Toukiden Demo Impressions

Toukiden is pretty much Monster Hunter.

That's the brunt of it, really.  It's not surprising - all the media beforehand suggested as much - but it also manages to not be disappointing through some magic of tweaking the basics of the Monster Hunter gameplay mechanics.  Still, the skeleton, most of the muscle and indeed, some flesh that resembles Monster Hunter is present, even though it's got a convincing costume of something else on top of it.

That costume is good, however - Toukiden's aesthetic is fairly interesting despite carrying a lot of the browns one would expect from a Demon War-torn country, as that simply makes the more striking bits shine all the more.  The cutscenes are standard KOEI fare as well, which means they're incredibly nice to watch and easy to enjoy with how deceptively good they look.  And really, just the game itself looks pretty good from the character designs and outfits, to the weapon designs and the Oni themselves.  Even the canned faces and such that you get through Create-a-Warrior (which is your only way to have a character, rather than my initial thought of having a cast of characters to select from like most Warriors games) are fairly good-looking, though I use that from an aesthetic point of view, and not one from personal tastes.  More to do with the model, the look than my appreciation of them.

I suppose I should clarify that I'm no Monster Hunter expert - far from it - as my only real experience was playing the demo for one of the PSP games for three non-consecutive hours and not 'getting it', and then watching a friend stream hours of Monster Hunter 3 footage while also similarly not understanding it.  So I appreciate that there might be a difference in 'feel' and an overall difference in the experience because of that.  However, I also know what I see, and what I see in Toukiden is something that is very, very close to the same -thing- that Monster Hunter is.  The maps are the same segmented affairs in which there are monsters (and I assume they can eventually move between them).  Missions are handed out in the same way, with even the same weights of Important -> Not Important (but you need to do some to unlock the next) -> Important -> Chapter Close.  There's still a little town that you can meet up with others in, you can still gamble with getting buffs before missions, you can still upgrade and create weapons and armor and while that all seems generic, it all has the same approach to it that the comparisons between both games are inevitable.

The weapons are different, at least in most cases, and they offer a suitable amount of variety for the combat to keep you switching up at the very start until one just clicks.  I myself really really wanted to enjoy the Gauntlets as I love punching people, but they're the strongest base weapons in the game which means they have to have a disadvantage.  Of course, that disadvantage (quite bogglingly so, really) is that they're the slowest weapons in the game as well.  So then I went to the other extreme with the Twin Knives which I believe (though I'm not sure) are the fastest, but weakest base weapons of the group, and I'm enjoying that much more.  I find that I quite like really fast combat as opposed to slow, but strong.  I imagine maybe the Katana and the Sickle/Chain will offer that as well, but I haven't really tried them out.  There's a lot of ground to cover in the demo yet, which is a good thing as it really lets you sink your teeth into what the game will have to offer.

All in all, the game seems competent enough, perhaps even -good-, though that remains to be seen as I am giving this my maximum amount of skepticism because KOEI and Monster Hunter are both involved.  I've yet to see whether or not the 'purification' mechanic is a game-changer - essentially holding R next to a fallen foe or severed boss part to rid it from the world and sometimes give you an item - but I can't really imagine it being so which is really why I didn't bring it up in any big capacity.  I pre-ordered it, as I'm wont to do with just about everything that has the KOEI name on it, and I'm pretty sure I'll enjoy it, but how much is what remains to be seen.  I'm hoping for "a lot" personally.

why would you fight with giant weights on your hands, that just seems silly

Well, I Like It

So I bought Terraria on Vita and wanted to mess around with it for a few minutes and then suddenly it was two hours later.
— Mogs (@DarthMogs) December 18, 2013

I'm not sure I can make a more ringing endorsement of the game than that, really.

I've watched my fair share of Terraria content in the past, so I knew the basics, but it is a wholly different experience actually being able to do it all yourself.  Obviously, task number one was creating a structure all my own after hewing the land to suit my whims.  I think we all like to think that, given the opportunity, we're going to create something magnificent right off the bat and I certainly thought this as well.

I did not.

I made the box you see above.  I made a three-tiered basement and enclosed it in stone walls.  I then set out to explore.  It's oddly liberating and strange that I would do that when all I -wanted- was a building game.  But I have to get blocks to do that, or at least that's the excuse I'm using while I'm cutting down slimes and seeking out the corruption of my lands to stem their creep with a sunflower.

I'm definitely satisfied.

words failed me, should've sent a poet, etc.

Oh, My, New Little King's Story is Delightful

I have to be careful with this one here because it seems that I have not been good with first impressions lately, both with the whole Touch My Katamari thing the other week and....some other things in my personal life that are -very- frustrating and the entire reason why I actually didn't get a post out last night.  Or rather, why I typed up a short post and, still in a blind fury, hit "Save" instead of "Publish" and closed the window so I could go be angry until I wanted to relax, which is when I turned to New Little King's Story.  You'll notice that the post is still not up, which is...mostly because it was me embedding a youtube video of a Halestorm song and typing a few angry sentences about how I wasn't able to do a proper post.  So you didn't really miss anything but the song which you are not missing now.  But that all is a terrible tangent and I've gone completely off-point.

Ahem.

Anyways, I bought New Little King's Story because it was going for a paltry $9.79 thanks to the wonderful Japanese Games Sale that I talked about a couple weeks ago.  Unfortunately I didn't play it until the sale was over (as it was just a couple days ago that I started playing it.) so I couldn't recommend it before it went back to retail price and it's -seeming- like that might be a bad thing.  I'm absolutely enchanted with the game from the start of it, so it's obviously endeared itself to me, surprising myself, to the point where I might be tempted to recommend it to others.  Except I'm wary to do so, mostly because of the issues mentioned above.  Especially with the price back up to $20 in North America, it's something I want to be a little certain on before I shout that you need New Little King's Story in your life if I do indeed end up doing just that.  I'll have to probably....like, beat the game first before I can decide if I'm going to do that or not and I'm not even -close- to that point.

What New Little King's Story -is- is something that I can't quite put a finger on, mechanics-wise.  It's like a really odd blend of what I can only assume Pikmin is like (having never played it) as well as the sort of easy-job system that probably has a better example than Fat Princess, but that's all I can come up with.  Basically the jobs, like in Fat Princess, are designated by hats, and you get the hats from buildings.  In NLKS' case, you send the members of your Royal Guard (basically people that you make follow you around) running into a building that gives (or sells in some cases) the hat you want them to wear and they walk out with that job.  There's a little more of a level of permanency to it than you might expect in that, while you can switch their jobs, and there doesn't seem to be a reason -not- to do so if you aren't so inclined, they will stay in that job from day-to-day.  So when you finish up for the night (game has a Day/Night cycle) and get up the next day, when you walk around town to pick your Guard again, those who were Grunts yesterday, Farmers, etc. will all still be in that job, mingling with the townsfolk until you recruit them again.

The story starts with you more or less building a domain from which to rule and that's a pretty decent start-up as any I've heard really.  Neighboring areas have monsters that don't trouble you unless you step out into the wilderness and even then they're start-of-the-game monsters so you won't be too fussed.  Though it introduces a system where a Miniboss controls the monsters of the area and when it's defeated, you gain control of the land.  So clearly, that's the idea to start out with so you can build more buildings and expand your kingdom for more subjects who will be more recruits with more jobs.  Etc. etc.  What this also means is that you should generally give a good bit of thought into your Royal Guard because there's certain things that you -don't- want to do, and the list includes: walking across a long, long distance with a group of grunts only to find out you need a carpenter to build a stairway, and walking directly into the den of a miniboss with a Hunter, Two Farmers and Two Carpenters.  Both can be very frustrating situations, let me tell you.

I haven't really even gotten into the meat of the game, though I suspect the meat is what my next objective is, so I'm -close-.  But even then, it's the first of many bits that comprise the meat, so it's going to be a fairly lengthy game, I'm guessing.  That's good.  I'm hoping that by the time I'm finished with NLKS, I'll think of it as the right length instead of wishing it'd been more or, even worse, thinking there was entirely too much there.  But I don't know -how- the game will get to a point where it will be too much of what I consider a good thing, nor do I know how this good thing can wear out its welcome.  So, overall, I'm just being quite positive about it.  It's going to be a nice ride in the meanwhile, figuring out the further nuances with the game and the jobs that it'll continue to offer.  And I'm sure this isn't going to be the last post that I make on the game, so there's that to look forward to as well.

I was lucky in that one miniboss encounter, however, since it just sat there and let my Hunter murder the shit out of it

Initial Dragon's Crown Impressions

Here I have a flame tosser, yes it is as awesome as you think.

As is usually such when I get a game, I don't generally get to play that game until sometimes the following day or at least until after I've attempted a blog post for the night because I at least try to be responsible, damn it.  So my impressions are generally a little bit late as I like to sink at least a little bit of my teeth into it properly because coming away with something approaching an opinion.  Since I have, at times, had a positive reaction initially that festered into something quite negative or in the best cases, the exact opposite of that reaction where I plug at a game until it becomes something special and amazing.  I know how easily it is to be pushed into a purchase because of positive impressions around and about, so I don't like throwing out my hat until I'm pretty positive on it.

