| chazumaru 1401th Post
  
Red Carpet Executive Member
    
    
    
    
|  "Xanadu rant / One Piece Amiibo" , posted Mon 22 Dec 22:56  
I discovered the original Xanadu on Falcom Classics, the SegaSaturn compilation of Falcom's three first hits: Ys, Dragon Slayer and Xanadu. Probably around 1998 or 1999? I can't remember for sure. As a Western player, my main interest was in playing the Ys remake, but I ended up getting much more engrossed in Xanadu (which was also a remake, but since I had never played the original, that did not matter). Now remember, at the time, there was no wiki or such a heavy access to games. You had to rely on the CjayC epoch of GameFAQs for most information on any game, and pray that local guys like KinsukeJP would come help you on the message boards (and I don't think that trend actually started until 2000, 2001). And my understanding of Japanese was pretty much non-existant at the time. So discovering how to play the game became its own adventure; Xanasu really doesn't have the most intuitive system. I have great memories of those daily sessions figuring out new mechanics and rules about the game. I think the memorable main theme played a big part in keeping me interested. What I also liked about the game was the streamlined experience, rid of all superfluous aspect like dialogues, cutscenes, etc. Xanadu had a "Zelda 1" appeal that I was starting to regret when playing contemporary games.
Fast forward a few years later. Around late 2003, early 2004, a friend gave me his old 3D graphics card, and that got me back into PC gaming. I was not so much interested into playing the big PC games of the time, but the card was good enough to play Falcom's recent output such as Arcturus, Vantage Master, Zwei!!, Sora no Kiseki, Ys VI etc. I also got belatedly hooked by Brandish after playing a friend's SFC copy. So I got back into Falcom games quite heavily during that time. That's precisely when Falcom started promoting the upcoming release of Xanadu Next, which I also followed closely because I was writing news for Insert Credit at the time. And Xanadu Next turned out to be a nice Action RPG. It's not a masterpiece, but it's quite effective and the shortcut-bound level design is rather clever.
That's also why I am a bit worried about the new game. The appeal of Xanadu has nothing to do with characters or a storyline, yet the first illustration showing all those anime-like teenage characters feels much closer to Falcom's Kiseki series or Persona than it does with Xanadu or Xanadu Next. The game might be good but it probably will not have any connection with what I liked about the franchise.
=============
So, plenty of Amiibo will be used for that One Piece game, including the elusive Wii Fit Trainer!
Strange that they did not use one of the princesses instead. I wonder if it is because Gambarion was involded in the Wii Fit series.
Même Narumi est épatée !
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| Zepy 1658th Post
Tailored Carpet V.I.P- Platinum Member
 
| "Re(5):Kantai Collection hitting the Arcades" , posted Sat 17 Jan 13:54:
quote:
I don't think Sega is dropping Miku. I think the entire Miku council is conscious that the phenomenon is trending down in Japan and that the potential for growth is in the West. Sega have just announced Project Mirai DX is a simultaneous worldwide release, for example. The US technically get the game two days before Japan!
Kancolle arriving in the arcades is not so surprising in the current context. What puzzles me much more here is the fact AM2 is in charge of that Kancolle game. Does not bode well for the AM division as a whole.
It would be interesting to look at the history of the rise and fall of nicovideo and the 御三家 of idolmaster, vocaloid, touhou.
The peak of miku and the drop is pretty steep, these are the view counts on nicovideo for original Hatsune Miku songs.
2011
above 500k views: 22 songs
above 1m views: 12 songs
2012
above 500k views: 21 songs
above 1m views: 8 songs
2013
above 500k views: 27 songs
above 1m views: 16 songs
2014
above 500k views: 13 songs
above 1m views: 1 songs
Kancolle started in April 2013 and started really taking off around September 2013. But whether this had a direct effect on Vocaloid is debatable.
But Vocaloid content has been having an ongoing problem where the top content producers are good enough that they will get offers to get hired somewhere and they start producing content commercially and they stop doing vocaloid content almost entirely. (making a living off purely nicovideo is a lot harder than youtube)
So now the problem affects the project diva series too because all the popular songs are from 2013 and before, and we may see a further drop in 2015 where potentially no big hits will come from the community. The next project diva game will have to feature mostly old songs, but that's not exciting enough and it might affect the sales for future games in the series, so what I suspect is the best route is to just ignore the project diva series for now and hope the community comes back again.
quote:
Kancolle arriving in the arcades is not so surprising in the current context. What puzzles me much more here is the fact AM2 is in charge of that Kancolle game. Does not bode well for the AM division as a whole.
AM2 was the developer for the 3DS Project Mirai series, I heard there's almost nobody left in the current AM2 that has worked on virtua fighter, but I don't have a reliable source to confirm this.
[this message was edited by Zepy on Sat 17 Jan 13:57] |
| chazumaru 1408th Post
Red Carpet Executive Member
| "A minstrel in distress" , posted Fri 23 Jan 03:28:
Kawazu's Legacy:
• It's cute.
