posts by christian
christian

Review – Killer 7

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There was once a silly, fluffy intro here, until I realized it wasn’t necessary for Killer 7. No matter what pages of forum analyses may claim, this is a simple game, both gameplay wise and story wise. Yes it is weird as hell and artsy in structure. And no, I don’t claim to “get” everything about it, but if you ask me there are a lot of people out there that don’t understand what this game is all about. Here’s a hint; all you need to do is stop thinking so damn much.

First things first; Killer 7 is not an action game. It is not a rail shooter. And most importantly, it is not survival horror. I’ve heard all of these names applied, and none of them make sense. Why is it action? Because you shoot things? That can describe a lot of games. Why is it a rail shooter? Because the game makes you move on a railed path through each level? →  Rule of Read

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Chords and Kawaii: The State of the Music Genre – Part 2

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While the rest of the kids played DDR in gym, joey here was practicing chords and meeting groupies.

And now, I present The State of the Music Genre

1. Passing the Torch

Let’s take a quick look at what makes a game like Guitar Hero click. Rather than dancing on a pad, you imitate playing a guitar by pounding down on different buttons and keys on a plastic replica of a Gibson SG. There are chords, sustained notes, and a whammy bar for adding your own bit of personal flair. In order for the song to actually play, the player must correctly perform the notes, or else face failure. Particularly good play can net you Star Power, a technique that allows you to increase your score. As for future installments, it looks as if we will see music, more styles, and possibly even more instruments that will all be able to join together for a virtual jam session.

Now here’s the kicker; just about everything described above can be found in some form or another in a Japanese music game (I’m not sure if there’s an equivalent to Star Power, but I’m willing to bet that there is). →  When one person suffers from a delusion, it is called insanity. When many people suffer from a delusion it is called a game.

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Chords and Kawaii: The State of the Music Genre – Part 1

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I am going to describe two scenarios to you. For the first, imagine yourself walking along with me, as we enter my last DDR Rave I mentioned in yesterday’s introduction. We’re about to step into a college reading room, essentially a student lounge of sorts with comfy chairs and a large television. Normally the room is well lit and welcoming; you can go here to study and have some coffee.

How to make anything much lamer: add Mario.

Tonight, however, the space is pitch black. Before you even see it, you can here loud, pumping music of a strange sort. Techno? Maybe, but there’s something else to it. As you walk in, you look at the TV and are immediately hit with a barrage of lights, colors and a strange mix of …stuff. You aren’t sure what it is, other than being distinctly Japanese.

There’re a few cases of Mountain Dew on the near table, and a quite a few people sitting in couches by the screen, looking like pale and timid ghosts in the shadows, their faces only partially revealed by the glow of the TV. →  18 Wheeler American Pro Reader

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Chords and Kawaii: The State of the Music Genre – Introduction

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There was a point in my life, not that long ago, when I played Dance Dance Revolution. Of course, that could mean a lot of things. For all you know my DDR career could have been nothing more than me jumping onto a pad one night at an upperclassmen’s place after having a couple of beers and nothing to lose.

The truth is, that was only my first time playing. And you know what? It was quite a bit of fun. After that, and for about six months, not a week went by in which I didn’t get my dance on. But not with upperclassmen this time, but rather with hardcore DDR fans. They weren’t the best, but they ate up the entire series with gusto.

It has been six months since I stopped playing the game, having only once stepped on a pad in that time. I tried to make the most out of that one last play, but it was too late. →  U R Not lamE.

Review – Capcom Fighting Evolution

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It looks as if Capcom Fighting Evolution may be the last 2D fighter from Capcom that isn’t some sort of compilation. This is frustrating for two reasons. Firstly, something tells me they could revive the genre at least a little bit if they actually released a beautiful and balanced Street Fighter 4. Second, Fighting Evolution is not exactly the best way to end a legacy. The potential for this game is staggering, but the final product feels rushed and cheap.

The premise of CFE is simple; take a bunch of characters from different Capcom games and have them square off. The acute reader will no doubt point out that this sounds a lot like the premise behind Capcom’s plethora of “Versus” titles, though in fact they are somewhat different. The “Versus” games are mostly focused on representing the “best of the best” from the company, and then putting them into a streamlined combat engine. This is why the rosters are sometimes filled with non fighting game characters (ie Marvel vs Capcom 2’s Megaman fighters), or why the Street Fighter characters always seem to be based on their Alpha 3 versions. →  The King of Articles 2002: Unlimited Match

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What is a hardcore gamer?

