August 31st, 2010 by The Grey Ghost
Episode 47: “A Magic General With A 6th Grade Reading Level”
Melty Lancer
Run Time: 51min 40sec
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Melty Lancer is like a Japanese version of the Justice League, minus any of the familiar character history. The fact that this OVA is based off of a JRPG on the Sega Saturn doesn’t earn it any favors from us either.
The lead characters rapidly transition from pop culture icons to super-secret black ops to street cops to saviors of the galaxy…all within six episodes. To suggest that this series needed more episodes will earn you a slap in the face… Because we’re not watching any more of this crap!
In the Method to Madness podcast, I’m joined with my good friend Kevin “The Business” Gray to discuss great anime and video games that you should be watching as well as ones you should feel ashamed you are watching.
Posted in Anime, Podcast, RPGs | 16 Comments »
July 20th, 2010 by The Grey Ghost
Episode 41: “Now I Got Yer Soul, Bitch!”
Folklore (and Disgaea)
Run Time: 55min 12sec
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Folklore and Disgaea: Infinite have recently been satisfying our pangs for gaming. “Satisfying”, I use generously.
As much as we have to say about these games in this podcast, we have so much more to say about just about everything else. Mostly turtles, rats, pizza…just about every ingredient for an unconscious Ninja Turtle discussion, if not for the inclusion of horrible, horrible internet memes.
In the Method to Madness podcast, I’m joined with my good friend Kevin “The Business” Gray to discuss great anime and video games that you should be watching as well as ones you should feel ashamed you are watching.
Posted in Games, Podcast, RPGs | 3 Comments »
February 25th, 2010 by The Grey Ghost
Earlier this week, two of Final Fantasy XIII‘s developers, Yoshinori Kitase and Motomu Toriyama, were interviewed over at Tech Digest. Along with questions about FFXIII and the current RPG market, the two were asked the eternal question of the possibility of a remake of Final Fantasy VII. The two had both worked on FFVII, so few could better offer insight on Square-Enix’s interest in the idea.
Yoshinori Kitase offered these words of discouragement:
If it were possible that we had all the right facilities and the right environment to be able to make and prepare a Final Fantasy VII remake within a year, we’d very much like a go at it! But even Final Fantasy XIII has taken over three and a half years to create. If we were to recreate Final Fantasy VII with the same level of graphical detail as you see in Final Fantasy XIII, we’d imagine that that would take as much as three or four times longer than the three and a half years it has taken to put this Final Fantasy together! So it’s looking pretty unrealistic! But if any such situation came about by any remote chance, then yes, we’d do it!
This is an excellent point…at first. There is no argument that each installment of Final Fantasy’s canon should continue to uphold the highest possible standard in graphical quality. However, the same need not be said of remakes or spin-offs.
Many fans of FFVII would like to have a remake of the game that is a heavy competitor for its current-gen cousins. But what they (or I should say “we”) want is a reasonable revamp of the original blocky polygons and incongruous cut scenes. The level of graphic quality from PS3 launch titles would be welcomed with open wallets. The FFVII tech demo–nearly 5 years old now–exhibits an impressive graphical facelift that could easily be applied with current development technology.
My suggestion would be to use the same visual style as Final Fantasy VII: Crisis Core or Final Fantasy: Dissidia. While not photo-realistic, it has a beauty that is both captivating and appropriate to that world.
There’s an undeniable market for Final Fantasy VII that Square-Enix is foolishly reluctant to tap. Since its release, the PSN port of the original FFVII has held strong at the top of the charts (with only a brief decline around the release of the PSP version of Little Big Planet). In fact, with graphics that are properly rationed, a FFVII remake could be available for download on either PSP or PS3 platforms. It could be the perfect incentive for gamers to more openly adopt Sony’s otherwise fruitless PSP Go.
There would always be fans that nitpick and the game’s developers may not be as artistically satisfied, but the game would sell like crazy. And isn’t that what this business is all about?
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January 26th, 2010 by The Grey Ghost
Episode 20: “Get Your DDR Out Of My RPG!”
Run Time: 51min 14sec
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In the Method to Madness podcast, I’m joined with my good friend Kevin “The Business” Gray to discuss great anime and video games that you should be watching as well as ones you should feel ashamed you are watching.
This episode, we discuss…
Persona 4 & Magna Carta
Persona 4 and Magna Carta are two JRPGs that we believe were tailored specifically to test Kevin’s nerves. If their intent was to break his will, leaving him curled on his floor as a mere shell of a human being, licking the bible for strength, then mission accomplished.
Kevin takes spotlight this episode as the minstrel of warning to those yet to suffer through these titles. People who have played Persona 4 and sing its praises, be ever humbled by this fact: Your awesome game has a penis monster…that’s on your side.
Posted in Games, Podcast, RPGs | 3 Comments »
January 15th, 2010 by The Grey Ghost
I’ve purchased Lunar: The Silver Star over three times across the past 15 years. This February, I’m going to buy it again.
