Tetris

...it's freaking Tetris. Come on.

Five out of five stars. 

Lumines: Puzzle Fusion

The Short

Pros
- Excellent puzzle game fusing music with block puzzlers
- Incredibly addicting
- Great on a handheld
- Visuals and music are top notch
- Easy to learn, difficult to get chains in
- Seriously, what do you expect from the guy who made Rez and Space Channel 5?

Cons
- Serious lack of modes
- New songs/colors are unlocked by playing further through the game in a single sitting, meaning most people won't see them all
- Vs. Mode isn't really all that awesome
- Could have benefitted from more songs or a shuffle mode

Let there be colors

The Long

Not going to lie: I'm pretty bad at Lumines. Just thought I'd through that out there. Or, at least I think I'm bad at it. Over the last few games, I've developed some strategies that I think will help me play better in the future. Plus, over the last few games I actually got some chains and figured out how to best work them with the power-up clearing piece. Just...hang on a sec, I bet if I tried again...

Hmm, yeah. I'm still the worst Lumines player. But I did get to a new theme and song this time! I wonder which one is after that one? Let me just put the computer down for a moment, I'll try again...

Yeah, I suck at this game, don't know why I keep playing it. I just really like the music, I guess, and the fact that when a track ends all the colors and shapes change completely. It's pretty cool. Speaking of which, the newest color/shape fusion I unlocked was really strange. Let me just boot it up again to check for the review...

...

What was I doing again?

I guess I'll put a graphic or something. Hang on, almost cleared this side...

Lumines is a puzzle game from Tetsuya Mizuguchi, famed creator of the Dreamcast's bizarre Space Channel 5 and the PS2's Rez (infamous for the "trance-vibrator" attachment...) and was one of the earliest PSP games to be released. Since then it's showed up on XBLA and gathered a few sequels, but here I'm just reviewing the original, unaltered game. So...is Lumines to the PSP what Tetris was to the Game Boy?

Not quite on the same level, but it's certainly no fault of Lumines. In this block-dropping, music-beat based puzzler, Q? Software has created something awesome. And really, really hard to put down.

I could never do this. 

In concept, Lumines is very simple. You are given a variety of cubes, each with a pattern of one or two colors. These can be generated in literally any combination available, keeping you on your toes. Once they show up you have free reign to spin them to your hearts desire as they fall (like Tetris), and if they fall with part of it falling over the side that part drops (unlike Tetris). Your goal is to get at least four of the same color in a square, which will fill in the squares. From that, you can extend the reach in groups of two or more at any angle, so long as you started with a nice 2x2 of the same color. Sounds simple? Well...uh...I guess? No?

The trick lies in the music. While you are playing a catchy tune (from a variety of genres including techno, trance, J-Pop, and others) beats in the background, and a bar pushes itself across the screen in time. As it crosses your finished blocks it blows 'em up, and the more it covers in a pass the more bonus points you get. 

Watch me Zen out in this game. 

This is where tricks come in. If you make a block right when the bar is passing, it might not blow up the whole box, which can screw you over. It also is good to build the chains right when it starts over again, but often you don't have time to preference as your blocks keep falling. It's a neat trick that makes the game feel a bit more frantic, which I appreciated. Especially since without it you probably could better time your placements, and with it I end up making huge useless piles of blocks that have no hope of getting destroyed.

Speaking of useless piles of blocks, the game does give you an out. There are specials attached to some blocks that, when made into a big collection, will delete every block of the same color that touches that collection (and can chain out). Again, the line-beat rule is in effect, so you can either use it super effectively or screw yourself. I appreciate that this power up (the only one, I might add) is in the game, because if not you'd get dug so deep you'd just be screwed forever. 

It's a Chain Reaction!

That, in a nutshell, are the core mechanics of the game, and as it stands it is very addicting. You're probably thinking it sounds super simple, huh? Yea? Well, Tetris was super simple. Bejeweled was super simple. So hush and go play five rounds in a row because you can't quit.

This original game does lack a lot of features the sequels would add, though. It has a bare bones list of modes, only including a Single Player, a sort of "remix" mode (that lets you pick from songs you've unlocked), a Vs CPU mode (which isn't honestly that great) and a vs Player mode if you are in the same room with somebody on the wireless. 

While I could again toss out the Tetris argument, it really does feel lacking, especially considering how you unlock new songs. The constant shift of songs (which also changes all the shapes while you are playing to different colors, etc.) is what makes the game entertaining, but the only way to unlock more is to grind through the Single Player mode to get to them. Fail, and you start all the way over, and they always go in the same order. A "remixed" mode, where it just shuffled through them all, would have been a fantastic addition. Instead, you'd better like the first five or so, because unless you get really good you'll probably just unlock those for your whole time with Lumines.

The color swaps can really catch you off guard. 

I love the way this game looks. It's got a sort of seizure-inducing, pulsing-beat vibe to it, and the fact the shapes and backgrounds change with the songs only intensifies the awesome. The bright colors really pop on the PSP's screen, and each of the shape combinations is unique and (weirdly enough) memorable. 

The music is also great, in a Rez slash Child of Eden slash Space Channel 5 way. Lots of crazy j-pop mixed with kickin beats and techno. There's something in here for everybody, though I will admit a few of the songs are a bit...grating. I wish I could just pick and choose the ones I wanted (again, have to unlock them), but hey, most are fantastic so we'll take it. 

Verses mode is...uh...it's ok? I guess?

Lumines is awesome. If you've never played it and you enjoy action-puzzle games, you should. It's beautiful, incredibly addicting, and has an awesome sense of style to it.

That being said, the lack of modes really makes this original release feel lackluster. To be completely honest, if you are looking to get into the series, ditch this one and jump on Lumines 2 instead. More modes, more songs (and I think it has all the ones from the original, too), and a better unlocking system. This game is still great and I'm totally hooked, but if you had to choose the sequel is the same game but better.

But still, quite an awesome puzzler. Grab the second one if you have a PSP, for sure.

Three out of five stars. 

WHAT IS GOING ON. 

