What is a Castlevania?

February sees the sequel to Castlevania Lords of Shadow, which is named as you might expect, Castlevania Lords of Shadow 2 .  That being said I wanted to take a minute to talk about this game and Castlevania in 3D.  Ever since Castlevania 64 and its much more complete director's cut edition, Legacy of Darkness were released, fans have been divided about CV in 3D. I personally think that Castlevania 64 and Legacy of Darkness are two of the best games in the series, and was an honest projection of the games' atmosphere into 3D.  The two CV games on the PS2 Lament of Innocence, and Curse of Darkness were great games in their own right, and important additions to the CV Canon, but sadly they are more dungeon crawlers than they are Castlevania.

If you think about the old games you had a hero (usually a Belmont) fighting his way through the Castle and countryside to reach Dracula and defeat him, and that's exactly what CV64 and LOD did. Both games featured stages with very distinct themes, and the 64 games had very distinct stages, with memorable set pieces. I'd also like to point out that the amount of things you can use the "check" feature on and get descriptions of is mind boggling. The developers definitely wanted to put some detail and personality in to the characters. It seems like every so often when I play the game I find some other random object you can click on and get a description, everything from chairs to "the mechanism that opens the portcullis" gets some little snippet of text giving your character's musing on it.  Some of the common complaints you hear about the N64 games is that the camera was bad, or the controls wonky, but having played them both all the way through numerous times I can honestly say the camera was never more than a minor annoyance, and in a time when 3D gaming, and 3D platformers were just getting off the ground I think that any annoyances with CV64 and LOD's camera was no greater than any annoyance you would find any of the other early 3D platformers on the N64 or PS1 at the time.

And don't try to tell me the controls were an issue. Have you played Castlevania 1, 3 or Belmont's Revenge? These are all considered high lights of the series, but the controls are far far from smooth. Not to say that they are bad, but in each one the control of the character was something that had to be mastered. Belmonts and their friends have always moved in less than agile ways, and mastering that was a part of the reward to the game. Once you got to know the controls and how they worked it was no longer hard to dodge enemy attacks, no you had everything you need it was just about thinking carefully how to use it.

Finally I get to talking about Lords of Shadow 2 and what it has to do with all of this. I was very excited for the first game and made the mistake of being very hyped for it, resulting in an excruciating wait for the game's release years ago. This time I have kind of distanced myself from the game and the hype so that I go in fresh not knowing what to expect.  I wasn't one of the types that felt that LOS wasn't a real CV game, because I felt it was, just in a different light.  A lot of people were saying around the release of LOS that they hoped it wasn't a "mistake" like the N64 games supposedly were. Ironically I think that Lords of Shadow 2 may end up being more like the N64 games after all.   The developers have told us that LOS2 takes place in an open world, which interestingly enough is how Castlevania 64 was first envisioned. You had to travel the countryside and the castle to make it to the final confrontation. It had multiple characters, and a freer roam feel to it than any Castlevania had ever had before Symphony of the Night changed the series game play style.  Also I view the plot of the N64 games to be some of the deepest the series has to offer as far as plot twist and back-story.  The whole atmosphere with the plot to ensnare Cornell's wolf spirit and the involvement of Gille de Rais and Actrise was all perhaps a bit campy but as far as CV games were concerned with it was daggum William Faulkner.  Lords of Shadow has done a great job of setting up a new CV lore and setting with a mere 3 games to work with as opposed to mainline CV's some 20 canon games released from the span of the 80s to now.  The reveal that the final scene in LOD 1 was taking place in the present day was quite a jolt to me. A storyline kind of jolt I had never got from another CV game, and I hope that Lords of Shadow 2 will continue to build on that kind of revelation.





My face when at the end of Lords of Shadow 2 you find out that the whole thing took place in modern day all along and that they were using water to fight the monsters because Gabriel was a ghost all along.

Fighting Layer

Fighting Layer is a bizarre Japan-only, Arcade-Only fighting game released by Arika in 1998.  Fighting Layer is supposedly similar to the Street Fighter EX series, which Arika also developed, however having only briefly played that at a friend's house back in high school I can neither confirm nor deny the veracity of that statement.  What I CAN confirm is that Fighting Layer is a great gem of an arcade fighter that sadly seems to have been buried at a time when fighting games were a dime a dozen, and 3D fighting games were starting to become more than novelties in the genre.

