Tendo City - GameBoy Advance Reviews

Donkey Kong Country (Again)

Tue, 27 Feb 2024 17:49:43 +0000

I'm just going to keep reviewing this game apparently.

In 2003, about a year after MS's acquisition of Rareware, the company ported Donkey Kong Country to the Gameboy Advance. By this point, many developers at Rare had departed for other companies, and worse still, the company had not kept the old source code. A few years earlier, Rare had ported the game to Gameboy Color and ran into the same issue. In that case, they had modified the Donkey Kong Land engine, but in this case they went through painstaking work to reverse engineer the physics by trial and error. This new version is, then, recoded from scratch with physics that don't match either the original SNES version or the GBC version. How close does it get to the mark then? Well, I should do things in the proper order, so let's start with the visuals.

The game's visuals are pulled directly from the SNES version this time, so right away it looks far better than the GBC port. The presentation adds a new title screen, new menu art, some new artwork for the Kong family member's homes, some new mini-games, and a new opening and ending scene. Further, there are changed effects. In the past, I thought the game was lesser based on how the first level no longer shifts from noon to dusk and stays at the same brightness. But, later levels keep these unique effects, so long as it doesn't affect level brightness. I suspect what's actually going on is an intentional choice to not make the level dimmer on the notoriously dark GBA screen. Further, all the colors are washed out in an attempt to brighten the game, as is often the case with SNES to GBA ports. There is one notable degrading of the graphics, and that's the reduced layers of parallax scrolling in level backgrounds. There are a few additional graphical flares, like little animals flying or crawling here and there that have been added, but overall yes, the SNES version ends up looking better. Oh yes, and it should be added the screen is cropped. This hurts this version of the game more than the GBC version because of just how little vertical there is on the screen's aspect ratio. Many secrets no longer have visible clues like a stray banana to guide you to them, and so I actually had to look up a few secret locations throughout the game even though I'd played through this game multiple times in other versions.

The sound effects are mostly the same, though many new sounds from DK64 have been added to the two main Kongs, as well as a few additional effects here and there to various enemies. The music was recomposed, as it had to be due to the lack of a dedicated sound chip. It mostly gets close, but the original still ends up sounding higher quality. Honestly I think I'd prefer hearing either the SNES or the "chiptune" GBC version over this, but it's not so bad it's unlistenable. Over the GBA speaker, it sounds fine. A few new songs were added for things like the new mini-games, menus, and new opening.

As mentioned, the presentation alters many things. The new artwork puts Cranky inside of his cabin instead of his porch and Funky inside his flights (and now fishing) lodge. After every boss, Cranky arrives to give some quip about how pathetic the boss was before "taking those bananas back for you". The new ending takes place on K. Rool's ship instead of back in DK's home. This is done so that the "aquatic baddie" reel can now take place underwater (scrolling under the ship), and to give K. Rool a few lines ordering the DK crew off his ship and swearing generic revenge. Unfortunately, this also means all the fun monkey shines between Donkey and Diddy, all unique frames of animation, have been cut completely. Further, DK and the gang are just too wordy, and DK commits the sin of actually talking as if this were the cartoon show (or the manual). While I do appreciate the scroll of underwater baddies actually showing them underwater, all in all I'd say the original ending is more entertaining to watch. The new opening and title also cut out the original "old man playing his Victrola" sequence entirely, though of course a new menu was needed to select the additional options. The new opening sequence on starting a new game is basically what's described in the game's manual, with Diddy doing guard duty before being stuffed in a barrel only for DK to swear he'll get back all his bananas and rescue Diddy a few moments later. Of course, that introduction was always pretty silly considering you find Diddy in a barrel ONE SCREEN away from the cave anyway. Lastly, it's notable that all the maps now scroll and are "zoomed in" heavily. In a few cases, the whole map was entirely replaced with a brand new one, which did throw off my sense of spatial awareness in a few cases.

On to the gameplay changes! Alright, the new level added to the Gameboy Color version is gone. It wasn't the best level, but it wasn't the worst either, but either way it's a shame for them to just forget about it. The added bonus levels put in Candy's save shack are also gone, now replaced with just what everyone always wanted, a rhythm dance mini-game. I'd consider this a straight downgrade and prefer the bonus level style mini-games from the GBC version. Fortunately though, you don't need to get a "perfect" more than once to complete the game, and getting a passing grade on every one isn't too difficult. Funky's flights is now built in as a menu option, allowing full backtracking after only reaching one of his locations. He'll still let you jump in a flying barrel, but there's not really a point, so now the fishing game is broken up into a bunch of unique challenges. It's less dull this way, and getting the "high score" outside of the main game is much more easily attainable, but it's still not much of a mini-game. The stickers from before are now gone, replaced with photos that consist of prerendered artwork made back when DKC first came out. They're also hidden in brand new locations, unlocked in creative ways like as a reward for ground slapping a Klump to death or getting a high score in one of the animal bonus levels.

The real star of the new gameplay options is "Hero Mode". The two difficulty options from the GBC version have now been combined, so there are no continue barrels, partner barrels, and in a unique additional challenge, you play as Diddy alone, in a yellow shirt. This one gets especially challenging in later worlds. Unlike the GBC version, this requires it's own save file so you'll need to find all bonus levels on top of that for full completion. Speaking of bonus levels, this version for the first time "saves" how many of those animal statues you've collected. What this basically means is you will now accidentally go into an animal buddy bonus level so often it becomes annoying, especially since they kick you back to the start of the whole level this time around. It's like a longer "death". All things considered, they should have reworked it so you spawn back in at designated spots at or nearby the third animal token you picked up. However, there's one major issue that's hard to overlook in this version. That's the mentioned physics reworking. Unfortunately, a lot of difficult jumps become even trickier now, or whole sections no longer work as they should. For example, there's a sequence where neckies come flying in bit by bit as you bounce from one to the next so you can bypass a jumping section, but now all of them basically spawn at once and rush at you. Donkey Kong no longer dips a little lower when he rolls off things, now behaving more or less just like Diddy. Bounce height doesn't work quite right, so certain bonus levels can only be reached with trickier jumps. This really becomes a major issue at the very last world, where so many perfectly timed jumps now have to be relearned and require even more perfect timing. The most frustrating section comes at the very last level, where before you could simply carry a barrel as you jumped to finish off the Krushas, now if you try that, you'll bounce off them at the same time you end them, killing yourself. The only way to handle this section is perfectly timed barrel throws, so that was a lot of trial and error.

All in all, this version of the game isn't the worst way to go, but the additions simply don't make up for the way the altered physics mess with the game's delicate platforming balance. Playable, but more frustrating than it should be. The difficulty feels outright unfair near the end of a "Hero" run.

The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap

Tue, 27 Feb 2018 05:36:07 +0000

The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap

For Game Boy Advance
Released in January 2005 (USA), November 2004 (Japan/Europe)
Developed by Flagship, published by Nintendo

Introduction

The Legend of Zelda series is one of my favorites in gaming, but there are some Zelda games I've never gotten around to finishing. Until recently, this game was one of those, as I'd started it but stopped early on, but while watching the 2018 Olympics I played through the rest of this game and decided to review it along the way. The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap is an overhead action-adventure game for the GBA which released somewhat late in the system's short life, after the Nintendo DS had already released. This game was the second, or sort of third, game that resulted from a partnership between Capcom and Nintendo to develop some Zelda games at Flagship, a Capcom/Nintendo joint-run studio that Capcom merged into its main company a few years after this game release. Flagship's first Zelda games were The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Ages and Oracle of Seasons, two paired Game Boy Color games that released in mid 2001. I like those games a lot, so I was interested to see what Flagship would do next with Zelda. Then they worked on the Four Swords part of The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past / Four Swords for the GBA. That multiplayer-only linear-levels topdown multiplayer action game has some good ideas, but its link-cables-required, local multiplayer-only nature is a big problem which made it very hard to play then, ever mind now. Several years later, Flagship finally released a second main-series Zelda game, but while it did okay, it didn't make quite the impression that Nintendo was hoping. The game sold well and got good reviews, but has since been somewhat forgotten. Even at the time reactions were somewhat mixed, though. Indeed, looking back at some old posts I made online back in 2004-05 about this game, I went from initial interest, to not even buying the game until at least five years after its release, and not finishing it until, well, this month. And I was far from the only person who overlooked or passed on this game at the time. Playing it now, though, it's good! The Minish Cap has issues, but I do think that I, and many other people, under-rated this game.

