In case you haven’t already seen this, take 10 minutes out of your day and watch it. This is the Ohio State University Marching Band’s halftime performance from October 6th.
Look for Epona at around the six minute mark. If you have ever marched before, you will shit a brick.
Know what’s great about Pokemon? The basic formula has never changed and the games remain as addicting as ever. For the last two weeks I’ve been playing through Pokemon Red again on my Game Boy Color (how that thing still works after the amount of abuse I’ve put it through is beyond me) and even with the two-tone graphics and beep-boop music I still can’t pull myself away. Taking down Team Rocket by infiltrating the Silph Company building is just as fun as it ever was, and finding the fastest route through the Safari Zone to get to HM03 is still a pain in the ass.
So it should come as no surprise that I still follow the series, which continues with Black 2 and White 2. The first numbered sequels in the main Pokemon series don’t disappoint – though they’re basically what you would expect. Instead of the anticipated “Pokemon Grey” as the improved version of Black and White, we got B&W2. The new-and-improved versions of these games feature a continuation of the storyline, new towns, and added Pokemon on every route. You have a few changes in Gym Leadership – your old rival Cheren is now the first Gym Leader faced, replacing Lenora as the Normal-type Leader, and the corresponding affirmative-action move is with Marlon and the new Humilau City Gym. We’ve also got a new Poison-type Leader with Roxie, who is pretty cool because she plays bass (like yours truly, because bass is the best instrument), and is also the first Poison-type Leader since Generation 2! It’s the little things that excite me these days.
Graphically the game isn’t a huge improvement over the first Black and White, but they packed about as much as they can into that tiny DS cartridge. I think it’s safe to say that this is the swan song of the DS – one last hurrah before the world (and developers) move on permanently to the 3DS. Little things have been updated – user interface, for one, plus every single trainer you run into has an animation now, instead of just the rivals and N in the previous games. Again, it’s the little things.
Story-wise, it’s basically what you would expect. You start off in your hometown – which is a city this time, with a gym and a Pokemon Center, instead of some podunk little town with a laboratory – choose your starter Pokemon (no change from B&W as far as that’s concerned), fight your rival for the first time and head out into the wilderness by yourself in the most negligent parenting move ever. I assume the Pokemon World doesn’t have social services. Regardless, you almost immediately run into the remnants of Team Plasma, who we all assumed were eliminated in the events of the first game. Much like how Team Rocket was still dicking around in Gold and Silver, Team Plasma still manages to worm its way into almost everything in Black and White 2. At least their uniforms look a lot cooler now.
And to be perfectly fair, Team Plasma still has one of the best battle themes in the entire series.
Speaking of music, much of what you’ll hear is remixed music from B&W. Not that that’s a bad thing, since most of the Generation 5 music was pretty good to begin with. The only theme that’s really disappointing is your Rival’s music, but the rivals in general have been awful since Generation 3. Hugh is tolerable but he’s not a jerk like I want him to be. The best rivals were Blue and Silver, because they were assholes, and that’s the point of a rival. He’s supposed to come in when you least expect it and ruin your entire day. Whatever happened to that, Game Freak?
By far the coolest addition to the game is the Pokemon World Tournament. You get to face every single Gym Leader and Champion the games have ever featured in region-based tournaments. It presents a great challenge to even the most seasoned Pokemon veterans. Only downside in my eyes is that the Elite Four doesn’t get any love – just Leaders and Champions. Kind of a blower. But you still get to face off against the original Pokemon Master, Red himself. He will still rape face with his Pikachu and don’t you forget it.
I guess it comes down to this – if you don’t already play Pokemon, you’re not going to get this anyway… so why are you reading this? If you’re already a fan of the series or even if you’ve missed a couple of generations, Pokemon Black 2 and White 2 are worth a play. Does it follow the exact same goddamn formula the previous games have? You bet your ass it does. But that’s why we keep coming back, right? To beat the snot out of the Champion and catch ‘em all, right? So go get your Pokeballs and set out again in Pokemon Black 2 and White 2.
VG Confab says: BUY IT!
Alright, maybe that headline’s a little unfair. But not really.
Bethesda announced the Hearthfire DLC for The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim today. What does this involve? Dragons and vampires and killing things and dungeon crawls and– wait, no, it doesn’t include any of that. Hearthfire gives you the opportunity to buy a chunk of land, build your own house, adopt children and do all of the things that aren’t even remotely combat-related.
Downside: It’s goddamn Sims. But for people who like killing dragons.
