Errata

So apparently a new Sparkster game has been out for months. I just discovered this on the PSN. Clearly I didn't do any research- even a quick Google search would have turned it up. But hey, the game just slipped in under my radar, and thus its place on my 5 classic series is moot. So anyway, yes, I just had a drooling retard moment.

The Island of Misfit Spinoffs, Sequels and Reboots

Since my review laid the smack down on Splatterhouse, I've decided to take a look at some other similarly ill-conceived, half baked, or late-term aborted sequels, spinoffs and reboots. So here we go!

Golden Axe: Beast Rider- The fact that it starred teh secksay Amazon from the original game in this reboot with a rather suggestive title didn't help sales of this piece of shit. Probably because they totally forgot what Golden Axe was all about- beating the hell out of people. With your friends. The fact that you can't play as Gilius Thunderhead is a pretty big red flag.

Final Fantasy X-2 - While Final Fantasy X is a pretty stupid game on its own...Good god, I can feel my brain vegetating just thinking about X-2.

Sonic The Hedgehog (06) Sega drops the ball again. I could choose many Sonic titles to criticize, but since I'm lazy I'll go with this one. Why is Sonic's love interest a human? I'm just creeped out by that.

Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow- I know, everyone likes this one. It just rubbed me the wrong way that this was like the 5th Castlevania where I was controlling an androgynous prettyboy.

Doom 3- I'm sorry Id, I thought this was Doom? Give me a gun, lots of ammo and plenty of light so I can see who I'm exploding into blood sausage!

Alone In the Dark (2008) It was unplayable. And the script was HILARIOUSLY bad. And did I mention THE DESIGN TEAM LOOKED TO UWE BOLL'S MOVIE FOR INSPIRATION. There's no way it could have turned out good.

Final Fight: Streetwise- Capcom thought it would be a good idea to make a Final Fight game without a playable Mike Haggar. This is the least of the game's problems, but that fact doesn't bode well, does it? They attempted to make a series that was reasonably lighthearted (or at least not too serious) and turn it into a grim and gritty urban sleazefest.

Bomberman: Act Zero- OK, maybe grim and gritty wasn't as big of a jump for Final Fight. I mean especially when compared to bomberman. Turning the cute lil' Bomberman into...a Master Chief ripoff was a terrible idea. And that's just the beginning of the problems.

GoldenEye: Rogue Agent- I don't think the crew of this had seen the film GoldenEye OR played the video game. They just heard the name and knew it was a cash-in and turned out this festering communal toilet of a game.

007 Racing- Another piss-poor James Bond game, this one has you driving around many classic cars, only it isn't fun because they all control exactly the same (badly) and it's less a racing game than a shitty vehicular combat game. I'd rather play Twisted Metal, myself.

King's Quest: Mask of Eternity- This is probably the game on this list that I hate the least. It was a decent game, just...not King's Quest.

Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3- They went overboard with the camp aesthetic here. Although the second game was campy (in the vein of a 50's Sci Fi flick), I just feel they went too far here. Although George Takei as the emperor of Japan is rather amusing.

Warcraft 3- There, I said it. Compared to the first two, it just felt too generic throw-it-all-in fantasy- like they were trying as hard as they could to see how far they could go without Games Workshop suing them. The big shoulders and lack of Bill Roper's voice didn't help. This is probably the only Blizzard game I really dislike (somehow I enjoyed WoW despite the art style). I think this one focused too much on the Hero aspect, which some people love, I just didn't care for it.

Metroid: Other M- Benzaie said it best. "Blah, blah, blah, the baby, blah, blah."

Medal of Honor: Rising Sun- You know, this game wasn't terrible just...not an impressive followup to the legendary Frontline. The gameplay was fine, and the move to the Pacific theater was a good choice. Unfortunately it was too short, linear, and shallow to make much of an impact.

Prince of Persia 3D- Before the truly wonderful Sands of Time, we dealt with this headlong jump into the polygon ceiling. 

Prince of Persia: The Warrior Within- After making a sublime, genre-redefining game with Sands of Time, Ubi Soft decided to go a different direction, turning the once-likeable Prince into...a jerk who smoldered with generic rage. Honestly, the gameplay isn't terrible (it is after all, the Sands of Time engine.), but the game is just...not as fun.

Tomb Raider: Angel of Darkness -I'm usually a pretty staunch defender of Lara Croft and the Tomb Raider series. This is the notable exception where I have absolutely nothing nice to say. It shipped broken and buggy. While the Crystal Dynamics reboots are nothing special, they're much better than this mess.

Silent Hill: Shattered Memories- Why do horror games (with the standout exception of Resident Evil) get such shit-tastic reboots? It wasn't scary, it wasn't tense, it wasn't even very interesting.

