Tag Archive: nintendo


Pokémon Sun/Moon review

Filed under: EGM (Electronic Gaming Monthly), Written — Leave a comment
November 29, 2016

I’ve been playing Pokémon games for nearly 20 years now, and have loved almost every second of them. As exciting as all the changes I’ve seen have been over that time, some things have remained steadfastly the same. But, with the release of Pokémon Sun/Moon, many of those seemingly untouchable pillars of the Pokémon universe have been changed—resulting in the freshest game the series has seen since its early days, and possibly the best yet.

Sun/Moon begins like many other games in the series. You wake up at home, and your mom tells you to go meet the local professor to begin what will surely turn out to be another fantastical Pokémon adventure. Unlike in others game, you’re the new kid on the block here, having just moved to the new region of Alola from Kanto (the region from the original Red/Blue Pokémon games). Breaking from what you may be used to from the franchise’s previous locations, Alola doesn’t have eight gyms for you to defeat. Instead, you’ll travel to four islands—each overseen by a Kahuna and their Captains who serve as gatekeepers to the powerful Guardian Pokémon on each island—and conquering them all is your primary challenge.

Because of your character’s roots in Kanto, Sun/Moon has a lot of callbacks to that original region—as well as other previous Pokémon games—with cameos galore from both characters and Pokémon alike. No other Pokémon game up to this point has been as self-aware of the universe in which the games take place, and it makes the region feel bigger than it is because of the influences from each previous game manifesting themselves in different ways. It also drips of nostalgia, giving long-time fans something to get excited about when they recognize obscure references, while potentially filling in the blanks for newcomers that want to learn more about those earlier generations. A perfect example might be the new nefarious group of Pokémon snatchers named Team Skull, who are more incompetent and comical than the original Team Rocket, but whose modus operandi falls alarmingly in line with the Kanto crooks and less with the world changing extremists of later titles.

Alola may take some cues from previous games, but in many ways it has a dynamic all its own that might actually make it my new favorite region in the series. Part of that comes from the fact that Sun/Moon is again pushing the 3DS’ graphical boundaries. While X/Y offered the first polygonal graphics in a Pokémon game, there was still a lot of grid-based movement. Sun/Moon finally does away with this altogether (while also smoothing out some of those rough polygonal edges), giving your character the full 360-degrees of freedom to move around as you would in most modern games. Making most of the game incompatible with the 3DS’ stereoscopic 3D effect likely helped to boost the graphical power, and I, for one, did not miss it. The camera still remains out of the player’s control to help keep items and secrets hidden via perspective shifts, but this was a huge step forward to making the world of Pokémon feel even more alive and vibrant.

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There is also the aforementioned Kahunas and Captains, who give a shot in the arm to the old gym system. Instead of just battling your way to the top of each gym and then taking on the Elite Four, Sun/Moon offers up a wide variety of gameplay beyond battling. Each Captain will place you on a trial that involves battling at some point, but which also require you to solve some sort of puzzle, such as collecting the ingredients for a recipe or needing to pass a memory exam. Only then will you be able to take on their Guardian Pokémon in a fierce battle that will reward you with a Z-crystal—proof of you conquering the trial and your proficiency as a trainer, which also unlock more areas of Alola. Once an island’s Guardians and Captains are behind you, you’ll then face the island Kahuna as you try to conquer the four corners of Alola.

Speaking of Z-crystals, they’re just the first of several major changes to the battle system. Besides taking the place of traditional gym badges in how they prove your mettle as a trainer, they also unlock special moves for your Pokémon. While there are Z-crystals representing each of the 18 Pokémon types, there are also lesser ones meant for specific Pokémon like Pikachu, Snorlax, or the three new starter Pokémon. A Z-crystal move can only be used once per battle for your entire team, so choosing when and what Pokémon to use it for adds an extra level of strategy that goes far deeper than X/Y’s Mega Evolutions. My only wish now is that Pokémon could carry two items, because it sure is hard to take a Z-crystal away from a Pokémon unless you definitely know what you’re going up against in the next battle.

Another major change in combat is how the UI now provides a chart showing stat changes (like if you’ve been hit with Growl and your Attack has fallen) and what moves are strong against what Pokémon. The stat changes are depicted via a series of arrows, which could be better if we were given actual number changes—but it definitely helps if it’s a back and forth bout. At first, I admit I was leery about the idea of the game just telling me what moves were effective and what ones weren’t, but I suppose it falls in more in line with what a Pokédex is supposed to do. With so many Pokémon and types changing from game to game, most people were probably heading to Google every few minutes to look up a Pokémon they were unfamiliar with anyway.

My only issue with it is that it doesn’t go far enough. You need to capture or beat a Pokémon first before getting that information on your second encounter with it, whether in battle or in the wild. Why not just give people those stats from the start? Ash’s Pokédex in the cartoon gives him the information immediately upon seeing a new Pokémon. It could’ve, and should’ve, been the same here when Game Freak decided it was going make this change.

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One other major change in combat comes in the form of the removal of Hidden Machines. HMs used to have major traversal or world changing moves like Surf, Strength, and Cut in them. They would take up a normally useful move spot for a member of your team that you couldn’t change, or take up a spot on your team altogether with a Pokémon meant to just know everything useful. Sun/Moon does away with this, although some HMs are still present as normal move-teaching Technical Machines if you want to impart some of the more effective combat moves (like Fly). Instead, you get a pager and can call seven special Pokémon to help you make your way around Alola. For example, you can call a Taurus to break away rocks, or a Charizard to fly you to different Pokécenters. It’s a no-cost service, frees up space on your roster, and might be the most important change yet that Sun/Moon adds to the series. The ease of use was great, and the effectiveness of my party increased tremendously because of it.

Besides the new island challenge and battling mechanics, there are plenty of side distractions to take part in as well. One new aspect is the Poké Refresh, which allows you to pet, feed, and play with your Pokémon outside of battle via the touch screen. A benefit to building up a good relationship with your Pokémon this way is it will offer unique bonuses in battle, but also is a free way of removing status effects on Pokémon. That means items like Awakening (cures sleep) and Antidote (cures poison) are only now necessary during battle—and that means less trips to the Pokécenter or Pokémart for medicines, and more time spent exploring the world and enjoying it.

There are also new places to visit, like your own personal set of islands you discover called the Poké Pelago. Each island in the Pelago can house the extra Pokémon you’d normally keep in Boxes at Pokécenters, which you still use to change your lineup. Now, though, they can train to level up or gather items for you on the side, instead of collecting dust as just another statistic in your Pokédex.

If you’re more about upgrading your trainer, another new feature called the Festival Plaza allows you to talk to people and earn special Festival Currency. This currency can then be used inside the festival to upgrade your trainer’s apparel and offers some much needed trainer customization to the game. Of course, I think it’d be easier if the game just let you customize your character fully from the get-go like every other RPG out there, but at least Pokémon is trying to get with the times when it comes to giving players a bit more expression on that front.

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The Festival Plaza is also where you can trade with or battle players online, or use the new QR scanner via the 3DS’ camera to scan friends’ Pokémon to add their info to your Pokédex (minus the trading aspect). If you’re all about battling like I am, however, then I can attest that—at least in a pre-launch state—I was able to connect to a few folks online, and found there to be minimal issues in one-on-one situations. You can even record your battles and save them to your SD Card to watch and analyze battles later. Besides one-on-one battles, there’s also two-versus-two and the new Battle Royal matches, where four players put one Pokémon in and the last one standing wins.

Unfortunately, it’s in these multi-Pokémon battles that some issues start to arise. Whether playing online, or even offline in the main game, whenever more than two Pokémon appear on screen (yours versus one other), the game starts to slow down a little, load times become more evident, and animation beings to crawl. These issues aren’t enough to ruin the experience, but they are enough to snap you out of your Pokémon reverie for sure—and it’s particularly shocking when this even happens against the computer in the main game.

There’s also a new feature where wild Pokémon can call for help. Sometimes, a wild Pokémon that’s about to faint will call on another of its species, turning a one-on-one fight into a two-on-one (which also triggers the above mentioned slowdown). It offers you, the player, more experience for beating more Pokémon, but—especially if you’re trying to capture one of the two—it can prolong the fight considerably. I once got in a cycle where I had to face seven Zubats because I would take one out and the other would keep calling for help. Finally, I just gave up and ran away because no Zubat is worth that much time. So, this is one feature that I hope future iterations of the game do away with.

