Luigi’s Mansion: Dark Moon tasks you to ghost hunt like a pro

During my junior and senior years of college, I dated a girl called the Giraffe. Relationship stuff notwithstanding, she played videogames in a fairly casual manner, except for a few specific titles like Crash Team Racing and Pikmin, which she ate up with glee. In fact, I was there the day she bought her Nintendo GameCube, slyly suggesting she also pick up Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles, an RPG I knew she’d never like, but one that I was most definitely curious over; to sum up that game, not so good. As we dated, her GameCube collection grew, and one game we ended up enjoying together was the original Luigi’s Mansion, but for altogether different reasons.

In Luigi’s first ghost-hunting adventure, he ends up in a haunted mansion after winning a contest that he never entered. He told his brother Mario to meet him there to celebrate his…uh, victory. Upon arrival, Luigi realizes that Mario arrived before him, but is now missing somewhere within the mansion. To help Luigi find his red-coloring sibling, an old professor named Elvin Gadd equips him with the Poltergust 3000, a vacuum cleaner used for capturing ghosts, and a Game Boy Horror, a device used for communicating with Gadd. You then explore the mansion room by room, sucking up ghosts and looking for any clues related to Mario’s disappearance. It’s a very charming game, with a lot of style and cartoonish sense of horror, and that’s what the Giraffe ate up the most. She would literally spend fifteen minutes just walking around a room pressing the “Call out to Mario” button, eating up Luigi’s uncertain, shivering tone. Me, I actually liked playing the game, though I never got too far into it.

Some ten-plus years later, and we now have a sequel with Luigi’s Mansion: Dark Moon for the Nintendo 3DS. This time, the adventure is set in a region called Evershade Valley, which is where Professor E. Gadd lives in his laboratory and studies friendly ghosts. The Dark Moon, which hangs above Evershade Valley, shatters thanks to a nefarious Boo, which causes all the local ghosts to suddenly become hostile. Luigi is summoned by E. Gadd to re-collect the five pieces of the Dark Moon, scattered in different mansions, to restore peace.

Currently, I’m still in the first mansion, and it’s been a lot of light-hearted, ghost-sucking-up fun, hampered by all things Professor E. Gadd. Firstly, he talks way too much, calling you constantly on your Nintendo DS phone device thingy. And this isn’t helped by the fact that he sounds completely like an Ewok. I’ve been rushing through his dialogue as quickly as possible, even though there are some great zingers to be read. I really enjoy sucking in ghastly ghosts via the enhanced Poltergust 5000, which can be likened to many fishing mini-games, where once you have a ghost “hooked” you need to pull in the opposite direction its moving to “reel” it in. And every new room feels like an unopened present, especially since there is so much that Luigi can interact with–blowing ceiling fans to reveal hidden floors, sucking up window curtains, moving rugs, exploring vases and desk drawers. My gaming OCD doesn’t allow me to leave a room until I’ve fully explored every crevice and interactive set piece, and that’s just fine by me.

Luigi may be all shivers and quivering words, reluctant to see what’s behind the next door, but I’m pretty excited to explore onwards. Will report back later if anything else surprises me about Luigi’s Mansion: Dark Moon though I suspect it’s going to kind of be a lot like the first mansion, but four more times until the end credits roll. Have not been able to unlock the online multiplayer stuff yet though my non-love for online multiplayer experiences tells me to try it once and then promptly ignore it. We’ll see.

Owl Creek has been invaded by ghosts in Phantasmaburbia

Well, I’m back for round 2 of digging into Box in a Bundle‘s latest package, which I covered previously in a post about the non-game Dinner Date. This time, I’m most definitely playing a game, and I know that because after two hours I’ve switched between three different playable characters, gained levels, equipped special items, killed ghosts and skeletal rodents and unshapely shades, and died during a particularly tough boss fight. If that doesn’t summarize me playing a game, well…no, that’s it exactly. I mean, I literally did mostly the same thing over the weekend in Ni no Kuni, calling it quits when Moltaan, the Lord of Lava, wiped Oliver and friends off Old Smokey.

