Valhalla Knights 2: Battle Stance is an upgrade of Valhalla Knights 2, the latest in a series that has struggled to develop an identity beyond a generic template for JRPGs. How does it do?

Developer: K2 LLC
Publisher: XSEED Games
Genre: RPG
Console(s): PSP

The verdict: Some essential improvements raise this upgraded version of Valhalla Knights 2 to passable status, but there’s still nothing noteworthy. Beyond that, there’s not much to recommend.

I noticed rather suspiciously that Valhalla Knights 2: Battle Stance was an updated version of a game that had been very recently released. This is rarely a good sign, and indeed, the original Valhalla Knights 2 was not well received, to put it lightly. So what does Battle Stance offer to redeem its predecessor? Battle Stance does provide a badly needed fast travel system that was absent in Valhalla Knights 2, but it merely makes Battle Stance tolerable, and the game never rises above mediocrity.

Another orphanage?

Valhalla Knights 2 (and Battle Stance as well) don’t exactly push the bar in terms of innovation, so in an attempt to spruce up this obligatory summary I’m going to use a counter of JRPG clichés as I narrate. Every millennium, a catastrophe strikes (one) in the form of the evil Goddess of Judgment punishing mankind (two). This particular time, the Witch of the Crystal managed to injure the Goddess, and thus sent her into hiding (three). You play as a young hero whose orphanage is burned down by heretics supportive of the Goddess (four) and escapes to join the Royal Latroci, a group of Crystal Witch supporters out to stop the Goddess (five). In short, the story is filler. It says nothing meaningful, does nothing innovative, and doesn’t stand out in any way.

There’s a degree of customization since you have the ability to create your character, though from a fairly limited palette. In addition to a gender, you’ll be able to choose whether you’re a human, an elf, a dwarf, a Halfling, or an akatoki, with two other unlockable races. There’s a relatively scant six preset facial templates and six hairstyles. It’s nice to have some customization, but given the level of in-depth modeling we can do in other games, this seems fairly threadbare.

Kill this number of monsters again, and again…

The game’s biggest problem is that the story never goes anywhere, owing in part to the fairly monotonous gameplay progression. Your main base is a town that features the usual inn for your resting and saving as well as an armory for items. You’ll be spending a fair amount time at the Royal Latroci guild building, where you’ll receive all of your quests. The problem is that it’s difficult to tell which quests advance the story, and most of them have no depth. They broil down to the same type of quests you would find in most MMORPGs, like killing a certain number of monster however many times. In tandem with the completely interchangeable story, there’s just not much to keep this story going.

Battles are decent enough, but very button mashy. Fights are real time in arenas, and while your four allies are handled by competent AI, you’ll be doing pretty much nothing but hammering the X button to attack. There are ten different character classes with various strengths and weaknesses, and additionally you can equip two sub-jobs per character. While a job itself enables a character to use gear specific to that class, a sub-job only allows you to perform spells allowed by that class, which still allows for a neat element of counterbalancing strengths and weaknesses. How often you’ll need most skills or even class differences is debatable, since even when enemies get harder they can be taken down very quickly; it’s just a matter of killing them before they kill you.

So what does Battle Stance do to improve the Valhalla Knights 2? Well, in the original game, the lack of a fast travel or teleportation system meant players would have to do a ridiculous amount of pointless traveling that padded the game out mercilessly. Battle Stance implements a teleport system that gets rid of a lot of backtracking, at least making game progression a little smoother. Beyond that you have four allies instead of six in a fight, not that it changes much.

Closing thoughts

Valhalla Knights 2: Battle Stance fixes the game-breaking problem of its predecessor and elevates it from snore-inducing to passable. It’s nice being able to customize character builds but there’s nothing that stands out here. The story is cookie cutter, the battle system is interchangeable, the job system is clever but bland, and there are far better RPG offerings out there on the PSP.

Disclaimer: This game was provided by XSEED Games for review purposes

The fine investigative polling at Joystick Division has unearthed specific reasons for why Activision employees were fired.  As outlined by Kotaku, 30% of the polled employees were fired due to lamenting wanting to work at a small company where it’s all about the games – like EA!

My personal favorite goes to “Started referring to employment at Activision as ‘Getting played via the subscription model”", with a respectable 28% of the vote.  I urge Joystick Division to do one of these polls for Square-Enix immediately.

Kotaku serves up an interesting story regarding a rejected piece of art for the ‘Childkiller’ status in Fallout 2.

For the uninitiated, Fallout 2 had a status known as ‘Child Killer’.  That’s right – Fallout 2 lets you do what not even Grand Theft Auto IV, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, or Fallout 3 dared to: Attack children.  There are serious repercussions if you get the label, though.  Here’s the artwork in question, if you can’t be bothered to hit the link:

Err, yeah

This obviously shouldn’t require too much explanation on why it was ultimately left out of Fallout 2.  It was dropped out of the game in favor of the less-inflammatory “Hated” reputation icon.  Kotaku also answers a potential question:

“I don’t think you’ll go to hell for laughing at this…”

Whew!

