Nathan Fillion has a new gig on ABC. It's called Castle. You're probably not watching it because you have standards. But, if you were like me and didn't have standards, then you'd be watching Castle and laughing your ass off. But, you do, so it's your loss. I'm moving on.
Here's a quick summary to catch everybody up. It's starring Nathan Fillion. Um, what else do you need to know? Okay, fine. He's a big shot, best-selling mystery novelist suffering from writer's block (he just killed off his cash cow main character). He's being played by Nathan Fillion, by the way. He has a stereotypical sassy daughter. And his publisher is his ex-wife. And his mom is living with him and is really horny (that one's a little awkward).
Anyways, the conceit of the show is that the police call him in because there's a serial killer copy-catting kills from his books. The detective on the case is a fan of his, and cute. So, he helps out (under a loose definition of helping out that consists entirely of clowning around and hitting on her). Of course, together (sort of) they solve the crime and he decides that was fun. So, he pulls some strings and convinces the police to let him to follow her around on cases, because she's going to be the inspiration for his next main character (and so he can keep trying to get in her pants).
So, yeah, that's the story. There's really only one relevant piece of information, though. And I've said it a couple times. It's starring Nathan Fillion. And, best of all, it's Nathan Fillion doing a variation on Captain Reynolds. This version of Captain Reynolds is a little bit more of an ass, but just as funny. And trust me, he's funny.
I mean the show isn't very good, but at the same time, it is totally amazing. Getting to watch Nathan Fillion just be hilarious and awesome again is so nice. Wonderful, really. Let's see, the other things I've seen him in since Firefly have been, um, Slither, White Noise 2, Waitress, Jade Empire (video game), Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog, and PG Porn. I only played Jade Empire for an hour or so, and I'm about 80% certain that his character is supposed to be a bad guy, but I pretty much spent that whole time just talking to/annoying his character, because I could. It was awesome, but not in a Captain Mal sort of way. In White Noise 2 and Waitress, he's playing more normal guys. He's funny and charming, just by the nature of his Nathan Fillion-ness, but not really as awesome as he is in Firefly (meaning, he's still completely awesome, just to be clear). In Dr. Horrible, his character is supposed to be rather stupid and annoying, so, while he is hilarious, it's not quite the right kind of hilarious (no funny snide remarks). PG Porn is less than 5 minutes long, so I'm not sure if that counts as a character.
In summary, the only other thing he's done since Firefly, in which he was as awesome as he was in Firefly, was Slither (and, if you haven't seen it, I strongly recommend it). So, yeah, I've been feeling a little left out. I mean, when I heard he was in Desperate Housewives, I seriously considered watching it just for him. But, I didn't.
So for me, just getting to watch Nathan Fillion deliver silly lines, perfectly, is just a joy.
Oh, only vaguely related, but in the most recent episode of Dollhouse, Tim Minear totally gave Helo (from BSG) a classic Malcolm Reynolds line. I was almost shocked. The best part was, it was clear that the direction he was given was: channel your inner Nathan Fillion. And, I have to admit, Tahmoh Penikett (I'm probably screwing that spelling up) channelled a pretty good Nathan Fillion. I was impressed. So, yes, consider that my glowing recommendation to keep/start watching Dollhouse.
But, as for Castle, I really like it. I get the feeling that the mysteries aren't going to be especially tough (but, I like Psych, so clearly I don't care about the mystery part all that much). The leading lady is decently hot and, more importantly, she's a fun sounding board for Nathan Fillion's character's antics. Her reactions to his ridiculousness are a key part of the show, and she certainly fulfills that purpose. So, yeah, I give her a thumbs up as well.
Also, it was kind of cool to see what James Patterson actually looks like. Anyways, I guess I pretty much expect this show to follow the same path as that show I was somewhat into around this time last year, called New Amsterdam.
Well, that's all I got. It's really funny and I still think Nathan Fillion is amazing. So, yeah, my Mondays are pretty good what with Chuck and now Castle, too. It's hard to complain about that (although Chuck is kind of stuck in a rut where it's awesome, but nothing is really being done or happening, which is too bad).
That is all.
