posts by golden jew
golden jew

Review – Etrian Odyssey 2

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Etrian Odyssey (the first one) was an interesting RPG by independent developer Atlus. Rather than focus on traditional RPG elements such as story save X kingdom from Y evil wizard, Etrian was explicitly a dungeon crawler. A giant dungeon has appeared near a city, adventurers flock by the dozen to be plumb the depths looking for treasure while mostly being savagely killed.

And that’s about all the plot you get. Instead of a standard plot driven party, you had an entire guild you could fill with various classed adventurers, and off they went into the meat grinder. It wasn’t a perfect game, but it was an interesting concept, particularly on a portable device where entertaining time killing is the primary motivator for many people. And one could plausibly assume, if one were naïve and trusting, that the franchise would be built upon and gameplay refined in future installments.

Unfortunately, Atlus thought that Etrian Odyssey 2 was a Halloween Masquerade, and Atlus showed up disguised as Electronic Arts. →  Rayman Reading Rabbids

Review – Rock Band 2

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Rock Band 2 came out this past weekend, with an odd Sunday launch to be precise. You’d have been hard pressed to learn this from Harmonix’s site, which was oddly devoid of fanfare about the release. Fortunately, the local Gamestop was plastered with signs indicating that Rock Band 2 was in fact available, and they didn’t even give me much shit when I told them I hadn’t reserved a copy. A moderate line of 7 people made me feel like less of a loser, particularly when most of the people in the line were young, hip, and attractive. Truly times are changing when the person behind me was a cute girl in her twenties (with her boyfriend) demanding Rock Band 2.

What you weren’t able to get was the full bundle: new guitar, new drums, new mic and game. That won’t be available until October. News to me. Apparently the new guitar was pushed back as well, leaving me to just get the game and the new drum kit. →  Now you’re reading with power.

Firaxis Rage

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I love Civilization. I really do. I’ve been on a massive kick of Civ 4: BTS multiplayer recently, and I’m eager for Civilization Revolution, as are many of my friends. But I can’t excuse some of the ridiculous activities that Firaxis has been engaged in lately.

First, they release ANOTHER faulty patch for Civ 4. Fanboys would tell me to shut the fuck up and enjoy this wondrous bounty from Firaxis: after all, with Civ 3 Conquests they promised a patch that never came. But despite this, I can’t help but be angry that they produce another patch that is so bug-ridden it requires a user patch. After their criminal negligence with this title, the least they could do would be apply QA resources to ensure that their name is more synonymous with “quality programming” than “you suckers will buy anything we produce, ha ha ha.”

They then follow up this indignity by revealing that in addition to diverting all of their resources to Civilization Revolution, they are going to be releasing a Colonization remake. →  Read Theft Auto 4

I fought the law and the law won – Tactics A2

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I picked up Final Fantasy Tactics A2: Grimoire of the Rift the other day and was initially very pleased to be playing it. I missed out on Tactics Advance on the GBA, but I am a longtime fan of the original. With about a hojillion classes, and the weapon-based learning system of FF9 (my personal favorite) I was immediately hooked.

But those details can wait for the full review. What I want to talk about is the law system. For those of you who haven’t yet played a portable Tactics, the law system is a mechanic that assigns a “law” to every battle. The laws aren’t your usual “no killing your neighbor” or “no raping your neighbor’s dog.” Instead they’re more Ivalice-relevant “no use of fire spells” or “no magic restoration items.” If you obey the law, you get bonus items at the end of the fight. In some cases, if you break the law, you fail specific quests.

This wouldn’t bother me but for two instances, one of which was annoying but possibly excusable, but a second that proves Squenix employs either sadists (possible, the Japanese have weird fetishes) or lazy programmers. →  It’s dangerous to read alone, take this.

Revolution… in reviewing?

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Civilization Revolution is about to hit US game store shelves. What separates this game from the horde of other games coming out on consoles is the record amount of bugs in a console game. I kid, I kid. What it does bring to the table is an adaption of the incredibly deep PC-based Civilization series, and from initial reviews and demo play Civ Rev is sleek enough for consoles without sacrificing the Civilization flavor.

It’s rare that a developer makes a platform jump like this, and even more so when they alter an existing franchise successfully. Naturally, Civ Rev is far from perfect, but it seems (at least based on initial reviews) that this jump was successful and it’s a fun game with reasonable single player appeal and a strong multiplayer mode.

What’s fascinating to observe, is that because the game is daring and fun, but flawed reviewers have no problem giving it scores in the 7-8 range. With today’s “score inflation” from the big review houses such as IGN, such a score, particularly from a well known publisher, would be considered a death knell. →  Professor Layton and the Diabolical Post

It’s the DLC, stupid!

