Article: Are Nintendo turning it all around?

After spending a few weeks with Nintendo’s new system I’m starting to get a feel for the Wiimote and I have to admit that I’m liking it a lot. Having heard much about Wii Sports I had full faith in the controller in terms of motion sensing capabilities, but I remained rather sceptical about how well the controllers would handle a title like Zelda, particularly considering the regularity of last minute indecisiveness regarding how motion sensitivity would be implemented into the game. Regardless of the potential the Wiimote had for a title such as Zelda, I think they made a good call- and interestingly the title is a great show of how easily the innovative controllers double up as a traditional style ‘pad’ so to speak. This is a great thing for Nintendo, as whilst motion sensitive games are a fantastic step forward in terms of playing style, it’s good to see that they don’t have to overly rely on this mode of control; sadly you can also expect a variety of cheap cash-in games that will sneakily infer motion sensing capabilities whilst in reality being tarted up gamecube style titles.
Wii Sports in particular is really making waves in the worldwide press at the moment, with Nintendo receiving huge accolade across the board and an unexpected sudden rise in demand for Wii consoles seemingly overtaking the insatiable desire for the PS3, you can’t help but feel that Nintendo are laughing right now… After years of speculation that the company would be soon going the way of Sega they seem to be in a very comfortable position right now. Particularly of note here is their infamously ‘bad on paper’ idea of the revolutionary handheld console that would have TWO SCREENS! The impact of the DS has been astounding, Dragon Quest IX being a hallmark sign of its domination of Japan not only as a handheld, but as a standalone console. So when did Nintendo start hitting the right buttons all of a sudden? They’ve had the same ‘games for everyone’ mantra for years; sadly one which has been misunderstood by many as being ‘games for kids’. But is this so unreasonable? Admittedly Nintendo have been making fantastic games throughout the whole of their time in the industry, but for a while their focus on reaching out to the mainstream has been taking the wrong path- creating quirky, aesthetically pleasing and colourful consoles that inferred a user friendly approach that in reality wasn’t hugely different from the other consoles on offer. Wii however is looking to change Nintendo’s philosophy into reality- Ipod chic minimalist styling is sure to raise the eyebrows of many a non-gaming consumer, and the ability to simply pick up and play games such as Wii sports shows an incredible step forward in trying to introduce gaming into a mainstream audience; not even to mention the potential impact that Wii’s exercise benefits could have on the gamer stereotype. But it’s the simple things that make Wii so accessible to non gamers, the classic frantic tilting of controllers when taking a hard corner in a racing game; cue to many a sly chuckle from ‘hardcore’ gamers is now not only totally acceptable, but in many future games will most likely be expected of the player!

Despite having put countless hours into Wii tennis, it seems that every time I play against someone who’s never touched a Wiimote before within minutes they’re on the verge of beating me. Nintendo have truly broken a new barrier between the player and the game, putting our instinctual reactions one step closer to an onscreen reality; Instinct is why Wii works so well- Unwrapping the box I was ready to come to grips with a brand new control system, but I didn’t have to. Within 5 minutes, I couldn’t even remember playing games another way- it just felt so natural. Nintendo look to have a bright future ahead of them in the next few years, and how they fare compared to Microsoft and Sony seems irrelevant now; regardless of the longterm figures of the next-gen war, gaming is going to change, and with their iron grip of the handheld market with the DS, and the inevitable link between this and their Wunderkind console: Nintendo look to be the ones to change it.

Review: Phantasy Star Universe

Confused franchise seeks genre for fun and games, maybe more.

