Sunday, February 21, 2010

Space Siege [Complete]

Woohoo!  I finally beat a game for once.  I guess I did beat Prinny a month ago or something.  I kinda felt like blogging about it a little.  Space Siege is a Action RPG from a top-down perspective.  By the creators of Dungeon Siege, Space Siege takes out the equipment entirely so that the player can concentrate on building the power of the weapons and individual aspects such as health, defense or element resistance.  The game is played with mouse and keyboard, and I really don't like the layout of the controls.  Thankfully, I have a speed pad.  What am I doing, I should be saying all this stuff in my review!!!

[Space Siege - PC]

So I had this game installed onto my laptop for a year and a half now and I just beat it.  It had a cheesy ending that was rather cliché and predictable, but I didn't mind too much.  I wanna be brief because I was actually game hopping/jumping (a term I coined which is just the act of going from one game to another in a short amount of time).

Story: The story wasn't very revolutionary, but at least it was consistent.  Humans explore space, they discover an alien race that wants to take over the humans, humans fight back.  That is the whole story.  Granted, there's a twist which I pretty much saw coming fairly early in the game.  What made the story interesting to me was the journey the main character (Seth Walker, such a cool name~) went through and how his personality is brought out by the interactions with the characters throughout the game.  The voice acting was very good which made the narrative more engaging and doesn't distract me when there's dialogue when I'm getting attacked (because you would have to read it while you fight which a lot of ARPGs do).  Story was probably its strong point in the game.  8/10

Graphics: It's top-down perspective, so you don't really get to see the details of the characters too often unless you have the time to zoom in and see the things around you.  The visuals for the game doesn't change all too much as its taking place within a space craft.  What is great is the animations throughout the game as there are many destructible environments, enemies with special abilities, and tiny little details with the physics that make it enjoyable to blow everything up.  It can be difficult to manage the camera angle when a wall is blocking the way.  7/10

Sound: I'm putting down sound instead of music since the tracks weren't very memorable.  If I listened to them, I'd probably recognized them being from Space Siege, but I wouldn't be able to remember what I sounds like without listening to it at the same time.  I wouldn't really put it on my music list to listen to.  Not to say it was bad or anything, it did match the theme and atmosphere of the game, so it did its job.  The sound effects; however, are great.  Explosions, voice acting recording, weapons, and lots of detail to small things like a box getting moved around or a can getting knocked across the floor.  So not counting music, sound was a strong point.  8/10

Gameplay: You're going to be pressing the number keys and "F1-F9" keys a lot, and so it makes it frustrating to try to play the game on a regular keyboard.  And like many RPGs, the shortcuts to a lot of menus like "Character Stats," "Map," or "Skills" are assigned to different keys around the keyboard.  Because of this, your left hand will be all over the place.  I really didn't like that when I was getting attacked by 12 enemies at the same times and couldn't find which key was to bring up my shield to protect my character.  Thankfully, I have a speed pad which made the gameplay immensely better.  There's a lot of action and need of focus, concentration, and quick strategical maneuvers in order to play this game, which was really entertaining when I was shooting and throwing 30 grenades in one battle.  The game is definitely difficult if you go down the path of a pure human.  I would explain this, but it might impede on the twist of the story which some people rather not know if they plan on the playing the game and haven't yet.  What's better than the single player campaign is the multiplayer mode where you play various missions with up to 4 people over the internet or LAN.  What's even better is you get to start out with every weapon in the game right off the bat, how to level them up is up to you. 7/10

Overall: Even though I had fun, the game was rather difficult going down the good ending path (if there is a bad ending, I don't know).  It also got repetitive since I'm chucking 30 grenades down the hall just to fend off 20+ enemies from killing me in 3 seconds.  I actually used cheats halfway through the game because it wasn't fun getting killed so quickly, and I just used the money cheat that gave me enough money to upgrade my abilities and weapons, and it was still hard (I still died on some parts).  Sure enough, the game was interesting enough after the cheat codes to keep me playing until the end.  I'm not sure if I would go back to play it again unless it's for multiplayer which I don't know anyone who's willing to play it.  Worth a try definitely. 7/10

[Prinny: Can I Really Be the Hero? - PSP]

I can't remember if I blogged about this or not, but I don't feel like doing a full review, so here's the short version:

This game is for hardcore gamers, SERIOUSLY!!!!!  You start the game with 1000 lives, that's how little faith they have in you finishing it.  The game is, no doubt, fun.  It's challenging, has charming characters and soundtrack, and humorous script writing that really contrasts to its sadistic gameplay.  If you ask me to play it again, I'd probably would after a bit of hesitation because it's capable of making players break down and cry.  I lost around 300 lives out of 1000 which is really good I guess, and I died exactly 60 times to finish the last area and boss.  The last boss is really stupidly hard/easy.  If you can memorize the pattern he goes through, you can beat it without ever getting hit (which I how I eventually beat him).

Looks like it's getting late, maybe I should just go to sleep.

Saturday, February 6, 2010

Winter Quarter 2010

I guess I missed making a post for January, I've been way too busy.

