My Games of 2012, Part 3

Here is where things start to get a little dicey.  I already sort of prefaced that yesterday, but it definitely bears repeating.  This is about where it becomes less and less about the numbers and more and more about just listing the games because they ended up being important to me for one reason or another.  Around this point, games start to not be 'better than' the ones that rank 'lower' than them, so the numbers part of it starts to become a little unnecessary.  This will only get more and more prevalent as we get closer and closer and I think I'll need to be a little more focused with these as it gets more into that, so from here on out, I'm going to do less at a time so I can put a little more explanation into everything.  This post and the next post will cover three games each, much like last year, and I will try to do them justice that way.

10.  Playstation All-Stars Battle Royale

You're surprised, right?  Because I'm surprised.  I'm really surprised.  I wasn't really excited for the game at all, but I got it because of the Cross-Buy, if solely so I could play the game on my Vita because, well, it's really kind of a value and I wanted to go with that in the hopes that it might come up more.  I expected the game would be a fun pick-up-and-play ordeal that would tide me over for a few days while I cleared the bulk of it and then moved on to something else.  I expected it would be decent, not particularly good and definitely not great.  I basically just expected, as I think most people did, that it was just an attempt at something that was kind of potentially ill-conceived and just a thing that was trying to reach for something that, potentially, they couldn't really get a hold of.

I was very, very wrong.

Playstation All-Stars Battle Royale is honestly really goddamn fun.  It is definitely pick-up-and-play, since your matches will generally last three minutes, at most, and after that, you can go off and do something else if you're not going to jump right back into it.  Every character is fleshed enough that they have their own strengths and weaknesses and the gameplay is deep enough that it's not -solely- about slamming on buttons and ending up the winner, but with the inclusion of the Super Gauge, it's at least got a welcome element of strategy.  A lot of people didn't particularly like that, but I am honestly really confused as to the why of that since, if you think about it, it's honestly not all that different from other games of this sort.  The only difference, really, is that the 'finishing moves' are attached to a single button that you have to charge up for.  What makes that different from fighting games where you have a special meter, and what makes it different from Super Smash Bros. where you need to use a 'big' attack after your foe is softened up enough to send them flying off the screen?

Obviously, the game got a lot of comparisons to Super Smash Bros. and really, that's fair.  They're definitely similar games and it'd probably be safe to assume PASBR was inspired by SSB, and in fact, I think someone said that it was.  Except, people say this as if it's a bad thing.  As if Nintendo owns the entire cross-over fighting game genre which is really silly, since they were mostly definitely not the first ones to step into that ring.  As if Sony has besmirched the honor of Nintendo, of gamers everywhere, by daring to make a game in that vein because 'Nintendo did it first'.  Because, you know, it's totally not cool to use a genre that already exists, so all the first person shooters, the racing games, hell every game now is ripping someone off and we should all be super angry about that you guys and stay purists to the originals.  Because clearly, they're the only ones that are -actually- good and fun.

The thing that kills me, is that in the same breath, people will tell you that it's a Super Smash Bros. clone and that it is also not enough like Super Smash Bros. to be fun.  As mentioned, the Super thing gets trotted out a lot as a shining example of how the game isn't fun, but really, -how- is it different from Super Smash Bros.?  In Super Smash Bros., you have to wail on your enemy til their damage percentile is high and then use a high-impact move to send them flying.  You have to hit them a lot and then use a specific move to finish them off.  I am thrusting my hands out and making wild motions with them now, I assure you for reasons that are probably obvious.  Beyond that, people complained about the token amount of story in the Story modes which is also kind of silly when compared to Super Smash Bros. as, from what I know (unless it got changed in later titles, I've only played the original), there is no story.

I don't really understand the gaming elitism that PASBR inspired and it's really, really unfortunate because it forced a lot of people to miss out on a really fun game.  That probably accounted for layoffs at SuperBot despite a sequel apparently already being green-lit.  And for what?  So people could feel smug that Nintendo did a fun thing first?  So people could have another little laugh at Sony?  If it's just not a game for someone, because, you know, there are things that are not for everyone and they are called everything ever, then I can understand that.  But the bulk of the people that I've ever seen smugly mocking PASBR are people that would never consider buying the game, have never played it and never will, and haven't even paid attention to its development whatsoever.  And I just don't get that because we are supposed to be in this hobby to have fun and PASBR is fun.

9.  Sorcery

As yet another game that I had a ton of fun with without expecting it, Sorcery was a welcome surprise in my late game rush, validating entirely the excitement for the title I had when it was shown off for the first time.  Again, I didn't really expect much out of the title, nor do I expect many others did if only for the Move functionality it requires (which is another can of worms that I -won't- be getting into tonight), but the game is wonderful and charming and provides a lot that we want, that we look for, in a game.  Despite the vocal minority, it's well-documented that there are motion games out there that people actually enjoy and Sorcery should definitely be on those lists for doing a bang-up job of mashing up the Motion gaming experience with traditional controls, thanks to the abundance of buttons and the like that are actually on the Move Wand and Navigation Controller (or DualShock 3 if you're into that, but seriously, the Nav. Controller is good).  It's definitely not the first that has actually merged the two, but it's yet another title that is proof that it is possible, no matter the insistence against the notion.

Each and every one of Sorcery's motion controls feels natural and is fairly intuitive because of that.  Whether it's swirling your wand like a tornado to switch to the Wind Spell, or drawing a line facing down to make a literal wall of fire before your character, or even just flicking the wand to send off an arcane bolt, it's obvious, the intent behind every gesture and it just works because of it.  What says the most for it is that it is not a game that then had gestures, motion controls added to it arbitrarily because they're just so ingrained into the core mechanics and properly at that.  Potentially the true mark of that is that, without the motion controls, you would still have a fun game in Sorcery, but not as fun as it -could- be, because part of the fun of the game is actually being drawn in thanks to the use of the wand.

Sorcery's progression of power is rapid once it really gets going, and because you're physically doing it, because you're making the gestures and flinging off the spells, it's surprisingly empowering.  Launching three Ice shots at an enemy to make them a frozen block of goblin while charging them to slam into them with your spectral shield at the last moment, shattering them into tiny bits just would not -be- the same without your physical input.  Making a whirlwind and launching it at a group of foes and then deciding to launch a fireball at it to make it a firestorm, burning all those trapped in the vortex to ash, it wouldn't -be- so right.  Slamming down a shock trap right in front of you just as several enemies are charging you, weapons drawn and watching them get taken out by the unparalleled voltage of the spell while also picking off foes further back with bolts of lightning just wouldn't make you feel like you've accomplished real, visceral power in the game without the Move wand in your hand.

It's because of that that, by the end of the game, I was practically begging for more.  I wanted challenge rooms, I wanted new areas, I wanted some form of being able to play the game more with all the Spells unlocked so that I could just go wild with the power.  I just wanted more, and if that's not a compelling argument for how fun it gets, then I don't think you'll ever be convinced.  I'm hoping against hope that there will be a Sorcery 2 or something that invokes the types of things that Sorcery itself did, using much the same methods and I don't know whether to be expecting that or not.  Obviously, the game didn't sell very well, but on the other hand, Sony isn't really all about giving up when it comes to Move games, even if they aren't flooding the market with them.  (Which, neither was Nintendo, really.)  I suppose if there's another game announced in the vein of it, or even a sequel, then you know who will be excited as hell, because it will be -this guy-.

