RedRodriguez87

#192: Enlightenment Oh, man, have I got alot to say about this one that I've been wanting to get off my chest for a while. I remember seeing the trailers for this back in 2010. You know, this one. And I was excited. It was like a japanese GoW with bloodier gameplay of a Naruto Ninja Storm game. So the year passed, the game was toned down quite a bit, but hey, it still looked awesome. After all, it looked like we were definitely getting some awesome boss-fights. So finally, it came out, I got it..... and by the time I finished the game, I was MAJORLY disappointed. This was not the game I thought it would be; it was a glorified QTE-fest with little to no punishment and dumbed down Ninja Storm esque combat that remained the same throughout. The cherry on top of the crap sundae for me? The story. Stupid anime melodrama in all its obnoxious glory. In 2012, I was sick to death of this, it seemed like it was in every anime I saw; lots of yelling, one-dimensional characters, and idiotic plots that were either "NO ONE SHOULD BE GOD" and "HUMANS ARE THE REASON THE WORLD SUCKS" bs, I just wanted to be done with it. Yeah, the visuals were amazing, the animation superb, but what does that matter with Asura's constant yelling and the villains insistence on being so one-note that they end up looking like dumbasses incapable of grasping the situation they're in to the point you wonder how they rose to power at all. Seriously, every confrontation between Asura and the bosses reminded me of this. Asura = dog Villains = Homer Bag of chips = them trying to kill him So I forgot about it, for a while, until the DLC for Nirvana came out. I figured, at least I will beat all of it so my criticisms could have SOME validity to them. So I did, and. There was something different about it. Something better. Not only in a more obvious sense, such as spruced up QTEs, more varied locations, more dynamic scenarios, and an actual sense of CLOSURE when it was all done, but, it kinda made me think, "Hm, maybe there was something more to the main game that I missed". I didn't think much of it, though, so that was it. 2018 came around, and I decided I wanted to check up on that last battle, which popped into memory for some odd reason. That in turn lead me to say, "Ah, what the heck, it's been years, let me give it a go once more, and try to plat it. That way, I'll know for sure what I think of it". So here we are, and man, what can change in 6 years. Not everything, mind you, but quite a bit. First of all, the story........ Yeah, it still sucks (IMO). A big part of what I can't stand, ARE the character's paper-thin personalities. I know it's meant to be fueled on emotion rather than logic, but c'mon, there's gotta be SOME foundation. You are supposed to feel Asura and his wrath, what with everything he loved snatched away from him, but the thing is, he's ALWAYS angry. He's angry when you start the game, and everything is a trigger for him. And because he doesn't have an off switch, it get's tiring to endure. There's comparisons to be made between Asura and Kratos; both perpetually pissed, going up against enemies that exist solely to piss them off, but here's the thing. Kratos' anger is clearly framed as destructive; the more and more it isn't quelled, the more and more screwed the world gets, until the end, where everything is in ruin, and Kratos sees that he isn't satisfied, and that everything is his fault; he won, but he got nothing out of it. There is a point, and payoff to his constant anger, and while the result may not be to your liking, it's there. Asura on the other hand, seems to be pissed just because from the beginning so when his life falls apart, you wonder "well, if it wasn't that, it would've been something else". And because noone else is affected by it, and nothing bad that happens is his fault, he just ends up being at best a boring character, and at worst exhausting to watch. So with no interesting characters to gravitate to, all that's left is the spectacle, which leads into ANOTHER issue I have with stories/anime/games that make it a point to constantly top itself; unless you establish who you are, what you are trying to do and where you are going, sooner or later, you're GONNA hit that ceiling. Any attempt to go higher is just gonna look stupid, and eventually, people are gonna be worn out trying to follow what you are doing. But what I did come away from appreciating even more than I did was just about everything else. The visuals are great, REALLY great. The game as a whole has a feel, an aesthetic, an arts-style all it's own, that obviously a lot of love and care went it into. The graphics, the character design, heck, even things like the gauges and button prompts look so unique and individual to this game. The gameplay is still monotonous, but hey, when you try to go for the plat, you come to appreciate all the little things you CAN do. It's kinda like KH2 for me; mash attack to win, but spice it up with a Triangle here and there for something cool to happen. The cutscenes? Loved them. Everything feels big, important, grandiose, spectacular, with fluid exciting dynamic animation to compliment it. CyberConnect (at least their animation department) to me remains the king of bringing anime to the 3rd dimension. So on the whole, I really am glad I came back to this one again. It ain't great, but it really was unique and one-of-a-kind when it came out (though I'll say it'd probably welcome nowadays with all kinds of story driven simplistic gameplay titles out on the market). It's definitely something to be looked at and studied for what it did wrong and what it did right. As for a sequel or successor of some kind; if it happens, I'll take a look, if not, that's fine too. I mean hey, in this day and age of properties older than AW being revived, none of can say it will never happen, right? And yes, I did get the DLC again. Gaea's Champion