• The visual style is heavily inspired by Bravely (ex. how the zoom works in villages), but the recent Bravely Second demo is leagues ahead in terms of programming and art direction.
• The story is paper-thin but that's not a big problem. It seems you are exected to replay the game with each character.
• The nods to old-school RPGs are pretty cool. For instance, in the dancer's story, there is a funny take on the absurd way a character's sprite could completely change right in front of you as they either changed stance, transformed ordisguised themselves. Those jokes will be lost on younger players, methinks.
• I like the frog less than I expected.
• Nice "SaGa-like" system with how HP is handled. Damage impacts HP as usual, but if a character dies in battle and keeps getting hit, their maximum HP is affected (I don't know if the character is dead forever when you reach Max HP = 0, but I guess so?). You can regain your "real" max HP at the inn, but that requires going back to the village. It's a nice tradeoff. I wonder if they shold have been meaner and make it harder to regain your max HP.
• Filling the map was initially fun, but it quickly became super repetitive. The problem is not enough interesting things happen in the maps. Not enough interactions with the background, from my view.
• As promised by a game for SaGa fans, the heavy sword macho guy can take the role of the group's healer and other shenanigans. They actually encourage switching formations.
• The music is really nice.
• And finally, the big dark point for me so far: battles are tedious. Elementary-based, a little bit in the style of Chrono Cross, they lack the punch and speed that made Bravely Default so addictive. At least you can (and are more or less encouraged to) skip battles in the typical Romancing SaGa way.
okay/10
I might have been more positive, had I not been swayed by the Bravely Second demo at TGS. I think true SaGa fans like Iggy will be more positive. It's definitely a better game in my book than those two DS remakes.
Même Narumi est épatée !
[this message was edited by chazumaru on Fri 23 Jan 03:29] |
| Professor 4217th Post
MMCafe Owner
     
| "Zestiria = Bandai Namco's next JojoASB" , posted Mon 26 Jan 05:54:
Bandai Namco seems to have a lot of misfortune when it comes to pissing off fans with their big-budget titles. First it was Jojo ASB, and now it's Tales of Zestiria, the latest Tales RPG installment commemorating the series' 20th anniversary.
The Amazon reviews have been pretty bad on the game, currently on its way to topping 100 single stars. There's around 30 five-stars right now, but most of it are reviews from people who've been into it for 3-4 hours, right before things take an interesting turn.
http://www.amazon.co.jp/product-reviews/B00O9SR9NK/
Before reading on, check this promo art for the game.
Basically what's causing the flame is that the heroine (in the right) always seen in advertisements turns out to be a temporary character that disappears after the first few hours. This is the biggest complaint that people are fussing, and for justified reasons.
- There was a lot of DLC that was released for the character, and people obviously bought them. People are pissed.
- There was an anime special featuring her as the heroine, and it aired nationwide in Japan when everyone was off for the years-end. A lot of casual consumers watched it since it aired in late Evening. I watched it too. No question that it boosted the game's sales.
- Overall, Bandai Namco was giving false impressions. She was announced together with the protagonist when the game was unveiled, she's in all the ads, she's one of the preorder bonus phone-straps packed in the game, and she's even got a figure coming out from Alter.
- A sub-character that wasn't announced until a month or so to release (image) turned out to be the real heroine. Most people seem to hate her since her character design's not that great and her personality is pretty shallow. From what the Amazon reviews say, she reportedly dominates the whole storyline that even the protagonist starts to feel like a sidekick character.
- To add vinegar, salt and olive oil to injury, the (originally thought to be) heroine's DLC stuff gets inherited to the new heroine.
- Reportedly, the party members start to badmouth about the original heroine after the new girl comes in. (I'm not sure how true this part is since I haven't picked up the game)
- Other complaints include poorframerate, poor camera work, and the lack of freedom in setting up party members because you can't take the new heroine out of battle after she joins in (meaning you only have 2 free slots).
People normally don't complain as badly about twists and turns in an RPG's plot, but this was a bit too twisted. It involved DLC, and it was also a Tales game, meaning people play for like 70% characters and 30% plot.
Rumor is that the producer really liked the other heroine and it might've had an effect in development.
And obviously people are assuming that BanNam will do their usual thing and throw out a complete edition fulfilling the frustrations and making extra bucks. But for now, it seems plausible that this iteration may be hitting the bargain bin.
[this message was edited by Professor on Mon 26 Jan 07:12] |
| Pollyanna 3722th Post
PSN: Lilly_Dopamine
XBL: n/a
Wii: n/a
Platinum Carpet V.I.P- Board Master
  
| "Re(1):Zestiria = Bandai Namco's next JojoASB" , posted Tue 27 Jan 09:51:
(You dragged me baaaaaack)
My Zestiria impressions are a little limited, since I haven't been able to pour a lot of time into the game (so I may still hate it in the end), but these negative reports are pretty gross exaggerations/misinformation.