8.  Uncharted:  Golden Abyss

I am a man who loves Uncharted games, if that was not made abundantly clear over the course of this blog.  All of them.  Yes, even 3, we are not starting that again.  So that means that I loved Golden Abyss which is definitely not a wrong statement to make.  I am definitely not alone in loving Golden Abyss, but I would say that I am definitely in the sub-group of folks who loved it -a lot- versus the people who loved it -kinda sorta-, because at its core, it is still an Uncharted game.  Unfortunately or not, depending on your perspective, it was also a game that included a whole lot of features that the Vita supports, features that were initially sold as optional and then made mandatory at some point in development.  People were not too fond of these and, being as they were made mandatory, I can't fully blame them since, for about 90% of the gesture controls, there was no real reason why they -couldn't- have been optional.  I didn't mind them, clearly, but I am, more often than not, the exception and not the rule.

That's not to say that everything that Golden Abyss did with all the extra functionality was poorly-implemented, because it certainly was not.  Something that I absolutely -adored- in the title was the ability to adjust your aiming through tilting the system, but it was a learning curve, admittedly.  It is something to get used to, but when you do, it adds a whole new layer to your abilities to efficiently take out your foes, of which there are plenty in typical Uncharted fashion.  The trick, clearly, is to use the sticks to get close enough to what you're aiming for and then shift a little to get it right on target since in most cases, it will offer you the absolute level of precision that you seek in a very swift and easy way.  While I initially turned the feature off, I popped it back on at some point to give it a whirl and my performance almost became night-and-day.  It was -the- thing that really allowed me to get into prime form, to make my several playthroughs of the game enjoyable without being too difficult.

That isn't to say the controls are lacking, of course, because they certainly weren't.  Nothing -about- the game, in my opinion, was lacking in any real form without getting a little picky.  The complaint that the whole thing takes place in a jungle and a temple, rather than offering slightly different locales as even the first game did (95% of the game in a jungle, 3% on ships, 2% in a bunker, more or less) is one that I will entertain, but even that wasn't too grating.  Of course, Bend Studios is -not- Naughty Dog, so the game probably could have been better somehow, but I'm not complaining one bit with the way it came out, because it was definitely an Uncharted experience in the palms of your hands, and that's all it said it was on the tin.  With any luck, we'll be seeing another foray into treasure hunting with good ol' Drake on the Vita before 2012 is up, because I could certainly be up for that.

As you can see, opinions are getting a little more and more strong for the games as I get closer to the top and -that- is precisely why it got so difficult towards the end.  We started crossing over from games that I liked well-enough to games that I really, absolutely adored and eventually reached games that I could easily say amazed me in some way or form.  All of these are intense emotions, difficult things to get a grip on, to quantify in a manner that made me consider any of them more or less worthy than others.  Yet, I think I did in -some- form, even though I will obviously inform you that every game on my list is -on- my list for a reason, and not simply because I played it in 2012.  My only hope is that I really sort of get across the -why- for those games, the reasons they made my list and the reasons they made the place they did.  Since my list is nothing if not urging you to play some of these games if you haven't, since goddamn, 2012 was a good year for our hobby.

Vita's Playstation Plus is Fantastic

When Playstation Plus was rumored to be heading to the Vita, and even after it was announced, everyone seemed to sort of tentatively wait to see in just what context it would, in fact, emerge in.  When it became obvious that it would be in a similar fashion as the PS3 iteration, with free games, discounts, Cloud Storage and automatic updates/synching, hopes were kindled, but cynicism even moreso.  It was mere moments following the breaking of the news, the outlining of the preliminary features that speculation was abound in terms of the 'free games' aspect, all wondering at the varied ways with which Sony could pull value away from Playstation Plus by splitting it across both platforms.  People were already imagining a world where the Instant Game Collection was still 12 games large, split across PS3 and Vita with the lion's share of the titles being for the former.

As you can see above, this is not the case.

It's almost with a certain level of smug satisfaction that I look on the titles offered, and their number, and consider just how many people just don't know what to do at this point.  That there is real and tangible value with enough meat to it that you can sink your teeth into it generously.  Not only do you get access to the same amount of games on the PS3, but an additional six games on the Vita now that, much like its console counterpart, will be shuffled out with other titles overtime to create a rather robust library for those who stick around and keep subscribed.  Being that, after being attached to your account, you can download a game for the PS Plus price of free even after it rotates out of being free there's a really hard argument to make against it beyond actually worrying about what you buy, in the case of not wanting to spend money only to get the same game for free later on.  It's an understandable fear, for sure, but one that I find is mitigated by the other upsides the program has to offer.

Personally, on the Vita side of the games, I already own half of them, and really, -really- came close to biting on two of the ones I don't own.  Combined, the games that I own set me back a cool $100 ($50 for Uncharted, $40 for Gravity Rush and $10 for FFT) so that does kind of sting, but being that I buy physically, I still have the cushion of getting a free digital version which, as we all know from other forms of media, not just games, you are not automatically entitled to simply because you bought the physical version of it at some vague point previous.  It's a method of 'future-proofing' so to speak, since everyone has been very lenient on allowing you to 'own' the games you purchase digitally, even if the company that sold it eventually loses the rights to actually sell it.  It hasn't happened a lot, but it has happened - developers and publishers letting selling rights to a game expire, meaning that it has to thusly be removed from a digital storefront in terms of purchasing.  If you -have- purchased it, it remains still in your download list for an undetermined amount of time that may truly be 'forever', and as we move further and further into the Digital Distribution future, all we can do is amass titles in a digital way and hope that the future has a place to play them.

For the games that I don't own, however, this is a straight-up double-tap of awesome since not only do we have a release date for Jet Set Radio HD Vita, but it's next week and it's free.  As if I didn't have enough to play as it is, now I get a game that was already prepped for purchase (I literally have left $10+ in my wallet specifically for the purchase of JSR) thrust into my lap for the price of nothing, meaning that money can then be put towards something else should I desire.  And I do, but one thing at a time.  I slowly realized with a growing horror that I have no less than half a dozen PS3 games alone that I want to play before years-end (though, I'll settle for Final Fantasy XII-2 and finishing Yakuza:  Dead Souls) and I have the bulk of Ragnarok Odyssey yet to conquer as well as the entirety of Assassin's Creed:  Liberation.  And then I have Persona 4 Golden awaiting my money next week as well as Playstation All-Stars Battle Royale because I have very poor impulse control when it comes to Cross-Buy, I've learned.  I think what I'm saying, as I've said all year (no seriously, it's a running gag) is that I just don't have enough time for all this gaming, goddamnit and that depresses me.

