Manga Review - One Piece

There's two big things I avoid when checking out manga/anime: shonen series and long-running series. I avoid shonen series because honestly, most of them kinda suck. And I avoid long-running series because it takes forever to get caught up with it all, and it typically isn't worth it anyway because when a series runs for a long time, usually what happens is the author runs starts running out of good ideas and the series goes to shit. Funnily enough, both these things coincide with the three big shonen series: Naruto, Bleach, and One Piece. Considering how ridiculously bad Bleach is right now, it seems my prejudice isn't really just a prejudice.

To my surprise however, I found that fellow Pseudoroid writer Taylor was a huge OPfag, and he heartily recommended the series to me. Since he (usually) doesn't steer me wrong, I decided to give it a try.

Most of you probably know what the gist of One Piece is: the quest of a young man, Monkey D. Luffy, to sail the seas and become "The Pirate King", the greatest pirate ever. Due to eating a "Devil Fruit", a mysterious fruit which bestows those who eat it with magical powers, he has become a "rubber man", able to stretch any of his limbs as if it were rubber.

While on his journey he builds himself a small but very memorable crew, including the former pirate bounty hunter swordsman Roronoa Zoro, the lithe and money-loving navigator Nami, the lying-prone big-nosed sharpshooter Usopp, the talking shape-shifting reindeer doctor Tony Tony Chopper, among various others. Throughout the various trials and tribulations he and his crew face, they all grow stronger as combatants and individuals and gain increasingly higher bounties from the World Government, who has since branded Luffy as an extremely powerful and dangerous individual.

After sitting through 594 chapters, I have to say I'm very impressed. I have never seen a shonen manga that has run for over a decade and yet has managed to keep itself together so well. Oda either has amazing foresight and planning (considering the fact that he wouldn't have a way of knowing that One Piece would be the massive succes it is, he wouldn't necessarily have to feel obligated to plan so far in advance), or he's ridiculously good at spotting opportunities to tie his story together.

Oda's art is very distinct, with highly caricatured and stylized designs that help make each character memorable and unique. Design aside, the characters themselves are also diverse and likable, from the simple-minded protagonist Luffy, to the comic relief villain Buggy the Clown, to the kickboxing womanizing chef Sanji, to the sinister and ruthless criminal boss Crocodile, every character is different and instantly recognizable.

It's not the best manga ever, but for a shonen manga, it's entertaining and surprisingly well-written. The series still has a ways to go, as Oda has gone on record to say that it is only about halfway done, which means there is still a lot in store left for the fans. I am definitely interested in seeing how it will all end up.

If you like shonen manga, you will definitely like One Piece.

Comic Con 2010 Game Impression: Marvel vs Capcom 3

Probably the first thing we rushed to was the Capcom booth, as it's known for being dedicated to video games. What we found was a store full of great stuff, a section set up for taking a picture of you in the Dead Rising 2 universe, and a whole upper deck dedicated specifically to Marvel vs Capcom 3.

As I made my way up to the Marvel vs Capcom deck, I saw that the line was anything less than friendly. Still, I was able to get my turn rather quickly, as only a couple matches after I entered the line, the Capcom employee asked if there were any other single players ready to battle. Apparently the ten people in front of me all wanted to play against each other, so I took my chance and when up there.

My opponent was a 25-some player who looked like he was going to kick my ass. And he did. I own Marvel vs Capcom 2, so I wanted to get a feel of the characters that I had yet to play as before. Seeing as Thor and Amaterasu were both left outside of the demo, I decided to go with Deadpool, Dante, and Chris. My opponent decided the exact opposite, and picked the characters he knew would allow him to win: Iron Man, Dr. Doom, and Wolverine.

Needless to say, I was pretty much destroyed. Iron Man plays exactly as he did in MvC2, so the guy seemed to know exactly what he was doing. I didn't get a great feel of anyone but Chris, as I was destroyed far too quickly to really do anything. Chris was a fun fighter though, and his long range focus kept me away from this guy's partner attacks. I also managed to use one of Chris's Ultra attacks to knife, pistol, shotgun, and bazooka the shit out of Dr. Doom. I ended up killing Doom and nearly killing Iron Man; my opponent never had to use Wolverine.

My combination of characters were terrible choices, to be honest. Partner attacks had Chris and Dante lunging forward and totally missing my opponent, so Iron Man continued to batter me as Deadpool. I had hoped to be able to be lucky enough to play around with the fight stick, but I ended up in an XBox 360 section, playing with the controller I was least familiar with. They had a somewhat-helpful little diagram on the bottom, dictating what buttons did what, but I ultimately ended up button-mashing as if my life depended on it.

The game itself, much like MvC2, can be very one-sided depending on who knows (or doesn't know) what they're doing. Button-mashing can take care of a lot for your combo needs, and pretty much bring your opponent to the point where they can't lay a finger on you. And frankly, I'm more used to playing Super Street Fighter IV on my PS3, which I feel doesn't focus on button-mashing quite as much as the MvC series. Ultimately, as I said, I was obliterated pretty quickly. Felt bad, bro. Especially because I only got the chance to play one game throughout the entire day.

