Nintendo Power v236 is the final issue for the year of 2008 and what an issue it turned out to be. Picking up a copy of Nintendo Power is always a bit of a gamble for me as there are usually no open issue for me to browse through first. Thankfully Nintendo Wikia provides a preview of each issue content for me to decide whether the issue is worth picking up and they usually don't disappoint. Nintendo Power is one of the few things related to Nintendo that have remained traditionally-hardcore. After all how many publications would feature Ninja Gaiden : Dragon Sword, GTA: Chinatown Wars and Madworld on their covers? I initially got this issue for the Castlevania poster included and the retrospective look at the Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. I was pleasantly surprised to find a Power Profile feature on Shinji Mikami and also a nice coverage of the recent TGS 2008, complete with an interview with Suda51 on the upcoming No More Heroes 2.
Saturday, December 20, 2008
Power to the People
Nintendo Power v236 is the final issue for the year of 2008 and what an issue it turned out to be. Picking up a copy of Nintendo Power is always a bit of a gamble for me as there are usually no open issue for me to browse through first. Thankfully Nintendo Wikia provides a preview of each issue content for me to decide whether the issue is worth picking up and they usually don't disappoint. Nintendo Power is one of the few things related to Nintendo that have remained traditionally-hardcore. After all how many publications would feature Ninja Gaiden : Dragon Sword, GTA: Chinatown Wars and Madworld on their covers? I initially got this issue for the Castlevania poster included and the retrospective look at the Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. I was pleasantly surprised to find a Power Profile feature on Shinji Mikami and also a nice coverage of the recent TGS 2008, complete with an interview with Suda51 on the upcoming No More Heroes 2.
Sunday, December 14, 2008
Handsome Devil with the Cigarette
Yakuza 3 is scheduled for release in February next year and i haven't even finish playing Yakuza 2 or heard anything of the Kenzan spin-off getting localised. If there is ever a reason to feel proud as a PS3 owner, this is it. Third-party exclusive doesn't get any better than this.
Saturday, December 13, 2008
Fearsome Combination
Apart from a movie adaption being developed with Uwe Boll and Stanley Tong participation very little is known of the fate of the Fear Effect series. However Fear Effect remains as probably the best game to pay homage to HK cinema, a generation before the likes of Jet Li's Rise to Honour and John Woo's Stranglehold. It has all my favourite elements which i still hold dear to me now; survival horror, cel-shaded graphic sand HK cinema so it's little wonder why i still reminisce fondly about Fear Effect.
Wednesday, December 10, 2008
Jack of All Trades
Series pioneer Shu Takumi has since gone on to work on the Ace Attorney series on the GBA and DS so it's highly likely we will ever see the resolution to that ending. But Dino Crisis 2 remains a fond memory of a time when Capcom could do no wrong and were churning out games like a factory.
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
Long Story Short
PN03 on the other hand is reportedly only a five hour game and sure enough i did finish it under six hours on my first try. However i immediately went back to playing it soon after that, this time trying to clear all the side missions as well as the main story mode. I'm only about two-thirds into finishing the game and if factor in the earlier five plus hours i spent on my first run, i would have spent about 20 plus hours on PN03 already. There is barely any story or cutscene in PN03 but yet the burning desire to master Vanessa moves and score professional rank on every mission have me obsessively playing the game non-stop for the past week. Perhaps it's the difference in genre that led to such different playing styles, now i'm starting to wonder should i even bother with Final Fantasy XIII when it ships.
Thursday, December 4, 2008
The Great Repeater
There i was, just moments from finishing FF VII and i felt the urge to cheat my way through the last three boss fights. You see at the start of disc 3, you are given the option of proceeding onto the last stage or continue to level up your characters through the side-missions. Having clocked just slighty over 40 hours of play, i felt that i spend well enough time on the game and bravely proceed onto the final stage. But most of my characters were not really up to task as i rarely spend any time leveling up my two strongest members, Cid and Vincent, they just happen to be powerful right from when i recruit them.
