the trainers. I think that's part of why having Umbreon and Espeon as the main party members was so enjoyable. As a kid, you want to catch them all and don't really get to appreciate it as much but I really felt for Espeon every time she got hit because in my head, these two have personality. Espeon barely got hit but when she did, it just seems to make Umbreon want to hit back more "You can't do that to my girl!" And the way Umbreon's lights flicker, when he gets thrown back, you wonder if his light will come back. It makes you feel for them which I suppose is the lesson here. Also, there's a manga based on it and it uses the exact same idea so I imagine it was deliberate.
Also Espy and Umbry (who I named Noctis and Lunafreya) are both in their 20s level wise at the start so there's no real need to start from scratch but when you catch more Pokémon, they're more or less good until that level cap is surpassed because they don't level up until they're purified. You can stick them in daycare but that's one at a time. Purifying them isn't that bad, I actually find the experience to be enjoyable because you have to get them to listen to you so it's not an immediate trainer and pet relationship so you'll have to rely on Espy and Umbry more than anything. But there are a good variety of ways to get the shadow meter down. Also, the battles more or less always aimed for Espeon over Umbreon which I thought was the level difference but then I got Espeon to surpass Umbreon so I have no clue what the AI was thinking.
There are certain things that slow the game down like walk speed and the time it takes for the animations, especially throwing your Pokémon out to begin but I'm going to chalk that up to age. Also, there's no reason Rui couldn't be the one to carry the second Pokémon in team battles, it'd give her a little more to do than just follow you around but again, an all around great story for a Pokémon game, would really like to see it represented in the anime similar to Chronicles and Origins.
This was my first Pokémon game so it's nice to come back to my roots, a good bit of nostalgia.
You get Umbreon and Espeon at the beginning so I just figured that you buy more Pokémon at the store, I mean the Pokéballs are right there. And since they came in a lot, I expected them to be a surprise. My child mind came up with the gacha system.
But those aren't even Pokéballs, I just thought they were. There's a lore reason as to why they don't have any Pokéballs there though…ITS THE DESERT. Apparently there just aren't any Pokémon to catch around there so there's only one place in the game that actually sells them.
The plot revolves around the Snagems, which have the power to steal Pokémon. One of those…is you. So yes, instead of random encounters, you choose to fight trainers and you can steal their Pokemon. You automatically turn Pokéballs into Snagballs.
They used things like FF7 as inspo to create a more edgy protagonist (that doesn't talk) and shake the game since players were getting older (and they weren't experts on Pokemon in general). There's even a Sephiroth looking fellow.
But the Snatchers can lock away a Pokémon's heart so they can't feel and are just a fighting machine. These are the ones that you can catch but you can also just choose to take them out the old fashioned way. But I felt the catch rate was absurdly lower than any normal Pokémon game. But the story is really good, better than your average "Team whatever is at it again in the quest to be the best" it has some break aways from the formula.
There's no normal build up like gyms, there are stadiums and colosseums, one is fixed fights that you can gain exp from, you can choose to do those one at a time. And the other is a gauntlet of battles between different trainers, (everything is double battles in this game BTW). You also raid bases though too like your average Team Rocket. This makes it seem like battles more or less happen one right after the other in a straight line, leaving me wanting a little more variety but that may just be Pokémon in general and just be more noticeable here.
And because of the no random encounters, being in the desert and all, you don't have to trek from place to place, you just choose on the map as if you had fly, but instead you ride a bike. You don't actually get to control the bike (it had a short development schedule or I'm sure you could have).
I'd mainly play the straight battle mode as a kid because I understood that a little more with both teams getting random Pokémon. Pretty sure the back of the box said 2 players, so I just assumed you plug in another controller and the other player plays as the opposing trainer so I tricked my cousins into thinking they were actually doing something but in reality, it was the AI making all the decisions. I mean they didn't play Pokémon either, they knew what it was but they were Playstation kids. I remember one of them particularly hated Sentret because of how easy he was to beat.
For a 2004 game, it has some pretty good and unique animations like Duskull's light being snuffed out and just the grey sheet falling to the floor. Or Spoink getting all spiral eyed and fainting as the orb rolls from its head. Even some of the trainers. I think that's part of why having Umbreon and Espeon as the main party members was so enjoyable. As a kid, you want to catch them all and don't really get to appreciate it as much but I really felt for Espeon every time she got hit because in my head, these two have personality. Espeon barely got hit but when she did, it just seems to make Umbreon want to hit back more "You can't do that to my girl!" And the way Umbreon's lights flicker, when he gets thrown back, you wonder if his light will come back. It makes you feel for them which I suppose is the lesson here. Also, there's a manga based on it and it uses the exact same idea so I imagine it was deliberate.