Lunar: Silver Star Harmony is the newest port of one of my all-time favorite JRPGs; this time on the PSP. I’d fallen in love with the Lunar games back in its original Sega CD days and picked up every incarnation ever since. From the PlayStation’s fully-revamped Silver Star Story Complete to the scaled down Lunar Legend on Game Boy Advance. The Lunar series has a strong cult following and I’m proud to count myself among the flock.
After playing through the PSP demo (released on the PlayStation Network earlier this week), I felt treated to sweeter, shinier eye candy with the more recent “Silver Star Story” flavor. The version of the story and gameplay so far appear faithful to the “Silver Star Story” incarnation and recycles its Gonzo-animated cut scenes. The soundtrack is just as familiar, though remixed to establish its own identity.
Withstanding the localization, while good, will be the most difficult for long-term fans of Lunar. Since the mid-1990s, the North American license for the Lunar games was cradled in the arms of Working Designs until its demise in 2005. The publisher and its captain, Victor Ireland, established their trademark in the form of their localizations, as well as their brilliant cast of voice actors. When time came to bring the PlayStation port stateside, extra effort was put toward bringing back the same cast from the Sega CD.
The license is now in the hands of Xseed, who–even though “Harmony” draws from the same material as its “Complete” predecessor–were not able to also acquire the rights to re-use Working Designs’ existing localization. This means a whole new script, new song lyrics, and new voice over cast for the English dub. This lack of consistency between this new port and the generations before it will be a challenge, though so far this orchestration has not felt inappropriate. As of this writing, I’ve yet to find any of the cast information and I’m anxious to hear if Ghaleon’s understudy can match the great John Truitt.
Lunar: Silver Star Harmony
Limited Edition Contents
The PSP version will be released in two forms: Standard and Limited Edition. The standard edition, which is only the game itself, is a mere $30…cheap compared to most other PSP releases. The Limited Edition is a mere $10 more and will include the UMD of the game, a soundtrack CD, and 13 bromide cards of the Lunar’s lovely female characters.
Don’t want to spend money just yet? I encourage you to play the demo for free. Xseed seems to have followed Working Designs’ example by making the save data from the demo compatible with the full version of the game. Working Designs had the wisdom to establish a level cap in its demo for “Complete” to discourage unfair griding; I’m eager to see if Xseed is just as sharp. Additionally, applying the PSP demo’s save file is rumored to unlock special features in the full game. So get downloadin’!
Posted in Games, RPGs | 3 Comments »
September 10th, 2009 by The Grey Ghost
Just in time for the launch of the PSP Go, several Nippon Ichi Software of America titles will be available for download via PlayStation Network. These titles include fan-favorites Disgaea: Afternoon of Darkness, Prinny: Can I really be the hero?, with other titles hinted to join them. As a special promotion, the games will be priced for “half off” (that is, $12.99 and under) starting October 1st and extending through that week.
Hold on a second.
This means that once the promotion ends, these games return to their normal price of about $25.99, correct? As I write this, I can buy hard copies of those games for the same price at retail. As I asked in my Secondhand Rant, isn’t the main selling point of digital distribution passing the savings of production costs on to the consumers? If the digital copy is priced the same as the physical copy, where’s the incentive? What am I missing?
Of course PSP Go owners aren’t able to play the UMD versions of the games, but then that’s the whole idea. If the entertainment industries can transition digital distribution from a low-cost alternative to the standard, they can go back to charging whatever they want. Worse, they’ll be able to justify it if they can eliminate the secondhand market, since they’ll then gain a monopoly over access to multimedia.
I do give big props to NIS America and Sony for finally having some kind of sale on the PlayStation Store. I can only hope that they learn the same lesson as Valve–that being if you discount the price, sales will greatly increase. Weekly sales would be welcomed by their consumer base and God knows I might just use the service myself more often.
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April 25th, 2009 by The Grey Ghost
It’s very rare that dating sim games make their way outside Asia. That’s why the discovery that Europe will be receiving a translation of Agarest Senki under its revised English title, Record of Agarest War on PS3. The game was originally released in Japan on PS3 in September of ’07 with an Xbox 360 port the following year.
Record of Agarest War is commonly described as a typical strategy RPG, though it’s been noticed by its unique “Soul Breed” system. This system injects dating sim gameplay, allowing you to create the next generation of characters by developing romantic relationships with the female characters.
The 'Soul Breeding' system, illustrating how each generation
in the game's story is determined
This isn’t the first time that dating sim elements have been incorporated into an RPG, nor is it the first that has been ported to the West. Some may remember Thousand Arms, a steampunk JRPG by Atlus where the lead character must date the girls in his party in order to draw the necessary inspiration to construct improved weaponry.
The idea of breeding–aside from tentacles or guro–is one of those that appear pretty frequently in Eastern erotica, though it doesn’t have much presence in the West. It’s not hard to find hentai where it’s regarded as a triumph for the male protagonist to either impregnate or at the very least, cum inside of the girl.
