Far Cry 3: Beaten

By which I mean the main story is beaten.  Yes, I have...a lot of the side-content tied up as well, all the radio towers sorted, all the outposts liberated, most of the hunts completed, etc. etc. but the crowning achievement is, clearly, finishing the story to the game.  The rest is just the gravy to that meat, if you will.  Continuing the metaphor, I will say that I do believe I preferred the gravy to the meat by the time the last portions were scattered about my plate which is rather unfortunate.  To the point where I can comfortably say that I'm glad that I'm -done- with that because now I can just focus on flying around the island (sometimes literally thanks to the wingsuit) and picking up things, doing things for the last few bits of single-player trophies so that I can move on to the next game.

I could review Far Cry 3.  I kind of wanted to review it.  But we'd all be better served if I simply deferred you all towards Chance's review of the game which was the sole galvanizing factor that inspired my own purchase and playthrough.  I agree with his review 95% where my only take-aways are perhaps more my own grievances than actual issues with the game.

Which is exactly why I'm going to spend the rest of this post pointing them out.

I'm going to one-up Chance here for my first point.  To his statement that Hoyt is a little disappointing and boring after Vaas, I will see that and raise it with the statement that the entirety of the game after Vaas is just a mess.  A lot of Far Cry 3's personality, a lot of its build and its structure was made on the back of Vaas.  Not only just his character, his performance and what he stood for, but his counter-point to Jason Brody.  The imagery is plentiful in the game and the marketing - Vaas and Jason are one in the same, cut from the same cloth so to speak - it's just that Vaas has fully given in to himself, his whims and his psychoses whereas Jason still has that shred of humanity still.  They're perfectly played off of one another and the foundation of the entire game is built on top of their rivalry.

When Vaas is out of the picture, he takes part of that foundation away.  That looming threat of his way of thinking finally perveying its way into Jason's head, that idea that, perhaps, Jason could aspire to something more than the pissant with a knife stumbling through the jungle, even if it's not something tasteful.  Though, that's not entirely fair as Jason does eventually find his footing, he grows and becomes a warrior in his own right, but with Vaas around, being what inspired that change mostly out of fear, there was always a chance of regression.  Vaas was Jason's fear and without Vaas, Jason is simply the flaming sword of retribution, poised to cut a charring swath through the rest of the organization Vaas was a part of.

Which sounds really cool, right?  You would think that would be awesome.

But it's....just not.

After all that build with Vaas, Hoyt might as well have been some hobo they dragged in off of the street.  And in execution, that's....basically what he was.  You go from this story where the protagonist and antagonist are just five paces removed from one another to a story where the protagonist sees the antagonist as a target and the antagonist sees the protagonist as a rat.  It's bland and uninspired .  To their credit, the actors involved (Hoyt and Jason's VAs, I mean) try and they do nicely in their jobs, but you're only as good as what you have to work with and what they had to work with just wasn't good.  Hoyt -could- have been made interesting, even in the wake of Vaas, but it simply wasn't in the cards (ha!) for him and that is really unfortunate.

Similarly disjointed was the change in pace from the game's wonderfully crafted and personal ideas in the jungle, in the Vaas sections, to the areas in Hoyt's section that involve you shooting about twenty privateers per mission while also blowing up at least two things with not much else to it.  It's a delicious display of destruction to be sure, but it's all style and no substance.  Where I was having fun with the story missions beforehand, I simply saw the latter group as chores to be worked through.  Inevitably, each mission, I just ended up being forced to run from cover to cover, plinking away with my Bushman Assault Rifle all the while, looking wistfully off to the side where variety sat, waiting to be utilized again in the form of sections where I could actually pull off stealth (the missions allowed for very few places to hide and stalk from, forcing you into the open, and whenever a body was found, no matter the circumstances, everybody knew it was -you- that put it there); areas where sniper rifles where the weapon of the day, where I could take my time and remember what it was like, being able to savor the moment when Jason inhales, lines up a perfect shot and pulls the trigger, exhaling as a spray of red bursts into the air like fireworks on a summer's eve.

While "the last third of the story pretty much sucks" might be a damning statement to most games (and likely should be one here), I can't help but state that, you know what?  It's all just water under the bridge.  When you're playing Far Cry 3, enjoying all of the nuances you find yourself getting more and more comfortable with, there's almost nothing to compare it to.  It's breath-takingly gorgeous, the jungle feels alive and the games many, many reasons to explore only reinforce that again and again.  Most of all, getting around, carving out your own story in the backyards of the Rook Islands is just fun - no bones about it.  I can't even begin to regale the stories that I have about each and every outpost that I liberated today - because there is a story for each one - which is an amazing thing in itself.  It manages to strike a perfect balance for any type of playthrough that you might be doing, which is something we clamor for and laud when we find the scant few examples of such a thing that we have.

It's for that reason that my big long angry rant about the Hoyt section and all that's involved is just my 5% of straying out of complete agreement with Chance's glowing review.  And in a sense, it's not even much of disagreeing, I'm just hammering on something far more than he did.  The capacity for sheer fun that Far Cry 3 has within its confines is staggering, and that makes it a truly great game.  Definitely one of 2012's best, which is something I certainly never would have expected before I played it.

My Games of 2012 - Number One

1.  Sleeping Dogs

For all my hand-wringing and second-guessing, it was more or less never about this game.  I didn't go into voting with the express intention of putting Sleeping Dogs in my number one spot, though I wasn't at all surprised when I put it there.  It felt right, because goddamnit I really love this game.  Of course, you all know that because I have gone on and on about it over the last year when I was playing through, finishing and absolutely completing it.  So, much in the same vein as how I covered AssLib, I would like to re-post some of the bigger sentiments I had about the game and then talk a little bit more about how my perceptions have changed and such with time, given that I haven't actually put a lot of time back into the game after Platinum'ing it, due to, you know, there being a whole hell of a lot of games that I've had to play in the recent months.

So I'll just throw this down to get this started:  I love this game.  I pretty much love everything -about- Sleeping Dogs and I am actually a little surprised that I enjoy it quite as much as I do.  But I really do, I throw hours after hours into playing it and never get bored - I just get tired or I just have to really do something -else-, but the game is easily one that I could see myself marathonning sometime down the road for no purpose other than to enjoy it all over again.  I never do that outside of cases where, like, my save got lost or there was a trophy patch or something of that sort because I simply don't have the time.  But I would -make- the time if the time was right to replay Sleeping Dogs from scratch.

Obviously what differentiates Sleeping Dogs from just about every other open world game out there is that it is a game that fully intends for you to play it using melee.  Yes, there are shooting bits, sometimes even with cover involved, but let me let you in on a little secret:  If you're playing Sleeping Dogs by plinking away at dudes from cover, you're being a pussy.  Guns are not guns in Sleeping Dogs, but power-ups, things that you use to take out a few guys while running at a pack, as you might use, say, the hammer in Super Smash Bros.  Best usage of guns in the game is not taking cover and popping up, but vaulting and getting that sweet sweet slow-mo going.  Vault and run at your enemies and make sure they all get a new hole for a third eye to keep it going, but more importantly, to be the baddest fucking Wei Shen you can be.  If you can effectively take out a room of guards who keep flooding in without staying in cover for more than a second at a time between setting off slow-mo vaults then congratulations, you are using guns in Sleeping Dogs the correct way. 

