I generally play a game the first time through on Normal, to get a feel of what the developers wanted the average player to see, when I find that it is in fact incredibly easy – I’ll replay it on a harder difficulty (especially when this results in a different ending or extra levels/bonus-dungeons.) Most of my reviews are on a game’s native, default, normal, medium settings of difficulty – because that’s what I expect the developers wanted the average person to play on and it generally seems to be what the average person starts out on (whether or not they finish up on harder ones is another issue all together.) (Such as this preview/review for Fire Emblem)

Along comes Dark Spire, the new DS dungeon-crawler roguelike. Now you may wonder, ‘Leighton – what the hell does that mean?’ Let me inform you — You are gonna get punched in the face and humiliated, potentially your mom will be insulted, as will your gaming honor. Lets take a quick trip down memory lane from the last time we had games like this (Yes I am a huge fan of Etrian Odyssey, yes it is similar, but it’s leagues away from the traditional feel that Dark Spire brings.) Might and Magic 5, Wizardry 3, Bard’s Tale (not that bastard child that was on the PS2,) Eye of the Beholder, Shining in the Darkness and if any of you guys remembered, or played them – pretty much half the games that SSI (Strategic Simulations Inc) did on the Amiga/Commodore/NES/PC.  I’ve probably put 300+ hours into Dungeons and Dragons : Pool of Radiance on the NES, and I’m still nowhere close to being done all the quests.

What does all that have in common? That’s all the 16bit era and prior.

Well along comes Dark Spire and it is here to tell you it is no cartoony joke that’s going to bring modern-day mechanics into an old genre. No, it is going to be that genre. It infarct has an option to PLAY it in 8-bit mode with vector line art – ‘Screw your graphics,’ it says.

I digress, I haven’t even explained what this roguelike dungeon-crawler is. Dark Spire is an RPG, except there is no giant vast scaling world, no cities to explore, no oceans to sail, no convoluted plot lines of love-interests between party members. You are a very forgettable group of adventurers, one of many bands of adventurers, in a bland city that offers the most basic commodities.

Then there’s the dungeon. The dungeon is this massive living thing. That’s what these old dungeon-crawlers are about, a kajillion floors, up, down, around, trap doors, treasure chests, pits, elevators, bands of briggands living on various floors, evil artifacts and ghosts and sorcerers. You are going to get lost more than once.

That’s half the fun and challenge with these games, wandering around, getting lost running low on potions and available spells and praying to the everliving gods that you can find your way out back to town to restock and sleep and get to the training hall to level up.

The other half of that is frustration, stepping on a trap-door, or pitfall or a revolving door or a one-wall secret wall and getting lost while trying to escape the floor you were on. Lost, with a bare minimum map (that does not show your location) hoping you remember which set of twists and turns you took, attempting to flee from battles…and..was that the door we came in through? Battle after battle as you attempt to reach freedom.

That is a dungeon crawler. They are all about number crunching and feeling brave to adventure further than you had before, without knowing what’s up ahead. Dark Spire brings you all this but does it very prettily.

The soundtrack is fantastic – well orchestrated, fitting the mood very well, in fact my copy came with a bonus CD full of the game’s music. I’m listening to it at my desk as we speak, that’s how good it is. Not only that but the graphics are fantastic too – in a style of game that we’ve come to expect to not have graphics at all (See above about the vector-line-art option.)

Which brings me to my original point (and finishes up my point about the art.)

This is your training master. The tutorial level if you will. First thing you do in the game is navigate a mini-dungeon and fight this guy. He hits really really really hard. My first time through he nuked my main tank in one hit on the first round. Training is learning how to die? Yes, it’s preparing you for the realization you will get demolished from time to time (I’m not joking.)

Nostalgia aside, there are two quick things to point out – the downside.

The menu is pretty clunky and a bit of a chore to navigate around at first – the quest screen is for some reason in the same menu as save/load/options. That seems a little ridiculous to me, in my mind it would fit better in with the equipment/spells/stats menu.

Second note – the learning curve. If you are not familiar with having your ass handed to you and figuring out a VERY simple class system (There are only 4 classes and equipment disables abilities of classes it does not agree with – ie: plate mail on a priest or multi-classed priest prevents casting,) as well as general unfamiliarity of not having blatant stat points on weapons (there are no +20 to attack on a sword vs +23 attack on an axe or anything like that,) you might have a bit of a rough start to this game.

