61 Frames Per Second : konami

Vandal Hearts Resurrected, Has Terrible Character Art

John Constantine — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 22:00:00 GMT

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. It was one of Konami’s early Playstation/Saturn RPGs that, like its cousin Suikoden, could have easily been mistaken for a Super Nintendo game. It had its fans, but after one sequel it disappeared into videogame history. That’s why Konami’s announcement of a Xbox Live Arcade/Playstation Network prequel, Vandal Hearts: Flames of Judgment, is such a surprise. They showed off some of the game at their Gamer’s Night 2009 event and Vandal Hearts is looking pretty different ten years after its last installment. First, the game’s entirely polygonal now, with a much darker color palette than it had back in the day. Its character art also looks less like this:

And more like this:

Bleh.

Word is Vandal Hearts: Flames of Judgment is out on XBLA in August and PSN shortly thereafter. More snide commentary on the art style as we see it.

(Link: Siliconera)

Related links:

The 61FPS Review: Suikoden Tierkreis
PSOne on PSN: Somehow, it’s Suikoden
Beating the Dead Horse Who Has It Coming: Playstation Releases on PSN

The 61FPS Review: Suikoden Tierkreis

Joe Keiser — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 13:00:00 GMT

Let’s get something out of the way first, to avoid misunderstanding: I love Suikoden. I know that Suikoden II is the best game on the PlayStation, and that it is easily one of the two best games I’ve ever played. I left Suikoden III spinning in my PS2 for hours, and I’m not talking about playing it—I’m talking about letting the attract video repeat over and over just to listen to its score. I played Suikoden Tactics from beginning till end, and so help me, I didn’t hate it.

I’m telling you this because I want you to understand the depth of my meaning when I tell you Suikoden Tierkreis isn’t for me. Sure, it cribs from parts of older Suikodens, and those parts of Tierkreis endeared themselves to me. But I can’t believe that’s anything but a Pavlovian reaction to JRPGs loved and lost (or rather, JRPGs loved and left to gather dust in the closet).

Here’s what is there from older Suikodens: 108 Stars of Destiny to gather, a castle with an elevator, a streamlined and elegant battle system. The series’ legacy of excellent music is upheld impressively as well. It’s what’s not there is a lot more important, and takes a little bit more explanation.

One of the most important elements of the Suikoden franchise is its constant focus on local histories—“local” in that it depicts conflicts between nations, and “history” in that it depicts them in a believable way with little sense of which side is good and which is evil. Those of us who play JRPGs may think it is compelling to wrest dreams of world destruction from the grip of a mad god, but that is nothing compared to maneuvering political webs and enlisting the local citizenry to take a conflict that may or may not be just to its better end. At its best Suikoden provided the latter but it also added personal battles intensified and complicated by the war at hand. An engaging mix that easily trounced the fairy tales of JRPGs it competed against, you never saved the world in Suikoden. Suikoden, for all of its successes and failures, was above saving the world.

So in Suikoden Tierkreis, you save the world from a mad god and the nation of zealots who worship him. Your team of “starbearers” are clearly in the right the whole time, and most of your enemies, with dreams based in selfishness or fanaticism, are clearly in the wrong. The nameless hero, a village boy whose origins are mysterious, is far too simpleminded to engage in political intrigue so the game pays shallow lip service to the concept. His simple nature and devil-may-care attitude also means personal troubles elude him completely. There are glimmers of past brilliance in the story—a handful of villains have complex motivations, for example—but this is largely JRPG 101, complete with horrible voice acting.

The rest is not horrible, provided JRPG 101 is your thing. Suikoden’s battle system is still a thing of elegant beauty, and it’s sleeker than ever in Tierkreis. The technical presentation is wonderful, though many of the face textures are pretty questionable. The main characters are likable—Tierkreis deserves credit for presenting its dumb, good-natured hick of a protagonist as an actual dumb, good-natured hick, and the rest of the cast falls into place well around him. There’s a lot of things to see and fun to be had, two elements that have not been present in every Suikoden. It’s not the worst Suikoden by a good margin, assuming it’s a Suikoden at all.

And it’s not, not really. It’s Suikoden with the heart ripped out—all of that good storytelling and risky characterization replaced with comfortable genre tropes and easy mythmaking. It’s Suikoden as directed by a publisher that is seeing diminishing returns on Suikoden, and its intention to make the franchise more “mainstream” feels obvious and cynical. It’s Suikoden for JRPG fans, but not for Suikoden fans. It’s amazing to me that there’s a difference, but Suikoden Tierkreis proves there is. It’s a good RPG, and yet I can’t help but be disappointed by it.

Grade: C+

Previous Reviews:

The 61FPS Review: Eat Lead - The Return of Matt Hazard
The 61FPS Review: Dead Rising: Chop Til You Drop
The 61FPS Review: Resident Evil 5

Silent Hill, Killer 7 and Not Having Fun With Great Games

John Constantine — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 02:00:00 GMT

I am less than taken with Bit.Trip Beat. Subsequent playings have not improved my opinion of the game. As I’ve gotten further into it, the fundamental flaws in its design I spotted at the beginning have been born out later in the game. Some people love it. I don’t. They think it’s fun. I don’t. C’est la vie.

As I mentioned in my article about Bit.Trip, though, I don’t think that games need to be fun in order for them to be good. I was pretty vague in making my point though. 61FPS reader Kit wrote me an email last week to ask just what the hell I was talking about. How can a game be good if it isn’t fun to play? Isn’t fun implicit in the very act of playing?

When’s a game good but not much fun?

Some games aren't fun in a traditional, visceral sense but are still substantive, engaging, and well designed. The two best examples of this are Silent Hill and Suda 51's Killer 7. Silent Hill games, particularly 1 and 2, are frustrating as hell. It's hard to see where you're going and your character is difficult to control even by survival horror standards. Beyond your basic interaction though, the games fill you with dread; they are never pleasant to play. The story, world, and actual play (moving your character, fighting enemies) are designed to make you feel uncomfortable. It doesn't matter. Silent Hill 2 is a good game because it taps primal emotions, like fear, at the same time as deeper, social emotions like guilt in the player. (David Cage from Quantic Dream actually gave a talk on the difference between social and primitive emotion in games last summer, and I haven't been able to get it out of my head since. If you're curious, check it out.)

Suda's Killer 7 is a little different, less about emotion than it is about dispassionately confusing the player. It discomfits with a dense narrative that is confusing and full of emotionally distant characters, strange noises, and weird camera angles. It also intentionally limits your range of movement and your perspective; you have to explore to succeed, but the game is constantly forcing you down rigidly defined paths. You cannot freely move through the environment. You have to stay on set path. Killer 7 isn't fun. It is artful. It's about challenging its player's perception. (What does it mean, does it mean anything at all, etc.) It's rare for a game to ask its player to think beyond solving a puzzle.

Neither game is what I'd consider fun in the way that say Super Mario Bros. 3 is fun, but they are nonetheless great.

What do you say, reader? Am I nuts? Or does a game have to be fun in order to be good?

Thanks again, Kit!

Related links:

The New Graphics Whores: Bit.Trip Beat is Gorgeous, But Retro Style Does Not Equate Quality
Interview Round Up: Suda 51, Shinji Mikami, and Mikami’s Replacements on Resident Evil
Ceci N'Est Pas Une 1-Up: The Surrealist Future of Postpunk Gaming
10 Years Ago This Week: Silent Hill

Gradius ReBirth and The Joy of Sisyphean Gaming

John Constantine — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 15:00:00 GMT

Every few years, I get the itch. I’ll be reading a book or sitting in café, enjoying the air and taking in some company, when my conscious mind will simply shut off. My eyes glaze over, I drool a bit, and whoever I happen to be with at the time starts to worry. They wonder if they’ll regret not bringing a tranq gun by the end of the day. It’d probably be wise for me to start wearing a medical bracelet. It should read: “John Constantine. Irregular shmup addiction. Administer either space/terrestrial, horizontal/vertical shooter immediately. Contact Dr. Vic Viper at Up, Down, Left, Right, B, A, Select, Start.” At the very least, it would ensure that no one gets hurt.