Another addition that was hit-or-miss is the new Alolan variants of Kanto Pokémon. For example, there’s now a dark-type Rattata (originally a normal-type), or an ice-type version of Sandshrew (originally a ground-type). For the most part, I like the idea of collecting different types of the same Pokémon, especially since only one is needed to unlock the Pokédex entry. What I don’t like about it is when those Pokémon are used in battle. When an enemy trainer is about to throw out a Pokémon, it only says “Ace Trainer is about to use Ninetails. Do you wish to switch Pokémon?” Normally, Ninetails is a fire-type, and I would counter with a water-type. The game never tells you what variant is being thrown out until it actually appears on your screen. If it’s the ice-type Ninetails, I basically wasted a turn needing to switch out my water-type for a fire-type. It’s a minor thing, but considering how serious some of us take our battles, wasting a turn isn’t something to be taken lightly.

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Pokémon Sun/Moon provides the series a shot in the arm we might not have realized it needed. Battling is more efficient than ever, and that cranks the fun up to levels we haven’t seen since the early days of the series—even with the occasional slowdown issue. New and old Pokémon come together to symbolize the balance this game has struck between Pokémon’s past and its future, providing nostalgia for us franchise veterans and some history for newcomers. Combine all this with more side content than ever before, as well as a beautiful 3D world, and Pokémon Sun/Moon is nothing short of an instant classic.

Publisher: Nintendo/The Pokémon Company • Developer: Game Freak • ESRB: E – Everyone • Release Date: 11.18.16
9.0
A couple technical issues aside, Sun/Moon might be the best Pokémon game yet. It freshens up a formula some of us PokéManics might not have realized was growing stale until now. Trials and Grand Trials provide variations on familiar gameplay, and the removal of HMs and telling players how effective their moves are rejuvenates battling.
The Good The island trials will make you never want to battle in a gym again. Ride Pokémon doing away with Hidden Machines from previous games.
The Bad Some slowdown in battles involving three or more Pokémon.
The Ugly Why is my character always smiling? Even when things take a turn for the worst in the game, my character’s facial animation never changes.
Pokémon Sun/Moon are Nintendo 3DS exclusives. Primary version reviewed was Pokémon Sun. Review copies were provided by Nintendo for the benefit of this review. EGM reviews games on a scale of 1 to 10, with a 5.0 being average.
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EGM Review: Metroid Prime Federation Force

Filed under: EGM (Electronic Gaming Monthly), Written — Leave a comment
October 11, 2016

I missed the boat when the original Metroid released on the NES—mostly because I was still wearing diapers. Near the height of my childhood gaming in 1994, when I only got games on Christmas or my birthday, I had a choice between Super Metroid and other SNES games; I admittedly passed on Samus Aran. It wouldn’t be until I was older and got a summer job, and therefore had some disposable income, that I would take a chance on Metroid in the form of Metroid Prime. It was there where I fell in love with the series. I’ve since gone back and played the classics, but the Prime trilogy continues to have a special place in my heart as my entryway to the franchise. So, when the Big N announced that they were releasing a Metroid Prime game for the 3DS that would follow the Federation and not everyone’s favorite gold-armored heroine, I (like many) was concerned—and Metroid Prime: Federation Force has gone on to prove those concerns were well founded.

Players take on the role of a generic Marine in the Galactic Federation, the governing body and beacon of order in the Metroid universe which often hires Samus Aran when things get dicey. Looking to become more self-sufficient and rely less on bounty hunters, the Federation has built new mechanized units that Marines can use on the frontlines of the Federation’s militaristic endeavors. One of these new fronts happens to be in the Bermuda system. What starts as standard mech suit training soon becomes a full-blown combat scenario against the Space Pirates, along with a search for answers as to why the pirates have established themselves around Bermuda’s three planets—Bion, Excelcion, and Talvania.

From the second I started playing Federation Force I knew I was in for a rough time. Quite simply, this is one of the worst-looking games I’ve seen on the 3DS. The first-person perspective does no favors in trying to hide the three dull, lifeless planets you have to explore: Bion, a desert world; Excelcion, an ice planet; and Talvania, your industrialized world. Basically, that means you’re constantly surrounded by different shades of orange/brown, blue/white, and gray/poison gas green, with little respite whenever you pick from the game’s nearly two-dozen missions in those settings.

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The chibi-like big head/little body design of the Federation’s forces—including Samus during her cameos—was also off-putting. It may be more of a personal preference against this art style, but it felt cheap and cartoony for a branch of the franchise whose character and world design used to be one of its strengths. I understand the 3DS isn’t a graphical powerhouse, but it should’ve been able to do more than this.

Beauty can be more than skin deep, however, and so I was hoping the game might be salvaged via its gameplay. Unfortunately, I quickly saw that Federation Force is ugly to its core. Although it utilizes the first-person perspective of the Prime trilogy, Federation Force does not play nearly as smooth as those games. The mechs are slow and plodding, and it’s almost impossible to avoid attacks from more difficult enemies, with many battles becoming a race to see how fast you can whittle down the enemy’s lifebar. The use of the 3DS’s gimmicky gyroscope for more precision aiming also quickly becomes tiresome when trying to line up a killing shot against armored foes with few visible weak points.

The worst of it all may be the balancing of the game, thanks in part to one of Federation Force’s primary selling points being its four-player co-op feature—which somewhat spits in the face of Metroid’s traditional single-player experience with Samus against the world, alone and often stranded in a hostile environment. Each stage you play on is balanced for a four-player fighting force. This means that even if you wanted to play alone, the game punishes you for it, and I am adamant that most players will be unable to finish later stages by themselves. If you are racing against the clock to defeat a dozen or so Space Pirates, but the timer and enemy count remains the same in single player versus four-player co-op, you can see where the better odds are. The Space Pirates may still be pushovers, but there’s only so much any of us can do against time.

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Oh, and good luck trying to assemble a squad to take on those later missions. Part of the reason why my review took so long to get done is it took me forever to find people just to play the game with—even after launch. If I created an invite myself, fewer and fewer players were available for the later missions; if I went to join someone else’s team, many were still middling around during the first half of the game. Throw in the obvious issues that come from not being able to communicate via the 3DS except for a handful of preset phrases on the d-pad (“Hello!” “Help!” “Hurry Up” etc.), and progressing through Federation Force was nothing short of being a chore—especially when you stumble upon someone who cared more about lone wolfing it than working as a team. You can obviously get around some of this by having four friends join together locally, but I couldn’t find three other people interested in picking up their own copies of the game.

It also needs to be said that there is the 3v3 multiplayer mode, Blast Ball, which can be played via download play on the 3DS from just one copy of the game. Because of many of the aforementioned reasons, like the slow movement of the mechs and the difficulty in precision aiming, you’re better off just going back to Rocket League instead of dealing with this rather obvious knock-off. I made the EGM crew try it out here in the office, and I think everyone is still mad at me.

The sad thing is, despite all my complaining, in those rare instances where everything seemed to come together—I found people to play a mission I wanted to play and we were all driven to finish the level as a team and move the story forward—Metroid Prime Federation Force actually worked. The story wasn’t spectacular, but it fit well into the Metroid universe. When four players worked together, there was a challenge, but it felt great to come together as a unit and accomplish the goals laid before you. Even the game’s idea of a more arcade-like experience—with each mission being short and sweet (rare was the mission that took more than 15-20 minutes), but there being a lot of them—could’ve lent itself nicely to experiencing the game in bite-sized bits. The shooting felt satisfying, at least until I ran out of the sparse special ammo or was forced to really take aim at something. Missions actually provided some interesting gameplay variety ranging from exploration to escort, from puzzle solving to shootouts against bosses, and the ability to customize the precise loadout of special weapons and buffs pre-mission meant a well-coordinated team could cover each other’s backs extremely well. The problem was simply that these stars aligned far too infrequently for the experience to ever be truly enjoyable.

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And, that’s Metroid Prime: Federation Force in a nutshell. There was a core idea here that wasn’t actually bad, just horribly executed. The lack of balance between one and four players, the ugly worlds and character design, the gimmicky controls, the plodding movement, Blast Ball—they all muddled what could’ve been a decent adventure that freshened up the Metroid Prime storyline and paved the way for a future, more realized entry. As is, though, Federation Force is a black eye on the series that stands alongside Other M as another failed experiment.

