Mathurin47

Vacation this week, so I’m pretty happy. Still a little chilly and the front half of the week looks pretty wet, but it’s above freezing and not snow so I’m not complaining (much). Nothing major planned beyond a trip down to the Toledo Zoo. The big trip this year looks to be happening in August. Once things finally dry up I’d like to break out my bike and check out some of the rail trails across the northern part of the county.

With 4 games beaten last month I kept pace with my challenge, but am still 3 games behind the week counter. Perhaps I can finally gain some ground during my vacation this week.

Legend of Heroes	Knights in the Nightmare	Divinity II: Dragon Knight Saga	Kirby's Epic Yarn
Trauma Team	Naruto Shippuden: Dragon Blade Chronicles	Naruto Shippuden: Naruto vs. Sasuke

February Gain +920 – 60 Achievements unlocked

March Gain – Level + 0 Trophies + 0

Backlog increased by 3 in April

Game spending vs. ‘10: Monthly +41% | Yearly -11%

An Amazon Atlus Gold Box Sale killed my budget for this month. Still, I didn’t go overboard and actually held off on a few titles I thought I could find cheaper down the road. I was rather disappointed to find Atlus only distributed the two Naruto games and didn’t publish them.

Fun platforming, though the lack of diversity among enemies drives the combat down. Nine areas cleansed. Thought I would have this beaten in April, but only put in once while Forza was downloading content. Game moves pretty fast, I need to just sit down and finish it.

I’m not a fan of racing games, but I have to admit I’m enjoying this one. Currently working my way through the 3rd season.

73:11
Character Quest Chapter 6: Grune
Battle Party Lv 70-72
This is it. The final chapter. Three dungeons to progress and then the onslaught of bosses for the finale. I dont’ expect to finish it this month, but it’s possible.

15:53 – Route 6 (Chargestone Cave) | Badges: 5 | Pokédex: 63
Had Phoenix Wright in most of the month so didn’t progress much. Grabbed a few gym badges, but made no progress in solidifying my team. Currently running 31 Servine/27 Sawk/26 Victini/30 Panpour/34 Krokorok/26 Archen. They’ve been getting the job done, though I barely got through the 4th gym with no good way to take down all the Flying/Electric Emolgas.

Short but enjoyable campaign, no Flood, and my beam rifle returns. The flashback approach to the story was done well and offered a nice contrast to the nighttime wanderings of Rookie. On par with Halo 3, but I definitely enjoyed it more.

Star Fox Adventures tries hard to take Fox McCloud out of Arwing and put him into a Zeldaesque adventure. It works, for the most part, though it comes across more of a Zelda-lite. Simple puzzles, simple combat, an awful lot of backtracking and an unsurprising final boss combined for a game that I could never really get into. It has its moments but they are few and far between.

It has a good premise, swinging your Wii remote at the on-screen monsters like a sword, but this Dragon Quest Swords leaves a lot to be desired. I had a hard time getting the game to register my slashes correctly, especially on diagonals. While there is a cursor that determines the position of your shield, by default your strikes are centered on the screen. If a monster is not aligned with the center of the screen you must press A before swinging to recenter your blade. That’s fine for a good chunk of the game, but when the pace picks up and you’ve got a screen full of off-center monsters and you’re trying to block incoming attacks as well, it’s an added frustration. You can choose 1 of 3 NPCs to accompany you, but all they do is cast spells and burn through their MP. The game consists of 8 short dungeons and a strong need to grind for the gold and materials for new equipment. Just long enough for the novelty to wear off.

I really enjoyed the first Phoenix Wright. Number two is good, but not as good as the first. The last case does make up for it though. The Psyche-Lock concept and people hiding their secrets is a good addition and adds some drama to the investigation sequences, though it can leave you wondering if you have the proper evidence to present. At least in court you know you have the right evidence. My biggest complaint remains from the first game. I can often see where the case is going, but sometimes struggle to line up the proper evidence with the exact line of dialogue.

It was a lackluster victory, Reimu’s Bad Ending No. 1, and denied me access to the final and EX stage, but marks my first victory against the endless rain of Touhou bullets. With “Beloved Tomboyish Daughter”, “Shanghai Teahouse”, “Locked Girl”, “Septette for the Dead Princess”, and “U.N. Owen was her?”, Embodiment of Scarlet Devil is musically my favorite of the Touhou games and definitely an added incentive to keep playing on a harder difficulty and at least attempt to face Remilia in battle.

As promised last month, here is a picture of my game wall. It’s not every game I own, but it is a fairly large chunk of it.

From the Catherine Sound Disc & Art Book (please include with US release Atlus!) comes MegaTen composer Shoji Meguro’s take on the 1st Movement of Symphony No.9 in E Minor “From The New World” by Antonín Dvořák. An arrangement of this popped up a few years back on Ninety-Nine Nights, but I’m liking Meguro’s arrangement more.

2 Pickups, 0 Additions

Atlus & NIS America

Catherine

Others

Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword	Record of Agarest War Zero	Mass Effect 3	Gears of War 3
Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

Brr… Seems someone left Michigan off the list for Spring. Boo! Not uncommon, I suppose; the last few mild winters have left me a bit spoiled. Not much going on beyond work, sleep, and gaming. Once the weather turns nice, I’m looking forward to getting back in my bike saddle. I didn’t ride much last year, and I’m pretty disappointed about that. I prefer to keep it in my parent’s garage as opposed to my apartment and unfortunately out of sight became out of mind.

Thanks to Dragon Age II (not that I’m complaining), I didn’t make much progress in my 52 game challenge, beating only 3 games on the list. While I’m planning to finish my Mass Effect 2 Insanity run and take of all its DLC, it won’t be a priority and barring any surprise announcements nothing must-play is releasing in the next few months. Perhaps I can finally catch up.

