This past Wednesday BandaiNamco was in town, and I was one of the few journalists that was able to swing by and check out some of their upcoming holiday releases (most were either trapped in Brooklyn, or didn’t want to bother try coming into the city due to the shitstorm that the MTA caused that morning… can’t say I blamed any of them either).
First up was Katamari 4…
… Or Beautiful Katamari as it will be known when it?s released later this year. Basically its the same exact game as before, minus the creator (Keita Takahashi, who is now busy crafting the greatest kids’ playground ever devised). And when I say exact, I mean exact; all the locales from the first and second (and third) game is represented, though with a larger variety of people and things littered about. And same familiar, and blocky, graphic stylings from before is also intact (for better or worse… I certainly don’t mind, though many, even fans, were hoping for a change, and its a valid complaint I guess).
So what’s different? Well, everything has been infused with high definition clarity, and while I’ve long been an anti-HD person, I gotta say, it makes something sweet a whole lot sweeter. The game is simply BEAUTIFUL (just like the titles says!), especially in motion; the game runs at 60 frames per second, and it actually makes a huge difference! Thing just felt faster, and a tiny bit fresher. Though from what little I played, there was some slowdown, but I was assured that it would ironed out by release time.
Virtually every single person that I talked to about playing this game asked one single question: what about the music? Unfortunately, everything was placeholder tracks from part 2. But I would have to assume that it’ll be just as catchy and wonderful and WACKY JAPPY as before (Keita might be gone, but most of the music staff from the previous games, who were mostly Namco in-house musicians anyway, should still be around).
The game will support online play. Maybe that’s why its only going to be on Xbox 360 only and not the PS3 as well as previously reported (well, I previously said so, maybe no one else did and I just got my facts wrong), since MS has a far more robust online channel. Namco also plans on selling stuff on the marketplace, like additional characters (so I guess the Prince’s cousins won’t be unlock-able in the game? that pretty much bites, and feels like the penny pinching of Ridge Racer 6 all over again) as well as additional missions (I’m assuming that they’ll be stuff from previous games, since like I said, the basic world is pretty much identical from before.
One thing I have to mention was the control; it’s the same as before, with both analogue sticks drive the action. But because the 360′s sticks are not right next to each other like the PlayStation’s, I found myself making mistakes quite a bit, at least compared to before (I hate to brag, but I’m pretty damn good when it comes to getting around in the first two games… I suck at the PSP edition, but that’s because of the gimped interface). Maybe I’ll get used to it in the end, or maybe I’ll keep going around in circles by accident like I did on Wednesday.
Next, I thought I was going to see Soul Calibur 4, especially because there was a PS3 in the room, but instead, the Wii was switched on and I got to check out Soul Calibur Legends…
For those who don’t know, its basically Tekken Force (think Streets of Rage/Final Fight-type brawler starring fighting game character, much like that bonus mode in Tekken 3), but with Soul Calibur characters, and with waggle controls. The story takes place between Soul Edge and Soul Calibur, and centers on Siegfried’s transformation into Nightmare via the Soul Edge. So I guess its kinda like Star Wars Episode 3; you following along the exploits of the hero whom you know is gonna turn bad. You also control another character, and switch back and forth. If one character dies, its curtains for both… kinda like Tekken Tag Tournament?
