Super Mario Galaxy 2 (Wii)
Third and final Mario game for the year, I swear. The Mario series has gone in lots of directions, such as 2D platformers and RPGs (and sports games and party games and kart-racing...), but here is Mario's continuation of his 3D platforming legacy. This game is a direct sequel to the often praised Super Mario Galaxy (1). Using the same engine, can this game stand out without the novelty of its predecessor?
The perils of the sequel
For me, anyways, the answer is yes. Indeed, the fundamentals of the game engine itself are fairly unchanged, you're still dealing a typical-controlling 3D Mario navigating a space with spherical platforms. The formula worked great when it was created, and it continues to work great here. Some of the wrappings have changed a bit, instead of having a central world hub on a satellite-ship...thing, you pilot your own space ship around a classic (SMB3 era) level selection screen. And by "space ship" I mean "face ship" (don't be angry with me, the game makes the pun off the bat).
Face Ship
I really got the feeling that the development team spent most of the time between SMG and SMG2 creating and refining the levels to perfection, given that they had a core game engine and design that worked. And indeed, the novelty isn't there, it can't be, but the levels are so spot on. I found myself so absorbed into this game, usually hauling in 30 stars per night or so (242 stars total). They strike a great balance of avoiding both triviality and tedium. SMG itself didn't really suffer much of a problem in these respects, but I felt that the quality of this game, as objectively as I am able to assess, is higher.
I find often that many sequels are bashed for not living up to the standards set by the original. It's understandably hard to avoid, the first often has novelty for the audience, and the fact is that novelty does have value. Of course, if the sequel is too different, then there are those who complain about the changes. I can't say whether this means there are two groups of people (those who like novelty and those who like refining a good thing) or one group of people (those who like to complain) at play here, but it does make for sequels being a tricky business. That said, there are definitely sequels out there which would more accurately described as a "level pack" and might warrant some of the criticism, but I don't think SMG2 falls into this category. Mine doesn't seem to be a very controversial viewpoint either, so I will harp on it no further.
Monster Hunter 3 (Wii)
Seems this is a series of games that's much more popular with the Asian market. To be honest, I knew almost nothing about the franchise prior to purchasing this game. I was drawn to it because Capcom usually delivers, and it seemed like a pretty solid online game for Wii. Plus I was looking for a game that would be a decent time sink for the stretches of free time which appeared before me over the summer.
I suppose I'll start this with a note about how my character turned out.
Boring character stuff for people who play MH
That's my Chromega, right there. Reading off the screen, got to level 68, and it only took me 237 hours! When I said I wanted a time sink for the summer, this game delivered.
I opted to be a lancer early on in the game. Controls felt the most natural to me, and I just find myself to be the aggressive DPS sort naturally. I'm sporting my endgame armor in that screenshot, full Agnaktor+, carrying one of my lances, the Alatreon Gleam. I generally played as a counter lancer, so I gemmed my skills as such, with Constitution+2, Guard+2, Flaming Aura, Razor Sharp, and Short Sprinter. I also found myself with a great lance collection, I got every ultimate lance save one, the Millenium, whose materials are obtained for a timed event my playing didn't line up with. Not a fantastic lance either, but it is a hole in my otherwise complete collection.
Grinding
One of the biggest complaints about this game is the grinding. The premise of the game can be summed up pretty easily. Kill dinosaurs and take their parts so that you can build better armor and weapons to kill bigger dinosaurs. A lot of these parts are random drops, so you'll find yourself fighting monsters again and again. And these aren't quick fights either. Unless you're revisiting monsters with your shiny new weapon, your first few times against a monster will take a half hour upwards.
Something else that doesn't help the game's case is the way it eases you in. Playing a good chunk of the first few minutes can leave you wondering where the combat you were promised is, as they'll have you gathering mushrooms and such. The battles will come, but not right away. If you're someone who likes to sample games to get their flavor, sampling this game will leave you unsatisfied.
Really, it all boils down to the core of the game: the combat. If you enjoy the combat, then it doesn't feel like grinding, every battle is different. If the combat grows stale for you, then yes, it is grinding, and this is not the game for you. I loved it, but I can't see myself recommending the game to everyone.
Combat
The core of the game is combat. You have a lot of control over the movements and attacks of your character, and you will need to become fluent in this control mechanism to be able to play this game. This isn't the sort of game where you can take a swipe at the enemy, and it takes damage if it falls inside the attack's oversided hitbox. Your attack hits if it hits. And where it hits matters, all of the monsters take different amounts of damage in different parts of their bodies. You can even break or damage parts of their bodies; one of the most frequent things you'll find yourself doing is trying to 'cut the tail' - the first time I did this is scared me, I thrust with my lance (which does do cut damage), and a giant sea serpent lept away from me, shocked, leaving behind a dead tail.
The weapons in this game do behave very differently and serve different functions. To give a sampling, lances are great for DPS, but are fairly immoble. Bowguns are great for ranged combat, but have poor defenses. Sword and shield has poor raw damage throughput, but is great at inflicting status or elemental damage. This leads to very exciting team dynamics in online play.
Multiplayer
I played through this game first in single player, and then later entered the online world. I'm glad I did single player first so that I wasn't useless online (and there is exclusive single player content), but playing online is so much better. Battles go faster, and it's simply the type of game where it's a lot of fun to cooperate with others. The weapon distribution was fairly balanced, so everyone had a role, and, maybe I had good luck, but I found people generally adhered to their roles well and we had great runs with the monsters. I only wish I had gotten a USB keyboard sooner, the alternative typing interface is very clunky.
