confidentialmisanthropy

Thanksgiving was a blur. What time, I didn't spend mildly intoxicated in Tokyo and Yokohama was spent with the FFXII demo. Oh, and that game they packed in with it: Dragon Quest VIII. Both the demo and VIII remind me of FFXI more than any other game in either series for different reasons.

When I first got my hands on FFXI, I was convinced I'd finally arrived at gaming nirvana. The MMORPG genre was always intriguing to me but most of it was mired in D&D fugliness. Draping it in Final Fantasy was enough to get me interested. The first few days I spent, like everyone, levelling right outside town. I was a bit more adventurous than most, though. After just a little while I'd managed to befriend a group of players that were either as equally intrepid as my thief, or just felt inclined to follow me wherever I'd take them. We'd stray as far away from Bastok as we could get, fighting along the way 'til we got killed. It doesn't seem like a big deal now. But at the time it felt pretty rebellious and a bit exhillirating. We weren't interested in merely grinding levels, but actually having some sort of an adventure.

I remember the first time we ever got to Konschtat Highlands and the world just sprawled out in front of us. It was the first non-dungeon I'd been to with no music. The lack of a score only helped the mood. It was raining. Hard. And we kept getting jumped by goblins, climbing hill after hill heading towards some weird landmark I'd spotted on my map. When the massive crag, finally came into view, the rain stopped and a rainbow appeared stretching across the sky.

I exclaimed, "This is the game I've been waiting for my whole fucking life."

Weeks of time sinks, bad parties, and waning adventure and waxing headaches deflated that notion as my time with FFXI went on. I kept trying to get that feeling back. And, truthfully, it came back a few times, in different forms, but hardly anyone was on my page anymore. No one wanted any adventure. They wanted to level. This, coupled with the realization that as a game FFXI really isn't that great drove me to unoficially quit the game.

Dragon Quest VIII is derivative. Sometimes it's offensively so. And it doesn't matter.

I'm going to go out on a limb, and say that 3D has lended DQ something of a greater identity. It's like it was always meant to be so. Gone are the tiles representing forests. No more disproportionate world map screens where your avatar's as big as a town. It all sounds purely visual, but we are talking about a videogame here. Seeing is neccessary. Why not make it drop dead gorgeous? Toriyama's character designs have never looked this good. 'Specially in the case of VIII's bestiary. Level 5 was so proud it seems, they added a first person view option.

The other night, on my way to Port Prospect I noticed it was getting dark. I ran past the gate to town, into a clearing, to a cliff overlooking the ocean. I switched to first person and watched the sun go down and I thought, "This is the game I've been waiting for my whole fucking life."

/shrug

The mere act of running down a path and seeing the next town come up in the distance is like a manifestation of what I always imagined moving giant sprites on world maps for all these years. DQVIII isn't the game I've been waiting for my whole life. It's the game I've been playing all the time, fully realized. It's an old-school RPG with benefits.

Emblem.



After polishing off the latest videogame trying not to be videogame, I gotta say it's nice to play one that's very comfortable in it's heritage. I am kinda disappointed with Path of Radiance in that the 3D facelift is just that. Terrain isn't any more a factor than it was in two dimensions. Fire Emblem has the tendency to dampen my post-modern progressive sensibilities though.

While the gameplay is largely still the same ol' song, Path of Radiance does stray a bit from series traditions in it's narrative. I was expecting more nauseatingly noble protagonists. And while there are some, Ike, the game's blue-haired lead isn't of noble blood and doesn't act it; the first Fire Emblem lead to be so. He's leading a band of mercenaries with no true alliegances to anybody's crown. The game's world of Tellius is comprised of two races: obligatory human-like beorc, and the animorphing laguz. The relations between the races are turbulent at best, and Ike an co. get mixed up in the middle, trying to patch things here an there but it wouldn't be Fire Emblem without a little war. I don't play FE for the story, but at least this one is less derivative than the fan-fic fodder from the last couple games.

In addition to the normal trappings gameplay-wise, there's a considerable improvement in the customization area. You can now pick which weapons you want upgraded units to be able to use. They also added "bonus EXP" that you can use to level up those random level nothing guys they throw at you like half-way through the game that are otherwise useless on the battlefield. And then there's the laguz. Nothing says "I love you" like units that have the strength of your frontline knights and the mobility of your mounted units all rolled into one character.

I wrapped up Wanda to Kyozō a couple of nights ago. A glance at the latest charts says at least the Japanese version is doing decently. It's #1 for the week of 23 - 30 October and it didn't launch 'til the 27th. Wanda came in with a lot more hype than Ico was ever privy to and it's nice to see Ueda got his wish, which was "to make a game lots of people buy." 140,000 people in 3 days is alot of people. It's nice to see such a radical game, on the PS2 of all platforms, get some well-deserved play. Huge banners on the side of half the buildings in Akihabara doesn't hurt either.

Hindsight is 20/20. This is the best way to critique a game, I've found. Hindsight has shown me that Wanda, for all it's gargantuan encounters, stunning vistas, and captivating emotions, is far from seamless. Thing is, Wanda's perfect where it counts.



Sometimes it putts along at 15 fps. Ken Kuturagi himself says 60 fps is like a slideshow. (Hyperboles. Ahoy!) Techno-babble like that never really holds any weight with me. The specs aren't important. It's what you do with what you have. Ueda knows this, and his team knows the PS2 very well. What Ueda and co. seem to be more concerned with is the player. Graphics help, sure. But cosmetics only take you so far.

Then there's the matter of the controls. For all of Wanda's Zelda-esque conventions, this one misses the mark. They're not bad. They just take some getting used to, whereas Zelda always feels like second nature. I haven't played Wanda in like 5 days now, and my right index finger still feels numb pressing R1 like my life depended on it.

I wrote a review for Drakengard a while back. I bring this up, 'cause in terms of character, out of all the games I've ever played from start to finish, it's at the opposite end of the spectrum from Wanda and Ico. Wanda's soaking in it. From the undaunted wanderer, to his willfull horse Argo, to the eerily lifelike colossi. That's why this game is so gripping. It's not trying to merely entertain as much as it is trying to make you feel something. In that respect, I'd say Ueda's done it again. I really want to see what he can do with the resources of a PS3. Even still, Wanda is a tough act to follow. Even at 120 fps.