Online gaming these days is big business; chances are if you’re reading this then you’ve either dabbled with a MMORPG, shared asphalt with a handful of strangers for a few laps, or perhaps you’re a veteran of Xbox Live who’s about to graduate from the legendary ‘School of American Smack-talk’. Or maybe like me you’re one of the few who remembers the golden era of 56k console gaming, and the swansong of the Dreamcast: Phantasy Star Online. Now ok, chances are if you’re reading this then you’ve played PSO religiously at some point; finding yourself lost in the hypnotic rhythm of the game, succumbing to its hugely repetitive but intensely gratifying cycles of grinding. If you HAVEN’T played PSO, then first of all you’ll think I’m freakishly obsessive, and secondly I think it’s about time you stop reading this review right now, and go and download Blue Burst from Sega’s website. Now this’ll be the point at which any Phantasy Star Online fans reading will feel their heart collapse like a wet paper bag full of soggy biscuits:

PSU isn’t as good as PSO. I hate to say it, part of me is surprised as hell that I have to say it; but it’s the sad truth. Now we all know that sometimes it’s hard to come to terms with the loss of a good franchise, especially those that clearly had so much potential. Devil May Cry 2 broke my heart, and left me bruised and battered in a ditch; but then Devil May Cry 3 came out, and I began to find myself having hope once again: I was one of the lucky ones. Others haven’t been so lucky, and I’d like to tell you about poor little Peter; The innocent boy who spent his whole life collecting Sonic games, only to find himself in a web of his own denial trying to convince himself that the 360 iteration was “a good game” which was “worth forty pounds”. I laughed at poor little Peter; we all did. But that was before I almost fell into the trap of Sega nostalgia myself…

I desperately wanted it to be the game I’ve waited years for, and I honestly did my very best to lie to myself that I was having fun, and that it was a great game. Then I found myself two hours into the single player game, and wanting to kill something. Now, whilst I mean this in the sense of wanting the characters to all shut the hell up with their inanely pointless chitchat and let me kill some monsters, I’m sad to say that by this point in the game I’d lost interest, and simply wanted to throw something out of the window and beat a stranger to death with my keyboard. My choice of keyboard was fairly premeditated here, as the PC version of PSU doesn’t support a mouse. You heard me right, it doesn’t support MOUSE. So, unless you’re fond of pain I’d dust off a USB controller right about now, or pick it up on the Xbox 360 instead. ‘Story Mode’ absolutely astounds me, because it manages to be infinitely more awful than the single player of PSO, which was arguably one of the most flawed and empty single player RPG experiences that I’ve ever seen, and being that I’m not actually a homicidal maniac most of the time I can’t help but think that it’s the fact that they’ve somehow taken the most broken aspect of PSO and made it MUCH worse leaves me in such a state of disbelief that my brain decides it’s about time to go a bit mental. Now am I being unreasonable here? You tell me, as I take you through the whirlwind adventure that the first few hours of PSU’s Story mode… Right, first of all you’ve got the main character- he’s an annoying prototypical American D00D who’s a bit feisty, instantly unlikable, and pretty much resembles every other generic computer game protagonist that you’ve seen in the last 10 years- He’s even got the whole: “My father died and I’m angry” vibe going on and hell, I wouldn’t be surprised if the end of game boss turned out to be the bloke who killed daddy. In fact, the only thing which differentiates the main character from [INSERT UNMEMORABLE MAIN CHARACTER HERE] is the fact that the voice actor sounds like he’s constantly tanked up on special brew; whilst he’s mumbling and slurring like a tramp, it’s actually fairly funny watching the cutscenes, although sadly it does nothing for the fact that I want all of the main characters to die horribly so I can kill some monsters in peace. But no ladies and gentleman! There’s no time for killing monsters in Story Mode, because these masters of yarn spinning have got some cracking tales lined up for you! Sit back and watch as the protagonist chases what appears to be a sexually confused tramp! Gasp as your sister predictably gets stuck behind some rocks or something! Cry as you once again lunge towards the keyboard to fight a boss, only to find that there’s no need, they’ve put in a CUTSCENE THAT DOES THAT FOR YOU. Sections where you’re actually playing can be equally painful, often having to flick through a small set of menus just to use a Metroid Prime style visor to detect weakpoints in piles of rocks. (It seems that even when swinging about a sword the size of a small country I was completely unable to break through debris without first having a gander through my magic goggles…)

