Oh crap

So i skipped ahead to God of war 2, basically just to make sure that I got two games done this month I'm just hoping that I can keep it moving...I got one thing to say about this game "THIS ISN"T A GOD OF WAR GAME" this is a really good imitation but its not a god of war game. Unless I was wrong about the first one, I think after I finish this I have to play it again. That fear of a God of war without David jaffey is starting to creep in again.
Time to get pissed at God of War 2
Also TIME TO SMOKE

The Shame of Defeat and The thrill of victory, while playing Panzer Dragoon orta.

Panzer dragoon was one of those games that I got frustrated that frustrated the shit out of me and did until I finally beat it. This is the third time I’ve came back to this game, the first couple weren’t very successful I remember having a hell of a time just getting past the first board on my first attempt at playing. On a side note brother beat this game in a week, I guess he deals with frustration better than I do because he said he “Whipped right through it” and I’ll never forgive him for that. It was the second time I played the game that I really got on a roll and break through to the end but got stuck on the boss. So basically it took three times at stopping and starting to really beat the game, as far as I can tell nothing has changed sense I played this game the first time maybe I have a little more patience for this type of old school shooter, we’ll see about that when I start playing Mega Man again.

But enough about my lack of video game skill, this game is “Old School” it feels like a Nintendo game in the way that every boss/enemy has a pattern to how they move and the way they shoot. The reason I was finally able to beat this game is because I finally realized that fact and was able to figure out his patterns then it was like bam next thing I know he’s a puddle of shape shifting goop. Another interesting thing about this game is the way that your character moves around the world, they figured out a way to make it feel like your giving directions to the dragon your riding as much as your controlling the little girl on top who shoots at the enemies. Basically you’re the center of 360 degree ratios’ and the enemies are coming at you from all sides, using the triggers on the controller to spin yourself around on that axis and to burst forward or backward to dodge enemies attacks. Along with its beautiful art style that I can only describe as vibrant colors with seizer inducing flashes of enemies, this game was stylized before they started using that word for Wii games as a substitute for shitty art.

All and all I’m really glad I stuck it out and finally beat it because I had a better sense of accomplishment from beat this game this I have for any of the other that I finished on my to way to shrinking my pile of shame. Thats two pretty much in the course of a week, I might have to change shuffle the order of my "pos" to make sure that I at least beat two games this month. Kotor is taking a hell of a lot longer then I thought it was going to.

TIME TO SMOKE!!

Another one done, took me forever to write it.

I have finished “Jade Empire”, and in my opinion most of the time if you want to beat a game all you have to do is play it, Jade was one of those games it wasn’t that hard in fact I just sort of walked through it. It was pretty easy once I figure out the rhythm of fighting there wasn’t a man or women in the Jade Empire that could stop me. After I completed most of the quests I was so powerful that the last boss was a piece of cake, the only weapon I really used my first sword skill and I cut him down like he was a regular enemy.

While I was playing Jade empire it struck me that its was basically an American take on Japanese role-playing fundamentals, It seemed to follow the same formula that square uses to make a rpg with a few small changes that make a huge difference in the way the game flows. The option of being evil just for the sake of being evil is huge when you look at the way games are made, not everyone wants to be the hero all the time. The role playing stereotype is that you’re the hero and are unquestionably good regardless of how many times you just barge into someone’s house and rummage through there stuff, Where as in a Bioware game you wouldn’t just rummage through there stuff if you wanted to be evil, you can kill them, steal there stuff then burn there house down. I think that’s why rpgs from Asia are not getting a lot of love as of late, the people playing them want a little variety in there games. Squares vision of the hero has become vannialified over the years and they are pretty much the same character with a new paint job every time they release a new game. In a Bioware RPG characters aren’t some emo kid or a plucky youth that has a gripe with the evil empire, they are pretty much what you make them to be. Your not forced into a boxed hero type the character is YOU, weather your saving a kitty from a tree or setting the tree on fire it breaks down to what you as this character want to do. What Asian developers haven’t realized about western gamers is that they have grown up playing there games and most of them are now adults who’s gaming tastes have changed as they grew up, most of them don’t want to play through some jerk off characters teenage angst. Maybe that’s why I find Biowares stuff more interesting now because I’m not being spoon fed the same characters over and over again. A little variety never hurt anyone, considering I’ve been playing the same game.

