1. The Yuffie Syndrome- There are few things I dislike more as a gameplay device than having your hard earned powers/weapons/doo-dads stripped away just so that you’re weaker while you go and traipse around to try and get them back.  While not the first game to do this by a longshot, Final Fantasy VII is the one that always pops into my mind here; in order to get Yuffie on your team, you must endure her stealing all of your materia first (and I always question whether it’s worth it, but in the end, I always cave and do it anyway).  Lords of Shadow doesn’t just do this once–oh no, that wouldn’t be nearly annoying enough.  Instead, you are forced to contend several times with creatures called chupacabras who take your relics and powers away–here’s the kicker–just for fun.  Because they can.  Never mind that you have to fight off werewolves or zombies or whatever happens to be in the area without half of your stuff in order to catch the little bastards and choke them into giving it back up, they just want to have a rousing game of hide-and-seek.  To make matters worse, they scream taunts at you while you’re tracking them down based solely on how close/far away you happen to be at any given time, so if you’re in the area and solving a puzzle to unlock a path to their location, they will only register that they’re practically right in front of you and will yell the same four lines of dialogue the entire time.  YES, I UNDERSTAND THAT I HAVE FOUND YOU.  PLEASE SHUT UP WHILE I REDIRECT THESE LASERS.  If only there were an option to beat the crap out of them once you find them.  Or a chupacabra genocide minigame.  I’d love that.  There’s also a boss fight towards the end of the game that does largely the same thing, but after the chupacabras, the level of annoying there was barely noticeable.

2. Star-Studded- Well, at least they didn’t spare any expense when it came to the cast.  The game’s protagonist, Gabriel Belmont, is voiced by Robert Carlyle, with other major characters played by Patrick Stewart, Jason Isaacs, and Natascha McElhone.  Frequently, when games cast well-known actors who aren’t strictly voice-actors, there’s a danger of them sounding stilted or simply wrong in their delivery, because this isn’t their normal field and they’ve been cast purely for name recognition.  Fortunately, these folks are all seasoned and/or talented enough that it isn’t an issue.  In fact, lest I sound like I feel that they only just escaped being horrible, I should clarify: I really enjoyed the voice acting, particularly from Robert Carlyle (and of course from Patrick Stewart, who is now paired with Morgan Freeman on the list of people I want to narrate my life).  The only real complaint I have in this area isn’t the actors’ fault; during larger fights, Lords of Shadow falls into the trap of only having a few lines of dialogue for an enemy to spout which are consequently repeated until you just want to defeat them to shut them up.  Even when you’re not fighting the character in question, this can get annoying; I mentioned the chupacabras above, and a couple of characters during fetch quests also feel it necessary to put their two cents in repeatedly if they think you’re not doing their bidding quickly or efficiently enough.  I’m looking at YOU, Baba.   

3. Huuuuuuge Tracts of Land- Oooooookay.  It’s time for me to get into the biggest bitch I have about Lords of Shadow.  First off, let me say that the designers really outdid themselves graphically.  The game is lovely, and the scenery really lends it a sense of scale that I think is incredibly important to the story they’re telling.  But what the FUCK is with the camera angles?  If you’re going to make a game that does not allow the player to adjust the camera, that’s fine, but if that’s the choice you make, you really, really need to make damn sure that the camera goes where you need it to go and shows what you need it to show.  Platforming was frequently made more difficult than it needed to be because the camera was too busy proudly displaying the lovely mountains and ruins to notice that Gabriel couldn’t see the next ledge to which he needed to desperately cling, and the camera during combat was nothing short of atrocious.  For a game that relies so heavily on dodging and countering, and particularly one that likes to throw large numbers of enemies at you at a time, having a camera that not only cuts the enemies off-screen but sometimes even cuts YOUR OWN CHARACTER off-screen is simply inexcusable.  In addition, since the camera isn’t fixed, but rather follows Gabriel around as it sees fit, some of the finer points of the puzzles which must be solved throughout the levels are made much more difficult than they need to be.  This was by far my least favorite part of the game, and something that I’ve heard almost universally from others who have played it as well.  If there’s a direct sequel, I really, really hope that they do something about the camera.  Really.

4. Choose Your Own Adventure- Lords of Shadow features a relatively standard advancement system–well, not really standard for Castlevania, but one which will likely be familiar to players nonetheless.  As Gabriel dispatches enemies, he earns experience points, which can then be used to unlock combo moves and upgrades that he can then use during his adventure.  While this sounds like a great idea in theory, I found that, similar to when I played God of War, no matter how many combos or new types of beatings I was able to bestow upon the slavering horde, I pretty much always stuck with the same damn thing.  Sure, there were times when something specific might be called for, but in general, the amount of dodging and quickness of foot that is required to make it safely through any given area means that attempting to pull off a fancy combo often results in getting your face gnawed on.  Or at least, it did for me.  It’s entirely possible that my own lack of skills was what made this feature kind of unnecessary, but still, I tended to get along just fine without much other than my cross-chain-whip-thing and the most basic forms of light and dark magic.  I kept unlocking other stuff, but I really didn’t use it that much, honestly. 

5. Warning: Here Be Spoilers!- No, seriously.  If you haven’t finished the game and you don’t want me to spoil it for you, skip the next paragraph, because I’m gonna spoil it hardcore.  Go ahead.  I won’t be offended.

All gone?  Okay, then.  So, what’s the one thing you can pretty much always count on to be somewhere in a game that bears the Castlevania name?  Dracula, right?  I thought so too, so I was full of theories from about Chapter 5 onward about how Zobek was Dracula (I mean, he was clearly going to be evil somehow), and kept waiting for him to reveal himself.  When the end of the game was a fight against not Dracula, but Satan himself (which was pretty cool, actually), I was a little disappointed, but I was still waiting.  One would think that you can’t really backtrack from Satan to Dracula, but I still harbored a little bit of hope that he might show up after all.  And then the credits rolled.  Not a bad story, I thought, but was it really Castlevania?  Yeah.  It is, it turns out.  After the credits, you find out that not only was Dracula in the game…. you were actually playing him all along.  Yup, Gabriel Belmont turns out to actually be Dracula.  In essence, this is kind of an origin story, which I thought was really, really cool, and I didn’t even see it coming.  The ending quite intentionally sets up for a sequel, and I for one will definitely be looking forward to it when and if it happens; even considering the issues I had with this game, I had a good time overall, and that ending was just the punch I needed to keep me wanting more.

For those of you who skipped the last paragraph, here’s all you really need to know.  Castlevania yay!  Now go play it.

1. One, Two, Three- In order to get the full story of Birth By Sleep, you have to play it three times.  At least, that’s what you are led to think.  While it’s true that, if you complete the game, you will end up with four separate save files, the stories that you play are more than different enough that you won’t feel like you’re repeating yourself.  For each playthrough, you select a main character: Terra, Ventus, or Aqua.  That was actually the order I played them in, but you can choose whomever you like in whatever sequence; their storylines intertwine in such a way that one won’t give you any clear advantage, nor will it “spoil” the others if you choose poorly.  I would, however, suggest saving Aqua for last, not because of her story, but because her gameplay style is markedly different from the other two, and takes a bit more finesse to execute correctly.  If I’d started with Aqua, I would have gotten really frustrated, but having the experience of the other two beneath my belt meant that I was better educated in how the combat system functions.  The basics are the same, however; you equip different commands for use in battle, which level up as you carry them around, enabling them to be fused together to create more powerful commands.  As in the other titles of the series, combat is real-time, and you fight with a Keyblade that can also be swapped out for more powerful models as you progress.  The worlds you visit are the same, but the areas within those worlds are not, nor are the events you experience while there or the bosses you fight.  For example, in Cinderella’s Castle of Dreams world, Ventus plays shrunk to the size of a mouse, cooperates with Jaq the mouse in recreating Cinderella’s dress, and fights a huge version of the evil cat Lucifer, while Terra (arriving after Ventus has already left) escorts Cinderella through the forest to the palace, fighting a gigantic music-playing Unversed (as the monsters in this title are known) at the end, and Aqua must clear the way for the glass slipper to make it to Cinderella despite the evil stepsisters and stepmother, who summon a giant cursed pumpkin coach for her to fight.  Each world has this sort of three-part structure, and while playing as any given character, you may sometimes arrive first, sometimes after your other friends have already been there, and sometimes even briefly team up with them, or simply meet in passing.  Overall, I was drawn in completely by how well the stories meshed, and didn’t feel like I was repeating myself at all.

