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I'm a good chunk of the way into Valkyria Chronicles on the PS3, so it's time to talk about it a little bit.

From the moment I saw the art style of the game, the only word to describe my feeling has been "enchanted." Just like Prince of Persia, it's the type of game that has such a complete, coherent look, that it could even hold up a mediocre game if it had to.  The watercolor/cel-shading style is gorgeous, and the character designs reminiscent of my favorite Dreamcast RPG Skies of Arcadia (Vyse is even in the game!) both did a lot to pull me in.  The solid voice cast and the mix of humor and sadness keep the story from being something you want to skip, as well.


I've also been in somewhat of a battle - I like strategy games, but I'm not very good at them.  I especially don't have tolerance for a drawn-out sprite-based spreadsheet - much of NipponIchi's library.

Valkyria Chronicles gives me my strategy by mixing it with a bit of action and keeping it from being overlong.  It's very different from just about anything else out there and what works, works really well.

There are some things I'm not such a huge fan of; slogging through the slow menus comes immediately to mind.  You can't scan the 3D battlefield except from the point of view of characters.  The 20 turn limit on every battle seems really weird.  The lancers and the snipers are horribly, horribly inaccurate.  You can only crouch or crawl when the game says you can.  You can't pause mid-battle and there's no autosave. These all irritate the crap out of me.

Some of that stuff just seems to be what I'd call "relics of Japanese game design," something I accept as part of the deal - whether it should be there or not.

Regardless, my current recommendation on this game is buy, buy, buy.  It's horribly underselling compared to its quality as a game.  This is one of the best things to come out of Sega in a long time.

At least, according to a recent post over at The Consumerist, it does.  My experience has been entirely different, and I'd consider myself a loyal customer.

I've been with Gamefly for over 3 years, maybe even more than 4, playing games from them on 6 consoles, 2 handhelds, and maybe more.  I've even bought a number of games from them.  I think this qualifies me pretty well to give a few opinions about them, versus someone who cancelled after 2 weeks.


First off, when you subscribe, don't expect it to be JUST like NetFlix. 

Costs:
Not only is the market for movies much broader, but the costs across the board are lower.  Buying a DVD is cheaper than buying a game; same goes for replacement.  When shipping, there's less impetus to protect the DVD, so shipping costs are lower (no cardboard outer sleeve). 

Shipping Time:
Because the market for movies is that much broader, Netflix has more shipping centers and therefore can get discs there faster. Additionally, because the cost of buying DVDs is lower, you can buy more copies of a given title than you could for a game, so availability for movies is higher at Netflix.  The sheer NATURE of the medium comes into play here, too.  You just rented Persona 4 and There Will Be Blood.  Both of those are epic as hell.  One of them can take upwards of 80 hours to get through--I'll let you guess which one. So, even if both companies have 100 copies of each title, it's going to take a LOT longer for people to bring the games back.

I think people come in with the expectation that they're going to get their #1 Extra Special Plus game right away in two days.  If your game of choice is in low availability, GameFly waits a couple days to see if it's going to come back in for you.  If that doesn't happen, they go down the list until they find one that's in and they send you that one.  So if you don't want to play Hello Kitty's Hugging Simulator, don't put it in your queue.

Here are some good experiences I've had with GameFly.  Once, I wasn't paying attention. This is 110% my fault: I sent them back one of MY games.  One of my DS games - meaning I had my save data on it.  I notified them and they got me back the right game, even after warning me I might not get my save data back.  Major kudos on them!

Then comes the GameFly store.  Their stock is in a constant state of flux, but you can get some great deals.  I've picked up some absurdly cheap stuff. Pair that with the fact that they allow Google Checkout, and have free shipping? That's awesome.  And then if you rent a game and want to keep it, many of the games have a "buy me" link on their page, and they'll send you the instructions and box.  You can buy a used game, and then see it before you pay for it - make sure it's not scratched or in horrible condition.

So, I guess it's a matter of what expectations you come into it with.  I call it "Netflix for games," but just like Fallout is "Oblivion with guns," that description is only accurate in the most basic of senses, and doesn't give a detailed picture.

