Father K's January "Wii Related Round Up..."

First of all, an apology to those of you who occasionally stop by the place... There's been very little to read of late... There are a number of reasons for this, however. Firstly, the old Wii has been somewhat eclipsed by the arrival of the 360 here in Krishna Towers, with Bioshock totally consuming all my gaming time of late... I've completed it now, and I have to say it has been one of the bestgaming experiences I have ever had... For a nice video review of this lovely game, look here...

The Wii has made a triumphant return of late however, with my first taste of playing Umbrella Chronicles co-op with a friend and two Wii zappers, and I have to say it's great fun! The only irksome thing about the experience would have to be that playing with the Zapper actually makes the game harder! How so? Two reasons really! Firstly is having to curl your finger around the Zapper to get to the 'A' button, vital for picking up herbs, first aid sprays, Umbrella memos and weapon upgrades... It feels awkward and uncomfortable while your other finger is on the trigger.

Secondly, shaking the Wiimote to fend off zombies that have you in their clutches, and also as a means of avoiding boss attacks and getting through QTE's is vital to progression in the game. But plug that Wiimote into the Zapper and it becomes impossible. The whole thing becomes very frustrating and led yesterday to me and my friend abandoning the game before we even reached the Spencer Mansion. Disappointing really...

Still, Link's Crossbow Training has shown how perfectly the Zapper can work as a Light Gun, and as this genre is one of my favourite in gaming, I'm not giving up on it just yet... With that thought in mind, it is wih some excitement that I look forward to the Wii's next two Light Gun offerings, Ghost Squad and House Of The Dead 2&3 Return (Please click on the titles to go to Sega's Official Sites for each game...)

Ghost Squad is a Confidential Mission style anti-terrorist shoot 'em up. Your mission is to save the world by blasting as many of the pesky so and so's as possible. And they rather obligingly throw themselves into your path, so you can blast away to your heart's content. The arcade perfect port looks very promising indeed!

House Of The Dead 2 & 3 Return is something of a lazy port, combining as it does HOTD2 (first seen on The Dreamcast) and HOTD3 (first appearing on the original Xbox.) No extra features, no graphically polished original HOTD (one of the Saturn's finest games, and the title which kicked off the franchise...) Is it worth your money then? Well yes and no... I won't be parting with any money for a full price purchase, I'll wait till the price comes down... And I won't allow myself to buy it until Umbrella Chronicles is well and truly completed. But as it's perhaps the greatest Light Gun game ever, I'll definitely be buying it at some point...

In fact it looks like 2008 is going to be a bit of a stellar year for the Wii with Street Fighter 4, No More Heroes, NiGHTs and even a sequel to the marvellous, (though much maligned) Red Steel. Watch this space!

Red Steel U-Turn!

What can I say? I'm grateful for any readers I can get on any of my blogs, but DAMN! How many U-Turns can I make? The latest is Red Steel... Having wavered and sat on the fence about Red Steel, now I'm doing a complete U-Turn! I love this game!!!

Story? Well the story is pretty standard, you're an L.A. Cop about to marry the daughter of a Japanese Yakuza boss, only on the eve of your wedding, they get kidnapped!!! You then have to battle your way through the game to get them back! Of course you're gonna have to travel from L.A. to Japan, slash and shoot your way through a variety of unfamiliar environments, battle Yakuza and gangsters, and win back your loved one! As a gaijin, you're not going to be well received, but the boss has entrusted you with his sacred katana, so you'll be alright! (See what I'm doing here? I'm dropping in Japanese words like I know shit... And I don't know SHIT!)

Graphics? Well here's the deal... I recently bitched on the Dreamcast Junkyard about how these graphics weren't a patch on Shenmue, which was a last-gen title produced on an older system, over six years ago!... and thats true! The graphics on the Dreamcast's Shenmue far excede this game's, but the money that went into Shenmue, far excede the money that went into Red Steel, and besides, Red Steel is more about the gameplay, more of which later... Ubisoft focused on the control system and it's swordman's-ship... So we'll concentrate on that for now... In a recent video review from IGN that I watched, they accused the graphics of being abit "carboardy"... Now I know that's not a real word but I understand what they were talking about... The cut scenes are 2D animations (and the loading times are criminal), but as a contrary mofo, I'll postulate that within the context of the game they work!!