While Derrick’s been having a renaissance with the genre and Joe’s all but abandoned it, my predilection for shoot ‘em ups has been constant over the past two decades. As I said, it isn’t regular. It just comes out of nowhere. It starts with having to track one down, preferably horizontal, with a killer soundtrack, and bright color. Then I go for weeks without playing anything except for stray, half hour sessions with them, games like Einhander, Life Force, or R-Type Final. Thing of it is, I’ve never gotten good at any of them. I wouldn’t say that I’m terrible. I can usually get through the first level of a shooter without dying or, in extreme cases, continuing on the first try. But I’ve never beaten one without cheating and I’m usually struggling to keep up just a few levels in. I love the ebb and flow of a great shmup, the movement from speed and escape to the sluggish crawl that almost always precedes some giant conflict against a screen filling boss. When I die, I smile, and start over. Bullet hell or Konami standard, I take immense satisfaction in pushing the rock uphill and letting it tumble back over me.

Which, when you get down to it, flies in the face of what we expect to be a satisfying experience, right? When we judge games, the most damning thing you can say about it is that it’s frustrating, the highest praise that it challenges us in a way that makes us want to persevere, to master it. If you aren’t good at it and you don’t get better, what’s the point?

Maybe it’s an issue of play vocabulary. If something is closed and linear, defined by a beginning, middle, and end, the way we play is defined by adhering to that linearity. That’s the game language we understand. For games like a shooter though, the pleasure comes from locomotion and reflex, moving a digital phantom limb about the screen and having it respond to your intent. Winning, beating it, getting to the end doesn’t need to be the point. This might be why we feel fighters and shmups feel like evolutionary dead ends design wise; they aren’t being designed to be fun even if you fail.

I’ve got the itch right now, and I know I’m going to have to clean out the Wii fridge one day very soon. Gradius ReBirth is a scratch worth scraping at. I won’t get past the third level, I know. But I’ll push against the stone, pick up a few options, and have a hell of a good time.

Related links:

Roundtable Discussion: Genre Design Evolution
Get Option. You Cannot Reach Option.
The Ten Greatest Opening Levels in Gaming History

Wii Brings Silent Hill to Climax

John Constantine — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 00:00:00 GMT

No, wait. Rewind. Switch that. Climax is going to bring Silent Hill to the Wii!

The rumor going ‘round the campfire is that those nutty Brits behind Silent Hill: Origins will be remaking the original Silent Hill for both Wii and PSP. 61FPS just spent this past Monday celebrating Silent Hill’s tenth birthday. What better way to celebrate the occasion than by taking a stroll down memory lane, waggling as you go?

As I mentioned in the Silent Hill retrospective, the game’s actual play has aged terribly. It’s also never been available for any system other than the original Playstation. A remake, in this rare instance, is an excellent idea. Climax’s Origins, while not exactly stunning in its originality, at least shows the team’s ability to properly capture Silent Hill’s atmosphere while making it more functional by modern standards.

Between Silent Hill and Klonoa, the Wii is starting to play host to some excellent remakes. I’d prefer that Konami, Namco, and every other publisher out there pour their resources into original content for Nintendo’s box, but I can’t complain too much. These are games that deserve an audience. If there’s anything that the Wii has, it’s an audience.

(Link: VG247)

Related links:

10 Years Ago This Week: Silent Hill
Silent Hill: Homecoming is, Thankfully, Both Silent and Hilly
Screen Test: Silent Hill Homecoming
Klonoa: Careful, Namco. You Tread On My Dreams.
Underrated: Klonoa Series

10 Years Ago This Week: Silent Hill

John Constantine — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 00:00:00 GMT

Silent Hill (released February 24th, 1999) did not mark a pivotal moment in the original Playstation’s lifecycle. Technologically speaking, Silent Hill was a solid effort, but nothing unusual for the time. Foregoing the pre-rendered backgrounds that were horror games’ stock-in-trade, Silent Hill’s full-3D environments weren’t as pristinely rendered as Konami’s own, year-old Metal Gear Solid. The CGI cutscenes, another requisite of the era, were competent but by no means up to the Squaresoft gold standard. Its control was wonky, its camera unwieldy, and the voice-acting was stiff even for a Playstation game. Of course, none of that matters. Silent Hill was a pivotal moment in game’s maturation as an affecting, expressive medium. Forget technology; its technical failings made it a stronger work. Forget genre; Silent Hill is not survival horror. It’s just horror.

The game’s premise and story are simple enough: widower Harry Mason travels to scenic Silent Hill with his adopted daughter Cheryl. On the drive there, during some of the game’s plastic-doll-CG, Harry almost hits someone standing in the road and crashes. When he comes to, he’s alone on the foggy streets of Silent Hill and the game has shifted to its playable state. Snow falls around Harry but doesn’t collect on the ground. From here, you, as Harry, follow what might be your daughter down a series of alleyways. As you go further down the alley, the camera shifts abruptly to successively stranger angles, mundane brick walls shift to rusting corrugated metal and rotting chain link fences, and silence gives way to buzzing dissonance. By the time you get to the end of the alley and find an eviscerated, inhuman body hanging from the wall, the gory imagery isn’t nearly as unsettling as the walk has been.

This opening sequence defines both Silent Hill as a series and its enduring legacy. The game that follows constantly shifts perspective in pushing you through the town’s locales, and there is no real safe haven. The game in Silent Hill is traditional exploration-puzzle-progress play made fresh by an unpredictable light-dark world dynamic. It’s not that one is good and one is bad; they’re both aggressive places. The duality is meant to unsettle and disorient both you and, in the hazy story, Harry. Every aspect of the design fuels that disorientation, too. Throughout Silent Hill, your field of vision is constantly obstructed, either by fog or darkness, a clever work around of the Playstation’s limitations, but essential to the game’s tone and goals. Akira Yamaoka’s sound design and its spectacular stereo mixing also aim to disturb. The game’s gurgling and grunting enemies are typically out of site until they’re right on top of you, and the only thing that signals their proximity is the static squall of the pocket radio you find early on. The awkwardness of the game’s acting, both the voice work, the script, and the animation of the characters, also serves the game’s atmosphere. While I’m not convinced it was intentional in the original Silent Hill, this sort of stilted drama has become a mainstay in the series, to great effect. It enhances the impressionistic tone, and lets the game’s unreality take root instead of constantly forcing linear plot on the player.

Horror games in 2009 are still made in the mold of the Playstation era: the dog-through-the-window scares of early Resident Evil, ominous-Gothic-setting of Tecmo’s Deception, and monster-escape of Sunsoft’s Clock Tower are still largely the types we see today. Sony’s Siren and Tecmo’s Fatal Frame series take atmospheric cues from Silent Hill, but are more tangible, less abrasively psychological games in subject matter. Even Team Silent took the franchise in a more digestible direction. After following up with Silent Hill 2 – a game that realizes every one of its predecessor’s ambitions – the team went on to make two more sequels that bear more tonal/structural resemblance to Resident Evil than their source material. The closest thing to a spiritual successor has been Punchline and Shuji Ishikawa’s Rule of Rose; Rule of Rose relies even more heavily on visual metaphor to convey its story than Silent Hill. (Unfortunately, it’s almost completely unplayable.)

Much as Silent Hill was informed by other games and media – the horrible “other world” and enemy designs recall Adrian Lyne’s Jacob’s Ladder and the metaphor-heavy psychosexual narrative shares many of David Lynch’s more recognizable tics – it has managed to stand on its own artistic merits ten years on. Sadly, it just isn’t very easy (or fun) to play any more. Its technological failings certainly helped it to be a creative triumph. But those failings don’t do it any favors as a game today. It doesn’t help that the game has never been re-released outside of its inclusion in the Japan-only Silent Hill Ultimate Box in 2006. With the Team Silent disassembled and the series now in capable, albeit not very creative, hands, it’s unlikely that Silent Hill will ever have the same impact it did a decade ago.