Publisher: Nintendo • Developer: Next Level Games • ESRB Date: T – Teen • Release Date: 08.19.16
3.5
There is a core idea here that could’ve worked, but Metroid Prime: Federation Force is nothing short of a disaster due to horribly thought out implementation and shoddy execution.
The Good Decent mission variety, and if playing with friends locally, four-player co-op has its fun moments.
The Bad Game is completely unbalanced for solo play. Movement is plodding to the point of almost being painful. Trying to communicate during online play is near impossible.
The Ugly Is the future of multiplayer just everyone kicking a giant ball around?
Metroid Prime: Federation Force is a Nintendo 3DS exclusive. Review code was provided by Nintendo for the benefit of this review. EGM reviews games on a scale of 1 to 10, with a 5.0 being average.
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10 minutes of new Paper Mario: Color Splash gameplay from San Diego ComicCon

Filed under: EGM (Electronic Gaming Monthly), Video — Leave a comment
July 24, 2016

I had a chance to check out a couple of demos of Paper Mario: Color Splash at the Nintendo Lounge at San Diego ComicCon 2016. While I did go hands-on for a time with the game, Nintendo refused to let this particular demo be played by anyone but one of their representatives. At the very least, it does mark the first time we are seeing this footage of Mario exploring the Dark Bloo Inn, where he has to exercise some Toad spirits and battle some Sledge Bros.

Paper Mario: Color Splash is coming to the Wii U on October 7.

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Kirby: Planet Robobot review

Filed under: EGM (Electronic Gaming Monthly), Written — Leave a comment
June 8, 2016

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Mech-Star Warrior

Whenever I think that HAL Laboratory and Nintendo are going to run out of fun gimmicks to wrap Kirby up in, they find a way to keep surprising me. Whether it’s as a pinball, a yarn creature, or riding a rainbow-painted path, part of the series’ charm has been how the gameplay always seems to be morphing into something fresh—much like Kirby himself when he copies an enemy’s ability—while still sticking to the pink puffball’s action-platforming core. The duo seem to have done it once again with Kirby’s latest outing for the 3DS, Kirby: Planet Robobot.

It’s another peaceful day on the planet Pop Star, with Kirby resting under a tree, King Dedede playing chess against a Waddle Dee, and Meta Knight patrolling the skies in the Halberd. The serenity of this scene is quickly shattered, however, when a mysterious UFO lands on the planet and begins terraforming Pop Star, transforming its inhabitants into mechanical monstrosities. Kirby immediately springs into action in order to get to the bottom of the appearance of these strange aliens and turn Pop Star back into the nature-loving home he knows.

At its core, Planet Robobot is much like any other mainline title in the series. Kirby must fight his way through a half-dozen levels, each broken into a handful of stages, and copy the abilities of the foes he comes across in order to solve puzzles, collect items, and bring the pain to the bosses he’ll face along the way. Along with that, there are several new elements that help Robobot stand out from its predecessors, and that add a lot to the game’s enjoyability.

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Any fan that has played Kirby games before will immediately pick up on the first of these changes, which is a brand new aesthetic. The terraforming plot point means exploring locations Kirby has never dealt with before, such as casinos, roadways, trains, pipeworks, and more. These also provide Robobot with an interesting contrast in its design, with the colorful, cartoony vibe we usually get from the series crossing with an urban, mechanized motif. Even old-school bosses take advantage of the theme, with the cyborg-like Clanky Woods serving as the hardest version of Whispy Woods we’ve seen yet.

The other major changes come on the gameplay side. Planet Robobot features four new powers for Kirby to wield: Jet, Poison, ESP, and Doctor. You can roast enemies in Jet’s afterburners, throw psychic energy around a room with ESP, bounce pill projectiles at enemies with Doctor, or surf on sludge with Poison to get through a level quicker. While each power has its moments in the game, I found ESP to be the most useful of the four—both because of its offensive strength against enemies, and its ability to help with puzzles by sending projectiles through walls to hit previously-inaccessible switches.

As nice as the new powers are, the biggest gameplay change, though, comes from the fact that Kirby now can pilot his own personal mechanized robot, which he acquires early in the game and utilizes on various stages. The mech not only affords Kirby super-strength that he can use to move large set pieces around each level (opening up new puzzle and platforming opportunities), but also allows for duplicating enemy abilities much like Kirby himself. Copying the flame ability, for instance, turns the mech’s arms into a pair of flamethrowers—great for lighting cannon fuses that can open up previously-inaccessible areas or toasting enemies.

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In some cases, the mech does more than just amplify Kirby’s abilities, too—it changes the very nature of the game. For example, the aforementioned Jet ability transforms the mech into a Gradius-like starship, providing some interesting side-scrolling shooter gameplay. Working in this stage variety provided a nice change of pace from the standard platforming that comprises much of the game, and had me switching powers at a far more frequent pace than when I normally play Kirby games, as I couldn’t wait to see how the mech would transform next.

As great an experience as this all provides, Planet Robobot does suffer from something that has plagued many Nintendo games in recent years: a lack of challenge. Life-hoarding became a game within the game for me, as I never died more than a couple times throughout my playthrough. HAL Laboratory tried to bump up the difficulty by adding three keys to each stage for you to collect—with you needing a certain number of said keys to unlock each boss—but aside from one or two stages, I never had an issue with collecting them all on the first go.

Lack of challenge aside, Kirby: Planet Robobot does a great job of continuing the tradition of what the best Kirby games do: provide a fun adventure that captures your imagination. The difficulty may not have been high, but it’s still a top-quality, tight-handling platformer that I couldn’t help but enjoy for the short time it lasted—and which I didn’t want to put down until I’d seen every power, solved every puzzle, and brought peace back to Pop Star. The new mech gimmick was a delight to mess around with, and in the end, Planet Robobot’s few new features paid massive dividends that any Kirby enthusiast should love to play.

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Developer: HAL Laboratory • Publisher: Nintendo • ESRB: E – Everyone • Release Date: 06.10.16
9.0
It’s probably one of the pink puffball’s shorter adventures, but the new mech gimmick provides a fun and fresh take on Kirby’s action-platforming core that I couldn’t get enough of.
The Good New mech adds a surprising amount of depth and variety to the classic Kirby gameplay.
The Bad No sense of challenge whatsoever.
The Ugly All of Pop Star and its inhabitants becoming mechanized reminded me an awful lot of Sonic the Hedgehog.
Kirby: Planet Robobot is a Nintendo 3DS exclusive. Review code was provided by Nintendo for the benefit of this review. EGM reviews games on a scale of 1 to 10, with a 5.0 being average.
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Star Fox Zero review

Filed under: EGM (Electronic Gaming Monthly), Written — Leave a comment
April 20, 2016

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Let the good times barrel roll

When the decision was made for Star Fox to finally grace the Wii U, Nintendo and co-developer Platinum Games made the easy choice to stick to the series’ roots—much to the joy of fans everywhere (let’s just say that every time Fox McCloud steps out of his Arwing, you can hear the collective groan of the audience underneath the hiss of the cockpit canopy opening up). Few could have predicted just how far they’d go in wanting to remind fans of the best times the series has previously provided, however. Instead of crafting an entirely new adventure, Star Fox Zero is an interesting blend of old and new elements under the umbrella of a “re-imagining” of what is widely considered the best game in the series, Star Fox 64—a particularly uninventive move considering they already re-released that game for the 3DS (aptly titled Star Fox 64 3D) just five years ago.

For those who might be unfamiliar with the franchise, the Lylat System has been thrust into war by a former Cornerian scientist gone mad named Andross. With his incredible technical prowess, Andross has built a mostly mechanical army the likes of which has never been seen. The only ones who can stop his crazy bid for power are the ragtag heroes-for-hire pilots that comprise the Star Fox team. Equipped with state-of-the-art Arwing fighter jets and their mobile base of operations, the Great Fox, Fox McCloud and company is ready to do what’s right for the sake of the galaxy (and their bank accounts). Three console generations, and nothing has changed.

