NEOGEO Battle Coliseum

NEOGEO Battle Coliseum brings together fighters from the various NEOGEO franchise games, pitting them against each other in a tournament to bring down a corporate empire known as WAREZ. The concept of this title is very much like the Capcom Vs. series games or even The King of Fighters (although the latter title is incorporated into this game). Characters making appearances span across a number of series including King of Fighters, Art of Fighting, Fatal Fury, World Heroes, King of Monsters 2, Metal Slug, Samurai Shodown, The Last Blade,  and Aggressors of Dark Kombat.

Like most other fighters on the market, this there isn't really a whole lot of depth behind the plot. But lets be realistic for a second, most of us don't pick up these kinds of games for the story. The real interest factor lies in the ability to pick up a controller and lay into other players without having to remember where you left off last.

The graphics are very retro relative to many other fighters on the market. While this is a PS2 and XBox 360 Arcade title, the graphics are very noticeably behind what you would expect to see in a series such as Tekken or Street Fighter. With that being said, I don't see the graphics as being a bad thing. Having the old NEOGEO, SNES, Dreamcast, PSX, character sprites brings nostalgia to the gameplay and a much more simplified features for a fighter.

While there aren't a great deal of unlockable features/characters in this game, it is still a great title nonetheless. The potential to really enjoy this game really lies in playing with friends. Being a huge King of Fighters fan and having a younger brother who is all about Street Fighter, NEOGEO Battle Coliseum was a title that we could really get into when looking for variety when playing fighters.

Bakugan: Battle Brawlers

I have to open this post by saying that I picked this game up for a steal price. While walking through my local Wal-Mart this weekend I saw in the PS3 section that Bakugan Battle Brawlers on PS3 was sitting in the case with a $1 price tag on it. I know, I thought it was a typo too. I was expecting it to ring in for $10 and figured something went wrong with the printing. Turns out though that it scanned in for $1!!!!!!

Now that I have gotten that part out of my system.....I have had the chance to spend a couple of days playing this game now. My first reactions to it as someone who has not had the time to watch the series yet, great game! There is not too complicated of a learning curve when playing Bakugan Batte Brawlers. In terms of complexity, it is very much reminiscent to Yu-Gi-Oh! Forbidden Memories on PSX.

Essentially the objective of the game is to win Bakugan battles by throwing your Bakugan into the arena and trying to get it to land on cards placed face down known as Gate Cards. The person who collects three Gate Cards through the battle wins. Gate Cards can be won in one of two ways, either you land two of your Bakugan Cores on the same card, or you and one of your opponents throw a Bakugan Core onto the same card and then the monsters inside the core battle.

An interesting element to this game is the need to use power up cards in order to increase G-Power for battles. This adds a large strategy element to the game and doesn't always play into the favor Bakugan who have higher G-Power base stats. G-Power can be obtained through small mini-game challenges before the battle giving weaker Bakugan an advantage. Mini-games are randomly selected (unless specific game cards are used) between 1) Controller shaking challenge; 2)Timing challenge; and 3) Shooting challenge.

Something that I found helped to keep the game interesting was the ability to have 1 on 1; 2 on 2; and battle royal style battles in this game. This obviously creates the opportunity to play this game with 4 players. When playing these modes with the computer, I dind't find the AI to be ridiculously easy or too hard, although I imaging that once I have had some more time to become better acquainted with this game the AI will start to bore me.

The shop aspect of the game gives some incentive for replay of matches. By winning points your world ranking increases, as does your cash flow. Having more cash allows you to buy Bakugan and cards, increasing the customization options for your deck. Each elemental property has the same Bakugan to choose from. A big part of what makes the game interesting is how you choose to employ elemental combinations. Your character is also customizable in appearance creating another element of personal connectedness to the game for some.

My overall verdict of this game is that for $1 is was definitely worth it. I would have been willing to pay the $18 that it was listed for previously. Bakugan Battle Brawlers has peaked my interest to the anime series as well as to the newer Bakugan Defenders of the Core game.

Oneechanbara: Bikini Samurai Squad

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to be a girl? Well, for most girls, that would be a no... since they are already one. For most guys, probably not for any good reason. How about being a Super Saiyan? For anyone who follows Dragon Ball Z/ GT, that is a may be. BUT, how about playing as a Super Saiyan girl (no, not like Pan who doesn't seem to have the ability to transform) while wearing close to nothing AND slashing things with your katana? Now, we are getting somewhere.

