In the quiet district of Kodenma, secrets and lies begin to surface as the police investigate the murder of a woman who’d recently moved to the area. Mineko Mitsui is found strangled to death in her apartment with very few clues to aid the police; one is a button found on the floor, another a box of sweets from a bakery. (more…)
Optional Goal: Destroy 1 video game, preferably this one
The concept was alluring – an M rated game starring an evil and malicious stuffed animal hell-bent on revenge and destruction. Everything seen in previews and trailers looked promising. It was one of the few summer releases that actually was on my “To Buy” list. Unfortunately, once Naughty Bear made its way into my Xbox 360 nothing but disappointment followed.
Poor Naughty. He didn't deserve this.
The repetitive nature of the game coupled with a map that never seems to change is just the first of many complaints I have with Naughty Bear. While the game offers seven chapters with additional challenges, the map is exactly the same each time with very minimal changes to the goals for each challenge. They always have one particular Bear that you need to reach and punish and the optional destruction of X amount of item (insert gift, bird, rosette, etc here). Some challenges require stealth, or simply to not be injured, and that’s all fine and good. Games should be both fun and challenging. However, when you are on your twelfth attempt to clear a challenge asking you to not be seen and out of nowhere five enemies all seem to see you trying to cross the bridge to the next section of the map, you just want to throw your hands up in the air and walk away.
Clearing these challenges is imperative to your advancement in the game. The trophies gained from completing a level helps to unlock additional challenges and main story levels, as well as costumes to increase various stats for Naughty. It’s too bad that playing through them begins to feel like a chore. I would much rather scrub a toilet in a public bathroom than attempt one more run-through on an Indestructible mode challenge.
Ahh! The refreshing feel of water swirling around your head.
Earning points isn’t all that difficult. You can really add to the multiplier meter by sabotaging items and laying a trap right in front of it, then hiding in the forest until some poor sucker gets caught and scaring the stuffing out of him. Then let him limp around the disco for a while before slamming his head into the fire-pit and watching him burn to a smoldering pile of nothingness. But when you get to the challenges that require you to stay out of sight, you have to rely on sabotage and traps to buffer up some points, which is extremely boring and seems to take forever. Over time the de-fluffication moves become stale and you would rather just stab the opposition to death than set up the more elaborate kills and scares.
Naughty Bear also has a multiplayer game mode, but I was not able to experience it. All of my attempts to join matches failed. More often than not I would find myself all alone in the lobby, waiting patiently for someone to arrive. And when someone did show up, they disappeared almost as fast as the arrived. If there had been people available to play with, the multiplayer may have been entertaining, especially with friends.
My other major issue with Naughty Bear was with the sheer amount of glitches that I encountered. The very first level I played my game froze right as I was walking through the gate back to Naughty’s house to end the episode. Frustrating, but I can forgive it the first time. Second glitch I run into, literally, was getting stuck in a tree in the forest surrounding the Disco. Another disappointment as I was just about to progress to the last area of the map. There was also poor collision detection with the doors of the buildings. Often times bears would be standing in the doorway and the doors would close on them, but the bear would be fused with the door. Several times, especially during Stealth and Untouchable modes, I would be attacking an enemy who was coming through the door. And somehow, bears would be able to see or attack me even if the door was closed.
Overall Opinion
Naughty Bear could have been a lot of fun, but it underwhelms and under delivers. A major disappointment as it was one of the few summer titles that had originally caught my interest. Perhaps if the game had released with fewer glitches and more variety in the levels it would have seen a longer stay in my 360.
Buy Naughty Bear
By far one of the most-loved JRPGs of the Playstation 2 era, Persona 3 Portable (or P3P) gives us the opportunity to re-visit the Dark Hour and discover the various Personas that our mind is able to call upon in the fight against the Shadows.
By day, you are a typical high school junior. You go to class, make friends, participate in school clubs and work part time for some extra spending money. By night, you and your dorm-mates enter into a time known as the Dark Hour where you battle your way up the looming tower Tartarus in hopes that you can right wrongs belonging to those who came before you. The story of Persona 3 still holds up as one of the best and most enjoyable titles I have had the pleasure of wasting away my time with the JRPG category over the past few years.
P3P strikes a wonderful balance between grinding in the randomly generated levels of the Tartarus dungeon and enhancing your Persona-wielding life-style with extra-curricular activities. Exploring Tartarus and defeating the Shadows lurking around each and every corner brings you closer to ending the Dark Hour for good. Making friends and creating strong bonds with them is what brings additional power to the Persona you create to assist you in your quest.
