Wii Retrospective Reviews: Elebits

And so, after a three-month long hiatus, the Wii retrospective review series no one cares about taking place exclusively on a blog no one reads finally continues. There are a lot of reasons for the delay, some good ones being my acquisition of the Wii’s successor and a few games for that console as well as my being absorbed in the excellent Japanese RPG developed by Namco, Tales of Graces f. And also, Red Steel is horrible.

Really horrible.

Yeah, sorry for the people who were actually following this and looking forward to that review – all zero of them – but Red Steel, I found, was a game so utterly heinous and bland that I couldn’t even bear to finish it. Really. But in the interest of fairness, I think I’ll go ahead and list off my grievances. First and foremost, pointlessly sensitive controls that make the game a pain to play. Secondly, to zoom in on enemies, you literally have to thrust the Wii Remote forward in a mechanic that is one of the most awkward ways to use the motion controller I have ever seen in my life. Third, the story, predictably enough, is absolutely cringe-worthy. Fourth, the soundtrack is bland and generic and the disgusting visuals overuse “FPS brown” to a mind-blowing degree. Also, it would be dignifying the game too much to claim it even has a framerate. Fifth, the enemies actually dress in brown and grey, meaning they’re often hard to see from any distance. Sixth, they are always able to shoot you as if at point-blank range. SEVENTH, levels are designed like those of a Call of Duty game except without any good hiding spots from the ridiculous enemies, confusing layouts and no radar. EIGHTH, it adds absolutely nothing to the FPS genre aside from some lame powers, terrible IR and NINTH, simply pathetic swordplay sections that can all literally be won by doing this:

Except with a Wii Remote.
(*ahem* Credits to The Completionist, JonTron, and whoever made this a gif)

Long story short, it was frustration heaped upon frustration heaped upon frustration without a single redeeming quality to its name, and I felt like playing a game I actually liked. Enter fellow launch title, Elebits, a unique and quirky little adventure developed by Konami, and it’s by far the best game I’ve played for this stupid retrospective so far aside from, obviously, Twilight Princess.  Now, I will say that like with Banana Blitz, this is going to be a shorter review because Elebits is a relatively simple game and there isn’t quite as much to go over. Anyway, here we go.

Actually, I wasn’t quite sure going back to Elebits if I was going to be praising it or ripping it a new bunghole. I remembered enjoying it as a kid, but my standards weren’t exactly the highest then and there were a lot of games I liked back then that I simply loathe now. But actually, Elebits is still pretty good. Of course, the story isn’t going to leave the most amazing first impression. At the beginning, it introduces us to a young boy named Kai who lives in a world in which tiny creatures – the titular Elebits – power all technology, and his parents are seemingly obsessed with them. “They love Elebits more than me!” this whiny little brat laments, but one night when he’s home alone, lightning crashes and all of the technology in the house stops working.  Now, armed only with a Capture Gun, Kai must catch all of the Elebits in the most amazing of adventures that will take him all through town and even to the amusement park wheee. Yeah, it’s trying to go for sort of a charming storybook-type deal complete with a cheesy moral and all that good stuff, but that’s best delivered with a main protagonist that’s actually likable and voice acting that…actually counts as voice acting. But hey, Elebits isn’t about the story. Elebits is about its gameplay, and that stuff is pretty nice.

See, if you didn’t quite catch it from the summary there, in-game you go around various areas collecting the tiny Elebits with your Capture Gun until you reach an adequate amount of wattage to finish the level. Predictably enough, the Capture Gun is controlled via the Wii’s IR sensor, and while it does feel a little bit more sensitive than it could, it’s more or less solid – a welcome departure from the insipid torture-fest that is Red Steel. And that’s great, because the gameplay is pretty dependent on the Capture Gun’s use. Catching Elebits isn’t all there is to it – you have to find the Elebits first and that requires your Capture Gun as well. Using the Capture Gun, you can pick up and move objects about, turn doorknobs and other such turn-able devices, open drawers and what-have-you, looking for the eponymous creatures.

Also, you can lift cars.

Your Capture Gun is only able to carry so much weight at first, but the capacity can be upgraded by levels by collecting Power Elebits. These Elebits are found by activating appliances and other such objects that require power, which become energized as you collect normal Elebits. Some of these only need to be switched on to use, some need to be activated through some other means and some require you to insert another object into them. Once you activate these, Power Elebits come pouring out and, in later levels, normal Elebits, making them that much more crucial to a level’s completion. It’s a very unique gameplay style that uses the Wii’s capabilities surprisingly well despite the gameplay’s simplicity, which is something that makes it stand out not only amongst the launch titles but among the Wii’s third-party library in general, and it’s a lot more fun than you’d think, too.

Part of the reason why is because it’s surprisingly challenging. Noteworthy is that each mission has a set time limit and what this means is that you not only have to be crafty and observant, but you also have to be somewhat fast. Of course, every level is very detailed and has tons of hiding spots, and the levels constantly grow in scale as you go through the game. Spending too much time in one area can cost you a lot as well as waiting too long to activate appliances. The higher your Capture Gun’s level, the larger the quantities of Elebits that you’ll be able to find and some areas are even blocked off to you if you aren’t at the proper level, meaning collecting Power Elebits always has to be a priority. As the game progresses, new types of Elebits are always introduced, some of which take more effort to catch, and thus the game always keeps you on your toes.

There are also various other obstacles peppered along the way, such as Black Elebits and small turrets run by other Elebits, which can drain your Capture Gun’s durability. If the Capture Gun breaks, you fail and have to restart the mission. Of course, to help you along the way are a number of power-ups that give your Capture Gun a certain effect, protect you from damage, or even give you an entirely different perk such as cancelling all noise. Several missions throughout the game have some other arbitrary restrictions or quirks, such as forbidding you from breaking too many objects, letting the noise level go above a certain number of decibels, or in a few missions, even…removing…gravity. But while it’s a bit random, it doesn’t seem completely pointless. Actually, all of this really lends Elebits almost an arcade-like feeling and a general sense of fun.

On the visual and sound side, the art design is very stylized and the character designs, though cutesy, have a lot of personality to them. The energetic and upbeat soundtrack is also something I found myself consistently enjoying. What’s pretty disappointing is the framerate. Yes, it’s a common sticking point in my reviews and maybe this sort of thing just annoys me more than other people (perhaps due to traumatic experiences with Shadow the Hedgehog, but I digress), but it’s a really prominent fault on this game’s part, especially in the later levels.

Unfortunately, the gameplay, though a lot of fun, has its fair share of hiccups as well. The knob-turning mechanic is a very awkward one and really shows that this game was made in the Wii’s infancy and turns the otherwise easy final boss fight into something cumbersome, annoying, and to an extent physically painful. Boss design overall is pretty lame due to extremely easy difficulty and general dullness, though there aren’t too many of them. And while the IR controls are very good for a Wii launch title, pushing objects forward and pulling them back with the Capture Gun is a difficult maneuver, as is breaking objects such as power-ups against walls and floors. I also found that the collision boxes for a lot of objects would often extend beyond the objects themselves, which often caused me to grab hold of the object rather than an Elebit or something else that I was aiming for behind it.

I couldn't find any other adequate or relevant screenshots, so here. Puppies.

But all that stuff is pretty easy to get over when you actually start playing the game. Elebits is a very original and very fun game to play and is probably one of the strongest titles to come of the six-years past Wii launch. It uses the controller very well to provide its own playing experience, and flaws aside, it works great. The game is pretty long for what it is, too, with almost thirty missions to its name. Consider picking it up if you own a Wii or Wii U – you might just find something decent.

Well, anyway, the next game for the Wii retrospective is…Sonic and the Secret Rings.

…

Help.

Sly Cooper: Thieves in Time Review - Congratulations, Sanzaru.

