Final Fantasy VII Remake isn’t going to live up to expectations

When Square-Enix revealed the long anticipated and much demanded Final Fantasy VII remake in 2015, they finally put their fanbase out of their misery and sent the community into meltdown mode, especially as the same expo saw the announcement of Sega’s Shenmue III. Things have gone decidedly quiet since then however with only the occasional reassuring statement to let fans know that development is still on-track.

[Image: wccftech.com]

This isn’t a post about how I have concerns for the project’s progress though. This is going to be me exploring why I believe that the FFVII remake – no matter the eventual quality of the finished product – will fail to satisfy expectations. This isn’t just baseless doom-mongering and negativity on my part but a stance inspired by videogame history itself which has shown that remakes and sequels to beloved games/franchises have such a microscopic sweet spot to hit if they want to please everybody.

Change too little and the new game can seem unnecessary and can even come off as a quick, lazy money-spinner for a publisher. Alter too much and the developer risks alienating fans of the original products. With the FFVII remake, it is my belief that Square could run the risk of the latter. I have no doubt whatsoever that the finished product will be a fantastic, polished game of high production value in its own right but in the process of thoroughly modernising everything and going down the episodic route it could lose too much of the original’s charm and ‘feel’. To look at one example, the FFVII community has been slightly split in the years following the original game with many not entirely happy with the realistic, sometimes ’emo’ mood that the spin-offs and – in particular – the Advent Children CG movie adopted. FFVII Remake is certainly going to look a truckload more realistic than the world inhabited by Popeye characters in the Playstation original but it’s important that Square don’t try and get all serious and gritty as with more recent Final Fantasy installments.

The game is going for a more action-based, realistic look this time around but will it put off stalwarts? [image: polygon.com]

Speaking personally, I can’t criticise the newer games because I haven’t played them but the battle systems and general gameplay have left me doubtful purely based on the footage I have watched over the years. Obviously, this could simply be me refusing to let go of the Active Time Battle system but on the flipside, I am one of millions of gamers who enjoyed the original on the PS1 and so a remake that behaves like many other action games will be off-putting. It looks a bit Kingdom Hearts-like thus far and while I had no issues with the battle system in those games, I also don’t have any overly fond or nostalgic memories of it either. Like it or not, people like me have to be catered for if you choose to remake a game that is as special as FFVII. Newer FF sequels…not really; they can do as they like and lean more towards the younger gaming generation. It’s called progress.

If you want to see some examples of remakes that succeeded in the black art of remaining true to the structure(s) and feel of the originals while also looking like fresh, modern experiences for newcomers then you need to check out the likes of Yakuza Kiwami, Pokemon FireRed & LeafGreen and last year’s Spyro Reignited Trilogy. All of these were brought right up to (the then) modern standards with minimal meddling with the original game design and mechanics.

Final Fantasy VII Remake is going to be an entirely different beast that will not resemble the original game that much at all and while I reiterate that it will be a great product, I also think it will simply be too different for those that adore the Playstation classic and still regularly embark on play-throughs of the game all these years later. This reasoning aside, it has also been too long, With all of the hype and anticipation that has built up over the past fifteen years or so (remakes were first talked about by Square in the PS2 era!), there’s very little chance for the remake to actually meet these sky-high expectations. This isn’t a damning prediction that I am levelling exclusively at the FFVII remake but at any long-awaited remake or sequel such as Shenmue III, Half Life 3 or Streets of Rage 4.

It doesn’t look like this segment will appear in the remake which is a shame. Direct your thanks to those who would find some way to twist it into an “offense” or social injustice…

You could say then that Square were foolish to even consider greenlighting such an ambitious project that has to be realised in a very precise and specific manner. On the other hand, a lot of the old guard amongst their fanbase have drifted away over the years anyway with hardcore fans who have been there since the early days of FF not gelling with the likes of FFXIII and the the recent MMO style sequels. In this sense, perhaps they don’t fear pissing off the loyalists as much as they might have done ten or fifteen years back. At the end of the day, it will be a great end product and it’s good to see a publisher committing money and manpower to a bring into being something that their fans have pleaded for.

Me personally, I would have opted for a much more mild remake that would have risked less consumer division and taken less time to produce. I would have kept the third-person perspective that they are going with for the town/overworld exploration but ensured that things don’t get too dark by careful use of colours and music. I would have retained the Active Time Battle system (regardless of how outdated it may seem) and given the music a sympathetic mix (i.e. not transforming the OST into the “badass”, techno and rock update that I fear will actually happen) with the option to use the original composition. I would have let the visuals, CG scenes, updated script and a few extra expanded areas here and there do the talking when it comes to the actual updates and new content.

But that’s just my view as a gamer who has a special place in his heart for the original and doesn’t wish to see radical changes that will alter the atmosphere I recall. The remake will be a big event, will be a good game and will likely sell by the bucketload so the opinion of a dusty oldtimer like me doesn’t necessarily mean all that much but there are a lot of us out there and I – sadly – don’t see us all being satisfied come release day. Pleasing everybody is impossible and that’s just a fact.

Consistency is Key

If there’s one thing we don’t see enough of in gaming, it’s consistency. With which franchises and developers can you safely place your hard-earned money for a day one purchase without waiting for the reviews to come in or the Youtube streamers to show you the truth of the final product? The answer is “not many” and it has always been this way. Games that hit the big time and spawn sequels will inevitably fall into one of several traps:

• Eventually the series will go for a sequel too far and interest will drop off once consumers have finally had enough of the same formula.
• On the flipside, a spin-off or radical revamp of a much-loved series will change too much and get universally condemned or – at best – become a “meh” title that purists shun.
• The publisher milks a good thing and turns it into a yearly series. Originality and consistent high quality become diluted and suffer as a result.
• A different developer/publisher takes the reigns and fails to capture the magic of the originals. See the likes of Spyro and Crash in the PS2 era for example.

Unforgiveable glitches and performance issues aside, Spyro: Enter the Dragonfly wasn’t a terrible game…it was simply bland and lacking any of the charm of the Insomniac games.