So, with that, I’m here to talk about Phantasmaburbia, a long-name game that appears capable of going the distance. To summarize, the year is 201X (twenty-X-teen), and the small modern neighborhood of Owl Creek has suddenly been overrun with ghosts. No one knows exactly why or how just yet. Four local kids, assisted by spirits of their ancestors, will group together on a suburban adventure to save the place they call home.

I’ve only gotten far enough in the game–roughly two hours and change–to have three kids in my party. I named the first boy Todd, the goth girl Rayne, and the gun-wielding, blonde-haired kid Drogo. Screenshots from the developer’s website show that the fourth character is another girl, so feel free to leave name suggestions; otherwise, she will be called something dumb, like Jam.

Anyways, it’s an RPG, with all the things you’d associate with the genre present. Its strongest element is its battle system, which is seemingly based around the active time battle model, with no room for pausing or breathing. Best plan your attacks before you even select them or the enemy, which consists of things like Catdavers and Roadents, might slip in an extra swipe. It makes for lively fights, but alas, many are over too soon, and the battle music takes a few seconds to really kick in and sound amazing. There are some other special elements to battles that involve you clicking dangerous tentacles away or loading bursts of light into a spectral gun, all timing-based.

The graphics are perfunctory, if not elementary. This is not a slam against Phantasmaburbia, as its story and gameplay more than carry the title forward, and graphics never are everything. Am I right, Minecraft? Anyways, there’s quite a bit of dialogue here, and the best is between each kid and their respective spiritual assistant ancestor. Everyone speaks in an Animal Crossing-like fashion, just making noise, but don’t take that as a reason to rush through the dialogue. The ghosts are particularly well-written, showing off their unique personalities.

It seems like most of Phantasmaburbia is spent either outside or underground in weird space/time dimension dungeons. These are where the puzzles are, as each ghost can interact here in a different way. For instance, one ghost can highlight invisible panels to walk on, and another can take over animals to move them onto special tiles. I suspect that once all four kids meet up and are one team, a lot of dungeon levels will involve switching between different ghosts to get everybody from point A to point B.

Oh, and one really small touch that I liked are the garage door motion sensor lights. You go near them, they go on. You walk away, they go off. It’s especially great when you’re nearby and see a wild animal trigger them. I don’t know. It’s the small stuff that can make a world feel big, and despite its rather generic look at times, Phantasmaburbia seems like a fully realized place, one I look forward to exploring more. Though that means I have to figure how to properly use Todd and Drogo to beat the current boss I’m stuck on. But for this sleek and somewhat goofy RPG, trying again is a must.

Vaike, the first of many permanent deaths in Fire Emblem: Awakening

Shortly before heading off to MegaCon, I found a retail copy of Fire Emblem: Awakening. That may sound like a rather simple statement, but this 3DS game quickly became rare after dropping in early February in sort of the same fashion as Radiant Historia, with only so many copies shipped to individual retailers. The three GameStops I visited did not have any in stock, nor did the local Target or Best Buy. At last, I found it behind protective glass walls at Walmart. So, y’know, always.

Regardless, I’m glad I got a copy before they all poofed and disappeared, though sadly that’s probably the main reason I purchased Awakening. Not because I have a love for all things SRPG or even any deep experience with the franchise, but because it’s a game that will soon be hard to find, and I’d rather get it now then not and moan and groan later over how difficult it is to obtain, just like I did for Suikoden III and Katamari Damacy for many years. Yes, I’ve become quite a neurotic collector over the past few years, and I’d rather have than have not.

As evident from my bipolar time with Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Summoner Overclocked, I’m not very good at strategy-based RPGs. I don’t really understand why that is, as I’d like to think myself pretty decent at action RPGs and just fine with regular RPGs, knowing how to level and equip better armor and grind for XP before the next boss fight. But as soon as I’m tossed onto a grid-like battlefield with a number of units to control, I fall apart. Maybe there’s too much info to absorb and understand, and from what I’ve seen so far of Awakening, there is a lot of data to grok.

Where to begin? Well, I guess with the plot: Chrom, the prince of the Halidom of Ylisse, and his companions, must join together during a turbulent era. The neighboring nation of Plegia has been acting suspiciously as of late, and in response Chrom commands a band of soldiers–called the Shepherds–to keep his country at peace. He encounters an unholy force called the Risen plaguing the lands and a masked swordsman claiming to be Marth, the Hero-King of legend. You end up controlling a character with amnesia who joins the Shepherds by chance. It’s kind of both typical medieval fantasy fare and non-typicalness, with hints of time travel. I’ve only gotten up to the start of Chapter 4, so that’s all I know currently.