I think all of the stink is a compliment in a way, since the problem mostly arises because Alicia is cute and likeable. I mean, she has an adorable design, but she has a cool voice and a heroic personality. She works well as a secondary heroine (or she would have).
Roze isn't a bad character whatsoever and I doubt anyone would complain about her if she wasn't "replacing" Alicia, who is admittedly a lot cuter (I like Roze a lot, but I referred to her as "the homely girl" before I knew her name).
I'm not defending Namco's decision here, in terms of how Alicia was promoted as they ruined the twist about Roze's character far in advance anyway. I think rather than the producer pushing Roze (it is his game, after all), it makes more sense that marketing pushed Alicia.
Really, the game is fine, thus far. Every Tales game has things it does better than others and things it doesn't do as well. I have some I don't like, but I can't pick a favorite, because every game has some kind of sticking point. This one doesn't stack up magnificently, but it's within acceptable margins for what I would call "a good RPG." Really, the Alicia thing is only going to ruin the experience for crazy otaku, even if it is an irritation. That being said, I like Alicia and this kind of sucks, but I like Roze, too. It's more like Vesperia where I was annoyed that they didn't let you use Flynn in the end...then they released a new version on a different console where you could.
A few things:
-Alicia is with you for way more than 3 hours, definitely. That doesn't actually make things any better, though, as the inability to use her in post game at least is still crappy.
-The party restrictions make sense, since there are two kinds of characters...Doushi and Tenzoku. The Doushi are Sorey (the protagonist) and Roze, who combine with the elementally affiliated Tenzoku characters to essentially make a new character. This is incredibly useful and one of the main concepts in the game. So the team is set up as two Doushi/Tenzoku pairs. Alicia is neither, so she has less functionality in the party than other characters. Once you realize this, you can guess that she probably won't stick around.
-The camera is only an issue because the game takes the "Chrono Trigger" approach and drops enemies on you right in the field. Since you sometimes will find yourself in a hallway or room with stuff in it, and unlike Chrono Trigger you can't move around freely in a nonexistent layer on top of reality, the camera has a rough time. This entire concept is the thing to complain about, as the camera is just an unfortunate side effect.
-Go Shiina did some of the soundtrack and it's amazing. Especially this one.
So yeah, it's a "what the hell is wrong with you Namco!?" thing, but not a "this game is crap" thing.
I got the Alicia phone strap, myself, and I was considering getting the figure if I ended up liking her. Now that I know that fondness is somewhat tragic, I'm torn. They should do a kamui (transformed/fusion) Roze, since she looks a lot more impressive that way.
OH! Preorders from some places also came with a mini calender which has Edna, Laiyla...and Alicia! No Roze!
EDIT: Harharhar Alicia epilogue chapter, only 1300 yen! The game isn't lacking in content, so it's not like Asura's Wrath, where you have to pay extra to finish the damned story, but I can't possibly imagine people being the least bit happy with this. It may be a necessary survival tactic, but Namco certainly loves bleeding money from their fans through DLC.
I am undressed from 80’s style and recreated with modern sexy and beautiful style that amaze you and feel never been experienced world before.
[this message was edited by Pollyanna on Tue 27 Jan 20:41] |
| Pollyanna 3723th Post
PSN: Lilly_Dopamine
XBL: n/a
Wii: n/a
Platinum Carpet V.I.P- Board Master
| "Re(5):Zestiria = Bandai Namco's next JojoASB" , posted Tue 27 Jan 22:24
quote:
And it's apparently free from the 12 to the 28!
That was fast...
But if she's leaving the party, who will she be teaming up with?
She can't be alone, can she? And what about the DLC the other girl inherited? 
Okay, it's...free? I read your post in the middle of posting mine. Well, I'll just delete my lengthy rant about how this is better than paying for a new game on a different system with non-transferring data/DLC and no added DLC scenario for the old version.
As for the party, there is evidently some sort of time skip in the ending, so this seems to take place in the meantime. The interesting thing from the screenshots is that Sorey (the protagonist) and possibly Mikleo (his real love interest) are not included. You're normally required to have Sorey in your party, so it seems that Roze will be your only Kamui user, mimicking the first part of the game when you actually had Alicia on your party. I haven't finished the game, so I don't know which characters are alive or dead, but it looks like all of the girls are part of the scenario.
It seems that she has some new techniques, but I can't tell from the limited screenshots if they also gave her some sort of new functionality to make up for the fact that she can't use kamui/fusion.
This could be good. I'm excited.
I hope it patches things up with fans, as it's clear that the only way they can survive with growing budgets and a shrinking market is by gouging superfans with insane DLC. I'm not judging. That's just the reality of the situation.
I am undressed from 80’s style and recreated with modern sexy and beautiful style that amaze you and feel never been experienced world before.
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| chazumaru 1427th Post
Red Carpet Executive Member
| "Deep Down news!" , posted Mon 9 Feb 22:24
Capcom actually gives an update about Deep Down in this week's Famitsu. It sounds a bit like this but here is the gist of the info:
• Deep Down will come out after Dragon's Dogma Online. DDO is the priority right now.
