Chrono Trigger really holds up. I played it on emulator in university, never being able to previously as it wasn’t released in my region at all until the Virtual Console and this DS port. It was a dumb move on Square’s part because the game is so good, they were throwing money away to not let PAL gamers play it. I was glad to be able to buy it legitimately, and so happy with the improvements they’ve made for the DS; it really is the definitive version.
To start with, it looks and sounds identical to the SNES original, but with the few extras from the PS1 port added (mainly a few animated cutscenes), minus the load times of that version and plus a few bonus dungeons and extra links to the sequel Chrono Cross. Although the new dungeons are fairly tedious, they’ve got great equipment as rewards and add to the story of the world somewhat. The DS port uses the extra screen to have maps for both overworld and sub-areas, which I appreciated, and also moves a lot of UI clutter down there too.
But what about the game itself? It has a few strengths that make it stand out among its contemporaries and even modern RPGs. For one, the unfolding time-travelling story tells a story of the entire history of this world, and the persistent threat across the ages. These different eras give a nice variety of environments and characters, from the simple and savage prehistoric times to the desperate Middle Ages, to the bleak future. There’s a sense of fun though as you travel around trying to right wrongs and solve the mystery of Lavos. It also doesn’t drag on like some RPGs; it tells the story it’s trying to tell succinctly, even with five different time periods to track and backtrack.
The companionship you feel within the playable cast is another strength. I felt so attached to the characters, and loved making different teams for different tasks based not just on their skills but their personalities. The updated translation has, I think, improved the characterisation by letting them say more than they did in the days of the SNES’s limitations (although even if it’s only item names that were significantly updated, that’s reason enough to cite the DS port as the clear superior). Banding together this team of misfits is so satisfying, and Toriyama’s designs help them feel even more familiar to this Dragonball fan.
The gameplay innovations are so clever, it makes you wonder why they weren’t more widely adopted. Despite having a traditional turn-based style (although with the 16-bit Final Fantasy’s ATB system) the battles all take place on the same map that you run around on, and mostly with discrete enemies that you can see before battling them. It’s a very immersive system. Battling leans on the Tech system, whereby each character has their own ability set, but can band together with whoever else you’ve chosen for specific team attacks. Enemies are also fairly strategic, with counters and weaknesses to learn, and bosses often being a bit puzzle-y. It was also one of the first games to feature a New Game Plus system, where you start again with your stats carrying over.
Of course, New Game Plus wouldn’t be much fun if they hadn’t implemented the multiple endings. You see, you can fight the final boss at pretty much any point of the game so depending on what part of the story you’ve done up to the point where you choose to take it on, you’ll get a different credits scene. The DS port keeps track of which ones you’ve seen, and I’m happy to say I got them all.
It can sometimes be hard to say why a game is so good. Chrono Trigger is just so polished and thoughtfully designed. The development “dream team”, a collaboration between Square and Enix employees along with some of the best musicians in the business, managed to get so many great ideas into the game and present it so well, that it’s clear why its reputation persists. The game is a masterpiece and I’d recommend the DS port to fans and noobs alike. I know it’s out on iOS too but apparently that version, like a lot of Square’s mobile ports, is a bit rubbish. This review was mostly just gushing but hey, I love the game. Now go listen to Robo’s theme and tell me it doesn’t sound like Rick Astley.
I was very impressed by Dawn of Sorrow, the first DS Castlevania, so got hold of the next one to see how it held up without the addictive soul-collecting system. It’s another Metroidvania-type free-explore-y one (ie. the ones I’m interested in), and the gimmick this time is the partner system. You have the vampire hunter Jonathan Morris and the mage Charlotte Aulin, so it’s a bit like DoS’s Julius mode. But this time you can have both on screen at once, fighting together! It’s a good feeling, a bit like playing Ice Climbers in Smash but with different skills between your characters.
This, along with a variety of equippable weapons (although not enough variety for Charlotte) and sub-weapons/spells gives you a good range of options… maybe too many. As in DoS, I had a bit of analysis paralysis when choosing skills, and changing them for different situations requires menu-wrangling; the partner system has superceded DoS’s dual equipment setup. Still, eventually I figured out how they all work and which few to stick with.
