Games Played 05/08/2009

Mario Kart Wii - Wii
Resident Evil 5 - X-Box 360
Rock Band 2 - X-Box 360
Sacred 2: Fallen Angel - PC

RANDOM GAME OF THE DAY:


Cyberbots: Fullmetal Madness (1997)
Developer: Capcom Co., Ltd.
Platform: SegaSaturn
Purchase Date: 07/16/1997


A screen-filling super move is the best kind super move there is.

Cyberbots is a 2D fighting game featuring 15 awesome looking mechs and 9 different pilots to choose from. Some of these pilots can have access to multiple selections of mechs while others can only pilot their own unique robots. The game only uses four buttons in all: two for direct attacks, one for boosting, and another for using the mech's equipped weapon. Even though the control is simple, a variety of strategic attacks can be accomplished by combining movements with the button inputs. There is also a super meter that can be unleashed when full. The game supports the usage of the optional memory cartridge: It reduces the loading time between matches slightly while it increases the amount of sprite animations. The game looks good and some of the backgrounds feature a large amount of moving scenery. Some parts of the play field are destructible and it feels nice to be able to cause these small destruction but nothing beats the feeling of winning a match when your opponent literary explodes into pieces right in front of you after you landed the killing blow at the end of a second winning round. Incredible! Street Fighter fanatics will be thrilled to know that there is a playable mech-Akuma in this game.

LIBRARY STATUS: 4 out of 5

Games Played 05/07/2009

ESPN International Track & Field - PlayStation 2
Resident Evil 5 - X-Box 360
Sacred 2: Fallen Angel - PC

RANDOM GAME OF THE DAY:


Puyo Puyo 4 (1999)
Developer: Sega
Platform: Sega Dreamcast
Purchase Date: 12/05/1999


Nothing says total pwnage like the happy face of a green-haired elf.

I have featured another Puyo Puyo game from my collection before, so it's safe to say that I really do enjoy this series - I even like playing Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine that keeps finding its way into those Sega classics compilation discs. Just like the other Puyo Puyo games, you are tasked to match colored blobs as they fall down into the puzzle area in increments of two. Every time you connect the puyos in a set of four or more, they disappear and colorless puyo blocks are then sent into your opponent's area. The key here is that you really have to truly master the art of chaining the destructions of the puyos. This is done by stacking up your puyo blobs so that one set of matched puyo would trigger a continuous matching of puyos as they fall down to fill up the newly emptied space. This is actually harder than it sounds and it will take a lot of practice before it becomes second nature to you. It is best to practice with a human player because the A.I. is quite brutal. The 2D graphics are charming and the game has a circus/carnival theme to it with cute but strange characters. The music is very pleasant and there are a lot of funny character voices. When a set of puyo blobs disappears, the sound of its destruction changes depending on the character who matched them. For the elf-archer shown in the screenshot above, it sounds like a cross-over between a balloon pop and a slap. I remember turning the volume up while playing this at one time and the slapping sound, coupled with continuous Japanese yelps, made my roommate rushed into my room because he thought that I was watching something terribly nasty.

LIBRARY STATUS: 4 out of 5

Games Played 05/06/2009

Dynasty Warriors 6 - X-Box 360
Fallout 3 - PC
Sacred 2: Fallen Angel - PC*


*Leaves... Leaves... Leaves!!! I am so obsessed with them. Is it unhealthy?
I guess I am so ready to buy Flower for the PlayStation 3.


*Finally got my first mount. The funny thing is I bought this yucky one by mistake.
"That's right little girl, just admire me and my ugly, sick-looking horse from afar."

RANDOM GAME OF THE DAY:


Parappa the Rapper (1997)
Developer: Nana On-Sha
Platform: PlayStation
Purchase Date: 11/21/1997


The only thing that needs chopping here are all those ornery onions.

If there is a game that can blamed for all those horrible rhythm action games out there, this game is it. Parappa the Rapper deserves to be discussed in a positive light however. It's hyper-optimistic, genre-defining, somewhat bold, and forever a classic. It's a very simple game where you have to hit the appropriate buttons at the appropriate time to rap along with the music. The songs feature some truly cringe-worthy lyrics - like the driver's test rap, urgh - but they are melodically catchy and memorable. What's great about the game is that it allows you to freestyle the command entries as long as you are able to match them properly with the beat of the music. I like the flat, paper-thin characters - it's very stylish and it keeps the game visually unique and interesting when I played it today. The game has a PlayStation 2 sequel but for some reason, I never got around to purchase it. Maybe I just don't want to be tortured anymore by hearing the rather desperate "I gotta believe!" motto being uttered by Parappa over and over and over and over and over again.