I'm going to be honest here; what prompt me to give this a try is what got every guy to give this a try. By the way, the key word here is "try". Despite all of the negative reviews I have come across, I still tossed this into the 360 and checked it out for myself.

So I am currently at Chapter 6 out of 20 which should only take about 1 hour or so to get to, my Aya (older sister) is at level 72 and Saki (the younger) is 17. However, instead of focusing on the story, which isn't much, I want to talk about other aspects of it.

Let's start with the voice acting. What's up with a game that has the text translated while the verbal dialogue is still in Japanese as in not dubbed over? My only guess is that no actresses wanted to part take in such a game or if they have people, the developer is afraid of ruining the game? Aside from that, there are your emotions in the tune and the voice acting from the actresses, etc. So not much to say other than that.

The other aspect that I want to mention is the Survival mode that allows you to train your characters (so far, I only have three) and to stock up items in which you can bring into the Story mode. This is definitely an interesting feature, which I would actually give praise to in having. It is also something that I don't recall seeing in many games. I have spent about 12 hours in the Survial mode leveling up the two sisters. All that training pays off in boss fights in the Story mode.

Another unique detail of this game is that you actually have to clean your katanas every so often so they won't get stuck in those zombies you try to cut up. This feature I guess would be your equivalent to your reloading guns? It actually kind of make sense from a realistic point of view, though I have knowledge in that area.

As mentioned above about being Super Saiyan, I am referring to the "Rampage mode". If you are using either Aya or Saki after chopping and slashing enough zombies you will go into the Rampage mode, what I would call Super Saiyan. Why I call this Super Saiyan is because that you become so powerful that you can cut through your enemies with one slash. How awesome is that!? Well, it can actually make the rest of the game pretty boring if you stay in this mode.
Lastly, there is the Dress Up mode. It's ironic when boys were younger they would take no interest in playing dress up with girls or would ever want to get caught playing dress up with a female doll like Barbies. So why is this created? It's because this is a service to the fans, which your typical normal gamers would NOT understand until you do some research on this sub-culture character - Aya. I personally probably won't really go in depth with this mode since you actually have to play through this game in length and through different difficulties and accomplish a lot of things in order to change your character: hair colours, eye colours, clothing, accessories, etc.; which will require more time than I intend to spend on this game and on stuff I really don't care too much about.

Now all the being said, I'm going to try and actually get to level 100 before wipping through the rest of the Story mode because I really don't feel like fighting through waves of boring zombies but I do want to know what happens at the end. If you feel like playing dress up virtually, playing as a female super saiyan equiped with katanas while killing zombies mindlessly, sure, go ahead and give this a try as well.

P.S. in trying to keep this PG, I excluded images on this post because you can easily search a ton of them online so if you must, go Google them yourself.

Samurai Warriors 2

For those of you who have played any games in the Warriors Series, it should be obvious that there haven't been significant changes in each release beginning with Dynasty Warriors 2. With the huge success of the Dynasty Warriors series, which were based around the Three Kingdoms era in China, KOEI released a similar series based on feudal Japan called.......Samurai Warriors.

Samurai Warriors 2 boasts the same atttributes as the first in the series which is essentially the same hack-n-slash, button mashing gameplay that we can expect from the Warriors games. The only real changes between this game and the first is that they have added some new characters and changed a few of the levels. There is also shop function in the game, which allows players to collect gold through the game to use for upgrading weapons, items, and characters. This has added an element of strategy to the game, since it now allows players to have some more control over their characters attributes and weapons. Previous games in the series caused players to have to repeat levels an endless number of times in order to acquire stronger weapons.

With each new release of the warriors games, there tends to be small improvements. I can personally say that I haven't picked one up yet that has not been an improvement, even minor, than its predecessor. KOEI has found a real calling with this series, and as they have demonstrated in newer releases such as Dynasty Warriors Strike Force, they are seeking new ways to add innovation to the simple hack-n-slash genre.