Story and Controls

The Minish Cap is a traditional overhead 2d-style Zelda game. As with the Oracles games, the controls, interface, and world design of Minish Cap take heavy inspiration from Link's Awakening, which, in my opinion, is a very good thing even if none of those elements quite match LA's greatness. The story is as familiar as the gameplay. Unfortunately though, it has none of LA's genius. You play as Link, and need to save Hyrule from evil Vaati. Your partner character this time is a sentient hat, which talks and can change your size. The terrible-as-usual sexist story has you saving Zelda, who has been turned to stone in what would prove to be the first of two consecutive times in handheld Zelda games. Just because this kind of really bad, sexist storytelling is common doesn't make it okay, though. This game has plenty of amusing writing in it, but the core story is, yet again, unforgivably awful. All three (two?) Flagship Zelda games have extremely basic "rescue the princess" storylines, which is too bad when they clearly are able to write some decent and often amusing stuff for the many side characters that populate these games. The only "unique" thing in the plot is that the main villain here is Vaati, from the Four Swords games, and not Ganon. This is Vaati's only appearance in a traditional Zelda game, and it is kind of interesting to see him in a regular Zelda game.

The controls are inspired by Link's Awakening's, with a few additions for the GBA's two additional shoulder buttons. As in that game, you can assign any of your items to the A and B buttons, so once again your sword and shield are not locked to buttons like they are in other Zelda games, you just assign them like any of your other items. The other items include some returning favorites and some new ones. My favorite new item is the air-blast item, which the game uses quite often to good effect. The R button is standardized, though, as it is used for a roll move, and also for grabbing and pulling things. Jumping requires an item you get deep into the game, but rolling is a default move locked to a button? It is a little odd to have this one function locked to a button, and it might have been nice for R to be customizable too. Still, it works this way and the roll is a good move. The L button's usage is not as successful, however. This button is locked to a function too: this trades Kinstones with the person or object in front of you, if you can do so. I will get into what Kinstones are soon, but in short they are items you collect and trade with characters, in return for unlocking things in the world. I'm not a big fan of this element of the game, and it is a significant part of it. Kinstone trading is a big part of this game, but it'd have been great to have another button for general use, and to put this function somewhere else. For the controls overall though, I have some issues with the functions on both shoulder buttons, but otherwise Minish Cap controls great. As always in Nintendo-published Zelda games the controls are very responsive, and Link moves around and items all work just as they should. I really like how you can assign the A and B buttons freely, as well.

Oh, there is also one other way you interact with the world in this game. As fitting for a game with Four Sword's villain in it, The Minish Cap has a Four Sword component. This game is single player only, but when you stand on certain floor tiles and hold down the sword button until it fully charges, keep the button held down, and move onto other tiles, you will create clones. You start with only one Link, but as you proceed you will eventually get up to four. It's kind of annoying that you need to hold down the attack button for so long before you are able to split, but the game makes good use of dividing yourself in many puzzles through the game, both simple and quite tricky.

General Gameplay

In the gameplay, The Minish Cap, again, is a traditional 2d Zelda game, but with some more modern updates. I won't describe this in full detail, as most readers are probably familiar with Zelda gameplay. In short though, this means that you explore a sizable world, including a large town full of many people in the center, and various zones surrounding that town. You wander around the world collecting stuff, fighting enemies, talking to people, and solving puzzles. At certain points you'll go into dungeons in this world, and in dungeons, and sometimes outside of them, you will get new items to add to your inventory. These items include some old ones and some new. You then use your items, and swordfighting skills, to figure out the way forward and kill the monsters barring your way. Combat is central to the game, and again, it's great! The enemies are varied, and you will need not only your sword and shield but also many items in order to effectively fight all of them. It's a familiar formula, and The Minish Cap executes on it very well. Flagship's experience and skill with the franchise shows through in many ways, from the puzzles, to the new items, to the fun dungeons, and more.

The issue of originality is worth discussing, though. Flagship's Zelda games are very good, but they do not have the same spark of originality that you see in most of Nintendo's Zelda games. They execute on the standard Zelda formula very well, and have a few new ideas in terms of items and the world, but for the most part this game and the Oracles titles stick to formula. I appreciate innovation, and Nintendo has done some fascinating things as the Zelda series has evolved. However, traditional 2d and Ocarina of Time-inspired 3d Zelda are some of my favorite kinds of games, so while this is an issue worth mentioning and I have criticized Flagship for this before, I also think that their games are great, because the classic Zelda formula is one of gaming's best! And on that note, this game keeps the standard Zelda item-collection system, of getting them in dungeons as mentioned, and does not mess with that as Nintendo's more recent titles have. I, at least, prefer things as Minish Cap does them. I'd rather progressively get items permanently as I go through a game, then have to rent them as you see in A Link Between Worlds, or just be given them all at the start as you see in Breath of the Wild. This game isn't necessarily better than those are, it has some faults for sure. I'm just saying that in terms of game design for Zelda games, I think the standard item-collection formula is great, and I've never been one of those wanting the series to drastically change.

The World of the Minish

And this game does have one significant unique gameplay element to it, beyond a few unique items of course. Now, having two worlds has been a common feature in most Zelda games since A Link to the Past, but The Minish Cap takes a unique take on it, as instead of travelling through time, as previously mentioned you can shrink and see the world from the ant-sized proportions of the tiny, and eponymous, Minish! As in Oracle of Seasons you can only switch sizes at certain, predetermined points here, and this is important for many puzzles in the game, and you will spend most of your time full-sized, but still the size-change mechanic works well and adds to the game. Figuring out how to progress through the world in small form makes for some fun puzzles as you try to figure out how to reach some Minish areas and find out what is there.

However, in addition to playing as a couple of pixels on the regular map, sometimes the game zooms in and you play as regular-sized Link in a tiny world. Unfortunately I have issues with this element of the game, as it badly lacks variety. On the better side, there is one Minish town, near one Minish-scale dungeon that isn't very different from the other ones, early in the game. There are also some caves to find where you fight bugs and such. However, the rest of the Minish areas come from two often-repeated formulas. First, there are single-room Minish houses, which have a Minish or two in them to talk to. These are usually pointless except for Kinstone fusion, though a few have actual useful hints. And second, there are entirely straight scrolling paths. The visuals here are kind of nice, as you see giant grass leaves and such, but in gameplay terms they are incredibly basic: you either go straight up and down, or straight left and right. None of these have a single bend, which is pretty weird, and most are short and present minimal challenge and have few obstacles in them. I like the size-change concept, and it's great to have some areas where you see the world from a tiny perspective, but why are these areas so incredibly simplistic?

While the size-change idea was new for a Zelda game, the idea of having two worlds fits to formula. Flagship did try some original things in The Minish Cap, though, both good and bad. On the positive side, the game has some pretty interesting new items to get which the game makes good use of, particularly perhaps the wind-shooting item. For anyone who hasn't played the game I don't want to spoil them all, but it's great that Flagship did not just reuse old items but came up with some good new ideas. Neutrally, the game has collectables -- those Kinstones -- that actually change the state of the world, And somewhat more questionably, Flagship made a 2d Zelda game with a difficulty level much closer to The Wind Waker than its 2d forbears. On that last note, probably the most common complaints about The Minish Cap are that the game is short, easy, and has a small world. These criticisms are largely accurate, as the game has only six dungeons, is the easiest 2d Zelda game ever made by a good margin, and will not take many hours to finish. Even so, I found the game quite fun while it lasted, playing it this time around at least.

The Overworld

The overworld is a major component of every Zelda game, and this one is no exception. The scale of that world is a definite issue I want to discuss, however. At first, The Minish Cap's world seems to be shockingly small. You go up just a couple of areas at the start, and you've already explored a good chunk of the map! However, while the world feels small, it is not as limited in scope as it may appear. The side areas add some decent size to the game, and the map screen makes things look smaller than they are due to its dual-layer design -- there is a single-screen map of all the areas, from which you can enter to view detailed maps of every section of the game. It's a great, and very detailed, map screen which is incredibly useful throughout the game.