Also Espy and Umbry (who I named Noctis and Lunafreya) are both in their 20s level wise at the start so there's no real need to start from scratch but when you catch more Pokémon, they're more or less good until that level cap is surpassed because they don't level up until they're purified. You can stick them in daycare but that's one at a time. Purifying them isn't that bad, I actually find the experience to be enjoyable because you have to get them to listen to you so it's not an immediate trainer and pet relationship so you'll have to rely on Espy and Umbry more than anything. But there are a good variety of ways to get the shadow meter down. Also, the battles more or less always aimed for Espeon over Umbreon which I thought was the level difference but then I got Espeon to surpass Umbreon so I have no clue what the AI was thinking.
There are certain things that slow the game down like walk speed and the time it takes for the animations, especially throwing your Pokémon out to begin but I'm going to chalk that up to age. Also, there's no reason Rui couldn't be the one to carry the second Pokémon in team battles, it'd give her a little more to do than just follow you around but again, an all around great story for a Pokémon game, would really like to see it represented in the anime similar to Chronicles and Origins.
Using this as my Wii review:
For those who haven't read my PC review, might be confused, so check that out here.
So how's this compared to the PC version?
Controls are still a bit unsavory because some stuff is mapped to the D-Pad which can be kind of hard to use when the remote is vertical. Moving the camera is also kind of like that by holding the C-button on the nunchuck and pointing the Wii remote where you want to look but at least you can see where you're jumping this time. I guess camera's just a Tomb Raider Anniversary curse.
Instead of just levers, there are little knicks and knacks like 'rubs' which sounds wrong but they're inscriptions that you can dust off like a DS game and run charcoal over them to get an imprint and match them up on a wheel. There are also a few more types of collectibles through that. You can chip away at the wall using a pick and cement knife to pick up your relics rather than just picking them up off the floor, same locations though. The gears are always right there on the floor though and 9/10 it'll be the same solution. And there's this funny drawing puzzle where you have to make symbols but they're really just squiggly lines.
I won't bother mentioning what's the same because most of it is, but I didn't get as many enemies getting stuck or even Lara for that matter, it was all mostly normal.
Framerate takes a dip but that's to be expected. Locking on seems a bit tougher because you actually have to aim at the enemies so there's no "up close and personal shooting mode" anymore. There's a flashlight now so some places are darker than before and QTEs are motion based. Wolves and stuff can grab onto you and you have to shake the nunchuck to get them off.
The dinosaur battle is a bit middling because in the original (PS1), you just fight it. In this one, you 'can' do that but it's going to be super annoying and long so they added the gimmick that you need to dodge at just the right time and let it hit these spike things but it relies solely on the dodge ability, you can't jump behind these spike logs so it turns out pretty cheesy. This was for both games but it's really disappointing to have a scene that iconic just be kind of limp. But at least you hear the gun through the Wii remote, there's that.
Take it from someone who bought the game twice because he wanted to like it but thought it was just the version he was playing, I label it as a bad game. Worst Tomb Raider I've played so far (not that I've played that many).
Was it worth it though? Yeah, kind of, now I know it wasn't just the version. What took me 2 hours in the Wii version took me four days to complete on PC, not just because it was my first playthrough but because it took so long to get it to work correctly. (I was in St. Francis Folly for reference) So I got to play the game a bit easier at times but it ended up evening out with annoying jumps that I knew how to make but just couldn't execute due to the Wii or bad level design (like the mapping I mentioned in the PC review). I saw enough potential in it enough to play it but it just didn't live up to that overall, too many things bogging it down. It seems (though outdated) the original PS1 game has this beat in very many aspects but I'm done trying to live through this again.
For those who haven't read my PC review, might be confused, so check that out here.
So how's this compared to the PC version?
Controls are still a bit unsavory because some stuff is mapped to the D-Pad which can be kind of hard to use when the remote is vertical. Moving the camera is also kind of like that by holding the C-button on the nunchuck and pointing the Wii remote where you want to look but at least you can see where you're jumping this time. I guess camera's just a Tomb Raider Anniversary curse.
Instead of just levers, there are little knicks and knacks like 'rubs' which sounds wrong but they're inscriptions that you can dust off like a DS game and run charcoal over them to get an imprint and match them up on a wheel. There are also a few more types of collectibles through that. You can chip away at the wall using a pick and cement knife to pick up your relics rather than just picking them up off the floor, same locations though. The gears are always right there on the floor though and 9/10 it'll be the same solution. And there's this funny drawing puzzle where you have to make symbols but they're really just squiggly lines.
I won't bother mentioning what's the same because most of it is, but I didn't get as many enemies getting stuck or even Lara for that matter, it was all mostly normal.
Framerate takes a dip but that's to be expected. Locking on seems a bit tougher because you actually have to aim at the enemies so there's no "up close and personal shooting mode" anymore. There's a flashlight now so some places are darker than before and QTEs are motion based. Wolves and stuff can grab onto you and you have to shake the nunchuck to get them off.