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Recently details came out about Guitar Hero: World Tour. It will have a fancy drum kit with faux cymbals. It will allow for music composition (sweet on paper). It may or may not be backwards compatible with DLC to date (depends on what article you read). It will feature approximately 85 master track songs, and will have a stronger downloadable content stream. It will also feature improved peripherals. Pricing will be “competitive” with Rock Band.

Rock Band 2 was just announced. It will feature improved peripherals, as well as support for third party peripherals. This is a great idea, because the equipment business sucks, and if Harmonix can find someone else to make better equipment, they can focus on their core competency: the music (we’ll get into that later). DLC songs will not only be forwards compatible, they will be backwards compatible: even if you choose not to upgrade to Rock Band 2, you will be able to continue to purchase new DLC and use it. →  All the lonely gamers, where do they all belong?

Review – Eve Online Empyrean Age

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Every so often, Eve does a major patch, introduces new goodies, and calls it an expansion. Normally I’d mock such marketing tactics, but since Eve doesn’t charge for these expansions, I will instead laud them. The last patch, Trinity, finally updated the ancient Eve graphics engine, setting the bar high for any future add-ons. Empyrean Age focuses around in-game content, specifically “faction warfare.” Faction warfare is one of those things that developers talk about for a long time but nothing ever comes of, sort of like World of Warcraft’s “Hero Classes,” which took two expansions (and the second isn’t out yet) for an underwhelming single class. Accordingly, the Eve community was skeptical of this mythical “faction warfare.”

Fortunately, the Empyrean Age brings one of the more seamless and thoroughly entertaining integrations of player vs. environment (PvE for you n00bs) and player vs. player (PvP, you’re still a n00b) content. In Empyrean Age, the plotline is that the four major empires have basically gone balls out war against each other, aligned in a 2v2 fashion. →  Oreshika: Tainted Postlines

Review – Civilization Revolution Demo

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As the name might imply, it’s hard to make a full judgment of Civilization Revolution based on the demo for a few reasons. The game is time limited, you can only play on “pussy” or “Jay” mode (we’ll let the readers decide which is worse), both giving you bonuses significant enough that it’s hard to get a flavor for real balance. The Civlopedia isn’t full, so you can’t analyze all the techs without playing countless times, and you are limited to two civilizations. Despite these limitations, what you can do is get a good feeling for how Firaxis dramatically changed the game-style of Civ while still keeping it Civ–a paraphrased sentence you’ve heard over and over again about the game which is an excellent way to open up this review.

This is unrealistic. If Ghengis Khan had a problem with you he would simply eat your family in front of you, fueled by the sound of your wailing and sobbing.

Leading off the list of changes is the fact the game has done away with workers – those little happy slaves who built the empire of Civilizations past have fled for greener pastures (they hired coyotes to take them to a more liberated game). →  Jet fuel can’t melt videolamer.

Gaming Industry Advice from a Non Gaming Industry Member

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Hey, that title looks like our slogan! This started as a comment to Derek’s post, but I decided I would kick it up a notch and give you all some Golden Jew advice on the gaming industry, if you actually want in. Matt is probably a better source than I, since he’s active in the industry and it’s been a decade since I was, but being Jewish, I know a little something about business (and about dodging Nazis).

Although the matriculation rate of QA peon to game designer is low in an institutional setting (EA, Maxis, Bioware, etc…shit… those are all the same company now!), it’s comparable to most other popular industries. Examples of “popular industries” include sports teams (going from bitch peon to normal peon), video games (QA peon to developer peon), and the movie industry (production assistant peon to producer peon). All of these are considered “hip” jobs and therefore are flooded with lots of people who want to do something “cool” and therefore are willing to flood their respective job markets with oodles of cheap, generally talentless labor and make entry level an absolute bitch. →  Think outside the post.

Eve Online: Second Life for Hardcore Gamers

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I hate Second Life. I don’t understand it. I already have a job. I already have a house. I understood Sims because the part where your Sim went to work (at least in the versions I played, they put out so many expansions my view is probably distorted) was skipped and my Sim just showed up home with money. Periodically he’d play on the computer or play chess and get smarter and get promoted. Then he’d come back from work with a bonus and I’d spend his money on nice shit. It wasn’t bad; in fact, I wish my life were like that, where I’d step outside my house, 8 hours go by and I’m home and playing video games again.

Second Life fails to me because it’s like the Sims, but you have to grind out money (or directly buy it). I like the Social Networking aspects: I like that the Centers for Disease Control (a US federal agency, look it up) and various nonprofits are involved for outreach. →  Read or Alive 2: Hardcore