Upside: It’s only going to be 400 Microsoft points to download.
Look for a review from me when it releases on September 4.
Coming in at number 1 on the long list of things no one ever really wanted but they’re doing it anyway just to spite us all… a working version of Cheetahmen 2. Yes, that’s correct – there’s a kickstarter going on to create a working, playable version of the nefarious Action 52 title.
If you’re not familiar with Cheetahmen, here’s a brief history: the Action 52 was a multicart released for the NES in 1991. The box stated “The Ultimate Challenge – 52 games in one cartridge!” Of course, most of these were buggy as hell if not entirely broken. The cost of the game at the time? $199. Yes, for more than the cost of a goddamn Xbox today you could get 52 terrible games for your Nintendo. The Cheetahmen, included on the cartridge, was the developer’s attempt to capitalize on the crime-fightin’ furry craze of the time (Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Battletoads, basically). It was a side-scrolling action platformer with six levels, and every two levels the character you used changed.
And then they decided to try making a sequel. They got through designing and programming only half of the levels before the whole project was basically scrapped, though in 1996 someone found 1,500 Cheetahmen 2 cartridges in some warehouse (probably with the E.T. Atari game) and threw the ROM online.
The game was UNPLAYABLE. Totally broken. The first boss goes off the screen and doesn’t come back, leaving you stuck there. You literally cannot get anywhere in the game without cheating somehow. That being said, the music was disproportionally good compared to the quality of the actual game:
Here’s my Cheetahmen anecdote: I used to know a guy who had a hacked version of Cheetahmen 2 on a flash cart on his DS. He would play Cheetahmen 2 ALL THE FUCKING TIME. I woke up in the middle of the night at an anime convention where he was rooming with me and our other friends one time and he was playing goddamn Cheetahmen 2. Any time he had 10 minutes to kill, it was Cheetahmen time. I imagine he’s shitting himself at the idea of a working version of this game.
The Kickstarter project is already more than $60,000 towards their $65,000 goal, and you can contribute and learn more about the project here. They’re even going to publish it on an NES deck!
Yes, that’s correct – according to a recently-translated Famitsu article, we’re going to have a fifth installation in the Persona series… instead of just remakes and ports, thank god. Persona 4 Arena just came out and Persona 4 Golden is on the way, and quite frankly, I’m getting a little tired of seeing Persona 4 all over the damn place. A completely new Persona title would be a breath of fresh air compared to that.
Let’s see… Since the release of Persona 4, the last main title in the series, in 2008, we’ve seen remakes of Persona (2009), Persona 3 (2010), Persona 2 (2011) and Persona 4 (2012), all on the PSP, which is by now a dead system. I think they’ve rehashed all they can possibly hash out of the previous titles and milked the money cow for all it’s worth.
I’m curious to see what system this will be coming out on. When the 3DS was first coming out I recall speculation of a Persona title being developed for it – could this be it? It’ll either be that or the PS3. If it’s on Vita, I’m going to be pissed. I don’t want to buy a Vita but a Persona title might spur me to do so.
The Famitsu article also mentioned that Katsura Hasino of Team Persona is also working on a project that he says will “surprise everyone.” Uh… alright. If it’s tacking on to an existing series I’m hoping it’ll be a main Shin Megami Tensei series title (because Strange Journey was so ehhhh and everyone forgets it’s a main MegaTen game), or a Digital Devil Saga prequel/sequel. But I guess we’ll have to wait and see.
Kingdom Hearts 3D: Dream Drop Distance came out last week.
This was my exact reaction:
Can somebody please step up and give me an actual reason as to why the Kingdom Hearts series is worth playing? Because I have been trying for YEARS to figure that out. The only game in the series that was actually worth playing was the first installment, and here’s why: it didn’t take itself too seriously. The first Kingdom Hearts game knew what it was – a silly mashup of Square-Enix and Disney properties that still managed to keep the whimsy of the Disney universe while having a fun RPG engine to run on. You got to square off against classic Disney villains, save the world, the end. Cool stuff.
And then the sequels started coming out, and I started hating this series.
Once they added all the assholes with the black coats, Kingdom Hearts became dead to me. Regardless of how well-rated any of these titles are, I will firmly argue that each of them after the first game is a total waste of time. Why? The series now takes itself too goddamn seriously for games that have Mickey, Donald and Goofy as main characters. Starting with Chain of Memories and Kingdom Hearts II, the plot started having all of this dramatic metaphorical bullshit with the Organization XIII people and Riku being this wild card and the plot and characters just got so convoluted that I decided that it wasn’t fucking worth playing anymore. And I still think I’m right.