So what is the secret formula that can produce consistency over a long period of time? I’m not sure that there is a concrete answer and there is perhaps an element of circumstance and dumb luck involved. Additionally, it’s important to remember that quality and consistency are also subject to personal taste/opinion. For example, mainstream gamers may say that the Onechanbara series is consistently a load of weird shit with terrible production values but avid fans of the series will say that as long as the games stay as they are then they are consistent in a positive way.

These things aside, I have decided on three ingredients of videogame development that I believe can contribute to consistent high quality plus a developer and series to help illustrate each point.

“It’s done when it’s done”

Say what you will about Rockstar’s Grand Theft Auto series but the developer doesn’t rush the next game out, no matter how loud the fanbase is calling for a remake of Vice City or a game that is even bigger than the last one. A new GTA simply arrives when it arrives and the consistency in the results is staggering. Each new game is bigger than the last, more feature-packed than the last, prettier than the last and all of this without sacrificing quality. Every game has small glitches but GTA games don’t arrive as buggy messes that need enormous day one patches to repair. They also manage to remain relevant and the series has avoided stagnation over the years as a result. The only deal-breaker is personal preference and for some gamers, the violence and outrageous moments are a turn-off but this aside, you cannot deny the quality of the completed product. Truly a safe bet for a pre-order.

Love

I’m technically cheating here – since I’m not focusing on one single game/franchise but a developer’s entire output – but this is my blog so screw the rules. You may recognise Vanillaware’s Dragon’s Crown up above and that’s because Vanillaware are a developer that clearly pours a lot of love into their games. The art is always beautiful and the team make the games that they want to make based on influences close to their heart. There is also an element of “it’s done when it’s done” with this developer in particular because there is always a long wait between new releases given that the team is relatively small BUT the wait is always worth it. Basically, if you adored the likes of Odin Sphere, Dragon’s Crown and Muramasa: The Demon Blade then you can safely slap your money down on day one, whatever comes next.

This long gestation time allows Vanillaware to put a lot of themselves into the game(s) and ultimately, they are making said games because they want to, not because some marketing bloke in a suit has ordered them to get to work on whatever’s hot right now. Of course, this way of working can also go the opposite way when a superstar developer uses his position to indulge personal fancies and the results are interesting games that suffer with horrible mechanics or dull gameplay, all the originality being confined to plot and wacky characters (see some of Suda51’s less critically acclaimed releases for example). On the whole however, I see love as absolutely essential for a series to remain of a consistent high quality. After all, if a developer truly loves a game then they won’t be satisfied with a shoddy hack job.

Constant Enhancement

Sega’s Yakuza series is almost a contradiction to the very factors that cause the stagnation of videogame franchises. After all, they have been pumping these games out at a crazy rate for a good while now with the older titles being completely remade at the same time that brand-new sequels are in development. We already have four Yakuza games on the PS4 for example which is noteworthy given how the first five (not including the two Ryu ga Gotoku Kenzan spin-offs and Dead Souls) were spread across two hardware generations. How many will we have on the PS4 by the time the platform is obsolete? Who knows.

Additionally, while the games improve technically and visually, you are basically doing the same thing every time: working through a cinematic, Japanese crime saga with many, many sidestories and distractions, beating up thugs and exploring Japanese cities/culture. Yakuza avoids the repetition factor however because each new game remains familiar enough to veterans whilst constantly introducing enough new stuff to surprise. These enhancements range from significant updates to the combat engine to smaller details such as new mini-games. Yakuza 4 introduced multiple characters/storylines for example while Yakuza 5 pumped even more fresh content into the game in the form of in-depth, character specific sidestories such as Kiryu’s taxi racing and Shinada’s baseball missions. Basically you know what you are getting but there are always enough enhancements and additions to keep the series feeling fresh. How Sega consistently maintain the overall quality and production value of the series while their other franchises (Sonic for example) are all over the place is something even I cannot answer properly however.

This constant, gradual enhancement is necessary for a long-running series to endure. Too much too soon and hardcore fans run away. Change too little and consumers will eventually ask “what’s the point” and not rush out day one.

These are just my thoughts on how to achieve consistency. Are there any other major contributors that I’ve overlooked? Let me know in the comments!

R.I.P Stan Lee

I haven’t made any posts relating to comic books here on DS90 Gaming as of yet (though I did have a few mini reviews in mind) but even so, I felt that it was impossible to ignore the passing of a comic book legend. To say that I was surprised to hear that Stan Lee had passed away would be a lie because I’d been expecting the worst for a while given his age but I was still sad to hear the news. Usually I’m not moved by celebrity deaths (as cold as that may sound) but it’s a little different when it’s somebody from “our” community who gave us so much and seemed like a genuinely nice guy.

Comics were a form of escapism for me in my adolescent years and I got into the world of Marvel through Spiderman and The Avengers, religiously buying the UK reprints (that are still sold here) on a monthly basis. It was from there that I first discovered the classic material and then the wealth of original US-published material that we don’t always see on this side of the pond.

This was my favourite era of Spiderman

My preferred era of Marvel comics was the 1990’s and all that came before. I stopped caring after the onslaught of mega, universe-consuming crossovers that began with House of M, Civil War and Secret Invasion. To me, It felt like Marvel overplayed the shock value card with constant deaths, major shake-ups and the end of self-contained books. Constantly resurrecting dead characters and undoing the emotional impact of their original demise also began to grate on me. I didn’t read very much beyond the aforementioned crossovers (which seem so long ago now) but I have had a look at various storylines from the following years and decided that current Marvel really isn’t for me.

The 90’s and previous were just so much more colourful and the artwork more raw and less computer-enhanced. Plus, the comics could be dark when they wanted to be dark (see the early 90’s Ghost Rider run for example) so there’s no argument to say that the older stuff was more ‘kiddie’ and less serious. I really cannot be bothered with current Marvel and the movie universe(s) which receives such massive hype. I’m not saying that any of this is crap in any way (because it most certainly isn’t) but it just isn’t for me and I’m comfortable with that.

Anyway, all that is a subject of its own for another time. The reason I talked about it at all was because Stan Lee is heavily intertwined with 60’s/70’s/80’s/90’s Marvel – my personal golden era. This was a time when he was creating new characters, penning the scripts or editing for the company. I’d just like to say “thanks” for creating so many fantastic characters and capturing my imagination over the years. You will be missed.

Excelsior!