The partner thing is kind of a theme for the game. Your antagonists include a pair of vampire sisters who are also a fighter/mage combo, and *spoilers* even Death and Dracula team up for the final battle. Cool! This one is set during World War 2, a unique setting with potential, but much like DoS’s near-future setting isn’t used too much to inform the game itself, unfortunately. More significant to the game’s layout is the magic painting system: like Mario 64, you reach different worlds through paintings, including an Egyptian pyramid, a spooky forest, a dimensionally-twisted circus or something, and an English town. This is a neat idea that gives you variety in locales and smaller self-contained maps to explore. On the downside, the castle hub feels rather plain in comparison.
It’s also a sequel to the Mega Drive’s Bloodlines, a fact which didn’t resonate much with me. It’s worth reading up a bit on the backstory but the game explains itself quite well without playing that one, which features the previous generation to this. The plot is developed fairly well for this type of game as you play through and the characters are mostly appealing.
The game looks nice; since each map looks different and has a unique design, they feel fresh. Sprite animation is as great as ever, but there is sometimes that odd mix of 3D polygons with the mostly 2D spritework, mostly for backgrounds and the occasional enemy. (I like it and it’s used sparingly.) The enemies are also the usual mix of cool monsters with the sometimes cute or humorous one, although some sprites are jarringly recycled from the previous game; fair enough.
Portrait of Ruin has in total 4 extra playable modes including Hard mode, which I think is a lot (although I haven’t played too many of these yet). It really extends the life of the game and each one plays differently enough to be interesting. You’ve got Richter & Maria as a team, which I gather is based on their playstyle from Rondo of Blood on the PC Engine; the secret and demanding Old Axe Armor, which is more basic but satisfying; and my favourite, the vampire sisters who are controlled entirely with the touch screen. This latter is very inventive and also the easiest.
So, PoR is really great. But is it better than Dawn of Sorrow? Well, there’s more modes here, which works well with the self-contained maps as you can master each of them. This fragmentation can get tedious though, with 9 areas in total, and they tend to be more sprawling compared to DoS’s relatively compact design. The soul-collecting system has been replaced by the enemies sometimes dropping a new spell or weapon, which is not as satisfying to me; in DoS, every single enemy was potentially a useful new skill or ability, and each one was necessary for completion. The new quest system here is a good idea, and the complicated weapon synthesis system has thankfully been axed. I also really liked the partner dynamic with its feeling of cooperation, which carried through most of the extra modes too. So I’ll give the edge to Portrait of Ruin, with its evolution in game design even if there were some compromises with the different core mechanic and level design. Hooray!
I’m really digging this Castlevania thing, yeah. The GBA ones are coming out now on the Wii U’s Virtual Console, so I might check those out next so I don’t spoil myself with the more technologically advanced Symphony of the Night or Order of Ecclesia. But those 5 are all the Metroidvania ones left! Konami, forget this dumb 3D Lords of Shadow bollocks and make some more sweet 2D exploratory action! No problem.
While taking a sabbatical from Rayman/Tonic Trouble, I played a game that my awesome wife bought me as a present when we moved house. When I got my first computer in university (an iBook G4) I was obsessed with finding software and games from wherever I could, preferably free. A friend passed along the cool free flash game N and I got hooked. Having already played I Wanna Be The Guy I had a taste for polished 2D platformers with excellent control that are super hard but not too punishing in that retrying is extremely easy. Super Meat Boy and to a lesser extent Rayman Origins later delivered a similar feeling.
Although I’m dismayed that the upcoming N++ is at this point a PS4 exclusive for some reason, I wanted to support Metanet and see what they’d done with this upgrade. The DS version doesn’t have the various extra level packs that the Xbox 360 version has, but well I’m not buying an Xbox am I now? I also found out that the DS one had a community and level sharing features that had quickly been shut down by the publisher Atari; the Nintendo WFC is gone now anyway so it’s moot. Having so many features in the menus that simply don’t work anymore is disheartening, but I mainly just wanted to play the levels anyway.
So how are they? To put it simply, they’re much easier than I remember the Flash version being. I barely got through half the stages in that one before becoming stuck on a whole range of available levels. Whether I have better skills now (unlikely), the controls suit it better (possible), or it was just tuned easier for more broad appeal (likely), I didn’t find it too bad to complete every one of the 50 chapters (5 levels each). However, entering the cheat code for the “Atari level pack” is essential as it opens a set of 5 chapters that retain the diabolical challenge that I remembered.
