Playsta
Posted: Sun Sep 05, 2004 4:18 pm
So my loans came through and, as expected, it's almost a grand more than I needed. Since I'm a fucking idiot who is, to quote the brilliant Ataru Moroboshi, "living for the pleasure of this particular moment", of course I decided to import a Japanese PS2 and some games. Tragically, it seems that many of the games I'd been itching to get my hands on are no longer available, but I got what I could.
The first item on my agenda, of course, was the Japanese version of ICO. Because I will have my melon ending, oh yes. Sadly, the original version of the game has long since been out of print, so I was forced to get "The Best" edition with that hideous yellow stripe running across the top and side. Nonetheless, it was my only option and only $25, so, y'know, I'll take my melon and de Chirico cover art however I can get them. The main reason I'm bringing it up is because of the manual. Of course I don't read manuals, I usually only slip them out once then flip through them rapidly just to say that I held them. But the manual to ICO isn't really a manual, it's more like a storybook. The basic mechanics are explained with flowing text (no charts or lists or even screenshots) and beautiful ink drawings. They just don't put this kind of care into the packaging of American games.
I also got Ka 2: Let's Go Hawaii, because the original was good simple fun and I figured the sequel would be at least that. Unfortunately, there's a new mechanic now that fucks everything up: in addition to simply sucking blood, you now have to play acupuncturist and alleviate various maladies from the Yamadas and their American friends. This is done by sucking blood from certain points on the body. The idea itself isn't so bad, but the execution is horrible. There's a slight translation barrier in figuring out exactly what's ailing them, as the only clue you have are the kanji symbols at the top of the screen (and sometimes their in-stage dialogue), but even if you know what their problem is, it's still no hint as to what magical points you're supposed to hit. It starts off simple enough: "oh, Rena's got a headache, I'll suck blood from her forehead." But later on you get all kind of weird stuff, like anemia and high blood pressure. There's a chart from the menu screen that lets you know the correct point to alleviate each malady, but even that doesn't help when the point you need to attack is hidden under clothing. When that's the case, the only thing you can do is to deliberatly get caught and enter battle mode, and of course, targeting and attacking a specific point on a giant, wildly flailing human figure is bullshit difficult. The collision detection is way off, so if you try to say, fly under their legs, you'll still get smacked as though you'd slammed right into them. The mosquito gets momentarily stunned everytime he gets hit, and because the people are moving faster than you, if you get hit once, it causes a chain reaction that often results in death. (The "recover" button used in the original is gone.) Even when you're not in battle mode, the poor collision detection makes targeting specific points more of a pain in the ass than it should be, especially when the character you're trying to attack fucking gets up and walks around the room. You can't land on the people while they're moving, so you basically just have to wait, and by the time you've got yourself repositioned, they're moving again. I spent two solid hours yesterday trying desperately to attack Kenichi's left shoulder blade to alleviate his fucking high blood pressure (whatever that's supposed to have to do with his shoulder blade in the first place), and I finally quit in frustration. (The previous stage had taken me an hour to clear for much the same reason.)
The original was a simple, solid action game with a unique premise. It never took itself seriously, and it was just simple, happy fun. This sequel has the same sense of humor and really relaxing BGM, but is nonetheless one of the single most frustrating, dysfunctional games I've ever played. The original had clunky mechanics, but it didn't really matter because you weren't ever forced to overcome them. I am quite sorely disappointed.
Moving on, I also picked up Panic Maker. I know this is coming out here, but goddammit, I don't want to play "Under the fucking Skin", I want to play Meiwaku Seijin Panic Maker. I'm just getting more and more anal as I get older. Anyway, I only played through on easy, but it took me about two hours to finish. It's got a real arcadey feel... it's simple and fun, but there's no depth to it at all. You basically just run around, initiate chaos wherever you can by pressing the circle button, collect the coins that the irritated people drop, and when your host body is out of devices of destruction, you find another host body and repeat the process until you've met the requirements for the stage. It's alot of fun in short spurts, but it's the kind of thing that gets old very quickly. It looks like there are a couple of 2-player games I've yet to try, and they might be neat, but I can't say how well a split-screen would work, as things get so chaotic it's a challenge to keep track of your character even on the full screen. I'll try the normal mode later, hopefully there'll be a little more to it.
