All You Can Carry

Resident Evil mini-games are usually a hit or miss.

For every the 4th Survivor, there is uhm, what is that Code Veronica mini-game called again?

RE Zero has its own mini-game called the Leech Hunter. I never gave this mini-game much of a fair shake until now.

It follows the first Mercenaries reward system. You want infinite ammo in the story mode? You got to finish Leech Hunter first and do it well. There are no countdown timer in this, your only challenge here is the inventory slot. You are tasked with collecting 50 leeches each for Billy and Rebecca within the training facility. You can't drop the leeches once you picked them up and each item slot can only carry up to 10 leeches. Obviously as you reached closer to 50 leeches, the game gets progreesively harder because your inventory gets tighter.

It's pretty challenging, never has inventory management in a RE game became so critical. Some players came up with the loophole of wiping all the enemies in the facility before picking up any leeches since there is no timer. Sure that could work but the danger is if you die in the middle of combat then all the hard work is wasted. Your leech count at time of death would be very little if you used this strategy. 

This mini-game is carefully thought out, you can only pick up the right color leech for each character. This prevents using Billy as the attacker and leaving Rebecca as the supply mule. You need to use both character as according to how the leeches are scattered and there are 3 random arrangements for the leech and weapons each time you play.

This is one of the better mini-games in the RE series. The RE0 game itself isn't all that great but bear in mind that REHD or any other RE game during this era never had any mini-games.

Forgotten Wolf

One of the first games I finished this year was The Legend of Zelda: The Twilight Princess. I felt like playing and finishing this Zelda game was a grand adventure itself.

First of all, I owned a Gamecube copy of the game and while my Wii is completely compatible with Gamecube, it's much more convenient playing the Wii version. That saves me the trouble of hooking up a Gamecube controller and memory card but more importantly, it tracks my playing time on.  So long story short, I was finally able to play the Wii version once I started running roms on the hard drive.

I loved my first Zelda console game The Wind Waker but there is no denying that The Twilight Princess is the better game. The Wii controls integrated into the game late in the development are a mixed bag for me while it's certainly useful when aiming in first person view, the use of Wii controls during combat feels tiring and cumbersome.

What really separates this game from the the Wind Waker were the dungeons, the staple of all Zelda games. The dungeons in the Twilight Princess were simply epic and really make you use each and every tool that you acquired throughout the game. There were a lot of the dungeons featured in this game and each of the dungeon were designed differently so it never felt like more of the same thing. 

I always thought that each of the recent Zelda game has a very clear theme, the Wind Waker was an experience set in the sea while Skyward Sword was obviously an adventure set in the sky. So where does that leaves The Twilight Princess? Well, The Twillight Princess covers all grounds, there was a dungeon buried deep beneath the sea and the last dungeon takes Link all the way up to the skies. Now I can't imagine playing the Skyward Sword and being confined to an adventure in the sky. 

Some fans complained that in between all of these impressive dungeons is a barren wasteland which offer little or not much to do. That's true but complaining about that is sort of missing the point, after all the dungeons are what most fans paid money to play and here they are scarily good. 

The Rule of Four

Capcom's rule of four seems to suggest that by the time a franchise reaches the fourth installment. a major rehash is in order. Tecmo may have took this theory to heart when they were developing the fourth installment of the Fatal Frame series. Collaborating with Grasshoppers and Nintendo on a new platform, a change of things was definitely in order.

Visually the game looks and plays a lot like the Ashley chapter in Resident Evil 4, completed with all the lighting effects that made the Gamecube version incomparable during its time. The control takes a bit of getting used to with a combination of classic and motion controls blended together but i liked to think it adds tension to the game much like the archaic controls of the early Resident Evil games. Many series veterans have lamented that this new installment on the Nintendo Wii has been dumbed down to cater a new audience but i didn't really get that feeling. There were plenty of cheap scares early on and the game generally feels creepy, it's definitely been a while since i had the hair on the back of my neck standing.

Easter Hunting

I was doing my own Easter hunting this last weekend only it wasn't Easter eggs i was hunting for but video games. I was with a friend combing over all the game stores in singapore, big or small in search for bargains and rare games. Though i did managed to amass a nice haul of games this time, i could have gone for broke and grab the rare copy of Ace Attorney: Trials & Tribulations which i have a feeling i will regret later. I didn't prepare a list or have anything particular in mind this time around so i really wasn't expecting much especially since i have another haul of games arriving later this month.