One of the tentpole features of this release is the updated graphics. Sound is basically untouched but the game looks fancier with a lot more detail on the objects and backgrounds. It’s possible to switch back to the Flash game’s “pure” style, but I liked the new style, only preferring “pure” for when I was stuck on a hard chapter and needed to concentrate without the extra complexity which could be slightly distracting.
This game is really just about the gameplay and presenting you with platforming challenges in a robust engine, and with that it succeeds. The game plays just as I remembered: like a dream, and the level designs are top-notch. If anything I had more fun than with the original, since I was actually able to finish it all. The DS works pretty well, showing the whole level on one screen and a close up on the other screen. This is an unfortunate side effect of the screen size but they made the best of it.
Speaking of the specifics of this port, there are quite a few minor UI niggles, such as the cursor defaulting to “new game” instead of “continue”, and menus generally being a bit unclear. The post-death physics and animation are also definitely inferior to the Flash game’s, which is a shame.
Still, despite a few annoyances and half the game’s features being unavailable now, this is for the moment the best way to play N. Well, maybe the 360 is better but this one’s portable, so there [oops, just realised it came out on PSP too—which has the full levels on screen… maybe try that one, but who has a PSP anyway?]. The slightly toned down difficulty made it more enjoyable, there were only a few occasions of the massive frustration that the original engendered. I’d recommend it since it’s on the cheap, although the only place I found it was through Amazon (I think it had a low print run). Anyways: recommended.
DNF stands for Did Not Finish, by the way. It’s a new category for games that I, well, I didn’t get to the end, and I’ll try to explain why.
In this case, why wouldn’t I want to play through? The wacky mayhem of the first two games enthralled me in my younger days, and the freedom of the sandbox in GTA3 and Vice City sucked many an hour into our Xbox. Why then, did I fail to connect with a game that aims to combine the two, with modern additions to the classic formula?
Maybe the screen was too small. Maybe the time investment was too much when there’s other things I’d rather play. Maybe the touchscreen gimmicks broke the flow of play. Maybe I felt uncomfortable with the heavy emphasis on drug dealing. Maybe I miss the social aspect of fooling around with my brothers while playing. Maybe I didn’t want to get involved with slightly more realistic characters in their violent world, as opposed to the more cartoonish nature of Tommy Vercetti and his garish 80’s environment. Maybe I’m just older now, and prefer my games uncomplicated.
Now I feel a little down. According to Game Rankings, this is the highest rated DS game ever (that has more than 3 reviews). Is the problem with me, that I couldn’t enjoy this? That I found it dragging and couldn’t give it more than an hour or two? Well, I don’t feel too bad. There’s all kinds of games, and all kinds of gamers. It’s ok if I didn’t like this one. I do have legitimate concerns about parts of the game, and they kept me from accepting the premise. But there’s other stuff out there for me.
Well that took a turn. Maybe next time I can be more analytical and less rambly. But this blog’s always been about games, but also about me and how they make me feel. Anyway that’ll do for now. Thanks for reading.
Some years ago, I decided it was time to try a Castlevania game. After a quick Internet search, I somehow arrived at Aria of Sorrow being a good example, at least of the exploration-based “Metroidvania” style. I emulated it and was very impressed, loving the style and well-crafted gameplay, along with the addictive soul-collecting mechanic. Emulation problems meant I couldn’t actually finish it, but after briefly borrowing the DS sequel last year, I’ve been on the lookout for my own copy. And finally I procured one for myself!
I couldn’t be happier with the game. As I type this I’ve just finished my third playthrough, in the unlockable “Julius Mode” which lets you play as a team of supporting characters with different abilities that supposedly call back to earlier games. I wouldn’t know, but even without a deep knowledge of the series I found it an absolute delight. The sprites and animation are just gorgeous, and it’s a dream to play. Collecting all the items and souls is still a powerful drive, and the unlockables are satisfying.
In fact, I was so impressed that Order of Ecclesia went straight on my wish list, and I may even look into Portrait of Ruin later (the other two DS instalments, which reviewed almost as well as this one). Symphony of the Night has also, I am now aware, often been touted as the high point of the series.
My only question at this point is why has it taken me so long to get into this series of excellent 2D action-platformers, one of my favourite genres? I don’t know, but I’ll try not to play them all so quickly, as I’m afraid of burning out on the seemingly homogenised aesthetics. Despite many taking place in radically different time periods, the castle and enemies always seem to look pretty similar in screenshots.
