MORE WITCHES!

Witches usually get a bad rap in the media. They're seen as wicked creatures in movies, culture, and occasionally video games.

They're the eaters of children...
Thieves of youth...
And, you know, the wives of Satan.
Though, with the release of Bayonetta, witches have a new angle: Sexy-asskicking-gun-toting-deadly-hair-machines.

After 500 years of containment in a lake, Bayonetta awakens and remembers only fragments of her past. While in search of a valuable gemstones called the "Eyes of the World", Bayonetta starts to piece together her mysterious history with the help of her defeated enemies, a woman with similar moves, and a plucky journalist. She journeys through the city of Vigrid slipping between the world of the supernatural and reality in order to deal with the Angel Clan that is constantly trying to twart our leggy heroine from accomplishing her goals.

Chances are, most people that bought the game bought it for the compelling storyline.
... it's a very well rounded, firm story.

Its a story anyone that plays video games has seen one time or another. Lost past, twists, and mysterious strangers that reappear in the protagonist's life all show up in Bayonetta. Its straight forward and nothing out of the ordinary for a action game.

What shines about Bayonetta is the combat system: fast, furious, and absolutely ridiculous. Punch and kick are the basic moves, but pushed in the right order can chain into different combos that are more effective than punching and kicking at random. Its actually quite easy to appear like you know what you're doing when you're only frantically smashing buttons. And the biggest advantage Bayonetta has over other action games (Lookin' at you, Devil May Cry) is the dodge button. When an enemy takes a swipe at Bayonetta, she can dodge out of the way with a hit of a button. Additionally, if the dodge is well timed, it will activate "Witch Time." Witch Time slows down time for everything but Bayonetta which allows her to wrack up some serious points and quickly kill off enemies.

The hair attacks and sets of weaponry is what makes Bayonetta so much fun. While pulling of a successful string of combos, Bayonetta's fist or leg will manifest as a giant column of hair that ejects from a portal of hell can easily crush enemies. That's only the beginning of the bizarre menagerie of weaponry Bayonetta keeps. To start off, Bayonetta has pistols in her hands and also strapped to her high heels. It is not uncommon for Bayonetta to whip in the air with bullets flying from all four guns simultaneously while spinning in a circle at speed. The weapons only upscale from the pistols. Later in the game, Bayonetta gains shotguns, whip, sword, and many more. Choosing a combination of weapons is entertaining in itself since the player can decide what weapons can go on the feet and which will be held in the hand. In addition, accessories can also be purchased. These give Bayonetta an edge by summoning butterflies to take hits for her, demons to dish out damage, or trading out "witch time" to do additional damage.

Bayonetta also has a magic meter which allows her to activate some accessories or execute "Torture Attacks". These Torture Attacks are quicktimed instant kill or high damage attacks that Bayonetta can perform once her magic is high enough. Said Torture Attacks are constructed as so: full of chunks of gore, a layer of sexy, and topped with humor along the lines of Dead Alive and Evil Dead. A couple of the Torture Attacks made even me, the weirdo gorehound that I am, blush and awkwardly laugh. One in particular was Joy, one of Bayonetta's holy sexy counterparts, is introduced by her being spread eagle and loudly moaning. (Alright, the game is obviously directed by men; confirmed.) The Torture Attack for Joy goes as such: A spiked pummel horse raises from a portal and Bayonetta perches on top of it and swings a chain around her head. The chain lashes out and wraps around Joy's body similar to rope bondage and yanks her to sit on the pummel horse. During this sequence, Bayonetta pushes her foot down on Joy, pushing her deeper onto the spikes until Joy eventually climaxes with glee and splits in two.

Awwwwkard.

While the game works amazing for an action game with great flow and speed, Bayonetta has some flaws. Namely, whenever the game tries to try out anything different other than the combat. In the chapters entitled Route 666 and Isla Del Sol, Bayonetta takes control of a vehicle and is set into an on-rails shooter. Not only are both of the levels lengthy, but they are painfully dull. Route 666 is a never-ending sea of cars and enemies that Bayonetta shoots blindly at while going at top speed. Isla Del Sol, Bayonetta takes to the skies on a rocket and shoots down flying enemies as they whiz by in a third person mode. The huge flaw for this will not effect everyone, but I had a lot of problems with motion sickness. The dodge mechanic in Isla Del Sol spins the screen. Bayonetta needs to dodge a lot in that particular level. I am sure you can see what the problem is.