Mutant Blobs Attack!! and Wipeout have also had my interest for a while, but I've simply never figured on having time for the former, and I just....really don't like racing games.  For the price of 'free', however, I think I'm willing to give Wipeout a shot because I just might like it.  Maybe not, and I doubt very much that I'll sink a lot of time into it in any case, but this is pretty much a brand new world to explore.  Being that things are a bit more flexible in terms of downloading when it comes to my Vita, I feel completely comfortable in letting it go to pull down a gig or two over the course of the ten hours it inevitably takes, so whereas I haven't really experienced any free PS3 games, I will be experiencing the shit out of the Vita ones.  Doubly so because of the cloud storage that Plus offers, though I suspect I'll end up crumbling and purchasing myself a 32 Gig memory stick at some point in the future.  I almost need to, I think, as I believe my 16 gig is a little off, corrupting things with little warning.  That is why, by the way, I haven't mentioned LittleBigPlanet Vita in a while - my save is corrupted, and I really am not going to replay the entire game right now.

The moral of the story in any case is that Playstation Plus continues to be one of the better, if not one of the best, member services out there by sheer bang:buck ratio.  Even if you're a stalwart and claiming that the games are not, themselves free because the exist behind a paywall, the basic math just throws everything off.  For $50 that I paid a few months ago, I will, next week, be able to play Jet Set Radio HD, Mutant Blobs Attack!! and Wipeout 2048 without paying a cent for either game.  I don't know what Wipeout retails for now and I'm not going to bother looking it up, but I assume, all told, those three games come in around or under $50.  I have thusly made up my investment.  Next month when a game or two moves out of the rotation and is replaced with another, that is another game where my money is safely unspent on it, able to be put towards something else.  And that's just on the games part - the cloud storage is going to be a goddamn invaluable tool, especially for those out there who really, really truly don't want to spring for a 32 Gig memory stick.  Need space?  Throw your data on the Cloud, delete the bubble, bam free space.  And you can come back to it at any point in the future after a redownload.

Well played.  Well played all around.

Platinum Get - Uncharted: Golden Abyss

Last week, after grinding for my last bounties, I ran through Uncharted:  Golden Abyss on Crushing, which had been a task I worried about as I worry over every attempt at a game on its hardest difficulty.  In the best cases, they are appropriate tests of your acquired learnings from playing the game on lesser difficulties, and in the worst cases, they're a gauntlet of bullshit strung together for 4-9 hours.  Never has an Uncharted game been one of the latter cases and Golden Abyss is no exception to this in the least; in fact, I would even suggest that as far as the Uncharted games go, this has been the easiest Crushing thus far.  That's not a point against the game, of course, as I'm not the type to actually hope a game would be harder, though a little more of a challenge would have been welcomed, if that makes sense to anyone but me.  As it stands, the only section I really had troubles with was Chapter 11 which, for anyone who has played the game, knows that that's a fault of the section itself, and not the difficulty.

I might suggest that part of the ease of the game came with the extended exposure to its specific mechanics I had, however, since farming bounties essentially turned me into a rather effective killing machine.  Playing each section on Hard does have its benefits of course, and while I was only able to employ my "Nathan Drake Finesse Training" in one section (basically saying I tried to avoid cover when possible and use a lot of Iron Fists and generally dangerous methods of attack), it paid off exponentially.  By the time I made it to the respective farming sections in Crushing, they went by in a breeze which is not something to expect in a Crushing run in the least.  While I won't say they're Trial and Error sections, since that gives the wrong impression, Crushing runs generally do entail learning from one death to another until you can effectively plot out a plan of attack that will leave you as the last one standing.  The real pleasure from that is derived from when it goes right and you stand amidst the guns scattered about, lacking owners, and feel it set in that there isn't going to be anyone coming.

As I've said before and will likely say again several times in the near-to-far-future, the most time-intensive part of the Trophy Set for Golden Abyss was really only the bounty hunting.  While Golden Abyss offers a campaign that is long enough for me to say it is, in fact, 'meaty', my last play-through of the game was over the course of two days purely because I was skipping every cutscene that I could and, well, not screwing up and dying a lot.  In some ways, Bounty Hunting probably took an equal amount of time, but we gauge as much on feeling and opinion as on reality, so to say that it felt much longer than completing the campaign the three times that I did (Normal, Hard, Crushing) is certainly saying a lot.  I apologize for bringing it up so much since I realize I do, but I am just trying to hammer in the fact that it took an amount of time that I really didn't expect from an Uncharted game.

I guess it's because of that that I'm not really bemoaning the fact that Golden Abyss offers nothing outside of a Single-Player experience.  Sure, you can trade bounties over Near, but that doesn't count in the least for multiple reasons.  In a sense, I guess it would be nice if there were Co-Op offerings in the same vein as Uncharted 2 and 3's respective ones, and it's a rare day when you don't hear someone clamoring for Competitive Multiplayer in everything no matter what, but most people refer to Online methods of the above as 'padding' and really, that's all it would be here.  Golden Abyss offers a really, really great experience, a hint towards the level of quality we can expect in the future (both on par with GA and above) and, most importantly, I feel it has quite enough content to justify its existence without opening the doors to Online profiles, Multiplayer matches against people who are level 53 and the like.  That is my opinion of course, but this is coming from someone who routinely spends 100+ hours in Dynasty Warriors games just to achieve the ultimate goal of thoroughly 'completing' them; I would suggest I have a pretty good grasp on the bang:buck ratio.

Still, at the same time, directly after Platinuming Golden Abyss, I saw no real point to keeping it in my Vita and switched it out for Dynasty Warriors Next without any real intention to play it.  With access to four other games on the Vita itself (Legend of Heroes:  Trails in the Sky, Final Fantasy Tactics:  War of the Lions, Persona 3 Portable and MotorStorm RC), I don't see why I -shouldn't- have Next in on the off-chance that I get the urge to play it, but, much like most of my games, when I am done with them, I am simply done, so perhaps it's just more me than anything about GA.  At the same time, Multiplayer didn't hold my interest in Uncharted 2 or 3 for much longer after the Platinums for them were attained, so I guess I'm just more focused on Single-Player things yet.  Part of the dying breed, as it were.  At any rate, with this Platinum, I'm up to 18 and am thusly reminded that I haven't gotten one of these baubles since Drake's Deception.  I have been getting lazy, apparently.

What I Did On My Spring Bre- er, Hiatus

So, I hated to do it, but not having a computer means I can't really do a lot, given the limitations of the browser on the Vita and the limitations of my patience, and because of that, as I posted last week, I had to go on a little hiatus.  It was both terrible and uneventful, yet relaxing and enjoyable all at the same time.  Much as when I had that hiatus last June, it was all fixed thanks to my computer guy who is awesome and amazing at the same time.  Long story short, the power supply on the computer went out, as I suspected.  Maybe it got shocked through the modem (and the router, both of which are fine), maybe it got a surge when I plugged it in, maybe it just died because it's old, or maybe gremlins.  I don't know.  After that was replaced with a brand new power supply, I hooked the computer back up, got ready to get on the internet only to find that it would not connect to the internet.  Again, the internet was fine; at the same time that I couldn't connect on the computer, I could connect on the Vita and used the browser to connect to Mibbit (an IRC client; it works, actually!  It's hard to use on the Vita, but it works) looking for tech support that didn't pan out.  Taking it back to the guy revealed that the Ethernet Port had simply gone out, necessitating a cheap, easy replacement.

That last part was today.  As you can see, it's working pretty decently.  But that's neither here nor there, nor is it particularly interesting, so I'll be getting into the good bit now.  The good bit being, of course, just what I did with my little 'break'.