Oh right – and saving often. I cannot stress this enough. I played for about 40 minutes my first time, hadn’t thought about saving, got murdered by a wandering group of bandits and had to start all over again, tutorial and all.

If you’re an older gamer like myself, you’ll probably feel right at home with Dark Spire, for people new to the genre – you might glance at it’s odd style of game play and think it’s not for you – give it a shot, you will fall in love with it’s quirky charm and the tension you get from delving too deep into the dungeon…unprepared.

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There's the save point!

Save points have existed for a while in jRPGs, but what is their real purpose? I know it’s something we don’t see nowadays so much but there was a time where save points were existent many video games. Personally I though save points were one of the worst ideas ever, and now that we are able to save anywhere in most games, I’m not sure why some games decide to use them. There is something to be said about the level of suspense and success feeling when you come upon a save point but there’s more wrong with the idea, then there is right with the idea. The pros have already been stated: easier to code, adds some level of suspense, and surprise, but let’s weigh down the cons to it.

• Ruins the surprise of a big event

You know what I mean. You’re fighting your way through a massive dungeon and suddenly you see a savepoint, you know that something funky is about to go down. Either you know that you’re going to be facing some kind of boss, of you’re half way through the dungeon, which can be kind of depressing if the dungeon is fun. Though save points ensure you save before possibly getting your ass kicked, it ruins the surprise.

• Pressured to find a save point when playing for a while

This point is also a no-brainer, you’ve been playing for an hour or so and you’ve gotten far, the first thing you want to do is save your progress. Well what happens if you’re cut low on time? If for some reason you have to go somewhere and you don’t have time to find a save point? What then? Then you have to force yourself to continue playing or start again another time.

• Some save points disable the ability to backtrack

Now I never saw the appeal of doing this. Why would a developer not want you to backtrack to explore the game more? It’s like asking someone into your home then restraining them to the backyard, you have no good reason to do it unless you hate your consumer.

Dynamic saving (saving wherever you like) is the best option, it’s not baby-ing your consumer. It’s giving them the ability to save for themselves, so they can take the responsibility to save wherever needed. If you didn’t save for an hour and then you lose a boss fight, then too bad, it teaches you to save more frequently, and personally I like a game a lot better when I’m given as much freedom as possible.

For some reason I was incredibly excited when Xenosaga was announced. I was in high school at that time, going through that phase where yes, bizarre esoteric philosophy really is the bomb (I was a nerd if you couldn’t already tell). Looking back on this I’ll be damned if I can figure out why, because the spiritual forebearer to this game, Xenogears, was arguably the most convoluted game I have ever played, both game play- and story-wise.

But that’s not my point. My point is Xenosaga. Going into it I probably knew immediately something was amiss. Why is that? Well, allow me to answer my own question with a question. Successful stories tend to make sense, don’t they? Because it’s about two hours in and I STILL HAVE NO CLUE WHAT IS HAPPENING. All I know is people are saying words (most are made up, I later checked) about… Something. I guess it was supposed to sound like a bunch of scientists in the future talking about future-stuff, but all it accomplished was confusing the hell out of me.

That’s pretty much par for the course of the entire game, though. Lots and lots of references to the Zohar and stuff like that, which even one glance of the associated Wikipedia page can tell that it’s definitely not something I want to even hear from, really.

I guess if you were really, really into fanfiction and comparative religion you have found your new favorite game. What I can say about both the story and the actual game itself is it seems like it took plenty of work, but the question is why someone might want to put so much effort into something so boring and so over the top convoluted. I wager that if they spent half the time actually thinking up decent characters and plot points instead of just attempting to sound deep the game would have been great. But instead it comes off as a game with a huge chubby for itself.

I’d make a bulleted list about what specifically is wrong with the plot, but I can summarize it with one bullet so I’ll do that:

• The story sucks. Plain and simple. Here’s the thing about sprawling space epics: typically the people involved are interesting enough so you care about their plights, and their universe by extension. I don’t know who this Shion girl is and she really doesn’t strike me as someone I’d care to know, so I really don’t care if these Alien (from the movie, Alien, and that’s where they ripped the idea from) eat her or not. Really none of my concern.

At its game play core it’s a competent RPG. Ignoring the stupid plot the game works by itself, so I can’t really comment. Room for improvement? Of course, but that’s really not the problem with this game. It’s as if the developers got together and, instead of concentrating on, I don’t know, making a good game, they instead got together and said “let’s make the most pretentious, convoluted mess of a plot we can possibly muster” and did just that.

