An Assortment of Debris

I haven't posted in awhile. So just because I had the idea, here's a quick rundown of stuff I've laid hands on recently,

Star Wars: Battlefront 2 - I've loved this game for years. Finding a copy for five dollars at my local Blockbuster was like a gift from the heavens. It's just as good as I remember, and if you have the Xbox version, with an active Live account and a valid credit card tied to said account, you can download content from Battlefront 1. Also Kit Fisto. Kit Fisto.




The Golden Compass(Xbox 360) - This is what you do with The Golden Compass, if you're ever in a position where you have to play it.

1. Try to enjoy the first five minutes where you're a polar bear.

2. Endure the ten minutes where you play as a useless little girl.

3. Earn the 10GS for beating the first boss, as a polar bear.

4. Immediately remove the game from your console, return it to its case, and throw it out the window. Never speak of it again.

DiRT (Xbox 360) Your approach to DiRT should pretty much be the same as that concerning The Golden Compass; play the first mission, get a couple achievements, and then get rid of it. Unless you like racing games, and then you might be tempted to spend a little more time with it. If that's the case, then go for it, but since I don't like racing games, and never play them, it's difficult for me to comment on the quality. I will say that the game is pretty, and the graphics are impressive by any standard. 'Course, I was drinking when I played it, so take from that what you will.



Condemned 2: Bloodshot (Xbox 360) - I only played this game for about twenty minutes, and it didn't hook me. Everything was dark and covered in black slime. Then there were monster things that burst into more black slime when you hit them. Graphics were good, though.




Virtua Fighter 5 (Xbox 360) - Maybe if I'd played this back when it came out, I would have enjoyed it more, but in a world where Soul Calibur 4 has already spent several hours dozen in my console, and Tekken 6 is only a short ways away, Virtua Fighter didn't impress me. At all. The graphics and sound were acceptable. Everything has a glossy, plastic look to it. The controls were stiff, and I found combos to be a difficult thing to pull off. Meh.




The Darkness (Xbox 360) - If you've ever watched Yahtzee's review of this game's demo, then you have a pretty good idea of what it's about. The controls weren't bad, but I had to manually adjust the aim sensitivity. The graphics were good. The narrative is interesting, but I didn't get far enough to really comment on it. Sound effects are good.


All of these were purchased from the buy-one-get-one bin at Blockbuster. As for the good stuff,



Shadow Complex (Xbox 360) - Hell yes. Hell. Yes. This game wins on all fronts, as far as I'm concerned. You can read a full review at just about any major game site, but if you're looking for another recommendation, you've found it. At 1200 MS points, Shadow Complex is well worth it's weight in gold. Or something. Herm.

Mass Effect: Pinnacle Station (Xbox 360) - At only five dollars, Pinnacle Station is a decent addition to the Mass Effect universe, but it's hardly a compelling one. It consists of a series of combat scenarios which, upon completion, award the player with a cumulative total 150GS. This bumps Mass Effect's total achievable Gamerscore up to 1200GS, if you're into that kind of thing. The early descriptions promised four hours of gameplay, but I completed it in about two, by my count. If anything, Pinnacle Station is a look at what multiplayer might look like when applied to the Mass Effect game model, and it's an interesting experiment.

Wet(Demo [Xbox 360]) - If you like guns, swords, hot chicks in tight leather, Quentin Tarentino, or extreme violence, give this demo a whirl. The demo contains a good twenty minutes of solid gameplay, and is a roller coaster ride of ludicrous, unadulterated fun. Slow-mo shooting and absurd acrobatics abound in this third person action game, as well as cinematic quick-time events ala God of War, and gameplay which will brings to mind John Woo's Stranglehold and even the Prince of Persia series. Try it. Go on.

Left 4 Dead - I suppose I'm late to the party on this one, but oh well. Left 4 Dead is a multiplayer survival-horror FPS extravaganza, which really doesn't do anything to revolutionize any one of the three. It does, however, do everything it sets out to do, providing players with several solid hours of good, clean, undead fun. Give it a rental, if nothing else.




ODST comes out Tuesday. Expect a review.

Mother 3

This is the first JRPG I’ve ever actually beaten.

