The Save Spot

One more for the backlist

 

 

 

The RPG, a favorite gaming genre, is stacking up recently as the bane of this busy gamer.  I haven’t had time to play through Oblivion, GTA IV, or Final Fantasy XII but I can’t stop myself from picking up each latest and greatest offering to the role playing gods.  These great games sit on my shelf and mock me with their dozens of hours of gameplay, sidequests, unlockable characters and gaming escape. 

The most recent game to insult me so is Final Fantasy IV DS, the latest in a long series of remakes of the game first released in the US as Final Fantasy II for the SNES.  I spent some time with the game yesterday, to get a feel for the remake and torture myself with guilt and frustration that I won’t be able to give this little gem the hours it deserves.  Here are some initial observations:

1)  The opening cinematics are excellent and well-matched with the Uematsu soundtrack.  Characters retain the look of the cinematics in the Playstation releases, and Cecil and Kain both look imposing in their armor.

2)  There are in-game cutscenes which do a nicer job of presenting the story than just dialog boxes did.  I really like an early scene where Cecil in a contemplative mood is shown with the moon framed through his tower window. 

3)  The 3D models look pretty good, almost PS1 quality, but obviously don’t compare favorably to non-portable final fantasy titles released in the last five years.  The effort at the armor for Cecil and Kain ends up looking cartoon-y, in contrast to the cutscenes where it looks intimidating.  Still, the game pulls a lot of horsepower out of the DS and it’s fun to see familiar sprite-based locations, characters, and enemies get the 3D treatment.

4)   It would be nice if battles moved more quickly.  You’ll want to go into the menus and turn up the battle speed dial as far as it will go.  They should have made it go to 11. 

I haven’t played far enough to get a feel for the difficulty or the amount of grinding that will be necessary to experience this re-telling of a great story.   I’d give even odds that I never will (or at least will have to push off the time when I can get to it until something like “retirement”) but if you’re a lucky gamer with more time than I, I’d certainly recommend giving this game a try.

 

 

 

 

 

Civilized differences

 

 

 

Over the weekend I spent a few hours with a good friend and a fresh copy of Civilization Revolution for the Xbox 360 - an activity I can strongly recommend.  Last night, my copy of Civ Rev for the DS arrived, and I stayed up late enough to be both victorious and quite tired this morning.  Alas, sometimes sleep must be sacrificed at the altar of the busy gamer! 

As a long-time fan of the series, I have fond memories of hours spent in front of my IBM 286 PC, running a copy of Civilization (the first one, before there were numbers!) off of a 1.4 MB floppy disk.   The game was so much fun, much of which shared with aformentioned friend, that as late as 1998 I still had an old 16MhZ 286 PC and a copy of Civ to play in my dorm room at college.  Just writing about it makes me want to go dig up a copy and find a way to play it on an XP or Vista machine.  Of course, since then there have been several successful sequels and I’ve also spent quite a bit of time with those.

 

 

So it’s with this background that I picked up a controller over the weekend, and my DS last night, to experience the latest iteration of Civilization.  Overall, the game on the console and handheld are remarkably similar (graphics not included, but then graphics isn’t really what Civ is all about) and also quite fun.  There are some key differences in gameplay, however, that make Civ Rev different from it’s PC predecessors, including:

1)  You no longer direct the engineering of land and resources directly with settlers or workers.   Roads are built instantly with cash, and land improvements are now made possible by certain city buildings or technologies.

2)  Military units and city buildings no longer have a financial or resource support cost.  Once you spend the resources to build them, there are no ongoing costs.

3)  Many of the techs, city buildings, and wonders have different effects than in the PC series - if you’re a Civ veteran, pay close attention to these as you’re making your choices.

4)  You don’t have tax / science / luxury rates to control in the same way.  Each city can be set to specialize in producing food, gold, science, production, or a balance of each.  But you can’t micromanage here and choose exactly which resource tiles are used by each city.

5)  In my two games on Warlord, there were no unhappy citizens.  Instead of keeping citizens happy, temples and other related city improvements add to your “culture”.

6)  Maps are smaller, overall, and games move quicker. 

There are other changes, as well, of course - many of which are noteworthy, but I won’t cover them all here.  Because of these changes, I’d say that the game is more tilted towards military conflict.  The fact that military units don’t have an ongoing support cost makes it much easier to build up an army and support a war effort.  You can certainly still work towards a technology, cultural, or economic victory though.  My first victory was economic, so I’ll be looking for a more satisfying military victory soon!

While I don’t see Civilization Revolution as Civ 5, it’s certainly been a fun game to enjoy so far - and I’m already strategizing about my next game.  If you’re looking to scratch that ‘just one more turn’ itch, it’s definitely worth a purchase. 