Bioware does abuse the dialogue tree on a regular basis there isn’t really a question of that, but the side quests and the way they are implemented and the way the quests add in little bits of story and context of the world around you through out the game. I’ve started “Knights of the old republic” a day ago and I’m seeing some of the same patterns in both games, it might be because it’s a Star wars game but “kotor” grabbed me faster then Jade did. When I started playing Jade, I couldn’t stand the side quest they seemed like a huge waste of time and a way to lengthen the game. It was like they just kept sending them at me over and over again. Now I see that Bioware replaced the grinding of old school rpgs with those side quests, instead of making you grind for four hours so that you can go fight a tough boss you progress though the game basically by just playing those added bits of the story, which is really nice because I don’t really have time to grind a lot anymore. They also as far as I know there aren’t any random encounters, which I always thought were really annoying. The side quest are really what gets you to the next level because they feed it too you in small spoonfuls of it, the exp ratio is tight too there isn’t a huge gap between levels which is why these games flow so well. I made it through Jade problem only killing 100 enemies throughout the whole game, so the focus of the game is on the story and not the next level. When is the last time a Final fantasy game wasn’t about the grind? That being said I don’t have square but there last couple weren’t good or even pretty good, they were lousy. Its time for them to take back there thrown and to take the power back, they have a dynasty of great games, too many for me to even write out here. Bioware has maybe 5 or huge games under there belt and they all seem to be good games or have good intentions with everything they make. Hopefully square can pull it together with final fantasy because with the economy the way it is any misstep could mean trouble with there new risky aqusitions.

TIME TO SMOKE!

Some times good guys don't wear white.

Alright so I’m into jade empire now, it took me a bit but its getting interesting now and even thought the story line hasn’t really progressed much because of the thousand and one side quests. They sure know how to make a side quest interesting over there at Bioware, from helping a scorned women get vengeance against her ex-boy friend through brutal murder or helping some spirits get some peace in the after life there is a lot more subplot lines in this game then most of the other games that I’ve play. Last night I had to force myself to stop playing before the assault on a Lotus Assassins stronghold, it was 4 and I had to work the next day so it was quit or sleep walk my way through work not that I’ve never done that before . At the pace that I’m playing this game right now I think I can have this game beaten by next weekend if nothing big comes up in the real world.

What I really want to write about is the option to play a good or evil character, Bioware an a few other companies have started implemented in there RPG games. The opportunity to effect the morality of the character you are playing is really interesting to me and it does some what effect the path of the game. In my case as hard as I try there’s no way I can play an evil character in a video game like this. Already in Jade Empire I’ve played the open handed course, which is basically the good guys: halo and all. For some reason playing the good guy is the only way I play a video game, which is funny because I love the Grand theft auto games….you can’t be a saint all the time. Playing the closed fist path might have been fun but in the end I would just end up having a case of pixilated guilt.

The first case of this was Fable, I loved the legacy building mechanics as the begging of the game, and basically your actions effect how you start the game. It was really simple and brilliant the way small actions like stopping a bully from stealing a doll from a little girl or taking it yourself changing your character. So the first time I played fable I played the good guy, but the second time I was the bad guy…it didn’t really last very long. Makes me wonder why they would want to screw with my emotions like that, when the little girl started crying after I took her doll I felt TERRIABLE and instantly regretted it. The worst part are the NPC's that say things like “I have a family, please don’t kill me!” or “Why are you doing this to me?” hearing that kind of makes you want to apologize to them and why; consider there just failed actors that are doing voice work because they aren’t getting enough hours at McDonalds. Either way it didn’t really effect the game much, they do look different depending on which way you go and they treated different but they story line pretty much stays the same, to be honest I couldn’t continue on the evil path and quit the game shortly after I started it…man I’m a wimp.

Fallout 3 for me is the same way and yes I’m a good guy again, it would be a lot easier to be evil if they didn’t give every character a voice. Man it’s like an emotional cheese grater when you hurt people in that game too, the reactions of the people after you do something evil like say…killing the Sheriff of megaton, everyone in town starts shooting or stabbing you. In that case it’s good that it didn’t auto save cause I felt like shit after doing that, if my Mom hadn’t instilled bullshit like “values” and “respect for human life” in me then I might be enjoying this game more. It’s strange how good and evil paths effect me in video game worlds, I’ve never had any problem killing the citizens of Los Santos in Grand Theft Auto. The only difference is the halo or horns that show up on my head after I commit an act of good or bad thing that causes a ripple in the world around me. But enough of this, I’m going to try to be evil in Knights of the old republic…I hope for my sake the dark side is the right path for me.

TIME FOR A SMOKE!

A few thoughts for the day.

* I really wanna play Skate 2 ever sense I played the demo

* I heard there was a patch for Gears of war 2's multiplayer modes going to try it this weekend for the first time

* I'm concerned about God of War 3 now that I heard that Dave jaffey isn't in on the project.

* Theres no way that I'm going to be able to beat Jade Empire before the end of the month.

* layoffs are starting at both Microsoft and sony.

* It cuts me deep that I didn't get done with Fallout 3 before the first dlc comes out

* Resident Evil 5 Demo is up for download.