But that’s enough about the story; this is all you really need to know: They’ve taken the main criticism of PSO not having a story, and they’ve obviously tried pretty hard to fix that- but after 20 minutes of playing it you’ll just be wanting to get back to the old PSO single player- mindlessly ploughing through dungeons over and over again with no so much as a whiff of characterization or plot. Aside from the awful characters and story the game world isn’t too bad- the music is pretty patchy, some of it frankly sounds like someone sat infront of an electric piano having a fit, whilst other tunes are more in the same vein of the original: Pretty bad, but I’ll let it slide. Graphically the game’s nothing mind blowing, but it’s fairly pretty aside from a few graphical glitches that pop up here and there- although it does suffer from some of the worst horizon popups I’ve seen in years, and the strange inclusion of generic NPCs in cities who actually fade and disappear when you get close to them rather than when they’re far away which just screams: “Don’t try to talk to him! We haven’t scripted stuff for them to say!” Walking around these soulless lobbies full of ghostly characters gives me a strange feeling that the PSU servers will before long be mimicking the emptiness of the universe they’ve created.

PSU single player grabs you by the reins, holds your hand and doesn’t let you go out of your depth. And I HATE that. For me, the reason I kept going back to PSO over and over was because I liked to push myself to the limit; the game gave you a set of very simple controls and let you choose your own pace- you could go through forest over and over until the dragon didn’t stand a chance, or you could whip up a HuCAST and go through Forest, Caves, and Mines in one afternoon and beat Vol. Opt at level 6. That was what made PSO special, the simple but rhythmic combat and the predictable enemies combined with the lure of better items just being in the next tier up meant that you were constantly pushing yourself to the limit, the simplicity of gameplay giving you an immense sense of control over everything; allowing you to survive in areas which the game deemed you to be not even nearly ready to handle at your level. PSU’s online mode still allows you to do this, but the system which made PSO such a beautifully simple game seems to have had its fingers broken. The rhythm based tapping to attack is inexplicably missing: The weapons still strike in their trademark PSO pace but the timing requirement is gone, the game encouraging you to just hammer the button. Nice new additions to the combat system include the ability to strafe in a basic manner, allowing you to spread machinegun fire across enemies- a luxury that PSO did not permit, and the ability to customize weapons with elemental power- essentially providing more effective versions of the ‘special’ functions on many of the rare weapons in PSO, but are constantly in effect rather than being triggered by an alternate button. These 2 changes are very welcome in the fact that they make playing as a ranger much more fun than it ever was in PSO, allowing you to John Woo it about holding back a small horde of enemies with icy greasegun bullets. In fact, despite the story mode being utterly dire the online mode of PSU is actually quite good; despite having lost many of the aspects which made PSO such a great game it still brings out those familiar addictive qualities, and whilst I enjoyed seeing some of the scenic new levels I was more than happy just repeatedly playing through the same areas over and over again just to get a little bit more cash for that upgrade. In this respect PSU feels like the younger brother of PSO, it’s tried so hard to be something better; to stand up tall and proud alongside the big players in the online market, and for this it’ll inevitably be kicked in the teeth. I sympathise with the guys who were making PSU, times have changed since the days of Dreamcast online gaming and PSU doesn’t even nearly make the standard as a decent MMORPG and in many ways it would have been better if they hadn’t tried to keep up with a plethora of pointless and badly implemented extra features such as the first person camera, which allows shooting but no movement…

But even though this younger brother aimed so high and fell so far, if you put in a few hundred hours into PSO like I did then you’ll still find yourself hooked to it just like you were on its predecessor, and if you can dig up a few old Ragol comrades it’ll be almost as much fun as the good old days, because you have to remember: PSO was horribly flawed too, we just learnt to forget about that. It’s nothing special, and compared to WoW or Guild Wars it’s dire- but if you’re prepared to switch your brain off, sit back with a joypad and grind with a few friends then it’ll give you hours of entertainment.

Same flavour, different recipe. Just stay the hell away from Story Mode

Graphics: 7
Gameplay: 6
Sound: 5
Lifespan: 8

Overall: 7

Review: Curious George

More fun than a barrel?

Having finished art college over three years ago I don’t tend to spend a lot of time these days watching children’s TV, so Curious George is a character I wasn’t too familiar with,
some minutes later on Google however and I’ve managed to ascertain that George is a charming little chimp who scamps about in a generally mischievous manner.
After watching a trailer for the movie this game ties into it seems that George’s curious nature relates rather strongly to finding tins of paint and then going on colourful graffiti benders like a maniac: Think Banksy but well less political agenda and more bananas.
Based on this, I was rather excited- imagining bounding around like the lovechild of the Prince of Persia tagging walls Jet Set Radio style…

Of course you don’t get to do all that- It’s sadly just a rather average platform game.