The game is the right length at about eight hours if its the player's first time through, but it can easily be beaten under three hours. Because of the short time it takes to play through the game, the other difficulties of Bayonetta are much more appealing to beat (especially with the promise of more ridiculously sexy outfits, new accessories and weapons). There are dozens of items and secrets in the game to continue to look for through the different playthroughs.

Bayonetta is a great game because it doesn't take itself seriously. It knows it's gory, sexy, and five levels of campy and it fully embraces that fact (unlike it's butch counterpart, Devil May Cry). Once the player can accept the voluptuous protagonist with all of her hairy beasts and outrageous fights, then a beautiful witch friendship witch relationship will start to blossom...

For now.

Looking back at 2009

It’s a New Year and there are some amazing new games on the horizon...However, I’m following the current trend and taking a look back what I sank my time into in 2009.

Before I go on, I want you to know I went through a whole list of what was released during 2009 and my list of three games exploded into around twenty. So, I’ll spare you and go with my top five.

#5 Left4Dead 2

This really shouldn’t be a surprise. I sank so many hours into the first Left4Dead that this choice really was a no brainer (Dohoho). Left4Dead 2 has access to extra weapons, modes, and new zombie types that really gives a nice shine to already polished game. Plus, I feel that the game significantly jumped up in difficulty (that or my group and I are incredibly rusty). This ensures that Left4Dead 2 will see a lot of play time much like the first.

And openly…

I’M SORRY I DON’T HAVE IT FOR PC! I KNOW IT’S BETTER ON THERE! BUT I DO NOT OWN A PC THAT CAN RUN IT!

#4 Plants Vs Zombies

HI IM BONNIE AND I LIKE ZOMBIE GAMES!

[ahem]

Plants Vs Zombies devoured many hours of my life. I went through the game several times when I first downloaded the game…and then several more time when Steam lost my save data after a reformat on yee olde laptope. Like Left4Dead 2, it has a lot of modes to choose from so the game stays fun and fresh (...for at least the first couple times through. I won't lie, it got pretty stale after the third time to get all the items I had before). I only wished I had screen capped my Endless high score of wave 64 before I lost everything, so I could look somewhat creditable when I state how awesome I was.

(So awesome.)

#3 Uncharted 2

This was really a game I was looking forward to in 2009 and it was well worth the wait. Uncharted 2 was a gorgeous, fun, and addictive game. There were several instances where I debated playing another hour or two or four rather than getting some much needed sleep just to see the next plot point. I still equate the game to watching an Indiana Jones style movie (with exception of Crystal Skulls. We all know that sucked). I'm glad to see this series has some legs, but I'm just hoping that it doesn't start to run stale after the next game. I'm anxious to see what comes next.

#2 Demon’s Souls

Despite being incredibly intimidated by this game at first, I grew to adore it. I became obsessed about finding all the secret items and hidden NPCs in the game. I dug around on the the Demon’s Souls Wikipedia to see what the different events were in the different soul/world tendency (I know, shame on me) and played every side of Demon’s Souls. On top of that, Demon’s Souls was all I could talk about for weeks regardless if anyone had played it or knew what I was talking about (somewhat like other people did to me when Fallout 3 came out). Even now, I feel as if I need to hold back about jabbering on about it once it gets brought up in conversation.

#1 Critter Crunch

Say what you will, but this game was built for me. Critter Crunch was that right amount of challenge and cute that I couldn’t stop play it. This was my “one-more round-game-that-actually-turned-into-5-more-rounds-because-those-last-four-didn’t-count” game. I blew through the adventure mode in a matter of hours and then stuck with the survival mode to get into the top 20. And I’m still rank #17 on the leaderboards. So suck it, nerds. <3 This game is also notoriously bad for making me do the "gamer-mouth-breathing" thing. I always catch myself gawking at the screen after about two hours of play and wondering if anyone caught me doing it.