2. Girl Power- Both Elaine and I have talked, both on our own podcast and as guests on others, about female characters in video games, and by the end of Birth By Sleep, I was quite surprised by how Aqua turned out, so I wanted to give her some special attention here.  Aqua is the first playable female main character in the series; previously, female characters were either non-playable or showed up only in “guest” roles (Ariel in KH1, Mulan in KH2, etc.).  In many JRPGs, simply by knowing a character is female, you can often make a few assumptions about her: namely, that she will be a magic-user of some kind (true for Aqua), and that one of her main motivations will be her love for one of the male characters (this one’s where the surprise comes in).  While yes, Aqua is physically weak, instead excelling at magic attacks (and she DOES excel… I believe the phrase “swirling tornado of death” is appropriate here), she ISN’T in love with Terra or Ventus.  Or anyone, actually.  The other two are her friends, and she is incredibly devoted to and protective of them, but it’s as a sibling might be, not a lover.  This, I thought, was an interesting choice to have made when the norm seems to be otherwise, and it’s even more so given that, in Aqua’s storyline, she often seems to be surrounded by moments where the classic “prince meets princess” love prevails (Snow White awakened by her Prince, Cinderella reuniting with hers following the glass slipper fitting, and so forth).  She just doesn’t seem to have romantic love as a priority, which actually leads to some humorous moments such as her total obliviousness upon being hit on by Zack; it’s moments like those, actually, which make me believe that Aqua’s non-romanticism is actually a conscious choice about her character, rather than “she was a guy but we gave her boobs to be different.”  It’s kind of refreshing, in that way. 

3. Missing Persons- In most of the other Kingdom Hearts titles, particularly the PS2 numbered entries, Final Fantasy characters such as Cloud and Squall are prominently featured right alongside their Disney counterparts.  The fight considered by many (me very definitely included) to be the hardest in the game is even a Final Fantasy character: Sephiroth.  However, in Birth By Sleep, FF character appearances are limited to one: Zack, who inhabits the Olympus Colosseum.  The way that the game is set up would, admittedly, make it a little difficult to shoehorn in very many of the other characters that have appeared in the series before, but to me it felt like they really half-assed it by including Zack, but no one else.   It’s always been a cool feature of the series that these characters could even legitimately BE in the same universe; I was among the doubters way back when the first Kingdom Hearts came out, because, let’s face it… the idea of Mickey Mouse slapping around baddies next to a dude with a gunblade sounds pretty ridiculous without any context to support it.  Even IN context, it’s a little weird, but it really does work, which makes it all the sadder that that particular element seems to have been forgotten in this title.  Hopefully it’ll return in the future.  Sephiroth and I still have a score to settle, after all.

4. So Very Pretty- If there’s one thing you can say for Square Enix, it’s that they know how to put on a show.  Birth By Sleep is goddamn gorgeous.  Not gorgeous “for a handheld title,” either.  It’s just really, really good-looking.  It’s pretty enough, in fact, to make me wonder why they didn’t target this for a wider console release; I love my PSP, but it’s not exactly the most popular system around, and with a title this high-quality and a series this well-loved, it just seems like they would have gotten a lot better exposure and, ultimately, made a lot more money if they had gone with a different platform.  They also would have been able to avoid issues like the RIDICULOUS LOAD TIMES that come along with a UMD-based game.  There is an install option; in fact, there are three.  I went with the largest one, which was something like 600 megs (over half my meager memory stick, but I figure I can always remove the install and re-do it if I want to play again).  Even with the install, however, there’s loading EVERYWHERE.  You load going into and out of menus, before cutscenes, when going into new screens, and basically every time anything new happens.  The install helped (the half hour before I realized I really needed to do this was very long…), but even so, it was excessive, particularly with Terra; for some reason, he seemed to have issues transitioning into his Command Styles where the others didn’t, but that may have just been something screwy with my copy.  Again, I don’t have a problem per se with Squenix’s platform choice here, it just… well, it makes me wonder.   

5. Mythos-  I mentioned up above that Kingdom Hearts is a series with a particularly strong story, and that’s where Birth By Sleep really shines.  It and the other titles surrounding the numbered entries (Chain of Memories, 358/2 Days, and the upcoming Re:Coded) really dive into the world that these characters inhabit; it’s vast and complex, and even if you’ve played all of the games, you still might be a little hazy on the details (I know I am).  To get an idea of how intricate the connections between the games and their characters are, look up Blank Points on YouTube and check out the user comments that accompany the secret video from the end of Birth By Sleep (which I, obviously, couldn’t be bothered to unlock myself… hence the YouTubing).  It’s fascinating stuff, and it really made me want to play KH 1 and 2 again to get all of the OH YEAH moments I think the handheld entries will spark in me.  Oh, and spoiler warning, by the way.

I’m modifying how I do Five Things; namely, I’m not writing up EVERYTHING I play, just the interesting stuff.  Look, I’m not reviewing Crafting Mama, okay?  I’m just not.  So next time will be…. whatever I feel like!  HA!

1. A Little Foresight Would Have Been Nice- So the Prince has this brother, right?  Nice guy, if a bit overzealous about some things, such as defending his kingdom.  Don’t get me wrong; I understand that you definitely want to keep your people safe, free from foreign invasion, blah blah blah.  This is perfectly reasonable.  What may not be as reasonable is when you just run out of ideas, or worse, want to shortcut it.  Sure, it sounds like an awesome plan to raise an army out of sand.  The castle is surrounded by it, after all, and not only do sand soldiers lack the ability to feel pain, hunger, or fatigue, they also (and this is key) don’t need to be paid.  Woohoo!  Did no one stop to think that maybe–just maybe–using some sort of dark magic to raise a sand army might result in a bunch of evil, nigh-unkillable motherfuckers who have access to your whole setup?  Remember what I said about them not feeling pain, hunger, or fatigue?  Still valid.  Only now, it’s against you rather than for you.  Remember, kids, shortcuts kill.  The more you know.

2.  All In The Timing- I’ve actually never played any of the PS2/Cube/XBox era Prince games.  (I’ve actually sort of been hoping that, like the God of War and Sly collections and the potential Team Ico collection, the three will be re-released on a PS3 compilation blu-ray, but I don’t think that’s even rumored at this point.)  I do have a backwards-compatible PS3 as well as a GameCube-capable Wii (and, well…. a GameCube), so I really don’t have any excuses other than being too lazy to track down copies.  Regardless, I’ve heard that, supposedly, this installment adheres more to the “original” series (Yes, I know there were PoP games before these.  You know what I’m getting at.) than to the previous 360/PS3 title, which was more platform-y and less swarms of combat fodder-y.  First of all, I should say that I loved the last Prince of Persia.  I found it soothing, sort of along the lines of Flower.  I thought it really flowed along nicely, with almost everything making sense and not requiring a whole lot of calculated thought.  Every once in a while you’d hop down and beat the snot out of some random baddie, but by and large, it was more about running along walls and such.  TFS definitely has more than enough platforming to keep fans happy, but it doesn’t feel the same to me.  Instead of being intuitive, it’s more of a puzzle.  This isn’t a bad thing, necessarily, but it does indicate a very different focus.  This sounds cheesy, but it’s less of an “experience” and more of a “game.”  As to whether something can be both at the same time, that’s a subject for another column… just know that, if the last (or, as in my case, only) Prince you played was the last one released, you’re going to need to adjust your play-style just a bit.

