RE4 Wrap Up & Apollo Justice

02/26/08 03:38:06 am

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• Apollo Justice
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When we last left our hero, he had infiltrated the enemy headquarters on ... some island. There are some rather eerie settings here, particularly the run-down hospital where you meet your first regenerator. And those minigun toting commando enemies? Ouch. It took me several attempts to beat Krauser, since I kept trying to shoot him and the time limit would run out. Use the knife? Bah.

On the other hand, I defeated the final boss on my first attempt ("what? All I have to do is shoot the eyeball, then use a context-command? ... Hmm."), after which I was disheartened to die several times on the jet ski escape from the island. I realize I must be simply awful at it, but it felt so out of place to begin with: I just beat the boss... game is over now - gimme a cut scene and some closure, not an opportunity to instantly die 10 more times before you roll credits.

All in all though, I had an unexpectedly great time with this game. I feel a good part of the credit for that must go to the Wii remote controls - for some reason I am near-incapable of simultaneously using one analog stick for movement and one for aiming. The Wii remote makes aiming far more intuitive and comfortable, especially for a n00b (of the genre) like myself. On that note, I can't wait to try out Metroid Prime 3...

But when another Gyakuten Saiban comes to call, nary an objection can be made.

Apollo Justice is the first game in the Ace Attorney / Gyakuten Saiban series to be made for the Nintendo DS rather than being a port of a Gameboy Advance title. However, several of the "new" features actually premiered in the fifth case of the first game - "Rise From the Ashes" - which was added on to the DS version of the title. Fingerprinting, video analysis, 3D evidence inspection and blood detection all return in Apollo Justice, in addition to "perceiving," foot printing, x-ray scanning and sound analysis with a mixing board, to name a few.

While I like these features, I couldn't help but wish for more freedom with them. Why can I only dust for fingerprints when I'm led to do so? Why can't I put any piece of paper in the x-ray scanner, even if it comes out blank? Giving us free reign on the gadgets might have drawn attention away from the stark linearity in the plot, but instead it's reinforced by "only when I say so" access.

And then there's the 3D rendering of evidence... okay, it looks nice, but feels pointless when an examination yields no additional information; this was implemented better in Ashes, where an object was only visible in 3D if a 3D analysis would reveal something special.

However, as usual, Gyakuten Saiban delivers an immersive, intricate story that had me hooked 'til the end. While I liked Trials & Tribulations for its interweaving of stories through three cases, Justice intertwines all of its cases. Since the series dropped most of its regular faces in favor of a new cast, character development was essential, and the game does a satisfying job of bridging the past and present, always revealing things in bits and pieces as you go, of course. Personally I wasn't so enticed by the new breed of smiley, polite prosecutor (it's more fun when they're being smarmy and mean... and cyborg!), but he plays an air guitar in court... how can I not be amused by that?

New Host

11/19/07 06:51:46 am

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I haven't been updating lately because I haven't been able to - I had completely run out of disk space, and the site was down a few times because of it too. But, if you're seeing this update, then you're seeing the site on its new host, where there'll be plenty of space and plenty of bandwidth! Hurrah! So... hopefully there'll be new content... somewhat soon.

There's also this game though, called Super Mario Galaxy... It rocks. I should have a rather more thorough opinion of it posted soon over at TwiddleGeek.com. Also recently completed Phoenix Wright: Trials & Tribulations, if you'd like to know what I thought about it.

You're Gonna Be Jealous

10/28/07 04:20:05 pm

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• Phoenix Wright
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You can all stop playing Pokemon, for I have officially won. I have captured a shiny... BIDOOF! Yes, that's right. Commence groveling.

Aside from that... Having pre-ordered Phoenix Wright 3, it arrived on my doorstep on Friday, and has seen a lot of play time since. Gameplay is, of course, exactly the same as the previous Phoenix Wright, but really, you're not expecting that to change in this series; sequels are for more trials, more characters, more humorous banter, and more fun convoluted case solving. More of the same, I guess - so if you liked previous titles in the series, you'll continue to like them. I'm quite fond of this new prosecutor, Godot, and his coffee mania (where do those cups keep coming from, anyway?...).

Also, because I pre-ordered with Gamestop, I got a bonus Phoenix Wright "plush." I use quotations because I myself would've called it a keychain. Here is the plush, next to my DS for comparison:

Frankly, the description as "plush" made me imagine it would be bigger (I don't think the size was ever mentioned anywhere), but oh well, it's still cute.

This could get ugly...