Conan [Playstation 2]

Note: This review is part of a series I am going to call “Resurrected Reviews”, essentially stuff that I wrote for previous (now deceased) blogs and review topics on various gaming forums over the years. I have dragged them kicking-and-a-screaming into the harsh light of the present day and revamped them where necessary. Some may say “Rehash” but I say “Recycling”.

Release: 2004 | Developer: Cauldron | Publisher: TDK Mediactive | Also On: PC, Xbox, Gamecube

“What does not destroy me, makes me stronger”

When talking about the videogame adventures of Robert E Howard’s legendary barbarian warrior, most will be more familiar with the PS3 game by THQ, a very average 3D adventure game that I personally found to be akin to a poor man’s God of War. The game that I will be talking about now (also titled simply ‘Conan’) came before on the PS2 and Gamecube and was published by TDK, developed by Cauldron. It’s completely unrelated to the THQ game but would it be better for it? Well…

Picture this: after a mere ten minutes of gameplay, I was staring dully at the TV screen with mental despair taking hold. I was thinking, why oh why are there no good Conan games? The PS3 game was an un-enjoyable slog to the finish after just a few hours of playtime and there are no others that I know of aside from the PC Age of Conan MMO which I can’t be arsed with as I simply don’t ‘do’ PC games. The only other Conan game I have glimpsed came in the form of a few screenshots for an unreleased Atari Jaguar side-scrolling beat ‘em up (the very definition of obscure!) so I was desperate for this PS2 effort to satisfy the Conan fan in me. But no, it just had to be another bitter pill of disappointment.

Why are there no decent Conan games? Why? The films were great (well, the first one was. Conan the Destroyer isn’t quite the same and the remake is just pointless) but the books were even better. I’ve read every one of Robert E. Howard’s Conan stories and they were brilliant. Between these and the movie adaptations, there is a world of resource and inspiration for some good Conan games so why…are…there…no…good…Conan…games? WHY? WHY? WHERE ARE THE GOOD CONAN GAMES?!?

Whew. That’s better. Talk about your pent up frustration. In the spirit of Conan himself, I persevered and so with pad in hand I asked Crom for the strength to beat this game and if he wouldn’t listen? To hell with him.

To give Conan some credit, the game is at least faithful to the source material when it comes to locations, weapons and even the characterisation of Conan himself. This isn’t Conan as played by Arnie but the real Conan from E. Howard’s books and – as a fan of those tomes – I really appreciated what Cauldron did to keep things legit and authentically presented. The ‘epic’ music is generic but a good fit for the game (nothing else to say about it to be frank).

Gameplay revolves dispatching enemies with various button combinations. You have light attacks, heavy attacks, grabs and a block button. These are utilised to pull off preset combos and by killing enemies the player earns points to spend on unlocking new, flashier moves – standard stuff. Movement however is really clunky and despite using a few different pads, Conan sometimes simply refused to move in the desired direction when changing course. It didn’t cause too many unnecessary deaths during my play-through but it’s pretty piss-poor when a game makes you question the condition of your controllers, especially when it turns out that they are all working correctly.

This screen is actually from the Xbox version but I’m not sure I care enough.

If you do run out of health though then Conan is transported to the realm of Crom where you must defeat enemies in an enclosed arena in order to be fully restored to the spot where Conan snuffed it. Sounds pretty sweet right? Especially when you consider that the feature has unlimited uses. It’s actually the opposite though because these arena battles are much easier than battles in the mortal realm making Conan’s resurrections assured and the threat of enemies neutered. If you can’t ever technically be killed then where is the challenge? Conan’s apparent immortality also makes a mockery of boss battles because you can be infinitely restored to the spot with the enemy’s life bar still depleted.

The only way that you don’t get a chance to fight for Conan’s restoration is by falling foul of environmental hazards such as holes or traps (apparently Conan hasn’t died as a warrior thus denying him the right to be resurrected) but this still doesn’t excuse the ability to ignore strategy completely and abuse this mechanic. Ultimately, I wondered if there was any point at all in trying to utilise the game’s full range of moves because you may as well repeat the same handful of basic sword combos while spamming this revival ability. It’s certainly possible to beat the game this way with little trouble.

You can switch between swords, axes and maces throughout the game but again, unless you need the mace for beating down armoured foes more effectively, there’s no incentive to bother. There’s also a running side quest to locate and assemble all four pieces of the Atlantean Sword but any exploration is voided by the fact that a) environments are incredibly linear and bland and b) only one of the pieces is easy to miss with the others all in plain sight or after beating a boss. The Atlantean Sword deals with enemies in one hit and shamefully, I even killed the final boss with one wild swipe! Who tested this shit?

Braving the harsh elements and wild animals. At least the feel of the character and setting(s) is there.

The main problem with this game is the clunkiness and just general, basic dullness of everything. It really is an exercise in getting from A to B by killing everything in between, pulling a few levers and avoiding pitfalls. Lots of games have adopted this approach in the past and have turned out really well but Conan is just so uninteresting to sit through with repetitive scraps that don’t ever offer something new or stylish to at least paper over the shortcomings. It does say something that my highlight of the game was the quick cinematic of Conan punching a camel in a marketplace, a reference to a humorous scene in the original Arnie film. It made me smile at least when nothing else did.

The sole reason I persevered to the end was because the authenticity to the original books was spot on and I still wanted to see what happened in the end. I can imagine a non-Conan fan playing this game and binning it after a few levels because as much as I appreciated the videogame renditions of stuff from the books, it was always a case of sitting down and saying “right, got to get this bloody Conan game finished so I can play something else” rather than enjoying the game. I’m bored just writing about it.

Now that I’m nearing the conclusion of this review, I’m looking back over my words and thinking that I haven’t really gone into much detail but the truth is, I just don’t have anything else to say. So…is this an angry rant ending on a mellow note? Not until I’ve gone over the game’s miserable save system! I knew there was something else I hated about Conan – must have blocked it out of my mind for a moment there. Well, there’s no use in burying my head in the sand so I’ll talk about it.