Whilst Activision continues its plan to release 87 versions of Guitar Hero each day for every platform going back to the Odyssey, a question looms in the air:

Will there be a Rock Band 3?

Yes, of course there will! To stay competitive, each company must maintain the status quo of releasing a yearly iteration of its primary product along with more specific sub-games tailored to particular genres or music groups, while updating with new features exclusive to the title to attract new players.

OR

No way.  Harmonix has its product out - a solid set of peripherals and a great song list.  Why waste the money for additional hardware and software manufacturing and distributing? They've established their music platform and from there, they can just release downloadable content which has none of the problems associated with physical media, with of course the exception of licensing fees (how are record companies keeping that racket going with music games bringing in all their money anyhow?).

---

Me, I'd probably end up buying Rock Band 3.  Despite not needing to play every game on hard or explore every corner of every RPG, I do enjoy that feeling of progression - unlocking new locations, items, clothing, and of course songs.  Some people just want to rock out to their favorite songs from the 80s, 90s, and Today! though.  If they are going to do a third Rock Band disc, I would love to see some additional game content - some multiplayer minigames, for example. And of course, more clothing and "dress-up" options, so that I can finally live out my dream of playing 80s Metal songs as Hip Hop Roy Orbison.  If Harmonix just keeps releasing songs instead, I can see the business sense in that, but I know I probably wouldn't participate unless they went and released something awesome like a Detklok or Japanese Rock pack.

I'm curious to see what Harmonix has for me this fall - I know what Activision's plans are for Guitar Hero.

First off, I'd like to thank 1up.com's 1UP Yours podcast! Without their podcast, this post wouldn't have been possible.  Because I have the memory of a tiny mouse.  As we move into the new year, though, there's already a crapton to look forward to. Some are definite buys, some are purely significant regardless of whether or not I care about them.  Don't expect any particular order to the list.

The first one that pops to mind is Resident Evil 5. Some of the newer visuals have admittedly been a bit underwhelming, but what I'm really looking forward to is the online, two-player co-op.  If they pull that off, that alone will make the game a must buy.  Considering I played through RE4 something like 10 times, I think it's safe to say I'm a fan.

After playing Uncharted this year, I can't wait to play Uncharted 2 after seeing the trailer. 

"That's my blood--That's a LOT of my blood."

The look on Nathan's face as he hangs from the end of that traincar is classic Indiana Jones.  Screw Indy and the Martian Men, Uncharted is the new action hero franchise to follow.

As I wrote before, I'm conflicted about Street Fighter 4.  I can't decide whether I genuinely like the game, or if it's more like admiration.  I like the fine-tuned graphics and precise controls, and I bow to those who can master the game, but do I want to master it myself? I'm not sure.  That said, I hope SF4 gets more recognition than SF3 did.  It is taking things back to, well, basics, and fan reception seems good so far.

Heavy Rain, on the other hand, I've been looking forward to since the first trailer.  Developer Quantic Dream was responsible for Indigo Prophecy/Fahrenheit, one the Almost Classics from the last generation, so I'm genuinely interested to see where this one goes.  What I've seen so far has to be some of the best motion capture and modeling to date.  I hope the whole game lives up to the trailers and demos.

Ghostbusters, one of my favorite movies, never scared me until earlier this year.  That is, when I found out Activision "We only publish games that we can release every year on every platform" Blizzard didn't want to publish a movie IP that didn't have a movie attached to it. OMGZ TEH HORRAR!!!!111  Well, thanks to Atari, that long nightmare is over, and cats and dogs are no longer cohabitating. With writing and voices by the original guys, I just can't miss this one.  Even if it suffers from Force Unleashed-itis (huge hype, great story, lackluster game), I'll still probably end up buying it.  I think I've seen Ghostbusters more than any other movie, so there's a lot of nostalgia value for me, too.