Francis
Saturday, March 14, 2009
Sunday, March 8, 2009
Prince of Persia Epilogue
So, this last Thursday, Ubisoft released a 10 dollar add-on to Prince of Persia called Prince of Persia Epilogue. Now, a reasonable response to this action on their part would be to question why this wasn't part of the original game. I mean, it seems as though they effectively decided to charge 70 bucks for the game instead of the originally agreed upon 60. But, well, I take a decidedly different view on this type of thing.
I'm the type of person who has bought well over a hundred songs for Rock Band. I'm quite willing and, possibly more importantly, able to buy these types of downloadable extras for games. Costumes and non-functional items are a little harder to justify, but content, yeah, I'll buy content. If I really liked a game, I kind of appreciate the opportunity to spend more money on it and get to play it even more. And there's no better way to tell developers that you liked their game than to spend money on it, right? Right, except maybe e-mailing them or something, I guess that might work too. I've never tried it.
So, long story short (ha, short, that's funny), I bought and downloaded this little extra as soon as I was able. I then played through it the next morning and I thought I'd put my thoughts on it down. This is only based off a single, admittedly pretty long, level, so my review can't be too long (oh, I'm sure it can), but this was definitely an interesting buy and experience.
So, if you recall, everyone's big complaint about Prince of Persia was that it was easy. We've already gone over the fact that most people's intuitive reason for it being easy (the fact that you can't die) is wrong. In my original review, I explained that it thought it was too easy because the Prince would automatically make the right directional choice as you were running along the walls or avoiding traps or whatnot.
Well, I can go on record as saying that Prince of Persia Epilogue is not too easy. I would put its exploration challenge level as right up there with the series from the last generation. This game is hard.
In the original game, there would be long sections between check points when you would need to avoid the traps as you'd run along the walls, but it was easy. I don't think I had fully understood why it was easy, though (or, rather, I struggled to articulate why it was easy). In practice, I could say it was easy because I never failed. I could also say it was easy because I was never even worried that I might fail. The reason I couldn't fail was because the game couldn't let me. Let me explain.
In the previous series, there were sections that required extremely tough timing to get through but you had two advantages. The first advantage was that you could slow down time. It gets a lot easier to get the timing right when things are moving slowly. The second advantage was that the hardest sections wouldn't usually involve the risk of falling to your death. This meant that if you screwed up, you would have to eat some damage (Oh no! I have to go drink some water now). It felt really hard, because you didn't want to eat the damage because that's lame, but if you needed to, you could get past it (and, let's be honest, you needed to, I mean, we all did).
In this generation, both those advantages are gone. You can't slow down time and you can't eat damage. Any interaction with any trap is immediately fatal (okay, fatal is a little strong since you can't die, but the moral equivalent occurs). On paper that sounds like it should make things harder, since they are taking away advantages that you previously had. In practice, though, the opposite occurred. It got easier because they couldn't design traps that were as hard as the previous games' traps. If they did, it would be too hard. The result were these extended sections that looked like they should be really hard, but in practice were really easy because the designers had allowed a very large amount of time for the correct initiation of the sequence (to put it in perspective, in previous games you would often have to slow down time before starting a section and wait for just the right moment to start navigating because if you left a moment too soon or late, you would get hit by one of the traps, typically near the end).
So, people complained that the challenge was gone, without fully understanding just why it might need to be gone. Hopefully, this little bit of content will educate them. For those who just want to beat it without finding any secrets, it's easily the hardest dungeon in the game. If you want the secrets (I found all of them, yay me!), then it's very comparable to the hardest challenges in the previous generation and they even sometimes made it hard just to figure out where the secrets were hidden (crazy talk!).
Some of the dungeon challenges they made include: cranks to change the architecture of whole dungeons, allowing multiple switches to be reached under different conditions, but requiring real planning and understanding. Yeah, you can move walls and buildings and different combinations of the movements can get you to different areas. Understanding how you want things set up to get where you want to go requires a huge amount more insight than just following the only available path (which is the typical strategy in all the Prince of Persia games). They also changed the traps (I don't really know what to call them, but they're equivalent to the moving chainsaws and shooting darts from yore) so that they can move at different speeds. This makes navigating them much harder than when they all moved at the same speed. Oh, and they got some set up so that the timing requirements were much tighter than anything you encountered in the main game.