The fun thing about what I'm going to talk about (more 'fun' for me, rather) is that every single thing I want to talk about will, in all likelihood, be its own post in the coming days, both because I have so much to say after not being able to do anything for a week, and because I need to catch up in posts.  That means that I'll need to find a way to say enough here without saying too much and taking away from future posts.  It's a problem that I've noticed Chance has come across lately and I completely understand it now.  Obviously, the above picture (with very minor Spoilers, sorry) would be how I would like to start "Platinum Get - Uncharted:  Golden Abyss", and I certainly will do so when it's appropriate, but it's also appropriate to talk about now since I got it on the first day of my hiatus.  So this is my attempt to not say too much here.

It really wasn't a -hard- Platinum to get like I thought it might be.  However, as I thought towards the end, it was a long, tedious one to get with the bounty sets requiring nothing less than repeated tries at a certain section where the yield percentage was the highest.  Or, in layman's terms, the spots in the game with the most enemies in the same checkpoint.  Coincidentally, those sections were mostly parts where you have Infinite Ammo or something close to it which makes it, well, 'easy' of course, but it also makes it frustrating because it's literally just pointing and shooting at things and restarting until you get a bunch of coins.  Alternatively, I could have just waited and just done it -after- my Crushing run, since I found out something really interesting!  Apparently, if you select the prologue on Crushing and then play the entirety of the game, you still get the trophy instead of having to start a whole new save.  This is my gift to you, potential Trophy Hunter; the gift of knowledge.  Use it so you don't end up screwing yourself out of bounty progress going for the harder difficulties.

Regardless, it was fulfilling and enjoyable as, as I've said several times, Golden Abyss was just a pleasure to play, despite the tech demo feel that it has with all the touch and motion controls towards the start.  Only one part gave me any real troubles and by 'real troubles', I mean 'this section is bullshit on Normal', and for anyone who's played the game, I don't even have to tell you that it was Chapter 11.  You know this already.  It's as bad as you think, and unfortunately, it seems insurmountable, but it is.  Mostly through luck  Actually almost entirely through luck.  There's really no sure-fire way to get through it and if there is, it certainly wasn't easy for me to find or do.  It just really requires determination and a lot of time and patience, which is something you probably have if you've ever gone for any Platinum.  Or that you might not have a lot left of, if you've been consistently going for Platinums.

For a very brief amount of time, Dynasty Warriors Next reclaimed my attention for quite simply being the only Vita game I have left that lacks progress.  I don't count MotorStorm RC when I say these things because MotorStorm RC makes me rage and want to destroy things.  Alternatively, Dynasty Warriors Next just drains everything resembling resolve and determination when I load it up because of the statistics screen above.  For the amount of time I've put into the game, which is conveniently displayed, which says 51 hours (about half the time I normally put into a DW game), I only have a paltry amount of things gained.  Of course, they all say 50-70%, but at the same time, I've voiced my complaints on the acquisition of these things before, pointing out just how tedious of a task it is.  And of course it doesn't show how many Sworn Sibling/Spouse Oaths I've formed which is 'Not a lot'.  There is likely 50 more hours of my time that Next demands before it will relinquish unto my a Platinum trophy, and I'm not sure I want to give it those 50 hours.

When I say a very brief amount of time, I mean the time it took to play two conquest maps which is, again, 'Not a lot'.  It would have taken less time had the first three rounds allowed me to do anything other than sit and watch myself being unable to invade because the RNG didn't give me a point in the one territory that needed it the most, though thankfully I also was not invaded during this time because my number stayed on par with my neighbors for those turns.  However, during that time, one of my enemies (it was a three kingdom map of twelve territories) made significant headway into the other and, on the turn I struck out, they invaded the Capital of my other enemy, thus absorbing that kingdom and making my job a lot more painful.  It's because of moments like these that I just don't find the desire to play the game when most other times, you have to find a reason for me to -not- play a Warriors game, whereas that reason is usually 'burn out'.

I guess 'burn out' is still a valid thing here, however, since the game simply doesn't have the same amount of depth, unfortunately.  After playing the story once, I really have no incentive to play that part anymore and, even if I did, it plays exactly the same way as the other mode, Conquest, with the addition of Cutscenes.  That's about it.  That isn't to say that I don't like the game, as I've clearly made it known that I do, just that I really wanted a little more from it.  Even if it was just literally DW7's Conquest Mode copy-pasted into Next, it would've been an improvement, or at least to have the option to have that alongside the Empires-esque version.  It's really just a numbers game at this point; 60-some characters in the game, each one has two Officer Cards, you can only get the second half after the first, and it's not a guaranteed gimme no matter what.  Then you have to form a Spouse and a Sibling Oath with each of those 60 characters.  Conservatively speaking, you can get one Spouse and Two Sibling Oaths per play.  I'm sure you can do the math for yourself.  Without anything approaching variety involved in all that, it simply becomes a slog and it's rather unfortunate.  Still, for a quick play here and there, it'll suffice just nicely.

Finally, as my most recent tweets (as of writing this, at least, I'm not going to link them and further my Twitter Whoring) might have already spoiled, I succumbed to the Siren's Song of the Newly discounted Persona 3 Portable after saying I really should resist for a little while.  Of course, I downloaded the hefty game at another house, turning what would have been a six-hour download into a 40-minute one, and thankfully, I've been able to stick with it this time, rather than my last play of it where I got entirely too obsessed with Social Links and quit because of the pressure involved.  Because if you want to get the 'most bang' out of a single play, it's a very strict schedule that you have to follow and I find that not caring has left me open to enjoy the game, actually.  Surprising.

At least, mostly enjoying the game.  I find myself disagreeing with a lot of the design decisions, but luckily the story has become really engrossing, keeping me around to get me more used to the things I'm not entirely crazy about.  Still for my money, the game isn't 'Fantastic', but merely 'Good' at the time of writing this in which I am about half-way through it.  At least, I think I'm about half-way through it.  Of the twelve, erm, 'events', I'm being led to believe that there are six more after taking two out in a single night.  Without a save point between them.  Which took 11 tries, despite me being fairly decently leveled for the section, purely because of really bad luck and, again, poor design decisions, this time merely with AI annoyances and the combat system (not in how you use it, but how enemies do).  When I eventually write about Persona 3 Portable more in-depth, I will go into it more, but suffice to say I think the game is great when it isn't bad, leaving no real room for a middle-ground.  Take that for what you will.

Still, there's something to be said about a game, any game, that actually makes you -feel- one way or another about the characters in a way that isn't all that shallow.  Like, more than "that's the antagonist, wanna kill him" or "that's a good guy, want him to succeed".  But to become emotionally invested in the characters for one reason or another, simply because of the way they're expressed to you, the player, speaks of a very rare talent, something special that is not present in most games.  Obviously, an RPG is the best place to go for this type of investment, but they don't always deliver.  No matter what I say about the mechanics of Persona 3, the characters will be the reason why I finish it.  I think that's pretty much the most important thing to say when talking about the game, since that's really the highest praise I can give it, and it's the highest praise someone should look for.