To make things worse you only get one save point troughout the final stage and far too many random battles before you even reach the final boss. When i did get to the final boss, i was overwhelmed by how powerful it and each time that i had to replay it, i had to endure the same pointless random battle before i get another chance at it again. By then I was convinced my characters were not up to the task that i consider cheating my way through. Again, just like i did with FFX a few years back.Unfortunately (or fortunately) I didn't have any cheat disc in my possession that would work with the game and left with no other options, i gave it one last try. I'm absolutely convinced that sometimes in RPG battle, a little luck is required. Luckily for me, the final sephiroth was not as violent as usual so with a little luck i managed to scrape through and finish my third RPG, the second for this year.
Friday, November 28, 2008
Rusty Gear
And i haven't even got to the boring bits like tracking naomi's footprints in Act 2...
Monday, November 17, 2008
Hear My Voice
Then about two-thirds into the game, something happened. Faced with what looks like a clone of herself, she begins to wonder aloud what the heck is going on. I have yet to finish the game but i always figured her to be a clone, a terminator of some kind. Now she just sounds European and her thick accent makes her more foreign than any of the fancy aegis suit that she wears. You know, i bet Franka Potente (Run Lola Run) would be perfect to play her character if they ever do a movie adaption.
The Man with the Glowing Beard
You know what they say about the little deflects that show up whenever you play ps2 games on a ps3 unit that doesn't have hardware-enabled backward compatibility? While i didn't run into any major problem with Silent Hill 3, i did notice one slightly amusing deflect from the game running on my ps3. Remember how Douglas reminded everyone of Donald Sutherland when you first saw him? His beard is certainly a work of art, augmented on the ps3 by the fact that it actually glows in the dark !No kidding during the cutscene where Douglas and Heather are both driving Silent Hill, you can still clearly see his beard behind the misty wet windscreen. Apart from that i'm happy to report that there were no other major deflect, i'm eager to see just how the other games would look like.
Friday, November 14, 2008
24-7
It often happened to me for games that i do not pay for and most recently it happened me again with crisis core so i'm determined not to let that thing happen again with FF VII. i have devise a plan to play the game every day without fail, be it for half an hour or two hours i must play the game at least once a day. Sure a plan like that might eventually make a simple thing like playing games a chore but knowing myself, the tendency of leaving a game as epic as FF VII unfinished is always there. After finishing FF VII, i intend to re-run Advent Children, take another stab at finishing both Dirge of Cerebrus and Crisis Core in order to get the full picture. That is, if i'm not already sick of FF VII by then...
Sunday, November 9, 2008
Straight Story
I remember when i was looking for Godhand with my friend in Singapore and he kept asking me if it was a good game. Worse when i eventually found a copy of it in one of the stores, even the shop assistant who was attending to me, leaned over to ask if this game was any good. Understandably, i ended up not buying the game from that store. Godhand a fighting game that may or may not have been made from the re-used asset and engine of mikami other hit, resident evil 4 caught gamers attention for the wrong reasons when it scored a lowly 3.0 from IGN. I happened to like it because of it's intuitive dodging system and memorable soundtrack composed by the legendary maestros at Grasshopper manufacture.
PN03 was the first of Capcom Five out of the gates and unsurprisingly the only one that was not eventually ported to the ps2 due to its poor critical reception and lukewarm sales. It has the same diamond in the rough feeling as Godhand where presentation are kept to a bare minimum and it's all about the gameplay. The game doesn't take you by the hand and simply thrust you straight into the heat of the action. I was a little caught off-guard by this but have a feeling i'm going to like this as much as Godhand...
Wednesday, November 5, 2008
Back for One
Now that i have the portable screen i can just keep my PSOne handy by my side on the desk instead of having to dig it up whenever i get the urge. Gamers prefer to wait for these PSOne classic to appear on the PSN but if you already own the game initially why bother paying for it again? While i don't actually have an extensive collection of PSOne games i do have everything i could ever want to play on the platform including a few gems i never got around to playing before abandoning the system. Vagrant Story and Syphon Filter 2 were the unfortunate lot as the former get condemned to hell by some of my friends and i lost interest in the latter when the series became a laughing stock with the release of a few poor sequels on the PS2.
