An update of sorts, mainly bits and pieces

Hmm, it’s been a pretty busy weekend/week, and sadly that means I haven’t had much time for videogaming. Between the day job, revealing the website for my forthcoming comic Supertown, and the cursed return of all my favorite TV shows, I just haven’t had the (mental) energy to plop down and game the night away. Sure, I could watch less TV, but The Office and House are too good to not see.

Okay, enough excuses. Here’s some tidbits.

Bought Scribblenauts. It could easily be summarized as “a fantastic toy, but a flawed game.” The very first word I typed in was “LOLcat,” which did not work, but then I remembered I was thinking actually of “keyboard cat.” That did work, and I quickly summoned a dragon to eat it. Feel free to analyze that as you wish. The one nice thing is that you don’t have to play every single level, just a few to open up more, and then you can hop to and fro from the world map. The music is pretty fantastic though.

Beat Shadow Complex. For a second time. This trek though was to get 100% of items, and man it was a bit tricky. Sadly, I had to rely on a guide to get two or three of them, but once you have everything you totally feel like a badass walking into battle. Will probably play through one more time to get the Level 50 achievement, as well as the less than 13% items achievement (which I’m anxious to even try). All in all, a really fun game, and I generally don’t play ’em more than once so this is obviously saying something.

And I finished up the main campaign in Magic: The Gathering: Duels of the Planeswalkers. Did not take very long to knock Tezzeret on his butt, and I’m still unsure how I feel about this stripped down version. Sure, it’s a wonderful introduction to the trading card game, but man does it feel so empty.

Full reviews coming on all of these games. When? Whenever.

Puzzling Master to the Extreme

Puzzling Master (20G): Completed all challenges

Last night I ran through all the puzzle challenges in Magic: The Gathering — Duels of the Planeswalkers, which were fairly basic, easy-to-solve brainteasers in the mindset of the ones previously published in The Duelist. While I liked the majority of them, I felt they were a bit too obvious and wished for, well, for lack of a better word, something more challenging. It didn’t take many tries to reach an answer, especially since there were multiple ways to outdo an enemy. I only used a guide after the fact to see how others handled certain situations.

Don’t mind me though, this is just some moaning and groaning because while Magic: The Gathering — Duels of the Planeswalkers is a fun waste of time, it isn’t the Magic: The Gathering I went through high school playing with friends in the cafeteria. Little deck customizing, odd timing issues when it comes to responding with an activated ability or spell, and bad, bad 80s rock muzac.

Also, I hate online-only achievements (<– silver account).

September 2009 game releases that interest me

Well, here we are, in September, with cloudy skies and cool breezes and the unrefutable knowledge that autumn is closing in. Truthfully, this is one of my favorite seasons for gaming…though I can’t specifically say why. It just feels right to bunker down inside on a crispy afternoon and punch buttons until your fingers hurt.

Anyways, lots of games coming out this month, and though I don’t have the money to get them all (or even maybe more than one), I’d like to mention the ones sitting quietly on the edge of my interest.

XBOX 360

Mini Ninjas – released on 09/01/09

I had a pretty good time with the demo, but I still don’t think this kid-friendly ninja romp is worth a full retail price of $60/$50.

The Beatles: Rock Band – released yesterday on 09/09/09

I still don’t think I’d enjoy any of these plastic instrument games (been playing real instruments since I was 15), but if there’s one to change my mind…well, it’d be the one with “Octopus’ Garden” in it. Heard only good things so far, too, which is always a plus. Granted, I don’t have anyone to play with so it’d be a waste. Still, I’m curious…

NINTENDO DS

Scribblenauts – being released on 09/15/09

Oh man, oh man, oh man. Everything about this game screams FUN. The art style is quirky, the game is meant to be played differently by everyone, and there’s just something about knowing you can totally summon Santa Claus to duke it out with an Elder God that is initially pleasing. This will most likely be my big purchase of the month, but it’ll be worth it, I’m sure.

Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days – being released on 09/29/09

I know nothing about how this fits into the whole storyline of things, but you can never go wrong with this Disney/Final Fantasy-like mashup.

…

And that’s pretty much all I’m interested in this month. Sure, there’s some big releases like Batman: Arkham Asylum and WET and Halo 3: ODST, but those don’t really speak my language. Oh wells.

Also, on the radar for October is Fallout 3: Game of the Year edition. Eee. I’m not even allowed to think about that game any more until I get some comics work done. Eeeeee.

IMPRESSIONS: WET demo

WET is, from what I can tell, an homage to a number of things: Quentin Tarantino flicks, Max Payne/Matrix bullet time, and the 70s. Highly stylized, the demo covers three aspects of gameplay, and has us in control of Rubi, a gun-toting, sword-slashing assassion on a mission that is not really explained. Also, she drinks Jack D for health boosts.