The game is incredibly fast-paced and the match actually did not feel that long, despite the fact that we each had three characters. As Deadpool, I just sort of jumped around and did kicks, and with Dante I only managed to use gun attacks for whatever reason. As I said, Chris was a majority of my gameplay time, and that's not saying all that much.

Combat isn't flawed, and it honestly feels a lot like Marvel vs Capcom 2 in 3D. As previously stated, Iron Man seemed to have nearly the exact same feel, and as I watched other matches on the gigantic screens streaming atop the booth, I noticed many of the other veteran characters looked like that too. The game looks nice, feels nice, and will ultimately be awesome. I'm positive of it.

But adding Gene or Phoenix Wright wouldn't hurt.

Comic Con 2010

It was awesome.

lol brazilian gamman

While I was at work Friday, a co-worker brought to my attention that there was a videogame-related event taking place at a mall in the southern part of the city, and made it sound really cool. Being that gaming is one of my biggest hobbies, and that the ticket to get in was only 20 brdollars (basically ten bucks), it sounded like a pretty good deal.

Having just gotten back from there, it wasn't really that great.

Basically the exhibit was split up in 6 areas: history of videogames, history of Mario, Rock Band area, soccer area, FPS area, and PS3 area.

While the history of videogames and Mario sections were interesting and informative, the fact that it's a historical exhibit means all the games on display were basically all shit I'd already played, or could easily play if I felt like it (through emulators). Though, it was kind of neat to be able to play on an actual Atari 2600, and hold the Sega Saturn and Dreamcast controllers. I played New Super Mario Bros Wii for a few minutes and decided to go do something else.

The Rock Band and Soccer games area both pertain to subjects I'm not particularly interested in, so I didn't really bother with either, though I did note the Soccer area had the biggest TV in the whole event (unsurprising given Brazil's huge soccerfaggotry).

I then decided to check out the FPS area, which had only two games up (one on 360 and one on PS3). Had it not been for the game's posters and what the guys playing them were saying, I honestly wouldn't have been able to tell you what games they were. What is it with all FPS's looking so much alike?

The 360 game was, unsurprisingly, Halo 3, which I actually got to play for about 15 minutes.

First impression: "...this is kind of like Quake."

Second impression: "...this is a lot like Quake."

Third and final impression: "...yeah this is Quake."

Not necessarily bad or unpolished, but yeah.

MAG I played for a few minutes and got bored when the novelty of shooting shit got old. For some reason, although Halo 3 was pretty much occupied the entire time, not that many people seemed to care about MAG.

The PS3 section was probably the most interesting, if only because, given the hefty prices electronics in general fetch here due to prohibitive import taxes, I have not had much experience with this generation of consoles in general. There were 5 games: some Splinter Cell game (which was actually for the PS2, but whatever), which I just overlooked; Modnation Racers, which I overlooked; Uncharted, which I got to play for a while; Heavy Rain, which I looked at but didn't really play; and God of War 3, which I played for about 10 minutes.

God of War 3 is a visually stunning game, as most of you who've seen anything from it will have noticed by now, but in terms of actual gameplay it doesn't really feel much different from any of the others. I got bored and decided to look for something else to do, even though I'd waited for a good half hour to be able to play it at all (demand for the game was pretty big, apparently).

Uncharted I played for about half an hour, which I could do so because nobody really seemed to give a shit about it. Funny, because it was easily the highlight of the event for me. I really enjoyed the little I played of it, it's a really fun and well-made game and I definitely want to play it from start to finish.

Basically, what I've learned from this: brazilians are gay for Halo and God of War (just like americans), God of War 3 is sameshitty, Halo is Quake, and Uncharted is cool beans.

It's events like this that make me realize what an odd case I am amongst most brazilians who play videogames, given how much more I know and care about the medium than pretty much anyone else here that I've personally met and conversed with on the subject.

Taylor sucks because he's going to Comicon and will without question have a much better time with that than I did with this.

Top 10 Mario Games: Number 3

i am getting lazier and lazier

3. Super Mario World

Where to begin with Super Mario World?

Super Mario World took Super Mario Bros. 3 and put it on awesome-enhancing steroids, increasing performance and fun-factor in a variety of different ways. On the outside, the game play very similar to it's predecessor with better music and graphics. However, the changes make it worthy of the third spot in this list.

The overworld map for Super Mario World is immense and filled with not only bright and creative settings, but also secrets and shortcuts. While it appears to be, essentially, a straight line there is a ridiculous amount of secret levels to find throughout the game, providing for an enriching experience.