With only about half an hour of playtime in Dragon's Crown I am pretty much bucking that trend because I don't care.  Dragon's Crown makes a very nice first impression with the art, with the voicing and presentation, and eventually the gameplay which I am obviously still a novice in, yet it doesn't -feel- as much.  Throwing down with the Wizard feels natural and I'm not sure if that's just because I dig him or because of some other crazy reason, but I'm not about to complain.  I've heard tale of people stating that he's kind of weak against the bosses and I can -understand- that, but, well, I didn't have that problem.  I don't say that to brag or anything, I'm obviously not a pro-gamer or anything, but I've found that it's all about the Teleporting.  The Wizard can teleport about the distance of an enemy (even a boss character) so....you know, use that.  Teleport behind them and Up+Square that bastard for a nice clip of damage.

It's curious that all the characters are geared toward different "Tiers" of players - Fighter is for 'everyone', Dwarf and Amazon are for 'Normal' players and the Sorceress, Elf and Wizard are all listed as being for  "Expert" players - since these types of games try to at least put up the façade of all the characters being balanced so that nobody plays favorites for such reasons.  Though I suppose maybe it's not an indication of who's 'better' like that, but rather just who is simpler to play which doesn't necessarily mean better returns and such.  Actually, yeah, it is probably just that and I'm just being silly.  Again, having just played this a little bit, it's not something that I have fully settled in on yet.  Still, I can see why the Wizard falls into the "Expert" category since he does have some advanced things to keep him viable - mainly the teleporting thing and the fact that you have to recharge his mana after using the nice big dangerous spells that are his bread-and-butter.  I imagine the difference between him and, say, the Fighter is that the Fighter can just charge up and hit things with his sword until they stop breathing, so, yeah, I can see the difficulty shift there.

I'm pretty confident that Dragon's Crown is going to be something that's going to keep my attention despite the ease that I put it down with.  In my defense, I did that because, again I'm trying to be responsible, and because I'm too distracted by all the other goings-on of being on the computer (talking to people, or at least trying to, checking message boards, reading things, etc.) to really sit down and enjoy what the game has to offer.  Tomorrow, that's when I'll be able to delve into it and likely throw hours upon hours at, so that's the game plan for it.  Though...I -do- have my Vita right here playing some music through the Music Unlimited app, and after I finish this....hrm.  It is tantalizing.  That is a good sign, friends.  That is a damn good sign.

seriously though, teleport is something you want to do a lot of, it's so good

I Finally Get Muramasa Rebirth

I picked up the Muramasa Rebirth Collector's Edition last week when it released and it wasn't until some point earlier this week that I actually gave it a little play, mostly because good lord, I have so many games and Animal Crossing:  New Leaf requires about an hour a day at least and I want all of the bells to have the best house as well as, you know, things around town.  Like a Cafe'.  Though I have been tired a lot lately and it has, of course, impacted my ability to enjoy things so when I looked at Muramasa's LiveArea screen, I told myself, "I am too tired, I'm not going to like it because of that and it's going to make me all negative about it" but I tried it anyway.  And I was correct - I was simply too tired and grumpy to actually enjoy the game, given that I haven't actually played it before and knew absolutely nothing of it in the broad sense.  A couple save points in, I saved, quit and switched to something else - I forget what.

Despite that, I've steadily been putting time into the game more and more, tiny clips at a time, and it began growing on me.  I had hoped it would because I really wanted to like Muramasa Rebirth, even if I doubted I would love it with a fervor that someone else has.  It looked like something that would scratch all the right itches from the combat to the art and to the animations, and I can say with certainty that it does not disappoint.  That is definitely a relief, though it was only through my tiredness that I suspected otherwise and to be fair, when I'm tired/grumpy, I might find something like REVENGEANCE annoying, which is....well, it's saying something since you all know I love me some REVENGEANCE.

The thing that threw me off initially was the difficulty of the game, or rather the lack thereof.  Granted, I was starting from the beginning and using the "easy" difficulty so I could get used to it, but I expected....something to be able to hit me or cause me some form of issue or problem.  Yet every battle ended with "Flawless Victory" bonuses among others and I quickly began to wonder at that.  It wasn't until later that I realized that that is, indeed, the point in making it feasible to end every battle without getting hit because the most difficult setting of the game requires that.  It sounds daunting at first, and indeed likely is, but knowing that makes the combat feel better to me as a base.  Of course, getting more and more used to the combat system after that point or perhaps because of it helped the transition as well.  As did getting some rather sweet weapons and learning to eschew long swords even though I want to get my Kojiro on.

Played correctly, the moment the "!" goes off-screen, Momohime turns into an ineffable whirlwind of steel and destruction for approximately 5-15 seconds before everything that stood as a challenge is slain and the comforting "Shink!" of a blade being sheathed is heard.  It's wonderful in so many different ways that I simply cannot find a way to properly describe.  Yet, that's not the true beauty of the combat system for me.  The true beauty sets in when you find yourself in a boss fight, where the goal is to be that same whirlwind of death, but with a time limit that is considerably longer, in a sense, and thus makes it all the more impressive in motion and feel.  Juggling a lone samurai on a beachside in such a way that he doesn't get to do much before half his life is gone?  Satisfying.  Utterly, utterly satisfying.  There's frankly not many other words or descriptors that I could use for it here.

Something I do find odd, however, and it's the only thing really, is that I don't care one lick about the story that is in the game itself, since that story is generally impeding my ability to cut things up which annoys me because I just want to get to the cutty parts because they are so good.  That is not....how I usually operate.  Perhaps it's because my first dip into the story was through a tired haze, but I read yet don't manage to retain the story as it comes up, simply looking forward to the next boss, the next sword upgrade, the next batch of swords I can technically forge.  A demon dude possessed a girl and is being followed by a jerk-ass monk while the demon looks for a sword that'll let him pick a better body is what I'm getting from my basic perusal of the story and that's.....well, a story.  It's a thing.  Somebody tell me why I don't just decapitate the monk while he just sort of stands there and taunts me?  Anyone?

I need alllllll of the swords

Hotline Miami Impressions

"Damnit......damnit......damnit!....Shit.....Guh!  This fuckin'......hurrgh...GODDAMN DOG!.....damnit.....yessss.....yesssss.  New stage time!"

The above is a basic approximation of my vocabulary whilst playing Hotline Miami, but with a lot fewer actual curse words (and a lot fewer words in general since a chapter here and there has had me stumped for a good half an hour or better already) while the game is doing its thing.  I put it this way because it's kind of hard to actually explain just how Hotline Miami works.  I can tell you how it plays, I can tell you what it makes you think, and I can compare it to this and that, but I'm having a hard time of putting on my finger on just what makes Hotline Miami [i]work[/i], because I assure you that it does.  I imagine that's one of the various things that ensures you come back to the game again and again, which ensures that you'll get your bang for your buck if you're worried about that.

I -want- to say the reason the game works is because of it's relative ease of use.  It implements an "easy to learn, difficult to master" approach to its gameplay, allowing you to get through a chapter with minimal effort (in a comparative sense) with a rating that reflects that.  It's the game's hope that you'll see that C- rating or whatever it is and tell yourself "I can do better than that", leading you to replay a level again and again, searching for that ever-elusive A+ rank.  Throwing this weapon at just the right moment to let you get two wall executions via forehead stomp, switching from a shotgun to an assault rifle to a pipe for a succession of foes, knowing when to burst into a room guns blazing are all practices that the game wills you to understand will help improve your rating and make it easier to do in the long-run.  Not to mention, when such tactics work correctly, it does instill a rather strange sort of satisfaction given the real, hard mortality that your character possesses in line with everyone you're shooting/stabbing/etc.

I also want to say the reason the game works is because of the unique blend of its bright, vivid retro graphics with a soundtrack that matches the era and mood the game attempts to create perfectly.  Though, perhaps retro itself isn't exactly the best word to use, but more of something like "Retro Progressive" or something, as it mimics a style that would have been the natural progression of retro graphics had we not skipped several leaps and bounds as we did.  The design, the look are reminiscent of 8 and 16-bit classics, but the fact basically remains that those 8 and 16-bit classics could not handle the amount of detail, the amount of colors or anything else that Hotline Miami manages.  It's a play on perceptions which I suppose is appropriate once you get into the meat of the game itself and the plot that it offers.  I do have to re-emphasize detail, however, as Hotline is absolutely ridiculous with it - on top of dozens of different corpse designs for your slain, you'll notice little things, the the bubbling of boiling water in a pot on a stove or, indeed, spent shell casings on the floor after you've fired a weapon.