There, I admitted it. As many Final Fantasy titles and such that I’ve played, I’ve never before beaten a single JRPG in my life, except for the Pokémon titles, and I’m not so sure those count. It was on my list of things to do before I die, beat a traditional JRPG, and now I’ve done it with Mother 3.

So what led me to play this game to completion while I can’t beat a single Final Fantasy? A number of things, really.

Mother 3 is the third and possibly final title in the Mother series of RPGs made by Nintendo. The first game, on the NES, never came to America, but the second one is best known here in the west as Earthbound on the SNES. Mother 3 also was never released in America, it’s a Japan-only GBA game. Thankfully, a crack team of hardcore fans got together and translated the game into English for us to play with the magic of Not-Emulators. Because emulating games you don’t already own is illegal, kids!

I’d played a bit of Earthbound before out of curiosity, and it was quite charming, funny, and sometimes outright surreal, so I was hoping for more of that when I gave Mother 3 a spin, and I was not at all disappointed. The story goes as such: The little village of Tazmily is the happiest place around. Everyone is kind and there is no form of currency at all, you can just walk into the general store and take whatever you need. Yes, it’s the happiest little place around…until tragedy strikes a small family made up of a husband (I named him Warren), his wife (Leia…don’t look at me like that), Lucas (you know, from Super Smash Bros Brawl?) and his twin brother Claus, and their dog who I named Dude. I won’t go into detail, but suffice it to say that the first half-hour or so of the game really messes with your emotions.



Lucas is the main character, as one would assume, but you don’t get to play as him for the first few hours of the game, instead controlling the father and a local thief (who I named Cage). The game is quite traditional as old-school JRPGs go; top-down view, turn-based battles, item management, leveling up, nothing you’ve never really seen before, but it has a few neat twists to it. There are no random encounters in the game, you see your enemies as they approach you to initiate the battles. Your HP counter is on a dial, so if you’re hit for massive damage, instead of instantly shaving off those HP and killing you, it rolls like a countdown, giving you a little bit of time to try to heal before you’re dead. It really makes those close battles thrilling, struggling to find the right item or attack to use before you’re snuffed out. And, thankfully, grinding doesn’t make up such a huge chunk of gameplay like it would in your typical Final Fantasy, so you don’t have to spend countless hours trying to level up just in order to face that one boss character who is an Arabian man with cybernetic parts and horns (as in the brass variety that play jazz music) coming out of his nose. It’s how he communicates, see, he plays smooth jazz music through those horns and a robot translates for him.

And that brings us to the main reason I loved this game and played to finish: there’s a lot of weird, quirky stuff and it’s very, very funny. Earthbound is rather infamous for its strange style and humor, and Mother 3 has it in spades. I mean come on, a major group of characters important to the game’s plot, the Magypsies, are drag queens with five-o’clock shadows! The ghosts in a haunted castle will trade you items for Rotten Eclairs, you have to fight monsters like a pile of lava wearing old grandma sunglasses with huge lips, and you spend a nice chunk of the game in disguise as members of the Pigmask army, the antagonists in the game who are responsible for all the horrible things going on. And yet, when you talk to them, they’re really not bad guys, kind of like Stormtroopers, only slightly more incompetent.



Oh, and the Mr. Saturns return, and it’s great.

So despite how it’s a bit easier than most hardcore RPGs tend to be, despite its simplistic graphics and gameplay, the story, the characters, the humor, the music, all of it wraps itself together in a unique little game that is equal parts surreal, uncomfortable, hilarious, and emotional. If only Nintendo would release it over here in America, yes?

[Brett]

Mechanical Violator Hakaider (1995)

Oh, Japan. You silly little guy, you. Just when we think we've seen it all, just when you get us believing that there aren't any more crazy, awesome, tripped out movies that you've been hiding up your sleeve, you wave your arm with a magician's flourish, and before us appears yet another hour and a half of WTFery.

This film, which is apparently a spinoff of the popular Kikaider series (which has seen treatment as an anime, manga, and tokusatsu live action series) stars the titular robot fighting against an evil, oppressive government which rules its citizens through the use of super-human cyborg-soldiers, and by robbing them of their emotions. It's a fairly straight forward plot, so I won't spend too much time commenting on it.

Apparently, the film was not well received by the Kikaider fanbase when it premiered in 1995. I'm not familiar with it personally, so I really can't comment. That's probably for the best, as I was able to take this film for what it is, and do so without any preconceptions or comparisons to the parent material.