Pac-Man 2: The New Adventures - Let's take the beloved hero of the classic arcade game, turn him into a henpecked husband and let the player experience THAT! Good idea, Namco! Why is this game practically forgotten again?

Death By Degrees - Now I'm just picking on Namco. Take THAT!

Raging Rant of Great Justice: On Reviewing

Since I reviewed Splatterhouse, I've gotten quite a few personal messages in the various forums in which I've posted it. Messages that tell me I'm wrong, that I wasn't fair to the game, that I should consider that a lot of people worked really hard on the game. I've gotten messages saying it's not my job to rip games apart. Well you know what?

Fuck that noise.

My review is my opinion. Yes, I accentuated the negative. I also highlighted what I liked. The problem was, there wasn't a lot I liked and there was a lot of negative to accentuate. And you know what? I did this because that's what a game reviewer has to do. A reviewer's responsibility is to gamers. To consumers, not producers. And you know what?

You might have a different opinion than I do. That's fine. It's even OK if you like the new Splatterhouse. A game, or a film, doesn't have to be good for you to like it. If you like it, it's your business. I'm not the taste police. But please don't try to tell me I'm wrong. You're wrong for telling me I'm wrong. Any review is subjective.

I developed my theory on game reviewing while my grandma watched me playing Final Fantasy X. It was one of the Cloister of Trial puzzles. And she asked me "Are you having fun?". I realized that I wasn't. I was bored out of my mind at the lazily designed puzzles I was solving. Since then, my key, most important feature of any video game? I should be having fun. And with Splatterhouse the fun ran out in about 20 minutes (loading pauses included). I played through to the end so I could review it fairly. And I gave my opinion, which included all of my problems with the game.

This is called reviewing.

And look, I'm not a paid professional. I'm not even a blip on the industry radar. I'm just writing for fellow gamers and consumers. I'm just trying to give potential buyers my opinion. Games cost a lot of money. I shelled out $65 bucks for Splatterhouse, and I think I should let other gamers know that I found it to be a steaming pile of shit before they spend that kind of money. And then the fanboys (who have formed after the game's been out for a day, that's scary) come out of the woodwork and tell me to shut my trap.

I don't care about the feelings of game producers if they produce a piece of shit. If you defend Splatterhouse by saying "a lot of people worked on this", then you can defend Action 52. Or an Uwe Boll film because a lot of people worked on them. Screw them. If they produce a low quality product, they should feel bad. They turned out a half-ass product and sold it for 60 bucks. They deserve to have their feelings hurt. Mediocrity should not be rewarded!

How dare I pay full price and demand a competent product instead of an unfinished game that rewards me with CG nudie pics. How is that even an incentive these days? I have the internet! I may be pitiful enough to look at pictures of naked women, but they're real flesh and blood women, dammit!

And as for bad jumping controls- Mario has been around for 25 years and competent jumping controls have been around at least since Pitfall on the Atari 2600. I could forgive the early Castlevania gams for tanklike jumping. But this is 2010. There's no fucking excuse. If you can't make a character jump properly in 2010, then stop programming and start working the Drive-Thru window where you belong.

Anyhow. Long rant short, you don't have to like my opinion. I just ask that you respect it so I don't have to call you an internet tough guy assclown who can't tell a Feral Ghoul from a Goron.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

My Splatterhouse Review is up at BnB Gaming!

http://bnbgaming.com/2010/11/24/review-splatterhouse-2010/

The Zombie Problem

They're everywhere! And frankly...I'm getting a little sick of seeing them EVERYWHERE. Zombies have been on the pop culture radar, but in the past 5 years or so they've exploded. We now have TV shows, Jane Austen crossovers, and they now appear in pretty much every videogame known to man. There's Nazi zombies, Red Dead Undead Nightmare, the Zombie Island of Dr. Ned...Hell, the only game that doesn't have zombies anymore is Resident Evil (figure THAT one out). The most egregious example to me, though, is in Uncharted. Up until near the end you fight nothing but human enemies in cover based firefights. And then...zombie-monkey things attack you. Um. OK. There was no point to that other than to destroy the cover mechanic THE WHOLE GAME WAS BASED ON.

This kind of thing just leads to me facepalming. Yes, I know zombies are ubiquitously humanoid without those things like thoughts and feelings so we don't feel bad about making their heads a splode. The thing is, they're becoming more generic than Imperial stormtroopers. They're just mooks. That's all they are.

Zombies and vampires have both been bastardized to hell and back in the last five years. Can't we try something new? I mean we had some great body horror films in the 80's, and we're just throwing that aside.