You move around with the joystick on the nunchuk and fight by swinging around the Wii-mote. You can perform standard vertical and horizontal strikes, similar to the fighting games, and with relative ease. “Most” of everyone’s special moves are also included, but I really pulled off one of Mitsurugi’s patented combo slices by total accident. The fighting mechanics are nowhere as deep as they are in the regular games, which I guess isn’t much of a shock to anyone; I didn’t ask, but I would have to assume that there’s really no parrying this time around. The game has you fending against wave after wave after wave of generic ninjas, barbarians, and mummies. So its a Streets of Rage/Final Fight clone alright… perhaps calling it a Dynasty Warriors clone might be more apt, but there aren’t hundreds of bad guys swarming you all at once. Kinda of a bummer I know, though I had my hands full when I had to deal with four at a time. Also, I didn’t encounter one, but there appears to be some interesting looking boss encounters throughout…
I was hoping for a Vs. mode, similar to a traditional fighting game, there doesn’t appear to be one. Also, and I hate to say this, but the graphics were a MAJOR letdown. At first I was totally confused since Soul Calbur 2 totally wipes the floor with it, and that came out on the lesser powered GameCube, and years ago, but then I realized that it only featured two characters, plus an enclosed arena. Here we have more characters on-screen at once, and more room to account for. But still, it doesn’t look very pretty, which is a problem that a lot of Wii games suffer from, and I’m not being a graphics whore here (again, I don’t bye the HD gaming hype). More on this later on…
Checked out a few other games, most of which I wasn’t too concerned with or interested in, and they didn’t exactly grab me either. Except for Ace Combat 6. I’ve been a casual fan of the series for a while now… I’ve spent some time with Ace Combat 5, but never gave Zero a shot (mainly because every AC fan says it sorta sucks… nor have I gone back to 4 which everyone says is the best). Anyhow, the game looked incredible on the PS2, but on the 360 it fucking screams…
Parts of it was damn near photo-realistic, I kid you not. Didn’t really get a chance to try it out, since to be honest, I suck at the game and knew I’d crash in 17 seconds. But gameplay-wise, it looks to be more of the same, as well as on a grander scale. Larger areas with more shit going on at once. Looks hot!
Afterwards, in the same hotel, was an Ubi Soft press thing that I wasn’t invited to, but I decided to crash it anyway. I ended up running into Steve Totilo, and him and I, along with N’gai Croal, simply stood around and bullshitted. Oh, and I finally got the chance to play the new Masaya Matsuura game for the iPod which I was freaking out over last time. Steve had a loaner video iPod and let me give it a spin. And… it sucks! Like Dave (Mauro) said, it really is just a semi-interactive screen saver; a song plays and some letter appear. If it?s in the title of the song, hit the button and you get points. That its. I guess it gets “harder” when the letters become harder to discern, but that’s pretty much it. So simple, yet I did horribly, because the interface was really confusing, plus I assumed there was simply more to the game that I was missing out on. Perhaps the biggest let down of the entire year for me, video game-wise.
Then I ran downtown to Grassroots for some drinks with Dave, Colin, and Jeremiah, along with Katie and Robin. Finally got my hands on a pair or primo Sega shirts that Jeremiah got from Japan but where, get this, too big for him (if anything, shirts from there are always too smal). They’re the Get Ready collection from The King of Games…
… Now I don’t feel so bad for not nabbing them myself (I could have, if I had managed to find METEOR while in Japan, which I tried to, but simply couldn’t). Unfortunately, Jeremiah was unable to find his copy of slime porn, which he was then going to make one for me. Though at least he described in great detail what it’s all about, with accompany arm gestures. Plus we all quoted our favorite lines from the Fox news report on 4chan.
The next night I went out to Jersey City after work, to hang with Rob and Michele. And man… my old neighborhood sure has changed. Ate at some new Thai place, which had pretty awesome pineapple chicken. And the day after that, didn’t do too much after work. Simply bummed around the house, doing some work and playing some games. Robin made me a copy of an old Dreamcast game that involved picture taking and Cardcaptor Sakura and picture taking that I had always wanted to give a spin but never got the chance, and was reminded of once again via a discussion that sprung forth from Pokemon Snap of all things (I even got to recount the day in which word of that game spread around office at Ubi Soft, which was where I was working at the time, and how everyone FREAKED THE FUCK OUT because it was a bit too close to some of the gameplay of Beyond Good & Evil). Anyway, couldn’t figure out how to play the damn thing, which is why I’m even more glad I didn’t pay for the real thing I had my one and only chance. I also played Picross DS quite a bit, and that’s a game I have no problems understanding, though that’s not to say that I’m super good at it… yet.
