Gundam and other sex crimes

Gundam Vs. Gundam Next Plus on PSP is, without a doubt, the most fun I've had playing a Gundam game so far. One only need consider the American Gundam library- or as I call it, the tripe we've had to put up with for being on the other side of the Pacific- to understand that that while that's high praise, it's not a large amount of it. It's like a pole vaulter who beats the High School record while failing to get a world record: sufficient, but there's certainly room for improvement.

As a fighting game fan, I know a cheap boss when I see one. That I know how to beat the likes of Jinpachi, Goenitz, and Magaki, et al., is proof that I can handle a cheap boss when given time to get to know them better. The boss battles in GVGN+ take the concept of a cheap boss and instead turn it into a very, very unfun version of "monkey in the middle". I'm not sure if the phrase "gangrape" would be inappropriate; in fact, it may be underselling the experience.

Let me begin by stating one problem that has persisted from the original GvG: You are given an AI controlled partner who serves two functions:

1)Jack all of your kills when the enemy is being easy, or even just moderately difficult

2)Sit in the background when a high level enemy comes into play. Due to camera issues, I can't visually verify if it's indeed sitting, nor whether it's thumb is, in fact, occupying its rectal area. But I have my suspicions.

This is annoying enough when your opponent is Nu Gundam, which actually means you have roughly 8 enemies, including its partner and the bits it shoots out . It becomes downright tedious when you're near the end of a route and the computer has decided the game has been sufficiently fun by that point and turns on you viciously.

Unfortunately, Namco/Bandai has also decided that a mere "boss" is insufficient. Which I'd agree with, if said bosses weren't mechanized death factories loaded with numerous versions of death blossoms and other patently unfair advantages such as super armor. No, we get the "boss stage", wherein we fight two mobile suits of the game's choosing (usually 3000 point level suits from the Gundam Overpowered Collection)at the aforementioned high difficulty. Then, and only then, we are greeted by one of the villains of the numerous Gundam timelines in their huge, ultra-mecha.

They are flanked by the 2nd-most powerful suit in their series.

It's sad that the most innocent crime in all of that is violation of canon. Your Gundam is suddenly thrust into a nightmare situation: run the fuck away and spam your beam rifle, or stand there while Nu Gundam, Alpha Azieru and all 12 of their bit/funnel weapons shoot lasers at you. When they're not doing that, you will undoubtedly try to take on the Alpha, which practically gift wraps your suit with a tag that says "To Amuro Ray: Please sodomize me". Presumably, your AI partner is somewhere filming you getting backjacked until you explode,and eventually, you lose enough that the difficulty ramping eases up and you can just barely win out.

Isn't it enough that the target suits are unholy machina bent on your destruction? Do they really need a tag team partner just in case their Fuck You Beam didn't penetrate through to destroy your backside? One battle pitted me against 2 Zetas, complete with temporary god mode enabled, followed by Nu Gundam and ZZ Gundam, followed by 3 HYAKU SHIKIS and Gundam Unicorn. Such a lineup would be an appropriate defense if, say, the very constructs of Time and Space suddenly became violently malicious.

Alas, I still play, and I still have things to unlock. But it saddens me that this genre, which is suffering from decent games, now has to suffer the same overblown challenge-mode bullshit that fighting games put themselves through. It doesn't lead me to better myself; I'm playing as well as can be expected. It leads me to abuse a tactic because it's the only one an overwrought enemy AI didn't plan for.

Now if you'll excuse me, I need to get back to flying my amazing Gundam DX in a complete circle while beating the fuck out of the square button. Fun, huh?

Just Call Me 'Ransoomair'

Or however the hell his name is spelled at VGCats, where the updates come as early as the next season. I'm starting to get as bad, but hopefully I can change that soon.

Steam has gotten me to do something I haven't done in years, which is: stock my computer with gaming goodies. For less than 45 dollars, I picked up a bunch of stuff that I had missed and otherwise would've had to buy a 360 for. While I don't hold any more or less disdain for the system than ever, It's really hard for me to pick up another system: currently, I'm rocking 4 of them, including my PSP. And each one has some semblance of a backlog, with my PS2 being the worst- not only do I have a lot of games to get through, they're all quite long, and this is all balancing with work, trying to take care of the apartment, A+ certification studying, getting ready for Fanime, working on a screenplay and coming soon: School.

One thing I will say about the PSP backlog: It got one game shorter. Not because I finished anything, but because I tried playing Tekken 6 on it. The PSP version might be easier to unlock things with, but it leaves a lot to be desired. At least it doesn't have a story mode.