And finally, of course, I grabbed Katamari Damacy, which was my primary motive in importing a system in the first place. I haven't started that one yet, but I'll post impressions later once I have.
Also, this doesn't have to do with my new treasure from the far east, but I started playing Star Ocean Till the End of Time. I applaud Enix for postponing the game in order to bring over the director's cut as opposed to the original version. I'm impressed that they did that. Anyway, it's still too early to pass judgment on the game, but one thing for sure: it's insanely detailed. I'm particularly impressed with the character models and animation. They're extremely expressive, and superbly animated. (Sophia gets points for having the perkiest breasts this side of Soul Calibur 2, but I'm afraid she'll put on something more modest than that tank top as the game progresses.) At the very start of the game, there's already a dictionary of terms that I spent an hour browsing through. There's elaborate explanations for various fabricated historical figures, theoretical physics, interplanetary politics... I think this may have officially topped Xenosaga in terms of exhaustive detail.
There's also extensive dialogue even for simple events. For instance, I examined the wastebasket in Sophia's room and Fayt goes on a tangent about the junk food she's eating and how she'll get fat. When I finally got to the combat tutorial, I played one round and had the option of continuing or quitting. I chose to continue, and Sophia whined that she was tired of playing. Then she died in the battle, and I didn't think I could've finished it on my own so I ran. Afterwards, the conversation flowed accordingly: Sophia whined that she was exhausted, but wondered why I ran because she thought I could've handled it. That wasn't just text, either, it was full spoken dialogue. I guess I'd had heard different conversations if we'd won the battle, or if we'd both died, or if I'd quit after the first round.
I didn't like Star Ocean 2 and of course I'm wary of anything from Square-Enix, but since this was created by Tri-Ace back when Enix and Square where still two separate entities, I guess I'll take a chance on it. (It was looking awesome throughout development.) It's ridiculously ambitious, and such big-budget endeavors usually turn out catastrophic, but let's see where this goes.
It's also worth mentioning that I didn't get to the first save point for two solid hours. Hopefully save points aren't that far between each other once the game gets rolling...
The first item on my agenda, of course, was the Japanese version of ICO. Because I will have my melon ending, oh yes. Sadly, the original version of the game has long since been out of print, so I was forced to get "The Best" edition with that hideous yellow stripe running across the top and side. Nonetheless, it was my only option and only $25, so, y'know, I'll take my melon and de Chirico cover art however I can get them. The main reason I'm bringing it up is because of the manual. Of course I don't read manuals, I usually only slip them out once then flip through them rapidly just to say that I held them. But the manual to ICO isn't really a manual, it's more like a storybook. The basic mechanics are explained with flowing text (no charts or lists or even screenshots) and beautiful ink drawings. They just don't put this kind of care into the packaging of American games.
I also got Ka 2: Let's Go Hawaii, because the original was good simple fun and I figured the sequel would be at least that. Unfortunately, there's a new mechanic now that fucks everything up: in addition to simply sucking blood, you now have to play acupuncturist and alleviate various maladies from the Yamadas and their American friends. This is done by sucking blood from certain points on the body. The idea itself isn't so bad, but the execution is horrible. There's a slight translation barrier in figuring out exactly what's ailing them, as the only clue you have are the kanji symbols at the top of the screen (and sometimes their in-stage dialogue), but even if you know what their problem is, it's still no hint as to what magical points you're supposed to hit. It starts off simple enough: "oh, Rena's got a headache, I'll suck blood from her forehead." But later on you get all kind of weird stuff, like anemia and high blood pressure. There's a chart from the menu screen that lets you know the correct point to alleviate each malady, but even that doesn't help when the point you need to attack is hidden under clothing. When that's the case, the only thing you can do is to deliberatly get caught and enter battle mode, and of course, targeting and attacking a specific point on a giant, wildly flailing human figure is bullshit difficult. The collision detection is way off, so if you try to say, fly under their legs, you'll still get smacked as though you'd slammed right into them. The mosquito gets momentarily stunned everytime he gets hit, and because the people are moving faster than you, if you get hit once, it causes a chain reaction that often results in death. (The "recover" button used in the original is gone.) Even when you're not in battle mode, the poor collision detection makes targeting specific points more of a pain in the ass than it should be, especially when the character you're trying to attack fucking gets up and walks around the room. You can't land on the people while they're moving, so you basically just have to wait, and by the time you've got yourself repositioned, they're moving again. I spent two solid hours yesterday trying desperately to attack Kenichi's left shoulder blade to alleviate his fucking high blood pressure (whatever that's supposed to have to do with his shoulder blade in the first place), and I finally quit in frustration. (The previous stage had taken me an hour to clear for much the same reason.)