Oh, and I also thought that I might have had problems with my appendix as well. I was just sitting around, not doing much, when all of a sudden, my right side began to feel… weird. Kind of like how it feels if you run too hard and your side begins to hurt, like that. My roommate was convinced that I should go to the hospital, and I would have, but I still don?t have medical insurance (yet), and wasn?t totally sure that it was my appendix, even though I had all the signs of possible appendicitis, at least according to Wikipedia. My roommate then called her brother, who almost died from a burst appendix, and he had me do a ?test? which involved me lying down and applying pressure on the point for a full minute. If the pressure was let go and I was in extreme pain, then it was definitely appendicitis. And I passed the test! Though I still felt strange, and simply went to bed. The next morning I felt great! Still don?t know what the deal was. Some think it was kidney stones. Others have suggested really bad gas…
Anyhow, the rest of yesterday was pretty packed; went up to the Bronx for Alana’s (that’s Jason‘s daughter) birthday party. It took place outdoors, in the park that’s right nearby their home, and because the weather was really nice, it promised to be a great time for both young and old, with plenty of presents for Alana, as well as plenty of food for the adults, plus candy and even bubbles for the kids. That was until we spotted a squirrel totally spazzing out.
It was running around in a circle, but kept falling over, onto its left side. And it was totally freaking out too. At first Jason and I thought it was maybe hurt, like its left leg was damaged, but it was soon apparent that something else was wrong, as if it was sick, possibly from rabies. Plus, flies were all over it… they obviously sensed death. A rather depressing scene, though also quite fascinating (enough for me to pull out my camera phone and record some video). Though when you mix an animal acting all strange and totally struggling to cling to life, one that might possibly have rabies, with a bunch of toddlers and kids not much older… you have yourself a possibly volatile, and dangerous, situation. But since none of us wanted to get bitten or scratched, all we could do is watch while it ran out of gas. Once it was seemingly down for the count, Jason and I had to run to the store of plastic forks, and when we returned, for the grim duty of getting rid of a squirrle corpse… it had mysteriously vanished. Strange.
Also, I really hope that Alana liked the presents I got her, which was a pair of maracas that teach both English and Spanish words, a stuffed horse that MK & I instantly fell in love with (which we affectionally dubbed “fat pony”), and a pair of goldfish that I got from work (the day before, everyone in the company got free fish as a gift… I was hesitant on passing them along, since it might be a bit soon to teach the harsh realities of life and death to a two year old, but they’re fucking goldfish and easily replaceable). I actually presented them to her, but Alana never bothered to look at them. Instead her gaze was transfixed on me… as usual. I get it all time from virtually ever single baby or kid I come across, mostly on trains. Just ask MK; she calls it “the Shine” or “the Taint”. Kid’s see it. Always.
Anyway, afterwards I went back to Brooklyn, to Greenpoint, to Dave’s place for the Fighting Weapon Battle: Drei. But unfortunately, our plans to play an obscure, and shitty PSone game featuring dinosaurs were never realized due to the fact that Dave can’t run bootleg PSone soft on his PS2, and because the trains were such a fucking mess (then again, its always fucked on weekends) I didn’t have time to grab my modded system, as well as some games, like the half-dozen or so generic animu fighters I’ve gotten my hands on. Instead we (Colin and Joe Salina were also over) went a few rounds with Senko No Ronde X…. sorry, Wartech (Jesus fuck Ubi Soft…), which was nice, especially since it was my first chance playing it. And the fighting mixed with shump action works remarkably well! Next Dave fired up MAME and we went at it via… Joust! And I had completely forgotten how amazing that game was (I played it to death as a kid on my Atari 7800). Grabbed dinner (more Thai) and popped in the copy of Beyond the Mat I had with me (I was hoping to see Mike and pass it along to him). As expected, the guys loved it. And hey, who wouldn’t after seeing Jake “The Snake” Roberts on crack?