“…but you will if you imagine it accompanied by a Looney Tunes kettle drum sound, like I did.”

Aw, crap.  Anyway, check out the article for some interesting input by Brian Menze, whose DeviantART page was where the art was posted.

From: SPARTAN Commander Carter-A259 <cartman@unsc.gov>
To: Fleet Admiral Sir Terrence Hood <t-hood@unsc.gov>
Subject: UNSC training capacity
Message sent: July 7, 2552

Fleet Admiral,

I wanted to bring to your attention an issue of importance in our fight against the Covenant.  As you know, Warthog Jeeps have been vital in our ground strategy against Covenant forces in the war thus far.  However, my planetside campaigns have exposed a disturbing weakness among the UNSC Marines and ODST Helljumpers.  When a small squad of our men and I were confronted with a small army of Covenant, I immediately took control of the turret of our lone undamaged Warthog in order to efficiently dispatch the hostiles.  One of the soldiers took the while and another manned the passenger seat.

The soldier driving proceeded to drive in circles around the Covenant, swerving wildly so I was unable to get more than a few solid shots, before driving into a wall, backing up, and then driving into a wall again.  The passenger seat’s only recognizing of this baffling anomaly was to fire a five round burst at nothing with his assault rifle.  Enemy fire rained onto our Warthog, which sustained damage.

As these valiant men and women are defending humanity from certain extinction, if I may speak freely, sir, it is perplexing to see this lack of proper training.  I pass this letter on to you in the hope that it will be fixed; it would be unfortunate that Spartan-117 John to be left alone with UNSC marines of this caliber in three future campaigns.

Respectfully,
Commander Carter-A259

From: Fleet Admiral Sir Terrence Hood <t-hood@unsc.gov>
To: SPARTAN Commander Carter-A259 <cartman@unsc.gov>
Subject: Re: UNSC training capacity
Message sent: July 8, 2552

Commander,

Glad to see you made it through that planetary gauntlet alive – we’re sorry to hear that the Covenant ultimately glassed the planet.  Due to significant budget constraints and a need to replace numbers in the wake of massive casualties, we have had neither the time nor the money to incorporate Warthog driving test requirements as part of UNSC enlistment training.  Rest assured that we are making every effort to fix this problem.  In the meantime, use your Spartan training to man the Warthog driver’s seat.  UNSC troops will support you with sustained gunfire.

Please follow up when you get the chance.  We are eager to see how our UNSC marksmanship training program is working.

Respectfully,
Fleet Admiral Sir Terrence Hood

From: SPARTAN Commander Carter-A259 <cartman@unsc.gov>
To: Fleet Admiral Sir Terrence Hood <t-hood@unsc.gov>
Subject: UNSC Warthog update
Message sent: July 13, 2552

Fleet Admiral,

Sir, I regret to inform you that the USNC Marksmanship Program has not delivered the results you expected.  I took your advice and assigned one of my UNSC comrades to control the turret while another rode in the passenger seat.  Upon our very first encounter with Covenant on the planet <location censored as per UNSC protocol>, my gunner immediately swiveled his gun and fired several times at the gun several feet away from the Covenant.  Only two of forty subsequent bursts hit a Covenant Grunt, which simply shrugged off the attack as Elites pelted our Warthog with plasma grenades.  I was forced to simply run over the hostiles because our passenger seemed unwilling or unable to fire rounds.

Upon stopping the Warthog and furiously questioning the UNSC gunner, his only response was to shoot twice at a Grunt corpse and yell “Get up, so I can kill you again!” This and other incidents suggest that UNSC soldiers have greater accuracy against enemy corpses and are unwilling to directly respond to superior officers.  I would cite these men for insubordination and dereliction of duty, but shortly after we dismounted from our Warthog they walked directly into enemy gunfire and were torn apart.

Respectfully,
Commander Carter-A259

From: Fleet Admiral Sir Terrence Hood <t-hood@unsc.gov>
To: SPARTAN Commander Carter-A259 <cartman@unsc.gov>
Subject: Re: UNSC Warthog update
Message sent: July 15, 2552

Commander,

As we all know troop morale of the Human-Covenant War is taking serious hits after the continual glassing of planets by Covenant forces.  Any soldier irregularities, anomalies, or lack of ability or willingness to fight can be attributed to the gradual advancement of the Covenant deeper and deeper into UNSC territory.  We’ve poured considerable amounts of time and resources into the SPARTAN program – we are hoping your elite training will compensate for the increasing lethargic nature of UNSC soldiers.