Previously on Ten Years Ago This Week:

Syphon Filter
Alpha Centauri

Related links:

Silent Hill: Homecoming is, Thankfully, Both Silent and Hilly
Screen Test: Silent Hill Homecoming
OST: Rule of Rose

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

John Constantine — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 01:00:00 GMT

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.

First up, your battle party’s now made up of four characters and not six, but characters that aren’t combat ready can be placed in support slots to provide back-up in the form of healing and other nice boosters. Combination attacks are also more open now, letting your lead pair up with most any other fighter. The biggest change, however, is in structure and progression. Tierkreis lifts Final Fantasy Tactics Advance’s overworld and quest structure wholesale. You choose quests and sidequests from a menu at your castle and are given a specific number of days to complete them. The world map is broken into units and travelling between each explorable wilderness or town location takes up one day. Just like in Tactics Advance, you can send other characters out independently to complete sidequests, and they’ll come back having earned experience and treasure. The structure’s well-suited to the portable format and, even though it’s an imitation of an established series, it’s a pleasantly fresh approach to Suikoden.

The game’s a looker too. Some folks might prefer the more realistically proportioned characters of classic Suikoden, but the super-deformed characters in Tierkreis are actually very charming. Plus, you get them full-sized and human-looking in dialogue scenes. It’s pretty common to hear an A-class DS role-playing games described as looking like a “really, really nice Playstation 1 game”, but I’d go as far as to say that Tierkreis looks better. It’s hand-drawn backgrounds and polygonal characters certainly best, in my opinion, Star Ocean Second Story’s. The voice acting ain’t too shabby either. Konami’s got an uphill battle to fight in a DS market glutted with JRPGs, but Suikoden Tierkreis’ quality should give it a fighting chance.

Related links:

Suikoden: Tierkreis is Coming, But Is It Everything Fans Hope For?
PSOne on PSN: Somehow, it’s Suikoden
Roundtable Discussion: The Relevance of Japanese RPGs

Whatcha Playing: Castlevania: Symphony of the Night (Again)

Nadia Oxford — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 04:06:00 GMT

I have a small stable of games I love returning to once in a while, and Castlevania: Symphony of the Night is among them. I own the original Playstation version (the actual original: it lacks the flu-snot green bar that labels it a best-selling re-release) and the emulation that was packed with the PSP's Dracula X Chronicles. I've finished both multiple times, but I decided that wasn't enough, so I downloaded the game once more on XBLA. Having lost my original Playstation at the bottom our sock drawer something like five years ago, it's nice to play Symphony of the Night on a large screen once more. It'd be nice if the Achievements weren't lame, but eh, if wishes were horses, and all that.

Symphony of the Night is still firmly in the top quality tier of the Castlevania hierarchy, but aging gamers draw in vital nutrients through message board fights about whether or not an esteemed game still deserves its lofty status. Over the past handful of years, Symphony of the Night has ignited similar arguments. Is the game as brilliant as we remember it? Was the Inverted Castle a stroke of game design genius or a cheap trick to extend gameplay?

Konami's premiere “Metroidvania” was one of the first titles I purchased on the Playstation: it helped usher me over the turbulent change from my teenage years to my adult years, which came with the inevitable realisation that you can't always do what you want to do, but there is no one who can stop you from enjoying the things that make the transition a little easier.

I'm undeniably biased towards Symphony of the Night, so I'm useless in a debate about its place amongst gaming history. At the same time, I don't think anyone can deny how lovingly put together it is. Every time I play Symphony of the Night, I discover some new thing: a mouse scurrying, doves nesting in the crevices of the Outer Wall, or (as I discovered very recently) the fact you can kill a toad by throwing Holy Water on its tongue, which pleases me greatly.

And even if you still insist on crossing your arms and saying “A-bloo-bloo-bloo awkward item screen,” you will surely recall how quickly the gorgeous piano melody in Orlox's Quarters made your annoyance melt away.

I think of Symphony of the Night as an integral soldier in the last stand for console-based 2D adventures. Sony of America was desperate to leave video gaming's “kiddy” image back with the colourful sprites on the Super Nintendo, and the 32-bit era of platformers—which birthed some of the finest in the genre—would have suffered for it if the likes of Konami and Capcom hadn't engaged in justifiable blackmail by threatening to hold big-name 3D titles if Sony wouldn't America have Castlevania and Mega Man. Interestingly, Symphony of the Night is a dignified and mature game regardless of its “primitive” presentation. Religious symbolism abounds, something Japan tends to be very hit-or-miss about. But it's all in context and it even aged well: heraldic imagery, spectral priests who listen to confessions, pious ghosts who cross themselves, and even a beautiful, sun-lit cathedral decorated with an ornate cross.

Incidentally, I still think Dracula has chutzpah for building a fully-loaded cathedral in the middle of his castle. He's all like, “Take that, God!”

I'm aware of Symphony of the Night's flaws, not the least of which is some kind of mapping joke that makes it prohibitively difficult to explore 200.6% of Dracula's abode. Certain gaps in the map will only be filled by doing a strange dance that involves shifting into a wolf, then shifting back after jumping. But who needs the reward at the end? Empty-headed Maria chases after Alucard. So what--

Oh crap, getting 200.6% is one of the Achievements on the Xbox 360 version of the game, isn't it? Bugger.

Related Links:

Suffering Castlevania Fatigue
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True Tales of Multiplayer: Fights, Tricks, and Fights!

Derrick Sanskrit — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 23:00:00 GMT

Lately I've found myself chilling with my homeboys Dan and Ryan, playing old video games that most of our friends don't remember or never heard of at all hours of day and night. It started when Dan found an old cartridge of the Jaleco's SNES beat-em-up The Peace Keepers. I was impressed by the ability to recolor any of the game's sprites however you wanted, but otherwise the game was an all-around stunningly frustrating experience.

Things picked up for the next round, however, when I popped in my favorite SNES "sports" game, DMA Designs' Uniracers. I've gushed about Uniracers before, how it paved the way for trick-based games like Tony Hawk Pro Skater and DMA's next big hit Grand Theft Auto. The bright colors and self-aware living unicycles scared and confused my friends at first, but once we hit the Bowl course, where players pull off the craziest tricks they can in a set period of time for a higher score, suddenly it was an intense competition. Hours were spent rolling back and forth in the bowl , flipping, rolling, twisting, z-flipping, pulling off tabletops and head bounces, scoring Tubulars and Gnarlys and the coveted I Hate Races. Heated battles ensued with eyes locked on the scores. Rounds regularly ended with last minute reversals thanks to 60-point mega-chains. There were upsets and supreme victories all around.

Time for a change of pace, Ryan popped his all-time favorite into the Playstation, a 1997 Konami brawler I'd never heard of called Poy Poy. A 3D four-player arena fighting game, Poy Poy plays and looks a lot like both Power Stone and Super Smash Bros, only it came out a good solid year-and-a-half before either of those more recognizable titles. Cartoon polygon people run around colorful and vibrant enviroments picking up rocks and logs and bombs, or even each other, and throw them. Get hit, get hurt. Last man standing gets the most points. Upgradable gloves gave each character powerful special moves. The game was simple enough for me to learn within only a couple of ass-beatings yet clearly compelling enough for Ryan to love unconditionally for eleven years so far. The one true downside to Poy Poy when compared to Power Stone and Super Smash Bros is that the Playstation was only designed with two controller ports, so four-player games required a multi-tap accessory.

Three forgotten games from over a decade ago, all completely addictive and fun with good company and messy tacos. I'm sure these game sessions will become a regular occurrance, with Uniracers and Poy Poy bound to see repeat performances along with plenty more semi-obscure games to come.

What are your favorite forgotten gems, readers? What do your late-night multiplayer sessions involve?