To be honest, I even want to put some of the blame or praise, depending on how you see it, on just how unapologetic the game is about its violence.  Make no mistake - Hotline Miami doesn't pull a single punch.  It doesn't say "Violence is bad!" in the same timeframe that it allows you to climb onto a fallen enemy and slit his throat with a knife.  It doesn't outright paint you as a villain, nor the foes you leave in your bloody wake as villains.  It's violence with a side of violence rather than a side of morality lessons or preaching.  If anything, I think this approach is much, much more effective towards sending a non-violence message were the intent there, because it's..well, unrepentant.  I haven't finished the game yet, so I don't quite know the fate of our main character, but I could hazard a guess.  And it is not a pleasant one which is fitting because it doesn't have to be.  To enjoy Hotline Miami requires you to check your expectations at the door since, while playing it you simply won't know what to think in regards to all this and in some ways, that might just be the better idea.

The word that Chance used was "lurid", and that's about as apt a descriptor as anything ever could be.  Put simply, Hotline Miami is a game where you don an animal-themed mask, burst into a building bustling with violent people and murder them before they can kill you.  The way it accomplishes this is not for the faint of heart, though if you distract yourself from that long enough, remind yourself that it's just a game, you can find a massive amount of enjoyment and lose hours of your life in a flash because you just wanted to give this stage one more try, go for that A+ ranking or even just refine your technique.  For that, it's well-worth the hype that it has received and I'm certainly glad that it made its way to the PS3 and Vita platforms so I could give it a whirl.  The fact that it has a Platinum Trophy honestly might give me enough incentive to play it enough to achieve that feat, but I haven't quite decided just yet.  Regardless, it has definitely been an interesting game so far, and one that I want to delve into the deepest reaches of if only to see the conclusion of the story that is honestly more interesting than it has a right to be given how threadbare it can appear to be.

btw Tony the Tiger mask is best mask - punch all of the things to death

3DSXL Impressions

Through all of the E3 talks and excitement, I've had a sort of new companion with me every step of the way to compliment my Vita which is also with me every step of the way.  Especially last night with the storms that prevented me from being on the computer for fear of power outages (of which we had several).  My shiny new Animal Crossing 3DSXL which may or may not have something to do with my suspicious impulse purchases of Strawberry Pop-Tarts and Captain Crunch's Oops! All Berries cereal has been my first dip into the 3DS line at all and has indeed proved to me that I have been missing out on a whole world of things.  It's not an expansive world, so to speak, but it's a world all its own, which always merits exploration.

The one major thing that both the 3DS and Vita -want- to do is give you a major impetus to carrying it around as you move about in the outside world, or perhaps simply in your own space of home.  My Vita accomplishes this merely by being a thing that has games on it that I find that I cannot be detached from for long periods of time as well as being my sole musical device thanks to Music Unlimited, whereas the 3DS takes a slightly different route, something a little meta if you will.  Within the 3DS is a pedometer, which if you're somehow unaware is a device that tracks your steps as you carry it about (I think only while it's closed), and not only does the 3DS track this, but it rewards you in the form of currency known as "Play Coins".  On its face, it's rather interesting, of course, but there is a rather unfortunately long list of caveats to them.

First off, you can only get 10 a day, and you get one per hundred steps, so that's 1,000 steps in a day.  That's.....that's really nothing in the scheme of things.  Beyond that, you can only use them in select few things, like Swapnote, Find Mii and Puzzle Swap, all of which are basically pre-loaded into the system now.  Swapnote is an amusing little app that allows you to send notes to friends where you are free to use the touch screen to draw and write whatever you want which opens up a world of horrific potentiality that is, of course, limited by the scope of 'friends only'.  Find Mii and Puzzle Swap are both basically meta-games for your Mii (Which is appropriate, since they're in the Mii Plaza) where the former allows you to use Miis that you Street/SpotPass to try and traverse a dungeon that grants you treasure in the form of Mii Hats and the latter uses those Miis as delivery systems for pieces of a picture representing a Nintendo game in some fashion.  It's not really a puzzle in that you don't get to 'assemble' the picture which was rather disappointing for me personally.

However there is -one- game that uses it in a rather lovely way and that way is Animal Crossing:  New Leaf.  In Nookling's shop, you can purchase a Fortune Cookie for 2 Play Coins.  Upon eating the cookie, it gives you a lucky ticket that you can then exchange for a Nintendo-themed article of clothing or decoration.  Thus far, I've collected Mario's Kart from Mario Kart 7, the Goal Post from Super Mario Bros. and Link's boots from Legend of Zelda.  Be assured that I am wearing them everywhere.  What that basically means is that your little Animal Crossing Tyke is able to cosplay as your favorite Nintendo character while also being Mayor of an entire town.  It's...somehow appropriate.  And just plain enjoyable, as well, which is sure to surprise absolutely nobody.

Something that constantly confused me about the 3DS prior to my owning one was always whenever someone would bring up SpotPass and StreetPass.  All I knew was that they are content-delivery services of some nature that deliver unto you neat things at times.  Now owning a 3DS, I have to say....I am still mostly in the dark.  As stated, however, they are content-delivery services, but the way they work is a little different since they're entirely passive things.  You'll mostly become familiar with them because of Swapnote and the Mii Plaza games, however.  They are mostly location-specific things that do the same thing, really, where SpotPass gets you things in 'spots' where you have access to the internet, and StreetPass gets you things while you're out and about and pass other people with 3DS systems.  Using my previous examples, SpotPass is what lets me send and receive notes in Swapnote from my friends in other states, whereas the Miis I look forward to getting will be enlisted purely from being near people who also have a 3DS.  (There are exceptions, of course, in that there've been all sorts of special Nintendo Miis from E3 using SpotPass, but shh.)

Of course you really can't talk about the 3DS without talking about the 3D so, here it is:  Yeah, it kind of works.  I haven't hit the level where I just turn the slider all the way down, as half-way seems to produce the best "Still 3D, but I don't have to keep my head in the exact same spot" yield.  It's kind of jarring because some games look absolutely gorgeous on it, like the cutscenes from the Project X Zone demo, where other games just....it's not even a matter of not using the 3DS' power, but rather not really having an idea about the art style, really.  Or they're using something that worked on the DS and not putting a whole lot of extra effort into it.  Which, I admit is a little frustrating when I see something fluid and dynamic like Fire Emblem:  Awakening, but I'll just attribute it to unfamiliarity with the product since it doesn't seem like most of the cases are intentional to reign in the budget some.

All in all, it is a rather nifty little piece of technology with some games on it that will ensure I spend -quite- a bit of time with it.  (Harvest Moon, Animal Crossing and Fire Emblem is, apparently the tri-fecta of "you have no time for a year now")  It's not going to threaten my Vita for handheld dominance, of course, and I do find myself missing features that the Vita touts when I'm playing my 3DS.  Namely the screenshot one - while Animal Crossing has an in-game command for this, it's the only game I have that does.  I don't regret getting it, however, of course, and I'm glad that I did.  It was never that I wasn't going to get one, it was always simply a matter of when.  With Animal Crossing released and Rune Factory 4's release on the horizon whenever the wonderful Brittany Avery is done with the text for it, that time was now.  Or...the 9th.  When I got it.  And now we simply go to the future, ready for anything in the handheld space.  It's a good feeling.

Men's Room Mayhem is a Dollar, Kind of Worth It

Men's Room Mayhem came out just this week for a mere 97 cents (for Plus members, or at least, that's how much I paid according to my receipt) and I, being eternally irresponsible with money, decided it was worth it to give it a try on concept alone.  "This sound suspiciously like a cell phone game", I told myself.  "But then again, so is Jetpack Joyride and I rather enjoy that."  I was still a little wary, but the pricing and the fact that it is, in a sense, a simulation/management game made the choice all-too-clear.  As part of a completely irresponsible PSN shopping spree in which I picked up this, REVENGEANCE's DLC, Discounted Sleeping Dogs story DLC and Far Cry 3:  Blood Dragon, none of which I'm actually sure I can download, or at least feasibly so, I picked this game up.

The wariness....was somewhat warranted, though to what degree, I'm not quite certain.

As discerned, Men's Room Mayhem has a very 'Cell Phone' feel about it in that it's meant, literally, to take mere minutes of your free time when it is scarce, rather than ask for your time while it is plentiful as most other games.  Your play options are Normal and Blitz - the former is a more nuanced approach to understanding the game's mechanics, where the latter is putting those to the test to make the most of chaos - and that's roughly it.  There's no real depth to it, much like Jetpack Joyride, relying on repetition with random-generation to make a new game experience for each play, and that sort of gaming is an acquired taste, I should say.  The gameplay is basically waiting as people enter the restroom and directing them to the facility they require.  A yellow droplet means urinal where toilet paper means the proper toilet stall.  For extra points, keep a space between occupied urinals and make sure to direct everyone to the sinks before directing them out the door while making sure that no one person touches another at any point because it will cause a fight and six of those in a round (which happens surprisingly easily eventually) means game over.

