Wayne Phinney

Pikmin

February 5, 2006

I bought [i]Pikmin[/i] thinking it would be an interesting new game by Shigeru Miyamoto. The man is a god when coming up with original ideas for video games and this is no different. You play as Captain Olimar who went on a vacation to ease the stresses of work. He goes on a little space vacation on his own and sets his ship, The Dolphin, on autopilot. He ends up being struck by an asteroid and blacks out during the impact. He then awakens to find himself on an earth-like planet. His ship is in bad shape and 30 parts of the ship are missing. He discovers that the planet he landed on is full of oxygen which is toxic and deadly to his people. His life support will only last him 30 days. Since there are 30 parts and you have 30 days, it’s good to have an average of one part per day in order to win this game. He can’t carry the parts alone, but he discovers an interesting creature that he calls a [i]Pikmin[/i].

[i]Pikmin[/i] are tiny little humanoid creatures that are generally known as common prey on this planet. Olimar is the size of a quarter and Pikmin are about the size of a dime. Olimar may have up to 100 pikmin on the field at the same time, and there is NO slowdown in the game at all from there being so many characters on the screen. There are 3 different types of pikmin and each have their own special abilities. While a couple of pikmin are near useless except for in the first area of the game, 25 or more is sufficient for most battles and chores, and 100 can take out most any enemy, even boss type enemies with ease.

[i]Pikmin[/i] is a great game. It is easy to learn, and the game pretty much teaches you how to play, but the difficulty in the game is the lack of time you have to accomplish your mission. Now, Olimar hints to you as the game goes that he may not need all the pieces to make it home, which may very well be true, but I got them all, so it really didn’t matter in my case. I did have to play through twice to get all the pieces though.

Now, overall the game is rather easy and simple, but there are points where you’ll do something stupid and lose 100 pikmin at once(like drowning them for instance). It CAN be a pain at some points, and a few of the parts do take a little thinking to get to, and that’s half the fun. Overall I think this is a great original game, and even if you fail to complete your mission at the end, there is a top 5 scoreboard that you get added to if you make the grade. This helps keep it from being such a disappointment if you lose. Overall, this game looks great and I have enjoyed it quite a bit. I find it rather addicting, and it has a neat little storyline to go along with it.

The biggest downside to [i]Pikmin[/i] is the days are short, and so is the game itself. The game can be beaten in just a few hours if you know what you’re doing. That’s why it’s probably better to rent this game, but it does have a top 5 chart that is good inspiration to play through again and again to try to beat your best high scores.

Still, even though the game is short, it’s a solid title. It’s quite unique and is the first great real time strategy game I’ve seen on a console. It looks great, there are no slowdowns, and there is virtually no learning curve.

Metroid: Zero Mission

February 5, 2006

Game Boy Advance / Reviews / by Wayne Phinney /

Justin Bailey. Justin Bailey. Justin Bailey.

Ok ok… so I’m having a flashback. Sue me. I recently gave [i]Metroid: Zero Mission[/i] a run-through, and let me tell you, I’m impressed. Sure, this game could have been better, but then again, how could it have been? It was a remake of a 20 year old game, so I really couldn’t expect something mind-blowingly awesome.

But then again… I did really enjoy it.

The first thing I must let people know is that this game is very short, and if you want to give it a try, I’d recommend buying a used copy on eBay or something to that effect. Short it may be, but it was very fun. It was great going back through a remade version of the old game that I had played as a kid. It was great seeing all the new things they added to the game. It was great that this game played very much like [i]Super Metroid[/i], which is a truly awesome game. That’s perhaps the best way to describe it. [i]Metroid: Zero Mission[/i] is essentially [i]Super Metroid[/i] but taking place in the story of the first game. That’s the simplest and most easy way to explain exactly what it is like.

One nice thing is that they fixed the few spots in the game where you can get stuck. For those that remember the old NES title, there are some holes that you can fall in that are either extremely difficult to get out of, or completely impossible. Those areas have been fixed so you can’t fall in a hole that you can’t get out of.

One of the biggest differences between this game and the old one is the addition of another area in the game. I won’t say anymore so as not to spoil it, but it was a great new place to explore, and I had a lot of fun with it.