The dinosaur battle is a bit middling because in the original (PS1), you just fight it. In this one, you 'can' do that but it's going to be super annoying and long so they added the gimmick that you need to dodge at just the right time and let it hit these spike things but it relies solely on the dodge ability, you can't jump behind these spike logs so it turns out pretty cheesy. This was for both games but it's really disappointing to have a scene that iconic just be kind of limp. But at least you hear the gun through the Wii remote, there's that.
Take it from someone who bought the game twice because he wanted to like it but thought it was just the version he was playing, I label it as a bad game. Worst Tomb Raider I've played so far (not that I've played that many).
Was it worth it though? Yeah, kind of, now I know it wasn't just the version. What took me 2 hours in the Wii version took me four days to complete on PC, not just because it was my first playthrough but because it took so long to get it to work correctly. (I was in St. Francis Folly for reference) So I got to play the game a bit easier at times but it ended up evening out with annoying jumps that I knew how to make but just couldn't execute due to the Wii or bad level design (like the mapping I mentioned in the PC review). I saw enough potential in it enough to play it but it just didn't live up to that overall, too many things bogging it down. It seems (though outdated) the original PS1 game has this beat in very many aspects but I'm done trying to live through this again.
This is PC specific, I'll post a Wii one too
This can be buggy. Places not properly mapped so trying to jump up onto places clearly there in front of you but there's no grab (though, I had auto grab on so maybe manual has a difference). Enemy AI getting stuck in odd places. Player AI getting stuck (mainly when crawling). And the camera…yeesh. Especially when you're trying to jump onto something behind you. It's a blind leap. Even worse when I used a controller, luckily I'm not picky enough to refuse keyboard and mouse.
This isn't an uncommon issue either, it comes down to how much tolerance you have for how a game works and crashes. I ended up verifying game files, uninstalling then reinstalling and somehow it came back. Even then, I played it with task manager in the background but it didn't last. What ended up working was playing in windowed mode. How? I downloaded a thing off github that I could provide upon request but there's a gimmick now. Sometimes the camera only wants to aim downwards so I can't see what I'm doing…It's just a shame that this game has aged this poorly because it could be darn fine if it all worked the way it was supposed to. But the way it is now, this is probably one of the worst games I've ever played.
What's more is that the swan dive just plain doesn't work, when you load a game, you have to start a new game, skip the cutscenes until you can play and then load it from the menu. The way to fix this is to either rename your profile (or just make a new one) or rename the manual save to autosave.trasave. I don't think I was noble by finishing the game with all these problems but if I wanted to play it, I didn't have a whole lot of other options unless I wanted to buy it for a load more money by buying an outdated PS3 or Xbox 360 and as I mentioned, when I tried using a controller, it didn't work so well.
Now that I said that, I bought the Wii version because I heard that it's the best version, a bit of an outliar. So, that will be a second review for my second attempt. I mentioned Underworld but don't get the Wii version of that one. (rather complicated, I know.)
This can be buggy. Places not properly mapped so trying to jump up onto places clearly there in front of you but there's no grab (though, I had auto grab on so maybe manual has a difference). Enemy AI getting stuck in odd places. Player AI getting stuck (mainly when crawling). And the camera…yeesh. Especially when you're trying to jump onto something behind you. It's a blind leap. Even worse when I used a controller, luckily I'm not picky enough to refuse keyboard and mouse.
This isn't an uncommon issue either, it comes down to how much tolerance you have for how a game works and crashes. I ended up verifying game files, uninstalling then reinstalling and somehow it came back. Even then, I played it with task manager in the background but it didn't last. What ended up working was playing in windowed mode. How? I downloaded a thing off github that I could provide upon request but there's a gimmick now. Sometimes the camera only wants to aim downwards so I can't see what I'm doing…It's just a shame that this game has aged this poorly because it could be darn fine if it all worked the way it was supposed to. But the way it is now, this is probably one of the worst games I've ever played.
What's more is that the swan dive just plain doesn't work, when you load a game, you have to start a new game, skip the cutscenes until you can play and then load it from the menu. The way to fix this is to either rename your profile (or just make a new one) or rename the manual save to autosave.trasave. I don't think I was noble by finishing the game with all these problems but if I wanted to play it, I didn't have a whole lot of other options unless I wanted to buy it for a load more money by buying an outdated PS3 or Xbox 360 and as I mentioned, when I tried using a controller, it didn't work so well.
Now that I said that, I bought the Wii version because I heard that it's the best version, a bit of an outliar. So, that will be a second review for my second attempt. I mentioned Underworld but don't get the Wii version of that one. (rather complicated, I know.)
I actually had this game for Wii but I didn’t make it very far, I think what ended up happening was that I sold it for my PS2 (I sold a lot for that dang thing) but I thought it had a very interesting story with neat characters that always stuck out in my head. I mentioned this before but I even named by frog “Nion” because Kento Marek (Starkiller’s father) was originally Kento Nion (it was changed between the book and game and stuff, last minute decision)
But I bought the Ultimate Sith Edition on Steam for 2-3$. Here’s what I have to say about it:
Well the title abbreviates to TFU which is…something, FU2 I suppose, lmao.