Another way in which it alludes itself to Jetpack Joyride is with the 'medal' system, in which you have up to three tasks at a time to perform through your playthroughs of the levels.  Completing the challenges unlocks those medals for you, bringing you that much closer to the next rank, but they're only marked as complete when you finish (read:  lose) the level you're currently playing.  Mind, there's no way to 'win' Men's Room Mayhem, I don't believe, you simply play to see how far, how high you can get in its hierarchy before it catches up with you.  Where Men's Room Mayhem gets it wrong is that these challenges start off -far- too easy to complete, in that you'll complete them after a few waves....and the game doesn't get challenging (and barely even then) by wave six.  So you have a choice of either taking a dive to get more challenges (since Bronze to Silver takes -25-) or ride it out to see just how far you actually can get.  Which purely depends on what you're trying to get out of the game, really.

Unfortunately, what I want out of the game is its delicious trophies.  From what I can tell, they're not too terribly difficult to obtain, and if I get them, I can safely delete the game without looking back.  I have two levels unlocked, but I believe I have experienced what the game itself has to offer and I'm not particularly interested in it.  If I want a pick-up-and-go game in that vein, I still have Jetpack Joyride and Plants vs. Zombies, both of which offer a more stable experience as it ramps up.  Men's Room Mayhem has no concept of a difficulty curve in that it will slow-feed you one patron at a time and then in the very next wave, you'll have them entering one after another, making fights easy to break out while you're trying to instruct everyone to proper stalls for Etiquette bonuses and the rest of everyone to the sinks to wash their hands and then out the exit.  All of it becomes incredibly difficult in short order purely because the amount of characters that will simply be milling about the screen is ridiculous when you have to be mindful of the routes of everyone at once.

Still, it's a dollar and it's perhaps your cup of tea even if it's not mine.  There's something in it that makes me want to like it, which again might just be the silly concept, but I'm not sure.  It certainly can be strategic if you're a bit more focused on controlling the chaos it becomes, which is clearly the goal, but I can't bring myself to actually care as much as it wants me to.  It is trying something, however, and it's not a bad game by any means, simply a small one that reinforces the idea that you do, indeed, get what you pay for.  I'm not expecting hours upon hours of content from it, nor should I, but what I will get from it will be fun enough, and then we'll be through and that will be that.  And I will be able to say that I played a game where I directed people to take a wee that wasn't a Sims game.

do I need to put something here?  It's a game about pissing

Dragon Fantasy Book I is Pretty Neat

With the whole late PS Store Update snafu, it's pretty easy to sort of write off the whole thing with a dismissive hand-wave until next week, but this week offers two very compelling reasons -not- to do that:  Dragon Fantasy Book I and the Soul Sacrifice demo.  Obviously, tonight is for talking about the former (and not just because it was the only one I could download, coming in at a very nice 90 MB) because I purchased it literally right when it was available and managed to play a little bit of it before the toll of today's work forced me to partake in a little napping.  Which I must stress was entirely due to work and not at all indicative of Dragon Fantasy's quality as nothing short of extreme and lasting pain would have kept me awake this afternoon.

Dragon Fantasy Book I is very much a game that reminds me of Dragon Warrior and I'm sure that is intended.  It is also delightful for me especially as, like I mentioned sometime previously, I spent a good chunk of my childhood time with my NES playing Dragon Warrior when I wasn't playing Crystalis.  The actual style and build of the games are similar in more than a few ways, from the window placement to the battle screen that just comes up offering a perspective on the enemy (perhaps multiple enemies later on?, maybe not, I don't think Dragon Warrior did), to the overall look and feel of it.  It's very much an homage, which is nice, and offers that little bit of nostalgia on top of doing its own thing, putting its own spin on the same type of mechanics and style.

Though I already mentioned it in a previous post about Dragon Fantasy, I really should bring up the whole graphics overhaul thing now that I have actually experienced it.  Contrary to what I thought, the 'Classic' graphics and music are tied together where the Redone things are similarly bundled, but that's not a bad thing by any means.  The way you handle it is going into the settings (Setup?) and finding the "Enhanced Mode" toggle.  It's instantaneous, the switch, without requiring a reboot of the game or anything like that.  So, if you were so inclined, you could just stop anywhere and toggle it just to see what it looked like and what it looks like now, which gives you a real understanding of the work that went into it.  But there really isn't anyway to quantify what the change is without actually showing it off, so I'll go ahead and do that.

Classic/Original

Redone/Enhanced

That is literally the same area, same screen and everything since all I did was go into the menu, toggle it, take a screenshot, toggle it back and screenshot it again.  The only difference, of course, being that I waited long enough for the Status reminder window to pop up for the Enhanced version screenshot, but it's a little enough thing and the shots manage to show off everything well enough, I would say.  Some of the changes are subtle like Ogden (our main character for the first Chapter) and the town/village sprite, but they're definitely changed up and smoothed out to fit in with everything else that is most definitely a bit more dramatically different.  I'm playing it through on the Enhanced mode for now, only switching every now and then, but I might actually do a go in Original mode, depending on how long or short the game is and how much time that I have what with Soul Sacrifice hitting next week and the demo being out.  (Which I can hopefully download overnight)

I will say that I also called a definite integration of humor into the game based on the trailer that we got, however.  As you might be able to tell from the first screenshot I posted, the script has a definite level of snark and humor running through it that has been pretty refreshing and enjoyable so far.  They even managed to incorporate a Legend of Zelda reference (Literally the "It's dangerous to go alone!  Take this!") rather seamlessly into part of the opening bit of the first chapter.  On top of that, some of the monsters have a little humor injected into their own battles, such as whenever you fight a Mr. or Mrs. Rock Monster.  Their attack animations read in a way that suggests an interplay between the two, obviously, and is quite entertaining really.  Mrs. Rock Monster is played as the angry, nagging wife to Mr. Rock Monster who is either really unlucky, or is just really not happy in his relationship.  It's a little thing, but it's....honestly not something I've seen before, really, so it's worth a mention.

My time with Dragon Fantasy Book I has been brief, but I'm sure you can tell it's already left something of an impression on me, and I'm only more than happy to hop back into it.  It'll be a little rough juggling this and the Soul Sacrifice demo (and Disgaea 3 now that I've opened that door again because Dinah must become level 9999) but it'll be a worthy venture.  I'm curious to see how the multiple chapter/multiple character aspect of it plays out as well, since that's a throwback to another series of RPGs altogether.  If only there was more time in a day.

Okay, I Really Like Persona 4: The Golden

There's no real qualifiers here, nothing I feel I need to clear up lest I say something wholly positive, and nothing that I feel is muddled in that statement.  I just really like this game.  I can't quite place the why per se, but there is something that is undeniable about Persona 4 that has drawn, kept and cultivated my enthusiasm for the game in a way that Persona 3 just didn't manage to.  I had expected it would, but certainly not to the degree that it has, considering the version of Persona 3 that I played, (Persona 3 Portable) incorporated a lot of improvements from 4 into it.  I had thought that, on a functional level, it would be roughly the same or a similar game at least, and that it would really be up to the story and the characters to sell it to me, but there's entire oceans of depths between the two games in some respects.  That alone is fairly impressive, but it's really just the game itself that has taken me aback.

There's so many damn little touches here and there that improve the overall experience that I can't actually imagine the game, any game like this, without them.  Especially the features in The Golden, as I find myself using Voice and SOS a lot.  For the former, it's good to kind of know a general idea of what might be a good thing to do if I'm not really too up on doing the same thing again and again, or I don't want to 'waste' an afternoon by idly hanging out with someone so that I may hang out with them -again- to actually get a boost.  Whenever possible, I like to make use of the times when I can't gain a rank, but can get some points regardless because there is something in me that desires to maximize my time with the game, even though there is a very real possibility that I will play it again in NG+ the full way through instead of like with P3P where I start one and ragequit because goddamnit Elizabeth, fuck your stupid time-sensitive quests.

The dungeon crawling, which was my most hated part of Persona 3, is much the same in 4, but it manages to not be that bad yet.  I'm not quite sure if it's because the actual dungeons aren't that big themselves, or simply because the design of the levels are a little more interesting uniformly and aren't things that you'll see for forty goddamn floors at the start.  Probably with the later dungeons, but with the first two being 8 and 12 floors respectively, that's certainly quite a short bit of crawling.  Beyond that, the Card Shuffle bit sometimes offers Cup Cards which restore HP/SP and if you're using SOS like I am, you stand to keep your vitals up to an acceptable level without doing too much actual work to do that.  Not that it's easy, of course, as there are still enemies who will wreck your shit if you're unprepared (Goddamn Dice with their Last Resort attack) and the amounts of HP/SP you gain through the mentions methods are drops in a bucket, in all reality.  They help - they don't scratch the itch completely.  Eventually you're going to have to suck it up and down an item or just head off for the night.  But, well, it feels like to me that I get a little bit more accomplished per dungeon trip than you would think, and it never feels really overlong, so I suppose they did something right here.