Well, this is it. My first highly anticipated game of 2013 is now here. Around two years ago, I reviewed the original trilogy of SlyCooper games for the PlayStation 2 in commemoration of the announcement of Thieves in Time. Certainly not some of my best material, especially Sly 3’s review, but nonetheless, it did a…passable job of explaining why I love this franchise and what it meant to my childhood. So, Sanzaru Games, the developer who crafted this latest entry, had some pretty high standards to live up to, and I would be lying if I said that once the “Holy crap, they’re seriously making another one” feeling began to fade away, I…started having my doubts. Outside of ports, the only credit on Sanzaru’s resume was an ungodly overpriced piece of Wii shovelware garbage: not something that would give one much faith, obviously. At the same time, the game looked great and the developers seemed like they genuinely cared about it. They only took on the challenge, after all, because they were such big fans of the series and as I saw more and more, I grew more willing to trust these strange folks that they wouldn’t allow Sly to go the way of Crash Bandicoot and Spyro the Dragon.

*shudder*

And they didn’t. Thank God.

Eh, so, presentation. For the most part, it’s pretty great. The soundtrack may not be the most memorable you’ll ever hear, but it’s very true to its roots in its style and instrumentation. And visually, Thieves in Time is fantastic. Character models and in-game animations may look a little off at first, but they do grow on you. The real strength lies in the environments. Ho-ly crap.  After the 3-D platforming genre lost prominence, I thought I’d never see the “cartoon” look done so well like this. Cel-shading is, of course, used liberally, but it really works, and each of the game’s individual environments explodes with color and inspiration. I haven’t seen environments this amazing and lively in a 3-D platformer since…well…Sly 3. And just like in the original trilogy, enemy designs are every bit a part of the environment and atmosphere as the scenery, and it all comes together extremely well. And character animations in in-engine cutscenes are something to behold.

Now, when I commend the cutscene animations, I don’t mean that they’re all that much more impressive than anything else on the market. To fully appreciate it, you need to look at it in the context of the series. See, for as well as the original trilogy captured the feeling that you were playing a cartoon, it never did much to capture the feeling of watching one. Cutscene animation in the PS2 games was…stiff and awkward at best, especially facial-wise. Of course, there were always the narrated Flash sequences between chapters of the story (and those are just as abundant here), but in-engine cutscenes always looked kind of…eh. In Thieves in Time, the in-engine cutscenes actually look better than the Flash ones – ehm, make of that what you will, but they’re quite awesome. The characters are very…well…animated, and oft-times I felt less like I was watching a video game cutscene and more like I was watching the latest from Dreamworks.

Yes. *sigh* Dreamworks.

Yes, I do love this image.

Yeah, if I may be up-front about this? The “humor” can get downright horrendous. I mean, it’s not all bad by any means. For at least half the time, it’s the same kind of stuff you would find in the original trilogy – cheesy, charming, Saturday morning cartoon-inspired writing interspersed with self-aware remarks and occasionally genuine wit. That stuff works. Then you have the fart jokes and the halitosis jokes and the jokes about the name “El Jefe” possibly being Spanish for “Big Baby” because comedy.  There are jokes about stepping in horse manure, jokes about a “rice and bean” flavored lollipop, obvious jokes regarding the fact that one of the main villains just so happens to be a skunk, and generally pathetic attempts at wisecracking more befitting of an episode of Johnny Test than Sly Cooper. It’s simply disgraceful, and while, again, the script had plenty of good bits to offset the pain, the awful lines really stood out.

In fact, to be perfectly honest here, the story in general is probably both one of the game’s strengths and its biggest disappointment. Character-wise, it’s arguably even better than ever. Sly, Bentley and “The Murray” are all just as awesome as they ever were, and due to her role in the story, Carmelita actually ends up being even more awesome. But it’s not just the main recurring cast. The game is, after all, about going back in time and saving Sly’s Cooper ancestors, and the ancestors and their interactions with the main cast lead to a lot of really entertaining moments. It even sets up some development of Sly and Carmelita’s relationship, as Carmelita, still bitter about Sly tricking her at the end of the third game, finds herself appreciating the company of his ancestors more. While the game ends on a bit of a cliffhanger, the development does go places, and it’s great. And, of course, the various villains are every bit as fun and memorable as ever and I simply love to hate them. Oh, and the climax was fantastic, too. I don’t want to spoil anything, of course, but I will say that nearly every character gets a moment to shine and it is awesome.

Art and animation in the Flash cutscenes aren't really the best, but to be frank, they never were.

But while the story stirs up character development with Sly and Carmelita, with the help of one of the most thoroughly idiotic and downright contrived twists I’ve seen Metal Gear Solid 2, it single-handedly destroys some on Bentley’s end and completely ruins a pretty decent character introduced in a previous game. The ending even pours salt in the wound, implying that, if this game gets a sequel, this is going to result in something of an arc. Hopefully they’ll either retcon it into something less mind-bogglingly inane or simply drop it altogether, but it’s enough to make one sick. There are a handful of other lame plot points, too, and to put it simply, the story is just a bit of a mixed bag. It’s got its really enjoyable aspects and some that…really aren’t so great.

So aside from some disappointing story elements, is there anything else worthy of note that Sanzaru got wrong? Well…a few things, but nothing serious. But before I get into that, I should go over how the game plays. Problem with that is that Sly is by its very nature an extremely varied game, so there’s quite a lot to go over. At the most basic level, it’s an open-world sandbox platforming game with heavy emphasis on stealth elements. Then you factor in all of the different mission objectives and playable characters on top of the ones they’ve added for this installment, Sly’s alternate costumes and the various mini-games peppered throughout the five episodes and there’s a lot of ground to cover. It only lasts about fifteen hours – not a problem given the 40-dollar price tag – but this is by no means a small game.

Now, I’m going to be pretentious and call back to my review of Sly 3, in which I complained that there was almost too much variety in its gameplay styles and the entire game ended up feeling inconsistent because of it, blaming it partially on some of the various characters introduced in that installment. I regret presenting this criticism in such a way as, while I still think Sly 3 went so far as to devolve into the identity crisis sin known as “genre roulette”, in the end, every new character and mechanic introduced in Sly Cooper brings an entirely new gameplay style with it, just within the same game space. And really, I think that’s pretty awesome.  Beyond Sly 1, at least, Sly isn’t a series you can go into expecting to do even remotely the same thing each time you play – it’s a series where you just have to buckle up and go wherever the ride takes you. You have to go in with no expectations other than a lot of surprises. At its best, everything falls together so seamlessly that inconsistency doesn’t become a problem.

Thieves in Time handles this extremely well. Main character Sly Cooper, of course, shows off the series’ gameplay at its most pure. Out of the main trio, he gets the majority of the missions involving acrobatics and heavy platforming. Bentley, on the other hand, is a more technical-minded type, using more explosives and long-ranged projectiles in his missions as well as partaking in the occasional hacking mini-game.  Murray is a fighter and, as such, takes on jobs requiring his strength. And, of course, the Cooper ancestors, while playing similarly to Sly at the core, have unique abilities and attributes that don’t seem like they would affect things so much, but end up creating entirely new styles of play in their own right. Tennessee Kid Cooper’s cane doubles as a gun that leads to some strong third-person shooting on his end as well as a Sonic-tastic ability to switch rails in the middle of a grind. “Bob” Cooper’s ability to climb walls of ice leads to parkour platforming of a very different sort, and the same can be said for Sir Galleth’s ability to quickly bounce between wall hooks.  The abilities of Riochi Cooper and Salim Al-Kupar aren’t quite as game-changing, but are utilized very well in their own right. That’s not even going into Sly’s various costume abilities, which each give their own attributes to said character and do their part to change things up as well. What’s extremely impressive is how nearly every mission with each character finds a new and often inventive way to play his strengths – not only are the characters highly varied, but the mission structure is as well. Sly’s costume abilities, in particular, are used in a lot of cool and imaginative ways that ensure that they’re more than just a boring gimmick.

The one character I really felt was seriously underused was Carmelita. About halfway through episode 2, she becomes fully playable for the first time ever in the series. She’s selectable from the hideout and you can buy all kinds of upgrades for her. This was one thing I was really excited about, since I thought it meant I would get to control her more and that her gameplay from Sly 3 would be expanded upon. ...I didn’t and it wasn’t. I suppose it is somewhat justified by Tennessee Kid Cooper doing most of the third-person shooting, but it just makes her feel sort of pointless – like she’s just there to be there. Oh, you use her occasionally, but the moments are so few and far between that you have to wonder why they made her playable in the first place.