Still, you can get across this world quickly. Why is that, though? Estimating going by the map, I think that the world here is about 16 by 16 screens, so it's not as small as it seems. There are probably two major reasons for this. First, the game spreads things out, with large buildings and fields that take up lots of space. And second, this game is, again, a lot easier than other 2d Zelda games. Where it's easy to die a hundred times in the 2d Zelda games before this one, this time dying even ten times in the whole game is unlikely if you're a moderately skilled gamer. I did die sometimes, and more often than I did through most of The Wind Waker, but this is probably the second-easiest Zelda game after that one. As a result of both of these factors, while there are surely a lot more tiles in this overworld than there are in Link's Awakening, or even the Oracles games, it probably won't take as long to explore through. Even so, as in those games this overworld is segmented. As you explore you will see many points where you will need to return later with an item you don't have yet in order to proceed that way. As you get items you will unlock new areas, shortcuts to get to areas of the map more quickly, and more. All Zelda games do this in some way, but the style here is very reminiscent of LA and the Oracles games, and it's fun and satisfying to reach new areas and unlock those quicker paths.

That aforementioned more spread-out feel to it that makes this world feel smaller than it is, though. I think that The Minish Cap's world is in a middle ground between Link to the Past's very 'open'-feeling world and Link's Awakening's very closed and segmented one. Personally I much prefer the more segmented style of Link's Awakening over the more open style of A Link to the Past, but I'd imagine fans of either one won't prefer this over those. I like that the world is more broken up than LttP's boring grid-of-squares world is, though. However, in my opinion the Kinstone element holds this world back, as I will get to.

So this is definitely not one of the best of the Zelda overworlds, but even so, it is a good one. The central town is large and there is a lot to do in it, first. There are people to talk to, puzzles to solve, some minigames to play, and more. I had fun exploring this version of Hyrule, and the size of the world is just about right for this somewhat short game. Of the side areas, the mountain may have been the most fun to explore, as it has a good balance between exploration, puzzle-solving, and combat. After that, finding out how to reach all of the tiny Minish-world areas in the central town was also a highlight. The world in the sky is interesting as well. Some areas aren't as well utilized though, such as a graveyard that is oddly large for how little time you spend there. Floating around and finding new areas is fun in that classic Zelda way; there's nothing like a Zelda game for having some of the best exploration gameplay around!

Kinstones the Overworld's Collection Quests

I do need to discuss those Kinstones, though. Starting a bit into the game, you will start to collect items called Kinstones. You get piles of these things, and can trade them with people and, in some cases, objects, scattered around the world by pressing L when you are standing next to someone who has a Kinstone thought bubble appear by them when you're nearby. Each character you can trade with has one half of a kinstone, and you need to match that with one of your own. There are eight or so generic kinstone types you will collect to trade with most characters, plus about ten special one-time-use ones you will use for game-critical puzzles. In total there are about 100 kinstone matches in this game, if you want to find them all. You can only trade with each character once, as once you match kinstones with someone, something will happen in the world. The plot-critical ones open up key paths you will need to go through after matching kinstones.

The other, regular Kinstone matches give you some kind of item reward, but you'll have to go and get it. Rewards vary from a treasure chest appearing somewhere, to ground appearing that allows you access to a previously inaccessible cave, to a small lake draining giving you access to a treasure-filled cave, and more. Helpfully, after matching kinstones the point where this change has appeared is marked on the map, so you won't forget which kinstone unlocks you haven't gotten yet. There are no map markers for characters you haven't matched kinstones with yet, unfortunately, so you'll just need to wander around a lot or use a guide if you want to completely fill out the map and find all of them. I won't be trying to do that, though, as a lot of these rewards are not too useful. Sometimes you will get good stuff like shortcuts or heart containers, but other times you get ... a kinstone. For your kinstone and time. Great. Rupee rewards lose their value past the mid-game as well, as once you've bought the more expensive items there is really nothing else to do with the things. Also, I don't like the idea of a Zelda game with this amount of fetch-quest backtracking in it, if you want to actually have a complete world map -- after all, as since every kinstone match puts something new on the map, even if you've explored everything, you need to find all of the things to see the "real" map. That's a very grindey game element to tack on to this game. On the one hand it's good that there is something here to keep you playing, as the short and mostly easy main game won't keep you playing for more than ten-something hours. Trying to find all the kinstones will take a lot longer than that, unless you look up their locations online. However, adding lots of fetch quest grinding to your game isn't the best way to add replay value to a game, and I just don't like a Zelda game where so much of the world is hidden unless I do a LOT of fetch quests! Even if most of that stuff isn't important, I want to know what it is... but don't really want to spend the time wandering around to find every match. Bah.

Oh, on a final side note in this section, in addition to kinstones, The Minish Cap has one other somewhat grindey collection element. As you play you will get shells. These can be spent at a shop that unlocks in town later in the game which essentially is a gatcha machine. That is, you spend shells, and get a random figurine reward as a result. The more shells you spend, the more likely it is that you get a new figure and not one you have already. There are 120 figures to collect, so while it's easy to get a bunch of them, collecting them all will be a frustrating, and entirely random, task. It's easy to get shells, but going through those text boxes at the gatcha shop takes a tediously long amount of time; collecting these figures is a big time-waster even if you have lots of shells, and the more you get the less often you get new ones. Fortunately I don't care much about collecting all of these things, but people who want them all might be frustrated here. Of all the collection things in Zelda games this is one of the least fun to get.

The Dungeons

In addition to the overworld, the other major component of a Zelda game are the dungeons. There are only six dungeons, but they're all fun to explore. As in the overworld, dungeons have a mixture of old and new puzzle and combat elements, as the new and old items are both used. Each dungeon heavily uses the item you get in that dungeon, but many items are used in multiple dungeons, which is nice; in some Zelda games you only use an item in its dungeon and then almost never after, but while some items here are like that more are widely used. As for the dungeon designs, they are linear, and don't match up to the best Zelda dungeons but do have plenty of good moments in them. Jumping around in the sky dungeon's a fun challenge, for example. Combat scenarios such as facing off against the games' heavily armored knights is also pretty fun, once you figure out how to fight them. And more.

However, As with everything about The Minish Cap, the dungeons here are relatively few and mostly won't put up the kind of fight you might expect from a 2d Zelda game. This game is quite fun while it lasts, but it is the easiest 2d Zelda game and that is quite noticeable here. The lack of challenge comes from multiple fronts. You don't take a lot of damage when you're hit, it's easy to get a lot of hearts in this game, and most enemies are much less threatening than they are in earlier 2d Zelda games. However, I did have fun most of the time, and the game does present a challenge sometimes. I did die once in a while, and this game is not nearly as kind as 3d Zelda games from The Wind Waker or beyond when you do, as you get sent back to the beginning of the dungeon. Dungeons do have one, or usually two, warp points in them, so you aren't stuck redoing dungeons all the way from the beginning every time you die as A Link to the Past annoyingly requires, though, so it's balanced fairly well. I think the punishment for dying here is just about right. Also, some enemies hit harder, and in dungeons hearts are not always plentiful; there are always certain points that always drop hearts, but you may not be near those areas when you need them, so there are moments of tension. You can get some healing items, but this is limited by the number of bottle items you have collected. I only got two of the possible four that are hidden away in the game, so the final boss fight particularly was nicely challenging due to limited health and enemies which hit somewhat hard.

Even so, with only about six dungeons, four for four elements and a few others at key moments, this game has fewer dungeons than other 2d Zelda games do. Several 3d Zelda games from this era also have six or fewer dungeons, including both Majora's Mask and The Wind Waker, but it's just as unfortunate here as it is in The Wind Waker. It doesn't feel like the game is unfinished as The Wind Waker kind of does, though, particularly with its 'there should be a dungeon here' moment; The Minish Cap just feels like it was designed to be a short game, with optional collection elements padding it out for people who want to spend more time with it. That works, and the results are pretty good, but a bit more substance might have been nice. Still, I like what dungeons this game has.

Graphics and Sound

The Minish Cap is, for the most part, a good-looking game. The regular-scale world has a pretty standard cartoony Zelda look. The game has a strong cartoony art style, with a light color palette that fits the GBA's screen well. Remember, with an original GBA dark palettes can be very hard to see so the lighter palette is appreciated. This games' look is definitely not my favorite Zelda artstyle, not even close, but it's a fine looking game with that Zelda style to it. I've always had one complaint about The Minish Cap's visuals, though, and it's that some of the Minish-scale stuff looks ... off, somehow, to me. The giant leaves and such look much more realistic than the rest of the graphics, and the contrast doesn't work for me. This has always bothered me about The Minish Cap.

Aurally, The Minish Cap has a good soundtrack, but a lot of the tracks are classic Zelda songs reused again. It's a great soundtrack of course, but is far from original. The limited audio capabilities of the GBA hold it back as well.