The new power-ups and your good pal Yoshi also spiced up the gameplay from what SMB3 had to offer. The cape, which is essentially a remodel of the Tanooki Suit, allows Mario to fly up into the air and glide himself back down to safety. Many levels provide secrets high up in the air, so having a cape is always handy. Being able to ride on Yoshi also allows for different approaches to levels and the enemies and secrets within them. Also added was the Spin Jump which, if used correctly, can save Mario from quite a lot of deaths.

Gameplay in Super Mario World never seems to feel old, no matter how many times you manage to make it through every level, even the secret ones, in the game; the replay value is literally that great. The game has become one of the greatest-selling games of all time and has a lasting legacy both throughout the Mario fanbase and media as a whole.

Super Mario World is fun, fast-paced, and challenging, but it never seems to get tiresome no matter how many times you pick up that controller and play. It has influenced future Mario titles and many other platformers in general, which is welcomed by the community. Beautifully designed, fantastically orchestrated, and wonderfully absurd, World took everything Super Mario Bros. 3 had to offer and made it even better.

And considering how fun Super Mario Bros. 3 is, that's a pretty big deal.

Top 10 Mario Games: Number 4

We skipped a day because we did

4. Paper Mario

Paper Mario is just one of those games where you first see it and think, "Why would Nintendo sink this low? Mario in paper form? That's just ridiculous." But then you play it because, hey, it's Mario and everyone is a Mario fan and it turns out you were wrong. Terribly wrong.

Paper Mario is incredibly creative and beautiful in its own right. The 2D characters on 3D locations mix well, and all the NPCs seem lively enough to make it actually look like every setting has some sort of life going on. Puzzles are scattered throughout the overworld, and must be solved via jumping, hammering, or using another creative paper method. Never too challenging to the mind, but the overworld will never just be a walk in the park either, which is a fantastic balance.

Gameplay is similar to most RPGs, in that you and your enemies take turns choosing moves in an attempt to beat the other. Mario can jump, hammer, or use special abilities to defeat the enemies or creative bosses that come in his way. Mario may also have one partner out to assist him at a time. Each partner character has unique and special abilities both in and out of battle that will help defeat enemies and conquer puzzles.

The music in the game is always fantastic and fitting, providing for an even greater atmosphere. The blend of RPG elements and a Mario-platforming sort of feel provide for a great game experience, and the clever characters and fantastic and humorous story, riddled throughout with puzzles and side-quests, provide for a unique Mario experience: deeper than any seen previously before.

Paper Mario is often compared to its RPG predecessor, Super Mario RPG, and for good reason: Paper Mario borrows quite a bit from SMRPG. Some argue that even too much was borrowed or "stolen" from the predecessor, but it's clear in the eyes of this Mario fan that Paper Mario clearly bettered what Super Mario RPG introduced.

But apparently, even Paper Mario can be bettered.

Anime Review: Baccano!

Baccano! was a series of light novels (see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Light_novel) written by Ryohgo Narita and illustrated by Katsumi Enami, that got adapted into a 16 episode anime series in 2007. Since then the anime has been lavished with praise by the western anime community and held in high esteem as one of the best shows in the last few years.

Praise well-deserved.

Baccano takes place in the Prohibition era of the United States, between 1930-1932. The show often switches back and forth between different time periods without warning, creating a non-linear presentation.

There are three main tales in the story: The first concerns a struggle involving an immortality-bestowing elixir in 1930, the second chronicles the doomed voyage of the "Flying Pussyfoot" train in 1931, and the third and final story is young Eve Genoard's struggle to find her missing older brother Dallas Genoard in 1932.

What really makes Baccano is the characters: simply put, they're all awesome, which is pretty good considering how large of a cast it is. Pretty much all of them are in a morally grey area at best (considering most of them are criminals), with some just being downright bad, but even so they all remain charming and likable and you want to find out what happens to them.

The only character who I couldn't really find myself giving a shit about is Eve's brother Dallas; to put it without giving any outright spoilers, unlike characters like Ladd who are charmingly evil, Dallas is just an outright douchebag without many redeeming qualities to him whatsoever.

But outside of his bitch ass, everyone is baller.

Baccano also has a surprisingly stellar dub by Funimation, which I have yet to see myself, but it's gotten lots of praise from just about everyone I've spoken to, and it's even one of the dub jobs most of /a/ likes. So I assume it must be pretty good. So you can go either sub or dub for this one.

It's worth noting that the anime does not cover all of the light novels, which are still being published in Japan. If you look around for Baccano stuff you will see many characters who have yet to be introduced. Hopefully someday we will get a second season that covers the remaining stories.

In short: with a fun and diverse cast spinning very interesting stories within the span of a small 16 episodes, Baccano definitely should be on your watch list.

Top 10 Mario Games: Number 5

And now it gets difficult.

5. Super Mario Bros. 3

Super Mario Bros. 3 essentially took the original Super Mario Bros and added improved level layouts, a more-preferred sprite design, and some creative and interesting power-ups. The result was an incredibly fun game that was not only brighter and cuter than the original, but even more fun.

