Can you keep up? I recently picked up this fairly old game that I realized we hadn’t reviewed. Considering my strange love of rhythm I knew this review had my name written all over it, just yelled A! at me.
Initial response: Taking Elite Beat agents out of the pack it was hooking pretty quickly I played through the game in just a few hours, but with multiple levels of diffuculty this game becomes absolutely impossible though insanely fun.
The good: It has a great selection of songs and generally is a good game. The stories accompanying the songs are actually fairly decent though I can see them getting old after things happening time and time again when trying frustratingly hard your one hundredth time to beat a level. This game in general has a quirkiness to it that makes you want to love it.
The bad: on this game there is a very limited selection of songs a very short story which is limited by the small storage memory of a DS game cartridge. The dialogue may get corny and sometimes get old and the rhythm of the game is hard to follow occasionally because of the masking of voices over the beat that you’re listening to.
overall impression: This game is really addicting you don’t get flustrated playing songs and when you do it makes you want to finish it that much more.
So Dragon’s Quest IX came out in Japan on July 11th and has been selling like hot cakes. I have enjoyed a few others in the series and have a couple more on my list to play right now. I have been looking forward to playing this game and thinking that a release date would be soon since all that would be localization. However the most recent word is that the game won’t be released until at least April of next year. Speaking to investors and then translated by Siliconera, it appears that Square Enix doesn’t really like money. Granted this is not the first time Dragon’s Quest has taken a long time to be translated, it just seems like if you have a smash hit on a huge selling system you would want to release it while the DS is still so hot! I guess it is good for me since I won’t have much money as a poor college student, no temptation to buy it if it is not available.
I will openly admit that when it comes to the Nintendo DS I am a huge fan. I have tons of games and it seems to be the system that I play the most. Readers have probably noticed that a lot of my reviews come on the DS and I really believe it has one of the best libraries of current systems, though it has not yet surpassed the quality of library that existed on the PS2. When Nintendo announced they were making it better last year, I was really excited. However it made it’s way to America and I still haven’t picked one up. Here is a couple of reasons why:
1. The Price- The Nintendo DSi retails for a cool $169.99. What more do you get on it over the DS Lite at $129.99? Some cool new software that looks better and allows you to change the brightness of the screen in the game. You get some playback of MP3s and a couple of lousy cameras that are only .3 Megapixels. It just isn’t enough for me.
2. MP3 Playback- I get why this is needed but the thing is it is not fun nor easy to get my music library on there. Why would I want to when I have an iPod that easily takes the music off my computer and seems to work better.
3. The Cameras- Sorry they are too weak to be used for anything that you would like to keep, my phone resolution is 10 times better and it is not like I go anywhere without it. It just seems like a little bit of a gimmick.
4. The Software- This is probably the thing that would make or break the deal for me. So far we haven’t seen anything from the store that is amazing, there are lots of Art Style games of which Pictobits seems the most interesting. I would also like to play the new March of the Minis but can that honestly justify the upgrade costs for me?
5. No GBA Slot- I am probably in the minority here. I like have my GBA slot and I don’t even play Guitar Hero which is completely incompatible as well with the DSi. I like to be able to play my old GBA games. I know it is probably so they can sell the same games to you again through Virtual Console on the DSi but still I want to keep playing my Golden Sun games when I get the urge, or the awesome Fire Emblem games. It makes the library that much better for me.
So what do you think? Have you upgraded? Can you give me any reasons to upgrade? Maybe if Zelda: Spirit Tracks comes out as DSi only or something. Until then I am going to stick with my trusty DS Lite.
I put off my review because I knew I really wanted to review this game but I hadn’t quite beat it, but here it is late tonight. Knights in the Nightmare by Atlus has to be one of the strangest games that I have ever played. Not to say that is necessarily a bad thing, in fact I would say that many of my favorite games are the ones that give me something that is nothing like I have ever experienced. The funny thing is I struggle to classify this game into any genre. Yes it is an RPG where you build your characters and get cool weapons. Yes it is a strategy game that deals with a grid system and certain characters having specific abilities to attack and you have to balance your team. Yes it is an action game where you are trying to pull off your attacks while trying to dodge the bullets of your enemies. I think maybe everyone has now understood my point, it is incredibly tough to classify.