Really, contrary to last time, that's what the majority of my hiatus has consisted of, is only a scant few games.  I guess it speaks more to P3P's favor that I spent a week straight playing it, but I am not without my complaints about it.  Still, as you can tell, I'm enjoying it more than I'm not, so at least it's positive overall.  Regardless, I do hope that Persona 4 is as much better than 3 as I've been lead to believe as I am very anxiously awaiting the Vita port of the game in the West, despite the fact that it will likely come out in a time where I don't have time, nor money, to buy it.  Which is pretty much the entire rest of the year.  Friggin' 2012, why do you have so many games!?

Bounties and Missed Opportunities

So after soundly finishing up the treasure hunting that I detailed yesterday, I began the arduous task of farming the Bounty Items and almost near-instantly regretted the venture.  I forewarn that it is certainly not something for the faint of heart, nor for the easily bored or distracted, because it is tedium at its worst, and a personal challenge at best.  Basically, as I feared, the objects in the Bounty sets must merely be farmed, rather than acquired in some fashion that allows for planning beyond "Restart from Last Checkpoint -> Kill Stuff -> See Step 1" over and over again.  In the right circumstances, however, this does allow for flexibility on your part which is where you can make the most of it, as I will explain, but otherwise it simply reminds me of all the time wasted in JRPGs seeking similar goals for items that actually did something, rather than provide meta-plot under the assumption that the object is eventually sold on the Black Market to ensure Nathan Drake and Victor "Goddamn" Sullivan scrape by.

The Tarot Card set was easy enough to do, since the best spot for getting those (as recommended by the internet, at least) was a nice big area that you can actually run around in and such.  Play the game tactically as it is intended; I say this because it will be important later, obviously.  To guard against how mind-numbing the task could be, since again, it is simply running the same battle over and over again via the "Restart from Last Checkpoint" function, I decided to have a little fun with it.  Since my treasure hunting had been done on Easy since I didn't want to bother with getting hit a lot and such, I was a little concerned that maybe my skills were in decline from the lack of reason to really tap into them.  In order to prepare for my Crushing playthrough, I set the difficulty back up to Hard to tackle this section, turning it into "Nathan Drake's Combat Finesse Training", making sure that I utilize both Headshots and the Steel Fist technique while not dying.  It was a success.

Granted, the area is fairly early on, so the challenge isn't terribly there, more like a pothole in the middle of a fairly clear road; you know it's there, but if you don't pay attention it will trip you and you will get hurt.  The real test will come with the latter sets, I realize, but for a re-introduction to combat, it worked spectacularly and kept me on my toes for sure.  The classic rush I get from taking out three foes in succession with the Steel Fist technique while my screen is quite gray, meaning that I just barely survived was one I felt the familiar tingle of at several occasions and once again, it reminded me that this was an Uncharted game, pure and simple.  Every reminder of that seems like it's the first, as I still can't quite wrap my head around the fact, no matter how prevalent and/or clear it is.  Hopefully if/when they do another iteration, they'll have figured it out enough that we'll get more than one environment, however.  I don't discriminate between Jungle and Burning Jungle, of course for said purposes.  And before you say "oh no spoilerzz" it's an action game.  Flammable things in action games -burn-.  That's just what they do.  You know this.

After I finished the task of collecting the Tarot Cards, my next task was the Pieces of Silver which are, in fact, Silver Coins.  I don't know why they simply aren't referred to as Silver Coins but that's neither here nor there.  The best spot to farm said coins (again, according to the internet) is during a section where you're given a Sniper Rifle and a healthy supply of ammo to shoot ~20 guys while trying to prevent someone else from being shot.  While true that there is a copious amount of folks here to kill, thus rationally increasing your chances of getting these rare drops, this is boring.  I don't get to run around and almost die, I don't get to punch things, I just sit and shoot at things, killing them in a single hit because the Sniper Rifle is powerful like that.  On its own, of course, it's fine, but when you play it for the extended periods of time that you have to to farm these coins, it becomes near unbearable.  The fact of the matter is, I spent about an hour or two grinding on this single spot and only went from 14 coins to 23.  So when I get back to it, I have more of the same awaiting me.

That is, of course, if I just go back to the most, ahem, 'efficient' spot.  I imagine there is a spot that is far more tuned to what I desire without the tedium of the sniper rifle, or at least I do hope so, because in peeking ahead at the suggestions, another one suggests an area for one of the later sets that is much like the Sniper section, but with a gatling gun instead.  It would be slightly different, of course, but not quite enough I suspect, so I'll be scouting for a different area for that as well, because I simply cannot bear this for much longer.  The only good it's doing is sharpening my aim which is plenty sharp as is, after all.  With any luck, it simply won't take as long as I suspect it might, because the quicker I get into my Crushing play, the better, and that will only happen once I get all the little extraneous things out of the way, possibly even the Kill trophies as well.

I suspect that my main issue with the Bounty sets, aside from the tedium involved, is that they simply don't offer anything but a few voiced lines for the sets and a few of the individual pieces (mostly the rare things) and trophies.  True, they do have an aspect about them as objects that are not always tangibly yours, since you can 'trade' them over the 'Black Market' (or Near), but since I have yet to get Near to work on my Vita (damn Skyhook), that aspect is completely shut off to me.  But if they're going to present these items as tradeable, why not make it worthwhile, by making the items desirable?  Make a mini-game around them; I suggested to a friend earlier that a Trading Card Mini-game where you collect the cards in the main game would be excellent, but as we know, I always think of Trading Card games.  Just -something- to use these things in is all I ask.  That they're tossed in in the way that they have been doesn't denote a lot of thought, and really means to me that they dropped the ball.  Something certainly could've come of this and that it didn't is a real miss.

Regardless, with any luck I should be done with this part of the game relatively quickly.  It's long, mindless work, but I'm fairly use to that with grinding on JRPGs and grinding on Warriors games alike, so there's nothing new to be had there.  That I'll be doing it using the mechanics of Uncharted sweetens the pot some since, as I said, I'm using it as 'Finesse Training' for my Crushing mode run, which will hopefully mean that that goes rather smoothly.  And when I'm done with that, well....then I have to figure out just what the hell I do next.  Since friggin' Gravity Rush doesn't come out til May and LittleBigPlanet doesn't come out til June.  It isn't like I don't have a wealth of options in the meantime, since I have commented on quite a few games for the Vita that are already out that I'm interested in, but my money situation might not like that option.  I really shouldn't worry about it too much not, however, since I won't know what the wait looks like until I am really done with Golden Abyss, which as I mentioned, might still have quite a life left in it.

Treasure Huntin' Like a Baws

So, as I am wont to do, I have been ever-vigilantly tracking down the Platinum Trophy that lies at the end of a fairly long and bumpy road called Uncharted:  Golden Abyss.  I finished my Hard Mode play earlier (I know, I'm a wuss for going Normal first and it only hurts me in the end, since I have to play the game -again-, but at the same time, it's fantastic, so I don't mind so much) and directly after, decided to just get some treasure hunting done before I started on Crushing.  I mostly decided this because I did pretty well on gathering up treasures this time around since I knew where all the previous ones were, as well as knowing just how to find a few more thanks to the tips and tricks I picked up along the way.  Indeed, when I started on the hunt, I decided I wanted to pick off the chapters that had the most treasures missing first.