Persona 3 Portable

The Short

Pros
- Evolution of Persona 3 on a handheld device
- Being able to take Persona on the go highlights the game's strengths
- Inclusion of a new female protagonist completely changes the game
- Female MC also comes with her own new soundtrack, which is much more appealing
- Can finally issue orders directly to your teammates, making the game considerably funner
- Many little added tweaks (like using the P4 battle system) further refine the game
- Personas giving skill cards also helps relieve some of the tension of fusing
- Load times are lightning quick
- Quite possibly the definitive version of Persona 3

Cons
- All animated cutscenes are gone, save a new intro
- You no longer have polygonal sprites representing you at school, etc. All interactions are replaced with visual-novel style text
- The thirty hour epilogue, The Answer, from Persona 3: FES is also omitted
- Game is still very long and time consuming, as well as text heavy. This is very much a JRPG

Welcome back to Tartrus

The Long

It already goes without saying I'm a huge fan of the Persona series, especially it's most two recent iterations. Persona 3: FES and Persona 4 are two of the best JRPGs in recent memory, and certainly brought me kicking and screaming back into enjoying the genre. The excellent fusion of turn-based RPG battles with a heavy emphasis on elemental weaknesses, along with the pseudo dating-sim and time managing elements made both these games very addicting, fun, and memorable. 

But the question remains: how do you get fans to replay a 100+ hour game? Easy: add a new main character, and make it so you can pick up and grind out a day at any time.

BOOM. Consider your drink MIXED. 

I don't think I need to say much about the previous two games in terms of design. As a super quick recap, this is how Persona 3 works:

The game is split between a social/dating simulator (slash visual novel) and turn-based RPG battles. The two systems interlink as you use Personas (essentially Pokemon) to battle for you. Unlocking better Personas is done by raising Social Links, which you do by engaging in the social simulator. The battles are fun (if they do get a bit repetitive), the writing for the Social Links is outstanding, and the game takes care to be certain you make connections with the characters you interact with. It's a strong fusion of two genres that somehow blends into a perfect, addictive whole.

Now that that's out of the way, here's why you should preference P3P over the previous releases.

First off, the game has been streamlined in ways that are mostly for the better (we'll talk about the negatives in a minute). Whereas before you had to walk everywhere in the city, now the quick-warp button from Persona 4 has returned to save the day. In addition, other minor bits of polish have been added. You don't have to watch the whole "I am thou, thou art I" every time a social link ranks up, it again being replaced by the quick, satisfying "swish" from Persona 4. Equipping your party is also much faster, as they all fit under the same menu now (vs having to talk to them individually to change gear). The game also loads insanely faster, making the game considerably snappier when going place to place (the loads are even better if you do the optional install). As a whole, this package is tight. 

You'll still see a lot of this, though. 

However, there are some absolutely major changes that should draw previous players back in. The biggest being the ability to manually control every character in your party. While this wasn't an option in P3 FES, it was in P4, and adding it to the old system completely changes the game (for the better). Now you don't have to rely completely on yourself to knock enemies over or have every element in the book because you don't know if your teammate will suddenly lose his mind and cast "heal" on himself instead of hitting the last enemy. Manual control makes the game considerably more enjoyable, and also makes picking your party more strategic. Simply put: it makes the 100+ floor grind through the main dungeon Tartrus considerably more tolerable.

The second is a massive berth of new Personas, items, weapons, side-quests, and abilities. There's more events to be had than before (though all those from FES carry over), more dialogue options, and tons of new stuff to do. Now you can rescue people who get trapped in Tartrus for a bonus, urging you to go back on different days. They've changed when/how you can study to better balance the game, but made social links a bit more lenient. The "girl jealousy" thing that really made juggling Social Links hard in FES has been removed, meaning you can be a total player without consequence. 

Perhaps the next biggest change worth noting is the addition of new Skill Cards. Before, you'd spend hours in the fusion room, trying to mix your Personas in a way that they inherited necessary moves to create the Ultimate Persona Dude (or Lady). That process has been made a bit easier, now, as every Persona comes equipped with a skill card. Upon reaching a certain level you get a one-use card that will teach the move in question. If you are skilled enough to Max out Social Links early, the XP bonus from that can guarantee a card each fusion, making creating the biggest, baddest Persona much easier (As well as use the cards to override crappy moves). IT's a good system that keeps the strategic gambling element of the game (something later removed in Persona 4 Golden) while allowing for more leniency.

Lastly, the way your characters get "tired" has been changed, probably to accommodate for the game's new emphasis on portability. It's not a huge switch but it makes grinding more enjoyable, and while charging to heal vs the regular free one is nice, they made the price so cheap it almost seems pointless. Still, worth noting. 

But now let's talk about the elephant in the room in terms of new content: a completely new protagonist.

This lady. 

Obviously the biggest hang-up for Atlas when re-releasing this game was that 1. These are kind of niche games and 2. People had already replayed it once for FES, and they take like 100+ hours to beat. Adding this female character, however, was genius, because it completely changes the game. 

Now let me get one thing straight: the core story involving SEES, the Dark Hour, Shadows, and all that jazz remains the same. There's some very minor plot hiccups, but overall the story remains the same. The gameplay, as well, at least in battles and Fusions is still exactly the same (minus what I said above). The significant changes, however, happen in the little things, especially the Social Links.

Social Links have been completely rearranged. Several characters have been axed completely (Maya from the MMO you could play on Sundays is gone, as is the shy bookish girl with the man phobia who looks weirdly like my wife) and replaced with new ones. A big boost here is that you can finally social link with everybody on your team, not just the ones from the opposite gender. As a girl the other ladies in SEES change how they react to you and become good friends instead (Fuuka's arch is still about her wanting to cook, but now you cook with her, which is a nice touch), and the boys (who had little depth in P3 and FES) are considerably more fleshed out as you can meet with and date them. You can also social link with Koromaru. Yeah. The dog. It's pretty great. 

Theo can also replace Elizabeth, and he's just as funny to take out. 

