AJ's Anticipated Game: Scribblenauts

If you spell it, they will appear.

If you haven't heard of the upcoming DS game called Scribblenauts, then you're very behind in innovation. Scribblenauts boasts a big claim, if you can spell it, it will appear. No joke. They really said it. That said lets get into what the game is about.

So far what we know is that the game is a Puzzle game in which you must collect something called Starite for whatever reason. The innovation comes with the solving of how to obtain each starite. You literally use your imagination and vocabulary skills to make any item you may need to appear and simply go from there.

I've seen trailers of a starite being in a tree and the player using a beaver in on instance, a ladder in another, and a lumberjack in one final one. So each puzzle will obviously have more then one approach to it. This is actually quite cool if you think about it. Since there's no linear push to what needs to be done, you'll need to flex your mental muscle in order to solve the puzzles. But we all know you'll go back to see how many outrageous ways you can solve each on.

Any game that lets you type in God, make him appear and give him a shotgun to fight a big green monster is awesome in my book. (Check around for gameplay trailers to see what I mean.)

Anyways, the game comes out in September. So if you got the imagination and a DS, look it up.

AJ's Fail Entry: Super Smash FAIL!

This new blog segment is called Fail Entry. This is where I take games, study them and analyze why the fail. I've decided to take one game that will most likely garner much hate. That being... Super Smash Brothers Brawl.

Super Smash Brothers Brawl is the junior entrant to the Super Smash series. If you don't know what Super Smash Brothers is, you're either and infant or have no life and should be ashamed of yourself. Super Smash Brothers is a collection of Nintendo Characters who duke it out to prove whose series reign supreme.

Three games later, the characters are still duking it out but it's not longer Nintendo Characters. Let's begin the fail...

1) Solid Snake... Don't get me wrong, Solid Snake is a bad ass. But in Brawl? That's like asking GI Joe to make an appearance on Chowder. Not even that, his special is so lame that if you do manage to hit someone with his Grenade Launcher, it would be because they randomly walked into it. But let's be honest.... WHO THE FUCK WALKS INTO A GRENADE DESIGNED TO KILL YOU!? 'Nuff said.

2) Create-a-Stage. Awesome idea at first.... till I saw the penis stage. And then a stage specifically made so that if you take one step, you're gone. Then another stage that if you fall all the way to the bottom, you're trapped with no way to be smashed. I mean, originality would be good. I don't feel like being the pun of every penis joke when I get smashed off the penis. Pun not intended.

3) The Dark Space Blob dudes. Did Nintendo run out of Gloves to use as bosses? Why not use the Sequin Glove from Billie Jean? I'm sure it would have loved whooping Lucas' ass. (For those of you who are MJ fans, Sorry. I am a Fan and mean no disrespect.) But instead we get dudes who are like dark purple and suck. Way to go nintendo for being generic.

4) Lucario. Pikachu? Okay. Jigglypuff? Trying too hard. Mewtwo? Nice. Lucario? Mewtwo clone. That's what he is. It's just Mewtwo in a fighting/steel form. And worse yet, his special blows. He shoots his load down at the stage. And it's horrendously slow to move. Way to go, Gamefreak Inc., you made an interesting pokemon boring again.

5)Smash Ball. Imagine this... a grown 24 year old... screaming "That SHIT is MINE!" No joke. Just imagine it. Now apply it to a video game about characters who should have never been in a fighting game in the first place. This is what the smash ball does to people. As soon as it pops, expect everyone and Grandma from down the block to chase after and scream like kids when they can't get it. It's midly entertaining.

6) Sonic. I will say this. Sega... you fucked up.

With that, I didn't really fail the game but if you play it and wish to play Melee instead, then you failed it yourself.

Then again, the Penis stage? Need I say more?

Retro Minute: Harvest Moon (PSX) Part 1

PSX, the pinnacle of gaming tech back in the Mid 90's. It was in 1997 we saw the rise of Sony as a home entertainer and yet, we fondly forget the games that brought us there. And the quirky ones soon to be replaced with things like Loco Roco and Katamari Damanci.

Harvest Moon is one of the longest running games about... Farming. Think about this a moment. This series has been around for 20 years. And it's about... Farming. Who in the hell thought that shit up!? I mean who randomly says "I feel like making a game so tedious and repetitive people will love it!"? Well obviously, the game has had some staying power since it's been around about as long as Final Fantasy.