Super Mario Bros. 3 is one of the industry's best-selling video games, and for good reason. The design is flawless, the music is enjoyable, and the gameplay is the same fun it was as in the first game. Plus, Super Mario Bros. 3 has the Koopa Kids, who are perhaps the coolest characters in the entire series. They are cute and enjoyable, and I suppose they were the first proof that Bowser is indeed sane enough to actually birth and care for children (perhaps not well enough, as they are rather easy to defeat).

The power-ups in this game are particularly memorable, which is both great and sad. Great because the Tanooki Suit, the Frog Suit, and the Warp Whistle were all innovative and extremely awesome additions to the series. Sad because we may never see them again, although the Tanooki Suit sort of saw a redesign as the Cape in Super Mario World. The power-ups, however crazy they are, still made for funner gameplay and a better time. Props, Nintendo.

Innovative. Ingenious. Fantastic. How do you beat Super Mario Bros 3?

You make games number 4 and up.

-Taylor

Great Games that Aren't that Great In Retrospect - Kingdom Hearts

You ever had that game series you used to love as a kid? Played the fuck out of it, went to midnight release for that shit, rocked out to the soundtrack, bought shittons of memorabilia...then one day you grew up and realized it really wasn't that great to begin with. You were just a punk with bad taste. It might have even been terribad. You then proceed to move on to much more heterosexual and not shitty games.

Well this segment is all about that.

Today's specimen:

Yeah I went there. Suck it up and read, bitches.

Nobody thought Kingdom Hearts was going to work (and eventually it didn't, but we'll get to that later). Why would it? Mixing the light hearted Disney (although to be honest disney isn't as kiddy as some people make it out to be)icons with the melodramatic and gritty Final Fantasy elements and imagery seemed like something out of an obscure fanfiction. But Square-Enix decided to go through with it anyway and made a sleeper hit. Kingdom Hearts eventually became a franchise, with 6 games and one remake under its belt, and one more remake and new game coming in the near future. Not bad for what seemed like a freak experiment, right?

I'm a pretty odd case because KH1 was not my introduction to the series. Chain of Memories was my first Kingdom Hearts game. I remember stumbling into it, seeing Cloud Strife interacting with Donald Duck and some animu kid and was like "what the fuck am i playing". I decided to keep playing. To my surprise I found it pretty enjoyable. After getting filled in on what exactly was going on, I got into the story and found the characters and plot intriguing and the dialogue well written. Plus the music was cool.

I got into the series pretty late, around the time KH2 was scheduled for an NA release. I spoiled the whole game sadly, and played it and kind of enjoyed it anyway, although not as much as CoM. Got the first game eventually and beat that too. Still haven't beaten Days.

Probably because of this, my opinion of the series is a bit different than most people's.

The general consensus amongst the fanbase seems to be that KH1 was god tier, CoM had bad gameplay but a good plot and writing (best character development in the series), while KH2 was either terribad in comparison or just not as good at the first game. Opinions on Days seem mixed at best.

To be honest, I don't find KH1 to be that good. I can certainly understand why some people like it so much, but that's really my whole point as to why a lot of my affection for the series has faded away: Kingdom Hearts mixed two things a lot of people really liked and managed to throw in a generic but serviceable RPG story and characters, with some fairly decent music for good measure. The result ends up being an awkward and deeply flawed game (terrible camera, bad platforming/level design, button mashy gameplay, etc), but one which evokes a magical charm that makes it likable in spite of its flaws, when it's really not that great of a game in reality. That's really all there is to it.

Unfortunately, with each game the charm from the first game wears off more and more.

While I liked CoM when I played it, it's really just a rehash of KH1's worlds except with alterations to the Disney plots to fit in the game's theme of memories. The problem is that the game doesn't even try to hide how filler the Disney worlds are. In Re:CoM the Disney worlds don't even have voice acting, Square KNOWS nobody cares about them anyway. Sure the plot in Castle Oblivion is interesting enough, but you have to get through a lot of shit to get to it.

CoM's gameplay was supposed to give a more strategic edge to the battle system other than MASH MASH MASH X, but given how you basically just put the highest level cards in your deck with some 0's to card break sleights, and win, it doesn't really work. It's also not really that fun.

KH2 didn't have the rehashing problem, but many new ones ended up rearing their ugly heads Part of the issue is, funnily enough, that SE listened to what fans and critics said. Terrible camera? Ok no problem, fixed. Terrible level design? Fair enough, let's streamline the worlds. Gameplay is too shallow? Alright, let's add some Drive Forms and Reaction Commands to spice things up a bit.

The thing is they didn't realize is that doing all of those things without making a few other tweaks accordingly makes for a much more polished game than its predecessor, but a much more shallow and underwhelming experience in general since the initial innovation of the first game isn't there anymore.

The worlds don't have awkward platforming anymore, but in compensation...there's not much at all, really. I would have liked good exploration rather than none at all. It's watch a cutscene, go to the next area, beat up some heartless along the way, watch another cutscene, rinse repeat until you get to the boss, for every world. This wouldn't be as much of a problem except

1) The plot is shit.