That's about when I made a horrible revelation:  I more or less went through the majority of the game missing only -one- or -two- treasures per chapter.  And in more than one instance, this single treasure or two were located more towards the end of the chapter, rather than the beginning.  Basically, my point is that I've been grumbling at every point available because of just this fact.  The above pictured treasure (that unfortunately isn't glimmering, but you see the chest symbol which means it's there) is literally, literally two seconds from the end of the chapter.  And you'll likely miss it because you run directly at the PLOT IMPORTANT things rather than where the game wants you to go, which is left and completely around those so you can climb up on a platform and grab a piece of Turquoise out of a crate.  Now, I'm not complaining about the design of it, really, because I don't mind that, more that I'm simply complaining of the circumstances, since it really is rather unfortunate.

Regardless of this terrible burden, I have made some really good progress.  I'm already past the halfway point in Chapter Selecting, which means that there's still quite a bit of stuff to get at, but it's that much more manageable.  The mysteries will be the easy part, at least, whereas the bounty sets will be considerably less so.  I'm really not looking forward to trying to farm those (I imagine that is the method you acquire them) and Near doesn't work for me in the slightest, so I can't rely on trades to help lessen the chore.  It's unfortunate, really, but not too much so since, as I said, the only thing wrong with it is that I have to play the game for an extended period of time to perform the task, and that is simply not an issue in the slightest.  In doing so, I'll be able to mop up the remaining Kill Total Trophies as well, so the process is that much more streamlined.  Of course, I still do need a good place for getting the Steel Fist Expert trophy since I keep getting into situations where I come across an enemy that I simply cannot kill with the Steel Fist, which ruins my streak.  Unfortunate, that.

I have discovered something that I find quite strange, but in a good way while playing through the game again and again.  It is friggin' long.  I never really put much thought into it as I was playing it, but the campaign in Golden Abyss is certainly nothing to scoff at.  It might just be because I have been playing it, but I would certainly put it at the same length that the "Big Boy" Uncharted games require which is an accomplishment unto itself, not to mention that this is for a portable game.  Clearly, this is not the Portable Games of yore, simple bite-sized experiences to be had and forgotten and if nothing else about Uncharted:  Golden Abyss will convince you of this, then the length certainly should.  But there is plenty to be impressed over, with regards to Golden Abyss and its platform, so I doubt that would be the one thing to really tip it over.  It certainly helps, however.

The only problem I find with Golden Abyss in general is that, despite the bulk of content I still have to conquer, I imagine I will be able to do that in relatively short order, perhaps over the weekend.  After that, I'm left with a rather large hole in my game time, as the heat has made using my PS3 a bad idea.  Only a brief reprieve from this is in the future, and once that passes, I will effectively be left with a Vita minus games.  I don't count MotorStorm RC because I begin raging at it approximately two minutes into playing it, and I'm not counting Dynasty Warriors Next either because I'm mad at KOEI and I don't want to deal with the BS surrounding playing Conquest again and again and again and again.  I suppose that is a bridge that I'll have to cross when I get there, but, much as the rope bridge in the early chapters of Golden Abyss, I'm not too fond of the path, nor what lay on the far end of it.

Spring Disclaimer Version 2

Now, last year, I had to make a post that basically said that Spring (and technically Summer, but we're just focusing on Spring for now) is my arch-nemesis as the presence of an overabundance of electricity (lightning) generally makes all the other electricity unusable.  Like computers.  Also game consoles (but not handhelds).  Granted, I'd hoped to have had a Laptop by this point to make this all a moot point, but best laid plans and all that.  So really, what was said last year stands for this one as well.  Now would be the time to start getting yourself acquainted with the lovely twitter side bar as, thanks to LiveTweet on the Vita, I have the best access to that as possible, and will be using it to say when it's storming, when I'm sick (because I'm gonna be sick a lot this Spring, I'm sure) and the like.  Just basically when you should expect little to no content.

I figured it was about time to say this as, as you might have noticed, the last couple of days have been kind of taxing on me because I'm getting adjusted to the heat and the sudden shift to it.  Also there was a threat of Tornadoes today which are no good.  Thankfully, everything's fine and the storm pushed me back into Uncharted:  Golden Abyss to get a little further into my Hard playthrough which will in turn lead me to  my Crushing playthrough.  Random side-note about all this, by the by:  Why can't I transfer all my Clues and such to a new game?  C'mon, I've had to deal with the lack of unlockable 'cheats' since the last Uncharted, now I have to find everything over and over again?  Story/path-related things I can see.  The early charcoal rubbings, the things you pick up when you're going the way you're supposed to go, etc.  But there's no reason why I can't carry over my pieces of Turquoise and such.  Angryface.

Anyways, just so I can have something approaching content, I did also want to say that I tried the Shinobido 2 Demo and it was pretty great.  I was a bit surprised by that, actually, since I figured I would be terrible at it.  Granted, it was just tutorial missions and then one singular actual mission (which means the demo was way too short) so it was easy enough and was meant to be as such, I'm sure.  But moreso than that, I'm pretty happy with how it controlled.  It's not amazing, but it's not overly tanky.  The grappling hook makes for some pretty righteous movement, though the lack of a double jump was something that I consistently forgot about which bothers me for several reasons.  Still, the lack of the different animations for kills (at least, I performed three stealth kills in a row that were the exact same thing, not too happy about that) was kind of a downer.  All in all though, a pretty good demo, in the same way that the Katamari demo was a good one; it gave me a tiny, tiny chunk of the main game that was fun enough to make me want the whole thing.

So, yeah.  With any luck, Mother Nature will stop deciding to be such a bitch about stuff and I won't have to worry so much.  Because I worry so much, you guys.  You don't even know.  Still, I guess it's good that I'm concerned since it helps me prevent disasters rather than find myself stuck in them.  Hopefully I'll get stuff sorted out this Spring so it won't be so much of an issue; I'll try to do things to give me material for personal pieces rather than parroting off news all the time since that is almost impossible to rely on.  With a steady stream of content like that, any bumps in the road will barely be noticeable, or at least that's what I think I've learned about this for being at it a year and all.

Beat Uncharted: Golden Abyss

So, the other day, I had finally had it with Dynasty Warriors Next, didn't want to play (read:  rage out on) MotorStorm RC, so I went "Well, what do I do now?  No new demos, I don't want to play those games, but I want to play -something- on my Vit-ohrightIboughtUncharted."  This is exactly why I wanted Dynasty Warriors Next because, while I admittedly neglected Uncharted:  Golden Abyss for far too long, it only made it that much sweeter when I finally started playing it.  I got to play it because I wanted to play it and I was by-and-large completely ready for the experience.  At least, I thought I was, but Golden Abyss ended up being far more than I expected, which is pretty much the highest of praises I could grant it.