The PSX version was a remake of the 64 version which borrowed on elements from the previous SNES versions which took from the Gameboy version. A game that takes from it's predecessor. Highly original. Anyways, whether that string of text is right or wrong, the PSX version is a rehash of the 64 version with some changes. Like.... New people. And names. That's about it. Oh and the town is a bit different. Otherwise, it remains largely the same. I'm not joking.

Your character wakes up one day to his grandfather, who he hasn't seen in 10 years, dying and leaves him the farm. Considering that the man was already like 70 when you visit him, it's a wonder how he remembered you. I mean when you get the farm it looks like the old man let it go for years. There's garbage every-freaking-where. So you get a choice. Stay or go home. There should have been an option called "Sell the bitch and be set for life.", however such option does not exist. If you choose to leave, Game Over. Worlds fastest game. Minus the 10 minute intro. Obviously, you're not gonna have that happen so you pick to stay on the farm. Then the curveball. You have 3 years to make it into a successful business in order to keep it....

Who makes the inheritance rules in this game!? Russia!? (just kidding.)

So, how do you achieve this goal of making it successful? You begin by cleaning up a farm that will later be known as Staten Island. So if you're a perfectionist like most gamers, you're gonna want to clean the farm up quick. Too bad it takes 2 upgrades of your normal equipment to do so. So your farm in the beginning can only be about 60% fully clean. Now, we need to till the ground. If you spent all day cleaning with the tools they gave you, you're probably exhausted by like 2:00. What a lame ass farmer dude. One swing of that ho, not swing at that ho for those of you out there, and you'll most likely pass out.

So no we'll wait. As time goes on you'll figure out theres a not so big town with people who have not so big stories. Amongst these people are the important ones... The shop keep, the Inn Owner, the Chicken lady, the blacksmith, the Rancher and 5 random girls you have to pick to be your bride.

Look.... This is a buzzkill... how the hell are we supposed to know all these things without reading the manual which is filled with tiny ass words!? Either way, this week's retro minute comes to a close as I take a stroll down memory lane another day.

Dissidia: Final Fantasy US Review

Almost 20 years after it's conception, more then 25 games and countless spin-offs, SquareEnix brings us yet another Final Fantasy game. However, it's not the kind of game you're thinking. Enter Dissidia: Final Fantasy, SquareEnix's attempt at a free-form fighting game with RPG conventions.



Dissidia exists in an alternate universe of the FF worlds. Dissidia does well to point out that all of the stories in the FF Universe are there own worlds, a questions fans may or may not have been wondering. Cosmos, the Goddess of Harmony is on the losing end of a long battle with the God of Discord, Chaos. So she summons her group of bad-ass warriors to take down Chaos' group of kick-ass villains. Needless to say, she still loses and sends the heroes off to a Quest to find Crystals to restore balance to the world and ultimately save the Universe from absolute destruction.

The story is kinda cut and dry. While it does feature the same kind of "Save the world." premise past FF games have had, it was done a bit better in said games. The story mode offers you Cosmos' heroes from the get go to play as to proceed through the story which would take you about 12-30 hours if you aspire to do it all. And these are just the basic stories from the 10 heroes who include Tina Branford, Squall and Cecil. Each story is pretty much the same, every character will be looking for a crystal, interacting with their party who do not participate in battles, but we'll get to that.

The story mode is played out on a board much like chess. You get you pawn piece that you move around and meet up with various pieces on the board. There's treasure chests, summonstones and enemies to encounter. The former two are pretty obvious. The enemies on the board range from Doppelgangers to the real Characters. Your goal on each of the 5 levels is to move your piece around to a Stigma Of Chaos which resides on the opposing side of the board. All the while, trying to end the stage with Destiny points, which offer up rewards if finished within the time frame of those moves. Sometimes, the objective is to move to the piece that leads to a Story fight to remove the tedium but it remains the same for all stories but with certain twists.

The enemies lead you to an Arena style fighting stage which allows you pretty much all the freedom you're dying to have. You'll zoom from point A to B to attack your opponents and try to win the battle. You'll have two attacks, HP Attacks done with the Square button and Brave attacks done with the Circle button. Large imposed numbers will appear on the bottom of the screen where you and your opponent's life bar is. These are brave points. The Fights in this game require you to increase your Brave points and lessen your opponents. As you lessen them, the increase in yours will denote the power behind your HP attacks.

Simple Math: If your brave points are 1300, a successful HP attack will hit 1300. But most HP attacks have some Brave attacks that add on before the final HP Reducing blow.

