A weekend full of StreetPass tags

Over the weekend, I attended and exhibited at MoCCA in New York City, a fun comics convention that is brimming with indie art titles and nice people. Also, tons of 3DS owners. How do I know this? Well, for two days, I kept my 3DS on Sleep Mode in my front pocket, ready to tag other traveling systems, and when it was all said and done, after giving in to pure obsession and checking again and again, I went from having one dude in my Mii Plaza to having 51 Mii peeps. Let me embiggen that number for you:

51

That’s a lot of tags. I even got lucky and ended up tagging several Miis multiple times, increasing their level each time. Sometimes, as I was checking who I had tagged, I’d tag two to three more people walking by. It was amazing and overwhelming and a little bit like drug use in that seeing that green light at the top corner of my 3DS sent a rush of tingles through my body each and every time.

With all these tags, I was able to get much farther in Find Mii, the built-in RPG for the 3DS, unlocking several more hats like Link’s Hat, the Kirby Hat, and Dog Ears. Still haven’t rescued my own Mii, but we’re creeping closer; got hung up on a shielded ghost, and nobody I tagged seemed to like the color light blue. There was also some puzzle piece swapping, but that function is ultimately uninteresting. You collect puzzle pieces, and your reward for finding them all is…you get to look at a picture! Oh joy. I completed an image of Link and a bunch of Pikmin if you were curious.

Here’s a tidbit to chew on: roughly 90% of all tags over the weekend were from male 3DS owners, and it seemed like the title of choice was Super Street Fighter IV 3D. I disappointed another exhibitor when I told him I had bought Pilotwings Resort instead.

But now with all this tagging done and an army of Miis at my control, I have to wonder what’s next. I mean, they just kind of stand around. Are they going to be added to any future 3DS games I play that use Miis? I wish there was more to do with them, with tagging, with communicating. Why can’t I simply add some of these people to my friends list since we’ve tagged each other? StreetPass is all about the short-term satisfaction, and it’s great at it, but there’s not much meat to it in the end.

The only bummer to all this crazy excitement is that I sort of burned myself out on the 3DS and have not carried it with me now for the past two days. I’ll get back to it though as I’m looking to increase the amount of walking I do now that the weather is turning, but there’s no longer any real incentive now that I’ve seen what a good amount of tags amount to: some quick entertainment, nothing more.

Better blogging on Grinding Down next week, me promises

I realize that this week’s postings on Grinding Down have been less than stellar. Two 2011 Games Completed posts, and one lonely musings post on my first StreetPass notification. That’s it? Yeah, that was it. I’m sorry for that, but I also have an excellent excuse: I’ve been crazily prepping for MoCCA these last few days. And the con is this weekend, meaning that once it’s all said and done, I’ll be back to my usual standards of randomly pondering about videogames, doing that 30 Days of Gaming meme, and complaining about all the letdowns built into the Nintendo 3DS.

I’ve completed Pilotwings Resort recently–or completed as much as I want to–and am close to finishing Costume Quest, making for another two posts on my 2011 completed games list. Plus, I’ve barely even mentioned all those games I bought last week during Xbox Live’s sale frenzy. Plenty of fodder all around.

So yeah, there should be more content next week. Please stay tuned.

Today’s my first day off from work this calendar year, and the wife and I will be heading to New York City later. Gotta make sure my 3DS is charged and ready to hopefully StreetPass some folk.

Games Completed in 2011, #11 – Monster Tale

Metroidvania is a special genre of gaming. It’s both linear and not, it’s devoted to progression and secrets, and it’s been around since the venerable NES days. I mean, it’s very namesake comes from two of its most obvious influences: Metroid and Castlevania. Over the years, Metroidvania has seen some peaks and valleys and straight-up dry spells, never finding a wide audience, but there’s been a rebirth of sorts on handheld consoles like the Nintendo DS. Mostly more Castlevania titles, but there’s also been the occasional surprise debut, and that’s where we find Monster Tale from DreamRift, the makers of Henry Hatsworth in the Puzzling Adventure.

In Monster Tale, you play as Ellie, a young girl who stumbles upon a magical armband, unhatched egg, and hidden world inhabited by monsters. She quickly discovers that she’s not the only human to venture into this world as it is ruled by snotty, personality-heavy kids, the worst being Priscilla. They have enslaved many of the monsters and turned them into their evil pets. The egg Ellie found earlier hatches, and the monster quickly bonds with our blue-haired protagonist, fighting off enemies, eating snacks, and evolving into more powerful forms. She names it Chomp, and he/she/it will be vital to her survival as she searches for a way back home.