And yes, I’m playing Awakening on Normal difficulty…in Classic mode. That means dealing with the permanent death aspect the franchise is known for. When a character’s health is depleted, that’s it–they are dead. No amount of Phoenix Down feathers could possibly bring them back. So you best be prepared for each and every battle, for every minute change to the enemy’s tactics, for every possible scenario and decision. Matt Mason over at Obtain Potion has some strong thoughts on defending casual mode, and I agree that people playing Awakening on Classic, but reloading a save after losing a beloved squad member are doing it wrong. If you care that much, switch to Casual and go about your adventuring, knowing every one is safe and sound in their big boy/girl beds after each battle.

For me, I’m embracing perma-death fully and plan to make it a point to share each and every loss I suffer here on Grinding Down, no matter how grand or small. I’m not trying to play the game as best as possible, following a guide and keeping all the best characters alive and paired perfectly. This is war, and war never changes. There will be deaths, and many more to come, knowing my skills. First up, however, is Vaike, an axe-wielding soldier with fun hair, which is a shame, as he seemed like quite a funny guy. But as quickly as he was introduced in Chapter 3, he was chopped to bits by enemy soldiers. My fault for not paying attention to weapon types.

I played a little more into Chapter 4 last night, losing Sully and Lissa, but also then having my own character die, which brings up the GAME OVER screen. So I kind of get a mulligan on that one, and hope that I can mix up my strategy better to keep everyone, including myself, up and moving. But if I can’t, well…them’s the breaks.

If you have any Awakening tips, please, please share them here. I still don’t understand a lot of it, and only just opened up all the Wireless functionality, which seems to offer side quest maps, new items, other teams to use, and so on. Also noticed that you can forge new items in shops. Oh boy.

Peeling away the good and bad of Paper Mario: Sticker Star

Man, I’m really torn on Paper Mario: Sticker Star. After twenty-two hours of saved game time (and maybe an hour or two of lost progress after succumbing to tricky, obtuse boss fights), I still can’t decide if I really liked it or really disliked it. Certainly, I’m lingering somewhere in the middle, and that’s extremely frustrating, as the charm is absolutely there, but other aspects fall short, and I truly can’t recall another game that I had to look up so many solutions for via an online walkthrough.

In total, there are five-and-a-half worlds (forest world, desert world, ice world, you know the drill) to journey through, but none are particularly exciting. Strangely, there is one level within each world that is balls-out charming and stands apart from the others in terms of uniqueness and design, such as the haunted mansion (4-3, The Enigmansion) or the trivia game show level. I really enjoyed these and wished that the thought that went into them was spread out more across all the levels, as some come across feeling highly linear and, more or less, sticker-wasters.

Despite no EXP to gain, I really enjoyed the combat in Paper Mario: Sticker Star, though without timed button presses for bonus damage/defense it’d be fairly boring. I got really good at timing my jumps for Boot stickers, sort of okay with Hammers, and awesome at Fire/Ice Flowers. Those were the mainstays of my attacks, with the occasional Thing sticker when in a…ahem sticky situation. The Thing stickers are quite absurd upon initial pick up, and the only way to learn how they work is to use them in battle. However, re-purchasing some from the secret store could be expensive, and so I’d say I only ever used maybe 30% to 40% of the ones I discovered, such as the Electric Guitar, Soda Can, and Bowling Ball. Oh, and I used the Pillow by accident in the final boss fight, thinking it would put Bowser to sleep only to learn it puts Mario to sleep so that he can heal some HP each turn. In short, go me!

Lastly, the game is forever gorgeous to look at. Its diorama appearance makes turning on the 3D option actually viable, and every level is brimming with color. The larger-than-life bosses are great, and you truly never know what to expect when you use a Thing sticker, such as instant replays on the Bowling Ball.