Beyond just the story, Star Fox Zero stays true to a lot of the gameplay aspects from what we played 19 years ago on the N64—all we’re missing is the struggle to find AAA-batteries for our Rumble Paks. Like Star Fox 64, Star Fox Zero is a mostly on-rails space shooter experience, with “all-range mode” sections of gameplay opening up into an arena for frantic dogfights against massive bosses and Star Fox’s evil counterpart, Star Wolf. The action is fast and heavy, harkening back to when many games still had arcade sensibilities, relying on twitch reflexes and with a single playthrough not lasting more than a few hours. Also, in true throwback fashion, it’s not about beating the game once; it’s about beating it again and again in new and fantastic ways.

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Star Fox Zero parallels its inspiration by featuring branching paths that open up different worlds of varying difficulty depending on certain feats. Beating a level within a time limit, getting a high number of kills, shooting open an alternate path while on rails, or destroying bosses via not-always-obvious means are just some of the catalysts to cause the game’s path to splinter. In addition, achieving high scores on each route not only looks impressive when everything is totaled up at the end of the game, but also awards medals that can be used to unlock special features outside of the primary experience. Even after almost two decades, this remains a great way to offer up a lot of replayability for what would otherwise be considered a short game by today’s standards.

A fair amount of locations from Star Fox 64 have also been reused here—including planets like Corneria, Fortuna, and Titania—but they all see a drastic facelift. Star Fox Zero has fully fleshed out each world you explore. Lush jungles full of dangerous “bioweapons” overrun one world, while another sees shifting sands half hiding space battle wreckage. This level of detail—giving them characteristics and enemies unique to every location—shows off a personality that the planets in previous games never really had. And not every planet is a rehash. There are also some brand new ones specifically designed to offer opportunities to show off the select changes that were made to the gameplay.

And it’s in these changes where things get dicey with Star Fox Zero. New scenarios have been added where you can turn your Arwing into a chicken-walker (sort of like the AT-STs from Star Wars) and you can now move around on the ground in levels you used to only be able to fly through. Your controls change between Arwing and walker modes—and, in a testament to repurposing mechanics, the walker features a Z-targeting system similar to what’s been seen in Legend of Zelda games for years. Z-targeting makes circling, strafing, and dodging enemy fire a lot easier for the slower moving form. Because of this, there are actually times when the walker mode is not only the preferred way to combat Andross’s forces (like in narrow corridors), but also for finding those alternate paths I mentioned earlier.

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Of course, there are moments where you’re forced to use the walker, and its lack of speed and maneuverability compared to the Arwing form becomes a hindrance. Those sections of the game artificially up the difficulty to frustrating levels, making you wish you could just stay in the Arwing the entire time. In fact, when the walker options don’t work, you’ll end up questioning why the transformation was added at all. Ground levels should just be left to the Landmaster.

Speaking of the Landmaster, it’s now gained a flying transformation. If you wanted me to fly in a particular stage, why not just let me stay in the Arwing? Mixing flying/ground sections in a single level—instead of just adding more dedicated levels for each, or allowing you to replay levels with different vehicles—was a curious decision. The transformations for both vehicles work, and work well for the most part; they just didn’t feel necessary. The same can be said for the one new vehicle, the Gyrowing, which adds stealth gameplay on its respective levels. While I can understand a handful of Gyrowing levels could be inserted as an attempt at a change of pace, they aren’t really something a Star Fox game needs.

The Gyrowing also features a sidekick called Direct-I, which requires players to pilot a secondary hacking drone into narrow crevices, slowing down the gameplay even more. All told, flying both the Gyrowing and Direct-I feels decidedly un-Star Fox-like and harkens back to the less than stellar adventure games of the series—even though we’re still technically in a ship—and not the fun flying action we want. Not to mention controlling Direct-I via first-person on the Wii U GamePad while the Gyrowing is left defenseless on your main TV just screams gimmicky controls.

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That leads me to Star Fox Zero’s largest problem: the controls. I’m reminded of The Wonderful 101, another Nintendo and Platinum collaboration that used the Wii U GamePad entirely too much. There is nothing worse than having to take your eyes off of the TV screen to see a different perspective on the GamePad, and more than anything, I wish the ease of control was what had been brought over from Star Fox 64.

When the game is played on your TV, it’s in the traditional third-person view, with the camera positioned directly behind your ship. The Wii U GamePad offers up a first-person perspective from Fox’s cockpit. This by itself would’ve actually been pretty cool, but the problem is that the aiming reticule is then married to the motion of the GamePad, forcing you to dance around your living room like a buffoon as you try to lock on enemy ships. Worse yet, the game mandates use of the first-person view in some sections—especially in the all-range mode arenas—to get the best shots on certain enemies. There is one alternate control scheme that allows you to lessen the impact of these controls, and I ended up spending most of my time using that option. Even so, doing that doesn’t do away with the motion controls completely, and you’re still required to move around far too much to aim/shoot at bad guys while playing.

Star Fox Zero manages to capture the essence of the original Star Fox 64, and rides that nostalgia train hard. At the same time, it leaves a lot to be desired. I can’t help but feel that choosing to re-imagine an older game instead of creating a truly brand new one painted the developers into an unfriendly creative corner. Star Fox Zero is a solid game, but due to its lack of ingenuity and difficult controls, it continues the trend of one of Nintendo’s most beloved IPs just kind of middling about.

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Developer: Platinum Games, Nintendo EPD • Publisher: Nintendo • ESRB: E10+ – Everyone 10 and up • Release Date: 04.22.16
7.0
Star Fox Zero’s status as a love-letter to the past is solidified. While it does a good job channeling a lot of what was great about Star Fox 64, it fails to really build on it in new and exciting ways, and stumbles because of the Wii U Gamepad.
The Good Searching for alternate paths through the Lylat System remains addicting.
The Bad I felt like I was fighting the Wii U GamePad half the time.
The Ugly Every time Falco shouts, “Thanks for the friendly fire, Fox!” I think I should go upgrade my Internet browser.
Star Fox Zero is a Wii U exclusive. Review code was provided by Nintendo for the benefit of this review. EGM reviews games on a scale of 1 to 10, with a 5.0 being average.
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Star Fox Guard review

Filed under: EGM (Electronic Gaming Monthly), Written — Leave a comment

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Don’t let your guard down

Over the course of Star Fox’s history, whenever the decision is made to deviate from the space combat the series is known for, it’s often led to disaster. Even with Fox McCloud and gang being revered and lauded amongst Nintendo’s great original characters, when the Star Fox team steps out from their Arwings, it usually spells trouble for the series and a lack of fun to be had by gamers. Well, never one to be deterred, Nintendo has again tried to branch out and expand upon the Star Fox universe in the form of Star Fox Guard, and again it seems they’ve failed to create a compelling game.

Star Fox Guard sees players take on the role of a security guard at Corneria Precious Metals, Ltd. The company has been expanding exponentially to all corners of the galaxy due to war raging in the Lylat System, and so company owner Grippy Toad, uncle to famed Star Fox pilot and mechanic Slippy Toad, felt he needed more help. Players must use each security camera—conveniently equipped with a laser blaster—in every CPM facility to find and destroy the evil robots that want to disrupt the mining operations (by decimating each plant’s power core, thus bringing their metal output for the war effort to a halt). It’s not the deepest story, but you don’t really need a lot of setup when it comes to a tower defense game.

I typically enjoy the tower defense genre, having many in my collection ranging from South Park Let’s Go Tower Defense Play! to Ninjatown. However, I can say, without a doubt in my mind, that Star Fox Guard is one of the most shallow and downright boring tower defense games I’ve ever had to play.

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Every level gives you a dozen cameras to place around each CPM facility in order to destroy all of the invading robots. Your TV acts as a sort of security monitor bank, with the screen broken into 13 segments—one for each camera along the edges, and a larger one in the middle signifying which one of the 12 you’re controlling at that given moment. Using the gamepad touch screen, you can switch from camera to camera, changing which one you control to better fend off incoming threats. And right here is where the problems start.

When first looking at Star Fox Guard, the controls appear downright simple. The analog sticks move the camera you’re controlling, and every other button on the controller fires the camera’s laser. The issues arise from the fact that you can only control one camera at a time, forcing you to look down at the Wii U GamePad in order to switch between them. Instead of giving us an easier option to rotate through the cameras, forcing us to use the GamePad leads to something I always despise when Wii U games make me do it: taking my eyes off the TV screen. During more frantic moments, when a half-dozen robots are rushing the facility core, looking down at the GamePad’s display and then back up—taking a second to re-focus your attention—is valuable time wasted in a tower defense game.

