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Vandal Hearts Resurrected, Has Terrible Character Art

You’d never suspect that, once upon a time, strategy RPGs were a rare and beautiful beast. Twelve years ago, you wouldn’t open a magazine and think, “Ah, yes, I see. This month there are thirteen different Game Boy games coming out from Namco, Square, Inis, Nippon Icchi, and Atlus that will allow me to train tiny warriors to walk across a colorful grid to slaughter evil beasts. Oh, look, there’s six more on Sony’s Playstation and nine more on Sega’s Saturn. Can’t wait to see next month’s haul. I’ll be moving across those grids and having fun until the sun goes out, by gum!” It just didn’t work like that. There were only a few of them. There was Tactic’s Ogre, which was made by Yasumi Matsuno. Then there was Final Fantasy Tactics which was, um, made by Yasumi Matsuno. But then there was Vandal Hearts, a dead ringer for Matsuno’s SRPGs that was, in fact, not made by Matsuno.

Posted Apr 13 2009, 06:00 PM by John Constantine with | with no comments

Filed under: playstation 3, game boy, xbox 360, konami, sony, sega, psn, Saturn, Suikoden, final fantasy tactics, tactics ogre, yasumi matsuno, vandal hearts II, monster madness, john constantinel xbox live arcade, vandal hearts, vandal hearts flames of judgment

Box Art Worth Remembering: Dragon Warrior III (NES)

Gamers are a resourceful species. We play our games, and then sharpen our claws on the box art. This has been our way for decades. It's an old practise, rich with tradition. I mean...look at this stuff.

North American box art has only recently stopped trying to hide the flavour of its innards. Anime character designs, for instance, were used very sparingly until the latter half of the PSOne's life. Instead, A-list titles like Castlevania: Symphony of the Night and Suikoden received jewel case covers that would have been well-suited for a “Count With the Count!” Sesame Street soundtrack, and an instructional CD on 108 ways to draw a generic hero.

Regardless, I think some interesting design choices came out of that strange era. When box art illustrators put forth an effort, the end result was comparable in quality to the original Japanese work. One of my favourite examples is from a title that remains one of my all-time beloved: Dragon Warrior III for the NES.

In 1991, Dragon Ball Z was still millions of years away from American audiences, thus rendering Akira Toriyama more or less nameless on this side of the pond. For Dragon Warrior III Enix of America chose a box design that was absent of any title characters—an interesting choice, given Dragon Warrior III's emphasis on character classes and large parties.

Posted Mar 26 2009, 10:30 PM by Nadia Oxford with | with 1 comment(s)

Filed under: dragon quest, retro, dragon warrior, nadia oxford, Suikoden, dragon warrior III, box art worth remembering, castlevania symphony of the night

Suikoden Tierkreis: The 108 Stars of Destiny Go Portable and They’re Looking Good

Suikoden games are an odd lot. Role-playing games are long enough without having to track down and manage 108 different, predominantly optional characters. You have to do this in every single one of the little blighters! Of course, the effort’s rewarded with lovely music, lively anime art, and, in the franchise’s best entries, really excellent war stories. That’s what JRPG fans lust after, isn’t it? Sure it is. Suikoden Tierkreis is a nice change of pace for the series; now you can track down 108 characters on the bog. Beat that for convenience.

I sat down with a near complete English build of Tierkreis today and based on just that small chunk, I find myself looking forward to a new Suikoden for the first time since Suikoden III. For the non-Suikoden diehards out there, here’s the formula. In Suikoden, you play as a plucky youth embroiled in some sort of military conflict that usually starts small and gets gigantic. You inevitably become integral in amassing an army whose core is 108 colorful individuals marked by destiny and some sacred runes. You all live in a massive castle that expands as you gather these Stars of Destiny together. You fight turn-based battles and many of your characters can do snazzy attacks together based on their personalities. Tierkreis adds its own special blend of spices to this classic concoction.

Posted Feb 19 2009, 08:00 PM by John Constantine with | with 1 comment(s)

Filed under: john constantine, konami, Suikoden, Suikoden Tierkreis, final fantasy tactics advance, final fantasy tactics

PSOne on PSN: Somehow, it’s Suikoden

Just in time for me to tell you about it before our holiday break, Sony has updated the PlayStation Network Store with another PSOne game. I’m not telling you this because this marks the second week in a row we’ve gotten a new PSOne on PSN game, although that probably at least ties the service’s previous record streak. No, you have to know this because the game is Suikoden, the excellent 1996 RPG that set the stage for its even more excellent sequel. So that’s the best part. The second best part is it’s selling for the PSN standard $5.99. That sound you hear is hundreds of Ebay sellers having simultaneous aneurysms.