Okay, no on to the bad–sadly. That whole “paperize” the world and peel parts away gimmick? Totally not used enough in the second half of the game, and when it is, it’s defiantly very straightforward. You literally just peel a part of the wall off, watch it flip itself upside-down in your book, paperize again, and stick it back on the wall. Consider yourself a real genius. I was hoping there would be more secrets to unearth via peeling, but there were only a few early on in the game.

Probably the most infuriating aspect of Paper Mario: Sticker Star are the boss fights, which require specific stickers or a combination of specific stickers to defeat. Now, you might think you have the right one, but you are generally wrong, and so you have to dig deep into your 1990s point-and-click adventure game logic to figure out what sticker is the right one for the job. This basically requires a lot of trial and error, which ultimately lead to me looking up answers via an online walkthrough. Not the most fun way to defeat the final boss of a videogame. Here’s a hint: Stapler, Scissors, Shaved Ice, and Tail; then as many shiny hammers you can use.

And speaking of the ending…well, I’m not exactly sure why I expected something grand or even fulfilling.. After you piece back the Wiggler’s body segments, there’s very few story beats in the ice and jungle worlds, which meant I completely forgot the what and why of Mario’s mission until the end credits scenes began playing. The story is basically this: Bowser ruins the Sticker Fest, you go collect the Royal Stickers, you defeat Bowser, and you start up the Sticker Fest again. That’s it. You get a wee joke from Kersti, and everyone laughs. Even Bowser. The end. Your progress gets saved at the end, but you’re dropped back into your pre-boss fight save slot; you can, however, visit a special Toad in Decalburg to watch the credits again, if you care to.

I guess the only reason I’d go back into Paper Mario: Sticker Star is for the museum, and maybe to complete those “Achievement”-like flags, which require some serious grinding and coin spending. Not ideal. Though filling out the museum is fun, but I have no idea if you get anything for doing it. Considering I’ve already now beat the game, I should just go give the museum all my special stickers and see what comes of it. And maybe I’ll hop back into Super Paper Mario, just for kicks…

But yeah, Paper Mario: Sticker Star. Love it, hate it–a combination of both.

Thoughts on Dinner Date while I wait for my dinner date

Thankfully, I’ve never been stood up; granted, I’ve only gone out on so many dates in my short time on this planet, and only two of them could really be considered “blind,” with most romantic outings being mutually agreed upon long before it all went down. So I don’t know what that feels like exactly, though I could naturally pull from the emotions I feel over other forms of abandonment and disappointment.

Well, with the latest package from Bundle in a Box, which is called the “Cerebral Bundle,” I now know how it feels to eat a meal for two all alone. Before I get to that, let me list everything you get if you beat the average price, which you totally should:

• Vampires!
• Dinner Date
• Phantasmaburbia
• Necrotic Drift Deluxe
• Dédale De Luxe
• J.U.L.I.A.
• I Get This Call Every Day
• Cognition, Ep.1: The Hangman
• Reversion – The Meeting

Whew. That’s nine games, and before dropping some coin on the bundle, I only ever heard of one thanks to an interesting article over at Giant Bomb. The other eight just look like strange ol’ names to me, and of them, I was initially drawn to try out Dinner Date first. Why? Well, it had the easiest name to digest, one which seemed to summarize itself in a single breath. I do hope to at least give each other game a try, especially J.U.L.I.A.,but knowing me and my awesome skills at multitasking and collecting more games than I know what to do with…well, not in a month of Sundays.

In short, Dinner Date has you exploring the subconsciousness of protagonist Julian Luxemburg as he sits at his dinner table, which is set for two, waiting for his date Meiko to arrive. As the night progresses and Meiko is nowhere to be seen, his thoughts continue to unfold  more frantically, and we learn about the worries that trouble him, many of which are not necessarily related to being stood up. Now, you experience this in a pretty non-traditional manner, slipping into Luxemburg’s mind with some control over his hands and movements. Think Being John Malkovich, but with keyboard button prompts. Via a first-person perspective, you can look at the clock, eat some bread, drink a glass of wine, smoke a cig, tap your fingers, stretch, and so on–all while Luxemburg mumbles and groans about his woes, quietly at first and then ultimately peaking after too much wine loosens his lips. Occasionally, I was unable to hear what he said, but his tone more than made his frustration cleared.