But what really sold me was how much better the writing is for the female character, in both choices and links. The new Hermit link (an older student who serves as librarian and is a doormat for abuse) is downright heartbreaking, and the new Chariot (sports team) link has a fun cross over with a male link from P3 that has been removed. When playing as a guy most of your responses were pretty bland, but the female protag is actually pretty sharp-tongued (which is how I tend to play all my games when given a choice) and it makes her seem both more playful and considerably easier to relate to. Nothing like mouthing right back to stupid Junpei when he gives you lip. Though "Operation Babe Hunt" from the male protag's POV will be sorely missed (easily one of the funniest parts of the game), female protag gets to visit the school from P4 and see a cameo of one of the characters from that game several years before the events of P4, which is a great shoutout.

Overall, Atlas could have easily just phoned this one in. Changed a few genders of characters, kept all the same dialogue, etc. But instead they went all out. Existing social links have new schedules, repeats (like the old man and dying boy) are similar but still change a fair amount, and overall everything feels better written and refined.

Plus, you can give a dog a tux. SOLD. 

So...where are those negatives I was going to bring up? Well, it's really just one, but it might be a big one for some people. Ok, two, but the second isn't that great of a loss. Let's address the big one first: the lack of polygonal characters.

Now, you keep the same sprites, etc. when grinding in Tartrus. Don't worry, that hasn't been changed. However, where previously you would run around the world an interact with people (giving you a sense of "being" in this school, etc.), now it's been replaced by a static image of the various school hallways and other areas, and you move a curser over the screen to pick who to talk to, etc. 

From an immersion standpoint, I can see why this is a bad idea. But from a gameplay standpoint (especially having played the game before and running around the school already) it's much appreciated. Days go a lot faster, it's easier to see who is available to social link with, and since I don't have to run for fifteen seconds to talk to somebody, I actually talk to NPCs now. So that's both a minus and a plus.

The biggest downer, however, is in removing these they also removed all sprite cutscene emotions, etc. that would go on in the background as they interacted. They now have been replaced by visual-novel style text and character portraits, with text and sound effects explaining what is going on during the more actiony scenes. This is probably the game's biggest loss, as those small emotions from the characters really portrayed a lot about their characters. They can convey some of it through narrative text, sure, but it is a much weaker way of conveying it. It also makes the game more text heavy, so if you hate reading...this really isn't the game for you.

Winning some, losing some. 

The other notable thing missing is the 30 hour epilogue The Journey from Persona 3: FES. And by that I mean "I didn't miss it at all." I understand why it's gone, because it links directly into the male protag's story and (while the female protag isn't canon at all) it would be weird to try and rewrite it for a girl. Also, it was awful. That's the point I'm trying to make. It was battles with no social links (the best part of the game) and it was super-hard. I don't miss it. Some people might, which is why I brought it up. I don't. 

Chillin' with Yukari. 

Graphically, I think this game looks much better than the previous iterations. While I did notice a bit of detail (artifacts, effects) had been toned down for some battles, the rest of the game looks loads better at the PSP's high resolution. The menus all change colors to a pink-red theme when you are a girl (vs the sky blue vs dark blue theme for the dude) which was a neat touch, and the battle sprites look better than ever. Widescreen is also appreciated, and overall I'd say it's the best looking of the bunch in every regard.

Music is also much better. While untouched from the male protag's side, it's all been remixed for the female. Everything from school to shops to battles has new, softer themes, all of which I actually liked a lot better. Don't get me wrong, some people like that battle song Mass Destruction, but there's only so may "BABYBABYBABYBABYBABY"s I can take before wanting to plug my ears. Point being: new songs are better, end of story. 

I honestly might even like the female battle song better than P4's "Reach out to the Truth." Ok, maybe not, but it's still good.

This is the definitive version of Persona 3, hands down. From the redesigned battles (which also take nods from P4 in how the "knocked down" system, which I neglected to mention before) to the new characters, music, and writing, this is the whole package. But the absolute best draw is the portability. Grinding through a 100 hour game I've technically beaten before is much easier when I can take it with me, or pick it up and play for a few in-game days and then go back to what I was doing. That, ultimately, might be the game's best new feature.

...nah, I'm lying, it's the female main character. But it's still great. If they'd just kept the sprite animations for cutscenes, this would absolutely be 100% the best Persona 3 experience you can get. Without them, it's still probably the best in this day and age, but that one omission is pretty glaring.

Regardless, I loved playing through it more than I did the first time, even when I knew the whole story. And that's saying something. For me, this is the PSP's killer app, and if you have a PSP you owe it to yourself to pick it up.

Five out of five stars. 

And it still has the Persona that looks like a dick. M rating: Justified. 

Various voxel engine ramblings

I have outed myself previously as not a big Minecraft fan, so take everything in this post with a grain of salt (as I obviously don't really understand that genre).

Anyways... recently this sub-reddit for open-source games was pointed out in our forums, and while it isn't really as lively as others (for example the Linux gaming one) it pointed out an new project called Iceball:

Pre-alpha Iceball screenshot

Seemingly made by people not happy with the recent commercialization of Ace of Spades, it's an all FOSS remake, those early development you can follow here (or on their Github page).

Now maybe the graphics are lacking on purpose (see disclaimer above), but I couldn't help to think: why for f***'s sake did they have to reinvent the wheel with their own engine instead of using for example Terasology:



Or Minetest, or the Ardorcraft API for that matter???

Ahh well, at least it made me aware that Terasology is still very much under development, and with its focus on DungeonKeeper & Dwarf-Fortress elements, it might actually become a game I would play (and doesn't make my eyes bleed :p ).

Speaking of which... the guy behind AgentKeeper released yet another nice video and graphics are constantly further improved as seen here.

DevCorner: Blender Game Engine

While Blender3D is one of the premier FOSS projects out there, its integral part the Blender Game Engine (BGE) is often belittled as not a serious game engine.

While the criticism is certainly not completely unfounded  and the integration of limited "non-programming" game code creation (via logic bricks) gives it a bit of a "RPG maker" image, it really is a quite interesting platform to work on it seems.
Ok, probably as of now the BGE is really more of a rapid game prototyping engine, but previous experience during the Yo, Frankie! project has actually shown that at least compared to some other well known FOSS engines, it is a serious contender (that Blender Foundation project originally started on Crystal Space, and after many problems was implemented in the BGE in a few weeks only).