And, just to add icing on the cake, they'd often made the hardest timing challenges occur in areas where there were either evil bugs flying around that would attack you if you stayed in one place for too long or damaging stuff in the air that would kill you if you stayed in the general area too long. Or both, that was the case pretty often too. And, lastly, they made sections where the next place to go wasn't actually visible (ie- no visible hints of where to go) and so you had to figure out where you should go almost blindly (as in, you had to eliminate all the places you could see that you clearly couldn't go and then go in the only remaining direction...in the time it takes to run along the wall, because at the end of that time it's too late...yeah, those situations typically took multiple tries).
In effect, this was their opportunity to show us fans that they hadn't gone soft. They still knew how to create sweet dungeon challenges and hide goodies in there too. Oh, and the architecture was pretty cool too.
So, yeah, I was really impressed. It was hard. And I liked it. Oh and the awesome dialogue was totally back. And I liked that it picked up right where the main game had left off and that it provided us with an idea of what the sequel is going to look like. I hope they make stuff in that game as hard as this. But, to be honest, I also liked that this wasn't part of the main game. That this was something optional and separate to the game. The end of that game was note perfect. It was emotional and the story had really built up to it. I wouldn't have wanted them to add this section just by default. Or, if they did, I would want them to still roll the credits when they do in the game, because that's just perfect.
In fact, on the topic of story and awesome dialogue, one of the best things about this Epilogue is that it gives the Prince a chance to really explain himself and his decision. We know why the Princess made her decision, but it was really cool to hear his side of things. He didn't just bring her back because he was in love with her and couldn't bear to let her die (I admit, that's how I interpreted it). He brought her back because he couldn't believe that her sacrifice was either the only solution, or even a valid solution at all. And I appreciated his arguments for it. That's cool.
So, my one complaint: there's still fighting. Yep, they kept that in. In fact, they added a new combat move. At any time, you can initiate a little quick-time button press event-thingie, if you so desire. Personally, that's kind of like being told I've got a needle that I can stick in my eye, if I so desire, but that's just my opinion. Yeah, I still didn't like the fighting. And, of course, there was a fair amount of it. Yargh.
But, ignoring that, it was awesome. I was really impressed and it was a huge amount of fun to get to play it a little more. So, yeah, good job Ubisoft Montreal. You guys rock. I was glad to spend my 10 dollars on your hard work of the last couple months.
That is all.
Francis
I'm the type of person who has bought well over a hundred songs for Rock Band. I'm quite willing and, possibly more importantly, able to buy these types of downloadable extras for games. Costumes and non-functional items are a little harder to justify, but content, yeah, I'll buy content. If I really liked a game, I kind of appreciate the opportunity to spend more money on it and get to play it even more. And there's no better way to tell developers that you liked their game than to spend money on it, right? Right, except maybe e-mailing them or something, I guess that might work too. I've never tried it.
So, long story short (ha, short, that's funny), I bought and downloaded this little extra as soon as I was able. I then played through it the next morning and I thought I'd put my thoughts on it down. This is only based off a single, admittedly pretty long, level, so my review can't be too long (oh, I'm sure it can), but this was definitely an interesting buy and experience.
So, if you recall, everyone's big complaint about Prince of Persia was that it was easy. We've already gone over the fact that most people's intuitive reason for it being easy (the fact that you can't die) is wrong. In my original review, I explained that it thought it was too easy because the Prince would automatically make the right directional choice as you were running along the walls or avoiding traps or whatnot.
Well, I can go on record as saying that Prince of Persia Epilogue is not too easy. I would put its exploration challenge level as right up there with the series from the last generation. This game is hard.
In the original game, there would be long sections between check points when you would need to avoid the traps as you'd run along the walls, but it was easy. I don't think I had fully understood why it was easy, though (or, rather, I struggled to articulate why it was easy). In practice, I could say it was easy because I never failed. I could also say it was easy because I was never even worried that I might fail. The reason I couldn't fail was because the game couldn't let me. Let me explain.
In the previous series, there were sections that required extremely tough timing to get through but you had two advantages. The first advantage was that you could slow down time. It gets a lot easier to get the timing right when things are moving slowly. The second advantage was that the hardest sections wouldn't usually involve the risk of falling to your death. This meant that if you screwed up, you would have to eat some damage (Oh no! I have to go drink some water now). It felt really hard, because you didn't want to eat the damage because that's lame, but if you needed to, you could get past it (and, let's be honest, you needed to, I mean, we all did).