The inconsistency of Sly 3 came more from the overuse of vehicle segments and other superfluous gameplay elements that didn’t serve to build onto what was already there and, in fact, detracted from the time spent with it. Thieves in Time, fortunately, does not suffer from this problem. Complaints do abound of the overuse of mini-game segments such as with the RC vehicles and computer hacking with Bentley, as well as a number of others. But while it perhaps has more than would be ideal, unlike with Sly 3, I never found them intrusive on the experience and I generally enjoyed them for what they were when they showed up. In particular, I always found myself getting a kick out of the “Alter Ego” hacking mini-games (one of the three types you’ll encounter along the way), which are 2-D scrolling space shooter-type deals.

But there was one variety of them that I really didn’t like, and no, it wasn’t this part (although I wouldn’t call it pleasant) or…even…(spoiler warning) this part, (probably one of the most uncomfortable gaming experiences I've had in awhile) but rather the downright offensive Sixaxis mini-games. Oh, they’re mercifully short, yes, and there aren’t too many of them, but I’m sorry. Unless you want to cause pointless frustration, you do not use the Sixaxis gimmick and you especially don’t use it in Sly Cooper. Out of all of the moronic gimmicks I’ve seen throughout my life, the Sixaxis controller is one of the most disgustingly vapid, and it’s never felt like such a slap in the face as in Thieves in Time. They even force you to use it when opening safes in the game, and it’s every bit as ungodly frustrating as you would expect. I’m really not one of those people who thinks that motion controls are inherently awful and, in fact, I’ve seen them used very well, but you don’t just stick a motion sensor in a run-of-the-mill gaming controller and expect everything to work out. That’s just unintelligent. But back to the game itself.

One thing that stood out to me about Thieves in Time was that it almost seemed to take a “best of both worlds” approach in reviving the series. The original Sly Cooper was a linear platformer a bit more typical of its genre. You had hub worlds and such, but most of the time was spent in segregated levels with an emphasis on getting from point A to point B. Sly 2 was basically a complete retool in which all missions took place in a single large hub world, being based on completing objectives instead of completing individual levels. Thieves in Time takes the big hub worlds introduced in Sly 2 and has several missions that take place within them, but also has about half the missions taking place in isolated, “level”-like areas. And it works. The hub worlds are actually larger than ever, and while that may seem like an odd decision given what I just said, exploring them is worthwhile joy in and of itself. Clue bottles return from the second game and collecting all of them will allow you to open a safe containing a treasure that gives you some special ability. There are also plenty of individual treasures that you can find and add to your collection provided you bring them back to your hideout in time. This brings not only monetary rewards but also unlocks various other goodies in the hideout. There are also Sly Masks hidden throughout the game, which unlock various cheat codes. Oh, and it’s not all completely superfluous. While the collect-a-thon is completely optional, you need a Platinum Trophy to see the secret ending. Since there are no good guides yet, it seems I’ll have to wait on that. Aww.

But anyway, item collection aside, the overworld is still used very well. As already mentioned, almost every mission has you doing something completely different, and even the ones that use familiar gimmicks such as taking pictures and following the villain of the week put a new twist on it. However, it’s in the "levels" where the game really shines. Not only do these also serve to emphasize the variety of the game, but Sanzaru has done a commendable job of crafting each with all of the love and effort you would have expected out of the original Sucker Punch trilogy. They certainly may not be as stunningly innovative as what you might find in a modern Mario game (although the creativity is still very much there, make no mistake about that) or as wacky and out there as the kinds of worlds we see in some of Sonic’s latest adventures, but through their own methods, they always find new ways to entertain with the way they constantly switch gears, utilize the game’s mechanics and at times even offer a compelling challenge. The platforming in Thieves in Time isn’t quite as forgiving of screw-ups as its predecessors, but checkpoints are generous, ensuring that frustration with the game’s design is a rarity at best. And stealth is still incorporated into the levels just as well as ever. Through and through, this is Sly Cooper.

I suppose there is one pervasive problem that I really need to point out, though, and that is the vile load times. Oh, this game loves to load, and while it doesn’t do it as horribly often as the likes of Sonic 06, when it does do it, oho, it goes all out. I actually counted how long it took for the game to load once after I died and it was nearly a full minute. What’s baffling about this is that the game is otherwise polished to a shine; I fail to see how the loading could be this bad. It’s a problem you’ll forgive just because of how good the bits in between are, but it’s a consistently annoying one. But other than that and my gripes with the story and Carmelita’s underuse (and, naturally, the Sixaxis bullcrap), this game…really was a pleasure to play throughout.

I still remember the utter disappointment when I first completed Sly 3 and feared that one of my favorite platforming franchises had just met its end. At the age of 9 and until literally six years later, I could only dream of what a new Sly game would be like. I remember, as a kid, hoping every year that Sony would come out and announce that Sly would be making his glorious return, and when the fated day finally came, I was simply ecstatic. Now that I’ve actually completed the game, I’m just that much more satisfied and I really feel like all of my nostalgia for the series was done justice. All the little disappointments I had along the way never felt like they mattered much in comparison to the things that impressed me. Sanzaru Games, against all odds, has delivered something that really feels special.

Of course, the critics can whine and moan and complain all day about how it’s “doing nothing new” and “playing it too safe” and you know what? It is playing it safe, but that’s exactly what I wanted. It’s the first Sly game in eight years – would we really want a revival of such a long-dormant series to completely overhaul everything or would we want it to remind us of what made the original games so great to begin with? I personally think the critics are missing the point here. I mean, I don’t want it to stay this way forever. If this game gets a sequel – and it deserves one – I do want to see some legitimate innovation brought to the table. But this wasn’t the game that needed to do that. To use a phrase often used jokingly in the Sonic fanbase, Thieves in Time is “Sly 4 as I truly imagined it” and I freaking love it. To compare it to the rest of the series, I think the easiest way to do so is to be pretentious again and bring up my reviews of the original trilogy. In those reviews, I gave Sly 1 a 7.5, Sly 2 a 9 and Sly 3 an 8. I don’t usually give scores anymore, but following that line of thought, I think I’d give Thieves in Time something around an 8.5. It has some bothersome problems, but it all comes together really well in the end. Here’s to hoping it sells well enough for a sequel and revives this franchise for good.

Paper Mario: Sticker Star Review - Just a Bit Disappointing

You know what I love? Paper Mario. Who doesn’t love Paper Mario? Paper Mario is the best. The original Paper Mario for the Nintendo 64 was the first RPG I ever played, and I enjoyed the crap out of it. It’s still near and dear to my heart to this day, and its beloved sequel, The Thousand-Year Door, is probably one of the greatest RPG’s ever made. And while Super Paper Mario wasn’t quite the true sequel most of us would have wanted, it was still a dang good game in its own right. People can fawn over Super Mario RPG or the Mario & Luigi games all day long, but the only Mario RPG series that’s ever grabbed me by the throat and never let go is Paper Freaking Mario. Paper Mario is amazing. Paper Mario is glorious, Paper Mario is…

…one of last year’s most divisive and widely disappointing games. One of many, actually, if the opinions of Resident Evil and Assassin’s Creed fans are to be valued. Oh, and Final Fantasy fans. Please don’t forget the Final Fantasy fans. But where does the widespread disappointment come from in the case of Paper Mario: Sticker Star? Is it merely fanboyish rage in the face of change as fans are still forced to wait for the ultimate sequel to the GameCube classic? Or is there something truly wrong with this game? Did Nintendo, one of the most revered game developers out there to this very day, actually screw up?

Eh…a little.