From Wii to PC. I really enjoyed the controls on Wii, it made me feel like “One hand is light, one hand is dark”. I wasn’t sure that I liked the skill tree idea when I was a kid but after playing more games proper with that incorporated, I think it’s fine because it shows you just how much more powerful Vader is at the beginning versus how Starkiller is. From a distance it looks like a beat ‘em up/hack and slash but I found a lot to it, the force powers alone made this journey worth it, the amount of things you can manipulate is pretty stunning.
I don’t remember how it was for the Wii, but for this PC version specifically, sometimes the game would freeze, audio would glitch or the loading could take a while. Makes me wish they still had support for this game.
One of the turn offs for me is the health bars above enemies heads, I know it doesn’t bother most people but any game that incorporates that just seems fake to me, I even mentioned how I turned it off in Neo: Twewy. It’s not healthbars that I don’t like, it’s that there are so many of them at one time and directly above their heads.
STORY. We know about the Jedi who escaped Order 66, who gets killed and his son gets found by Vader and taken under his wing. Or at least, I think everybody knows at least that. But I feel it’s so much more. Sam Witwer, who also voices Maul now btw, does a great job. He reminds me a lot of Anakin, showing how much his training shines through. But the idea of Vader using him in secret as his personal lackey is pretty cool too, even away from the Emperor. Palpy wouldn’t let Vader really go after these Jedi, I assume because the Emperor had his own plans for them so he sent someone to do it in secret.
Starkiller’s design alone gives me a lot of information, he has what looks like a restraining bolt on his left, his heart. Which makes him seem cold but also just a puppet to Vader. Nothing more than a droid. A slave. So the slave becomes the slavemaster…maybe I shouldn’t talk about that. But like I said, we get to see Starkiller basically live out this life that Vader couldn’t, and that just so happens to include love, softening him. You see, one of the main characteristics about Anakin is that he’s a good pilot but Starkiller here doesn’t get that joy, he has Juno Eclipse fly for him, his personal chauffeur. I could see Vader depriving SK, I mean he gave him the name Starkiller, didn’t he? He knows killing, that’s it, yet they made him a cool character despite those restraints.
I’ve always considered this canon above any of the other games and wanted it to make an appearance in mainline Star Wars material or at least the idea of it. I mentioned with Obi-Wan Kenobi that it just always seems like there’s another Jedi who escaped Order 66, which at the time this came out wasn’t a problem, but the idea of Starkiller hunting them for a living as if there’s an endless supply is…questionable. But I also mentioned that I thought Kenobi would’ve done better as a game and in a game context, this idea works really well. This was also the original bridge between 3 and 4 so this pioneered a lot of the ideas Star Wars has built since then. And even the lost masters have interesting bits to their story despite just being boss battles. Kasdan Paratus for example is overwhelmed with grief of Order 66 and has a makeshift Jedi Council room made of scrap where he made mannequins of the Masters. That’s deep for someone who has only a few lines of dialogue.
As far as cosmetics and spectacles, it obviously has some really good setpieces, this is where that scene of bringing down the Star Destroyer came from. The complaint I have about that one in particular is that the scene requires you to fight off waves of TIEs as well and I’m fine with QTEs but the way that specific one was done was kind of shoddy. Each world you visit is unique and very fitting like George had a specific hand in it. Remember that really colorful plant area that Aayla Secura was killed in Order 66? You visit that planet! Felucia. And to top it off, you get a new costume every time. You want to change the color of your lightsaber? You can do that if you find the collectibles.
What, that wasn’t enough?
Then aside from the costumes you gain for each mission, you also get skins for different characters throughout the series. I beat Darth Vader with the Ben Kenobi skin from Episode IV and a black lightsaber (I don’t think the darksaber officially existed yet). I played a level as a Clone Wars animated style Starkiller. I beat up Luke Skywalker with a Sith C-3PO and Old Ben with a Luke from RoTJ. It’s letting me live my fantasies and I think that if it wasn’t for gameplay falling a bit short in a few aspects, this would be my favorite Star Wars game but for now it’ll just have to settle for second to Lego Star Wars.
I’ll probably leave the sequel to the novelization. Yeah, believe it or not, there are novelizations of these two games and comic books that add a little more depth, especially in the case of #2. There’s a bit more elaboration to them to which I think would only strengthen the story. One boss in particular just sort of happens in this game and they only briefly explain it afterwards but it kind of comes from out of the blue, a novelization would only expand on this already great game. Even the DLCs that came with the Ultimate Sith Edition are good. I may have only paid around $3 for this but this is worth more than full price to me.
But I bought the Ultimate Sith Edition on Steam for 2-3$. Here’s what I have to say about it:
Well the title abbreviates to TFU which is…something, FU2 I suppose, lmao.