Beyond that, the characters are actually really enjoyable.  I'm not sure if I prefer anyone on this cast to Junpei and Yukari from 3 (both of whom I have discovered I hold a lot of enthusiasm over only after thinking about 3 because of 4) just yet, but there's nobody I actively dislike aside from the obvious character who I don't even have to name because you know who he is and he is meant to be hated.  Also King Moron.  (You see the joke is that I was obviously referencing him and then suggested it wasn't actually him.  It's bear-ly a jo-goddamnit Teddie)  The scenes so far have all been entertaining in their own right and I haven't really had a "hurrrrgh, just shut up" moment or anything like that.  Really, I'm just kind of waiting on when I'm going to find something in the game that I just hate.  I feel like there -has- to be something, but so far, I'm honestly just turning up nothing.  That's.....that's uncommon to say the least.  But Persona 4:  The Golden is an uncommon game.  Uncommonly good game.

Early Persona 4: The Golden Impressions

I haven't played a lot of Persona 4:  The Golden, but that's mostly because the start of the game, moreso than Persona 3, I believe, is a lot of talking and cutscenes and making sure you go this way and that way.  The actual 'game' part, where you can go around and do whatever you want to do unrestrained, is something that I've finally gotten to a handful of hours in (admittedly some of it is idle time) and it's fresh and new, but familiar all the same.  Familiar even though I have not once played Persona 4 prior to The Golden, despite having bought Persona 4....like when it came out.  I believe back then I told myself I would only play it after I beat Persona 3 which I was going to play after I played something else, and well, you all know how that kind of thing goes.  It was only with Persona 3 Portable and my Vita that I was able to fell the JRPG beast that is Persona 3, and it's only fitting that I similarly tackle the new behemoth on the very same platform - especially with the enhancements The Golden has to offer.

Of course, having never -played- Persona 4, said enhancements are often fairly hard to spot and it's only with very careful counsel skimmed from the internet that I have a rough idea of what is new.  Aside from what is very blatantly new, of course, such as the SOS system.  It is blatantly new because, well, even though the PS2 had internet capabilities of a sort, I'm sure Persona 4 didn't make use of them.  I find myself wondering about the SOS system as well - it's neat in concept and theory and I'm willing to say execution as well, but there's still something off about it.  Basically what it is, if you haven't already experienced it or read up on it yourself, is whenever you're in a dungeon, you can hit the SOS button in the upper left corner of the screen.  Doing so sends a broadcast over the network that will, in turn, bring up help requests on the screens of other dungeon dwellers.  Those people can choose to tap the "Send aid" button (which is just there, doesn't pause the game or anything like that) and if they do that before you enter your next battle, you will receive a nominal HP/SP refill before it gets underway.  And I mean nominal like 10 HP, 8 SP total for a few people aiding you.  So don't -rely- on it for your HP and SP needs, but hope that it'll be a nice little bonus to help you out.

Similarly, the function that I believe is just referred to as "Voice" is an ability to get a little tip about where others who are playing the game have gone when faced with the same situation as yourself outside of a dungeon.  So, on April 21st, if you want to have an idea of some things you can do in the evening, you hit the voice button (where the SOS button is in a dungeon) and it'll bring up a mess of bubbles stating different actions.  Some people read a book, some people studied, and others just went straight to bed.  This is particularly helpful for someone who hasn't played the game before since, well, at times I've been informed of things I can do already in the limited experience I've put in the game.  "Oh, someone talked to Marie?  Yeah, I suppose I -can- do that, hadn't even thought of it."  "Someone studied?  Hrm....why?" and then I walked to the library, talked to the girl outside of it who informed me that studying on rainy days meant you could receive a higher bonus from increased concentration.  Seeing as I'd already read the "increase Knowledge gain from studying" book, that was a no-brainer (huuuurrrrr) and three Knowledge bonuses later, that little edging in a direction proved to be a good one.

Newness aside, The Golden feels familiar because it takes a lot from Persona 3 and refines it, not drastically changing a lot of it.  As Persona 3, you spend quite a bit of time -outside- of dungeons and what you do there matters almost as much as what you do in dungeons, if not matters equally so.  Social links are the name of the game, and you'll want to do whatever you can to build them up unless you're more interested in bettering yourself so you can, in turn, get -more- Social Links.  There's no wrong answer here - just whatever works for you since you'll inevitably have to do your heavy lifting on a New Game + unless you want to meticulously follow a guide to a T.  That's never much fun, so it's really not recommended of course.  I do see how experience with Persona 3 has affected my experience with 4 already, however as, even though a lot of 4's improvements saw their way into Persona 3 Portable, there's many more that didn't and I can appreciate those for what they are.  Beyond that, I'm familiar with how the game works, so I don't need to stress out over Social Links and such as I did with 3 - I can simply relax and enjoy the game as it comes.

At the moment, I'm simply interested in actually getting into the meat of the game as I'm still entirely too early on in it.  I've started unlocking some Social Links and exploring them and I have a renewed reason to dungeon crawl again after the initial on, but it's still all introductory.  The time where I find myself overwhelmed with choice still hasn't dawned and that's the point where I'm looking forward to it most, since it'll ensure that I don't have to worry about figuring out something to do, more that I'll simply have to decide what I need to do of everything available.  I want to find out what my protagonist (named Masamune Noboru btw, Last/First) is like after answering enough of the (sometimes silly, as you see above) social link responses and otherwise, and after enough of day-to-day activities.  Not to mention the learning of the finer points of the rest of the cast along the way since I'm assuming that's going to be 4's strength as it was one of 3's.  To that end, I think it's time to hop back into the Castle and slay some more shadows, as money for weapons and armor is not just appearing in my pockets any faster by not doing that.

So I've Been Playing Final Fantasy XIII

I haven't played long, but I can already start to understand the myriad of complaints that have been leveled at Final Fantasy XIII in the time after it's been released, but I'm not really prepared to add to them, at least not yet.  I can't say that I've actually had fun playing the game yet, but it's only been a few hours really, and in an RPG where you'll spend a good 40+ hours through it, that's negligible and not really indicative of the overall experience.  When you start it, you're just supposed to be learning the systems that will take you through the game, and it's after that point, when you have the tools, that you're meant to be able to make of them what you will and there's where the fun comes from.  In picking this and that, making these combinations as you see fit, and fine-tuning them as necessary.  That's when the real experience starts, for me at least, which is usually well past the intro.  Still though, in a series where you make kind of a big deal about the way it's intro'd, I'm not quite sure what I think of Final Fantasy XIII's intro myself.

I feel like Squeenix was doing what they -do- and trying to throw you into a scenario at the start where you're already in a situation and the only way to get any idea on what's going on is to get through it.  Make you look for your answers and wonder a little, that sort of thing, while also keeping you interested because there's a ton of shit going on.  In Final Fantasy VII, it was the whole infiltrating and blowing up the Mako reactor, in Final Fantasy VIII it was getting you tested for SeeD by sending you into a Mercenary Mission, and in Final Fantasy XII it was giving you a likeable character as he was set upon a mission....and then killed him off to give you Vaan.  We....don't talk about that anymore.  Regardless, XIII throws you right into the thick of things, but I sort of think that perhaps they threw us too into the thick because of the way the actual beginning sequence is orchestrated, which I think is more than a little off-putting for anyone who might not be initiated in Final Fantasy games or even RPGs as a whole.

You see, during the first couple of hours, the 'party' as it were has more or less just not met up and you end up spending a little bit of time with just about everyone individually or at least mostly individually as their own 'story' starts to get set up.  In theory, it's kind of brilliant and something that -should- happen, because it sets everyone up as a fleshed out character instead of "that guy who stabs stuff" or "that girl who is a healer" and you would expect that their story would only progress naturally as the game goes on.  In execution, however, it....sort of loses something in that there were about nine character swaps between the three or four 'parties' (counting some where one was left out separate since sometimes that meant controlling the -other- person) in the first two hours of the game as everyone raced towards the same conclusion for their own reasons.  I'm not sure -what- bothered me about it in particular, but it just didn't work and that's a shame.  Perhaps if the switches had been less jarring or if more information had been spread out during them instead of literally just moving some of them forward a bit instead of them just 'showing up' at an area, or if there'd just been less of them, it would've been better, but it just began to grate a little.

And so far, that's kind of been the mantra of the game as a whole, in that it's -trying- to do something right, but the way it does it just grates.  It's dangerously close to being something enjoyable, but falls short and it feels like any minute now, it'll break that barrier, yet I'm not sure if it will.  The rumblings of the '30 hour tutorial' (in that the first 30 hours are a tutorial, and not the 'real' game) have certainly instilled me with a fear, since I feel like I know from where that draws, but I haven't let pessimism take hold yet.  I do, however, find it a bit odd that when the battle system is supposed to be unique and great because it offers on-the-fly customization (ala Paradigm Shifts) I'm limited in its useage in the formative moments of the game, where it should be teaching these things.  You don't get to use it at -all- for the first few hours, and then once you're inducted into its trappings, you're not given the full thing.  You see, game, I know that at some point, I'll be able to do what the fuck ever I want with classes, but you won't -let me-.