Well, let’s start with the story…the – ehm – small sliver of something they call a story, anyway. Basically, there’s a festival to celebrate the coming of the Sticker Comet, then Bowser typically shows up and ruins everything by touching the thing, causing stickers to scatter everywhere. These include the “Royal Stickers”, which grant a lot of power to whoever wears them and Bowser, naturally, gets one. Then he captures Princess Peach in a move that’s almost as old and repetitive as the jokes about how old and repetitive it is. How wonderfully paradoxical! But then! Mario meets a sentient Royal Sticker named Kersti and joins up with her to travel across the lands, searching far and wide for the rest of them so that the Mushroom Kingdom can be restored to its usual state of peace and happiness.

GOTTA CATCH EM ALLLL~ (haha i r funni)

Sticker Star’s story is about as basic as it gets for a Mario RPG – of course, Sticker Star is barely an RPG, but I’ll get to that. Yeah, remember how Thousand-Year Door and Super Paper Mario had awesome storylines that actually tried to break the usual Mario mold in some ways and had tons of charming characters and even a bit of narrative depth? Heck, even the original Paper Mario, for as simple as the story was, had tons of great characters that kept the whole journey interesting. Well, say good-bye to all of that. Instead, you get an annoying crown screaming at you for the entire game with maybe two or three well-written NPC’s along the way that still don’t really do all that much. The individual worlds of the game – replacing chapters – don’t even follow their own funny sub-narratives anymore aside from a small one in world 3. Put simply, the storyline is simple at best and vapid at worst, and while having a more minimal storyline isn’t inherently bad per se, when the series’ standard for this sort of thing is much higher, it feels like a major step down.

But the presentation, on the other hand, is excellent. Sticker Star is likely one of the most visually interesting games on the 3DS to date. Unlike other games in the series, where, in-universe, the whole paper thing is nothing more than a cool visual gimmick, Sticker Star literally presents its world as one made entirely of paper and cardboard. This not only leads to some neat environmental graphics, but also to some unique designs for bosses and other enemies and rather unconventional interactions with characters and the scenery. One of the game’s most prominent gameplay mechanics, in fact, involves finding or even tearing off pieces of the game world to use somewhere else. The 3-D effect is also extremely well-done and even works with the game’s environments. Not only does the greater depth add to the platforming elements, but it also adds to exploration, occasionally revealing (with the help of a careful eye) hidden passages and other such secrets, making exploration feel more rewarding than ever before. Oh, and the one thing just about everyone can agree on is that the soundtrack is simply gold. It’s memorable, it’s well-composed, the instrumentation is wonderful…it’s pretty much awesome.

Now, the gameplay is the most divisive aspect of this game outside of the minimal storyline. As you would probably expect, it’s just a bit different from the other Paper Mario games. The RPG elements have been neutered quite a bit – practically the only thing that ever serves to remind you that you’re playing an RPG-inspired game is the separation of battle screens from overworld screens. There are no more experience points, no more leveling up, no more partners – aside from Kersti, who barely counts – little character interaction, and there is only one town in the entire game. Overworld navigation is also your typical Mario fare, and levels end when you find Comet Pieces. The battle system has also been completely overhauled, now focusing on what else but stickers! But is this all necessarily a bad thing? Well, personally, I don’t think so. At its core, Sticker Star actually comes as a refreshingly original take on the genre and on the series itself. There are times when it really doesn’t work, which will be covered in a bit, but let’s talk about the ways in which it does first.

So, first of all, about that battle system? I…actually rather like it. It works thusly: You find various stickers on walls and floors as you go through the game’s areas. By peeling them off, you get to take them and after that, they go in your Sticker Book, whose capacity increases every time you get another Royal Sticker. Every ability and attack you use in battle will be used with these stickers, and once you use a sticker, it’s completely gone. However, enemies tend to drop useful stickers when killed and you can also buy them from the shop at any time. Still, if you don’t have any stickers useful for your situation, there can be problems. This is the reason why the game no longer uses experience points – you’re always allowed to run from battles and you’re under no obligation to fight enemies, but doing so can lead to good rewards. For instance, fighting enemies is the best way to earn coins, which are used to buy better stickers and also to activate a timing-based slot machine in battle. Matching two or more pictures on said slot machine will allow you to use more stickers in a single turn. Battles are still heavily timing-based; to use attacks effectively, you will have to press the “A” button at the right time during each attack sequence to either get more hits or do more damage.

A lot of people don’t care for this battle system, but if you know how to use it, I personally think it’s rather nice...in general. Originality aside, it adds an extra element of inventory and resource management to the game that usually isn’t so emphasized in RPG’s. It makes you think about just when and where to use certain stickers, since it won’t be so easy to get it back once you’ve used it, while at the same time often forcing you to use certain stickers when you’re thrust into a battle. At the same time, you’re always finding more to use, and if you find you don’t have any, you can just run away. Exploring areas to find new stickers is always fun and even rewarding as you find a lot of the best ones this way. This sticker system also gives you a much more diverse range of attack and defense options at your disposal while at the same time limiting you to what you have in your inventory. And like I said, player input has not been forsaken, and the one-use-only nature of the stickers encourages you to maximize their power as much as possible. It’s a strange beast of a gameplay style – deep and expansive, yet also very restrictive. Whatever the case, it’s new, it’s interesting and I quite like it.

The level design is another thing I found myself enjoying quite a bit. While Sticker Star finds itself returning to the 3-D adventuring style that Super Paper Mario abandoned, it does some different things with it. Worlds are now separated into sections a la typical 2-D Mario platformers, but Sticker Star finds the time to ensure that every area has something unique about it. For the first couple of worlds, the level design may come off as more simplistic and less detailed than that of its console older brothers, but by World 3, I found myself consistently appreciating the variety of unique obstacles and mini-games every level threw at me. Platforming elements are also incorporated very well and, as I already mentioned, show off the strength of the 3-D effect.

What really made the level design so compelling for me, however, was the Paperization mechanic. I touched on this briefly earlier in the review, but it deserves more elaboration, since it’s something you’re going to be using a lot. Basically, with Paperization, Kersti transforms the world around you into a two-dimensional sheet of paper and allows you to manipulate it in certain ways. This is used for a lot of puzzle solving in the game. Bowser’s minions have left much of the world out of whack, flipping objects and pieces of scenery on their sides and ripping them out of the very landscape and putting them somewhere else. Using Paperization, you can pick up these objects or pieces of scenery yourself and put them in their correct place, which is often required to progress. The process isn’t complex, but there are times when using it effectively will require an observant eye, looking out for things that look suspicious or out of place. The general rule is that if you’re stuck, you probably have to use Paperization. Other Paperization puzzles require you to place specific “Thing” stickers – real world objects you find in the game that are converted to stickers – in the proper place in order to solve them. While the place that the "Thing" sticker goes is conveniently outlined, it’s up to you to figure out which to use. The game does give you hints at times, but others, you just have to use your brain.

But for as cool as all this is, this is where things start getting a tad problematic. See, remember how I said that you can only use stickers once in battle and then they’re gone? Well, that extends to the “Thing” stickers, which doesn’t exactly lend itself well to the Paperization puzzles’ trial and error nature. Using the wrong Thing in the wrong place could completely deprive you of the opportunity to use it at a point that you would actually need it, and if you don’t have the right Thing, you’re going to have to buy it from the shop or backtrack to find it. But that’s not the only problem that arises from the sticker-based system. Alas, folks, this is it. This is where we get to the negative part of the review. All enjoyment stops here, ladies and gentlemen. Without further ado…sigh…this is it. I’m not happy about this one bit, but there are some things about Sticker Star that I have to admit are simply asinine.

Yeah...

Only a few paragraphs ago, I mentioned that I really liked Sticker Star’s battle system, and well…I do…in concept more so than in execution. As it is, when the battle system works, it's great, but when it doesn’t...egh. The major problem we see in Sticker Star is that the game refuses to give you any sort of choice outside of your sticker selection. By that, I mean, you can’t target specific enemies when facing off against a group. You’re always going to target the first one regardless of what enemy types you’re going up against and there is nothing you can do about it. What makes this is a problem is that the sticker system coupled with the variety of enemy types can lead to some rather unpleasant situations. For instance, several enemies in the game tend to change stances, which will change what kinds of attacks you can use on that enemy. That’s fine. But say that you lack the proper sticker for one stance. Logic would dictate that you would use that turn to attack the other enemies, but nope, you can’t simply jump behind that guy because this game said so, even though you were perfectly capable of doing that in the previous games.