And now Cedricks_human bitching about his pile of shame…aka Jade Empire

I’m about a third of the way through Jade empire, something like 16 hours into it give or take a few minutes here or there and I’m finally starting to get into it. Its not that it’s a bad game but there is something that feels kind of generic about the environments and the combat system seems like it was tacked on. Yeah I know a game that’s about a crew of destiny warriors having tacked on fighting, how did that happen most of the time during combat all I really have to do is dodge until I’m behind my enemy and then hit them in the back. It wouldn’t be so bad but its just repeating that cycle over and over again gets really boring. Knowing the outcome of every fight as long as I follow that combo kind of takes the fun factor out of the game. Now I’ve heard the definition of madness is doing something over and over again expecting different results but what happens when it always works, what would Freud probably something like “The fuck do I know I’m high on coke right now” smart man that Freud. This is a Bioware game and as of late in my mind there held in higher regard then manly because Square for some reason has this quantity over quality thing going on. But when they were at there peak they were golden and untouchable, now that America is getting ahead of the Asian companies and the balance of power is shifting. But enough about square Jade Empire is my target for now, anyway what I was really trying to say is screw your dialogue trees and work on the core mechanics of the game. The more I think about it Mass Effect had the same problems with is own combat system, even if it did feel better then jade empires does, I know its not easy to make a game I’ve never been tempted too But can you really have one without the other, a good story to go along with an epic rpg is important but so is combat. Out of the 16 hours of play time I’ve spent most of the time running through lines of dialogue like I’m studying to be the lead in a high school play. I guess you could say well why did you buy this game, you knew Biowares M.O dialogue trees and story are what put asses in the seats. Sacrificing one for the other isn’t OKAY its just another sloppy developer trick, woo them with the graphics (which for the time were really good) and the bells and whistles of story based dialog trees then put an Band aid on it with “combat” written on it. If you think I’m bitching now wait until I got through the same BS on Kotor.

Time to smoke!

My big disappointment...The Wii

So, I said I was going to touch on the Nintendo Wii and here goes. This has been a long time coming. So, when the Wii was put out my buddy Eric picked one up. He actually walked into a Target a few weeks after the release and there was one sitting right there on the shelves. So, he bought it. He has since sold his and for a very good reason. I will delve into that later. So he set it up and had us all over to play Wii Sports. I fell in love with the system right then and there. It was fun and showed great signs of things to come.

Well, I was at work one day and a woman in IT sent out a mass email to the whole building saying that she had a brand spanking new on for sale for the original price. I jumped on it. She could have easily sold it on Ebay at that point for probably twice the cost if not more. I got it home and set it up and started playing. Then it struck me. This sucks when you play it alone. So, I picked up Zelda, Raving Rabbids, and a few other games for the system. "Alright, I can do this alone," I thought but I was only kidding myself. I felt stupid waving the wiimote around and the games just weren't challenging. So it sat there next to my television collecting dust and being broken out when I had people over. It was still fun with a group of people after all. I've played one other game for a different system that falls into this catagory as well. That being Rock Band for the PS3. Yes, it's a great game but it's just not something I want to sit around and play by myself. At least that still gets broken out when I have people over. The Wii just sits there.

Don't get me wrong. I keep trying with the Wii but the love isn't there. People are jazzed about the old games you can download and play on the system or the fact that they can play Gamecube games on the system as well. Well, you know what? The only game on the virtual console I want that I haven't downloaded yet is Toe Jam and Earl and that's for purly nastolgic reasons. I remember playing the hell out of that game with my friend Matt back in the day. Otherwise all the other games I can just pick up at garage sales, Ebay, or at used game stores like Cedar Cliff Collectables. Not really meaning to put a plug in for them but the store is awesome. If you've been there you know what I mean. It's kind of like that really good used book store with books piled up on the floor that you could spend hours digging through but instead of books it's used games and systems, action figures, anime, comics, etc. Anyway, the point is I don't see the point to it. I found one game that was absolutely a blast to play and that was Excite Truck. I'm not even a racing fan but that game to me captured everything that an arcade racing game ought to be or tried to be. Zak and Wiki was a challenging puzzle game but over all lost it's appeal in the end. Paper Mario was decent but over all was just the same thing over and over again. No More Heroes was intesting and had a good feel to it at first and then became this overly repetitive thing...I can go on and on and on.

The Nintendo Wii is just not a gamers system. Nintendo lets all these companies release game after game of pure kid oriented crap. When I say crap that's exactly what I mean too. Is there a single adult out there that wants to play Disney Princess: Enchanted Journey or all of the stupid Petz games? I don't think so. I will give Nintendo a little credit though. They have put out something remotely interesting with the balance board. The downside to it is that it's only being used for games that aren't games. Wii Fit or the other various excersize games. They have totally alienated the actual gamers out there and that's why Eric sold his system and why mine has been that close to being sold as well. Sometimes I am just hopeful that there will be the rare gem that comes out for the system that is actually fun and challenging to play by yourself instead of having to have a group of people over to play it but my hopes keep getting dashed. And fuck no I am not buying into the Animal Crossing craze. That shit is exceptionally lame. Shoot me. If you have any suggestions for games to check out for the system please let me know. Or if you're looking for the system let me know what price you're willing to pay.