Other changes included Kraid who was a giant like in [i]Super Metroid[/i], and Ridley who seemed to be exactly like he was in [i]Super Metroid[/i] (like I’m complaining. It’s hard to improve on awesome).

The best addition to this game though is a map, and it telling you where you are supposed to go next. When you are new to the world of [i]Metroid[/i], it’s pretty daunting to get around without a map, and certainly not easy without someone telling you which general direction you should be going in. [i]Zero Mission[/i] solves those problems.

It’s really hard to write anything in depth about a remake of a 20 year old game, but to be as clear as possible, I will reiterate a few things. This game is basically [i]Super Metroid[/i] in the setting of the first game. If you ask me, that’s a great thing. I loved this game, and although it’s a tad on the short side, it was also originally made in 1986, so I can’t say much.

If you are a [i]Metroid[/i] fan in the least, you owe it to yourself to pick up this game. You will not regret it.

A guilty pleasure of mine

February 3, 2006

News / by Wayne Phinney /

Big fan of Diablo here. I really loved the atmosphere of the first one, and the ability to run, all the new items, and new features of the second one. I have been dreaming for a full 3D Diablo game for some time. Are we going to get one? It [url=http://www.gamespot.com/news/6143594.html]seems to be[/url] a possiblity.

Of course, the people they are looking for will be working with what’s left of the team that was behind Diablo. Naturally, this doesn’t neccesarily mean that they are working on a new Diablo game, but what the hell. I’m going to get excited anyways.

New Diablo! New Diablo! New Diablo!

Ok… now that I’ve gotten that out of my system, let’s move on. I hope this will be a new Diablo game, but I would even go for a new Hack n Slash RPG by Blizzard.

kill.switch

January 29, 2006

Reviews / Xbox / by Wayne Phinney /

Take Cover. Take Aim. Take Over. This is the slogan for [i]Kill Switch[/i]. It’s amazing how six simple words can pretty much tell you the basis of the game. The only problem is, you need more than six words to really describe all the good and bad in this game. In [i]Kill Switch[/i] you are a soldier named Nick Bishop. Inside your head you have some amazing technology that keeps you in contact with your superiors a la Splinter Cell, but it also appears to be one of the big reasons you are such a good soldier. While not clear in the game, it apparently gives you an edge on the competition. From a storyline perspective, it probably gives you better aiming ability and such. The only problem with sticking technology in your head though is that it can be corrupted. This is exactly what happens, and that’s how you start out in the game.

Little do you know that you are working for your enemy. They have tapped into your tech and taken control of you. One of the men is basically controlling you as if he was playing a video game. The other is simply intent on creating chaos and wants to use you for it. The reason he wants to use you is more of a personal thing that I will leave out. I don’t want to spoil too much of the story.

The first several levels you will be playing will involve you doing things for your enemies because you simply can’t control yourself. The problem with this though is that as a player of the game, you don’t realize this is going on(well, I guess after reading this review you do). It’s far from clear as to what is happening. While it’s nice in the sense that it gives the game a bit of mystery by leaving you out of the loop, it feels like it leaves you so far out of the loop that you have no idea what’s going on.

At first I thought this problem was just me, but my brother played the game and also had no idea what was going on. It really doesn’t become even remotely clear until you get to the end of the game. The only good about this is that the game makes you feel like you need to play it again to really ‘get it.’ I think this is a weak attempt, however, at making the game feel like it has more replay value than it really does.

[i]Kill Switch[/i] has a lot of strong points though. Unlike most shooters, this game actually has pretty good voice acting. At first it threw me off that when I thought Bishop was talking his lips weren’t moving. I immediately thought to myself “How could Namco screw up so bad that his lips don’t move?” A few levels later I realized why once I uncovered a bit more of the story. He wasn’t the one talking. The guy controlling him was.

Along with the voice acting comes the cutscenes. This sort of thing tends to go hand in hand in most games. I loved the cutscenes though. Overall they were all of good quality, and there are a handful of them that are just freaking sweet! Seeing the battle go down in Bishop’s apartment via cutscene is just amazing. I felt like I was watching a great action movie for about a half minute or so. It was quite impressive.