I had previously hoped for an experience that mirrored the one you could have with Uncharted:  Drake's Fortune; overall pleasant with some unfortunate little issues here and there but overall a refined product, and at the very least, Golden Abyss managed that.  While I will openly admit I'm not a fan of all the extra bells and whistles to show off the added functionality of the Vita's possible control scheme, I can't help but celebrate some of them which I never thought I would be doing.  I absolutely love the Charcoal Rubbings and Cleaning off artifacts for reasons that are far, far beyond my understanding, and the motion-sensitive aiming actually does help - while I wasn't too plussed with the normal aiming at first, it was beyond useful with Sniping, so I ended up turning motion back on for normal aiming for the last few chapters of the game to find that it was quite nice.  Even towards the end when there's a lot (and I mean a lot) of touch screen interaction after a whole lot of nothing, re: non-traditional controls, I started liking that since it, at least, fit the thematics of what it was covering which I won't spoil.

Of course, it didn't all work for me, and there's a few things I would've preferred didn't exist at all.  Well, actually, it's just one thing that was fully useless for every use it was implemented in.  Every usage for the tilt controls (beyond the aiming which is different) was just awful and I hated those portions of the game quite passionately.  Going over a log and/or a beam that became slippery right at the end for some reason, necessitating you stand there and wobble back and forth for a minute is terrible and was, in fact, the cause of my first death in the game which killed my budding killstreak and annoyed me greatly.  Then there was another section at about the mid-point of the game, possibly a little before, where they're used for an entire sliding setpiece that just...it's undoubtedly the low-point of the game.  For me at least, which considering it only lasts about a few minutes at most, means that there's a whole lot of good about the game.  Essentially for the section, however, you have to til to avoid rocks and, if you're all OCD like me, there are a few collectibles through the path that, in my playing, always ended up getting me killed for getting them.  Which kind of sucked.

This looks better in the game, I assure you.

Another area that the game definitely succeeds in the goal of being an Uncharted game is the writing and the acting which is quite clearly a big part of the franchise.  I didn't expect the game to be as heavy on those elements as normal but, when I sit here and think about the game, those are mostly the parts I remember most, and I keep thinking of more of those bits, so I would say there's a fair amount of them.  Every character really sort of got that charm and thought put into them as per normal so that, even if you were supposed to hate a character, you couldn't help but like a trait of them, since it was really done quite well.  The only exception to this might be one of the main antagonists (who you will realize exactly who I mean when you play the game) but even then, I liked him if more for the end-game development of him than his parts here and there in the story.

One thing I feel compelled to spoil, however, and this is probably wrong of me to do, but it's something everybody should know about the game.  Victor "Goddamn" Sullivan -is- indeed in the game, and he's as glorious as ever.  I found myself wondering at several points if he was going to show up and it did, indeed, seem as if it was getting less and less likely as time went on.  But then, after a mention, it did eventually get to the point where he was involved and, man, man, that was definitely one of the "Oh shit, this is friggin' Uncharted" moments for me.  There were several of these moments, as I've sort of alluded to, and it makes me so happy to know this.  It truly is a portable Uncharted game rather than a portable game that tries to be Uncharted.  Already, already, right at it's launch, the Vita manages to have a game that offers a definite console-like experience on the go.  It's magical.

I will admit, however, that this comes with (only the barest of) consequences and drawbacks, but part of it, I can simply attribute to the tech being new and the game did not come directly from Naughty Dog, but rather mostly from Sony Bend who do good work, clearly, but aren't completely in the same realm as ND.  In that they don't have magic like Naughty Dog clearly possesses.  The graphics at times were not silky smooth, showing some unsightly pixels and edges that are very minute, which is not what we're used to it's so insignificant that it barely matters.  The worst example is the fire that's in various parts of the game which, it's tricky to have good fire as a basis, so it's understandable.  Something a little less so was this type of shennanigans which I encountered approximately four times in the game which isn't -bad- by any means.  3 of those times, it was just a mid-air suspended gun, rather than a full person, so it wasn't too noticeable either.  Still, it's something that bears mentioning, if just to try and fairly present the game as a polished, but not 100% completely so, product.

It is still amazing, however and I look forward to my usual "Play it over and over again for all the trophies" ritual as I do with every Uncharted game that will begin....well...half an hour ago.  When I've been writing this post for about an hour now, off and on.  Because I procrastinate sometimes, you see.

Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

If you couldn't guess, the above is my current Page One of my Vita that I bought today, actually held and played with and finally experienced exactly what this machine had to offer.  If you're surprised that my background, rather, that the first place I went to was Drakengard, you clearly don't know me too well but that's okay, I forgive you.  While I haven't gotten to really look around for proper-sized Vita backgrounds just yet, as I assume it'll still be something of a task to do so, I have that and a few others that I'm toying about with the prospect of using so I am not left wanting.  All that aside, I did, obviously, spend the bulk of the night with my Vita after  I finally got home from purchasing it and having it charge and then download and install the update that had been pushed out last week for maps.  Which wasn't painful at all and I wasn't pacing around the house the entire time or anything crazy like that no sir.

My first experience was, clearly, a fantastic one, and I come away, having finally turned it off prior to working on this post, feeling a satisfaction that I didn't quite expect, despite barely dipping into the device whatsoever.  My journey to GameStop didn't yield the results I'd hoped for, unfortunately; while I got my Vita and Uncharted with no hassle (in fact, I forgot to tell the guy I had Uncharted pre-ordered and only by virtue of the magical computer did he grab it), the prospect of owning a 16 gig stick on this way was snatched from me for a brief moment when the clerk, 'Leo' (who was a fantastic guy) told me in no uncertain terms "We're out."  This was directly after he informed me that they did not get nor have any copies of Dynasty Warriors Next for sale, so my response and in fact the only response one could have at that moment was to say, "Aww, man you are killing me here".  A quick assurance that they did, in fact, have more 16 Gig sticks from the other clerk working the store made it alright however and $335.17 later ($35.17 after my gift cards) I exited the store with a big bag of the three mentioned items and a sense of unbridled excitement.

The obvious kink in my aforementioned plan is present now as, with no Dynasty Warriors Next, I cannot play Dynasty Warriors Next before Uncharted:  Golden Abyss which I -actually- have and that presents a rather real and annoying problem.  Namely, after waiting so very very long for this thing, I'm not quite ready to play it since, while I assure you that I am chomping at the proverbial bit here to play Uncharted, I know that when I begin playing it, I will not stop and at the launch of a system, you want to have options or at least the illusion of them.  If I play Uncharted for the simple reason that I can't afford to not play Uncharted, then I will not, then, be playing Uncharted specifically because I want to.  It's insanity in pure text, I realize, but this is what's going on in my head and it's for this reason that I spent the majority of the day playing with Welcome Park, rather than the Gilded Chasm, as it were.

Welcome Park is....well, it's not 'satisfying', but at the same time, it's far more surprising than I had anticipated.  The five mini-games are there simply to do as you have been told - to teach you how to use the functions of the system that are, in fact, so intuitive that you don't really need to be taught them.  Regardless, they're mostly all fun in their own right besides the one that revolves around the camera, since it involves you taking a picture with it and then solving that picture as a sliding tile puzzle of 7, 8, 14 or 15 tiles.  I'm sure it's stated somewhere in the big book of Collected Video Game Knowledge, but in the off-chance it is not:  Fuck sliding tile games.  They are never fun.  They are not fun now, they were not fun when I was a wee young'n playing The Simpsons:  Bart vs. the World, they will not be fun when I'm forty and playing Final Fantasy 16.  It's just never going to happen and their mere existence annoys me beyond words.