The Metroid Trilogy is undoubtedly the highlight i wasn't interested in this collector's edition a while back having failed to be impressed with metroid prime hunters but after my friend started gushing about how great the series is (bar hunter) and even showing me his copy of the CE, i just knew i had to have it. I found the only copy in HMV City Link but still wasn't prepared to shell out full bucks, having just got Dead Rising and Uncharted during Gamescore Wii promotion earlier that day. As it turns out, i managed to snagged the Metroid Trilogy at stock clearance price the next day where i would least expect to find it but i supposed it all makes sense as most wouldn't go there to buy games. Notice the Uncharted happens to be the original black label packaging? Another nice find at Gamescore as these 're-packaged' Greatest Hits are a collector's dream come true, original black labels at Greatest Hits price though i was actually planning to get Uncharted 2 but prices for those were still too expensive. Despite all this new stuff, i still have more coming my way later this month which you should keep your eyes peeled for.

You Only Live Twice

There was a common theory that Separate Ways was conceived or at least the idea of it before the Gamecube version of RE4 even shipped. That it was held back so Capcom would have the added incentive to tempt gamers who played RE4 on the Gamecube to pick it up again. There are parts of the game that feels pretty clever how like the developers manage explain what happened to leon jacket but then there are also parts that doesn't make any sense at all.

Take the part where chapter 2 ends and chapter 3 begins, at the end of chapter 2 we see ada watching in the shadow as luis sera dies and the sample falls into saddler's hands. Then she proceeds to radio wesker and tells him the location of the sample only to arrive at the start of chapter 3 when she meets krauser and ask him the same thing wesker just asked her only moments again. Ok so the scene where krauser is having a conversation with ada while playing with his knife was in the original game but you would think the developers could have done a better job of making the scenes all tied up. Of course this could go on forever like did krauser actually die in Separate Ways or the end of Assignment Ada? It's pretty clear that ada was the one who put him away for good but it's as how mikami intended in Assignment Ada or what kawata envisioned in Separate Ways?

Separate Opinion

Now that i have finished No More Heroes i can really sink my teeth into RE4 Wii edition to see how much better it's compared with the Gamecube version. With the help of some save files on gamefaqs, i was able to unlock everything from the go and immediately jump into Assignment Ada and Separate Ways. True enough, Assignment Ada does feature knife attacks now so it's possible for RE fanatics to do their knife-runs. As much as i liked the Wii controls i also notice it makes the game almost too easy to play, aiming is second nature and you can switch back and forth between knife attack instantaneously. I didn't even get hit one bit by krauser during my first run on assignment ada which i usually struggled before.

Separate Ways is definitely re-built from the ground up using the Gamecube engine so everything looks on par with the rest of the game. I have heard that ada model is ripped definitely from the ps2 version without any enhancements so that could possibly be the only downside of this Wii edition. The cutscenes are also in FMV like the ps2 version but since Separate Ways doesn't feature any alternative costume, it's not such a major issue. It has taken me a long time to finally play the Wii edition but i'm glad the time is finally here since i told myself i won't bother with it until i'm on LCD display.

Wii Edition Impressions

I finally finished playing Resident Evil 4 on professional mode last night, the entire run took roughly two hours more than my previous and seeing that i clocked a Leon death count of triple digits, i suspected a lot of the time was spent replaying some of the more difficult set pieces in the game. I had my copy of the Wii edition ready with me so by the time the credits finished rolling, i immediately popped in it for comparisons.

Sure enough, the Wii edition is indeed enhanced 16:9 widescreen so you don't have the black borders if you are on widescreen display. A couple of minor issues worth noting, Capcom has included all the game demos that played when the game is left idle from the previous versions and had enough sense to change the gameplay scenes to Wii controls so that's a really nice touch. The game manual also has a couple of extra pages introducing the supporting cast of RE4 which i really liked, complete with classic quote from the game and a portrait shot. The bonus trailer of Umbrella Chronicles included does a good job of tempting gamers to buy it but i wished Capcom didn't try to disguise it by sneaking it onto the extras menu and calling it a bonus video. No shame in advertising your product if it's a quality game and Umbrella Chronicles certainly deserves much better.