3. Water World- The very most challenging part of my TFS experience centered on a series of jumps that should have taken about a minute and a half, but ended up taking me about an hour to complete.  I’ll describe it, and perhaps you’ll know what I’m talking about (or, like the friends to whom I’ve already lamented this, you won’t, and I’ll come off as a hopeless idiot, which I guess is par for the course anyway).  Upon entering the palace towards the end of the game, you are confronted with two parallel sheets of water, beyond which is a series of ascending water spouts.  One of the key features the Prince must master throughout the course of the game is the manipulation of water; once it’s “frozen,” you can run across it, jump on it, and otherwise treat it as solid.  In this particular instance, you need to stand between the parallel sheets, freeze them, and then wall-jump between them to the top.  This is where the tricky part comes in.  At the top, you have to unfreeze the water after you perform the final jump so that you pass through the opposing sheet, then quickly re-freeze it so that the spout on the other side can be grabbed.  You must find the sweet spot after you pass through the sheet but before you get to the spout, but for some reason I just couldn’t do it.  They say that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result.  Well, if that’s true, then I was absolutely batshit.  I simply could not figure out what I was doing wrong, so again and again, my little princely fingers would go crashing through the water spout, or I would just smack off of a solid sheet of water, frequently resulting in a painful (usually deadly) drop to the floor below.  The really funny part (in retrospect… at the time this was not funny AT ALL) is that when I finally got it right, I was so excited that I immediately screwed up afterward because I wasn’t expecting to succeed, and thus was not prepared for what would happen when I did.  So I had to start all over… but thankfully, some sort of muscle memory took over and I lucked into success much more quickly the second time around, even though I never did consciously figure out what I changed.  The moral of this story is that water sucks.

4. Group Brawl- I mentioned before that in the last PoP, you rarely fought more than one enemy at a time.  In TFS, as I understand was the case in Sands of Time, etc., fighting larger groups is not only the norm, it’s something that they tout as a big bonus, since apparently a lot of people had a problem with the single-combat model.  Personally, I don’t care whether I’m fighting a big group or just one; it’s just a different style.  As advertised, there are in fact a crapload of enemies thrown at you in any given fight, and the combat styles you have available to you are quite different as a result.  I found that the tornado ability is pretty much all you need, actually.  It’s all well and good if you want to introduce some variety by trailing a line of fire behind you or whatever, but if you can suck everything into one big vortex, seriously, what else is there?  Just get used to being swarmed.  I never had a terrible issue with this, but if you’re the easily distractable type, be warned that there will be a lot of things requiring your attention.

5. Getting Better All The Time- It’s not exactly a secret that I enjoy games which offer a well-developed progression system.  It’s a lot easier for ME to get better of my character and/or his/her equipment gets better as well.  Better yet is if I have some sort of say in how that progression takes place, so I’m happy to say that TFS does just that.  As you level up, you can develop your character map as you see fit, expanding basic abilities and stats as well as making your special shiny skills specialer and shinier.  As I mentioned, the only skill other than the basic ones that I really put to use was the Tornado, so that’s the one I pumped my points into.  If, however, you prefer to spread your smackdown methods out mre evenly, well, you can certainly go that route as well.  If you’re of the more variable sort, and you’re playing on the 360, there are, as an incentive, plenty of tasty, tasty cheevos to be had as well.  (I imagine trophies for the PS3 are the same, but I played on the XBox…. and also, “cheevos” is more fun to say.)  The Prince is yours to develop, though, and that’s the m0st important thing.  You’re really not going to screw yourself over no matter what you do.  Unless you ignore the tornado.  Seriously, that skill is awesome. 

Well, my meeting is only about halfway over, and I’m still bored, so guess what?  This Five Things just became a Ten Things double feature!  Next on the list is Muramasa: The Demon Blade.  This is an interesting little title that’s worth snagging if you happen to run across a copy (which you probably won’t, as it didn’t sell very well).  It’s by Vanillaware, and it very definitely looks it.  In fact, I think the box blurb should really be something like “A Dumbed-Down Odin Sphere!”  ….Well, that’s being a bit mean.  Not inaccurate, mind you, but not very nice, because it’s not a bad game, just not exactly complex.  Let me see if I can clarify this a little.

1. Easy Mode- Muramasa is not a difficult game.  In fact, to tie some threads together, it’s sort of a relaxing experience rather than some sort of extreme test of skill.  Even though the gameplay (and obviously, the visual style) is extremely reminiscent of Odin Sphere–and I’ll be talking a lot about Odin Sphere for that very reason, so get used to seeing it–it’s much, much easier.  Much.  It’s so easy, in fact, that it sometimes feels a little boring.  Odin Sphere was fiendishly difficult at times, so a bit of a decrease was probably due; surely, though, there should have been a middle ground somewhere?  These games are both enjoyable on their own merits, but they could have been really good with just a few minor tweaks.  I feel like Goldilocks–the “too hard” and “too soft” games are already covered, but I’m still waiting for my “just right.”  Come on, Vanillaware!  I know you have it in you!

2. Twin Paradox- There are two main characters in Muramasa, Kisuke and Momohime, and each of them has his or her own individual storyline.  This is great in theory, but in practice, they get a bit same-y.  The stories themselves are kind of neat, and both are worth telling, particularly in context with each other, but I think it could have been just as effectively covered in one interwoven playthrough as opposed to two parallel ones.  I sort of had the same issue with Folklore (might as well call out all the obscure titles I can while I’m at it), where dual storylines were presented in more or less discrete chunks, which after a while just starts to feel like you’re repeating yourself.  Because you are.

3. Backtracking- One of the reasons I really would have preferred to see a single storyline is that you see a lot of the same scenery in your second playthrough as you did in your first.  Now, don’t get me wrong; the art is lovely, but when you’re looking at the exact same thing for hours at a time, even pretty art gets old.  What bothered me even more than that repetition, however, was the fact that you have to run back and forth across the map every time you get a new quest destination–and there is no fast travel option at all.  In my ideal version of Muramasa, there would be a fast travel option, perhaps unlocked once you have traveled the long way to a place once (I’m actually a big proponent of this in most games–if there’s a storyline reason to hoof it, that’s fine, but there rarely, if ever, is; once you’ve established a travel route, it generally works just as well to hop around).  Once travel times had been condensed, it would be a lot easier to interweave the storylines, too; with both of those things accomplished, the finished product would end up being much tighter and more polished–less sprawling and artsy, perhaps, but I think that would actually be a good thing.  For me, anyway.

4. Collections Department- Have I mentioned that I’m a bit of a completionist?  I may have.  This usually translates into an obsessive devotion to side-quests, which don’t really exist in Muramasa.  Instead, there’s a great big flowchart of 108 swords you can forge for your characters.  I suppose you could argue that the swords themselves count as side-quests, because they are obtained by spending the souls you obtain when you slay your enemies, so if you were so inclined, you could farm enough souls to continue unlocking as many blades as you wanted (some are storyline-linked, but aside from that, this holds true).  You’d probably expect that I would get a little crazy about my blade collection, being, as ever, a collector at heart.  Honestly, though?  I just got kind of bored.  I did like the idea of forging your own upgrades, though, and if the repetition issue had been fixed a bit, I probably would have gone for a full complement.  As it was, I unlocked as many as I could for both characters (they do have separate trees, which eventually intersect, but not until well past where I got in the process).