Infamous and Prototype look to be in the same vein - that is, the Crackdown vein.  If that ends up being the case, I can see myself wasting a lot of time with them.  GTA4 became a little repetitive for my tastes, while Crackdown's over-the-top action managed to keep things interesting in spite of the singular "Whack the Gang Leader" directive.

I'm very curious about Batman: Arkham Asylum.  It's a Batman game that's not connected to any particular movie, show, or storyline.  Visually, it is much closer to the comics than anything else.  The Joker and Batman are being voiced by their animated series actors, Mark Hamill and Kevin Conroy.  That is to say, this game has a LOT going for it.  Even so, there's this... air about it. Something just doesn't feel right--I guess I worry that if it doesn't get cancelled halfway through development, it's going to be boring at best. I'm hopeful, but concerned.

Blizzard, whose incredible track record of critically-acclaimed, blockbuster games can only be matched by Valve, has two games on the way this year. One I look forward to eager and the other I couldn't care less about - though apparently I'm quite the minority in that feeling.

Diablo III looks like a truly worthy successor to the series and has the potential to get me gaming at my PC again.  Starcraft II, on the other hand, is one of those games that I just don't "get."  Wildly popular in South Korea and still doing well in the US something like 10 years after its original release, the original is the hallmark of the RTS genre. Command & Conquer and Warcraft may have come before it, but nothing compares to SC in sheer numbers of players.  It almost makes me wish I wasn't even worse at Real Time Strategy than I am at Fighting games.

Then there's Bioshock 2 - Is that coming this year? I am not sure.  Bioshock is almost one of those games that I wish they'd just leave alone.  I mean if the sequel's good then that's great, but I worry that the ambition of the sequel won't include the philosophical questions asked by the first.  That isn't to say it should deal with the same issues; just that it should have some sort of a philosophy, and ask the player some sort of question that doesn't have a good answer.  The twist of the original simply can't be surpassed, no matter what, and I hope the team working on it doesn't go M. Night  Shamalamadingdong on it and throw in an unnecessary twist.

So, what am I missing? There's a lot to look forward to next year!

The first resolution I will make for the New Year is this: For each game I play, I will make at least one post.  As I try to look back at the last year of games, I'm finding myself at a loss regarding what all I played.  It's easy to remember this fall's insane glut of games, but that aside it's difficult to look back at what I've played and be sure I'm not leaving anything worthy out.

We'll see how long I last with this resolution....

This week, I rented The Force Unleashed from my buddies at Gamefly.  First off: YES, this is definitely a rent!  The story is great so far, and the main character is pretty interesting. It actually feels like Star Wars.

Sadly, the game itself has some major problems.  Some are certain areas, some are broader.  The main thing is targeting.  Why would I ever throw my lightsaber at a crate? I wouldn't! I never have, not once.  Not on purpose, that is.  It's irritating, and it affects everything in the game.  It's very frustrating.

Then there's the Star Destroyer part.  shouldn't pulling a star destroyer out of the sky be FUN?  Wouldn't that be hard to screw up?  Because they did it! It's not fun.  You have to battle a bunch of TIE fighters which are hard enough to get a handle on, and then you pull the Destroyer down.  Then the TIE fighters come back and the destroyer starts to recover.  Depending on how long you take you may be back at square one!

Also, a lot of the really epic Jedi stuff is done in quick-timer cutscene events. There's sort of two things here.  One is that I wish it was more interactive.  I am not sure how they would've done it though.  So, barring that, I wish I could've just watched them instead of having to watch for button-presses.  The cutscenes would be more fun that way.

It's disappointing, but still worth playing.

This just in from the Games No One But Eric Remembers news-ticker: Broken Sword is coming to the Wii (and DS)!


This is awesome. Broken Sword is one of those point and click adventures.  It had gorgeous art, nice animation, real voice acting, and an interesting story.  I played it first on the PlayStation, then the PC.  I'm looking forward to picking it up and having an excuse to use my Wii, though I don't know that the point and click will actually work on the Wii.  There's a reason we don't hold our mice up to the screen to use them - it gets tiring!

None the less, I'm psyched.