So what makes it so interesting? Well for one there is the full integration with a creation tool (obviously Blender3D) so that getting your content into the game is only a matter of making it. No exporters or anything needed... it just works. Then of course there is the fully scriptability via Python, also integrated tightly. Basically you never have to exit Blender, and testing your game can be done right in the editor with one click (no compiling etc. necessary). Oh and did I mention the great physics capabilities via Bullet, also build right in?

In addition your created game will be immediately available on any platform the Blender Game player has been ported (all major desktop operating systems, with an Android port under development and a browser plugin, too). In addition you can choose to publish your game as a single .blend file, giving the users a direct access to all the source files of the game; a wet dream of any true FOSS game developer!
The tight integration with the GPLed Blender Player, has been a major source of discontent with the predominately propitiatory game developing users of the BGE however. Thus there now exists also a few options to encrypt your game and/or run it on an external engine that can be kept close source (but I will not go further into that here). 

You can find a lot of (sometimes really awesome looking: 1, 2, 3) game projects on the Blenderartists.org forum. Now as I said, most of it is sadly closed source with propitiatory artworks, but I also have the feeling that some simply don't know or care about the legal implications of their "freeware" game (which sadly shows that even many people who use a great FOSS tool, mostly care about the "free as in beer" aspect of it). 

One of the more interesting projects right now (which might or might not become a full FOSS game) can be seen in this video:



It shows the most recent work by Martinesh, who is basically BGE's resident game art guru. Two years ago we already featured previous awesome work by him, but sadly that Air Race project is by now canceled.
What he is now working on is however rather a show-case for the really nice new graphical features in the BGE which he and others are developing in the so called "candy" development branch (on his blog there are also more details and nice videos from some time ago).

Another cool recent project it the rewrite of the the logic bricks visual programming idea via nodal logic blocks called Hive.

While not completely integrated into Blender yet, you can already try it via an external editor (the created python code works fine inside Blender). There are also some tutorials and a documentation for it.
Since my programming skills also lack somewhat, I find that an interesting tool... however most likely it is rather a nice way to do some level scripting, than actually programming the real guts of a game with it.

So where can you get started with developing your own game using the BGE? Well, the blenderartists.org sub-forums are always helpful, with some nice beginners video tutorials linked here, here, here and here ;)
There are even some books available (this one in particular is quite recent, which is a plus given the fast development of Blender3D) and there is of course the official Blender documentation.
Oh and a good source of content is (besides our friends opengameart.org of course) Blender Swap (nice interview with one of the creators here).

If you have further questions please comment below or ask over at blenderartists.org!

Updates from AgentKeeper

I mentioned this nice new project that appeared on our forums some time ago already, and while the promised source-code isn't available as of yet, a new and quite good looking video was recently posted:



Now as you can see, it shares quite a lot of graphics with OpenDungeons, which is not completely dead either, but there is at least some discussion to "jump ship" as AgentKeeper is progressing much quicker (with it being a University supported project).
You can follow AgentKeepers progress here if you fancy some nice dungeon management simulator ;)

P.S.: Stay tuned for an new version of Red Eclipse early next week.

Internal Conflict: Does Persona 3 Hate Itself

(Warning: I wrote this at like 1 in the morning and wasn't really thinking clearly. It's just me barfing a bunch about my thoughts on Persona 3. It might not be very coherent or even correct, it's just mind vomit. There's probably some interesting stuff in here, but I apologize if you have to dig for it)

So I've been playing the everloving crap out of Persona 3 Portable on my new PSP system, getting sucked into its "one more day" addiction and perpetual obsession with increasing stats that will in turn increase that other stat which will allow for better stats to be made and raised in this chain cycle of addiction. It's a known fact I really love both this game and Persona 4, which is essentially the same game except Scooby Do and with better voice acting. It's weird replaying a 100 hour game again, knowing full well what I'm getting into, but luckily the female protag in P3P adds enough freshness (and it's been about a year and a half since I first beat P3FES) that the story still seems very new.

However, I noticed a few things replaying the game. Things that are...strange. Really strange. And as I thought further on the gameplay mechanics and systems in play inside Persona 3, I realized something. Like it's suicidal prone, head-shooting teen protagonists, Persona 3 might actually hate itself.

Let's go over quick basics of how the two most recent Persona games work just as a refresher. The game is a pretty standard turn-based JRPG at it's core, with an emphasis on elemental weaknesses. You get XP the normal way, which levels your Personas (a batch of spell-casting pokemon you can make). You have a bunch of Personas to level (meaning XP management is a thing you have to do), while your team is simpler and they just straight up level (you also level in addition to your Persona, which is weird considering your teammates are all-in-one, but I'm digressing).

The point of the game in a basic mechanical sense is to get the biggest and baddest Personas, level them up so they learn moves that can apply to enemy weaknesses (as you cannot beat this game without exploiting enemy weaknesses) and then mix them to make bigger and better ones, take them and level them, etc. In a traditional JRPG sense, the numbers go up but the spells don't really change. You have a single use fire and a multi-enemy fire, and then you get a higher damaging one that takes more SP (but your SP pool has grown, so the percentages are still all the same). That's the combat portion of the game.

Taken at its core, the battle RPG mechanics are, frankly, drivel. Yeah, it's all the rising numbers game nicely dressed up in some awesome art direction and head-shooting goodness, but it's still the rising numbers game at its absolute core. While I appreciate the elemental requirement that makes it so you have to have a balanced "team" of personas (much like Pokemon), that doesn't stop battles from quickly becoming repetitive and tedious. Replaying the game only solidified this fact: the level grinding is painful.

I will make note that the game is designed so that you shouldn't have to level. With the right elements, you should be able to get pretty far without having to grind (though grinding makes things easier). However, there are things obviously gated by lack of leveling. SP levels stay low (and are required to fully use the elemental weaknesses system) if you don't level a bit. Party members (which you thankfully can control in P3P) also need to level to learn moves to be able to deal with new threats. I only bring this up because I know people will get on my case for what I'm about to say because "Persona isn't a game about grinding," but let's be honest here: the system is in place to encourage it. Moreso in 4 and P3P then FES (as FES very clearly said "YOU ARE TIRED NOW STOP LEVEL GRINDING AND DO SOMETHING ELSE," which was clever, but P3P and 4 don't do that and just let you grind forever until you run out of SP or money to buy SP), but still...they wouldn't give all those billions of Persona's XP bars if you weren't going to fill them.