• They will show more Deep Down later this year. (TGS?)
• It's still planned for later this year in Japan.
• They hope to use the basis of Deep Down for the next 15 years.
• Therefore, it's super important to release it right.
• Deep Down requires 5x the investment spent on MH Frontier (Sugiura-san's previous project).
• Breath of Fire 6 (announced in Summer 2013) is also delayed until it's satisfying.
• The main challenge for BOF6 is to make everyone happy, newcomers and old fans.
• 10 more titles on the way from Capcom Online Games, with Japan as the primary target audience.
Well, as someone famously said, "a delayed game is eventually good, but a rushed game is forever bad". I hope Deep Down is good. I can't believe I played it at TGS 2013! It seemed pretty far along, back then.
By the way, a friend at Capcom kindly gave me a copy of Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate. Is anyone on MMC planning to play the US or Euro version? (The Japanese version MH4G is not compatible online with those versions, as far as I understand.) I am not sure I'd be brave enough to play another MH alone, but maybe with other hunters, I might give it a try. I usually play Great Sword.
Keeping track of my bet with Zepy, the game is now at 2.7M shipped in Japan!
It almost assuredly won't make it to 3M in Japan by next quarter, though.
Même Narumi est épatée !
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| Maou 2735th Post
PSN: zonepharaoh
XBL: n/a
Wii: n/a
Platinum Carpet V.I.P- Board Master
| "Re(1):Deep Down news!" , posted Tue 10 Feb 04:20
quote:
Well, as someone famously said, "a delayed game is eventually good, but a rushed game is forever bad".
Dear old Victor Ireland, no less! "Delays are temporary, mediocrity is forever!"
He was right, of course. On the other hand, I'm pretty sure Duke Nukem Forever II Final Fantasy XV will still be bad.
Meanwhile: I need someone to convince me I should buy a console, and a Wii U of all things, just so I can play these Xenoblade games and maybe Last Story. I was mad enough to play Xenogears twice in my youthful days, but you wouldn't get me anywhere near Xenosaga. Whatever that means.
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
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| Spoon 2791th Post
Platinum Carpet V.I.P- Board Master
| "Re(3):Deep Down news!" , posted Tue 10 Feb 05:02
quote:
You should buy a Wii U just so you can play these Xenoblade games and maybe Last Story.
The WiiU has Bayonetta 2, and you can get a WiiU that comes bundled with Super Mario 3D World. I've played the two for nearly a hundred hours and not felt like I've needed to buy more games, and I haven't even gone back to play Bayonetta 1 yet. The two games are not just extremely finely crafted and fun, they seem to exude this joyful exuberance about them that is rare and wonderful.
To put it another way, I have a copy of The Last Story, played like 20 hours of it before, and though it has its rough spots and weirdness, it's a blast. But I haven't gotten back to playing it because I'm enjoying SMB3DW and Bayo 2 so much.
SMB3DW also probably has the bluest skies outside of MGSV and FFXV. If you really want an interesting talking point about blue, though, it's that the WiiU tablet has a weird color gamut. The colors on it are very rich, with the blacks being very black, but the blues have a tilt towards green. Not all games have calibrated against it (SMB3DW seemingly has). This shows up very prominently in Bayonetta 2, where things like the clock graphic in the cutscenes and menus are greenish.... and it actually looks great, especially given the water theme of the game! It really conveys a sea water feeling. I thought there was something wrong with my television, but then when I looked at the videos on Platinum's own site, I realized that the issue was with the WiiU tablet.
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| Mosquiton 2024th Post
Platinum Carpet V.I.P- Board Master
| "Re(2):Deep Down news!" , posted Tue 10 Feb 17:40:
Wow, Deep Down's legacy will carry on for 15 years? I'm not exactly sure what to take from that.
quote:
• Breath of Fire 6 (announced in Summer 2013) is also delayed until it's satisfying.
• The main challenge for BOF6 is to make everyone happy, newcomers and old fans.
Hah, if they hew too closely to these rules the game will never be released....
quote:
My favourite BoF and the only one which I've actually beaten is Dragon Quarter. Of my friends who have played BoF games prior to Dragon Quarter, something like 2/3 really dislike Dragon Quarter. At the time, this made me one of the "new" fans of the series. Dragon Quarter is now over 12 years old. Dragon Quarter is the fifth game in the series.
It's strange that I get to consider myself an "old" fan of the series now.
Dragon Quarter is great! One of my absolute favorite PS2-era games. I immediately skew my assessment of someone's character if I discover that they either really like or really dislike it. Obviously Spoon you are a person of good taste.
The game's director, Makoto Ikehara, is of my favorite Capcom people. Sure, he's pretty much the Breath of Fire guy, but he also wrote the scenario and script for Haunting Ground. He also contributed to scenario/design for Dead Rising and Mega Man Legends. What a productive and talented guy.
Oh wait a minute...
I guess the last thing he did at Capcom was directing Blade Fantasia. I never heard anything about it after the announcement, but I guess it launched. Had anyone heard how that was going? It looked pretty decent for a mobile title.