Characters only start out able to use a few different classes and more unlock as the game progresses (Not everyone even starts with the same, meaning people have defined roles in a game with on-the-fly customization) and that breeds a battle system where I can only do so much with it in terms of using that customization.  Pre-made values are all that's available to me, with 'witty' titles to them like Slash & Burn (Commando/Ravager) and War & Peace (Ravager/Medic, I think) and that's governed by who is in my party which -seems- to change every five minutes.  I mean, this is the point where it kind of sucks being a guy who knows about games because I know what the fuck is going on, because it's that transparent that the game is just trying to make me use everyone in every scenario to get a feel for them, but I just want them to knock it off.  Let me try this out, take away the training wheels already.  I got this.

Despite all the negative things I say about Squeenix, I almost always genuinely hope they put out something good because what they do put out is...kind of uncontested anymore.  There's simply not a whole lot of RPGs out there, even ones that pretend to play at the old style as FFXIII does with its clinging to the ATB system in a sense, but there are some of us out there who do quite enjoy RPGs.  Just make a good game, and we'll buy it, anyone out there making games, don't worry about trying to 'keep up' with trends or anything, just don't include the trappings that classic games had that we have outgrown.  What those are, I couldn't tell you right now, but I assure you, there are some out there that are unnecessary anymore, that you can make a good, proper RPG without including them.  With any luck, I'll grow to enjoy the game, but I'm not really going to put any bets on that.  I just want to get through it to the fun that supposedly awaits me on the other end.

Silent Hill: Book of Memories Demo, You Say?

So, I have actually been waiting with something resembling morbid curiosity for the last few months as word of Silent Hill:  Book of Memories started to track out there and impressions started popping up, mostly from people who hadn't experienced the game in any fashion beyond looking at things for it.  My interest in it is basically that it is a game for the Vita, as I'm not much of a fan of roguelikes, and I've always experienced Silent Hill on the outside, shall we say.  In layman's terms, I mean that I am a giant chicken baby and have never played a Silent Hill game proper beyond enough time to play Silent Hill 1, get scared by the giant moth thing that very well may have simply been a giant moth at the very start of the game and presumably I shut off my PS2 (since, yeah, BC) and cried in the corner like a small child.  Also I played like half of Origins on PSP and just got bored with it.  So I am only a Silent Hill fan in the sense that most people are football fans - not once have they ever really picked up a football, nor have they really 'experienced' the game, nor the team sensibility, but they have something of a vested interest in it anyway.  (Yes, I just mentioned Silent Hill and Football in the same breath.  That just happened.)

Impressions have been a wide bag between people who are Silent Hill 'purists' shitting all over the game because it is clearly not a Silent Hill game, to people expressing interest because it's certainly not a combination you would -expect- to hear, to people just saying "Huh, I guess that looks pretty good" or similarly, "Huh, that doesn't look very good".  Basically what I'm saying is that there is no real consensus out there yet for how we are all 'meant' to feel about the game as it often happens so I'm free to really just say what I think without wondering if I'm bucking the trend, going with the flow or what have you.  Not that I -care- one way or another about that sort of thing, but it is something that does get brought up every now and again, so it is a thought that crosses my mind every now and then.  It's just a liberating sort of feeling being out there with a game that is still kind of up in the air so far as "it could work" goes since the real proof for this kind of thing is strictly in the playing of it.

I am all at once impressed, intrigued and confused by Silent Hill:  Book of Memories after playing around with the demo for a good half hour, I believe it was.  As a game, it's fairly accomplished - a roguelike dungeon crawler that presents you with a certain artistic direction and at least a semblance of a reason as to why you're actually crawling through said dungeon.  As something to do with Silent Hill, and again I am no means an expert here, it's....not so great.  It's one of those setups where the game is there and it feels like they just sort of attached a name to it instead of trying to establish it as a new IP.  I'm a dude in a place bashing the Hellhounds and Nurses to death with 2x4's and lead pipes, but it's less like Silent Hill 1/2's: Aaaaahhhh what the fuck is happening aaaaaaaaaaahhhhhh run away, kill it I dunno haaaaaaalp, and more like Silent Hill Homecoming/Origins':  Alright who's next?  The guy about to leap out from over there?  Okay, gonna smash ya.  It's all the paint with none of the aesthetic, is the point I think I'm trying to get across here, but I suppose that's not necessarily a bad thing.

That it's somewhat loosely attached to Silent Hill doesn't detract from the game itself, and it's kind of an interesting theory behind it from what little bit I've been exposed to with the demo.  At the start of it, we're introduced very.....very slightly to a main character, perhaps -the- main character, who has a book delivered to him on his birthday from Silent Hill which apparently sends up no red flags other than that he doesn't know anybody from Silent Hill.  The Postman just sort of chuckles and states "Oh, I don't know.  People get around these days...." before leaving.  Inside the book, our demo hero discovers that it chronicles his entire life to that point, his memories on every page of the book up to and including the meeting with the post man and the delivery of the book.  Being a stunning paragon of common sense, he decides to write something in this book of his memories because that never goes poorly, and then goes to sleep.  He 'awakes' in the Nightmare that is the Silent Hill dungeon layout of Book of Memories and the game sort of just goes from there.

Something that I believe is a first for the series as a whole is that it features a merchant who is, in fact our friendly post man who has a shop on possibly every floor of the dungeon that just requires a little finding.  The currency is memory remnants which is something that I'm not even going to bother trying to wrap my mind around and for an amount, he will sell you obvious things like weapons to carry, first-aid kits, upgrades to your backpack and the like and you can also bring him things to sell - basically what was mentioned already.  What's a little finnicky for me personally is the fact that the weapons in the game are finite - you can find a few in just about every other room, but that's because they have a durability meter indicated by what color the weapon is - green is good, red means it's going to break.  As such, I'm not quite sure where the compulsion is to buy a weapon from the Postman when it is going to break and money is not something that just everything drops like in your average dungeon-crawler.  Though I'm not about to get upset that I can grab some weapons scattered around the floor and make them into money for little to no reason.

What I -can- say about the game is that I'm pretty much going to keep playing the demo for a time - see if it actually saves progress like I think it does in the books scattered around the floors, or if I have to start anew each time.  Neither would hamper my interest so much as it's only a demo and I want to experience it a few times over before I'm fully equipped to deliver anything resembling a verdict on it.  Still, I think one of the main purposes of a demo is to present a game that you might be interested in playing and Wayforward has certainly crafted something here that I am interested in playing, albeit for free and as a demo.  Whether I will put money down for it is up in the air as, if I do, it will certainly be down the line a bit unless I catch a windfall, and my desire to do so will hinge on repeated playthroughs of the demo to get used to the roguelike thing all over again.  My main beef is the random dungeons since it rarely feels like there's anything 'crafted' to them - it's just interchangeable rooms and hallways randomly pieced together and I'm not really for that.  Still, like I said, I'm planning on playing BoM some more, and that's probably some high praise right there.

LittleBigThings: I Beat LPBV's Story

So, technically I beat the story to LittleBigPlanet Vita (I'm cutting the Playstation part of the title because it's extraneous) a couple nights ago, and since have just been going back into them and trying to Ace them, some with far greater success than others, but I think that added experience has done wonders for my ability to appraise it as a full product.  Not in a review sense, since I really don't think that'd be fair since, in all actuality, the real beef of LittleBigPlanet Vita is not -there- yet in a sense.  Which is not a slight at MediaMolecule or, in this case, Tarsier Studios, of course, because the things that they do are magical, but they are probably cheating a little.  You know that every single Community Level you play is drawing from the exact same set of tools that you yourself have available to you and I'm just not quite sure that the developers have those same tools or those same limitations, particularly on space.  And besides, I think I love LBP a bit too much to offer it a fair appraisal (though I said that about the Yakuza series and I think I did alright there) especially as I play more and more Community Levels (and make my own) because I'll just get too attached to things that aren't necessarily of the game itself.

Even now, trying to think of the actual story missions, just in its own, I'm also considering other things like Bound: Prologue, a capable enough little tech demo for something of an actual sword-n-spell combat system that people have only been asking for since the Paintinator, more or less, and Snatch which is a basic little Escape the Room type game that I happen to have something of a fondness for when they're not completely overwrought.  Also, I'm thinking of my own projects, one of which I've started some very basic preliminary work on, where the other is only a concept for now.  When either of them get a little more accomplished, I'll likely be doing up a Behind-the-Scenes type of post here to show off what I've got going and what I'm envisioning for the rest of the level.  Because it's going to be pretty cool, I assure you.  Or at least, I think it will be pretty cool.