If Square-Enix wants to make an action-RPG with a bunch of douchebags in black coats where the hero is a kid with spiky hair and wields literally the stupidest RPG weapon since the gunblade (seriously, a KEY? SERIOUSLY?!), that’s their prerogative. All of that BS is stuff the company’s known for doing in pretty much all of their games anyway. But you can’t have Mickey fuckin’ Mouse in your game and still prance around like you can be taken seriously, I’m sorry.
It also doesn’t help that the people who are really into these games all look like this:
Yes, apparently, to at least half of the fandom, all of the characters in Kingdom Hearts just want to bone each other. Everyone’s gay, the end. So let’s dress up like them and go to an anime convention and make out with each other to fulfill our heart’s desire! As someone who is a frequent attendee of said conventions, I’m pretty sick of seeing this shit all over the place. And whenever a new Kingdom Hearts title comes out, there’s bound to be a resurgence.
So please, stop buying these games. Stop asking for Kingdom Hearts 3 and stop supporting this godawful series. Once you’ve come to the same conclusion that I have about these games – that they are a huge waste of time with the worst fandom I think I’ve ever seen – you’ll wonder why you ever bought them in the first place.
As soon as Nintendo announced a world tour of the Legend of Zelda symphony, I couldn’t contain my excitement. Two of my favorite things – the Legend of Zelda and orchestral music – in one event? Awesome. So when they finally announced concerts in my area, I immediately got tickets. And earlier this month, I got to use them. Finally.
The Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra with the Philadelphia Choir performed The Legend of Zelda: Symphony of the Goddesses flawlessly. I figured that they would be playing most, of not all of the tracks included in the CD that shipped with Skyward Sword, and I was mostly right. I also chose ahead of time not to spoil the set list for myself, either.
The performance began with the Overture, which you may remember from Nintendo’s E3 press conference last year. It’s essentially a medley of songs from nearly every Zelda title, and worked well for the opener. From there, they went into a few shorter songs before beginning the four-part symphony; these included a Dungeons medley (which focused mainly on the dungeon theme from Zelda II: The Adventure of Link, which is still probably the most iconic dungeon music out there), Kakariko Village’s theme, and a medley of Ocarina songs.
The Symphony itself was a four-part movement which included a prelude of the music from the creation of Hyrule as an homage to the three Golden Goddesses before delving into the heavy stuff. The first movement focused exclusively on the Ocarina of Time, and included samples from the title screen (people went absolutely nuts in the stands when they started that), Hyrule Field, the Lost Woods, and the final battle with Ganondorf. Following this, they went into the Wind Waker – for this, the conductor used a replica Wind Waker baton, which I – and everyone else in the audience, I’m sure – felt was a nice touch. Here, we were taken out on the ocean with Link and the King of Red Dragons and back down to the depths of the sea to a ruined Hyrule, to defeat Ganondorf once again.
It should be noted that through each piece, large screens showed gameplay and cinematic footage from the games the music was from – and it was all synchronized to the music pretty fantastically. Whoever was running the video screens deserves a pat on the back, seriously.
After a quick intermission we got back into the music, starting with the Great Fairy Fountain’s theme. The creative director came out and said he felt “refreshed,” which was fitting, I suppose. He then introduced the third movement of the symphony, which was Twilight Princess. We saw Link’s transformation into his wolf form and his bond with Midna grow. Following this, we had the fourth and final movement of the symphony – A Link to the Past. From Link’s first steps out of bed and into the castle sewers to find Zelda, to the battle with the wizard Agahnim and subsequent transport to the Dark World to the final scene with the Triforce itself, everything was portrayed beautifully and this was by far my favorite movement of the symphony itself.
Seriously, give it a listen.
Despite the fact that the symphony was over, we weren’t quite done yet. A three-song encore was performed by the orchestra. The first of these songs was the Ballad of the Wind Fish from Link’s Awakening. I’ll be honest, this was my favorite song of the night. Link’s Awakening was the first Zelda title I was ever exposed to, the first I bugged my parents to take me to Funcoland to buy and the first of Link’s adventures I got into. Hearing that song orchestrated took me back to when I was about eight or nine years old and I was one of just a few kids at a barbeque my parents had taken me to. One of the other kids there – I don’t remember his name – had a Game Boy Color like me and had the DX version of Link’s Awakening. He was at the Moblin’s Castle mini-dungeon and let me beat it for him. From that point on, I was hooked. The overwhelming nostalgia from hearing Ballad of the Wind Fish was just an incredible feeling – and now I’m playing through Link’s Awakening again.