Conclusion

In conclusion, I may have complained about this game a lot in this review, but I really do think that The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap is a very good to great game. It may have a lot of little issues, from graphical weirdness to seriously lacking challenge and length, the somewhat small-feeling world, and the annoying collection-quest elements, but it also has fantastic gameplay, just about perfect play control, a solid mix of old and new puzzle and action elements, fun dungeons, a mostly good look, and more. The good and bad are both significant here, but overall the strengths much outweigh the downsides of this game. I think I will give it a 9/10 (A-) score, which is good, but not quite on par with the best Zelda games. That is probably about the right place for it. Any classic Zelda fan who hasn't played The Minish Cap absolutely should! It's a very fun, ten-ish hour experience you will probably enjoy. If you don't like Zelda this one won't change your mind on that, but for most The Minish Cap is well worth a try. Know about its downsides, but don't let them stop you from playing it.

Final Fantasy VI Advance

Tue, 27 Feb 2007 03:55:41 +0000

Review: Final Fantasy VI Advance
Platform: Game Boy Advance
Rating: 9.5/10[indent]Final Fantasy VI Advance is the latest in a series of GBA ports based upon the classic series. Fans of the series are usually divided into one of two massive camps. One considers Final Fantasy VI to be the pinnicle of the franchise, and the rest consider Final Fantasy VII worthy of that honor. Those of the former category will be thrilled to see their choice finally get some attention after the much-hyped Compilation of Final Fantasy VII.

Final Fantasy VI is the tale of a world on the brink of repeating a cataclysmic disaster. Magic is a force that once scoured the world of much life and civilization, after which it nearly vanished. Now, an ambitious emperor seeks to find this power and harness it as a weapon in order to subjugate the world. A large cast of disparate heroes must band together and stand against the emperor before his greed and avarice threaten the very fabric of the world.

Since this is a port, and of a game I have reviewed previously, this review will focus more on the port, than the game from which it was ported.
[/indent]
Graphics: 8.5
[indent]Practically identical. The only changes are in the text appearance and menu fonts, which are all more streamlined. It also helps that the GBA screen is sharper than a television, and that helped the appearance some. Overall, if you liked it before, no reason not to now. The screen resolution is of course decreased but you probably wouldn't pay attention if I didn't tell you that.
[/indent]
Audio: 7.0

[indent]This is where the most complaining comes, from the old-school fans, and it's certainly the only justified complaining. Some of the songs just plain sound funny (Searching for Friends has this weird clicking beat) and some of the sound effects are odd, but not to any real extent. Overall, the quality dropped, though I don't weigh this very heavily because there was no avoiding it, and it could have been handled a lot worse. The music we all knew and loved is still intact.[/indent]

Gameplay: 10.0

[indent]The gameplay has been, more or less, left intact. If you played it thirteen years ago, you'll have no trouble with it now. There are a few, very, very minor slowdown issues, mostly noticed when a large, graphically-complex spell is cast. There is also, allegedly, slowdown when using a chocobo or one of the two airships, but I honestly did not notice it at all. Those sequences seemed just as fluid to me as I remember.
[/indent]Translation: 10.0[indent]Oh boy. If you've ever seen other reviews of this game, you'll have seen no shortage of mincing over the new translation. Well, allow me to editorialize for a moment:

Pity them, laugh at them, but don't take them seriously. Not for one second.

The original Ted Woolsey translation was, to be fair regarding his constraints, unimpressive, and the game screamed for someone to do a decent job. The dialogue now is much, much more coherent and in many cases fleshes the storyline a bit more. Better still, the new translation clarifies several plot points that were confusing and incoherent before. We now, for instance, know that a certain mother was not an idiot who hands over her baby willingly only to regret it five seconds later, but rather the victim of child-snatching, for starters. Can't say too much without ruining things, but you get the idea. In this area, the translation was vital and extremely welcome. The original is a joke in comparison.

Spell names, item names, Monster and Esper names and the like have all been updated either through the original translation or to be more consistent with the ongoing Final Fantasy saga. Some veterans will suffer some momentary confusion, but if you've played the game before, you'll know what the stuff is, and everything has a description to help. Newcomers, of course, won't have any such problems.

Overall, this was the major selling point for me, and I'm incredibly impressed with the results. If one appreciates quality and coherence over silly nostalgia, one too will be impressed.

[/indent]Final Word

[indent]This game has long been one of the games by which an entire franchise, to say nothing of an entire genre, has drawn comparison and with good reason. Anyone who appreciates a good RPG, especially a good RPG made much better, owes it to themselves to hook a copy of this game.[/indent][indent]

[size=6]9.5
[/size][/indent]

Final Fantasy V Advance

Sat, 02 Dec 2006 10:14:13 +0000

Review: Final Fantasy V Advance
Platform: Game Boy Advance
Rating: 8/10[indent]Final Fantasy V Advance is the latest in a series of GBA ports based upon the classic series. After the more story-driven Final Fantasy IV, Final Fantasy V focuses more on the gameplay aspect, and the character-building Job system seen first in the original Final Fantasy, and expanded upon considerably in Final Fantasy III. The story centers around a group of adventurers thrown together by circumstance to share a common goal; the preservation of the world's Crystals, which maintain the forces of nature. Some malevolent and unseen force is causing them to shatter, and Bartz and his friends must find out why, and stop it before their world is thrown into chaos.
[/indent]
Graphics: 7.0

[indent]Though the visuals for the game are hardly poor, they are a noticable step down from the graphics seen in Final Fantasy IV Advance, which had most of its graphics upgraded from the Super NES original. Final Fantasy V's graphics are mostly unchanged, save for the nicer pre-rendered backdrops in the battle sequences. The characters remain squat and squarely-proportioned, though the characters are better-animated and considerably more expressive than in FFIV. FFV is a big game with a lot to see, and even without the enhancements, there are still moments that will impress, but it is a bit of a disappointment that no effort was made to improve the visuals, as there was room for it.

As in previous games, the best graphics are seen in combat. Character sprites are larger, and even though Final Fantasy V has one of the smallest playable casts in the series at five, it may have the largest variety of character appearances. There are nearly two dozen Job Classes for your characters to utilize. Each Job gives your character a markedly different appearance, and each individual character appears quite unique in each outfit (for instance, Faris as a Knight looks markedly different than Lenna does when she is a Knight). Monsters are large, and better-looking and more detailed than FFIV's. Spell and skill effects are also improved over the previous game's.
[/indent]

Audio: 8.0

[indent]The soundtrack for this game is rather standard, in relation to other Final Fantasies. What is there is, at worst, serviceable, and there aren't any tracks that are outright bad. Some are even quite good (the theme played while piloting the Submarine comes to mind). However, there seems to be lacking any iconic or memorable themes, the kind which you'd instantly identify if you heard it out of the blue. This game is more upbeat than most in the series, and it reflects in the generally peppy, optimistic themes found throughout most of the soundtrack.
[/indent]

Gameplay: 9.0

[indent]Final Fantasy V is known for sporting the most-evolved application of the Job system that had been featured in the previous odd-numbered entries of the series (though Final Fantasy XI has since taken it much farther). This allows you to take your characters and basically customize the hell out of them, building each to your tastes and present needs. The different Jobs become available as the game unfolds, and your options get better all the time. The upside to this is that you can use many creative methods to tackle whatever problems you face, and while there are some Jobs that are of questionable, or only situational use, there aren't many that are overwhelmingly great, either. This forces you to experiment, and find the strenghts and weaknesses of each job, and the uses of the inherent talents. By gaining Ability points, your characters can memorize certain talents inherent to a Job; for instance, you can have Galuf reach level 2 in the White Mage Job, so if you decide to make him a Monk later, you can give him the option of using White Magic while enjoying the much greater offensive power the Monk class offers. There are literally thousands of possible party configurations, and many, many useful applications to be found. The game is also a bit more of a challenge than most Final Fantasies, mostly because it's more difficult to find a combination of talents and classes that make your party consistently outclass the monsters you'll face.

