A new Devil May Cry game was announced. Awesome, right? Well, most DMC fans don’t seem to agree, and I’m one of those.

While the fanbase for Devil May Cry is in an outrage right now, there’s also a large amount of morons thinking that we’re whining for no good reason.

So I’m here to shed some light on the issue, and explain just exactly why people are complaining, and hopefully people will understand why we’re complaing and that the complaints are legit.

So read on and see what’s making people’s blood boil.

It’s a reboot?

Well, one big problem with the title it’s that it’s being touted as a reboot. That’s pretty much unacceptable. Did anyone at Capcom or Ninja Theory play any of the previous DMC games? There’s TONS of story that has yet to be explained in the series. After 4 games and an animated series, we still don’t know much about Sparda. Why not a prequel centered around him? We also don’t know THAT much about Dante. We know he’s a badass, we know various little plot points about him, but there’s still some more we could learn about him. What about Vergil? What the heck happened between DMC3 and DMC1 for him to become the Dark Knight? We know he probably lost against Mundus and got his mind possessed or something, but how did that transpire? What about Nero? He was the main character in DMC4, for about half the game, and yet we literally know nothing about him, like WTF is that Devil Arm? And I could go on (more about Trish, more about Lady). DMC has a lot of unexplored territory, yet they’re going for a reboot without telling us anything about what has yet to be told in the series? No wonder fans are going apeshit. Sadly, that’s not all that they seem to be fucking up with this one. Keep on reading.

Dante’s new look (AKA “The Hair”)

The problem with the new design isn’t JUST that his hair is black instead of white. Anyone who thinks that isn’t looking at the big picture. The problem with the new design is that he literally looks nothing like Dante. His head has a different shape, his hair is a completely different style, his badass red coat is nowhere to be seen, and he’s just completely different physically from the other games. You don’t just change such a popular character like this. Dante himself is just as iconic, if not more, than the series he comes from, and here he is, looking nothing like he should. One complaint I see a lot is how this new Dante looks like he’s out of Twilight. I actually didn’t see that at all until I saw THIS image. Yeah he IS straight out of Twilight, he might as well be glittering. When was Dante ever this lame?

If you’re still wondering why people are mad about the new design, imagine the following situation: Nintendo announces a new Mario game. But this time, Mario is black (no racism, just an example), he has a huge blond afro (meaning his hat is gone), and his trademark clothes are nowhere to be found, but instead replaced by a tutu. Fans would be pissed. This is just about what DMC fans are going through right now.

Point is, Dante should look like Dante. This new design is completely different from what Dante should look like. Why is his hair black? Where’s the coat? Why is his skin brown-ish(it’s probably partly because they’re using UE3 rather than MT Framework like DMC4)? Where the fuck did you put the real Dante? Definitely not here.

Let’s look at it this way:
THIS IS WHAT WE EXPECT DANTE TO LOOK LIKE (or this)

WHY DOES HE LOOK SO DIFFERENT HERE?

Heck, let me put it this way: Just look at Nero, whom a lot of fans don’t really like much as a character (despite the awesome new gameplay mechanics he brought to the game). He makes for a much better Dante than this new guy who claims to be Dante. Sure, he’s a bit different, and has a badass blue coat instead of a badass red coat, but he still looks very similar to the Dante we all know and love, just younger than DMC3 Dante. Yeah, I have no idea why it was so hard to keep Dante’s normal design.

Lack of Dante’s trademark weapons

If there’s one thing about Dante that shouldn’t change, it’s his weapons. Sure, he gets more weapons on his adventures, but he always has the Rebellion, and he always has Ebony and Ivory. All of those are gone here. Unless they’re planning on showing us how he got those, there’s really no reason for them to be gone. Not much more to say here. He has awesome weapons usually, but they’re not here.

Dante smoking

Dante doesn’t smoke. He’s not supposed to smoke. Hideki Kamiya originally designed Dante in such a way that he didn’t “need” to smoke to be cool (he said so himself). So why is he smoking here? What’s wrong with just making him eat more pizza? Yeah, pizza is cool isn’t it? Dante was cool because of his love of pizza, sort of like the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Making Dante smoke is like making the Ninja Turtles smoke, it’s just purely stupid.

For some characters, smoking to make them cool works. Like Bunta from Initial D (going in full drift with his eyes closed while lighting up a cigarette=badass). Dante isn’t one of those characters. Dante has style. Dante has badass fighting techniques. Dante is witty and fun, always spewing funy/badass one-liners. Dante enjoys rock music, fighting demons and eating pizza. Dante drives motorcycles and defies gravity doing so. He should never need to smoke, he’s already so awesome.

Well, here, “Dante” grunts a lot, he doesn’t seem to be nearly as witty as before, and he doesn’t look anywhere as cool, so I guess making him smoke is the only way to make him cool? I mean, maybe they made him personality-lacking this time, that seems to be the norm with modern games.

Dante getting his ass kicked

Why is Dante so badly damaged here? Seriously, WTF is that? Dante has to get massive amounts of damage from super powerful demons to get hurt in other games, or at least fighters that are close to his power level, like his brother… yet here he’s all fucked up from normal dudes in a mental institute, and some policemen (or at least that’s what the trailer makes it look like). Wow, Dante goes down pretty easily here. I mean, Dante usually just shrugs off getting impaled (multiple times per game). He almost instantly heals most damage (in cutscenes anyways). He uses broken scythes imbedded in his arms and legs (scythe blades which were used by demons who were attacking him, which he got impaled by at multiple areas on his body at the same time) to fight and he takes the blades out without pain. Seeing him all bloody in the trailer from getting beat up is just pathetic. Heck, whoever it was who captured him… actually managed to capture him? How did they manage that? They’re either incredible badasses, or Ninja Theory has no idea who Dante is and how strong he is.

Ninja Theory

Ninja Theory sucks. The only other game they made is horrible. I mean, Heavenly Sword isn’t exactly bad in some senses. The presentation is not too bad, though there’s choppy framerate, and the plot is okay. But the gameplay just sucks. And that really annoys me because there’s some interesting ideas there, like the different stances that have different moves, and having to use different stances to fight different enemy types. But, despite that, it just boils down to a crappy button-masher with crappy QTEs.

Oh, but they’re making a new game, called Enslaved, based on Journey to the West (sort of). Well, if the demo for that one is any indication, the game is completely terrible. It uses the tired Uncharted/Assassin’s Creed style of nearly automatic “platforming” which is never fun. The fighting is a super dumbed-down version of Batman: Arkham Asylum’s freeflow battle system, which boils down to button-mashing once again. And, surprisingly, the presentation is horrible compared to Heavenly Sword. The graphics are pixelated and blurry, the shadows are amongst the worst I’ve seen on a modern console, and the colors are drab and lifeless. Oh, and framerate problems from HS are back here too. Come on NT, are you even trying?

Ninja Theory are a company with potential (as shown in the few good ideas they had in Heavenly Sword), but, rather than using that potential, they just make crappy button-masher games. And THAT’S the company Capcom are going with for a new Devil May Cry game? A company whose only sort of noteworthy game is a crappy clone of God of War, which is itself a crappy button-masher clone of DMC? I mean, what’s wrong with Capcom? This is the second time they’ve made this stupid error. Just look at Bionic Commando. Sure, Grin made a good port of the arcade classic for the downloadable market… but it was just a port, any company would have done just as good a job with that. The “actual” game Grin was employed to make, the new “big” Bionic Commando game, was a gigantic pile of of shit that barely old at all (less than 500k copies). Look Capcom, if you’re reading this at all: IT WILL HAPPEN AGAIN. The point is, Capcom should make their games themselves or at least get a good company behind the game, they shouldn’t hire a crappy company to do it. Heck, Hideki Kamiya, the creator of DMC and Bayonetta, said on Twitter that he wouldn’t mind working with Capcom again on a new DMC game, so why not get Platinum Games to do this project? Come on Capcom, learn from your mistakes. Western developpers shouldn’t be making japanese games, because they have no fucking clue how to do it.

Overall

Well… Is it any surprise that people are unhappy about what they’ve seen with this new game now? It looks bad, it’s being made by a developer who constantly has framerate problems in their games (not a good thing when it should be a game about having perfect reflexes) and who have yet to make a game that doesn’t suck, and they completely changed the series’ main character to a point where he’s completely unrecognizable. Dante went from a badass with semi-long white hair and a badass red coat to being the fucking Red Mist (Really).

People aren’t just complaining for the sake of complaining, they’re complaining because Ninja Theory is ruining a series they love. I mean, the first DMC is a masterpiece, as is the third, and the fourth one is also fairly good, though not exactly as good as the third. Those 3 games are perfect examples of action games done well. This new game? Well, it’s made by a crappy company who seem to be making it their job to piss off fans of the series, and who routinely makes terrible games, so how high are the chances of it ending up being good? Not very high.

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I’ll comment about both things that were announced, and my impressions about the conferences as a whole. There were 5 big conferences, and I’ll talk about all of them, though I will just skim through the less interesting ones.

And I know that E3 isn’t done yet, more could be announced, but this is just about the conferences.

So read on!

Microsoft

Expectations
None. I knew they’d talk about Gears 3, Natal, Fable 3, and Halo Reach. I didn’t expect anything more.

Opening
I don’t understand why they started this with a multi-platform game. Most likely because Call of Duty Black Ops will have its DLC on the 360 first, but this still wasn’t a great start. Mostly because the gameplay segments they showed for Black Ops were stupidly boring to watch.

The “hardcore” part of the conference
After the bad start with Black Ops, they showed all the “core” games.
It was cool finally seeing gameplay footage for Metal Gear Rising, it looks interesting for sure.
Then Gears 3 was shown, and that wasn’t too interesting. All it really showed was that it plays just like the previous 2 Gears games. Though I will say that I was surprised to see some color in there. Also, in this part, they called Marcus Fenix and Master Chief unforgettable characters… that was weird and false.
After that a bit of Fable 3 was shown… not much of it though. Nothing new.
Speaking of not showing much, they showed something called Codename Kingdoms, with a cinematic showing real people surrounded by bad CG. No gameplay was shown, so revealing that was completely pointless.
Then the Halo Reach demonstration showed that they basically changed nothing since Halo 3. Though it didn’t look bad.

That’s it for the “hardcore” part. The coolest thing here? Cliff Blezinski’s t-shirt. It featured a yeti riding a unicorn… fucking awesome.

Kinect Time!
After only a few minutes of “core” games, they devoted the rest of the conference to Kinect (renamed from Project Natal). They showed off various Kinect games, and showed off the technology, like how you can control the 360 with your voice and body.