This movie is insane. Persons familiar with the likes of Casshern, Kamen Rider and Garo will find themselves in familiar territory, but that's not to say that the movie is without it's own unique style and charm.

The movie kicks off showing a group of anonymous armed men running through dark, dank corridors. They find a locked door which they open with some weird electronic key, and inside they find a man chained to a wall. After yelling about how they had hoped to find treasure and not a person, the man in the chains looks up. Then they shoot him. A lot. They shoot him like you would shoot a skinless four headed dog, if it showed up in your bathroom and you just happened to have an assault rifle handy.
Suddenly the guy is neither in chains, nor is he a guy anymore. He's a heavily armored, heavily armed robot, and he kills everybody. He then spews some cliche, "WHO AM I I CAN'T REMEMBER" dialogue, and reclaims his motorcycle which nobody noticed before. It should be noted that the motorcycle was chained to the floor.
From here, Hakaider drives his newly liberated motorbike across an undefined distance to Jesus Town (it's actually called this, in both the Japanese original and translated version) where he fights guys in white robot suits and eventually liberates the people from their oppressive overlord, Gurjev (who wears a dead bird on his shoulder at all times).

I can say with relative confidence that any impressions you may have of Hakaider after reading the above summary are absolutely accurate. The movie is absurd on every level, and while one may find it somewhat more digestible if they are familiar with the Kikaider series, I suspect that bewilderment will follow a first time viewing of this film regardless of who's watching.

Over all, the movie is a lot of fun. The special effects are inventive, and include some early, and painfully obvious, CGI (it was 1995, after all). The action scenes are fairly well thought out, and the final battle between Hakaider and Michael (Gurjev's robot minion and the archetypal counterweight to our mechanical hero) is riveting. Fans of the Tokusatsu genre, wild Japanese cinema, and robots will find a lot to like here. I certainly did.

Arthas: Rise of the Lich King

This book from Christie Golden was fun and easy to read. If you have never heard of World of Warcraft and the RTS games that spawned it then you might be a little lost as to what is going on. This book has been released to help promote the newest expansion Wrath of the Lich King and gives a bit of an explanation as to why players were not fighting him before now.

The story takes place as three characters recall various points in the life of Arthas Menethil, who becomes the Lich King during the events fo the Warcraft 3 game.

The opening scene of the book actually requires understanding of the nature of the Lich King to fully comprehend. The Lich King is the spirit of an Orc Shaman named Ner'Zhul who was imprisoned by the Demons who wanted to control Azeroth and sent to Northrend to do so. In the opening scene the spirit of Ner'Zhul is sitting at a table with the humanity of the man who was once Arthas Menethil, which is portrayed by the youth he was long before all this happened. The humanity is sick and frail looking like it is clinging on with it's last threads.

The story then takes you to Arthas as a youth and proceeds to tell the story of his growing up stopping to show the events that turn him into the man who becomes the Lich King. It shows and intriguing look into the past of the character and leads to another short break. The second section of the book opens with the character Jaina Proudmoore (another main character from Warcraft 3) as she drifts into remembering what Arthas was like. The story then shows the love affair between the two characters and takes you through the events of Warcraft 3 from the perspective of a person who is not resurrected or able to build almost infinite troops. 

After another short interlude the story introduces Sylvanas Windrunner (a character Arthas killed and tortured in Warcraft 3 after becoming a Death Knight) and shows a bit of her plans, and then jumps back to cover the events of The Frozen Throne expansion to Warcraft 3.

I enjoyed the book and found it to be a good read. I do think some of it might be hard to follow if you know little to nothing of the Warcraft world and mythology. Although I think it could still stand as a story about the lengths one might go to if they are not careful.

Ultimate Wolverine Vs Hulk

I hate superhero comics nowadays.

I can’t keep up with them, they’re all too heavy and bloated with continuity issues, crossovers, I abhor the overall art styles coming from both Marvel (too realistic and dark) and DC (too bright and colorful), and it’s all losing its appeal. It just exhausts me and frustrates me, looking at the shelves full of superhero comics in stores when trying to find something genuinely interesting.

However, I love Ultimate Wolverine Vs Hulk, despite having no idea what the hell’s really going on in the Ultimate Universe or where this fits.