One of my own personal favorite environmental bits is not any of these types of things, but rather just using gravity effectively for fun and profit.  There's not -very- many areas where it's viable, but with the useage of the grapple-dash and the running throw, you can turn an uppity gangster into a projectile aimed at a car twenty feet below and that, my friends, is a rush.  I never have hit a car yet, but as far as instant kills go, getting a running start and throwing a guy off what is basically just a covered bridge over a road is something that I could suggest will never get old.  Even when you don't have the unabashed freedom to throw them directly off, having the ability to, after wearing a foe down, basically clothesline them over a railing to the road below or what have you is still fun in itself.  Similarly fun, but rather confusing, is the fact that the game suffers from a case of the protagonist being the only man alive who knows how to swim.  That means anyone who hits the water instantly dies.  And when you have a lot of areas where there's water and no real barricade around it....well, I'm sure you can imagine just where that leads.

[...]

The true beauty of Sleeping Dogs, for me, is that I am retroactively nostalgic for this game already.  I just 'finished' the game earlier today, but I remember all sorts of things as you would only remember a game from years gone past, with the same amount of fondness involved.

I should start by saying that, all of that?  Still true.  Still definitely true and, in many ways, even moreso now than it was then.  I have been itching in the worst way to actually just start playing Sleeping Dogs over again from scratch and I can tell you right now that, when I do, it will not be the last time I do it. I look forward to embracing the acquisition of power almost as much as I anticipate having it, and will enjoy being able to employ Wei Shen's full arsenal again.  After earning it all over once more.  Sleeping Dogs is definitely a game where they journey is just as much fun as the destination, as they say, and even when you reach the destination, there's still plenty of things to do with the many collectibles that the game has (which is will give you maps to in a sense) as well as the fight clubs and random mooks on the streets to use your skills against.

What really gets to me, I think, is how absolutely in its own league that Sleeping Dogs truly is.  There's just no other Melee-focused open-world game out there on the market.  Possibly Arkham City, I suppose, but I haven't played that just yet and it'll likely be a while before I do so.  Even the Yakuza games aren't completely Open-world, nor do their battles exist in the map itself (just yet), so that's a different case as well.  Yet, rather than being something that wears out its welcome, Sleeping Dogs shows us how rewarding something of its kind can be.  It eschews that which a lot of games have made almost standard for this generation in gun combat for something a lot more technical, visceral and, in my own opinion, enjoyable.

I'm not going to go on and on here as I've done that more than enough in the past.  Sleeping Dogs is my Game of 2012 by virtue of being the game I enjoyed the most and the game I found most important because of what it did.  Though it may not completely and totally overshadow other games, especially the others on my list, it has that certain something, that special quality that makes me gravitate towards it.  If you haven't gotten yourself a copy of it, then what the hell are you waiting for?  Go out and procure, return home and savor it.  Enjoy it.  Even if you have bought and played it, give consideration to dipping into its pleasures once more.  I know I will, because the game is a rare treat and one to savor from time to time.

My Games of 2012, Runners Up

Here's the first of the last batch before I am finally done with Game of the Year stuff (aside from "Games that Weren't my Games" which I might not do right away because good god) detailing the three games that were not number one on my Game of the Year list.  This was, of course, the hardest part, and I'm sure that'll get across in the way I talk about the games individually since, in most cases, I will be trying to convince myself of why I -didn't- pick it as my Number One, but liked it so much that it was that close.  It's weird to say that any of these games, hell even the last three games before this, could have just as easily been my number one pick.  They're all special and wonderful in their own ways, so it was just a matter of trying to pick the one that I'm going to remember the most down the road.  In that, I think I figured it out quite well, but even still, it's a hard call.

4.  LittleBitPlanet PS Vita

It's no secret that I am a man who enjoys LittleBigPlanet in any and all facets, be they the regular Sidescroller ones or even Kart Racers, so that the iteration that happened to appear on what is rapidly becoming my favorite system ever is one of my most favorite games of the year is absolutely no surprise.  It is probably the antithesis of a surprise, and I am imagining everyone reading this was probably just awaiting the occasion where it would finally come up in numbered form.  That it is in the number 4 position is mostly a surprise to myself, but it's mostly because I didn't spend as much time with LBPV as I would have liked thanks to my profile getting corrupted right before I was going to make a real, proper level.  Game.  Whatever the term you want to use is.

Of course, that was honestly -my- fault, as I'm fairly certain that I closed the game while it was auto-saving more than a few times and doing that is just asking to have your game messed up.  I'm not holding it against the game, but in the same vein, it made me consider just how much I wanted to do all of that again, like I had done with the first title in the series after losing my save/profile there to a PS3 YLOD.  I love the LittleBigPlanet games, and I love replaying the story levels in them, but I love doing them at my leisure, not having to worry about dragging in some random to grab three score bubbles halfway through a level every other level.  It's fantastic indeed, truly, that LittleBigPlanet Vita can support proper LittleBigPlanet multi-player, it really is.  However, I'm not so much a fan of multi-player in general, so I can't help but cringe at the thought of all those bubbles where I will have to, once again, involve others in what is my game and my fun.  Especially when my time is as limited as it is.

Still, I'll do it eventually.  Not only because of my enjoyment of the franchise, but because the story in LBPV might just be one of the better ones of the entire series.  The levels are rich and charming, the aesthetic is clear with each and every one, and they're just jam-packed with fun that comes with a full appreciation of LBP2's inventory of power-ups as well as the few Vita-specific ones.  For certain items, I found myself replaying levels several, several times over and not once was it ever really a chore.  Sure, sometimes it was because I was just trying very desperately to Ace a level and it was so very difficult, but even then, I was never really deterred.  Cautious, sometimes, but never deterred.  I'm not happy that I'll have to do all that over again, but I'm not too fussed either.  My return to LBPV, whenever that is, will be glorious and because I've experienced it before, I know I'll fall in love with it all over again.  It's just clearing the rest of the games in the way so that I may truly enjoy it when I get around to it that is an issue.

3.  Far Cry 3

So, did you guys know that I really like Far Cry 3?  Because I really like Far Cry 3.  I liked it so much that I just couldn't believe it.  As in, I literally could not believe that I liked the game so much and I just knew, I knew there had to be a part where it started to crack, started to fall apart for me, because not doing so was an impossibility.  Unfortunately, I was correct, but even still after seeing some cracks I can't help but marvel at this game.  It went from a relative unknown to something that I had to have when I read a rather glowing review from Chance and there is not a single point that he touches on that I disagree with.  The game is fun incarnate.  You could break off large chunks of the fun Far Cry 3 offers and make an entire other game with it and both of them would still be fun.  Fun, fun fun.

The cracks only started to show when, as Chance said, Vaas left the stage.  Directly thereafter, the larger foe in Hoyt precedes a change in scenery and a change in gameplay, somewhat, as it becomes apparent that the best way to get close to Hoyt is to infiltrate his privateers.  That's not a bad idea in the slightest, except the way that the game executes it is faulty at best.  In order to get a privateer outfit, you have to engage in a forced stealth level where you cannot kill anyone or be seen.  The entire game, you've been honing your craft, your skills for killing and yet now, in the situation where it most makes sense, you cannot make use of that skill in any way for what is absolutely a twenty minute long level if you manage to get through it in a single go.  You will not.  You will not at all.  And you might think, when you get it and look like a Privateer that stealth just got a whole lot easier, right?  You would think that.

You would be wrong.