And the people who waste their time talking planning for a zombie apocalypse...enjoy your perpetual virginity. Because like a zombie apocalypse, sex is never going to happen for you.

And by the way: I'm not criticizing Shaun of the Dead because A) it predates the zombie bandwagon and B) it's brilliant.

Selective Fire Canon: Star Wars

"You'll find that many of the truths that we cling to depend greatly on our own point of view."

...Obi-Wan explains the film Rashomon

The Star Wars Universe is one big clusterf***. Depending on what you like and what you don't you're going to pick and choose your own canonicity, in spite of what George Lucas says. Because he's old and senile and basically nuts. 

So I count the original trilogy, as originally released in theaters (in 77, 81, and 83), as indisputable canon. I'm not going to argue that Luke and Leia are siblings. I am going to argue that Boba Fett is space-Clint Eastwood and not an australian guy.

I count Timothy Zahn's Thrawn trilogy of novels. Because I like them. I count the Dark Forces/Jedi Knight series of games- I accept that Kyle Katarn obtained the Death Star plans from the secret Imperial base and later did other incredibly badass things. And Shadows of the Empire is canon. Again because it's awesome.

I also count Splinter of the Mind's Eye, and the Han Solo and Lando Calrissian trilogies as canon.

I don't count the Special Editions. They were cool when I was 9, but now they just piss me off.

I count some of the prequels' events and characters- as in I believe that most of those characters existed and events happened in the Star Wars universe...I just don't believe that Anakin was such a whiny bitch, or that the clone army was based off of Boba Fett's dad (which is probably the biggest and most painful pandering I've seen short of having Natalie Portman naked for the entire film.). I thought Boba Fett was awesome before that. When you see him as a little kid going "Heh heh heh"...well shit, I'm done.

I also tend to believe Mace Windu was a much cooler character. Not the level-headed guy he was, because WHOSE BRIGHT IDEA WAS IT TO HAVE SAMUEL L JACKSON PLAY A CALM AND COLLECTED GUY?

I tend to believe the exploits of Obi-Wan, Qui-Gonn, and Yoda are well represented. However I accept that the Gungans were actually a race of Hawkmen (as evidenced by the fact that Brian Blessed, Prince Vultan himself, is their leader). However, Hawkmen would have been too f***ing awesome so they were recast as incompetent underwater Jakovasaurs. I believe Darth Maul existed, had a double-bladed lightsaber and looked like the Devil.

I don't really think that Palpatine fooled anyone with his Sidious bullshit. Seriously, have you ever tried to keep a hoodie down like that? It doesn't work for long, and surely everyone would recognize the f***ing Republic's chancellor and wondered where he was disappearing to while meeting with his lackeys.

And finally, I believe Christopher Lee's character existed. I just have a problem with the fact that he's called "Dooku", which is one step away from Dookie. So in the Chad Morelock Canon, he is officially Count Dracula. In space. With a lightsaber.

Dracula Approves.

And for the record, Old Anakin appears at the end of Jedi. While a traditional Ewok celebratory song- Yub Nub! Is played.

Shining Force- Save Our Series!

I'm a big fan of the first two Shining Force games (and I'm sure I'd be a fan of the third if I had a Saturn and the money to get a copy). If you haven't played them, I recommend downloading the two Genesis classics from the Wii Virtual Console or checking them out on Sonic's Ultimate Genesis Collection for the PS3 and 360.

I really love them. They're the first example of the Tactical RPG that America saw (while Nintendo did create Fire Emblem first, that series didn't see Western shores until the 21st Century. Your loss, Nintendo. ). In any case, they allow for a much more interesting battle system than you find in Final Fantasy and Dragon Warrior, much more akin to the wargame-descended tabletop roleplaying games like Dungeons and Dragons, allowing you to move units around during combat, use terrain to your advantage, and use traps, ambushes, and area-of-effect spells.

In addition, you had access to a multitude of cool characters- Centaur knights, Hawkmen (DIIIIIVE!), Dragons, Ninja, Samurai and...whatever the hell Domingo is (an egg monster from Mars, maybe?).

Unfortunately, in recent years the Shining Force series has derailed into a series of mediocre action RPGs which don't live up to the storied name of their predecessors.

Anyway, I'm here to tell you about a site that's dedicated to restoring the good name of the series. This site is a campaign to get Camelot Software Planning and Sega back together to continue the series. And they could use your help.

*Whistles the file select tune while you peruse the SOS page*

So anyway, I just wanted to bring this to your attention. You can also follow them on Twitter if you so desire (this is in fact how I learned about the campaign).

C'mon! It'll be an adventure!