Respectfully,
Fleet Admiral Sir Terrence Hood

From: SPARTAN Commander Carter-A259 <cartman@unsc.gov>
To: Fleet Admiral Sir Terrence Hood <t-hood@unsc.gov>
Subject: Re: Re: UNSC Warthog update
Message sent: July 16, 2552

Fleet Admiral,

I must respectfully disagree on your attribution of UNSC soldier inefficiency to morale.  Whenever a squadron of UNSC soldiers follows me, they whoop and yell as loudly as if they have never experienced a war before.  Has the USNC not instigated a policy for soldiers to keep low and avoid detection?  Our luck in not being ambushed in response to our soldiers’ apparent testosterone rushes seems to be that Covenant squadrons are engaged in mild chatter of their own.

Again, I must inquire if there is a deadline for badly needed revitalization of UNSC training programs.  If the Covenant discover the location of Reach, our current UNSC defenses will be wholly inadequate to handle an attack by the Covenant.  What if Reach falls?

Respectfully,
Commander Carter-A259

From: Fleet Admiral Sir Terrence Hood <t-hood@unsc.gov>
To: SPARTAN Commander Carter-A259 <cartman@unsc.gov>
Subject: Re: Re: Re: UNSC Warthog update
Message sent: July 15, 2552

Commander,

As we have spent virtually every novelization hyping up Reach as an impregnable, undetectable stronghold, the chances of Reach being discovered, let alone conquered, are approximately seven hundred million to one.  Currently we cannot provide the data you have requested; in the meantime, I recommend using ODST Helljumpers in lieu of UNSC standard soldiers for Warthog assaults due to their higher levels of training.

Respectfully,
Fleet Admiral Sir Terrence Hood

From: SPARTAN Commander Carter-A259 <cartman@unsc.gov>
To: Fleet Admiral Sir Terrence Hood <t-hood@unsc.gov>
Subject: Really?
Message sent: July 16, 2552

Fleet Admiral,

Okay, now you’re just fucking with me, aren’t you?  The first Helljumper to attempt driving a Warthog drove me right off a cliff.  How is it that UNSC troops can handle dropships just fine, yet as soon as they climb into simple jeeps the training goes to hell?  Master Chief Petty Officer 117-John is already issuing similar complaints; what if he’s alone with USNC soldiers without other Spartans for backup?  It will be the end for us all.

Respectfully,
Commander Carter-A259

From: Fleet Admiral Sir Terrence Hood <t-hood@unsc.gov>
To: SPARTAN Commander Carter-A259 <cartman@unsc.gov>
Subject: Really? (AUTO REPLY)
Message sent: July 18, 2552

THIS IS AN AUTOMATIC REPLY: I am away from my office on a classified assignment and will not have access to this E-mail terminal for seven days.  If this is Carter, stop whining.  Until you’ve been among the ranks of General Kyong’s North Korean super soldiers, you haven’t seen bad training.  Worse still is the BSAA African branch operative training.  Did you know they waste valuable medical supplies on you if you get a paper cut?  Consider that when your UNSC men get a little annoying.  Good luck out there, soldier.

When you start playing video games as a kid, as I did when I first picked up the NES controller at my cousins’ house, you notice some things about games as you get older.  A lot of things have changed: Maybe it’s been the huge advances from 8-bit technology to the glistening graphics we have today, maybe it’s much better gameplay elements, or maybe it’s just nostalgia.  Regardless, for every gamer there are some important points of self-discovery that shape perceptions about games in significant ways.  Here are some personal milestones for me, as it will.

Playing a game and enjoying it as a kid, then growing up and discovering it’s a turd
Ack, this one has a few immediate standouts.  One of my earliest PC games was this stinker:

You will die for rendering me in crappy pixels!

Ah, Crusaders of Might and Magic.  Drake is a young lad whose family is murdered by legions of the evil dead in Medievalville because…I guess his family owed back taxes.  This was one of the first games rendered in “full 3D” so it had a lot of hype behind it, and the opening cinematic seemed so badass to an 11-something gamer like me.  Of course, it wasn’t until I got older that I noticed certain things.  Drake speaks with a hilariously casual tone of voice as he confronts the evil lord who killed his family, his face looks like it’s melting, and combat is so imbalanced and awkward looking that you’d swear the enemies were falling down from exhaustion due to some form of break-dancing.

Quest 64 also deserves mention for this category since I actually managed to finish it, albeit with heavy GameShark usage.  This seemed like an epic, heroic, moving tale of a young wizard/sorcerer named Brian who goes on a quest to find his father, stop evil lords, and ultimately confront a giant demon.  Later I would realize how silly the story is and how incomprehensibly boring the combat is, even for an old school RPG.  Maybe I was just entertained easily as a kid.