Now onto the game itself the controls are as great as what reviewers have raved about, it's hard to believe the Wii controls lend itself so well to the game without dumbing it down. I like the little buzz from the Wii mote speaker when Hunnigan radios Leon and kinda wish Capcom would have included her dialogue onto the speaker ala No More Heroes but seeing it's a two way conversation between Leon, it would be a little difficult to realised. I do foresee the inventory menu being a bit cumbersome with the Wii controls, Capcom should have just went all the way and implement a drag and drop function for that whole part. Of course the big question remains whether the previously-ps2 exclusive Separate Ways campaign was completely redone in the original Gamecube game engine but unfortunately you still have to finish the main campaign in order to unlock it. Perhaps i can steal a save file from somewhere just to see for myself first.

Days of Being Wide

Contrary to what i earlier thought the new Resident Evil Archives does indeed support widescreen display unfortunately the game itself isn't made widescreen-ready (if there is such a term). This is based on what i have gathered so far as i have yet to purchase the new Archives or even test the original NGC version on my new setup.

Remember back when everyone was on 4:3 display and you always get letterbox borders when viewing widescreen movies on dvd? Well this is similar except now your display is widescreen while the source of the presentation is still well, 4:3 wide. Thus if you have your Wii set to 16:9 display then RE archives will have black borders on both sides to preserve the 4:3 aspect ratio. In a way the game is now widescreen-friendly but without sacrificing the original aspect ratio of the game. Alternatively if you want the image to be stretched across your widescreen display you have to "trick" your Wii by changing to 4:3 display in the settings and then manually adjusting from your TV remote to stretch to 16:9 display. The NGC version i believed doesn't have this feature and because of this will always appear to be "fullscreen" regardless of your type of display. The solution therefore is really quite simple if you have 4:3 display you should stick to the NGC version while if you have a 16:9 display then you should really get this new version. Assuming you are the type of person who actually cares about preserving the original aspect ratio. Of course the real solution is Capcom should really have made this the definitive version by going widescreen though i heard it's a bit impossible considering the backgrounds are all pre-rendered.

Metal Geared

I didn't have a good experience with my first Metroid game being Metroid Prime Hunters on the DS so naturally when the Big N announced that they are re-packaging all three Metroid games onto one Wii disc, i was still sitting on the fence whether or not i should purchase it. Then i saw the promotion pictures of how the box art would look and i was sold, the game housed in a metal tin box with a cardboard jacket looks pretty tempting indeed. To top it off, Nintendo is sure to step up and deliver updated controls and visual to the first two NGC games, unlike the recent Resident Evil Archives. The only shame here is Retro Studios are no longer developing the series and the price is still a little too steep for three old games bundled into one. My only concern at the moment is this going to be the standard version for all copies of the game or it is limited like numerous collector's edition?

Borderline Annoying

I rushed home today to find that my Biohazard Organic Dioramas have arrived promptly from Play-asia so someone should have got their commission by now and hopefully would return the good deed soon. These diorama looked better than i expected, i can't wait to display them and would certainly consider completing the entire set of six in due time. Since Resident Evil Archives was also released yesterday, i thought it might be a good time to reflect on my current decision whether or not to re-purchase the game.

Early impressions were as expected, the game supports progressive scan of 480p but unfortunately lacks 16:9 widescreen support. The widescreen support probably won't bother me a week ago but now that i'm on widescreen display and don't intend to switch my Wii back to the 4:3 tv, it has become a bigger issue than before. I really can't stand black borders around the screen, the RE4 NGC version has tested my limits so buying a Wii edition of REmake just for the sake of collection now doesn't seems like such a good decision. Another thing worth noting was one gamer commented that the NGC version runs on "full widescreen" on the Wii without having to adjust anything while the Wii edition doesn't though bear in mind neither of these are actually true widescreen. If that is indeed the case then too bad for the latecomers and RE4 band wagoners out there, i will probably confirm with my NGC version soon and see if it's possible to continue to play that version until the price of Wii edition comes down.