Let’s flashback a bit: Early 2006, I’m a senior in high school, some friends have just gotten me back into comics, and I’m picking up just about anything I can find (which leads to some ultimately painful, regrettable purchases) in comic book stores, nearly spending entire paychecks. This was when the first two issues of Ultimate Wolverine Vs Hulk were released together in one fancy “Director’s Cut” book, with sketches and the complete scripts for the first two issues. I got it out of curiosity, and was floored. I couldn’t wait for the next issue to come out…

…And, well, I kind of had to. Issue 3 was delayed so horribly that it didn’t come out until March 2009. Yeah. THIS YEAR. I had to wait THREE BLOODY YEARS for the series to pick back up again, and it just recently finished up, with the sixth and final issue coming out just last week, and I couldn’t be happier.

I mean, c’mon. Three pages into the first issue, you get a glorious two-page spread of Hulk ripping Wolverine in half. You heard right, HULK RIPS WOLVERINE IN HALF.



Yeah!

You’d think being ripped in half in the first issue wouldn’t make the rest of the story very interesting, and while these first two issues are largely flashbacks, it doesn’t stop crazy things like this from happening.

Oh right, plot. Did you read volume one of the Ultimates or watch the Ultimate Avengers movie? The basic gist is this: Hulk went mad, killed 600-some odd people in New York, and it was up to the newly-formed Avengers, known as the Ultimates, to stop him. Afterwards, S.H.I.E.L.D. publicly executed Bruce Banner by leaving him on an empty aircraft carrier in the middle of the ocean and dropping a nuke on it.

Except, you know, it didn’t kill him.

Flash forward a bit, and strange, violent occurrences are happening across Europe and Asia, events that, linked together, prove that Hulk is still alive. So Nick Fury hires Wolverine to go find Hulk in the Himalayas and kill him.

It just gets better from there.

There’s one primary reason that I love this story: Every single issue, without fail, has something positively INSANE happening, and hilarious (though admittedly somewhat juvenile) dialogue that always has me laughing out loud.

“Right before I got twisted around so I could see my own ass…I was lookin’ down at you and thinkin’, ‘what would be a really neat way to *&(@*&ing kill that mother*&$^*?”

The writer is Damon Lindelof, apparently the head writer of Lost, which I’ve never watched, so I can’t make any comparisons, but I can say the guy does a bang-up job of writing a good comic book story that’s actually FUN and ENTERTAINING. He also makes many sly references to previous Hulk Vs Wolverine encounters in the original Marvel universe, throws in a reference to Star Trek, and even takes a jab at that whole Civil War fiasco in a conversation between Captain American and Iron Man as they play ping pong out of costume. As far as the artist goes, Leinil Francis Yu, he can be a hit or miss artist, especially if someone else is inking his work and if the colorist is half-assed, but thankfully no one inked his art in this and the coloring isn’t too bright, but isn’t some monochrome, dark crap, either.

Plus, I can’t imagine many other artists being able to render a nice big shot of Wolverine, naked, trying to fight a panda and having flowers come out of his hands as opposed to his usual um, claws.

So, it is awesome, what more can I say? Even if you hate superhero comics, if you’re just a fan of wacky, violent hijinks and such, it is definitely worth checking out. The trade will undoubtedly be out in a few months’ time so you’re going to have to wait, but trust me: I waited three years for this, and it’s totally worth it.

[Brett]

Abbreviewations: Summer Movies May

Hello, I know I have not posted much, but I have been rather busy and my laptop died a month or so ago. I have been on a desktop since then but never got around to logging in. I figured I would post my thoughts on the summer movies that I saw last month during May.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine

I really enjoyed this movie, the action was fun and for me who has never read the comics much it was interesting to see the past of one of the characters from the x-men movies. I know this may not follow the comics very well (or it may) but as I said I have not read them. My biggest complaint is that Ryan Reynolds only is in the first ten or so minutes of the movie and then when he supposedly reappears they have sewn his mouth shut. Other than that I enjoyed it. The ending I got to see after the credits was a big disappointment, and I wish they could have given something more worth sitting through the credits at all theaters instead of just some. I understand them trying to combat the "leak" but while the movie was good I do not feel it was worth seeing multiple times for a 15 second clip and only seems to me to be a move of greed to try and get those who actually care enough to spend another 9 dollars

