Tuesday, June 18, 2002

Review of Lost Kingdoms for Gamecube     Publisher: Activision     Developer: From Software     Genre: Action/RPG     # Of Players: 1-2     Peripherals: None     Combining elements of Pokemon and Yu Gi Oh (or any other popular card game), Lost Kingdoms is the first RPG on Gamecube (hopefully the first of many).  In it, an ominous black fog is slowly spreading across the land, and everything it envelops, it disappears.  Entire populations of towns vanish, lush forests disappear, and of course, vicious monsters appear in the fog as well.  The kingdom’s only hope is the possessor of the runestone, which has been in your royal family for generations.  The runestone gives you the power to summon monsters through cards, each with varying attributes and abilities.  Unfortunately, this unique hybrid falls flat on its face due to some extremely simple gameplay oversights. Graphics: Well, they get the job done.  There’s no slowdown, glitching, or drop in frames, but that’s because this essentially looks like a smoothed-out N64 game.  The character and monster designs are extremely generic, as are the extremely generic towns & dungeons.  This doesn’t look ugly really, but it’s one of the poorer-looking games on the Gamecube. Sound: No voice acting, the music is just barely tolerable, being some of the most uninspired (and just plain non-fitting) music I’ve heard in a long time.  Sound effects are barely existent outside of battle, and extremely generic bells and whistles inside. Gameplay: Ok, while the cards themselves are simple to use and set-up, everything else is not.  You can buy more cards with money, but I’m not sure how to get any without selling my cards that are worth squat anyways.  Once cards are used up in battle, they are gone for good, even though they gain experience.  Obviously, this carries onto the next card you pickup, but it’s lame if I want to get my werewolf more experience, but can’t cause I used up my last card last battle.  You can’t do an attack personally, so if you run out of cards, you are completely screwed and have to start the area over.  And even though there are random battles, you can only carry 30 cards, which get used up pretty quickly (I was using an average of 5 cards a battle), also, I have no clue how the experience works, as there was no good indicator of how close my cards were to a level up. Features: There’s a two-player game, but I didn’t even bother trying.  If I wanted to play card game against another person, I wouldn’t pay $50 to do it. Funfactor: This is the only RPG on Gamecube right now, and will be the only one until Evolution Worlds (which is a remake anyways), so if your only system is Gamecube and you’re an RPG nut, this really is your only option (but if you’re an RPG nut, why do you have a Gamecube?).  The quirky battle system may be enough for you to look past the gameplay flaws and poor graphics, but it wasn’t enough for me. --Final Scores— Graphics: 4.5-Every level, character, and monster in this game just screams generic & unoriginal. Sound: 4.0-Bland music, barely existent sound effects. Gameplay: 5.0-Card system is well setup and easy to use, but too many stupid limitations. Features: 5.5-Two-player mode is a nifty extra. Funfactor: 5.0-Only apply if you desperately need an RPG and have no other options. 7:28:35 AM    comment []

Review of The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind for Xbox     Publisher: Bethesda Softworks Inc.     Developer: Bethesda Softworks Inc.     Genre: Action/RPG     # Of Players: 1     Peripherals: None Morrowind represents a new experience for the console rpg gamer.  You play a mysterious stranger who was taken prisoner and brought to the mysterious island of Morrowind for a specific reason.  But once you get off the boat, it’s completely up to you what you do from there.  You can set off on your on adventure, there’s not route to follow.  You can try and slaughter a town (although that isn’t too wise since the guards are ridiculously strong and will attack you on sight), or try and be a great hero, it’s all up to you.  You don’t even have to stick to general class conventions, you can make up your own.  Ultimately, though, Morrowind brings both the best and the worst qualities of games of this style. Graphics: Ok, the frame rate occasionally hiccups and the animation is crap, but the game looks fantastic.  Every area is gorgeously detailed, and there are great little effects that make you really feel like you are in another world (like when you remove a candle, it actually gets darker).  And although the animation isn’t that great, there are some truly creative and original character and monster designs that are fantastic.  It really creates an atmosphere of a whole other universe. Sound: The combat sounds are fairly generic, but the voice acting is done pretty well, and the music is good, but I wish there was a little more variety to it (I think it’s just one really good track that loops over and over again).  