But if anything, I think that helps illustrate my point that I was trying to make.  I could go on and on and on and on about LittleBigPlanet in any iteration without mentioning the story whatsoever, and that is simply because that half of LBP as a series is just so big that it could, in fact, be its own game.  I have a secret hope that, with LBP being a thriving series and LBP Karting coming up (as well as the existence of Modnation Racers) that we will see other genres embrace the LBP-style experience and let us get things out there.  Touching on something I went on about the other week, can you imagine if someone took, say, the RPG genre and did up something like LittleBigPlanet for it?  Having a game with it to show you some of the mechanics, and giving you an opportunity to earn the tools, then having an entire community creating and releasing things for others to enjoy.  Or, honestly just about any genre out there, I think anything could be molded in a way that it would work really.

Anyways, yes yes, I really should be getting on with actually talking about what is there in LittleBigPlanet Vita when you pop it into your Vita in some fashion.  I find it particularly funny that just after talking about it the other night, and mentioning that the touch controls had been used quite nicely that I run into a level that uses the rear touch pad in a manner that I am tempted to call abhorrent, but I won't go that far, because it's really not -that- bad, just disappointing since it makes me look like an ass.  As I do, I went ahead and took a screencap of the level I had in mind and provided it above, so that I can sort of explain what's going on.  Now, it's hard to tell specifically, but that is my Sackboy (Detective Penguin~) on something that is basically a lightning bug or something of that sort by way of controllinator.  So you see that screenshot and probably say "Hey, alright, twin-stick shooter type thing" and you are wrong.  And seeing me say that and now remembering that I just brought up the rear touch pad, I'm sure you're very confused.  As well you should be.

You see, your only method of input for that entire level (which is mercifully short) is, indeed, the rear touch pad.  You touch on a spot and your bug moves towards your finger and that is how you get from point A to point B.  Depending on how far your finger is makes it kind of faster, but that's not really a considering factor, really.  It's unwieldy and it's unnecessary and it's just not a very good idea.  I get that they were probably trying to do something to let you know that you can use the rear touch pad for more than just bumping out platforms, but I'm sure that anyone could have thought of something far better to use as a tool to do that with.  With the other touch controls, some of it is stuff that, well you -don't- need it to use it, like the panels you pull down to bounce your Sackboy up with, but it ends up feeling fairly natural anyway.  But there's really just no excusing using the rear touch pad as a navigation device when you have not one, but two control sticks on your device.

In all honesty, however, that's really the only stand-out situation where it is inherently just poorly used.  Other times, I could mention because it forces use at semi-hectic times, but it's not -bad-, and just takes a little skill, much like any other control method.  Control-wise, that's kind of how the game is; for the most part it's fantastic (same as usual) and for that one level and bits and pieces here it's less than stellar.  Similar is the story, which is more or less what you would expect - charming and light, though to its credit, every region has a genuine reason for you being there which could have been something that would get muddled up more than not.  I was fairly impressed with it, and it was pretty much what you would want.  Perhaps I'll get around to getting into that more eventually since the story isn't quite as spoiler-ruined as most, but there's not really much expansion to do without telling the whole of it, which I don't plan on doing tonight.  No, what I plan on doing is purely getting a little more acing done, and then sleep.

I Bought Harvest Moon: Hero of Leaf Valley Today

I still don't know why.  I mean, I know why - it's because it's $7.50 in the Playstation Store for Plus Members instead of $30 and goddamned if I don't like a value.  Of course, Harvest Moon:  Hero of Leaf Valley's value was, before I purchased it, highly suspect, as it seemed to be a port of Save The Homeland, which I didn't care for at all, what with the year time limit the game has in place.  While I'm not sure if it's a hard time limit or not, I'll likely never find out as I'm not planning on playing Save The Homeland again anytime soon, and Hero of Leaf Valley is much more loose with it than previously indicated, I suspect.  This is for many reasons, but the important bit is that, when presented with the same scenario with slightly different end-goals the game did something that I suspected it was not capable of doing, being what it is:  It drew me in and made me want to play it.

I am not absolutely certain, but it seems that the time limit in this game, as opposed to Save the Homeland is two years, rather than one, which is certainly a lot easier to swallow when informed of that upfront.  I'm not sure if that's going to be correct, or if there's some sort of subtext that I missed, but the CEO of the place that is coming in to bulldoze the entirety of Leaf Valley told me that I was to have 50,000 G before two years had passed, so I'm just -saying-.  Or, rather, she said "I guess if you have that much money before we come to tear this dump down in two years, I'll sell you the deed" or something that amounted to it but semantics.  So right off the bat, you have twice the time that you have in Save the Homeland, or at least the game presents as much to you.  There is still an end-point and that's still a thing I'm not comfortable with, but I handled it with the Rune Factory games, so I believe I can handle it here.

Beyond that, after checking a few things that point out the differences between Save the Homeland and Hero of Leaf Valley, one of the big differences is that you can get married in Hero of Leaf Valley which is such a goddamn Harvest Moon standard that any game that doesn't include it is pretty permanently on my 'nope' list for this fact.  It's only a big deal because it's a goal to strive for, a meta-goal even, in a game that is built on its own meta-goals because, in most cases, it doesn't have a 'goal' itself, which is the inherent strength of the Harvest Moon series.  Learning (perhaps re-learning) that Save the Homeland doesn't include the feature while Hero of Leaf Valley does, it only served to push the former further down my list (Below Innocent Life, even because let's face it, Innocent Life at least has a goddamn dune buggy) and the latter higher up in prospective places.  Since I barely played it at that point, you see.  In all reality, I've -still- barely played it, as I'm only on Spring 8th in my save file, but I'm sure you see the distinction.

Beyond the fact that it was $7.50, I think the other reason that I bought the game is that I always, always crave having another Harvest Moon game, and one that is at least somewhat 'new' as Hero of Leaf Valley is.  Despite a quick play of Save The Homeland years ago, the place is basically a clean slate as the inhabitants of Leaf Valley are not featured in any other Harvest Moon game to my knowledge.  At least, no other game that I've played.  There is a such thing as being over-familiar with characters, you see, so any game in the Harvest Moon line that offers me an opportunity to romance women who are not Ann, Popuri and the other caste from Mineral Town is a game that I will happily attempt, if nothing else.  Even though I believe Friends of Mineral Town to be one of the better Harvest Moon games out there.  If they could just take about 90% of that game and just fill it with new characters, that would probably be the next best thing, really.

Seeing as I expect my days to be filled with Sleeping Dogs when available, having Hero of Leaf Valley serves as quite a fine counter-point.  An indulgence after another indulgence if you will.  I get to enjoy the violence, the visceral nature of Sleeping Dogs and then step into something that is wholly counter to that, yet entertaining on its own merits.  While jarring, it's a nice jarring, something that I don't think a lot of people get to experience or, if they do, enjoy, which is a little bit of a shame really.  Both are equally valuable, however, which is what I want to embed, so people who don't enjoy a good slow down with Harvest Moon or similar games are missing out I say, but not in a way that is detracting from what they're enjoying regardless.  Which sounds a little muddled now that I wrote it out, but whatever, it's late and took me like three hours to type this up because I am tired.  Off to bed, folks.

Some Fairly Early Sleeping Dogs Impressions

People who follow my Twitter or at least give a little looksee to the Twitter widget on the side know that I had quite an adventure today in actually getting to the point where I can play Sleeping Dogs, which I haven't played prior to today, despite buying it on release day.  And by quite an adventure, I mean I popped the game in when it was an appropriate temperature in my room, what with still being in a goddamned heat wave, and expected to play the game.  I was incorrect in thinking this, as a 348 MB patch awaited me.  In the near two hour download of that (And people wonder why I insist on saying I hate the thought of a digital future) I busied myself with Twitter and catching up on some Treasures of Montezuma Blitz which I have sorely overlooked in favor of simply binging incessantly on Youtube videos since, despite my misgivings, the App appears to offer -most- of the videos I want to watch, it's just an issue of getting to all of them without the aid of descriptions or playlists or anything of the sort that is there to assist you in this process on PC.

Anyways, the point in pointing all of this out is that by the time I actually got to the point where I can play the game two hours later with the update and game installed when it was much hotter in my room than previously, forcing me to throw caution to the wind, I was not a happy fellow.  I was grumpy, indeed, and I had a very real fear of Sleeping Dogs not being able to remove this from me, so that I may enjoy the game.  I thought it would be the ultimate annoyance; here was this game that I had yearned for, pined for, been so excited for for as long as I have, and everything would conspire against me to ensure that my experience with the game would be an ultimately negative one.  Really, I just thought that, after everything, after how grumpy, annoyed and such I was by the point I made it to the point where I could play Sleeping Dogs, I wouldn't enjoy it.

I was very, very wrong, thankfully.

Sleeping Dogs' intro is not the greatest intro, but I say that because I had to wonder if this was possibly the greatest.  It is a very good intro, certainly, which is why I went to that extreme first, but I am confident that it's not the greatest simply because the intro does not wholly involve the greatest part of the game itself which is, clearly, the combat.  It is there after a chase scene and after laying the ground works for this genuinely being a crime drama story, but I consider that like the first chapter or so if this were a book, not the prologue.  It is highly enjoyable nonetheless and as it opens up more and more, the game leaves you more and more to be happy about, even though you understand completely that you're being fed things at a deliberate pace, at least, the instructions for tools that you already have and can use regardless of your story progress.  Your basic tools for melee, the attacking and countering, are given to you exactly when you need them, and to be honest, that's all you really -need- for the most part, though I look forward to seeing the intricacies the game ends up delving into.

