Front Mission Evolved:
This game exceeded my negative expectations, meaning that it was worse than I was predicting. Who is this game for? It fails from a fan service standpoint. It fails from a shooter standpoint. It fails from a customization standpoint. The game does nothing for either shooter fans or RPG fans. The story is terrible, the gameplay is terrible. With Final Fantasy XIII, Heavy Rain, and Front Mission Evolved, 2010 has to be my worst year as a gamer.
I threw my money at this game with the hopes that Square Enix would do something with the franchise. At the very least, I'm hoping they bring Border Madness for the DS to North America (very misplaced hopes). But if Evolved is the crap Squeenix plans on continuing Front Mission with, then I hope this game sold bad enough for them to kill the franchise.
Valkyria Chronicles 2:
As bummed as I was for this game, I played the hell out of Valkyria Chronicles 2. Not counting Infinite Space, I spent more time with VC2 than any other game released in 2010.
The game met my expectations. The generic characters that populated VC2 are the very reason I stopped watching anime and the smaller battlefields with the portal bases weren't as satisfying as the first game's battles. Not only that, there's only 6 or so maps in the game and you just play different parts of those maps, which became very noticeable and quite annoying as the hours went on.The game was par for the course of what I was expecting, but something really annoying came out of left field: the Tech class. I loved the balance of the classes in the first game and VC2 messes that up for me. They removed some of the Engineers functionality, making the class practically useless, and gave it to the new class, the Armored Tech. Techs, when they become Fencer and it's upgraded classes, are also broken with their high attack and defense. Their low AP is completely negated with the game's addition of Armored Personel Carriers.
How mediocre the story and characters were didn't matter much because the gameplay kept sucking me in, even with the annoying changes. I am now hotly anticipating Valkyria Chronicles 3 with Sega's promise of making it feel more like the first game. My excitement for VC3 is follwing the opposite arc that I had with VC2. When VC2 was first announced I was excited, but that excitement dwindled as details about it came out. For VC3, I was ambivalent when it was first announced by my excitement increased as details came out.
Okamiden:I've come close to replaying Okami this winter, but I reminded my self that Okamiden would give me my Amaterasu fix in a couple months. Since it seems that the North American release of Okamiden isn't going to have the balls-out Special Edition Japan got, it seems that I will be pirating the hell out of it with the flash card my buddy got me for Christmas. My feelings about Okamiden haven't changed in the months since I drafted my Bitch List, but the lack of a sweet Special Edition and a free flash card have made my wallet happy and I am waiting for March. Until then, Marvel vs. Capcom 3 should satiate my Amaterasu fix.
The huge tower that can be seen from our town, the Willis Tower, all the adults got pissed when the name changed. Like it was really a big thing. The skyline that can be seen from miles away, it looked to me like a maw that signified some kind of omen, a maw spreading out and covering everything.
Finally. Finally! The wait was over. Fortune smiled upon me, as I smiled as well. The line lead to a machine with sticks instead of controllers. Michelle wasn't too thrilled about the stick, but Adil and Nick were envious as the PS3 they lined up for used controllers with the button mapping being especially awkward. Dear reader, I hope you appreciate the form matching content. The minutia you sat through before actually getting to the gameplay is nothing compared to the hours that this evening took up.
With Devil May Cry being one of my favorite franchises and Okami being one of my favorite games, the effort that Capcom put into translating Dante's and Amaterasu's moves into a fighting game astounded me. Every weapon in Dante's arsenal from DMC3, which boasted the largest collection of Devil Arms and guns, have been translated into a special. Amaterasu's specials too are ripped straight from Okami. For her basic attacks, Amaterasu is even able to change between the three different weapon types from Okami. The hardest to figure out from my team was Trish. I love playing as trap characters like Testament from Guilty Gear and Rachel from BlazBlue, but they take time to figure out the nuances and one match certainly isn't enough time for that.
I'm not one for nostalgia. I am staunchly against it in fact. The game being held in such high regard, making practically every top 100 game list, was working against the game in my regard. In the past few years or so, I've started a Castlevania or two. The Belmont's dominant genetic traits for bulky, lumbering frames and the typical side-scrolling action Dracula's castle offered never interested me enough to actually follow through. I've also gone through a Super Metroid play through and played Zero Mission and Fusion independently. Like Castlevania, I only played the Metroids in recent years and have no nostalgia for them and I naturally dislike like them for their high regard in gaming. I enjoyed the Metroids for what they were but there was an overwhelming sense of "been there, done that" while playing Zero Mission and Fusion after Super. Like the Castlevania series, every Metroid game is almost exactly the same. They were sequels without evolution, which is exactly what I'm against in the making of a sequel. There is a turn that came with both series though. The Metroid series changed with Prime. The parallel turn in Castlevania occurred in Symphony of the Night, when Castlevania turned into Metroid.