There's no reason for you to be wrong to the degree that we all are in thinking this, however.  Obviously, direct aggression against a fellow privateer will make it clear to them that you're not one of them.  That's fine.  Anyone who witnesses it will be aware as well.  That is also fine.  However, what is not fine is that, in a mission fairly soon after you get the uniform you have to infiltrate an area with three captains and kill them to try and find some important plans and documents on their persons.  That, in itself, is fine.  It takes place along the side of a mountain, basically, which is important.  The mission area is very vertical.  The problem I have with the whole set-up is that, if I mess up with the privateers at the very bottom of the mountain, Oblivion Guard Syndrome will kick in and every single privateer in the mission zone will know that I am an imposter.  For a game that pays attention to every single other thing with such incredible detail, this is almost deplorable and it was so jarring that I nearly quit the mission in frustration.  In truth, after I cleared it, possibly a few others, I haven't played it, having focused on AssLib and other things these last few days.

Still, it's just a minor speed-bump in the road that Far Cry 3 runs and it's more happenstance than I haven't played it in the last few days than reasoned.  There's just so much enjoyment to be had in Far Cry 3 that I'll be back soon enough and I'll spend entire days within its confines before I wrest my victories from it.  There's still beasts to hunt, still relics and letters to be found and, certainly, plenty of pirates and privateers to be dealt with.  While the looming 'threat' of Vaas is no longer in it for me, meaning no more fun moments like his "Insanity" speech, the fun of the game is still there and I am looking to grab hold of that and enjoy it as the last throes of the game are shown to me.  I know they won't disappoint.

2.  Binary Domain

I expected to like Binary Domain.  I expected to pick it up and enjoy it for what it was, feel a slight swell of pride for Yakuza Studios for really doing something that they wanted to do, expanding their horizons and move on to other games.  I expected it to be fun, yet flawed and be something that I couldn't universally suggest to anyone as a great game to play.

Sometimes, though.  Sometimes what you expect and what you get are not the same thing at all.

I can say, with certainty, that I love Binary Domain.  I can't quite put my finger on it, but the game is just so wonderful to me that I just cannot say anything less of it than that.  For their second attempt, it's a magnificently done third-person shooter, especially so when you consider their first attempt was Yakuza:  Dead Souls.  Given that they nailed the gameplay, which is the only part you should worry about with a Yakuza Studios game, the rest, as they say, is just gravy.  Production values are sky-high considering, and the Voice Acting in the title is fairly fantastic as is the dialogue.  Despite the themes in the game, the moments of humor that are sprinkled throughout are genuinely hilarious.

Honestly, if I had to say that there was anything that the game doesn't do well, it would be boss fights.  It's not even a matter of them being badly designed or anything, it's just that they go on far too long.  Perhaps that was exacerbated by me playing the game on the 'hard' difficulty, but even still, they seemed to drag on forever and ever which became a bit of a problem when I would die at the end of them sometimes, necessitating that I do the entire thing over again.  When the game plays so smoothly, however, it's not even -much- of a complaint there and is more about the time invested than anything.  Even the multi-player has its own charm from what little bit of it that I played.  The 'Invasion' game mode has you and others clearing a small map of 'Scrapheads' as they flood in, giving you only a limited amount of ammo for every five rounds of survival.  The squad I was in, unfortunately, only made it to the 25th round of 50, and it was mostly thanks to a lack of cooperation (limited ammo means take it only when you need it), but it was a blast regardless.

There's not really a whole lot more that I can say to try to impress upon you how much I liked Binary Domain.  What I've said, plus the second-place rank it took should hopefully be all the recommendation you might need.  It's cheap now in the wild, I'm sure, and it's well worth the price you'll pick it up for.  From the fantastically told story (with the usual Japanese weirdness to it), to the solid gameplay, to the absolutely entertaining cast, it's well worth the second place spot in the list, much like the last few games probably are as well for their own high successes.  Still, I think Binary Domain shone just a little brighter all told, and my hope is that a few more people pick up on it somehow, for some reason.  They won't be disappointed.

My Games of 2012, Part 4

We're hitting the home stretch here and praise everything for that.  There's not a whole lot that I can say here to preface these picks that I haven't already said, and I'm not really up for restating them, so let's just get on with it.

7.  Gravity Rush

Gravity Rush was a rather stunning game from the first time we saw it, to the time we finally got it in our collective hands and to the time where we uncovered all of its secrets, saw its story and gameplay and truly knew what the game was about.  This was among the few games shown off for the Vita, prior to the release that people were clamoring for, the games that people purchased Vitas for and thankfully this was one of the games that made that purchase well worth it.  The art style grabbed and the story charmed and the gameplay amazed.  In all facets, it was just a wonderfully well-done game.  In a lot of ways, Gravity Rush is definitely one of the best games that came out in 2012 because of just how different it was and how good it was as well.

Make no mistake, if you have a Vita and you do not have this game you are, in fact, doing it wrong.  Though I highly doubt that is a possibility because the game is one of the prime staples of the Vita's Playstation Plus Instant Game Collection which means it is -your- game for -free- whenever you want it.  Because if you have a Vita and you don't have Playstation Plus....well, again, you are doing it wrong.  So, by virtue of not being a wrong person, having a Vita and having Gravity Rush is basically hand-in-hand and this is a very good thing indeed because the game deserves to be something that is played by a wide audience.  It's something to be lauded and appreciated and it's something to hold up as a prime example of what a handheld game -can- be and in a lot of ways, what one -should- be.  Whenever the sequel comes out, with any luck, it will definitively reinforce that.

I think my fondest memory of the game, since I haven't played it in so long, is just the feel, the freedom, of 'flying' around the city in which the game takes place.  It's a simple affair, but because it is so simple, it allows for a lot of personalization, if you will, and it inspired a lot of that as well.  It becomes much more than "Shift, point at building, shift to 'fly' to it, you are at your destination".  It becomes "Well, if I launch myself at that angle and cut off my flight at this point, I'll land right there and then I can do this and that"  It becomes a thing that you can finesse and just have fun with on its own merits and, given that it's something we normally don't have access to in games - flight- that is a big deal.  Because not only is it done, but it's done well which is a rarity unto itself.  So long as the sequel has more things to -use- that flight, that finesse of movement, it will be an amazing game itself.

6.  Lollipop Chainsaw

I realize that, around these parts, I did not exactly say a lot about Lollipop Chainsaw once it was released, once I had played it myself and that was not fully intentional.  Rather unfortunately, the game came out at a time in my life and situation where things were hectic and annoying everyday thanks in part to the extreme heat wave, but clearly, there was a bit more going on than just that.  I won't get into the finer details, but there was a -thing- that I was trying to do with Lollipop Chainsaw and it simply fell through, but I didn't want to give up on it completely, so I just sort of held out to see if it could be salvaged.  And time passed, as it does, and I just got into other things that I could and wanted to talk about, so it just sort of fell by the wayside.  That is, of course, rather unfortunate.

So, let's talk about Lollipop Chainsaw.  Let's first discuss that, while playing Lollipop Chainsaw, no matter what the hell was going on around the house, in my life and such at the time that had me down and got in the way of doing things, I could not force the grin off of my face.  Lollipop Chainsaw is a thing of beauty because it is a perpetual entertainment machine.  If you're not enjoying the absolutely stylized, wonderful combat (along with the Sparkle Hunting finishers and the super mode that played "Hey Mickey" in the background while it was active), then you're enjoying the hilarious dialogue between Juliet and Nick, or the other characters, and if you're not enjoying either of those then you just aren't playing the game.  I am mostly serious when I say that I exist in a world where I think it is an impossibility for one to -not- consider Lollipop Chainsaw fun and/or entertaining on some level.