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So E3 has come and gone. I missed out on most of the news and hoopla, in favor of catching up after the dust settled. I did, however, read more than a few articles that popped up in the month prior to E3, specifically those that dealt with the marketing aspect of the games industry. I’ve seen articles discussing mobile games, non-roleplaying MMO’s, and a mysterious new thing called “Serious games.”

Holy crap the Serious Games Summit looks like fun!

Most of this meant very little to me in the long run, but one debate that has been brought up as of late has piqued my interest: “Who is a hardcore gamer, how do and why should we cater to them?” This has to be one of the worst questions they could possibly ask, and even worse, they can’t even get the answer right.

The modern game industry has pinpointed the hardcore gamer with a very specific definition. For one, they are a group of people in which gaming is a very serious hobby, which I can certainly agree on. →  SaGa 3: Shadow or Write

Oblivion, breasts, the ESRB and you

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Another video game character with average proportions.

 

As I write this article, I am playing a few bouts of King of Fighters ’99. Oh how simple it was back then. Just a collection of sprites, no nude codes or hacking or anything profane, aside from the odd Mai animation.

These days things are a bit different. We have PC’s for modding, and a larger fanbase of gamers and developers who don’t know when to quit. In case you’re wondering, I am referring to the changing of Oblivion’s rating from Teen to Mature due to the discovery of topless female models (and also due to more violence and gore than previously thought, but I call BS on that). If you are to read all of the opinions and news posts about this, then all of the following are true:

– The “mod” uses data that Bethesda already put in the game. All one has to do is change a text file so that the character mesh is missing undergarments. →  All you need is read.

Review – Ninja Gaiden

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I wanted to like Ninja Gaiden. I really did. Despite my disinterest in Namco’s Team Ninja and their “style over substance” approach to game design, I always hoped that this new Ninja Gaiden would live up to the high standards set by the 2d originals. It turns out that the final product is much like I expected. Team Ninja has a history of being able to do one thing incredibly well, be it the graphics of Dead or Alive or the … models in Extreme Beach Volleyball. Meanwhile pretty much everything else in the game ends up being mediocre at best.

The good news is that Ninja Gaiden’s combat happens to be the one thing that is done right. The bad news is that once again everything else is rather crummy. You’ll have to cut through both your enemies and several layers of bullshit in order to become a true ninja, and whether this is actually worth doing is a difficult question to answer.

 →  Sly 3: Honor Among Reads

A falling Star(craft)

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So it seems that Starcraft: Ghost, has been put on “indefinite hold” (meaning “canceled”) after four years in development. An interesting turn of events to be sure, but what is even more intriguing is the community’s reaction, or should I say non-reaction to the news. I expected message boards to light up with threads and comments, but instead it seems that very few gamers are troubled by the loss. I gave it some thought, and I came to a few conclusions that might explain why no one cares (or has ever cared) about Ghost.

1 – *Blizzard Fans are like Enix fans*

And by saying this I mean no insult. It is simply that Blizzard’s fan community is much like Enix’s in Japan; they are used to certain kinds of games with certain kinds of features from their favorite developer, and anything outside of that realm may not be greeted kindly. Blizzard has made their name producing Strategy games and RPGs, and it is what fans have come to expect from them. →  I only ask one thing. Don’t read in my way.

Best Game Ever – Dragon Quest

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Developed by Enix

Published by Nintendo for the NES

Released 1989

What more can be said about the original Dragon Quest? As the story goes, it was Enix’s attempt to bring American style Role Playing Games like Wizardry and Ultima to Japanese consoles (a game called The Black Onyx introduced the genre to Japanese PC’s a year earlier). This attempt gave birth to a cultural phenomenon, as well as the most popular franchise in Japanese gaming.
A sight so beautiful it almost hurts.

Yet while most know about the Dragon Quest series in general, not many people ever discuss the original game. It may get a few paragraphs in “history of RPGs” or “NES classics” articles, but it is often overlooked by its biggest competitor of the time: Final Fantasy 1. For many gamers, FF is the only early RPG that matters for anything. You can find hordes of paragraphs detailing how great FF1 was for its time, how great it still is today, how it is so much better than Dragon Quest and that it is Squaresoft that should be considered the father of RPGs. →  Xenoblade Articles X