/ / /
[this message was edited by Mosquiton on Tue 10 Feb 17:53] |
| chazumaru 1442th Post
Red Carpet Executive Member
| "Re(4):Petangrisser" , posted Tue 24 Feb 22:22
quote:
Tokyo Xanadu is confirmed for Vita, although we still don't know what form that game will take.
And now we do.
quote:
The game is set in the fictional “Morimiya City” located in the Tama district on the outskirts of Tokyo. The protagonists attend Morimiya Academy and get caught up in an otherworldly incident, and with it, a major conspiracy.
Dengeki PlayStation details the first two characters:
Kou Tokisaka (Protagonist) – A 17 year-old second year high school student. Though brusque in his mannerisms, he’s not unfriendly towards others and is an archetypal modern day student all around. He uses a sword whip and specializes in mid-range attacks.
Asuka Hiragi – Kou’s classmate. She has an attractive face and figure, quick reflexes, gets excellent grades, and is class president. Though on the outside, she looks like a typical heroine… She wields a one-handed sword and specializes in close combat.
During the game’s modern parts, players will explore areas like the school and shopping district to trigger events before heading to the other world to progress the story. During other world parts, players will explore labyrinth-like areas and fight against enemies using weapons known as “Soul Devices.”
Personadu 
Même Narumi est épatée !
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| karasu 1478th Post
PSN: robotchris
XBL: robotchris
Wii: n/a
Red Carpet Executive Member
| "Re(1):Konami - Kojima = -Konami" , posted Fri 20 Mar 08:45
quote:
Well, it finally happened.
What I find odd about this is that I knew for years that Konami was all about making bad decisions, but preserving their relationship with Kojima I thought was the one and only thing they would try not to mess up.
I mean, do they have ANYONE left there that can make a game? Castlevania, Contra, Silent Hill, even Metal Gear had their last games outsourced. What does Konami even do internally besides MGS anymore? Rhythm games for arcade?
Also, Kojima seemed to the unenlightened outsider (me) to be something of a cash cow for Konami. He makes Metal Gear games, and hundreds of thousands of people all over the world just buy them, sight unseen, based on it being made by Kojima. He must be incredibly difficult to work with/expected too much money/they've decided to just go exclusively Free To Play mobile or something.
You have to carefully reproduce the world of "Castlevania" in the solemn atmosphere.
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| Loona 845th Post
PSN: IkariLoona
XBL: n/a
Wii: n/a
Red Carpet Regular Member+
| "Re(2):PXZ2" , posted Mon 13 Apr 18:42
quote:
And now that Sega owns Atlus, I wonder if this is going to be yet another crossover for Atlus' character pool?
Forget Atlus: this is probably our only chance to see Bayonetta VS Dante.
Or, because it's "made for the west", they replace Dante with Donte. To be honest, if they do that, I won't even get mad.
Classic Dante is confirmed for PXZ2, and so are a bunch of other characters - it's only natural, since he was in the previous game already.
It's interesting that they're using at least one mixed-company team, in the shape of Strider Hiryu and Hotsuma from the modern Shinobi games... It makes it a little less likely we'll get a Morrigan/Bayonetta team for maximum innuendo, since now a Sega/Capcom team is covered - I wonder if we'll see remaining Sage/Namco and Capcom/Namco teamups too.
Hopefully they've trimmed down the battle lenght a bit - something like pre-programmed timed combos you could then skip would be nice. PXZ already optimized the formula from past games by skipping animation on non-boss enemy attacks, so there's hope...
Kazuma Kiryu making it in should be a nice way to introduce me to his series, and with Kage taking Pai's place in Akira's VF team, maybe they'll get to play a bit more with the Dural plot from their games.
As for other fighting game quirks, Jin teaming up with Kazuya is weird as well, but this sort of thing isn't that new to the series. The lack of any SF or Darkstalkers reveals so far is pretty unusual though.
As is, as someone mentioned at NeoGAF, the comparatively smaller proportion of female characters in the currently revealed roster - PXZ1 was pretty balanced about that.
Heh, Ryu will probably make it, but I figure they'll team him up with Chun-Li or something this time...
Looking forward to this, and I'm optimistic about the fact the trailer seems to refocus on Reiji and Xiaomu instead of of the lame protagonists from PXZ1.
...!!
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| Spoon 2842th Post
Platinum Carpet V.I.P- Board Master
| "Re(6):#sqex_secret (PS3+PS4?)" , posted Wed 15 Apr 03:39
quote:
In other news, this recent commentary by Mr. J. Parish got to the root of a subject that often irks me, and that I've talked about my opinions on around here from time to time.
That article is all over the place with its justifications to the point where I don't want to agree or disagree with its thesis because it's just so wonkily argued. But the point it wants to make, that it's ok for beloved franchises to die, is not an invalid one.
