This week the RoboComic takes a look at the dangerous of Nintendo’s hardware.
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All posts for the month January, 2013
Speaking personally, The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker is my second favorite game in the series. I was understandably very happy to hear the announcement of an HD remake. Possibly the most exciting part is the “tune up the overall game experience” Nintendo mentioned. Now it’s most likely that this means Nintendo will slightly alter the textures, draw distances, text speed, and other small insignificant features barely noticeable and no one should get too excited. But where’s the fun in that? Instead, let’s all hop aboard the Pipe-Dream Express and take a trip to Speculation Station. Here’s six changes we’re hoping for.
There are many types of people in this world. There are thinkers and there are doers. Then comes along a man who does both. This man is known as brentalfloss and he has challenged the mind and the soul by asking the most important questions known to mankind. What if (insert video game title) had lyrics? Not only does he ask that question, he solves it.
Mega Man 3 with Lyrics was his first entry of the series and it wasn’t just some beginner’s luck either. He went on to solve that riddle for millions (Over exaggeration) of video games. He wasn’t finished there either mind you. He cut a swath through the internet like no one has ever seen! Not only did he spend his valuable time to answer the most important of riddles, he also gave us a wonderfully comedic web comic, as well as other video game themed videos. Want to listen to his stuff on the go? Well he has two full length albums. The man is funny, he is smart, and he can play the hell out of a piano. He proves it live as he travels the country telling his story. His live shows with the Cartridge Family are uncanny explosions of funny. To honor him in this VGM Spotlight, I’ve shared my five favorite brentalfloss videos!
I hope you enjoyed this VGM Spotlight. If you have a favorite VGM type act for me to check out, let me know!
This may be old news for a lot of you, but late is better than never, right? Capcom recently announced some more details concerning it’s upcoming action adventure game, Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate for Wii U and the Nintendo 3DS. This game is one of the first for Wii U that will allow cross platform play between its 3DS counterpart; meaning you can transfer your save file from the Wii U to the 3DS and play your same game on the go, and vice versa.
If you aren’t familiar with the Monster Hunter series, it pits players against fearsome monsters and gives them the opportunity to upgrade their equipment with materials obtained from these monsters. A demo hits the eShop for both systems on February 21st. The game’s retail release date follows soon after on March 22nd.
If you are as excited about this game as we are, you will probably enjoy looking at the pile of screenshots below.
Even with Mario missing, Luigi won’t be alone. Nintendo has announced it’s upcoming Luigi’s Mansion: Dark Moon will feature both online and local multi-player.
This week the RoboComic finds some loose threads.
Nintendo has released another Nintendo Direct video centered on the Wii U. Here’s a handy list, complete with opinions and commentary, on all that was shown.
You’ve heard me gush about The NESkimos and Random Encounter for a while now. It would be alright to assume that I would love to see some sort of collaboration. Well that possibility has come true with the release of Random Encounter’s new song Dead Labs. Along with Random Encounter, Dr Wily of the NESkimos joins forces to throw down an amazingly crafted Video Game inspired energy fueled rockgasm.
It comes at the perfect time too, as not only was this song inspired by System Shock, but also heavily influenced by Dead Space and Dead Space 2. Dead Space 3 is right around the corner, so maybe check out this jam to build the hype.
Final Fantasy Tactics has always been one of my all time favorite games. In fact, my love for it has kept me away from most other Strategy RPGs for fear of them not living up to the greatness that is FFT. Of course there have been a few exceptions, but generally FFT is the game I always fall back on.
As soon as David conjured up this fun segment of RoboAwesome, I immediately knew I had to discuss the Final Fantasy Tactics battle that all fans know. I had to talk about Rooftop. I think I just heard the collective sigh of every FFT fan across the globe. This battle was frustrating as hell but beating it felt so good.
Final Fantasy Tactics being a strategy RPG, there are some simple mechanics that you have to understand. The player has a group of five or six characters with different skills. Each character goes one at a time, including the enemies, so you have to plan your movements and thus the strategy. Occasionally in FFT, you will be joined by a guest character. These guest characters are AI controlled and can sometimes be pretty badass, or they can be Rafa.
The Riovanes Rooftop battle doesn’t sound all that complicated at first. You have to fight two assassins and an arc knight and you get five characters to use. One of them is a guest character which have been helpful so far. Best part is you don’t even have to kill all three enemies. All you have to do is get one of them to critical health. Sounds stupid easy right? You are probably reading this thinking I am crazy. Well guess what? You just touched the stove. There are a couple of things about this fight that make things extra difficult. For one, the assassins have INCREDIBLE range on their abilities, which include paralyzing your characters. Second and most important is that you have to keep Rafa alive. This is even more challenging when she bolts off right into the assassins and starts trying to fight them. There is no stopping that either. You have to make sure your speed is high enough and your heavy hitters don’t get stunned. Then you need to hope luck is on your side.