Ys I & II Chronicles	Ar Tonelico Qoga	Dragon Age II	Forza Motorsport 3
Penny Arcade Adventures I	Penny Arcade Adventures II	Pokémon: Black

February Gain +1055 – 52 Achievements unlocked

March Gain – Level + 0 Trophies + 0

Backlog increased by 3 in March

Game spending vs. ‘10: Monthly -24% | Yearly -24%

A couple of preorders and a few randoms as well. Been waiting for Penny Arcade to go on sale and 50% was good enough for me. Not sure why I grabbed Forza 3. I don’t really play racers, but I saw the Ultimate Collection sitting on the shelf and figured “Why not?”. Of course, I haven’t actually found time for it yet…

Fun platforming, though the lack of diversity among enemies drives the combat down. Four areas cleansed. With Dragon Age II and Halo 3 hogging the disc drive I didn’t get to it. It will be finished in April though.

10:12 – Route 4 | Badges: 3 | Pokédex: 38
Supplanted Radiant Historia as my DS game. Nowhere near as original as Historia, but something about that Pokémon formula compels me to push forwards though the 8 gyms to the Elite Four. Still in the process of forming my team. Other than my starter Snivy and over-powered Victini, the others are fair game for replacing.

Not a bad game at all, though I’m still having a hard time getting into it. 67% complete, it should be done in April.

Halo 3 left me wanting more. It felt really short and I did not enjoy the majority of the last two stages at all. The new weapons and vehicles were nice, though I missed my Beam Rifle. Still, it looks nice, plays well. I just didn’t enjoy it as much as Halo 2.

At first glance it would appear that Bioware attempted to do with Dragon Age what they had done with Mass Effect. Streamline the combat, inventory, user interface, etc. In some ways it was a success. Combat flows faster and there is a wider variety of skills and ways to set up a character (though I didn’t like having each tree on a separate page). In other ways, they were not so successful. From a story perspective it makes sense to limit the game to one city. But by Act Three and your 3rd trip around the Wounded Coast it gets a little tiring. Even more noticeable is that for each dungeon type there is only one map. Entrances vary and certain doors are locked changing the accessible area within, but there is no hiding that the overall map has not changed at all. The story starts off slow, but gets much better as time goes on and various quests start to tie together. Bioware has also cleaned up the visuals quite a bit from Origins. Bottom line: Enjoyable but not as good as its predecessor. Just a footnote in the greater plot this game has unleashed. Though worth playing, just to see the conclusion.

My first run last one and three quarter hours. Of that nearly two hours at least half, if not a tad more were spent watching cut scenes. Now these were Square quality cutscenes so they look quite nice, as does the game itself. Unfortunately the game does not play as well as it looks. The basic attacks are pressure-sensitive (pressing the button harder does a more powerful attack), a feature that, thankfully, few games take advantage of. Once I bought a few special attacks that combo’d well together, I pretty much stuck to those the rest of the way. Perhaps the most disappointing aspect was that the characters you unlock by advancing through the game are only accessible in the versus component and not in the main game. The story was decent and left enough questions I’ll probably play through the game with the other two main characters at some point in the future.

The beginning was pretty easy, the middle pretty difficult, and the end relied a bit to much on Monkey Combat. Overall it was fun, but I didn’t enjoy it as much as the first two. I definitely missed the cursor, as here you often had to standing in just the right spot and facing just the right direction to get the correct action and object to appear on your menu. The early 3D models hold up fairly well, as does the prerendered backdrops. Now I just need to find a copy of Monkey Island 3.

“stray whisper taker” from CYTOKINE’s last album, VOICE BLINDED COLOR. Singer is Mei Ayakura. Based on the Stage 4 theme of Lotus Land Story, “Alice Maestra”.

3 Pickups, 2 Additions

Atlus & NIS America

Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky

Divinity II: The Dragon Knight Saga

Catherine

Others

Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword	Record of Agarest War Zero	Mass Effect 3	Gears of War 3
Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

Eyes on the Future

I’ve been aware of this title for a while, but I haven’t really paid it much heed until the recent batch of previews came out. Lead designer for Morrowind and Oblivion is in charge of the design for Reckoning. Long time fantasy writer R.A. Salvatore is overseeing the fiction. I haven’t read anything of his that I haven’t liked. Open-world, classless skill progression, fast-paced combat, it clearly has Elder Scrolls in its sights. Can it match Skyrim, or even come close? The last game I thought had a chance was Two Worlds and that a game best left forgotten…

March has arrived, but you wouldn’t know it from the weather around here. 40 and raining one day and 25 and snowing the next. It’s been a long winter with more snow than we’ve had in years. Spring is welcome anytime…

Still running slightly behind on my 52 Game Challenge. As of Week 9, I have 7 game beaten. I should have at least 4 beaten in March which will let me keep pace, but catching up is going to be difficult.

Hyperdimension Neptunia

Radiant Historia

February Gain +995 – 63 Achievements unlocked

March Gain – Level + 1 Trophies + 37

Backlog decreased by 4 in January

Game spending vs. ‘10: Monthly +58% | Yearly -23%

Just a couple of preorders coming in. If I can stay around 20% for the year, I’ll be happy.

Fun platforming, though the lack of diversity among enemies drives the combat down. Four areas cleansed.

Hilarious dialogue and references, plenty of 4th wall breaking on top of lackluster gameplay.

I’m enjoying this time-traveling RPG very much. One of the most original games I’ve come across in quite a while.

An improvement over the first Halo in almost every way. The repeating sections that annoyed me have been toned down and none of the stages were reskins of earlier ones. Dual-wielding was fun early on, though the need to have a free hand to grenade during the endgame run limited. While the story deeper, it proved to be too much for one game, forcing a rather abrubt ending that resolved nothing.

My computers tend to be fairly average in terms of power, but there is something wrong when a game a year older than my computer still chugs along on the lowest settings. I knew this would be a bad game going in and I was not disappointed. Nothing original here at all. Stealth kill until detected and then bunker down behind cover and clear the waves of enemies. Proceed down linear path to next section. Even the larger areas are blocked off into corridors.