From Wii to PC. I really enjoyed the controls on Wii, it made me feel like “One hand is light, one hand is dark”. I wasn’t sure that I liked the skill tree idea when I was a kid but after playing more games proper with that incorporated, I think it’s fine because it shows you just how much more powerful Vader is at the beginning versus how Starkiller is. From a distance it looks like a beat ‘em up/hack and slash but I found a lot to it, the force powers alone made this journey worth it, the amount of things you can manipulate is pretty stunning.
I don’t remember how it was for the Wii, but for this PC version specifically, sometimes the game would freeze, audio would glitch or the loading could take a while. Makes me wish they still had support for this game.
One of the turn offs for me is the health bars above enemies heads, I know it doesn’t bother most people but any game that incorporates that just seems fake to me, I even mentioned how I turned it off in Neo: Twewy. It’s not healthbars that I don’t like, it’s that there are so many of them at one time and directly above their heads.
STORY. We know about the Jedi who escaped Order 66, who gets killed and his son gets found by Vader and taken under his wing. Or at least, I think everybody knows at least that. But I feel it’s so much more. Sam Witwer, who also voices Maul now btw, does a great job. He reminds me a lot of Anakin, showing how much his training shines through. But the idea of Vader using him in secret as his personal lackey is pretty cool too, even away from the Emperor. Palpy wouldn’t let Vader really go after these Jedi, I assume because the Emperor had his own plans for them so he sent someone to do it in secret.
Starkiller’s design alone gives me a lot of information, he has what looks like a restraining bolt on his left, his heart. Which makes him seem cold but also just a puppet to Vader. Nothing more than a droid. A slave. So the slave becomes the slavemaster…maybe I shouldn’t talk about that. But like I said, we get to see Starkiller basically live out this life that Vader couldn’t, and that just so happens to include love, softening him. You see, one of the main characteristics about Anakin is that he’s a good pilot but Starkiller here doesn’t get that joy, he has Juno Eclipse fly for him, his personal chauffeur. I could see Vader depriving SK, I mean he gave him the name Starkiller, didn’t he? He knows killing, that’s it, yet they made him a cool character despite those restraints.
I’ve always considered this canon above any of the other games and wanted it to make an appearance in mainline Star Wars material or at least the idea of it. I mentioned with Obi-Wan Kenobi that it just always seems like there’s another Jedi who escaped Order 66, which at the time this came out wasn’t a problem, but the idea of Starkiller hunting them for a living as if there’s an endless supply is…questionable. But I also mentioned that I thought Kenobi would’ve done better as a game and in a game context, this idea works really well. This was also the original bridge between 3 and 4 so this pioneered a lot of the ideas Star Wars has built since then. And even the lost masters have interesting bits to their story despite just being boss battles. Kasdan Paratus for example is overwhelmed with grief of Order 66 and has a makeshift Jedi Council room made of scrap where he made mannequins of the Masters. That’s deep for someone who has only a few lines of dialogue.
As far as cosmetics and spectacles, it obviously has some really good setpieces, this is where that scene of bringing down the Star Destroyer came from. The complaint I have about that one in particular is that the scene requires you to fight off waves of TIEs as well and I’m fine with QTEs but the way that specific one was done was kind of shoddy. Each world you visit is unique and very fitting like George had a specific hand in it. Remember that really colorful plant area that Aayla Secura was killed in Order 66? You visit that planet! Felucia. And to top it off, you get a new costume every time. You want to change the color of your lightsaber? You can do that if you find the collectibles.
What, that wasn’t enough?
Then aside from the costumes you gain for each mission, you also get skins for different characters throughout the series. I beat Darth Vader with the Ben Kenobi skin from Episode IV and a black lightsaber (I don’t think the darksaber officially existed yet). I played a level as a Clone Wars animated style Starkiller. I beat up Luke Skywalker with a Sith C-3PO and Old Ben with a Luke from RoTJ. It’s letting me live my fantasies and I think that if it wasn’t for gameplay falling a bit short in a few aspects, this would be my favorite Star Wars game but for now it’ll just have to settle for second to Lego Star Wars.
I’ll probably leave the sequel to the novelization. Yeah, believe it or not, there are novelizations of these two games and comic books that add a little more depth, especially in the case of #2. There’s a bit more elaboration to them to which I think would only strengthen the story. One boss in particular just sort of happens in this game and they only briefly explain it afterwards but it kind of comes from out of the blue, a novelization would only expand on this already great game. Even the DLCs that came with the Ultimate Sith Edition are good. I may have only paid around $3 for this but this is worth more than full price to me.
I’ve never played a Paper Mario game until now. When I was a kid, they had it on display at KMart and you could play it, I thought it was really cool but I never played the whole thing none the less, I had a lot more on my plate. By the time I was interested in buying it, it was already hiked up in price and Nintendo being Nintendo, never ported it or put it on the eshop. I was hoping that for the 20th anniversary, they would come out with a collection of the first 3 games kind of like they did with Mario 3D All Stars but that day never came and it probably won’t ever come. I wanted to start with this one specifically because I heard it was the best one and if not then second best plus when I see the other games, I see a similar sort of style or pattern that I think would be a genuine experience no matter which game you started with but may potentially get derivative afterwards so if I was to pick only one out of the series, it’d be this one. I will go and try to visit the other games, it just may be hard for reasons I’ve already stated.