The first time you hated a game when all the reviews loved it
At some point in every young gamer’s life, he or she discovers that game reviews are, in fact, opinions, rather than the highest authority.  Upon playing this game, a gamer will realize it is perfectly rational to dislike a game when everyone else is heaping praise onto it.  What’s my game for this?

The Force is with you, Star Wars Galaxies...but you are not a good game yet

Few games induce as much bile in me as Star Wars Galaxies.  In a way it’s fitting that this was my introduction to MMORPGs because Star Wars Galaxies was an itemized list of everything wrong with them.  Despite the game-breaking glitches, routine server crashes, ludicrous amount of grinding, unintuitive menus and interfaces, and laughably stupid combat reviewers hailed Star Wars Galaxies as the digital Second Coming, assuring reviewers that, in time, it would be a great game as soon as the problems were ironed out.  Based on how the user base plummeted, my guess is it didn’t.  I consider this retribution for the $50 I would never get back from LucasArts, personally.

Loving a game, then watching it age horribly graphics-wise
There are a lot of PSX/N64 era games that could be hot contenders for this, but for me, there can only be one:

I wish the game looked as good as the box art

I can’t count how many hours I poured into Goldeneye.  Between replaying single player missions over and over again, exploiting cheats and hilarious glitches, and multiplayer with friends, it’s safe to say there are entire days of my life logged into this game.  However, as time went on, something was happened to my beloved Goldeneye.  As time wore on, the faces of the characters grew more and more pixelated, their faces increasingly less descriptive, and their bodies more awkward and gangly looking.  Or was the game itself just looking older?  Yes, Goldeneye is one of the most notorious casualties of hindsight, what with the shiny glistening seventh generation graphics we have now.  It’s still fun to play in a campy way, but it’ll never quite be the same.

Watching the decline of a beloved game or franchise
This one has less to do with nostalgia and more with watching a good franchise inevitably end, as immortal as it may appear at the time.  It might not even be because the games got progressively worse; it could simply be that the developers abandoned it.  Speaking of which:

We'll always miss you, Tribes

Ah, Tribes.  The first Tribes and its sequel, Tribes 2, were no strangers to my computer.  The huge, open worlds, vehicles, bases, and ability of flight gave you a lot to do for 1998 and 2001, and what’s more, you could do it all with your friends.  These games were a lot of fun and some of the best multiplayer offerings back when PC gaming was soaring high, but after Tribes 2 the series started to weaken.  Tribes: Aerial Assault didn’t make nearly the impact that its predecessors had.  Tribes: Vengeance was better and even incorporated a single player storyline, but by now the competition had grown severe.  2004 gave us Half-Life 2, Halo 2, Counter-Strike: Source and Unreal Tournament 2004.  Ultimately, the developers sadly abandoned the Tribes series, officially concluding it and marking the end of a great series.

Watching a beloved older game turn into a horrible reboot
Let’s conclude this journey down memory lane by coming full circle to today.  Every so often a video game developer will attempt to remake or reboot an old franchise.  Some of them are good, some of them are bad, and some of them are awful enough to negate every good thing the older, better games had ever done.  Case in point?

How could you, Golden Axe?

Sega’s Secret Level team apparently thought it was good idea to turn a classic 2.5D side scrolling series into an aggravating, needlessly hard, flat out boring game.  It’s difficult to believe a game about a bikini clad woman riding a fire-breathing dragon on a quest to avenge fallen loved ones by confronting a giant demon could be this dull, but somehow they pulled it off.  I haven’t used the term revival because I can’t in good conscious consider this a revival of anything.

So that concludes some critical elements of growing up as a lifelong gamer.  I admit to still having some fondness for Quest 64 – the feeling of epic grandeur it held for me as a 10-something year old has been replaced by a campy retro charm that’s hard to overlook.  It’s a guilty pleasure, to say the least.  That being said, it’s important to not to simply dismiss the bad titles we played as young’uns, no matter how deeply they shame us today.  They shaped our perceptions and gave us some entertainment while they lasted, and even bad games have a place in history.

All I needed to hear was that Half-Minute­ Hero – by itself unusual for a JRPG title – apparently satirizes the genre.  Growing up with Final Fantasy, Dragon Quest, and Tales exacerbates repetitive and archaic elements of JRPGs, so I had to check this out.

Developer: Marvelous Entertainment
Publisher: XSEED Games
Genre: RPG?
Console(s): PlayStation Portable

The verdict: Finally, a JRPG willing to think outside the box and poke some fun at itself.  Half-Minute Hero is very entertaining, thirty seconds at a time.