Ironically Fighting Layer still has a website on publisher Arika's page after all these years, though it is all in Japanese. Using my limited knowledge of Japanese I was able to glean that the story line is nothing we haven't heard before. A group of fighters headed to a tournament on an island, each with their own reasons and quirks for going, as well as a sinister villain waiting to defeat the last man standing.  The game draws  its odd name through the mechanic in which you progress through the game. Instead of moving up a ladder your character is presented as fighting through a mansion with various "rooms" and "floors"  that the game's matches take place in. There are also several bonus levels which can alter your path throughout the game. At one point you will fight a suit of armor, defeat it and you go up and later get to choose your animal fight stage, lose and you're headed to the basement and set on a course to fight the shark. Yes that's right there's a shark. Before you face the game's sub-boss and the final boss Vold you'll have to fight a dangerous animal. There are three of them, Tiger, Eagle, and the aforementioned Shark.  These animal fights can be challenging until you get the pattern down, and what's worse as a cheap way to get quarters you only get one round on these fights, which is fine if you win, but upon losing you have to pay for another one round match just to try to beat these stupid things. Considering this game will mostly see play on emulators nowadays this isn't a problem, but I can see this being a major turn off for Fighting Layer's case back when it was in Japanese arcades.

If we take a look at these goofballs trying to fight their way through the island tournament, we'll find fighting game staples such as Tetsuo Kato, your typical Japanese martial arts type character complete with always training attitude and torn white gi so he's not too straight edge,  WrestleMania heyday lookalike characters like Exodus, and Clemence Kelieber, Lan and Shang, your Chinese kung-fu type characters, a ninja etc, but also complete oddballs like Cappriccio  who looks like something out of Alien Resurrection, and the game's final boss Vold who is something of a mix between a wild animal and a Japanese train pervert.  That's not to say these characters are bad, to the contrary, most of them are fairly fun to play as and are interesting enough that you'd want to know a backstory. Unfortunately, most of the official ones are pretty vague, and the game's endings tell you even less about them. There are two characters from Street Fighter EX, whom I suppose have a little more meat and potatoes to them, but some of Fighting Layers more interesting characters like George Jinsent, Preston Ajax, and Janis Luciani have almost no information available about them.

Gameplay wise Fighting Layer works like something of a hybrid between those weird Fighting Vipers era caged 3D fighing games and other 3D fighting games like Tekken and Virtua Fighter. It is possible to find yourself moving into the fore or backgrounds, however much of the action will take place on a 2D plane, and you are limited by a cage. The juggling and combo aspect feels very Tekken though with it being possible to chain normal attacks and supers on to falling opponents to knock in a few extra hits.  Unlike Tekken and Fighting Vipers however it does feature a super move bar, which maxes out at three units allowing you to execute super moves.  These super moves also can have powered up variations which change the name of the move. The names of them super moves are spelled out dramatically on screen when you finish an opponent with them which is a nice touch that theatrically falls somewhere between the seizure inducing Street Fighter round ended with a super animation and the not so spectacular fall down animation from being finished off by MK9's X Ray moves. The game's introductory cut scene boast a number of advanced features such as Barrage Blows(the supers), Hard Reversals,  Super canceling etc, but its nothing we really haven't seen before, and if Fighting Layer of all games did pioneer any of these things, its notability has been lost by the sheer obscurity of this title.

Despite its obscure nature, and a somewhat limited , though interesting single player experience Fighting Layer is a lovely gem of a fighting game, and its a shame it never got a proper PS1 port with awful looking but endearing Tekken 1 era CGI endings, Vs. modes and move list etc.   If you  have the means its worth checking out. I'm not saying that MAME can emulate it, but MAME can emulate it and if you have a good enough computer it should run easily well enough to enjoy.

 

As an aside what’s the deal with all those old 3D fighters having the matches take place in cages? I remember Virtua Fighter having ringouts, but it just seemed like everyone else said we’re doing this in a cage. I guess at that time they didn’t really know a way to handle the fact that the arena had to be realistic, which would have been hard if the players just moved on infinitely. It took the Tekken team to finally say SCREW IT we’re doing infinite stages the ground will just have to look silly when it moves, and if you don’t like it tough Ganryu.