Conan needs to possess a crystal to save the game. You can save anywhere (good) BUT you can only carry four of the damn things at any one time (bad) and let me tell you: there’s nothing worse than trying to make your last crystal go as far as possible only to fall down a hidden pit or be killed by a barely-visible trap because it means slogging back through the whole unsaved section all over again, slaying the same boring enemies and looking at the same uninspiring scenery (extremely, diarrhoea-grade bad). Who thinks that weird save systems like this are a good idea? Fuck these people. A game this underwhelming didn’t need to be any worse but congratulations developers, you managed it.

Overall Thoughts

It’s a shame that the gameplay is so uninspiring and bland because the source material was treated really well with this one. Conan is at least authentic in spirit but that means little when you barely want to play the actual game. Another missed oppurtunity.

Book Review – Joyland [Stephen King, 2013]

As an avid Stephen King follower that has read almost everything by the author, I have to begin this review by admitting that I find most of his modern output lives in the shadows cast by earlier, more horror-centric classics such as The Stand, Salem’s Lot and Christine. Don’t get me wrong though: I love the newer books and never fail to get into them proper but it’s rare that I can wax lyrical with the same praise that I had for the old stuff.

Joyland was an exception though. The book is short by Stephen King standards and – here in the UK at least – was published under the “Hard Case Crime” banner so it was a little different straight away. In fact, I’d somehow not heard of Joyland at all until I was given it as a Christmas gift back in 2013.

The story is short but powerful and contains a small splash of the supernatural but is largely grounded in reality and tells the story of Devin Jones, a young college student who takes a summer job at a carnival-style amusement park called Joyland. It is there that he meets new friends, has new experiences and tries to move on from the first girl to break his heart. There is a central plot strand running through Joyland that focuses on a series of unsolved, heartless murders – the last one occuring at Joyland – that Devin finds himself investigating but this isn’t really the main premise of the book.

Joyland is actually a story about love, being young and foolish and growing up. We’ve all been there at Devin’s age and through his eyes I was able to recall my own similar experiences, thoughts and heartache. I found that I really cared about the characters in this book – Devin especially – and wanted the best ending for them but as we know from real life, the ideal isn’t always possible and our naive, young selves have to learn these lessons along the road.

As I mentioned earlier, the book is short yet King still manages to squeeze a lot of emotion, vivid detailing and character development into such a limited space (283 pages). It packs a real punch without being a novel of three to four times the size and captured my interest so much more than many of his modern, bigger books. Most of all though, the story and characters are incredibly endearing and it was the kind of book that I genuinely didn’t want to finish because I simply couldn’t get enough of the world that Stephen King had created within the pages of Joyland.

Overall I would recommend Joyland to any Stephen King fan without hesitation but even if you aren’t familiar with his work then I would be just as firm with my recommendation because this is a great story with very relatable characters that anybody can enjoy without needing to be onboard with the horror/supernatural themes that often form the basis of King’s books.

In addition, this book has also brought the Hard Case Crime line of books to my attention so I now have a new avenue of reading to explore…

Onechanbara Z Kagura with NoNoNo! [Playstation 3]

Note: This review is part of a series I am going to call “Resurrected Reviews”, essentially stuff that I wrote for previous (now deceased) blogs and review topics on various gaming forums over the years. I have dragged them kicking-and-a-screaming into the harsh light of the present day and revamped them where necessary. Some may say “Rehash” but I say “Recycling”.

Onechanbara has always been a bit pervy but it does feel like the development team hit new heights with a new gen of hardware at their disposal.

When I completed Onechanbara Z Kagura with NoNoNo! (more on that nutty subtitle later) for the PS3, I contemplated reviewing this import curio but eventually decided not to bother. Why? Because it’s flippin’ tough to form a stack of paragraphs for a game that has the player hacking up zombies as girls in skimpy bikinis – that’s why. There’s scant room to expand on this paper-thin concept. Z Kagura is one of those games that you simply cannot sit on the fence with; you either feverishly imported a copy as soon as it was released OR are currently about to click away from this blog to go and read something more highbrow on a different site…a detailed analysis on particle theory perhaps.

What I will say however is that Z Kagura is by far the most enjoyable and accessible Onechanbara game I have yet played and I have tried them all aside from the Japanese-only PSP instalment and the gloriously-titled Bikini Samurai Squad on the Xbox 360 (a system I don’t own). The older games felt punishing and extremely bare-bones with excruciatingly sluggish levelling up systems and the less said about the hellish Wii waggle-a-thon controls in Bikini Zombie Slayers, the better. Z Kagura immediately struck me as easier to stomach for long periods of time and the game generally felt better presented with solid controls, a compliant manually adjustable camera and more fluid hack ‘n slash action than ever before.

(But wait; this is turning into a review after all isn’t it? Fuck.)

Otherwise it was business as usual and thanks to the greatly improved aesthetics and sense of progression (upgrades are much easier to afford and equip than in past games), it was certainly no hardship to be tasked with cutting down crazy numbers of zombies and other freakish abominations while playing as an unsuitably garbed heroine. You can switch freely between the buxom bikini-clad Kagura and her more conservatively dressed sister Saaya but thanks to the wonders of the customisation mode (or ‘co-ordinate’ mode as the game dubs it), you can stick Saaya in the same bikini as her sister for double the jiggly boobs and gratuitously exposed bottoms. Look; until there actually is a zombie apocalypse, nobody can say for a fact that these kinds of outfits aren’t suitable for a desperate battle against the undead can they?

Kagura had guys lining up to buy her a drink. Most non-interested girls politely decline but some reply with the business end of a massive blade. Life lesson: stay single; you’ll live longer.

Kagura can go to war against the zombies with either a pair of katanas or her long-reaching blades that she swings about on the end of a chain just like Kratos from the God of War series. Her sister meanwhile can flick between fighting with her fists and feet to using a chainsaw. It was nice to have a variety of weapons rather than another all-swords affair but I didn’t really gel with Saaya’s hands-on melee style or her cumbersome chainsaw attacks so tended to stick with Kagura. Her chained blades are useful when you need to fight from a distance and the katanas are just that much more speedy as well as visually pleasing.