What comes to mind when you think of JRPGs?  50-plus hours of linear gameplay?  Immensely complex narratives?  Lengthy, beautiful cutscenes?  Half-Minute Hero takes all of the conventions of JRPGs and tosses them to the wind.  Marvelous Entertainment’s 8-bit retro can loosely be classified as a parody of JRPGs, taking typical JRPG stereotypes and reinventing them in imaginative and clever ways.   There are some rough patches, but nothing that stops Half-Minute Hero from being a thoroughly enjoyable experience.

Saving the world 30 seconds at a time

Half-Minute Hero doesn’t have a plot, per se, but the game’s greatest strength is an uncanny sense of irony the developer took to simultaneously poke fun at the JRPG genre and give it a nod of appreciation.  The titular half-minute aspect comes into play because every single quest is 30 seconds long.  You’ll have 30 seconds at a time to use your selected hero to attack enemies, complete side quests, complete a spell, or do any number of things to stop the latest diabolical overlord from ending the world.  There are four gameplay modes, each of which naturally emphasizes speed and a sense of frantic urgency that makes the game a blast to play.

Half-minute perspective

Hero 30 is the primary game mode, and plays most similarly to a typical JRPG.  An evil mastermind has cast a spell of destruction that will doom the entire world in 30 seconds.  Your hero must race around the world defeating monsters and gaining experience and gold until you are strong enough to take on the dark one.  If you find yourself running short on time, you can pay the Time Goddess statue to restore 30 seconds to the clock, giving you precious extra time.

Princess 30 is akin to a shooter; the Princess and her honor guard move through the landscape while the princess shoots at anything unfortunate enough to go near her squad.  Given how helpless the princess usually is in a JRPG this mode will feel cathartic to JRPG players.  It’s fun and chaotic but there are times when all the action gets a little too busy to make out what’s going on.  The simplistic formula also means things will get old fairly quickly.  Still, the rapid pace means dullness never sets in for too long.

Evil Lord 30 draws elements from real time strategy.  You are (what else?) an evil lord, and your objective is to kill all of the baddies in 30 seconds using summoned monsters.  The game utilizes a rock-paper-scissors component so different enemies have strengths and weaknesses.  There are some minor AI goofs when my summoned monsters seemed to forget where they were, but they minor and didn’t detract from an entertaining experience.  Knight 30 is also simple, but has a creative concept.  You need to protect a sage casting his own 30 second spell in order to destroy the evil one trying to destroy the world.  The action is a lot of fun, but your effective close range combat makes the traps you’re given unnecessary in most situations.

Replay value, one pixel at a time

Collectively the four gameplay modes provide an impressive ten hours of replay value though individual missions last a few minutes each.  This may not sound like much and may disappoint old school JRPG fans, but given the short length of the missions ten hours is still admirable.  The rapid pace also eases any repetition brought on by the same objectives, not to mention the difficulty ramps up as you’re tested in a number of different ways relating to the power of enemies and the time mechanic.

Half-Minute Hero presents itself as a retro homage, and for NES veterans it will be a charming throwback to days before water-reflective surfaces or even 3D.  The graphics and sounds are highly reminiscent of 8 and 16-bit technology and it gives the game an endearing charm.  Environments are deliberately threadbare to emphasize the time period we’re in, but everything is colorful and cutely designed.  Sprites for monsters and characters are exaggerated and over-pixelated to emphasize the atmosphere.  Even the text and menu have a retro feel to them in the way they look.  Marvelous Entertainment didn’t use this as an excuse to cut corner; in its own way the game looks great, and there’s no slowdown even when the Princess 30 missions get frantic.

Conclusion

JRPG game, homage, and satire; Half-Minute Hero is all of these rolled into one.  Objections do get a little repetitive, but the pacing makes the experience a lot of fun and the sheer charm of the game makes it hard to resist.  It’s easy, accessible, and bound to make older gamers feel warm and fuzzy.  Even if you aren’t the biggest JRPG fan (indeed, this might help), Half-Minute Hero is a worthy addition to any PSP library.

Good ol’ Tekken.  This is a fighting series that has endured the test of time, and now the sixth game of the primary series has landed in arcades, consoles, and even the PSP.  So how does the PSP version hold up relative to its console counterparts?

Developer: Namco Bandai
Publisher: Namco Bandai
Genre: Fighting
Console(s): Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, PlayStation Portable

Disclaimer: This game was provided by Namco Bandai.

The verdict: Tekken 6 looks great, plays wonderfully, and packs an impressive amount of content onto the PSP.  It just gets old even faster than its console counterparts without the online play.

The concept of a fighter is something that would inherently fit well on a portable: Got ten minutes before your flight leaves?  Break out the PSP and K.O. a few opponents without having to run around looking for a save point.  All you need to do is make sure is that fighting game in question utilizes the full power of the PSP to offer an enjoyable experience.  Thankfully, Namco Bandai has brought the same enjoyable sixth iteration of the Tekken series to portable grounds, albeit with some expected trimming in terms of content.