Oh well, as I said the sprite art is amazing anyway. The plot is also not too deep or groundbreaking, but I did get attached to the characters involved, despite the slightly spotty localisation. Touch screen use is a tad gimmicky but does add, rather than detract, from the experience. So despite a few small quibbles, I loved this one. I have absolutely no complaints about the control or structure of the game itself, it’s wonderful.
I find myself running short on words for this, because it was just so good. So I’ll leave it at that. I hope other games in the series can engage me as much as this has, even if they don’t have the addictive soul-collecting mechanic.
Yoshi Touch & Go is an early DS game. More like a tech demo for the DS’s features, it’s nevertheless authentic to the Yoshi’s Island aesthetic that I love so much, the nostalgic that I am. I’ve just now acquired a copy of the game (which is pretty rare these days… even rarer with its manual).
Since the manual has not been uploaded anywhere online that I could find, I decided I should scan it myself. I’ve submitted it to my favourite resource for game manuals, replacementdocs.com, but due to their file size limits I had to use a 150dpi scan, which is not the best quality. What I offer here is the superior 300dpi scan, which due to its higher fidelity adds up to over 18 MB.
Quickie time: Metroid Prime Hunters: First Hunt. This demo for Hunters was distributed a couple of years before the game was ready, at the DS’s launch. By comparing it to the final product, not only are there lots of differences but the content it offers is largely unique. The multiplayer maps are apparently similar to ones in the final game, but I couldn’t test that anyway.
The uniqueness is in the three single player modes. Regulator is a combat challenge map where you clear each room of enemies, including (unlike Hunters proper) Metroids, which behave as in the larger Prime series. Survival is a larger free-roaming map where you have to hunt down enemies to get a high score before you die. Morph Ball is a cool race/obstacle course where you roll along collecting tokens. They’re like fun minigames that I think could have fleshed out the Hunters game in addition to the story and multiplayer, if they’d been included and expanded on. Imagine that Hunters the game is a combination of this and the final release, and you have a more full proposition.
Apart from the HUD and such being shifted around, there’s things that I’m glad were removed from the final game, like the basic beam using ammo, and a shared ammo/missile pool. I may be missing other gameplay subtleties, but I had to play this in the far from ideal conditions of an emulator, which necessitated button-only controls: an awkward situation, to be sure.
You do see carts rarely, but since the full game fleshed out the multiplayer over this preview, the unique solo modes are the only reason to check it out, and there’s not much there. Like I said, a nice extra to Hunters, and I wish they’d explored those ideas further in addition (but not in place of) the story mode. Plus Metroids! On the DS! That’s new (although the solo modes are stated to be a training simulation, so they’re not real).
I didn’t ever review Okami, I played it before starting the blog. But trust me, I loved it. This is back before we were married, my then-girlfriend bought it for herself because it looked so good, and she was in the position of many people of suddenly owning a Wii and not being sure what to do with it. She made me play it though because she found it too hard, which is fair enough. She loved to watch me play, all the way through, and it’s by no means a short game.
When we found out about the sequel on DS, of course we were interested. Especially because it was apparently a little easier. She was so excited to find a game that she was both interested in and was up to her abilities. In fact she did play through it, and despite putting it down for a few stretches (the boss battles in particular), eventually finished it for herself. I was very happy for her but of course looking over her shoulder every now and then wasn’t the ideal way to experience the game.
So finally after a long time, I also played it. Now apparently you can only have one save file, but that’s ok because I started from her New Game Plus and got the weapon that breaks the game. Cool beans. Even without that, you can consider it a cut-down, simpler version of Okami. Which is a great thing.
Clover went under, and came back as Platinum away from their awful Capcom overlords. But to their credit, Capcom actually made a sequel, farming it out to a little company called “Mobile and Game Studio”. Doesn’t exactly stand out, but look here, among all their cheap mobile games, it’s Okamiden: Chisaki Taiyo (aka Little Sun). In my opinion, this unheard-of studio did a fantastic job converting the Okami experience to the DS.
The art is just like how you remember, as is the music (although that gets repetitive). They even recreated many of the areas of Okami, albeit smaller and broken up by loading zones. They change them up though and their new content and environments fit right in. I wish there weren’t so many “points of no return”, which prohibit backtracking. But the price you pay for that is the new system of buddy characters. Throughout the game Chibiterasu (Amaterasu’s son, and the most adorable gaming protagonist bar none) meets five children that he befriends, who serve the Issun role of interpreting for you, dialogue and so forth. But having five distinct kids helps vary the personality of that companion role. Not to mention the help they give you in battle.