Even though I’m terrible at bullet-hell shooters, I do enjoy playing them and at least trying to dodge the elaborate patterns. DeathSmiles is one of the more accessible ones I’ve played thanks to a nice setting and infinite continues.

I enjoyed the first Uncharted up until the combat heavy finale. Uncharted 2 manages to toughen the opposition without feeling so cheap for the end-game. An all-around great sequel. The mix of platforming and gunning feels right and throws plenty of “Oh Crap!” moments along the way.

Although I didn’t enjoy this one quite as much as I did the first Monkey Island, it was still fun trying to puzzle out the challenges. Even if some of them were rather obtuse.

I had fun with Summon Night, but it was probably made with a younger audience in mind. Combat is a bit simplistic, but the weapon crafting system gives you plenty of options to take into battle.

A Thorny Labyrinth by Queen of Wand.

2 Pickups, 4 Additions

Atlus & NIS America

Legend of Heroes: Trails in the Sky

Divinity II: The Dragon Knight Saga

Ar Tonelico Qoga: Knell of Ar Ciel

Others

Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword	Dragon Age II	Mass Effect 3	Gears of War 3
Pokemon: Black	Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

Eyes on the Future

Is it 11 November yet?

A new year, and a fresh start. My streak of 28 consecutive monthly blogs came to a sudden end. While my internet has been more consistent, knock on particle board (Is anything made of solid wood anymore?), it was far to sporadic to try writing an entire entry online. Lesson learned; write offline, edit online.

As I noted in my year-end entry, the last few months have been a little rough. I’m pretty much back to 40 hours (51 last week thanks to a massive snowstorm), and my shoulder is almost pain free, though there is some lingering numbness on occasion. I’ve been to the doctor once before for this, though last time there was more numbness and less pain with no sleeping issues beyond just not lying on the affected shoulder. It’s always been my left shoulder, so I’ve been wondering now if there is some long forgotten injury since I’m right-handed.

One of my unfulfilled wishes was to get some Winter pictures of the Detroit Zoo covered in snow. Then I went to midnights and doing things during the day became the equivalent of staying up all night. So with 3 days off in row just before New Years and a new camera in the mail, I decided to give my Kodak Z712 a proper send off. The results are posted here. If the weather is decent my new Panasonic Lumix FZ40 will get its test run with a Toledo trip in early May. The new camera has twice the optical zoom of the Kodak (12x to 24x). This should keep me from having to dip into the digital zoom (i.e. crop and enlarge) for many of the long-range close-ups.

Fiscal conservatism continues into 2011. I foresee about two more years of reduced spending being needed. This looks like a good time to really work on my backlog. So for 2011 I have started the 52-Weeks-52-Games Challenge. I have drawn up a list of 60 games and I intend to beat one for every week of the year. I’m off to a terrible start (Thanks New Vegas!) with only 2 games beaten through the first week of February, but I know I can knock off three in the next week and a half. With Dragon Age II, Twilight Princess, Mass Effect 3, and worst of all, Skyrim, looming in the future, I’m not sure if I can pull this off.

Kingdom Hearts: Birth By Sleep

Monster Hunter Tri

Golden Sun: Dark Dawn

January Gain +765 – 39 Achievements unlocked

March Gain – Level + 0 Trophies + 0

Backlog decreased by 2 in January

Game spending vs. ‘10: Monthly -70% | Yearly -70%

If it wasn’t for an expiring Buy-2-Get-1-Free coupon this would have been the first month since August 2004 in which no games were purchased.

Nearly ten years late to the Halo party, but I finally decided to give it a try. And it’s actually not that bad. My only real complaint is the repetition in the stages. Perhaps it was hardware limitations, or just the rush to hit the xbox launch, but many stages just seem to drag on with scenery changing very little (or not at all, Library!) in each section. The later stages were largely repeats of earlier ones. Very solid game, I can certainly see why it has gained such popularity. Still not my cup of tea though. I prefer the slower-paced cover mechanics of Gears and Uncharted.

Elite Beat Agents is certainly one of the more unique games I’ve played. I suck at rhythm games, but I had a good time with it even as I repeatedly failed out thanks to the humorous scenes that accompany each song. I barely got through the last song on the easiest difficulty level.

Trace Memory is a bit on the short side and almost too easy. The story was interesting and kept me interested in continuing forward to the conclusion, even if it was fairly easy to see how it was going to play out. The developers made pretty good use of the unique features the DS offers.

I was a little slow to get into New Vegas, but once I did, I didn’t want to put it down (until it froze). #1 reason why I’m so behind on my 52 game challenge. The bugs I encountered were mostly minor graphics glitches and random game freezes. I once got stuck in a cave wall and plummeted to my death. Annoying, but hardly game breaking. Though I was unable to get one of the endings as the script refused to execute past a certain point in the ending scene. It’s on par with Fallout 3, but it could have been so much more.

Not bad for a collection of minigames. The game kind of plays as a puzzle as you try to win and find the items you need to proceed deeper into the theme park the game takes place in. Since this is Bomberman, pretty much all the mini-games involve bombs in some manner. Normal mode moves fairly smoothly, though some of the later challenges took quite a few tries and pushed the time limit to the max.

The final battle theme to Mana Khemia. Someday I hope to actually hear it in game. The vocalist is Noriko Mitose, who pops up in quite a few Gust games as well as one of my favorite ending themes, Radical Dreamers ~Unstolen Jewel from Chrono Cross.