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A Silver Lining to The Dark Knight

Bob Mackey — Tue, 20 Jan 2009 02:00:00 GMT

While Batman may have grappled his way back into the hearts of movie-goers with 2005's Batman Begins and last year's The Dark Knight, he hasn't really had a notable video game in quite some time--and no, Lego Batman doesn't really count. At some point in time, a Dark Knight game was actually in the works, but after becoming a complete development disaster, what should have been a sure thing was taken behind the barn and shot in the back of the head. Like any Batman fan, I was a bit disappointed by the death of The Dark Knight; after all, I grew up in a time when good Batman games actually existed. Sure, there've been quite a few stinkers with the Batman name attached, but when developers like Sunsoft and Konami had the license, they made games worth playing--especially The Adventures of Batman and Robin for the SNES, which was a damn-near perfect interpretation of the mid-90s cartoon.

It seems that YouTube user elmacbee shares the same sentiment towards the Batman games of old; he's produced a pretty convincing mockup video of what could be an NES version of The Dark Knight if we somehow existed in a universe where technology is about two decades behind. I'd love to see this fictional game in action, but for now, the introductory video has me salivating for what could have been.

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Castlevania III: Dracula's Reign Ends, Sypha's Baby Factory Opens

Nadia Oxford — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 02:45:00 GMT

When I was a kid, I ate crayons while I was supposed to be tested for giftedness, I lost interest in achieving the honour roll when I found out it wasn't covered with sticky frosting, and I could never understand why grown-ups got so uppity if I was wearing my shirt backwards (still can't). But I finished Castlevania III all by myself, without cheating, and I'm still damn proud of that. It remains one of about two games both my husband and I played as kids, but only I've completed.

I've only finished the game with Grant as my aide, mind you. Even my childlike stupidity and gullibility had its limits. “Ha ha,” I said as I watched the credits scroll, “I am never doing this again!”

Ah, but it looks like I will with the help of the Virtual Console. Once I get my platforming legs back, I'd like to try and finish the game with Sypha. I've seen her ending already thanks to the modern magic of YouTube, but it still fascinates me. The second Dracula dies, the schmatte covering Sypha's head falls off on cue and Trevor's like, “Holy shit, Imma touch this bitch.” And he does.

Sypha's gender is pretty ambiguous up to that point. It's basically a Samus-style unveiling, but Samus was alone in the depths of space. The only person who was present when she said, “Um, excuse me, I have a vagina,” was the player.

So what's the deal between Sypha and Trevor? Did he know from the start that Sypha was a female, but he said “Shhh, let's not tell the player until they've finished the game and gone half-mad through the attempt?”

Or did Sypha wait until that moment to show Trevor what was under her robes, and Trevor just said, “Oh, well, you're a girl.” (*belt hitch*) “I guess we'll be makin' some babies, then?”

Only they know, bless their little pixel-sized hearts.

Related Links:

Suffering Castlevania Fatigue
Watcha Playing: Castlevania Portrait of Ruin
Castlevania: Curse of the Stupid Red-Headed Kid

New Year’s Resolutions For a Few Of Our Favorite Publishers

John Constantine — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 00:30:00 GMT

Now, to close out the first full week of 2009, we will do for videogame publishers what we did for console makers: we will tell them how to live their sordid, godforsaken lives! You’d think developers would make the list, but no. No, I tend to trust them, so they will be left to their own devices, free from the crushing logic of advice from 61 Frames Per Second.

In 2009, the following folks should resolve to do the following things:

EA – Stick to your guns and keep investing in new IP. 2008 was good stuff, Riccitello. Keep promoting Mirror’s Edge and Dead Space, they will find their audience. And EA Sports? How about SSX4 already.

Capcom – Resolve to support Dark Void with an aggressive marketing campaign and release it during the summer. Do not let this one die during the holiday rush. Also, Street Fighter III HD Remix. You know it would be sweet.

Atari – Do not release Ghosbusters until it is perfect.

Namco – Push Klonoa like you have never pushed a game in your entire lives. Tell people it will make them lose weight, tell them it will make them smarter. And knock it off with the nickel-and-dime DLC already, what is this, 2006?

Square-Enix – S-E, I want you to go out tomorrow, hop on a train, and pay Jupiter Games a visit. You cut them a check, and you tell them to make whatever they can imagine. The people who made The World Ends With You should be allowed to make whatever they like.

Konami – Release a press statement claiming you were forced to make Rock Revolution at gun point.

Midway – Um. Hang in there?

Activision – Give Neversoft the vacation they so desperately need and deserve.

Atlus – More PS1 reprints!

Take-Two – If Bioshock 2 looks stupid, don’t be afraid to cancel it.

Ubisoft – Release Beyond Good & Evil 2 by the end of the year. Please. PLEASE!

XSEED – Keep on keepin’ on, you guys. Can’t believe you actually localized Retro Game Master. Just awesome.

Tecmo-Koei – No Dynasty Warriors: Dead or Alive games. Just don’t. I know you're thinking about it.

SEGA – Disband Sonic Team. It’s over. Enough.

And that about covers it. Happy New Year, everyone.

Related links:

Microsoft’s New Year’s Resolution
Nintendo’s New Year’s Resolution
Sony’s New Year’s Resolution
Virtual Console New Year's Resolutions

The 61FPS Review: Karaoke Revolution Presents American Idol Encore 2

Derrick Sanskrit — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 16:00:00 GMT

Given to me 'fore the holiday break,
A white microphone and a challenge to take:
American Idol Encore 2 for Wii,
to play and review whilst home with family.
Karaoke with pop songs of past and of present:
The Bee Gees, Depeche Mode, Beyoncé, John Lennon,
Rod Stewart, the Spice Girls, Bon Jovi, the Fray,
The White Stripes, Survivor, R.E.M., and Coldplay.
To sing the melody, or hum, coo, or howl,
You'd be praised by Paula, chided by Simon Cowell.
To call it a fun party game is no wrong,
But after an hour you've run out of songs.
Aye, a track list of forty with no DLC
Made me want to go out for real karaoke.

Okay, writing in verse is fun and all, but I need to state a couple of things here in plain English. I was genuinely looking forward to playing this game after it was handed to me because the tracklist actually had a surprising amount of songs I'd enjoy singing, songs like "Rocket Man," "Pinball Wizard," "Enjoy the Silence," and "Since U Been Gone" (shut up, that song flippin' rocks).

The gameplay is just like every other karaoke video game, so there's no surprises there, the selling feature here being the American Idol brand and in that regard I must say the voiceovers by judges Randy Jackson, Paula Abdul and Simon Cowell are all impressive and fun, if unwaveringly vague (they can't, after all, really see or hear you). The main problem here being that playing a karaoke video game is entirely unlike being on American Idol. In the game, you can forget the words (which are, of course, on screen) and just hum the melody and score perfectly, a behavior that would get you kicked out of the show. Straying at all from the original vocal track will result in instant penalty, whereas doing so on the show would qualify for commendation as "putting your own unique spin on the song."

We knew what we were getting into playing the game, though, and none of that really bothered us at first. What ruined the entire experience for me came along when playing through the game's "story" mode (essentially singing your way through a full season's worth of performances). After warming up on songs that barely qualify as singing like The Killers' "Mr. Brightside" and Franz Ferdinand's "Take Me Out" I decided to class things up with Hall & Oates's "Maneater" and, during the bridge, the audio skipped ahead approximately seven seconds. The game, however, did not skip ahead, and so the lyrics and bar I was supposed to be singing along to were well over a full line of lyrics behind the audio, an exercise in cacophony. I had to cover my ear and sing based solely on the text on screen and the memories of the song in my head, ignoring the music which was essentially wrong. This glitch is what we call a "game-killer."

Between that unforgivable error, a decidedly stunted tracklist (I even looked on my PS3 to see what downloadable songs have been made available... nothing I want so far) and an overall boring presentation with none of the glamour and excitement of the show it is based on, I can not rightly recommend this game over any other karaoke title. If you own a Playstation 2 or 3, go play Singstar. On XBox 360 I've heard good things about Lips. If you only have a Wii and are desperate for a karaoke game the whole family can enjoy in short bursts, sure, get this. It's certainly a better option than High School Musical: Sing It! Here's hoping Hudson releases their Joysound karaoke game on WiiWare outside of Japan.