Unlocking Personas is like catching Pokemon. Once you start, you just can’t stop! When you first enter Tartarus you’ll only have the inherent Orpheus available. As you defeat Shadows you’ll be able to hold more Personas acquired by obtaining special tarot cards. The further you climb to the top of Tartarus, the more powerful the cards you can find. Visiting the Velvet Room, a mainstay of the Persona franchise, you’ll want to fuse as many new Personas as possible, with some instances requiring up to six Persona cards in a fusion.
Featured in this new handheld version of the game, P3P now allows you to chose between a male or female main character. Social Links with classmates and other residents around Port Island will differ depending on which you choose. While the overall story is the same, it’s the little things that impact you will remember your high school days.
Social Linking with Yukari strengthens the Lovers Arcana
This being my second time through the story of the SEES group, I chose to experience life at Gekkoukan High School as a female student. Choosing the female option, your cursor and other icons are a soft shade of pink as opposed to the blue for the male option. I joined several clubs, including the volleyball team and student council, making a lot of wonderful female friends. I also spent time after school hanging out with fellow SEES members Junpei and Akihiko in an attempt to get closer to them. With the female character, you can also choose if Igor’s assistant in the Velvet Room is the beloved Elizabeth or the new male option, Theodore.
The one aspect of playing with the female character that I was most interested in exploring was seeing if it was possible for her to date the guys around her much as the male character could in the original. I spent nights slaving at Chagall Cafe either working or just having the Pheromone Coffee so that I could increase my Charm to a level that would allow me to build my Social Link with the dreamy and sought-after Akihiko-senpai. Sadly, there was no smooching or hand holding to be had. Once I had maxed out the Social Link, Akihiko was not to be found in his usual spot Monday and Friday afternoons in the Lab Hallway. I was unable to find any information to see if I had done anything incorrectly, which means my poor high school crush on Akihiko will forever remain just a crush.
Atlus has also included the part-time job option which allows you to earn some money while increasing your Academic, Charm and Courage skills. Before you could only enhance these skills by studying, correctly answering questions during class and spending money at certain establishments. While you can still simply spend some money and do so, working at a shop helps boost two of these areas at a time as well as pocketing some money to help by that fancy new weapon you’ve got your eye on.
My favourite new additions to P3P are the outrageous outfits to stuff into my wardrobe. It’s an added bonus that your characters really do wear these in Tartarus. My favourite was the Battle Panties, a white bra and panty set with matching knee-high stockings giving the wearer a plus two stat bump to their Magic skills. Santa suits, bathing suits and maid outfits are other special apparel you can collect.
Other tweaks to P3P include bringing two new difficulty modes, meaning you now have five degrees of difficulty at your fingertips, as well as the much desired battle command control as was offered in Persona 4. Using the Tactics option from your in-battle menu, you can now set parameters for those members currently part of your team. This option can only be accessed when you are controlling the main character and gives you a much better handle on those tough bosses.
Use the Battle Menu to set Tactics for your AI characters
P3P is not a perfect port of the original PS2 title. Due to the limitations of the PSP disc, the anime cut-scenes have been replaced with game graphic voiced over scenarios. I do miss them, but it is a small sacrifice to make in order to have everything else introduced to this version of P3. Also excluded from P3P is the additional content The Answer which was released with Persona 3: FES.
Overall Opinion
Since P3P arrived at my doorstep I have done nothing aside from spend all day on my PSP. Even in my sleep, I am thinking of what extra-curricular activities I want to do over the next school week, figure out how many floors in Tartarus I want to climb and which types of Personas I need to create so that I can get the best of the best for the inevitable final battle. Looking for something to waste countless of hours on? Then this is your game, as you can grind and grind to your heart’s content. There is so much content on this disc that it’s about to burst at the seams. Do yourself a favour and buy this game now. Buy it for a friend, too. Share the love of the twisted darkness that is Persona with as many people as you can.
Buy Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 Portable
Why is it that game companies want to force me into moving around like an idiot in front of my TV to play my games? When I want to move around I tend to do something constructive, like baking, exercising or running away from spiders.
Going completely controller-free is not in my future, no matter how hard some companies might be trying to steer us in that direction. Part of being a gamer is memorizing button combos and having something in your hands you could almost throw at your TV. The controller is a natural extension of who and what we are.
At first I thought that we were set with the ridiculousness of the Wii. A controller shaped like a remote, waving our arms around, starving for real games and then watching as the great games sold horribly while the shovelware flew off store shelves. The Wii quickly became a hot item for the casual and new gamer demographics, with slews of four player sporting games leading the way. Nintendo also brought out some games for their core gamers, however the wait time in between those games turned a lot of those original purchases into dust collecting machines.