Adjusting for new accommodations

Tekken 6 on the PSP may make some players wary because some cutdown is going to be inevitable, but the portable version of this game is as solid as you would get on a regular console.  No corners were cut from the experience itself.  The roster features a whopping 41 fighters ranging from series favorites to some superb newcomers from Tekken: Dark Resurrection, as well as newcomers for Tekken 6 itself.  Longtime series fans will notice that some tweaks have been made to existing characters in terms of move sets and abilities that help balance gameplay and emphasize different fighters’ strengths and weaknesses.  Most fighters are still generally accessible to newcomers, but veterans will easily be able to familiarize themselves with favorite characters.

It’s also nice to see Tekken 6 maintaining a sense of humor; the developers obviously didn’t try to take the game too seriously.  It’s not quite as silly as Soulcalibur: Broken Destiny, but Alisa is a good example of the game’s willingness to have fun.  Alisa is a new character who happens to be an android.  Her abilities include using chainsaws mounted to her arms and literally detaching her own head and using it as a bomb.

Round one, FI-okay, I’m done milking that joke

Beyond the character roster, the combat itself is a blast.  Abilities are used via the face buttons and stringing together moves and combos is a fairly robust process.  Characters all feel unique (even if they don’t have chainsaws for arms) and have their own play styles.  The variation on character styles makes for a fair amount of strategy.  Mashing buttons or just backing up and blocking will work up to a point, but like any repetitive strategy weaknesses will quickly be exploited.

Part of what makes the experience rewarding is how well the PSP has been used technologically.  While it’s true that the graphics are a step down from the 360 or PS3, they look fantastic for the PSP.  Character models and animations are smooth and crisp and environments are detailed and colorful.  Meanwhile, sounds like fierce shouts to accompany attacks or bone-crunching hits that land on the intended target come through crystal clear.  In short, technologically the game runs beautifully and only serves to make Tekken 6 on the PSP more enjoyable.  I’m not as keen on the music, which seems to be setting an epic feel, but just comes off as annoying and bombastically pretentious.

Game modes: The good and the bad

The only real difference between the PSP version of Tekken 6 and its console counterparts is the removal of the lengthy Campaign Scenario mode, which shouldn’t disappoint too many fans.  It’s a safe bet to say that few people care enough about the story of Tekken to let this be a deciding factor, since what we’re really here for is the combat.  The other modes focus more on combat and less on story and are subsequently more entertaining.  Arcade and Practice are the self-explanatory bread and butter of fighting games, measured by how good the combat in any fighter is: In this case, standard but very enjoyable.  They still spice things up because in Arcade mode there are some neat little additions, such as characters gaining ranks and five difficulty levels, all of which have level-appropriate AI.

Things get more interesting with Challenge mode, which features a litany of modes including Survival, Time Attack, and Gold Rush (where you get money for attacks, ala Super Smash Bros.).  Ghost Battles match you against AI opponents with different ranks.  What’s the reward for all of this?  The money, of course.  In Tekken 6 money can be used to purchase customization options for characters, including various clothing parts and even sound effects.  It’s nice to have a reward for fighting, although customization options are fairly limited.

While the offline single player modes are fun, after several hours you’ll pretty much know all the motions, and online is inevitably limited relative to the console counterparts.  The only way to play multiplayer is locally if someone has another Tekken 6 UMD disc on the PSP, and without the robust online system found on Xbox Live, Tekken 6 PSP’s most glaring weaknesses is exacerbated.  Replay value is fairly limited, especially if you’ve played previous games, meaning you will likely be familiar with the combat and core gameplay mechanics.

Final round

In the end, the Tekken 6 PSP version definitely holds up, but it’s a matter of what you personally want out of a fighter.  If online play matters to you, then steer clear; if you’re willing to trade a graphical downgrade and some content cutting in exchange for being able to play wherever you want, Tekken 6 on the PSP is definitely worth a look.

What’s the first thing you think of when you hear Final Fantasy?  Is it epic battles, attractive cutscenes, or maybe mini-games?  Probably not that last one, but that’s the interesting direction Square-Enix took with Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: The Crystal Bearers in an attempt to give the game more of a casual feel; it’s just as well, considering Crystal Bearers is a Wii exclusive title.  How does this new direction fare?

Developer: Square-Enix
Publisher: Square-Enix
Genre: RPG (sort of)
Console(s): Wii

The verdict: An interesting setting and world and some worthwhile ideas aren’t enough to save Crystal Bearers from ever rising about mediocrity stemming from interesting but repetitive mini-games and extremely lackluster combat.