Something that I learned before I was told was that every car, and it has to be a car as the motorcycles lack the pure bulk to do so, has the ability to ram other cars with a push of the square button and a direction, provided you're going at a distant speed and have not, in fact, -just- rammed someone already.  Without that knowledge, pushing square was simply an exercise in confusion as, suddenly, my vehicle went this way for reasons unbeknownst to me, for values that I didn't comprehend.  I tried to use it as a navigation assistant, a quick-shift to move -away- from obstacles and other cars with limited success - it seems I will simply have to get better at drifting, as the game enjoys putting you behind the wheel of a car, and I shudder to think of car chases where I cannot figure out how to move properly in them.  As a method to move -into- cars, with destructive intent, the ramming action works just as intended and is quite enjoyable for that; allowing you to make rather short work of anything that just so happens to be in your vicinity.

Another thing that I stumbled on just prior to being informed of, is the fact that some cars allow you to pull a tire iron from their trunk for whatever mayhem you could think of doing with a tire iron.  It proved quite useful in my adventures as you might imagine, but the funny part is how I was told about this little tidbit.  You see, the game has side missions in the form of 'Favors' that you do for seemingly random people (though the tasks themselves are not randomized, I'm sure) and one such man asked me to help him get back at a rather rude racer.  He tells me that in a race his opponent knocked him off track at the last moment simply to win, and he was not standing for that, so if I was gracious enough he told me that he would enjoy hearing that the man's car was found a little roughed up.  I rushed to the nearest parked car, grabbed a tire iron from the trunk and hopped in, driving to the designated spot where the game prompted me to get out, ready to take the business to this rather bright yellow vehicle.  The game then tasked me with retrieving the tire iron from the trunk of said race car.

The awkwardness of the scenario was palpable as I considered the turn of events, possibly more than the game itself had done.  Here I stood with the very instrument the game desired I acquire, albeit from a different vehicle, yet it seemed to insist that the one in the trunk of the target car was the one I wanted, perhaps a better one.  Or perhaps it was simply a matter of it being the tire iron that had been in the car itself.  Or, even more possible, I was simply making a deal out of something that didn't matter because the scenario was funny in my head.  Dutifully, I dropped the tire iron I had and moved to retrieve the other, this better one, so that I could begin my work.  And it was good.  Part-way through the owner of the car came by and we had a little fun.  Or rather, I had fun, as I doubt he was too pleased with getting his face slammed into the hood of his own vehicle.  Repeatedly.

I ended my journey in Sleeping Dogs today simply running around and enjoying the aspects of the open world as you are wont to do in open world games.  I partook in a little reckless driving, explored environmental attacks by breaking random women over the backs of benches in a rather grisly fashion, and tried, unsuccessfully, to acquire a handgun from the local police and retain it, simply to have a piece to walk around with.  As my time holding a firearm was short, I didn't explore the shooting mechanics, but in a sense I find that liberating.  I'm missions, plural, into the game and not once has it tasked me with firing a gun, even though the mechanic is there.  There had not even been a scenario where I could in all good faith -have- a gun, which is equally tantalizing.  All I really wanted from Sleeping Dogs was an Open World game that focused on melee, on having -good- melee, and I should say that it has done well enough on that front.  Delicious.

Yggdra Union Impressions

The second game I want to talk about in my big Atlus Splurge is Yggdra Union which was sold to me the minute it mentioned "Cards" in any fashion in the description.  It took me a bit to actually get to the part where I bought it and downloaded it, yes, but I'm sure you understand what I mean.  Unsurprisingly, if you take a look above, the game is another GBA conversion that I had absolutely no idea about prior to actually buying the game, but I think it shows it a little less than Riviera (which doesn't show it all that much itself) does, and if anything, it's more Gameplay that shows it as such than the actual style of the game or anything else.  Still, I should say the biggest thing about Yggdra Union is that I completely didn't know what I was getting myself into by playing it, and I still don't, really.  On top of that, I haven't quite decided if that's inherently a bad thing or not just yet.

As you might have also gleaned from the above screenshot, Yggdra Union is a strategy RPG, of which I could best equivocate it to Advance Wars.  Which is...fitting, given the original platform for the game, for both games, rather, and Advance Wars, I'm told, is a fun game in its own right.  I...don't really remember it too much myself.  GBA was quite a long time ago, you realize, and I didn't play a lot on mine beyond Pokemon and Harvest Moon which was completely not a damn-near prediction of my trend with Nintendo devices or anything.  No sirree.  I mean it's not like I've spent the most time with any game on my DS on Pokemon or Harvest Moo....Well it's not like I'm planning on buying a 3DS exclusively for Pokemon and Harvest Mo....hrm.  (Yes, I'm being facetious, but only because it's uncanny and I didn't realize it until just now.)  Regardless, the staples you might expect here, grid-based movement, combat that you don't necessarily directly control which is influenced by percentages and Weapon affinities, they're all present and drive the game in a way that I honestly don't mind so much.

Just to get this out of the way, the way cards come into play is pretty much the entirety of the game, despite part of them not taking place in at least the first four or five battles of the game.  (the skills.  I say this because I haven't gotten to use a one just yet)  Cards control how many movements your units can take in your turn (move pool is shared, so 12 move means one unit moves twelve spaces, two units move any combination of moves equalling 12, etc.) and how damaging your attack will be when and if you use one.  Notice I said attack, as in singular, because only one unit may attack per turn.  This does little beyond force strategic usage and pad the game length as, if you could attack once per unit, then rounds would last a lot less time.  And of course, it's not so easy as 'only one attack' as you can use the units placement on the map to extend that out for prolonged battles.  Without getting too deep into the specifics, if you have three units and place them just so before attacking, all three of them will launch an attack in succession against that unit unless its own units are in a similar formation, meaning Units just sort of pair off.  If it's 3-on-3, then each one has one attack, 3-on-2 then the first two match and the third one attacks the first unit again, and 3-on-1 obviously means that one unit is in three battles, which likely means poor things for that unit.

Battles are a thing, since you really don't get to influence a whole lot of what happens in it, much like Advance War (I believe), which once again perhaps points at the influence.  You have your unit numbers (Generally I've seen units of 8 for swordsmen and axe-users, but only 4 for Knights which use spears, though I'm sure there's plenty more variation) and every battle starts with a charge and retaliation.  Depending on the weapon affinities, that first hit could just decide a battle.  I've seen units get -halved- on that first strike if the weapon is strong against that type, which essentially means that unit is then proper screwed.  The basic affinity chain, by the way, is like Rock, Paper, Scissors.  Spear beats Sword, Sword beats Axe, Axe beats Spear, no don't ask me how, I have no idea.  Following the first strike and retaliation, the units just sort of stick on their side of the screen and swing their weapons until the complex background math decides that somebody has died.  The battle ends, obviously, when everybody in a unit has died and after that, Morale is deducted from their overall total.  When Morale hits 0, that unit disappears from the map.  Some units obviously take more than one loss to get removed, but the upside is that your cards attack power goes up with every victory, be it a Morale-duster or not.

So what can you do while the little people are flailing about with their weapons and doing things that only vaguely make anything resembling sense?  You can hold Left or Right, of course!  There is a Passive/Aggressive bar that allows you to make your unit fight more....well, Aggressively or Passively.  Fighting Passively restores the bar (which will eventually be used in conjunction with skills) where Aggressive stance drains the bar.  The options merely increase or decrease your attacks effectiveness which means effective use could win you victory in a battle you should technically lose or absolutely spank foes who you hold superiority over.  Aside from that, there's not a whole lot you can do in battle aside from let it play out, which means that the battle is more fought in the way you approach it, rather than the way it plays out.  It's a good sentiment, of course, but doesn't make for the most involved gameplay one could hope for.  Still, it is a bit rewarding to get those victories and those times when it just works out for you when, again, you -should- lose pretty much legitimize it.

From what I've played so far, it's a pretty interesting game.  I can't say that it's wonderful quite yet, but it does have another rather unique set-up that I could see eventually elevating it to something beyond what I've seen.  Especially when skills come into play, whenever that is, since that will of course add an entire new layer, not only for the player, but against them as well.  The story is nothing if standard at the moment but that's how they're supposed to start, anyway, so I'm not really too fussed about it just yet.  Much as with Riviera, I don't immediately regret the decision to buy it, nor do I suspect I will ultimately do so, but I am far more forgiving on games than most, so take my recommendation with a little bit of salt.  Take it more like "If you like these games, this is what it kind of has to offer, so make your decision on that" than me simply saying "This is great, buy it".  Because trust me, if I tell you something is great and you should buy it, you'll know it.  (Still waiting on Second Chapter, XSEED.  You have my money when you make it happen.)