Then we get to the other part of the game: the dating sim. OR social sim. Or time management sim. Or whatever.

In both 4 and 3 you have a boatload of "stats" traits you have to raise (Strength, Charm, Academics in 3) that are basically just gatekeepers to Social Links, so I don't think I need to talk about them. They're annoying (basically they exist to fill time and require you to pace your social links, which the Social Links do normally with their "points" requirement to level, but this is just another buffer I guess?) but they fill time and give another bar to raise and actually do change bits of the game a little, which is cool.

What I want to talk about is Social Links, and why I think they both compliment and are at odds with the battle system, depending on your point of view. Raising Social Links has nice little visual novel stories attached (which is, honestly, my favorite part of the game), but from the battle side they provide a benefit as well. For each Arcana they let you fuse better pokemon monsters (allowing for a higher damage fire spell to use with your new SP max) but also do something important: give you free XP. The higher your level in an Arcana social link, the more "bonus XP" you get when fusing a Persona. This amount is usually monsterously huge (I believe you gain the # of levels on the Persona equal to the # of levels in your social link, but I might be wrong. Point being: fuse a Lv 88 persona, get a free jump to like 95, which would be roughtly twenty quadzillion XP normally).

...which is weird, because I thought this game was about the battles. Basically, Persona 3 has this system that's like "Hey! Spend time social linking, then we'll toss ya some XP so you don't have to go level grind these guys anymore!" But isn't the point of JRPGs like this the battle crawl to slowly gain XP to get better numbers? Why is this system bypassing it?

At first I thought it was because the game hated itself and was putting its two systems at odds. The social link is basically straight up saying that leveling sucks, so if you do some visual novel bits we'll throw free levels your way so you won't hav eto worry about it (though you still do, as you yourself and your party won't level). It isn't like a JRPG to admit its grinding is the worst thing ever.

But the more I thought about it the more I realized that maybe it's actually genius. Maybe it knows grinding sucks. Maybe it knows all the battles are (frankly) tedious and not particularly interesting, and it knows you'll have higher social links near the end of the game (hence more XP) when you are getting super bored of all that crap. So it's basically saying "congrats! You read a lot of text and were good at managing time. Here's some super-powerful guys, now just cruse through this dungeon." Which is very nice of it, because I got bored of leveling in Tarterus after the second block.

But then again, does that really make sense. I mean, it's basically giving you an "ignore this portion of the game" card (or at least it's telling us that's what it wants us to do. On the harder difficulties, you are going to have to grind regardless), but then doesn't that kind of kill the point of the rest of it? The mandatory stats raising and social links are just a different sort of level grinding. I'm pushing up social links so I don't ahve to grind battles in tarterous (and on that level, grinding my character stats so I can unlock more social links to do so I can do those social links to to get better monsters so I can avoid the level grind in the battles). So this whole thing still seems structured around keeping you out of battles as much as possible and just spreading the grinding out over two systems.

I don't know where I'm going with this, I'm just overthinking it. Grinding in these game is so tedious. Boss battles are the funnest part because they are actually challenging (normal battles can be too, but after discovering an enemy weakness it turns more into "spam the weakness" for every battle, so the focus changes again to figuring out how to get everybody down while winning the war on attrition against my SP bar) and you can give them your all without the attrition thing for the dungeons, but you spend the bulnk of your time in these games wandering the dungons slapping up shadows. Why is the game designed around trying to get rid of that? Because it knows it's super tedious?

If they knew, why didn't they make it better then? The rest of the game seems clever in how everything is integrated, from the fusing system to the social link leveling and all that, it's just the battles that come off as the super lame duck of this whole equation. I honestly enjoy doing social links and screwing around fusing personas the most out of everything in this whole game. The time management is stressful but in an entertaining way, and the regular battles bore me. Again, it really feels like they built this whole awesome system to get you great personas, and then actually using them is a drag (and the game knows it, so it makes them fat an dpowerful).

Anyway, this is just me thought barfing. I could see why people could quickly hate this game for that one half of it (the battles) while still loving it for the other half (the social links). I personally don't know what side I'm siding on, but after playing through FES, then 4, and now replaying P3P, I can say for certain that Persona 5 better do something to make that battle system more dynamic. Kudos to them for making a turn-based system that's actually relatively fun to execute for the first few times, but enough is enough. Spice the game up. The systems in place all focus down onto these battles. Make them better, not a war of SP attrition as I spam stuff hoping to find a weakness and do an All Out Attack. I spent ten hours in the fusing room, make my reward feel more significant.

That's all I can think of because I'm tired and my brain hurts. I was going to put graphics in this so it isn't a huge wall of text, but it's going to have to be after the fact as I literally can't think at the moment. Hopefully you enjoyed this little rant (and I still love these games, fyi. I just think they could do a few things better) and I promise I'll actually put a review up sometime.

Some nice screenshots...

So it seems like it is up to me again to keep this blog alive ;)

Not too much to report though... therefore I present you Red Vs Blue Unvanquished edition:

Well at least that could be fun... anyways, as they explain in their last two weekly updates (1,2), their Demon Engine has seen quite a few graphical updated an bug fixes lately. Furthermore they highlighted an upcoming major change in game-play compared to Tremulous, as Unvanquished will be using a real resource gathering system.

Also a cool new screen comes from the "Modern Warfare" mod for 0 A.D.:

Tanks in 0 A.D.

In their WIP thread on the 0 A.D. forums they have also confirmed that the mod will be "open source" however did not specify this further. It also seems like they have plenty of good artists, but are lacking a bit on the coding side. So if you know your way around Javascript and XML hacking, give them a hand (and secretly lobby for a full FOSS release ;) ).