Returning with new old content.

My good pal and fellow blogger RivenMike has been blogging for online for several years since the introduction of his own blog That Guy Named Mike (link incoming), and at one point I planned to do some guest game reviews on there. Why cleaning out my pc hardcore for Guild Wars 2 I came across this little  gem of a review I wrote for Castlevania Curse of Darkness on the Playstation 2. As a fun treat and as a way to get this blog powered up again, I decided to post it here in all its unedited glory.  My apologies for lack of updates, it has been a busy few months. Between work, and getting engaged to the best girl in the world its hard to write on here!  With Tekken Tag 2, Guild Wars 2,  Resident Evil 6 and some of my other favorites on the horizon I'm sure I'll have plenty to talk about !

Castlevania Curse of Copy Paste

Hello gang Mike has been gracious enough to give me a spot here to post my game rants and reviews so here they are.

My game reviews often have no rhyme or reason. They come and go at my whim and this has been a long standing trend that started with my video reviews on youtube.  I might review and NES game one day, and then decide to review and arcade game the next. There’s really no telling, and I’ve had no problem with that trend there so I’ll use it here as well.

Castlevania Curse of Darkness is Castlevania’s 2^nd outing on the PS2, and it bears an overwhelming similarity to its PS2 predecessor Lament of Innocence.

Curse of Darkness is a direct sequel to Castlevania III on the NES . Even though Trevor and co gave Dracula the boot Wallachia is still under the curse of Dracula.  It seems that one of his old devil forgemasters is trying to resurrect him or some crap like that and its up to you (as Hector a devil forgemaster that betrayed Dracula and thus gave Trevor and co the big open door to kill Dracula) to defeat this crazy lummock and destroy Dracula’s curse. 

Hold on a minute. What’s a devil forgemaster?

Apparently devil forge masters   are the guys who make Dracula’s minions. Unfortunately the game just starts throwing this term around as if fans of Castlevania Canon have heard it before. Good job Iragashi here you go again.  My problem with this is that the game goes on about the forge masters, but it never gives you any back story to them. And since this game takes place quite early in the canon the absence of these forge masters later in the time line makes it even harder to swallow. Maybe since the loss of one forge master was such a great loss that a guy with a whip , a cross dressing magician,  a pirate, and rebelling teenage(by vampire years) son were able to defeat the almighty Dracula he decided to give the whole forge master plan the boot in successive resurrections, but I digress.

In all fairness the story isn’t THAT bad. For the most part it follows the Lament of Innocence format of throwing you some story information after important boss fights or when entering new areas. Other than the oh-by-the-way introduction of the Devil Forge masters the only hero from Dracula’s Curse that makes an appearance is Trevor, and he’s stabbed later in the game as a way to make you have to fight Dracula when he’s inevitably resurrected.

Control has actually been changed slightly from Lament of Innocence. Instead of using one of the two attack buttons to open doors you use the button on the opposite side of the controller. This takes a bit of getting used to, but it’s no big deal. The moving around was to simplify the attack system. Instead of your usual hard and light attack buttons you have one attack button, and a combo ender button that allows you to spice of your combos. Each weapon has several combos and special attacks that can be fiddled around with, and you’ve got multiple types of weapons this time around. Hector can pick up mineral fragments that enemies drop and combine them to make weapons. Weapons fall into 4 categories Swords, Spears, Knuckles, and the random? category.  The first 3 are self explanatory, and the ? Category carries everything else. ?  Category items range from spiked baseball bats to bludgeoning shields.  Using these weapons are pretty much standard to your 3D action beat em up. Anyone who’s played Devil May Cry, God of War or any other game of that genre will get it.