This also touches on the second issue with Star Fox Guard’s gameplay, and why it fails short as a tower defense game: the cameras aren’t automated whatsoever. The best tower defense games are meant to test your ability to strategically plan both before a match starts and on the fly. Star Fox Guard only tests your twitch reflexes as you bounce from GamePad to TV and vice versa, and from camera to camera. There is a minimal amount of strategy involved, since often the default placement of the cameras is the most strategically sound, and you’re given them all before each encounter. Some of the game’s challenge missions—extra levels with unique win conditions that make up half of the included 100 levels—get away from this, allowing you to slowly build your defenses up. Unfortunately, those mission types are few and far between.

Since there are only 12 cameras, there are also very limited upgrades. As you continue to successfully defend Grippy’s metal processing plants, you’ll level up your security clearance. At certain levels, you unlock a multi-shot cam, a freeze cam, and a slow-time cam. You only unlock one of each, however—so, at most, you’ll have nine regular cameras, and then three specialized ones. It adds a little bit of strategy, but not enough to really give the game the depth it so desperately needs.

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Not everything about Star Fox Guard is a complete bust, though. The game offers up some challenge with the variety of enemies it throws at you. Fifteen types of enemy will mess with your cameras, including some that steal them away or knock them offline for an extended period. If the cameras are offline or gone, obvious holes can start to appear in your defense, which the remaining 11 enemy types will take advantage of. That’s 26 types of enemies total, each with their own strengths and weaknesses, making you wish even more you could do more with the cameras.

The other nice aspect of all those enemies is Star Fox Guard’s Squad Mode. Once you beat the first 20 or so stages, you unlock the game’s online component, which allows you to put together your own robot horde and send it after a buddies’ processing plant core, or reverse the situation to defend your own personal core from their army. Successful attacks and defenses increase your online rank, while losses will knock you down the leaderboards. As you face new enemies in single player, you’ll unlock them as options for your multiplayer horde, giving you at least one reason to grind through the game’s 100 lackluster and repetitive stages.

There’s a reason why Star Fox Guard is a free pack-in game bundled with the first run of physical copies of Star Fox Zero. It’s not a broken game, but there’s really not enough to grab your attention and hold it for more than a few levels. It’s a shallow cobbling together of tower defense parts that relies too much on the Wii U GamePad, one that doesn’t do anything interesting beyond Squad Mode. If you should tire of Star Fox Zero at some point, I could see you devoting a couple hours to it just because it was there if you get the physical version. On the other hand, if you’re going the digital route with Zero, there’s little reason for you to chip in and pick up Guard along with it.

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Developer: Platinum Games, Nintendo EPD • Publisher: Nintendo • ESRB: E10+ – Everyone 10 and up • Release Date: 04.22.16
5.5

Every time Star Fox tries to do something out of its space-combat comfort zone it fails. Star Fox Guard sadly continues this tradition of games that make you go “meh” when Fox and the gang step away from their Arwing cockpits.
The Good There’s a lot to do and the online component adds some surprising replayability.
The Bad Shallow, repetitive tower defense play that relies too much on the Wii U GamePad screen.
The Ugly Slippy’s uncle is nothing but a war profiteer.
Star Fox Guard is a Wii U exclusive. Review code was provided by Nintendo for the benefit of this review. EGM reviews games on a scale of 1 to 10, with a 5.0 being average.
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Pokkén Tournament review

Filed under: EGM (Electronic Gaming Monthly), Written — Leave a comment

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Gotta fight’em all

Whenever Nintendo develops a smash-hit franchise, it’s only a matter of time before spin-offs happen—and Pokémon is no exception to this rule. Whether it’s the Rouge-like Mystery Dungeon series, the safari-driven Pokémon Snap, or the arcade-inspired Pokémon Pinball, Pokémon has been a great resource for when it comes time to break away from its turn-based RPG roots. I think even those of us who have been playing Pokémon over the past 20 years were a little perplexed, though, when we heard of its latest mash-up: Pokkén Tournament, a mixing of Bandai Namco’s Tekken gameplay and Pokémon.

Set in the newest continent added to the Pokémon universe, Ferrum, players will choose from a roster of 14 Pokémon to fight by their side as they attempt to conquer the region’s different leagues and be crowned the Grand Master. Along the way, they’ll learn the history of the region, and come to understand why an old enemy has re-emerged and is threatening the sanctity of Ferrum’s battle tournaments.

What’s interesting about Pokkén Tournament is that it didn’t try to just throw a bunch of elements from both Tekken and Pokémon together, instead working to find the right aspects of each one to merge in hopeful harmony. And when that harmony was achieved, the basis for one of the more interesting fighters we’ve seen in some time was born.

Before the battles begin, you start by customizing your own personal trainer, choosing their gender and a handful of visual options such as shirts, hats, and more. As you fight, you’ll earn PokéGold, which can then be used to buy more lavish items including background lens flares, feather boas, or even a pirate costume. To personalize things further, you can unlock fight titles like in other games of the genre—my favorite of which is “Living Legend”, perfect for when I take on other players (or even the CPU) locally and online with my mighty Machamp. You can also earn up to five bonus items a day by placing Amiibo on the Wii U gamepad; they had to work the figurines in somehow, I suppose.

Those personal touches are always nice in any game, but the real mixing of elements comes in the core fighting gameplay of Pokkén Tournament. Taking a page out of the Pokémon games, the more you fight with a particular Pokémon, the more they level up. So even though you can switch between Pokémon on the starting roster between fights, sticking with a single character rewards you more, and makes it easier to progress through the game, as they’ll have higher stats that can then be carried over into battle. For example, by the time I finished the single player story, my Machamp was a level 95, with points distributed relatively evenly amongst four categories: attack, defense, synergy (the speed at which your synergy meter fills up; think an ultra meter in other fighting games), and strategy (the strength of your support Pokémon).

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Those just-mentioned support Pokémon are an idea that adds an extra wrinkle of planning to every battle, similar to the Assist characters from Marvel vs. Capcom. There are 15 pairs of Support Pokémon, but while you’ll choose a pair before each battle, you can actually only use one of the duo each round. Each support Pokémon has a different effect: some do offensive damage, while others buff you or debuff your opponent, similar to the powers these Pokemon would have in the mainline games. This flurry of decisions can be difficult (especially with only a 10-second timer) but could mean the difference between victory and defeat. Personally, I prefer Quagsire and Magneton, mostly because Quagsire’s Mud Bomb has a nice area of effect and can do massive damage.

Besides Support Pokémon, players also get a cheerleader—the girl who introduces you to the Ferrum region. Between each round, she’ll give you advice (akin to real-life trainers in boxing or MMA), and while said advice is never really helpful, it can give you boosts to different meters depending on how you want her to coach you pre-fight. To be honest, I ended up finding her kind of annoying after only a few fights—another casualty of atrocious voice acting across the board in Pokkén Tournament—but I won’t argue with a fully-charged ultra meter to start round two, and it’s another surprising layer of choice to how you approach each fight.

The most impressive part of Pokkén Tournament’s gameplay, though, is the actual fights themselves. This doesn’t feel like some cheap re-skin of Tekken, nor is it some poorly-balanced clone. While I don’t agree with every move made, the heart of this fighter is strong. If you play other fighting games like myself, there is a bit of a learning curve, especially with the limited button re-assignment options. Like Mortal Kombat, you have to press a button to block instead of holding backward, but more unnatural was another button-instead-of-dpad-direction decision: jumping with the B button rather than up.

Once I finally got my brain retrained, I found that Pokkén Tournament might actually be a great introductory game for players new to the fighting genre. Its controls are super-simple, with no special move requiring more than a combination of a single direction and button press. Throws, counters, and ultras, meanwhile, all only require two buttons. While the move inputs may be simple, the core of gameplay is the rock-paper-scissors system not only found in many fighting games—throws beat counters, counters beat normal attacks, normal attacks beat throws—but also the Pokémon RPGs themselves. Of course, here everything is themed to the series, with moves such as Rock Throw, Ice Punch, and Seismic Toss.