0 Pickups, 0 Additions

Atlus & NIS America

Hyperdimension Neptunia

Ar Tonelico Qoga: Knell of Ar Ciel

Radiant Historia

Others

Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword

Dragon Age II

Mass Effect 3

Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

Eyes on the Future

Thank you Namco! I’d almost given up on Tales leaving Japan, so it was a pleasant surprise to see a sudden teaser for Graces ƒ. No release date beyond a coming soon. I did spend a little time with the Japanese demo and found they’ve played with the combat quite a bit, though it still looks and feels like a Tales game. My Japanese is getting very rusty, so I need to go back and force myself to try and read more of the text.

Is it 2011 already? You won’t hear me complaining. Working retail, I’m used to having holiday burnout, but 2010 was something else. I was ready for New Years before Thanksgiving had even arrived. When I last wrote I was halfway through my last vacation. Since then, I’ve clocked in over 50 hours of overtime and spent a few weeks hauling pallets off the truck with with a hand jack after the store’s power jack died. It’s no wonder I’m ringing in the new year with a pleasant (i.e. painful) case of Bursitis. Things have nearly gotten back to normal, though I’m still feeling a little drained.

The monthly blog has expanded to cover the 3 months I missed, though it still needs some work and I just haven’t felt like writing it. I think I’m just going to skip it and start fresh with January. Perhaps I’ll post it at some point since it does have quite a few reviews, though I can’t guarantee if and when.

91 games were added to the collection last year which is pretty even with last year. A full 1/3 of those came from an Id collection Steam had on sale. Cost averaged $5.00 less per game and altogether I spend 19% less than 2009 despite some splurging on Collector Editions (Castlevania, Fallout, and Reach).

2010 (2009) [Total]

	0	( 1 )	[ 60 ]
	13	( 24 )	[ 110 ]
	33	( 10 )	[ 75 ]
	2	( 17 )	[229 ]
	7	( 7 )	[ 22 ]
	6	( 8 )	[ 57 ]
	8	( 6 )	[ 38 ]
	0	( 1 )	[ 80 ]
	22	( 19 )	[100 ]
	91	( 93 )	[1166 ]

Avg 2010 cost: 22.95

Publisher:
#1 Nintendo – 9
#2 Atlus – 6
#2 Microsoft – 6
#3 Sega – 4

Developer:
#1 id – 16
#2 Nintendo – 5
#3 Raven – 4

Genre
#1 FPS – 23
#2 RPG – 21
#3 ARPG – 11

20 (37) [224]

Breakdown by platform:
Console | Beaten | Played
360 – 8 of 13
Wii – 3 of 7
GCN – 3 of 4
DS – 2 of 7
PS3 – 1 of 3
PSP – 1 of 3
PC – 1 of 6
SNES – 1 of 1
PS2 – 0 of 1
XB – 0 of 1

20 beaten of 46 played. (43.5%)

One of the most glitched games I’ve had the pleasure of playing, right down to one the three ending scripts I was able to run on this save being broken. Guess I’ll have to try the House ending again on my 2nd run when I support Caesar’s Legion. I even got stuck in a cave wall and plummeted to my demise when I ran out of floor. Glitches aside, I spent a good 100 hours with game and have no regrets in doing so.

On par or better in every regard to the first Mario Galaxy. Phenomenal soundtrack and mechanics. Challenges without feeling impossible. Definitely one of 2010′s best offerings.

Level 5 continues to do nice things with the Dragon Quest franchise. While it doesn’t stray far from the Dragon Quest formula, it does it very well.

Perhaps in part because I never got far into the original PS2 release (or start FES), and because I haven’t really played the other contenders (Ys Seven and Valkyria II) I name Persona 3 Portable my top PSP game for the year. Atlus tweaked a lot of things that bothered me about the game and I found this version far more playable than the console release.

Another year, another Bioware game as my top pick. More streamlined as a third-person shooter than its predecessor, Mass Effect 2 aims to keep you from micro-managing in the menus and moving forward. The focus is less on the main story and more on the companions you travel with.

2011 Challenge

There are 52 weeks in the year and I intend to beat a game for every one. Trying to time it so that I finish a game every calender week will be challenging so I’m just going to try to beat them as quickly as possible (especially with timesink Elder Scrolls V hitting in November). While I’ve gone into this with a clear list of games, time is of the essence so I have added a few games to serve as alternates should I grow frustrated with a certain game.

This post will be updated throughout the year to reflect my progress.

31 May, Week 22 – Games Beaten: 20

Adventure

Action/Adventure

FPS

Others

Alternates

After a hectic August, September was a nice break. Actually, as I look back and try to reflect upon it I realize I can barely recall it.

I signed up for the Tour de Troit, a 30 mile bike ride through Detroit which drew 3200 cyclists this year. Unfortunately I couldn’t get the night off and it was a night I was in charge. Not the best night to come in dead tired, or even worse, oversleep. Disappointing, as I was really looking forward to this. Next year, then.

Atelier Rorona

Uncharted 2

Etrian Odyssey III

101-in-1 Sports Megamix

August Gain +500 – 15 Achievements unlocked

March Gain – Level + 0 Trophies + 0

Backlog increased by 2 in June

Rank 38 on the MyGamercard.net RPG Leaderboard +4

Game spending vs. ‘09: Monthly -39% | Yearly -22%

The fall is typically where I spend most of my money as all of the big name RPGs tend to release then. Except, where are they? Such a quiet year. Atelier Rorona with its artbook and soundtrack and Etrian Odyssey III were my big purchases for September. I enjoyed the first Uncharted, so I’m looking forward to popping in Uncharted 2 soon. Who knows what Atlus was thinking with 101-in-1? Cheap license, maybe? Next month is the big one, Fallout: New Vegas. Oh, and Fable III. But I’m not buying it just yet.

111:44| 25 December
Battle Party Level 60-63,69
Tartarus: Floor 214
I’m really enjoying Persona 3 this time around. Pretty much everything I didn’t like about it has been made more like Persona 4 and makes for a much more enjoyable experience. The last section of Tartarus will be opening in a few game days. The end game is definitely in sight.