The second song of the encore set was Gerudo Valley, a track that came on the CD that shipped with Skyward Sword. Hearing it live, however, was just amazing, and seeing the footage from Ocarina of Time to go with it was awesome as well. This was by far the biggest crowd-pleaser of the night, judging by the response it received when the main melody started.
Finally, we heard music from a game that otherwise wasn’t mentioned at all that night – Majora’s Mask. The creative director came out and explained that they took fan feedback into consideration when they were planning on expanding the tour, and the thing that fans asked for more than anything was a selection of music from Majora’s Mask – and so they delivered. The suite consisted of the beginning of the game, when Link is first transformed into a Deku Scrub, the theme from Clock Town, and the final battle with Majora. Despite the fact that Majora’s Mask is one of my least-favorite Zelda titles, I still got a kick out of hearing the music. I can also appreciate the fact that the people in charge of this endeavor are taking the fans’ opinions into consideration as they add to the set list.
Overall, this was an exhilarating concert experience. As a lifelong Zelda fan, I would definitely go see it again. However, the casual fans (of which there were several sitting right around us who were taking notes on which Zelda titles they now wanted to play) clearly enjoyed the experience as well. The tour continues through the fall and you can see all the tour dates at their website.
As reported by Kotaku earlier today, it appears Final Fantasy Versus XIII is dead. Gone to the wasteland of vaporware. Though it hasn’t been officially announced for Square-Enix’s apparent fear that it would damage their stock prices, Kotaku’s sources informed them that the title was officially canceled a few weeks ago.
Even more rumors abound about the status of Versus XIII, with some suggestions being made that the game will be “folded” into the next numbered Final Fantasy title – XV – in some form. Meanwhile, there are even more people suggesting that the development team will be working on a Final Fantasy XIII-3, which is something absolutely nobody on this planet needs.
Am I even surprised that this game is supposedly canceled? Honestly, no. The game was announced way back in 2006, when I was still in high school. I’m out of college now. Square-Enix is good for long development cycles on mediocre games (see FFXIII), but even for them, six years is a long time. I think that the game would have come out by now if it was going to come out at all. We didn’t hear abotu it at the Tokyo Game Show and we didn’t hear about it at E3, either. We’ll have to see if elements of this game or any characters show up in FFXV, but I couldn’t possibly care less one way or the other.
My take: Final Fantasy hasn’t been any good since VI anyway, and Square-Enix needs to stop wasting our time on this Fabula Nova Crystallis bullshit and get back to making good games and not glorified hallways.
ADVENTURE TIME!
So here’s our first little taste of game play footage from the upcoming DS/3DS title, ‘Adventure Time: Hey Ice King, Why’d You Steal Our Garbage?’ As explained in a recent Nintendo Power issue, the game mechanics are based off of Zelda II: The Adventure of Link. Which is awesome, and I think it fits the Adventure Time style really well. I really hope that the Cosmic Owl is a boss (from the trailer, it looks like it!).
Also, they’ve announced a limited edition for this game – for just an extra $10, you get a steelbook case that’s designed to look like the Enchiridion, a stylus shaped like Finn’s sword (whether it’s his old sword or the demon-blood sword he recently acquired is still up in the air), an art book, a poster of the Land of Ooo, and an activity book. Oh my glob, you better get your hands on it soon – the Adventure Time game for DS and 3DS is due out in October of this year.
Thanks to Lego Cuusoo, we might have our own at-home Build-Your-Own-Portal-Level sets… Made out of plastic pieces that destroy your feet when you step on them. That’s right – a LEGO Portal set could be coming out soon, complete with testing chambers, turrets, and of course, GLaDOS.
Lego Cuusoo is like Kickstarter, but for LEGO sets. Fans can submit ideas and then vote on them, and the ones with at least 10,000 votes get submitted to the LEGO company’s review process. We got a Minecraft set released earlier this year via the project – which makes a hell of a lot of sense, given that Minecraft is essentially digital LEGOs – and it looks like Portal is next up. They’re zeroing in on their vote goal already, and if the bigwigs at LEGO decide to go for it, you could have your own little testing chamber to endlessly configure.
Now, if they could only figure out how to make the LEGO portals functional, I think we’d really have something. No word yet on whether there will be combustible lemon LEGOs.
Source: The Verge