When you combine all of that with the speed of the action (courtesy of devices that give players psychic links to their Pokémon according to the story), this is the first time in video game form we actually get battles close to what we see in the cartoon. In the back of every Pokémon fan’s mind, mine included, we’ve always appreciated the strategy and RPG aspects of the games, but have longed for a more visceral experience like we see on the TV show. Pokémon Stadium got us closer to that than the handheld entries, but it still never reached that fever-pitch that most competition brings because of a lack of speed and intuitiveness. Pokémon is extremely enjoyable, but you can take your time with it, often requiring dozens of hours per playthrough. Pokkén Tournament requires faster thinking and action and lasts 80 seconds, and that leads to a special kind of frantic fun that fans of Pokémon have been waiting for whether they realized it or not, and I couldn’t get enough of it, particularly when playing with my friends.

With that said, not everything in Pokkén Tournament is in perfect harmony. One major flaw I found was the “Phase” system, which dictates how battles play out and from what perspective. Each match starts in Field Phase, which sees players fight in a 3D space like the Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm series. When you perform certain attacks on your opponents, however, everything shifts to a more traditional 2D plane called Duel Phase. The primary problem with this system, besides the jarring movement of the camera, is the moves of your Pokémon change along with the shift. It’s almost like you have to learn two different characters and be ready to alternate between them on the fly. While I’m sure the best players will be able to transition seamlessly between Phases in due time and string out massive combos, the rest of us would probably prefer learning a single set of moves and mastering those. It feels like that while trying to keep the controls simple—to perhaps draw in that Pokémon crowd that may not necessarily be fighting game fans—the developers still wanted a large moveset that could appeal to fighting game veterans. This shifting phases was the result of that odd compromise and in the end I don’t think either camp will be completely happy.

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Now, most people will likely jump into single player when they start up Pokkén Tournament for the first time, but to say that mode is a grind would be like saying Charizard likes to burn things. To finish off the loose story woven through each of the game’s five leagues, I battled my way through about 150 fights (with only a handful of losses) before I could be declared Grand Master. And with a glaring lack of personality from everyone you fight (including the league leaders), the story feels horribly shallow and devoid of any character whatsoever. Only by continuously winning can you quickly shoot up the leaderboards in each single player league, filled with an ever-increasing number of dozens of combatants. You don’t have to fight through each person, but considering you only move up 10-20 spots every five battles before taking part in an eight-person tournament and then getting to fight the league leader, you can see where the grind starts to creep in.

Pokkén Tournament also features online and local versus. I played several matches online, and found no issues whatsoever with the servers. Mind you, there were probably never more than a few hundred people online at any given time during my pre-release time with the game, so hopefully the servers will hold up come release.

Local versus is another matter, though. While there were no technical issues, I found one aspect particularly irritating—and it goes back to the camera I mentioned while speaking about Phases. Because the 3D arena camera has been positioned behind each Pokemon, each player ends up needing their own personal view of the action. To accommodate this, Pokkén Tournament forces player one to use the gamepad’s screen as their main display, while player two must use whatever TV the system is connected to. It is a means to try to simulate the fight feel you have with the Pokémon RPGs, hiding what main and support Pokémon each player is selecting. One person playing on a six-inch screen, and another on a 46-inch screen always feels like the player with the better screen has a slight edge, though, and when dealing with competitive fighting games, anything that tips the balance in another player’s favor that isn’t skill-based is just asking for trouble.

My final gripe with Pokkén Tournament might’ve been my most disappointing. There are over 720 Pokémon now, yet only 14 are playable in the game (16 if you count the two special unlocks) with another 30 appearing as Support. There are 20 pure-fighting types alone in Pokémon, and Machamp is the only one on the roster. No Primeape. No Hitmonlee, Hitmonchan, or Hitmontop. No Throh, Sawk, or Hariyama. And that’s not even including Pokémon with secondary fighting characteristics, of which there are only two others on the roster—Lucario and Blaziken—out of another 24. Not to mention all the other Pokémon who could’ve easily been worked into this game, like Greninja.

One saving grace that comes with such a small roster is that at least all the Pokémon are extremely well-balanced. Clearly some time was invested to make sure that no Pokémon, no matter its natural-type advantages in the RPGs, would be so outclassed here that it became frustrating to play with any of them. Whether it’s a power-type like Machamp who specializes in up close and personal melee attacks, a speed-type like Sceptile that can pummel you with a variety of high-counting combos in no time flat, a technical-type like Gengar that relies on its specials, or a standard-type like Lucario that is even across the board, all the Pokémon work nicely in combat and it shouldn’t be long before you find a main Pokémon to specialize in, again harking back to the relatively easy to learn controls.

When I started reviewing Pokkén Tournament, I had no idea how the gameplay of Tekken and the world of Pokémon were going to find a way to reconcile, yet amazingly, they did. In fact, when elements of both fit together, it arguably produced gameplay greater than the sum of its parts. But when those elements didn’t mesh, the train wreck it created was doubly worse, and the small roster is disappointing. There were enough successes amongst the failures in this odd marriage though, and because of that, Pokkén Tournament has created a solid core to build on for potential future continuations of this spin-off series—even if this game is not quite ready to be declared a champion quite yet.

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Developer: Bandai Namco Games • Publisher: Nintendo, Bandai Namco • ESRB: E10+ – Everyone 10 and up • Release Date: 03.18.16
7.0
Pokkén Tournament was a brave experiment, and it succeeds in many areas. However, it fails in some others—whether from lack of depth or outright poor design—that keeps it from reaching that upper-tier of the fighting game genre’s elite entries.
The Good Solid balancing of all the characters leads to fun and frantic fighting game action.
The Bad Small roster. Switching between phases. Single player is a grind. Having player one forced to play off the Wii U gamepad in local battles.
The Ugly “Luchachu” would’ve sounded so much better to me than “Pikachu Libre”.
Pokkén Tournament is a Wii U exclusive. Review code was provided by Nintendo for the benefit of this review. EGM reviews games on a scale of 1 to 10, with a 5.0 being average.
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Fire Emblem Fates Special Edition review

Filed under: EGM (Electronic Gaming Monthly), Written — Leave a comment
February 25, 2016

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You are the ocean’s gray waves

Nintendo has never been afraid to try something new. Sometimes those gambles pay huge dividends, and other times, they end in disaster. But the Big N keeps innovating, and its most recent change of pace comes with its beloved strategy-RPG series, Fire Emblem. Instead of giving us one adventure, this time Nintendo and developer Intelligent Systems has split up it’s most recent chapter into three perspectives dubbed Fire Emblem Fates.

In Fates, players assume the role of Corrin, a young prince (or princess) from the land of Hoshido who was kidnapped and raised by the kingdom of Nohr as one of their own. When Corrin comes of age and the war between the two kingdoms reaches a fever pitch, you learn the truth of Corrin’s upbringing, and are faced with a game-altering decision: Return to Hoshido, stay with Nohr, or forge your own path towards peace and choose neither.

What’s nice about Fire Emblem Fates Special Edition is that it offers all three paths on one game card, even allowing you to jump straight to the fateful decision on repeat playthroughs. This is a boon, because if you otherwise wanted to explore all three perspectives, and learn all the details there are to learn about this latest Fire Emblem world, you’d have to buy the games separately as Birthright (Hoshido story), Conquest (Nohr story), and then Revelations (neutral story) as a DLC coming nearly a month after launch. It’s like Pokémon, but for plot points.

Unfortunately, of the three stories, the only truly satisfying one comes from Revelations. Not to spoil anything, but key plot details are hidden by siding with one family or another, and although playing through both Birthright and Conquest offers you an overall greater insight into the cast of characters, only Revelations feels like a true Fire Emblem game in terms of the stakes that are on the line and the role your avatar plays.

Besides the altered narrative of each title, the three games also offer slightly different gameplay experiences from one another. Birthright could actually serve as a great starting point for newcomers to the series. It provides the most experience points to level characters up, and gold to upgrade and purchase the best weaponry with—all while giving you a taste of what to expect from other Fire Emblem games, even with its singular “destroy all enemies” goal of most missions.

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Conquest is for the more experienced Fire Emblem player, and provides a harsher playthrough. Experience points and gold come at a premium, and you’ll have to truly outsmart the computer if you hope to advance, not to mention make full use of every advantage you might have on the battlefield. There are also more varied goals like capturing points, or defeating only a certain number of enemies amongst the mission objectives.