Now obviously it’s aimed at very young children, and our protagonist is a lovely little character- cheeky and happy and full of spunk, and the character model and animations for the most part tend to do an admirable job of translating the cartoon monkey into a playable character. Graphically however the environment design is very hit and miss, basic textures and chunky object models not reflecting the beautifully drawn world seen in the film very well.
This is particularly evident in the first level of the game which is based in the jungle, which reminded me rather a lot of the Tarzan level in Kingdom Hearts…
Now, for anyone who hasn’t played Kingdom Hearts- this isn’t a good thing.
The control system is rather clunky, jumping around is uncomfortable and the double jump function seems very odd- if you don’t execute the second jump almost immediately after the first then you simply can’t use it. Because of this I found myself falling to my death repeatedly during very early sections of the game, and an early frogger style platforming section involving jumping along the heads of people moving through a village I found incredibly frustrating. Thankfully the loading times aren’t too bad at all, and they seem to have decided to take lives out of the equation as many other popular kids games have, arguably though this may have been a necessity- Having died 9 times on the first level I probably would’ve had difficulty keeping myself sane should the game have been punishing me with GAME OVER screens.
The difficulty of some parts of this game seem very out of place and inexcusably linked to a pretty broken physics engine, especially considering the fact that a narrative voice holds your hand very firmly right from the start of the game telling you exactly what to do next. At the same time however the dodgy engine often makes some parts of the game easier than they’re supposed to be, letting you stand on ledges that clearly weren’t meant to be platforms.

Once you get used to the slightly sloppy controls though, it’s not TOO bad- my only really major complaint being that they’ve taken a lot of really fun stuff and somehow made it seem like the game’s on autopilot, actions like swinging on vines and ropes are completely uncontrolled; the direction, and amount of swing being constantly controlled by the game, and even sections where you slide down slippery slopes are completely on rails.
It’s an odd mix of gameplay, taking away aspects which perhaps were deemed to be too challenging for the younger player but keeping the rather tricky platforming sections; many platforms for reasons inexplicable to me don’t show George’s shadow when above them, which naturally makes trying to land in the right place a bit hit and miss at times.

Whilst much of the level design is rather cute in a simplistic kind of way, it still looks too much like an N64 game for my liking; I’m no graphics whore but much of the design just seems incredibly lazy- particularly of note is another frogger style section involving jumping along cars, on the first run through it’s not notably too bad… But it’s in sections such as this where you’ll be dying and playing the section again and again that the graphics much like the gameplay really start to become noticeably bad.

Simple versions of various rhythm based minigames pop up occasionally, doing a fair job of filling up time between the platforming sections. They’re very easy indeed of course, but that can hardly be faulted too much- it IS a game for kids after all… Although it has to be said that the minigames are overstretched and take far too long to complete, some of the minigames are so bad all round that they verge on being fairly surreal; the balloon bursting game in particular having such a strange combination of graphics and sound that it reminded me rather a lot of something out of Warioware.
Focussing on the sound it’s a mixed bag, some of the background tunes reminding me rather of Monkey Island and Banjo Kazooie, other tracks being some of the strangest game music I’ve ever heard…

Now from what I’ve said so far you’ll have got the impression that it’s an utterly awful game, and by all accounts it really IS a terribly made platform game…

But the fact is, it’s rather a lot of fun.

Sure, it’s oversimplistic, slow, the difficulty spikes are hugely noticeable, the voice acting is awful, the graphics and level design are mostly dire- but I still found myself playing it till half four in the morning.
To be honest, I’m not entirely sure what it is about the game that makes it entertaining- perhaps it’s simply the fact that running about being a monkey is a lot of fun all by itself, regardless of how poorly the game itself is put together: Jumping about collecting bananas, crawling through airvents like the monkey counterpart of solid snake, it’s not a blast to play, but it’s certainly good fun.
It’s not worth picking up full price as a standalone children’s game, the fun quickly wearing thin after a while, but it’s definitely worth a rental.
Chances are, if you’ve got children who love Curious George then they’re probably going to want this game regardless of how good it is, and I think a fan of the character could squeeze a lot of enjoyment out of this game.
Just bear in mind that to buy this game for a five year old and leave them to get on with it would be sadistic, to put it bluntly. It’s a game that you’ll want to be on standby to help out with, because they might find some parts of the game very frustrating indeed.