A warning on the story of Knights in the Nightmare, you may not understand it for the first 10 missions or so. This can get kind of frustrating and I am sure many players will quit playing simply because they don’t get what they are doing it all for. I can honestly say after beating the entire game I don’t understand everything from the story. Also, be careful with this game because you aren’t always going to feel like you are the good guy doing the right thing. For that reason, I wouldn’t really recommend it for kids. I might just need a second playthrough to understand everything that happened in the game.
The gameplay is pretty awesome. You control a wisp and you have the ability to make knights on the field attack. You have to give them items to attack, and this is not turn based, the enemies are constantly firing different things at you that you must avoid or risk running out of time. You have specific goals of either beating the boss or getting kills in a certain order to beat a level. There are also various statues and other objects in each level that you will want to destoy because they hold items, including the items that are required to make a knight join your so you can use them in later battles. I know it sounds confusing it is, and it is one the few games that I think the tutorial is absolutely necessary. In between battles you will have time to level up your knights, combine your weapons and use materials you find to make those weapons stronger. There is the leveling option when means you can play any of the normal monster battles again (not boss battles) and collect new items and experience. However you will not be able to obtain the rare items again.
This is the priestess rocking the battlefield!
Overall, I would have to recommend this game highly but only to certain groups of people. The replay value is extremely high in case you want to go through and try again at collecting all the knights and get good rankings on every map. Also a replay might help you make more sense of the entire storyline. It really is an immersive world that you will want to visit many times. The music is great though it will be slightly repetitive by the time you finish, and the visuals are actually quite nice. Again this game is only for select gamers but if that is you it is a must buy!
Who should buy:
Players looking for games that are completely original
Fans of RPGs that don’t mind a lot of tactical and action elements
Who should pass:
Younger audiences
People who play video games to relax, you won’t feel more relaxed after playing this
I haven’t been much for gaming lately but it doesn’t mean I’m not a geek and when I sit down and play I generally become a little OCD about it, so I have to balance my life. But recently I had the pleasure of picking up the game Lego Battles.
To my knowledge Lego Battles for the DS is the first not cross over Lego game in a while, and as many people know I’m kind of a Lego fanatic so of course I would pick this game up to play. After plugging it in I was immediately drawn to the graphics, which appear sub par to recent games, after the first round I was getting more and more concerned because it appeared to be a bit shallow especially for an RTS. After the first castle campaign I was sold though, the adventure is well worth the price of admission. I would unlock different types of units and when i started to cross genres from Castle to Pirates to Space, I quickly started to see the depth. And just like its other Lego Counter parts they included plenty of extra to collect.
Who Should Buy:
Lego Fans, RTS beginners, and anyone looking for a generally amusing game.
Who Should Steer Clear:
Graphics Junkies, Younger Children (I know it appears that way but its pretty deep in control).
Overall: 7.5/10
PS: Picked up Ghostbusters for the 360 so expect that review soon
5th Cell is getting a lot of press for the upcoming release on the NDS of Scribblenauts. I am definitely intered but I thought it would be usefull to look at some of the other products of this development house. Everyone seems to know about Drawn to Life, the game where you draw parts of the game and make it look however you would like. The game that fewer people know about is the one that came out in the middle of these, Lock’s Quest.
The story of Lock’s Quest is actually not bad, you take control of an aspiring young archineer (half architect, half engineer) who has to defend against the army of Clockwerk who is trying to destroy everything. There are twists in the story that really keep it fresh though. At it’s heart the game is a tower defense game where you build lots of towers with different materials out of source that you receive for destroying the invading armies.
The gameplay does have a few twists that set this title apart a little. First there are traps that you can set for a single wave of enemies that help immensely and they are cheap so sometimes they are the best strategy to employ. The second is your control of Lock during the waves. You have a limited time to build in the middle of waves, but during the waves you can take Lock out to repair your towers or take him out and join the fray in destroying the baddies.
Watch Out! Here they come!
The sound is good, the graphics are interesting and you continuously unlock things which keeps you playing. The multiplayer isn’t bad, it allows you to set up your defenses and then choose what types of bad guys will be going against your opponet. This is interesting because it becomes a guessing game where you try to choose the types they didn’t defend against. The problems for me come because after you beat the 100 days, there is nothing to do. I would have liked an endless mode because it seems like everytime my defense was getting really cool, they changed location on me so I had to start over. I would have liked an Endless mode or some scenarios that kept you in one location a long time.