Most interesting one for me in this regard is not Metroid, but Front Mission, a long-running franchise which basically did die about 2 years ago: the studio unit which made the games has long since dissolved, and the last story thread which maintained the franchise, a manga authored by one of the longtime staff of Front Mission, had concluded. Front Mission is a saga of development that stretches from one of my favourite action games ever, Cybernator/Assault Suits Valken, reinvented itself as a TRPG on the platform it debuted on, and soldiered on through 3 generations of hardware. I wonder when the final chapter of that manga was done, I wonder if it went down like this.
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| Maou 2767th Post
PSN: zonepharaoh
XBL: n/a
Wii: n/a
Platinum Carpet V.I.P- Board Master
| "Re(7):#sqex_secret (PS3+PS4?)" , posted Wed 15 Apr 05:19:
quote:
In other news, this recent commentary by Mr. J. Parish got to the root of a subject that often irks me, and that I've talked about my opinions on around here from time to time.
One of the industry's greatest tricks, aside from the crime against language itself, was getting normal, breathing human beings to use the word "franchise" seriously. Aside from serving as a distasteful reminder that most games "journalism" is regurgitated official PR, the phrase divorces a game from its artistic status and obscures the questions people should be asking about who is making a game based on a previous game that they liked.
Even more so than Parish indicates, for instance, it's easy to make peace with Final Fantasy's "death" in my mind because Sakaguchi and friends haven't been involved since 2001 or so. I wouldn't trust a book based on someone else's work to be good, nor a movie sequel just becaue it came from the same studio without being from the same director and screenwriter. Ditto Rockman, post-Naka/Ohshima Sonic, Lunar, etc. (Extreme example: Valis.)
True, the desire to peg "authorship" on one specific person is another analytical flaw when considering large-scale projects like video games, but clearly it matters who's making things, and it's not a tragedy that a known character vanishes when the people most responsible for its creation are no longer involved.
...not that you can't have some fine successors doing good things with something previously established, but character- and title-driven fandom is profoundly confused to begin with.
人間はいつも私を驚かせてくれる。不思議なものだな、人間という存在は．．．
[this message was edited by Maou on Wed 15 Apr 05:33] |
| Spoon 2843th Post
Platinum Carpet V.I.P- Board Master
| "Re(8):#sqex_secret (PS3+PS4?)" , posted Wed 15 Apr 09:08
quote:
One of the industry's greatest tricks, aside from the crime against language itself, was getting normal, breathing human beings to use the word "franchise" seriously. Aside from serving as a distasteful reminder that most games "journalism" is regurgitated official PR, the phrase divorces a game from its artistic status and obscures the questions people should be asking about who is making a game based on a previous game that they liked.
It's a grossly commercial word, to be sure, but I'm not sure it's better or worse than the next word that they're happy to use, which is IP. Even for industries which have used this term for ages, like the movie industry, things which are "franchises" connote something that is at once crassly commercial and lower art. I actually don't know what is the ideal already-existing word to describe such a thing. Calling it a "series" isn't much better and is sometimes inadequate (Mario Kart is definitely not a sequel to SMB), calling it an "oeuvre" might be ok in relation to a particular person but it fails in relation to the IP/franchise, etc.
One thing I actually do like about Kickstarter projects is that any Kickstarted game that does get big has had at its core a great deal of material about the people who make the game and the development process of the game.
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| Spoon 2845th Post
Platinum Carpet V.I.P- Board Master
| "Re(1):Dark Souls II in the media" , posted Fri 17 Apr 16:18
quote:
Though I've never actually played Dark Souls or Bloodborne, I love them indirectly out of a knowledge of their own love for roguelikes and especially the original Fuurai No Shiren, one of my favorite games in the world. So it's with these happy feelings that I was pleasantly surprised to see a write-up on the remastered Dark Souls II on the Washington Post, one of the US' most important newspapers, that's actually written seriously and is more than a paragraph long. It seems pretty niche, and maybe it's only in the online version, but given the amount of time I spend complaining about the sorry state of games "journalism," it's interesting to see a real journalistic source giving the game this space.
On a completely different note about divisive games, I've played through most of Resident Evil 6 lately.
RE and Street Fighter seem to represent two curiously different approaches to characters within Capcom. SF characters are eternally youthful, while the Resident Evil crew really did get older with the passage of time. Chris is in his 40s by RE6, Sherry grew up from a schoolgirl in RE2 into an agent (and is in fact 6 years older than her partner in the campaign), Leon is knocking on 40...
I vaguely remember some of the criticisms of RE6 that were mentioned here on the cafe a few years back, and it's certainly a game that deserves them from multiple perspectives. It's just about the least scary RE game since RE5 (once you see "zombies" riding on motorcycles and twirling chains, you've entered full-on 80s action movie), it followed the bizarre path of RE4->Gears Of War->post-RE4 TPS, it's even more of a shooter than RE5 was, and though Sherry looks troublingly beautiful neither her campaign nor Chris's campaign are as good as Leon's. RE6 feels like the latest entry of the Fast and Furious franchise, where suddenly all of your old friends are back together again having a big adventure that varyingly references your old adventures... but you definitely feel that something is off when Leon's clearly RE2 referential survive-through-the-city sequence is solved entirely by shooting and running your way through it, when his RE4 referential cemetery and chapel sequence is dominated by running and shooting, and sure enough he finishes with getting a rocket launcher at the escape helicopter to finish the big bad with, but he does Diamond Cutters on zombies and that's awesome.