Lollipop Chainsaw does not complicate itself.  It doesn't over-saturate itself.  It simply exists as what it is, and it's because of that simple entertainment factor that it's just so damn wonderful.  It's not going to be one of those games that changes your outlook on anything, it's not going to redefine a genre for you and it doesn't need to.  It is a game that is fun.  That's all it is and that's all it needs to be.  In that vein, there's absolutely no way I could advocate picking up a copy of it yourself, since you probably didn't, and going through it.  You might not laugh at everything, you might struggle with the combat system at first, but if you don't crack a grin, if you don't chuckle here and there, then, well, there might just be something broken inside of you.

5.  Yakuza:  Dead Souls

It is a very, very odd thing for a game with "Yakuza" in the title to not be in the Top Two of any of my lists, and an even more odd thing indeed for said game to barely break the Top Five.  There is a very, very simple reason for why Yakuza:  Dead Souls didn't make the illustrious cut and, put simply, it's just because it was very, very obviously Yakuza Studios' first attempt at a third-person shooter.  Painfully obvious.  It was also fairly obvious that the Yakuza Engine (even modified as it was) was not intended for third-person shooting in any facet beyond cursory.  So, in the end, all it meant was that the Studio wanted to try something different, which is completely and totally admirable, they used a franchise of theirs to make it happen and it just didn't come out with the same level of quality as their other games.  It's unfortunate, but that's just what happened.

Now, clearly I'm not saying the end result was a bad game.  Because it wasn't.  In a way, Dead Souls was an absolute wonder in its own right and a lot of that is because they used the Yakuza franchise.  Not only did they use it, but they respected it (obviously, I mean, it's -theirs-) and made its out-landish story and concept fit into the long-running narrative and canon.  Though, obviously the game is not canon for the series (seeing as Yakuza 5 exists and Tokyo is not in shambles), you could totally believe that it is because of the way it just fits into everything that already exists in the series.  One of the moments that made me actually stop in something approaching shock was when I approached the upper right portion of the map, where Kamurocho Hills had been in development for the last two iterations of the series and suddenly, finally it was there.  It's like going to your old neighborhood and seeing things that are familiar, yet also seeing how time has changed it, the blending of nostalgia and awe of new things.

Something that Yakuza Studios said about Dead Souls was that, if the game were to get localized, they would 'like' to change up the gameplay some to more mirror Binary Domain's controls, the second third-person shooter they released that is much, -much- more like a third-person shooter.  After playing both games, I can safely say that that, unfortunately, did not happen even in the slightest, and Dead Souls really flounders in that respect.  It's not bad, it's just kind of clunky which is not at all what I would ever suggest is an attribute of a Yakuza game.  So, it's bad in comparison to its pedigree, I should say.  Yet, on the whole, it's a wonderfully realized game with the same things you love about a Yakuza game (aside from the combat system), which means it's a quality product indeed.  That might seem to clash with some of the things I said, but realize that I have a far more vested interest in the series than most, so I'm going to be a little over-critical of it.  And, considering it still made it as high on my list as it did, despite my grumblings, that should be a message in itself.

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.

My Games of 2012, Part 2

Tonight's group of games is where things started to get a little dicey and where the surprises really started.  If there's any section of my list where I imagine the games could be shuffled about and still be representative of my overall opinion, this could probably be it since I like all these games....in a sense, but at the very least, I liked them all -more- than the previous group, if only just a little in the case of a couple of them.  Again, that's all that really matters for this kind of list in the end, but still, I do feel a little wonky with the places some of these have ended up.  Oh well, it's not like I won't make it painfully obvious which of those are the ones.  Still, enough stalling, let's just get to the numbers and get this one knocked out.

15.  Retro City Rampage

I'll admit, when I played Retro City Rampage the first time, I spent hours just enjoying the hell out of it and loving it for what it was, or rather, what it was trying to be.  I told myself, told you folks that it was just too awesome for words, because I simply couldn't find the appropriate ones.  Admittedly in the months since I played it, my opinion has simmered quite a bit, thanks in no small part to the absolute awful final boss/section and the rather tedious and annoying task of mopping up the last collectibles in the game that, in all honesty, are really hard to find.  Not to mention a certain trophy that has all sorts of hidden flags that are -not- what it says on the tin, turning a rather simple matter into something entirely different, much harder to accomplish, which borders on "Why should I even bother?" territory.  Ultimately, that sort of thing just gets in the way of my fun, detours it and unfortunately just takes the rest of the game down with it.

Not that it isn't a really wonderful little game, if only for the nine billion references to gaming and pop culture, classic and modern, that have been packed into it.  It's just that, yes, the fun does eventually run out when there's nothing else to do because, ultimately, the city that Retro City Rampage takes place in is built on references.  Once you've seen them, they become less "Oh wow, that's awesome" and just blend into the scenery, which leaves it to be simply a place that you navigate on the way to your next objective.  Hence, when there's -not- a next objective..there's little reason for you to make one for yourself.  To its credit, it's very much like classic games in that sense, which, I mean, the game was definitely going for a classic game feel.  You can only conquer those worlds once and then do it again and again if you wish, but there's no incentive to remain once you've planted your flag, so to speak.

14.  Ragnarok Odyssey

I admit, when I first saw Ragnarok Odyssey, I wasn't expressly seeing it for what it was, and was instead looking at it like it was something else that I wanted.  What I -want- is another Phantasy Star Portable experience, but Sega has been a little too busy with the doing jack shit in America thing to comply.  At first glance, RO seemed like it would fill that need quite capably - after all, it's about entering zones, taking down mobs and getting loot, what's the difference, right?  Well, unfortunately the difference is there in a way that I can't quantify and while I ended up liking Ragnarok Odyssey for what it was, it just wasn't what I wanted in the end.  It doesn't help that the difficulty turns from an uphill climb to a sheer cliff-face in the latter chapters which is what ultimately put me off the game, but really, there was just a little more to it than that.

Part of RO's charm, and yet part of its short-comings is the way it handles your character and the specific customization of it.  You can buy new outfits, you can change the hair style and this and that after the fact and eventually, you can even change jobs.  You don't -have- to start a new character to find out what a Cleric is like - just switch to the Cleric Job and go do a couple missions, bam, Cleric experience garnered.  If anything, though, that more or less highlights the fact that you -don't- really have that much to say in exactly what your character can be, because your character is flexible enough to be anything decently.  It all boils down to your playstyle in a sense, which is admirable, but again that just sort of negates the replayability and such of the game since if you don't like being a Mage, there's no -reason- to because you will not get better at it.  

It's nothing like other games where you spend hours playing one style because it's what your character needs, then switching to another character so you can see what it's like on the other side of things.  That individuality might seem unimportant, but ultimately it's one of the factors that brought me down on the game.  Of course, that only brought me down after playing into it for eight or so chapters, spending hours on extraneous missions and just straight-up going back to older bosses and murdering the shit out of them only to prove that I could.  Which is to say there's some definite fun to be had with the game - I had it - and it's well worth a look if you're into the type of thing it's offering.  Still, I'm hoping for something more and I'll openly applaud the first damn company that gives me the Phantasy Star Portable experience because I friggin' need it.