There are also new dungeon-type areas, which, to go along with the Zelda comparison that’s often stated of Okami, are presented similarly to the top-down 2D Zeldas. Using your partner is usually a big part of these zones. I appreciated the change-up of the gameplay here, and they are appropriate for the DS’s capabilities.
Another thing the DS is ideal for is the brush techniques, many of which return plus some new ones (plus the brush gods all have little babies now too! So cute!). Whether the recognition is better or whether it’s just much more accurate drawing directly on the touchscreen, I almost always pulled them off when I wanted to. Very gratifying compared to the sometimes spotty Wii drawing, although without the benefit of the coloured smoke before drawing which that version’s control scheme allowed.
In terms of the story, it follows on from Okami with events nine months later, although you also go back in time to set things up or alongside events of that game, as well as going back 100 years to the “backstory” portion, something Okami did as well. It gets a little confusing, but the story feels suitably meaningful and you meet many familiar faces and new ones too. Sometimes it feels like things or people are only there to reference Okami instead of serving the game in any important way, but taking both of them as a whole is probably a good way to look at them so the way it complements its mother(?) game only strengthens them as a unit, I suppose.
I should have said that the core gameplay is pretty similar to Okami too; traversing 3D environments, instanced battles, plot-focused, exploration and collecting. Of course, many mechanics have been removed or streamlined for this DS iteration. It doesn’t feel compromised though, the way it’s designed everything feels just fine. And the humour and charm is perfectly intact.
The additions are also very welcome, as I’ve said. There’s a new village you keep returning to that you can improve and grow by inviting people to live there. There are enemies that appear on the “overworld” so to speak, outside of the scroll battles. There are different materials to collect to upgrade your weapons, and elemental attack items. And the partners are great.
Basically, I had a lot of fun. It’s also fairly long for a DS game I suppose, it took me 24 hours. Although the broken-ass weapon helped some battles to go quicker (the battles are one of the things that gets tedious after a while). So I’d recommend playing it after someone had finished it once? There are some items to collect that remain collected on subsequent playthroughs though. It’s that annoying balance where you get rewards after completion, but it’s long enough and so plot-driven that you don’t want to replay it too much.
Either way, if you love Okami this game will certainly please you. Unless you can’t get past the low resolution or the gameplay simplifications. In my case, I swallowed those easily and found the perfect follow-up to one of the best games on the Wii (and PS2 and the HD one and whatever). Don’t write it off, it’s really quite wonderful. Once again I express my surprise that this unknown studio that makes so many “casual” games has lived up to Clover’s work. Play it! Even if only to see Chibi’s reaction to the silly nicknames his partners give him. It’s worth it.
Hi everyone! You may remember my Super Princess Peach review (check the #tose tag on my blog); I found out it was a Mario-branded spin-off in a way from the Starfy series. Well, if not spin-off, then very similar. It’s the same type of exploratory 2D platforming, finding collectibles, fairly gentle difficulty, and just general look and feel.
It’s no secret that a character’s presence in Smash Bros will also increase my interest in them slightly. Anyway as the only translated Starfy title, official or otherwise, I thought I’d give this a shot. Immediately I was reminded of Ikachan, the brief indie game from the creator of Cave Story. Although Starfy is more level-based, it has a similar feel. Ok maybe it’s just because it starts underwater.
Starfy has an interesting level design dynamic, as there’s essentially two control schemes that are used equally in the game: on land and swimming underwater. Even in places like forests there’s giant droplets falling down, or later the whimsical ability to swim in rainbows that keep the balance between the two. It helps to change up the way you’re playing, and keep it fresh.
The characters in the game are all very likeable and amusing. In this game (the fifth in the overall series), there’s lots of returning ones but an unfamiliarity with the franchise didn’t hurt my appreciation. The art style includes a puppet or stuffed toy aesthetic that is very charming, as well as manga-style cutscenes. The game itself does the interesting blend of precise spritework for the environments, while decking out the backgrounds (and the occasional boss) in 3D polygons. It all adds up to an appealing mix of styles that still gel together in a colourful way.
As I alluded to, it’s pretty simple to play, and not too punishing. You get lots of health, and it’s cleverly tied to the primary minor collectible. I found it relaxing more than anything to play through, and with a configurable bottom screen, you can also be alerted to the presence of treasure if you’re looking to get everything. You will also have to replay past levels to find the secrets after unlocking more abilities, which got a little tedious at times.