Many of these games are of the Japanese Gundam Game variety, including ones like Another Century's Episode 2 and 3. Sure, there's other suits, but anybody who knows me knows that I bought ACE 3 for a chance to play through a story mode based on Gundam X. I'm already traipsing through part 2 using Kou Uraki, and while I haven't heard his trademark howling of Gato's name, I sit in comfort knowing it won't be long until I do. Also, REALLY looking forward to nuking something with the GP02A. Perhaps a Gundam Wing character or two.

As for this year: yikes, there's a ton of new stuff. Part of the reason I'm trying to get through some of my PS3 backlog is to trade in for new stuff this year, and even then, I'm still behind. There's a lot I missed from last year, such as Katamari Tribute and Uncharted 2. I will be hesitant on picking up Final Fantasy XIII, as readings of some of the features suggests that Versus XIII may stand a better chance of being good. There's also been an announcement of an announcement- something I've come to downright loathe- from Tetsuya Nomura, that a long-talked about game is coming, finally. I won't speculate on what this is, but suffice to say, unless it involves a ps3 and a keyblade, I don't give a shit.

Tekken on the system

Tekken 6 is just that: The sixth iteration of the franchise. By now, you should know full well if it's worth your money or not.

For long time fans like me, the complaints have nothing to do with the fighting, which is where it must excel. They instead reside in things that, I'll admit, I never thought I'd have a problem with. For instance, you don't have your normal menu. You have "Online mode" and "Offline mode", which isn't exactly self-explanatory. Then you go into Offline mode only to find your cursor highlighting the Scenario campaign. The long version: You get to watch a bunch of Story mode schlock, complete with Metal Gear length cutscenes, and then you get to play a side-scrolling beat-em up version of a fairly technical fighter.

The short version: I hope you liked The Bouncer, motherfucker, because you're going to play it again.

And the reason you'll play it again is because you will wish to unlock things, which simply doesn't happen at a very fast rate- this is actually the fastest mode to do it in. Even stranger, if you want to unlock an ending, this is where you do it. Not through arcade mode, or even through the store. Here, and only here, by fighting in the "Arena". Oh, and you can only use people you've already unlocked in the Scenario campaign. It's actually somewhat humorous to leave the arcade mode, with its huge brigade of characters to head into a mode where you have two.

Speaking of characters, there is a robust character customization in place, even allowing some cosplaying to go on. This is important to people like me, who actually think KOF characters aren't in enough (good) games. However, this process is kneecapped by the pittance of cash your fighter is paid for victory: I've but in a fair amount of hours, and, god willing, by the end of this month I might be able to afford a new shirt for Asuka. The wide canyon between how much money you get and how much things cost puts fucking minibars to shame, except for certain accessories, which is my way of saying you'll be able to afford a sword long before you can get your character a hair cut.

So, yeah, the fighting game's intact, and the online's alright, but I'd be lying if I didn't wonder what sort of bizarre experiments were going on at Namco.

Tony Hawk:Ride (more like Deride)

Watch that .gif a few times. Take it in.

Got it? Good.

Now, let me make a few notes about it.

1. This is not a hacked version, nor are there any cheat codes being applied. This is the retail, otherwise untouched, finished product.

2. As far as I know, TH:TR does not feature a level design like Strider's, where gravity switches on you throughout a level.

3. This ill-programmed shovelware bomb sets you back a cool $120, though it does provide you with a board that also wasn't programmed well.

It's been a hard time for the THPS series, which happens when you take a game about skateboarding and indie bands and exchange it for Top 40 radio and riding in grocery carts. Oh, and you fail to innovate throughout 4 or 5 sequels. This being the age of the gimmick, be it plastic instruments, motion controls or ridiculous pack-ins, they decided to technically add all three and do none of them well. Which would be fine if that was step 2- then I could merely write it off as "meh, shovelware". And it would be harmless, as it would be just another Tony Hawk game.

Unfortunately, everything about this game points to the heads at Activision getting the market concept down - Here's a game with a REAL(tm) Skateboard Controller! - and then slacking on the game side of things. There's not an ether on this planet strong enough to get me to believe they ran QA on this atrocity. This has been a really unfortunate side effect of the motion control/instrument side of the gaming industry, and indeed the mainstream popularity of it: mediocrity is acceptable, since hey, we're getting new customers who have no problem with the controller not working properly or the game being shit. I think the best review I've seen is a youtube video where a soccer mom says "for somebody who can barely walk a straight line, this is great!" Not high praise to be lumped in with an activity reserved for field sobriety tests.