Monster Tale is a mix of platforming, combat, and pet raising. You’ll travel through five themed worlds—a wicked treehouse and demon express train, for example—until you can’t travel forward any more; most likely, Ellie will need to learn a new ability like charge shot or obtain a key to open a locked gate. Unfortunately though, DreamRift is a wee bit masochistic and decided to make back-tracking a high priority here. Very high priority. Now, with Metroidvania games, back-tracking is the point; you get a new ability, and now you can get past X from that earlier level. However, the back-tracking in Monster Tale feels unnecessary, and often the item/power needed is on the far opposite side of the map. There’s no fast-travel system so Ellie and Chomp have to trudge all the way back; I was constantly checking the map so as to not get lost. It feels like something implemented to transform a four-hour game into an eight-hour game.

Good thing the combat is fun, especially thanks to Chomp. He/she/it is an adorable monster that helps attack enemies on both screens of the Nintendo DS. Chomp can’t spend too much time up top as it drains its health, but the bottom screen acts as a sanctuary, healing it and housing many special items for it to interact with. There’s some great animation work when it comes to Chomp chompin’ down on some cold pizza. As Chomp defeats enemies and eats entire bowls of rice, it gains XP and levels up, opening up new forms. I had him evolve into the Juggernaut by the end of the game and kept him there, but there’s plenty of other forms for people to tinker with if they’re curious. I only wish that Chomp was a little more proactive when on the top screen; it seemed like it wouldn’t attack an enemy unless Ellie personally chauffeured it over.

Story-wise, Monster Tale doesn’t ask too much of your attention. There’s small bits of dialogue between Ellie and another kid before a boss fight, but other than that—it’s purely background fluff. I likened it previously to a Saturday morning cartoon plotline, and I’ll still stand by that. I do think that DreamRift missed out on a great opportunity though; all along, Ellie is trying to get Chomp back to its mother, but this plot point fizzles out. It’s safe to assume the two are reunited, but it would’ve been nice to see some monsterly reunion on-screen.

The production values in Monster Tale can’t be ignored. The 2D sprites are colorfully crisp, and the animation work is top-notch. The quality kicks it into even higher gear during the boss fights, my favorite being against the deranged bunny rabbit. Background details such as monsters hiding behind paintings really help with the immersion. To be honest, I did not notice much of the music; I eventually turned all sound off as I got tired of hearing Ellie make a noise every time I hit the jump button. Every. Single. Time. Thank goodness the game’s gorgeous to look at for extended periods of time.

Monster Tale came out shortly before the Nintendo 3DS launched, a period being labeled as “the end of the Nintendo DS era,” but not by me. It might be late to the party, but it’s a pristine example of why gamers should stick around a little longer. Sure, the back-tracking gets tiresome, but the combat and pet raising is irrefutably addicting. It’s definitely one of the more unique Metroidvania titles in some time, and if you’re a fan at all of fun, friendly platformers, this is one helluva tale.

—

A copy of Monster Tale was provided to me by Majesco Entertainment for review. My completion total was 78.6% after just under eight hours. I’m pretty sure I found every room, but did not spend a ton of time evolving Chomp into different forms. I basically stuck with the Juggernaut form and grinded him to level 30 before the final boss fight. The hardest part of the game involved a moving platform and floor lined with deadly spikes.

My first StreetPass tag notification in all its glory

I got my first StreetPass tag almost a week exactly after I purchased my Nintendo 3DS. Like, I bought my system two Sundays ago around 5:00 P.M., and this last Sunday I passed someone else with their system on around 4:00 P.M.-ish. How freaking weird is that? I had almost given up hope of ever tagging anybody, too.

Anyways, his name is Dominic, and he was definitely at the Rockaway Mall on April 3, 2011, doing some spring shopping. His birthday was pretty recent on March 2, and his dream is “…to master an art!” Sadly, his favorite game title is, um, activity log. I immediately used him to spice up the two minigames within the Mii Plaza: Puzzle Swap and Find Mii. Sadly, he didn’t have a puzzle piece to share, but I did have him take some sword swings at ghosts. He’s now hanging out in my Mii Plaza, looking lonely, looking bored. I guess that’s all these Mii tags are good for–a one-time use.