And so like a singer with congested sinus,
American Idol I grade a D-minus.

Previous Reviews:
Prince of Persia
LittleBigPlanet part 1, part 2
Dead Space
LOL
Dragon Quest IV
Ninja Gaidan 2 part 1 & part 2
Metal Gear Solid 4 part 1 & part 2
Wii Fit
Grand Theft Auto IV part 1, part 2 & part 3

PSOne on PSN: Somehow, it’s Suikoden

Joe Keiser — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 00:47:00 GMT

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.

Dare we dream that this is the beginning of an actual, viable, classic PSOne service? Could our world be one where anyone with a few dollars and a song in their heart could play Silent Bomber? That would truly be a holiday miracle. In any case, you should buy this right now: not only will it accompany you well on your travels via PSP, Konami could get the message and follow up with my favorite PSOne game, Suikoden II. Seeing that $150 masterwork on sale for six Washingtons would bring incalculable joy to all. Well, to all besides those Ebay sellers. They'll probably be pretty pissed off.

Related Links:

Beating the Dead Horse Who Has It Coming: Playstation Releases on PSN
Sony Gives Thanks Via Charming PSN Deals
Sony Might Just Hate You

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

John Constantine — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 23:45:00 GMT

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. Over the course of the past two years, SCEA, along with a handful of other US publishers, have put up a measly twenty-six Playstation games on PSN, while Sony Japan have released close to a hundred. This isn’t the first time I’ve brought up this inexplicable disparity here at 61 Frames Per Second, but seriously, Sony. What the hell is going on here?! If the current market has proven anything, it’s that you can put almost anything up for download on a console and someone will buy it. There is no other explanation for Boogerman’s presence on Nintendo’s Virtual Console. The expense of having a game re-rated by the ESRB can’t be that high if Boogerman is getting re-released.

Sony, if you want to convince people to buy a Playstation 3 or PSP, then nostalgia-bomb them. Tell them they can relive all their fondest memories of 1997 for a mere five dollars on the Playstation Network and I promise you, people will literally throw money at you. And no, I don’t mean you should put up more Jet Moto games.

Related links:

Sony Gives Thanks Via Charming PSN Deals
Far Out, Man
I’ll Tell You When I’ve Had Enough!
Sony Might Just Hate You
Boogerman: Too Immature for Children

Yahtzee's Homecoming

Bob Mackey — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 01:30:00 GMT

I love the Silent Hill series, but I've never really been able to play any of the games; the music, characters, mythology, and storylines are all fantastic, but the actual playing process scares the crap out of me. Well, maybe "scare" isn't the right word. My last attempt to work through a Silent Hill game happened in 2002, when I tried as hard as I could to overcome my wimpyness--only to find Silent Hill 2's unique atmosphere of loneliness and dread leaving me feeling physically ill and mentally dirty. But my near-nervous breakdown is a credit to how effective Silent Hill 2 is; and this title's spectacular atmosphere is also one of the reasons why SH2 is a favorite of gaming curmudgeon Yahtzee (of Zero Punctuation fame).

But since development house Team Silent has been disbanded (or since they broke up, it's never really been clear), the future of the Silent Hill series has been hijacked, first for the PSP's Silent Hill: Origins, and now with the new PS3 release, Silent Hill: Homecoming. While the latest Silent Hill doesn't have the hubris to slap a "5" onto the title, the aforementioned Yahtzee finds quite a few problems with Homecoming's lack of authenticity:

Will there ever be another Silent Hill game as good as the second one? It seems unlikely, but I'd certainly be happy if it happened. Of course, I'd be appreciating it from afar.

Related Links:

Silent Hill: Homecoming is, Thankfully, Both Silent and Hilly
Games to Movies: Why Is It So Gad-Danged Hard?
Screen Test: Silent Hill Homecoming

It's Official (And Officially Sad): Castlevania Judgement Is Ghoulis

Nadia Oxford — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 20:36:00 GMT

I guess some tiny corner of my heart was holding on to the hope that Castlevania Judgment might be worth playing--or, at the very least, not in need of a holy water/acid bath. Alas...

"So what, exactly, doesn’t work? Like I said, everything. It’s like a daisy-chain of failures. Let’s kick things off with the arena. The arena doesn’t work. It’s too large. So instead of fighting for 90 seconds, you end up chasing each other around for 90 seconds. Which is bad enough, but then, the camera doesn’t work. Because it’s fixed, one player will often end up running at the camera, losing all sight of where it is they’re going."

You know what, this might work out after all. I've always had this fantasy about staging a Castlevania-style Benny Hill chase. See, Maria will run around the arena and Richter will chase her. Simon will chase them both and Death will chase after them all--

Then the camera will drift off and I'll promptly forget what I'm supposed to be laughing at.

Really, this news heartily sucks. I know nobody expected grand things from Castlevania Judgment; from the very start we treated it like the fat kid in gym class; maybe it wasn't our first choice this holiday season, but deep in our souls we hoped it would surprise us with some hidden potential.

A Castlevania fighting game does have the potential to be fun. One of Castlevania Judgment's primary strengths is its enormous roster of Belmonts and Belmont offshoots, each one raring to prove themselves more worthy of their leather, lace and whips than the previous generation. Sadly, a game can have a cast of millions for all the good it will do if it's simply not fun to play. There's also the small issue of Castlevania Judgment's character designs being appalling. Nothing against Death Note or Takeshi Obata's art; I enjoy both. It's just that I want to play as Simon Belmont and not Simon Belmont dressed up as a Light cosplayer. Seriously, just look at Simon--is that Simon?--on that cover art. "Do you know that Shinigami love wall meat, L?"

I won't even address what Kotaku says about Castlevania Judgment's gameplay because it's a no-brainer. Executing special moves solely by waving the Wii remote like some posessed voodoo priest? Bravo, Konami. Definitely good incentive to spend hours with the game, honing my skills.

Well, it's not like we don't have other upcoming Castlevania delights to make up for this...misstep.

Related Links:

Watcha Playing: Castlevania Portrait of Ruin
When Good Developers Go Bad: Koji Igarashi
Castlevania Fighting Game Elicits Anguished Moans From the Living

Castlevania Symphony of the Night 2: What is a Screenshot? A Miserable Little Pile of Secrets!

John Constantine — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 17:00:00 GMT

Can you dig it, everyone? Tokyo Game Show is off to a running start and while it appears that some games that everyone expected to appear, like Team Ico’s Playstation 3 debut, are nowhere to be found, plenty of other exciting games are rearing their glorious digital heads. Who in their right minds expected No More Heroes 2 to be announced? That is a beautiful, beautiful thing. Of course, Tokyo Game Show isn’t without a little mystery here in 2008. For example, take this screenshot Koji Igarashi showed off during a chat about Castlevania:

Why, that appears to be Alucard, star of the ubiquitous Symphony of the Night and apple of ten billion goth girls’ eyes. A discerning fellow might also intuit that Alucard is holding a gigantic glowing sword in front of a certain titular castle and a giant moon. Now, I don’t read Japanese, and no intrepid fan has translated the +D article this picture originates from, but folks over at the Castlevania Dungeon, run by the inestimable Kurt Kalata, are saying that this is from an Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 title about, "the bloodline that has been surrounded by darkness and curse, betrayed his own kind and destroyed his own father, the cursed destiny."

We do not trade in rumor and speculation here at 61 Frames Per Second. Well, not often. But here’s a huge dose of rumor and speculation for you anyway: this appears to be a full on sequel to Castlevania: Symphony of the Night.

Can you hear that? That’s the sound of one million geek hearts exploding simultaneously.

Thanks to both NeoGAF user Guymelef and The Castlevania Dungeon for alerting us to the madness.

Related links:

Castlevania Judgment(s): Iga Continues to Show a Keen Understanding of His Franchise on DS, But His First Wii Title Misses the Point
Watcha Playing: Castlevania - Portrait of Ruin
When Good Developers Go Bad: Koji Igarashi
Castlevania: Curse of the Stupid Red-Headed Kid
Castlevania Fighting Game Elicits Anguished Moans From the Living

Question of the Day: How Do You Make a Horror Game Horrifying?