The original was a simple, solid action game with a unique premise. It never took itself seriously, and it was just simple, happy fun. This sequel has the same sense of humor and really relaxing BGM, but is nonetheless one of the single most frustrating, dysfunctional games I've ever played. The original had clunky mechanics, but it didn't really matter because you weren't ever forced to overcome them. I am quite sorely disappointed.
Moving on, I also picked up Panic Maker. I know this is coming out here, but goddammit, I don't want to play "Under the fucking Skin", I want to play Meiwaku Seijin Panic Maker. I'm just getting more and more anal as I get older. Anyway, I only played through on easy, but it took me about two hours to finish. It's got a real arcadey feel... it's simple and fun, but there's no depth to it at all. You basically just run around, initiate chaos wherever you can by pressing the circle button, collect the coins that the irritated people drop, and when your host body is out of devices of destruction, you find another host body and repeat the process until you've met the requirements for the stage. It's alot of fun in short spurts, but it's the kind of thing that gets old very quickly. It looks like there are a couple of 2-player games I've yet to try, and they might be neat, but I can't say how well a split-screen would work, as things get so chaotic it's a challenge to keep track of your character even on the full screen. I'll try the normal mode later, hopefully there'll be a little more to it.
And finally, of course, I grabbed Katamari Damacy, which was my primary motive in importing a system in the first place. I haven't started that one yet, but I'll post impressions later once I have.
Also, this doesn't have to do with my new treasure from the far east, but I started playing Star Ocean Till the End of Time. I applaud Enix for postponing the game in order to bring over the director's cut as opposed to the original version. I'm impressed that they did that. Anyway, it's still too early to pass judgment on the game, but one thing for sure: it's insanely detailed. I'm particularly impressed with the character models and animation. They're extremely expressive, and superbly animated. (Sophia gets points for having the perkiest breasts this side of Soul Calibur 2, but I'm afraid she'll put on something more modest than that tank top as the game progresses.) At the very start of the game, there's already a dictionary of terms that I spent an hour browsing through. There's elaborate explanations for various fabricated historical figures, theoretical physics, interplanetary politics... I think this may have officially topped Xenosaga in terms of exhaustive detail.
There's also extensive dialogue even for simple events. For instance, I examined the wastebasket in Sophia's room and Fayt goes on a tangent about the junk food she's eating and how she'll get fat. When I finally got to the combat tutorial, I played one round and had the option of continuing or quitting. I chose to continue, and Sophia whined that she was tired of playing. Then she died in the battle, and I didn't think I could've finished it on my own so I ran. Afterwards, the conversation flowed accordingly: Sophia whined that she was exhausted, but wondered why I ran because she thought I could've handled it. That wasn't just text, either, it was full spoken dialogue. I guess I'd had heard different conversations if we'd won the battle, or if we'd both died, or if I'd quit after the first round.
I didn't like Star Ocean 2 and of course I'm wary of anything from Square-Enix, but since this was created by Tri-Ace back when Enix and Square where still two separate entities, I guess I'll take a chance on it. (It was looking awesome throughout development.) It's ridiculously ambitious, and such big-budget endeavors usually turn out catastrophic, but let's see where this goes.
It's also worth mentioning that I didn't get to the first save point for two solid hours. Hopefully save points aren't that far between each other once the game gets rolling...