I’m very curious to see if my system gets any more love while I’m in New York City over the weekend. I’ll be selling Supertown comics at MoCCA 2011, as well as walking around the city a wee bit. If I really come back completely StreetPass-empty, I’m gonna give up on the function entirely. I can earn my 10 Play Coins easily enough by the lunch hour, and after that then there’s no reason to be constantly carrying it with me.

Have you gotten your first StreetPass tag yet?

Games Completed in 2011, #10 – X-MEN Arcade

My mother absolutely loved Walt Disney World, and it seemed like no more than two to three years would pass in my youth before we’d drive down to sunny Florida from buggy New Jersey yet again to spend a week walking the parks, seeing the sights, and eating like royalty. We always stayed inside Walt Disney World, but rarely at the same resort, and for all intents and purposes of today’s post I’m going to be talking about the time we stayed at Disney’s Coronado Springs. I was definitely under ten years old then, but many details remain fuzzy. I do, however, remember there being an arcade at the resort, an arcade with air hockey and Pac-Man and, most importantly, an X-MEN Arcade cabinet. I think the game itself was just called X-MEN, but that can be rather misleading and generalizing so we’re tossing in arcade for good measure. So, this arcade…it used quarters, not tokens or playcards, truly a relic of the past. I never had to beg for change from my parents, and I have this sort of LOST-style flashback of myself running up to my mother on one of the bike paths, watching in boyish anticipation as she fished around in her vacation belly-bag, and pulled out a handful of quarters—all mine.

As a kid, I thought the X-Men were just the coolest. Nothing cooler than a team of crazy-looking superheroes fighting even crazier-looking supervillains, in fact. I had the comics, the collectible cards, the TV series recorded every Saturday morning. And if I had my way, I would totally have been born a Mutant. My power? A cross between Kitty Pryde and Colossus, which is funny if you know anything about their history together. I’d basically like to either phase through walls or simply bust through ’em. But yeah…videogames. The X-MEN Arcade cabinet always had a crowd thanks to its ability for six people to play at once. It was definitely the most popular cabinet at the resort’s arcade—at least in my eyes it was—but it was worth the wait.

X-MEN Arcade is the continuation of the plot from 1989’s Pryde of the X-Men, an animated film I watched so many times that the VHS tape eventually disintegrated, wherein the X-Men go after Magneto for kidnapping Professor Xavier and Shadowcat. Six characters are available to play as—Wolverine, Cyclops, Dazzler, Storm, Nightcrawler, and Colossus—and each plays pretty much the same save for their special moves. I usually selected Nightcrawler because his superpower could easily clear the screen of enemies. However, I never completed the game in the arcade—didn’t have enough quarters, didn’t have enough other players to help out, didn’t have the skills to beat the Blob without using up all my lives. Many, many reasons. And I never did find another X-MEN cabinet back home in New Jersey, and so that was that. Other X-Men games came out, but none quite like the arcade version.

Jump ahead in time like Bishop to 2011, and I’m playing X-Men Arcade again. This time, it’s very different. It’s silly, it’s easy even on the highest difficulty setting, and it’s unbelievably short. I beat it twice so far. When I played the game in the arcade, I never got farther than beating Wendigo, and I was surprised to see there was only a couple more levels to go. You have unlimited continues, which seems weird, and each level is more or less the same: walk left to right, beat up every enemy, continue on until you hit the level’s boss. It’s a perfunctory brawler and bland, but because it’s the X-Men, I’m okay with that.

Last October, my wife and I went on our honeymoon to Walt Disney World. Amazingly, we stayed at Coronado Springs, too. Here’s us waiting for the bus:

The arcade is no longer located in the resort’s main building. Instead, it’s been moved over to one of the pool areas, and we did see signs for the arcade, but we just never got over to see it. The hot tub was too soothing, too comforting. I’d like to imagine that the X-MEN Arcade cabinet is still there, still eating quarters.

The XBLA version is both a port and completely different take on the game. Go in for nostalgia’s sake, and you’ll have a good time. Otherwise, it’s nothing amazing these days. However, the experience of playing it again some twenty years later means a lot to me. I just wish I could tell my mom how much.

Free “Back to the Future” episode from Telltale Games

Remember how I said I had downloaded five games yesterday? Well, let’s adjust that number and call it…my oh my, six games. Yup. Shortly before the day was to end, I learned that Telltale Games, makers of the Back to the Future adventure games for the PC/Mac, were releasing the very episode “It’s About Time” for free. For zero Microsoft Space Bucks. For absolutely nothing. No April Fooling about.