Final Fantasy XIII (360)
You may not be surprised by the fact that I've got some Final Fantasy under my belt. Not a whole lot, mind you, but enough to get the gist of the series (1, 6, 7). You might observe that there are a lot of numbers between 7 and 13. I haven't been observing the evolution of the series, so I was excited to see what they came up with. I wish I could say I was more impressed, but fortunately there are older classic formula Final Fantasy games still left for me to play, maybe those will satisfy me more. I'm all for experimentation, but sometimes experiments don't work out, and I hope the developers can learn from the game's drawbacks.
Linearity
You all saw this one coming, so I won't harp on it too much. But really, this marches you down a line nearly the entire game. They don't hide it either, the linear hallways are visually all too plain. If you ever see a fork in the road, spoilers, one is a short dead end with an item at the end, then you can turn around and get back on the main path. Linearity's not always a bad thing, but, perhaps it's my mindset, I like to explore in RPGs. Indeed, my favorite part of the game is when the linearity is removed for a while. I've heard people assert that "it was just a tutorial before that, this is the real game now! (30 hours or so in)" or "the linearity exists to form a constrast with the open world of Pulse and exists to make a statement." I don't know whether either of these is true, but it wore on me.
Combat
This game was a first for me. The first time I've ever fallen asleep actively playing a game. I fell asleep mid battle. Rather than focusing on the "micro" like most FF games where you hand pick each attack, the focus of battle is more "macro" where you assign roles to your team, such as healer or black mage (or rather, medic or ravager). The default command for attacking is "auto battle", where your characters will fight in accordance with the paradigms you have set for them. Granted, the option is there to select your own attacks, but the pacing of the battles doesn't really lend itself to that, and I didn't really feel like extending the game much longer than it already was.
Not all is lost
The game did have its redeeming qualities, though. I can't say I'm usually a harsh critic in this regard, but I enjoyed the story. There were plenty of memorable cutscenes. On a related note, the graphics for this game were absolutely stunning, but in those cutscenes and during normal game play. But these redeeming qualities basically have nothing to do with the game itself. And indeed, the game was really a pretty movie with some game-ness in between cutscenes. Anecdote, I put the game into the 360, about to play. My 360 misread the disk and brought me to the "Play DVD Movie" menu. I felt very proud of the fact that I have a witty console.
Metroid: Other M (Wii)
Metroid. When you put that in your title, you've got a lot to live up to. I'm sure I'll do a post about why Metroid Prime is amazing at some point in the future. But for now, suffice to say, I love Metroid, and was thrilled when this game was announced, and I was very curious to see what Team Ninja would do to the series. And when I saw initial screens and saw it was in 3rd person, I was reminded immediately of what I thought the original Metroid Prime would be based off of the original E3 2001 trailer (relevant footage near the end of the video):
Ninja Samus
One thing this game nails is the feeling of an acrobatic Samus. It's hard to get that with 1st person controls, so that element of older Metroid games wasn't really captured in the Primes, but this game hits it dead on. This existed in both navigation and combat. The perspective also naturally makes the game more amenable to classic upgrades such as the screw attack and speed booster/shinespark. (Yes, screw attack was in Prime 2, maybe 3, I forget, but your mobility was far more restricted than here).
Linearity
While this game destroys the Primes when it comes to capturing Samus's acrobatics, it's a far cry away from capturing the exploration prominent in classic Metroid. Prime 1 captured this perfectly. A more linear Metroid game isn't unheard of, this game is really the sequel to Metroid Fusion, a great and similarly linear game. Fusion and Other M are also more story driven than most Metroids. Perhaps some types of storytelling are most easily executed when there is a linear story presented to the player, who knows. It's not quite on the level as FF13, there still is the hunt for powerups throughout the game. But despite some hunting for powerups, I didn't really feel the spirit of exploration which drew me to other Metroid titles.
Story
This is a big point of attack for this game. And I'm not putting this section here to join in on the attack, I'm saying it didn't really bother me. Sure, Team Ninja took some liberties and gave Samus some flaws (and incorporated "weapons authorization" as a very weak gameplay device). I don't think humanizing Samus during by giving her flaws was necessarily a bad idea, perfect, flawless characters had been done. Perhaps it's because so many players identify themselves with Samus since they had the opportunity to do so before, and now there is this needy, scarred-from-childhood girl forcing them out of the armor and taking their place. I can't say for sure. As I said, I can see how it would bother some people, but I wasn't horribly taken aback. Besides, how can you hate a game with such lovable characters as below? If you've played the game, you might be able to guess my favorite Metroid enemy.
Little Birdie
Post Game Content
I don't want to spoil much here, but this game has a kick ass post game. You might see an old friend from Super Metroid. But yes, the game's not over after the credits run. Also, I did get in a second run through the game on hard mode. No health upgrades. I thought the game was on the easy end on my first playthough, so I definitely enjoyed it more on my second playthrough. Most of the later bosses can one-shot you, it's intense.
End of Part 2
We're entering the school year now, fall semester. For part 3/4, you can expect:
-Shadow of the Colossus
-Metal Gear Solid 3
-Minecraft
-Rock Band 3
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