Current Party – 15Hoplite/15Gladiator/15Princess/15Monk/15Farmer
Low-level areas of the first 4 floors is primarily complete. Next objective is the boss of the first stratum, Narmer, but my first attempt failed. I’ll have to grind out a few levels and give it another shot. B2 FOE is killable, perhaps I’ll see if I can take out the hippo FOE on B3. Steep learning curve, but not as bad as some dungeon crawlers.

55:07
Character Quest Chapter 3: Chloe
Battle Party Lv 59-61
Some slight forward progress. Don’t think I’ll finish it this month, but possibly in November. Wait…Fallout in a week and a half… Make that December.

Only Darkspawn Chronicles and Golems of Amgarrak remain for DLC. Awakening is finished and reviewed below. (1285/1750)

Made some progress through the Fifth Ark. Will probably clear Chapter 10 next time I play. (230/1000)

Treasures 82/102
Stage 8-4
A cute little platformer that is probably meant for a younger audience. Solid, but not spectacular. The story focuses on the power of friendship. Aside from the post-game Chapter 10, which I’m struggling to beat, the game is incredibly easy. My only game overs came during boss fights. While I would not recommend to adults (unless they enjoyed fun cute little platformers), I would not hesitate to recommend it to a youngster looking for something beyond New Super Mario Bros.

Dragon Age was my GOTY last year. Needless to say, I am all to happy to have a full-fledged expansion as opposed to the DLC they’ve been trickling out. Awakening adds about 10 levels to the soft cap of 20 (My mage is currently 35 with 1 DLC to go), quite a few new skills to go with the higher levels, 5 new PCs and 1 carry-over, and quite a few quests to keep you busy. It took me about 25 hours to clear the game. The story was actually pretty nice, with some of it coming rather unexpectedly. If you played and enjoyed Dragon Age, Awakening is more of the same with no complaints from me.

I wasn’t sure what to post here this month. Then I found this track buried deep in my Touhou folder. I don’t really listen to much rock, but I definitely recognized the song that serves as the core of this piece.

The first set of Vesperia figures I pre-ordered back in the spring has finally arrived. Though random, I was able to put 3 full sets together with an extra Estelle. One is for myself, one I’m giving a friend a good deal on, and the remaining six figures are going on ebay. I won’t break even, but I should only be out about 40 bucks, which is less than it would have cost me to buy the set through a 2nd party. I expect the second set to cost a similar amount, though with the way the dollar is sinking against the yen…

2 Pickups, 1 Additions

Atlus & NIS America

Ys: The Oath in Felghana

Others

Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword

Fallout: New Vegas

Eyes on the Future

The 3DS has been in news for a few months now. I have yet to comment on it because nothing has caught my eye just yet. I still can’t see 3D as anything other than a fad. However, it was brought to my attention that Namco Bandai is working on a 3D version of Tales of the Abyss. How interesting. Still not enough to sell me on a new 3DS next spring. But definitely a game I will purchase when I do finally decide to get one. Considering they’ve already translated and dubbed it (skits excluded), there is a good chance they would bring it over. Of course, given their track record of late (Vesperia PS3, Graces Wii, PS3 pending, Innocence DS, Hearts DS, Tempest DS, Radiant Mythology 2 PSP, Versus PSP), there is just as much of a chance, if not more, that it stays in Japan.

What a month August proved to be. The final week of covering for my bosses vacation (at least until Christmas) was an absolute nightmare. The week began with a scheduling snafu involving two requests for the day off. It was his intention to honor both, however one never made it to the posted schedule. Needless to say, we ran a body shorter than expected. The fun continued into Sunday as two hours into his shift the summer hire ran over his foot with a pallet jack loaded with pop and juice; 500lbs+ easy. Nothing was broken, thankfully, though his toenail was removed. 3 hours to deal with start to finish, including the trip to the hospital and he would not be in the following night. The bulk of training consisted of how to write an order and deal with the nightly paperwork. Dealing with an emergency was not part of it at all. Tuesday through Thursday actually went without incident, though there was plenty of catch-up from the weekend. Then came Friday. Ah, Friday. The week is drawing to close, just one more night after this and what! Two call-ins!? I was not surprised to have to take three pallets of stock back, though they did put a good dent in it. And finally Saturday. It actually went well, though it would have been better if half the crew hadn’t been scheduled for 6 hours instead of the full 8. In all we lost about 38 hours due to absences and injuries. I’m just going to call it Murphy’s Week and move on.

Not much else of note this month. Didn’t make much progress in “The Wheel of Time”, reaching perhaps midway through Book Five. Renewed my membership to the Detroit Zoo and took a trip there with a friend and his sister. Barely half-an-hour away, I don’t get down there nearly as often as I’d like. Actually, I haven’t been down there I shifted to midnights several years ago. Pictures from the trip can be found here.

Ys Seven	Morrowind GOTY	Oblivion GOTY	Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth
Commander Keen Complete Pack	Doom 3	Doom 3: Resurrection of Evil	Doom II
Final Doom	Heretic: Shadow of the Serpent Riders	Hexen II	Hexen: Beyond Heretic
Hexen: Deathkings of the Dark Citadel	Master Levels for Doom II	Quake	Quake II
Quake II: Ground Zero	Quake II: The Reckoning	Quake III: Arena	Quake III: Team Arena
Quake Mission Pack No. 1: Scourge of Armagon	Quake Mission Pack No. 2: Dissolution of Eternity	Return to Castle Wolfenstein	Rogue Warrior
The Ultimate Doom	Wolfenstein 3D	Wolfenstein 3D: Spear of Destiny	Metroid: Other M
Valkyria Chronicles II

August Gain +40 – 2 Achievements unlocked

March Gain – Level + 0 Trophies + 28

Backlog increased by 29 in June

Rank 42 on the MyGamercard.net RPG Leaderboard +4

Game spending vs. ‘09: Monthly +2% | Yearly -19%

Looks like alot, but all but Ys, Metroid, and Valkyria were part of a Quake-con pack Steam put up for a mere $70. My primary target was Elder Scrolls III & IV for PC and Commander Keen. All the Doom and Quake stuff I consider a bonus. While I have to admit I would have preferred boxed copies, one thing I’ll give Steam is the ease in which you can get these classics running.