Wii Deserve Better

Now that i have the proper HD TV setup that i have been longing for i can finally play the ps3 like it was meant to be played. In the process i also couldn't resist hooking up my Wii to it as well despite the Wii not being a pure HD console. Actually with some decent component cables, the Wii doesn't look too bad on a LCD screen from my early playtest of No More Heroes. The same unfortunately cannot be said of Gamecube game running on the Wii, Resident Evil 4 NGC looks absolutely terrible with letterbox borders and a very blurry image compared with NMH. I'm sure not all Gamecube games looked this bad as Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes demo theatre looked pretty dazzling with progressive scan mode on. I'm tempted to switch over to my Wii edition of RE4 to see if it's any better now that i'm on LCD display but i'm already halfway through professional mode so i'll try to make it as quick and painless as possible. These are some of the games i have tested on the new display over the weekend, the best part of it all is seeing them again and how much better they looked on LCD display.

State of Panic

You can probably tell by now that i use my Wii to play Gamecube games more often than Wii games these days. A pair of AA batteries can last me for a great deal of months, even more so now that i sort of drifted off playing Oneechanbara on a consistent basis. Yup i replaced my AA batteries so rarely that the thought of getting re-chargables AA has never occur to me, i had a terrible experience using them with my first Gameboy and would really like to avoid them as long as i can.

So imagine my surprise when i was about to replace my AA batteries last night after a long period of use and reached out to my supply of spare AA batteries only to discover that two have leaked! I have built up a healthy supply of AA batteries over time but it seems i'm not using them up fast enough for them to outlive their usefulness. This sends me to a state of panic because now i have to use the remaining ones as fast as possible so they don't leak like the last two. It doesn't help that i hardly any Wii games i'm eager to play right now, be it new or the ones i have completed. Guess it may be time to look for some new Wii games after all, there is only so much Oneechan one can take.

7" Wonder

While i was at a local game store last week i spotted a 7" portable LCD screen for the Wii, something similar to the 5" screen i have been using with my PSOne. I do admit i loved my 5" PSOne screen to bits, having the comfort of playing games right on the desk of my room but i just don't see myself doing the same with the Wii just yet. Gamecube game perhaps but playing Wii games where you have to point the wii-mote at the screen sounds like a nightmare with the 7" screen. Frankly i can bear with playing PSOne games on a small screen because of the low resolutions which don't look especially good when blown up to a huge television screen but i still think that Wii and Gamecube game should be appreciated on a bigger screen.

The price is pretty tempting, about half the price of a korean Wii set but i don't know how long these babies will still be on the shelf. Probably not long enough till the day when i decide that Wii and Gamecube games don't look that great anymore and would prefer to play it on a smaller screen.

That Was Then This Is Now

Capcom finally unveiled what looks to be the final box art for the release of Resident Evil Remake on the Wii. While it's mostly what i have expected with the white borders and all, i realised it could have been a lot worse. Now my decision to purchase another copy of Resident Evil hinges almost entirely on how this final box art will look as i have a history of being very picky with box arts, meaning strictly no budget reprints to ruin my collection.

Things became a little complicated when speculations came about that Capcom plans to release both REmake and RE0 together as a double pack for USD30 as i had no intentions to buying another copy of RE0, having already own two copies of that game. It did sound a little too good to be true to have both game retailing for only USD30 although Capcom did eventually published a double pack for that same price during the tail-end of the Gamcube era, that was then and this is now. These were and still are high quality Resident Evil games, able to stand with some of the best the Nintendo Wii has to offer, it would be foolish to think that Capcom would consider selling them together for that price.

Another Code

I have two versions of Code: Veronica which i'm contemplating which to play during my RE marathon leading up to RE5. I decided to try RE Code: Veronica on my ps3 since i managed to transfer my old ps2 game saves to my HD after picking up the memory card adaptor recently.

In this brief impression of the 80GB ps3 backward-compatibility with RE Code: Veronica, i'm sad to say that the game doesn't run as smooth as i hoped it would. Core game aside, i briefly try out the unlocked battle mode with umbrella bikini-ed Claire and to my dismay, the frame rate dips where there are more than five zombies on the scene at once. I couldn't tell from the game running but being a gun fanatic, i could tell from the sounds of the automatic gunfire that the game is not running as smoothly as it should. It's not to the point of the game being unplayable but it does get to you if you love the sound of gun-fire as much as i do.