The cuteness may get overbearing to you if you’re particularly macho, especially the costumes you get to dress up your perpetually-beaming star. You also get to dress up Starfy’s sister Starly, although disappointingly she’s only playable in specific sections of levels by co-op download play (a bit of a half-assed feature), and in an epilogue chapter.
There’s lots of levels, and lots of extra content to find and unlock, and it’s not too hard to do it. I think if you like the Kirby games (I haven’t played too many, but they’re definitely the most similar), this should keep you occupied. It’s got lots of fun dialogue too, so it’s got its own niche. I guess I could make a thing out of playing a game for every series represented in Smash… What do you think?
Well, Mario Kart. What can I say? I haven’t played one since 64, but obviously it’s the hotness. I don’t particularly care to pursue it, but hearing again that DS had a Mission Mode (during discussions of Mario Kart 8’s shortcomings) prompted me to borrow it from my brother. No, I wouldn’t buy the thing!
You could say I’m in the Diddy Kong Racing camp. I just like my games to have a little more depth, and since I’m your basic antisocial nerd, the multiplayer components of most games are lost on me. As it turns out, I found MKDS’s missions to be quite cool, especially when you have a boss fight against Super Mario 64 DS’s bosses.
It’s also the most crossover-y Mario Kart, which appealed to me (not counting the Arcade ones with their Pacmans and Tamagotchis and drums, but pretty awful gameplay, or MK8’s not-yet-available DLC; I’ve written off that game already). I guess when you get right down to it, R.O.B. and the Blue Falcon don’t amount to much, but… well, I’ve already undercut my point, but to be fair, I played this game before the DLC thing.
It wasn’t exactly a full experience borrowing it like this: my bro had already unlocked most stuff. I just tried to see all the content, and do the missions. It was fine. Seeing how much better his times were on some missions took me right back to childhood competitions. And considering also I haven’t played one since 64, overall it was a somewhat nostalgic experience.
I’m putting my foot down now though: no matter the fancy graphics and lighting effects, no matter how many weirdo characters they add, I’m not buying a Mario Kart until that mission mode comes back, or at least some other single-player options. I absolutely did not buy into the MK8 hype, and I feel a bit of a minority in my position to want more from the franchise. Pink Gold Peach and Baby Rosalina most certainly did not help. Enough whining though, I’ve got more games to play. Now should I play Konami Krazy Racers, or a Crash Team Racing? Maybe I’ll fire up the old Nokia emulator for Rayman Kart.
You probably don’t want to read yet another Lego review. I don’t particularly want to write another one either. I’ll just say that it was a novelty to go back in time as it were, to a more basic Lego game.
What the heck, I just played this to chill out anyway. It was fun. There you go, there’s your review.
And so I finally got around to playing the final Star Fox installment. I bought it a while ago, but waited until I’d played them in chronological order. I’m glad I did, because they do share continuity and build on previous events.
This game has been criticised, just as Adventures and Assault have, for not following up on “classic Star Fox gameplay”. I share the sentiment to some extent, but then again trying new things can be good and we can always just play Lylat Wars again. What a lot of people also fail to realise is that this game, unlike the 64 one, was made by the people behind Star Wing/Fox and the unreleased Star Fox 2. Additionally, it carries over many gameplay features from the latter, as it never had a chance to be released.
It’s surprising actually, how different Star Fox 2 is, and by extension this game. We have strategy maps, with your ships planning movement and taking simultaneous turns with the enemy. When the two meet, you enter instanced battle arenas in which you complete repetitive objectives and destroy enemy ships. There are a variety of characters, whose ships all have different attributes. All these qualities are shared between 2 and Command, which gives it a heck of a lot of legitimacy even as it differs so much from the scrolling stages we love.
There is some limited scrolling-type gameplay in missile chases and some bosses, but most combat is in All-Range mode. This is my less preferred gameplay style but the greater focus on charge shots makes it more forgiving. There’s no tanks or submarines, ships just fly underwater when they need to.
It’s also one of those DS games that does everything by the touchscreen, all buttons being identical in function as the shoot button. You move, boost, bomb, aim, and do the strategy stages by touch. It works pretty well, although the boosted usefulness of the roll belies its slightly awkward swiping activation. I didn’t have any major troubles with it, it’s just another control scheme to get used to.