#191: Big Adventurer My first plat of 2019, and.... well....... Like, this was definitely done as a gag, right? A multi-layered gag, perhaps? Like, you look at the screenshots and expect a simple anime-esque indie platformer, then realize it's a bottom-of-the-barrel budget game? But then you get through the first level and it's simply crappy game-play and think "Well hey, at least it will be an easy play-through" but then get to the 2nd stage and suddenly the enemies are kicking your ass thanks to said crappy game-play? But you power through, then start getting slaughtered more and more, until you reach the point you wanna give up? But then you realize you cheese the game out with jump attacks and before you know it, the plat is yours? I.... I just.... i don't know what to say about this one. Well, maybe it would be kinda funny if someone pulled a Sha-fu on this one and tried to make it better as well?

#190: SQUAREBOY VS BULLIES Not my last trophy of the year, but def my last plat of the year. Maybe even longer than that, because I'm just not feeling it anymore. I keep forcing myself to come back to hunting, but all joy and sense of accomplishment is long gone, and... blegh, another one of these posts. Nevermind that, Happy New Years everyone! Here's to 2019!

Kinda disappointing you just kept it in terms of graphics. There is a good chunk of games where the realistic graphics go quite a ways in compliment the gameplay in unique and interesting ways ie GoW and the Infamous series. Now where it gets stupid for me is when one tries to put realism in the gameplay, because it's just not meant to be. It's like you are never gonna fully recreate an authentic farming experience (or ANY activity) and still hope to get people interested in your game, rendering hairs on a horses scrotum doesn't accomplish anything in how the game will be remembered (and really, would you WANT to be remembered as the game with the hairy horse ball-sacks?), and I don't to be doing mundane things that I can easily do in real life.

Seems appropriate. Nirvana

I'll keep it short and sweet; is it possible to earn ANY of the Hard mode trophies via chapter select? I've seen it asked all over the web, but no one has given a clear answer of yes or no.

Noice. Way to be looking out, @DJ_AdruA!

And now, my Christmas Plats! First off, my surprise platinum that I had no intention of getting right now. #189: Gnasty's Demise Ever since I played the very PSX demo released, I always wanted to play through Spyro, but for one reason or another (money) I was never able to. So decades later, I finally got a chance play it, and I'm glad I did. Though, I wonder how much more I would've appreciated it HAD I actually played it back in the day. Great grpahics, charming characters, easy levels capped off with an annoyingly frustrating finale, and you got the makings of a classic PSX game. It may have been an obvious choice, but I am glad they want back to this design for Spyro, instead of sticking with that ugly-ass Skylanders one. I also probably would've gotten this platinum alot earlier, but I ended up putting on hold during a bad day I was having, and just wasn't in the mood, then the following month pretty much preoccupied me. So lo and behold, I finish it during my next attempt in one day. And now my INTENDED X-Mas platinum: #190: Platinum Trophy I actually liked this one. Like, really alot. It is of course a spoiler-free take on Ice Age 3, and going off of that, the devs managed to get quite alot of diversity packed in here. You have solid standard 3d platforming, more complex combat based platforming, 2d platforming, chase sequences ripped right out of games like Lion King or Mickey Mania SNES, on rails shooting levels, free roam shooting levels, plenty of collectibles to find, upgrades to buy, time-trial and point challenges, there is so much content here that you would've never expected, and it all plays good. It's not mind-blowing content, but it feels like the devs attempted to go beyond what was expected, and I commend them for that. Anyways, Merry X-Mas, y'all!

#188: Rise of the Guardians Merry Christmas eve! Here is my Christmas Eve plat for the year! I I'll keep it short; its concept (4 player coop with the main Guardians), ideas (traveling to different locations and realms) and half it's execution (the environments and music are great, and core gameplay are alot of fun) goes beyond what's (becoming more and more unfairly) expected of a movie tie-in. However, it still lacks the polish and refinements (buggy enemies, loads of padding and repetitive filler to fill out an otherwise short game) to keep it in the public eye after the movie goes to home dvd. Speaking of which, I really should get around to actually watching it.......