To Sony credit, this was originally a Sega Dreamcast game before being ported to the Playstation2 and Gamecube so perhaps porting the code to run on the ps2 was already difficult enough much less to run on the ps3 with limited backward compatibility. Yet somehow i have a feeling i won't encounter such problems running the Gamecube version on my Nintendo Wii.

Wii're Alright

Wii are one today, actually more like one year and about five days old but it's been one heck of a year as far as the Wii is concerned. I have been pretty careful when it comes to selecting my Wii games chiefly because of the amount of shovelware available for the system so as a result, i have more or less the same amount of games for the Nintendo Wii then i do for my four-months old Playstation3!

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.

Number Crunchers

A lot of issue has been made about the technical difficulties of porting Dead Rising to a lesser platform like the Wii, chiefly like how many zombies will appear on the screen at once? After all, the original Xbox360 was an average game made great by the mere number of zombies Capcom were able to generate on-screen at once and also the number of creative ways you could disperse the zombies. I have always been a firm supporter of playing games on their original platform and would really just contradict myself if i were to proclaim that the Wii version would be superior to the original Xbox360 version. I'm however, a lot more optimistic about how the Wii version would turn out than most, simply because i believed in the potential of the platform. I was an avid player of the Mercenaries Mode in Resident Evil 4 and was really amazed by the number of zombies on-screen at once on the Gamecube version having gotten used to the PS2 version. It made me believe that the Gamecube and PS2 version of Resident Evil 4 were indeed worlds apart and the Gamecube was a much more capable hardware than the PS2. And now the Wii is capable of so much more too, sure it will never match the PS3 and Xbox360 in the technical department but we have yet to witness just what the little white box is capable of.

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.

Paper paper

I was playing Okami on the Wii last night when the rolling demo kick in at the start menu after leaving your controller idle for too long. I'm sure it was footage taken directly from the playstation2 version because it had a completely different look to it, the infamous paper filter effect of the ps2 version.

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?

Wii love Suda

and Suda51 loves Nintendo. Sure it's probably a business strategy for Grasshopper Manufacture to develop games for Nintendo given its relatively low development cost and large user base but over the years, Nintendo has played host to some of Suda's finest work.

killer7, Suda's US debut was originally meant to be a Gamecube exclusive before Capcom started with their multiplatform strategy but the Gamecube version remained as arguably the definitive version of Suda's debut. No More Heroes, a sort of spiritual sequel to killer7 is Nintendo Wii exclusive and still reigns as one of the finest third party action games on the platform. Fatal Frame VI, another love child of Suda and Nintendo collaboration was recently released in Japan to favourable reviews.

Now, the Nintendo DS is about to play host to another Suda game, Flower, Sun and Rain, a Playstation2 title originally available only in Japan, completely remade from the ground up for Nintendo's popular handheld.I have seen the demo of the game and frankly, the 3D engine for the DS version looks like an early PSOne game it certainly looks like the developers are taking a lot of constraints in shrinking this Playstion2 title to the Nintendo DS. It still looks mighty enticing and being a Nintendo fan, it looks like i'm going to have to get used to being compromised as the Wii developers at Capcom are apparently facing major hurdles too in bringing Dead Rising to Nintendo Wii.

Zero-ing on My Options

Biohazard Zero Wii was just released in Japan today and i don't know what's left to say about the game that i haven't said before already. Granted i haven't actually got the chance to talk about the game seeing that i started this blog shortly after finishing the game. I was always far more infatuated with the Gamecube remake mainly for nostalgic reasons even though in reality, that game was a little less polished than this. I remember rushing through this game fairly quickly because Umbrella Chronicles was already out by then so i really didn't give this title the fair amount of attention it deserves. I wanted to play UC pretty badly then so Resident Evil Zero felt like just another obstacle in the way at that time.

The decision on whether or not to get this Wii port would have been made a lot easier had i not already own three copies of the original Gamecube version. Also given that i hardly get any chance to play my Wii these days, having another game lying around isn't exactly a comforting thought. Not the mention the issue of the Wii game being region lock so i would probably have to fork out some more cash in order to actually play this game. Oh yeah, this is easier than i thought...