Sexy.

Honorable Mentions

Resident Evil 5, The Maw, Little Kings Story, Shadow Complex, Monster Hunter Freedom Unite

What were your games?

Shattered Hopes

Admittedly, I’m a bit of a Silent Hill fanatic. I live for its twisted world of macabre creatures and bizarre plots. I currently own all the Silent Hill games despite its recent shortcomings in the recent installments in the series. Each time I pick up a Silent Hill game, I’m always striving to find that same dread I got when I wandered the streets of snowy-foggy Silent Hill and heard the radio spring to life with white noise for the first time. When I played Silent Hill 1-3, I was so freaked out by the imagery, I developed complicated system of turning the lights on and off when I made a mad dash for the safety of my bed and blankets. But, after Silent Hill 3, I haven’t quite found the Silent Hill that has the same terrorizing effect on me. Sadly, even Silent Hill: Shattered Memories has not recaptured the horror I desperately want back in the series.


Silent Hill: Shattered Memories is a retelling of the original Silent Hill plot as first seen on the Playstation. Harry Mason stars in Shattered Memories, awaking from a car accident to find his young daughter, Cheryl, missing from the wreck. Harry begins his search for her in the strange town of Silent Hill. In Shattered Memories, the basic plot structure of the original Silent Hill is still there. The town itself, however, does not hold the same amount of occult horror as it did in the first game. Silent Hill is much like a modern mid-western town during a large snowfall. Everything is caked in snow and the streets are full of vacant cars and void of people. However, during his trek in the snow, Harry is sucked into a nightmarish winter hell where strange creatures relentlessly pursue him. Throughout his exploration of Silent Hill and search of Cheryl, Harry is plagued by doubt and confusions about his life and his daughter.


The game is split up into three parts: Silent Hill, Frozen Nightmare World, and The Worst Psychologist Ever. In Silent Hill, Harry travels through a snowy town interacting with residents and solving puzzles that ultimately brings him closer to Cheryl. The areas have a soft quietness to them, which is both calming and strangely creepy because the locations have a strikingly real quality to them. These qualities are what make the town of Silent Hill such an interesting place to explore.


The Nightmare Mode throws Harry into a frozen landscape filled with humanoid monsters that he cannot kill and all he can do is run in terror. In this world, everything is encased in ice except Harry and his enemies. While the areas are visually chilling, it’s incredibly hard to take in when all Harry can do is flee and hide from enemies. So, the effect is completely lost in the frantic blur of the chase. During these chases, Harry must complete inane tasks in order to move forward. Harry does have the option to hide in certain areas (much like Haunting Ground and Clock Tower), but this option is so ineffective that it feels pointless to ever do it. In this mode, players can look forward to getting lost and dying frequently if they tend to have a bad sense of direction or memory (Yo).


Lastly, we have Dr. Kaufman’s office where he asks the player a number of psychological questions. This is part of the game where it “starts to play you”. By answering these questions and completing tests with the doctor, it changes the world of Silent Hill to build situations based on what the player answered. However, Dr. Kaufman is terrible psychologist. He talks at length about your faults, criticizes everything about your character, and during my playthrough focused WAY too much on sexuality. I understand the concept of putting sex in a game to be edgy or taboo, but after about the fifteenth time talking about the character’s sexuality it becomes mundane and ridiculous.


Where I was excited to see this world of Silent Hill re-visioned, it is loaded with disappointment. Shattered Memories doesn’t hold the chilling fear that the other Silent Hill’s have some grasp on. The monsters are uninspired geometrically shaped meat-puppets that shriek and blindly chase Harry. The Nightmare Mode does offer some interesting effects with the ice, but with the monsters always snapping at Harry’s heels, it’s impossible to take it in unsettling nature of the surroundings (like a car being suspended in a huge block of ice).


Despite the game lacking the certain Silent Hill scary bite, it does bring interesting characters, game mechanics, and plot. Digging into Harry’s past and discovering his true identity is a compelling point to trudge through the tedious Nightmare Mode. Fans may be happy to see some familiar names and faces pop up throughout the game as new characters (I know I was).