John Constantine — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 22:00:00 GMT

Don’t be afraid. There are no ghouls here. Just nerds.

‘Tis the season for delighting in frights, is it not? That time of year when Halloween is just around the corner, the days get darker, and the things that go bump in the night start getting goosebumps, because, hey, it’s cold out there. As I mentioned last week, it’s also the beginning of game season. Horror, as a genre, doesn’t have quite the presence it did in gaming a few years back, but autumn 2008’s seeing a number of high-profile scary games hitting consoles across the land. Silent Hill’s back after a four year absence, EA is releasing their brand new IP Dead Space in just over a week, and Atari is re-launching their ill-fated Alone in the Dark on PS3. Horror games are an absolute favorite of mine. There’s a visceral thrill they provide that is distinct to the medium, mixing the tension-and-release dynamic essential to horror in any medium with the deep satisfaction of accomplishment that comes from successfully playing a game. The best of them are unique amongst videogames for being almost exhausting to play. The original Silent Hill excelled at this; it made me physically uncomfortable after a certain length of time, further enhancing the reprieve of safety in the game world. This is an essential ingredient in making a horror game truly scary. If it doesn’t make you uncomfortable, if it doesn’t put you, the player, in the shoes of that character compelled to discover what’s making those noises in the dark, it fails. But that’s just my opinion. What is essential to making horror games scary to you, reader? Is it making the game difficult to play on a mechanical level, making it unfair, as Jenn Frank from Infinite Lives hypothesizes? Is it making dogs jump through windows when you totally don’t expect it? Let me know in the comments.

(Note: The image above is from the glorious mess of a horror game called Rule of Rose. It is one of the best games I have ever played. It also happens to be one of the worst.)

Related links:

Gears of LittleBig Fable Music: Considering the First-Party Blitz
OST: Rule of Rose
Overworld: Friday the 13th
Screen Test: Alone in the Dark
Silent Hill: Homecoming is, Thankfully, Both Silent and Hilly

Alternate Soundtrack: Castlevania III vs Bush

Derrick Sanskrit — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 15:30:00 GMT

So there's this election around the corner, right? All about choosing a new President for the United States or whatever, and I keep hearing people complain about how after this election they won't be able to rant about how much they hate Bush anymore. Personally I don't understand where they're coming from. I, for one, love Bush. Those guys rocked so hard throughout the 1990's and early 00's and anyone who hates on them just can't be my friend anymore.

I've always been particularly smitten with their 1996 sophomore record Razorblade Suitcase, an emotionally dense powerhouse of crunched guitars, squealing feedback and ominous negative space. This album cries out for monsters, as demonstrated in the music videos for singles "Greedy Fly" and "Mouth", and monsters it shall receive in the form of Konami's 1990 classic Castlevania III: Dracula's Curse for the Nintendo Entertainment System.

There's a lot to love about Castlevania III, but I feel I couldn't possibly add to what's been said before aside from I love it to pieces. Instead, I will add that this marks the first Alternate Soundtrack video to be available in iPod video format. If you have a free Vimeo account, feel free to download your portable copy of today's video right here and let me know if this is something I should keep doing / find a less exclusive download source.

More Castlevania Love:
What's in my MP3 Player: Castlevania II "Castle of Tears"
Five Games That Will Be Awesome to Remake in LittleBigPlanet
Castlevania Judgment(s): Iga Continues to Show a Keen Understanding of His Franchise on DS, But His First Wii Title Misses the Point
Castlevania: Curse of the Stupid Red-Headed Kid
What Is a Man? More Than a 4Chan Meme

Previous Alternate Soundtracks:
Ai Cho Aniki vs. Xiu Xiu
Battletoads vs. The Blood Brothers
Super Star Soldier vs. MSTRKRFT
Orbital vs. The Notwist
StarTropics vs. Islands

Silent Hill: Homecoming is, Thankfully, Both Silent and Hilly

John Constantine — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 22:30:00 GMT

Horror, in any medium, relies heavily on the unknown to be effective. For any fans of Silent Hill out there, I recommend not reading the following impressions. They aren’t spoiler heavy, but knowing anything about the game prior to experiencing it first hand may dilute it. You should, however, know that if you’re one of those fans, you should play Homecoming on day one, and don’t be embarrassed if you have to turn on the lights when you do.

It speaks volumes of Double Helix Games’ new Silent Hill for Xbox 360 and PS3 that, provided you have a pair of slick headphones, the game can manage to be terrifying, ominous, and discomfiting even when played in a room bustling with journalists, PR agents, and noisy Dance Dance Revolution kiosks. Silent Hill: Homecoming does what Silent Hill should, in principal, do: it makes you profoundly uncomfortable. Not just scared, but itchy and nervous. If you can’t tell, my playthrough of the game’s first half-hour not only left me impressed, but helped to allay my fears that a full-bore Silent Hill game not crafted by Team Silent’s careful eye would not live up to the series’ past accomplishments.

Of course, Homecoming does start off on the wrong foot. The game’s opening moments, an unplayable sequence that finds protagonist Alex Shepherd bound and wheeled through a nightmarish hospital pulled right out of Jacob’s Ladder, feel overly traditional. Frantic as Alex sounds and creepy as the mute, blood-spattered doctor is, the imagery and scenario are par for the Silent Hill course. Actually playing through the hospital after Alex’s inevitable escape is just as familiar; when the faceless demon nurses show up, it feels like running into an old friend rather than intimidating. The cryptic dialogue with a mysterious child, the eviscerated bodies scattered around the environment, the bloody, organic walls all make Homecoming initially feel like blank homage to its predecessors, albeit a very good looking and controlling homage. It isn’t until the hospital is left behind and Alex makes his way home to Shepherd’s Glen, where the game begins in earnest, that Double Helix shows their understanding of Silent Hill’s legacy.

I’m not going to go into detail in describing Alex Shepherd’s homecoming. I will say that this sequence, of Alex being forced to explore his childhood home – his actual home, mind you, not a warped, cast-iron, evil version – gets to the very root of what makes the Silent Hill franchise tick. Each of the original four Silent Hills take utterly mundane, familiar locales (a mall, elementary school, hotel, a city apartment) and make them alien and wrong while maintaining their familiarity. It’s always done to emphasize and reflect each protagonist’s plight, from Harry Mason’s desperation to save his adopted child to James Sunderland’s crushing guilt and masochistic need for punishment. I don’t know Alex Shepherd’s story, but this first real environment in Silent Hill: Homecoming betrays his sad background and implies that somewhere between his youth and what you play, something went terribly wrong for him.

There’s a lot more to say about Silent Hill: Homecoming, particularly regarding its revamped control scheme and newfound emphasis on combat, but those are topics best saved for our review. As of now, I’d say that the pinnacle of interactive horror is set to comeback in a big, big way.

Related links:

Screen Test: Silent Hill Homecoming
The Ten Greatest Fire Levels in Gaming History, Part 3
Top Ten Most Terrifying Enemies and Then Five More

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

John Constantine — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 00:30:00 GMT

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.

It’s well known that sprite-based 2D games have a better chance of success on handhelds, particularly Nintendo’s dual-screened juggernaut. Suikoden hasn’t sported sprite characters since its first sequel, and while its successors’ 3D character models and environments have been nothing to sneeze at, they were never as memorable as those found in the first two games. As you can see from these screens, Suikoden: Tierkreis is a looker, and the play looks just as good even though parties are limited to four characters and not the traditional six. But I can’t help but wonder if the game wouldn’t have been better served by returning to the series’ graphical roots.

What do you think, dear reader? I know you, 61 FPSers are JRPG hounds! Let me know in the comments section.

