Despite its unique gameplay, gorgeous visuals and inventive design, Viva Piñata never quite became a powerhouse Xbox 360 title, perhaps thanks to the guns n’ guts demographic that the system commonly appeals to. If the platform is the problem, then Viva Piñata: Pocket Paradise has a chance to prove itself, as Rare has temporarily broken the shackles as a Microsoft second party to team with THQ and bring its candy-stuffed world to the Nintendo DS.
So, how does Viva Piñata work on Nintendo’s handheld? Does the touch screen serve to improve or hinder? How has the game survived the graphical downscale? What color does a Fudgehog turn when you feed it a chilli? Some of these questions will be answered in this, the Destructoid review of Viva Piñata: Pocket Paradise.
Reviews are a touchy subject both on and off Destructoid, generating all sorts of discussion, controversy and outrage. In a somewhat fruitless effort to try and curb the endless bitching that surrounds reviews, my predecessor Aaron Linde published Destructoid’s first review guide.
As handy as it is, Nick Chester and I got together and discussed updating the manual to reflect the needs of the modern woman. I hope to make this a little more concise and address a few recurring issues that I’ve noticed when it comes to our reviews. Most importantly of all, we are introducing a brand new scoring scale, offering greater differentiation between numbers and hopefully making scoring a little easier for the review team.
Without further ado, let us be off on our journey then. Please enjoy the brand new Destructoid Review Guide.
The Japanese RPG never ceases to astound me. It is a nearly untouched genre, steeped firmly in tradition. It beckons players to grind for experience senselessly for hours on end with an overly simplified battle system. It entertains with the same archetypal build of protagonists, antagonists, and supporting characters. The genre’s males look like women, and the women look like 12-year-old girls. The games have multiple discs, hours of cut-scenes, and a massively linear style of exploration and gameplay.
Over the years, these cracks in the armor have turned into massive fissures, releasing steam and bubbling goo that have catalyzed the spawning of odd hybrids. One could surmise that the success of the Western RPG, which is typified by its non-linearity, often-complex story structure, and redefinition of battle, has aided in expanding the cracks into the gaping holes that we recognize now.
Tales of Vesperia resides in this transition period. It’s obvious that the developer, Namco Tales Studio, has tried to integrate part of the Western experience into its game. There are marked improvements in the genre itself, changes that were needed for the betterment of the series as a whole.
Taken out of transition context, how does Tales of Vesperia perform as a standalone title? Does it captivate, immerse, or entertain? Is the visual art a viable alternative? Is the battle system fluid and fun? Will it transcend the Tales series?
Hit the break and I’ll tell you.
It’s felt like a long time coming, and the hype has been extraordinary considering the platform, but Castle Crashers finally hit Xbox Live Arcade and has made a huge splash with gamers the world over.
Hailing from the minds of Tom Fulp and Dan Paladin of The Behemoth, Castle Crashers has been highly anticipated for its sense of humor, retro sensibilities and the fact that The Behemoth’s last major game, Alien Hominid, is a well-loved example of hardcore gaming at its hardest. With Castle Crashers, Fulp and Paladin have delivered a more accessible, considerably larger and far more ambitious title, one that was so eagerly awaited that its online servers are still clogged with gamers desperate to get their co-op time in.
Has Castle Crashers lived up to the hype, or was The Behemoth’s medieval hack-n’-slash destined to disappoint? In keeping with the game’s four-player sensibilities, we have assembled a four-man team of trustworthy reviewing knights in myself, Reverend Anthony, Jordan “Grim” Devore and Mike “Savant” Ferry. Don armor and come with us for the official Destructoid review of Castle Crashers.
Two decades is a damn long time, and that’s how long Madden NFL has reigned supreme in the realm of simulation football videogames. The franchise has had its ups and downs, to be sure, but in general, EA has delivered a quality product every year since 1988. Madden celebrates its 20th anniversary this year, and for one-fifth of that time period — the last four years — it has been the only officially licensed pro football game on the market.
So, cover athlete fiasco aside, how does Madden NFL 09 fare against its EA-developed brethren from the previous 19 years? Is it another mere “roster update” to a franchise that many complain is getting stale, or does it shake things up enough to provide a great football experience? Hit the jump for opinions from two longtime football fanatics, myself and Brad Nicholson.