The Baconing

The Short

Pros
- Basic loot driven action RPG
- It has dialogue in it
- Graphics look cartoony and nice
- Kind of reminds me a lot of the Deathspank games

Cons
- Good thing this isn't a Deathspank game, because if it was it would be the same recycled crap all over again
- I mean, really. It clearly isn't. "Deathspank" isn't even in the title
- As a savvy consumer, I have brand awareness, and based on that alone I can conclude this is not, in fact Deathspank 3
- Because if it was Deathspank 3, it would be one of the laziest, lamest, most unfunny rehashes of an already beaten-to-death game series I've ever played
- And this would be especially bad if it was $15

Thank goodness! A new action RPG from the makers of Deathspank!

The Long

Wow, Hothead is really amazing! After releasing the sort-of-good-despite-itself Deathspank, they followed it up with a really cashed-in, mediocre sequel Deathspank: Thongs of Virtue. I was worried that they'd keep trying to milk this franchise with something like Deathspank 3, probably using a corny subtitle involving bacon that is drawn out and not funny, but I was in luck! It seems Hothead is trying a whole new franchise, completely separate from that other basic Diablo knock-off game with bits of humor (and by "humor" I mean "the one Ron Gilbert wrote was sort of funny" [and by "the one Ron Gilbert wrote was sort of funny" I mean "Deathspank 1"]). I must commend them for releasing two new IPs in such a short span of time, completely different and not at all the same as each other.

So let's take a closer look at this totally unique, not-Deathspank sequel because if it were it would say "Deathspank" in the title: The Baconing.

If you are not a savvy gamer, you may think this is a picture of Deathspank. BUT YOU ARE WRONG, GAMER TROGLODITE! FOR THIS IS CLEARLY NOT DEATHSPANK, YOU CASUAL ANGRY BIRDS PLAYING TARD!

The Baconing has a rich and unique storyline not at all tied to previous Deathspank games. In The Baconing our main character Deathspank (which I assume is a totally unique and new character who just so happens to have the same name as the iconic character from the Deathspank games, which are totally unrelated to The Baconing) has rid the world of all evil (prequel potential?) and is now bored out of his skull. He also wears a lot of thongs, which is also unexplained, though it does seem oddly similar to Deathspank: Thongs of Virtue's ending. Luckily,  I'm smart and know this is not the case.

Anyway, these thongs are evil, so he has to travel the world and throw them into the sacred Bacon Fires in order to stop an uber-Deathspank mech from destroying the world. 

I will say this: I sure am glad The Baconing is its own original IP and not a Deathspank: Thongs of Virtue sequel. Because if it was, it would be one of the lamest, poorest, most desperate attempts to extend an already concluded story (with multiple endings) into a completely asinine premise. 

Also, this game thinks its funny but it really isn't. At all. I'd say something here like "it's somehow even less funner than Thongs of Virtue", but since the two games are clearly unrelated I will refrain from saying something so uneducated an uninformed. I do have gamer blog integrity here, you action RPG peasant. 

This casino includes a delightful new feature: run around a whole lot to get quests far away that do nothing. Once unique to Deathspank, now a part of The Baconing

Speaking of Action RPGs, that's what The Baconing is, if you took everything that made them compelling and streamlined it to the point of extreme boredom. Plenty of gear drops, but there isn't any big decisions to be made here, so much so that you can have an "automatically equip best stuff" button so you don't even have to go into the menu. Brilliant. Why even have armor at all? Who knows. 

This is a similar system that was implemented in Deathspank and, while tolerable there, got extremely boring in Thongs of Virtue, especially once you realized all the little "ticks" that make these grindy-looty type games actually enjoyable were streamlined so much they were completely gone, and you were just playing the same damn game over again. But this is not Deathspank, this is The Baconing, so what would have been an absurdly tired and downright monotonous tedium-fest through the quagmire of boring suckness is now amazingly bright and fresh again. I squealed with glee every time I leveled and the bonuses were so small and gated it didn't matter. I was overjoyed when I kept getting variations of the same weapon that just did slightly more damage, essentially meaning the game never changed. I was enraptured in the throngs of virtue (whatever that means) as I spent the majority of the game walking and eating food on a timer because the potion limit is so obscenely small. All these features, which were tolerable in Deathspank only because it was the first to do it, were magically made fresh because this game was called The Baconing and not Deathspank III. Thank goodness for that.

Also Strong Bad is in this game. COPYRIGHT INFRINGEMENT MUCH?!

This game looks totally and completely fresh, assuming you have never played, seen, or been around someone who has ever played a Deathspank game in their lives. Which, considering this is a new IP, you probably haven't! And a good thing, too, because this is by far way blander than any of those games. While the sort of weird computer world is cool, you only go there for a few brief moments, and the rest of the world is brown and gray. Even sailing (a feature I'd say was lifted from Deathspank II without frills, but this is a new IP so forget I said anything I should just delete this sentence on nooooo) is on muddy looking water with tons of random islands that look bad and have nothing to do on them. The Animal Crossing-esque world rotation is still sort of a neat gimmick, but it's been overdone in the Deathspank games. Too bad games from a totally different series coincidentally had a similar art style that tarnished what would have been The Baconing's unique and lemony-fresh graphical style.

The music, I am sorry to say, is directly ripped from Deathspank. I don't know if The Baconing (as a new IP) was made by a fringe group in Hothead or something, but the Deathspank guys really should sue them, if that's possible within a company. Every song is exactly the freaking same as Deathspank, from the battle songs to most of the roaming music. I mean, come on guys! I know we recycled sound effects and stuff in the NES days, but this is 2013! Get with the program! 

This game has clones in it, which is weird because The Baconing feels like a clone of Deathspank. But luckily it's a totally different game, as I might have said once or twice during this review. 

Thank goodness Hothead knows what they were doing. Had this been a third Deathspank game, one without any notable improvements, upgrades, or even the slightest of changes, I'd have been downright infuriated to have had been forced to play it. It would have been one of the most cashed in, cheapest sequels I've ever experienced, with recycled music, graphics, and even less humor than the already unfunny Thongs of Virtue. Not to mention the streamlined ARPG mechanics, which were decent at best previously, would now only exacerbate the fact that this game is the same monotonous tripe we experienced in Thongs of Virtue, and trying to stretch the idea for a freaking third game would have been abhorrant and downright insulting. In brief, the game would have been literally painful to play, and this reviewer wouldn't even have had finished it, quitting shortly after the 2/3rds mark.

HOWEVER!!!