In this generation, both those advantages are gone. You can't slow down time and you can't eat damage. Any interaction with any trap is immediately fatal (okay, fatal is a little strong since you can't die, but the moral equivalent occurs). On paper that sounds like it should make things harder, since they are taking away advantages that you previously had. In practice, though, the opposite occurred. It got easier because they couldn't design traps that were as hard as the previous games' traps. If they did, it would be too hard. The result were these extended sections that looked like they should be really hard, but in practice were really easy because the designers had allowed a very large amount of time for the correct initiation of the sequence (to put it in perspective, in previous games you would often have to slow down time before starting a section and wait for just the right moment to start navigating because if you left a moment too soon or late, you would get hit by one of the traps, typically near the end).
So, people complained that the challenge was gone, without fully understanding just why it might need to be gone. Hopefully, this little bit of content will educate them. For those who just want to beat it without finding any secrets, it's easily the hardest dungeon in the game. If you want the secrets (I found all of them, yay me!), then it's very comparable to the hardest challenges in the previous generation and they even sometimes made it hard just to figure out where the secrets were hidden (crazy talk!).
Some of the dungeon challenges they made include: cranks to change the architecture of whole dungeons, allowing multiple switches to be reached under different conditions, but requiring real planning and understanding. Yeah, you can move walls and buildings and different combinations of the movements can get you to different areas. Understanding how you want things set up to get where you want to go requires a huge amount more insight than just following the only available path (which is the typical strategy in all the Prince of Persia games). They also changed the traps (I don't really know what to call them, but they're equivalent to the moving chainsaws and shooting darts from yore) so that they can move at different speeds. This makes navigating them much harder than when they all moved at the same speed. Oh, and they got some set up so that the timing requirements were much tighter than anything you encountered in the main game.
And, just to add icing on the cake, they'd often made the hardest timing challenges occur in areas where there were either evil bugs flying around that would attack you if you stayed in one place for too long or damaging stuff in the air that would kill you if you stayed in the general area too long. Or both, that was the case pretty often too. And, lastly, they made sections where the next place to go wasn't actually visible (ie- no visible hints of where to go) and so you had to figure out where you should go almost blindly (as in, you had to eliminate all the places you could see that you clearly couldn't go and then go in the only remaining direction...in the time it takes to run along the wall, because at the end of that time it's too late...yeah, those situations typically took multiple tries).
In effect, this was their opportunity to show us fans that they hadn't gone soft. They still knew how to create sweet dungeon challenges and hide goodies in there too. Oh, and the architecture was pretty cool too.
So, yeah, I was really impressed. It was hard. And I liked it. Oh and the awesome dialogue was totally back. And I liked that it picked up right where the main game had left off and that it provided us with an idea of what the sequel is going to look like. I hope they make stuff in that game as hard as this. But, to be honest, I also liked that this wasn't part of the main game. That this was something optional and separate to the game. The end of that game was note perfect. It was emotional and the story had really built up to it. I wouldn't have wanted them to add this section just by default. Or, if they did, I would want them to still roll the credits when they do in the game, because that's just perfect.
In fact, on the topic of story and awesome dialogue, one of the best things about this Epilogue is that it gives the Prince a chance to really explain himself and his decision. We know why the Princess made her decision, but it was really cool to hear his side of things. He didn't just bring her back because he was in love with her and couldn't bear to let her die (I admit, that's how I interpreted it). He brought her back because he couldn't believe that her sacrifice was either the only solution, or even a valid solution at all. And I appreciated his arguments for it. That's cool.
So, my one complaint: there's still fighting. Yep, they kept that in. In fact, they added a new combat move. At any time, you can initiate a little quick-time button press event-thingie, if you so desire. Personally, that's kind of like being told I've got a needle that I can stick in my eye, if I so desire, but that's just my opinion. Yeah, I still didn't like the fighting. And, of course, there was a fair amount of it. Yargh.
But, ignoring that, it was awesome. I was really impressed and it was a huge amount of fun to get to play it a little more. So, yeah, good job Ubisoft Montreal. You guys rock. I was glad to spend my 10 dollars on your hard work of the last couple months.