There’s an amount of sense to it, though. After all, the biological keystone for male sexuality is finding females with suitable genes to produce heirs. Referring to it as an “impregnation” or “breeding fetish” is often regarded as a misnomer, since its biological roots exempt it from falling under the definition of fetish or paraphilia. When you apply it to actual fetishes with themes of rape and domination, insemination is just as visceral as a symbolic means of placing your “mark” on (or rather, in) the woman being subjugated.
The concept isn’t completely alien to Western culture. In fact, eugenics play a significant role in ancient European civilization when bloodlines defined power. As we approached the modern era, sex became viewed more as a recreation. In fact, we tend to value sex without consequence even more, with the reflection of our growing birth control market.
Can we say...symbolism?
Even so, it’s easy to recognize the surviving unconscious drives that fastens mating as a factor in our sexuality. Social/financial status still weighs in heavily as a factor for how many women a man will have sex with and the physical attractiveness of those women. Alpha males have more sex with more women, thus their dominant genes have greater chances of being passed on to the next generation.
In video games, the idea of breeding isn’t all that new. Since Pokémon Gold/Silver (a popular game geared toward children), players have been able to breed different species of pokémon together in order to produce new types of pokémon. Final Fantasy VII encouraged players to breed superior “golden” Chocobos to access secret areas and items. (Though that often resulted in bizzare inbreeding.)
You may even consider the Materia Fusion system from Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII as a form of item breeding. It’s only when human breeding is introduced that its presence in video games becomes controversial.
Back to the game at hand, it’s unfair to casually toss Record of Agarest War in with hentai games. If there is any pornography to the breeding aspect of the game, it’s soft-core at best. Each female character has a wedding cut scene for when your form your blessed union, which ends in a “honeymoon” shot of the girl shrouded in bedsheets. Horny gamers looking for some nudity will be painfully disappointed. Even the hot springs scene, while titillating, keeps the girls respectfully covered as the main character ogles their fair-skinned girly parts.
Since the game has succeeded in achieving a European publication, I’ll assume that a North American release will depend on European sales. So far, the game has barely registered as a blip on enthusiast gaming news sites, but if the mainstream media catches wind of a “breeding video game”, that could be a deal breaker. Then we’re at the mercy of greedy importers taking advantage of a scarce print run.
While the game would only deliver disappointment to both strategy RPG and eroge enthusiasts, it would be a cool new cultural perspective for the gaming community. I applaud mature, real-life subject matter acknowledged in games. (Breeding is a fundamental part of humanity–deal with it.) Otherwise, video games just grow stale and cliché.
Posted in Games, RPGs | 1 Comment »
April 6th, 2009 by The Grey Ghost
I now have yet another reason to buy a PS3…
Thank goodness that Nippon Ichi Software is one of those few companies that know that the best way to sell a product, is to publish it. We may have been robbed of Namco X Capcom, but we will be getting Cross Edge, a 5-way crossover turn-based tactics game. Of the five companies involved, the only ones whose properties interest me are NIS’s Disgaea and Capcom’s Darkstalkers, two family that should marry beautifully.
The only extinguishing feature about the above trailer is the poor voice acting. If Capcom sends over their own cast of voice actors for their own characters, we may be in good shape. But the vocal “talent” filling the roles for Namco, Gust, and Idea Factory are downright terrible. If they include the option to use the original Japanese audio track, I think I’ll take advantage of it.
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December 27th, 2008 by The Grey Ghost
About a year or so ago, I picked up Disgaea: Hour Of Darkness for PS2, but I’ve yet to finish it. How can I? It’s a game that I boast of being the most economically sensible game, since you could potentially play it forever.
If you’ve heard of Disgaea, then you’ve also probably heard of its reputation for being able to enter and level up from within each and any item that comes into your possession. With infinite items to acquire, infinite potential characters to develop, and a level cap of quad-9, you can see how Disgaea is a grinder’s wet dream realized.
What has saved me from this trap up until now? I had to be at home to play on my PS2. Thanks to my new PSP and the gift of Disgaea: Afternoon Of Darkness, this restriction has been lifted. I may continue on my PS2 version to work my way through Prince Laharl’s story arc at home, saving time to explore Etna’s alternative plot line while abroad.
Yet owning two copies of the same infinitely progressing game is not what makes my situation absurd. I now have cause to pick up a third version, that being the DS port. I’d toyed with the idea of my sister and I both getting the DS version to take advantage of the multiplayer modes (since she only has a DS), but now that I hear that my girlfriend got the DS version for Christmas, I may have to give this more consideration.
By this upcoming year’s end, I’m sure I’ll have accumulated three versions of the same game that each have infinite play potential. This is also not counting the copy of Disgaea 2 that I’ve yet to start! And yet I also yearn to try Disgaea 3 once I finally get a PS3 and plan to grab the Prinny: Can I Really Be The Hero spin-off due out next year.
I haven’t been this insane over buying multiple versions of a game since the Lunar series. God, I miss Lunar…
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November 6th, 2008 by The Grey Ghost
This is one of the most original
costume ideas I’ve ever seen!
Posted in Cosplay, Games, RPGs | No Comments »