5. …For A Wii Game- Seems like every time a good (or even sort-of good) game comes out on the Wii, you can rely on this to be the end of at least a few normally positive review sentences.  It’s like people feel that they have to be apologetic because it just can’t be a good game if it isn’t on the 360 or the PS3.  And, admittedly, the Wii has some limitations.  It’s not high-def, and it doesn’t have a standardized control scheme, which often makes it more difficult for a “traditional” gamer to get invested in a title.  In general, the Wii isn’t geared towards these people anyway, at least not in the majority.  This has always been a sort of sticky point for those who would identify themselves as “hardcore,” or even as “gamers” at all–most soccer moms who just bought the system for Wii Fit and Just Dance aren’t very likely to self-identify in this way.  So, when a game that dares to strike outside that mold comes along, it somehow falls lower on the prestige scale than, say, your typical 360 shooter.  I’m not saying that this is never warranted–sometimes it is.  But I think that some games unnecessarily get a bad rap just because they’re on the Wii, and that’s not fair.  For all my issues with it, Muramasa is a pretty damn decent game, for a Wii game.  And for a game.  Period. 

Well, now that my hand is cramped as hell from writing all of this, I’ve actually managed to stay relatively sane throughout most of a horrifically boring day, so even if no one reads this, I’m a winner!  Until I have to transcribe it all… I’ll look up what’s going down next time as soon as I get home and find my list.  It’s something awesome, I’m sure.  (Note: It’s Trauma Team.)

Did that help?  I don’t even know that I expect it to; it’s really tough to get a grip on this game unless you’re playing it, in large part because it’s actually four games, all of which share only the restriction that you must complete your task in thirty seconds.  Hence the name.  See what they did there?

1. An Odd Sort of Balance- It’s not balance at all, actually.  At least, I certainly didn’t think so.  As I mentioned, there are four single player modes (with one more that opens up after you’ve beaten those four): Hero 30, Evil Lord 30, Princess 30, and Knight 30.  The game plays very fast, and it’s very addictive, so I ended up playing the whole thing in only a few sittings of goodly length; what this made me notice, however, is that the developers seemed to focus much more on the Hero campaign than on any of the others.  I don’t just say this because the other campaigns are shorter, although that is definitely the case, but more because only the Hero campaign really seems to have any depth to it (or as much depth as you can have when you’re only playing 30 seconds at a time, I suppose).  Each character’s story is designed to follow a particular gameplay style: Hero 30 is the RPG, Evil Lord 30 is the RTS, Princess 30 is the shooter, and Knight 30 is the action game (which turns out to be one big escort quest.  Yippee.).  I don’t know whether my personal viewpoint might be a bit skewed due to my own preference for RPGs, but I felt that the others were just kind of half-assed, although admittedly fun (for the most part… there were a few spots in Evil Lord 30, for example, that I cordially invite to die in a fire).  Time-wise, my theory holds; I think that the other three campaigns together *might* have taken me as long to get through as Hero did, although again, if they were truly holding to the game types, this isn’t exactly unheard-of for an RPG.  According to Kotaku, the announced sequel looks like it’s going to focus on the Hero end of things exclusively, and I have to say, I’m okay with that.  I appreciate the attempt at variety, but not when the effort is barely there.

2. Simple on the Surface- This point (or “thing,” if you will) focuses mostly on Hero 30, largely for the reasons I mentioned above; in fact, I think it’s why the Hero section seemed to outweigh the others by so much.  Each of the sections contains its own method of manipulating time, whether it be to slow it down, rewind it, or reset it, and these methods may be used to differing effect throughout the game.  While it’s largely just gimmicky in most places, though, it’s actually an integral part of the story in Hero 30.  The actual battles here don’t consist of selecting actions as they do in traditional RPGs, but rather of slashing your way across the encounter screen while your opponent attempts to do the same.  Much like in the Wario Ware series, however, the true challenge doesn’t lie in actually executing the actions needed to succeed, but in processing what is needed before you get to the actual part where you pull it off.  Your brain has to be pretty speedy to pull something like this off (I know, right?  How did *I* finish it?), and the fact that you’re actually completing multi-part quests within these constraints means that the complexity of the game can be a bit surprising at times.  I found this rather nifty.

3. 8-Bit Awesome- You might be fooled, by looking only at the box art of Half-Minute Hero, into thinking that the game utilizes some sort of stunning graphics/cutscenes/whatever.  Not so.  Instead, the characters and their surroundings take a cue from games of yore and go about it all 8-bit style.  Far from being a detriment, though, this actually proves to be a brilliant choice.  More complicated sprites would simply look silly speeding through the levels at the pace required, and–again, Wario Ware comes to mind here–adopting less ornate graphics allows the player to concentrate more on what needs to be done rather than on drooling over the pretty pictures.  The PSP has plenty of gorgeous games already; the aim of this one is different, and the art style reflects that.  Lest I sound like I’m putting it down, however, allow me to clarify; by no means does Half-Minute Hero look bad.  The sprites are designed and put together quite well; they’re there to lend an air of nostalgia to the story while still being functional.  Speaking of that, my next point…

4. Nostalgia- It’s not just the looks; basically everything in this game is intended to appeal to those of us with fond memories of, say, the original Final Fantasy or Dragon Warrior.  Characters are frequently aware of their own ridiculous stereotypes, and when they aren’t, YOU are.  Take, for example, the bumbling king of Princess 30, or the numerous villagers and shopkeepers of Hero 30.  These are characters that would look and sound perfectly at home slapped down in a NES game circa 1987, and they’re absolutely perfect.  The nostalgia factor of this game, for me, made it even better than it would have been had I never played one of the legacy games it emulates, and I suspect the same is true for many people.  I’m definitely not saying it wouldn’t have been fun otherwise, but that really made it stand out for me.

5. Auto-Save My Ass- There isn’t one.  Guess how I know that?

Next time, it’s back to the console as I talk about Prince of Persia: The Forgotten Sands!

1. Not So Random- Is there anyone who actually enjoys random encounters in games?  I really can’t imagine that there is.  Personally, I try to fight as many enemies as I can throughout the normal course of events in these sorts of games just so that I’m not stuck level-grinding later on, but it’s admittedly nice to have the option to skip around a fight or two, particularly when you’re on a mission of some sort or just don’t want to deal with a particularly difficult type of monster.  Lunar falls into the yes-you-can-see-your-enemies camp, which I love; as I mentioned, I do frequently enjoy scouring the map to clear it of all its outstanding vermin (even knowing that they’ll be back if I change screens enough times), but that’s the point: you can make PROGRESS, and know that there are a certain amount of fights you’ll have to win in order to have caught them all.  I guess that’s just me being a weirdo completionist again.  I do think, though, that being brought up on games where any step could potentially dissolve into monsters who were invisible a moment before but now seriously want to snack on your face has contributed to making me kind of jumpy and high-strung.  I mean, really.  How do you not notice that you’re walking straight into a Behemoth?  You notice!

2. Vaguely Creepy- I guess it’s not really a surprise when a JRPG is a little bit creepy about its female characters.  JRPGs are strongly related to anime, after all, and although I don’t have much experience with anime, I have enough to know that schoolgirls are frequently involved.  So to speak.  Don’t get me wrong; I really like the ladies in this game, particularly Jessica, who may have been my favorite character (She hits things with a big fucking hammer!  *I* want a big fucking hammer!).  However, they do have boobs, which leads to a few kind of creepy situations.  For instance, there are cards you can find during the course of the game which can be equipped as accessories by the male character associated with each girl (Alex gets Luna’s, Kyle gets Jessica’s, and Nash gets Mia’s).  At best, the cards provide minor stat boosts, and so aren’t particularly useful in that way.  However, if you select to view them in your inventory, you find that each card displays a picture of the girl in question in some sort of suggestive (usually an “oops, you found me and I don’t even know you’re taking my picture” style) pose.  The collector’s edition of the PSP port even came with physical versions of the cards.  What’s more, there’s an optional bathhouse scene you can unlock where you are treated to a video of the ladies splashing merrily in the buff.  To be fair, though, there’s also a male version of that particular scene. 

