Guys, I really hope this new Strider turns out great. Can I tell you I was this close to buying LocoCycle yesterday now that it’s on sale but Strider’s coming to Xbox One in just a few more weeks. I’m also pretty sure LocoCycle will be a prime candidate to be one of Microsoft’s free “Games with Gold” before too long so I’ll put that $10 right into Shadow Complex 2 Strider instead.
26 Jan, 2013
Three in the morning is an odd time to have a revelation about Resident Evil. That was the hour when I felt listening to the original soundtrack would be a great way to fall back asleep. The first several hours of the original Resident Evil were the most terrifyingly effective. Even today, seventeen years later, the experience is fresh in my ailing mind. Stalked by zombies, ambushed by skinless dogs, trapped in a room of spikes, ravaged by an enormous snake.
Spoilers were rarely a worry back then and so it was a complete surprise to find a sprawling lab full of diaries explaining that all the wicked evil I just fought through was manmade. The game was still fantastic and terrifying but that was always a bummer to me; I was sure this was all the work of the devil. I went on to love Resident Evil 2 but my excitement died off from there and I haven’t really been interested since.
That brings us to 3am when my sleepy neurons lazily misfire and for the first time I apply all my memories of Resident Evil to its Japanese namesake, Bio Hazard. Suddenly it all makes sense and, of course, the zombies and giant snakes are all manmade because it says as much right in the title. As great a name as Resident Evil is it’s such a lie and one that can only be played for a shocking twist once. That twist came seventeen years ago and since I’ve always wished the series was more true to the name.
With characters and corporations that grow more complex in each game it’s clear that Capcom isn’t planning to shock us with a supernatural twist. Umbrella is actually a front for Satan’s army of zombie biologists who created the T-virus to subvert humanity’s faith in religion by offering them perfection through science? Probably not gonna happen. No, it’ll be up to me to come back to Capcom’s side and after this midnight revelation I’m starting to think I finally could. All I need is a sticker that says Bio Hazard to put over the logo and maybe I could finally finish Resident Evil 4!
Here’s a few quick and highly specific categories that have nothing to do with one another. I asked for award suggestions online but only Mr. GamerParent himself responded. I’m also happy to report I spent very little on DLC this year, most of which was on sale. And finally, look at all the weird Japanese stuff I played! Most of it wasn’t released in 2012 but it was almost all new-to-me and wonderfully atypical.
Best Capcom game that isn’t Monster Hunter
DLC I actually paid for
Honorary Japanese Weirdness Award
Feature / Microsoft / Now Playing
25 Apr, 2012
“This demo is dumb Shawn lol” read the message in KakaoTalk from my wife. A real understanding of what Dragon’s Dogma is has been hard for me to come by and this foreboding message was as close to a cut and dry explanation as I’d come. A “Japanese Skyrim” or “another Monster Hunter knockoff” seem to be the most frequent comments but now I’ve played it myself and I can definitively tell you that it’s… well, it’s like… uhm…
Dark Souls meets Monster Hunter. Having barely played either of those titles I still feel totally comfortable in telling you that’s how Dragon’s Dogma boils down… probably. Obtuse systems and peculiar terminology mixed with epic fights against giant beasts in an open world. There, now you’ve got it.
The demo throws you straight into things with its “Prologue Quest” and offers only a couple screens that break down what the buttons do. And wow, there’s a lot of button combos. Blocking with your shield enables 2 attacks and an Aggro call while you have a default Regular and Strong attack as well as 3 more combos that use your stamina. An inventory of found ingredients and a screen full of numbers and status symbols await you if you press the Back button. There’s nowhere you can go in this game that doesn’t initially look overwhelming.
Your companions — flippantly referred to as “pawns” who can be warped to you at special stones — try to help but they’ve clearly played this game before. Mimicking the live chat of an MMO, their comments and hints are constantly scrolling up the left hand side of the screen as they run directly into combat with or without you. You’ve got a few commands on the D-pad but no matter how frequently I called them to my side they would always run off chasing the story while I was trying to get my bearings. You can’t live without them, though, as they are the A.I. embodiments of your MMO hotbar. A mage will cast healing spells or buff your weapons while another brute will yell out that he’s going to draw the beast’s attention. Still other characters will be shouting out hints and offering to launch you onto whatever monster is around.