What the other Paper Mario games also allowed you to do was to skip your turn or simply defend if the situation didn’t permit you to do anything effective. Sticker Star, the game that would easily benefit most from this, doesn’t let you do this at all. Combined, this all led to a lot of wasted stickers and even otherwise unnecessary overkill, in which I was forced to use a good sticker I might have been able to save for a better time. With these limitations, the battle system becomes more restrictive than was really necessary and it just proves a cheap hindrance.

And speaking of “cheap”, can I tell you something about this game’s boss design? It’s downright baffling. I honestly fail to see how Nintendo of all developers could design bosses so utterly despicable. These bosses are down there with some of Sonic Team’s worst, and it’s all because of the obnoxious handling of the “Thing” stickers. A lot of the bosses literally require you to have just the right “Thing” on hand to even stand a chance, and if you happen to use it at the wrong place or at the wrong time, you’re basically dead. It's not just "Things" either - it extends to normal sticker types, too. There was another boss that required me to have a bunch of "Spiny Hat" stickers to kill. It just so happened that when I first fought it, I didn't have enough and, consequently, I died. The ones that aren't like this still tend to be downright nasty. Kamek, a recurring boss in the game, has a tendency to replace every sticker in your whole inventory with sandals, and the fight plays out with you beating her senseless with them. It’s funny until she flies up in the air, meaning you can’t reach her, and like I said before, you can’t simply skip your turn. And those sandals? They are literally taking the place of other stickers in your inventory. Once you use that sandal, the sticker you had before is gone. 

This one is dumb, too.

And then we have the final boss with Bowser, which I personally believe will go down in history as one of the worst final bosses in video game history. Even Persona 3’s final boss could potentially feel less hopeless. That’s not something I say lightly, especially of a Paper Mario game. See, the fight’s second phase is, in a sense, luck-based the first time you face it. The first phase is so freaking long and difficult that you won’t see a second coming, but it does. And by that time, you’ve probably used most of your stickers and are potentially on the verge of death.  And here’s another great thing about it: if you run out of stickers during this boss, then you are simply crap out of luck. You can run away from bosses (although that’s not exactly easy), but not from the final boss, oh no. My experience with the final boss of Paper Mario: Sticker Star can best be described as being beaten over the head with a water bottle until you lose consciousness, and then waking up to find that there’s still twice as much beating to be done. Oh, and the ending was simply lame. As a matter of principle, I won’t give any spoilers, but there’s not much to spoil anyway. Yeah…

This is an experience I never want to have again.

So what’s the best way one can describe Paper Mario: Sticker Star? In short, it’s kind of a mixed bag. When everything comes together, it can shine, using its original gameplay mechanics and level design to provide a very different and fun sort of almost-RPG experience. And yet, for everything it does very right, there’s something it simply does wrong. The battle system is really cool, but makes some absolutely ridiculous decisions. The Paperization is fun to use, but the trial and error “Thing” puzzles are simply tedious. The levels are great, but the bosses are downright terrible. And finally, the story is simply lackluster compared to every other RPG in the Mario franchise. It’s really not hard to see why so many people were disappointed in this game, and, to be honest, I…kind of am, too.

But I don’t want to give the impression that this game isn’t worth playing, either. For all of the problems I had with it, I did enjoy most of the time I spent playing the game and I walked away from the experience feeling glad that I had it. I can’t recommend it without reservation, but I can say it’s at least worth more than just a rental. In fact, Sticker Star is fairly long for a 3DS game – I personally took about 20 hours to beat it. The good outweighs the bad here; it’s just that when the bad shows, it really shows. I’d say you should probably check it out at some point down the line. Just don’t expect anything top-notch.

An Era Gone By: Mega Man X8 Review

Ugh.

Yes, much like just about every other denizen of the Internet, I’m pretty fed up with Capcom’s current treatment of their corporate mascot. I wouldn’t by any means call myself a big Mega Man buff, but I do like the franchise a lot. So, when I get an iPhone-based, on-rails piece of insipid sub-excrement that wouldn’t even look passable in Flash and could easily be replicated on freaking Newgrounds for the Blue Bomber’s 25^th anniversary, especially considering the kinds of games Mario, Sonic and Zelda have been getting for their own milestone celebrations, I don’t take it very well. Perhaps one could argue that this only reflects Capcom’s intentions to ruin all of its major franchises, if Resident Evil 6’s critical and fan reaction and the inexcusable garbage they’re calling a Devil May Cry “reboot” are anything to go by, but for the love of all that is good and holy, Capcom, this is your beloved mascot. Treat him with some respect.

But, supposedly, the real 25^th anniversary celebration doesn’t begin until December 17^th, the 25^th anniversary of the Japanese release of the original Mega Man game for NES. On that day, Capcom has prepared for us something truly special: a fan-made Street Fighter crossover styled after the 8-bit Mega Man games. Oh, but Capcom funded it, and they’re even allowing it to be released for free!  And by the way, they’re going to use the number of downloads to gauge interest in the franchise. To be fair, I do applaud their decision to embrace a fan-made game rather than pull the copyright infringement card like the evil tyrants they are, and it’s also the main office in Japan that has resulted in the degeneration of Mega Man, while it was Capcom of America that funded the fan-made project. Perhaps there are still people at Capcom who care and are doing what they can, and the game does look pretty fun. Besides, who can argue with a price like zero dollars and zero cents? We'll see what the future holds, but so far it's not looking so bright.

It's really a shame that Capcom as a whole hasn’t been treating their mascot with much love and respect, but I, on the other hand, will. For quite a while, I’ve intended to write scathing reviews of such “classics” as Mega Man X6 and X7 - *shudder* - but in light of the circumstances, I feel that would be in poor taste. Why dishonor Mega Man even more than Capcom already has? So, instead, I’m going to take us back to an era when Capcom actually cared about their mascot by reviewing a game I rather enjoy: Mega Man X8.  Odd choice? Perhaps, but let me give you a bit of my personal experience with this franchise: X is…the only Mega Man series I’m really into. Oh, don’t get me wrong, Classic Mega Man is awesome, but I’m pretty terrible at it. I also enjoyed Zero, but I only have the first game and have yet to pick up the collection and the ZX series didn’t interest me much from what I played of it. Battle Network never really piqued my curiosity either. Also, I only have the Nintendo 64 version of Legends, which I can’t imagine has aged very well on its original console anyway. So, yeah.  X is my favorite, and even though X8 isn’t necessarily my favorite entry in the sub-franchise, I have my reasons for choosing it specifically.

So, as for a bit of information on the game itself, X8 was released for the PlayStation 2 in 2004 as the last console release in the franchise until the downloadable Mega Man 9 as well as the last entry in the X series to date (aside from the remake, Maverick Hunter X). That’s part of the reason why I chose to review this one (and it also has to do with the fact that I want an X9 with the intensity of a thousand suns), but honestly, I think X8 is…pretty underrated. See, X8 follows the disastrous X7. As the first entry for the PS2, X7 attempted to bring some legitimate innovation to the notoriously stagnant franchise, but failed miserably. With X8, they went back to basics, but at the same time refined a lot of X7’s ideas in the right direction and even added some new ones. The result is a game that stands out from the rest of its sub-series not as being strikingly different in terms of mechanics and structure, but as being a solid evolutionary leap that shows how you don’t have to completely overhaul something to make it feel fresh. Debatably, it was the last Mega Man game to really understand this, so let’s get this party started. Ladies and gentlemen, this is Mega Man X8.

In Mega Man X8, the future dystopia in which X and friends live has yet to become any less dystopian, so humanity has decided to relocate to the moon by building an Orbital Elevator as part of the Jakob Project. However, the other side of the project involves the creation of advanced New Generation Reploids, led by the ludicrously effeminate Lumine, that can copy the data of any other Reploid and are unable to go Maverick…or so the humans think. But then, the old enemy Vile returns and kidnaps Lumine, and then suddenly all heck breaks loose and the next gen Reploids are, in fact, going Maverick. Thus, it’s once again up to X, Zero and Cousin Oliver- I mean Axl, who is a next gen Reploid himself, to save the world once again. Oh, and some other stuff happens, too. Also, it ends on a cliffhanger. Yeah, Capcom? Where’s X9?