The series' writing has never been particularly stellar, but it became unbearable in KH2. A lot of the dialogue sounds awkward or just plain retarded. I don't know if it was a bad localization or just plain bad writing. The plot itself has some interesting ideas, but the execution is godawful. Outside of the aforementioned dialogue, the pacing is awful.

In a sense, the worlds aren't as filler as CoM's, but even then the memory worlds had lessons and writing that paralleled the problems Sora was facing in Castle Oblivion so they had SOME worth, however little it was.

In KH2, you're basically doing the same thing as the first game: fighting Heartless and stopping Disney villains from causing havoc.

...except the plot isn't supposed to be about that. The main threat are the nobodies and Organization XIII, they're clearly supposed to be the big bads of the game. But the game focuses on them very little to the point where they don't really feel like that much of a threat at all.

The Organization doesn't even really show up in most of the Disney worlds. Most of them just have Pete and his antics which don't really amount to much, and aren't particularly interesting. It doesn't really help that you have to revisit most worlds at least twice, and the second time you go there isn't usually that much better than the first.

Oh yeah, they also turned Maleficent into a joke. Isn't that great? She and Pete become the game's comic relief villain.

Maleficent. A comic relief villain. That is just....not right on so many levels.

A shining example of shitty writing. The final confrontation with the Organization doesn't feel epic (for lack of a better term) at all because there's practically no build up, it doesn't feel like you're stopping the game's main villains finally after all the shit you went through because YOU DIDN'T FUCKING SEE THEM AT ALL. Some games pull the enigmatic villain thing well, but kh2 isn't one of them.

2) The gameplay can be somewhat fun and overall it's all flash and no substance. You don't have to do much other than just mash X and mash triangle when the reaction commands pop up. Good games don't necessarily need deep combat systems to be good, but in KH2's case it's just kind of too easy. It's not a problem that they gave you too many options, rather that most of the enemies are negligible punching bags.

The nostalgia filter is undoubtedly involved somewhat in this whole issue for some people, as KH1 wasn't that great either (and as someone who's played KH2 before KH1, I can attest to that), but at least it was kinda cute when it came out.

As for Days?

Well I don't really fully know what I think of it yet, to be honest. It doesn't really feel like it was necessary, I didn't even think there would have been anything too important during Roxas' days at the Organization to warrant a full game at all. So they made up some shit about a girl nobody remembers (which incidentally, is a plot device they seem to be using a lot, more on that below) so they could avoid the issue of why nobody talks about her in KH2. The gameplay is kind of fun and seems to actually be kind of hard at first, but once you realize magic is overpowered, it kind of balances itself out. The panel system is pretty cool so I'll give it props for that. Haven't been able to finish Days, and the reason for that is one of the flaws that's becoming apparent for the series as a whole, which I will get to in a moment.

Birth By Sleep is coming out in September. I haven't really had the chance to play this outside of a few minutes, so I've no opinion on the gameplay so far. I have spoiled a lot of the plot for myself though, so I can talk about that a little bit.

Honestly it sounds like they're not trying anymore. I don't mind the fact that some of the twists are pretty predictable, but the plot in general seems kind of silly. Recycled character designs are getting annoying. I won't say anything in particular, but if you've seen the english trailer and listened to Vanitas' voice you've probably already guessed at what I'm getting at.

Also, X-Blade is a really stupid name.

Music for BBS is stellar, the synth for the strings is fantastic. For the record, Takeharu Ishimoto (world ends with you, crisis core, dissidia) composed the vanitas themes, not Shimomura.

That's about it.

Re:coded? coded gets on my nerves and I don't feel glad about the fact we're getting it remade. Why? Because it's the third rehash of kh1 they've done so far. Going to the same areas of the same worlds over and over and over again is getting really boring, and it's just lazy and insulting of SE to assume people won't mind if they just keep rehashing the best game in the series over and over again....except they're right because people keep buying the games anyway.

"but but but they're going to memory worlds it has to be worlds they visited-"

No, shut up. There are many ways around that. Just because it's the same world doesn't mean it has to be the exact same areas to visit. And bugs could also interfere with the memories and create new worlds or some shit. I don't know. I'd just be glad never to go to Agrabah ever again. THAT'S why I haven't finished Days.

The series' plot is getting more and more convoluted. it's not for the better. At first it was just a simple little Disney animu game, and now it's all ZEAAAAANOOOOOOTOOOO and KIIIIIBURREEEEEEEDO MASUTAAAAAAAA and shit and it's just really sophomoric.

The trailer for KH:3D makes me lol because it's KH opening kind of shit. Apparently it's not representative of the actual game, we get to play as Riku, AND go to new worlds, so this might not be as bad as it could have been.