Outside of the Job System, Final Fantasy V is a pretty standard RPG. Outside of the Job System, any Final Fantasy veteran will instantly understand how most of the game operates. As stated earlier, there are fewer characters than in most games in the series. Storyline and character development have taken a step back from FFIV. You know who the good guys are, and you know who the bad guys are. The story rarely deviates from the standard rah-rah, save the world stuff. Those who have played the previous incarnation on the Playstation, or the fan-translated ROM, will notice that the characters and dialogue are considerably changed, and for the better. They still don't match up with the likes of Cecil or Terra's bunch, but the characters now have better-defined personalities. Bartz is still a pretty vanilla do-gooder, but he's also a bit of a wiseass. He and Galuf have many of the game's lighter moments, as the two frequenty take good-hearted jest at each other. Faris is less the Jack Sparrow stereotype, though she does still drop several groaning pirate cliches around ("By the great beard of Neptune!"). Lenna and Krile are changed little. The game's main adversary, Exdeath, is your average megalomaniac villain, the Bad Just To Be Bad stripe a la Kefka, with no redeeming traits. He wants to control the power of the Void and make the world kneel at his presence... because that's what omni-powerful villains do. Almost all of the game's dialogue has been changed and improved, so conversations flow more naturally than the clapboard translations you might remember.
[/indent]

Final Word

[indent]Final Fantasy V is definitely a love-it or hate-it game. You'll enjoy it if you can overlook its rather deficient story and vanilla characters, and if you love the challenges of character-building and ciphering the nuances of the Job System. It's also a welcome addition for those looking for a bit more challenge. A worthy entry in the series, though a little lost among many of its far more memorable siblings.

[size=6]8.0
[/size] [/indent]

Riviera: The Promised Land

Sun, 11 Sep 2005 02:58:49 +0000

Riviera: The Promised Land
Release date: July 2005
Review started 10/10/05
System: Game Boy Advance or newer
Developed by Sting
Published by Atlus USA

Riviera: The Promised Land is probably this year's major Game Boy Advance RPG. It is a unique title that, in one mark of a good game, both fits within numerous conventions and innovates. People expecting a standard console RPG experience won't get it here, and this is probably for the better. Trying to do new things and succeeding is somewhat rare in videogames.

Gameplay: Riviera is, at its core, a traditional console RPG, complete with turn-based, menu-driven battles and an epic plot. However, the differences from normal become quickly apparent. First, there is no direct movement of your character in this game. Instead, you move between screens, like some kinds of old PC-style RPGs or adventure games. The character is in the center of the screen and arrows displayed on the screen show which ways you can go. If that was all there was to it, however, it'd be too simple. And indeed, it is not.
There is also, of course, looking at your surroundings. In normal console-style RPGs the challenge comes from dealing with all the (usually random) battles you must fight to get between places, or with the confusing level designs you can get lost in. With only set battles, not random ones, the fact that the game has an onscreen map of the area you are in always on the screen, and the simplified movement system, this game minimizes that -- there is an important exception of some puzzles (some of which are truly challenging, but even these could definitely be solved with some logic and a piece of paper to write down the pertinent information on), but the game minimizes it just the same. So instead, the challenge is not finding the items. Pressing 'A' will switch between movement and observation mode, where pressing a direction will intereact with the onscreen trigger point (so, like with movement, you are limited to four points per screen).

This is not to say that there is no challenge in interacting with those points, however. To activate a point and see what happens there, whether it's a conversation or an item, you need Trigger Points, or TP. These are gotten in battlehe game has a points and rating system. Depending on how well you do in combat, you will get a rating from C to S. The higher the rating, the more TP you get... This means that sometimes you will see chests or items you wish you could get but cannot because you didn't do well enough on the battles before it in that level. It's an interesting solution to the question 'what do you do when you make the exploration so simple?', and it works well.

There are three kinds of triggers. The first require no TP to use and are mostly people in the town and triggers you have already activated. The second are normal triggers that give a conversation or an item. The third will, in the course of the conversation, set off a minigame, or rather, a timing challenge. Shenmue-like, you must do things like pressing A at a specific time, or copying a complex button combonation quickly, or tapping a button some number of times within a short time. These are challenging and are very frequent. Some are for the ubiquitous traps on chests, but others are at story-relevant points. Sometimes, it isn't your choice to take one path or another -- sometimes failing at a minigame will force you onto one you did not expect. It helps liven up the game and keeps your reflexes quick... and also increases user interation in a game otherwise lacking anything that requires reflexes. Of course it's best to play it through and resist the urge to retry things until you "get them right", but I wasn't able to every time... sometimes, though. It's definitely different, to be able to fail and keep going, and sometimes actually take a different route thorough that part of the game...

The battles themselves are equally unique within what is expected. While they are not random -- they occur at specific screens and are set up with dialogue -- they are typical in the sense that they have no movement and you just choose from options on a list. Even here though, things are not quite as you expect. Before combat, you choose which party members to use -- you get five in the party, but can bring only three -- and then which items. You see, you may only bring four items into combat. Your inventory holds 16 (also an issue, as you constantly have to choose whether to keep some new weapon or item or drop it, as that 16 fills up fast and once you have something you keep it until it's used up), but you may only take four. Also, like in Fire Emblem, all weapons have durability -- so once you use that sword fourty times it breaks. Before I got the game, I heard about this and imagined that limiting you to four items in battle would be a major problem -- only four weapons in each battle? How boring! However, there are several mitigating factors. The main one is the fact that no two characters do quite the same thing with each weapon. In fact, every character has a slightly different action with every item (or at least, every weapon; many items do have the same effect on multiple characters). Fia, for instance, heals with rods while Cierra does magic attacks and Serene does nothing useful. You see, each character is ranked in each weapon type. This means that instead of having four weapons, you really have twelve, assuming a party of three. There are even more, including the special attacks.

That ranking also directly effects the other part of the combat system: the special attacks. With every weapon type the character in question is ranked with (they will have one rank 3 weapon, 2 rank 2's, and 3 rank 1's), that character gets a special attack of that magnitude -- so each character only gets level three specials, the strongest ones, with their 'signature' weapon type. But how are these special moves activated? Well first, the special move has to be unlocked. Each time you get a new weapon, you need to use it enough to unlock its special move for that character. Also, in battle, in another interesting design decision, and perhaps one taken from fighting games, Riviera has power meters. Each time you hit or get hit, your meter rises, and gradually fills. Each time you use a special move, that many levels of the meter get drained. The enemies have a meter too; it only has two levels, but functions the same. When their meter fills, some enemy will use a special. So between having to carefully select your party and your items, and the interesting, unique power-meter system in combat, Riviera's combat is quite unique and engaging.

All this talk about combat naturally brings up a major issue in any RPG: levelling up. Remember how you unlock special moves by using weapons enough, sort of like Final Fantasy Tactics? Well, that's the level up system. Each time a character unlocks a new special move on an item, they gain a "level" (though it is not called such). When combined with the abovementioned fact that all weapons have a durability, this could be a concern... well, they have a solution. Practice battles. On one of the pause menus, you can choose to fight a battle against a selection of enemy groups you defeated in the previous level. In practice mode, durability does not decrease. You don't get points or TP for practice battles either... However, the experience with the weapon is still recorded, so each time you get a new weapon, the best thing to do is immediately fight practice battles until all of your characters who can have gotten their special moves (and levelups!) off of it. This also has the effect of lenghtening the otherwise fairly short levels, and game.

Oh yes, one more thing, death and healing. Lose a character and there is no penalty, they just come back. Win a battle and all characters get their health filled up -- there is no carryover of low health to the next battle. And with the power bar powering the special ability system, you also don't need to worry about running out of "mana". Similarly, lose a battle and you simply get a chance to retry it -- and it's made a bit easier. This serves to keep the game fun, while not making it too easy, due to the good job of balancing it all the devlopers have done.

Singleplayer/Story: Riviera is broken into seven levels. Each one takes maybe four or five hours. They are broken up into many stages, and you can save each time you reach a new stage -- during a stage you just get an interrupt save option. So, it is a bit short. It tries to make up for that with the branching level design that forces you forward, making you responsible for your actions (so you can't just go back and get those other items on that other path without reloading an old save game) and with the replay value.

Riviera's story is mostly fairly typical anime or console RPG stuff. You are, shockingly, a male warrior-type character named Ein (the "young male warrior hero" of 99.98% of RPGs). Ein is a type of being called a Grim Angel, tasked by the Gods to judge and protect Asgard, the land of the gods. He, another Grim Angel, Ledah ("older, mysterious, attractive male warrior"), and Ein's familiar, a flying cat that can talk named Rose (yup... the story is pretty standard anime stuff, for sure... which is mostly good, in my opinion. Others may disagree, of course, but I would definitely say that it works quite well. There is a lot of story, too, for a game of this length, sort of like Fire Emblem...), go to Riviera, a land where an ancient evil has been sealed away that is on the verge of escaping, with the task of destroying the place. Of course, things don't quite turn out that way. Ein and his friend Ledah seperate from your friend and travel to Riviera and set out on an epic adventure. There, you meet your new travelling companions, four young female characters, Lina, Fia, Serene, and Cierra. of course, this being anime, all four like Ein and, depending on your choices in conversation points throughout the game (and on how often you use them in battle -- they get more attraction for winning battles, and less each time they die in combat), you hopefully will get a high enough attraction with one of the female characters to get one of their endings. Including the bad ending and the various good ones, there are a total of six. When you add to that the multiple routes through levels, the sidequests which require items from specific levels (which, of course, you cannot return to once completed), and the special items to find that unlock the sections of the bonus menu (sound test, bonus (but dissapointing) boss battle, display of the cinema scenes, character images, etc), there is definitely more than enough replay value to keep you going past the 25 or 35 hours it will take to beat the first time.