3. La Di Da- It’s been a while since I finished this game, and I’m currently playing Arc Rise Fantasia (which, if my current habits continue, I should get around to reviewing sometime in 2012…), which greatly resembles it in many aspects, so I think that’s what brings me to this topic.  I’m not at all against the use of music as a weapon against evil in games, but have you ever noticed that the task generally seems to fall to singing girls?  I’m not trying to point an OMGSEXIST  finger at this or anything, but I do find the character of the plucky-but-physically-fragile-songstress an interesting one, because it’s an unusual place to center what generally turns out to be some pretty formidable power.  Luna, after all, is the reincarnation of a goddess, and drawing the line from there to Arc Rise, Ryfia is treated as royalty in her land due to her abilities.  These ladies are far from powerless, but they can’t do much just by hitting things, either.  I think this is why I liked Jessica so much; she has magical abilities, which aren’t as extreme as Luna’s (or Mia’s, for that matter), but she can still kick some ass.  Regardless, I’m not quite sure what I think about the whole songstress thing, but this is making me want to write a more general article on video game women.  We’ll see.

4. Giving and Taking Away- It’s always irked me when a game puts a character in your party and makes you think that this person will be with you for a long time, then snaps them back out again, sometimes taking your hard-earned equipment (and at the very least taking the time you spent leveling them) along.  I think this is why I’ve always held such a grudge against Aeris; why make me waste my time with her if she’s just gonna get stabbed at the end of disc 1?  I don’t have a problem with guest characters, nor do I mind when characters are rotated in and out of the party, as is frequently the case here, but I do like to know when someone’s not going to be around for very long.  I’m thinking of Ramus here; he’s not exactly up to par with Luna and Alex, combat-wise, but the way he’s presented in the beginning, when he’s a permanent fixture in your party, makes you think that he’ll be around until the end.  Or, well, that’s what it made *me* think, anyway.  It’s not that big a deal, but it would have at least been nice if the amount of time you spent with Ramus would have translated into something else, like discounts at the shop he eventually opens or some sort of special item, perhaps.  Luna herself poses an even bigger problem; she doesn’t exactly turn into your enemy, but she’s definitely not on your side after a certain point, and since you’ve invested quite a bit more time into her than Ramus by the time you lose her, this can be pretty frustrating. 

5. Morphin’ Time- I can’t think of another game that has undergone quite as much editing and change between different versions as this one seems to have.  Sure, the Final Fantasy titles, particularly the early ones, exist in roughly half a million forms across multiple platforms, but the actual storyline tends to remain pretty much the same.  Lunar, by contrast,  has gone through no fewer than four iterations in English alone, each of which has massively altered some aspect of the game.  I won’t go into the details here, because I haven’t played any except the PSP version, so I can’t speak firsthand about how these changes affect the gameplay or the overall feel of the story; what I will say is that I don’t think I like the idea of spreading these kinds of changes out like they did.  Wouldn’t it make any kind of meaningful dialogue more difficult if one person played a version with a completely different ending than another?  Then again, I loved Heavy Rain, so who can say for sure?  I guess it’s all in how they’re connected….maybe I’ll have to track down another version and see for myself.

Next time I’ll stick with the PSP and blab about Half-Minute Hero!

1. Are You Paying Attention?- I admit up front that I am pulling the following statement out of my ass, so if you would like to dispute it and/or present differing examples, please do: God of War is one of the first games that really latched onto the idea of quick time events (the bane of many a gamer, myself frequently included) as a major gameplay feature.  It’s an interesting choice, because you can get away with a largely button-mashing approach through a lot of the combat portion of the game if you are so inclined, but the QTEs ensure that you have to at least have some connection to the fight.  Yes, it’s frequently annoying, and yes, I’m quite sure it’s resulted in many, many, MANY broken controllers over the years, but I’m just putting it out there: quick time events serve a purpose.  Even if you don’t think they serve a mechanical purpose in the fighting, you have to admit that they do allow for some pretty badass cutscenes and death animations (for the bosses, that is…. for repeated larger enemies they admittedly get a bit annoying).

2. Shinier and Shiner Swords- This isn’t a complaint that’s unique to God of War, but to me it does seem pretty pronounced here; while you do get some pretty sweet weapons throughout the course of the game, and they are definitely fun for the first ten minutes or so after they show up, the weapons you have at the start are the ones I used pretty much consistently throughout the whole thing.  Sure, there are times when different ones are either necessary or just more efficient, but once you’ve spent so much time on one set of sharp pointy things, there’s really just not much of a reason to switch them out unless you have to.  So, while the upgrade system was neat and all, I (like many others, I’m sure) basically just ended up dumping all of my orbs into the Blades of Chaos until they were as good as they could get, and then remembering that I also had other weapons.  I mean, they’re blades permanently chained to his arms.  Should there even BE other weapons?  I think it’s debatable.

3. I Get It, You Loved Your Wife- I joked about it in the introduction, but in all seriousness, Kratos actually is a pretty interesting character, and behind all the blood and boobs, there is a cool story to the series.  I’ve got to say, though… the sequence at the end where you have to hug your wife while you’re being attacked by a billion clones of yourself?  I could have done without that.  And when I say I could have done without that, what I really mean is ARGHRGHADHGAHGUIKRR. 

4. Look At The Size Of That Thing- One of the things that really sticks out for me about God of War is the sense of scale you feel when fighting bosses.  I wish I’d played the game when it first came out, because I bet it was even more impressive and striking when it wasn’t quite as commonplace as it’s become with more recent games, but even now, it’s pretty damn awesome to walk into a fight with something many, many, MANY times your size and walk out with one of its bleeding appendages as a trophy.  The scale is a huge part of what makes you feel like a badass in God of War, and feeling like a badass is what the game is all about.  Well, that and boobs.  Speaking of which…

5. That’s What She Said- It would be easy to have a knee-jerk reaction to the female characters in God of War, and I’m sure that many people have.  I’m sure many have also had a something-else-jerk reaction to them, as well.  (*rimshot*  Thank you, I’ll be here all week.)  While the nudity is admittedly pretty gratuitous, though, there’s actually more to the female cast of GoW, such as they are, than T&A.  The Oracle of Athens is the one who tells Kratos how to defeat Ares, Athena literally has the power to make him into a god, and the girls he bangs at the beginning of the game…. well okay, they are just T&A.  I played that minigame real good, too.  Even Kratos’s wife, much as I may resent her for making me hug her, and even though she doesn’t have a very direct role during the actual events of the game, is incredibly important, because it’s her death (at his hands) that sets off his slicey-bleedy rampage, so without her, there wouldn’t even be a God of War.  It’s really interesting (well, to me at least, and this is my goddam column) to ponder how the effect of the ladies here might have been different if they weren’t so hyper-sexualized.  I’m not saying it would have been better or worse, necessarily, but I definitely think it would have changed things up.

It’s been a while since I’ve done a JRPG, hasn’t it?  I’ll rectify that next time with Lunar: Silver Star Harmony.

1. Re-Imagining- I may have ranted about this before, but it’s especially appropriate here; this is one of my least favorite terms for a recycled idea (be it video game, movie, or otherwise) ever.  I’m not sure exactly why it rubs me the wrong way… perhaps it’s that you’re not really re-imagining anything; the imagination bit came around the first time, so either you’re ripping off someone else’s creative vision with minor cosmetic changes or you’re applying a big name to your own (mostly) original idea so that it goes over better with a pre-established audience.  (Side rant: This was my problem with Rob Zombie’s Halloween “re-imagining.”  It was a fine film, but it wasn’t Halloween, and I didn’t really see the reasoning behind not just making it its own stand-alone piece, other than the benefit of having the name attached to it.  Waaaaaaay beside the point, though.)  Despite my own personal misgivings, which are mostly semantic in nature, Shattered Memories can (I suppose) be described as a “re-imagining” of the original Silent Hill game.  You play as Dad-of-the-Year Harry Mason, on a quest to locate his daughter Cheryl in the creepy town of Silent Hill.  Without that particular setting to connect it, the game would have little to do with the first installment, for reasons I’ll detail in some of the other Things; this doesn’t mean that I think it was bad (I don’t) or that I don’t think it belongs in the series (I don’t… mostly), it just means that I’m not so sure it really merits the badge of “re-make.”  I guess that’s why they went for “re-imagining” instead.  Hmmm. 