Friday, October 31, 2008
Eternal Sonata
Like most great handheld games, it eventually inspire a sequel on the 16-bit Super NES and another back on the GB platform but this is where it all started. I can't believe how naive i was when i first played Resident Evil and heard jill playing moonlight sonata, thinking that it was ripped from Dr. Franken. I immediately thought of Dr. Franken which i still credit as the catalysis for my fascination with the survival horror genre and the game that made me believe video games could be scary even in the 16-bit era. If you are in the mood for some portable horror this halloween, you need to play Dr. Franken.
Sunday, October 19, 2008
Pandora Box
It all started with my friend who told me i didn't know what he went through until i tried the DEVIL mode, having finished the game rather easily on HUMAN mode. When all i wanna to do was to finish the game again to view the extended ending, i certainly didn't expect to be playing the game this thoroughly. Little by little i come to realise i barely scratch the surface of the game when i first played it. In trying to acquire the blue orbs from my unfinished secret missions, i had to learn up every intricate move in Dante and Nero fighting style as the game is so highly customistable that you could actually finish the game without having to learn the fighting style or weapon that you don't fancy. Though some of the tactics are highly questionable such as engaging the Pandora missile pod to fly over a stream of laser beams you are supposed to jump and avoid, i don't think it necessary counts as cheating as the game never really tells how you are suppose to accomplish your goals. I come to learn and appreciated Dante's Pandora box and Gilgamesh and even Nero's hold with the devil bringer.
Devil May Cry 4 carried over the scoring system from DMC3 which you actually save all your high scores on one common scoreboard, making it easy to compare your previous runs. In the end, i probably enjoyed replaying DMC4 now than i did when i first played it, which is rare when it comes to most games. Production Studio 1 who are responsible for both DMC3&4 has managed to achieve what kamiya set out to do with the first Devil May Cry. A game that not everyone will like but for those who do, like will be a bit of an understatement.
Friday, October 17, 2008
Wii're Alright
All that is about to change come next year as there are actually more third party Wii titles that i'm interested in compared with the Playstation3, or any other systems for that matter. On top of the Nintendo Gamecube games which i have, the Wii has keep me entertained and thrilled pretty well during this year and yet that's still so much i have yet to experienced on the system, i haven't even got started on the Virtual Console store yet! What impressed me most is how reliable the system is, the backward compartibility is just perfect and every game that i played, Wii or Gamecube runs smoothly without any hiccups or slowdowns even the supposedly glitchy Okami Wii. So as long as suda51 and capcom keeps supporting the Nintendo Wii, i'll be a happy camper for a long time to come.
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
A Night with Symphony
I'm amazed at how much innovations Symphony has introduced and yet, somehow all the games that followed in the series failed to adopt it. The ability to transform to both a wolf and a bat, though isn't much of any use in the puzzles or the boss battle is still a welcome addition to the series. The ability to equip different weapon in both arms, clothes and equipment that appear on-screen when equipped, it's easy to see why Symphony of the Night is such a beloved entry in the series. Perhaps it's not fair to compare Symphony with the Castlevania GBA and DS games that followed, after all Symphony was a console game and i have always maintained that console and handheld game are very different, especially in the nature of the time and resources invested by the developers onto the project.
I'm hard-pressed to decide which one i liked better between Symphony and Rondo of Blood, being an action junkie Rondo of Blood felt like the Die Hard of the series with it's endless boss battles and straight-forward action approach while Symphony was amazingly innovative.
Sunday, October 12, 2008
November Rain
Perhaps it's not such a bad thing that the game release date has slipped into November, i have way too many orders waiting to be ship out during the month of October and most are not even game-related. Given the current situation, i might just have to download the game to play while i continued my hunt for it. Chances are there might be game stores in singapore that will bring it in since the influx of PAL DS games into the region.