But don’t despair, it’s unintentionally a gem of a game to watch as an adult- some of the quotes the game comes out with being absolute corkers; my particular favourite so far coming from the calm female voice which guides you through the game: “Good Job! Now Perform For The Next Group Of Children.”
I’m sure it’s not supposed to be, but it’s pretty damn funny.
Curious George is one of those games that completely confuses the hell out of me.
By all accounts it’s a very poor game, but one with enough charm and fun to draw me in so much that I really enjoyed playing it despite all its faults.

Not worth full retail by any means, but I’m sure it’ll happily entertain young children through a rainy weekend, and for very young fans of the cheeky chimp it’ll probably be much loved.

Outro: Flawed and repetitive, but charming.

Graphics: 7
Gameplay: 5
Sound: 6
Lifespan: 4

Overall: 6

Fanboyism?

The next generation of games consoles has just begun to rear its head around the world, and with it comes shiny new graphics, exciting possibilities, and some truly revolutionary steps forward in how games are both played and distributed in the mainstream market.

But with these new consoles comes another war, old scars resurface and new tensions arise- not only between the companies themselves, but also between gamers; With each new generation of console comes a new generation of fanboys.

To put the question frankly: What the hell is fanboyism all about? In terms of this generation it’s understandable to an extent, with the Wii playing an entirely different hand of cards in terms of their overall plan and style of play. (The PS3’s supposed different battleplan to 360 arguably being neglible, as I remain sceptical of their claim that they are marketing a home entertainment system until I see the Blu-ray figures rise significantly.) But fanboyism is something that continues to boggle me, as it’s not something so salient in any other form of media; anyone ever met someone who refuses to watch any television other than the BBC, or won’t go to see a film in a cinema unless it’s financed by 20th Century Fox?

This avid and blind support for a company when put in perspective is an incredible phenomenon, these companies have such financial power that the lifelong allegiance of a horde of teenagers isn’t really requested, and it’s not as if they try and instill a sense of aggression towards other consoles into their press releases- it just seems to happen!

But why? Admittedly, when I was much younger I was a Nintendo fanboy- I didn’t like the Playstation and I loved my N64 to bits… Now perhaps it was just my natural desire to support the underdog- but I don’t think so… I think I was afraid.
When you get a new console it’s an investment, and it begins just being financial- but as you get more and more great games for it and begin to see its potential you slowly grow to cherish it, and something I realised during my N64 years that had never hit me when I had a Megadrive is that CONSOLES DIE. Back then I wanted a Snes too, because maybe I was just too young back then to realise that one console could potentially kill off another. And this realisation was awful.

Now with two of the big contenders releasing a seemingly very similar console to a growing market that seems to crave innovation, things are going to get very messy;
Sony and Microsoft look to be clashing horns once again for what could be a console war for the history books, fanboys flaming till the bitter end- until sooner or later one console will most likely kill the other.

Now bear with me guys and gals, because I’m going to go all psychological on you here…

Perhaps fanboyism is an example of us realising the mortality of our much loved gaming systems, and trying desperately to deny the fact that this might ever happen through blindly declaring that all the other options are awful.
The Wii, PS3 and 360 all have great potential, just choose carefully and try not to pick the console that dies first, as it’s an experience that most of us have had at some point; for those who haven’t it can be painful, believe me.

On the other hand you can embrace death: I bought a Dreamcast when it was on its deathbed and it brought me huge amounts of joy, although having tasted forbidden fruits the lack of Shenmue 3 may come back to haunt me later in my life…

Enjoy the new consoles, but just remember that being a fanboy won’t change the outcome of the war. So pipe down, and enjoy what you’ve got. Then when the other consoles die, point and laugh.