Regardless of that, while I still somewhat like the series and plan to check out (see:pirate, because spending money on this shit would be silly when I could put that money towards more important things like MOTHERFUCKING SKYWARD SWORD AAAAAW YEAAAAAAH) Birth By Sleep and re:coded, I definitely don't like it as much as I did 4-5 years ago. It was an odd idea that ended up working surprisingly well at first, but then went to shit fast. Square-Enix is milking the fuck out of it because that's how capitalism works. Not gonna blame them completely, since the fanbase is stupid enough to put up with that shit.

But on the whole I like better games now.

-Paolo

Top 10 Mario Games: Number 6

Hey guys, it's

6. Super Mario Bros.

Seems a little fuzzy to put this guy in the list in the first place, and I can understand why some might think that way. While it is responsible for both the "true", popular birth of Mario, as well as keeping video games alive in North America after the crash in 1983, the game itself is rather simple.

My rebuttal: so what?

Super Mario Bros is simplicity in its finest, and was the introduction to video games for an entire generation. If you've never played it, you have problems that you need to sort out immediately. While the story is by no means fantastic (not like Mario platformers ever really have good stories), and the gameplay is simplistic (honestly, the game can be finished in 15 minutes if you know what you're doing), the game is a fun time and can be a bit challenging at some points.

However, despite it's great platforming design and fun levels, the game itself can be repetitive as time goes on, with little design change in most "worlds". As previously mentioned, the game can also be completed in a very quick amount of time if you are aware of the shortcuts. While this doesn't make the game less fun, it makes the fun last a shorter time, which is certainly not a good thing.

Still, despite these flaws, the game itself has contributed not just to the Mario franchise, but all of gaming as a whole, creating the Platformer genre and allowing Mario to become the face of Nintendo and one of the most famous icons of all times. Few games can make you come back to play more than 50 times and still present a fun time (certainly not any other game on this list). Still, we cannot award merit based on what the game has spurred, but rather what the game is in itself.

Which is about a good 20 or so minutes.

-Taylor

Top 10 Mario Games: Number 7

Time for another controversial edition of...

7. Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga

I'm not actually sure how many fans will agree with my choice to put Superstar Saga above Super Mario RPG, but here it is anyway. Superstar Saga is responsible for spawning the great Mario & Luigi sub-series, which included two great games and one not-so-great game. Do with that what you will.

This nifty little RPG title borrows elements from Super Mario RPG and Paper Mario in terms of battle, while adding Bro Attacks and the likes for a twist; the twist being that you actually must control both Mario and Luigi defensively on the enemy's turn. It makes for an interesting style of gameplay aimed at correct timing and precision.

Like all other Mario RPGs, Superstar Saga has a cast of lovable characters who are hard to forget (honestly, how could you forget Prince Peasley), as well as a creative and interesting land: the Beanbean Kingdom. Bosses are fun and creative, but also challenging in their own right. The story is always interesting and attempts keeps you wrapped in, while also putting your mind to work via intuitive puzzles.

Still, the game has its own flaws. The story can be both predictable and repetitive, and the characters themselves do not seem completely fleshed out all the time. The battle system, despite it's interesting idea to allow you to control both Mario and Luigi defensively at the same time, is honestly nothing that we have yet to see before, and feels like nothing truly special was implemented. Despite these small flaws though, the game itself is quite great. Plus, it introduced us to Fawful!

And then Partners in Time happened.

-Taylor

RPG Gems - Final Fantasy Tactics

The turn-based RPG isn't something that every gamer really enjoys. Some find taking turns and selecting menu commands to be a boring and tedious way to play games, as well as just being unrealistic (although this particular argument is kind of silly, because videogames aren't exactly supposed to be realistic in the first place; they're supposed to be fun). Some are just fine with that though, and I am one of those people. With this new segment of Analogg, I will be talking about RPG's that are notable for being particularly excellent and well-polished nippon products.

Today we're going to look at this baby:

Aaaaaw yeah, son.

Final Fantasy Tactics was a strategy-based RPG released in 1997 (in Japan), made by a team largely composed of people from Quest, who had previously worked on the acclaimed "Tacics Ogre" and "Ogre Battle". Apparently the game was made to make Tactics Ogre-esque gameplay more appealing to casual gamers, who were off put with the series' complex branching storylines.

And that's what this game does: it takes Tactics Ogre and makes it a Final Fantasy game. While it's a spin-off, it is most definitely a true FF game, with FF classes, items, currency, monsters, themes, and even its very own Cid.

Being a SRPG, it uses 2d sprites on a 3D isometric field split up into squares during battle. The game features a very fun and very robust class system. Units earn "JP" for every successful action (excluding movement), which can then be used to "purchase" abilities from their class. The fun comes from the fact that once an ability has been obtained, it can then be equipped to a different class. This leads to some very interesting possibilities, such as obtaining a "Wear Heavy Armor" ability from a knight class, changing to unit to a Monk, and equipping it on them, which creates a very mobile and powerful "tank" unit.