The games shown were: Kinectimals (AKA nintendogs), Kinect Sports (a mix between World Class Track Meet(nes), Wii Sports and Track and Field 2(nes)), Kinect Adventures (which looks like a boring mini-game compilation), Your Body Fitness Evolve (which looks like a Wii Fit-esque application that seems good for Wii Fit fans), Dance Central (made by Harmonix, looks really fun if you like dancing), a new Forza game which looks like it’s just Forza 3 with Kinect features and finally a crappy-looking Star Wars game that basically involve waving your arms around at random.

Nothing really interesting was shown for Kinect, but the tech looks impressive… though I can’t imagine much for the “hardcore” gamer here.

Overall
Well… it was rather boring. Spending more than half the time on Kinect wasn’t a great idea, announcing nothing new was a terrible idea (everything shown for Kinect was known the day before), and barely spending any time on the “gamers’ games” wasn’t too good either. And the opening of the conference was just stupid. The high point was the Metal Gear Rising trailer, which was way too short.

EA

Expectations
Nothing really. I only watched it because it was there. If I’d say I had any hopes for this, I really did hope seeing Mirror’s Edge 2…

Opening
Starting with a new game announcement is a great idea. The trailer made it seem interesting. And then they showed some live gameplay… They couldn’t have made it look any more dull. Need For Speed Hot Pursuit looks like it could be good, and it IS made by Criterion, but they should have made the demonstration a lot more interesting.

The rest
They showed Dead Space 2, the new MMA game, EA Sports Active 2 (for all consoles), Madden 11, Sims 3 for consoles, Crysis 2, Bulletstorm and a cinematic trailer for Star Wars The Old Republic.

This didn’t really feel very good. It’s nice that they showed some gameplay for some of the games, but for the most part it was really boring talking.
On a positive note, the gameplay demo for Bulletstorm actually really interested me. Looks actually fun for a modern FPS, concentrating on fun weapons and fun ways to kills rather than all the seriousness in other modern FPS.

But please tell me, what’s the point of making an epically badass cinematic trailer for an MMORPG? I don’t get it. Don’t get me wrong, the trailer was awesome, but it felt pointless.

Overall
Relatively weak opening, the rest of the thing felt way too dragged out, and nothing was announced. Announcing Madden 11 doesn’t count, of course, and it was obvious they’d milk the cash cow that is EA Sports Active. The high point was… hum… the Bulletstorm demonstration I guess…

And the lack of Mirror’s Edge 2 makes me sad.

Ubisoft

Expectations
I had no idea what to expect, since I didn’t really care about what Ubisoft had to show. Again, I watched it because it was there, hoping for surprises.

Opening
The started with Child of Eden, a psychedelic shooter controlled by Kinect. My only thought through the whole demonstration was “Are they re-releasing the Power Glove?” Because frankly that’s what it looked like. But what a weak opening that was. The game doesn’t look fun. It looks too artsy to be any fun to play.

After the opening
Assassin’s Creed Brotherhood, Shaun White Skateboarding (which looks sort of interesting), a “Real” FPS game that’s nothing more than an advanced version of laser tag, a Vitality Sensor rip-off with a “breathing” application that seemed stupid, a few Kinect games, a new Rabbids game involving time travel, Ghost Recon Future Soldier, Driver 4, Project Dust (no gameplay was shown so it was ENTIRELY POINTLESS), there was the most exciting announcement at E3 up to that point (Rayman Origins), Mania Planet which is a hub for user-generated content games like Trackmania 2 and a few more, and finally a Michal Jackson game.

A lot was shown, though only one REALLY interesting thing was announced. What really irked me is the Kinect part, showing Your Shape: Fitness Evolved… It’s okay to show the same game in 2 conferences, but why did they have the exact same script as in the Microsoft conference? That was just stupid.

Overall
Rayman Origins looked awesome. Very awesome. It was a huge surprise for everyone and it was the high point of the conference, and by far the most interesting element of E3 up to that point. The rest of the conference wasn’t very interesting, though I can see why some of the games that didn’t interest me would interest other people.

Nintendo

Expectations
Well, everyone knew they’d show Zelda and the 3DS. But otherwise, their stuff was pretty hush hush. There were some rumors, but nothing really precise. So Nintendo easily had the most potential to surprise. I had a few unreasonable hopes, as usual, but that’s what happens with Nintendo E3 conferences. Every year fans hope for a new F-Zero, Kid Icarus, Star Fox and various other things (like how I always hope for Star Tropics to be finally revived), but they never come.

Opening
One thing that sucked in every previous conference was the opening. Here, there was no fucking around. Everyone wanted to see Zelda, so they showed Zelda right away. The graphics looked nice, and Miyamoto was presenting everything. But there was a slight problem: their wii remote had trouble working, presumably because of wireless interference. They did show some of the gameplay, and what they did manage to show looked interesting. After the conference we did see videos of the controls working properly (such as on Kotaku) and that was nice, but it would have been cool to see it working properly on-stage. But still, Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword was easily the best opening of the conference.

Core games
NBA Jam, Mario Sports Mix, Golden Sun Dark Dawn, Goldeneye, Epic Mickey gameplay, Kirby’s Epic Yarn, Dragon Quest 9, Metroid Other M, Donkey Kong Country Returns…
OMG. New Donkey Kong made by Retro Studios? New Goldeneye made in the style of the original with some changes? New Kirby? Badass gameplay trailer for Golden Sun Dark Dawn? Showing that the gameplay for Epic Mickey looks solid? Mario Sports Mix looking like a fun multi-sport title? That was fucking awesome. Seriously. A bunch of new games announced, dates given for already known games, and they concentrated on the gameplay rather than pointless cinematic trailers… just wow.

Just a note on Kirby… It looks really strange, and I’m not too fond of the new graphic style, but the gameplay looks solid, and it might be a nice change of pace from previous Kirby games. We’ll see. Though I really wonder what happened to that Kirby project that was being made on Gamecube… They did say it was “transferred” to Wii, but then it disappeared… weird.

And a note on Donkey Kong Country Return… I’ve been waiting for this since Donkey Kong Country 3, why did it take SO LONG for a new good side-scrolling DK game? This is a very exciting announcement, and the fact that the guys behind Metroid Prime are making it is just AWESOME.

Casual games
Surprisingly, barely any of them were shown. Just Dance 2, and Wii Party. While Just Dance is terrible, the first one sold a LOT. And let’s not forget E3 is a trade show, to show to investors what they have coming up, and Just Dance 2 made them very happy. As for Wii Party, it just looks like a very dumbed-down Mario Party… meh.

I like that there was almost no casual games, but that they still showed a few for people that it might interest.

Nintendo 3DS
That’s the big thing of the conference. I like how it was presented. It’s different functions were introduced, the fact that it’s NOT just a new DS was made very important, and then they showed off the first game. One thing to say here: HOLY. FUCKING. SHIT. A new Kid Icarus? No one expected that for real, it was just false hope. And the trailer… was that a 3DS game? It looked as good as the best-looking Wii games. And then they name various other titles in some trailer/developers’ impressions video (Metal Gear, Street Fighter, Mario, Zelda, Kirby, Ninja Gaiden, Star Fox, Nintendogs+Cats for the casuals)… wow.

The presentation for the 3DS was phenomenal, and the high point of all of E3. There was sadly no way to show the 3D effect without experiencing yourself, but showing peoples’ impressions after the conference (people in the conference room got to try it) was a great thing, and was highly positive.

Overall
Now THAT’S how you do a conference at E3. Non-stop news and badass gameplay trailers. And the lack of Cammie Dunaway was a HUGE improvement from the last years’ keynotes. Strangely the Vitality Sensor was missing… that was weird, though understandable considering what was shown… And frankly who cares about the Vitality Sensor?

Sony

Expectations
Well, I expected mostly talk about Move, and maybe a cool new game announcement or 2. A lot was already announced before, so new stuff wasn’t what I expected. What I did NOT expect was that this would be the worst conference at this year’s E3.

Opening
The conference was opened with a presentation of Killzone 3 (there was some idle talking at the start, which doesn’t matter). I guess it was an okay presentation, though I found KZ2 to be a rather boring game. This looks like the same thing, but with different environments. Though the jetpack looks kinda interesting.

3D
There’s like 15 minutes of Sony talking about how they’re the first and ONLY console to do 3D… guess they missed the NES 25 years ago (Rad Racer) and Nintendo’s Conference (Nintendo doing 3D BETTER). So much talk about 3D, yet there was no substance whatsoever… It was a big waste of time.

And then there was a boring trailer montage. That’s not the only one here.

Move
After about 20 minutes of NOTHING, they finally showed Move, for almost an hour. They showed off Sorcery (which doesn’t look great, but seems better than any Move game I’ve seen for now), Tiger Woods which seems to be just as precise as the one on Wii (maybe even less, the person demonstrating it had lots of trouble playing) and Heroes on the Move (mixing Sly, Ratchet, Clank, Jak and Daxter) though no gameplay was shown making it pointless.

That was incredibly dull. It ended with them showing how overpriced the Move is. If you already have the PSEye, it’s 50$ for the Move itself, and 30$ for the nunchuk knockoff… Why did people applaud for this? That’s horrible pricing… I mean, 320$(+ tax) if you want enough for 4 players? And even more if you don’t have the camera? And no packed-in game unless you get the bundle with the camera? That’s bullshit. That makes the rumored price point for Kinect of 150$ sound reasonable, since you only have to buy one of them.

And it was very long-winded considering it had no noticeable improvements over the Wiimote…

The PSP part
What’s with that ad campaign? It’s really bad, and here I thought the Move commercials were bad. I have no idea why they wanted to show off that terrible ad campaign and I hope they get rid of it. After that a few trailers with barely any gameplay for a few PSP games are shown, and it’s time to talk about something else. Good thing the whole PSP segment wasn’t too long, since it was really boring.

The PS3 part
They start of the PS3 part with LittleBigPlanet 2, which is nice. They showed various features of the game, and it looked good and a lot deeper than the first one.

Then they revealed Playstation Plus, a service costing 50$ a month which gives access to free games/avatars/other stuff, as well as discounts on games. The downside? Well, if you cancel your subscription, you lose access to any free things you got during your subscription… that’s pretty bad. And people applauded anyways.

After that, it became dull again. Medal of Honor which was shown in a previous conference more in detail, Dead Space 2 got a small but unconvincing gameplay demo, then a small Portal 2 trailer with barely any gameplay, then… I missed the part about FFXIV (sorry), then a boring thing about Assassin’s Creed, finally a release date for Gran Turismo 5 (does anyone even care anymore? doesn’t seem that much better than Forza 3 considering the extra dev time), a cinematic trailer for inFamous 2 and the big “surprise”, a new Twisted Metal game that looks pretty good (but didn’t we know about this already?).