Lastly, Revelations strikes a balance between the two, offering up more opportunities for gold and experience like in Birthright, but providing the variety of objectives and true strategic gameplay seen in Conquest. Having played every game in the series since Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance, I again found Revelations to be the most satisfying of the three, because it provides the most true to form experience—even if I can appreciate how the other two can appeal to players of different skill levels and familiarity with the franchise.

Once you get past these nuances in plot and gameplay difficulty, the three games play very similarly. The core Fire Emblem mechanics of moving sprites around a grid-based battlefield in a chess match of sorts—with different character classes and weapons having advantages and disadvantages against certain enemies—returns here, and remains relatively the same since the series’ inception over two decades ago in Japan.

There are also a few new features to help punch up the familiar gameplay. Once you choose your path, players will acquire their own fort where they can have Corrin interact with the troops to further relationships (leading eventually to marriage, and then children who can fight by your side) or boost everyone’s stats via items. Building on the StreetPass battles introduced in Fire Emblem: Awakening, Fates now allows it so that you and your friends can invade each other’s forts, with each fort’s customization adding to player resistances. For example, having a fully upgraded weapons hut might add several points into your fighters’ strength (attack) stats. This limited multiplayer aspect adds an interesting wrinkle to the replayability of the game.

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Not every addition is a winner, though. Fates adds a brand new Phoenix mode that should actually be called “Baby Mode”, or “Why Even Bother Playing This Game” mode. One of Fire Emblem’s staple features is its permadeath, where when a character dies in battle, they stay dead. The difference between permadeath in Fire Emblem and other strategy-RPGs, like XCOM for instance, is the fact that keeping all your characters alive affects not only the ease with which you might prepare for upcoming battles, but alters subplot storylines, too.

Awakening’s Casual mode first took a shot at softening this by allowing characters to come back after each battle. Here, at least, you still had the rush of needing to complete a conflict in order to see your units return to action. The strategy part of the game stayed intact, even if the stakes were lessened. Phoenix mode, however, turns you from an armchair general into a blunt weapon of destruction by allowing each character to come back to life after every turn, removing all semblance of consequence for your actions. And while it is only an option, one I only tried for the sake of this review before starting a new game and switching back to Classic permadeath, the absence of ramifications took a great amount of joy away from playing the game, as nearly every decision was meaningless.

Some of the fun I’ve derived over the years of playing this franchise has been quitting back to the main menu and restarting missions to try to discover that perfect strategy that would get my entire team through each conflict. It lengthens the experience artificially, but seeing every character’s special ending made it worth it for me, especially knowing I had earned it. Whether it was splitting my forces and flanking enemy bosses from both sides, using higher-leveled units as scout teams while leaving the bulk of my force behind to protect the rear, or slowly moving all my units forward like a phalanx of death towards my objective, solving the survival puzzle that leads to an ultimate victory was always worth it, no matter the time investment, and is at the heart of what makes this a great strategy-RPG series. Fates seems to be trying its hardest to be an introduction to the series in many ways, but to those newcomers, I still recommend at least trying Classic mode first before switching over to Casual or Phoenix mode.

This seems to be Nintendo’s strategy with Fire Emblem Fates in a nutshell. If you’re willing to dig a little, the strategy core that has made this series so popular remains fully intact. Meanwhile, it offers a variety of options to players of all different skill levels, and even provides multiple storylines molded around potential play styles in an attempt to lure in new and old players alike (with certain aspects obviously not appealing to everyone). In a game about choices, though, the biggest grievance comes from the central one. After playing all three stories, it felt largely unnecessary to split Fates into three parts. Revelations provides the most well rounded experience—one that long-time fans should gravitate more towards— with Conquest and Birthright really just adding nuance and character development to what would’ve been fine as a standalone plot. All three still work as solid additions to Fire Emblem’s long-running strategy-RPG pedigree, though, depending on what exactly you’re looking for.

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Developer: Intelligent Systems • Publisher: Nintendo • ESRB: T – Teen • Release Date: 02.19.16
8.0
Whether new to the franchise or a long-time fan, there’s something for everyone in Fire Emblem Fates’ three games. Unfortunately, when you find what you’re looking for in one, you might be disappointed when it’s then not present in the other titles.
The Good Each game offers unique challenges to appeal to every level of Fire Emblem fan.
The Bad Phoenix mode turns you from a calculating general into a blunt tool of destruction.
The Ugly Me singing Azura’s song in the shower. I just can’t get the damn thing out of my head.
Fire Emblem Fates Special Edition is a Nintendo 3DS exclusive. A review copy was provided by Nintendo for the benefit of this review. EGM reviews games on a scale of 1 to 10, with a 5.0 being average.
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EGM Review: The Legend of Zelda: Tri Force Heroes

Filed under: EGM (Electronic Gaming Monthly), Written — Leave a comment
November 17, 2015

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Fashion faux pas

When a new Legend of Zelda game comes out, it’s damned near impossible for me to stop playing it until I see the end credits roll. Ever since that first golden cartridge hit my NES when I was a little kid, those initial playthroughs spurred marathons that likely contribute to my insomnia today. While most of them were worth it, there have been a couple of misses along the way—and it seems that The Legend of Zelda: Tri Force Heroes falls into that category. While I hate to see most Zelda titles end, I couldn’t wait until Tri Force Heroes was mercifully over.

Tri Force Heroes does not take place in Hyrule, but instead the world of Hytopia, a land where all the people are fixated on fashion. When this realm’s Princess Styla, the most fashionable person in Hytopia, is stricken with a witch’s curse that traps her in a black body stocking, the king sends out a decree searching for heroes to strike down the witch and bring peace (and high fashion) back to his kingdom. And, according to Hytopian legend, three fated heroes who look alarmingly alike will have to come together to break this curse—with you destined to be one of those heroes.

Since Hytopia is such a fashion-obsessed society, a big element of Tri Force Heroes is that what Link wears plays a large part of being a hero there. After grinding for different crafting materials by repeatedly beating dungeons, he can have the local seamstress put together new costumes that give him subtle benefits while out battling in the Drablands—Hytopia’s fashionless equivalent to Hyrule’s Dark World and where most of the action in the game takes place. For example, the Kokiri Suit allows Link to fire three arrows from his bow in a spread formation, while the Big Bomb Suit increases the size and strength of your bombs.

As ridiculous as it all may sound, it’s not the first time the Zelda franchise has made it so that Link wasn’t saving Zelda, doing work in a realm outside Hyrule, or even teaming up with duplicates of himself. It’s also not the first time we’ve seen unique gameplay elements added to the series, with games even as recent as 2013’s A Link Between Worlds immediately coming to mind. So, while I may have been hesitant upon first hearing the premise, I put my misgivings aside and tried to look at Tri Force Heroes as I would any other Legend of Zelda title.

Surprisingly, I didn’t really have problems adjusting to life in Hytopia or the garb-centric gameplay. Instead, it was everything else involving gameplay that ended up preventing me from enjoying this experience.

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The biggest disappointment with Tri Force Heroes is that there is no exploration in the game whatsoever. Hytopia acts as a small hub world before Link sets off in a linear adventure where he must beat four levels in each of eight different worlds, as Link looks to collect the parts of a dress that will allow him to break the princess’s curse. The levels are broken down into four mini-stages with each requiring you to solve a puzzle, usually oriented around the three heroes of the story working together.

In fact, the levels are so puzzle focused that Link doesn’t have an item inventory. After selecting your costume from your wardrobe, each area then starts you with the items you’ll need to beat each stage. For example, you never have to worry about finding the bow in a dungeon because it’s gifted to you in certain levels, but then taken away and replaced by the boomerang (or other classic Zelda item) in others, depending on the level design and puzzle parameters. It simplifies the gameplay to a point there is minimal challenge because there are so few variables when all you have is your sword and a single item. Plus, this removes the fun of discovery that most Legend of Zelda titles have, and only compounds the game’s linearity since there’s no opportunity to backtrack and unlock the secrets of an ever-expanding world. Unlike the magical garments that populate the game, what you see is what you get with Tri Force Heroes.

To try to replace some of this lost replayability, each level has three optional challenges that you can complete. Beating a level within a certain time limit or completing it without having used your sword are just a couple of the numerous challenge variations you’ll come across. This means that the 32 levels the game touts actually can turn into 128 if you are patient enough to try and beat each and every challenge. It works well, but it feels out of place being the sole focus for something in The Legend of Zelda series.