Also, for future reference, Monolith Soft, when you threaten to tell your story in eight parts, you’ve already lost most of your audience due to time and money constraints alone. How long did it take the Final Fantasy series to reach number eight? The Dragon Quest series? You’re looking at ten+ years and several hundred dollars just to finally learn the deep secret of this drab, boring universe which will undoubtedly end like every generic RPG I’ve ever played (because you aren’t capable of better, let’s be honest): THE REAL ENEMY IS GOD!? NO!! You were already heading in that direction with the esoteric Jewish and Christian theology anyway, so don’t lie.

Written for Gamer Blag

Live-A-Live

Live-A-Live is a game created by Squaresoft for the SNES in 1994. It was only released in Japan, due to several anatomical jokes that I’m sure if I mentioned would make the editor throw my article into the trash, let alone get past censors. It was a strange game with an odd sense of humor and a battle system unseen before.

Instead of the standard ‘everyone on opposite sides’ RPG battle that Squaresoft usually offered, the game presents a grid where your characters can freely move around and attack and cast spells. Position as compared to the enemy is ridiculously important, as some attacks only hit certain squares- Say, two spots to your left and right. This adds a degree of tactics to the battles- One boss, for instance, can be defeated by remaining horizontal or vertical from him. It’s an excellent tactic to let people who simply don’t want to grind progress through the story. Overall, the atmosphere is an amusing one, gameplay is stellar, and it should entertain most RPG fans.

The game is presented not as a singular path, but as several chapters you can pick and choose to play at any time- And each one is extremely interesting and unique, as each one has it’s own unique style and tricks to them. The chapters are, in no particular order: Caveman, Robot, Psychic, Kung-Fu Master, Ninja, Wrestler, Cowboy. After you complete them, there is one more chapter, Knight, and then the final chapter, which ties them all together fairly well.  Plot is decent, characters are pretty well developed, and it’s great fun. It is almost silly how exaggerated the amount of awesome the game offers – It’s as if the game follows the Rule of Cool. One downside to the multi-chapter gameplay and the gimmick-per-chapter setup is if you don’t enjoy a chapter, you must bear through it if you want to complete the game.

The music is great at times (Go! Go! Buriki-Daioh! comes to mind, where – SPOILER! – While you’re flying a giant mecha around a town the song plays and lyrics appear at the bottom of the screen, as if it was karaoke.)  but at other times it gets repetitive and bad. The graphics are decent for SNES era gaming, but they aren’t anything to write home about- Think above FF4 but below FF6.

You can still play it if you somehow managed to legally acquire a copy of the ROM – There’s a fan translation patch on the internet which does a great job of making it into simple, understandable English.

If you’re a fan of RPGs and want to pick up something fun, Live-A-Live is the way to go.

You can download a copy of the Live-A-Live translation patch here.

All images are copyright Nintendo and respective owners.

First, Fallout 3 has dark humor in it, you can find it as soon as you escape the tutorial part of the game, but to the level of Fallouts 1 and 2? Maybe not but you can’t deny that Fallout 3 doesn’t bring at least some of it to the table. Second, Fallout 3 lacks on the dynamic endings, sure there are some variations depending on the path you take but ultimately it ends the same. So in some perspectives you can say Fallout 3 has changed from the originals.

Does that make Fallout 3 a bad game? You best be joking. If this game was released as a different name people would eat it up like no tomorrow. Of course I might be writing with a bit bias at the moment, let’s check out the key features so you can decide for yourself.

The game looks wonderful, and the colour scheme for the game matches it perfectly. No longer do you have brown and gray without a reason! The character models and the monster models are well-detailed, though there are graphical issues, as with all releases. With such an immense world you can expect to see people walking awkwardly on certain surfaces (feet floating in mid-air) and everyone’s favourite: clipping issues, along with stiff NPCs that lack expression in body language. However, you probably won’t notice them all the time with all there is to do in the world of the Capital Wasteland.

As lovely as a wasteland can be.

Gameplay – Here’s the part where you expect to see “OBLIVION WITH GUNS”. Yes it does seem like Oblivion, now drop it you troll. Fallout 3 may be similar to Bethesda’s The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, but it feels like more of an independent game than a mod for Oblivion.