Wednesday, October 8, 2008
Black on White
Personally i'm not too pleased with the decision as i went though a lot of trouble to acquire those Gamecube titles that i really want to play. It's not that i'm sore about these title getting a re-release and being widely available again but the reality is, i already had my "fix" and would rather look forward to future Wii release. But to be fair, the Gamecube had a relatively short shelf life and its amazing software library deserve to be revived to a new audience however i for one will probably not indulge in any of these re-release.
Well maybe just the Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker for obvious reasons.
Tuesday, October 7, 2008
7th Heavan
Saturday, October 4, 2008
Heavan Can't Wait
So as it turns out, i waited a little too long to come to a decision and lucked out on this one as the Greatest Hits version of Dracula X Chronicles has already been issued and Play-asia is no longer carrying the black label version. Well there's always the shadier side of Singapore games stores which i can turn to should i still intend on hunting down the black label Dracula X Chronicles. Lesson learnt, looks like i better pre-order the upcoming Castlevania Judgment for the Wii soon.
Friday, October 3, 2008
Trigger Finger
In Lost Planet, the top two shoulder buttons (L1,R1) are used to align the character focus either 90 degrees to the left or right while the bottom two shoulder buttons (L2,R2) are free up to fire your primary and secondary weapons. Very practical though unusual setup of controls, it functions pretty well but the same goes the Gamecube shoulder buttons is that i can never tell the difference between pressing the button completely and lightly pressing it.
Kinda defeats the purpose doesn't it?
Wednesday, October 1, 2008
Two Steps Forward Two Steps Back
In the end, you get a Capcom game that is more Japanese (in terms of storytelling) than their previous efforts and yet, more Western (in gameplay) than anything they've done before. It's a strange fusion of East meets West, not the most successful attempt by Capcom but a real effort to address some of the shortcomings of traditional japanese game style, though unnecessary in my eyes.
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
Yakuza Second Run
Number of completed sub-scenerios - 16
Percentage of moves acquired - 78%
Number of defeated enemies - 816 KOs
Percentage of coin lockers opened - 10%
Number of retries - 9 times
Number of saves - 35 times
Play time - 14:59
Monday, September 22, 2008
Okami Play Scores
Devil May Cry was a short but very sweet game, a nice length for an action game but yet somehow kamiya still managed to ruin it by plugging in an on-the-rails shooting/flying segment with the final boss. Viewtiful Joe was far worse, upon beating the final boss you are treated to an ending that revealed that it's not quite the end of Viewtiful Joe and co yet. I don't exactly remember much of the last level as i thought the game sort of fizzle out after the big boss fight with Fire Leo, probably because i had to cheat my way through the rest of the way. Okami? Plain awful final boss and a rather abrupt ending similar to the first Viewtiful Joe, i wonder if it would have felt more fulfilling had ReadyatDawn left the original credit sequence in there?
Play time - 56hr 29min 53sec
Days passed - 88
Saves - 98
Deaths - 0
Enemies defeated - 450
Money gained - 2429823 yen
Demon fangs found - 96
Praise earned - 4190
There you go, i have finally finished the game. Man, i feel like i deserved a medal for this!
Sunday, September 21, 2008
If You Wanna Rock, You Gotta Roll...
If you happened to follow my blog you would know i have a tendency to replay old games in anticipation of new ones and in an effort to prepare for the new Megaman 9, i picked up the Megaman Anniversary Collection to replay the first eight Megaman installments. I have been contemplating which versions to get but since i found the Gamecube version at a nice bargain price i decided to go with that. Its exclusive content also happens to be far more enticing, now i'll just have to see if i got the skills to make it past all eight games as Megaman is notorious for its difficulty.
Thursday, September 18, 2008
Dawn of a New Order
It seems that Play has wise up to their customers scheming ways. In the past, they would do partial shipment whenever the other items in your order is already in-stock but not without giving you the full discount on your initial invoice. That way, if you were to cancel your remaining order before it's shipped, you would have earned the full discount on only a partial shipment.