Madden NFL 09 screenshot 1
Madden NFL 09 (PS3, 360, Wii, PS2, PSP, DS, Xbox)
Developed by EA Tiburon
Published by Electronic Arts
Released on August 12, 2008
Samit avatar
Samit Sarkar (PlayStation 3 version)
After the immense disappointment that was Madden NFL 08 (on the PS3), I was ready for a fresh start. I love my Madden, and I was eagerly anticipating this year’s release, especially after hearing about all the improvements and changes EA Tiburon was making to the game. Unfortunately, the finished product doesn’t quite live up to the hype, but it’s definitely worth checking out.
Last year, I picked up the PS3 version of Madden 08, and it was visually inferior to its 360 counterpart in a number of ways. While the 360 version was locked at 60 fps, the PS3 version only ran at 30 fps — sometimes. Slowdown was pervasive, and I just couldn’t deal with it. In this day and age, there’s no excuse for delivering a notably lesser product when the two platforms are supposed to be (roughly) equivalent, and EA finally understood that this year. On my PS3, Madden 09 runs at a silky smooth 60 fps, and this game in motion is truly a sight to behold. I never experienced a hint of slowdown throughout the entire game, and that’s saying something, considering last year’s mediocre effort.
One of the things EA Tiburon revamped for 2008 was the tackling engine, and it shows. Combining “canned,” motion-captured animations with some procedurally generated movements, the engine produces the most fluid, lifelike football movements this side of ESPN. Gang tackles look painful, and they finally work as they should. In past years, once a tackling animation was in progress, any other bodies would just bounce off the two players involved in the tackle. Now, tackle animations have no pre-determined result — if you’re quick enough, you can even break free or control which way you fall after you get hit.
Madden NFL 09 screenshot 2
Here’s an example of how things can play out in Madden 09. Let’s say you call an outside run. A cornerback comes at you from the right, while a linebacker barrels toward you on the left side. The CB hits you first, sending you reeling toward the middle of the field, and then the LB smacks into you, forcing you back to the right (and forward, if you’ve kept your feet moving). It may not seem like a big deal, but anybody who knows a thing or two about football will realize that this kind of scenario, which was physically impossible in a Madden game until now, is vital to accurately recreating the sport in videogame form. This isn’t just relegated to tackling, though; receivers can now bobble balls, which makes for some pretty spectacular catches.
The graphics have also undergone a major overhaul. Player models look better than ever, and wouldn’t you know it, they’re actually differentiable from one another! In other words, undersized defensive ends no longer look like offensive tackles. In addition — and this will sound trivial until you see it for yourself — grass looks loads better than it ever has. The turf has been retextured, and it looks fantastic. Along with the field, vast improvements have been made to weather. In past Madden games, you’d have been hard-pressed to tell the difference between a snowy field and a normal one, because the weather engine just didn’t have the horsepower to really recreate a blizzard. Now, if you select “heavy snow” as the weather for a game, the visuals will be transformed — the game takes on a cool bluish hue to reflect the frigid temperature, and snow piles up on the field only to be shoveled away (on the yard lines, that is). You’ll even see a mess of footprints created on each play as the players move around.
Fair-weather games also benefit from upgrades. Your players will get noticeably dirtier over the course of a game, with grass and dirt stains soiling their jerseys. However, EA Tiburon didn’t quite go the extra mile here. Footprints appear in the snow, but inexplicably, there aren’t any “body prints” when players get tackled to the turf. It’s a rather glaring omission that doesn’t make sense. And while the condition of jerseys will worsen throughout a game, there isn’t any perceptible field deformation — it might be double overtime, but the grass will be just as green as it was at kickoff.
Madden NFL 09 screenshot 3
There’s one last visual change that EA made, and it’s a hugely successful one. In all previous football videogames, I found it difficult to keep all the on-field action in view due to the camera angles that the games employed. Madden 09 introduces the ActionCam™, and I can’t really explain how it works its magic, but I can say that it is by far the best camera in the history of football videogames. The only way one of your receivers will be caught off-screen is if he runs a quick out route, and you happen to have rolled out all the way to the other side of the field. There are also special angles for breakaways (when there’s nothing between you and the end zone but the open field, the camera zooms in to follow you to paydirt) and big hits (a jarring shudder of the camera).