Multiplayer: None.

Graphics: The graphics in Riviera are very, very good. The backgrounds are very well drawn, something very important for a game mostly about looking at static images. The character artwork and cutscenes, anime style, are also fantastic. The ingame character artwork is more standard console RPG stuff, with small, stylized characters, but they look great and have a lot of animation (even if they don't move much), so that works very well too. This game is one of the titles that shows why it's somewhat unfortunate that the GBA has so many Super Nintendo ports: the GBA is capable of so much more than the SNES was!

Sound/Music: The sound and music are equally fantastic. The game has a significant amount of speech for each character, with voices for special attacks, victory in battle, exclamations while adventuring, etc, and a good, solid RPG musical score. This is about as good as the GBA gets audio-wise.

Final Notes: Riviera is a very good, and original, game. It's a console RPG without random battles... without money or buying items... without complex level designs that are easy to get lost in... without a traditional level-up structure based on how many enemies you kill... and yet, it is a console RPG with complex, challenging puzzles that make you think back to the PC or SNES days of writing down what goes where or what was said in order to figure out the puzzle... with as many practice battles against past foes as you want... with a complex branching mission path that virtually requires replay to see everything... with timing events... and with characters and as story you'll become interested in, even if it is somewhat cliche.
So, as you can see, Riviera is a mass of contradictions. It both streamlines and rolls back the clock. Reviews are somewhat mixed -- if "sevens through nines" is mixed -- however, and that is probably because of how different it is. Some people will like the unique elements of the game more than others. Some surely wouldn't like how different this is from normal RPGs in so many ways, but I loved it. If you're looking for flaws, there aren't many that matter. About all I can think of is that the ending is somewhat dissapointing (though there are six of them, providing replay value), but maybe that's as much because I was loving the game and wanted it to go on longer as anything... I guess that's where that replay value comes in... I am sure this is a game I will play more.

Gameplay: 9/10
Singleplayer: 9/10
Multiplayer: N/A
Sound: 10/10
Graphics: 10/10

9.4/10 final score (not an average).

Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones

Sun, 12 Jun 2005 00:00:54 +0000

The kingdom of Renais has just suffered a surprise attack by their longtime allies, the kingdom of Grado. Under orders from the king of Renais, Seth, the captain of the army, takes Princess Eirika out of Renais and away from the attack. Seth and Eirika then depart to the other lands to warn them of Grado's treachery and try to find answers as to why, after hundreds of years of peace, Grado attacked without provocation. Along the way, many other brave men and women would join their cause, and as darkness spreads across the land, the answers Eirika finds would prove far more terrifying than they could have ever imagined.

GRAPHICS

If you played the original, you'll feel very familiar with the units, interface, landscapes, battle animations, and even backgrounds of Sacred Stones. That's because very little was changed graphically in the sequel, the game uses the same engine as it's predecessor. Some may find this lack of graphical improvement detrimental to the game, but I rather like the familiarity. Still, if you're expecting a flashier show out of the sequel, sadly, you won't get it.

If you're new to Emblem, you'll find the graphics pleasing yet practical. Every unit on the map is distinctive and easy to discern (unless you have two or more of the same class of unit on the map at once, in which case you must move your cursor over him/her to tell the difference), landscapes and backgrounds look detailed and realistic, battle animations are smooth and in some cases, a sight to behold; many units critical attacks will leave you laughing at your enemies painful demise.

SOUND

Sound effects and music far from disappoint, they add a great atmosphere to the game. While much of the visuals of the previous game were recycled, music is almost all new, and the few remaining familiar songs are redone and made better. As for sound effects, all are well done and clear, adding much to battles. Attacks that do no damage give a pitiful *chink*, while critical attacks make an extremely satisfying BOOM when they land.

GAMEPLAY

The original Fire Emblem set a new standard in the genre of turn-based strategy/RPG for the Game Boy Advance. The entire concept revolves around easy-to-learn but hard-to-master gameplay, epic storylines, and incredibly deep character development. The formula that Fire Emblem created, Sacred Stones wonderfully perfected. All the shortcomings of the original were rectified and great new options added, Sacred Stones is everything a Fire Emblem fan could want out of a sequel and more. Much like the Final Fantasy series, each Fire Emblems storylines and characters are new and seperate.

One welcome addition was the Supply option. In Fire Emblem, about halfway through the game, you would acquire the services of a merchant to carry your excess equipment, and to access it, you had to visit the extremely vulnerable supply tent that was set up on the battlefield. As all weapons and most equipment degrades with each use, eventually they will break and you'll need to replace them. Before, this involved leaving your allies in the battle behind, exhausting possibly several turns trekking unarmed back to where the tent was set up while avoiding enemies, getting the weapon you needed, and rushing back to the battle, if it's still even going on. Well, this inconvenience has been thankfully removed. From the beginning of the game, Eirika serves as your supply and can hold up to 100 weapons and items not currently equipped by any of your units. Therefore, since Eirika is not only on the field, but also in combat, your units probably won't be far from a new weapon if the one they have breaks.

As with it's predecessor, Sacred Stones focuses heavily on the interaction between the men and women in your army. Every unit has compatability levels with certain other units, and if they spend enough time near one another, they may recieve the opportunity to have a support conversation. These conversations can range anywhere from hilarious to heartwrenching, can lead to rivalries, close friendships, and even love, but they all have the same benefit: The more conversations those two units share (up to three), the better they fight when they are near one another. Putting units near each other with full support level can raise both units speed, defense, evasion, critical hit ratio, and other factors. Thus, supporting one another on your team can lead to great dividends. Choose your relationships wisely, though, as every unit is only capable of 5 conversations apiece. Supporting units is also much easier in Sacred Stones. In the original Fire Emblem, some units would have to spend literally hundreds of turns next to each other to prompt a conversation, but it's been reduced for the sequel, so conversations are much more frequent and, sometimes, even unexpected.

Another welcome addition is the ability to enter certain areas without missions simply to train your fighters. Two such areas exist, each containing 8 progressively more difficult enemies, and are mostly populated by monsters. Training here every so often will help your characters level up, and is especially useful for catching up some of your lesser-used fighters. One aspect that is prominent in the game is that units that do good will continue to do good, while weaker ones get used less and less, if even at all. Your strongest fighters are usually the ones you want in important battles, and since taking your weak units into a chapter battle can be risky, you can bring them here to level up. Also, if they've bit off more than they can chew, the option to retreat is always available if things get nasty.

The basic principle of the game is easy. Your army starts on a predetermined area of a battle map, and you must complete certain objectives to pass the chapter. Usually, this goal is to either clear the area of enemies, or to defeat a powerful boss enemy, though some missions require you to simply survive a certain number of turns or to protect a neutral unit. Battles follow a weapon heirarchy of axes, swords, and lances. Swords best axes, axes best lances, and lances best swords. Magic follows a similar pattern between light, dark, and anima (elemental) magic. Simple enough, and crucial to learn, but this is just the basics of the basics when it comes to battle. For instance, some axes are specially equipped to best swords, certain lances and axes can be thrown, hammers deal extra damage to armored foes, light magic does well against monsters, and arrows deal critical damage to flying units. Such are a few examples of many tactics that must be taken into account when entering a battle. You'd also be smart to check enemy equipment as well. Sending your mounted units against enemies weilding Halberd axes, Horseslayer lances, and Zanbato swords will likely end badly for you, and enemies armed with Killing Edge swords should be dealt with swiftly, as the odds are against you. Likewise, a group of enemies weilding swords can be handled easily and fairly painlessly with one or two units skilled with a lance.

Overall, Sacred Stones is a great follow-up to an already solid game. The lack of innovation may be a turn-off for some, but if that doesn't bother you, and you enjoyed the original Emblem, you'll love Sacred Stones just as much, if not more than the first. I rate this game 9.0 out of 10.