Since The Baconing CLEARLY does not have the word "Deathspank" anywhere in its title, I am completely sold on the fact is is a new IP and thus everything in this game is fresh, unique, and fabulous. Thank you, Hothead. Thank you for not releasing useless drivel that causes me actual, physical pain to experience. Thank you for not filling me with regret for even installing the game, despite having gotten it as an extra in an indie bundle. Thank you for calling this The Baconing, and distancing yourself completely from the Deathspank IP. 

Because if you hadn't, it would have been beating a dead horse into the ground that had already been beaten to death in Thongs of Virtue. Much like the overrunning joke for this review has been completely and utterly wrung dry, probably back on like the third paragraph.

One out of five stars. 

Editors note: The Baconing is actually Deathspank 3. This review was supposed to be funny as an overexaggurated reaction to the fact they took "Deathspank" from the title, obviously because people were seriously bored of the IP by this point. I apologize if somehow you got to the end of this without understanding, but if you did...maybe The Baconing is the game for you.

The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords Adventures

The Short

Pros
- Very fun and furious co-op Zelda experience
- The inclusion of subtle competitive elements causes dissonance between teammembers, which is awesome
- Puzzles and dungeons are, for the most part, great fun with friends
- Controls are reasonable with regards to character management if you can't get the complete set of four buddies together
- Graphics look straight out of the SNES Link to the Past
- "Dark Link" verses mode is weirdly amazing, providing a four-player murder spree using 2D Zelda elements
- Seriously, it's a 2D Zelda game. We never get these anymore. I'm going to take what I can get here.

Cons
- Need at least two Game Boy Advances and the link to Gamecube cables to play co-op
- Playing single player is sort of a rotten experience
- Despite being mostly good, some puzzle elements are sloppily designed, especially for a Zelda game
- I praised the SNES style graphics, but they do look a bit...fuzzy in SD
- Music is all recycled from other Zelda games. As in, directly lifted. Well, there is one remix, I guess.
- Story is lame and forgettable; just a collect-a-thon quest
- Game puzzles get predictable at around the 7th or 8th world
- No real sense of exploration, a major staple of the Zelda franchise

The calm before the inevitable storm.

The Long

When people say Nintendo has never mixed up the Zelda formula since Ocarina of Time, I sort of cringe a little. Yeah, the 3D Zelda games have sort of gotten stale (not "sort of;" they have gotten stale), but there's been a good batch of weird offshoot games since then. The DS Zelda games are a good example of Nintendo using a touch screen to change the Zelda experience, but what particularly stands out in my memory is Four Swords Adventures on the Gamecube.

Please allow me a little self indulgence here. My first experience with Four Swords Adventures was my freshman year in college. A friend had the game but no Game Boys, and I (for some reason) had two Game Boy Advance SPs. We borrowed three cords from a friend, and then hauled my other buddy's portable TV, Gamecube, and Game Boy Player (the attachment for the Gamecube that lets you play Game Boy Advance games on it) into our tiny dorm room. with two friends on Game Boys and one using their Gamecube as a Game Boy, we burned through about half of the game in a night. Let me tell you this: things got violent. Very violent. I believe we had to ban a certain player from ever using the Fire Rod ever again...and I think that player was me. Yeah, I'm kind of a pyromaniac...but hey, that field of bushes needed to be burned! It's not my fault all my teammates were in it when I torched it!

All that aside, I've recently picked up the game as well as a few cables to play with my wife in two-player to see if the experience is still the frantic, at-each-other's-throats co-op experience I remembered fondly in college. Was it? Well, read on and I'll tell ya.

Had this been with my friends, somebody was probably in that explosion.

Zelda: Four Swords Adventures strips the Zelda formula down to it's absolute basic, and changes a good deal of things in order to make the co-op experience work. Gone is any sense of story (though, to be honest, Zelda games are hardly Shakespeare): six (or was it seven?) magic sage ladies have been stolen, as have four mystical gems for some knights or something. When Link yanks the fabled Four Sword (imaginative name, that) from the stone like King Arthur, he splits into four different colored versions of himself that love to fight, bicker, and throw each other off pits out of spite. It's also good that happens, because apparently the whole world was designed around four people navigating it, which seems really inconvenient if you start thinking about it too hard.

In stripping the formula down, you lose a lot of what makes Zelda, well, Zelda to people. There's no exploration here; the game is divided very evenly into nine worlds, each with three levels (hey, kind of like every Mario game ever). These worlds follow the usual themes (forest world, ice world, fire world, etc.), and there is no carry-over between levels. Items you find in each level such as boomerangs, bombs, and the dreaded fire rod, all stay in their worlds after you beat them. It's more "Zelda arcade" than anything.

Ooh...pretty. Now throw Purple over the ledge to get the force gems.

While purists might take offense, I applaud Nintendo for doing this, because Four Swords Adventures, at its core, is not a traditional Zelda game. At it's very forefront it's a co-op puzzle slash action game, and one that Nintendo knew would be hard to get friends together for. Nobody wants to slog through seven hours of Link to the Past on four player co-op; people have lives. Shrinking it into stages that last around thirty minutes to an hour and a half makes it a great "pick up and play" game, which is what it needed. You still get the basic Zelda gist of tossing boomerangs and opening doors with keys, just in bite sized chunks.

And it's good that way, because the puzzle are, frankly, some of the worst in the franchise. Now, let me remind you that this is the Zelda franchise we are talking about here, so even at its worst the puzzle are decent at least. My main issue with Four Swords Adventures is the lack of conveyance. You play a whole temple learning that sinking-sand is bad, adapting tricks to get through it quickly so you don't sink to the bottom and die. Then you have a room where the only way out is to sink to the bottom, with no indication, prompts, or even hints that this is the correct way to go. And that's far from the worst example. Many puzzles involve using items in ways the game never taught you, and only using them that way once. Rooms have levers and stuff you can push/pull that only works sometimes. And don't get me started on the bracelet that "lets you lift anything!" which actually translates into "some trees, sometimes, and only if you come at them from the right angle." But hey, at least you can toss the trees at your buddies.

And there we have the saving grace for this game: the fantastic competitive co-op. 

Game Boy Advance: Now a bomb shelter. 