So here we are. FINALLY.
First thing I have to say is that it has personality, I feel like that was a given though. There’s an audience while you’re fighting which I could gush about just that for minutes on end but just the overall characters, lore, and world is very fun, it’s like if you gave Mario more layering when I already have that initial interest just from playing the platformers. There’s a dedicated button to have someone in your party just tell you what things are “Oh that’s Goomfrey, he thinks he’s gonna hit it big but we all know he’s not.” and stuff like that. Goombella can get a bit annoying that way at times but it’s well within tolerance.
At the beginning there’s a path blocked off to you by a toad and the way she stops you is she says “Freeze! I’m looking for my contact lenses.” so if you move then you automatically break them. There’s an in game reason not to let you pass, I can respect that and even if you do break the lenses then she stays there in spite “well I’ll block you until you buy me another pair.” and it’s committed. You go to the shop next door and the clerk says “We’re fresh out of contact lenses, we’ll have to special order those if you can just wait a few days.”
It feels like a good old classic Mario fanfiction but even if you’re not into it at the beginning, I’d give it until after Hooktail because I found that the plot itself of “getting the crystal stars and save the princess” storyline is kind of a cliché but once you start getting accustomed to everything else around it, it sells itself a bit better.
Playing it on Dolphin allows me to add on the HD texture pack which looks gorgeous, it also enables widescreen which can be both a blessing and a curse because it really shows you how windowed the game was on the GC and makes me wonder what other games have been limited to. Some scenes are only partially mapped out to fit the widescreen, so you can turn it off if it becomes too much of a burden seeing things load in and green screens pop in. That might actually be part of the reason they didn’t remaster it, despite the need because of aspect ratio and the amount of work it’d take to uprez.
I won’t say a lot about the gameplay but I feel like it tries to engage you with its combat which is good for someone that doesn’t really care for turn based gameplay. The Punis (that could’ve turned out badly) are a good idea at first glance but man are they annoying to make follow you around. I actually had one softlock me because it got stuck on the other end of the bubble bath and it wasn’t affected by the stone so it couldn’t be blown, luckily I had an older save. So really I feel like each of this game’s chapters can be different in quality, some I liked, some I didn’t, so the adventure aspect seemed a bit choppy to me but other than that, good game.
So here we are. FINALLY.
First thing I have to say is that it has personality, I feel like that was a given though. There’s an audience while you’re fighting which I could gush about just that for minutes on end but just the overall characters, lore, and world is very fun, it’s like if you gave Mario more layering when I already have that initial interest just from playing the platformers. There’s a dedicated button to have someone in your party just tell you what things are “Oh that’s Goomfrey, he thinks he’s gonna hit it big but we all know he’s not.” and stuff like that. Goombella can get a bit annoying that way at times but it’s well within tolerance.
At the beginning there’s a path blocked off to you by a toad and the way she stops you is she says “Freeze! I’m looking for my contact lenses.” so if you move then you automatically break them. There’s an in game reason not to let you pass, I can respect that and even if you do break the lenses then she stays there in spite “well I’ll block you until you buy me another pair.” and it’s committed. You go to the shop next door and the clerk says “We’re fresh out of contact lenses, we’ll have to special order those if you can just wait a few days.”
It feels like a good old classic Mario fanfiction but even if you’re not into it at the beginning, I’d give it until after Hooktail because I found that the plot itself of “getting the crystal stars and save the princess” storyline is kind of a cliché but once you start getting accustomed to everything else around it, it sells itself a bit better.
Playing it on Dolphin allows me to add on the HD texture pack which looks gorgeous, it also enables widescreen which can be both a blessing and a curse because it really shows you how windowed the game was on the GC and makes me wonder what other games have been limited to. Some scenes are only partially mapped out to fit the widescreen, so you can turn it off if it becomes too much of a burden seeing things load in and green screens pop in. That might actually be part of the reason they didn’t remaster it, despite the need because of aspect ratio and the amount of work it’d take to uprez.
I won’t say a lot about the gameplay but I feel like it tries to engage you with its combat which is good for someone that doesn’t really care for turn based gameplay. The Punis (that could’ve turned out badly) are a good idea at first glance but man are they annoying to make follow you around. I actually had one softlock me because it got stuck on the other end of the bubble bath and it wasn’t affected by the stone so it couldn’t be blown, luckily I had an older save. So really I feel like each of this game’s chapters can be different in quality, some I liked, some I didn’t, so the adventure aspect seemed a bit choppy to me but other than that, good game.
2020
This review contains spoilers
I first saw the trailer for this when it was announced and thought it looked unfinished, I mean it only came out a year after RE2 Remake and there were certain things they rushed (though it ended up being a masterpiece anyway) but I was worried for it. Does that show more in this game?