Between this and last week’s Castlevania Chronicles, it almost seems like Sony and Konami have figured out how to use this service properly. Both these titles are uncommon and in demand from franchise fans. Neither game has aged particularly badly, if you keep in mind that Chronicles was a port of a port and already felt pretty old school upon its original launch. And finally, they’re both from extent franchises that each could use a bit of a boost right now.

Posted Dec 23 2008, 07:47 PM by Joe Keiser with | with 2 comment(s)

Filed under: konami, playstation network, psone, song, Suikoden, joe keiser, castlevania chronicles, Suikoden ii

Beating the Dead Horse Who Has It Coming: Playstation Releases on PSN

Castlevania Chronicles, the peculiar Playstation remake of a peculiar X68000 remake of the original Castlevania, was released as a downloadable title on Playstation Network today. It ain’t the best Castlevania out there, but it’s still a swell action title. The disc release was never widely distributed either, so this will be the very first time most interested players will even get the chance to try it out. Of course, the same could be said of a lot of Playstation games. The halcyon days of 2003 when you could walk into any Blockbuster or Gamestop in the country and pick up five classic PS1 games, often times still shrinkwrapped, for ten or twenty bucks are long over, and the collector’s market is making many great games prohibitively expensive. Want to play Silent Hill? Hope you’ve got an extra sixty-five dollars lying around. How about Suikoden II, considered to be the series’ definitive installment? That’ll be $150. And what about cult classics like CyberConnect2’s Silent Bomber? Yeah, seventy smackers.

You shouldn’t have to pay top dollar for these games, though, considering they could very easily be released on the Playstation Network.

Posted Dec 18 2008, 06:45 PM by John Constantine with | with 1 comment(s)

Filed under: john constantine, playstation 3, psp, silent hill, konami, castlevania, Playstation, psn, scea, Suikoden, cyberconnect2, castlevania chronicles, silent bomber, Suikoden ii

Suikoden: Tierkreis is Coming, But Is It Everything Fans Hope For?

Konami had a pleasant surprise at their NYC fall preview today in an early build of Suikoden: Tierkreis, the recently announced seventh game in the twelve year-old RPG franchise, and first original handheld entry in the series. Tiekreis, weird name aside, looks like a solid 3D role-playing game on the DS, easily the technical equal (and possibly even superior) to Matrix Software’s Final Fantasy III and IV remakes. While the brief demo on display couldn’t show if Tierkreis lives up to Suikoden’s grand tradition of great storytelling, it did make me wonder if the handheld entry isn’t something of a missed opportunity.

Posted Sep 16 2008, 08:30 PM by John Constantine with | with 5 comment(s)

Filed under: john constantine, nintendo ds, final fantasy, konami, Suikoden, matrix

about the blogger

John Constantine, our superhero, was raised by birds and then attended Penn State University. He is currently working on a novel about a fictional city that exists only in his mind. John has an astonishingly extensive knowledge of Scientology. Ultimately he would like to learn how to effectively use his brain. He continues to keep Wu-Tang's secret to himself.

Derrick Sanskrit is a self-professed geek in a variety of fields including typography, graphic design, comic books, music and cartoons. As a professional hipster graphic designer, his recent clients have included Nerve, Pitchfork and MoCCA, among others.

Amber Ahlborn - artist, writer, gamer and DigiPen survivor, she maintains a day job as a graphic artist. By night Amber moonlights as a professional Metroid Fanatic and keeps a metal suit in the closet just in case. Has lived in the state of Washington and insists that it really doesn't rain as much as everyone says it does.

Nadia Oxford is a housekeeping robot who was refurbished into a warrior when the world's need for justice was great. Now that the galaxy is at peace (give or take a conflict here or there), she works as a freelance writer for various sites and magazines. Based in Toronto, Nadia prizes the certificate from the Ministry of Health declaring her tick and rabies-free.

Bob Mackey is a grad student, writer, and cyborg, who uses the powerful girl-repelling nanomachines mad science grafted onto his body to allocate time towards interests of the nerd persuasion. He believes that complaining about things on the Internet is akin to the fine art of wine tasting, but with more spitting into buckets.

Joe Keiser has a programming degree from Johns Hopkins University, a tiny apartment in Brooklyn, and a fake toy guitar built in the hollowed-out shell of a real guitar. He writes about games and technology for a variety of outlets. One day he will stop doing this. The day after that, police will find his body under a collapsed pile of (formerly neatly alphabetized) collector's edition tchotchkes.

Cole Stryker is an American freelance writer living in York, England, where he resides with his archeologist wife. He writes for a travel company by day and argues about pop culture on the internet by night. Find him writing regularly here and here.

Peter Smith is like the lead character of Irwin Shaw's The 80-Yard Run, except less athletic. He considers himself very lucky to have this job. But it's a little premature to take "jack-off of all trades" off his resume. Besides writing, travelling, and painting houses, Pete plays guitar in a rock trio called The Aye-Ayes. He calls them a 'power pop' band, but they generally sound more like Motorhead on a drinking binge.