The RPG reserves on the Wii seem woefully dry; it’s just as well, since just about every RPG I’ve seen on the Wii has been a dud.  Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: The Crystal Bearers unfortunately has not done anything to help.  The game makes an interesting attempt to incorporate a casual audience, but all it does is demonstrate that some things do not mix: Namely Final Fantasy and casual audiences.  While the creative world and atmosphere are still here, bad design choices hold it down.

Swapping out magic for science

Crystal Bearers takes place a millennium after the original Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles.  Magic is outlawed, instead shoved aside by a new age of science.  There still exist individuals who can use magic appropriately known as “Crystal Bearers”, who are ostracized by the public for their abilities.  Enter the Crystal Bearer Layle, an easygoing mercenary caught up in a conspiracy when a routine mission goes awry.  An airship Layle is escorting comes under heavy fire by monsters, and a sequence JRPG clichés has Layle racing to save the world of Crystal Chronicles.

At its most basic summary the plot is typical JRPG fare, but it unfolds in a fairly unique way.  The story dispenses of the usual JRPG character archetypes and the overall narrative is interesting enough to keep most RPG fans playing.  The game’s biggest strength is the world, which drops you off in a bustling city after your airship crash-lands after the introduction.  There are a variety of different settings and terrains with uniquely designed characters along with Final Fantasy classic enemies.  The game almost feels reminiscent of Star Wars, striking a creative balance between whimsical and believable, and little elements like world news updates do a lot to enforce believability.  Everything feels augmented by the graphics, which are some of the most clear and crisp of any game I’ve ever played on the Wii.  Details such as leaves on trees and Layle’s hair give a sense of authenticity to the world and everything feels vibrant.

Conversely, the story and world take several immersion-breaking hits.  The English dialogue is extremely subpar, with characters spouting out unfunny jokes in broken, incomplete sentences that don’t hide the bad lip-synching.  Voice acting itself is even worse; characters make a brave attempt to “get into” their characters, but the result ironically backfires.  There’s a female photographer whose voice sounds like a screeching parrot, and Layle tries to sound like a hotshot but winds up being obnoxious.  Layle just isn’t relatable or likeable, and by the halfway point of the game you’ll likely want to deck him.

Cutscene, mini-game, cutscene

Gameplay gets off to a shaky start, falling into a very common JRPG trap: A lengthy cutscene where you have no control of your character.  Instead, there are a few mini-games that involve shooting at hostiles in midair as you fall from your ship and steering your vessel to safety.  This unfortunately sets the standard for what gameplay will be like and also raises a perplexing issue.  Why am I not allowed to control my character during a fight?  This happens repeatedly throughout the game and features some gameplay elements that should have been incorporated into combat but weren’t.

Gameplay is actually mini-game based, and the two above mini-games are actually examples of what a large chunk of your gameplay will consist of.  Most of them do make solid use of the Wii Motion controls and it’s a dazzling experience to fall through the air shooting at enemy targets, aiming using a cursor.  These combat oriented mini-games are actually a lot of fun and Crystal Bearers could have benefited from more of them, but a lot of mini-games revolve around silly, unnecessary things like ballroom dancing.  For every combat-based one that’s entertaining to partake in, there’s another mini-game that serves no purpose and just feels like padding.  Within  a few hours, the gameplay becomes so oversimplified that there’s no challenge or complexity to work through.

Ambition and shortcomings

Mini-games are admittedly an easier experience than actually controlling Layle due to several serious problems.  The only combat capabilities you have when controlling Layle directly is a gravity manipulating power that lets you pick up items and people and hurl them.  This was actually a really clever idea, but it’s never built upon or expanded.  All you do is go through the exact same motions of picking something up and throwing it; it’s as if the development team forgot about this part of gameplay because they were developing the mini-games.  It’s kind of funny the first time you use your gravity powers to lift up a city guard, but it’s a shame we aren’t allowed more gravity manipulation, since it was the germ of an interesting idea.

In general gameplay feels like the developers had impressive ambitions, but for every step forward they take half a step back.  There are some additions to the game that make it more worthwhile to play, like an achievements list with a whopping 330 tasks.  There’s a fair amount of gameplay to be had with around twenty hours, but again, there’s nothing really to do besides some minor exploration, the same repetitive real-time combat, and frequent mini-games with similar mechanics.

In terms of technology the game runs just fine, which is admittedly admirable during for how attractive it looks on the Wii.  Unfortunately, music doesn’t share the same high status as the graphics.  Most of the songs are obnoxious guitar loops that are too goofy to be taken seriously, and a few of them are a pain to listen to.  There’s no real sense of what the soundtrack wants to be; it’s just a mediocre offering of different types of songs.  I heard something that sounded suspiciously like bagpipes at one point.

