Broken, Beaten, Scarred

     It's not been a very good several weeks. I won't get into the details, all I will say is that very bad things have happened recently. Christmas day was a welcome respite, a very nice respite, but the darkness has fallen again. Speaking of which, it's the time of year where it gets dark at 4 pm. LOVE that.>sarcasm<
      Depression, cold, darkness. It's at times like this that I'm glad I have videogames to play. To be able to be another person, in another world, for a little while. Of course one cannot truly be immersed in video games, to play for long hours at a time and truly lose sense of self. No matter how bad things get, I have to deal with the real world.
     I would like to believe that instead of binge drinking or taking several forms of drugs, my self medication is video games, as it probably is for many others. I fully believe that excessive game playing can be very detrimental, as bad as booze or drugs. If video games take over your life, then you are an addict and need help.
     Immersing yourself in a book or movie is a wonderful way to get away from how truly bad life can be. Videogames are special in that you can be the hero, perhaps even save the world. That can make anyone feel better, at least for little while.
     Plus, headshots can be so cathartic.
    
    By the way, the title refers to a Metallica song, which I believe is about no matter how much life beats you down, you won't give up without a fight.    

Keep it simple, stupid

In my day, games were simple. Simple graphics, simple gameplay. Of course, they had to be, by necessity. Back then video games were in their infancy (although some say they still are.) But for the most part, the games were still fun. Well, a lot were.


Nowadays, games have to contain everything but the kitchen sink. A playtime of at least 40 hours, multiplayer, achievements or trophies, voice acting, state of the art graphics and sound, and a novel length story. Granted, new games cost 60 dollars this generation, but back in the day Nintendo games could cost up to 40 dollars. That's just 20 dollars cheaper than games today, minus, well, just about everything the bloated games of today have.

It seems like gamers today, especially this generation, are asking for more, more, more in thier games. Enjoyment and fun have taken a back seat to how much is crammed into the game. Game reviewers are notorious for this, knocking a game if it doesn't have this, that, or the other damn thing.

Call me old-fashioned, but gamers today expect too much from their games. There is a difference between games that are simply bad and games that people hate because they don't have "robust" multiplayer. What matters is if a game is enjoyable to play, and people seem to be losing sight of this. I've seen games that were good but simple in concept lose to huge open world games where you can do 300 boring things. But hey, open world! So many inane things you can do!

Simple can be fun. Too bad so many people have forgotten this.

Two Sides of the Horror Coin, Part 2:Eternal Darkness:Sanity's Requiem

Imagine a game that combines Resident Evil (prior to RE 5) with the stories of HP Lovecraft. Sounds cool, right? Well, Eternal Darkness:Sanity's Requiem is even better than that. One of the very few M Rated games for the Gamecube, Eternal Darkness:Sanity's Requiem (one of the best videogame titles ever, IMHO), is a horror game that transends space and time to weave an engrossing story. That's not hyperbol; the story extends over thousands of years and takes place all over the world. It begins in the present day (well, the year 2000, but close enough). Alexandra Roivas gets a call that her grandfather has been gruesomely murdered in a locked room (poor guy lost his head) and goes to his estate in Rhode Island in order to help the police find out who, or what, killed him. Exploring the mansion in order to find any clues, she comes upon the Book of Eternal Darkness. Reading it, the book tells the tragic stories of several people who have come in contact with the book and their horrible fates. Some of the pages have been torn from the book, and Alexandra finds them as she explores the mansion. The characters in the stories, all of whom you you control as their tale unfolds, are touched by a supernatural evil. And soon, Alexandra finds that she may be the only one able to stop the coming darkness and the destuction of mankind... I don't want to say much about Eternal Darkness' story, except to say that it is excellent and genuinely terrifying. You will fight gruesome horrors (the RE influence) and steadily lose your mind as you do so (the Lovecraft influence), There is much more, but again, I don't want to give anything away. The sanity meter and what happens as your sanity drains away has been been much hyped about, and it is a cool concept. Basically, the game will screw with your mind; at one point, I thought I had accidentally deleted my saved game and was actually pissed about it, until I realized that, yes, the game was screwing with me. The fact that I actually believed it for a moment is a testament as to just how imgenius this game is. The graphics are unifomaly excellent, and help draw you into the game world. The music, too, is very well done,. Very eerie, as it should be. Throughout the course of the game you will also learn magic spells that will give an edge against the coming evil, and believe me, you will need them. If you like horror games at all, I strongly recommend Eternal Darkness. Hell, if you like good games, you should play this. Just try not to be too scared...you might lose your mind forever. Oh, the horror, the horror....