Anyway, X8’s storyline is one of the more interesting you’ll find in the series. It certainly won’t win any awards, but it does keep you into it and is aided by some pretty decent presentation. Sure, the graphics haven’t aged the best, but the CG cutscenes still look nice and the character art used for in-engine scenes is fairly expressive. What’s really impressive is that for the first time in the X sub-franchise, the voice acting isn’t cringe worthy. In fact, the vast majority of the actors on display are…pretty good. Mark Gatha (X) and Lucas Gilbertson (Zero) both do a fantastic job of portraying their respective characters and actually reprised their roles in Maverick Hunter X, and Vile's voice actor is pretty great, too. The rest of the cast ranges from average to decent, with Axl, unfortunately, still being kind of obnoxious, even if to a much lesser degree. Alia doesn’t make me want to shoot myself, anymore, though! And while the Mavericks’ voices are a bit cheesy, what can you really expect from characters with such delightful names as “Optic Sunflower”, “Gravity Antonion”, “Gigavolt Man-O-War” and “Burn Rooster”? Yeah, if you thought they were running out of ideas when they got to “Tornado Tonion”, think again. But really, the cheesiness of the Mavericks here feels endearing rather than annoying. Rest assured; there is none of this in X8.

Mmhmm.

The characterization in X8 is also spot-on, which is another thing it improved on over the pile of dreck known as X7. X has always been characterized as being really depressed over the war, constantly wondering why we can’t all just get along and will we always have to fight like this and blah blah blah, but X7 took it one step further: it turned X into a wuss, to the point that he had to be unlocked as a playable character in a game of his own namesake. Expect none of that in this wonderful game. Zero has also stopped being stoic and emotionless and started being just as awesome as he was before X6 completely butchered every aspect of his character. And once again, he’s been given an excellent voice actor to compliment it, so no longer does he wonder what he’s FIGHTING FOOOOOOORRRRR. (I had to.) The new support characters also have a lot of personality, and Alia finally acts like she actually cares about what’s going on. And Axl is…tolerable, I suppose. It’s kind of hard to make a character such as him outright likable, but they do their best. Oh, and don’t worry; Sigma is just as ham-tastic as ever.

The visuals of X8 look…okay. They certainly haven’t aged as well as the sprite-based graphics of the first six games and the character models are a bit simplistic, but they don’t look awful either and the way the game blends 3-D environments with a 2-D playing field is seamless. Admittedly, the soundtrack isn’t up to the series’ standard, though. Easily the game’s weakest aspect, only a few of the tracks out of the game’s list are particularly memorable and some of the instrumentation is kind of bleh. The rest of the game makes up for it, but that does remain as X8’s main disappointment.

Getting to the gameplay, X8 basically adheres to classic Mega Man structure. You have to beat eight bosses and you have to get through their levels to get to said bosses. Once you beat one of said bosses, you get that boss’s weapon, which is another boss’s weakness. You then get that boss’s weapon and so on and so forth. It’s a tried and true formula and X8 uses it just the same as ever, but the game also takes pains to make the gameplay a lot more expansive. Available from the get-go are three playable characters: X, Zero and Axl, and all three have different specialties that change the gameplay and all of them also receive different weapons and moves from the bosses. You take two of these characters into a stage with you, where you can switch between them at will. You also choose a support character to aid you, of which there are now three. Palette is good at analyzing the stage to find hidden routes, Layer is good with enemies and boss strategies, and Alia dabbles into a little bit of both.

X7 was the first game to introduce the character-switching mechanic, and, admittedly, that was one of its less terrible ideas. However, in X7, it felt more like a useful perk than something that genuinely changes the experience. In X8, on the other hand, the teamwork aspect feels more like a legitimate game-changer. This is partly due to the fact that the characters’ strengths and weaknesses are much more balanced in X8, which is going to prompt you to switch between your characters often. While X7’s levels were mostly designed with Axl in mind, which rendered Zero almost impractical to use at times, X8’s generally aren’t designed for any particular character. Any character can overcome any obstacle, although some characters may be easier to use for certain situations. However, even outside of the level design, the gameplay encourages you to switch frequently.  Occasionally, the character you will be controlling can get trapped by a boss or enemy’s move, in which case, you can call the other character in for help. When one character takes damage, some of that character’s health bars become red rather than disappearing; switch to your other character, and the wounded character will gradually recover health, a process you can speed up by attacking enemies. This is very handy in its own right, but doubly so because characters take damage quickly and, since this is Mega Man, the game isn’t exactly going to go easy on you. If one character dies, you’re going to be stuck playing as the other character, but as you collect gems and kill enemies, a gauge next to your life meter will gradually fill. Fill it all the way, and the dead character will come back, and if the gauge fills and both characters are alive, you can perform a deadly and extremely useful Combination Attack.

Now let’s talk about the characters themselves, starting with X. X is, in essence, about the same as he ever was in his base form, to the point that he’s…kind of the most useless character if you don’t give him any upgrades. He’s got all the same moves you know and love: dashing, charged shots, Maverick abilities, etc. But, ever the one to plan ahead, Dr. Light somehow found a way to hide armor upgrades in every stage before he tragically died. It doesn’t make sense, but hey, I’m not complaining, because this is the best way the armor system has been handled since X4. In the first four X games, there were only four armor pieces, each with a different effect, and you’d need to have all of them for 100% completion. X5, instead, introduced two different types of armor with different specialties, but you’d have to fully assemble them to use them. X8 also has two types of armor pieces – Icarus and Hermes – but they can all be mixed and matched as you please, while fully assembling an armor type still gives you a special perk. In general, Icarus parts are geared more toward general maneuverability while Hermes parts are geared towards speed, but all are useful in their own ways and you’ll need them for X to be effective in gameplay. Of course, X also gets Maverick weapons as always, and the vast majority of these are really cool and generally useful in at least some way. There are a few duds, but X’s weapon selection in this game could justifiably be called one of the best in the series. Axl’s repertoire isn’t exactly lacking either.

Ah, yes, Axl. This character didn’t exactly make the best first impression with fans upon his introduction in X7, partially because he replaced X as the long-ranged attacker for most of the game and partially because he just plain sucked, but X8 doesn’t just make him tolerable in the the story. In gameplay, Axl is a freaking beast. He can’t move while shooting like X can, but instead, you enter a rapid fire mode when you hold down the “Square” button. From that point, while remaining stationary, you can aim in any direction using the analog stick. This actually makes him more flexible than X in a way, combined with the fact that he retains his ability to hover for short distances with his foot-rockets. Effectively, you can remain stationary in the air while shooting for a short time, which – believe me – you will be doing a lot if you ever control Axl. Not only does this set him apart from the rest of the cast, but it’s also just plain satisfying. And again, the arsenal of weapons he gets over the course of the game is pretty awesome, too, and not all of the weapons function in the same way. He also retains his copy ability from X7, and while it’s a lot more practical to use now, I still rarely found myself using it except for getting a few upgrades – a subject I’ll touch on later. It doesn’t suck this time around, but you rarely ever need it.

As for Zero, the close-ranged attacker, while defeating Mavericks doesn’t normally give him any weapons, his moveset is the most expansive out of all of the X series. Zero always received new moves from Mavericks rather than new weapons, but in previous games, not all of them were very practical to use. Generally, you’d find a few that worked and just stick with those. X8 gives him not only a much more varied moveset, but also a much more practically useful one.  But Zero also gets several new weapons, which, while basically optional, add more depth to this character’s close-ranged gameplay. All of them have their various advantages and can even change the effects of Zero’s moves or even his base combo. My favorite ended up being the D-Glaive, which has a wider attack radius than his other weapons and even has an awesome spin attack. Of course, even it is outclassed by the Sigma Blade, but you don’t unlock that until after you beat the game. Overall, Zero’s more hack-n-slash take on the Mega Man gameplay is still a lot of fun and continues to add a layer of diversity to the gameplay.