Overall
The big problem with this was that it was almost 2 hours long, and it was almost all padding. It wasn’t interesting to look at, there were barely any announcements, and when they showed games they almost always showed cinematic trailers rather than gameplay trailers, which is really not a good thing, and there were almost no gameplay demonstrations.

Though the opening was okay, it was all downhill from there. The only saving grace of the conference was Twisted Metal, which looks like a nice twist on the franchise.

Oh, and, on the internet side of things, it was very unstable. Lag all the time, streams not working properly, it was very bad in that aspect… I had to switch streams like 5 times because it kept fucking up.

Winner

This is clear, there is no doubt about it. If there was a “winner” in regards to conferences, it is Nintendo. The most interesting conference by far. No time wasted anywhere in there, they just went from badass announcement to badass announcement. There were some big surprise, and everything they showed (other than NBA Jam) gave us a great look at the gameplay. There was a nice balance between casual games and “core” games too. And the official reveal of the 3DS was incredible. They found the best way possible to present this new handheld, with its wii-level graphics, 3D with no glasses, a bunch of game announced for it, and of course the super surprising reveal of Kid Icarus Uprising. I mean, no one was expecting that. The other conferences felt rather pointless.

Though Ubisoft gets an honorable mention for announcing Rayman Origins, that looks awesome. And seeing Kinect in action in more detail than last year was really nice too, I am a bit more interested than before.

Nintendo, you HAVE to keep kicking this much ass. Sony/Microsoft/EA/Ubisoft/anyone else who wants to do an E3 conference: look at what Nintendo did this year… seriously. Learn from how bad the other conferences were and how awesome the Nintendo conference was.

Though, with all that said, we must not forget that E3 is a Trade Show. It’s made to show investors what will make them money. The conferences aren’t exactly made to be interesting to gamers. Which kinda sucks.

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And finally it’s released! We’ve been seeing stuff about this game for 4 years now, and it’s probably been in development for a lot longer. So it’s definitely something to finally be playing the game.

Before it came out, I was not really hyped for it, since I knew it would take a long time to come out. But when the American release date was revealed, and that the game was released in Japan (so I could actually see peoples’ impressions on the game), I was hyped. There were strangely tons of complaints about the game, probably more than the average FF game gets, but none of those seemed like anything nearly big enough to be game-breakers, and just sounded like nitpicking, so I was still hyped.

So let’s see if those various complaints were actually detrimental to the game, or if people just like whining for no good reason. READ ON !!
In a slight change of pace, this game will have 2 sections: the actual review, and me talking about what I think of the various complaints the game has been getting… as well as a few complaints of my own. So check it out!

(NOTE: no, I’m not a Final Fantasy fanboy… if I was I would have finished more than 2 games in the series)
(OTHER NOTE: I will NEVER write a review this long again, I promise…)

Developer: Square Enix
Publisher: Square Enix
Date of Release: March 9th 2010
Platforms: Playstation 3, Xbox 360 (PS3 version reviewed)

Genre: Japanese RPG
Players: 1
Rated T for Teen

The Review

Graphics
If there’s one thing no one should complain about in this game, it’s the graphics. Everything looks great. The dark caves, the sprawling city-scapes, the fields with mountains everywhere around, the machinery, the technology… Everything had tons of work put into, with near-perfect attention to detail. Not only is the graphic quality great, but the visual style is really well done. Everything they show on screen is well done enough to look believable. Some weird ship flying around that’s nothing like we have in the real world? You can look at it and kinda understand, using video game logic, how it can manage to fly. The characters are also pretty well done, each being fun and unique to look at. Each character has lots of personality and is easily recognizable from anyone else in all of Final Fantasy. Their animations are really good and natural as well. The only thing actually wrong with them is their fingers, they look kinda weird when seen close-up, but that rarely happens so it’s not a problem.

The monster design is not too bad. A lot of the monsters/enemies are new to the series, but they look fairly good. There’s also a lot of returning enemies. Tonberry and Cactuar look as wacky as ever, feeling completely out of place compared to every other enemy in the game. Flans and Bombs are back, but they look completely different, with only a few aspects making you think “yeah, those are definitely bombs/flans”.

The animations are generally very nicely done as well. The cinematic are just great, not only in regards to animation, but also because there’s so much going on, and the graphics take a huge increase in quality. Final Fantasy, or any other game for that matter, has ever looked as good as the cinematics in FFXIII. The cinematography is like that of big name action films, with great camera angles, fast-moving action, and nothing really feeling out of place.

Just looking at the game you instantly know why it took so long to make(aside from the whole “porting to the 360″ thing).

Sounds and music
The Final Fantasy series is, amongst other things, very well known for always having great soundtracks, and some of the most memorable music in the industry.

In that regards, I feel FFXIII doesn’t have lots of really memorable tracks. But that’s not to say the music isn’t awesome… because it is.  Though there are a few bad tracks, like one of the two Chocobo songs (it has lyrics, and sounds lame), or the one that sounds like elevator music in the Yaschas Massif on Gran Pulse, overall it really has a very good soundtrack. Most of the tunes sound very Final Fantasy-ish. If the intense action in some scenes doesn’t get your heart pounding, the music during those scenes definitely will.

But I think the “problem” here is that the composer isn’t Nobuo Uematsu, whose music has become synonymous to Final Fantasy, and some of the best music in the gaming industry. Instead it’s Masashi Hamauzu, who made some(not all) of the music in FFX and Dirge of Cerberus. So the music doesn’t have exactly the same feel as the average FF music. Bu I feel he did a pretty good job at making the music here.

The rest of the sound is pretty nice as well. Swords, magic, the weird technology everywhere around the game’s world, everything sounds great. The voice acting is actually pretty good in english, with only a few minor problems, like Vanille sometimes having an accent, and other times not having one… The rest though is very nice and the voice actors certainly made a lot of effort to deliver most of the lines properly and make them believable.

Story
I won’t go too much in detail since I don’t want to spoil too much.

The story takes place partly in a place called Cocoon. It’s basically a floating mini-planet, that floats above Gran Pulse. Pulse is considered by the people of Cocoon as an evil place, due to government propaganda. In both those places live semi-mechanical creatures named Fal’Cie, who have special powers to help or destroy mankind. Fal’Cie from Pulse are considered evil, and Fal’Cie from Cocoon are considered to be good guys. Fal’Cie occasionally turn people in L’Cie, who are given a “Focus”, which is basically an objective to do. They are given special powers to be able to complete their task. If they fail at doing the objective after some time, they become Cie’th (basically zombie-like monsters), and, if they accomplish the Focus, they are given “Eternal Life” as a crystal.

You play as a rag-tag band of people all completely unrelated originally, but brought together by unpredictable circumstances. The game begins during a “Purge”. A Pulse Fal’Cie was discovered in a town, and since anything from Pulse is considered evil in Cocoon, the people of the town need to be deported by the government. It ends up becoming an all-out war. In the madness, 5 of the 6 “main characters” (Lightning, Snow, Hope, Vanille and Sazh) meet up in the ship containing the Pulse Fal’Cie. After fighting the Fal’Cie, the group are turned into L’Cie by said Pulse Fal’Cie. Their task? Seemingly the destruction of Cocoon, though they seem to think otherwise because of what Serah (Snow’s girlfriend as well as Lightning’s sister) told them before becoming a crystal herself. From here on out the characters try to find what to do: Will they fulfil their Focus? Will they even find out what it is? Will they say screw their Focus and protect Cocoon? Yeah, that’s where I’ll stop with the story.

The game features a very Final Fantasy-esque story. Lots of the set pieces are there: small group of people joining toghether against a common evil, twists and turns at every step, including some that were quite unexpected, giant propaganda-spreading corrupt governments, giant magical creatures with plans to take over the world in weird ways… No matter how you look at it, this is what a Final Fantasy story should be like. The pacing is great, despite there being a few kinda slow parts, it does flow very well. As you progress, you see some of the characters’ back-stories unfold, or flashbacks to previous events, giving you a better look at the story’s larger picture.

The characters are very well done, but I feel that they’re a bit lacking in some aspects. There’s constantly character development going on, the dialogues are mostly fun to listen too (though this IS Final Fantasy, so expect a ton of cheesy lines), the characters have distinct personalities… But by the end of the game it feels like all the characters become very similar personality-wise… but maybe that’s just me. And also I’d like Sazh to be more interesting, it kinda sucks that he’s pretty much just comic relief (minus that one serious scene he has).

Not my favorite FF story, but it’s definitely up there.

Gameplay

Battling
Easily the most important aspect in any RPG. If the fighting system isn’t interesting, the rest of the game isn’t either, no matter how great the presentation is, or how masterful the story is. If the actual “gameplay” part of the game isn’t fun, the game itself isn’t good. And in that aspect Final Fantasy 13 doesn’t disappoint… or at least it didn’t disappoint me, I could kinda understand why some people wouldn’t like the new fighting system.

Basics
The basic fighting system is relatively simple. After meeting an enemy or group of enemies on the map, you go to a seperate fighting screen like most previous FF games. Here, you control one of 3 characters in your active party, the one which is selected as the party leader. If you have any more than 3 characters with you, they go in “reserve”. In battle you get access to 5 commands: “Auto-battle”(changes name depending on role), Ability, Technique and Item. As battle goes on, your character’s ATB bar goes up, filling up segments. Each attack/spell/whatever you use takes up one segment of your ATB bar. Some take more, up to 5 (you start with 2 ATB bars, but you get more as you get stronger). Each “turn”, you can fill up your ATB queue before the ATB is actually full, choose a target, and your character will execute the commands as soon as the ATB bar fully fills up. If you want your character to take action ealier, use the Triangle button to execute as many ATB segments as you have loaded, which stops the ATB bar’s loading. If you want to stop your character’s moves while they’re doing them, press Circle. This preserves your unused ATB segments and let’s you choose different moves. Also, on the battlefield, your characters and the enemies move around wherever they want. You have no control on that, but if enemies are close enough you can use Area of Effect attacks that hit multiple enemies at once (same goes for them).

So for the commands. Auto-battle fills up you ATB queue automatically. An AI tries to decide what would be the best thing to do in your current situation, and you get to choose the target. The AI doesn’t always do the right thing though, so if you don’t want to do what the AI chose, go to the Abilities menu. Here, you will see what abilities your character has in it’s current role, and you can line them up in the ATB queue, and then choose a target. Techniques use none of the ATB segments, but instead use the TP bar that’s below your party leader’s HP. The TP bar goes up to 5, and each technique(such as Summon, Quake and Libra) uses between 1 and 3 TP. Finally, items also don’t use any ATB bar, just a bit of your time to actually use them, as well as the item in question. You have antidotes, potions, phoenix downs, and a few others that heal status ailments.