But there are some nice little extras like hearing creatures off in the distance and being able to hear footsteps and so on. Gameplay: And this is where the best and the worst of the game shows itself.  Let’s get the bad stuff out of the way first.  Morrowind is a huge place, it would probably take all day to explore the entire place, and therein lies the problem, it’s real easy to get lost and not know where your going, there is a map function, but it should be better utilized because it gets annoying having to press select so often to pause and look at the map.  Then there is the fatigue factor.  I think this is one of the stupidest ideas ever in game history.  I don’t want to have to rest every few minutes because my guy is tired.  And finally, there is the combat.  You can’t tell how much damage you are doing to the guy, so I never know is this is someone/something I should be fighting or not.  And it really is simple hack n’ slash fighting, even if you are an archer or spell caster it’s hack, hack, and hack some more until your enemy goes down, but combat is intense enough that it keeps it from get dull.  The good news: You can literally do almost anything.  You want to steal items or pickpocket the shopkeeper?  Go ahead; just make sure you don’t get caught because these guys remember. There are no class limits.  You can have heavily armored mages, ridiculously strong thieves, and so on.  And again, you can even make up your own class.  You can even make up your own spells.  The game is so non-linear you can easily take up 100 hours doing other stuff before you even start on the main quest.  I’m not even positive if the game really ends.  And you build up your skills doing real life things (i.e. if you want to increase your acrobatic skill, jump a lot, it’s that simple). Features: There aren’t really any extras, but given what’s already available, what else do you really need? Funfactor: This game does have some real serious flaws, and if you are a hardcore console rpger, this will probably not appeal to you.  But the reality of this is that it is a new experience for most, a solid rpg overall, the only real RPG for the Xbox (I don’t count Hunter), and the only one coming out for the rest of the Summer, this is a more than valid choice for gamers with an open mind looking for something new and different with a kind of freedom they haven’t had before. --Final Scores— Graphics: 8.0 Beatifully textured universe and character/monster designs, but frame rate hiccups occasionally and animation just plain sucks. Sound: 6.0-Good music (too bad it’s only one track), and very good voice acting, but combat sounds are extremely generic. Gameplay: 7.0-Easy to get lost, battle is kind of simplistic, and know way to tell how much damage you are doing, but the huge variety and customization, and the ability to choose what your adventure is makes up for the shortcomings. Features: 5.0-No real extras, but who needs them in a game like this? Funfactor: 7.0-Again, if you only like console style rpgs (like FF), you probably won’t enjoy this one, but this is for those who wanted to live in a world rather than just take a trip through it. 7:26:15 AM    comment []

Review of Bomberman Generation for Gamecube     Publisher: Hudson Soft     Developer: Majesco     Genre: Party/Platform     # Of Players: 1-4     Peripherals: None The ultimate party game returns in full swing.  All those pretenders like Mario Party should lay down and worship the king, Bomberman.  The long ongoing series of games has never really messed with their simple tried and true formula but has never managed to get boring, either.  Now aside from the now infamous multi-player (you and up to 3 other friends throw bombs at each other and try to not get blown up in the process, pretty simple), there is a new one-player game where you try and stop a bunch of bad guys from retrieving the ‘bomb elements’, which would make them unstoppable.  And as usual with the series, the multi-player is one of the best in history, but the single player is a generic Zelda wannabe that falls flat on its face. Graphics: Well, for his first appearance on the next gen systems, Bomberman has decided to go the popular cel-shaded route.  This adds a lot of color and dimension to what has been a somewhat stale style for the past couple of changes, so it’s a nice change.  The levels and effects are colorful, with no hint of slowdown, pop-up, or flicker no matter how much is going on, and everything is fairly well-animated, but the style dictates that this doesn’t really push the Gamecube to it’s graphical limits, but it more than works for the feel of the game. Sound: Well, the unfortunate fact is that this is a game for ALL ages, which translates to almost so cute it’s painful sounds & music.  Very cheery, even when your bomberman dies, it’s fairly cheerful.  Luckily, sound is not important in the game, so you can turn it off. Gameplay: Ok, basic controls are extraordinarily simple.  One button to drop bombs/pick up and throw bombs, and you move around with the analog stick.  That’s it.  Now, while this would normally be something you’d knock a game for, it translates perfectly well in multiplayer.  