All right, the first section seems to be a run-of-the-mill action scenario. You’re in a room with bad dudes, and you must eviscerate them all to continue on. The difference? Shooting them sufficiently is only gained by entering “slow-mo,” which happens when you slide, jump, or run against walls, allowing for better precision and multiple targeting. It takes a bit getting used to the fact that you can never just jump normally, that every jump is like pushing off from the bottom a swimming pool, but eventually all Generic Bad Guys crumple to the ground and you’re ready to move on to the next part of the demo.

Rage mode is next. Or maybe it is better dubbed Red mode. That’s what you’ll see most of: red, with some white splashes of blood. Neat look, but it’s just a hectic run from one end to the other, slashing with your sword (don’t bother trying to shoot anyone at this part as it is just unfeasible). The music, however, totally rocked, and for that Red Rage mode was worth it.

Lastly, the car-hopping stage. Quick Time Events are never my favorite thing because I generally have to fail five or six times before I can figure out what is needed. Do I hit the X button once or continue to mash it in? Rubi is riding along car tops, shooting bad guys and avoiding exploding trucks. Visually, it’s amazing. Gameplay-wise, it leaves very little in your control. I’d have liked it more to be the one doing the jumping from car to car rather than pushing a button, but one can’t get everything.

That said, WET isn’t really my sort of game. Too much mindless action, not enough open-ness. And if it’s all just run-and-stab, well, that is something that quickly becomes boring, even if there’s a rockin’ soundtrack to back it up. Oh wells.

In Metroidvania, no one can hear you scream

Just acquired this achievement last night in Shadow Complex:

Make ‘Em Scream (20G): Get 100 soldiers to scream

What’s nice about this achievement is two things: 1) it was not one that I had to consciously be aware of achieving, in that I just shot soldiers and tossed grenades their way, and sometimes they’d scream when being blown to bits and other times they’d just crumple to floor and 2) Shadow Complex does a wonderful job of providing in-game tracking towards its achievements so I knew I was getting close to this one, making each further scream all the more rewarding.

My first glitch in Shadow Complex

There I was, crouching along in some dark and stuffy vent, flashlight at the ready in case there were any bombas or orange-colored walls to shoot, when all of a sudden I dropped through the floor to a secret room below and found myself frozen in mid-air, face only centimeters away from a locked door. I tried moving around, but could do very little other than shut off/turn on my flashlight and hit the menu buttons. Frustration quickly set in.

So I had to reload from a previous save, losing about 15 minutes worth of game. Luckily, not much had happened during those 15 minutes save for finding a gold bar location and getting a couple of soldiers to scream (my, how I love to make ’em scream) so it wasn’t terribly frustrating. But now I’m much more wary of this sort of thing and save frequently.

When I fell down the shaft a second time, I kept to the left (away from the door) and landed perfectly on the floor. So yeah, just a minor glitch. No big deal. Still loving the stuffings out of Shadow Complex, and I’m probably only halfway through the main game.

Two new Xbox Live Arcade games downloaded

Needed a little pick-me-up last Friday evening, so I purchased some Microsoft Space Bucks and downloaded Shadow Complex:

…and Magic the Gathering: Duels of the Planeswalkers:

I’ve had only a limited amount of play-time with both games, but so far they’re not terrible. In fact, Shadow Complex is quite impressive for an Xbox Live Arcade title, doing many a things great. Magic the Gathering: Duels of the Planeswalkers is not the MTG I’m used to playing, but now that I lack a group of friends to play with it does a decent job of filling said void. More later as I continue to work through ’em…

IMPRESSIONS: Mini Ninjas demo

I knew very little about Mini Ninjas before I downloaded the demo for Xbox 360, and that’s okay. There didn’t seem to be much that I needed to know. Only this: I am a ninja, and I will probably do ninja-like things. And in that respect, the demo delivered fully.

You start out in a forest, meandering down a linear path until you come to a small village being assaulted by local samurai warriors. Taking control of either three ninjas (Hiro, Suzume, or Futo), you’re tasked with taking out the bad guys and exploring the local landscape.

Hiro is your Average Joe of ninjas, with a special attack move of dashing in and hitting multiple enemies. Suzume is a master of the flute and can use her musical gift to get samurais a-dancing like “Kung-Fu Fighting” by Carl Douglas just came on the radio. Lastly, Futo is all muscle, swinging his mallet without speed, but with all his might. I played the majority of the demo as Hiro.

Along the way, you’ll free animals from locked cages, discover ingredients, and search of for hidden Jizo statues. Mini Ninjas seems to balance the collectathon and action/platform parts fairly well. I’ve seen folks on the forums saying you can possess animals, too…but I must’ve missed that during my playthrough.