Anyone who played Lament of Innocence will know that that the biggest problem was the overly repetitive level design. In LOI you spent most of your time fighting through a room of enemies, going down a hall way, fighting a room of enemies, and repeating that.  Normally with a sequel you build on game play of the first while righting the wrongs done by the first. For some strange reason Iragashi decided to think outside the box and make the game’s level design more repetitive and improve on the already decent combat system and oh by the way some monsters in to help you via the ID system.  For the most part this CV functions as a dungeon crawler. You fight your way through the levels (occasionally you have to use a special ability to cross a section) and get to the boss. Since it’s up to combat to make the game more interesting they gave us the earlier mentioned “Innocent Devil System.”  Since Hector used to make minions for Drac it makes sense that he can make his own to help him in his fight against Dracula’s minions. You get about 6 of these critters and they range from being Golem type monsters to fairies. Each of them has multiple transformations depending on the jewels you give it. Jewels can be obtained by killing monsters with a certain weapon. This is an interesting concept, although some ID transformations and more useful than others, and you have to use certain weapons to get them.  It’s a bit troublesome to have to switch between weapons to get certain crystals, and at times the weapon you have to use to get a certain  crystal may mean taking a hit in power which is not what you want when you’re facing a horde of enemies.

All and all Curse of Darkness is a good romp and likely the Castlevania fan, dungeon crawler, or beat um up enthusiast will have fun with it. If you’re a CV freak like me it’s worth the buy especially at the bargain price you can likely find it at now.

Specific Situation Complaint:

Later in the game you must fight Hector’s former friend and fellow devil forge master, Isaac. During certain portions of the fight he’ll summon his own ID which must be killed before you can hurt him. This situation has come up in many games before , but please remember game developers it shouldn’t take me 30 minutes to kill a minion. Issac’s first ID is a flying demon which is very hard to hit thanks to Hectors very heavy jump physics. (pretty much makes all flying monsters in the game a pain) The lock on system will insist on locking onto Issac (who is invincible), and thus drawing the camera away from the real target. Worse still while Isaac is locked on to the flying ID he summoned will fly around bashing you and spitting fire. Meanwhile your own senseless ID will try fruitlessly to attack him thus wasting his own life. It’s really one of those “this shouldn’t be that hard but it is  RAGE moment.” 

Tekken 3

After a long hiatus I'm back at it again and we're firing back up our goal of reviewing all the main series entries of Tekken .

Tekken 3 isn't necessarily my favorite entry in the series, but nonetheless I do believe it is probably the most important. In the storyline 20 years has passed since Tekken 2.  This was essentially Namco's excuse to introduce a new protagonist and make him old enough to fight in a tournament. That protagonist is Jin, the son of previous series protagonist/antagonist Kazuya, and the Tekken 2 newcomer Jun Kazama. Heihachi's Tekken Force uncovers an ancient fighting alien named Ogre who goes around slaughtering worthy fighters (including Jin's mother), so he seeks out Heihachi and together they plan to use the King of Iron Fist 3 to lure Ogre out and defeat him. Of course Heihachi has his own sinister motives, but that's a whole thing altogether.

Tekken 3 was sort of a "refining" Tekken. Due to the 20 year time jump alot of characters were simply too "old" to fight or just disappeared altogether. Most of the clone characters like Kunimitsu and Wang simply disappeared, and most of the Tekken 2 newcomers save Lei Wulong disappeared as well.  Because of this we also see the introduction of what are now series mainstays such as Jin, Hworang, and Bryan Fury.

The series physics have also undergone a major overhaul as well. The more rigid stiff fighting system of Tekken 1 and 2 has been replaced with a more fluid form of movement, as well as even more potential for juggles and the deeper tactics we see in Tekken today.  This sharper system combined with newer slicker graphics drew in the players and made Tekken more mainstream than ever.

Though still not my favorite Tekken alot has to be said about the Playstation port of the game. It effectively builds on the modes and features of Tekken 2's home port and delivers a very meaty home experience. Along with your standard, arcade, practice, and time attack modes, modes like the beat em up styled Tekken Force, and the addition of a theater mode (that lets you use the Tekken 1 and 2 discs if you have them) for in game movies and music are welcome additions that really give you bang for your buck, espeically if you picked the game up for 15$ like I did. There are also two console exclusive characters, but they are very gimmicky, and haven't returned as playable characters since.

All in all Tekken 3 is a very solid entry and a very important one in the series. The only real problem I have (besides from my bias at my old favorite Lee being absent in this one) is that it just feels slightly bland, perhaps because Namco has put so much effort into selling Jin as a character. To be fair Tekken really didn't have a protagonist until 3. Kazuya was in 1 till you found out he was evil in 2, and Heihachi won Tekken 2, but he was never really a "good guy," so shoehorning Jin into this thing, and aging all the other characters 20 years to do it was like a chemo treatment to the series. Good in its own way but at the same time it killed some of what classic Tekken was.