While you’re busy controlling your character, the AI is controlling your partners (or partner, depending on how far you are in the game). The AI makes your partners act differently depending on their role, and the current situation on the battlefield. Having one (or zero) Commando in your party will make every member attack the same target. Multiple Commandos will attack different targets. Medics have different priorities: first they heal the leader, then they heal each other if the leader is good enough, then they revive a dead partner, and then they do Esuna. So learning the various quirks of each role definitely helps, especially in the tougher battles in the game.

Each time an enemy is hit, a bar goes up for it. If the bar reaches the monster’s stagger point, he “staggers”. That boosts your damage, and gives you access to a few special moves if you have them. When you hit a staggered enemy, the chain bonus goes up. The higher it goes, the more damage you do. Doing your best to stagger enemies is the basic idea to beat them as fast as possible, but that becomes a lot harder as you meet stronger enemies, where staggering them isn’t an option anymore.

After a battle, you get CP, possibly drops (the higher your rating, the more chance you have of getting a rare drop), and your characters are fully healed. That might seem stupid, but I find that here it’s a good thing, since it made it possible for Square Enix to make the fights harder. No need to manage HP and MP anymore, just make sure you fight properly.

Overall the fighting is relatively simple, but it definitely requires strategy against the tougher enemies. I don’t just mean using paradigm shifts at the right time either, I also mean things like having the proper equipment for each battle, exploiting enemy weaknesses, and other stuff. You won’t make it through to the end just by mashing the Auto-battle button all game long.

Paradigm Shift
The big change here is the Paradigm Shift system. You can set 6 of what are call “Paradigms”. In each Paradigm, you set each party member to one Role: Commando(physical attacker), Ravager (Black Mage), Medic, Saboteur (Enemy Debuffer), Synergist (Party Buffer) and Sentinel (Tank). During battle, you can press L1 to choose which paradigm to change to, to change your strategy to fit various situations. 6 different paradigms kinda limits what you can do, so you have to set them appropriately to be able to react to any distuation. The paradigm you choose changes the roles of your whole party, which changes not only what you can do, but how the partner AI acts as well. Fully mastering the Paradigm Shift is basically required to advance through the game. As you advance through the game, you’ll need to react faster and faster to what’s happening to always use the right paradigm. Also, each Role has different passive functions. For example, each Commando on the field boosts all damage, and each Ravager boosts the chain bonus for the stagger meter. So knowing which Role to use at what time is really useful.

Summons
The final element here is Summons (also called Eidolons). Each character has access to one of them, and you can only use the summon your party leader has. They require 3 TP to summon. When you get a summon out, only the party leader and Summon remain on the battlefield. As you and your summon hit enemies, your “Gestalt” meter rises. Your summon can only be up for a limited time, represented by his SP bar, which goes down not only with time, but when he gets attacked. During summons, the summon will always heal you when you get hurt. And if you die, you get fully healed but the summon will leave the field.

Whenever you want (but preferably when the Gestalt meter is full), you can press the Square button to enter Gestalt mode. Here the summon will go in a transformers-like cutscene, where he’ll change from it’s more humanoid form to a vehicle or animal form… Let’s just say it look pretty ridiculous seeing the Shiva Sisters transforming into a motorcycle the first time… So in Gestalt mode, you can execute various attacks just by pressing X (the game will choose automatically), or X and a direction on the Left Analog Stick. When you have no points left to do attacks, press Triangle to execute the Eidolon’s final attack, which usually deals a good chunk of damage. After that’s done, you go back to your normal party. Everyone will be fully healed, and the enemies will have their stagger meter back down to 0.

The problem with the summons is that they’re weak. They don’t power up through the game, and your actual characters will become much stronger than they are in no time. Late in the game they basically act as a panic button you’d use to fully heal your party if you’re in trouble, and just a little bit of extra damage. Not terribly useful, other than against a few enemies (USE VANILLE’S SUMMON AGAINST TONBERRY!).

Leveling
The other important element in any RPG is the leveling. Not as important as the battle system, or the story, but still, the leveling is always important in some way.

Crystarium
Here you level up using the Crystarium. Using Crystogen Points you win from battle, you go in things similar to the Sphere Grid in Final Fantasy 10, and pour points into the next node in the grid to get stat boosts. Each character has 6 “grids”, one for each Role. At the beginning of the game though your characters only get 3 grids, for their 3 “best” Roles, and the other Roles can only be obtained for each of them much later in the game.

The nodes in the Crystarium can be one of 6 things: HP boosts, Strength boost, Magic boost, extra ATB bars (each character has 2 in total), extra accessory slots, abilities (either normal abilities, auto-abilities or techniques) and Role Levels. Most of those are self-explanatory. Role levels not only say “Hey, you’re now a level 2 Commando!”, but also boost the passive bonus the Role gives in battle. All the stat nodes are permanent, no matter which Role your character is currently using. So if you get +5 strength in the Commando tree, you will still have that +5 strength every other Role.

I guess the only complaint one might have here is that lack of customization, since each grid is almost completely linear (with short branches here and there). But that’s not much of a problem really.

Also, until you beat the game’s final boss, you always have part of the Crystarium locked from you (you open more and more as you fight bosses), so you can never really be “overleveled” compared to enemies where you’re at.

Equipment
After you get a certain item, you can go to save points and upgrade your weapons and accessories. Using items dropped by enemies, or found in treasure chests and shops, you can put them in equipment. That gives said piece of equipment experience points. At certain numbers of EXP, the item levels up, becoming stronger. When it’s maxed out (the item’s level will be shown as a star instead of a number), you can use a transformation catalyst component, which will make the item evolve to it’s next form, and it can continue being leveled up from there, until you reach the item’s final form.

For weapons, there’s a quirk. Each weapon’s second form requires a Trapezohedron catalyst, which is dropped by incredibly powerful enemies (or sold in a shop for 2 million Gil), to become its third form. Each weapon type’s third form has the same name. For example, all of Fang’s weapons become Kain’s Lance. But each “Kain’s Lance” will be different depending on which weapons was used to make it. For example, a Dragoon’s Lance will become a Kain’s Lance with a LOT of attack power, but no magic boost whatsoever, while a Kain’s Lance made from a Bladed Lance will have less attack power, but will have some magic power as well (and both will have different passive effects as well).

In addition to upgrading, you can Dismantle equipment. This destroys the item, but gives you new items in return. For example, a Doctor’s Code (which is entirely useless in battle) becomes 1 Aegisol and 1 Fortisol, which is massively useful. Some items will also give different stuff if you max them out before dismantling them.

The equipment boosting is really where there’s some customization, since you can equip your characters with weapons and accessories (up to 3 of them) that fit what YOU want them to be. Very nice stuff.

Outside of battling/leveling
There’s not TOO much to say here. You will walk tons, through corridor-like areas (until Chapter 11). You see enemies before fighting them, so if you want you can try to avoid them (though some are placed in a way that they become unavoidable). There’s gonna be occasional forks in the path, mostly leading to treasures or enemies, and eventually side-quests. Every 5 to 10 minutes you get to a Save Point. There you can Save (of course), Shop (where else would you shop? Can’t really have L’Cie casually shopping in normal stores, right?), and Upgrade your equipment. The shops get new inventory from time to time, and you get access to more shops as you progress through the game(some are gotten from side-quests, others against some bosses).

If there’s one thing I’d complain about here, it’s that a lot of the “corridors” are long and empty, when they could have been made a lot shorter… a lot of them are just padding really. And there’s pretty much no puzzle-solving to get to the next area, just walking and fighting.

Side-quests
The game features 64 side-quests. All of them have the same sort of goal: find an enemy and kill it. You get access to those missions as you get to Chapter 11. Talking to Cie’th stones will tell you that Cie’th’s original Focus, and you’ll go to complete it. Those missions are where you’ll fight the game’s most powerful enemies, and also where you’ll find some of the best equipment. As you do quests, you’ll open up more, and open up new areas as well. That’s probably the best part of the entire game, and Chapter 11 is also the best place to grind if you’re into that sort of thing.

Addressing to the complains

Rather than being welcomed with cheer and happiness by Final Fantasy fans, Final Fantasy XIII was greeted with millions of complaints, ending up being one of the least liked Final Fantasy games out there, other than 12 and 2 (the Japanese version). So I’ll address to those complaints here and give my point of view on them. And basically explain why most of the complaints suck… Though there are a few that are indeed big problems.

Linearity
This complaint is definitely the one that you’ll hear the most, and it’s also pretty stupid. I mean… hasn’t anyone ever played any other Final Fantasy game? They’re all completely linear, with some side-quests along the way… just like in this one! The only difference is that here you don’t get a world map… something that 10, 10-2 and 12 lacked too… so why is it such a big problem here? Yeah, every area is pretty much a corridor with occasional branches, but the game is basically a series of “dungeons” (though chapter 11 onwards changes that up a bit, where there’s actually exploration and such which people crave). And just like every area in this game, every dungeon in every Final Fantasy game before this has been the EXACT same way: one set path to follow to get to the end with occasional branches that lead to treasures and sometimes monsters or side-quests. So why is it okay in other FF games to have dungeons like that, but here it somehow makes the game bad? Why is it such a big complaint when every other Final Fantasy is just like this? Heck, most games, in general, are just like this. This complaint completely eludes me.

Only controlling one character in battle
I’ll say that I was pretty skeptical about that idea, since I liked having control over what my whole party did in previous FF games, so that’s one complaint I thought I might agree with. But I didn’t.

Controlling only 1 character does lead to a few problems of course. The AI for your allies usually does the job very well, but other times they’ll be completely pathetic. For example: in a boss battle, Hope died, so I wanted Lightning to become a Medic and heal him. But both Lightning and Fang (whom I was controlling) were damaged, so the Medic AI prioritized healing Fang and Lightning until they were healthy enough to go and revive Hope. Okay, that’s fine. Lightning COULD have just used Cure on me 4 times, and 3 times on herself, and we’d have been fine to revive Hope (without much of a chance of the boss hurting us too much). Instead, she kept using Cure once on me, then waiting a bit, then using it again, etc. After each time she used Cure, I got hit, making the previous cure useless. If I hadn’t stepped in and used a Phoenix Down on Hope, he probably never would have gotten revived by Lightning, and I probably would have ended up getting my party killed. For the most part though, other than the occasional hiccups such as the “Medic not healing properly” problem, the AI is pretty good at deciding what to do and when to do it. And you do have a BIT of control over them by choosing the right paradigm and choosing the proper enemy targets. It’s not perfect, but it’s good enough.

Another thing is that the AI can’t do some things you can, like cancelling a chain of actions. So if Lightning starts attacking an enemy with her physical attack, but the enemy uses a skill that makes it immune to physical attacks, she’ll finish executing her string of commands anyways. The only way to stop that is to use Stopga or Paradigm Shift. It’s a minor annoyance, and only applies to certain battles, but it’s annoying.