Metal Saga

So as I mentioned in an earlier post, I really wished that they would make an open ended RPG much like Saga Frontier. It looks like my wish came true. Metal Saga on the Playstation 2 is very much the same idea of creating your own parties and following the story that the player wants to follow. Instead of just running around with a character and doing combat using only special super human abilities like many of the RPGs out now, this game allows the player to create their own tank or vehicle to pilot during combat. Running around the world map is also done using vehicles. One of the things I really love about this game is the ability to uncover better tanks as you progress through the game. Much like Saga Frontier, if a player knows where to find certain characters, then can make a strong party early in the game before even getting into the story. This same concept is available in Metal Saga when it comes to uncovering tanks. A player can use some more powered up tanks early and put more of their earnings in the game into buying better equipment for these tanks early on.

In terms of the battle style, party selection, and even customization, another great PS2 title that allow for the same gameplay is MS Saga: A New Dawn. This is essentially the same concept of game as Metal Saga except instead of tanks, characters use Mobile Suits from the various Gundam series (hence the MS in the name). Although I haven't beaten this game yet, it has not disappointed me thus far. There is also not the same kind of long time commitment every time you sit down to play that we find in many newer RPG games. If you are in for a light time passing gameplay period or down for a hardcore marathon of play, Metal Saga can deliver on both fronts.

Warriors Series

I addressed part of the warriors series in a previous post (Dynasty Warriors Gundam 2). In this post I will look at the other parts of the series (Dynasty, Samurai, Orochi). Pretty much all three of the sagas in the series follow the same pattern of hack and slash hundreds of peons on a fixed map. Although I do love killing as many things on a screen as I can, I have tended to find the gameplay of this series fairly linear. From each version (Dynasty Warriors 3-6, Samurai Warriors 1-2, Warriors Orochi 1-2) of the series, KOEI tends to find that adding a few new characters constitutes and new release title. The gameplay itself does not vary a whole lot. Although the large selection of characters seems to keep us coming back for more. The gameplay can be a little tedious at times, especially since some levels can take up to 45 minutes to complete depending on which objectives you are trying to fulfill.

With each new release in the Dynasty and Samurai series, we usually find and Xtreme legends disc following shorty afterwards to provide us with a few remixed levels, new armor, and often a character or two. For the most part, this series has tended to be quite successful despite its repetitive gameplay. The one thing that was pretty cool though was the crossover in the Warriors Orochi series. Although the story line sucked to all hell, the fact that there were 77 characters to chose from in the first one was enough to keep me wanting to play.

KOEI also switched things up by adding in a 3 person team system with tactics encompassing speed, technique, and power. This allowed for players to rotate their characters during gameplay to recharge musou (special) and health gauges.

I would imaging that KOEI will continue to launch these titles as more and more games are releasing for the next gen consoles. I would venture to guess that I will probably be dead before the series as during my funeral Dynasty Warriors 100 will be coming out (I'm joking).

For the most part, if you are a fan of hack and slash games with minimal brain work then this series is definitely what you want to look at.

Dynasty Warriors Gundam 2

This is easily my favorite game on the PS3. I know that many of the reviews out there describe the Dynasty Warriors series as a repetitive hack-n-slash game. I will be the first to admit that there is an element of repetitiveness in this game, along with pretty much all the other Dynasty Warriors/Warriors game. What appeals the most to be about this series and Dynasty Warriors Gundam/DW Gundam 2 is the patience needed to beat the game in its entirety. Of course any individual could pick up the controller, and button mash the square until they have gone through all 6 missions. Where I think this game shines for true gamers is the ability to sit and repeat levels, using some of the crappiest suits and achieve high scores along with the level 4 ranked parts. Also the ability to customize your parts allows for some pretty interesting co-op play and versus matches as players can develop their mobile suits to suit their strengths.

Essentially in this game you have the ability to explore a series of maps where you will take out enemy commanders and conquer different fields to gain advantage in your battle. The new thing that has been added to this game that is really nice is the friendship system. Basically when you kill certain pilots or even encounter them as enemies, your relationship with them changes. As you build different relationships with characters new levels and suits become unlocked. This makes beating the game a little more challenging as you cannot unlock all of the levels with just one character from the outset.

Now my opinion of this game may be a little biased. Gundam is my favorite anime series and I do tend to look past many of the flaws in the games that others would be quick to point out. The reality is that regardless of the game, you will have people who hate it and people who love it. I tend to find that ratings of games are not always the greatest representation of my enjoyment factor when playing a games. I have played games with a 10 out of 10 and hated them and played games that are a 2 out of 10 and loved them. The whole thing comes down to your own style of games and where you emphasize as your areas for enjoyment.