The monsters in the game look great. In fact, if I were to judge the game entirely by how great the monsters looked and how solid the combat felt, it's an entirely positive experience. Sherry's campaign certainly isn't as good as Leon's, but being able to play a campaign as a troublingly beautiful grown-up Sherry who can do veritable Sweet Chin Music on horrifying mutants is enough for me to forgive a great deal of things.
I don't know if I'm actually going to play through all the other campaigns again as the alternate characters, not because I didn't have fun doing it the first time, but because it's a really long game. In fact, I can't think of many AAA shooters which have such a long story campaign. It is probably in contention with Gun Survivor for being the lightest RE on puzzles. But what is up with the weirdly scratchy voice samples for the Cantonese-speaking J'avos? I know they've got masks and mutated heads, but at times it sounds like they were recorded with a bad mic onto cheap tape.
Now to play Resident Evil HD Remaster...
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| Iggy 9887th Post
Platinum Carpet V.I.P- Board Master
| "Re(2):Dark Souls II in the media" , posted Fri 17 Apr 18:49
I'm following the opposite path: 4HD, 1HD, and when I'm done (and I grab it for cheap during the next Steam sales), 6.
I skipped 5 and had very little interest in 6, but my eye got caught by a huge wall of text on NeoGAF about how 6 has a hugely complex control scheme that is never explained but offers almost DMC-levels of movement, and now I want to try. At worst, it will end up being another game as unplayable as Wonderful101, but at least this one will be much cheaper.
On that topic, I keep hearing that Revelation 1 is hugely overrated, but Revelation 2 is surprisingly good?
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| karasu 1484th Post
PSN: robotchris
XBL: robotchris
Wii: n/a
Red Carpet Executive Member
| "Re(3): RE: Revelations 1&2" , posted Sat 18 Apr 01:37
quote:
I'm following the opposite path: 4HD, 1HD, and when I'm done (and I grab it for cheap during the next Steam sales), 6.
I skipped 5 and had very little interest in 6, but my eye got caught by a huge wall of text on NeoGAF about how 6 has a hugely complex control scheme that is never explained but offers almost DMC-levels of movement, and now I want to try. At worst, it will end up being another game as unplayable as Wonderful101, but at least this one will be much cheaper.
On that topic, I keep hearing that Revelation 1 is hugely overrated, but Revelation 2 is surprisingly good?
RE6 was a first for me: a Resident Evil game I couldn't play at all. It was too much of a mess control wise, it was bland design wise, and worst of all it was pretty much a shooter where the enemies happened to be monsters and zombies. I don't feel bad since I paid about $6 for it in the first place. And it's not like it didn't have promise-- I love the idea of this huge sprawling game that brings in all kinds of characters from the series's past.
Anyway, yeah. I had completely forgotten about RE4HD, so I suppose I'll pick it up.
Iggy, my take on Revelations 1&2 is that 1 seems very much like a portable game that was ported to a console (I played it on PS3) but that isn't necessarily a bad thing. It has that constrained design that worked so well in the first RE given the setting, and it returned to a bit of the clunkiness of the pre-4 games, as well as the 'search for the item' business of helmet/armor/sword keys, crests, and so on. There are definitely some late-game areas that drag, but overall it was satisfying, but then I'm a fan of the pre-4 games. As long as you're not expecting a 50 hour long game with state of the art controls and graphics, I think you will probably enjoy it.
Revelations 2 I'm in the middle of, but so far it's been pretty decent. I like the episodic nature of it, and it returns to the Rev1 conceit of two teams of two characters that you switch back and forth between. I've been waiting to play as Barry for ages, so there's that as well-- and he's written exactly like you might think he should be written given his character in RE1. It's clearly a lower budget game than say RE5, but I don't think RE as a series needs or even benefits from an enormous AAA budget. The controls are tight, the partner AI is reasonable, and I enjoy the partner switching mechanic, where each pair has an offensive member and an exploratory member. There aren't any scenes that are particularly scary, but then again I can't really remember being scared in an RE game since the first one, and only then it was slight. They do succeed though at what I've always thought was essential to the RE experience: creating stress and tension. Overall I'd say if you like pre-RE4 games, and even if you like RE4, consider checking it out.
Hmm, maybe Polly will catch wind of this and provide some thoughts!
On another note: boy do I wish RE2 would get the HD and/or REmake treatment! It's handily my favorite game in the series!
You have to carefully reproduce the world of "Castlevania" in the solemn atmosphere.