Another big problem I have is that, since you only control 1 character, you also don’t have access to any of the other characters’ summons. I understand not having access to those outside of your active party, of course, but why can’t Hope use his summon if he’s in my active party when I’m playing as Fang? That’s really annoying. It’s a problem that could have been remedied REALLY easily… Why not just put the summons of all the active party members in the “Summon” menu in battle? My problem is that now if I’m using Lightning as my party leader, and I really want to summon Hecatonchires (Vanille’s Summon), I can’t, even if Vanille is in my active party.

But other than those relatively minor complaints, I find that it’s a really good thing that you only control 1 character, since the battles are so fast-paced and there’s so much to pay attention to that you wouldn’t really be able to look at everything going on while, at the same time, giving commands to 3 characters(especially since the ATB bars fill up quite fast). You just have to learn the various quirks of the partner AI, and make good use of paradigms, and you’ll easily feel in control of your whole party despite only having direct control over 1 character. It just takes some getting used to.

PRESS X AND WIN!
Yeah, I actually saw moronic complaints like this. “All you have to do is press X (or A on the 360) non-stop and you win the game because of the Auto-battle option!!!!” or “ZOMG the game plays itself!!”. Not only is that completely stupid(easily the stupidest complaint I’ve heard), but it’s also false. I mean, yeah, as you power up the earlier fights can definitely be won just but using an offensive Paradigm and mashing X, but you’ll get destroyed in the later fights if you even think of trying that. In the tougher fights, you have to pay attention to everything: what your AI partners are doing, what the enemies are doing, which enemies you should prioritize on attacking, changing paradigms accordingly to fit the situation… There’s no way just mashing X (or A) will bring you anywhere in this game.

Like the linearity “problem”, this is something that is present in all Final Fantasy titles too. Fights are definitely gonna be super-easy(requiring only mashing A or X) if you’re much stronger than the enemies, but enemies in new areas, unless you’ve grinded a lot, will be tough and will require more strategy to beat. The same applies here, so this complaint is definitely really stupid. Why is it a problem here if it was fine with previous games in the series? Heck, it was more of a “problem” before, since grinding was a lot more effective in previous games than it is in this game.

Lack of NPC interaction
There’s one I can’t really relate to for one simple reason: unless it’s actually needed(Fallout 3, older RPGs where the next objective wasn’t easy to find at all like Dragon Warrior), I never interact with NPCs in an RPG. I know some people really like interacting with NPCs (I don’t konw why…), but here, I’ll say that it wouldn’t make much sense to talk with tons of NPCs story-wise. I mean, most of the time you’re nowhere near towns or highly populated areas in the game(Gran Pulse, which you spend  a good amount of time in, is pretty much deserted, other than monsters), and when you are there’s usually some kind of chaos going on because people are freaking out since your characters a “evil” L’Cie, so why would the NPC want to talk to you anyways? And when you are in a populated area and there’s somehow no chaos going on, you CAN talk to NPCs. So I don’t really get that complaint much. Maybe it’s just me.

I think what annoys people is the lack of inns and shops… But is there really any difference between talking to a generic NPC that has nothing to say to buy stuff, or just going in the save points and going through exactly the same menus? And still, having the shops centralized in the save point makes it less annoying since you don’t have to constantly backtrack to older places just to find a shop that has something no other shop has.

Overall not a “bad” complaint, it’s a matter of taste I guess, but one that makes very little sense if you actually follow the story.

My own complaint: you get access to some basic features really late in the game
There’s one thing I haven’t addressed yet that really annoyed me. And I’m not the only one, as I’ve seen this complaint in a few other reviews. The game locks certain features from you, despite not having any reason behind that, just to unlock them halfway through the game.

You get access to the Crystarium only when your characters become L’Cie, but that’s understandable (though that means you don’t power up for the first hour or two of play, which can be a bit annoying). But why do I have to wait until almost halfway through the game to be able to change my active party, or party leader? In the beginning you have a party of 5 people, yet you can only use 3 of them and you can’t switch them out. That’s really annoying. There’s a few other functions like this that are locked for a while until you reach certain points, and that’s really annoying. Other than the crystarium being locked at first, there’s no reason to lock any of the locked functions. That’s one thing that really annoyed me at first. Good thing that, half-way through the game, that problem completely disappears.

Another complaint that I agree with: You lose if your party leader dies
That’s one thing I find really stupid. I have 6 characters in my party, why should it kill my whole party if only the leader dies? Why don’t I get a game over when any of my other characters die? It happened to me multiple times, where the leader got killed really fast and my other party members had full HP, but I lost anyways… How does that make any kind of sense? It’s not a good thing, it’s just annoying.

Overall

Well, this is the second Final Fantasy game I actually completed (other than side-quests, but I plan on getting those done soon). The first was Final Fantasy 4, which I finished a very long time ago, and did all the side-quests in as well. So for me that says a lot. I mean, I played all the FF games, aside from a few spin-offs such as Chocobo Racing, and yet there’s only 2 of them I actually completed.

The fighting is really fun and requires fast thinking and fast reaction times. The leveling system is quite simple making the game slighlty more accessible for people who just want to check it out, though it requires a lot more from people who want to max out their characters or equipment. The game is VERY straight-forward, but from Chapter 11 and on, you have the choice of continuing the story, or exploring and finding all the 64 side-missions, which are a lot more challenging than the rest of the game. The story is very fun and enjoyable, so you really want to see it through. The ending is pretty predictable, but then again what RPG ending isn’t? (hint: none)

It’s not perfect, and there are various complaints (stupid or not) people have with the game, but really it’s a great game in the series. Much better than 12 (by far), I’d say around as good as 10 (which I really liked too). Sure, it doesn’t surpass FF4 (my personal favorite) for me, and it doesn’t surpass 6 (the best in the series) in overall quality either, but I still really enjoyed it, and will keep enjoying it while I complete the side-quests.

I say a game that’s able to keep my attention for over 70 hours is definitely not bad. I mean, most games get boring for me in 8 hours or less…

Pros and Cons
Pros
- Incredible presentation
- Fun enjoyable story
- Great fast-paced fighting system
- Leveling is fun and simple, enabling for a little bit of customization with the item upgrading and huge variety of accessories
- There is some challenge to be had with the side-missions
- Thankfully the cinematics are never too long or annoying
- Centralized shops at save points (yes, I count that as a good thing)
- Healing after evey battle enables the game to have much harder battles
- Lightning’s “Gun Blade” weapon actually makes sense! That’s what Squall should have had instead of that stupid and impractical… thing he carries around…

Cons
- The “linearity” might be a turnoff to some people (despite the rest of the series being just like that… yeah, I still don’t get that complaint)
- The whole party “dies” if the party leader dies… How stupid is that?
- Late in the game, Summons are basically just Panic Buttons that you can use to fully heal your party, since they’re much weaker than your characters
- Not being able to use a summon that isn’t your party leader’s
- A few quirks of the battle system (such as improved partner AI and maybe adding a Party Leader Change button…) could have been ironed-out/fixed
- Some features that shouldn’t be locked at all are locked in the first half of the game
- The AI never uses their skill that uses 5 ATB segments… why?
- You don’t get money from winning battles (minor annoyance)
- The game could use some puzzle-solving elements to progress through certain dungeons

The Save Factor
The Save Factor for this one would seriously be the starting price of $60. There’s some things that could have/should have been ironed-out, there’s some things that don’t feel just right, but it’s a really good game nonetheless. If you’re unsure about it, rent it first, or wait for a price drop. Either way it’s gonna be money well spent.

Share/Save

Well, I got my review out for the game, but one tiny element was missing from it. And that is the characters. I thought that, instead of just having a passing mention of each, I’d talk a little bit about each of them in a seperate post.

So let’s go right at it! (The new characters are in their own section instead of being in their respective side)
(NOTE: I’m not a pro at fighting games… so if i get some thing wrong, that’s why… cheers… comment if you want to offer insight)

The Tatsunoko Side

You migh not know what Tatsunoko is, but that doesn’t mean their characters aren’t worth playing. Definitely check them out, you might find a new favorite here.

Ken the Eagle

Ken is a bit of a basic-like character. He has good attacks, a good runaway game with some nice projectiles and hit and run potential. He’s one of those relatively easy to learn characters with good enough combos and easy to learn strategies and stuff. Overall… he’s good. Nothing more, nothing less.
His assist is slow and not really useful.

Jun the Swan

She uses exploding Yo-yos. Do I really need to say more? Okay… well she has some nice combos, her yo-yo attacks place explosives on the enemies which you can explode whenever you want which can be pretty good. The rest of her attacks are good, she has good range and combos. Her supers are acceptable and deal good damage. Nothing more to say really… SHE USES EXPLODING YO-YOS!
Her assist installs an exploding Yo-yo on the enemy which you can explode later when you switch characters, which can be quite useful.

Tekkaman

He has good range, about half the screen. He’s strong enough, he has anti-air and he has some good supers. I haven’t used him much, but he has some okay combos but I have to experiment with him a bit more. (Sorry I can’t say more, I prefer Tekkaman Blade so I kinda ignored the “normal” Tekkaman).
His assist is an anti-air, which can be useful in the right situation.

Casshan

This guy is really strong. His comboing ability isn’t huge, but just a few hits from him does huge damage. Otherwise he has lots of good single-hitting attacks too. And being able to summon his dog, Friender, to do various attacks, is quite nice, which actually really helps for combos/preventing your opponent from moving. His supers are pretty good too. The first is a huge wave that comes out of the ground, dealing quite a bit of damage. The second is a series of electric punches which deals good damage if you combo into it properly. His level 3 is slow and tough to use properly, but deals good damage(I’d suggest using it from super-close range). Overall he’s a good character, and not too hard to use either.
His assist is pretty useful. He slams the groung, hitting anyone near him.

Polimar

He’s pretty strong, he has simple combos, some option select attacks, good attacks and some okay supers. He’s fun to use too. His level 3 super is pretty powerful too. My only big problem with him is that he moves really slowly when he’s not attacking… It feels kinda weird, he barely moves at all if you’re not attacking or dashing. Otherwise though, he’s fun to use.
His assist is not bad at all. An instant 3-hit combo right in front of you to help out with your comboing ability.

Yatterman-1

He’s quite fun to play as. His attacks or close to mid range, they’re fast and multi-hitting, and a slight bit unpredictable. He has some good combos, and his suppers are okay. His first summons Yatterwan who does a tackle attack that deals good damage if the opponent doesn’t block it. The second one summons Yatterwan who does a short-range tackle, and then shoots fire which you can direct. His level 3 is not bad, it does tons of damage if it hits. Overall he combos well and has lots of potential for mindgames I’d say.
His assist is rather weak though.