The Massive Mass Effect Fiasco

You knew it was coming. I had to tell you all about just what I thought about Mass Effect 3 and the ending that has seemingly rocked a fan base at its very core.  First off for what its worth ME 3 is not a bad game at all. The story is a solid continuation of the narrative from the first two games. Its also worth noting that the gameplay is also very solid. Mass Effect 2 tightened up the gameplay from the first game and made it into more of a narrative based shooter, and Mass Effect 3 took the best of both worlds . Its much easier to run at angles than in ME2 and though sometimes its spotty you can now run over cover without having to sit down the other way and duck first. Despite this addon  the cover system seems to have gotten much stickier. Often times while attempting other actions I found myself sticking to cover on the side fire was coming from resulting in a few stupid deaths. Also in the stupid death department is the ability to die after you've been "saved by the cutscene" There were a few instances in the game where I completed an objective just in the nick of time only to find that after it finished playing the game gave me the ole critical mission failure screen.

Mass Effect 3 also attempts to rectify the whole disdained mining system from two by having you simply ping planets for objects and then gather anything useful that you find. Its an interesting incentive to search the galaxy, as it gives you war assets that determine your final strength for the final push.

Mass Effect 3 also has a multiplayer mode for the first time in the series. As skeptical as I was to begin with I can honestly say I've spent more time in this mode overall than I have with the main storyline. After finishing the main game and having its ending leave a bad taste in my mouth I've been playing the multiplayer. Its a blast to say the least. Its very simple, you and 3 others against ten waves of enemies, while you try to complete various simple objectives. You can do these games on Bronze, Silver, or Gold and the higher the difficulty the more XP and Credits you'll earn. You can use these credits to buy weapon packs which include weapons, mods, upgrades, and ever new characters. They have also released a free DLC pack called Resurgence, which adds several new weapons and a new character for each class. For the first time we get to actually control the other races in the series and its quite fun. Want to play as a Geth or maybe an Asari? How about classic ME enemy race the Batarians? With the free resurgence pack, you can!

Now about that ending, no I wasn't on the side of those who actually liked it, but as far as the whole fiasco I'm quite surprised something this catastrophic has happened within the fanbase. Games have been giving us less than satisfactory endings since the dawn of the video game narrative, but I don't think one has ever elicited such a fierce backlash .  I won't spoil too much here but the problem I have with is isn't really the route they took with it, but the fact it went so much against the whole your choices matter in the end. I made a point to get nearly 100% of all the war assets and get maximum readiness, but the ending I got was still equally depressing and for the most part the same as the "bad" endings. There are also a few off the wall continuity errors with a certain scene involving your crew as well.

So yeah. The ending may leave a foul taste in the mouth of some because of a lack of influence and continuity errors, but I'd still say its worth the time of a playthrough.  The game has , if anything caused EA To hit the "Bad publicity" spotlight, which may be a positive thing. With all the nickel and diming by EA and other DLC pushers its might be a good wakeup call that the customers can turn things on you if you do something so bad you get enough of them to care.

Tekken 2

By late 1994 Namco had already managed to get Tekken 2 out there to arcade goers. Of all the games I play Tekken 2 is one of my absolute favorites because its everything a sequel should be and a large source of nostalgia for me.

Back when dad was in the arcade business Tekken 2 was one of the games he had that i remember playing quite alot when it was in the shop.  At that time I had never played Tekken 1 but now that I have I can make the comparison call and talk about what it did that was so special.

First off the bat if you had played Tekken 1 you will instantly notice the overhaul the graphics received. Though the characters faces are still largely stoic, the character models and faces have all been redone to make everyone look much smoother.  Even the CGI cutscenes in the game totally overshadow those of the first game. Though most of the CGI endings are short burst showing the characters doing something like they do each one has a ton more personality than those in Tekken 1. Rather than sticking in those ugly sprite backgrounds into alot of the scenes everything is fully rendered and flows much more fluidly than before, you'll find no more of Michelle's odd knee running in this game.