The linear nature of the series hasn’t changed though. You still have to eliminate all enemies within set areas before moving onto the next zone and occasionally facing off against an ugly boss. Thankfully though, the combat itself was much more enjoyable this time largely due to the decent camera (manipulated freely with the right analogue stick) and easy to execute combos that devastate zombie hordes, sending blood spraying everywhere in a comically over-the-top fashion. The rampage state (induced by doing enough killing to fill a blood meter) is still here and you still have to routinely clean your weapons to keep them effective but somehow it all feels a vast step up from those earlier PS2 games which were fun playthings but ultimately too frustrating beyond the first few stages to properly enjoy. There are some brief cut scenes here and there but this is a Japanese import so don’t expect to understand any of it and certainly don’t expect an English-language release to become available because – y’know – this shit is just too weird for us over here apparently. That said, there isn’t much that a language barrier can do to complicate a hack ‘n slash game when all you need to understand are the concepts of swords, zombies and breasts.

There’s blood. Lots of it.

Speaking of weird, there’s that subtitle to address: Onechanbara Z Kagura with NoNoNo! That’s not the sound of the game’s heroines protesting as the developers dump them into a zombie apocalypse with bikinis for protection; it’s the name of Z Kagura’s special guest character, unlocked by completing at least five of the game’s ‘Quests’ (a screen of various targets to meet i.e. collect enough yellow orbs, use enough items in battle, clear missions without switching characters etc.). This is an Onechanbara game though so it’s no great shock when NoNoNo! turns out to be a blue-haired maid with ginormous boobs and a ludicrously round rear end that could only exist in such a smutty videogame as this where developers have sat at their workstations playing God when it comes to plausible anatomy.

NoNoNo! fights while cheerfully dancing about and shooting at zombies with some sort of sci-fi laser pistol and…yeah. Because Japan. I had a brief look online and couldn’t find out who this character was supposed to be. I can only assume that she’s some sort of Japanese idol or ‘vocaloid’ character similar to Hatsune Miku but as much as I love all things Japan, I’m clearly not Otaku enough to know the truth about NoNoNo! (searching on Google brought up a Swedish band of the same name). Anyway, I didn’t particularly enjoy playing as NoNoNo! over Kagura or Saaya so I did feel a little deflated after all that work for the unlock but there was at least her tasteful and conservative rampage mode costume, certain to please progressive gamers:

Obey the ‘CAUTION’ tape.

So it’s ridiculous, gory and sexy but there were some things that I have to grumble about. First and foremost are the numerous glitches. I experienced a few nasty ones:

• Getting stuck in the boundary fencing during a boss battle and being unable to avoid being beaten to death or fight back.
• Hitting a zombie through a boundary fence and being unable to clear all enemies from the area in question.
• Falling through some scenery and getting stuck inside before falling again into a horrible, blurry black abyss of glitchy hell.

All of these required software resets and generally gave me little faith in the game’s stability, leaving me waiting for the next game-ruining gremlin to pop-up. This wouldn’t really be something you could moan about too much on the older PAL PS2 games since they were cheap, budget affairs that didn’t warrant any sort of expectations. Importing is expensive though and Z Kagura was more or less the same price as a brand-new, full price PS3 game for a sealed copy so these bugs irked me more than usual. That said, expecting a lot of polish from an Onechanbara game is like expecting a Sharknado sequel to stand alongside Citizen Cane.

Another issue is that you won’t be able to access the game’s DLC unless you mess about with multiple PSN accounts. It’s not a strike against the game itself of course but it is a shame because Z Kagura’s add-ons include customisation parts, new outfits and even Aya + Saki from the previous Onechanbara games as playable characters. On a side note, a quick images search online shows that some of the DLC outfits are so skimpy that the player might as well sell their imagination on ebay because they likely won’t need it anymore. Who said DLC was cynical?

These few niggles aside however, I still stand by my decision to rate Z Kagura as the best Onechanbara game so far. I haven’t really criticised the linearity or simple nature of the game because to expect anything else by now would be foolish and it’s almost a part of the series’ charm in a crappy way. If a studio such as Platinum were given the keys then we might see something truly extraordinary but until then, this is bizarre Japanese budget gaming at its most enjoyable. My only advice would be to skip ahead to the sequel, Z2 Chaos, which received a worldwide release on PS4 and should be an even better game at a more affordable, non-import price. Unless you really must play as NoNoNo! of course…

Overall Thoughts

So rubbish, it’s amazing. That’s always been the Onechanbara way and it’s no different with Z Kagura. You already know if you will enjoy this so you really don’t need my seal of approval.

 

 

Soulcalibur VI is a miracle

At the time of writing this post, it is Monday the 22nd of October. Soulcalibur VI was released on Friday the 19th and quite honestly, I’m still getting over how impressed I am with the game. Obviously, I knew that the game was going in the right direction from all of the previews and teasers that showed off a more nostalgic character roster harking back to SC, SCII and SCIII but I deliberately held off on knowing too much which may be why I was so pleasantly surprised when I had the actual game in my hands at long last.

It’s great to see Tira back with her SCIII “sexy green rags” and even that decidedly non-15th century hair colour.

In short, this game feels a lot closer to SCII and SCIII as far as I’m concerned. More competitive players might feel otherwise but as somebody who has heavily enjoyed the series from the very beginning, I feel qualified to say that. I absolutely abhorred the reinvention that was SCV so it is absolutely joyful to discover that – Critical Edge ‘super’ moves aside – literally everything about that game has been chucked into the dumpster, hopefully in the most unceromonious way possible.

Gone are the new characters and descendants/disciples that nobody asked for in the first place. Gone are all the new gameplay mechanics that they introduced for SCV. Those super moves are still cinematic and damaging but this time, they don’t feel quite so decisive and the meter that governs their use appears to fill at a more sedate pace. There is also some single-player content this time in the form of a main story mode and a secondary story mode which involves some levelling-up, side-missions and attractive production value. I haven’t gotten anywhere near finishing the latter yet but it feels like it could take some time so that’s nice.

I’m also extremely satisfied to see the classic Guard Impact feature return with no restriction. SCV made GI a meter-dependant technique which (in my opinion at least) killed the gameplay. Guard Impact was always about mastering the timing and committing to that risk vs reward element just like with the parrying in Street Fighter III. It separated button-mashers from practiced players and was a staple of the series so it is fantastic to have it back in a free-to-use capacity.