13.  Persona 4 Arena

I am not a fighting game person, despite my love for punching dudes in video games.  The allure is that, in most cases, you are exponentially more badass than the dude whom you are punching and that gap in skill allows you to skillfully display that.  Which is fun.  And every now and then, you get that opponent that is -as- badass as you and it's a challenge, but at the same time, it's fun because you're getting to put your badassery to the test.  It's a welcome change in pace every now and then.  Nothing to be repeated over and over, however.  To me, that's what fighting games are - going against an equal with the goal of punching them a whole bunch.  In these occasions, I find my skills lacking more often than not and I don't really find it all that fun to 'train' within the confines of fighting games to then get better at it when I could just pop in Yakuza and suplex a guy across a steel divider and just enjoy that.

Still, I allow myself the occasional dalliance outside of my comfort zone here and there if the draw is right and fresh off my Persona 4 Golden playthrough, I was admittedly looking towards Persona 4 Arena, if only because I am told it is at least somewhat canon and, well, I really dug P4's canon.  Then the stars aligned and the price dropped to $20 the day before I was going to head into GameStop and they just happened to have a copy.  It was providence, pure and simple, so who am I to argue?  Perhaps thankfully, I went in with the same expectations as any fighting game and as such, I wasn't disappointed with my brief dips into it here and there.  It is definitely interesting from all sides, and it is also definitely entertaining, even if it is a fighting game to the core.  Perhaps because it has the lovely Arc System Works people behind it who excel at making wonderful looking fighting games, which this is no slouch at either.

I haven't played P4A a whole lot, but I've played it enough to appreciate it for what it is, I believe and I will certainly be dipping back into it sooner rather than later.  I like it, I honestly do, but I would like it a whole lot more if I knew just what in the blue hell I was doing.  I played through all 67 or however many tutorials there were (which, admittedly were single things like a single tutorial about crouching, a single tutorial about blocking, etc.) and all that information just went in one ear and out the other.  When I am put down in a match with a (computer) enemy (hahaha, noooooo, no online for me, no thanks) I just do things and eventually I win, but it's not skillfully, it's not with mastery of the system, it's just because I hit a lot of buttons that did a lot of stuff.  I hope to figure it out as I play, but I guess if that'll carry me through everyone's story modes, I'll take it.

12.  LittleBigPlanet Karting

Much like fighting games, I just don't do racing games a whole lot, but I did have to make an exception for LittleBigPlanet Karting for the simple fact that it's friggin' LittleBigPlanet Karting.  My opinion of it hasn't changed much since I last talked about it, but that is to say I haven't really played it much since the last time I talked about it.  I've been thinking about it, but I just haven't yet gotten behind the cardboard steering wheel once more, namely because I've been scrambling to put my playtime into other games so that I could judge them as well.  I still say that, for as weird and out-of-sorts as the mash-up of LittleBigPlanet and a Kart Racer is, it's also a perfect fit in a sense because, well, that is the strength of LittleBigPlanet.  It's meant to be anything and everything you could want it to be, which is why the other iterations of the series have been so popular, or at least so striking with a certain group of people.

In the end, however, I think LittleBigPlanet Karting is a good enough idea to be good, but probably not a good enough idea to substantiate an entire game.  I've only been to two different planets in the story, but if previous games are any indicator, there will only be about five or six in total, so I've seen quite a bit already.  If, perhaps, Karting was simply a level choice for a grander, larger LittleBigPlanet game, that would have been the best course of action, though I understand the scope for that is quite large, almost absurdly so.  So what we're left with is a good idea that goes on a little too long, even if it does take every opportunity to give you ideas that it's not just a racing game.  In all reality, it's -not- just a racing game, but it is, of course, -mostly- one, which does not differentiate itself enough.  Still, it's charming and it's fun enough and I should say I'm better at driving games than fighting games, so I'm not quite as hard pressed to find my own enjoyment with them.  Not much, though.

11.  Assassin's Creed 3:  Liberation

You would think that, after just reviewing it recently, I would be sick of talking about AssLib by now.  You would also be right in that.  It hasn't even been a full week since I posted that up and I've even been playing it -still-, trying to mop up the miscellany because the Platinum trophy is behind a wall of tedium, not one of impossibility, so I want to get it and be done with it, that I might return to the world of Persona 4 or some other Vita game, just so I am not playing Assassin's Creed 3:  Liberation anymore.  So, if you will allow me to be so lazy, allow me to take an except from the review to leave you with here:

Assassin's Creed 3:  Liberation is not a perfect game, much like no Assassin's Creed game is a perfect game by any stretch of the imagination.  The upside is that Liberation is just as flawed as the previous titles, not more, which means if you enjoyed them, you will probably have quite a bit of fun with this.  The story itself is fairly short and not terribly involved with the rest of the overarching story, but in many ways, that's probably a good thing all told.  The draw here is pretty simple - more Assassin's Creed, but wherever you could want to play it at, and that's a very good thing since it does work much the same as the previous titles.  If you're looking for something Action-y to throw into your Vita for a while, AssLib is a fine choice that likely won't leave you feeling disappointed.

So there's that.  Nothing but the Top 10 left and already you've seen some games that might've just been heavy hitters for my list, or might've been considered so, given how much I've talked (or haven't talked) about them.  Still, if you've been keeping up with Kupowered, you'll probably be able to figure out which games are still yet to be revealed, and I'm sure you can understand that it was goddamn hard to actually rank the games that are remaining.  So yes, it's all uphill from here and it's going to be rough going to actually explain my reasoning for why some of the games are where they are.  That is a problem for another night, however, likely tomorrow night.  For tonight, I just have some music and some writing (elsewhere) on my mind.

My Games of 2012, Part 1

I have been putting this off and putting it off more than usual and that's mostly because I've been given the leisure to do so.  It is Game of the Year time, or at least, it -was-, but given that I use the voting over at a few forums, namely the Penny Arcade ones which didn't start until this week (Last Sunday, I believe), to make my list, I've just been stewing on it til tonight.  Tonight, I sat down, I opened a spreadsheet and input the games I'd played last year (well, 20 of them.  I played 21 friggin' new games last year) and began the arduous task of ordering them.  Ranking them from 20-1, wracking my brain the entire time over whether I wanted this game over that one or that game under this one.  Twenty Games is a -lot- of goddamn games, so it makes a hard decision that much more difficult, but I managed to come up with a list that I'm satisfied with even though it was damn rough putting it together.

2012 was a friggin' big year in gaming, because even as I perused the list of games to add to my own, I must've ticked off three or four games at least that I -could- own, that I -could- have played, that I sort of -wanted- to own and play, but there was just no damn time for it.  This last week and a half, I played over five of the games that ended up making my list and that's not because I was -waiting- to play them or anything, simply that it was opportune to do so.  I could swing playing them now and be able to give them a fair shake.  Granted, I did stray here and there last year playing games that I -couldn't- vote for (namely Final Fantasy XIII and Demon's Souls) but there were reasons for those (for the former, so I could appropriately judge FFXIII-2, and the latter because it's goddamn Demon's Souls) and most of these games that I played just recently weren't in my possession prior to December anyway.  Still, I'm stalling now, so I'm going to jump right in this.  As I have twenty games in my list, it's going to require quite a few posts, but I don't want to straggle them out too much.  This first post will have my bottom five, and perhaps tomorrow I'll cover a good portion of the next bit of it over a single post or maybe two.  Just to get them out there and get this done and dusted.