For my time with Dinner Date, I sat mostly mesmerized. A lot of that had to do with the soft, ambient music and just the surprising excitement that came with a new button prompt after X amount of time. Oh man. I can dip the bread in sauce? You mean I can stir my soup before I eat it? Sweetness. I have to wonder if this is what Heavy Rain is like in terms of detailed actions. If so, I’m in. Alas, after the credits rolled, the game crashed, which kind of left me a little confused, as I wasn’t sure if I had played the entire game or just a small slice of it; based on forum postings, I’ve done it all, which means it ends rather as one expects, which is a letdown for Luxemburg, as well as myself. I’d have liked to see how he fared the next day, the next week. Maybe even try again to get Meiko over. Oh well…

Dinner Date is about thirty minutes long in total with limited interactivity despite all the actions I listed that you can do as our leading curmudgeon. You’re basically just passing time until he is ready to move on to the next scene, the first of which covers wine, the second soup, and the third dealing with smoking a cigarette. It’s interesting, for sure, but I’d have liked more game than story in this one, which ultimately leaves it feeling like a fine piece of art, one you can look at and, untraditionally, touch, but can’t control. Still, there’s eight more games for me to check out from Bundle in a Box‘s “Cerebral Bundle.”

A scientist and studying mage join forces in Patchwork

Right now, I’m really embracing the short, free PC games, as well as the point and click genre yet again, having recently beaten one where a magical forest critter rescues his stolen sister, one where a grumbling D.I. saves a his town from exploding, and one where a medium solves the mystery behind a murderous street psychic. Oh, and early on in January, I finished up the final two episodes of Telltale’s The Walking Dead. So yeah, points and clicks–it’s happening. I really hope I’m still embracing the genre like so by the time Double Fine’s Reds (codename only) comes out. Y’know, whenever that is.

Until then, there’s plenty of small, free point-and-click adventure games out there on the Interwebz to eat up my time, like Patchwork. Which is a fantasy adventure game from someone under the username of Ilyich. Sorry, that’s all I could really unearth about the dev. If you know more, please enlighten me. In it, you take control of both a scientist named David and a young student mage from another realm called Lin as they struggle to close the rift between their two worlds that they themselves inadvertently caused. It’s ironic and fun, with colorful screens and soft, ambient music that kind of lulls you into a daze, pulling you into another world. The animation work isn’t too bad either.

My favorite part of the game is that you get to control two characters, and just like with Rosa and Joey from Blackwell Deception, Lin and David can interact with items in strikingly different ways. Even more, Lin can see what David can’t considering he is in her magical realm, a place that is just normal in her eyes. For instance, on the screen above, David just sees a large tree, but Lin knows it truly as a dryad and can even speak with it to learn that she desperately needs her roots watered. Both characters have their own inventories, and you can also combine items to make new ones, though it’s not always clear if the item creation failed because the items didn’t gel or if I clicked wrong. Think a simple “No, that doesn’t make sense.” kind of comment would have greatly helped, especially as I tried to make a pair of glasses for a certain eyesight-impaired blacksmith using every item I had. What? Just stick ’em on a rock and go.

The only nitpicks I have with Patchwork so far involve, naturally, basic grammar issues. The writing itself is lively and fun and not very serious, but “it’s” is incorrectly used every single time, and there’s a love for writing “all right” as “alright,” which is a personal pet peeve of mine. Would also have loved if Lin (or David) was able to carry the spellbook with them, as it does offer clues on how to get each element, but I have to keep returning to Lin’s house to read it. Nothing terribly devastating, especially when you remember that this wee adventure comes at no cost.

If any of the above sounds like your cup of point-and-click, head on over here to download the game. I suspect I’m about midway through it, only have to get a few more items to summon a rain storm and Back to the Future (I’m using that title as a verb) David to his true world. Just need to solve the cave puzzle of humming crystals, please the fire spirit, and water the tree by somehow opening up that fire hydrant. I think. Wish me luck.

Shapik: The Quest is a magical twenty minutes elsewhere

I was not in the mood to go out for lunch today, and so I stayed in, gobbling up my turkey-and-cheese spinach wrap in record time and washing it all down with a bottle of Arizona green tea. No, really–I ate super fast today, and so I had some free time during my lunchbreak, and what better way to fill free time with than freeware. In this scenario, I’m speaking specifically about a little point-and-click darling called Shapik: The Quest, which you can play totally for free in your browser over at NewGrounds.