Star Trek

I remember growing up watching episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation with my dad, and when I caught episodes of DS9 or Voyager I enjoyed them. In fact I own the DVDs of The Next Generation. Despite all this I have never liked  the original series. After hearing about the train wreck (although I have not seen and cannot confirm) of Nemesis, I hear about a new Star Trek Movie in the works. Then I hear about the fact that it will follow the original crew before they became the crew. I will admit that for a bit there I was iffy about the new movie. I started seeing the trailers and as Alex put it even not being a fan of the original crew I wanted to see it. Well I sit here after having seen it three times now and I say it was an excellent movie and worth seeing. I will admit when I was hanging out with friends going to see it I debated (since it would be my third viewing) fearing I would be bored during parts. I wasn't I was as enthralled (not accurate but closest I can think of right now) as much as I was the first two times. While I was originally worried about Sylar playing Spock, Zachary Quinto was so perfect that I can't think of a better actor for the part now. Many reviewers complain about the part of the story with Leonard Nimoy reprising his role as Spock Prime (as he is listed in the credits), but I find this a crucial part of the movie and it is just great to see Leonard Nimoy. Without Spock Prime the story of the movie does not fit with the already set up Star Trek Universe and would not be able to truly take the name. 

Angels & Demons

What many people do not fully realize, is that Angels & Demons came out and is set before The DaVinci Code, the thing is that the DaVinci Code got so much more press that they decided to make a movie of it first. The movie clearly did well enough that they decided to go ahead and make the other book in the series into a movie. Thankfully they did not try to reset the world and pretend the first movie had not happened, leading to one of the many changes from the book that are there. But the changes work for turning it into a movie and making it decent. Although (as is almost always the case) the book is better I enjoyed the movie, the downplay of CERN and the assassin are both acceptable although I felt the assassin seemed barely developed, but I can't see how they could have done better in a movie situation. I feel the change with the murdered CERN scientist/priest (although his being a priest is barely mentioned if at all, the biggest sign I noticed was he had on the collar at the beginning) to just Vittoria's partner, instead of her adoptive father is a bit questionable, it does not hinder the movie enough. Overall I felt it was worth watching although it might be better for a rent instead of the theater for most. I have to say my biggest question about the whole thing is why the magazines are claiming it to be a church movie, when it really has nothing to do with the church except that many of the main characters are heavily involved with it and it takes place there.

Terminator: Salvation

Fun explosive movie, lots of booms and gunfire, the biggest things that (only slightly) hinder the movie for me actually have little to do with the movie. The "big twist" of the movie is revealed in the trailers, otherwise the opening scenes would not work as the opener, essentially revealing that the character there is not fully human anymore. The movie to me shows why the whole series exists in that the machines do not understand the humans very well, which is why they keep losing the fight and need to try to change things. For those who were looking for the end of the series will be disappointed. The biggest questions I have are where does this fit in line with the other entries in the Terminator world, which ones are still valid which are not and where does this truly fall. I know it falls after Judgement day, but before the catalyst for Terminator, but does T3: Rise of the Machines count, or did judgement day happen some other way. I do know they have a chance to make at least one more, although that does not necessarily mean the series would have to end, the machines send a Terminatorback to try to tip the scales in their favor, but what happened to the resistance after they sent Kyle.

Well that is what I have seen this past month the last week (29th) did not have anything I really wanted to see, although I might see Up at some point, and Drag Me to Hell is only minimally tempting because Alison Lohman looks really beautiful to me in it, but I have never relly liked Horror

Thoughts on Punch-Out

It's about 11 minutes after 10 PM on Friday, May 29th, and well, right now, I just can't get my mind off of Punch-Out for the Nintendo Wii. I'm sure you don't want me to go and just praise every corner of this game like a lot of sites have done. Unlike a lot of recent Wii titles (MadWorld, eh-hem), this game seems to me getting exposure. Granted, it is a first party Nintendo title, but that doesn't excuse the fact that some games on the Wii just never seem to get the recognition they deserve.

I'm here to say that Punch-Out deserves every bit of attention it gets. I can't say the game is for everyone, but I know the game is certainly for me.