At one point I referred to them as my three moms, constantly telling me to do this or watch out for that. “Let him do it himself, it’s the only way he’s going to learn,” I hear an imaginary dad say, one I wish was in the game to assuage the fears of my pawns. Maybe there’s a way to tailor the behavior of at least one pawn — your dedicated follower — but I sure didn’t see it in my five runs through the demo.
I also wasn’t aware that there are character classes in this game! The Prologue Quest forces you to use the default fighter dude but the second demo mission lets you use anyone you’ve made in the world’s worst character creator to try out the ranger-like class. Sure enough my Legolas-like lady wields dual blades, ditches the shield for a bow and has amazingly different moves than the default guy. Then it’s off to fiddle with their physical appearance which can be tweaked to create some truly horrific (but also recognizable) figures. Sliders define how “ladylike” or “confident” a character is while wrinkles can be added but only to the head. It is perfectly bizarre and totally Japanese and you can expect it to be a short-lived meme or a Joystiq header image.
I never did get to really sink into Dark Souls so I’m hopeful that Dragon’s Dogma will be my perplexingly difficult fantasy adventure game to comprehend and conquer. It seems like there’s a ton to learn and even more to customize about your character and those nannying pawns. I don’t think the demo does a good job of explaining exactly what the game is but at least I know how it plays and can say for certain that I really want to dig into it. Check out the demo yourself (it’s out on Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3) because if you’ve read this far you’re clearly as intrigued by the game as I am.
Done Playing / Feature / Microsoft
23 Apr, 2012
World Gone Sour is another one of those increasingly common games that I buy not for its apparent quality but because of how it revolves around real people I know online. When certified real person Adam Boyes (from co-developer Beefy Media) plays the game alongside equally real Giant Bomb co-founder Jeff Gerstmann, their banter is more than just a PR dude trying to sell a press guy on the game. They’re friends and though they may not call me the same, I feel a friendly connection to the two from years of Giant Bomb podcasts and tweets. It was during this quick look that Boyes mentioned a Giant Bomb logo hidden in the game which further blurs the line between things I like. If that wasn’t weird enough context to come into this review I also just earned enough free Microsoft Points from Bing to cover the cost of the game. Let’s just qualify it as “individual results will vary”.
World Gone Sour is a game about Sour Patch Kids candy but like in the days of Cool Spot and M.C. Kids it doesn’t shove candy or soda or happy meals down your throat. The licensed property is just there to set the scene, in this case a world where candy that doesn’t get eaten goes crazy and builds contraptions and obstacles out of everyday junk. You’re a saintly sour patch candy whose quest to rescue his friends has suppressed the madness. What that sets up is a Pikmin-lite system where you find other Sour Patch Kids and hurl them at switches, precariously placed pick-ups, or absorb them to grow bigger and enable new powers.
Those powers include growing and shrinking in size, doing a ground pound move and using your buddies like a bowling ball to take out enemies and explore the side-scrolling levels. It’s nothing cerebral like Fez or daunting like Super Meat Boy and paired with the mellow music and narration of Creed Bratton the whole game feels largely subdued. I’d even call it a nice change of pace from other platformers of late that feel like they’re out to prove something. World Gone Sour is also subdued (in a bad way here) in its visuals with textures that almost look out of a PlayStation 2 game. I like the Toy Story scale of things and the depth of field effects but I didn’t expect to be squinting at blurry objects to make out the gag labels in a modern game. That Giant Bomb logo looks crisp though, oh, and so do the Sour Patch Kids themselves. You can practically taste the crystals of high fructose corn syrup that cover them.
World Gone Sour is aware of what it is — a platformer based on a licensed piece of candy — and it tries to make it special. The narration is clever in spots and the Method Man video takes itself perfectly seriously but it doesn’t go far enough to be really memorable. If you don’t also have a strange meta connection to those involved with its production I can only call it a palette cleanser that isn’t as sour as you’d expect from a pun that bad. It’s cheap, lasts for a couple of days, has local co-op play and you’ll likely get all of the Achievements without much extra work. I hate to call it a throwaway diversion between bigger games but given the sugary nature of the source material that may be the most fitting way to put it.
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