Monday, August 25, 2008

Cranium: Kabooki (Wii) and Warriors of the Lost World (psp)

So, I'm not sure how old these games are, but I played them recently and thought I'd give some short reviews of each.


Kabooki:


Story: This is a family fun time type game. There is no story. 2/5


Audio:
The sound isn't that amazing. It's not supposed to be a musically intense game, but the sound and effects don't really do anything. 2/5


Graphics:
Low level of graphics. Enough that you can see what you're doing, which I guess is all that's needed. 3/5


Gameplay:
The game is you split into 2-4 teams and attempt to get 24 points first. You get points by successfully doing different challenges. Each round you spin a wheel and get a challenge. Some involve answering questions, some involve drawing, some involve playing music. The challenges can be fun; however, the game provides very little in the ways of information on how to complete these. And some of the challenges, mostly those that utilize the wii motes motion sensors are incredibly difficult to figure out. For example, the acting ones require you to move the wiimote in the action shown. You're supposed to hold down A and do the action. Neither the game nor the guide saythat you release A after completing the action, and many of the actions are difficult to figure out or do just right. Another involved solving a word puzzle and shifting the wiimote around to impute the word. It was very difficult to manage to get the letter you wanted, in fact we never managed to get one letter right in the time limit given. But for the bad, there are some good challenges too. It's all a matter of patience and luck. 3/5


Replay:
IT's worth playing again assuming the people you played with didn't riot from how difficult some of the challenges were before. 3/5


Overall:
It's a fun game with lots of potential. If the guide would be more explanatory,things would be better. But it was cheap, so maybe your family or friends would like to give it a shot. 3/5





Warriors:


Story:
You are one of four heroes who is sent to investigate a variety of maze like dungeons around this city. It's not an amazing plot, but what do you expect from a dungeon crawler. 3/5


Audio:
The music is meh as are the sound effects and vocalizations. 2/5


Graphics:
The graphics aren't bad, but I wouldn't call them stellar. The dungeons are your traditional standard square segments. The walls and enemies and people all look kind of grainy. 3/5


Gameplay:
It's a dungeon crawler hack'n'slash. You will be spamming buttons to do various attacks. You will pick one of four characters that will have different abilities. You can also pick their outfit, but this basically means decide which of the 5 colors you like best. At the end of the dungeons will be a boss that you must kill. Sometimes in the dungeons there are traps that you can try to manuever enemies into for more damage on them. You also get special attacks that you can equip which level up as you use them more. Some are more useful than others. The center of the game is a small town square where you restock on items or attempt to upgrade your weapons and armor. You can also barter items you've found for more items. You also use this time to adjust any stats you might have earned through leveling. The gameplay is standard dungeon hacking, so it's not bad. The town aspect could use some cleaning up or better explanation, but it's not bad. 3/5


Replay:
I guess you could, that's your choice. 2/5


Overall:
It's kinda entertaining, in a mindless sort of way. I'd definitely rent rather than buy. 3/5

Saturday, August 16, 2008

Final Fantasy IV (DS)

Photobucket

Okay to a remake/port from the old days of when SE was 2 companies, not one hateful...anyway,
let's see how FFIV for the DS does.

Gameplay: Like any classic RPG the game is turn based on an attack gauge system. (a little bar that fills until its your turn) The battle system is fun and interactive enough to make it interesting. Where the game fails in game play is the ridiculously skewed difficulties. normal enemies go down pretty easily which is good since you'll have to grind constantly before each and every boss fight as each and ever boss is insanely overpowered most having simple mass killing move...You;ll do most fights 2 or 3 times before beating them and the fights that have specific gimicks to beating you'll either spend hours trying to figure it out or crack and look it up. 2/5

Story:
The shining point of the game. The story is engaging and not overly so. It does a good job of drawing you in and carrying you through without being too full of itself. You'll take the role of Cecil the ark Knight from a kingdom once peaceful now expansionistic. The recent actions of the king will drive Cecil on a journey of self exploration and along the way you'll meet all kinds of fun and interesting characters from a spoony bard, a set of magical twin, too a sexy ninja. 5/5

Graphics:
The graphics have been redone but really aren't anything spectacular they really could have done better. Dungeons and towns are all pretty generic. The characters have a kind of wonky big head model which takes away from the epicness of the game a bit. Magics, specials, and general battle animations are pretty nice a lot of classic FF there but this they really could have done better. 3/5

Audio:
The game have good music its just the same 5 tracks, Town, Dungeon, Battle, Boss, Cinema...there's probably a few more than that but it really starts to drag on you to hear the same handful of songs over and over. The voice acting tho saves it here as it is amazing. Great choices oh voice actors they did a great job bringing life to the characters. 3/5

Replay:
There's really not much replay being that half the game is a grind. If you're a classic FF fan this is a replay for you anyway. There's no real point in playing again unless you really like that game. 2/5

Overall:
Okay firstly I know I'm gonna get hell for this but the game is really coasting on its already giant FF fanbase. Here's the problem though there are major design flaws A: the strong lack of direction more often then not you'll end up not knowing where you need to be which works for the next flaw, B: The insane difficulty which turns the game into a giant grind which really takes away from the games really strength being its story. Which though amazing and well done its not enough to carrying the game. 3/5




*Additional thoughts by Kit:
As this was the first play through for Yuuki, and a replay for me, I thought I should put in my own two cents on where the game differs from my beloved memories of it.



*Possible Spoilers*
First off, they've added a new summon for Rydia which is like a substitute for her in battle. To upgrade it, you have to do little minigames that make use of the DS capabilities. It's ok, but really I never summon it, so it's more of a "i'm bored" what else can i do to kill braincells" type of thing.


Next, there is the boss difficulty, as Yuuki mentioned. This is both new and old. While a number of the bosses were diffult in the original, and subsequent remakes attempting to capture the japanese original feel, they were never quite as insane as they are now. Bosses I remember killing in only a handful of turns now have new abilities that wipe out the party. On the other hand, while there is a grind, I don't find it too terrible. It's fairly easy to level, and only a handful of level can make the difference.


Which brings me, somewhat, to augments, a new thing where you can add abilities you've discovered in the world to your party and set them for battle. Besides Gil Finder, and possibly twin cast, I've rarely found any occasion for these. Of course, I've noticed the bosses have some new abilities as well, most notably the obnoxious counter abilities that screw over your party long before you have a chance to do the same to it.

I think that's it for my comparisons from my childhood.
*end Spoilers*

One other note, I'm definitely going to have to disagree with Yuuki's assesement of the music of the game. I think this is one of Uemetsu's finest soundtracks. Characters have theme songs, and in general the music does a good job of conveying the mood of the moment. I probably have more to say on that, but other things now distract me. So if you've never played ffiv and you like old school rpgs, go pick up this version, or find a copy of the GBA version. It's a great game.