Related links:

Are You Buying Final Fantasy IV DS? Huh? Huh? Huh??
Gaming on a Train: Final Fantasy IV
Final Fantasy IV DS: Love, Hope and Betrayal For the Busy Commuter

Castlevania Judgment(s): Iga Continues to Show a Keen Understanding of His Franchise on DS, But His First Wii Title Misses the Point

John Constantine — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 00:00:00 GMT

I tried to keep an open mind when Castlevania Judgment was announced back at the beginning of July. Yeah, it seemed that making a Castlevania themed fighting game – oh, forgive me, Mister Igarashi. A 3D versus action game. Right. – was about as good an idea as a Sonic the Hedgehog fighting game, but it might be good! Stranger things have, after all, happened, and Castlevania has twenty years worth of memorable characters, weapons, and environments to pull from. The open arena play, borrowing heavily from Capcom’s fondly remembered Power Stone brawlers on Dreamcast, also seemed like the ideal foundation for the franchise’s transition into the world of fighters. Maybe it would be good fun. Maybe, just maybe, it wouldn’t be as bad as Soul Calibur Legends.

Well, it’s better than Soul Calibur Legends, but, after going a few rounds with at Konami’s fall preview event in New York today, I wouldn’t call Castlevania Judgment a must play Wii game. I also wouldn’t call it a good game. The problem comes down to the fact that, even though the game is due out in the next couple of months, it feels woefully unfinished and empty. The arenas recall classic Castlevania (the crumbling cemetery and Dracula’s gold and red throne room as seen in Symphony of the Night and Rondo of Blood) but they’re nothing but gussied up, barren cubes for the fighters to run about. A stray zombie rises out of the ground in the cemetery, but they’re more of a random nuisance than something to build strategy around. The actual fighting is just as problematic since Judgment uses the Twilight Princess model for basic attacks: shake the controller, and your character attacks. To say that it feels imprecise would be an understatement and the problem is compounded by a camera that completely obscures the action at worst, and confuses you while playing at best. The demo on show had three selectable characters, a barely recognizable Alucard and Maria Renard alongside a pretty swell Simon Belmont, but they were only distinguishable in appearance, their move sets all but identical. The fact that Igarashi’s first Wii title feels more like a throwaway unlockable mode from one of the more recent 3D Castlevania adventures is besides the point, though. Even if all of its disparate parts worked perfectly and in concert, the game would still be flawed on a fundamental level. There is a reason that the franchise is named after its setting and not its characters; at its heart, Castelvania is a series about a world and not characters. Which is why, unsurprisingly, the latest DS Castlevania, Order of Ecclesia, is faring much better than its console sibling.

Anyone who’s played any of Igarashi’s last seven 2D Castlevanias (excepting the excellent PSP remake of Rondo of Blood) will feel right at home with Order of Ecclesia. The tight control and smoothly animated sprites are as comfortable and smooth as a pair of worn-in boots. Ecclesia’s glyph system, the new play style replacing Dawn of Sorrow’s enemy-soul-collecting and Portrait of Ruin's dual characters, shows significant promise thanks to its emphasis on combat (that you can equip a weapon in both right and left hands is made useful for the first time in series history.) Even more impressive is the new environment. The introductory areas of the game show the same incremental visual evolution the series has enjoyed for a decade, but they feel particularly fresh thanks to a more open world and variety of locales. Ecclesia takes a step beyond Portrait of Ruin, taking the game entirely out of the castle and providing a world map. The first area of the game, a monster-filled monastery, has one of the most beautiful areas I’ve seen in a Castlevania since Symphony of the Night: a tangled forest at twilight, with interlocking bare tree branches obscuring your character, Shinoa, from view as she approaches the monastery entrance. It’s wonderful.

This gets to the heart of what does, and what doesn’t, work in Castlevania. The series has yet to be successful in three-dimensions because no three-dimensional Castlevania has been designed to have a compelling world first and good action second. When Iga finally builds his 3D castle, he’ll finally solve the 3D Castlevania mystery that’s plagued the series since the N64.

Related links:

When Good Developers Go Bad: Koji Igarashi
Castlevania: Curse of the Stupid Red-Headed Kid
Castlevania Fighting Game Elicits Anguished Moans of the Living
New Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia Pics

Trailer Review: Golden Axe

John Constantine — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 21:00:00 GMT

In the grand pantheon of beat-em-ups, brawlers, hack-and-slashers, kiss-your-mother-with-that-mouth-ya-jerk, dick-punching games, Golden Axe is a middleweight. Hell, it started as a welterweight in 1989. The fantasy setting, magic powers, and ride-able dragons and chicken-salamanders were novel, certainly, but how could it compete with Final Fight, a game that let you be a pro-wrestling mayor who compulsively took off his clothing? How could its triumphant trio of sword-guy-in-underpants, little person, and Red Sonja-cosplayer compete with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles? Golden Axe was plain outclassed for its first couple of games. That is, until arcade-only sequel Death Adder’s Revenge came out, a game so gorgeous, strange, and playable that it stands as the best beat ‘em up ever made outside of Capcom and Konami (yeah, that’s right. It’s better than Streets of Rage. All of them.) Right when the series started showing its mettle, it all but disappeared. Death Adder’s Revenge’s legacy lived on in a cruddy Genesis sequel, a Saturn fighting game, and a bizarro PS2 remake of the series debut. Until now! Yes, the new Golden Axe that Sega first showed way back at E3 2006 is finally coming out and, as you can see from this trailer, it’s got a case of the browns. Golden Axe: Beast Rider looks competent for a modern beat ‘em up; not quite a God of War or Devil May Cry, but at least on par with Conan or Heavenly Sword (though more brazenly cheesecake than either.) Returning Red Sonja-cosplayer-protagonist Tyris Flare actually appears to be wearing more clothing than she used to, but not much, and her vocabulary has been greatly expanded. The biggest problem here? No multiplayer. Golden Axe’s best selling point, stripped right out.

I’m actually kind of excited about this game. It looks like readymade Up All Night fare.

Related links:

A Perfectly Cromulent Beat-Em-Up

Previous Trailer Reviews:

House of the Dead: Overkill
Riz-Zoawd
Idolm@ster PSP
The Last Guy
Tecmo Bowl: Kickoff
Captain Rainbow
The Past and Future With Mega Man 9 and Chrono Trigger DS
Densetsu no Stafi 5
Sonic Unleashed
Infinite Undiscovery
Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood
Street Fighter 4
The Conduit
Mirror’s Edge

Everyone Will be Able to Rock

John Constantine — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 19:00:00 GMT

At the end of June, my concerns for the future of videogames' burgeoning rock star genre were growing by the hour. Activision was waving their new drum kit in EA’s face while Konami tried to get people to like their music games outside of Japan. The big problem? None of those companies appeared to give a damn that they were flooding a market and audience already drowning under a torrent of plastic instruments. Not to mention that none of those instruments were guaranteed to be compatible with games that didn’t come packaged with alongside them. Yeah, Guitar Hero 3 and its electronic axe might be one of the ten best selling games in the history of games but that doesn’t mean the genre bubble can’t burst. Today, another faceless company has helped to allay my fears.

And, would you believe it, it’s Sony doing the allaying.

The once haughty Japanese giant stated on their Playstation blog that they have reached an agreement with Activision, EA/MTV, and Konami to allow every single publisher’s rock & roll instruments will work with every publisher’s games on the Playstation 3. Bought Rock Revolution but want to get in on Rock Band 2’s killer track list? Go for it. Feel like using that gorgeous new Guitar Hero World Tour drum kit with Konami’s new opus? Fine, have fun. Not only that, but SCEA also said that, though it isn’t happening just yet, they’re working on a fix for the original Rock Band and Guitar Hero 3 as well.

This is the first step on the road to peripheral-based music games finally coming into their own. Guitar Hero made them an institution but this agreement will help cement the instrument set as an expandable platform that doesn’t necessitate annual hardware revisions. What else needs to happen to guarantee this glorious, melodious future? Microsoft and Nintendo need to step up to the plate and make the same arrangements on their respective consoles. It’s likely Microsoft has already got this in the bag, but Nintendo? They enjoy screwing over their customers a little too much, methinks. All that would remain after that would be a centralized music store that supported every game and hosted a library akin to iTunes that offered procedurally generated tracks based on the engines developed by Harmonix, Neversoft, and whomever else gets in on the action.