The game mechanics are exactly how a survival horror game should be on the Wii. With the wii-mote, the player has control over Harry’s flashlight. It’s a small detail, but it really adds a fun element to the game that really draws in and makes the player feel like they are a part of Silent Hill. Along with the flashlight, the majority of Harry’s actions revolve around his phone. From it, he receives and makes calls and text messages of the bizarre and disturbing kind, take pictures, and access maps. With the wii-mote, the player can choose to have the sound from the phone come through the wii-mote speaker like it were a really clunky cell phone. Another interesting feature is interacting with the monsters in the Nightmare Mode. In order to fling off the monsters that cling to Harry, the player has to throw the wii-mote and the nunchuk to whatever side the monster is on Harry. A bit of a warning to those who are frantic in horror games, you may run the risk of smacking yourself in the face (I’m not admitting to anything).


Silent Hill: Shattered Memories is a game that is loaded with great ideas and incredible failings. The new take on the horror of Silent Hill is an interesting one, but it still is not the Silent Hill that everyone (including myself) is looking for. Perhaps the next re-visioning or the next game in the series will have what it takes to put the horror back in Silent Hill. Until then, I can walk to my bed with the lights off without the trepidation of some grotesque creature trailing behind me.

Guess who's rank 49 on the Critter Crunch Leaderboards on Survival Mode?

Yo.

Don't Wanna Die

Alright, so I may have cheated having Brandon in the room when I went through the first level of Demon's Souls. He had to go through all the cheap deaths before me (there are several of cheap death spots, I might add), so he knows all the ins and outs of area 1-1, Boletarian Palace. I'm playing through as a Magician which gives me a lot of MP and a few spells right out of the gate, but makes it incredibly easy to die fast since I have incredibly low health.


Before I go any further, I think I should go over WHY this dark fantasy action RPG is so insanely hard (and why it's probably a bad idea for me to play). Demon's Souls punishes you for dying. Not only do you start at the beginning of the level each time you die, you also lose your physical body, possibly make the enemies in the area harder, and you also lose all your demon souls (which allows you to purchase items, spells, and level up.). Losing your physical body causes you to be in "soul form" which halves your health and causes you to inflict less damage to enemies If you die so many times in a level, you may start to shift the world's tendency. A darker world tendency can make the enemies much harder, but they do start dropping better items. A light world tendency makes the enemies easier to kill, but item drops are pretty blah. And finally, when you die, you lose all of your souls. However, the game gives you a chance to regain the lost demon souls. You can run to the spot where you died to pick them up; no harm, no foul. That being said, it is very easy to die along the way to retrieve them. If you die a second time on your way to pick up your payload of souls, you will lose them all.

So, knowing all that, I was incredibly paranoid about playing through the first portion of the game. What I ended up doing is looking back at Brandon every few steps, waiting for the okay to move forward. After a while, he'd clam up and made me make my own mistakes. Luckily that didn't get me killed. It wasn't until I was fairly far into the level when he started to crack a knowing smile.

Guess whose paranoia shot through the roof.

"Is this okay? Is there something around that corner? What? What?"
"No, no, no. You're fine. Actually, just look around the corner."
"What? Why? What's... What's around there? Are you trying to get me killed?"
"You'll see."
"You're trying to kill me. What's behind there? Oh god, what's there?"
"No, you won't die, just don't charge through the doorway."

When I peeked around a ledge and ...

Around said corner is not one, but two dragons that do about 3,000 damage with one fireball.

I have 400 health.

Unfortunately, I can't find an image to really illustrate how BIG these things are (Clint Eastwood showed up a few times though), but I ended up standing there for a minute, just gawking. Then, it dawns on me. What are they doing here anyway?

"You'll want to run across this next bridge real fast."
".... Oh god."

And sure enough, as soon as I touched the first brick of the bridge, I heard the dragon screech and blast fire on the enemies that occupied it. I had about 2000 souls and I had already been pushing my luck in this level; too many close calls and lucky shots. I doubt I could regain my souls if I died here. I made a break for it after the dragon does another buzz by. I made it. In fact, I made it through the whole level without dying. A feat that I probably won't be able to replicate EVER again.