Overall, I would have to recommend this game for the interesting twists it throws into the tower defense genre. If you have an iPhone there are probably some games that are just as good for cheaper but otherwise this is one of the best tower defense games that I have played. The campaign is long enough that you feel like your get your money’s worth especially since you can get a copy for under $20 now. This game is solid but I wouldn’t put it in the epic category. Once you have you can look forward with me to the release of Scribblenauts, 5th Cell’s up and coming awesome game!
Who should buy:
Fans of Tower Defense games that haven’t had the flood on the iPhone
People who can’t wait for Scribblenauts and want to play with 5th Cell stuff now
Who should pass:
Those who are completely sick of tower defense style games
Let me start out by saying that I am not a Suikoden follower. In fact this was my first Suikoden experience, but I have heard so much about it that I finally decided to give it a shot when it came to the DS. This relatively new title from Konami is pretty basic when it comes to RPG, but there are some things that are significantly different that make it worth checking out for those that really like the RPG genre.
The thing that will stick with me about this game is the fact that there is 108 possible playable characters. I got 95 so feel free to post and gloat if you got more. The story is pretty standard, a big bad guy named the One King wants to unify all the eternities into one world where you lose your choice because you follow the one way that has been established. The hero’s line that he continuously says is “We’ll never know until we try!” which gets really old. There is loads of voice acting which sometimes came off as cheesy, in fact it is one of the first games that The Wife has made fun of while I was playing it. The voice acting and cut scenes do make it feel epic as an RPG on the DS.
The graphics are not terribly notable and the sound was not great but it didn’t drive me crazy either. The magic system revolves around you touching “False chronicles” and each time you do, you receive a new spell to each of your characters. Really building a team consists of finding characters with a good mix of the spells that you like. There are various quests that you can accept that do help to make things interesting, though usually you are just doing it to find out what new playable character you can get out of it.
The leveling system is a bit different because each level is 1000 exp. A character that is underleveled for where you are fighting will get up to 7 levels from a single battle while over leveled characters will get like 30 exp from the same battle even though they are like 10 levels higher. It helps to balance the characters, but I didn’t really enjoy that it forces you to have certain characters so often in your party that it was frustrating to try expand your characters that were at that level.
Overall, Suikoden Tierkreis is a game with some serious things that drive you crazy but a nice 40 hour RPG for the DS. There are so many characters that you don’t feel like you connect with many of them which is definitely a downside. If your are going to give me that many characters, at least have 1 battle when I can use a ton of them in something that feels epic. Though it feels like your team is big enough that you actually could change the world. When I play an RPG I usually over level my characters a bit so that I can enjoy destroying anything, but the experience system makes that nearly impossible which also was kind of annoying. It is basically a solid RPG with some flaws you have to decide if you can overlook.
Who Should Buy:
Suikoden Fans (I don’t need to say this because they already have it.)
Hardcore RPG gamers who don’t mind more of the same
Who Should Pass:
Gamers looking for originality
People new to the genre simply because there are other better complete experiences
Haven’t you always wanted to level up your team of characters so far that nuclear bomb blasts don’t seem to touch them? This is what Disgaea DS by NIS allows you to do. Standard RPG and Strategy games allow you to level to about level 99 and some of the more intense ones allow you to go to level 255. Disgaea however allows those with no life to speak of to arrive at level 9999. This of course would take a ridiculous amount of time, but it is technically possible.
This game was originally published on the PS2 and since I didn’t have a PS2 I never even thought of playing it. Then it was released for both the PSP and the DS with a few differences. The new versions have the availability of Etna mode which changes your main character. In addition there are more unlockable levels and characters available. The other big advantage is the fact that it is portable, which is always a bonus in my book. The PSP has slightly better graphics because of its processor but overall this shouldn’t change any decisions about the game.
The gameplay is really just a slight variant on the typical tactical RPG system. One interesting change is the ability to lift and throw characters to different parts of the board. Everything is done on a grid system and you can essentially equip whatever item you like on any character. The downside being that some characters won’t get better with those weapons very quickly. The cast of characters is fun and the story doesn’t take itself too seriously which for me seems to be a common downfall in this genre.