While the graphics are mediocre (you’d think this was a first generation Wii title), the art style is simply wonderful. The ninjas all have a distinctive look and are cutesy, and the forest level is lush with greens and blues and bouncing animals. Voice acting worked well for those that did some talking. I don’t remember there being much music, but the thump and thwack of your weapon against the skin of your enemies is always a nice sound no matter how it is recorded.

So, fun, colorful, and varied bits of gameplay. The Xbox 360 is severely lacking in great platformers (I’m thinking about the Jak series, the Ratchet and Clank series, and the Sly Cooper series here), but Mini Ninjas might just be what it needs to stand out. Hopefully, it won’t retail for $60, but anything around $30 would be worth picking up.

JUST BEAT: Assassin’s Creed

Developer/Publisher: Ubisoft Montreal/Ubisoft
Platform: Xbox 360
Genre(s): Third Person, Action-Adventure
Mode(s): Single player
Rating: M
Time clocked: Not sure exactly, somewhere around 15 hours or so

The Basics
You are Desmond Miles, a bartender kidnapped for his memories. Conversely, you are also Altaïr, an assassin stripped of his rank and forced to earn his place back in the cool club by eliminating a number of targets that are somehow involved in the same plot to obtain a “piece of Eden.” It’s all very mysterious stuff, and you basically just told what you’re told (“Go to sleep, Mr. Miles!”) until you can begin to piece things together for yourself.

The Good
The graphics, namely those of the cities you’ll visit and explore, are simply stunning. The cities and their streets and their rooftops and shadows and little dirt-covered crevices—they all just look absolutely gorgeous. People walk through the street with lifelike fluidity, and the small sounds of chatter or a pot breaking really do add to the world.

Free running is a blast, and it works out well just about 90% of the time. Once the guards knock you down and have you surrounded, there’s really no chance of escaping without doing some good ol’ sword-swinging.

The combat system (at times) is fun. You have a variety of options: take guards out ahead of time with throwing knives, do a low-profile kill with your hidden blade, or duel it out with swords, countering as you go. This, however, is not button-mashing combat, and if one isn’t careful with their timing, they can find themselves getting slaughtered easily. But once you find your rhythm, taking out an entire circle of city guards is both exhilarating and nerve-wrecking.

The Bad
Unfortunately, Assassin’s Creed is a lot like the directions for shampoo. Once the game gets going, you are sent to one of the main cities—Jerusalem, Acre, or Damascus. After sneaking inside, Altaïr must find the local assassin bureau where he’ll get his first clues about the mission. After that, there’s some eavesdropping, integrating, and pick-pocketing…once enough of these side missions have been done, Altaïr is then given the option to terminate the latest target. Kill him, and head back to Masyaf for some talking until you are thrust back to another of the Holy Land’s cities. And that’s it.

The Fugly
It’s annoying to have to do the same thing over and over again; it’s even more annoying when the said same thing offers you nothing new. I saved every single citizen being bullied by city guards, and about 50% of them told me they’d run right home and the other 50% said that all the city would know of my good deeds. Neither of these claims really solidified. What would’ve been nice is if my actions led to something. For instance, maybe extra guards get posted in areas where I saved someone, or a single citizen (maybe the saved citizen’s brother?) would help me in a fight or something like that.

Speaking of worthless, there’s the flags. Fun to stumble upon, a pain to fully track down, and they exist only for Achievements-sake. Again, if they did something for Altaïr (like letting him run faster or fall from greater heights) then they’d serve a point. Alas, they do not.

Lastly, there’s the “ending” to talk about…what a disappointment. I was just as dumbfounded as Miles was after seeing that weird vision and writing on his bedroom’s walls. Granted, Altaïr’s storyline came to a sound and understandable conclusion—why couldn’t Miles? After the credits roll, we’re given control again and can wander around his confined cell for clues, but there’s really nothing else there. A shame, as I wasn’t even sure if the game was over at that point, but I guess it was…

The Overall Vibe
Assassin’s Creed is a game that should be played though not entirely to its end. Visiting your first city and running along a stream of rooftops is a sure-fire blast, but once you beginning to see the game as nothing more than the same ol’, same ol’ it loses its charm fast. There are some great moments here, but it takes a bit of grinding to get to them. The “ending” is a complete letdown, nothing more than a lure for those hungry for Assassin’s Creed II.

7 out 10

Fable III has been announced

See the announcement and its details here.

No, you did not leave the kettle on the stove by accident. That sound is my girlish cry of joy at its highest screech–can’t wait to rule Albion! Anyone that does not bow to my dog will be tossed off the nearest parapet!