Two sides of the horror coin part 1:Stubbs the Zombie

It's not easy being a zombie. Just ask Stubbs. All he wants is a little brain juice. It's what keeps him alive. Or undead. Whatever. However, the citizens of Punchbowl don't really care for having thier skulls bitten open. But hey, what's a zombie gotta do to get a drink around here? Stubbs the Zombie:Rebel without a Pulse for the original XBox is a breath of fetid air in a time where every other game has you shoot zombies in the face. They are the villians. In Stubbs, you are the (anti) hero, simply in search of brains and perhaps, a little love. Isn't that what all zombies really want? I really love this game, and not just because it's different. It's very much like a dark comedy; there is plenty of gore, but also some comedy. Stubbs will rip the arm off a random policman and he will exclaim "But that was my favorite arm!" Stubbs is a silent protagonist but the humans around him will say the funniest things. As Stubbs shuffles around Punchbowl (did I mention the game is set in the 50's?) and snacks on humans, they will not take kindly to this and fight back with batons, guns and rocket launchers. However, Stubbs has various methods of fighting back himself. He has a vicious...well, fart attack that will stun anyone around him. He can use his own rotting organs as makeshift grenades. He can tear off his own arm, which is ambulatory, and use it take over humans minds so that they will do things for him (such as shoot guns at others. Stubbs can't see that well since he came back to life.) Finally, Stubbs can take off his own head and use it as a bowling ball, which then explodes. Stubbs arm and head will grow back (zombies can do that, right?) Stubbs "health" will regenerate if he stops taking abuse for a short time. Best of all, all the humans whose brains he has feasted on come back to life as zombies themselves, so that Stubbs can create his own zombie army that will follow him around. Who would'nt want their own zombie army? It's really too bad there aren't any games like this anymore, and in this point in time it's very unlikely there will ever be a sequel. So if you ever find for the original XBox, give it a whirl. You'll find being undead isn't so bad, after all.

The little gaming manual that was

=I love reading video game manuals. Too bad that are being phased out completely as digital distribution is the next big thing. Even store bought games barely have any manuals, basically one or two pages of controls, and that's it. It makes me sad that yet another childhood ritual...opening a new videogame and enjoying the often well written and entertaining manual...is pretty much gone. And games still cost 60 dollars if you buy them physically, so there is yet less to the total package for no reduction in price. Maybe a lot of the younger generation could care less, who needs game manuals. They are archiac and old and why would you need a manual for a phone application anyway? Oh, and all games have a hand holding tutorial in them that you have to go through, no matter if you want to or not. I'll especially miss RPG manuals, which used to be 20-50 pages long and filled with character bios, magic attacks, weapons and sometimes even pictures of the monsters you will fight. An enjoyable reading experience, a lot of fun, and that's even before starting the game proper. Japanese RPGs had great manuals, but we all know how unpopular JRPGs are now, right? Anyone else who will be mssing video game instruction manuals? Me, I'll be reading and rereading mine, happy in nolstalgia while the state of gaming becomes more and more depressing.