The best part about this game is also the focus of the game… cover fire. This game really does force you to use your surroundings as cover to accomplish your goals. Overall the game is realistic in that if you get shot a few times, you will die. Even though you have typical body armor on, it doesn’t take a lot to kill you. This brings me to the health meter. I think it was very well done. As you get hit, your meter goes down for “permanent damange” for lack of a better term. Initially though the meter gets lighter partway down to signify temporary damage. This means that if you get shot too much too quickly you will die even though you may have nearly full health. If however you take the occasional potshot here or there, you will likely be fine.

Because it is so easy to die on this game, you really can’t go running in like a typical shooter and just blasting the hell out of everything and figuring you will survive. This won’t happen. You have to really take advantage of using cover, and also make use of the variety of weapons available to you. Most weapons are your typical guns you would see with the military, and then of course you have a variety of grenades and such. My favorite of which being the sticky grenade. Hit a person with that and they start running around about to explode, and they tend to take out others with them. There’s also flash grenades which debilitate your enemies for a short while, but don’t set one off too close to yourself or your screen will go white and you won’t be able to see a thing.

In [i]Kill Switch[/i], it doesn’t take too long to learn how to use the cover provided to you. You can shoot around it on the sides, over the top, throw grenades, or what have you. It’s all very well done in that respect. Being able to blindfire is nice as well. You just put your gun around the corner without looking. It’s clearly not as accurate as poking your head out and looking, but if the enemy is directly around the corner, there’s no sense of risking being shot if you probably won’t be able to even miss him.

The problem with blind firing though is you could easily come to rely on it. Since targets at a distance are hard to hit if you don’t aim, you will waste a lot of ammo trying, but even so, it’s not like you will run out. Enemies drop ammo all the time, and you start with plenty as it is, so you really can’t run out. I once ran out of ammo in one gun, so I put it away and grabbed one of the four or so others that I had with me. My other gun was full of ammo again after killing a few guys and I was on my way. Ammo is plentiful, but that still doesn’t make the game easy.

Because it is so easy to die in this game if you’re not taking cover, it can make for some pretty difficult times. While it helps that if you can’t see your enemy who is offscreen the game will put an arrow on your screen telling you where you are being shot from, it still is not easy. There are plenty of areas where there isn’t a lot of cover to work with and you just have to shoot accurately and dive a lot. The problem with shooting accurately is the recoil. While realistic, it prevents you from really just running around and shooting. Thankfully though, your diving will help a lot in not getting shot. You are harder to shoot while you are diving, and on top of that, if a grenade lands at your feet, it is a great way to get away from it.

Overall, [i]Kill Switch[/i] plays quite well, and I really loved the focus on cover fire. This wasn’t just another shooter where you run around and kill people. This game felt like it had actual strategy and skill involved. While the game was an enjoyable experience overall, it doesn’t mean the game is perfect… no… not by any means. This game has a handful of flaws that are just too hard to overlook.

First thing’s first. This camera needs a lot of work. When you are outdoors it is all well and good, but much like a lot of third person shooters, this camera isn’t very good indoors at all. I found that frequently when I was going down hallways I couldn’t see because the camera would pull closer to Bishop so as not to go in the wall. While that is good, an over the shoulder view would be preferred to the ‘Hair Club for Men’ view. I don’t need to be inspecting Bishop to make sure he’s got a full lush head of hair. I need to see past him so I can actually aim. Thankfully there are only a couple of levels where this is an issue, but it certainly didn’t make playing any easier.

As I’ve already talked about, it is quite easy to die in this game. This is both good and bad. It adds to the realism and certainly makes you use some strategy, but the problem is that there are some levels that force you to go about in a run and gun method of gameplay to get past that area, and when it’s so easy to die, this is not good. When a game’s focus is on cover fire, they shouldn’t put in levels that offer very little cover and a lot of enemy fire. Not a good combination.

A big complaint that I have with [i]Kill Switch[/i] is that the story is simply difficult to follow. In the beginning it seems to make no sense at all. You don’t know who is who, who you are fighting, why you are fighting them, what the purposes behind your missions are, etc. None of the story is remotely clear until you start getting towards the end of the game. Then it starts making sense, but we shouldn’t have been left so in the dark early on that it is confusing. Like I said, I thought it was just me, but I wasn’t the only one that had trouble following the story. It’s a great story. Don’t get me wrong. It’s just that the execution of it could have been a little bit better.