Now, there are countless little adventure freeware games out there, but Shapik stood out mainly on its visuals. It’s fantastic art is like a criss-cross of Samorost 2 and Botanicula/The Tiny Bang Story (both owned, but not yet played), with colorful, kooky critters standing out in a cutesy way against detailed and other worldly backgrounds. You start out in a magical forest and end in more modern locations, like a building’s interior and roof, but those places still retain a unique look to set them apart from what one might deem traditional. All along, there’s ambient music that is evocative, but not distracting, and no voiced dialogue, just grunts and sound effects and pictures in word balloons a la Machinarium, which helps keep the magic self-contained.

But what is Shapik’s quest? Why am I playing this freeware point-and-clicker? I’m glad you asked. Allow me to copy/paste the game’s description and control scheme, bad grammar left as is, as presented on its NewGrounds site:

This is a story of Shapik, traveling through magic forest in search of his missing sister. Explore a beautiful world, full of mystery, magic and danger and find your missing sister, solving puzzles on your way.

Use your mouse.

Right. You are Shapik, a kind creature of the forest, your sister was stolen by bug-like things for unknown reasons, and you are off to rescue her. That doesn’t take very long, spanning nine individual screens, each of which has maybe two or three puzzles to solve. I ended up finishing it all in around twenty minutes, road-blocked only in two cases: once for a cryptic doorlock code, and the second for figuring out how to overload a furnace. There is no inventory; you just click on things, and either Shapik interacts with it or his bee friend will, and the puzzles themselves are very straightforward, such as using a crane to lift a hatch open.

So that was pretty enjoyable. Really, if you’ve got twenty to thirty minutes to kill, give Shapik: The Quest a go. Oh, and since it’s my blog and my gaming history, I’m counting it as one more done for 2013.

An angelic army enslaves the world thanks to Overclocked’s early bad ending

Well, after battling both demons and angels for a little over forty-five minutes, after losing every single team save for P-san’s, after constant spamming of gun-run-heal tactics, I finally did it. Victory was mine, earned with sweat, devotion, new strategies, the use of the Drain skill, and various sacrifices. I beat that mission in Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Summoner Overclocked that has repeatedly kicked my ass these last few days, constructing a roadblock of sorts. With the angels and demons defeated, P-san and his friends Atsuro, Yuzu, and Midori escaped the lockdown, bringing Honda and his frantic buddies along with us for good measure. Y’all welcome.

However, immediately upon exiting, a strange lighting storm appears over the lockdown. The angels, who P-san was beginning to side with, declared that the lockdown was a failure and decided to kill everyone inside it with lightning. Pew pew pew. For those outside the lockdown–namely, P-san and friends and remaining family members–the angels have declared humanity to be in default of their responsibilities as children of God, and an angelic army appears to enslave the world. Anyone who is not immediately subservient is killed outright, and the remainder are stripped of their free will. This is all told via text on the screen, which is then promptly followed by the words “Mission Failed,” sending you back to the main menu to load from a previous save.

It’s heart-wrenching, and not necessarily from a storyline perspective, but the suddenness of a GAME OVER screen after all that story and choice and time spent battling monsters and trying to survive to live another half hour really does leave something to be desired. I mean, this whole time, we’re trying to escape the lockdown, and now you get the chance to, and if you do it YOU LOSE. The logic behind is severely flawed. Evidently, you are supposed to the fight demons and angels and then attack the humans to break their COMPs while also protecting them from the previously mentioned angels and demons who can, in one hit, take them out, and any civilian dying is a mission fail status. So the easiest option of kill everything and run for it results in death, despair, and dropping you back to the start screen.

Evidently, there are six endings in Devil Summoner Overclocked, and of them, one is literally called “the Early Bad Ending,” which is obtained by breaking through the barricades of the Lockdown on Day 6 and escaping after defeating both the angels and demons in your way. I had no idea about this as I played; I was just playing, making the choices that seemed right and logical, like escaping the demon-filled lockdown at first chance. For that, I felt like I should have been rewarded, but instead I was punished.