I have unintentionally exploit this to my advantage when i ordered Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow along with another game back when supply of the game was begining to become scarce and rumour started to persist about the low print run. Play partial shipped out the other game in the order which i believe was Sprung, discounted down to USD14.90 after the full USD5 discount. However they took a bit too long in securing new supply of Dawn of Sorrow and during the wait, i managed to buy the game at a local game store as i simply didn't want to take the risk. So i ended up canceling the remaining order with Play and in the process, earned the full USD5 discount on only a partial order USD19.90.
Things seem to have changed as Play have not partial ship my order for the upcoming Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia even though some of the items are already in-stock. Perhaps it has something to do with me using a bigger discount of USD10 off this time?
Sunday, September 14, 2008
Unspeakable Secret
Ever had something you wish you could blog about but couldn't because of the possible people who might end up reading it? It's horrible it's even worse than not having anything to blog about, i'll tell you that.
I apologise for the long hiatus, everything is fine and well gaming-wise and otherwise. Got some great stuff to you guys in the coming days so just hang in there.
Tuesday, September 9, 2008
Order of the Day
I haven't decided yet whether i will play it as soon as i get it, seeing that i have yet to play Portrait of Ruins.
Sunday, September 7, 2008
Bittersweet Symphony
Having finished Jeanne D'arc recently , i thought of playing Symphony of the Night on the Dracula X Chronicles so as to drum up some hype for the upcoming Order of the Ecclesia released on the DS next month. I missed the sound of UMD spinning in the disc drive and it's always a good time to give it a good spin after running on the memory stick for so long. I always thought that the Dracula X Chronicles was a really good value for money as you are essentially getting three games for the price of one. I would probably have spent more time on it had it not been for the language barrier on the japan import, it's certain not impossible to play given Rondo of Blood distinctly old school lack of menu and text.
But Symphony was a slightly newer game with a little more emphasis on RPG so there was always that worry there. I'm going to try to play it on the import version and if it really does prove too difficult, there always the US version recently discounted on Play-asia. When i initially boot up Symphony, the graphics took a little getting used to as it was from an era of Castlevania that i was not entirely familiar with. Widely regarded as the pinnacle of the series, this should keep me busy for some time to come.
Saturday, September 6, 2008
Once a Thief
All in all i took about 40 hours to finish the game, leveling up most of my characters to about 60+ level and a pretty good accomplishment for someone who doesn't indulge in RPG like myself.
Now i'm ready to tackle Rogue Galaxy !
Thursday, September 4, 2008
Stranglehold Second Play-through
My second play-through Stranglehold was thoroughly more enjoyable than the first, marred only by some occasional skipping of the action on my Playstation 3. The freezing was less apparent on my first run, maybe it has something to do with me turning up the difficulty a notch from casual to normal? Anyway the game froze on two occasion causing me to reluctantly force-shut down the machine and later downloading the patch for the game. i wonder if the patch actually did any good apart from adding a new hard boiled difficulty mode?
Enemies defeated - 1234
Highest style combo - 33
Style point earned - 2884
Paper cranes found - 96
Damage to world - $ 153,664,459
Overall ranking - C
Monday, September 1, 2008
Think Tank
It has happened again, years ago when i first played FFX i got all the way to the final sin and was unable to proceed because i didn't level up my characters properly. Now i just got to stage 35 of Jeanne D'arc and i faced the same dilemma only this time, the solution is less clear cut. I relied too much on my archers and magicians early on, leveling them up quite a fair bit only to reach the end and come to the startling realisation that they aren't very useful against big bosses. I neglected my brawlers (or some FAQers refer to as tanks) and have to now level them up evenly if i were to stand any chance against the big bad boss.
So close yet so far, i had a friend who spent more than 60 hours on this game alone, i wonder if all that time was spent leveling up?