Another misstep for Tri Force Heroes comes in the form of the heavily touted co-op. As the title and plot imply, you can play with two friends and tackle the levels as a group, but the option to play with two people and with one AI is oddly missing outside of a tacked on versus mode. You can even play locally with only one cartridge per three 3DSs. And trust me, the local option is the preferred route. Although playing online with people over great distances is all well and good, the communication system in Tri Force Heroes is limited to eight emojis that translate to “Hello”, “Good Job”, “Go Over There” and other simple phrases that really handcuff your team when trying to solve the game’s puzzles—making the already limited core gameplay even more difficult to enjoy. Playing with people in the same room, whether with one or three cartridges, is really the only way to go because communication is key when working with others towards a common goal.

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With so many of the puzzles revolving around three Links needing to solve them, the issue then arises of what do you do when playing by yourself. Luckily, much like The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords Adventures, players going it solo can control the trio of Links. Unfortunately, however, Tri Force Heroes’ system of control is far less efficient than that Gamecube classic.

Instead of allowing players to control all the Links at once and put them in formations like in Four Swords Adventures, you have to switch between each one manually. As the story goes, Link is actually traveling with two “doppels”— enchanted dolls that he can pass his soul between. This means that many times you’ll have to backtrack in order to drag the sometimes-left-behind doppels to the end of a stage after clearing the path, because you can only beat a stage when all three characters are on a Triforce symbol. (Which makes no sense, really, when you consider Hytopia is a world without Zelda, Ganon, the Triforce, etc.). This repetition only adds to the inherent grind the game already provides if you try to collect all the items necessary for the various outfits Link can wear.

All that being said, let me be clear, The Legend of Zelda: Tri Force Heroes isn’t a horrible game. Hytopia and its people are as charming as those found in any other Zelda title, and the fashion gimmick is an interesting gameplay twist. If you like the idea of solving simple puzzles with a Legend of Zelda flair, and small, quick levels for short bursts of gameplay, then this game delivers.

For those of us who have grown up with Zelda, and who can’t help but be sucked into nearly each and every one of Link’s subsequent adventures, though, I can’t get past the sense that this could’ve been any other adventure game minus the Legend of Zelda coat of paint. Tri Force Heroes just comes off as too one-dimensional in its focus for diehards of the series to get into it—but it might make a decent time sink for more casual fans who can chip away at the levels and their challenge variations on their daily commute.

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Developer: Grezzo, Nintendo • Publisher: Nintendo • ESRB: E – Everyone  • Release Date: 10.23.15
6.0
Tri Force Heroes is a Zelda game in name only. When you dig just past the surface, poor gameplay mechanics and key missing elements for a Zelda title tarnish what is otherwise a serviceable adventure game.
The Good Tons of content. Puzzles are good in short doses.
The Bad The grind for unnecessary gear. Difficult to complete without friends who are in the same room as you.
The Ugly Anyone who has wanted to see Link in a dress for an entire game can now get their wish.
The Legend of Zelda: Tri Force Heroes  is a Nintendo 3DS exclusive. Review copies were provided by Nintendo for the benefit of this review.
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EGM Review: Puzzle & Dragons Z + Puzzle & Dragons: Super Mario Bros. Edition

Filed under: EGM (Electronic Gaming Monthly), Written — Leave a comment
May 31, 2015

Let sleeping dragons lie

Puzzle & Dragons is nothing short of a phenomenon in Japan. Even legendary Nintendo creative mastermind Shigeru Miyamoto admitted he was playing it when I spoke with him back at E3 2013. And if I were a smarter man, I might’ve been able to predict that Nintendo would ultimately bring Puzzle & Dragons to the 3DS.

My poor cognitive function aside, when Nintendo finally did make the announcement, I think most were still surprised that not only would Puzzle & Dragons Z be coming to the 3DS, but it’d be bundled with a Super Mario Bros.–inspired version to boot. I admit I was particularly intrigued—especially because I’m a sucker for anything that features Mario (I even own Dance Dance Revolution Mario Mix for the GameCube). I absolutely had to see what’s captivated so much of Japan—and also whether Mario could transition into the world of match-three games.

Puzzle & Dragons Z plays out just like its mobile counterpart. You take on the role of a coming-of-age teen (and have the choice to be male or female) who’s decided to join a national peacekeeping force. When a terrorist organization called Paradox upsets the delicate balance of the world’s key elements (fire, water, wood, dark, and light), you’re tasked with piecing back together your crumbling world by traveling to temples dedicated to each respective element and restoring order. Along the way, you receive eggs that can instantly hatch back at the home base; you then train these beasts to become part of a six-monster party that fights on your behalf. Members of the party then attack when you match special orbs of power into rows of three or more that correspond to the creature’s color-oriented type.

The Super Mario Bros. Edition of Puzzle & Dragons utilizes similar gameplay but stays true to the Super Mario Bros. formula: Bowser kidnaps Princess Peach, and Mario must traverse eight worlds in order to get her back—with the first seven guarded by Bowser’s trusted Koopalings. The difference here is that Mario and the gang can add members of the Koopa Troop (including Goombas, Bloopers, and Giant Hammer Bros., among others) much in the same way you acquire eggs in Puzzle & Dragons Z. Both games also have a basic RPG-inspired leveling system where the creatures in your party grow stronger the more they fight.

Unfortunately, while this 2-in-1 bundle removes the original’s free-to-play microtransactions, it doesn’t really add anything to the experience, either—and Super Mario Bros. Edition feels like a cheap reskin. After only a few worlds of each game, I found myself utterly bored by the entire thing.

Sure, gathering monsters and leveling them up is an addictive proposition that’s been a cornerstone of collect-em-all RPGs like Pokémon, and there’s a hint of that in both of these titles. Puzzle & Dragons Z even adds a town where players can speak with NPCs and receive items and side challenges—but these folks are about as interesting as the Toads who populate the Mario Bros. games.

After playing a match-three game for any substantial amount of time, you start to realize that, far too often, the game revolves around luck. The best entries in the genre, however, find ways to hide this with an interesting story, stronger RPG elements, or even the aforementioned microtransactions, which surprisingly enough can act as a boon in this case since they either force you to walk away after a short period of time or inspire a gambling-style rush if you put extra money on the line, helping keeping boredom at bay (even if in the worst way possible). Neither of the games in this bundle have any of those properties, though, and so monotony quickly sets in.

Worst of all? The tedium comes before you even get fully invested in either adventure. The difficulty between a board with four different-colored orbs and one with six is monumental, since there are ever only 30 orbs on the screen at once, which is far less than most other match-three games. After only a few tutorial battles, you’re thrown right into the six-color-orb conflicts, rarely to ever return to four or five. Since harder monsters have more HP, you’ll find yourself praying each time you clear a row that the right orbs will fall into place, like a gambler futilely hoping for 7s to lock in on his slot machine.

As much as I love puzzle games and Mario crossovers, Puzzle & Dragons Z + Puzzle & Dragons: Super Mario Bros. Edition is a disappointment on every front. It’s not inherently broken in any way; it’s just painstakingly dull. Puzzle & Dragons borrows so liberally from so many other franchises that when you peel back the layers, it leaves nothing but a half-baked match-three game at its core—and Super Mario Bros. Edition is simply one more layer trying to bolster the illusion that this is an interesting game. It’s not.

Developer: GungHo • Publisher: Nintendo • ESRB: E – Everyone • Release Date: 05.22.15
4.5
A bundle that embodies the worst grinding elements of popular RPGs with a lackluster match-three gameplay mechanic. This version of Puzzle & Dragons tries to use the gold standard that Super Mario Bros. represents in order to bolster the façade that this is an interesting, worthwhile gaming experience. It’s not.
The Good The addictive Pokémon-like nature of collecting and leveling up creatures to fight for you.
The Bad Progress is slow and grinding and nothing about the gameplay hides this fact.
The Ugly I think the reason why Japan loves this franchise so much is they have a gambling problem. It’s time for an intervention.
Puzzle & Dragons Z + Puzzle & Dragons: Super Mario Bros. Edition  is a 3DS exclusive. Review code was provided by Nintendo for the benefit of this review.
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