The best way to die in battle (if you have weird, perverse ideas like me anyway…) returns thanks to the re-inclusion of Sophitia.

Overall it simply feels like the development team have poured a lot of love into Soulcalibur VI. I have read that this game NEEDS to do well at retail or Namco-Bandai may very well can the series once and for all. SCV wasn’t ‘supposed’ to happen after all and only saw the light of day due to internal resistance to the idea of the series being put away in storage. It then sold poorly so perhaps Project Soul were permitted to make this game more to their tastes as opposed to reinventing Soulcalibur again in accordance to the wishes of marketing men.

The only negatives I have to report so far are pretty minor niggles. ‘Soul Points’ (used to ‘pay’ for unlocking certain customisation parts) are pretty tough to earn offline and the 5000 Gold > 100SP exchange rate within the Libra of Soul mode is pretty rough. I have no doubt that Soul Points are easier to earn by playing online (it’s usually the case with any of these reward systems in modern fighting games) but as I don’t actually have a Playstation Plus sub, I can’t comment on that side of things right now. The other mini-moan is directed at the character creator mode itself and the fact that the bulk of the parts are exactly the same as those we have been using to build characters with for several generations of SC games now. Some fresh bits and pieces would have been nice.

Those small issues aside, I’m loving this game. It’s been great to leap back in with my ‘main’ – Sophitia – and instantly get back into the groove with all of her well-practiced moves. I intend to learn Zasalamel and Tira next since those are two more of my favourites, Zasalamel in particular being a character that I wished for pre-reveal but didn’t expect to actually see in SCVI given that this game takes place before SCIII (Zasalamel’s debut). I’m guilty of being a cynical old git when it comes to modern gaming so the fact that SCVI has exceeded my expectations and shocked me with how much it appeals to the SC series veteran in me feels like a small miracle, especially following SCV which I didn’t think I would ever get over.

Stay tuned and I will get some pictures up soon of the collector’s edition (European version).

Sprung: The Dating Game [DS]

Note: This review is part of a series I am going to call “Resurrected Reviews”, essentially stuff that I wrote for previous (now deceased) blogs and review topics on various gaming forums over the years. I have dragged them kicking-and-a-screaming into the harsh light of the present day and revamped them where necessary. Some may say “Rehash” but I say “Recycling”.

If the back of the game’s box doesn’t make you question your life decisions i.e. buying this game then not much else will, I’m afraid to say.

If the recent coverage of relatively mainstream games on this blog has failed to ignite your interest then I sincerely hope that this review of Sprung: The Dating Game for the DS will go some way to making amends. To the gentleman sitting in the back corner of the room there: recoiling in horror was indeed the correct response. We’re heading a bit further off the beaten track this time and we may find ourselves in the tangled undergrowth where anything could be lying in wait; woeful software for handheld gaming devices for instance.

A few important side notes before we continue:

1. People handed over £25-£30 of their hard earned cash for this at the DS launch!

2. Some people out there (they won’t show their faces for the shame) would have bought this back in April 2005 instead of the likes of Mario 64 DS or Warioware Touched. Christ. I mean…I’m all about personal tastes and all that but still…Christ.

I’m not going to pull any punches here; this game is crap. However, I’m a reasonable chappie capable of spotting redeeming qualities in most games and I firmly believe that too many gamers these days rush to use the “worst game ever” judgement. In my experience, most disagreeable games are merely average or flawed with merit-worthy aspects. I’ve played hundreds of different games across many consoles and I can honestly say that I could count the truly awful ones on less than ten fingers. They simply don’t exist in the quantities that are made out. Unfortunately for Sprung, it easily manages to make it onto my Worst Games I’ve Ever Played roll-call.

You know what to do here. Get her [edited for obscenities]

Without a doubt, this should be the undisputed worst game in the DS’ European launch line-up but it is spared that accolade due to the existence of Ping Pals, a title that was nothing more than a tarted up version of FREE software built into the DS from day one yet PP was expected to sell to customers for real money (lolz etc.).

Now I don’t have anything against dating games per se as there have been some really quirky and interesting examples produced in Japan (such as Konami’s Toki Meki Memorial series) that I’d love to play but the language barrier is a big problem. More recent examples have been a bit too much for our Western tastes which simply (and rightly so) do not gel with the concept of chatting up digital schoolgirls with obscenely voluminous water balloon knockers but there are alternatives that won’t have you checking the skies for black helicopters. If Sprung was intended to be the Western response to the Japanese games however then the developers failed and I’m going to explain why.

To start with, the story is a load of stereotypical rubbish about a group of college friends going off to a ski resort to have a good time. You can choose to play as either a boy or a girl and the entire game from there on in is literally just a series of conversations with other people on the mountain. Most of these exchanges involve you trying to chat somebody up in a park, club or bar but others are supposed to be humorous and some are just downright bizarre. ‘Gameplay’ boils down to choosing from a preset selection of lines on the touch screen and trying to say the right things to advance the conversation in the correct direction. Remember when you bought your shiny new DS for those revolutionary new ways of interacting with your games and all the innovative possibilities that the touch-screen might offer? Yeah – I do too.

Decisions, decisions…

There are so many problems with this basic game premise that it’s difficult to know where to start. First up, it’s a bit boring isn’t it? Sitting there and just tapping away at lines of wordzzzzz..zzzz…The boredom is also complimented by infuriating frustration as it quickly becomes apparent that the ‘right’ things to say to NPC characters are the things that you’d never expect and when most of the conversations are so bloody weird in the first place, selecting the correct options is a lottery. Additionally you can only get so far with making the wrong decisions before you fail the chapter and have to start all over again. ‘Miserable’ and ‘brain-rotting’ are apt descriptions for the typical mental state that Sprung will induce after just a short while with the game. You start to analyse this software a little too deeply i.e. is Sprung telling me that I should tell a woman whatever it is they want to hear in order to stop them slamming their legs shut? (protip: don’t use this game as any form of ‘training’)

There are also various items that you can use at key moments but you’d have more luck cracking a combination safe than deciphering when to use them and with which NPC. Just in case you needed an extra layer of cryptic obscurity of course. But the worst is still to come, oh yes it is.