Let me talk about difficulty. So, it’s a short game. With RE2, you had the excuse of playing multiple routes to get a grander ending as well as little differences between the two but this one is kind of just straight to the finish line. I felt the need to play on hardcore mode because of its length, but enemies are bullet sponges. Which is fine for regular zombies because you can dodge them a lot of the time but when it comes to ones you more or less have to fight (Nemmy and Hunters) it’s really noticeable, even if I get the fight on the first try, it just seems like it’ll never end. And because of that, you use all your ammo.
There were points where I’d get knocked down and not even cornered, just unable to get up because Nemmy kept attacking or I was pinned in such a place where I couldn’t press the A button to escape despite being given the prompt. I don’t remember if Mr. X was like this or not but I definitely felt cheated with some deaths because the attacks kept coming and kept hurting even if I was stunned, impossible to fight back or dodge. (which is technically realistic but stupid for a game mechanic) This was my main gripe with the actual gameplay.
And we see multiple areas again, (granted we do in the OG as well but there are more areas in the og, though much smaller so it kind of evens out). We mainly just see sections of the hospital and police station again. Which would be fine since we only see certain sections of them but this is already a short game, to fill that with stuff we’ve seen just makes it seem like an alternate RE2 at times. But here’s a fun memory I got out of it. The bathroom was flooded with zombies, I shot about five of them in the shower room, two more in the next room before another walked through the door, one of them bit me to the danger zone so I had to B-Line it out of there (there’s a green herb just outside the door) so I hit the dodge button which also acts as a punch button for Carlos, so I try to dodge the one behind me and a Licker pops through the window in front of me (Never got to this point before), so Carlo’s punch ended up knocking him down on accident, so I just hit it again. He gets back up and I knocked him right back down. Funniest thing. I worked my way into the STARS office and that was that. Completely on accident after getting stuck on it over and over again.
Speaking of, I don’t really get a say in what I want for future RE titles especially since I have a bountiful amount left that are already out but I wouldn’t mind if there was never another one where you get chased by something. That was the whole reason I waited so long with this one actually. I heard it was short, it cut content, the story was predictable, and that you would be chased again. But then I heard that Nemmy was just a big baby and I got over Mr. X so I said I’d get the game when it was on sale (plus I saw Jill had a Stars costume). And wouldn’t you know it? It’s on sale right now for a whopping all time low of $16 on Steam and RE4 Remake was just announced, so what better time?
And because I waited so long, I played that opening at least 5 times across the demo on PS4 and PC, hardcore mode, standard mode and with alternate skins. It’s such a kicking opening, I already loved the game at that point.
I didn’t compare RE2 Remake to its predecessor because I never played it but I went and watched footage of the whole original RE3 to compare the two, since I heard there was fan favorite cut content. I won’t bother listing all the differences because they can be hefty and someone probably already explained it ten times better than I could but I’ll give a little bit of a rundown of what I like better between the OG and Remake.
From what I can see, it’s action versus horror. It really just matters what preference of order of events you want too. This is purely story, I won’t say too much about gameplay. Uh, a few spoilers in this section by the way.
REMAKE PROS: It made things knit together a little tighter and gave certain scenes more meaning by giving them their own action sequence.
I like Carlos, surprisingly. I didn’t think I would because I never even heard of Carlos until this remake so I figured he was just a one and done type of character but I actually kind of like how he’s nice from the very start and tries to do the right thing all the meanwhile being sent to do the wrong thing and when he comes to find that out, he’s kind of betrayed. He’s better than the original. I do think Tyrell could’ve been built up a little more along with him but I understand why he wasn’t.
OG PROS: There’s a mechanic called “live selection” where you can choose between two choices, one outcomes in a fight, while the other leads to the next area. This can also effect the order of events or the way things happen, for example, you can meet Carlos in a press place or you can meet him in a restaurant. Fight Nemmy early and you get the Stars ID early in the police station.
In addition to that, there are technically multiple endings, with each stemming from what live selection you pick at the very end.
Mikhail and Nikolai are slightly better characters. They’re kind of one-note in the remake.
It feels like Jill is on her own mission while in the remake, it’s like she’s always trying to reunite with Carlos, which makes Jill out to be a little bit of a better character in the OG in my opinion.
The only thing about Carlos that I like more in the OG is that his friend gets infected and he has to shoot him, so it makes it more impactful when Jill gets infected.
I think the remake suffers from an overall “lack” so there’s a lack of elaboration, giving you bare bones in some areas. It chalks itself up to needing “more time”, whether its playtime or development time. Maybe that’s why they gave it the ‘greed’ theme, because they knew players would want more (which wasn’t in the og). First half, great, second half shortcoming. 4 comes out in 2023, which is 3 years from this one (though they had other games in between, those might be different teams though) so I imagine they’ll learn from the feedback of this one plus take extra care since 4 is so highly regarded.
I’ll round it to a 3/5 or be nice and say a 7/10.