Developer "Next Level Games" is the same team that brought us "Super Mario Strikers" and "Mario Strikers Charged" on the GC and Wii. I personally love all of the Mario sports games, but soccer is my favorite sport outside of the Mushroom Kingdom, so of course those are my favorites. That being said, I will admit that those games can be challenging. Especially Strikers Charged on the Wii; some of the challenges the game had to unlock a few cheats were near impossible, and (un)fortunately, that difficultly rears it's head once again in Punch-Out.

Some people like a difficult game, so that can be a good thing, depending on how you look at it. I like a fine middle ground, and for the most part, this game achieves that.

A lot of people seem to be ripping on the motion controls in the game, and to be honest, I don't get why. The classic control scheme is available by holding the Wii remote sideways, and that's cool and all, but I just think the motion controls are way better. I've heard some people say that they seem unresponsive, and well...no. They respond just fine. It is easier with the remote, because it's much quicker to press the 1 and 2 buttons than it is do all the motions, but is it necessarily more fun? I don't think so.

Either control scheme you go with, the controls do feel great. I stuck with the motion controls and I made it all the way through Career and I'm working my way up Title Defense mode right now. I have no issues yet. There is the option of using the Wii Balance Board, and well...I should give it a try, but I just haven't. I heard a lot of people say that it just doesn't work that well. Honestly, I just don't feel like giving it a try. Call me lazy, but, I like dodging with the control stick just fine.

The music is AWESOME! One really cool thing is hearing how familiar it all sounds. Not only is the original Punch-Out theme redone a number of times with different instruments, but you can hear some of the sound effects and guitars and such from the Mario Striker games, and those games had great music.

And have I said just how cool Little Mac is? I think I look like him. OK, OK, I just want someone else to make that parallel so I had to say it myself. Sorry, I'm lame. But seriously, this game has just SO MANY cool moments. In between rounds, Doc Louis will just drop some of the best lines. Sometimes he really does help you out, and sometimes he just lets you know that his favorite flavor of protein shake is chocolate. And really, it's always great! You can even press the minus button once during a fight and Doc Louis will pull out a chocolate bar and eat it, giving Mac a health boost. Who thought of that? That's so cool.

It's the little things that Punch-Out does that makes it a classic. I love love love the NES version, but this version is my favorite. In fact, it's one of my favorite Wii titles ever, and that should mean something from a guy with over 30 Wii titles in his collection.

Little Mac changes outfits as you go up through the ranks. You get to see him wearing a green outfit with a blank top, a navy blue outfit with light blue trim, and even a gold outfit with red, white, and blue shorts.

Did I mention that there are cut scenes between fights going into the lives of your opponents? You get to see Glass Joe posing with a big loaf of bread in France. You get to see Bear Hugger beating up some bears. You get to see Von Kaiser reading a newspaper about Little Mac winning the WVBA World Title. There are a ton of them.

And for all the humor the game has, it totally gets you pumped up with it's attitude. It's like watching a Rocky movie. Seeing Little Mac go to town on a punching bag and chasing after Doc Louis on his bike just makes me want to go get a gym membership and start doing crunches.

Some people would say that this title isn't worth $50 dollars. I say it's worth more than that, but I would also say that it's value varies depending on what the game would mean to you. I know that's no help, but hear me out. Do you like boxing? Did you like the original Punch-Out? If you answered yes to either question, you could easily drop the money for this game and you will get more than your money's worth out of the purchase.

If you hate the Rocky movies and you're looking for a game with a lot of story, a lot of innovation, and mind blowing motion controls, this game probably won't be up your alley. However, I can't stress enough just how friendly this game can be to all types of gamers. Give it a rent if you're on the fence. I really don't see how someone could have ZERO amount of fun with a game like this.

If you're currently playing this game and you love it, then HIGH FIVE to you, because I love it too. I really think Next Level Games did a fantastic job with the game and I can't wait to see what game they get to work on next. I would love a sequel sometime down the road, but I personally hope they get a Donkey Kong game. Speaking of that old gorilla, he plays a bit of a role in this title, but that's spoiler worthy, so I'll shut up.

It's hard to really find the words to describe just how happy I am when I play this game. So, since I can't think of any on my own, I'll take one out of Doc Louis' book. Join the Nintendo Fun...er...Club Nintendo today, Mac!

-Mave