However, the other four games (well, three, I don't explicitly count the Sound one as a game) are fun in their own right; the touch screen-based game has the right level of "27 seconds?  Psh, I can get 26" replayability, Face Finder is interesting enough that I actually remembered the name of it and will likely be looking for faces in the real world because of it now, and the Sixaxis game is just....just fun, actually.  I was surprised too, and maybe it's just the twenty minutes of collected time I spent playing with it talking, but I got the trophy for it with no trouble on my first go and have played it three times since, content to just try and hop all those bouncey orbs as a little distraction.  It's not going to sate my gaming desires for long periods of time, but it'll do in a pinch.  I only hope that my quest to Target tomorrow yields positive results as I believe my time with Welcome Park drew to a close earlier and I won't be able to sustain another day on it exclusively.  I guess we'll see, though!

Vita Trailers On - Let's Do This

I don't think I've ever just had a post with trailers in it for the games coming out for the Vita when it hits its February 22nd release date in America.  This is mostly because the trailers have only recently started to come out in English (that I know of) and also because I haven't really wanted to consolidate all the Vita games I want since that is all sorts of money that I don't have.  If I have, I'm pretty sure it was with Japanese trailers and was a few months back so for all we know, it's new to us now.  Regardless, that's what I'm doing because it's what I want to do and with the frequent internet outs, I can't keep calm long enough to write something nice out because the internet cutting out whenever it seems like it won't/shouldn't fills me with so much rage.  So much.  Because it's bottom-of-the-barrel DSL and has been terrible for the years we've had it, but at least it was fairly, uh....reliable?  Non-reliable -and- shitty is not something I'm going to tolerate.

Anyways, the first trailer I'm queuing up is for the only game I have pre-ordered on the Vita which will not be a surprise to you because most every other person interested in a Vita knows of this game as 'the game' to get when you pick up your shiny new handheld.  Uncharted:  Golden Abyss likely won't be as great as the two that came before it, Uncharted 2:  Among Thieves and Uncharted 3:  Drake's Deception (which stand on equal ground as far as I'm concerned), but I at least expect it to be the same quality as Uncharted:  Drake's Fortune in that it'll be the first outing on the system, before they've mastered the wizardry necessary to make it mind-blowing.  Remains to be seen if it will be, but I have some faith in Sony Bend and I imagine they've worked closely with Naughty Dog and Sony's First/Second Party coordinators, so I think my faith is well-placed.

As you can see, it's not quite as bright, vibrant, nor quite as crisp as we could hope, but that could be the difference between watching it on youtube (in 360p in my case) and playing it in person.  And I'm not exactly sold on all the optional control methods, but I will grant that they are that indeed - optional - and that's the important part that should be at least touted.  I'll try them and if I don't like them or they actively impede my progress, I'll switch them off, but at least I'll give it the old attempt.  The game deserves at least that much, I think.  In the end, I expect another Uncharted adventure which is a prospect enough to get me excited for it, which is why there is $5 credit residing in the GameStop database implicitly stating I will own it.

Up next is the game that, if Uncharted:  Golden Abyss didn't exist, would be -the game- that I would have to have.  As it stands, I still have to have it, but I'm not sure what the fundage is going to look like come February, as I have to consider how much GameStop credit I have in card form, how much I am probably getting for Christmas, and what the difference is between that and the pricetag for the system, a memory stick (which we still don't officially know, price-wise) and Uncharted.  Basically, Gravity Rush will be the second game I own for the Vita, but the time between its purchasing and Uncharted's purchasing might be extended or it might not.

If you could sell a game on style alone, that game would be Gravity Rush assuredly because the look of it is so gorgeous that it practically sold me alone.  Then the actual concept of the game sank in, and that's what cemented it.  I've gone over Gravit y Rush before, but it remains to be said that the game looks like something you'd expect from further down in the Vita's lifetime, not right at the start.  It's possible that the gameplay might be a little more basic (minus the fairly original concept of using gravity as it does) which would point to 'launch title' but that still remains to be seen.  And it will be seen with great anxiousness and curiosity at some point.

Next up is the other "No surprise" game that I'm looking forward to for the Vita.  LittleBigPlanet (for the Vita) has been the subject of quite a few excited fanboy moments for me, especially with all the different showings it's had and will continue to do so.  It's one of many games announced/shown off for the system that doesn't quite have a release date yet, but that's only because "Not soon enough" isn't a valid date for some reason.  And if nothing else, the people at the helm of this one know how to make quite an enjoyable trailer.

From the looks of it, it's looking like it's trying to be LittleBigPlanet 2, but in your pocket, which is tantalizing for me.  I think the problem with LittleBigPlanet 2 for me is, quite simply, that it's on the PS3 and number one, I have far too many games for that already, and two, I don't play the PS3 near enough to even get through that gaming library as is.  I'm not expecting LittleBigPlanet Vita to have the same level of inter-connectivity with LBP or LBP 2 as LBP 2 has with the first game, but it would be nice.  They have said in the past that your entire costume gallery from the PS3 installments will be available to you on your Vita game, but we'll just have to see on that, since I've yet to see it trumpeted off again.  You know that I love me some costumes, but this likely won't be a deal-breaker for me.  Maybe.

And finally (as I decided not to get any trailer not from the Playstation Channel and barely looked as it stood) we have one of the more intriguing games for the system that I'm not yet sold on.  Escape Plan has charm and character and a style all its own as does Gravity Rush, so I have to compliment it on that much at the very least.  However, I'm just not too sure on the game for various reasons.

The goal is, obviously, to make you think "Oh, a good puzzle game" when you watch that trailer because of the neat and innovative uses of all the different things the Vita can do.  Of course, the goal of every trailer for every puzzle game is to make it look good and clever, when very seldom are truly both of those things.  Where some stumble by 'overthinking itself' and making it too easy or 'overestimating itself' by making it too hard ('How the fuck was I supposed to know I had to hit that first to get this thing to happen?!'), very few manage to find that precarious balance upon which a puzzle game is claimed "just hard enough" to make you consider it, but never enough to toss your controller/handheld away in frustration. 

Yet another pitfall puzzle games hit is basing puzzles not only on figuring them out, but giving ridiculous restrictions on how it's accomplished ("Flip a lever to drop a ball on the other side of a wall that you could only find by running around like an idiot.  The ball is used to weigh down a platform that is only accessible for the brief window in which the lever stays flipped, giving you a 0.7 second margin of error.  GOOD LUCK!") which is far and beyond the reason I've quit a number of puzzle games.  Yelling "I KNOW HOW TO DO THIS, WHY WON'T IT WORK" does nothing, nor does it make any fun occur.  I see every puzzle game as a game that can have any of these issues which is why I approach them all with caution.  That is mostly my hesitation for Escape Plan, so we'll see how that weathers when more on it comes out.

There are plentiful other titles for the Vita that I could probably find trailers for (Sumioni, Samurais and Dragons, etc.) and throw them here to show you that, yes, I do want quite a few Vita games, but I won't do that right now.  Assuredly when the Vita gets closer to launch on our fair shores, I'll have more trailers than I'll know what to do with besides post them up here.  And that is a day I almost cannot wait for.