The game throws you a lifeline by offering checkpoints which, on paper, is a great idea. Some of the chapters are very long so not having to re-do the entire thing over due to an inevitable error should be a relief but in practice these checkpoints have a downright sinister side. You see, saying the wrong thing sometimes means that certain text selections don’t pop up further on in the chapter. This is already bad enough because you will unwittingly play on, unaware that an earlier mistake has made it impossible to complete a chapter and so you proceed until its Game Over. Huzzah for checkpoints then eh? You wish…

Let’s be honest: this guy looks like a jerk without Becky having to say it.

In a heinous turn of events, making that critical mistake before a checkpoint means that you can return to that checkpoint as many times as you like but it will be impossible to correct said error and you will always be left with the same strand of dud responses post-checkpoint. You can’t backtrack because you are locked into restarting from the checkpoint and you can’t talk your way out of it because every available line will only lead to dating doom since the options you need won’t appear due to that mistake before the checkpoint. Did anybody test this bullshit? Clearly not.

Are there any positives? Well, the cartoon-like character art is pretty good but otherwise…no! The “gameplay” is about as inspiring as an empty void, the DS’ unique features are all wasted and the humour is as funny as a funeral on a rainy day. It all adds up to a nasty maelstrom of frustration and tedium that must be binned off with all haste to preserve one’s sanity. Sprung’s tag-line is “The game where everybody scores” but it seems to me that they forgot to add “an all-expenses paid trip to the sanatorium”. It must have not fitted on the box.

Why would anybody play this shit instead of doing the real thing? Who was it aimed at? At least Japanese dating sims have an anime charm and far eastern weirdness that makes them appealing for us Western gamers. Sprung on the other hand has literally nothing to offer apart from negative vibes and a guaranteed bad mood when you finally switch the console off (hopefully after no more than five minutes of suffering and even that would be showing the game some saintly generosity…). It may seem like I’ve barely described this game but that’s because there’s nothing to discuss. You click on lines of text and stare at character portraits hoping that something, anything else will happen but it never does.

If you see Sprung on the pre-owned shelves for a few quid and are curious then don’t be. They say that curiosity killed the cat and if you were to compare yourself to that proverbial cat then you’d be sprawled in an upsetting heap in some gutter after being hit by a bus at 50mph should you give in to curiosity. I paid five English pounds for this game to see what it was like and that was embarrassing enough but if I’d paid £25 on release? I would have killed myself as a bare minimum response to such epic masochism and stupidity.

Overall Thoughts

Playing Sprung is like taking a hot date to bed then discovering that you’ve contracted a multitude of STD’s. Heed this public service announcement and avoid, avoid, avoid.

Need For Speed Underground 2 [Playstation 2]

I have a strange relationship with EA’s Need for Speed Underground games. Despite always being a big car person (or ‘petrolhead’), I looked down on these games when they were current because they tapped into a street racing subculture which appeared far more glamorous in Japan or the US while here in the UK, it was associated with ‘ricers’ or ‘chavs’ building ugly, thunderous monstrosities out of Citroen Saxos or Peugeot 206’s. I was busier playing my intellectual JRPG’s and skillful fighting games while the masses were buying NFSU in droves.

There was also a stigmata associated with EA during the PS2 era if you ran in certain gaming circles. It was the impression that they only slapped their name on yearly cash-cow updates, average licensed fare and software that they could sell via cynical marketing which tapped into what teenage boys of the mid 00’s wanted. So football, loud cars and tits then.

It probably didn’t help that I eventually played the original Underground and wasn’t that impressed. However, I have been heavily re-involved with cars and the ‘scene’ over the last 6-7 years and in an ironic twist of fate, I now actually MISS the days of The Fast & The Furious movies, street racing culture and magazines like Max Power with topless models draped over ridiculous cars. Most of this has evaporated and with the constant droning message about road users needing to be responsible as well as the ‘lads mags’ being killed off (because sexism…whatever), the world feels like a more sterilised and straight place.

So I was ready to give NFSU2 a chance after snagging a cheap copy in a bundle of PS2 games. It is after all, one of the better-regarded games in the series with a bit of a following.

Urban cityscape and a nitrous-fuelled motion blur: welcome back to the mid 00’s.

The first thing that hit me was how good the game still looked. ‘Jaggies’ and outdated textures are pretty minimal and the car models are fantastic. As a petrolhead, I can safely say that all of the cars in this game are modelled highly accurately with a nice level of detail down to the correct badges and original exterior equipment. This was a nice surprise because I admit I was expecting worse from an annual EA update, perhaps a mistaken presumption that the game would have been blasted out by the developers in time for its intended release with a lack of polish. But no, the visuals and those cars look a lot better than many other racers of the generation and hold up incredibly well today.

EA added in a free-roam structure to NFSU2 as well and this really elevated it above the first game. Simply speeding about the city to different race events is enjoyable and even though the ‘free’ aspect is obviously limited by being stuck inside a car, it’s much more preferable to selecting races from a menu. Most circuit and sprint events use sections of the city too so getting familiarised with the many corners and shortcuts while in free-roam mode definitely helps when it comes to the races.

Race events are varied with circuit and sprint events joined by drift challenges (score more points than opponents), drag races and the new ‘Street X’ event which consists of small, tight courses that take place in car parks or (for some reason) building sites. These are more about acceleration, handling and taking the best racing lines. Finally there are the Underground Racing League events. These are the biggies that take place on proper race tracks and progress the game’s career mode. You are able to use a dyno and test track(s) to custom tune your car for each event, settings that are auto-loaded upon entering each style of event which does at least offer a bit more depth.

You have to start somewhere with cars like Vauxhall’s Corsa.

Progressing the career mode also means meeting the requirements of various sponsors that sign up to your cause. These demands are pretty straightforward and involve winning a set amount of events as well as sponsor races which pay out a lot more cash. You also need to get your car featured on a set number of tuning magazine and DVD covers and this is achieved by raising the star rating of your ride’s visual appearance until the call comes in for you to hightail it to the photographer’s location.

The only crappy thing about this aspect in my personal opinion is that it forces you to go all in and fit every conceivable modification possible such as neon underlighting, carbon body panels and hydraulics. So if you’re like me and prefer minimalism or a stock appearance then it ain’t going to cut it with the sponsors. It also means paying for components then having to continually replace them with ‘better’ versions down the line as parts are gradually unlocked, an artificial method of extending the game’s life but completely expected. I kept a separate Nissan 240SX that received the visual mods purely for this side of things then spent the rest of my cash on performance upgrades for my other cars that I could then ‘tastefully’ modify on the outside.