With that out of the way, let’s move on to some gameplay mechanics, namely combat. Standard combat (first person shooter style) is clunky, but Fallout 3 brings a new style of combat to the table, the V.A.T.S. (Vault-Tec Assisted Targeting System) which is essentially a system where you pause combat and select where you’d like to strike an enemy. After you pick your locations you engage in a mini cut scene where you see yourself in the third person shooting at your target from different angles with slow motion. It’s quite awesome.

Getting headshots has never been easier

The V.A.T. System works really nicely in Fallout 3 but makes the game a bit easy if you aren’t playing on a hard difficulty, especially because it’s more than possible to be rich and have all the guns and artillery to kill anyone in sight by level 5.

The story isn’t anything you’ll love to bits but its entertaining enough that you’ll play along with it, the main thing going for Fallout 3 is its environment. There are over 30 locations to explore over an immense map, each offering its own little value into Fallout 3’s overall appeal. Exploring alone will take you 30 hours, the story will add about 6 hours to your time.

The RPG (roleplaying game) elements of Fallout remain top tier, the leveling system is standard but fair and along with each level comes a perk. There are numerous perks with its own advantage and its own application. None of the skills are left out in gameplay so you won’t get screwed over by picking the wrong skills. In addition to skills you also have a set of statistics that you decide in the very beginning of the game called S.P.E.C.I.A.L. (Strength, Perception, Charisma, Intelligence, Agility, Luck) points that allow you to choose how you want to play. One thing Bethesda might have gone wrong with was a 20 level cap, that’s right, after you hit 20, you’re maxed out unless you use the PC in-game console to reset your level.

Everyone is S.P.E.C.I.A.L.

Music in Fallout 3 is also very well done, you can listen to a radio in game at all times, even though the range of stations is very limited, you’ll fall in love with the music being played. I had to find the soundtrack for Fallout 3 because the sounds were so catchy, I would hum them and sing them during my daily routines. 50’s music is the bomb.

Last but definitely not least, the vast amount of replayability. Having 4 distinct endings ensures 4 playthroughs, but there are also different moral choices in the game that can have a varying effect on how NPCs treat you, so you’ll want to play again to make different choices. You’ll also want to play again to try out different play styles. Say you were a gun-toting bad boy the first game who didn’t take no bull from other people, the next game you can be a hand-to-hand expert with a heart of gold, or a thief that steals from the rich and gives to the poor (Robin Hood with a Laser Rifle anyone?). The possibilities are vast.

Then when you’re done with everything in-game, you can expect to see mods being released that will give you extra quests, extra content, more locations, more radio stations, and probably fix the game for the better in general.

One last note (down here because it’s a problem that can be fixed), Fallout 3 has the tendency to crash on PCs. I’m not 100% sure on consoles but I’ve heard that its the same story, I’ll only include this until a patch of some kind can be implemented to fix these issues.

The Pros:

• Very immersible
• Amazing music
• Creative and entertain Combat System via V.A.T.S.
• Well-implemented RPG elements
• Wide world with loads to do
• Lovely Environment
• Realistic to what it aspires to be
• Great level of customization
• Great level of replayability
• Modifiable with mods to add more to the game

The Cons:

• A bit on the easy side
• NPC interaction feels stiff
• Graphic glitches here and there
• The ending is less than satisfactory
• 20 Level cap
• Tendency to crash

Ahaha, eat lead.

”Men cry not for themselves, but for their comrades”

Crisis Core : Final Fantasy VII is the first good FFVII spinoff. Instead of being a gigantic clusterfuck of fanservice that was Advent Children or plain old crap like the Dirge Of Cerberus game, this game is actually worth your time.

The game tells the story of Zack Fair, Soldier 2nd Class (later 1st Class) and follows his adventures until his eventual demise that leads (indirectly) in to the original Final Fantasy VII. The plot of the game is quite interesting with some new characters together with some old ones returning. I`m happy that the game only has two scenes of over exaggerated Advent Children action and both of which turn out to be virtual reality, the rest of the game is down to earth in terms of action by Final Fantasy standards.

Now, what`s really interesting is the game`s combat system. It reminds me of Kingdom Hearts 1 if you removed your character`s ability to jump. During battles you move around on a 3D map and control Zack like in an action RPG. you attack, use items and use materia you have equipped by pressing the X button and use the L/R shoulder buttons to switch commands. You use the Square button to dodge, Triangle button to guard and Circle button to reset the commands back to attack. Dodging plays a vital part in to gameplay. But here`s the interesting part.