When the “Mission Failed” text came up, I literally started at it for over a minute, mouth agape and heart-rate increasing. I just couldn’t believe it. This game loves to waste your time and test your patience, and despite how patient I actually am, I’m over it. I took Devil Summoner Overclocked out of my 3DS and tossed it back into my cartridge bag; now, if I was truly over it, I would have put the cartridge back in its case and then on the shelf to sit untouched for the remainder of days. But there’s a sick part of me. It’s hungry and demanding and greedy and covered in dirt. There’s a sickness within me, and this side still wants to see how things are supposed to go down (or one of five possibilities) before deeming the experience over. I mean, after thirty-seven hours am I just suppose to accept an early bad ending as the final say in this story? Especially now that I know what I’m supposed to do to “beat” the mission correctly.

I’ll try again, I will. Devil Summoner Overclocked and I just need some space, the kind you build after everything breaks down. I’ll end this fail-driven blog post by quoting Nick Hornby’s fail-driven High Fidelity, which I think does a good job of summing up this Day 6 battle set on the fringe of the lockdown that literally tore me apart: “What went wrong? Nothing and everything.”

My latest strategy for Devil Summoner Overclocked is more grinding

Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Summoner Overclocked is a game I’ve been playing off and on now since Hurricane Irene hit way back in August 2011. And yet, according to my save slot, I’ve only logged around thirty-five hours. I suspect that I’ve played maybe six to seven–heck, possibly eight–more hours than that, as the game naturally doesn’t count time lost when you struggle through a 45-minute battle only to wipe in the end because the upswing in difficulty took you by surprise yet again.

It’s a really frustrating game that I, at the same time, enjoy a lot about. The voice acting, not counting Midori or most of Yuzu’s lines about demons and the government, is really good and helps keep me engaged in the somewhat stretched plot. You also get to make choices, the kind that do effect the story, determining who stays in your party and who doesn’t. So far, I’ve lost a few peeps who I won’t mention for those that care about spoilers. And the demon fusion, which can be a brainteaser at times, allows you to customize the demons in your party and level them up through cosmic breeding rather than gaining experience points (which takes longer). The heavy, distortion-based electronica tunes, few that there are, really rock and stick with you as you battle or re-arrange your team.

It’s just that the combat can feel at times grossly overwhelming and unfair. But combat’s how you proceed, and so you have to learn. Which I think I have over my thirty-five-plus hours playing the game, but the latest fight I’m stuck at suddenly pulls the rug out from under you at its very end, pointing a gnarled finger between your eyes and berating you for not grinding enough. Let me explain.

I’m actually pretty close to the end of Devil Summoner Overclocked. Well, I think. The 3DS version supposedly gets a bonus eighth day of action. Currently, P-San and his friends are nearing the end of Day Six, which is supposed to culminate with another big battle against some Bel-named demon. Belial, perhaps. Anyways, it is 4:30 PM, and the only options are a single free battle location or to advance the story with a Honda-related battle. This is my current sinkhole, stuck point, unbreakable wall–what have you. Basically, Honda and some friends are trying to escape the lockdown, and you have to decide to whether to assist or stop them, as well as siding with the demons or angels there to get in the way–or none of the above. The win/lose factors can change dramatically based on your choice here.

I can handle Honda and the two civs trying to escape just fine; the problem is that when you kill a team of either demons or angels–who will fight each other at times, too–a second version appears. The angel ones aren’t anything crazy difficult though they love using Recairn to bring back fallen friends. It’s the demons that ruin all my tactics, and I’m specifically talking about this frakker right here:

That’s a Decarabia, the sixty-ninth spirit listed in the Goetia. Whatever that means. Regardless, this pentagram star is quite annoying, especially when the demon team consists of three of them. Why? Well, they love spamming the Shield All spell, which protects themselves from a single attack, and they seem to always do it right before my team gets to attack, thus wasting our entire turn. Secondly, they all have Fallen’s Mark, a racial skill that says if a Decarabia defeats an enemy, some HP and MP is restored to the entire team, based on the level of the defeated enemy. So, in short, they protect themselves from most damage I can do, and then when they off a supporting demon or main character, they restore a majority of their HP and MP. From what I can tell, the second spawnings of Decarabia are around level 48, and I’m able to take down them all save for the team made of three Decarabias. So, with P-San and fellow friends around 45/46 we have no choice but the grind. Unless there’s a strategy I’m missing.