I want to be good at Street Fighter.  I really do.  To even begin to go anywhere with it, I need an arcade stick.  That's an investment of at least $80.  Then the Hori Pro is $130 and the Street Fighter IV Tournament Stick is $150 (seen below).



That's a HUGE investment!

The thing is, those games are nearly unplayable without an arcade stick these days.  It was almost doable on Super Nintendo and especially the six-button arcade pad for the Genesis. The 360 and PS3 controllers though? They suck for fighting games.  You just can't play to any skill level without one.

It's a vicious cycle: I need a stick to get good, and I need to get good to justify getting a stick.  A guy I know in Japan is going to check on stick prices for me over there, but PlayAsia is probably the best bet on that note.  If I DO import, it'll definitely be for PS3, because the 360 just isn't popular enough over there to make the sticks readily available.

Whatever I do, you'll probably see it in my gamercard on the left or right here in the main column.

For those interested in arcade sticks, someone has taken the time to make a ranking sheet for arcade stick quality. It's worth checking out.

Now, I don't know if this is a real setlist or not.  Kotaku doesn't seem to know.  They have a post up with potential artists, including (pertinent sections bolded by me for emphasis):

• Alice In Chains: No Excuses
• Bob Seger: Turn The Page
• Judas Priest: Hell Bent For Leather
• Kyuss: Demon Cleaner
• Lynyrd Skynyrd: Tuesdays Gone
• Mastodon: Blood and Thunder
• Michael Schenker Group: Armed and Ready
• Samhain: Mother of Mercy
• The Sword: Black River

As well as unannounced tracks by Slayer, Queen and the Foo Fighters.

The Metallica songs include, but are not limited to:

• Enter Sandman
• For Whom The Bell Tolls
• Fuel
• Hit The Lights
• King Nothing
• Master of Puppets
• No Leaf Clover
• Nothing Else Matters
• Sad But True
• The Unforgiven
• Where ever I May Roam

Now, like I said, not sure if this set list is real.  But KYUSS?

KYUSS?
Really, KYUSS?

I just peed a little.  Not to mention the possibility of a Queen song? Awesome!

I'm about 60% through the new Prince of Persia game and I feel safe saying it's really good.

I was a big fan of the Prince revival on the last generation of consoles (at least, the first iteration- the later ones ventured into some angstier ground.) and this one looks to be a return to form.


We're with a different Prince in a different world.  The Sands of Time are gone, replaced by a badass-looking gauntlet.  Of course, the Prince is a jackass just like the last one, but he's more "Han Solo" this time around - a bit less bratty (side note - he's voiced by the same actor that did Nathan Drake in Uncharted, and he fits in quite well here too, playing somewhat of the same character). Farah, too, is gone, replaced with the far more interesting and useful Elika.  She's not just not annoying, she's actually useful.

The game's main mechanic is, very simply, flow.  The game does almost everything it can to keep you moving, including eliminating death entirely.  Instead of wasting your time with dying and reloading, Elika takes your hand and puts you back on the last platform you stood on.  It speeds things up and takes out something that, in retrospect, just seems unnecessary.  There's no lifebar, either, and you won't miss it.

The platforming aspects are also considerably smoother this time around and far less rooted in reality (like they were before?).  Another aspect is that the Prince at the beginning is the same as the Prince at the end.  He never changes, while Elika gains access to a few new powers.

All this focus on flow coupled with the game's stunning visual style moves the title toward the elusive "games as art" honor, but that doesn't stop it from having a few flaws here and there. I'm not sure how I feel about the collecting of Light Seeds.  I will say this - I've explored MUCH more than I would've otherwise.  I think that was probably the intention of the creators and the Light Seeds have done well in that respect.  At the same time, they do feel rather "video gamey," as does the amount of backtracking you end up doing.  That said, the game is so much fun to navigate that you never get tired of leaping, sliding, and moving around the world.

Is it a buy? I'm not sure.  It's really, really good, but it's also really short.

UPDATE:
I've now finished the game.  Check for spoilers after the cut.