The big draw of this game to me was the plot and characters. It has a familiar path-choosing system but ties it to the plot and decisions, giving you the potential not just of different stages to play but different combinations of characters in coversation and eventually different endings. The breadth of these branches makes many mutually exclusive, but the fun is figuring out what aspects of which branches are “most canon”, or at least canon to you, and which are compatible. For example, maybe Star Fox defeats the bad guys, or maybe Star Wolf does, with or without Krystal. If Slippy’s on Aquas then Falco can still be with Fox on Solar, etc, etc.
It does a great job though of involving many beloved characters. No Tricky unfortunately but many previous antagonists show up, either aligned with the new Anglar guys or with their own agendas. The new characters also mesh well, with each one having dialogue to involve them and make them feel right in that world. Said dialogue is well written for the most part, although I find Krystal’s characterisation confusing, a tradition of Star Fox I guess. It did make me laugh though at other parts. They also bring in Octoman from F-Zero as an enemy, which along with a couple other nods cements the connection between those series. Great stuff.
The mechanics of the game are relatively simple and as I said you repeat them many times, especially if you’re replaying for more endings. But I don’t mind that so much as long as the game has other factors to keep me playing, which it does, plus those mechanics feel good enough moment to moment to carry me through. Despite its lack of bombast and fidelity compared to Assault, I think I prefer it. It’s allowed to explore smaller, more personal stories in amongst the conflict due to the branching structure, and look at consequences and relationships rather than a series of big action scenes.
I’ve really enjoyed Command, it’s a fitting end to the Star Fox saga (for now!), there’s a lot of closure in there amongst some silliness with all the endings. There’s also a strange sense of fulfillment as it delivers on all the concepts introduced in the unfortunate Star Fox 2. Sure, it’s not the scrolling shooter we really want but for the DS that might not have worked so well anyway. I do want more but I concede that this game seems to end things well. Unless they do a continuity barrel roll, or else go the next generation route like Golden Sun or Sin & Punishment (I don’t have the confidence Nintendo will do that, it’s not safe enough). Well Nintendo, trust your instincts. Or not, whatever.
Being a fan of the DKU (as described by dkvine.com), and Rare games in general, I was interested in the Viva Pinata games. It’s the last successful new IP they’ve made since Banjo, really, and has done well for them. It’s also one of the last things they did before being totally creatively lobotomised by Microsoft. This is the only VP game on a non-Microsoft platform and hence the only one I have access to.
In a situation similar to Viewtiful Joe, I feel very underwhelmed by what the DS version is presenting and feel that while the control scheme could be good for the format, the other limitations fo the platform make it suffer compared to its console counterpart. I’m also not fond of the Rare handheld team’s latter work, which is characterised by ugly menus, messy graphics, and a general lack of polish.
My problems with this one aren’t just aesthetic, though. I’m not great on open-ended sims at the best of times, but the goals in this game confused me and while I learnt how to perform a few functions, I couldn’t figure out how to progress. There didn’t seem much point. I bred a few pinatas but then I had too many milling around, so I had to sell them or feed them to others. I couldn’t build an attachment to them. I dunno, the whole thing just didn’t grab me.
I basically picked up the game because of Rare, it was their very last game on a Nintendo platform. But apart from the lackluster presentation, I don’t think this style of game is really for me. It doesn’t happen often but I didn’t play it much and I don’t see myself going back. Sorry Pinatas!
I was curious about some of Clover/Platinum’s games, because Okami is so great and a lot fo people have nice things to say about Viewtiful Joe. I should have gone with the Gamecube one, but I just felt the DS one would be more accessible and cheaper. Turns out it’s not very good, so either it’s too watered down or the fundamentals of the series are not for me.
The first thing is, it’s confusing. I did’t know what I was doing or how I was doing it, both in plot and mechanics. They keep introducing new moves for you to execute using the touchscreen, but they’re universally awful, hard to activate with the tetchy controls and of dubious usefulness except when forced into a puzzle-type situation. I didn’t know any of the characters nor was I properly introduced to them in the game.
It seems to be favouring presentation over substance, with a silly slideshow feature in cutscenes, and a persistent camera UI overlay on the action screen which is pointless. The heavily cel-shaded style doesn’t really work and the graphics end up muddy.