The DMW. In the top left corner of the screen you see slots that spin as long as you have SP, these slots roll and provide bonus effects. If three numbers of the same kind are rolled, you gain a status effect such as ”Endure” or ”Null MP Cost” or ”Invincibility”, etc. Also at the same time, portraits bearing the images of characters from the game also spin and if three of the same kind are rolled, they make Zack do a special action such as the Omnislash or other limit breaks. These attacks are gained as relationships are built with these characters throughout the plot. Also the DMW sometimes will roll a summon, such as Bahamut or Odin or Ifrit or other series staples. These summons are gained by gaining the summon materia from bonus missions. The DMW mixes up battles quite a bit but it makes some battles too easy.

Now, the story portion of the game does demand some sitting for long times, but if you want to play the game in tiny bits then the game also has a wide variety of bonus missions, although they`re almost always the same ”Kill specific enemy” quests. Beating these missions always nets you some nice items and gear and if you beat all of them then the story part of the game will be too easy.

9/10

This game is worth getting and I advise you to do so.

Release Date: February 28, 2008 (Japan), No US release scheduled.
Genre: Action RPG

(Names of sections stolen shamelessly from Gametrailers)

A game that has not yet graced the shores of the United States has recently graced my Nintendo DS which, before now, lay dormant on my shelf collecting a thin layer of dust.

It has only been a month or so since I was introduced to the world of ROM Hacking and ever since I sought to play this game. The folks over at GBA Temp are host to many fan-based translation efforts for both the GBA and DS platforms. Through the magic of various kinds of hex editors and a massive number of hours, fans of games help those not literate in Japanese or other foreign languages to enjoy the games in their native language.

The catch is you need to have a ROM of the game – and by the Fair Use clause of the United States Copyright Act of 1976, if you own a physical copy of the game you are entitled to own a single digital copy for archiving purposes. With the help of E-Bay I put my hands on a copy of this game and proceeded to download and patch the ROM.

You’ll need a flash card of whichever type you prefer to play the game, but putting that all aside I finally was able to enjoy the game I had heard about only through GBA Temp.

Story

Soma Bringer is, for all intents and purposes, impossible to place within a timeline relative to our own calendars. It takes place on a planet which is governed by magical energy called “Soma”. All technology is based on Soma energy and it is interwoven into the lives of all the inhabitants of the world. The story concerns itself with the 7th division of the military organization known as Pharzuph who have been called upon to deal with the arrival of beings known only as “Visitors”. On their first mission, the 7th division comes across a girl trapped inside a cocoon in the forest whose memory has been seemingly wiped clean. The girl, Idea, joins up with the 7th division on their investigation of the Visitors and the plot they uncover threatens to affect the entire world.

Every aspect of the story has been done before and there isn’t anything really groundbreaking here. The members of the 7th division have unique characters and it’s more than enough to entertain during cutscenes. You are introduced to the entire cast of characters from the get-go and though at first it may be hard to differentiate, before much time has gone by you come to make sense of everything.

Typical RPG story cliches follow leading up to a conclusion that completes the story without leaving you saying “..finally”. Overall I would say that some of the supporting characters lacked much arc throughout the story which detracted a bit, but I came to be at least emotionally involved enough to garner a satisfying feeling.

8/10

Design/Gameplay

Soma Bringer pulls the same kind of scheme that Ragnarok Online pulls but in reverse — similar to the PS1 era Final Fantasies. Characters, items, and enemies are 3D models while environments are 2D backgrounds. The two blend together quite well, as even the best 2D character sprites cant quite convey the same character detail. Environments range quite a bit throughout the games chapters and you never feel like you are in one place for too long.

Character development is big in this game and it really helps to keep the variety going throughout. There are 6 playable classes which represent the classic RPG archetypes, each with a multi-tiered skill point system. Each time you level up you get points to increase your base stats as well as skills. The great thing is that you aren’t bound to whatever spec that you choose. At any time you can remove and reassign points into different skills if you want to try out a different play style or if you find a new type of weapon for which you are not specialized.

Joining your character are two other members of the 7th division of Pharzuph whom you are able to select or change whenever you are in a main town. Aside from being able to select which team members you have you are able to select from a list of different skill specializations and AI behavior for each member. The party AI is pretty rudimentary, though severe errors are infrequent. I can only recall one instance in which my party member designated for healing decided it would be a better idea to melee than stand back and be supportive. You cannot change the equipment of your party members, instead their equipment is dictated by their skill presets.