Karas

While he does have good combos and some pretty good attacks, he has the low HP in the game (around 37000), so use him wisely. One thing that really annoys me with him is that one of his supers is a counter, and it’s really obvious when he does it so it’s easy to “avoid”. His other super requires you do be doing a certain of his specials and to do the required motion while that attack is going on. Not the easiest super to use if you ask me. Overall he’s not really easy to use and he dies fast, but he is considered very high-tier so it could be worth working on learning him.
And his assist is a really fast but short-range melee attack. I’d say pretty good for defensive use.

Doronjo

Doronjo is a pretty fun character to use (and strangely the only vilain in the game…). Fighting a good Doronjo player means the screen will be filled with things happenings, explosions, her 2 helpers stopping you all the time, and overall being assaulted nonstop. Her 2 teammates from the Doronbo team constantly come out for different attacks, there’s traps everywhere, projectiles… tons of stuff. Her supers are a mixed bag. One requires good timing, since the guy who comes out of the ground when you do it has to press a button for the super to actually happen, where, after a while, something falls on the field hurting the enemy if he touches it without blocking. The second one is a counter, which I’m not a bit fan of. The level 3 super is… insanity. It can be used to punish slow predictable attacks. It’s pretty strong though. Overall, she’s really fun to use, though she requires some time to learn.
Her assist is a bit weak. A slow, not strong projectile.

Ippatsuman

He’s good. His attacks are fast and rather strong. I find him a bit tough to combo with, but not a big problem. He also has a projectile. His supers are a bit weird too. One is an anti-air grab, which I find tough to use properly and not really easy to combo into. The second one summons a vehicle that spans most of the screen, damaging anything in the way. His level 3 is… unique. A giant robot appears in the background. You can make him do punches and stuff like that… and a giant attack that SEEMS unblockable (though I’m probably wrong), but deals around 90% of damage… I don’t like that level 3 much. Overall he’s a good character.
His assist is good too.

The Capcom Side

Capcom are probably a bit more familiar to you, though they went with a few interesting/unexpected choices here.

Ryu

He’s Ryu. He’s the basic fighting game character. He has the same moves as usual, similar combos as usual… One thing I like is that his Hurricane Kick is actually Ken’s, the multi-hitting one. He’s good, he’s easy to use. His level 3 super is a shoryuken, and it’s a bit hard to use properly. Well… He’s Ryu, nothing more to say really.
And his assist is an average speed Hadouken, it has some uses.

Chun-Li

I find her a bit easier to use than usual. She has lots of good combos, are attacks are good, she’s pretty fast and has some good air combos. Her super are pretty good too. Her Level 3 can only be used in the air, but I’m sure it can be used pretty easily.
Her assist is pretty good too. A few fast quicks in the air.

Alex

Alex… He’s big, he’s strong, he has a few grabs which deal high damage, and he’s actually kinda fast. He has a really good air attack too. His supers are pretty good too, though his level 3 is a grab so it’s a bit tough to use properly. Overall I find him to be pretty good.
His assist is nice too.

Morrigan

I really like her. And that’s a bit strange. In her own games I can’t use her properly, but in cross-overs I always like her… weird. Anyways, she’s fast, she has good combos, some projectiles, and okay supers. Her first super, which sends a barrage of missiles, is a bit slow to start, but not too hard to use. You can also control the trajectory a bit. The second one deals insane damage, but it’s hard to use properly. Her Level 3 is not bad, but I feel it’s a bit hard to combo into. Overall she’s simple and straight-forward.
Her assist is a slow projectile. There’s probably some good ways to use it.

Batsu

He has good attacks, and gameplay-wise I’d say he’s pretty similar to Ryu. His attacks are a bit different, and I’d say a bit more interesting. Not exactly as easy to use as Ryu, but he has good combos and good supers.  Not much more to say about him. He’s a good character, not too tough to use, easy to learn.
His assist is pretty useful too.

Mega Man Volnutt

While I feel he’s a bit random for a Mega Man representative, he’s still a fun addition. His attack are pretty cool. One cool thing with him is that you can change his weapon. One thing that sucks is that all quarter-circle moves for him are “weapon change”, which is redundant since pressing down twice and an attack button also changes his weapon to the corresponding attack buton’s weapon(Heavy is Drill, Medium is Shield thingy, Light is Gatling gun). Though, when you get used to that, he’s a pretty versatile character with some pretty good moves. His supers are good too. One is a multi-hitting uppercut, the other is a machine gun. His level 3 isn’t too great though, since it’s a grab that basically requires touching the opponent. One complaint I have is his projectile… it’s slow and weak. Overall though he’s interesting to use.
Good multi-hit assist.

Kaijin no Soki

I haven’t used him that much, but I feel he’s an okay character. He has slow attacks, but he’s kinda strong. He has a cool move that seems to chain after most hits, which is nice for combos. His 2 normal Supers are really good. One being a medium strength slash that’s not too hard to combo into, and the other being more of an anti-air, but it deals damage in a big area too. His level 3 transforms him, but I’ll be totally honest here and say I have no idea what to do during his transformation. Overall he seems like a pretty good character. And I thought he was a cool addition since Dawn of Dreams is the only Onimusha game I actually properly played(only played the beginning of 3…).
His assist is average… not great, but still usable. A kinda slow wide slash of his sword.

Roll

She’s small, she’s kinda fast, she has good attacks, some okay projectiles, good supers. She’s actually(surprisingly) good. Her first super is healing, though if the opponent is above you when you use it, it damages him(though it won’t heal you if it hits the opponent). The second one requires a charge motion… it hits on the ground, it’s not too bad and deals good enough damage. Her level 3 is really short range and hard to use properly I feel. Her HP is quite low(40000), which isn’t surprising considering she’s a loli robot with a broom… Either way, she’s pretty good.
Her assist is a projectile, so it can be useful.

Saki

Saki apparently got a big boost from the first iteration. Lots of people are calling her this game’s Cable now. I think that’s wrong, but whatever. She’s a very good character. She has good range, her grenades are great, she has various types of bullets she can shoot all of which have different properties. Her supers are okay. One super loads a strong bullet which you can shoot anytime you want (only once, for course), the other shoots a diagonal beam which does quite a bit of damage(a bit tough to land properly). Her level 3 is a counter, which I’m not a big fan of, and does about 23000 damage. Overall though, if you learn to use her properly she has huge potential.
And her assist is a really slow melee attack, not really good.

Viewtiful Joe

Viewtiful Joe makes me sad. Why? Because he sucks, while I really wanted him to be a good character. I might be completely wrong, of course, since I’m not an incredibly talented fighting game player, but… Yeah, I can’t find any way to use him properly. His normal attacks have no range, his range attacks have huge startup and recovery times, his bomb attack is useless(and can hurt him) and his supers suck. His first super is a cannon that takes over 2 seconds to shoot and that is nearly unusable properly. His second super is a series of melee attacks which is initiated by a short dash, which is kinda comboable. And his level 3 isn’t too good. Overall… not to say he’s not kinda fun to use, but I can’t see him being competitive at all.
His assist just does his bomb special, which sucks.

The Giants

There are 2 giant characters. Both of them have similar features: they’re huge, they have lots of HP, they deal lots of damage, they both have super armors (unless 2 giants are fighting each other, or you’re fighting the final boss)…

Gold Lightan

He has reasonable speed, really strong attacks. He’s a bit slow though. He’s also the character with the most HP, at around 71500 HP. He’s not bad, but he has tons of recovery time after every move, making him a bit easy to deal with. He’s fun to use, despite not being super good. I highly doubt he’s very competitive.

PTX-40A

He’s not really fast, but he has good attacks. Really good air attacks, a nice tackle attack that switches out the other player’s active character. He has less HP than Gold Lightan (around 65000), but I feel he’s a bit more versatile.

The new characters

There are 5 characters that are completely new in this game. I decided to talk about them separately. For the unlocks, what count is which character deals the final hit on the final boss.

Tekkaman Blade

Takkaman Blade is unlocked once you finish the game with 3 different Tatsunoko characters.
I was quite surprised with him. Since he’s from a remake of the original Tekkaman, I was expecting him to have a very similar moveset, but it’s actually completely different. Tekkaman Blade is a bit faster, a bit stronger, and has really nice set-ups, though he does have a bit less range. He has okay supers too, though his beam super, which I thought would be the same as Tekkaman’s, is diagonal making is a bit tougher to use. His level 3 super is a bit hard to use too, since it has really short range(basically a grab), but it does pretty big damage. I think he’s good, but he has one major flaw: his dashes are incredibly delayed (because his “jetpack” or whatever needs to charge before he dashes). But otherwise he’s a very solid character.
His assist is a slow multi-hit melee attack, not incredibly useful.

Joe the Condor

Joe the Condor is unlocked once you finish the game with 6 different Tatsunoko characters.
He’s a fun character to use, but quite tough to use. He seems a bit basic at first, but I find that his attacks are a bit awkward. He’s not bad, and his specials aren’t too bad. The supers are pretty good. The Bird Missile super deals damage at first when Joe’s plane passes by, and then, about 5 seconds later, a missile falls on the field and hurts both characters(funny stuff). The other is a series of projectiles. His level 3 is a short range melee attack which isn’t really easy to hit with. Overall I think he’s good, but I can’t really use him properly.
His assist is not bad… But not great.

Frank West

Frank West is unlocked once you finish the game with 3 different Capcom characters.
He’s one of the characters I wasn’t really looking forward to playing, but it ends up he’s not too bad. His attacks are weird. He can summon zombies, he has a zombie projectile, he has pretty good range, and his supers are quite good. One is… The Real Megabuster, where Frank puts on a Mega Man costume and shoots a huge beam. It’s REALLY FUCKING FAST and really easy to combo into. The second is a grab. The level 3 requires to be at a certain distance from the opponent, but there’s some ways to combo into it so it’s not too bad. Frank is the only character to have an extra Level 3 super for giant characters, which is pretty fun. Overall he’s really fun to use, though he’s tough to learn.
His assist just stuns your opponent for, like a few frames. It CAN have a use, I guess, but for an average fighting game player such as myself, it’s not really useful.

Zero

Zero is unlocked once you finish the game with 6 different Capcom characters.
I really like using him. He’s fast, he has really good combos, and he has good maneuverability. He’s not without flaws though. His HP is terribly low (40000, which is the same as Roll, and just a bit higher than Karas), his damage output is rather low and his supers aren’t too great. His first super is really bad… it’s basically impossible NOT to block it… Just a bunch of slow rainbow beams coming from the sky, it’s WAY too predictable. And his second super just modifies some of his special attacks for a very short while, which can have some use, but it’s not great. His Level 3 is not bad, but it requires being at just the right distance from the opponent, making it hard to use properly. Otherwise though, Zero is a very solid character.
And his assist is fairly good, dealing a Shoryuken-like attack right in front of you, good for combos and such.