In Sickness and in Gaming

I have been very sick. Oh, so very sick. Got a stomach virus, got better for a week, then got infected AGAIN. It seems this frikkin' virus is almost a pandemic, sweeping across Massachusetts and the rest of the counrty. It has been nicknamed the boom virus; you can probably imagine why. Me, I don't have to. :S
My poor wife also got this virus from hell, and there was a period of time where we were both deathly ill. Not a good predicament to be in. At least we have no kids that would also have gotten sick. That would have added to misery.
We are gradually getting better. Enough of this *bleep* is enough.
I have been playing games when I have not been puking or worse. Started Persona 4, good game so far but it starts real slow, at least for me. It was a good three and a half hours before I actually got to go dungeon diving. The story is great, it's just the setup seemed to take forever. Really not a knock on the game, I am after all the impatient type, and very eager to see where the games' story takes me. Plus great music (and the game comes with a bonus music disk, niiice.), graphics and delightful persona splicing. Looking forward to more...
Also playing Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days. Good game, although at this point my thoughts for this game could be summed up as "Um...". Gameplay mostly consists of going on missions, beating up on Heartless, rinse and repeat. There is a panel system where every single weapon, magic, action, even level you earn must be placed, which at this point is very frustrating to me. Plus I could care less about any of the main characters, even Roxas. Despite this I do like the game, which will likely get better as I'm only about 10 hours in. Oh, and the camera sucks...but that's standard to most Kingdom Hearts games that I have played.
Finally, just got Thor for the DS. It rocks, it's by Wayforward, nuff said.
Hope everyone is well. I suggest lots of Purell, you DO NOT want to get the Boom virus. Take it from me, I know.

The House of the Dead 2 trifecta

A lot of video games have their own spinoffs; not sequels exactly but games that have the same characters and sometimes plot points. The Kingdom Hearts series, for example, has only two real games in the series but about 20 different spinoffs (give or take.) Actually, I think KH3 is just a myth created by SquareExix, a carrot to drive the horse so that the company can make spinoffs forever.
Nintendo is master of the video game spinoff, so much so that they have gotten it down to an art form. Mario has been whored out to so many different games that don't require jumping and butt stomping goombas that it boggles the mind. Me, I'm waiting for Cooking Mario. It will happen soon, trust me.
No video game has had spinoffs as eclectic as The House of the Dead 2 for the Dreamcast, however. To date there has been only two, although Zombie Revenge could be a gaiden (side) story for The House of the Dead 2. That's never been proven, however.
Mind you, the spinoffs I am about to mention are both based on HotD 2. There is the original House of the Dead for the Saturn, which most people of would rather forget about, as well as House of the Dead 3 for the Xbox and House of the Dead Overkill for the Wii and Playstation 3.
Several pinball games have been 'spun off' from different series, such as Sonic Spinball and Metriod Prime Pinball. And so too does The House of the Dead 2 have Pinball of the Dead for the Gameboy Advance. A light shooting game with zombies having it's own pinball game? Yes, and a pretty good one too.
This game reminds me of the the old Turbographx chestnuts Alien Crush and Devils Crush, and since I adored these games, that is a very good thing. There are three tables to chose from, all loosely based on a chapter from HotD 2, including Boss battles. There are sound bites taken from the game too, complete with horrible voice acting, but they do add to the game. I was lucky enough to get this rare game for 10.50 from amazon, and if you have a GBA, like a pinball and are a fan of HofD 2, then it's highly recommended.
Can there be anything more different than shooting zombies and typing...never mind typing so that you can shoot zombies? Well, that's what you do in The Typing of the Dead for the Dreamcast. Also based on The House of the Dead, instead of using a gun, you use a keyboard to type out letters and phrases to get rid of the zombies. It doesn't sound like that much fun...but it is, as well as being hilarious. Your in game character has a keyboard strapped to his chest instead of packing a gun, and some of the zombies, instead of bloody axes, have toy hammers as weapons. Typing of the Dead is almost a direct port of The House of the Dead 2, except that words can kill. Also recommended, but both the game and the Dreamcast keyboard are hard to find. If you can though, learning to type has never been so much fun.
So from The House of the Dead 2 comes two unlikely but ultimately fun games. Got to hand it to Sega, making these instead of the usual kart racer. Wait a minute, has there ever been a cart racer made that has zombie drivers? And why hasn't that been made yet, with every other video game featuring zombies? Perhaps The House of the Dead 2 well has not dried up just yet....