That is all.
Francis
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Mirror's Edge and Valkyria Chronicles
Okay, so a couple months ago I reviewed the demo for these games and pretty much said that they were amazing and that I was totally excited to play them when they came out. Well, at this point, I have now played through both of them and I thought I'd put my thoughts on them down now. Yes, I'm kinda sorta reviewing these games, okay?
So, let's start with Mirror's Edge. Now, a lot of reviews/people said that while the game demoes really well, the finished product leaves something to be desired. Typically, they then compare it to Portal and then dismiss it. Usually they complain that it's hard somewhere in there too. Well, I did not have that experience at all.
What I loved about the demo was just the way the game makes you feel when you're moving forward. I don't think I've ever played a game where the biggest reward comes just for continuously moving forward. It's kind of funny, but the only reward for moving forward is that you get to keep moving forward, only faster. But that's reward enough, because moving forward feels like freedom in this game. So does flying through the air with your hands waving. Also sliding down a rail or underneath a platform. Or running along a wall. And, admittedly, you could do all those things in the demo, so maybe the fact that there were no new rewards made people sad. But it didn't bother me, because the feeling of doing any or all of those things was good enough. I just wanted to keep doing them.
And so that was my experience with the game. I don't care that the scenery doesn't change overly much (but it does change a lot more than people give it credit for, keeping in mind that the setting is a city so we've got: rooftops, buildings, ground floor, below ground, boats, and trains). I just want to keep running.
One thing that surprised me in the game is that you spend most of the game getting chased. You're not just getting from place to place as fast as you can because it feels good. You're doing it because there's a bunch of police officers following you who kind of want to shoot you. I don't mind that, but it definitely added a level of pressure that I hadn't fully expected. I liked it.
Also, the Flash animation cut scenes were stupid. No argument there. I would definitely have preferred if they just did everything with the game engine. Totally unrelated, but the concept art that you unlock as you play through the game is actually kind of interesting.
Oh, and one last thing. The game is not hard you pussy reviewers everywhere. I mean, seriously, what's wrong with you guys? I'm really not all that good at video games, and this game is not that hard. I'm sorry that it sometimes takes more than one try to do a section. This is a platformer and someone decided to make it require very precise timing: which is absolutely their perogative. It's not the end of the world. Also, considering the liberal use of check points, you're really not going to be losing all that much when you fall 10 stories and listen to your bones crunch when you hit the ground. Just try again and don't screw up and don't blame the game when you do. The controls are tight so every time you screw up, it's because you screwed up. Get better.
Alright, onto Valkyria Chronicles. Now, when I played the demo I said that it was one of the most beautiful games I had ever played and it managed to follow the graphics up with one of the deepest and most interesting turn-based strategy RPG systems ever devised. So, now I've played the full game. Have my thoughts changed? No, but maybe a little yes too.
It's still an incredibly beautiful game. No one can take that away. But, after over 40 hours, I'm a little desensitized to it. I almost wish I wasn't, but I am. Of course, the only real end result of that is that all other games just won't look as good because I've spent too much time looking at this game. Still, I can't enjoy the graphics like I once did.
The story was nice. Serviceable, I guess. I think I prefer the Fire Emblem story and world, though. I will say that I liked that the main bad guy had some interesting good qualities about him. In a world full of racism and bigotry, he ruled his troops as a meritocracy. The good guys couldn't say that. Their army promoted people for their bloodlines rather than their performance in battle and that's one of the main reasons why the good guys almost lose. So, I thought that was cool. Of course, he was cruel and evil and as soon as someone disappointed him he cast them aside, but still, anyone could ascend his ranks and take command (and if people made poor strategic decisions in the name of bigotry, he punished them for that too).
So, let's talk about the strategy. It's very hard to balance this type of game and playing through it, I found out that it could have been done better. At the start of the game, the balance is really very close to right. Scouts have a huge amount of movement and vision, but they're not very accurate and they don't have much life. You can make good use of them by exploring and finding ambushes, as well as using their grenades to knock enemies away from cover, but if they run into a group of enemies, they'll get torn apart really fast.
Machine gunners are a little over-powered at the start, but their low movement stops you from utilizing them as much as you'd like. They're great for defending because they can destroy anything that gets in their range, but they're also great for attacking because they can withstand some serious damage and then deal it right back.