I actually wanted start off paying my respects to Fuzzy, our family pet chicken. He died earlier today and I was informed by my dad about it soon after when I called home. He was the last of the four pet chickens we raised. We've raised Fuzzy up to about 9-10 years and have gone through many memories with him. I'm sad he's gone, but now he can crow all he wants in heaven. R.I.P. Fuzzy (2001-Feb.5, 2010)
My sister was especially close to Fuzzy, it was her favorite. The four pet chickens were mainly my sisters to raise, though it ended up being our dad taking care of them the most. We all helped out to take care of them, and I helped take care of Fuzzy during my three years of Junior College when I was living by myself (waking up to his crowing every morning, gah...) He was an odd one, he would crow at odd times of the day and even night (yes, 4AM night...or morning, whatever).
Aside from the sad news I recieved earlier today, my work schedule has become a hurricane of madness. Dunno how many times I've said this already, but: 3 classes, 3 clubs, 3 recreations, 5 game projects, and 1 independent studies. For my classes, I have Chinese Art History, Culture Flows: Asia, and Project in Technology Hacking. It's a lot more work than I previously anticipated, but I'm hanging in there (somehow). I'm still in the same clubs: Videogame Development Club, Kendo Club (for extra practice), and Tomo no Kai. At the Anteater Recreation Center (ARC), I'm taking classes for Kendo, Iaido, and Kyudo (Japanese fencing, katana techniques, and archery respectively). For the game projects, I am mainly working as audio for the groups, a bit of design to finish up one project, and play testing a game close to being published. My independent studies is with a Professor on debugging a editor program he created for his research by making a game out of it and reporting all the errors and glitches I run into. I have a full plate to chow down on, but don't really have the stomach to take it all in (that being the time to do all of them).

Because of this crazy schedule I put myself into, I've been getting only minimum sleep. On Friday and Saturday nights, I would stay up playing videogames, yet I haven't touched any yet since I've been drawing tonight as well as blogging at this moment. (dang, 4:30AM...) I'm prepared to graduate, and I still haven't heard from the JET Program to know whether I get to go to the next step in getting into the program and get to study in Japan for a year while teaching English. I'm also thinking of interning at Blizzard Entertainment this Summer as someone in the industry had suggested me to do. I feel somewhat lost as I know what I WANT to do, but not sure what I'm good at to pay the bills (growing up sucks, lol). As much as I enjoy the "freedom" (if you could call it that), I miss having free time to experiment and work on things I like and being actually able to PLAY videogames. This quarter really is messing me up, but it's also building me up as well as I've been meeting quite a bit of people in the Interactive Entertainment Industry. I even got to go to Blizzard Entertainment for a presentation, but that's as far as I am at liberty to tell (I wanna protect the company you know?) If I did get hired for intern at Blizzard, I'd probably apply for QA for WoW or the unnamed MMO they announced last year or as a map designer for Starcraft 2. To be honest though, I really hope that Starcraft 2 gets out by the time I graduate though. I can't wait to buy the game and start making maps like I did back in High School~

Man I have a lot to blog about. Writing was something I used to hate a lot (I think) because I was forced to do monotonous assignments of reading and reporting long papers of topics I didn't care for too much. I think I started liking writing a bit by Jr. High because of an awesome teacher (I still remember his name, Mr. Holt) and became more competent in structure and grammatical syntax (though I'm pretty sure that my skills in writing from vocabulary choice to spelling is still flawed) from Mrs. Connors (if it weren't for her, I don't even know if I could have survived the rest of High School). ANYWAYS, my point is that I've realized I really like writing, as long as I'm passionate about what I'm writing. It's also a way for me to reflect upon myself and let my mind run free (and have all of you reading suffer from it, bwahahaha. Though probably no one reads my blog...)

I've finally started drawing again (here and there) and I can't get over how bad I am at it. I want to practice more, but given the limited free time I have, I usually spend on practicing on music or playing videogames ('cause I'm trying learn more about design, honest~). I'm glad I bought Acoustica Mixcraft, I've been able to improve on using audio programs and train my ears for various tasks. I really don't know what I'm going to do as a career (other than wanting to be in the Videogame Industry) because I still love drawing, I do videos, I do photography, I love music, I always have crazy designs, and I enjoy creating stories. I want to do everything right now, maybe I'll find what I'm good at and do that as my career as work and do everything else as a hobby.

OKAY, aside from all the boring and sad stuff, I am rather excited for 2010 line-up of games. 2009 was a scary year for the Industry because of the recession that caused financial upkeep problems and the termination of certain developers such as Pandemic studios. Here's what we get to look forward to this year:

Starcraft 2 - PC

Oh c'mon, who's NOT excited for this game?  I really want to get this game mainly for the map editor as it was the original Starcraft that really inspired to go into the path of the Interactive Entertainment Industry (although I always had that intention my whole life).

Dynasty Warriors Strikeforce - PS3

Missing out on an awesome $10 deal for the original PSP version, I'm excited to hear that it's being released for the PS3 with hi-res graphics.

Castlevania: Lords of Shadow - PS3

Not surprising as I am a big Castlevania Fan.  Being developed by another company, I am expecting epic battles, innovative gameplay, and memorable game time when it finally comes out.

Metroid: Other M - Wii

Let's just say I'm a big fan of all games as Metroid is one of them as well.  I have not play a Metroid game where I felt it was poorly made or a waste of time.  Along with Team Ninja's association with Nintendo, this game is going to be more exciting than ever before as well as shedding some light on the story.

Phantasy Star Portable 2 - PSP

Yup, second one is coming out and I haven't even started the first one.  I'm still play Universe, haven't gotten to the expansion, and I barely got anywhere on Zero.  I'm still playing Phantasy Star Online, that's how good the series is! =P

Ragnarok Online DS

Yay, they're actually bringing it to America.  According to Gamespot, it's in 10 days.  I'm so tied down with everything else, I doubt I'll be buying any new games anytime soon.

That's it for now, I really need sleep @_@; (frick it's 5:10AM!!!)