Still, the magazine and DVD covers made me smile and took me back to that period in time that I talked about earlier. They might look ‘laddish’ and chauvinistic by 2018’s easily offended standards but I like ’em.

If you remember these types of magazines with a fondness then you will definitely appreciate NFSU2 and the culture it represents.

It’s a shame that the game’s AI didn’t make me smile as much. If you want to take the proper racing lines and overtake opponents cleanly as you would have to in real life then forget it. Towards the beginning of the game this is entirely possible but later on as things take a turn for the challenging, you’d best forget it. Rivals launch themselves up the inside of your car kamikaze-style in the corners and pile into the back of you for braking zones as if this is a Destruction Derby sequel, not Need For Speed. Worse still, they have no qualms about punting you off the track or even utilising the police-approved PIT maneuver to spin you out. Cheating bastards!

I tried to race fairly because I hate winning in racing games by abusing a lack of damage modelling to bash my way to the front but unfortunately, you have to lower your standards with this game and fight fire with fire sometimes, especially since the game’s AI has another crafty weapon up its sleeve: the dreaded rubber band effect. Opponents seem a lot less inconvenienced by collisions with civilian traffic (whereas a single smash can ruin YOUR entire race) and can somehow take tight corners at impossible speeds, sometimes while using nitrous. You can leave them several seconds behind by getting out in front and driving perfectly but the game allows them to catch right back up to you on the last lap as if they have been handed a secret performance boost. This sort of thing makes sense in a game like Mario Kart but in a proper racing game involving real cars that have real performance figures and capabilities…well, it just sucks.

It also blew my mind to witness heavy muscle cars like the Mustang and Pontiac GTO leaving me for dust on twisty, technical circuits that should never favour such vehicles. Losing drag races to Vauxhall Corsas and Ford Focuses somehow capable of reaching near-200mph speeds was another mind-boggling development.

The game can also strategically place a taxi or van around a blind bend and this is unbelievably frustrating after investing seven-or-so minutes into a race, successfully keeping those shady opponents at bay for three long laps only to lose it all and have to start again because there was a unavoidable crash around the final corner. I’ve even experienced a white van speeding over an intersection right into my path as if God himself decided that I wasn’t allowed to win the race. Whether this was EA’s subtle commentary on the infamous “White Van Man”, I can’t say but I swore quite a bit!

Overall Thoughts

There is a lot to like about Need For Speed Underground 2 and thankfully, the good bits just about outweigh the rotten AI-related elements. There was of course the added bonus of getting a far more polished game than I was expecting but it definitely helps if you consider the racing to be more of an arcade game than a serious sim. For me personally though, I really enjoyed being transported back to that era of street racing and the JDM craziness inspired by what was happening in Japan and the Fast & Furious movies. NFSU2 perfectly captures that subculture – just don’t expect gentlemanly conduct from the game’s AI.

Book Review – Cell [Stephen King, 2006]

Stephen King’s Cell is – in my opinion – the sort of book that becomes a bit more relevant with each passing year. The story’s post-apocalyptic world is nothing new (even coming from King himself) and the ‘journey’ format starring a group of survivors heading out into a new world full of danger has been done before by the same writer (see The Stand for one example) but the fact that mobile phones are the cause of doom and destruction? Well, that part seems more and more plausible with each passing year.

We do after all, live in a world where so many rely on their phone for so much. People are glued to them on buses, trains and even in social gatherings where they are supposed to be communicating with real people (remember those?). Drivers would rather risk crashing on the road if it means checking their messages or Facebook updates whilst crawling in traffic and there is of course, an app for everything.

So Cell’s concept of a brain-scrambling virus sent out across mobile networks to phones worldwide and wiping any trace of civilisation from their owner’s minds doesn’t seem so far-fetched as a form of cyber terrorism that could hit most of the world’s population in one fell swoop. The book doesn’t focus on who was responsible for this attack or where they orchestrated it from because that isn’t the point. Instead, Cell takes the reader on a journey with a group of survivors who are thrown together in the wake of this catastrophe because they were either fortunate enough to not have their phone with them or because they didn’t own one in the first place.

There is the typical rich yet unbloated detail that you’d expect to find in a Stephen King book, especially with regards to the primal, unfeeling violence that those affected by the cellular virus (known as ‘The Pulse’) dish out in the immediate aftermath. It all seems quite real and a fair image of what might actually happen should such an event hit a technology-reliant Western society in the real world. As with any Stephen King book, no punches are pulled when it comes to the description of the violence and gore and this helps make the situation feel even more vivid.

Once the initial impact of The Pulse has had time to ruin the world, Cell then focuses on the characters and how their mental state responds to suddenly being thrust into a world of madness and survival. The main character is an everyman up-and-coming artist named Clayton Riddell who just wants to get home and find his young son, hoping that he hasn’t switched his phone on and that he still lives. He soon meets with other survivors who have their own stories and they set out to get away from the city, work out what is happening and to try and find safety.

I really enjoyed Cell the first time I read it and re-reading it today in 2018, it was just as good. The characters are very likeable and relatable as ordinary, everyday people. The mental journey and character development that they go through also feels believable and you – the reader – do feel as if you are on this journey with them (albeit in the safer confines of the real world!) and the book becomes a page-turner like most of Stephen King’s output. I also really enjoyed the detail and descriptions of the violence and the state of the ruined world, all of which hit me as believable.

If I have any criticisms of Cell then they would be the inconclusive ending (which kind of leaves the reader to decide on what ultimately happens) and the fact that some new friends are introduced during the latter stages of the book yet there isn’t really the time to explore their characters and get to like them as anything other than a late-game support cast. I found that I was only there to see what happened to Clay and his original companions, not the new additions to the group.

Overall though, Cell is a great book and one of the better ones in Stephen King’s ‘modern’ lineup. I do tend to prefer the older, more horror/supernatural-orientated books but Cell still manages to feel a little like those past glories while also having the other foot planted in a more current era.