A typical attack on a fortified position at the start of the game involves getting a scout to scope it out and lob a grenade to get everyone exposed. The scout then runs a safe distance away and gets behind cover. This allows the scout to shoot any targets that move on the enemy's turn while hopefully keeping her safe (all my units are girls). After the scout's done her work, I send a shock trooper (machine gunner) in to mow down all these people who no longer have cover protecting them. Without the cover, the attack is almost certainly overwhelming and most of the targets die (this might take a couple movement turns).
For heavily fortified positions, or those that have tanks guarding them, you need tanks and lancers as well. At the start of the game, both these units are not very accurate so you can't use their most powerful weapons against ground units. Tanks still have mortars and machine guns, but the lancers have no way of fighting against ground units. Early in the game, they're so wildly inaccurate that you can't even use them to try to take out any cover that the enemy units are hiding behind (same with the tank's main gun).
So, if there's a heavily fortifed position, you need to have your tank come in and literally run over the cover the bad guys are hiding behind and then attack the opposing tank. With your tank in the middle of the action, you can send your ground troops in and let them hide behind the tank when they're not in use (it works quite well). But, for taking out the enemy tank, you just have to grin and bear it as you send your explosive weapons into it until it gets taken down.
You can also bring engineers along to keep your tanks safe and to rebuild cover after you have won a fortified position. Occasionally, you also want to bring in snipers, but early in the game they're not quite accurate enough to get the head shots required to make them effective.
In short, the early game strategy is all about slow, patient advances on an enemy position. Going in without proper support will result in untimely death. You have to command and control your units as a team and when you use them properly, you will kick a lot of ass. But, if you don't, you'll get in trouble very quickly.
But, late in the game, things change. Scouts get strong enough to do decent damage. Even worse, they get accurate enough to be able to land consist head shots out of the range of the machine gun units. So, suddenly, scouts aren't afraid of shock troopers anymore. Even more amazingly, they get grenage launchers so that they don't even have to get close to dangerous fortified positions to destroy all the cover.
The machine gunners become ridiculously strong and can pretty much just walk into the middle of a firefight without too much fear. Plus they get flamethrowers that can essentially one shot anyone who isn't behind cover. And they sweep with it, so they can often get multiple guys with a single movement point (crazy!).
The lancers end up getting so much defense that tanks can't defend themselves from them. Tanks end up needing shock trooper escorts to protect the tank's rear vulnerable spot, otherwise a lancer can literally walk around a tank (while taking machine gun fire the whole time), ready her lance and drop the tank in one shot.
Snipers end up getting so much range and accuracy that, on wide open levels, you can actually just have a sniper near the middle take down any unit, anywhere on the map, with a guaranteed head shot. A sniper plus an engineer to renew her supply of rounds can de-fang even the worst attack/group of reinforcements (but guys behind cover remain relatively safe).
In short, the strategy slowly evolves and becomes very different. A single scout can often stage a decent attack on a fortified area, where before you needed at least a scout and shock trooper. Tanks go from being the key unit to breaking through the enemy defenses to a liability that you have to expend effort to protect (on the other hand, they get really accurate as well and you can use them for some pretty cool stuff as well, but you still have to protect them). Shock troopers, while still very powerful, soon find that they don't have as much of a role as they once had. Lancers either eat damage and take down tanks in the way or they remove the enemy's cover or, in a pinch, they become accurate enough to fight against ground troops.
And, well, the early strategy is really cool and fun, but that later stuff is a little bit less balanced. I know it's hard, but it did lose a little bit there at the end and it probably could have been avoided. Essentially, the problem was that I realized that if I could be accurate enough to get head shots whenever I wanted, then I could rule the world (so I focused all my research on accuracy). So, maybe I should have been purposely stupid and not done that so that the game would stay more balanced. But that kind of defeats the purpose.
But aside from the strategy breaking down at the end, it really was a very, very good game. I'm still totally impressed and I have to say that I'm looking forward to seeing how the rest of the genre reacts to this game. Because, in all honesty, they have to. I really believe that this gameplay is so much better than the typical grid set up that some of the other strategy RPG game makers have to at least consider stealing some of these ideas for their own games. They have to.