If you have the resources (meaning at least two GBAs, link cables, and a willing friend), Four Swords is an absolute riot multiplayer. First off, the game is designed exceptionally well when it comes to co-op required puzzles. Enemies, including bosses, often are "color coded," meaning only a certain color Link can damage them. This requires your team to be fast on the draw, as this color can often shift after being hit, and gives each person a time to shine. Puzzles also do this, with certain blocks only able to be pushed by certain colors, and the limited number of sub-items causing each Link to be specialized for a specific thing. You have your guy who has the dash boots and can run across pits, but can't use the fire rod to melt the ice on the other size. You have to work together as a team to pull through most of the game.

But where the game is really fun is the parts where you don't work as a team and instead try to hack each others' faces off. Let me tell you about Force Gems for a second.

Force Gems: Making your friends hate you since 2004

Force Gems are the Rupee replacement in this game. Essentially, they drop all the time (mostly when solving puzzles or killing enemies), and when your team collectively gets 2,000 on tap you unlock a more powerful spin attack. However, where this matters is at the end of each stage you and your friends are ranked. You're given bonus points for killing the most enemies, having the most health at the end, and penalized for dying. And then they add your total Force Gems to the mix, and whomever is #1 gets to be awesome while the rest bow their heads in shame.

Add the mechanic that burning your friends with the fire rod causes them to drop Force Gems, and things get fiesty. 

There's a certain incentive to keep your gems so that you'll reach maximum power (and if someone drops 100 or more at once, Tingle will come from off screen and steal it away, so everybody loses), but depending on your friends the real goal is to beat the stuffing out of whomever has the most. This includes but it not limited to:

- Picking them up and throwing them off a cliff

- Baiting enemies to them so they get hit

- Burning them with the fire rod (my personal favorite)

- Luring them out into a field then burning the field with the fire rod

- Tossing them out of their GBA screen just when an insta-kill bomb goes off

- Grabbing them with a boomerang to pull them off cliffs or into enemies

- Throwing trees at them

- Generally being a butt to your "buddies"

This "co-op but competitive" vibe is what makes the game awesome. And you know Nintendo knew it, because they plan just enough dead time between puzzles that you'll get antsy and start being jerks. Not only that, usually when someone solves a puzzle they are rewarded with a hefty amount of Force Gems, incentivizing people to race to the solution (or just let your friends do it and steal the reward, HAHAHAHA!). 

Or you can all just fight. For like twenty minutes. On the same screen. That happens a lot, too.

I hate all my friends now. Thanks, Four Swords!

So as a Zelda game, Four Swords is just passable. But as a co-op (and, dare I say, "party") game, Four Swords is incredible. The Zelda elements are just icing on the cake, with the somewhat easy puzzles really being there to incite more and more vicious competition amongst friends. It's pretty brilliant, in a way.

All this is completely removed if you play single player, which is absolutely awful. While it's true you don't need a GBA to play Four Swords by yourself (a standard Gamecube controller will suffice), the rest of the Links trail behind you like obedient puppies, and the competitive nature (aka the best part of the game) is lost. Playing this like a normal single player Zelda is, frankly, super lame. And considering it isn't a great Zelda game under there, you'll probably either get bored or frustrated very quickly.

Which brings me to another point: the GBA usage. It's primarily used in two situations: going indoors (caves, houses, etc.) or when you are in the Dark World. And while I admit the game does one or two clever thing with it (you can pick up "light world" buddies while in "dark world," making for a few interesting puzzles), I hardly found it necessary. Splitting the screen might have been cumbersome, but the game probably could have been designed around four-player co-op on just one screen. Having to find four freaking GBAs (or somebody with an extra TV, Gamecube, and Game Boy Player) as well as cords was hard enough back when this game was new, and now it's just as big a pain. While I will say it's worth it if you already have the GBAs (link cords are on eBay for like $5, and the game is only around $20), I think the forced GBA linkage sort of killed this offshoot.

That looks totally safe. 

Graphically, I have mixed feelings. While I like the very obvious Link to the Past throwback, it doesn't look like they did any real graphical improvements except for fire effects. As in, this seriously looks exactly like Link to the Past. You know, the game that came out on a system two generations before the Gamecube. The obvious dissonance between the bits they wholesale ripped and the few new things they added makes it extra weird, and with modern games these days adapting a "retro" look much better, Four Swords feels a bit like a cash-in on the graphics department.

Same goes for the music, which again...mostly straight up ripped from Link to the Past or Ocarina of Time. There's maybe two or three remixes of themes (I like the snow mountain's song, which is Death Mountain with like a flutey, softer feel to it), but stuff like the castle and cave songs are the exact same song, in the exact same midi chipset from the SNES. Dudes, you had a disc. Reorchestrate them or something, seriously. 

Four Links enter, one Link leaves. 

I'll give a passing comment on two other minor features: Tingle's Tower and Shadow Link Battle. Tingle's Tower is a minigame collection that pops up after you beat the second level in each world. It's cute, but frankly crappy. Ignore it.

Shadow Link Battle is actually kind of cool. Basically it tosses the four of you in a small stage, then randomly spawns powerups, bombs, etc. You can even grab a chicken and toss it at enemies to steal life, which is downright awesome. While it's hardly Halo or anything, it's a laugh riot with friends, and helps you blow off steam if your friend was a particular Force Gem robbing jerk in the main game. 

All in all, Four Swords Adventures is a pretty dang great multiplayer experience, with its only real issues being the mediocre Zelda elements and the high bar for entry. All that aside, don't let my negativity bring you down: if you have a Gamecube (or a backwards compatible Wii) and a few GBAs lying around, pick up some cables, Four Swords, and some buddies and have a great time. I should also mention quickly: the game works great with just two players as well. While you have to micromanage Blue and Purple, it still is a lot of fun (if a bit less competitive, at least when playing with your significant other). Just...don't play it by yourself. Really.

Four (swords) out of Five. And hey, Nintendo? This game would work great online, you hear? And since the WiiU doesn't suck online (and also has a big fat screen in the controller), maybe it's time for a reboot that doesn't require four handhelds to play?

Friends 'til the end. Until about five minutes into the game.