Yatterman-2

Yatterman-2 is unlocked by finishing the game with all the other unlockable characters(again, what matters here is who deals the final hit on Yami).
She’s really fun to use. Similar to Zero in some ways… she uses fast attacks that deal relatively low damage and she doesn’t have a lot of HP, but she can combo like crazy if you use her properly. She has good combos and good supers. Her first super shoots a bouncy lightning ball which can deal multiple hits. The second summons a tiny robot that will fly around for about 10 seconds hitting the opponent at certain intervals, so it’s pretty good for comboing. Her level 3 starts with a slide on the ground, and it’s not too tough to combo into. Overall she’s quite good and not too tough to use. Her HP is a bit low (42000), but she’s good enough which is okay.
Her assist is okay, but a bit slow. A slightly diagonal melee attack.

Overall

I really like the cast here. It’s a good number of characters for a “first” game in a series. I find that, other than Viewtiful Joe, from what I’ve experienced, there’s a good balance in the game. The characters are all good, all unique, all fun to play as. The giants can be quite easy to deal with if you know what to do, but the “normal” characters seem like they are quite balanced… Or at least a LOT more balanced than Marvel VS Capcom 2(okay, that’s not really an accomplishment). People use a lot more varied teams from what I’ve seen, and choosing the right partners can definitely make up for the weaknesses of the other character. The cast is great, both on the Capcom and Tatsunoko sides.

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Let’s go right away and define what “Gold Standard” means. It’s pretty simple. It has to be:
1. A game that defines the genre it’s in.
2. It has to be a high-quality game/series.
3. It still has to be fun to play.
4. Of course, it doesn’t need to be the BEST in the genre, but it has to be the one to have set most of the genre’s standards.
5. It has to be an older game, as much as possible.

So read on and see what are the Gold Standards in the gaming industry! Of course, if I’m missing a genre(there’s some I didn’t put in because I either could think of any 1 game that defined the genre, or that were too similar to another genre that I didn’t need to include them), or if you think about a game that I might not have thought about for any of the categories, be sure to comment!

Action

The Action genre is fairly new. There were multiple games in the genre starting in the Playstation generation, but they were rarely good. The genre really took off when Devil May Cry came out. At the time, it defined the genre. Fast-action, multiple combos depending on the timing of button presses, multiple weapons, badass cutscenes, no cumbersome QTEs… it had it all. Some tried to copy it and failed (*coughgodofwarcough*), others did a fairly good job at taking the concepts from DMC and making their own game(but never as good). But the genre was near perfected when Devil May Cry 3 came out. And THAT is when the Gold Standard of the genre was decided. It took everything from Devil May Cry but made it all better. The original DMC was held back by the fact that it used a slightly modified Resident Evil engine. DMC3 had it’s own engine and was a lot smoother and just overall better than its predecessor.

So the Gold Standard for action games is: Devil May Cry 3. As of the writing of this post, the game to follow the standards it set the best is Bayonetta. We’ll see if it becomes the new Gold Standard in the coming years.

Fighting

There’s really no doubt behind this choice, right? This is THE game everyone thinks about when you mention “fighting games”. It’s still one of the best fighting games, and it’s been at it for all of 19 years. Street Fighter 2 is without a doubt the Gold Standard for the genre. And what better example for what I mean by “Gold Standard”? It’s been around for 19 years, it has consistently been good for 19 years, and people still play it after 19 years(with occasional new versions from time to time). It will always be a great game. Every fighting game after it used the same basic gameplay as it, but they made minor changes to make it their own game. May it be concentrating more on juggling, different button input methods for special attacks, or adding a bunch of cancels, more speed, every fighting game is basically SFII.

So the Gold Standard for fighting games is definitely Street Fighter 2…. any of its millions of incarnations.

Beat’em Up

This is a tough genre to decide on a Gold Standard, mostly because most games in the genre pretty much play exactly the same. So for this one I just had to go for one that is highly recognized and popular. It’s timeless and still a high-quality game. And all that after 23 years in existence. The game I went with here is Double Dragon. No, not the NES version, but the original arcade version. A good Beat ‘em Up always needs multiplayer, which the NES version lacked. Since then there have been tons of Beat ‘em Up games, some just as good, and even better than Double Dragon, but at the basics all of them are following closely in the footsteps of Double Dragon.

This is why Double Dragon is the Gold Standard of the genre.

Platformers

I don’t even know WHY I have that genre on here. the answer is incredibly obvious. May it be Side-Scrolling or 3D platformers, is there a better choice than Mario? No, there isn’t. There were platforming games before Mario came on the NES, but none of them were anywhere as good as what Mario created with its NES incarnations. Mario perfected the side-scrolling platformer with Super Mario Bros 3. In the switch to 3D, Mario was eager to use the new dimension to it’s full potential, and Super Mario 64 was the perfect way of doing so. It might have started the trend of collecting a bunch of things instead of a more linear story progression, but it worked very well with idea.

Mario is easily the Gold Standard of the platforming genre. Super Mario Bros 3 is the Gold Standard for Side-Scrolling Platformers (and has yet to be surpassed). And while I think Super Mario Galaxy was a better game than SM64, it did just follow the standards SM64 set and didn’t really add innovation to the mix. So Super Mario 64 is still the Gold Standard for 3D platformers.

Shooter

By shooter, I mean shoot em’ ups. Side-scrolling or vertical-scrolling games where you control a spaceship or flying magic-user, shooting everything in your way, finding power-ups and dodging millions of bullets (sometimes literally). This is a genre that hasn’t been very well represented in recent years, but it’s still not dying. Neither should it, because the Shmup is one of the more exciting/challenging genres in gaming. What would best represent the genre? I think Gradius fits the best. Gradius 2 to be exact. The arcade version released in 1987. I feel it’s the one that solidified the power-up system(with multiple options) in the series and created better level design for the genre in general. It solidified the genre’s fast-paced bullet-dodging gameplay, had a nice comprehensible upgrade system, cool bosses, it was pretty tough, and being able to choose the upgrade “path” at the beginning set the basis of shmups with multiple characters and play styles.

So the Gold Standard for Shooters is Gradius 2!

Action Platformer

The action platformer is basically a mix of platforming and shmups. It’s not exactly a Shmup, yet not exactly a Platformer, but it concentrates a bit more on fast-paced action rather than the platforming. Contra set the standards for that genre. The NES version I’d say, the arcade original isn’t exactly as fun. There’s bullet’s everywhere, the controls are silky smooth, shooting enemies is fun, it’s challenging, the various different weapons are awesome, Co-op… and there’s the spreader. What’s not to love about Contra?

Contra definitely set the standards for its genre. A genre that is very under-represented nowadays, but a great one nonetheless.

FPS

Another hard choice. Because there are so many of them, and because it’s kinda hard to pinpoint exactly which of them started it all. To get some of them out of the way right now: it’s not Wolfenstein 3D. It’s not Doom or Quake either. Though each of those are definitely inspirations for the Gold Standard, they don’t have enough gameplay elements to count. It has to have, at the least, fast gameplay, cool weaponry and solid multiplayer. A good single player is a nice asset but not exactly a must. It’s a hard choice, but I think Unreal Tournament(released on PC in 1999) takes this one. There’s other good candidates like Goldeneye and Perfect Dark, or even *shrugs* Halo. But UT took the basic multiplayer gameplay from Goldeneye and made it near perfect. It took all the modes and made some modes of its own, made the gameplay millions of times smoother, better controls than basically anything else on the market, the weaponry was a lot more interesting and it was a lot more satisfying to blow the crap out of other people. Not to mention the game’s modability.

So… while it wasn’t exactly an easy choice, I think Unreal Tournament defines what an FPS should be. It might not have a great epic single-player story, but the single-player mode is still quite interesting and playing a LAN game with friends is tons of fun. To this day, all FPS multiplayer is based on modes UT created. (I know some people will disagree with me on this one)

Adventure / Action-Adventure

I originally had a section for both Adventure and Action-Adventure… But suddenly I realized both genres had a similar Gold Standard. I think it’s a simple to find who wins this one. Of course it’s Zelda. I had a few other choices(like Adventure on the Atari 2600), but none of them fit nearly as well as Zelda. The original Zelda is definitely a great adventure game. You have to find hints to get to the next part, you need to find new items to solve puzzles, there’s tons of hidden stuff. Definitely an adventure. There’s really no other game that’s as influencial to the Adventure genre than the first Zelda game. It sets a shitload of standards not only for Adventure games, but for gaming in general. For Action-Adventure games, I’ll says Link to the Past had a bit more influence on the Action part of the genre. The action was faster and more interesting, and the huge amount of items to use in combat just made it that much better.

So the Adventure genre has 2 Gold Standards: the original Zelda for Adventure games, and the faster-paced action gameplay of Link to the Past for Action-Adventure games.

RPG

The RPG genre has a ton of colossus. Giant super series that have existed for over 20 years and that are still popular. Sure, the main inspiration for the genre is basically Pen and Paper RPGs like Dungeons and Dragons, but those definitely can’t count as the Gold Standard. There are 2 series that are the obvious choices for the Gold Standard: Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy. But choosing which game in both series can serve as the Gold Standard… not an easy task. Both series set standards in the whole genre. Final Fantasy 1 and 3 went with the whole “custom team” idea and character classes, as did Dragon Quest 3. Final Fantasy 4 and 6 innovated the kind of story an RPG could tell, as did Dragon Quest 4, 5 and 6, with multi-character/multi-quest epic plots that spanned long time periods…

So let’s cheat this time and say that the Gold Standard for the RPG genre is both the whole of the Final Fantasy and Dragon Quest series(up ntil the final SNES incarnations of both series), why don’t we? Both contributed greatly to the genre, and are the main inspiration to most RPGs now… Other than the ones that use a D&D system, of course. Those series also set the standards for RPG sub-genres such as the Action and Strategy RPG.

RTS

When I think RTS, I think Command and Conquer Red Alert. It’s the game that introduced me to the genre, and it was a very good game. But after replaying it not too long ago and having a bit of trouble with the controls, I realized it couldn’t exactly be the Gold Standard. Nah, the Gold Standard for this is a relatively easy choice: StarCraft. Great fast-paced RTS gameplay, incredible resource management, 3 unique races with completely different gameplay styles and… high-level games are just crazy to watch (not like I have the skills required to actually play in those high-level matches). It’s no wonder there’s still a ton of people playing the game online, and that’s probably not going to change, even when Starcraft 2 comes out.