Oh, lastly, in case you're curious, Persona 4 came out at the end of last year and I am still trying to reclaim my life. It's hard on all of us.
Well, that is all.
Francis
So, let's start with Mirror's Edge. Now, a lot of reviews/people said that while the game demoes really well, the finished product leaves something to be desired. Typically, they then compare it to Portal and then dismiss it. Usually they complain that it's hard somewhere in there too. Well, I did not have that experience at all.
What I loved about the demo was just the way the game makes you feel when you're moving forward. I don't think I've ever played a game where the biggest reward comes just for continuously moving forward. It's kind of funny, but the only reward for moving forward is that you get to keep moving forward, only faster. But that's reward enough, because moving forward feels like freedom in this game. So does flying through the air with your hands waving. Also sliding down a rail or underneath a platform. Or running along a wall. And, admittedly, you could do all those things in the demo, so maybe the fact that there were no new rewards made people sad. But it didn't bother me, because the feeling of doing any or all of those things was good enough. I just wanted to keep doing them.
And so that was my experience with the game. I don't care that the scenery doesn't change overly much (but it does change a lot more than people give it credit for, keeping in mind that the setting is a city so we've got: rooftops, buildings, ground floor, below ground, boats, and trains). I just want to keep running.
One thing that surprised me in the game is that you spend most of the game getting chased. You're not just getting from place to place as fast as you can because it feels good. You're doing it because there's a bunch of police officers following you who kind of want to shoot you. I don't mind that, but it definitely added a level of pressure that I hadn't fully expected. I liked it.
Also, the Flash animation cut scenes were stupid. No argument there. I would definitely have preferred if they just did everything with the game engine. Totally unrelated, but the concept art that you unlock as you play through the game is actually kind of interesting.
Oh, and one last thing. The game is not hard you pussy reviewers everywhere. I mean, seriously, what's wrong with you guys? I'm really not all that good at video games, and this game is not that hard. I'm sorry that it sometimes takes more than one try to do a section. This is a platformer and someone decided to make it require very precise timing: which is absolutely their perogative. It's not the end of the world. Also, considering the liberal use of check points, you're really not going to be losing all that much when you fall 10 stories and listen to your bones crunch when you hit the ground. Just try again and don't screw up and don't blame the game when you do. The controls are tight so every time you screw up, it's because you screwed up. Get better.
Alright, onto Valkyria Chronicles. Now, when I played the demo I said that it was one of the most beautiful games I had ever played and it managed to follow the graphics up with one of the deepest and most interesting turn-based strategy RPG systems ever devised. So, now I've played the full game. Have my thoughts changed? No, but maybe a little yes too.
It's still an incredibly beautiful game. No one can take that away. But, after over 40 hours, I'm a little desensitized to it. I almost wish I wasn't, but I am. Of course, the only real end result of that is that all other games just won't look as good because I've spent too much time looking at this game. Still, I can't enjoy the graphics like I once did.
The story was nice. Serviceable, I guess. I think I prefer the Fire Emblem story and world, though. I will say that I liked that the main bad guy had some interesting good qualities about him. In a world full of racism and bigotry, he ruled his troops as a meritocracy. The good guys couldn't say that. Their army promoted people for their bloodlines rather than their performance in battle and that's one of the main reasons why the good guys almost lose. So, I thought that was cool. Of course, he was cruel and evil and as soon as someone disappointed him he cast them aside, but still, anyone could ascend his ranks and take command (and if people made poor strategic decisions in the name of bigotry, he punished them for that too).
So, let's talk about the strategy. It's very hard to balance this type of game and playing through it, I found out that it could have been done better. At the start of the game, the balance is really very close to right. Scouts have a huge amount of movement and vision, but they're not very accurate and they don't have much life. You can make good use of them by exploring and finding ambushes, as well as using their grenades to knock enemies away from cover, but if they run into a group of enemies, they'll get torn apart really fast.
Machine gunners are a little over-powered at the start, but their low movement stops you from utilizing them as much as you'd like. They're great for defending because they can destroy anything that gets in their range, but they're also great for attacking because they can withstand some serious damage and then deal it right back.