Musical score? OK! One of the best musical score of any game I've ever played! The only score that can fit the bill as well, in any media I've ever experienced would be the musical score for the Matrix! (And that was damn fine!!!) There's plenty of J Pop (which I've come to love through J and Elderly) sprinkled into the mix, as well as excellent anonymous 'action music' that springs into life whenever you've got a Yakuza battle on your hands... Did I mention my love of all things Japanese? Since playing Shenmue, I've been a Japanophile... I love the language, the culture, the rendered Cityscapes, the neon signs in Japanese... BASICALLY EVERYTHING!!!!!!!!!

Gameplay? Stunning! This is a FPS peeps, and usually that would have me turning off any console at the start... But somehow I've managed to get past my aversion on this game... I love only being able to see my forearms! Wether carrying a sword or wielding an Uzi, it just feels so RIGHT! You've got a forgiving "checkpoint" game save system, so you never have to replay too much if you fuck up...

Control System? Let's move on! The Wii-mote is your point and click gun, and also your sword... Your nunchuck helpfully reloads your gun, and acts as a parrying, defensive smaller sword... If your arsenal is running low, step over any weapon that you've already got and your bullet count is increased... Better weapon presents itself, and you can swap! Basically, as you progess through the game, you can increase your weapon stash! Which is good! You've got a lot of enemies to fight! And sword fighting is just great! Use your Wii-mote to hack and slash, your nunchuck to defend and parry... Once you've played a bit this becomes intuitive and you can defeat the most hardcore bosses...

Oh! and I forgot to mention that I'm playing this game using the official strategy guide? For those of you that don't know what that is, it's a walkthrough that is published by the game developer, but you have to pay for! But I didn't! I got mine for free! When I bought Red Steel, I grabbed a strategy guide off the shelf to help me through my quest. Due to a till/register fuck up, the price came up as 1p! And the dude behind the counter gave it me for free!! Happy days!

Links? OK, to create some kind of context and perspective, I'll need to post a few! For better reviews look here, here and here...

And BTW! Can I just say that this is a vastly inferior review than the one that Blogger fucked up! Despite the new auto-save feature Blogger is still a cunt! DON'T TRUST BLOGGER! I'm going on vacation for two weeks to my Lighthouse in Wales, I'm taking my PS2 and DS, so I'll post some reviews of games on those consoles when I get back! Happy days!

Red Steel - Ubi Soft
Uploaded by Luciole_Keikoku

Red Steel: first Thoughts...

Wow! I played through the first two levels of Red Steel today! It's quite something! I have to say however, that the Wii so far hasn't grabbed me completely yet! I'm still dividing my time equally between all my older systems... It's significant that I've bought the Wii classic controller and Resident Evil for the Gamecube to play on my Wii.

I would suggest that (like Samba De Amigo), the motion sensor element of the Wii is better utilised with friends than on your own. The games such as Wii Play, Wii Sports or Warioware Smooth Moves will be great and "revolutionary" in terms of gaming. It will bring in non-gamers who like to play charades at parties etc. through the element of it being a silly physical experience that we can laugh at.

But Red Steel would be an equally good experience with a standard controller! (I'm going to whisper the next bit...)
I'd be equally happy with a PS3 or 360. I might change my mind as I get more familiar with the control system, but for now I'm happy with my Wii, but not blown away by it.

Having said that, it took me a long time to get into my DS.Originally I plumped for the PSP. Now I would as soon have a PSP as herpes... I'm a massive advocate of the DS, I think that it is indeed a truly revolutionary piece of kit...
Maybe I'll feel the same about the Wii in a few months time...