20.  Final Fantasy XIII-2

You're probably thinking, "Woah, hey Mogs, you hated Final Fantasy XIII-2!  Why is it on your Games of the Year list?"  And that is an entirely valid wonder to have.  Because I kind of wondered myself on whether or not it would even show up.  The only thing I had below it was MotorStorm RC (Because fuck that game, stupid goddamn drifting and grumble, grumble) and it would have been a simple matter to leave them -both- off my list, to only have 19 games to cover.  That probably would've been the wisest course to take, really, but there is something important to Final Fantasy XIII-2, much as I am begrudging to admit it.  Final Fantasy XIII-2 was Squeenix's attempt, a real honest attempt, to do all sorts of different things, to go wild after the wildly constrained Final Fantasy XIII, and to improve it.  That they failed miserably, utterly and completely is its own condemnation, but I do have to hand it to them for at least -trying- instead of directly going to the next numbered Final Fantasy game that A) won't be out for like two or three years at -best- and B) will be all sorts of different itself, possibly in good ways, possibly in bad ways, but not very likely to have a lot in common with XIII.

Final Fantasy XIII was a good game mired in bad decisions and Final Fantasy XIII-2 was a bad game dragging down good ideas.  They're victims of their own extreme natures, but that there was -something- good about XIII-2 is enough to qualify it for my list, even if it is the very bottom spot.  There is also a very small (read:  like huge) chance that the voice-work of Liam O'Brien and Laura Bailey in the same game did wonders for its playability when the actual game itself did not.  While it may a bit silly that I would hold either of those in that high regard, in some ways, there is something to be said for production values and the things associated with that, as even the most fun game could be dragged down by less-than-quality voice-overs for the simple fact that you do still have to listen to those at some point, much as you have to play a mini-game at some point (for, let's face it, like most games) or have to really take a look at some of the texture quality at some point.  It's all just to get a general opinion of a game and that is the name of the game here.

19.  Resistance:  Burning Skies

The fact that I played Resistance:  Burning Skies, got the Platinum trophy in it and reviewed it, yet I don't really remember a whole lot about it is probably a good indicator of why it went so low on my list.  At the end of the day, Burning Skies just wasn't a very memorable game one way or another.  It was decent in quality, neither good nor bad and I think that that's almost worse than being bad since it just leaves it to get forgotten as you move on to other games that actually invoke something in you, whether it is positive or negative.  It's only because I actually liked the game a little bit for not being bad that it topped FFXIII-2, for instance and otherwise it was just a game that existed, that I bought and played and then moved on from.    Really, for as much as I like Resistance as a series, that's quite an unfortunate turn of events, but is not, in itself a condemnation of the game.

Burning Skies' only success, really was showing the world that First-Person games can be competently made and played on the Vita.  Because of the way it controlled, with just a little more polish Burning Skies could have been a good game, one that you would speak of when not specifically asked about it, but doing that seemed a little bit out of Nihilistic Studios' abilities.  It's very unfortunate that they then went on to be given the reigns to the Call of Duty game that was similarly tepidly received even though I'm assured that it controlled nicely as well.  Still, people know that the ability is there, we just need somebody that will capitalize on it.  Since Nihilistic is (thankfully) out of the way, having moved on to becoming a Mobile game studio, that leaves them out of the running to make anymore FPS games for anyone else that offers a quick buck.  Regardless, Burning Skies was definitely not a need-to-play title, but I urge you, if you have the opportunity (perhaps if it is free for Playstation Plus), try it out and see that FPS games work on it, because Burning Skies will tell you that, even if it won't tell you much else.

18.  Tales from Space:  Mutant Blobs Attack!!!

Speaking of things free on Playstation Plus, for a little while there, Tales from Space:  Mutant Blobs Attack!!! was one such title offered and I snapped it up, somewhat eager to see what the little title had to offer.  I knew nothing about it other than it was a rather charming little platformer with a touch of puzzle elements and, well, that is pretty much what I got.  Those impressions pretty much put everything on the tin and there's nothing at all wrong about that.  It does make it a bit hard to say much else about the game since...well, there's not a whole lot of depth to it, really.  Even the story, such as it is, is barely interspersed between chapters with no real dialogue, relying on some basic images to convey a basic story of the blob landing on the planet, getting bigger terrorizing everything and so on.

It's simplistic and that's most of its charm really - you navigate levels, eating whatever you can to make yourself bigger so that you can advance, and then you get to the end.  The next level has you eating more things so you can get even bigger and so on.  You start out as something that one might find on their desk and, in short order, are large enough to consider houses something to hop off of like stepping stones, chowing on cows for a snack and pulling in Helicopters for a good meal.  The presentation doesn't necessarily do the scale justice, but it's done well enough that, if you think about it for a moment, it really sinks in.  As it gets more and more complicated, however, as platformers and puzzlers tend to do, it becomes less and less fun, for me anyway, and for that reason, I didn't even bother finishing the second to last and last areas, since I just got overwhelmed with the puzzle elements and just found the levels to be a chore.  Still, it was fun while it lasted, as they say.

17.  Dynasty Warriors Next

If you're even a casual reader of Kupowered, you probably know that I was a man who enjoyed a good Warriors title.  I say 'was', however, since KOEI, in their infinite wisdom, decided it was a good idea to stop making disk-based games solely for the PS3 and solely for the NA region.  Yes, yes, there's that whole story about "Sony won't let us because blah blah blah", but it's a bunch of horseshit and I'll not hear anyone tell different.  As such, Dynasty Warriors Next is probably the last Warriors game I'll be able to enjoy unless they release any new titles for the Vita since their download sizes will probably not be the 11 gig monstrosities that One Piece:  Pirate Warriors, Warriors Orochi 3 and such have been.  Next was not quite the best send-off for the series, either.

While it aspired to be Handheld Dynasty Warriors 7 in a way, it ultimately didn't live up to that specifically because the replayability is mired in a randomized, barebones attempt at an Empires game that doesn't even accomplish a good shake at that.  Still, it -played- mostly like DW7 and that is a very, very good thing.  Beyond that, it kept my interest for a long, long time, though not anywhere near the 78+ hours that would have been required for at least one of the trophies, which would put me that much closer to the Platinum for it, a task which I have fully acknowledged will never happen.  Because I just am not about that.  I don't have that kind of time.  Clearly.  All in all, however, I liked Next even if my opinion of KOEI and all things Warriors has changed dramatically since.

16.  Sound Shapes

I had a lot of fun with Sound Shapes, and in my opinion it was a pretty neat little game, even if 'little' ended up being quite the descriptor.  I'm not sure what gave me the impression, but I expected there to be full albums (which, admittedly would be three songs/stages) as DLC to accompany the post-release of the game and it was only a year later when the game got -anything-.  It was not Album DLC either, but simply new tools to use for music in the creation tool which, while welcome, did nothing to extend the actual -game- itself.  In all reality, that was Sound Shapes' biggest fault in that it just was entirely too short, especially for the build the game had going behind it.  The online community reflected that in dying off fairly shortly, or perhaps that's just me being bitter because the level I created only got 4 plays and none of them were from anyone that reads this, I don't think.  I even showed if off here, though that's only the visual side to it, not the audio, which I thought was pretty good!