A typical attack on a fortified position at the start of the game involves getting a scout to scope it out and lob a grenade to get everyone exposed. The scout then runs a safe distance away and gets behind cover. This allows the scout to shoot any targets that move on the enemy's turn while hopefully keeping her safe (all my units are girls). After the scout's done her work, I send a shock trooper (machine gunner) in to mow down all these people who no longer have cover protecting them. Without the cover, the attack is almost certainly overwhelming and most of the targets die (this might take a couple movement turns).
For heavily fortified positions, or those that have tanks guarding them, you need tanks and lancers as well. At the start of the game, both these units are not very accurate so you can't use their most powerful weapons against ground units. Tanks still have mortars and machine guns, but the lancers have no way of fighting against ground units. Early in the game, they're so wildly inaccurate that you can't even use them to try to take out any cover that the enemy units are hiding behind (same with the tank's main gun).
So, if there's a heavily fortifed position, you need to have your tank come in and literally run over the cover the bad guys are hiding behind and then attack the opposing tank. With your tank in the middle of the action, you can send your ground troops in and let them hide behind the tank when they're not in use (it works quite well). But, for taking out the enemy tank, you just have to grin and bear it as you send your explosive weapons into it until it gets taken down.
You can also bring engineers along to keep your tanks safe and to rebuild cover after you have won a fortified position. Occasionally, you also want to bring in snipers, but early in the game they're not quite accurate enough to get the head shots required to make them effective.
In short, the early game strategy is all about slow, patient advances on an enemy position. Going in without proper support will result in untimely death. You have to command and control your units as a team and when you use them properly, you will kick a lot of ass. But, if you don't, you'll get in trouble very quickly.
But, late in the game, things change. Scouts get strong enough to do decent damage. Even worse, they get accurate enough to be able to land consist head shots out of the range of the machine gun units. So, suddenly, scouts aren't afraid of shock troopers anymore. Even more amazingly, they get grenage launchers so that they don't even have to get close to dangerous fortified positions to destroy all the cover.
The machine gunners become ridiculously strong and can pretty much just walk into the middle of a firefight without too much fear. Plus they get flamethrowers that can essentially one shot anyone who isn't behind cover. And they sweep with it, so they can often get multiple guys with a single movement point (crazy!).
The lancers end up getting so much defense that tanks can't defend themselves from them. Tanks end up needing shock trooper escorts to protect the tank's rear vulnerable spot, otherwise a lancer can literally walk around a tank (while taking machine gun fire the whole time), ready her lance and drop the tank in one shot.
Snipers end up getting so much range and accuracy that, on wide open levels, you can actually just have a sniper near the middle take down any unit, anywhere on the map, with a guaranteed head shot. A sniper plus an engineer to renew her supply of rounds can de-fang even the worst attack/group of reinforcements (but guys behind cover remain relatively safe).
In short, the strategy slowly evolves and becomes very different. A single scout can often stage a decent attack on a fortified area, where before you needed at least a scout and shock trooper. Tanks go from being the key unit to breaking through the enemy defenses to a liability that you have to expend effort to protect (on the other hand, they get really accurate as well and you can use them for some pretty cool stuff as well, but you still have to protect them). Shock troopers, while still very powerful, soon find that they don't have as much of a role as they once had. Lancers either eat damage and take down tanks in the way or they remove the enemy's cover or, in a pinch, they become accurate enough to fight against ground troops.
And, well, the early strategy is really cool and fun, but that later stuff is a little bit less balanced. I know it's hard, but it did lose a little bit there at the end and it probably could have been avoided. Essentially, the problem was that I realized that if I could be accurate enough to get head shots whenever I wanted, then I could rule the world (so I focused all my research on accuracy). So, maybe I should have been purposely stupid and not done that so that the game would stay more balanced. But that kind of defeats the purpose.
But aside from the strategy breaking down at the end, it really was a very, very good game. I'm still totally impressed and I have to say that I'm looking forward to seeing how the rest of the genre reacts to this game. Because, in all honesty, they have to. I really believe that this gameplay is so much better than the typical grid set up that some of the other strategy RPG game makers have to at least consider stealing some of these ideas for their own games. They have to.
Oh, lastly, in case you're curious, Persona 4 came out at the end of last year and I am still trying to reclaim my life. It's hard on all of us.
Well, that is all.
Francis
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