2. Winter Wonderland- Now, correct me if I’m wrong here (it’s been known to happen), but I’m reasonably sure that this is the only Silent Hill game in which, instead of going into a sort of rusty industrial setting when things go all wonky and we transition into Evil Silent Hill, we go to a frozen-over version of the town.  I’m not really sure why this particular change was made, but it does work in its own way; while I personally don’t find it quite as unnerving as the traditional rust-covered venues for which the series might best be remembered, it does lend a unique air to the title (although, at the same time, this distances it from the series a bit, so… I don’t know if it’s a good thing or not).  The snowy surroundings do serve a more practical purpose as well, occasionally blocking off paths or posing different puzzles than those you might find in the “normal” version of the town.  As in other Silent Hills we have known, though, one thing definitely stays the same: when the shift between realities occurs, you’d better be ready to encounter some creepy creatures.  This leads me to my next point… 

3. Like Alan Wake, If Alan Wake Were A Giant Pussy- I was a big fan of Alan Wake, as you may be able to ascertain by reading the Five Things I wrote about it.  SHSM shares a *lot* of features with Alan Wake, from its flashlight-wielding protagonist to the fact that you spend an inordinate amount of time wandering around in the woods faced off against badass well-protected critters who can only be called off by the use of said flashlight.  Here’s the major difference, though, and it’s my biggest problem with SHSM: you don’t have a gun.  In fact, you don’t have *anything.*  You can’t fight AT ALL; you just have to run away.  The light you carry will slow down your enemies to a point, and you do gain access to flares that, much like Alan’s, will keep the baddies at bay for slightly longer periods of time, but there is no permanent way to stop the monsters that constantly pursue you through the nightmare town.  Occasionally you can slow them down by pulling obstacles into their path, but ultimately, if you aren’t quick enough, they will catch you; if they do, you can shake them off…. but really, you can’t even punch one in the face?  I just picture Harry shrieking “GET IT OFF GET IT OFF” like a little girl trying to kill a spider.  I would have understood if SHSM wanted to solely get rid of firearms or… well, or anythng you wouldn’t normally find lying around streets not located in downtown Philadelphia.  It would have been nice, though, and saved a great deal of annoyance, if there were *some* way to effectively damage your enemies using your surroundings.  Can I at least have a plank of wood or something?  A tire iron?  Something?

4. Profiling- Perhaps the biggest departure that this Silent Hill installment takes from the rest of the series is that, periodically, you take the role of a patient in a psychiatric therapy session who seems to be Harry (spoilers: it isn’t).  As the story progresses, you answer questions and perform tasks designed to subtly produce a psychological profile of you as a player.  It’s far from unknown for games to screw with the player’s head (for my very favorite example of this, go play Eternal Darkness), but SHSM lends another element to the mix by using your own responses to determine what will mess with you the most; this means that each playthrough could potentially be different depending on what you do, how you play, and what responses you give in different scenarios.  Some of the changes are a bit heavy-handed and obvious, such as the colors of characters’ clothing changing according to how you color them in therapy, but some are surprisingly subtle and cool; I really thought this was a nice touch, if perhaps a bit rudimentary and unfinished-feeling in places.  I’d like to see a game really take this mechanic and run with it even further.  The whole thing culminates in a full psychological profile of the player at the end of the game; fans of the series will be aware that there are always multiple endings available, but this goes beyond even that.  After the game ends, a series of notes appear about ”the patient” (you) that purport to describe your real-life personality.  Of course, you can manipulate these responses if you are so inclined, but if, in general, you answer the questions honestly and play “as yourself,” you’ll actually get some interesting (and relatively accurate) results.  I did, anyway. 

5. Brevity- I played Silent Hill: Shattered Memories in a single sitting.  This can mean multiple things for a game; it can mean it’s incredibly gripping, it can mean that the player has nothing better to do, or it can just mean it’s short.  Given the title of the paragraph, I’m thinking you can figure out which one applies here.  My playthrough clocked in somewhere between four and five hours; I don’t necessarily think that the length of the game should count against it, but if, say, the developers might have added some combat, it could have drawn things out a little and solved one of my other major problems with the game as well (see above).  There were, admittedly, times when things just felt rushed; running away from enemies with absolutely no incentive to slow down and check out your surroundings will do that, I suppose.  Given that one of the strongest features of the series has generally been its tendency to reward exploration and puzzle-solving prowess, the whole RUN AWAY mechanic seemed like it mostly made you skip merrily along through sizeable portions of the game.  Don’t get me wrong; you still solve puzzles and explore some places, but I believe there was definitely room for fleshing out parts of the gameplay that felt a bit underdeveloped.  There’s definitely some replay value to be had here, though, so I suppose I’ll have to try that out as well.  You know, because I don’t have any other games to play.

Next time, put on your retro hats for God of War.  Yup, the first one.

1. What Did I Miss?- I was genuinely curious as to what the differences might be between Cake Mania 1 and 2, because I didn’t play the first one.  Wikipedia came through for me on this one, noting that instead of a cookie oven, as was present in the iteration that I played, Jill (the protagonist) instead utilized a cupcake oven.  Sounds like she downgraded to me, but I suppose it depends on the type of cookies she was baking.  That’s pretty much the only difference, so in the time that you imagine you would normally have spent reading this point, I want you to go look at this page, which I clicked on as I was “researching.”  Now, go make cupcakes.  And send me one.

2. Storyline- I’ve never really seen why games like this bother to give themselves a storyline.  I mean… I guess I *do,* but do they really think it’s going to make that big of a difference?  People playing Cake Mania aren’t there to agonize about whether Jill can keep her bakery open, achieve domestic bliss, and retire in the countryside with 2.5 kids and a golden retriever, they’re there to click on stuff.  And then click on stuff some more, a bit faster.  You’re not getting your jollies in this game by building a deep, lasting empathy with the main character, but by using your own skill to get through a demanding pattern series and see the happy screen at the end that pats you on the back for your efforts.  I almost feel like they should play Ode to Joy there.  (Peggle joke!)  Maybe that’s the next step in the series.  Not Peggle music, but character development.  Just think about it.  CAKE MANIA RPG!  Coming to DS, Wii, iPhone, and your toaster this fall!

3. Dumbing it Down- Not that this style of game requires a PhD to get into in the first place, but having played Diner Dash before, I couldn’t help but feel, picking up Cake Mania 2, that it was much simpler than its ancestors.  I’m not sure that that’s necessarily a bad thing; I actually remember getting seriously pissed off at some of the later levels of Diner Dash the last time I played it (whenever the hell that was), whereas I had no trouble whatsoever clearing all of the Cake Mania 2 levels.  There are just a lot fewer things to keep track of; it was one of those situations where I was doing so well that I eventually ran out of things to upgrade in my kitchen, and would occasionally end up standing around, even on higher-difficulty levels, because there was just nothing for me to do but wait.  I suppose the point here is that if this is your style of game, you may find it a bit easy for your tastes.  I don’t really think I have a problem with that, but some elitist bastard might. 