Still, Sound Shapes was a fantastic little thing for what it was, and that's really what counts.  The levels were fun and varied, the music was wonderful to listen to, and the package was fully there, even if it was a bit too easy outside of the challenge levels.  If there had just been a little more to it - maybe a couple more albums, it would've rated much higher in public opinion, I think and it would've kept interest for a lot longer than it did.  It's another case of "great while it lasted" and if only it had lasted a bit longer.  If only.  I could say it again and again, but the fact of the matter was that it just wasn't and still isn't.  Maybe the community's put together something fantastic in the meantime, but I'm not sure and I probably won't be finding out since the 1 gig and change of space that Sound Shapes needs is being used up by something else that I'm actually playing.

So that was the bottom five games of my list.  That...that was pretty much the easy part.  It was everything after this where things pretty much got harder and harder to pick as it went along, and I ended up surprising myself quite a few times when faced with all the options I had.  It wasn't like some years where I had x, y and z games that were -my- games, where the rest, I just enjoyed in some form.  No, there were quite a few games that were -my- games, and it was hard putting them in order, though I think I did so in a satisfactory manner.  Hopefully by the end of all this, I'll feel the same way, because man, I'm sure I can regret it and I fear that I might because of how close it was.  Still, that's something we'll have to see about!

Sorcery is the Latest "Gotta Play 2012 Games" Title for My Rush

In a show of unadulturated luck, the Game of the Year polls have not opened just yet and probably won't before Sunday night which means I have so much time, you guys.  So much time.  Like three days to play a fair bit of a few of the games I've got to get a good approximation of them for my list when I get around to doing that.  Which probably won't be Sunday which means I theoretically have more time, but shush, details.  I finished Assassin's Creed 3:  Liberation earlier, by which I mean I beat it and am now in the arduous task of completing all its goals so that I may expel it from my Vita and never speak of it again.  Which is not to say I didn't like it, I am just thoroughly annoyed with it, much like every other goddamn Assassin's Creed title I play and you would think I would have learned by now, but you would be wrong on that front.

Regardless, this is not an Assassin's Creed post, but a very, very different post indeed.  This is a post about Sorcery which you may or may not remember as the title that got you interested in the Move, if anything would.  (Beyond cursory uses like FPS games)  It takes a very simplistic, yet effective approach to the Move wand, turning it in your hands into a magic wand in the hands of a young sorcerer who gets caught up in a quest well and truly beyond his scope and consideration.  Paired with the Navigation Controller (which you really -should- have if you want to play this, but the other, far more common usage of FPS controller will benefit as well) you have near perfect control over the main character, Finn's (no, not -that- Finn) actions as he struggles to get through the challenges he's unknowingly thrust himself into.

It sounds fine in concept and in execution, it....works surprisingly well, actually.  I expected a little fun kind of 'distraction' game, but in all reality, it's a fairly well-realized game in its own right which might be a hard pill to swallow for folks who aren't that into the  whole Motion Gaming thing.  Admittedly, my own exposure prior to this is limited since I never really played a lot of Wii stuff, but you will be using motion a -lot- if you chose to play and that's not really a bad thing.  At the start of the game, you're given the first spell you'll utilize for the most of it, a simple Arcane Bolt which you cast by flicking your Move controller in the direction you're firing the bolt - you know, like you're actually shooting for it.  It's a novel concept, I'm sure.  Where and how you flick matters too - flicking high and flicking low throw your bolts in different ways, obviously, and a sort of curved flick will send an arch bolt - useful for throwing around a corner should that be necessary.  It's fairly simple to explain and it works well as you're playing, but you're going to give your arm a real workout in doing so.

The other method of casting spells is actually touched on when you pick up your third one, a Frost Shot spell.  The basics work like your Arcane Bolt, except the bolt is ice and can freeze your foes in place, allowing you to switch to the bolt to get a few unhindered shots at them (which, for most of the fodder foes is more than enough, really).  However, one of the things that was touted in Sorcery was environmental stuff and that's where this comes into play.  Drawing a quick, sideways line in front of you with the wand will trigger the other capability of the frost spell which is to send out a chill wave - enemies close enough will be frozen but, more importantly, you can freeze waterways with this, allowing you a method of passage where you might otherwise not have.  (Because Finn suffers from classic "what, why do you want to swim in a video game" syndrome, unfortunately)  It's a really cool effect and makes its usefulness known in short order.

Also made out as a fairly big thing in the early showings were potions, both in the making and taking of them and that is still quite the case here.  Potions come in two 'flavors' if you will (oh god, don't hurt me), temporary effect and permanent effect.  The game doesn't expressly inform you of this in quite the most direct fashion, but once you understand where the divide is, it becomes obvious.  The first, the temporary effect starts out as basically just Health potions, but I assume there will be others in that there will be others of its kind later on in the game.  The Permanent Effect potions are a little more interesting as they require you to 'research' their ingredient combination before you can actually brew one.  Ultimately, this just means throwing three things in a menu and then seeing what they would make if you combined them.  Grave Dust, Bloodberries and Brimstone make something highly different than Rotworm Ichor, Troll Sweat and Starlight Essence, after all. 

Upon researching a potion, if you have an empty bottle (which can only be used once and is thus sort of an indicator of a 'level up' as it were) you can then brew it, provided you have the ingredients to do so.  This will prompt a little....not a mini-game, but a section in which you actually 'assemble' the potion, shaking, pouring or grinding whatever the ingredients are into a cauldron and then stirring it until you have a potion.  Then you shake the Move wand until it's primed and turn it upside down to drink.  It sounds silly, hell it looks kind of silly, but it's honestly really kind of charming, and I really enjoy that, as tiny of a thing as it is.  For what it's worth, you prime health potions before you drink them as well, adding the barest extra amount of thought you'll have to expend, seeing as you'll have to shake it up and then 'drink' it before it'll actually start working and those are seconds you just might not have.  Another nice little touch with this is that, for the Health Potions at least, the ball on the end of the Move wand will light up faintly to start and get brighter red as you shake it until it's done.  (It takes all of a second or two, but it's, again a really nice little touch)  Superfluous?  Certainly.  Neat regardless?  Absolutely.

Sorcery is honestly a pretty fun game so far, which might be a little surprising, but it certainly -did- look nice when it was being shown off, so it's not completely out of left field.  Just....mostly since those kinds of showings generally incorporate the 'best' of a thing in them.  Unless you're showing off the Kinect because that just gets horrible fast, apparently.  I sort of thought to myself that if it had been released for the Wii (with Motion Plus support) we would still be hearing the Nintendo diehards crowing about it, since it is a really good example of a Motion Game done right, but the Move is certainly not going to get it the attention it deserves unfortunately.  As is, it's probably just going to be one of those charming, nice games that sit around, unrecognized for the most part except for random schmucks around the internet like myself.  Perhaps once I've played a little more of the game, I'll be a little less enamored with it (or perhaps more, of course), but from where I sit now, Sorcery seems like an actual good game that uses the Move and if that's not saying something to you, then I just don't know what would.

New Years Stats Time!

Do you like numbers?  Well, if you do (Like I do) you're going to love this post!  This year, much like last year, I'm going to share some specific numbers about Kupowered, if just because I -can-.  I certainly don't know if anyone's interested, but I think it's fun to do and it's my blog after all, so I'll do it if I like.  And I do.  So I do it.  It's been a trying year to say the least, so actually sitting down and looking at these numbers will be something that I'm doing for the first time as I write this, which I think makes it partly more fun for me since this is all new to me.  I get to look at the numbers and then figure out a way with which to express them in a way that isn't just A, B, C.  Or at least a little -more- entertaining a version of A, B, C like the last years post was.