What sets this game apart is two amazing features that are really the reasons that I always have it with me. First is the Senate system which allows you to pass things through that change the game, for example, harder enemies, or better items in the shop, or opening new levels to you. You bribe the senators and if in the end they still vote against you you can force the issue but this means you are going to have to kill every senator that says no. The downside of this is the fact that everytime you kill them when you see that senator later they are going to hate your idea no matter what it is. Sometimes there is no way around forcing your way through. The second is the item world. Any item call be leveled up and depending on it’s rarity it sometimes can be leveled up a whole lot! This is all done in the item world where every level is random and so your experience will never been the same. You can take your ordinary stick of chewing gum and make it restore all the health you need if you decide to level it up. This is also where the best items of the game are found.
Overall, pick your system and play this game if you have ever thought a strategy game was even slightly interesting. It is an excellent value because there is always more things to do in it.
Who should buy:
Those interested in getting only one game for the next 6 months
All fans of strategy games that enjoy the deep complex experience
Who should pass:
Those who already have a long list of games to play this game can take a lot of time
Of course E3 is some of my favorite times of the year, and this season appears to be no different. These Lego games hold a special place in my heart, as my brother can confirm, I have an entire room dedicated to my Lego addiction. My 7 year old and I can sit down and burn several hours pretty quick, in fact about 6 months ago he decided we needed to unlock all the characters on Lego Star Wars, and since then we play to get 100%. So with Lego Rock Band coming out we were not expecting any new major releases and of course they give us this teaser trailer. So watch it and enjoy and expect a review from me as soon as it hits the shelf.
One of my favorite games on the GBA was Golden Sun. It was an original RPG that had Djinni which you collected. The story was great and it linked to Golden Sun 2 that if you copied your code after beating the first one you could put it into the second one and it would help you later as you played the game. The graphics were stunning for a GBA and could rival many of the NDS games that are now being published. At Nintendo’s press conference today they announced there will be Golden Sun DS coming out in 2010. I might have to break out my GBA and replay these games so I can be ready. I honestly enjoyed the franchise that much.
Check out this picture from www.Engadget.com and their blog on the event. Nothing too clear, but hopefully we will see more soon, because this is one I am excited for!
I will openly admit that when it comes to the Nintendo DS I am a huge fan. I have tons of games and it seems to be the system that I play the most. Readers have probably noticed that a lot of my reviews come on the DS and I really believe it has one of the best libraries of current systems, though it has not yet surpassed the quality of library that existed on the PS2. When Nintendo announced they were making it better last year, I was really excited. However it made it’s way to America and I still haven’t picked one up. Here is a couple of reasons why:
I put off my review because I knew I really wanted to review this game but I hadn’t quite beat it, but here it is late tonight. 
I haven’t been much for gaming lately but it doesn’t mean I’m not a geek and when I sit down and play I generally become a little OCD about it, so I have to balance my life. But recently I had the pleasure of picking up the game Lego Battles.
5th Cell is getting a lot of press for the upcoming release on the NDS of Scribblenauts. I am definitely intered but I thought it would be usefull to look at some of the other products of this development house. Everyone seems to know about Drawn to Life, the game where you draw parts of the game and make it look however you would like. The game that fewer people know about is the one that came out in the middle of these, Lock’s Quest.
Let me start out by saying that I am not a Suikoden follower. In fact this was my first Suikoden experience, but I have heard so much about it that I finally decided to give it a shot when it came to the DS. This relatively new title from 
Haven’t you always wanted to level up your team of characters so far that nuclear bomb blasts don’t seem to touch them? This is what 
One of my favorite games on the GBA was Golden Sun. It was an original RPG that had Djinni which you collected. The story was great and it linked to Golden Sun 2 that if you copied your code after beating the first one you could put it into the second one and it would help you later as you played the game. The graphics were stunning for a GBA and could rival many of the NDS games that are now being published. At Nintendo’s press conference today they announced there will be Golden Sun DS coming out in 2010. I might have to break out my GBA and replay these games so I can be ready. I honestly enjoyed the franchise that much.