Treasures 82/102
Stage 8-4
A cute little platformer that is probably meant for a younger audience. Solid, but not spectacular. Having fun with it though.
Played it pretty heavily in August and sit outside the “final” stage. Should have it finished next month and perhaps the two post-game worlds as well.

62:58| 22 September
Battle Party Level 38-40,46
I’m really enjoying Persona 3 this time around. Pretty much everything I didn’t like about it has been made more like Persona 4 and makes for a much more enjoyable experience. With Ys Seven on the shelf and Valkyria Chronicles II shipping arriving today, I’m not sure how much longer I can keep the UMD in the drive

48:08
Character Quest Chapter 2: Norma
Battle Party Lv 55-57
Ack! I didn’t get to this at all in August. Will definitely rectify that in September. Not sure why I’m having a hard time getting into this one. It’s not a bad game at all.


Level 28 Elven Circle Mage
Downloaded Darkspawn Chronicles, Leliana’s Song, and Golems of Amgarrak. Began playing Awakenings. Finished one main of the three main quests and am about halfway through the second. Did just about all the sidequests not tied to regions I have not yet reached.

Went through story mode with Rachel, BooLitchi, and Noel. Noel has thus far been my favorite as her drive has been the easiest to work with. My dislike of online gaming and inconsistent internet connection has kept me bound to the single-player mode, which may be for the best as I’m not very good. My goal is to at least play through all the stories and see the true end, though I’m not going to put a time frame on this. Any character recommendations for who I should try next, Ravirr?

Nintendo is a firm believer in the policy “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” Fire Emblem is one of many examples. The series has changed very little since it’s beginnings 20 years ago. The nicest tweak seen here is the accumulation of bonus xp which can be used to buff up your preferred units or bring a lagging unit back up to the rest of the group.
The campaign takes a good chunk of time to work through, especially if you are insistent on not losing any units in battle. The story is also by far the deepest I’ve seen in a Fire Emblem game. While the story still revolves around a few core characters, the side characters are not without life.
The shift to 3D is not without its drawbacks, however. These simple 3D polygons just don’t match the detailed sprites of the portable games. Many of the units look identical out on the battlefield. Final time: 41:53. Recommended unless you have something against Strat RPGs.

Here’s a classic dating back to 1983. It’s been a long time since I played a game with a text parser. The puzzles are for the most part fairly easy to figure out, and many of the tougher ones include several ways around. Still it’s not without it’s stumpers and despite my best efforts I was forced to refer to a FAQ for a few of these. Short, but highly enjoyable and has held up well over time.
Rating pending completion of King’s Quest Collection

Almost posted this one last month, but I had already decided on Locked Girl. The animation in this video seriously impressed me in the way the shadows shift from 2D to 3D and transition from character to character. I prefer to include English lyrics when I can, but have deliberately chosen a video without so as not to distract from the animation.

3 Pickups, 3 Additions

Atlus & NIS America

Etrian Odyssey III

Atelier Rorona

Others

Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword

Fallout: New Vegas

Eyes on the Future

I have adjusted the name of this feature to reflect that very few of the games I’ve mentioned in this slot are actually slated for a 2010 release. This month’s game is Atlus’ newest announcement, Catherine. This will be their first HD game. Atlus USA has published a few 360/PS3 games, but none were Atlus developed. I’m not quite sure what to make of Catherine yet. It is certainly… unique. It would appear to be a horror game with sexual elements, nightmares, and sheep. Lots of sheep. The box art mock-up shows a Cero C (15+), so it can’t be too much more revealing than the trailer. Developing for both the 360 and PS3 considering the 360 market in Japan could mean they plan to let Atlus USA localize it.

Seems like I just wrote one of these. Ah, right… I did. That’s what I get for taking so long. Another quick month. Between my bosses vacation’s and a week of late trucks, things haven’t really slowed down. I’m still not completely comfortable in the “leadership” position, but perhaps it just that yoke of responsibility I thought was gone after I left the service desk nearly two years ago. Can’t run forever, I suppose. Nor can I complain about the paychecks. Those 40-hour checks are going to seem so small now.

The Wheel of Time re-read continues. I polished off Book 3, “The Dragon Reborn” and made it through the fourth book, “The Shadow Rising”, as well. TSR is probably my favorite of all the books. I’d forgotten just much more I enjoyed the earlier books when the individual plots didn’t take several books to get resolved. Not that I haven’t enjoyed the recent volumes, they just didn’t seem to go anywhere.

In other news, another birthday has come and gone. That makes 30 now. I usually take the night off, but the boss on vacation and me covering for him, I couldn’t get out of it. I ended heading over to my dad’s the next night for a barbecue, though I ended up sleeping to late and missing it, pan-frying the rather large slab of salmon he had gotten for me instead. Talked to my sister for awhile, though I never returned my mom’s call. It’s been six years since she ran off and I suppose I can’t push her away forever, but I just don’t have anything to say just yet…

Persona 3 Portable	Trinity Universe	3D Dot Game Heroes	Arc Rise Fantasia
The Witcher: Enhanced	Monkey Island 2 SE

March Gain +0 – 0 Achievements unlocked

March Gain – Level + 0 Trophies + 4

Backlog increased by 6 in June

Rank 38 on the MyGamercard.net RPG Leaderboard +3

Game spending vs. ‘09: Monthly +30% | Yearly -22%

I hadn’t planned on getting P3P considering I already had both the original Persona 3 and the FES version. But one thing Atlus does well is dangling those preorder bonuses. I do like the hat, but too bad hats don’t seem to suit me. The 360 port of Witcher seems to be dead, so I grabbed the PC copy along with the Zelda “homage” 3D Dot Game Heroes at a recent GameStop sale.