4. Porting Problems- Since Cake Mania and its sequels have come out on pretty much every platform imaginable, I suppose it was inevitable that at least a few of them were going to come out with some problems.  I played the version that was released for the DS, and I think that may have been a poor choice, because while the touch screen does lend itself well to this style of game, the size of the screens definitely worked against me, even with a DSi (perhaps I do need an XL…. NO LEAH THAT’S A BAD LEAH).  Some of the cake shapes look very, very similar to each other at this size, particularly when the customers start requesting that they be stacked on top of each other.  I can’t tell you how many times I baked a circle instead of a heart just because the kitty cat topper was blocking my view.  Yes, I am aware of how ridiculous that sounds, incidentally.  The other aspect of the screen size that gave me problems was that the touch zones would occasionally be a little off, causing me to frost a cake incorrectly or attempt to deliver it to the wrong person if the targets were particularly close together.  There’s no way to cancel an incorrect action, so oftentimes if you screw up, you’re just stuck.  I suspect that many of these issues would have been solved had I played on my computer instead of the DS, so perhaps if I play Cake Mania 3 (oh yes, there is a Cake Mania 3), I’ll go that route instead.

5. Flashbacks- Anyone who has ever waited tables for a living will tell you, upon playing Diner Dash, that it is frighteningly accurate.  I’m one of those people, and while I’ve never baked cakes for a living, Cake Mania 2 held kind of the same vibe for me.  People order shit from you, and you bring it to them, all the while catering to their demands so that they don’t get too bored or impatient.  Sometimes their demands are perfectly reasonable, and sometimes people are just bitches.  Something that leads me to believe that the creators of these games must have had experience in some sort of customer service field is that you can often tell how a customer is going to react simply by what “type” they are.  This is less of a concern in Cake Mania 2 than it was in Diner Dash, but the basic idea still stands; the astronauts are very busy and important, so their happiness meters drop quickly, but the sumo dudes are very chill… they just like to have second helpings, so they’ll be there a while.  While I do enjoy these games, though, I can’t play them too often because of that very accuracy; otherwise, I end up feeling vaguely anxious and uneasy.

I’m going to write about Silent Hill: Shattered Memories next, but I’m waiting until the fever is gone.  I actually want that to be a GOOD article.

 1. Continuity- I really enjoy it when a series takes its own mythology seriously enough to pay attention to detail and carry over important facets of its characters and events from one installment to another.  Really, for this particular type of game, it shouldn’t even be a remarkable thing when this occurs, but sadly, it often is.  Not where BioWare is concerned, though!  One might say that this is kind of their “thing.”  It’s definitely an option to start a brand-new Shepard at the beginning of your game, so if you hated how yours turned out, no longer have access to your save file, or are adventurous (read as: dumb) enough to start with the second game in the series without playing the first, you can just go right ahead.  However, if you have a save file from the first Mass Effect that you would like to import, quite a few of the decisions that you made and actions that you took carry over and have consequences in the new game.  Perhaps the most notable of these involves the Citadel Council, who you can either save at the end of ME1 or let die while you focus on other stuff going on.  So essentially, you decide who leads the galaxy in the second game, which has a pretty big impact; in my own game, I let the council die and put Captain Anderson in charge.  If, however, I had saved them and put Ambassador Udina on the council, I would have ended up with a completely different configuration.  Your “romantic” choices of the first game are referenced as well, although, at least in my case, you don’t have the opportunity to get your former paramour back, as such.  Kaidan got really cranky that I was “dead” for so long and didn’t call or write or whatever.  He’s a damn crybaby.  Most of the changes that occur as a result of your choices are things that I imagine wouldn’t be all THAT difficult to fit in, but they are incredibly nice touches, and contribute heavily to the immersion factor of the game.   

2. Ladies and Gentlemen- Mass Effect has gotten a lot of attention (and, I believe, rightly so) for being one of the relatively few games that actually offers a fully fleshed-out female character in addition to the male option when you create your Shepard at the beginning.  If you choose to play as a lady (as I did) you don’t get just a boob-skin slapped on top of the pre-existing male, and you don’t get a hyper-sexualized space slut, either; instead, you get…. well, you get a person.  Regardless of the gender of your character, choices surround you, and while some of them DO rely on your character’s gender, you’re not going to find that certain choices are less important than others, they’re just… different.  I feel like I’m not explaining this very well; perhaps you simply need to play as a female and as a male Shepard to really absorb the differences.  In a nutshell, BioWare nailed equality.  In space.

3. Bow Chicka Bow Wow- Hey, remember how Fox News made a gigantic fucking deal about there being side-boob in the first Mass Effect?  IS IT A RAPE SIMULATOR?  Uh, no.  And neither is the second one.  You can, however, have all kinds of space sex, regardless of whether you choose a male or female Shepard.  Some of the options, I am led to understand, are even the same.  Rather than opine on the relationships of Mass Effect 2 in general, I think my own specific playthrough experiences may actually illustrate the whole deal better.  As a female Shepard, I was fully prepared to go back to my “relationship” with Kaidan from the first game, only to find that that wasn’t an option.  What was a girl to do at that point?  Well, what I personally did was immediately start hitting on nice, dependable Jacob.  We had a pretty good thing going for a while, but it was way too slow for my rakish heroine, who had, after all, been dead for a while and was up for a little more action.  The real trouble started once we took Jack on board.  After going for reliable, steady dudes for so long, this unstable, uninhibited convict seemed pretty different and exciting.  Surprisingly, though (or at least it was to me), Jack is not open to relationships with the lady-types.  Oh well.  At least we had a friendship of sorts going on.  By that time, the seed of doubt had been sown in my time with Jacob, though, and I started looking around in other areas of the ship for companionship… which is how I ended up with Garrus.  The “romance” dialogue options with Garrus are downright spectacular, as are some of the side effects around the ship(notably, when Mordin offers tips on such topics as avoiding chafing).  Jacob became offended and withdrawn after that, but I suppose that’s to be expected.  Bitch shoulda put out sooner.  (Oh wow, that’s terrible…)

4. Upgrading- Prepare for me to be angry, because I am angry about this.  Very angry.  Throughout the game, you are given the opportunity to upgrade different aspects of your ship.  I say “opportunity” as though you really had any choice in the matter, because I was under the impression that you *did.*  I didn’t focus on the parts of the universe where I could have searched for resources, because I wasn’t really having any trouble going through the storyline, and while I did go through some of the side-quests (particularly the loyalty missions), I mostly focused on moving forward.  There really didn’t seem to be that many points where the condition of your ship affected gameplay, particularly if planet exploration wasn’t exactly your forte.  Then we rolled around to the end of the game, and I was subjected to a most unpleasant surprise.  If you don’t upgrade your ship, you automatically get three crew members killed.  What.  The.  FUCK?  Other crew members can (and in my case, did) die for other reasons, but this particular pitfall seemed completely arbitrary to me, particularly since there are no warnings or reasons to think that this would be the sole reason for their survival.  Grrrrrr.

5. The “RP” Part- Surprisingly enough, this is something that I don’t actually do a whole lot in video games.  It’s too easy to see when a game will punish you for choosing the “wrong” dialogue option, even when you supposedly have the freedom to go through whichever character development route you want.  In the Mass Effect series, your Shepard follows along the general paths of “Paragon” or “Renegade,” but that’s not all there is to it.  The dialogue is masterfully written, as is BioWare’s way, to the point where you can actually develop a personality for your character beyond simply “good” or “bad.”  This development is bolstered by the ability to give him/her a background, which can thusly inform your choices, if you are so inclined.  Of course, if all you want is to make the galaxy’s most evil motherfucker or to portray a shining example of humanity…. well, you can definitely do that.  Again, though, I’ll bring my own Shepard into play to illustrate what I mean when I say that your character just seems more real than in other games.  Kat Shepard grew up surrounded by the military lifestyle, so it was no surprise when she entered the service herself; when her entire unit was obliterated except for her, she developed a hard outer shell designed to keep most people from getting too close, but her own survivor guilt meant that she still desperately wanted to be loved, because that might mean that on some level, she was forgiven.  Playing this Shepard, then, meant that she was intense and practical, weighing her options with as little regard to outward emotionality as possible, to the point where most people would kind of think of her as a cold bitch.  For those who would bother to get to know her, though, she would be fiercely loyal and protective… as long as they were still useful to her, of course.  So yeah, I got a little more into my character than in many other games of this type, and I think it’s a mark of BioWare’s excellence that they were able to draw me (and, I’m sure, many other people) in like this.  I admit, I’m plenty excited to see what direction the third installment will take, and I can’t wait to get Kat back out into the galaxy.