There’s little doubt about this one(though I did consider WarCraft 2 for a minute there, before remembering that StarCraft exists), the Gold Standard of the RTS is StarCraft.

Simulator

The simulator… Now I don’t mean Flight Simulators, or Train Simulators, or Racing Simulators, or Rape Simulators. What I mean is games where you’re given a city, or people, or companies, and you have to manage them. Getting money to build up, keeping residents/clients happy, becoming as successful as possible… that’s what I’m talking about. Though my favorite in the genre is probably the original Roller Coaster Tycoon game, there is little doubt in my mind that Sim City set the standards for the genre.

With its multiple scenarios and innovative gameplay and features, Sim City set the standards for the Simulator genre (and spawned a needlessly high amount of sub-series).

Racing (arcade)

It’s Ridge Racer!

RIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIDGE RAACEEEEEEEEER!!!
(I could go on and talk about how it did things that no other racing game before did and such… but I won’t waste my time when just 2 words is all I need)

Racing (Simulator)

The racing simulator genre is still a young genre. The game that I think set the standards is Gran Turismo 2. Sure I think Forza 3 is a lot better and might be setting standards itself, but until Gran Tursimo 5 comes out (it’s not out as of the writing of this post), I’ll hold back and keep an older game as the Gold Standard here.

So Gran Turismo 2 it is!

Music

The music genre exploded recently. But it’s been going on for a while. Before Guitar Hero and Rock Band, there was only one: Dance Dance Revolution. Okay, that’s a bit wrong. Other games came out a bit before/around the same time in the genre(like Beatmania), but the first one to really have an impact was DDR. It started out a bit basic, but the fun and original techno music and the new type of fun gameplay had instant appeal. Sure, we all looked like morons playing the game (unless we had insane skills… which I didn’t), but we had lots fun(AND it was great exercise). The gameplay was fast and frantic, the music was occasionally interesting(though newer versions just slap on a bunch of crappy pop music… the older Konami Originals are badass), it was challenging, and becoming good at it was very satisfactory.

Now we have Rock Band, which takes the fun DDR gameplay in a good direction with multiple instruments and such, but the game that set all the standards for the genre is definitely Dance Dance Revolution. So that’s the Gold Standard this time.

Puzzle

One day I woke up and my Gameboy had Tetris in it. I could never get it out.
Also: Tetris music by Powerglove
And this too: Tetris God (it’s so true)
And maybe a bit of this: Brentalfloss
Why the hell not?: First-person Tetris (even like that it’s insanely fun)

I don’t need to say anything about Tetris…. Really. I think it’s the most obvious Gold Standard in the list.

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So why am I posting about MW2? Find out after the break!

I haven’t even touched the single player yet, for your information. I plan to but I really just got this to play multi. It is the IT game for this season. I just felt a tad left out playing my Borderlands (now complete aside from Mad Moxy) and I had to catch up. As I type I believe I’m rank 30. I’ve unlocked a few things but I’m still all about my FAMAS. I think it makes me a better player, at least when it comes to Hardcore mode. The only way you should be playing CoD. Everything else makes me think of Quake 3. Search and Destroy is still around but they shortened the title down to SD.

I am so discouraged by the type of people I play this game with. It seems that 50%+ of the players are complete bigots. But then again, I only hear the vocal ones. Every match I pretty much end up muting more than half my team.

Why should I have to do this? I understand that this game is probably going to please a certain demographic which I shouldn’t really have high standard for but I seem to remember Counter Strike, when they enabled voice, not having this problem. Heck, Halo did not have this much of a problem. Not half as much trash talking. People gloat, people bash regardless of winning or losing. When I get back to lobby after a match I’m getting an earful of colourful words.

So here’s my rule of thumb. I HATE you and I will mute you if…

- You’re 12. There’s a lot of you out there. I don’t need to hear your prepubescent voice constantly. I understand a lot of you are not 18 yet and through some bad parenting or absent parenting. You’ve gotten your hands on this game. I played violent games as a child too. I didn’t have access to voice in game until that wonderful patch in the original Half-Life engine. Please keep this in mind and don’t have these lengthy conversations with people that don’t care.

-You’re singing or playing your music in your headset. I see you like music. I do to. Maybe not yours. In any case, keep the communications channels clear. I don’t really care to be listening to your music at the time I’m playing.

-You’re breathing into your microphone. Put it an inch further from your mouth or nose dude.

-You’re playing to basically just harass your own team. At this point I may end the match, submit unfavorable reviews and leave.

I’m filing a complaint if:

-You’re using a known exploit to the game. This speaks for itself. I understand that using it once might be exciting. Report it to the dev team and never do it again. But shit like the javelin was just plain annoying.

-You’re being a HUGE bigot. You mastered the English language. You are now using homophobic, racial slurs and insulting everyone you play with. Congratulations. Wordsmith extraordinaire. I hope you get a communication ban. Seriously, nobody thinks you’re funny and that internet alpha male thing you’re trying to project just doesn’t work. I understand some people find it amusing to trash talk. But what you’re spewing out of your mouth is the reason I hate games like CoD. I have to deal with your kind.

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We’re going a bit differently than other sites here. Instead of choosing a number 1 for each category, we’re going for 5 games in each category(except Games of the Year), and we won’t actually rank them. Just give a handful of games for each of the categories that are all good choices.

Here are the categories:

Best PS3 Exclusives
Best 360 Exclusives
Best Wii Exclusives
Best DS games
Best PSP games
Best Multiplatform games
Best Downloadable games
Best Soundtrack
Best Singleplayer
Best Multiplayer
Biggest Letdowns/Disappointments of the Year (can be more than just games)
Biggest Surpises of the Year (can be more than just games)
Games of the Year

Yeah, no Best PC exclusives… Guess we don’t have many PC gamers on our team yet so we don’t know what exactly was good this year on PC.

So, by tonight or tomorrow we’ll start having posts for each category, finishing with our choices for Game of the Year. And in a much better format than that crap I made last year, that’s for sure. Look forward to it!

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While I think that a full Rock Band release for Green Day is ridiculous and really not needed(just like Guitar Hero Metallica and Guitar Hero Van Halen), and there’s tons of bands that deserve their own Rock Band game before Green Day, I’m still kinda happy about it because it might give more attention to the time when the band was actually good and respectable. So this is a wishlist for the game’s tracklist.

Without further ado, let’s see what I think should be the tracklist of Rock Band Green Day! (yeah, random short post to delay my review of Spirit Tracks >_<)

1,039/Smoothed Out Slappy Hours
This is actually a compilation album which includes 3 short albums that came before it, but I’ve always referred to it as their first album…This album is quite different from anything else Green Day offered afterwards. Lots of punk-ish love songs. The sound is a bit raw and sounds like it’s not incredibly well-recorded compared to any of the following albums. But it does have quite a few good songs, despite a lot of them sounding quite similar. And since it shows the band’s beginnings, I think they need quite a few songs from it in the game.
My list:

At the Library
Don’t Leave Me
I Was There
Green Day
Going to Pasalacqua
16
The Judge’s Daughter
409 in Your Coffeemaker
1,000 Hours
The One I Want

Kerplunk
This album features a lot of good songs, but this is really where Green Day found their style. Not their best album, but it’s a blast to listen to anyways.

My list:
2000 Light Years Away
Welcome to Paradise
One for the Razorbacks
Christie Road
Private Ale
One of My Lies
Android

Dookie
The height of Green Day’s history. This is where they had the most popularity (until now, sadly) and where they really left their mark in the music industry. Most of their greatest songs are there. They solidified their style and made one of the best albums ever. Nothing more to say really.

My list:
All the freaking album
Seriously, not one song from this album SHOULD be omitted. Including Welcome to Paradise, it sounds different enough from the Kerplunk version to warrant having it a second time in the game.

Insomniac
This continues with Dookie’s style of music, and there’s some really good songs in there. Not exactly as solid as Dookie, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t have some great songs. It also features a song that spawned what is probably their best video clip, Walking Contradiction.

My list:
Armatage Shanks
Stuck with Me
Geek Stink Breath
86
Brain Stew/Jaded
Westbound Sign
Walking Contradiction

Nimrod
This album tried a different style than what was used in Insomniac and Dookie. The songs didn’t all sound exactly like the Green Day we were, by then, used to hearing. For that it wasn’t really critically acclaimed. But it had some great songs nonetheless.

My list:
Nice Guys Finish Last
Hitchin’ a Ride
Platypus (I Hate You)
King for a Day
Scattered
Uptight

Warning
Again, Warning features a bit of a different sound than before, but it was Green Day’s last great album. I omitted one song I like because of the more “mature” nature of it.

My list:
Warning
Church on Sunday
Castaway
Deadbeat Holiday
Waiting
Minority

American Idiot
I hate this album. Forget the change in style, it’s a change of genre completely. They went from Punk(first 2-3 albums) to Punk Rock(basically from dookie to warning) to… Modern Pop. Yeah… But there are just a few good songs in there, or at least good compared to all the crap that’s in there.

My list:
American Idiot
Holiday
St. Jimmy

21st Century Breakdown
Oh god. I thought American Idiot was  terrible. But this… doesn’t even have 1 good song…

My list:
NONE OF THE SONGS

OH WAIT. There’s one! I almost forgot about that song because it was only in the japanese release of the album. I want to know why too, because it’s great and by far the best song Green Day has produced since the Warning album. It sounds like older Green Day songs and it’s really really good.

My real list for this album:
Lights Out

Final Words
A Green Day-centered Rock Band is a really weird idea, and we could just do with DLC. But considering all the albums the band produced, I think what I have here is a really solid track list. The final tracklist will probably be quite different, concentrating more on the newer albums than the old ones, but I can still wish, can’t I? I’ll probably end up just buying it and exporting the songs to Rock Band 2 and then bringing it back to EBgames…

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EA and Bioware have released images of the boxart that will be plastered on all copies of Mass Effect 2. Sadly, I don’t find the boxart for the second entry in the trilogy to be as good as the first game.

I feel the boxart is too “ACTION PACKED ACTION AWAITS THEE” and less emphasis on the space-drama feel the first game’s box art had.

Hopefully this is just to advertise the game to those who want to shoot things and ask questions later instead of having a bit of a chit-chat.

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Disgaea 3 is getting a patch for trophies on the PS3! But that’s not without some bad news.

Read on for details!

The patch that adds trophies will come out on July 16th.

That’s fine and all, but there’s a slight problem: installing the patch renders any game save before the patch came out UNUSABLE. So you played the game 200+ hours? Well if you want to get trophies this all goes down the drain.

Here’s the press release.
Press Release

And the trophy list.
Trophy List

Most of the trophies are pretty lame, since they mostly require either doing basic stuff in the game, or being extremely lucky. Some are fine though, since they require to know the inner workings of the game well to boost your power high enough.

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