I will beat Devil Summoner Overclocked. I will get P-San and his remaining friends out of the lockdown, for better or for worse. I will escape my own Decarabia-shaped lockdown, and then I too will be free.

The Sony PlayStation 4, my hopes and fears

Well, it’s coming down to the wire, but here it is, a blog post on Grinding Down about the forthcoming Sony PlayStation 4. Later today, Sony is hosting a meeting which many believe exists to announce its newest console, the next in its line of PlayStations. Given that I just bought a PlayStation 3 only a few weeks ago and have barely found time to both play with it and explore its non-gaming functions, like Netflix and PlayStation Home, I’m not at all interested in owning Sony’s newest system any time soon, but I am curious to see what it’s going to be all about. As always, I remain cautious, but let me share with y’all some hopes I have, as well as my biggest fears, many of which can apply with whatever Microsoft’s new console is gonna be, too.

Here we go.

Hopes

New games in established franchises

From the look of things, Naughty Dog is done with the Jak and Daxter franchise, but I think they should open it up for a new trilogy. That kooky platforming series really did wonders for the PS2, and a new Jak game could easily sway me, especially if it is more Jak II than anything else. Let’s also get a new true Ratchet & Clank game, one that focuses solely on platforming and crazy-ass guns. Some steps have already been made, with Sly Cooper 4 coming out and surprising everyone, mostly because it came out with little promotion from Sony, but whatever–it exists. New IPs are exciting for their newness, but offering up a new experience in familiar territory can be quite comforting. Hopefully I’m not alone in that.

Bring back the forgotten

I want a new Jumping Flash! I want the rebirth of Crash Bandicoot. I want whatever might come after Chrono Cross. Remember how awesome, G-Police was? Yeah, me too. Now’s the time, as those franchises are old enough to hit the nostalgia funny bones and unknown enough that the younger generation might just think of them as new IPs, sad as that might be. A return to the glory days, ya know.

Enhancing PlayStation Plus

My only complaint so far about getting a free year of PlayStation Plus is that I don’t have enough time to play all the free games they give out. I’d love to see this service carry over to the new system, as it offers a ton of great content and discounts for a reasonable price. Granted, my first year is free, but I can see myself signing up for it once that runs dry.

Fears

No backwards compatibility

When the PlayStation 2 was revealed, the concept of “backwards compatible” was entirely new. You could buy the new console, but still play all the games from the previous one. Sah-weet. It’s a concept that is fantastic for gamers, but it seems that head honchos don’t love it, eventually snipping it as a feature from later remodels or iterations. I believe the PS4 will allow you to play (or at least download) Ps3 games, but maybe they won’t for a guaranteed amount of time. Which would stink considering how many great games are still coming out for the PS3, like Ni no Kuni and The Last of Us. But the times, they are a-changing.

Always online

Granted, with Wifi, always being online is easier to accomplish, but something about the restriction rubs me wrong. There are certainly situations that might cause for your Internet to be off, but your power still on, and the fact that you then couldn’t play the videogame you paid for on the system you paid for seems really offensive. Yes, I have Steam and use it frequently, but haven’t really run into any problems with always being connected. But Steam is on a computer, and a videogame console should really be treated as a separate entity.

Online no longer free

I’m really close on cancelling my Gold membership for the Xbox 360, since the only time I really use it is to play Borderlands 2 online, which is happening less and less these days. You don’t have to pay to play online with the PS3, something I’d love to see going forward. If that gets put behind a paywall…well, dang. Just yet another thing to pay for that should be part of the whole package. It’s the first step to charging players to save their game progress.

Gimmicky controller

I’m sure you’ve seen that image of a supposed PS4 controller, which has some kind of touchpad on the front of it. Whether this operates as a sort of main menu hub is yet to be determined. I just hope I don’t have to look down while playing to do something else; that only works on the DS/3DS, where the screens are very close together to begin with.

—

Hopefully we’ll know a lot more by tonight! Are you going to watch Sony’s presentation live or wait for reports to go online? Me, I’ll be watching Giant Bomb watch it live, as I need some kind of humorous filter to get through all the pomp that these events harness.