Next time, I’ll be stretching my brain to see how the hell I can get a full article out of Cake Mania 2.  No, really.

Alan Wake, AKA The Game of Eternal Development Time, is a bit difficult to put an accurate plot synopsis to in a sentence or so, but I’ll give it a try: a popular writer takes a vacation with his wife in a rustic mountain town, where she disappears under mysterious circumstances.  Creepiness ensues.  There is, however, quite a bit more to it than that, which I can hopefully shed some light on (see what I did there?) with these Five Things.

1. Stephen King- I read books like many other people watch TV; sure, there are a lot of times where there’s something specific I want, but every once in a while I’ll just have something around as background noise.  Stephen King novels frequently fall into that category for me.  I don’t say that to be insulting or derivative; I enjoy reading them, or I wouldn’t be doing it in the first place.  However, they’re not generally something I must have immediately, nor are they usually ground-breaking or particularly surprising.  You usually know what’s going to happen.  Frim its very first line of dialogue, Alan Wake makes absolutely no effort to hide its unabashed ripping-off of essentially all of the conventions that make Stephen King what he is.  Before I even started playing, a friend told me it was “like playing a Stephen King novel,” and he was absolutely right; that’s what they’re going for, and they definitely hit it on the head.

Interestingly (and, to me, humorously), the developers didn’t stop at emulating the best parts of King’s style, but rather went for everything, even when it ended up being sorta silly.  Small town filled with creepy locals hiding some kind of dark secret?  Okay, I’m with you on that one.  HAUNTED TREES?  …..okay, we probably could have done without that.  There are times when the whole “poltergeist” mechanic is genuinely creepy, but to me, it just seems shoehorned in most of the time; it’s like whoever the guy on the dev team is that has that signed Stephen King poster above his bed was allowed to go wild, and no one stopped him when he said, “Hey, you know what would go really well here?  POSESSED SHIT!  That’s what Ki…. that’s what *I* would do.”  The name-dropping is also a little excessive, but I guess if you’re going to plaster a guy’s work all over your own, you should at least give him a shout-out now and then, right?

2. The Light Thing- I guess I should go ahead and get this one out of the way.  You can’t really talk about Alan Wake without talking about its core schtick, which is the use of light and darkness to signify safety and danger, good and evil…. well, light and dark.  This is actually really cool, because it’s different.  You can survive without bullets (and if you intend to pursue the achievement “Gunless Wonder,” as I did, then you’ll need practice at this…), but if you run out of light… well, then you’re really fucked.  When fighting enemies, you must first use your chosen light source (usually a flashlight, although flares and car headlights are also frequently available) to remove the protective dark film around them before you can shoot them.  When you start running into posessed stuff, the light is actually all you need; if you can dodge around until you zap them completely, you’ll never even have to fire a shot. 

I’ve never been much good at traditional shooters (although I have gotten much better recently!), so the setup of Alan Wake was a refreshing change for me; you can’t simply shoot everything before it gets to you and starts gnawing on your face, because there are too many of them, and they are much faster than you.  They’re also eerily quiet, so when the camera helpfully slows down and zooms in on an incoming pack, remain on your guard, because there’s probably at least one behind you as well.  You’ll need to learn which enemies have their covering removed slowly and which quickly, and use that knowledge to keep things stunned while you pick them off.  Oh, and flashbangs.  They were my very bestest friends. 

3. Scarcity- One common complaint I’ve heard about Alan Wake is that it’s possible to run out of batteries and ammo much too quickly, leaving you vulnerable to the nasties that lurk in the literal shadows.  Maybe it’s because I’m a veteran of the survival horror genre, but I really didn’t have a problem with this.  It’s true that supplies aren’t exactly abundant, but would you honestly expect them to be?  AW at least makes an occasional attempt to explain why you can find shotgun ammo lying on benches around town (The not-actually-crazy-but-rather-the-only-one-who-knows-the-truth lady left it there!  Of course!), which is more than you get out of most games of this sort.  It’s true that I did get a little annoyed when I would end a chapter or sequence with a well-stocked armory tucked in my digital pockets only to have some contrived occurance (oh noes!  I fell out of a helicopter!) strip all of that from me and make me start over.  It was like the Metroid syndrome, only ten times in the same game.  However, with just a bit of rationing, I didn’t have any trouble making my supplies last.

A moment while I climb on my soapbox.  I’ve probably addressed this in the podcast before (and I know I did on Gamehounds a couple of weeks ago), but I feel it’s appropriate here; while I, like any other gamer, will yell and curse and squeak when I run out of ammo, in a survival horror game, it’s almost part of the experience that you should do so from time to time.  If you don’t have any fear for your own safety, then it’s not really horror, is it?  And if you’re provided with a constant stream of bullets and health, then you’re not going to be concerned about your survival.  The uncertainty and the need to watch out for yourself are what makes the experience unnerving and thrilling.  This is something that the Silent Hill series does extremely well, and I feel that Alan Wake does also.

4. Faces- I’m not normally a graphics snob.  I don’t care all that much if a game doesn’t look perfect, as long as I’m having fun.  So, when I say that the facial animations in Alan Wake were kind of an issue for me, you can take that as meaning that they pretty much sucked.  It’s a real shame, too, because the rest of the game was really immersive for me, so breaking into a cutscene where the characters’ mouths weren’t moving anywhere near the dialogue I was hearing was jarring, to say the least.  Alice was a particularly bad offender in this category; every time I saw her, I just thought that she didn’t look right at all.  The character models themselves were pretty good; upon looking through the artbook that came with the limited edition strategy guide, the similarities between the in-game graphics and the live models was quite impressive.  Even Alan’s body animations during gameplay, beyond perhaps an occasional clip or jolt, were fine…. but once they opened their mouths…. no good.  You’d think a game that was in development for this long would have gotten that sort of thing straightened out, but apparently not.  Oh well.

5. Product Placement- Oooooookay.  I understand that you have to pay for your game somehow.  I understand that you need sponsors, that you need to be able to pay all those people you’ve apparently been keeping employed for the last eight or nine years.  I can’t help but wonder, however, what the fuck Energizer and Verizon were doing that the developers felt obligated to kiss their asses quite this much.  Were they perhaps providing hookers?  Cocaine?  Free ham sammiches?  Whatever it was, it resulted in branded batteries being slapped into Alan’s trusty flashlight every thirty seconds (which seems a little backwards to me… wouldn’t you want your batteries to seem like they last forever?  I guess the fact that they repel evil was good enough for the marketing folks) to the point where there is actually an achievement called “Energized” that you essentially can’t help but get.  Likewise, Alan’s cell phone is provided by Verizon (similar to my Energizer complaint above, I can’t help but notice that Verizon’s product never seems to work when it’s really important), and while there isn’t an achievement related to it, there are quite a few in-game billboards that get thrown in your face any time you might have been in danger of forgetting who the top wireless provider is in these parts.

Overall, I was completely hooked on Alan Wake, and I’d definitely recommend it if you enjoy the Silent Hill franchise, or even if you’re just looking for something different to tide you over until… I don’t know, Halo or Call of Duty or whatever.  Just stay in the light.

Next time I *promise* I’ll get back to Mass Effect 2.  You understand, right?