This was also the first game to take place in the world of Ivalice, which would be revisited by Square in future titles, such as Final Fantasy Tactics Advance, Final Tantasy Tactics A2, Final Fantasy XII, and Vagrant Story.

This is a pretty different Ivalice from say, XII's (which incidentally, is comparable to Tactics in many ways other than the fact that they're both Ivalice games). It's a very bleak world that reminds you of a magic medieval Europe more than anything else. There are no airships, the more fantastical elements of the game's world are downplayed until a ways into the game, and there are no races other than humes.

The game's plot concerns the story of Ramza Beoulve, the youngest son of the prestigious family of Beoulve nobles, and his role in the "War of the Lions", an important historical conflict that split Ivalice in two. Mirroring his character's journey is the figure of Delita Hyral, Ramza's childhood friend who at first accompanies him on their stay at the Academy they both attend. A series of shocking and terrible events occurs that splits the two friends, sending them both off on different paths with different ideologies guiding them. Without giving too much of the game's plot away, you could say that the point of their characters is examining the true nature of heroism.

The game's plot is arguably one of its greatest strengths. It's a very unique case where the characters themselves aren't exactly the point of interest so much as the events that unfold around them. Rather than being a character-driven love story like, say, Final Fantasy VIII or X, Tactics foregoes this for a plot that heavily centers on political intrigue...much like XII's. You're surely beginning to see how exactly these two games are so alike. The nature of the game's story can be off-putting to some people, but I find it a refreshing and more mature departure from most RPG stories.

Tactics' story is also one of the tasteful examples of a phenomenon I like to call "relitroll", which is basically what happens when a work of fiction takes thematic elements from religious traditions (most often, Christianity) and focuses on them considerably, in an even sometimes negative light (see: Shin Megami Tensei, Xenogears, Neon Genesis Evangelion, etc). To explain how Tactics manages to do this without being distasteful would be to give too much of the game's plot away, so I'll just say that a major driving force in the story is the Church of Glabados, which functions rather similarly to how the Catholic church functioned in medieval times.

The game's music was composed by Hitoshi Sakimoto and Masaru Iwata, whose music have since become practically synonymous with Ivalice. It's not the most AMAZING score you've ever heard, but it's still memorable enough, and synthed in a manner that brings to mind a midi orchestra.

While the game was relatively successful critically and commercially, it was largely overlooked by fans, no doubt in part because of Final Fantasy VII, which was released shortly before. "Eeeeew sprites, what is this, Super Nintendo? Fuck dat shit mang, polys are where at it's at".

It's rather ironic, then, that part of what makes Tactics so great is that it's aged very, very, very well in comparison to something like VII. Obviously some amount of nostalgifaggotry plays into that, but not for me particularly. I played it only two years ago, so nostalgia doesn't really factor into my appreciation for the game.

Certainly though, graphics-wise, nostalgia or no nostalgia it's silly to deny which game has aged better. I have no opinion on VII as a whole, since I still haven't finished it. However, it looks like blocky shit by today's standards. On the other hand, Tactics' pristine sprites wowed me simply because I wasn't used to seeing sprites that had so many unique animations before. I was used to something like the SNES Final Fantasy's, which did not have this level of detail in their sprites. Simply put, Tactics is much more appealing to look at now than most early 3D games.

The original release of FFT is notable for its shoddy localization, which generally got the point across, but felt somewhat awkward and was full of typos and translation blunders (such as making "Ice Breath", "Ice Bracelet").

I loved the game anyway. Even in this day and age and with a shitty translation, it was just a really unique and enjoyable experience from start to finish. THAT is the mark of a truly excellent and well-made game.

Arguments can be made against the game, certainly. While you could say that the game was underrated initially, this is hardly the case anymore, as the game has a very notable following which, while perhaps not as large as, say, VII's (derpderp), is equally devoted and passionate about it, to the point where you might be able to argue that Tactics is a little over-rated.

For one thing, the game seems to encourage you to grind a lot, since there's no easy way to run away from battles when going into areas that they can take place in outside of just resetting the game and hoping to not trigger an encounter when passing through that area again. Due to the nature of the gameplay, battles can also be very time-consuming because you can't just mash the attack option over and over again to hope to end the battle quickly.

Unlike most RPG's, the amount of exp needed to level up is always 100, which is compensated by the fact that exp is gained during the battle with every successful action an individual character performs. Meaning that if a character didn't do anything the whole battle, he won't gain any exp by the end of it, even if you are victorious. Since it's not always easy to get everyone to do a whole lot during a battle, this can be somewhat frustrating.

However this is easily side-stepped by the "Accumulate" ability, which raises your attack power and nets you exp every time you use it. Provided that you have it, a character will always be able to reliably use this to gain exp every turn.

The enemies in random encounters level up with you, regardless of the area, but the enemies in story battles don't. If you grind too much, you might have a more difficult time with regular enemies than the games' bosses!