Madden 09 also makes a colossal upgrade in the audio department: the lame “radio announcer” who has been calling the games since Madden 06 on the Xbox 360 is gone; in his place, the NFL on NBC duo of Tom Hammond and Cris Collinsworth does a wonderful job. Hammond handles the play-by-play, while Collinsworth provides analysis. The calls provided by Hammond are serviceable — he’s nothing to write home about, but he gets the job done, even though his constant reminders that the game is brought to us by EA Sports quickly get annoying. But the real star of the show is Collinsworth. I’ve always enjoyed his work as an analyst, and he proves knowledgeable as well as entertaining in Madden 09. One of my favorite lines came from his discussion of how a running game helps a quarterback do his thing: “This running game has become a BFF of this quarterback!”
The commentary is mostly spot-on — of course, there’s the occasional missed call, like Hammond saying that you got “stuffed” with “not much room” on a five-yard run, but those are exceedingly rare. Unfortunately, there’s plenty of repetition after playing a few games, but until text-to-speech technology gets to the point where commentary can be procedurally generated in people’s voices, we’ll just have to deal with that. Overall, though, Hammond and Collinsworth are infinitely better than the radio guy from the past few games.
Madden NFL 09 screenshot 4
But that’s not Collinsworth’s only analytical role. In a brand-new feature for Madden 09, dubbed “BackTrack,” he gets to truly strut his stuff. BackTrack is a truly brilliant addition to the franchise: essentially, after you make a serious mistake in the passing game (i.e., getting sacked or throwing a pick), Collinsworth will take a look at what went wrong and tell you how (or if) you could’ve prevented the error. This is complemented by a visual overlay of large arrows to open receivers, who will be highlighted on the replay. There’s more, though — Collinsworth will even show you the play that you selected, and its NFL success rate against the defensive playcall. It’s a comprehensive tool to help gamers become more adept at picking apart defenses with their quarterbacks, Peyton Manning-style.
The latest title on the high seas of the PlayStation Network is Ratchet & Clank Future: Quest for Booty. Taking place right after Ratchet & Clank Future: Tools of Destruction, this title is a mini-adventure as part of a larger search for Clank. Washed ashore on Hoolefar Island, with most of your items gone, you’ve got to find some way to find Clank.
Thus begins Quest for Booty. The mini-adventure for the PSN is high-riding at $15, and clocks in at around four hours of play. Does this game have the mettle to provide the fun and enjoyment appropriate for what you’re buying, or is it just an overpriced game?
Nick Chester and I delve into it after the jump.
Ratchet & Clank: Quest for Booty (PS3)
Developed by Insomniac Games
Published by Sony Computer Entertainment
Originally released on August 21, 2008
Brad Rice
Not having played any of the previous Ratchet & Clank titles, I put the weight of whether or not I would play any of the other R&C titles solely on Quest for Booty’s shoulders.
I was vaguely aware of who Clank is in relation to Ratchet, but the game does a fine job of filling in the blanks right as the story begins. Clank has been captured, and now you need to find some way to get him back. The only way to find him? Talk to an undead robot pirate who has connections with the Zoni. Thus the pirate adventure begins, sending you on an island-hopping campaign in search of a way to find Clank.
The game throws you into the action almost immediately, letting you figure out the controls piece by piece as the enemies come at you. Even if you’re already familiar with how the game handles, the opening world isn’t simply a cake-walk designed to act as a tutorial — it expects you to figure out the controls quickly and make use of them, otherwise you’ll die.
The game runs you through several worlds, each with their own high level of polish and nice design, with each world feeling like it has its own set of puzzles and platforms, and aren’t lifted from other worlds within the game. Within each world, though, the puzzles seem to operate on a single idea with a few variations. So once you’ve solved one, the others can be done with little to no thought put into them.
This doesn’t make the worlds just fly by, though. The game features a great mix of action and platforming along with the puzzles, so it rarely feels like you’re just going through a grind of one task or another, unless it’s specifically a gauntlet test. What I found was that within each world, tasks fluctuate back and forth between rather easy and irritatingly difficult, with little middle ground in between.
When I say “irritatingly difficult,” oftentimes this was due to complaints from the camera. When you send me on a beam-walking adventure, don’t prevent the camera from moving because there’s a piece of scenery in the way — especially when I don’t have a chance to catch myself before falling off the edge. When I’m in combat, the targeting system rarely locks on to what I’m trying to hit, ending up in a miss.
But playing through the game, these concerns only bothered me every so often. During the four hours or so it took to complete this game, I had nearly lost track of everything else I was supposed to do. The game’s stunningly beautiful visuals, coupled with a decently funny script made for an enjoyable adventure. By the time I was done with it, I immediately had the urge to play through the game again — something that I rarely do — just for fun. For the price that it’s at ($15), the game is well worth it for the fun you’ll have.