I chose the easy mode because I didn’t want to struggle through combat on top of struggling with the mechanics, and things came together for me more as I went through. I should say it’s a 2D beat-em-up, with upgrades to your fighting moves purchaseable between stages and light puzzle-platforming elements. I found a technique to get through battles and didn’t vary much all the way through, which probably wouldn’t work in hard mode, but I didn’t want to put in the effort to master it. I just wasn’t invested enough. The combat system seems robust enough though.
So there’s a lot of weird design stuff to this game that didn’t gel with me. The touchscreen stuff was implemented pretty incompetently, and the characters, after my initial bafflement, were just kinda bland and cliche. It was a little amusing to fight bosses based on Robocop and Edward Scissorhands. But is it a movie? Or real life in a movie theme park? Or what? There’s a film MacGuffin, or something… I’m glad I played on easy though, it would have been too frustrating otherwise and I did want to keep going. Can’t really recommend it though, it didn’t win me over.
As part of readying myself for Dream Team, I had to finish the first three games, and this was the last one I needed. It may just be the latest-played-game effect that I’ve experienced before, but I felt like this was the best of the three. This contradicts opinions I’ve read that place it below the other two. Just taste, I guess. Since the gameplay is very similar to the other two, I’ll mostly just try to compare them.
The first thing that grabbed me coming straight off Superstar Saga is the increased graphical and sound fidelity on the DS system. The effects look better, the resolution is higher, it sounds better. The second screen is also used very helpfully, with maps of the area you’re in most of the time. It’s got that functionality from having the screen, whereas Bowser’s Inside Story only sometimes had a map, and sometimes Bowser or the Bros, depending on what was happening. It was inconsistent.
That principle follows through into other game aspects. BIS uses both screens, and the microphone, and touch controls. It’s cool to use the hardware but got gimmicky at times. PIT is more pure, like SS, but more advanced technically. I appreciate that. The “minigame” segments were also more organic, and less forced (and less often, I think).
The item systems are cool in this game. We still have eqipment badges rather than the activated badges of BIS that I didn’t use much. Special attacks are also activated by items rather than a character’s points stat, which is cool because you can stock up then feel better about using them more often, and you also get more different rewards on the map more often, which feels good.
The big feature of this game is the 2x2 gameplay, with the Bros. teaming up with their baby counterparts. I thought this was a very fun dynamic, and totally cute too! Instead of cycling through many abilities, they’re activated by different interaction between babies and adults, together or separate. Unlike the alternative of Bowser in the third, these characters are together and working together most of the time. The teaming-up mechanic weaves through both overworld and battles, and even to item management, not to mention the cutscenes. It’s a strong system, and getting more level-ups is always cool.
The presence of babies is due to the time-travelling plot. I liked being in the Mushroom Kingdom this time, and interacting with its residents under attack by a conquering alien race. Rather than the open world of the first or third games, this one is based around a hub in the present with portals leading to isolated locations in the past. It allows for a bit more variety to locales than in SS, and the stage-based structure has its pros and cons, but they do feel cut off. I did approve of having a Yoshi’s Island location, though.
The time travel was used a few times in cool ways, most often in interactions between younger and older versions of characters. Unfortunately there was no sense of consequences to locations, since you were stuck in the castle in the present, and the implications of an attack in the past to the present was not really explored.
The plot had a few little twists to it, which kept it interesting, as well as good use of recurring characters (I especially loved Stuffwell, Baby Bowser and Kamek, and the Toadsworths). However, the Shroobs made for less interesting antagonists. Despite their eeriness and apparent power, they didn’t really communicate with you so you didn’t have an equivalent to Fawful with his amusing writing. There was a stronger through-line than SS and even BIS, though, the plot being more focused.
So this game was a good sequel to SS, expanding on it and polishing its mechanics. The complexity of the 2x2 team was a good kind of complexity, and the babies were just great characters with a lot of potential and fun interactions with their older selves. It also is more focused than the other two I feel, especially the gameplay systems which got a bit out of hand in BIS. I was surprised that I seem to hold this one in the highest esteem of the three, judging from other reactions I’d read. But now it just leaves me to find out how Dream Team will stack up. Now that I’ve written this, I think I may be ready to play it now. Back to adventure!
Being a fan of the DKU (as described by dkvine.com), and Rare games in general, I was interested in the Viva Pinata games. It’s the last successful new IP they’ve made since Banjo, really, and has done well for them. It’s also one of the last things they did before being totally creatively lobotomised by Microsoft. This is the only VP game on a non-Microsoft platform and hence the only one I have access to.