LIBRARY STATUS: 4 out of 5

April 2009 Monthly Gaming Analysis

The results shown below are of course based on the combined data from the Daily Game Log which should provide a clear indication of a game's usage frequency. Bear in mind that even if a game is played twice or more during a particular day, it would still register as 1 in the Day Count column below. In a sense, "merits" are given based on how often a particular game can make me play it again throughout the entire period of the month on a daily basis. A game that makes a gamer play it over and over again or at least spend a lot of time with it... Isn't that what we mostly want from a great game? I don't think it's really fair to count all the way down to the number of hours played since some games only require a short amount of time to properly serve their purposes.

OVERALL BREAKDOWN:



Total Games Played: 82

None of my played games was able to reach the double digit day counts last month. I was feeling a bit random until around mid-way into the month when I started to look for hack-and-slash games to play. My original plan at that point was to start playing Champions of Norrath for the PlayStation 2 with a friend from the beginning until our characters are maxed out and decked out. Unfortunately, things didn't work out - my friend's PlayStation 3 was not able to allow him to play it online - and the it just fell on the wayside soon after that.

The most played game in April 2009 was Resident Evil 5. Instead of playing Guild Wars after much prompting by an old friend, we ended up spending most of our time with this game instead. We were able to beat the game on "Veteran" mode and are now working on finishing up "Professional". The game certainly has a lot of replay value because of its clever weapon upgrade mechanics. I had a lot of fun playing it last month and if the aforementioned friend would refocus on the game, we should be able to beat "Professional" rather quickly.

I finally completed Kameo: Elements of Power. It was my first X-Box 360 game that I purchased even before the console came out because it was released early in anticipation of the console's arrival. I played around 2-3 hours into the game when I was finally able to secure an X-Box 360 but the game was not able to engage me like Rare's earlier platform/action games. It took a lot to finish it because my general opinion about the game still remains the same after all these years.

Whenever I can't decide on which game to focus my attention on, I tend to play something fast and rewarding while waiting for the inspiration to come. Rez HD was great as a quick fix and every time I sat down to play it, I would end up playing all of the stages from the beginning until the end instead of just working on the individual stages to get a new high score for each of them.

As for Sacred 2: Fallen Angel, it has been an on and off experience. Like I have mentioned before, the game is mediocre at best but the graphics are simply out of this world. I have only played the multi-player online mode a couple of times but it wasn't fun to play it with random strangers who seem to like doing their own thing for the most part. I plan to just level up my character alone and then once I hit the higher level range, I will then start looking for more people to play it with.

Best New Game of the Month:
Phantasy Star Portable (PlayStation Portable)

Unexpectedly Forgotten New Game of the Month:
Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles - Echoes of Time (Nintendo DS)

I Missed You I Want You Game of the Month:
Rhythm Heaven (Nintendo DS)

Games Played 05/05/2009

Black & Bruised - GameCube
Breath of Fire III - PlayStation
Conan - X-Box 360
Neverwinter Nights 2 - PC
Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II - PC
World Racing - X-Box

RANDOM GAME OF THE DAY:


Kingdom Hearts (2002)
Developer: Square Co., Ltd.
Platform: PlayStation 2
Purchase Date: 09/21/2002


The real reason why you play this game.

What Square has done with tons of Disney characters in this game is just simply astonishing. Kingdom Hearts is an action role playing game that features child-like versions of Square's characters alongside those highly recognizable faces from the Disney universe. A lot of careful artistic decisions were taken into consideration to ensure that the combination of both worlds makes sense in the game. The tone of the tale is more Square than Disney but it was well-written and highly engaging. I really don't want to ruin the plot but I would like to point out that for a game that is aimed towards the younger audience, Kingdom Hearts is incredibly epic in its scale and its concept of reality is potentially thought-provoking. While playing the game, I didn't care too much about the main character, Sora. It's probably because Donald Duck and Goofy just completely outshine him in terms of star quality. It's tough to pit a generic Square character with the typical Square characterizations against classic Disney icons. The only flaw I could find in this game is that the Disney characters are merely reduced to supporting roles/villains: It's obvious that Sora is always the game's focal point. There are sections of the game that play like a 3D shooter where you control a customizable "Gummi" ship. I remember many people were complaining about these parts of the game but I thought that they were able to provide a nice change of pace in between the actions. I was expecting to be able to see many graphical flaws during my play session today but I couldn't believe just how beautiful this game still remains. It's certainly one of PlayStation 2's best looking games. The real time cut scenes are -dare I say it?- Disney-quality. I picked up the sequel to this game in 2006 but I was not able to get through the first hour of that game without falling asleep! I am now reminded of the need to complete the sequel soon because this first game is not a complete experience in itself.

LIBRARY STATUS: 5 out of 5