The funny thing is, back in the day chances are that unless you had a friend who already played it, you had no idea that you needed to get one of the assassins to critical. I remember just trying so hard to get them all locked down and defeated. Once I finally beat it, I realized I just needed to focus fire on one. Even knowing that now doesn’t really take the edge off of the battle. Rafa’s unpredictable nature and the Assassin’s huge range and debuffs make this battle rough for just about anyone. It certainly is a memorable one for all fans of Final Fantasy Tactics. In fact, later today I think I will play this classic again, I mean why not?
People come in a a variety of sizes, shapes, attitudes, colors, and smells, but despite our differences there are a few basic needs and desires that we all have in common with each other. Me, being a cold, hardened, and vicious Chicagoan, have an innate desire to commit massive crimes, run people over with assorted vehicles, and shoot things with a wide array of weapons. Until recently I had to keep these urges locked up deep down inside of me, hoping against all hope that the time would come when I would have an appropriate outlet for my violent and criminal tendencies. Not only does the newly released Retro City Rampage allow me to cover all of these bases, but it is a game that doesn’t take itself too seriously, which is something anyone can appreciate these days.
Gameplay
At its core, Retro City Rampage is an open-world sandbox game. This simply means you could probably spend a fair amount of time just engaging in sidequests and other optional aspects of the game without ever really touching the main quest. It also means things don’t necessarily need to be performed in a specific order, so you can play the game in a structure that best suits you.
While exploring the game world of Theftopolis, you will assume the role of the main character named PLAYER. Almost all tasks in this game will revolve around some sort of crime. Whether it’s burglary, assault, or grand theft auto – you name it and it has probably found its way into the game.
You can add grand theft TANK to your rap sheet!
If you’re going to commit crimes, you obviously need weapons, which are definitely not in short supply in Theftopolis. Each weapon is uniquely designed so you will need to learn the best weapon for each situation in order to succeed. Most people’s first instinct is probably to “run and gun” through missions in this game, but that would be a mistake. If you want to keep PLAYER alive, you will need to make a plan before heading into a room guns blazing. Thankfully, there is a simple but ingenious targeting system in place to ensure you will be able to make every bullet, rocket, or squirt from your flame thrower count.
If you ever tire of the main game’s action, simply hop over to Nolan’s Arcade and play some of the mini-games. Some familiar indie game faces will make an appearance, such as CommanderVideo in “Bit.Trip: Retro City”, and Super Meat Boy in “Virtual Meat Boy”. When visiting the arcade, it was pleasantly surprising to see how easy it was to spend almost just as much time on the mini-games as the main game.
Presentation
Let’s start off by getting the obvious out of the way; Retro City Rampage is a current generation game designed to look like an 8-bit classic. To drive this old school feeling home, players can select different frames to put around the action, such as a UHF TV frame (if you have to ask what that is, you’re too young to comprehend). If all this is just TOO much of a throwback for you, there is the option to remove the frames. You can also toggle scanlines on or off. Despite all these tricks that were employed to give the game a retro feel, a well polished and fully HD game shines through. It would have been so easy to cut corners and say it’s for the sake of making the game look older, but thankfully that wasn’t the case here.
No 80s classic game is safe from the developer’s humor.
While you’re ogling the sharp, HD 8bit goodness of Theftopolis you will notice another visual element of the game, and that is quite a few nicely done visual jokes. We won’t dive into all of them here, but make sure to read the signs on businesses as you are blazing through the streets plowing over pedestrians or evading the fuzz. You will be pleasantly surprised and the amount of laughs to be had.
To solidify Retro City Rampage‘s 8-bit feel, a killer chiptune soundtrack has been crafted to bleep and blop along with you as you terrorize the city. If you find there is one of these songs you just can’t get enough of while you’re playing, you can pick an in-game radio station to listen to. However, the game’s soundtrack is so awesome you would do better to leave it on the default setting so you can listen to the music as it was intended.
Video games often get a lot of heat in the media for being too violent, and therefore promoting violent tendencies in their players. However, it’s easy to see from the comical tone of Retro City Rampage that VBlank Entertainment Inc. had nothing but good intentions over the years it took to create this game. Not only is this a finely crafted parody of the 8-bit games we 30somthings cut our teeth on, but it also manages to poke a little fun at modern sandbox style games while throwing in heaps of other humor and nods to pop culture both old and new. We here at RoboAwesome recommend doing whatever you have to do to get your hands on this game, short of looting, plundering, or pillaging.
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Pros: This game will not only appeal to gamers who grew up in the 80s, but fans of games like Grand Theft Auto. It is the finest modern example of a parody video game.
Cons: The old school graphics and music are fantastic, but they may alienate younger gamers.
Value: At $10 this game is a steal, considering the amount of play time you are likely to get out of it.
Verdict: Retro City Rampage is definitely a game that needs to be played to be appreciated, but you won’t be sorry for giving it a shot.
Score: 9