Sunday, August 31, 2008
3 is The Magic Number
Thursday, August 28, 2008
Better Than a Dozen Die Hards
The film mark the high point of John Woo career when the man in the top of his game and ready to move to the greener pastures of Hollywood. It also significant for me as it bridges the gap between my early infatuation with Woo and later admiration of the works of tony leung and wong kar-wai. I begin to admire the subtle acting method of tony as opposed to the often over-acting and dramatic style of chow.
This disc best demonstrate the true power of blu-ray, both the game and possibly best presentation of the movie on a single blu-ray disc! Seeing how good Hard Boiled look makes me glad that i lucked out on the earlier standard edition and got this instead. Afte rall, the movie is definitely the highlight of the disc despite being 16 years older than the game. However i find the cover of the standard edition more enticing than this collector edition, perhaps because Chow looks more like tony leung on that cover.
Wednesday, August 27, 2008
Are you Blu or Are you Blind?
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Stranglehold Scores
Enemies defeated - 1264
Highest style combo - 32
Style point earned - 2857
Paper cranes found - 110
Damage to world - $ 146,048,617
Overall ranking - C -
Monday, August 25, 2008
The Dead Will Rise
Sunday, August 24, 2008
October Rain
Next was the PAL version of Metal Gear Solid 3 Subsistence, the standard edition for the PAL market comes with all three discs included while the US version only had two disc as the standard edition. While i won't mind the standard two-disc US version at that time, it too became scarce when i was about to purchase it so i have to settle for the PAL three-disc version. Most recently was the konamistyle edition of Castlevania Dracula X Chronicles, probably my biggest purchase so far. i thought about it for some time and even hesitated a while primarily because it wasn't cheap but since it happens to be close to October, i thought what the hell.
This year, the only release in the month of October which i'm interested in is Suda51's Flower, sun and rain but sadly, no US release date has been announced yet. The only other option is the PAL version scheduled for release this October, however shipping it from HMV is not going to be cheap, what with the postage rates they charge.
Saturday, August 23, 2008
Home is Where The Heart is
I suppose it has something to do with my distinct taste for gaming, as you can tell from this blog i don't usually play a wide-variety of games, in fact my friend would go so far as to pigeon-holed it as "anything horror or gothic with guns & bullets in it". While i don't deny the appeal, i would suppose it's one of the reason why i got so many system to cater to my distinct taste. One game coming out this Fall quickly slipping out of my radar is Silent Hill: Homecoming which received even less attention during this recent Leipzig. Is the game coming out this Fall and has everyone forgotten about it? One thing's for sure, i won't be getting it on release day as i decided to wait it out until the price drops. The reason?
There's no collector edition announced.
Friday, August 22, 2008
Coyote Chow
Thursday, August 21, 2008
Into the Blu
I always made the excuse that i can barely keep up collecting games so that's why i don't collect blu-ray movies. Judging from my pattern of owning multiple copies of the same game, it's a probably good idea to keep away from the temptation of blu-rays. The truth is i used to be an avid collector of DVD during the DVD boom and it pains me to have to start all over again. Sure i'm sure many faced the same dilemma and i have seen some new blu-ray collector letting go of their old DVD collection to fund their new interest. I for one do not intend to do the same though it's not to say that i would completely ignore the format, the blu-ray version of newer films are still the most viable way to go. As for older movies, those that i already owned i intend to keep and won't necessarily upgrade to blu-ray unless the new version happens to have some new features.
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
Grindhouse
Yes i know, it's not something that i'm proud of and hopefully it won't happen again with Jeanne D'arc.
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
Dead Out of Stock
Monday, August 18, 2008
Number Crunchers
I'm glad it's coming to the Wii and with the development team at Capcom Japan re-designing the game from the ground up using the RE4 engine, the end result should be promising. Of all the games coming to the PS3 and Wii, this is the one i'm most looking forward to and no, i'm not kidding.