One of his new weapons is two Japanese fans. Sharp Japanese fans.

But while the gameplay variety offered by these three characters is great, it would be basically meaningless if there weren’t any good level designs to compliment it. Some of the ever-annoying critics seem like they would have disagreed around the time of this game’s release, but I personally think that the level designs of Mega Man X8, in general, are pretty dang good. A massive step up from the cheap and rushed frustration-fests of X6 and X7, X8’s level designs are very challenging, but also fair, like the level designs in a Mega Man game should be. Each of them creatively uses challenges posed by both the enemies and level structure, and a lot of areas feature some pretty unique ideas. Gravity Antonion’s stage, for example, features areas in which you must use switches that rotate the stage either 90 or 180 degrees to maneuver through it; Burn Rooster’s stage requires you to descend a volcano base while using passing platforms so that you don’t fall down or fall behind; and Optic Sunflower’s stage hearkens back to Cyber Peacock’s level in X4 by forcing you to complete ranked challenges, but has its own unique take on it. Oh, and there's also a level where you get to use a crane to destroy a giant Mechaniloid. There is one dud level, though. That would be Gigavolt Man-O-War’s stage, which entirely consists of you chasing the boss down. It doesn’t sound too bad on paper, but there’s a time limit and the way they’ve done it is just plain frustrating.

This was really annoying.

As for the bosses, I’d probably say that they’re some of the most fun and challenging I’ve personally experienced in the series. While bosses in previous games might switch attack patterns occasionally, if you had their weakness, they’d generally be quite easy. This is not the case in X8. Even if you have a boss’s weakness, it’s pretty rare to find one that’s a total pushover. Bosses are constantly changing up their moves and strategies, so you always have to be on your toes. Many even use the layout of the arena to their advantage moreso than prior bosses, and bosses also get invincibility periods just like you, so there are times where you will have to focus more on dodging attacks rather than delivering them. Regardless, the bosses in X8 are difficult, but, again, fair, and tons of fun to fight.

They're still completely ridiculous, though.

When it comes to other matters of importance, one of the most prominent differences in X8 is that powering up your characters is much more important than it was before. As you kill enemies and traverse a stage, you’ll find pick-ups called “Metals”, which function as kind of a currency. You’re not technically “paying” for anything, but you will need certain amounts to make upgrades in the R&D Lab. These upgrades include those that affect all three characters, with most of these being temporary, and those that only go to a single character. Heart Tanks are now done away with, in fact, in favor of two buyable health upgrades, a change likely made to accommodate the new partner system. Regardless, the R&D lab is a very welcome addition to the game, not only because it gives easy access to various upgrades so long as you have the materials, but also because it opens the door to more exploration of the game’s levels.

Another one of the less idiotic ideas introduced in X6 and carried over into X7 was the Chips, or permanent character power-ups, and X8 is the only X game to date to execute this idea well. Rather than having the Chips tied to Reploids that can easily be killed forever and only going to the character you saved the Reploid with if it didn’t get killed, the mostly optional Chips as well as Zero’s extra weapons are merely found by exploring the levels using the abilities you collect throughout the game. Thus, the item collection aspect of the X series is expanded upon more so than ever before. It really isn’t perfect, though. If you intend to get 100% in this game, then you’re going to have one heck of a time. Without some very strategic planning, you’re probably going to have to play through each stage several times to get everything and a lot of items are so well-hidden that you pretty much have to use a guide. But, at the same time, you aren’t by any means going to need everything to beat the game, even on Hard Mode. That’s the great thing about it. All of this stuff is there, but if you don’t feel like going out of your way to get it, you don’t have to. Not to mention that the game is designed with multiple playthroughs in mind, so this isn’t completely unjustified. In the end, with this on top of X’s armor pieces, which I already went over, exploration and upgrade collection are more substantial than ever before.

Really, if there’s one thing X8 does significantly worse than previous installments, it’s that you…sort of have to buy extra lives in this game. The amount you can hold is also limited based on what difficulty level you’re playing on – play the game on Hard Mode and you can only have three. This is likely the only real aspect of fake difficulty present in the game. It’s not a massive problem, but it is pretty asinine. Also, while I doubt it would be very bothersome now that the game is eight years old and could easily be found for pretty cheap, Mega Man X8 is quite short. But hey, most Mega Man games are pretty short, and X8 does offer item collection and a New Game Plus to keep you occupied even after you beat it.

So yeah. With all of that said, can you see why I want a Mega Man X9 so badly? It’s not just because of my partiality to the X series – though, make no mistake, that has a lot to do with it – but also because of what X8 represents. I do believe that the first five X games are all very good (and I’d even say that X4 is the best out of all of them), but it’s true that the series did stagnate quite a bit. Then X6 ruined everything with its awful level design and poorly-translated, Swiss-cheese mess of a story and X7 is quite possibly one of the worst games to come out of any major gaming franchise. To put things into perspective, that puts it down there with the likes of Sonic 06. Yeah. But X8 followed and succeeded in almost every way the last two games failed, not only at being a good Mega Man X game, but also at bringing some legitimate evolution and expansion to this stagnant franchise. In the context of the series, X8 felt fresh, but after that, the X series just quietly ended along with Mega Man’s time on home consoles. To me, X8 deserves a sequel that would not only do it justice, but also the rest of the X series. I wouldn’t even care if they did the same thing that they did with Mega Man 9 and make a 16-bit throwback to the SNES games; just conclude this story, and give it a memorable end. Heck, if this Street Fighter X Mega Man thing turns out alright, I wouldn’t even mind if they just let the fans make it. Either way, so long as the game was good,we'd be happy.

But alas, unless Capcom suddenly starts giving a crap about their core IP, I don’t see this happening in the near future. Don’t say I’m just asking Capcom to make the game I want without regard for what’s actually best for the franchise. For one thing, Capcom has already proven that they have no idea what's best for the franchise, but really, I’m not like those idiot Sonic fanboys relentlessly gagging for Sonic Adventure 3 because it will “save the series”. Mega Man X is a unique sub-franchise with its own principles, mechanics, and storyline that sets it apart from other Mega Man games, and none of the other numerous Mega Man sub-franchises are quite like it. Maybe the Zero series is kind of similar, but not strikingly so from what I played of it. Not to mention that, if you think about it, the X series was Mega Man’s flagship console series, and it hasn’t been touched in a long time, so it would be appropriate or maybe even nostalgic for Capcom to revisit it. Looking at the success of Mega Man 9 and 10, I think there’s a good chance a lot of people would buy it.

But I suppose anyone reading this is quite tired of my whining now. Bottom line, Mega Man X8 is a freaking awesome game. When compared to the rest of the X series, I’d say it falls somewhere in the middle: it’s not quite as good as X4, X1, or maybe even X5, but it’s better than X2 and X3 and miles ahead of the two infamous games I’ve been deriding for almost the entire review. If you ever find it, I’d definitely recommend it; you’ll most likely find a challenging, rewarding and, most importantly, fun Mega Man experience.

Wii Retrospective Reviews: Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz

Well, I was planning to do Red Steel for my second Wii review, but as it turns out, I can’t play that game very often lest I lose my sanity. Thus, to take a break from that obscene pile of insipid puke, I decided to tackle fellow launch title Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz, developed by SEGA.

Ah, I’ve been kind of interested in revisiting this one for a while, but never really felt the motivation to do so. I was always a bit curious about the Monkey Ball franchise, so, upon discovering this game for a reasonable price, I decided to try it. A few levels later, I quit in frustration. Still, I’ve always wanted to give it another chance, especially now that I’m quite a bit older and much less prone to blaming a game for my personal inadequacies. And hey, the critical reviews were decent and I tend to like SEGA’s wacky, experimental little Crazy Taxis and Jet Set Radios and NiGHTS’s, and I thought that maybe it would be one of those games that you can still kind of have fun with even if some frustration comes along with it. I came into this game with an open mind, and when I finished it and looked back on my experience, I said to myself, “At least it was better than Red Steel”.