The future, she is bright this day.

(Link: via Joystiq)

Related links:

Everyone Should Be Able to Rock
Why Dontcha Cry About it, Saddle Bags: Konami Sues Viacom Over Rock Band
Warner Music Wants More Royalties

What Is a Man? More Than a 4Chan Meme

Nadia Oxford — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 03:17:00 GMT

Konami will never live down the original translation inflicted upon Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. It tried to atone for past sins by re-doing the voicework for SOTN in Dracula X Chronicles for the PSP. It was a fine attempt, but a worthless gesture overall; you can't erase the past. I can't deny the fact I'm descended from sheep thieves and Konami can't deny Dracula's infamous riddle to Richter Belmont. "What is a man?" (I don't know Dracula, what is a man?) "A miserable little pile of secrets!"

I hang out and make trouble at Gamespite because sometimes I learn something new. Today, for example, I learned through a fellow forum comrade named eirikr that Dracula's riddle is not his own. It was, in fact, lifted from a French author named Andre Malraux. Interestingly, Malraux was born in 1901, meaning he picked up the quote from Dracula during a time jaunt through the Carpathian Mountains. Damn, I need to manipulate some kids into writing this down for a history project. These are TRUFAX being doled out here, people. Remember them, and pass them onto your children.

If you're interested in the source material, check out The Big Curmudgeon: 2,500 Outrageously Irreverent Quotations from World-Class Grumps and Cantankerous Commentators. If you can recite the book's title to the store clerk before running out of breath and dying, that is.

Related Links:

Games to Film: Paul W.S. Anderson's Castlevania
Games To Movies: Why Is It So Gad-Danged Hard?
When Good Developers Go Bad: Koji Igarashi

Screen Test: Fragile

John Constantine — Tue, 22 Jul 2008 18:00:00 GMT

I’m as bad as every other slavering fanboy on the internet when it comes to Wii software, ranting about the garbage publishers have vomited onto the system, games that would have been visual embarrassments on the Dreamcast with gameplay that makes Tamagotchis seem like the most sophisticated machines on earth. Instead of a new 2D adventure, Konami makes a Castlevania fighting game. Instead of a brand new Rygar game, Tecmo ports over a six year-old PS2 title. Instead of a fresh Resident Evil, Capcom makes a glorified light gun game.

The worst part is that some people are making very promising titles for the Wii, yet no one knows about them. Case in point: Namco’s Fragile.

All anyone knows about Fragile at this point (some eighteen months after its announcement) is that it takes place after the end of the world. You play as a young man named Seto and you explore an abandoned earth. It’s developed by tri-Crescendo and Namco says it’s an RPG. It is also absolutely gorgeous.

If more games on Wii looks like Fragile, I probably wouldn’t spend so much time ranting about it.

Many thanks to NeoGAF user Stormbringer for pointing us to these new screens. Check out the rest right here.

Previous Screen Tests:

Fallout 3
Final Fantasy Versus XIII
Star Wars: The Force Unleashed
Alone in the Dark
Silent Hill Homecoming

E3 Day 3: No Alarms and No Surprises

John Constantine — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 18:00:00 GMT

With the Big Three’s press conferences out of the way, E3 has settled into immersion mode, the vast majority of the press and publishers getting into a groove of demoing games, showing off videos, and hosting meeting after meeting after meeting. Publishers Take-Two, Konami, Ubisoft, and Capcom have all held press conferences and the extent of big news was the Capcom’s making a movie out of their sci-fi shooter Lost Planet and Ubisoft is making a game called I Am Alive, in which the player tries to survive natural disasters. Exciting stuff, eh?

Not to beat a dead horse — 61 Frames Per Second prides itself on beating only a select number of dead horses — but what, exactly, is the point of this year’s E3? It certainly seems to be running more smoothly than 2007’s air-hangar-showroom debacle, but it’s become clear that everyone in the business of making games is not using the event as a venue for announcing new titles. The obvious implication is that, with the expansion of the gaming audience and the broadening of mass market releases throughout the year, publishers no longer need a centralized event to show North America what’s on the horizon.

There is, however, a more subtle implication.

The lack of marquee title announcements at E3 2008 shows that the business of game creation has finally adapted to the information age. Now that the main source of gaming news and coverage is online venues and any-and-all information (right down to press conference rehearsals) is transmitted to the public instantaneously, the preview cycle for videogames is shortening. Games could be shown in early, unplayable states in the past because of the delay of that information reaching consumers and enthusiasts. It takes a month to put together a print magazine, publish it, and get it into readers hands, a whole other month for creators to work on their games before anyone sees or hears about them. Now, things are being kept under wraps until they’re in a state where they’re in a form close to finished.

The internet broke you, E3. Now go away.

Related links:

E3 Day 1: Microsoft, Sony, Final Fantasy, and For Whom the Bell Tolls
E3 Day 2: Spin, Malaise, Sony's New Clothes, and Nintendo's True Disruption

Why Dontcha Cry About It, Saddle Bags: Konami Sues Viacom Over Rock Band

John Constantine — Thu, 10 Jul 2008 20:00:00 GMT

It seems that Rock Revolution isn’t the only way Konami is responding to Harmonix’s meteoric rise to music-videogame power. The house of Castlevania announced that they are suing Viacom, MTV Games’ parent company, and Harmonix specifically because Rock Band and its instrument peripherals violate Konami patents. According to Bloomberg.com, the patents in question detail, “simulated musical instruments, a music-game system and a ‘musical-rhythm matching game.’” They are not, however, suing Activision or Red Octane, makers of the current incarnation of Guitar Hero. Guitar Hero and its original guitar peripheral were themselves designed by Harmonix, so it seems peculiar that Konami wouldn’t direct their hissy-fit at them as well.

What do you think FPSers? Does Konami have a leg to stand on or are they just being babies because no one likes their music games anymore?

Our thanks to Bloomberg and NeoGAFer TheOddOne for alerting us to the breaking news.

Related links:

You Got Served: Zubo Puts Music in Your Combat
Everyone Should Be Able to Rock
Whatcha Playing: A Little Singin’, A Little Dancin’

Everyone Should Be Able to Rock

John Constantine — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 17:00:00 GMT

When Konami announced Rock Revolution back in May, their re-entry into the rock and roll videogame arena, you could practically hear the gaming world’s exasperation, eyes rolling, sighs exhaled in unison. No one wants stagnation, obviously. Guitar Hero’s fresh approach to music games revolutionized the industry three years ago, a feat Konami’s GuitarFreaks hadn’t managed in the better part of a decade. But no one wants clutter. Yet another band game hitting the public means yet another set of proprietary instrument controllers. Problematic, considering the precedent set by Activision last fall. They made it abundantly clear that they’re not interested in having their instruments completely compatible with another publisher’s software, a point they’ve reiterated by developing brand new drum, guitar, and microphone peripherals (with different functions than those made by MTV Games for Rock Band) for the upcoming Guitar Hero: World Tour. It seems that Konami’s chosen a more reasonable approach. Konami associate producer Keith Matejka told MTV News’ Patrick Klepek, "Compatibility is a big issue for music games. Peripherals are expensive for the user and they are expensive to produce. The existing peripherals all deliver only a slightly different gameplay experience. Different teams have varying perspectives on what should be compatible with each game. I think all guitar- and drum-based games need to be compatible with each other to some level."

He’s absolutely right, and not just from a consumer friendliness perspective. While they’ve sold millions of $90 guitar-and-game sets over the past few years, it’s impossible for Activision to continue monopolizing the market as competition continues to grow. Every publisher making an instrument based game is going to have to contend with the market saturation born out of their own success; people simply won’t buy new instruments every year. For the music game genre to be successful going forward, Activision, MTV Games, Konami, and whoever else joins the fray will need to swallow the same bitter pill hardware manufacturers have choked on for years. The money’s in better software, not gear.

Related links:

Whatcha Playing: A Little Singin', A Little Dancin'
The Magical Mystery Tour is Coming to Take You Away