Sunday, August 17, 2008
Lost in Amazon
As you probably know Amazon does not provide free shipping overseas and shipping for books aren't cheap so i actually talked my friend Andy into ordering one for himself in order to save on postage! One problem solved then came the day when it would finally arrived, about 10 days after it was shipped from US. All that came was a little pink slip asking the recipient to pick it up from the post office collection centre in downtown. Being a bit of an otaku, i had no idea where is this collection centre so getting there was going to be a bit of a problem. So in the end, i got my dad to drive me down on a Saturday while i navigate our way with a roadmap. When i finally got there and went inside their storeroom, it looked like the warehouse where they stored the ark in Raiders of the Lost Ark. Apparently the parcel could not be shipped to my home address as it was encased in a M-bag (which looks more like a fishnet to me) and the post office had no authority to open it.
So i got home and open the parcel only to discover that the book shipped all the way from US was actually printed in HK! Oh the irony of that, Play-asia could have stocked it so i wouldn't have to go through all that trouble just to get it.
Saturday, August 16, 2008
Violent Reaction
Friday, August 15, 2008
Art of Life
It didn't work out quite like what i expected, ordering the book did not spurred me to play the game further (though i'm still playing it) and i wouldn't be passing it to andy as he wouldn't be making it to tomorrow's gathering. Oh well, that's life right?
Thursday, August 14, 2008
High for Five
Now the past few collector edition has mostly been Gamestop/EBgames exclusive so naturally were very difficult to obtain especially if you don't live in the states. Metal Gear Solid 4 and Ninja Gaiden Sigma were the most notable examples though some were still able to buy it off eBay but not without paying an arm and leg for it. Since i already missed the Collector Edition for MGS4 and DMC4 (and Sigma while we are at it), there is no way i'm not getting this one ! As you know i'm an absolute RE nut and so that's why i think i'll pass on the upcoming konamistyle edition of Castlevania: Order of Eccelsia in order to save for this one.
Wednesday, August 13, 2008
Paper paper
Now i'm not familiar with japanese art style but paper filter effect to someone with a casual eyes like myself just looks like hazy, grainy, blurry effect. I really wonder if the developers intentionally created such an art look for the original version or they just couldn't get the ps2 to generate such rich vibrant colors? After all, the gamespot reviewer remarked that the Gamecube version of Viewtiful Joe had richer more vibrant colors than the subsequent ps2 port. This is all just pure speculation from my side unless someone is able to provide me with some proof that the paper filter on the original ps2 version was intentional. Anyone?
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
Prepare to Go Ballistic
Monday, August 11, 2008
We Can Remember It for You Wholesale
You see, since i got the new console i haven't really got the chance to go shopping for games especially early generation games which i might have missed, or even some old PS2 gems since i got a BC unit. I'm the sort of guy who likes having a stack (a small one, preferably) of games by my side just waiting for me to play and I have compiled a list of games which i have been meaning to make a trip down to Singapore to look for.
1. Zack & Wiki
Yes, i haven't given up on looking for this title and i'm fairly confident i should be able to find it there. i've seen it selling in several stores and since most asian wii users don't normally buy original games there's a good chance it might still be there.
2. Ace Attorney 3
The final episode in the Phoenix Wright is just golden, it was never released in Europe and and came out shortly before Apollo Justice so i suspected it had a pretty low print run. Of course, there is always the Japanese import version available but since i owned the US version of both the earlier two episodes i would really like to keep it consistent in completing the trilogy.
3. Stranglehold
I have been following this game all the way from development to release and still haven't played it yet! The collector's edition would be perfect as i don't think i want the regular edition anymore after missing out on getting it for less than USD 20. I always make it a point to only get games that i would play more than once and this one fits the bill perfectly. On top of it, i'm a real big fan of John Woo and Chow Yun-fat.
4. God Hand
A bit of a odd one, i made a pact with Andy to pick this up the last time as it was selling cheap and was on offer if you buy more than one. I don't remember the details but i never got around to buying it then, i still want this one for the sake of completion because i also happened to be a big fan of shinji mikami and despite what the reviews said, i liked this game.