That was my first adventure in Demon's Souls. I'll have to see how the next one goes without Brandon's advice and me complaining that I don't want to die every two seconds to him. Hell, it might be worth recording.

We'll see.

And we'll see if any of my luck holds on the next area.

responsibilities

Yes, there are a number of games that I've been powering through the past couple of weeks. Yes, there are a number of things that should have taken priority over said games. But, c'mon, what would I be if I didn't shirk my responsibilities every once in a while? (A responsible adult, hurhur).

The two big games that have been consuming my time are Uncharted 2: Among Thieves and Critter Crunch.

To answer a big question: No, I have yet to play the multiplayer yet. I cannot comment on how good or bad it is. Supposedly though, it's amazing and I'm apt to believe that after playing through the single player campaign.


The ads for this game are incredibly accurate (you know, aside from the dumb broad that can't tell a game from a movie). For all intensive purposes, I played a ten hour Indiana Jones-esque movie-game hybrid. The camera angles give an amazing perspective and depth to the game. In the first ten minutes, my jaw was FLOORED at climbing up a train car that was dangling over a cliff. I had no idea what was going on (and I'm not about to spoil it for you), but there's the beloved Nathan Drake dangling at the end of this train car and has to climb up to the top of the cliff edge to safety. The camera pans upward so you can look down at Drake and see the massive DROP below him.

Uncharted 2 eventually takes you to Tibet through daring escapes, ruthless gunfights, and massive puzzles. Several chapters of the game have that very same tension as it does at the beginning. Dizzying heights and impossible jumps are littered throughout the game without becoming repetitive or boring.

The characters are amazing and as lovable as ever. They really make the story come alive. Not to say the story is terrible, but I wouldn't call it mind blowing or anything either. However, I could listen to the characters banter for hours, which luckily for me, they do. There's a lot of Drake talking to himself or shooting a snarky comment to whoever is near him.

... And plus, Claudia Black voices Chloe. (Lady in Farscape, Pitch Black AND briefly in Hercules). I got too giddy when I first heard that she was in the game. Probably too excited to really comment on. But anyway, this is just a combination of awesome right here: great actors, amazing cinematography, and an interesting story. Even if you haven't played the first Uncharted (shame on you, if you haven't), Uncharted 2 can be played separately and still be an enjoyable experience.


Speaking combinations of awesome, Critter Crunch has had me saturated in it's cuteness and color for weeks.


This game fits all the requirements of my "ultimate gaming equation". (And to quote a friend after seeing the loading screen, "You WOULD like this game.")

The game focuses on Biggs, a furry blob of cuteness(Adorable). Biggs shoots smaller creatures into larger creatures, who gobble them up until they explode into gems(+Puzzle Game), which, Biggs eats. You can chain up combos that allow you to fill up your "Hunger Meter" so Biggs can move on to different areas and bust out some impressive dance moves at the end of each level. (+ Sweet Dance Moves). The puzzles are set up in columns so the creatures Biggs has to pop are always slowly moving down toward him. If they reach the bottom, it is curtains for our adorable little hero as the creatures he usually pops bum rush him.

The adventure mode has a mixture of the basic gameplay, puzzles, and challenges. In this mode, you only need to fill your hunger meter to move on. However! This mode also allows Biggs to feed his son, Smalls. After popping eight creatures or more in one move, Smalls shows up to be fed. Biggs can barf up RAINBOWS to feed his kid and allows YOU to earn a sweet bonus as well as meeting a requirement for the stage. No joke, rainbows.(+This) The creatures are attracted to the colorful vomit and move down faster as Biggs feeds Smalls.


... And they usually jump Biggs (thus me losing) while I'm playing, because I *have* to get the little bastard fed in one move.


"YOU'RE KILLING ME, SMALLS!" and restarting the stage again is usually the end result of most levels. Because, you know, I can't just finish the puzzle without feeding Smalls.