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| Spoon 2846th Post
Platinum Carpet V.I.P- Board Master
| "Re(4): RE: Revelations 1&2" , posted Sat 18 Apr 02:41
quote:
RE6 was a first for me: a Resident Evil game I couldn't play at all. It was too much of a mess control wise, it was bland design wise, and worst of all it was pretty much a shooter where the enemies happened to be monsters and zombies. I don't feel bad since I paid about $6 for it in the first place. And it's not like it didn't have promise-- I love the idea of this huge sprawling game that brings in all kinds of characters from the series's past.
Anyway, yeah. I had completely forgotten about RE4HD, so I suppose I'll pick it up.
Iggy, my take on Revelations 1&2 is that 1 seems very much like a portable game that was ported to a console (I played it on PS3) but that isn't necessarily a bad thing. It has that constrained design that worked so well in the first RE given the setting, and it returned to a bit of the clunkiness of the pre-4 games, as well as the 'search for the item' business of helmet/armor/sword keys, crests, and so on. There are definitely some late-game areas that drag, but overall it was satisfying, but then I'm a fan of the pre-4 games. As long as you're not expecting a 50 hour long game with state of the art controls and graphics, I think you will probably enjoy it.
Revelations 2 I'm in the middle of, but so far it's been pretty decent. I like the episodic nature of it, and it returns to the Rev1 conceit of two teams of two characters that you switch back and forth between. I've been waiting to play as Barry for ages, so there's that as well-- and he's written exactly like you might think he should be written given his character in RE1. It's clearly a lower budget game than say RE5, but I don't think RE as a series needs or even benefits from an enormous AAA budget. The controls are tight, the partner AI is reasonable, and I enjoy the partner switching mechanic, where each pair has an offensive member and an exploratory member. There aren't any scenes that are particularly scary, but then again I can't really remember being scared in an RE game since the first one, and only then it was slight. They do succeed though at what I've always thought was essential to the RE experience: creating stress and tension. Overall I'd say if you like pre-RE4 games, and even if you like RE4, consider checking it out.
Hmm, maybe Polly will catch wind of this and provide some thoughts!
On another note: boy do I wish RE2 would get the HD and/or REmake treatment! It's handily my favorite game in the series!
The biggest control problem of the game for me is that switching between gun-category and grenade(?) category weapons involved letting go of the movement stick in order to push the dpad, but since that's a well-established thing in just about every other shooter on modern consoles (even ones I love, like Vanquish!), followed by the dodge action being awkward conceptually because it's aim+use.
If anything's funny about the game, it's that the controls make it feel very much like Dead Space, which is just about the most RE4-derived AAA game out there.
I'm actually really curious what you found most clumsy and awkward about the controls! I did find some of the context-sensitive things a little funky at times, and the game straight up doesn't explain how to dodge until after at least one sequence where it would've been REALLY USEFUL. The cover mechanics feel a bit awkward, but one of the things I liked about the game is the relative lack of highly obvious cover spots which scream "THESE ARE COVER SPOTS PLACED HERE TO BE COVER IGNORE HOW CONVENIENTLY WAIST HIGH ALL THESE THINGS ARE".
quote:
but I don't think RE as a series needs or even benefits from an enormous AAA budget.
Part of me strongly disagrees with this, because historically Resident Evil games have been AAA productions. There's no denying that RE2, CV, and RE4 were staffed by enormous teams with then-enormous budgets, and making games which have the sheer scope of environments and art and everything that those games had or making something worthy of succeeding them in the way they succeeded themselves I don't think can be done by a small budget+small team.
But nowadays the definition of "AAA budget" is different from 10 years ago, let alone 15 years ago. Does an RE game need a $500 million budget like Destiny? Probably not. Does it deserve more than, say, Tamsoft? Probably.
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| Iggy 9904th Post
Platinum Carpet V.I.P- Board Master
| "Emerald Dragon / XenobladeX" , posted Sat 2 May 01:34
Even in this day and age where every crusty self-proclamed classic gets threatened by a crowdfunded sequel, I really didn't expect Emerald Dragon to come back.
Obviously, I was wrong.
So, let's make the genericest JRPG possible and slap the name of an old game on it to make it at least slightly more appealing. OK, got it!
We don't have an RPG thread, do we? I just wanted to say that despite having a bad sci-fi scenario and abysmal characters, XenobladeX is absolutely amazing. I adored Xenoblade, which I see as a vastly improved FF12, so your mileage may vary.
I also loved the setting, scenario and characters of Xenoblade so the new ones are a huge let down, but god is the game gorgeous, fun to play and rewarding. I am unable to progress in the scenario to unlock new things and places, because I'm too busy spending hours running in the first gigantic area, jumping like an idiot from cliffs and getting wiped out by a level 60 shark that was waiting for me in the ocean. It's one of these rare games where the simple action of moving your character is so fun that you sometimes forget there is an entire game built around it (see: Vampire Savior or Mario 64).
Another amazing WiiU game along with Bayo2 that nobody will play.
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"Naoki Maeda" , posted Wed 28 Jan 21:56
イジメしない！させない！許さない！
"Strawberries and Banana DLC? What the hell is tha-"