Treasures 33/102
Stage 5-1
A cute little platformer that is probably meant for a younger audience. Solid, but not spectacular. Having fun with it though.

46:43| 9 August
Battle Party Level 31-33
I’m really enjoying Persona 3 this time around. Pretty much everything I didn’t like about it has been made more like Persona 4 and makes for a much more enjoyable experience.

Green Star Challenge | 148 Stars | 48 comet Coins
Apparently 120 stars wasn’t good enough for this sequel so the developers have scattered another 120 stars throughout the game. Not sure how long it will take, but I will open the final stage.

48:08
Character Quest Chapter 2: Norma
Battle Party Lv 55-57
Set aside during the move, I’ve finally restarted my Tales marathon. Side questing put me against some rather high level foes, so now that I’m back into the main quest things have been proceeding rather smoothly. I’m rather curious if the plot revealing itself in these character quests will tie back into the plot that was resolved with the main game.


Chapter 5 | Level 29
Not quite what I was expecting, though it certainly has its similarities to Cross Edge. The game is essentially a continuous dungeon crawl through the various dungeons that float in and out of orbit of the city the game is set in. There’s not much of a plot, though the game doesn’t take itself seriously at all to hilarious effect. Random encounters are pretty frequent, though fairly easy to power through. Boss encounters, especially in non-story dungeons, are another story. And I’m not even close to being strong enough to take on the Lurkers that roam most dungeons, pouncing when you’ve stayed too long. It’s a niche title, with only a handful of crossover characters. Cross Edge had too many; Trinity too few. Though the dialogue is hilarious, I can see the dungeon crawls getting rather repetitious.

It was a little more than 10 years ago, not long after I started my first semester of college, that I learned of things such as emulators and ROMs. While I recall downloading many of my favorite SNES titles, two games stand out from this time period. One is Seiken Densetsu 3, the Secret of Mana sequel of which an official release is one of two games that would break my Square Enix boycott. The other is Final Fantasy V. While FFV would get an official Western release the following year, at the time a hacked ROM was the only way to enjoy it in English. I doubt I’m the only one who preferred RPGe’s translation over Square’s official one for Final Fantasy Anthology.
And so every few years I would remember that buried deep in my computer was my SNES ROM folder and I would get a little further in FFV. I bought Anthology but the load time was almost as bad as the translation. FFV Advance too, though I didn’t get that far. It was always the ROM I would come back to. And it is the ROM I finally cleared.
Sandwiched between the the far stronger stories of IV and VI, FFV comes across as rather weak. Where V truly shines though, is in its class system. With an ever expanding array of jobs and the ability to mix and match learned skills, battle is an ever changing experience.
Worth going through once, but FFV is not among the best Final Fantasy has to offer.

Take the Bump of Chicken song Laugh Maker, add a Touhou theme and you get this.

3 Pickups, 2 Additions

Atlus & NIS America

Etrian Odyssey III

Others

Ys Seven

Metroid: Other M

Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword

Fallout: New Vegas

Eye on 2010

And so begins Square Enix’s attempts to woo me back after the FFXI fiasco. Here we have a reimagining of 1995′s Tactics Ogre. Not only is the original designer, Yasumi Mitsuno, returning after stepping down during FFXII, the original art director Hiroshi Minagawa is serving as director and the composers Hitoshi Sakimoto (!) and Masaharu Iwata as well. I never got around to trying out my PS1 copy, but this certainly looks promising. Comes as quite a surprise considering they have done nothing with Ogre/Tactics since buying Quest in 2002. Not quite enough to break my boycott, but certainly a nice try.

This has proven a difficult entry to get typed up and posted. Part time constraints, part exhaustion; I just haven’t felt myself the last few weeks. This is by far my least favorite time of year. After a few mild years, my allergies have hit a bit harder this year. I’ve seen them far worse though. Another few weeks and everything should be cleared out. Work has kept me very busy as I covered two of my boss’s vacation weeks last month. The second week running through the 4th of July holiday weekend. This has involved plenty of mental stress, an extra day of work for each week, and any overtime needed to ensure that everything gets done. That has been part of the delay, though I’ve had a hard time putting Persona 3 Portable down since I got it on 7 July (but that’s a topic for another month).

In years past, I was very much an avid reader. The more I bought and played video games, the less I read. I still bought books on occasion, though I don’t think I actually read through any of them. The last few months have seen a reversal of that. In preparation for the final three books of Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time, the first of which I received for Christmas last year, I’ve been re-reading the series from the very beginning. I’m currently nearing the end of the 3rd book. The latest release is book 12. I imagine it will take a good chunk of the year to complete.

Bioshock 2	Red Dead Redemption	Divinity II: Ego Draconis	Alpha Protocol
Vandal Hearts	DeathSmiles	Legend of Starfy

March Gain +800 – 34 Achievements unlocked

March Gain – Level + 0 Trophies + 0

Backlog increased by 3 in June

Rank 35 on the MyGamercard.net RPG Leaderboard +7

Game spending vs. ‘09: Monthly +34% | Yearly -26%

I didn’t think I’d splurged that badly this month, but last year I’d only bought 4 games, three of which were DS titles, which skewed the numbers a bit. Bioshock 2 was a Special Edition found at half price on Amazon. A steal as far as I was concerned. Red Dead I probably could have done without, but I don’t regret picking it up used. Divinity II finally dropped below $20. I’ve had my on Starfy since it came out and I found myself one game and a couple of surveys short of the platinum Club Nintendo prize.

Treasures 28/102
Stage 4-1
A cute little platformer that is probably meant for a younger audience. Solid, but not spectacular. Having fun with it though.

