Gaming off the Beaten Path

  The end of a console's life cycle was always a weird and interesting time. People talk all the time about how much innovation there is at the start of a new generation, but they rarely talk about how much innovation occurs at the end of one. Sometimes you are better off sticking with the best of what old technology can provide rather than the worst of what new technology offers. I think that's something that goes beyond just gaming and extends to most different kinds of media, or even hardware, but that's a different discussion for a different day. A lot of underrated, forgotten (and expensive) games come late in life cycles, most gamers just move on to the next generation without a second thought. By the end of 1995, everyone wanted to play with the shiny new toys, the PlayStation and the Saturn. Those games had some interesting and outstanding early titles, but the 4th generation consoles weren't ready to go quietly. There were a lot of notable titles that came out ...

It's been a long time coming, but it finally happened. I finished franchise mode. I had heard for years that it was possible but had never seen it happen. The mode ends after 30 years and I don't think I ever got past 15. I would usually get bored once the actual players all retired and you were just left with randomly generated guys. But this time I threw in a twist. I would also play NCAA football side by side and import my draft class in each year. I decided on doing this all on the '08 version of both games. The reason? It's the only year I had both games. Nice and simple.  Full disclosure, I am not going to finish my NCAA dynasty through to the end, that runs 60 years and it's just not going to happen. Honestly, I just don't like the NCAA games as much as I do Madden. For one, I, like any good Northeasterner, don't really care all that much about college football. Who am I going to root for, Rutgers? I used to live about 10 minutes from High Point Solut...

  Last week, we looked at Yakuza: Like a Dragon, a refreshing modern take on a JRPG based on a series more known for third person action. The story and presentation, while not perfect and often long winded, was outstanding. It was backed up by an all time great cast of characters and some of the best voice acting around. But how did the gameplay fare? Much like last week, we have the best and worst of both modern and old school gaming on display. RPG veterans will feel right at home with the combat system, which is a callback to the old-fashioned turn based battles they are used to. That coupled with the polish typical of modern games makes the combat incredibly fun, if a little repetitive. Encounters are all touch based, any potential enemies will have red arrows over their head and a field of vision cone on the map. Cross this field of vision and stay there too long an it will trigger an encounter. Battles are fought in an incredibly traditional turn-based style, where characters...

  I don't play a whole lot of modern games, they generally don't interest me. But every once in a while, something new catches my eye. I do occasionally review newer games, but it's usually because they fall into my lap rather than because I seek them out. Typically, the ones that I do play are from the 7th gen. I guess I should back up and talk about what I consider modern. To me, anything from the 7th gen on is considered modern. The PS3, 360 and Wii kind of start what I consider the modern era. Even those games are 15 years old at this point, pushing 20. I'm also not talking about games that are done in an old school style, stuff like Chained Echoes or Mega Man 10. Those games are modern, but they exist on a completely different plane than the stuff I'm talking about. Which brings me to Yakuza: Like a Dragon. A lot of people were really excited about this game when it came out...and I wasn't one of them. The announcement of a new game in a franchise known for...

  Sometimes, I wish I had more time to play video games. You know what? That's not a sometimes, it's an always kind of thing. I actually do play the games I review and unless something is just straight up terrible, I try to play it to completion. Trust me, I'd like to play more RPGs but I can't bang out a 40 hour game in a week. Usually, I feel like I have sufficient time to get at least an everyday gamer's level of understanding of a game. That's kind of all I need, it's sort of in line with my gimmick. But sometimes I come across something I wish I could put more time into, or at least feel like I should put more time into. I have heard since the 90's just how great Virtua Fighter 2 is, that it's incredibly easy to learn but incredibly difficult to master. I don't know how true it is, but I remember hearing stories of Japanese players lining up and waiting for hours to receive lessons from pro VF2 players back in the 90's. It's not hard...

Making a good sequel is easier said than done. For all the good that can come from change, a lot of bad can come from it too. And sometimes being more ambitious leads to bigger pitfalls that simpler games just don't have to contend with. Illusion of Gaia isn't a true sequel to Soul Blazer, which I looked at earlier in the year, but it is the second title in what's come to be known as the Quintet Trilogy. I talked at length about my experience (or lack thereof) with these games and the story behind them already. To summarize, they were a series of action RPGs developed by Quintet and published by Enix in the 90s. Illusion of Gaia was released in the West in 1994, two years after Soul Blazer. It was by far the most readily available of the trio, Soul Blazer was hard to find near me and Terranigma wasn't even released in the U.S. But Illusion of Gaia was available for rent just about every week at all of my local video stores, so it still shocks me that I had never played ...

  It's been quite a while since I've done a post that's not about a game, but it's time to discuss the latest TV adaptation of a classic gaming franchise: Twisted Metal. Twisted Metal is a franchise I have a lot of love for, so much so that I dedicated an entire month to it on my blog. The reason for that coverage? The announcement of a new TV show, based on the long-dormant franchise. Well, that show is finally here. Not going to lie, I hated everything about this show when I first heard about it. I even talked in one of my reviews about how the initial plot synopsis sounded like it was written by someone who had never once played the games.  But then the trailers started coming out. The first one I saw showed that someone, somewhere at the very least understood the darkly irreverent attitude of the series. That was good. Then the trailer with Sweet Tooth dropped, and you could tell right away they nailed everything about him. That got me really interested. But I still...