 

 

Old school for the win!

 

 

   

With lots of great games on shelves right now, it is both an exciting and difficult time to be a busy gamer.  Where should you best spend your limited gaming time?  GTA IV is still largely unplayed on my shelf, MGS4 has a meacritic score of 92.9, and I’m itching to see how the Civ experience translates to consoles in Civilization Revolution. 

And that doesn’t even include the great portable games out right now.  Just for DS, there’s an embarrasing number of good options right now if you enjoy RPGs or SRPGs: The World Ends With You, Etrian Odyssey II, Final Fantasy Tactics A2, and (coming soon) the remake of Final Fantasy IV.  There are literally hundreds of hours of gaming goodness right now, just in games you can fit in your pocket! 

So with all these great choices, what’s filling my gaming hours this week?  It’s the old school gameplay of the only game mentioned above that you probably didn’t recognize, Etrian Odyssey II (EO2), that wins my time for now.  This is a classic dungeon crawl with a bare-bones story that, much like Monster’s Den: Book of Dread, focuses on the basics of engaging gameplay for it’s success. 

EO2 is a throwback to games like Phantasy Star.  Like PS, you move around a 3D dungeon by moving your character (and the camera) in discrete ’steps’.  There are no curvy walls here - you’ve got rectangular rooms, walkways, and right angles everywhere.  Random battles are in, and show you facing off with one or more enemies on the top screen, with some very limited attack animations.  You want a dungeon map?  Make it yourself!  The bottom screen of the DS is presented with some simple map-making icons and tools so you can make your own map of each floor of the dungeon.  You both need to do this to find your way around (think of those days when you had to do this using graph paper) and will want to do this (it’s surprisingly satisfying, and really adds to the sense of exploration).

Punishingly difficult at times, EO2 can randomly spawn a high-level FOE into battle or while you’re gathering items.  Will there be level grinding?  You bet!  But the difficulty keeps you on your toes: you won’t venture deep into the labyrinth without carefully outfitting your characters, keeping an eye on your stats, and optimizing your party and battle choices.  Forming the best party to tackle a job is part of the fun too, and in EO2 you can hire and train a score of adventurers to choose from.

This kind of gameplay isn’t for everyone (there’s almost no story) but if you’re old enough to remember Dragon Warrior, Final Fantasy (the first one - before they had numbers!), and Phantasy Star you’ll know what you’re getting yourself into.  Etrian Odyssey 2 is a pleasurable throwback, a game that focuses on the basics, and that will have you thinking about your party build and strategy even when you’re not playing. 

 

Monster’s Den: Book of Dread

 

 

 

Four brave and adventurous souls set out to explore the depths of a dark and mysterious, blah, blah, blah. I will rarely say this, but in some cases the story in a game simply doesn’t matter. And Monster’s Den: The Book of Dread is one of those games.

The Book of Dread is the most compelling internet browser-based game I’ve ever played. I couldn’t stop. As of this moment I’ve played The Book of Dread 10x longer than I played Supreme Commander. If this game was around when I was in college I never would have finished a paper on time.

And the sad thing is, I’m not exaggerating.

The game does all of this without any shiny graphics, any cool sound effects, or stunning FMVs. What we’re left with is a tried and true game play.

  

  

The game consists of a series of dungeon floors. With each floor you clear, you gain one level. And with each level you kick more of evil’s ass. Simple. Efficient.

But don’t let the simplicity fool you.

There’s several things that make this game fun. The first is the simplicity of the design. In a world of highly complex games (which I love by the way), sometimes all you want to do is play for 15 minutes. This is the strength of games like Rock Band, or consoles like the Wii.

Within each battle lies some serious strategy. Especially at early levels. Since there is no way to reload a battle - when you die, you don’t get to restart. You’re forced to live with the consequences of your (poor) strategy. Each death carries with it a penalty of random equipment loss. That means that great armor you just bought, or that sweet sword could be gone with one careless round.

Painful, but not too steep.

This penalty actually affects you before you enter a battle. Rarely have I been so nervous going into a fight knowing that I could lose my favorite gear. As with all risk though, the thrill comes when you survive. Not only did you win, but you got to keep your favorite gear. What could be better?

  

  

Kill – Loot – Equip – Repeat. Anyone who’s played Diablo will be quickly at home with the inventory system. Part of the fun of these games is finding new equipment. And there’s plenty of gear to be found. Purple is elite, blue is rare, green is magic, and white apparently comes from Wal-Mart.

I can’t stress enough how much fun The Book of Dread is to play. And did I mention it’s free?

Do yourselves a favor, don’t walk, but jump on a T1 and click your way into battle. Your gaming addiction will thank you.