Gaming off the Beaten Path

Sometimes a game's reputation proceeds it, for better or for worst. And today, we are going to focus on the "worse." I have heard quite a bit about Ballz 3D, a fighting  game released for the Super Nintendo and Sega Genesis late in the lifecycle of both systems. As we all well know at this point, that can be really good, or really bad. A lot of games released late in a system's lifecycle take full advantage of hardware that developers have had quite a bit of time to figure out. On the other, the end of a console's lifecycle is prime territory for developers dumping half baked, low effort titles onto a console just to say they did. That was especially true of fighting games, which were all the rage at the beginning of the 4th generation but starting to lose favor by the end of it. Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat and Fatal Fury had established the right way to do these games and the days of just slapping a license on top of a random tournament fighter and having it s...

It's been a long time coming, but we've finally reached the end of our GBA Metroidvania mini series. Well, I guess it hasn't really been that long, it's been less than a year since I started this whole thing. I usually  take a lot longer to finish stuff like this, if I finish it at all. It certainly helps that almost all of these games have been vey good, but the Quintet Trilogy games were all really good and it took me damn near two years to finish all of those. Sometimes, I don't finish these mini-series at all. But I've successfully worked my way through the Metroid and non-linear Castlevania games on the GBA and it's time to wrap it up with the third and final 'Vania title on my list. Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow was released for the GBA in May or 2003, a rare example of a title that actually hit the shelves in North America before it did in Japan. It wasn't by much, but it was still a rarity. Even though it's the last game I'm covering ...

Last week, we started our look at Albert Odyssesy: The Legend of Eldean, a traditional JRPG for the Sega Saturn. The story was pretty solid, if a bit uninspired, and the characters were much the same. But what about the gameplay? Well, for the first time in what feels like a long time, I think the gameplay pretty much matches the story in terms of quality. AO was absolutely in line with exactly what you would expect from an RPG that came out in the middle of the 5th generation: gameplay with firm roots in the 4th gen with the console's newfound power used more to make the world bigger and bolder. If the story here was almost directly in line with a traditional JRPG, then the gameplay pretty much traces that line directly. With almost not exception, AO is about as typical as a typical JRPG can be in terms of party growth, combat and exploration. That may come across as a negative, and it may be in some respects, but I actually think it's quite positive as well. Simp...

It's time to check another console off the list, because I finally got my hands on a Sega Saturn. It's been a long time coming, I've always found myself fascinated by Sega's 5th generation offering. Even when it came out, something about it's look and lineup of games piqued my interest. The problem was, I was just a kid and there was absolutely no way I was ever going to be able to afford more than one console. At least I didn't think so. Being a SNES kid, I got an N64 on launch day, it was the first thing I ever bought with my own money. While it had some great games, it was also a wasteland for RPGs, which were quickly becoming my favorite genre. Believe me, when I first saw screenshots for Final Fantasy VII, I was incredibly upset I would never be able to play it. Again, so I thought. Thanks to a massive sale on top of a price drop, I was able to pick up a PlayStation in early 1997 for a surprisingly miniscule amount of money. But the Saturn still eluded me...

Back in the 90's, we were far too edgy and cool to spell words the correct way, becuz everyone nu that spelling korrektly was boaring. I think there were more Zs used between the years of 1989 and 2003 than there were in the entire rest of the history of the English language. You better believe that if you could swap out a boring, lame-o S for a Z, you were doing it. And Cs? Who needs those when you have Ks. The video game world was certainly not immune to this trend, I have legitimately met people that truly believed the word 'combat' started with a K until they were in their teenage years. We may not have been paying attention in school, but we were certainly focused on playing round after round of Mortal Kombat, battling each other tooth and nail while seeking out a bevy of secret Kharacters to battle. Mortal Kombat might have been the most popular game franchise to decide properly spelled words weren't cool, but it was far from the only one. Which brings us to Ske...

It's back to Metroid for our latest in the saga of GBA Metroidvania titles. After a strong start, the last two of these games I've played have disappointed, one slightly and another drastically, so will this next game right the ship? As I make my way through this series, I found myself leaning more heavily towards the Castlevania games than ever before. I know I've said this before, but I've always considered Metroid a series I liked more than loved, and my reviews of Castlevania: Circle of the Moon and Metroid Fusion certainly demonstrated that. It's not that I didn't like Fusion, it's just that I could very easily see why there was so much hype surrounding Circle while I couldn't do the same for it. Of course, that train quickly derailed, as I found myself very underwhelmed by Castlevania: Harmony of Disonance and ready to jump into the next game on my list. Which brings us back to the Metroid side of the series. Released in 2004, Metroid: Zero Missi...

We have decided to rid the world of your worthless civilization. Prepare for WAR! I have said it before, but I think it bears repeating every so often: I'm not entirely objective about my game reviews. While I absolutely focus on the quality of the games I play, I won't hide the fact that sometimes, I just like certain games for reasons beyond what I can explain. Maybe it's a specific gameplay loop, or story beat, or even nostalgia, but some games just have that "greater than the sum of their parts" feeling. That is especially true of my 10s games, many of which I have deep seated relationships with. I myself categorize these games a lot of ways, but I definitely have, at leas in my head, a ranking on how much nostalgia or other intangible factors impacts these titles. And I have no shame in admiting that Civilization II is more influenced by those factors than any other game on that list. It might be the one I get the most pushback on when I talk to people, I g...

I don't want to say I've been dreading this post...but I've been dreading this post. Because now, I'm going to have to attempt to explain how Vagrant Story works. Before we get started, I am going to make it clear that I'm going to explain the game's mechanics on a fairly basic level. Some of the systems run very deep here and I would be lying if I said I had much more than a surface level of understading of how they work. I will say, it's actually not too bad once you  figure it out, but  Vagrant Story has the reputation it does for a reason. There is a lot going on here, especially for a console RPG and it's going to take some time to really lay out how it all works. But we also have to address the elephant in the room here: is the complexity on offer good or bad? Do all these detailed stats and equipment combinations improve the game or make it worse? Well, that depends who you ask. But with so much to unpack here, we best get started. While it has ...

Of all the games that I thought would make go back on something I said, I never thought it would be this one. It's time to talk about yet another golden era PS1 RPG, one that certainly divides opinion amongst the RPG fanbase. But before we do that, I want to go back and revisit a topic I covered regarding how I talk about games in general. A few years ago, I talked at length about the words "overrated" and "underrated" in the general gaming discourse and how much I disliked them. I discussed at length how these terms were used as a crutch for overly simplistic and shallow criticism, often serving as vehichle for the myriad half-baked edgelord hot takes that permeate gaming discussion. That said, I even admitted that the two terms were somewhat difficult to replace and that while I would actively try to avoid them, there would be instances where I wouldn't be able to do so. And that brings us to this week, where, after years of not using either of those word...