The first glaring number that stands out is 2012's post count total - 307.  A full year's posts would have been 365 and my post count last year was 349, a whole 42 posts more.  Still going by the "Every other day" rule of 183 posts (which I fell on a lot this year), I'm still up by 124 posts which, hey, I think is pretty respectable.  It's not 165 like last yeah, but the fact that I actually have two years to compare to one another is a miracle unto itself, I should say.  This is the part where I start wishing I could break down views by year but that's simply not offered in Blogger's overview (or if it is, I'm struggling to find it), so I'll just have to update the All-Time views which will account for, you know....All-Time.  Last year and the year before.  (I'm just realizing that it is technically 2013 so Whoops)  Still, that'll be neat because it'll still give me numbers to compare it to since I guess I just filter out the differences and that'll be the year not accounted for.  You know, with math.

Coming in at the top of the All Time posts is once again "Really Tired", which if you missed me explaining it last year, was simply me being silly and doing a silly post about dragons.  Silly posts are fun, but I don't intend to do them all the time even though that one ended up being rather popular because of a particular picture used in it.  Its post count currently sits at 5,071, up from 4,069 from last year's review meaning it's only been viewed 1,002 times last year.  Only.  "Guilty Pleasures - Yakuza 4's Hostess Maker" is still second with 739 views, up from 290 last year, meaning it's been viewed 449 times in 2012 - not bad at all.  Third place is where 2012 shone, though, with "Zone of the Enders 3 is a Thing in Development" coming in at 590 views for 2012 alone, simply because it was -in- 2012 only.  I believe I can safely say that means it was the highest viewed post of 2012.  Second to receive that honor was "Kupowered's 501st Post" which came in at 248 views for some reason!  Overall, that post came in 7th, however, behind "inFamous 2 - My Thoughts on the Story and Endings (Spoilers)" at 547 views, "What Went Wrong - Innocent Life: A Futuristic Harvest Moon" at 414 views and "The Regular Show is Pretty Great" at 399 views.  Because 400 views would just be too easy.

Trying to use the Page View Graph this year is just as unfeasible as last year, perhaps even more so, so unfortunately, I won't be doing a month-by-month thing since, well, I have no idea when those are properly updated.  Trying to navigate the graph takes me from January 2011 to February 2012 which....isn't correct, so, yeah, it's a bit silly.  Raw numbers will suffice.  My "Pageviews Last Month" figure comes up as 2,457 views, which I suppose might be for the full month of December, or like half of November and half of December or something.  I bring that up solely because that figure is higher than any single month presented in last years figures (the highest being 2,297 views) which means it's about in line with things so I'm keeping steady.  Or, rather, perhaps 'last month' was a low month because my All-Time Pageview History number now sits at 46,580, a full 29,751 views more than last year and, in fact 12,922 views more than last years All Time History of 16,829.  This is where I wish I knew how to do percents so I could figure what percentage growth that is, but looking at the numbers just says "a lot" which is pretty cool nonetheless.

Clicking on the Audience tab brings up something rather surprising in the sense that things have sort of shifted via countries that view Kupowered.  Like, dramatically.  America is still at the top with a whopping 19,799 views (up from 7,987 last year or an increase of 11,812 views), but Russia came out of friggin' nowhere at second place with 5,589 views (up from 485 last year for a 5,104 view increase) which...should I be worried about that?  I don't know.  The United Kingdom pulls up third with 2,210 views (up from 892 last year for a 1,318 view increase) and it's not until we get to fourth place that Canada finally shows up at 2,155 views (up from 1,123 views for a 1,032 increase).  If you're interested in the rest, the full list is as follows:  (Country - Pageviews - Increase):  America - 19,799 - 11,812, Russia - 5,589 - 5,104, United Kingdom - 2,210 - 1,318, Canada - 2,155 - 1,032, Austalia - 1,576 - 695, Germany - 875 - 411, Indonesia - 775 - 636, Brazil - 606 - 470, Ukraine - 436 - 302, and France - 430 - N/A.  All this only adds up to 34,451 Views, so the rest of the  12,129 views is smattered across other nations in smaller numbers.  Firefox again is the most used browser at 19,171 (or 42%) of views, with Chrome and Internet explorer switching places this year at 11,398 (25%) and 9,162 (20%) respectively.  Windows is still the most widespread OS to be used to view at 34,413 (75%) where Linux has bumped up a little, coming in at 6,296 (13%).  Mac at 2,133 (4%) is the only other number to brag about with Android and iPhone representing 1% each with 872 and 634 respectively and the remaining five of iPad, iPod, PSP, PS3 and BlackBerry are all <1% with 350, 260, 179, 178 and 168 in order.

I haven't really made many new 'types' of posts since last year with the notable exception being, appropriately, "Gaming By The Numbers" of which I only have two posts for - Dynasty Warriors Next and Trails in the Sky.  These posts are basically just ones in which I take a game and turn it into full-on Number Porn somehow, either talking about the hours of time needed to do something specific, or just how easy it is to do something, taking into account the most 'profitable' means with which to do it.  Or you know, whatever.  It's number porn so it's about numbers in whatever form I can take them in.  Somewhat like -this- post and the last year's review, I should say.  Most everything else has been either a stand-alone thing, or part of a 'type' I established the first year, which is just fine, I think.  I don't need to make a whole bunch of different things for my posts to fit into and I probably established the most that I'll need in the first year, though there's always the future to tell.

Compared to 2011's three reviews, I did a surprising nine in 2012, which is still a really small number, but considering the amount of work that goes into every review, it's not something that I can do all the time unfortunately.  Those reviews are, in order of post date:  Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood, Alpha Protocol, Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky, Resistance: Burning Skies, Kenka Bancho: Badass Rumble, Sound Shapes, Gravity Rush, Assassin's Creed: Revelations and  Final Fantasy XIII.  Obviously, I linked them in case you wanted to check them out again (or for the first time, if you've missed them) and if not then at least it's nice to keep these things together for something in the future.  That number would have been ten, but alas, I still haven't finished the likely vitriolic review for Final Fantasy XIII-2 which is unfortunate, but that's just how these things go sometimes.  Still rather impressive for me, I think.

I imagined if I tried, I could pick up a few of some posts that I really liked this year (since I can't play Favorites), but really, I'm pretty happy with them all.  If anything, I remember the Gaming by the Numbers posts more than the rest for the simple fact that they were number porn posts and those are ultimately really fun to write.  While it's still recent, I do also still remember the two posts I made for a concept I dubbed a 'MoveShock' which is a theoretical controller that would combine a DualShock with two Move wands, offering a 'best of both worlds' scenario where one could expect to use both methods of input simultaneously instead of giving up one for the other.  I've rarely been as excited at a prospect as I was with that, and while I doubt it's going to happen, it's still nice to dream.  Because honestly, it's a pretty cool concept if it would work in the scenarios I put forth.

And that's about it for 2012.  It was apparently a year of highs and lows, but while I didn't like the year, it was still a rather productive one, all-told.  Hopefully 2013 will be a better year, both in me keeping up with posts and just....you know, being a better year.  It's got a chance as it is now, but it's only two days old so, well, a little early to be wondering, I suppose.  If you've read this and enjoyed it, then I thank you and I hope you'll stick around for the posts as they come this year.  I mean, again, number porn so your mileage may vary, but I certainly had fun with it!  Here's to 2013 kicking 2012's ass in all the relevant facets!