My biggest problem with this game, which is probably worse than all those I’ve already listed is that it is way too short. I played through this game on normal, and from start to finish, it took me approximately six hours to beat the game. I died dozens of times and yet I still managed to beat the game in six hours. Now come on… six hours for a shooter is pretty bad. You guys couldn’t have at least thrown in a few more levels or something? Anything would have been nice. I don’t see $50 for a six hour game being worth it. In fact, I actually felt ripped off once I beat the game. This is not a good feeling to have if Namco wants me to be a repeat customer.

What could have saved this though would have been a multiplayer option. Namco should have hooked up with Microsoft to at least get this game put up on Live for the Xbox version. The other ones would be nice too, but at least with Live, there’s not much to do. Create a few levels, throw in some added content, perhaps have teams or something. The hard stuff is already done thanks to Microsoft. You have the headset, the connection to Live, the hardware(noone has to buy a broadband adapter for the Xbox), and you have a multiplayer gaming experience. I can’t imagine that it would have taken a lot of time to slap together a dozen multiplayer maps for this game. Considering that multiplayer could have really saved this game, they should have made the effort.

[i]Kill Switch[/i] really is a good game, and I hate to give it such a bad score, but it has a handful of flaws, and the total gameplay time is far too short. When a game like this is a multiplayer game calling out to you from a single player game disc, then you know you have failed. Namco, you really should have included multiplayer. I’m sure with that this game would easily be worth a much higher rating. Anyone can look past a short single player experience if there is some multiplayer action thrown it, but without this, the short single player game just stands out too much. [i]Kill Switch[/i] begs to be played on Live, but since it is not, the only thing I can do is say this. Rent this game. It really isn’t bad. It’s just that with the flaws it has, it’s barely above average and not worth buying. I would certainly give this game a “Rental of the Year” award if we had one, but beyond that, I’m sorry to say I can’t do much.

Namco, if you are planning on a sequel to this game, please include multiplayer, or even better, base it around multiplayer. Make the original [i]Kill Switch[/i] a Platinum Hits title, make the new one for playing on Live, and you will have a much better game on your hands as well as increased sales. Seriously…this game needs multiplayer like an anorexic needs food. It desperately needs it.

Golden Sun: The Lost Age

January 29, 2006

Game Boy Advance / Reviews / by Wayne Phinney /

How do you take a perfect game styled after the classic RPGs of the past and improve upon it? Well, I suppose tagging [i]The Lost Age[/i] onto the name is enough. I can’t really explain how this game lived up to the greatness of the original [i]Golden Sun[/i], but somehow it did, and I am quite impressed.

This game picks up right where the last one ended. While the lack of a complete ending in the last game could have been bad, the game had a good feeling of accomplishment when you did beat it, therefore leaving you feeling satisfied at the end. Satisfied or not, though, you still wanted more. When I finished [i]Golden Sun[/i], I went right out and bought [i]The Lost Age[/i]. I hoped that this game would deliver and it sure did.

Going into this, I didn’t care if all the skills and spells were the same. I simply wanted to continue on the story and triumph over evil and the like. I was pleasantly surprised to find out very early on that there are many different things. Of course the first thing you will notice is the new world layout. You can see the entire world this time from falls to falls (that’s right, waterfalls are at the ends of the earth). You can see on the map the land you once traveled through with Isaac, Garet, Ivan, and Mia, but now you can no longer get to that area. You start on an island continent that up until recently had no contact with other land. Due to the lighting of the Venus lighthouse however, the island has shifted and is now connected to the southern part of the Gondowan continent as well as another island continent. Your travels of course will take you through all these new lands, new towns, and new environments. Other new things include spells and skills, Djinni abilities, forgeable items, and so on.