So what’s the main problem with Banana Blitz? Well, it’s hard to say exactly what the main problem is when the gameplay is plagued by so many major ones, many of which tend to overlap with or exacerbate others. But I’m getting ahead of myself, since some of you may not be familiar with the gameplay of the Monkey Ball series. In that case, allow me to educate you, which won’t take long, since the gameplay is very simple. Basically, you are a monkey in a hamster ball…for…whatever reason. And you roll through various landscapes, clearing the obstacles the wonderful level designers have laid before you. Oh, but rest assured; as the first entry for the Wii, Banana Blitz ensures that your experience will completely and totally revolve around fluid and polished motion controls. And by “fluid and polished”, I mean “awkward and cumbersome”.

See, the way they work is that you use the Wii Remote to tilt the arena in various directions, which will, in turn, affect the direction of your monkey. In theory, this could actually be quite fun, but it appears that the monkeys coated their capsules with grease prior to embarking on this most thrilling adventure. You’re going to find yourself slipping and sliding all over the place and even when the controls aren't sending you careening off the edge of a cliff, they just feel weird. I’m certainly not expecting the balls to stop on a dime – in fact, if anything, I expected this game to use the principles of momentum and inertia to great effect (and it still does, which leads to some other problems, but we’ll get to that later), but this game feels a little ridiculous. You would really have to play it to see what I mean. Of course, the problems with the controls are compounded with the fact that this game is so…“bouncy”. You literally bounce off of every object, surface and bump that happens to be on the edge of the road in your seemingly plastic ball, often for ridiculous distances. Thus, even the slightest nudge against the edge of a rope bridge will send you falling to your doom. Needless to say, these “quirks” pretty much eliminate any sort of precision the gameplay might have had.

Looks cute, doesn't it? Oh-ho, just wait until you see the level designs.

Still, awkward controls and physics don’t have to kill a game. Let’s take Jet Set Radio, for instance. I had never played that game before the XBLA port, and when I got it, I found that the controls were pretty awkward and imprecise by today’s standards. Nonetheless, since the game didn’t operate on precision, I was able to bear with it and eventually found myself enjoying the game quite a lot. This…is not something that can be said for Banana Blitz. A lot of this game’s level designs, especially towards the end, require the utmost precision. Move the Wii Remote a millisecond too early and you die. Move the Wii Remote a millisecond too late and you die. Move the Wii Remote an inch too far to the left and you die. Move the Wii Remote an inch too far to the right and you die. If you jump and it’s not at just the right time and at just the right angle, you will die. If you’re going fast and don’t jerk the Wii Remote right back at just the right time, you will freaking die. What makes this worse is that the game goes out of its way to punish you if you attempt to go fast, something that is also completely compounded by the controls and bouncy physics. There was one level that was basically a giant slide. I thought this was my cue to just cut loose and blast down the thing, so I tilted the Wii Remote forward and began maneuvering left and right in accordance with the direction of the curves. There was a sharp one, so I tilted the Wii Remote as sharply as I could…and still flew off the edge to my doom. There were also a number of levels in World 7 that even featured Sonic-esque dash pads that would propel you forward at maximum velocity. Logic would dictate that I’m meant to use these to go fast. The exact same thing happened numerous, numerous times. Oh, and sometimes the levels can be downright cheap, placing some sort of bouncy object or corner right at the edge of a steep incline, or possibly even a three-inch wide bottomless pit that you would never be able to see coming.

This killed me many more times than it should have.

What I came to the conclusion that this game wanted me to do was jerk back on the Wii Remote constantly at just the right moment, grinding my monkey to a screeching halt. This led to a very awkward and jarring start-stop pacing in a game that, in all honesty, should allow for a lot of speed. What I was expecting from Banana Blitz was a game that, once you got used to the level designs and acclimated to the controls, would allow you to soar through the levels at high speeds, eventually earning the satisfaction of high scores, somewhat similar to Jet Set Radio or even the daytime stages of Sonic Unleashed. Of course, I’m not saying that it’s necessarily a bad thing for the game to require you to go slowly every now and then; in fact, the Monkey Ball series is, as far as I’m aware, more of a puzzle series than a platforming series. And yet, the level designs of Banana Blitz are so simplistic and linear that you always feel like they were meant for speed, but didn’t allow for it due to incompetent design. Oh, and part of that incompetent design includes some of the most unfathomably awkward incorporation of platforming elements I’ve encountered in all of my years. Far too many levels of this game have sections that require you to jump up or down flights of stairs or other tiered objects in a ball that literally cannot be stopped – only slowed down – and also bounces off of literally everything. Sometimes, this platforming is even of the “stop and go” variety. This came to a head in World 5, which had so much of this crap that it ended up being the first time I almost gave up on the game in frustration, a notion that also popped into my mind many times in World 7, none more so than at that world’s boss fight.

Here, you are supposed to stop and wait for a platform that swings in a massive arc to make it over to you. Whoever thought this was a good idea should be punched.

Oh, yes, the bosses. Well…okay, before I say anything else negative about this game, I think I should throw a bit of praise its way, as this is starting to become less of a review and more of a lengthy rant. Really, for everything that completely breaks it, I don’t want to say this is a downright terrible game. While it suffers from all kinds of incompetence – both technical and in terms of design – I can sense that there was at least some semblance of effort that went into this game. There are a handful of levels that aren’t legitimately poorly designed, only rendered frustrating if at all due to the game’s technical problems. Some of them, if you can get past that, can even be kind of fun and some even offer some pretty unique little elements. Most of the levels in the first half of the game (the key word here being most), I’d say, are pretty inoffensive; it’s only at World 5 where things start to get especially rough in terms of design. World 6 is hit or miss, and then it’s all downhill from there, but even then, there are a few that at least work in theory. Oh, and the soundtrack is probably the one thing I seriously loved about this game and, most likely, is what kept me sane as I was playing it. Just listen to this. I suppose it’s not really one of the best tracks in the game, but it samples two – count em – two songs from Sonic Rush. That alone is enough to put a smile on my face. Oh, and I also love the ending desperately. (Skip to 4:12 in the video - don't worry about spoilers, as this game barely has a plot.)

No, it doesn't even make the slightest amount of sense in context. That's why I love it.

And back on the topic of unique ideas, a lot of the bosses are kind of creative. It’s…really much too bad that the controls and physics turn almost every one of them into an ungodly mess. Much like the level designs, the bosses from the first half are okay, but also much like the level designs, they turn into horrid frustration-fests soon afterwards. The World 7 boss was easily the worst, since, after its giant golem crumbled, you had to chase the tiny (and incredibly fast) enemy throughout the arena by fighting with the controls. It would often jump on parts of the broken golem as they rolled around the room at high speeds, no less, which rendered almost any chance of scoring a hit hopeless. This boss legitimately almost caused me to quit playing and write the review you see before you prematurely, but nonetheless, I persevered.

Oh, yeah, there are these fifty party games, too, or something. I don’t know, apparently that’s one of the big draws to the Monkey Ball franchise. I played a few and they didn’t seem too interesting or fun. I didn’t feel much incentive to play all of them, really. I did my time, and I doubt what few people who actually read this thing really care anyway. If I didn’t like the main game, why would I give a crap about the extras?

The Verdict

Banana Blitz…isn’t really one of the worst games I’ve ever played. Far from it, in fact, but good Lord was it a pain to play. It’s certainly a poor example of what the Wii was capable of, even in its infancy. Twilight Princess only had a few mini-games and mechanics that made heavy use of the Wii Remote’s features, but even they were far more competent than anything you’ll see in this game and that was technically a port of a GameCube game. I guess it’s gotten me a bit interested in previous entries in the series, since there does seem to be a pretty fun little game buried underneath all the crap. Even the Wii Remote controls were a cool concept. They were just…executed horribly and didn’t work with the level design at all.

But, subpar though this game may be, it is nothing compared to the piece of crap I’m going to have to review next for the Wii series. Fortunately, Halo 4 came in the mail right on cue to save me for at least a bit. Welp, until next time, sayonara.

~T-Man