16:56:55| Carina/1F
As expected I leaned back towards good after clearing the last sector. Current team is working, though a little too wind-centric. Need a vary the team a bit more before engaging next boss.
PC Lv 24 | Karasu Tengu Lv 22 | Suparna Lv 17 | Mandrake Lv 23

33:44 | Chapter 26 – Clash!
Didn’t really play it much. Made one serious attempt but instead of killing the three mages that appeared at the end, I tried to steal all their good spells/staves. They promptly focused all their magic on swordmaster Zihark who did not survive…

Green Star Challenge | 136 Stars | 48 comet Coins
Apparently 120 stars wasn’t good enough for this sequel so the developers have scattered another 120 stars throughout the game. Not sure how long it will take, but I will open the final stage.

One run completed. Recruit background with stealth/handgun focus. See Completed section below for review. (685/1000)

28:56 | Chapter 10 | The Fifth Ark – Upper Traverse
After what has been the most challenging boss fight thus far, plot has taken an interesting, but not unexpected, turn. The party united, I do believe the tutorial is officially over. (150/1000)

Ran back through it for the remaining achievements. Would have been just as fun the 2nd time through if I didn’t have to skip over most the dialogue to make sure I finished in under 3 hrs. (200/200)

Honor: Honest Joe | Fame: Greenhorn
Game Completed: 17.3% | Time: 7:16
12 Days | 10 Missions
I was never a fan of Grand Theft Auto, but this is a romp through the Wild West that I have enjoying. Still early in the game, as open-world games tend to see me do more exploring than plot advancing.(20/1000)

Super Mario Galaxy was the last game I gave a 10 to. Now several years later Nintendo manages to release pretty much the same game, only better. The hub world has been replaced with a much more pleasant stage grid, the challenge has been upped quite a bit (but in a good way), and Yoshi is once again saddled and ready to go. The soundtrack has been given a phenomenal orchestral treatment. A minor complaint would be the pair of gliding and Super Monkey Ball style stages that are motion sensitive. While moving with a tilt of the wrist is fun intially, later challenges (the Green Stars in particular) require a precision the control scheme lacks. These stages are so few, so it is not really an issue. I can give this game a score no lower than it’s predecessor. 10 out of 10

Rarely does the general consensus leave me as confused as it does here. I did not find the bug-ridden, unfinished mess that so many reviewers did. Instead, I found a decent game with some glaring flaws holding it back. Though I can see these flaws turning people away from the game.
The story is well-executed, with an interesting flash-forward segment prefacing each area of the game. The many characters Michael encounters are full of personality, their reactions and dialogue changing depending on how choose to slant your dialogue. Most dialogue branches give you the option to be professional, suave, or aggressive with about 20 seconds to decide how you want to go. Just like real life, you don’t get much time to sit and think. My only complaint on this part is you don’t know exactly what you are going to say until time is up. There were quite a few times the dialogue I received was not what I was expecting to get.
Unfortunately, the game comes up a bit short everywhere else. The AI bounces between good and idiotic. The skilltree progresses nicely at first, but becomes broken by end game. Too often the game forces you into a position where stealth is no longer an option and the only way to advance is to gun everything down. Boss fights almost seem to be an exercise in futility and luck until a certain skill is maxed. Cover doesn’t provide much cover from fire. Melee combat with no blocking mechanic, especially when bosses can kill you with a few punches.
It’s a shame the excellent RPG aspects are buried behind so many flaws. That did not stop me from enjoying it and I do plan to make a few more runs through it, though it is hard to recommend it at full price. 7.1.

Approaching 7 years old, this remains the last Gamecube title that saw regular play amongst friends that hasn’t had an update for the Wii (I’m not counting We Love Golf!). I don’t think I can even hazard a guess at many rounds, how many hours have been spent with this game. Almost all in the company of friends. If there is one thing Nintendo has excelled at over the years, it’s in games such as this. Fun to play solo on occasion, but a blast with a roomful of friends.
The game is mechanically sound (at least to a non-golfer such as I), pleasant to look at (especially the water), has a decent Sakamoto soundtrack ( I think… music has been off in favor of audio CDs for years), and packs plenty of modes to play. The straight-hitting characters are pretty easy to play, though they lack power. It is with the power-hitters (such as my favored golfer, Daisy) where the physics seem to get a bit wonky. If there was ever a game that exemplified Steve-Luck, it is this one. Balls that mysteriously veer off course, putts that circle the hole without going in…
So why am I calling this beaten after all these years? I finally unlocked the remaining 3 hidden characters. One required completing the birdie challenge, 18 straight birdies on a course of par 3s. The second was finishing the ring challenge. The goal was to hit the ball through a number of rings hovering above the course while parring the hole. Some were pretty easy, others seemed almost impossible. The final character was unlocked by completing a series of challenges involving landing the ball in a red circle 8 out of 10 attempts. Sounds easy, but this proved the most difficult of the three. Especially during the long range tee shots.
Until Nintendo puts out a new Mario Golf for the Wii (whether done by Camelot or another studio), I expect this title to continue to see plenty of playtime. Final score: 8.5.

Took a little while to track this one down on youtube. 旧地獄街道を行く arranged by TAM and Keigo Kanzaki. I see it translated as Walking the Streets of a Former Hell.

2 Pickups, 1 Additions

Atlus & NIS America

Persona 3 Portable

Trinity Universe

Others

Arc Rise Fantasia

Metroid: Other M

Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword

Fallout: New Vegas

Eye on 2010

For the longest time Ys was bound to Japan, though in recent years this seems to have changed. So it was with only a little surprise that XSeed announced they were localizing Ys Seven for the PSP. Though I’ve spent little time with the games themselves, I have always enjoyed the music from the series. The premium edition for Seven looks pretty spiffy, sporting a nice cloth map, soundtrack disc, and and a 60-page artbook and I’ll likely add it to my preorders fairly soon. Gamespot’s preview was pretty positive for a series that hasn’t tinkered too much with it’s formula over the years.