Next I finally got the chance to play Half Life 2 on Dave’s brand new, souped up PC. Forever now, I’ve heard Half Life 2 referred to as the greatest video game ever, and I have to say, after just a small taste of it… I can totally understand the hype. I went through the very beginning of it and was completely floored. I guess it helps that the system running it was a total monster, capable of cranking the game up to 11, but I was also amazed by how fluid the mechanics were, and how I was never once confused, unlike 99.9% of every other FPSs out there. I was also go for a solid 30 minutes until… the inevitable happened. My motion sickness kicked in (and it started setting in, right after I went “Gee, guys, this is the first time I’ve been able to play a FPS and not get dizzy, LULZ”). I don’t know why I was able to last so long; maybe because of the pristine frame-rate. And I still don’t fully understand why I eventually got sick… it totally sucks, though I still want to get my hands on that game when it comes out for the PS3/Xbox 360. Or maybe finally get a PC! But yeah, while Joe played, I simply lied on Dave’s bed and closed my eyes, to center myself.
Afterwards. Dave fired up various shumps for Joe and I, including Burn the Trash, the latest from the guy who made Clean Asia, which K Thor originally passed along. It was pretty hot, as well as very pretty. Got to play Dan Dan Dan (or at least I think that’s what its called), which Dave had previously told me about, as well as Shoot The Bullet (this crazy shump in which you don’t shoot back at the bad guy but instead take pictures… guess I should post YouTube vids in that Pokemanz thread), the crazy disco theme Caved shmup that Jeremiah just got for his Astro Cab on Wednesday night, but whose name escapes me (once again, hopefully Dave can help me out here), as well as check out Radiant Silvergun via MAME and a Sega Saturn emulator (these days, the game doesn’t have nearly the good name it once had… which is a shame, since I still feel its one of the best shumps ever created). Also saw how well NiGHTS ran on it, and it?s always fun trying to explain to people what the hell that game is all about.
Oh, and Within A Deep Forest actually looks pretty neat. We also saw some recent videos of Super Mario Galaxy, like this one that Dave originally passed along to me earlier in the week. And the game looks absolutely mesmerizing. I guess the best part here is the return of suits, a la Super Mario Bros 3. Dave noted that he?s a bit worried that there?ll be too many flatland/black hole levels, and not enough of the mini planets, which we have seen thus far. I think Joe noted that perhaps the unique physics of such an environment might pose problems, especially when it comes to jumping. Hopefully the folks at Nintendo have had a chance to check out the in-progress footage of the abandoned ver. 2(?) of Sonic Xtreme and checked out what it did right and wrong. At the very least, that game looks hella pretty. And that?s the thing I don?t get; why are all the Nintendo games so fucking jaw-droppingly gorgeous while pretty much everyone else looks like crap, practically sub-par Cube games at best. Actually, not everyone… Dewey?s Adventure still looks amazing.
BTW, Colin also passed along a totally sweet shirt! But since my picture taking abilities are severely hindered at the moment, I can?t pass along a pic, but when I get the chance, I will do so!
As for today, again, mostly hung around the house, doing work and playing games, some of which is technically work! Aside from various Hudson cell phone games (btw, Fatal Fury Mobile kinda blows, yet Burgertime Special kinda rocks), I’ve been messing around with Cave Story for the PSP; believe it or not, I haven?t been able to play it that much previously; there?s a Mac version, of course, but have always had problems getting my USB controller to interface with it. Also tried figuring out Coloris, which I bought from Dave last night for $8, plus some beer, and Thai food. He also passed along a copy of Guitar Hero 2: Hackers’ Edition, but it sadly won’t run for me. And I so wanted to play the game with Blue Oyster Cult and Elvis Presley too.
Oh, and I may as well pass along yet another round of assorted wacky shit from the forums that everyone should check out, including…
- the obligatory YouTube thread (featuring Overdrift and the trailer to the new Michel Gondy flick, which looks positively amazing)
- actual reasons to see the new Lindsay Lohan flick
- a report from the Daft Punk show last Thursday which I’m now really pissed that I missed
- the NSFW repository keeps getting awesomer
- learn about the “carry phenomenon”
- and not just one, but two threads featuring the work of Shintaro Kago, who might quite possibly be the greatest manga artist that no one really knows about. They’re also slightly NSFW (actually, kinda very), but SO worth checking out. And remember, because its from Japan, read left to right!