Conclusion

I can see some ambition behind Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: The Crystal Bearers but the interesting world and some clever ideas are buried under extremely awkward writing as well as simplistic and repetitive gameplay.  I can’t imagine that this is the final product that the developers envisioned, but as is it’s difficult to recommend to anyone but hardcore Crystal Chronicles fans.

It’s tempting to argue that arcade racers are a dying breed.  Between Need for Speed: Shift, Forza Motorsport 3, and the upcoming Gran Turismo 5, realistic racers seem to be taking the spotlight.  Ironically, after Need for Speed: Shift began the Need for Speed franchise’s apparent shift towards more realistic simulators, Need for Speed: Nitro has raced onto the scene presenting itself as a classic arcade racer.  How does it hold up?  Let’s take a look.

Developer: EA Montreal
Publisher: Electronic Arts
Genre: Arcade racer
Console(s): Wii, DS

The verdict: Nitro is fun, fast, and chaotic for a few hours, but it can’t muster enough variation and creativity to be star.

While the more realistic, simulator-leaning Need for Speed: Shift has been released for the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, Electronic Arts has served up a pure arcade racer for the Wii.  Nitro definitely feels at home on the Wii: The races are fast, intense, and bring the “speed” part of the Need for Speed series.  The lack of content makes the fun get repetitive quickly, but Nitro is still a well-done racer.

3…2…1…

Nitro definitely has a more casual and family friendly audience in mind, which is why it feels tailor made for the Wii.  Pristine realism and crippling damage done by hitting other cars are elements that have no place in Nitro; instead, the game opts for a different (but still enjoyable) experience.  In a nutshell, everything is deliberately exaggerated and overblown in an entertaining way.  Cars are based off of real life models but look more like Hot Wheels toys than their real-life counterparts.  Environments and scenery also have a much cartoonier look to them, and everything is augmented with bright, cheerful colors.

GO!

However, you won’t have time to admire the attractive environments because most of your time will be spent watching them whip by.  Nitro delivers the speed part of Need for Speed very nicely, and with rewards for drifting and being more aggressive and reckless, roads will get pretty chaotic.  The game essentially rewards you the crazier you act, but even that wasn’t enough for EA Montreal, since they added police cars into the mix that will chase you.  All of this leads to a hilarious and thrilling experience that best represents what’s good about arcade racers.  There are even in-game items to quickly repair your car or provide other bonuses.

Chief among gameplay modes is Career Mode, which takes place across Rio de Janeiro, Singapore, Madrid, Cairo, and Dubai.  You progress by gaining stars related to various aspects of your race performance ala Shift, and despite the game’s laid back atmosphere some of the stars can be very challenging to earn, providing a fair amount of difficulty for racing veterans.  Arcade mode is more direct, letting players choose their own race details.  Both gameplay modes provide a lot of opportunities for the speed and road rage that make Nitro such an entertaining experience.

Not enough gas

The lack of description about gameplay modes provides a segway into the weakest part of Nitro: Lack of replay value.  As fun as the races themselves are, the charm can get old very quickly because you’re essentially doing the same things repeatedly in order to score stars and points across a very limited spectrum of locations.  There’s very little reason to keep playing after a few hours.  You’ll know all the motions and will be able to progress through career mode without any real difficulty, and with a scant 30 cars (on the Wii version) there isn’t much to discover.  There’s a somewhat robust customization system but even that is limited.

The game also carries baggage that feels almost customary for arcade racers, namely wonky physics that wind up being cumbersome even though exaggerated physics were the idea behind this title.  There’s no real way to measure how a collision or a tight turn will impact your car, and it’s difficult to discern whether clipping the hood of the car behind you will throw you off momentarily or send you careening out of control.  Differences between the various cars in terms of statistics seem very incremental; again, the physics seem to factor into this.

Closing thoughts

Need for Speed: Nitro starts off fast but the experience wears itself thin quickly.  Is it bad?  Not in the least; it just doesn’t maintain the momentum it starts out with.  The cartoony aesthetics and sense of speed are superb and the Career and Arcade modes are fun to play for a while.  Nitro never lets down, but it can’t quite achieve the level of success to recommend for every Wii user.  Whether or not this is worth $50 really hinges upon your love of arcade racers.  Give it a chance, but don’t expect to be wowed.

As the long-awaited Final Fantasy XIII countdown continues, if you happen to live in California then January 13 sees your chance to play Final Fantasy XIII before anyone else in North America.  The bus will bear a demo of the North American version of the game and will be making stops throughout the San Francisco and Bay area throughout the 16th.  It can be followed on the Twitter site @PlayFFXIII.

I personally would rather see the game be released, but bravo for touring the game regardless.  I’ve never found outdoor buses conducive to enjoying games; the only time one of those buses stopped at a Gamestop in my vicinity I was playing the original Super Smash Bros. with a crippling glare from the sun.  I still look forward to playing the final product in March.