And good news: there's already a plan for the sequel. That's okay, I'll be over here working on my Survival Arts skills. Let me know when you can get quality even similar to that of Top Skater, an arcade game that came out 12 years ago.

Ramen and Video Games: A Perfect Match

And now, it is beginning of a fantastic bowl of noodles!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SmVB0Lz3U0o

As somebody who walks around at work humming game tunes (yeah, seriously: I actually use the level transition music from Double Dragon II when I go up/down stairs), this is pretty f'n awesome. I always felt Bubble Bobble had one of the less appreciated themes. I'd love to see somebody do a Trans-Siberian orchestra style version of it. The opening chords would be worth it alone.

Back to writing

I'm going to be resuming actual writing activities, and boy do I have a lot to talk about. Here's what's on my plate for reviews:

Gundam F91

Mobile Suit Gundam: Movie Trilogy

BlazBlue: Calamity Trigger (and my view on the new version, Continuum Shift)

Cheap Boss Stuff

Hokuto No Ken The Fighter

Ghostbusters (PS3)

Snatcher (Sega CD)

Phantasy Star- Yes, the first one

Pulseman

Super Robot Wars/Another Century's Episode

And lots of other stuff that doesn't suck.

-Trakdown

More like King Of Fail.

Wow. I owe the makers of the KOF movie an apology.

See, I originally lambasted them for leaving out the Ikari Warriors. Instead, I realize they just blew me a big, wet sloppy kiss by leaving them out, as well as all my favorites.

Because trust me, this movie is going to be shitty. Like Toilet-in-the-back-of-the-worst-gas-station-in-a-small-hick-town shitty.

The only person that looks anything like a video game character in this is the woman. I assume that's Mai, but it looks more like a H-Doujin cosplay version of Final Fantasy 8's Rinoa Heartilly. I'd like to think that guy in the trenchcoat might be Iori, but I'll never know since the emo, brooding jackass is now wearing FUCKING HOCKEY GEAR.

Did I mention Terry Bogard, the "Lone Wolf", is now a CIA Agent? See, this is why I'm glad my faves are far away from this rectal remnant. Lord knows, Goenitz would be played by an Eskimo and selling hot dogs, Blue Mary would be a hooker played by Lil' Kim, and Geese Howard would be a crossdresser who's actually a chick.

The worst thing about this is that I know my parents are going to be like "It's worth a rental". Yeah, they tried to pull that with "Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-LI", a movie destined to fail when they took my fave villain from the Street Fighter universe- M. Fucking Bison- and made him Irish. For fucks sake, the only movie I can even think of with an Irish bad guy was Leprechaun, which, I might remind you, ended in space. It's sad to think Raul Julia actually got the better deal with his portrayal of the sick evil bastard. So, yeah, I'm avoiding this like the plague.

But wait...There's more! A NEW KOF GAME APPEARS!

I'd like to start off this rant with a little history lesson. Namely, this: Video games in Japan, like many of the country's pop culture items, can be named whatever the fuck they want, regardless of the content of the game. Doki Doki Panic (Heartbeat Panic), for instance, has almost nothing to do with hearts and isn't a particularly breakneck speed game. You should know this, since you played something very similar in Mario 2. Sure, for the most part, they actually contain what it says, but then, for the most part, their market is dating sims.

But I digress.

KOF XII was an unadulterated disaster. So my hope was that maybe, they'd rework it to work better. So when I landed on Destructoid and witnessed the horror spoken of above, I saw an ad for King Of Fighters: Sky Stage.

I thought "Okay, strange name, but since I have a game called Melty Blood: Actress Again, maybe it's just their way of getting us a remake!"

Oh, it's remade alright.

Now, I know a lot of people are going "Oh, those wacky Japanese game designers!" Me, I'm too busy with my trademark "FUCKING REALLY" to even go there. I know my friend Shadow loves shmups to death, but this is tragic. There's already a vast ocean of quality shmups available, I don't see any reason why anybody would be going "YAH DOOD BUT YOO CAN PLAY KOF GAIZ". Fuck that. Give me Dodonpachi "Jesus, there's only a bout 3 pixels of open space on the screen" version. I may suck at that, but at least the suck will be on my side and my side alone.

All I can say from this point on: KOF XIII had better be stellar or this series has had it.