Let me talk about difficulty. So, it’s a short game. With RE2, you had the excuse of playing multiple routes to get a grander ending as well as little differences between the two but this one is kind of just straight to the finish line. I felt the need to play on hardcore mode because of its length, but enemies are bullet sponges. Which is fine for regular zombies because you can dodge them a lot of the time but when it comes to ones you more or less have to fight (Nemmy and Hunters) it’s really noticeable, even if I get the fight on the first try, it just seems like it’ll never end. And because of that, you use all your ammo.
There were points where I’d get knocked down and not even cornered, just unable to get up because Nemmy kept attacking or I was pinned in such a place where I couldn’t press the A button to escape despite being given the prompt. I don’t remember if Mr. X was like this or not but I definitely felt cheated with some deaths because the attacks kept coming and kept hurting even if I was stunned, impossible to fight back or dodge. (which is technically realistic but stupid for a game mechanic) This was my main gripe with the actual gameplay.
And we see multiple areas again, (granted we do in the OG as well but there are more areas in the og, though much smaller so it kind of evens out). We mainly just see sections of the hospital and police station again. Which would be fine since we only see certain sections of them but this is already a short game, to fill that with stuff we’ve seen just makes it seem like an alternate RE2 at times. But here’s a fun memory I got out of it. The bathroom was flooded with zombies, I shot about five of them in the shower room, two more in the next room before another walked through the door, one of them bit me to the danger zone so I had to B-Line it out of there (there’s a green herb just outside the door) so I hit the dodge button which also acts as a punch button for Carlos, so I try to dodge the one behind me and a Licker pops through the window in front of me (Never got to this point before), so Carlo’s punch ended up knocking him down on accident, so I just hit it again. He gets back up and I knocked him right back down. Funniest thing. I worked my way into the STARS office and that was that. Completely on accident after getting stuck on it over and over again.
Speaking of, I don’t really get a say in what I want for future RE titles especially since I have a bountiful amount left that are already out but I wouldn’t mind if there was never another one where you get chased by something. That was the whole reason I waited so long with this one actually. I heard it was short, it cut content, the story was predictable, and that you would be chased again. But then I heard that Nemmy was just a big baby and I got over Mr. X so I said I’d get the game when it was on sale (plus I saw Jill had a Stars costume). And wouldn’t you know it? It’s on sale right now for a whopping all time low of $16 on Steam and RE4 Remake was just announced, so what better time?
And because I waited so long, I played that opening at least 5 times across the demo on PS4 and PC, hardcore mode, standard mode and with alternate skins. It’s such a kicking opening, I already loved the game at that point.
I didn’t compare RE2 Remake to its predecessor because I never played it but I went and watched footage of the whole original RE3 to compare the two, since I heard there was fan favorite cut content. I won’t bother listing all the differences because they can be hefty and someone probably already explained it ten times better than I could but I’ll give a little bit of a rundown of what I like better between the OG and Remake.
From what I can see, it’s action versus horror. It really just matters what preference of order of events you want too. This is purely story, I won’t say too much about gameplay. Uh, a few spoilers in this section by the way.
REMAKE PROS: It made things knit together a little tighter and gave certain scenes more meaning by giving them their own action sequence.
I like Carlos, surprisingly. I didn’t think I would because I never even heard of Carlos until this remake so I figured he was just a one and done type of character but I actually kind of like how he’s nice from the very start and tries to do the right thing all the meanwhile being sent to do the wrong thing and when he comes to find that out, he’s kind of betrayed. He’s better than the original. I do think Tyrell could’ve been built up a little more along with him but I understand why he wasn’t.
OG PROS: There’s a mechanic called “live selection” where you can choose between two choices, one outcomes in a fight, while the other leads to the next area. This can also effect the order of events or the way things happen, for example, you can meet Carlos in a press place or you can meet him in a restaurant. Fight Nemmy early and you get the Stars ID early in the police station.
In addition to that, there are technically multiple endings, with each stemming from what live selection you pick at the very end.
Mikhail and Nikolai are slightly better characters. They’re kind of one-note in the remake.
It feels like Jill is on her own mission while in the remake, it’s like she’s always trying to reunite with Carlos, which makes Jill out to be a little bit of a better character in the OG in my opinion.
The only thing about Carlos that I like more in the OG is that his friend gets infected and he has to shoot him, so it makes it more impactful when Jill gets infected.
I think the remake suffers from an overall “lack” so there’s a lack of elaboration, giving you bare bones in some areas. It chalks itself up to needing “more time”, whether its playtime or development time. Maybe that’s why they gave it the ‘greed’ theme, because they knew players would want more (which wasn’t in the og). First half, great, second half shortcoming. 4 comes out in 2023, which is 3 years from this one (though they had other games in between, those might be different teams though) so I imagine they’ll learn from the feedback of this one plus take extra care since 4 is so highly regarded.
I’ll round it to a 3/5 or be nice and say a 7/10.