Fire Emblem

Sun, 22 May 2005 18:11:28 +0000

Okay, so you've played Advance Wars. Time to step it up a notch with this wonderful, until recently Japan-only series. Fire Emblem for the GBA is the first game of the series to see a US release, but it's the 7th game in the series from Japan.

The concept is simple, yet so very complex. As you start the game, you are a tactician, and you wake up in the house of Lyn, a nomad from the Sacae plains. As the two of you speak, you learn of her tragic past and of her limitless resolve. Then, a noise outside startles the girl, and she runs outside. Finding a small band of thugs descending on her house, she requests your aid as a battle tactician to fight them off. They pose little challenge (None actually, the game holds your hand through this entire battle), and afterwards Lyn decides to journey to find out who she really is. Little did she know how much there was to find.

If you only had Lyn (and further in the game, the game switches to two other characters, Eliwood and Hector, as the "main" characters), you wouldn't make it very far in the harsh, bandit filled world. As such, in your travels, you come upon dozens of soldiers willing to join your cause. The romantic buffoon Sain. The proud cavalier Kent. The axe-weilding Dorcas just looking for money to help his family. The male-fearing Pegasus rider Florina. The arrogant and annoying Serra. The list goes on and on, each character has their own personality and reason for joining you. Each party member becomes close to you, which makes it hard to see them...die.

Yes, die. Fighters who lose all of their HP aren't just "Phoenix Down" dead. They're "FMV Sequence" dead, and they ain't coming back (Although some who die in Lyn's chapter may reappear "healed" during Eliwoods chapter). This throws and interesting dynamic into the game. Do you really want to risk your archer getting near enough to a boss to kill him so they can get the experience, or send in your unstoppable Paladin for a guaranteed kill, but wasting the experience on someone who does't need it (you who've played, you KNOW what Paladin I'm referring to).

On to the weapons. Each character weilds three types of weapons and magic. For weapons, axes, spears, and swords, and most characters can only weild one or two types. As for magic, there is Light, Dark, and Anima (elemental) magic tomes. Now then, the easiest way to describe the weapon system is rock-paper-scissors. Rock beats scissors, scissors beat paper, paper beats rock. In the same way, axes beat spears, spears beat swords, and swords beat axes. This is a *crucial* order to learn, so you know who to send in to take on what enemies. Sending in a swordfighter to attack an enemy with a spear will end badly for you, but send in someone with an axe, and now you're talking. There are some slight deviations though. Airborne units like Pegasus Knights take double damage from arrows. The same three-way hierarchy applies to magic too.

For a GBA game, Fire Emblem musters quite an epic story, and lasts quite a while too (30 individual battles in all, not counting extra ones that can be obtained). All things considered, this is one of the flagship titles on the Game Boy Advance right now. If you enjoyed Advance Wars, Fire Emblem will blow you away.

Wario Ware Inc.: Mega Microgame$

Sun, 13 Jul 2003 05:24:26 +0000

Review: Wario Ware Inc.: Mega Microgame$
Platform: Game Boy Advance
Release Date: 05/22/2003
Rating: 8.0/10

[bq]Wario Ware is by far the most unique game ever made. To the jaded gaming cynic that might sound like a gross bit of hyperbole, but to anyone who has experienced this game, it will seem like a criminal understatement. This quirky little cart is home to a collection of 200 so-called 'microgames'. See, Wario decides that getting into the gaming industry is a quick on-ramp to the highway of easy money. So he calls all of his buddies all over Diamond City and together they come up with dozens of short games, all bundled together in one package. Wario has chosen you to be his beta-tester, and you must complete each series of games from Wario and his friends.

Sound simple? Well, it is. But who plays a game like this for the backstory?
[/bq]
Gameplay: 10.0
[bq]Quite simply, there is something for everyone in Wario Ware. There are 200 different games packed into this cart, and they are volleyed at you constantly. Each of Wario's friends has their own set of microgames, and each microgame has three levels of difficulty.

The basic idea is this: You challenge one of the denizens of Diamond City, and they will throw their microgames at you. As stated above, each of these games is about three seconds in length, and some of the games are radically different from others. Each of Wario's friends features games that are thematic. For instance, Dribble and Spitz's games are all sci-fi based, Dr. Crygor's games are all based on realism, and 9-Volt's games are all taken from classic Nintendo games.

Many of the games involve simple reflex actions, like pressing the A-Button at the correct time, or moving to avoid an oncoming obstacle. You are given one-word clues as to what sort of action is required to defeat the microgame, and no information on what button does what, so your first attempts at the games will sometimes be poor. However, since the games do repeat themselves, you will soon master those, and many of them are pretty obvious anyway. The games are all timed, and the time limit ranges between three and five seconds. Taking too long will result in a loss for the game.

In normal mode, each character requires you to beat a certain number of mini-games, usually fifteen but sometimes as many as twenty. You are given four chances in which to do this, and whenever you screw up or take too long, you lose one of these 'lives'. Every few levels the games will increase in speed, meaning that not only does the timer get faster, but so do the games themselves. When you manage to defeat all of the required microgames, you are faced with a "Boss Game" challenge. Boss games play much like the microgames, but are usually longer and more challenging. Each character has one boss game. After you clear a character's level, you can challenge them again. This time however, it becomes an endurance challenge. The games continue after the boss fight, and the games become more challenging, by way of extra obstacles and such. Beating certain scores open secret games.

The other game mode is Grid. In Grid mode, you can select any microgame you have already faced, and you play an endurance challenge. Unlike normal mode however, you play the same microgame over and over again, with the challenge and speed increasing every single round, and you play towards a high-score challenge. Like in Normal mode, you have four 'lives', and Grid mode only ends when you finally lose all four, so if you're good and you have the reflexes of a cat on speed, you can play up to one thousand levels, each one faster than the last. You can only play the games that you have already played in normal mode, so some will be inaccessable (and keep in mind that you will have to challenge characters multiple times in order to play all the games.)

Whether in Normal or Grid, the games are a blast and the way they are presented is not only incredibly unique but also incredibly fun. There are so many different games to challenge that you will want to challenge all the characters multiple times just to see what else the game can throw at you. With an astounding amount of variety, extreme simplicity and a perfect learning curve, this game is truly the GBA's magnum opus.

In addition to all that, there are a number of multiplayer games that are unlockable, and they are quite unique. They are all adaptations of regular microgames, but they are not timed, rather they are a single endurance challenge. The most notable of these is a fully-reproduced Dr. Wario![/bq]

Graphics: 10.0
[bq]With such an enormous variety in the types of games you will encounter in Wario Ware, it goes without saying that you will also see many, many different graphical effects. It's hard to go into specifics since there are literally hundreds of things to see, but what you do see will include hand-drawn graphics, photo-realism, stop-motion, many Mode-7 effects, graphics taken directly from NES, SNES and G&W games, cartoons, ray-tracing and even simple stick-figures. Add to that impressive animations, nicely-done cutscenes, and more than a few things that will make you laugh out loud at their sheer absurdity, and you end up with a graphical blast that, if not the best the GBA has to offer, it is most certainly the wildest and most varied. [/bq]

Sound: 10.0
[bq]Like with everything else in this game, the sonic experience from Wario Ware is much like a pizza with about seven trillion different toppings, from pepperoni to sausage to pistachio ice cream to sugared watermelon to Philly-style cheesecake. You get a little of everything and too much of nothing. It would be impossible to describe the sound effects in detail but by now I'm sure your imagination, coupled with my prior descriptions of the game can do the job better anyway. Musically, almost every game has it's own tune, short though some may be. Each fits perfectly within the time frame of the game. As above I couldn't possibly overview the whole package but you'll get everything from classic Nintendo themes to children's classics to the short bursts of hilarious J-Pop playing during the short intermissions in Spitz and Dribble's stages. Quirks abound in a game that is all quirk and overall the sound is absolutely perfect for the game.[/bq]

Overall: 8.0
[bq]Okay, now I'm sure you're asking yourself; he's given the game glowing raves for the entire duration of this article, gave it nearly perfect scores the whole way around, so why give a final score of just 8.0?

My answer would be that there is one problem I had with the game, and it unfortunately was a very large problem: The game is far too short! I kid you not when I say that I had completely beaten this game within six hours of purchasing it, and I couldn't help but feel a bit cheated that such a fun experience was also such a fleeting experience. Quite simply, though there is so much to see and do, you will honestly see and do it all much quicker than you will like.