The problem is that it doesn’t in single.  All that it boils down to is laying/throwing bombs and hoping they hit whatever enemy your aiming at.  They try to add in some “charabombs” that give you different abilities, and some minigames to get different kinds of bombs, but it doesn’t really alter the basic gameplay enough to make it interesting. It’s so short that even little kids could beat it in two days and you don’t get anything extra for beating it, so it’s pretty much pointless.  The multi-player is where it really shines though, with a good variety of ways to play, and it just gets insane very quickly. Features: Well, no real extras to earn (some hidden stages for multi-player would be nice), but the wide variety of twitching available in multi-player is more than enough for this game. Funfactor: Rating the funfactor for a game like this is somewhat difficult because it applies differently depending on what kind of gamer you are.  If you like to play games by yourself, I definitely do not recommend this, as multi-player is only fun for a little while by yourself, and the single player is lacking to say the least.  But if you have friends over regularly to play games, youneed to get this, because it’s simply the best party game of the year and pretty much the best one since Bomberman on the Saturn. --Final Scores— Graphics: 7.0-I like the look and how colorful it is, but it’s still very simplistic. Sound: 4.0-Music and effects are just too cutesy for their own good. Gameplay: 7.0-Multi-player is flat out fantastic as usual, and as usual the single-player game is extremely weak.   Features: 8.5-No real extras to earn or hidden modes/stages, but multi-player is jam packed with ways to make it different every time. Funfactor: 7.0-If it was just the multi-player with more added, I would’ve scored it higher, but the extremely weak single player makes it only for those who play well with others. 7:22:30 AM    comment []

Review of Britney Spears Dance Beat for PS2     Publisher: THQ     Developer:     Genre: Rhythm     # Of Players 1-2     Peripherals: None     Oh dear god, it’s a Britney Spears Game!  Isn’t that the seventh sign of the apocalypse?  Well, at least she’s sticking to something that suits her (unlike crap like Shaq Fu & Michael Jordan in the Windy City).  In this “game” you audition to be a backup dancer for Britney on her upcoming tour by “dancing” (i.e., pathetically fail at having rhythm by trying to press buttons in tune with the music) to some of her biggest hits.  Now while there is plenty of nifty extras for Britney fans, the gameplay is so mind-numbingly simple it ruins what could’ve surprisingly been a solid game. Graphics: The animation is real smooth, and done really well on the dancers.  My only complaint is that ALL of them look like pop band rejects.  All of the dancing stages are weird acid flashback effects, but it works for the game. Sound: It’s Britney, all Britney.  If you like her stuff, you’ll love every second of hearing it, if not, why are you even bothering to read this review?  Britney does the only voice acting, so it’s as good as it can get.  But there are no cool sound effects, and again, the dancers never say anything themselves.  Gameplay: Ok, first of, the only difference between the dancers seems to be their appearances, nobody’s faster, more agile, uses a different style, etc.  And unlike other games, where you have to press different buttons, in Dance Beat you just press X, X, X, and X again.  The appeal of these types of games is limited as is, why make it less appealing by making it have something in common with Kabuki Warriors? Features: Surprisingly, this is where the game actually shines through.  You can watch and unlock videos, unlock backstage footage, there’s a two-player competitive mode, and there are dancers to unlock as well.  I couldn’t possibly think of anything else you would want in this type of a game. Funfactor: Well, I wasn’t sure what to expect here, but what you get is some nice wrapping covering up the fact that there is nothing in the box.  Making you use different buttons or the ability to use a dance pad (sure it would be expensive, but so what) would’ve actually made this a solid game, but fans of rhythm games & even Britney Spears diehard fans would be better of with Parappa 2 or Dance Dance Revolution to get their fix. --Final Scores— Graphics: 8.0-Nice animation, cool trippy stages, but I just personally don’t like the character design. Sound: 6.0-Real voice by Britney and authentic songs, but no other voice acting or sound effects (plus I’m just not a fan of her music). Gameplay: 1.0-Press X a lot.  That’s it.  That’s all there is to it. Features: 10-Hey, for Britney fans, this is all they could ask for as far as extras go. Funfactor: 4.0-Good looking, but lacking in substance (hey, just like Britney, sorry I couldn’t resist :) 7:19:48 AM    comment []