All you have to do is register to the website and then the download is yours. Simple as that. I will have to give it a try later after I brush up on my time displacement and find enough plutonium to achieve 1.21 gigawatts. I know I got a bunch of it around here somewhere…

30 Days of Gaming, #8 – Best soundtrack

To be completely honest, I usually don’t listen to a lot of videogame music unless I’m hearing it as I play the game. For me, there’s plenty of other things to listen to–currently digging Freelance Whales and lots of Connie Francis and Regina Spektor–and if I was to generalize, I’d say that a good portion of videogame tunes are unlistenable when they stand alone.

That said, I simply adore the soundtrack from Chrono Cross, the 2000 follow-up to Chrono Trigger. Composed by Yasunori Mitsuda, the official soundtrack features 67 tracks spanned across three CDs, hitting about three hours of music in total. That’s a whole lot more tunes than some games get. A few tracks subtly recall themes from Chrono Trigger, but it’s the new stuff formed for Chrono Cross that really make it unique, memorable. I’ve found it’s wonderful background music for drawing and writing, ranging from up-tempo town songs to battle music to somber undertones.

My personal favorite is titled “Reminiscence ~ Sentiments which Cannot be Erased,” a haunting piece of piano and echoes. Please listen to it as you continue on with today’s post:

One of the hardest things to write about is music. I know this for a fact; as a journalist for my college paper and alternative zine, I covered concerts and new album releases. These ranged from holiday choir specials to the latest Butch Walker CD to seeing a bunch of bands play live at summer festivals. At times, it was a grueling task. Describing how music is heard, understood, taken to heart–it’s a complex process, and it can be very hard to not seem overenthusiastic or fanboyish or simply in love with pretty sounds. Plus, how can I, someone who can’t sing, really critique those that can? So, yeah…writing about music has its tricks. It can also lead to pretty lazy sentences like, “The drums were totally kicking!” Not that I did that, ever, but the temptation to play it slack was always there. Music is meant to be heard, not read.

For this post, it’s best if I just link you to some of the finer moments from Chrono Cross‘ soundtrack:

“Dream of the Shore Bordering (Another World)”

“Leaving the Body”

“Garden of the Gods”

Enjoy!

Xtreme shopping sales on Xbox Live today

There’s some crazy deals happening on Xbox Live today for tons of games. Seriously, there’s a lot of content marked down, way too much for little ol’ me to type up, but Major Nelson has a good summary of it all.

Having only 400 Microsoft Space Bucks left over from when I recently purchased Torchlight (well, 410 if you wanna be specific), I figured I’d grab one game for a good price and be done with it. Then I started to peruse all the deals, and well…I caved. There’s also one-day only sales happening today, the day of fools, and I just couldn’t pass one up at the discounted price. I purchased another 1600 Microsoft Space Bucks and have now downloaded five arcade games in the past 12 hours. Check ’em out:

A Kingdom for Keflings – Marked down by 50% to 400 Microsoft Space Bucks. I don’t really know what this game is…an RTS with your Avatars? Interested to find out even if I’m probably late to the multiplayer aspects and all that.

3D Ultra Minigolf 2 – Marked down by 50% to 400 Microsoft Space Bucks. Golfing season approaches, but one probably couldn’t tell considering it is SNOWING outside right now. Maybe this will help pass the time.

Costume Quest – Marked down to 600 Microsoft Space Bucks. I’ve heard many great things about this bite-size RPG. It looks freakin’ adorable to say the least. Might feel a little weird to play a Halloween game in April, but that’s not enough to stop me from charging forward.

X-MEN – Marked down by some insane percentage to a mere 200 Microsoft Space Bucks. WELCOME TO DIE!

Monkey Island 2: LeChuck’s Revenge (Special Edition) – Marked down by 50% to 400 Microsoft Space Bucks. I missed out on an entire generation of point-and-click adventures, and this one seems like a fun time. I like that it can be switched between new art and the original screens. Hope it’s not too confusing since I never played the previous title. Oh well. I’m sure the Internet could help me there.

I normally don’t splurge like this, but honestly, these were some great deals. I’m most excited about Costume Quest and seeing what I’ve missed out on in Monkey Island 2.

If you too are interested some of these titles, you’d better act fast. This foolish day is almost done.