I have since powered through both games, still leaving Fatal Frame 3 and ICO unfinished. Eh-heh! Someday, I'll quit kidding myself and say I won't finish them, but until then, I'll probably have them finished by next time I post. Look for an update on Demon's Souls sometime soon. It's sure to be a colorful commentary because of the game's difficulty and MY lack of patience.

Good to be King

The Wii has finally been seeing some good games floating its way lately. Muramasa: The Demon Blade and Dead Space: Extraction are being played on and off from the last time I updated. Both are well constructed games, but neither have really sucked me into that dreaded “One more hour mode.”…Until I came across Little King’s Story. There was a span of time that was lost to me. One minute, it was only 10:00 PM and then the next time I glanced at the clock; 3:00 AM. Little King’s Story sucks you into its world with an interesting combination of real time strategy, action, and a cute cow that delivers messages of woe.

Little King's Story follows the tale of a young boy and the building of his kingdom. The young boy is lured from his home by a family of pesky rats and eventually finds a crown and scepter. With these, he can command anyone to listen to him and proceeds to assemble his own little kingdom of Alpoko. At his side, he has a Howser and his trusty cow, Pancho, Liam the Minister of Anything, and Verde the Minister of Records. With these allies, The Little King faces against seven kings in order to unite the world and save the seven princesses that they have captured. His loyal subjects guide him in the right direction and give him helpful hints along the way.

While the story seems cut and dry, it has adult themes despite how adorable everything in the game appears. Science versus religion comes up frequently. Questions about tyranny begin to rise as your little king starts to conquer other kingdoms: Is he really uniting the world or simply dominating it? The topic of Armageddon eventually rises up in the game to bring another surprisingly bleak outlook. It’s not to say the game isn’t filled with the standard Nintendo cuteness, but around the edges you can start looking into the other themes. What Little King’s Story offers should be pulling in a more adult audience, but with the way it’s initially present will have a lot of children lost in its complexity.

That being said, there is a boss in the game that throws poo at you.

The game combines real time strategy, action adventure, and SIM elements into one package. You can gather various townspeople to your side to dig holes, kill enemies, and unlock different areas for you (similar to Pikmin). In turn, you can gain different items which are worth a certain amount of Bol (the game's currency) and expand your kingdom to gain even more citizens. Your Little King starts off with a simple entourage of farmers and grunts that can get the job done, however, different classes of citizens become available. Later on, you can bolster up your numbers with veteran soldiers, ripped miners, manly lumberjacks, and several other classes with special abilities.

You will need these different classes to tackle the various bosses and enemies in the game. Little King’s Story offers a number of different boss fights that keep the game interesting. My concern at first was that all the boss battles would be the same hum-drum of launching as many soldiers as I could, as fast I could until it was beaten to death or all my army was taken out. Luckily, I was proven wrong. The majority of the boss fights have some gimmick to them. One boss fight you play as a pinball game. The other is a race against the clock to reach a top of a mountain. Another is a memory/geography quiz game. It’s not to say that the game doesn’t have beat ‘em up enemies. A number of special monsters in the game make you plan strategically in order to bring them down effectively and without losing any of your men in battle.

This leads into the next section of the game. Early on in LKS, you have the option to build a suggestion box for your people. This allows your citizens to voice their complaints and compliments as well as setting you up with some quests. Most quests are going out to conquer various enemies to either earn Bol or clear out areas to expand your kingdom. The rest are story quests and requests from your royal advisory staff.

As a whole, the game (enemies, heroes, and world) has a very storybook quality to it. During the cut scenes, the imagery turns into a picture book illustrated done in watercolors. The style, with big headed characters, is cute and takes the edge off tough enemies and darker themes of the game making it more of a zen experience. Another interesting design choice of the game is the music; it is all public domain. So, it was not uncommon to hear The Sugar Plum Fairy or Hall of the Mountain King. The public domain music gives a unique soundtrack from older songs that could have been heard at a childhood age for most of the gamers to, again, play off this notion of a storybook-like game.

In general, Little King’s Story is a fun exploration/RTS/SIM game. It has interesting boss fights, a somewhat intriguing story, and a darling world filled with equally darling characters and enemies. It’s a world worth exploring and possibly staying up until the early morning hours just to give your little king that extra push into glory.