Review of Wrestlemania X8 for Gamecube     Publisher: THQ     Developer: Yukes     Genre: Wrestling     # Of Players: 1-4     Peripherals: None The WWE makes its first appearance on Gamecube!  With over 30 of the top wrestlers, almost every kind of match available, various venues to choose from, and THQ behind the license, this is sure to be the best wrestling game yet, right? Yeah, right.  Let’s face facts, despite a massive power upgrade, so far all the wrestling titles appearing on current platforms have been disappointing so far, not nearly measuring up to their predecessors on far less powerful systems.  So, how does this latest title measure up?  Well, while it’s an improvement over Xbox’s RAW, it seems like for every two steps it took forward, it took one back. Graphics: Ok, RAW for the Xbox is easily the best-looking wrestling game ever, so it’s hard to look at Gamecube and judge it fairly.  The animation is incredibly smooth no matter how much is going on, the wrestlers for the most part look like their real life counter parts (Shane looks bad, and for some reason these games can never do the women well), and the wide variety of arenas have good detail.  And Sure, in comparison to Xbox it’s not good, but based purely on it’s own, it’s very well done. Sound: Ok, somebody dropped the ball here.  While the effects themselves are done decently enough, the weird techno funk beat during the game just plain sucks.  And many of the wrestlers don’t have their theme music (Hardys, NWO, Booker, Trish all don’t have their own theme music).  There’s no commentary, but that’s a good thing given how poorly it’s been done in the past. Gameplay: Ok, first I have a problem with the roster: I understand you can’t put everybody in, but that’s no reason to leave out Billy Kidman, Maven, and Hardcore Holly (not to mention a few others).  The engine is somewhat like the Smackdown series, as you pretty much grapple on the fly, but it works a lot better in this game than it does in that series (and guys actually stay down long enough for you to be able to do things like set-up ladders & chairs unlike Smackdown).  And while the championship mode is fun, some matches don’t quite fit (remind me why I have to win a fatal 4-way TLC with Albert, D-Von & Test if I’m going for the cruiserweight title).  But the game does actually keep track of who has what titles, and you can even get your own custom belts (there’s literally enough for everyone to be a champ).  The counter system works great, as you can even counter finishers, and it’s all done realistically.  However, the system relies way too much on counters.  If your playing against a friend that doesn’t like to let you up and you can’t pull of a counter, you are screwed.  And submissions are done way better, but still need work (my friend was able to beat my in an iron man simply because he kept applying a sleeper on me while I was on the ground).  A.I. is way improved over RAW, but still a little flaky (i.e. your partner will take away a table you setup, or spend way too long outside on tag matches). And there’s no run-ins, which is one feature I was really hoping they would keep intact.  But I love the fact that there is a real live ref, that you can distract and knock out, and that takes time to run over and count, and so on.  I don’t think these games have had a ref since the 16-bit days.   Features: Well, it’s a big improvement over RAW, but you can tell it was a little rushed.  Lots of match types including 4-way, TLC, Iron man, rumble, hardcore, table, and so on.  The create-wrestler needs a drastic overhaul.  No masks or face paints, only the simplest shirts, pants and logos, and making your wrestler the correct proportions is way too complicated (whatever happened to just picking type instead of doing it by numbers).  More moves, but still missing a lot.  The faces available just suck (and half look like Goldberg), and the selection of colors is even pretty limited. Funfactor: Albeit it flawed, this is currently the best wrestling game on the market.  I’ve never had more fun and insanity than playing in a fatal 4-way TLC match.  There’s nothing like knocking a guy of a ladder with another ladder, Tazz-plexing a guy through a table, or accidentally grabbing the ref and putting him in your finisher.  The straight out one-on-one matches are a little stale, but there’s more than enough to keep you and (your friends) busy for a long time.  But it’s still not even close to those great wrestling titles of yesteryear. --Final Scores— Graphics:  8.5-Great animation, and good variety of well-done arenas, but not all wrestlers look good, and it’s just hard to get over how good RAW looked. Sound: 6.0-Techno-wannabe-crap music during gameplay, and lots of wrestlers missing theme music.  Sound effects are solid, however. Gameplay: 7.0-System is too reliant on counters, and A.I. is a little flaky, but I really like how easy it easy to do moves, the whole flow of the game, and the live ref. Features: 7,5-While there are plenty of features, one of the most crucial, create-a-wrestler, needs a lot of work. Funfactor: 7.5-If you’re looking for the next No Mercy, this ain’t it.  But it is a solid title in it’s own right and overall the best wrestling game for next gen systems. 7:17:11 AM    comment []