There are a vast number of items and equipment in the game each with a slew of different possible enhancements. Loot is present in massive amounts stemming from creatures and randomly place chests. which brings back memories of Diablo 2, though there isn’t the same tedious inventory micromanagement. You are entitled to so many inventory slots on your character’s person and a handy storage system which can be accessed in main towns. You are able to send items to the storage from the field whenever you wish as to keep your bags a little lighter. Similarly to just about every MMORPG after World of Warcraft, items come in a variety of rarities ranging from common to legendary. Interestingly enough Unique items are not as good as Legendary items, though they have much cooler names.

My qualms with the items lie in the fact that there is simply TOO MUCH loot. There is so much loot in this game that after selling off all the excess I was left with such a hysterically large amount of gold that I wondered how my character managed to carry it all at once. There really isn’t a huge use for gold either. The equipment you find on the field is always better than what you can purchase from vendors, and the only time I found myself spending anything near a large amount of gold was when I was ditching my old potions for newer, better ones.

An interesting fact about this game is that it does not use the touchscreen at all. Instead it opts to use the lower screen for extra information display. The screen is utilized surprisingly well by the intuitive menu system that the game employs. On the main screen is all the relevant information about your character, and with a press of the shoulder buttons, you alternate between bag and battle mode. In bag mode you are able to bind four items to the face buttons of the DS and under battle mode you are able to bind four skills to the face buttons. There are 2 different sets of battle mode hotkeys which can be alternated between with a second press of the right shoulder button. The menu system works extremely well in every situation and is very easy to become accustomed to.

The battle system takes place entirely in real-time very similar to how a game such as Diablo or Dungeon Siege would operate. Enemies are placed singly or in small clusters throughout each map and after they are killed they do not respawn unless you quit and reload your game. You will face a very large number of enemies throughout the game whose types vary based on each location. Enemies each have skills and weaknesses which can be discovered through fighting them. Sprinkled into the mix of normal enemies are stronger variations of common enemies which offer better experience and always leave behind a chest as well as boss enemies with unique names and the best loot the game has to offer.

Story related bosses are quite frequent throughout the game though their difficulty doesn’t always reflect your position in the story. There were several occasions where I encountered a random boss in a dungeon that was several times more challenging than the story boss located at the end of the same dungeon. Small irregularities in the design like this are easy to look over however when you consider the obvious care put into designing the rest.

The penalty for death really isn’t all that great. When you die you are sent back to the most recent main town and must return to a headstone that was placed at your death site to recover some of the lost experience. This might sound daunting, however frequent warp gates that function as checkpoints ensure that you are never more than a couple screens away from where you died. In addition, enemies do not respawn making the runs back quite painless and they even seem to maintain the HP levels that they were at when you died making even the toughest of boss much less challenging.

There are a small number of side-quests which can be picked up in the main towns and they rarely take you too far away from where you’re supposed to be during a chapter. Overall interaction with NPCs is quite limited, there really isn’t much exploration involved in the main town areas, and the journal in your inventory always tells you exactly where you should be going and what you should be doing.

On top of the single player aspect there is a cooperative mode that is available over the DS’s wireless capabilities. I cannot speak for the functionality of these aspects as I could not find anyone to play the game with.

It is extremely obvious the level of care and time that went into designing this game. It is easy to pick up and put down without having to re-familiarize yourself with the game’s controls or nuances, it is highly customizable and beckons multiple playthroughs due to its interesting classes, and the length of the game is quite surprising for a handheld title. I sunk at least thirty hours into it before I finished the story, although I did take on the additional short side-dungeon as well.

9/10

Presentation

In terms of technical prowess the game doesn’t push the envelope of the Nintendo DS. That being said the games graphics are impressive. The models of characters, enemies, and especially items are wonderfully detailed. There are no generic weapon models in this game, each type looks different and genuinely awesome.

Spell effects are impressive, some featuring 3D models, others being sprite based. They are colorful and varied, though it isn’t terribly easy to distinguish certain spells from one another.

Animations are a little blocky in a PS1 feeling sort of way, though there aren’t any kind of game-breaking clipping problems or unrealistic movements.

The art style of the game incorporates high fantasy with a few steampunk-era notes in a few of the cities. The styles mesh together nicely in the wonderfully detailed and varied environments throughout the course of the game.

Overall the game does not push new ground, but manages to still impress at times despite the DS’s limited hardware capabilities.