One addition that would have extended the worth of this game tenfold easily would have been an endurance option for each of the minigames, in the same manner as the multiplayer games, where you play one game until you finally lose. Granted, not all of the games really would benefit from such an implementation, but many of them truly would have. Such a small, easy-to-implement addition would have made this game better in exponential amounts.

That aside, this glaring issue is the single, solitary reason I scored this game 8.0 instead of a perfect 10. Everything else about Wario Ware screams quality so loudly your eardrums will burst. Should Nintendo consider a sequel, and I know I'm not the only one who hopes they do, that they implement that one simple extra feature. If they do, I think many people will find a game that they will not be able to put down, ever.

In any case, Kudos to Nintendo for creating a truly memorable game that is outside of and beyond the realms and boundaries of any game ever created before. Wario Ware is a true melding of insanity and balls-out gameplay that no one will be able to resist. Even if the game lasts a mere six hours, I guarantee you that six hours will be one of, if not the most fun quarter-days you'll ever experience in your life. [/bq]

Ryan Usher, 7/12/2003

Wario Ware: Mega Microgame$

Sun, 13 Jul 2003 01:05:00 +0000

This is the face you will make when you play Wario Ware the first time:

:S

But once the game gets it's addicting claws into you, you'll more likely be doing this:

Wario Ware is the pitome of pick-up-and-play gaming. It consists of well over 200 minigames...no, scratch that, MICROGAMES! Minigames sounds too big. All of these microgames only last about 3 to 5 seconds, and consist of using A, the control pad, or a combination of the two. What you need to do in those 3 to 5 seconds is totally unexpected and you must think fast. Right before it starts, it'll give you a one or two word description of what you must do, such as "Run!", "Jump", or "Sniffle". Yes, sniffle. The games collected in here are from every end of the spectrum, and even some too odd to even be let IN the spectrum. They range from classic Nintendo games, to shaking the paw of a collie (and he'll cry if you fail). Dropping a strawberry on top of a moving cake, to deploying an airbag to save a crash test dummy in an accident.

As odd as this game sounds (and t is), I guarantee that once you get into it, you won't be able to put it down. Since the games are so quick, you can squeeze in a little play time practically anytime! There's very little sounds or music to the game, and what is in there isn't too remearkable, though the opening theme song is cool.

There are characters too. Quite a few of them in fact, and they're stereotypical to the EXTREEEEEEEEME! There's Jimmy, the disco freak, who possesses an afro wig which takes up more mass than his whole body. There's 9-Volt, the Nintendo freak who has a giant Game Boy and a conveyor belt full of equally huge GB games. There's also Mona, the hot chick; Dr Crygor, the mad scientist; Orbulon, the alien; Kat, the samurai who also still in kindergarten; and of course, Wario.

There's also something to be said that this game wasn't changed much from the Japanese version. Japanese words, music, and people appear frequently. Marijuana plants are also a common sight (guaranteed you won't find Mary Jane in any OTHER GBA game!).

It takes a bit of time to get the feel of this game and really begin to enjoy it, but once you do, you'll easily consider it one of the best games the GBA has to offer. I sure do.

Megaman & Bass

Thu, 19 Jun 2003 23:32:59 +0000

Megaman & Bass is a step back, in the right direction! Back to the days of simple, yet challenging platforming fun. 6 new robot masters, and 2 robot masters revived from Mega Man 8. The big difference is, you can either play as the hero in blue or the villain in black. Auto is back again to make you an arsenal of new power-up and items, including incredibly useful ones like an auto-charger for Mega Mans Buster, and simple yet extremely useful ones like one-time-use guards which protect you from instant death on spikes.

Each character has distinct skills, as well. Mega Man has the usuals: a slide, a chargable Buster, and Rush. Bass can perform double jumps, rapid fire shots, and Treble. Not to mention the plethora of extra stuff you can buy with bolts from Auto. Of course, you also acquire enemy skills once they kill the respective Robot Masters.

To make things interesting, Dr. Wily is not the antagonist of this game, it's a new villain named King. King calls himself the most powerful robot in the world, and is spreading the philosophy that powerful robots should rule over the earth. Mega Man can't have that, and Bass is quite sure that HE is the most powerful robot in the world. So both of em have a bone to pick with King, yet only one can succeed.

Also, there's more than energy and weapon capsules and bolts to find, King has stolen 100 CDs from Rolls CD collection, and each one contains information on robots from previous games, as well as other important characters from the series. You see robot data from Mega Man 1 straight up through the Playstation games (only numbered, not X). They're pretty cool to hunt down and find, and each one brings up nostalgic memories from days past.

Your Robot Masters!

Cold Man - Launches walls of ice towards you while jumping around and forming annoying little clouds which slow you down, prevent you from shooting, and restrict your jumping.

Astro Man - Remember him? He formes holographic copies of himself and flies around. He is also very difficult to hi since only hits on this top half count.

Ground Man: One of the most stubborn bosses, he jumps mostly, but also tunnels underground and comes up to surprise you, also climbs into the ceiling and comes down with a gigantic drill attack.

Burner Man - He's really fast and does a lot of damage, so you kind of need his weakness weapon to defeat him. He lays mines, throws grenades, and uses a flamethrower, among other things.

Pirate Man - He throws homing mines and jumps around a lot. If you have the weapon which hurts him, though, he's a breeze.

Dynamo Man - I take back what I said about Ground Man, Dynamo Man is the most stubborn boss. He has a lightning attack which hits the whole screen, and when his health is low, he jumps into a recharging station to regain health. If you don't destroy both sides quicky, he'll completely replenish hs health and your job gets much tougher.

Tengu Man - He's back too. He spends much of his time airborne, and throws blade and cyclones at you. You'd better have quick reflexes to beat Tengu Man.

Magic Man - Throws cards at you which, if they hit you, they replenish Magic Man's health. Also tosses balls of energy at you which drop annoying little robots which hold you and make you a target. Tough to beat.

In conculsion, it would be absolute heresy to miss out on this game, you don't even need to be a series fan to have a ball with this game. I give Mega Man and Bass a 9.0! BUY IT NOW!

Game and Watch Gallery 4

Sun, 23 Feb 2003 04:21:13 +0000

Standing proud, outwardly defying that sound and graphics make a game, is the Game & Watch series. Going on 20 years old, they still provide a fun factor that can still be unmatched by many games on next-gen consoles. I defy anyone to play Fire, Chef, Manhole, or Octopus and not get addicted. They're deceptively simple in gameplay with usually only two controls for movement, yet they can be maddeningly difficult on the higher difficulty levels and when things get hectic. They made the handheld game what it is today, but now with the onset of better handheld consoles, these gaming gems are slowly and unfortunately falling into obscurity. Not if Nintendo has anything to say about it, and with that in mind, they release Game & Watch Gallery 4, which showcases these gaming legends for all to enjoy once more.

You start out with 6 games, the ability to unlock 6 more, and I've heard rumors you can unlock games you see in the Museum part of the Gallery. If true, this brings the total to over 20 games, not a bad deal for the same price as any other GBA cartridge which includes but one game. The games you start with are Boxing, Rainshower, Mario's Cement Factory, Donkey Kong Jr, Donkey Kong 3, and the most popular game of all, Fire. Each game includes the classic black and white, frame-by-frame game as it used to be (they even make it more realistic by making it appear to be an LCD screen by shading the unoccupied frames gray). The beeps and boops from the games remain as well. If you're looking for something a bit more visually and audibly pleasing, they've also included Modern versions of every game, starring famous characters, catchy music, and of course beautiful graphics. Boxing pits Luigi against Wiggler, Boo, and even Waluigi, while Fire has Peach's castle on fire and you must save falling Toads, Yoshis, and Donkey Kongs.

Controls are very responsive, for the most part. One complaint I have is in Modern Boxing. It can occasionally be difficult to switch Luigi's punches from upper to lower blows. Other than that though, they are flawless, which is necessary considering the sometimes quick movements you must make in order to win. Music in the Modern games is quite catchy, and I found myself humming some of the songs to myself on just the second day I had the game.

If you need a break from the old-school games, you can take a trip to the Gallery, where you can access the Museum, which showcases more Game and Watch games (as I said, I've heard rumors you can unlock these to play too, but I don't know for sure), also you can play all the music from the game in the music room, or you can visit the present room where Mario and Mr. Game and Watch (who looks exactly like he did in Melee) gives you what you've unlocked.

Game and Watch Gallery 4 took me back to when gaming was simple yet enjoyable, and when Nintendo made games because they wanted to entertain people, not to compete with other company's sales. I rate this game an 8.0!