Enough is Enough

I was digging through the huge amount of video games I own so that i could find a bunch to play instead of just buying game after bloody game, and found so many that I had barely played...I mean only 5 minutes so I could see if the game actually work (the bulk of the games I have are used since I have last generation systems, although they are a hell of a lot cheaper than current gen games). I was throughly disgusted with myself, and promised myself I would not get another game for quite some time. I mean, I have these great, wonderful games stacked atop each other and what do I do? Buy more games that I don't bother to play.

I like to fancy myself a collector of video games, but I also love to play the damn things. If I comtinue this way, I will have stacks of games taller than myself, and one day they will collapse on me and I will be unable to free myself and die of starvation. I can see the headline now: "Idiot man dies after his collection of video games falls on him. What a bloody git." That, or I'll end up on the show Hoarders.

So I'm going to bucke down and FINISH some games before I buy more. This is also the reason I will not buy any new consoles for awhile, I am really, really far behind. Like 2005 behind. Probably for the better anyway. More systems means more games that I can't afford and don't have the room for anyway.

So if you will excuse me, I am going to play this interesting looking game call Halo:Combat Evolved. I heard it was quite good.

Shadow Hearts:An underated JRPG trilogy

Among the many, many great JRPGs for the Playstation 2 are three great ones that are very unique. Mix an RPG with horror elements, humor, a unique battle system and general wierdness, and you have the Shadow Heart series:the original Shadow Hearts, Shadow Hearts Covenant and Shadow Hearts From the New World.

Shadow Hearts could be called a "spiritual successor" to Koudelka, a PS1 JRPG that was part survival horror, part RPG. I own and like the game, but it has some problems, not the least of which is that the developers put save points after, not before, major boss battles, leading to a lot of frustration. Shadow Hearts is a definate improvement, adding one of the best ideas in the form of the Judgement Ring.

Imagine a stylized clock face, only having one hand that spins around very quickly. In order to fight, use an item, or use magic in battle, you have to hit one or several pie shaped highlighted sections on the ring. Miss one or more and you lose your turn (in attacking, if you do miss one of three sections, you still get to attack, you just don't get as many hits in.) In addtion, there are tiny slivers of red on the judgement ring that, when hit, cause more hit or magic damage, or in the case of healing spells or items, more hit points back.

It takes a short time to get used to, but it's an awesome addition to standard turn based battles. And it's not a matter of fast reflexes, just a matter of getting the timing right. Instead of just hitting attack and targeting an enemy, you also use your own skill with the judgement ring to cause damage, making battles more interactive. Do you try to hit the red section to cause more damage, or lose your chance to attack?

Shadow Hearts Covenant brings this idea even further, in that you can link judgement ring attacks of different party characters. As long as you keep hitting the right spots, you can get a chain going and beat the crap out of a monster (almost all the enemies and bosses you face are monsters, which get weirder and more groteque.)

Add to this a main character in the first and second games who is a harmonizer, or a person who can transform into 20+ demons once he defeats them, each with their own special attacks. (In the third game, there is a character who can also transform into demon forms, except it is a she this time.) Other party characters throughout the series are a vampire wrestler, an old man named Gepetto who attacks with female dolls, a cat who knows martial arts, and a ninja names Frank. Told ya this series was weird.

The games also hit all the other marks:great graphics wonderful sound and engaging stories. I really can't recommend these games enough. I managed to find SHC and SHFtNW at Gamestop for reasonable prices, and found Shadow Hearts at Blockbuster. Amazon or Ebay are probably the best bet to find these wonderful games. I would probably buy a PS3 if they ever came out with a fourth gamein the series, but with JRPGs being in the state they are in, that will probably never happen. One can dream...