8/10

Conclusions

I have to say that while I enjoyed my time playing Soma Bringer immensely, the hack and slash aspect got old for me around chapter 5 (of 6). There were simply too many enemies for me at that point and the dungeons became only increasingly larger as the game progressed. I had to put the game away for about a week before I came back to it to finish it off and the time away definitely helped ease some of the tedium.

Overall the game is a solid hack and slash RPG that, while it doesn’t do much to separate itself from the crowd in terms of story or technicality, is a fantastically designed and executed game that would appeal to anyone who is a fan of the genre. If you’re a hardcore turn-based RPG fan I’d still greatly suggest giving Soma Bringer a try, it may even swing you around to discover a great, albeit more casual, genre.

Story : 8/10
Design/Gameplay: 9/10
Presentation: 8/10

9/10 [Not an Average]

There were a lot of amazing games on the N64, one of the greatest among them was Paper Mario. Paper Mario was one of the best RPGs released ever in my opinion, and that’s not nostalgia talking. A week ago I bought Paper Mario again for my N64 and replayed the bad boy, and it was more fun than  when I played it originally all those years ago because I understood the wit.

The story is the same as almost every Mario game, bad guy takes the girl, you’ve got to collect x amount of y to beat the bad guy. In Paper Mario’s case it’s Bowser (who else), but this time he’s got the Star Rod, you’re probably thinking “I’ma Mario, I’ma gonna win!”, the game lets you try to beat Bowser, but it’s impossible. So what do you do? Collect the 8 star spirits to gain the power to take him down.

The story isn’t what drew me in though, it was the characters, the environment, the fun boss and sometimes challenging boss battles, and the general charm that came from Paper Mario. The game just has so much charm. so much life to it. I mean never have I seen before a game where the characters are made of paper. I know you may think “oho paper, so amazing”, and I admit it’s nothing god-like, it just adds to the experience.

Peaceful chat, yeah right..

You may ask where the charm comes from? It’s the gameplay, the dialogue, and the characters. The gameplay is turn-based but with timing elements and twists, there are times where you can actually interact with the environment to cause some tide-turning action. The dialogue is witty and comical, usually Mario RPGs are, but this game offers a fuzzy feeling of comfort, a kind of “things aren’t alright, but you can beat it” that displays itself well in the game. There are also times where you play as Peach from inside Bowser’s floating castle to help with the defeat of Bowser, these times are completely puzzle based and highly entertaining. Lastly the characters, Mario is the same guy he always is, the moral white knight, but in this game you get several sidekicks which each have their own personality and their own style, another plus is the bosses and how they have their own back story (in most cases), and their own challenging aspects.

Meet your rival.. what a strange guy.

All-in-all Paper Mario is a game that will remain entertaining for decades because of its simplistic style, its remorable moments, its very entertaining boss battles, and above all, its charm. Personally I don’t ever see a point where Paper Mario can become so old where no one plays it, from what I hear Paper Mario: Thousand Year Door on the GameCube is as good or better than the original, I’ll have to check that out. In the meantime, if you have a way of playing N64 games, you love RPGs, and you can get your hands on Paper Mario, I highly suggest you pick it up, it’s one of Nintendo’s masterpieces.

Disgaea : Afternoon of Darkness is the enchanced port of the PS2 Strategy RPG Disgaea : Hour Of Darkness. The original game was developed by Japanese developer Nippon Ichi Software, published in America by Atlus but the PSP version was published by NiS America. The European version is published by Koei. Now, I am aware that there was a recent DS port but as far as I know the PSP version still remains the best version, therefore I will be reviewing the PSP version.

Gameplay

Now, the gameplay in the game is standard SRPG gameplay, you play on a isometric map divided in to a square grid resembling a checkerboard. Your objective (which sadly, never changes) is to dispose of all enemies on the map. You have the standard RPG commands such as attack, use skills unique to your character`s weapon or the character himself or herself. You also have the option to throw enemies, allies or Geo Cubes. For most of the time you will forget that you have the ability to throw things but if used effectively you can use the throw to a great advantage, such as throwing a weakening Geo Cube in to the Panel type that the enemies are standing on or throw an ally further than he can move by himself. If you throw an enemy of the same kind on top of an enemy, these two enemies will combine and level up. This works great for grinding but this might get you screwed over by creating an enemy too powerful to take on.