At E3 2010, Microsoft and Sony showcased their new motion control line up for the coming Holiday season. I was not at E3, so my opinions below do not contain any hands-on experience, but I believe there are other gamers who share in my hesitance to have another console turn into another fitness program.
Xbox Kinect (aka-Project Natal)
After everything I have seen and read post-E3, Kinect looks to be a large disappointment for its core gamers. Microsoft’s desire to convert more casual gamers to the system is all fine and good, but it’s a major slap in the face to the long term supporters. Not adding optional support for console selling franchises such as Halo and Gears of War doesn’t entice those hardcore FPS and action adventure gamers to run out and drop the $150 on a fancy motorized camera.
Being completely upfront with my readers, I strongly favour my Xbox 360 over my PS3 or the household Wii. I have spent thousands of dollars on retail and DLC games, I pay for a Gold subscription so that I can play online with my friends. I am not against purchasing accessories and games for a console if I believe that I am going to have a great gaming experience. Kinect’s high price tag and a launch line up of completely casual games that remind me of all the shovelware titles that we’ve previously seen on the Wii make me want to keep that $150 in my pocket. And not including any games (as of now) in that package leaves a nasty taste in my mouth.
The only impressive game that I saw for Kinect was Dance Central, which I’m sure will be a hit with people who want to dance. Me, not so much. From everything I’ve read about it and impressions of people I know who were able to try it out, Dance Central is fun and challenging and worked well with the Kinect camera.
If Kinect remains a tool used only for casual and family games, it will inevitably fail. As much as they believe their hardcore gamers will be buying this on day one, I think that they will be shocked when that does not happen. I don’t know too many people who want to wave their hands around or use voice commands to play movies. Voice commands are fine if you’re the only person in the room, but what happens when you are having a party and everyone is talking? Who’s voice will the system respond to? How will it be able to differentiate amongst everyone in the room and pick out only your voice? And if someone walks behind you while you are playing, how can the Xbox be certain that person is just walking by and not mistake their actions as someone else trying to sign in? These are just a few questions I have not found the answers to, and we probably won’t until much closer to the November launch.
They talk a big game on how Kinect will be something their core gamers will embrace, yet I fail to see anything that makes me feel the need to run out and pre-order this today. We’ll see how things change as we come closer to the Holiday 2010 launch of Kinect and what Microsoft does to counteract a potential loss of sales to the Playstation Move.
Playstation Move
Instead of going completely controller free, Sony’s Move is a lot like the Wii – two unique controller pieces working together with the Eye (camera) to bring the player a new sense of involvement with their Playstation gaming. So while you can choose to play games swinging your arms around, you’ll at least look as though you’re actually doing something.
The key difference between Kinect and Move is that Sony is ensuring it’s motion controllers will resonate with the potential new and casual gamer markets as well as their core gamers. They are bringing a solid mix of family, casual and hardcore games to the PS3 that will make use, if you so choose, of the Move controllers. Killzone 3 and the newest SOCOM title will both offer DualShock 3 and Move support, giving their core gamers a perfect reason to invest in Move. It’s nice to be able to play with your family every once in a while, but there are times when you want to play online with your buddies, and pretending to look down the scope of a sniper rifle is more fun with a controller than it is just pointing your finger at a screen.
Another bonus with Move is that Sony has announced that their Move line-up will be retailing for $39.99 per title (this does not include other titles that support Move controls such as Killzone 3, etc). Smarter still is their introduction Move bundle for people who would like to be up and running with a game. Granted, it is the standard sports collection, but it is better than getting a peripheral without any software.
While games like Invizimals and the sports collection are not titles I would spend my money on, Sony will be bringing out some action adventure titles such as Heroes on the Move and the Sly Cooper Collection which has a lot of the core gamers talking. These are the kinds of games that Microsoft is missing from it’s launch line up – games that do more than have you swat flies from the screen or run on the spot. Sony already made those types of games for the PS2 when they released the EyeToy.
My only concern with Move is that I might experience the same stiffness/soreness in my wrist that I get when playing a Wii game for more than 20 minutes. Holding a traditional style controller is much more natural position. While I may not play a Move title for an extended period of time, they are bringing some excellent titles to the system that I am sure will have me using my PS3 more often than I do now.
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I’d love to hear any thoughts or concerns that any readers of this post might have. Objective thoughts only, please!
Design by ThrallMind