This makes the fight fun a lot of the times, just trying to find new ways to decimate your opponent. Especially as EX Cores, a collection of energy you'll get as you pummel or get pummled by the opponent which will lead into flashy Special Attacks like Trances or Overdrives. As you fight, you'll level up mid-battle and have those stats immediately added on so you can keep going. Leveling up will give you access to new skills and attacks which will increase your ass-whooping arsenal. It's cool, but you have to be careful how you do it, as each move and skill will cost Command Points to use. And Command points can fly right out the window with some moves/skills.

The game offers a shop where you can buy new weapons, armor and accessories. While the weapons and stuff are purely stat cosmetic, you'll never see them in the game. It's cool and not cool at the same time, but given the amount of stuff already in the game, we can let SE slide on this. There are other weapons that can be made, requiring a recipe by obtaining one of it's pieces to make it appear and collection of it's remaining items. This is fun for a Perfectionist but tedious for a common man who will have to go about destroying a Level 9 AI Level 100 fighter to gain the items they need, and have a huge amount of luck in attempting to get it.

Further more, there's a PP shop, which will allow you to buy the, at first and with no story of their own, Villains. The PP Shop will also allow you to buy new stages, costumes and music selections for fights. They even grant you changes to the core system options such as the Calender which is a nifty idea but can be abused easily. The Calender allows you to pick a day known as your special day which will grant you bonuses of all the Major gains, EXP/Gil/AP/PP. Then it uses a preset calender to fill in the rest of the days of the week randomly with other bonuses. The PP shop will allow you to increase the probability of more of these days to pop up by buying the calender upgrades, which at max will get you 2x EXP/Gil, 30 Extra PP and 3 Extra AP per fight and will make 3 days out of the week almost exactly the same as your special day, which in truth makes your special day obsolete.

The calender also gives out rewards for playing the game by sending you Mognet Mail which will contain Random PP gains and items. The game has it's own system of Achievements, which under certain requirements will unlock new accessories that go beyond the power of the normal ones. It's cool that the game offers so much for just playing.

There are some downsides though. For those of you who played the Japanese version, you'll noticed that the Shade Impulse storyline, which to you newbies is the continuation of the 10 Heroes' stories, is unlocked immediately after completing one story. This gives the player no incentive to try the other stories if he just wants to play as his favorite character the whole way through and Max out his level.

Arcade mode is also different from it's Japanese predecessor which was actually more fun and more strategic. The American Arcade mode is a survival type mode which sends you through a series of fights. Succeeding will earn you some PP and a prize. But there's no Gil/AP/PP/XP bonuses to gain. This makes Arcade mode a turn off however, it's made that you must play it to unlock certain items. Which is bad.

The camera in the Fights can be a task to handle. Especially in indoor stages where it hangs behind scenary. This is bad if you can't plan out your next move accordingly when doing one of the Aerial rushes the game loves to have (ala Advent Children fighting in the air). This can be a headache and cost your precious HP or Brave Points.

Besides these problems, Dissidia offers a lot. It offers 11 heroes and Villains with diverse move sets, customization, and an okay story. IT also lets fans duke it out as villains and heroes to end all those "He can beat that dude." discussions. There's so much content in the game, that it's suggested that you Data Install to make it run at optimal speed, otherwise, load times can be long. But hey, if there's this much stuff, how can it not be worth exploring!? Enjoy your fave FF tracks and beat your opponent down and take the Universe into the light or darkness. IT's your choice.

Final Score: 9

While it has it's problems, Dissidia does it's fair share of making sure there's always more to come back for.

Am I suppose to Welcome you?

Well, I guess first impressions are due here but if I give you the wrong impression now, I apologize. In fact I will clear the air as is and make you understand several things at once. So be prepared. This is a blog. Written by someone who should probably be locked in a mental institute and never seen and or heard from again. That being said I can already hear the legions of friends I have telling me to stop overdoing it. That's cool. I appreciate that. What I don't appreciate is being told what is when I already know better so let me give you the inside scoop.

You may call me AJ. I will call you Petey. Why you ask? Because I feel like it.

I love anime. (despite only watching one atm). I love to write. (Despite only haven written a new story... sometime in 2007) I love music. No side remarks this time. I love Manga. (I'm reading 3 of em at the moment.) I love to RP and here's the kicker....

I love video games! Oh. It's not that shocking but so long as you know that much about me we can proceed into a hilarious friendship that will lead into a fun filled world.

I dare you to join me.