This game is a giant grinding fest that demands you to donate tens to hundreds of your life to the game. Nippon Ichi is particulary famous for creating SRPGs that demand you to grind a lot. Sure, you can breeze past the first few chapters without that much grinding but not grinding will come back later and bite you in the ass. Somehow I have currently made it to chapter 12 but I constantly have my ass kicked, therefore that leaves me only one choice : grind some more. Grinding actually replaces strategy in this game, as no problem can`t be solved by grinding and you don`t really have to use your head that much, but hey, that`s a thing most SRPGs suffer from, Disgaea just suffers from it more than a regular SRPG.

To mix things up a bit, the game also sports a mechanic called ”Geo Panels”. The squares on the map that glow in different colors are Geo Panels and if Geo Cubes are put on them, all panels of that color gain effects such as Invincibility or Bonus EXP or stat boosts. At the beginning these panels will mostly be to your advantage but later you will be cursing them for screwing you over so.

Anyway, by killing enemies you gain Mana which can be spent in the Dark Assembly to create more characters. The characters come in two types, Human Characters and Monsters. Human characters come in various classes such as Warrior, Mage, Monk, etc. and can use various weapon types, altough you should probably just stick with a weapon that is made for the specific class as Weapon Mastery rises faster with that type of weapon. For regular characters, their special moves are decided by their weapon type and mastery. As the mastery gets higher, the character learns new weapon-type specific special moves, which are the only moves regular characters learn and there is a wide variety of weapon types to chose from, such as swords, staffs, fists, guns, etc..  By defeating certain enemies for the first time, these enemy types become available in the Dark Assembly for creation. Monsters learn new, monster-specific special moves by leveling up.

There are also special characters such as Laharl, Etna, Flonne, etc. who join your party at certain plot points, usialy at the end of the chapter or by completing a bonus mission. Special characters learn both weapon-specific special moves and character specific moves by leveling up.

Plot, music, bonus content.

The plot of the game tells you the story of Laharl, the son of the deceased Overlord of the Netherworld and his servants as he goes on his quest to become the new Overlord and some other misadventures. The game is split in to seperate episodic chapters, most of the game`s chapters act as seperate scenarios but the final chapters of the game pulls everything together and connects everything. The game is humorous and charming. Most of the story is told trough portraits and dialouge boxes but there are some in-game cutscenes. There are multiple endings.

The soundtrack is solid but there are no truly memorable tracks. The English voicework is pretty bad but luckly you can change to the Japanese voice track which isn`t that bad. The PSP version has omitted the game`s themesong since Atlus holds the copyright to it.

The PSP version also has an extra story mode called Etna mode where Etna accedentaly kills Laharl and replaces him as the main character. Also the PSP version has multiplayer which comes in three modes, ”Defeat The Leader”, ”Battle” and ”Capture The Flag”. Also the PSP version is the only version to support widescreen.

Get this game if you like strategy RPGs, you won`t regret it.

9/10

Ever since the dawn of the gaming industry, developers have spent a lot of their time creating games based on magical fantasy worlds where knights, wizards, dragons and damsels in distress were more than mere possibilities. There was a will to interact with these stories in reaction to centuries of spectating them. After years of toying with the limitations of A.I scripting, the bread and butter of the RPG genre, the Internet finally provided the necessary tools to connect role players worldwide and make them mutually interact inside virtual dynamic worlds, huge online theaters where every actor played an independent and unique role while affecting others at the same time. Thus MMORPG genre was born from the RPG and proceeded to replace its predecessor gradually, while not completely, attracting a considerably larger and more diversed fanbase and spawning an unusual amount of success and response.

However, what game developers failed to predict was how seriously some people would take this form of entertainment. Even though an excess of dedication of a player over a video game is taken as a benefit for software companies, since it usually translates on a larger income, growing obsessive behaviors towards a video game can generate hazardous effects, both game and real life based that will consequentially damage both players and developers.

Over the last few years we have heard of people who ruined their lives, commited suicide and even murdered others over MMORPG-related issues. Now, it is absurd to think or claim that this game genre carries some kind of curse or that its a threat to public health, but these facts clearly illustrate that something is indeed wrong with the way some players face it. What was initially intended to be a way to relax people is becoming more of a new source of problems and worries for those who use it. Though this social phenomenon might be a shadow on the role video games have started to play in our society, it is quite a fact that the MMORPG genre, with its so called “freedom” and “social interaction” has given birth to some of the most controversial cases and situations ever spawned by the game industry.