As previously noted, the game's story will probably not be your cup of tea if you are used to a more character-centric story. The game's plot is also initially somewhat confusing and difficult to understand (although with time you'll get the gist of it pretty quickly).

Regardless of all this, I still think this is one of the best games Square-Enix has ever made, and one of the best RPG's of all time. The game has since received an upgraded PSP port in the form of War of the Lions, which features a brand new and far superior translation, as well as many new extras including two new classes and extra scenes not present in the original.

If you have not already played the PSX Tactics, or have already played it and feel like going through the game once more, I would definitely consider investing in the PSP port. You won't regret it.

-Paolo

Top 10 Mario Games: Number 8

oh wow two back to back i must be crazy

8. Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars

Oh, Super Mario RPG, it's so sad that you're always overlooked. You are truly a fun game, and nobody even knows it! Well, rational people do but that number is rather small.

So if you've never played, or worse, never even heard of Super Mario RPG, it was a game developed by Square for the SNES way back in 1996. It's a nifty turn-based rpg that introduced fun mechanics held by all further Mario RPGs (see: Paper Mario; Mario & Luigi), while also presenting a ridiculously interesting and fun story and characters that have, sadly, never been seen since.

The game has a nice cast of characters that are fun, innovative, and lovable. If you've never heard of Mallow, the Axem Rangers, Geno, or Smithy, you and me are going to have a serious problem. The characters were interesting and full of life, something that many games lack. What else does this game have that other Mario games lack? Princess Toadstool (not Peach, Toadstool) and Bowser actually join your party and help you fight against the evil Smithy and his gang, repairing Star Road and reclaiming Bowser's Castle in the process.

The game itself has some fun locations, with Bowser's Castle serving as the main place, as it is the portal to Smithy's home world. Outside of that and Mushroom Kingdom, every other place is fun and new. Nimbus Land is, as it may sound, a land full of cloud people, much as Moleville is a city of moles. Still, we see some familiarity here: Yos'ter Isle is the home of the Yoshis and another fun location you'll encounter in the game (Cute reference to Yoshi's Island here, which will unfortunately not be included in my list. Despite it's Super Mario title, it just feels, clearly, like a Yoshi game. Look for it in my future Yoshi list, though.).

With great locations, fun and lovable characters, a memorable cast of villains, and a great soundtrack to boot, it's a mysterious why this game goes so unnoticed. You'd think that when Nintendo and Square collaborate, everyone and their brother would be all over it. However, many Mario fans don't even really know about this game. Perhaps it was okay before 2008 to use the "It's ridiculously difficult to find," excuse, but now that SMRPG is on the Virtual Console, it's hard to buy that sort of thing. In fact, go purchase and play it right this second.

P.S. There is no Yoshi list coming.

-Taylor

Top 10 Mario Games: Number 9

Oops, guess we got a little busy and forgot to update Analogg a bit. Many of you have likely already had fun with Galaxy 2, much like we here have, but it's never too late to continue on with our list. Without further ado, I present number nine:

9. Super Mario 64

Super Mario 64 introduced us to Mario, Bowser, and the Mushroom Kingdom in 3D graphics: something that we should all be truly thankful for. However, the game itself is more-often-than not overpraised.

Don't get me wrong, Super Mario 64 is a fun game, it just did not feel like a Mario game. The distinct lack of power-ups that Mario fans felt so accustomed to were removed for a karate-based sort of attack system, with Mario flinging out an array of punches and kicks to defeat his enemies. While not exactly what many Mario fans might think of Mario doing, it certainly was interesting. Still, the classic jumping-to-destroy enemies mechanic was still present, assuring that Super Mario 64 still remembered who Mario was.

The game itself also seemed to lose itself in terms of fun and fanciful thinking. The game itself seems to lack surrealism, something that feels ridiculously odd in a game centered around a plumber saving a princess from a gigantic, mutated turtle whilst using odd power-ups to destroy his mushroom and turtle minions. The idea of being able to access new worlds via paintings was both interesting and cute, but it seemed to lack the feeling of a Mario game.

Still, despite its lack of actually feeling very much like a Mario game, Super Mario 64 was still incredibly fun and was a great 3D debut for Mario and all residents of the Mushroom Kingdom. Nintendo must have agreed, as Super Mario 64 saw itself a re-introduction in Super Mario 64DS.

Super Mario 64 also introduced the idea of Mario gathering stars in order to conquer Bowser, slowly gaining more access to more difficult and innovative levels as more Power Stars were collected, and all the while gaining closer access to Princess Peach. This mechanic has followed in Super Mario Sunshine and Super Mario Galaxy 1 and 2, allowing for a wider variety of worlds you can explore and play in, instead of silly ol' Mushroom Kingdom.

Certainly not a terrible game, although it does not feel like a true Mario game. Was Nintendo trying to make Mario feel newer due to his introduction on the 3D N64 system, or is this writer just crazy?

Probably both.

-Taylor