Non graphically speaking the gameplay is still the one step per button tap style, but it all feels much more fluid. Whereas Tekken 1 could get almost sticky feeling at times, Tekken 2 handles its movement system much more better. In this entry we also start to see some of the characters signature moves that they have even still in Tekken Tag 2. Heihachi and Kazuya who were near perfect clones in 1 even start to disseminate themselves slightly, a trend that would be solidified in the great clone character slaughter of Tekken 3 and 4.

All that being said the game manages to bring over all of the original cast, although several of the subbosses got little attention other than being graphically redone. Characters like Kunimitsu, and Ganryu had real potential, but instead they are just mainly clones of their respective rivals, with a few extra moves that they got from the PS1 port of Tekken 1.

All in All Tekken 2 is a monumental entry to the series, and an important game in the early 3D fighting game scene.  I still load it up from time to time to hear those catchy tunes and experience the addicting gameplay.

Skull Girls

Well because I found yet another subject worthy of review I'm pushing on back the Tekken 2 review to next time I run out of ideas to do. Skull Girls has for me been one of those under the radar games. I first heard about it on Gamefaqs a few months ago and made a mental note to pick it up once it dropped and try it out, as I'm always eager to try out any new fighter that hits the market.  Much to my surprise the other day I logged onto the computer to see that it had released the day before. Fortunately I had a few spare points on my XBL account so I dropped them and downloaded the game.

One major selling point of this game right off the bat for me was that it was not only created in part by Konami, but longtime Castlevania series music composer Michru Yamane had  a large hand in the composition of the tunes within.

Skull Girls may feel a bit skimp when one first turns it on. At launch there are only a handful of characters, and sadly the developers did not put move list into the game meaning you'll have to experiment, or go on the developer's website to find out what they are. Gameplay wise it plays like a good ole 2D fighter with an all female but interesting set of characters. They range from your psychotic abomination out for revenge character to your cartoon character inspired crazy gunner type character.

Despite solid gameplay there are a few things that might turn away a newcomer to the fighing genre or maybe less hardcore fighting fans. The very first time I played the game I loaded up the story mode and picked a fun looking character to get a feel for how it played.  I left the difficulty set on normal, but within seconds the CPU destroyed me. I was paired up against Peacock, a very zoning efficient character who ran to the other side of the screen and mercilessly destroyed me with all sorts of spammed projectiles. Probably just a tough character matchup i thought. I'll try someone else. Well I picked another character and once again had it handed to me within seconds . What Skull Girls considers normal is a Normal Difficulty CPU on level 1 unleashes 10 and 15 hit combos , wall stunning, and overall humiliating you. I had to set the CPU to the easy and next to easiest setting to even get something remotely beginner friendly. I realize alot of the people buying this game won't be for single player yes, but if we ever want to increase the player pool a little bit more care should be taken in creating CPU. I almost feel like for a fighting game a dumber CPU (regardless of the difficulty) say something like in Tekken would be more adequate over one that just destroys you and refuses you practice.

Despite the flying sunglasses "deal with it" CPU the game does have one beginner friendly mode and that is the tutorial which will walk you through and test you on everything from walking and jumping to chaining advanced level combos together.  That being said chaining combos in the game in a big part of the gameplay, and unlike alot of Capcom's latest, getting a big showy combo together really isn't too tough. I applaud the game devs for showing you how the chaining works and giving you some examples to work with to help the newbie get started, if only the CPU wouldn't rape them as soon as they decide to actually try some of this stuff.

After having seen all this and clearing all the storymodes I decided to check out the online, and sadly I was disappointed. The online ranked match attempts to join you to an impromptu room, but after several minutes all I was able to find in any region were "room no longer available," and could not connects.  After I finally did get a match the game paired me up for my first match ever with someone who easily destroyed me in about 3 combos and didn't break a sweat. I realize that this is an arcade title but even early XBL arcade ports of other games have ranked systems that match you to the right skill, or let you choose same skill or below you. You can only learn so much from being destroyed before you waste your time. If you want to get better you need to play players near you level to get a feel for the game's system, as well as see what beats what, what works, what does, etc.

Bottom line is Skull Girls worth the 1200 MSP price tag? I'd say yes. Fighting game fans will have alot of fun with this new gem into the foray, and with promise of DLC and probably fixes ahead the game might very well fix some of its flaws. If you're new to fighting games Skull Girls might be worth picking up despite its CPU unfriendliness because of the in depth tutorial system and small number of characters means less to learn overall.