The main difference in [i]Golden Sun: The Lost Age[/i] is the focus on the other half of the story. This time you play as Felix, accompanied by Jenna, Sheba, and eventually a newcomer to the game, Piers. Playing the role of Felix opens up a lot of the story and helps you to understand why he was against Isaac in the prior game and what his intentions are. Because you are playing as Felix, that is the excuse the game offers for why you can’t go back to the towns you visited in [i]Golden Sun[/i]. Those people remember you as an enemy and do not understand the intentions behind your actions, so it is safer to not visit them. I think Camelot did well with this detail to help you feel like there’s a reason for not going back beyond them not having all those areas programmed into the game.

Even though you see the story from a different perspective as Felix, the story still remains pretty much the same. Instead of trying to stop the lighthouses from being lit, however, your goal is to get to them and light them. Felix has his reasons, but so as not to spoil the story, I will leave that out. Most RPGs tend to have a problem with using the same enemies over and over, but this is not so in [i]The Lost Age[/i]. While some enemies you faced in [i]Golden Sun[/i] are back, most of the enemies are new and fresh. New skills of course help out, and the new Djinni seem even more powerful than once before. For instance, in [i]Golden Sun[/i], there was a Djinni that could revive a fallen comrade, but along with those, [i]The Lost Age[/i] had a Djinni that can revive all fallen comrades. Between the new enemies, levels, towns, skills, Djinni, and characters, this truly is a brand new game in its own right. While it plays the same as the original [i]Golden Sun[/i], it feels like you are playing an entirely different game, and this of course is a key element in what makes this game so enjoyable.

Speaking of similiarities and differences, this brings me to something I wanted to mention. A lot of people are hesitant to get this game because they haven’t played the original [i]Golden Sun[/i]. While that is certainly a good reason to try [i]Golden Sun[/i] first, [i]The Lost Age[/i] can be played without having played [i]Golden Sun[/i] prior to it. When you first start you get a briefing on what happened in the prior game, and since you are using new characters, you don’t actually need your characters from [i]Golden Sun[/i].

While you don’t need your characters from [i]Golden Sun[/i], for the best gaming experience, I recommend playing the first game and then carrying your characters over to the next one. Some parts of the story will mean more if you have played the first one, and I found that in the case of the final boss in [i]The Lost Age[/i], I needed all eight characters. While you can only play as four at a time like before, once your party (Felix) meets up with Isaac, you can mix and match characters, Djinni, etc. I finished the game with the lineup of Felix, Garet, Piers, and Sheba who are Earth, Fire, Water, and Wind adepts respectively. Jenna’s low HP made me drop her to my backup team. On the final boss though, I did as much damage as I could with my backup team, then when they died and Team Felix continued where they left off, it was easier. Since the final boss did more damage as the fight went on, it was easier this way.

Being able to move Djinni from character to character between teams was incredibly helpful, but even with the best Djinni setups, some enemies have a Djinni drain skill. Two enemies that I can remember had this. One was only able to drain one Djinni at a time, which wasn’t a big loss since I had a dozen others to work with, but the final boss had a habit of draining all the Djinni on one character. While I could live without the skills, the hit point, attack, and defense bonuses lost from this made dying all too easy.

Thankfully though, because of the game’s random enemy spawning like in most classic RPGs, you tend to level up at just about the pace you should be leveling up for your travels in the game. Just like in [i]Golden Sun[/i], when I got to the end I was the proper level to make it possible to beat the final boss, but it was still a fair challenge making the reward of winning that much sweeter.

Speaking of winning, the game’s ending is superb. While I don’t want to spoil anything, I will say that it ties up a lot of loose ends and brings plenty of closure to a game that was essentially left wide open at the end of the first one. As much closure as there was though, like most great games and movies, there is just enough left without a conclusion that makes it possible for yet another [i]Golden Sun[/i] game. Again, I won’t spoil anything, but if Camelot wanted to right now, they could make another [i]Golden Sun[/i] game and I would be ready and willing to plunk down the cash for it.

I really can’t say anything bad about this game. It is a perfect game styled after the RPGs of old, and just like the first one, it was a very solid gaming experience. With the longer gameplay(about 35 hours compared to the previous 25 in [i]Golden Sun[/i]), you really get the most bang for your buck. I can’t recommend this game more to anyone who owns a GBA. If you like RPGs in the least, you owe it to yourself to go out and buy [i]Golden Sun[/i], and then follow it up with [i]Golden Sun: The Lost Age[/i]. You will be glad you did.

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