Top 10 Old Games of the Year

Old games played this year? What madness is this?

This year has been a pretty busy one, I have played over 45 games and most of them didn’t come out this year. I have had a lot of catching up to do, making this one of the most grueling and difficult lists to compile. As always, one per franchise and must not have been released in 2o13.

10. FTL

An incredibly addictive strategy game, that had me spending too many hours not to include on the list.

9. The Secret of Monkey Island

Hilarious and unsurpassed, this little gem still looks good and plays great today.

8. Dragon Quest VII

Perhaps if it were a better entry in the series it might have appeared higher, but even this still manages to pack a punch.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

7. Half Life

It’s Half Life, do I really need to spell it out?

 

 

 

 

 

6. Ico

Perhaps some of the puzzles are a little easy and the platforming a little unresponsive, but this is still a hugely inspirational game, and a great complementing piece to the greater Shadow of the Colossus.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

5. Metal Gear Solid

Although a little top heavy in narrative to gameplay at times, Metal Gear Solid is not only a precursor to a brilliant run of games hence, but also is one of the best of the franchise itself.

4. Super Metroid

A great improvement, solidifying the series as a keeper and frequent go-to whenever Nintendo begins to feel the heat.

 

 

 

 

 

 

3. Silent Hill 2

A difficult choice on where to go in the list, although a strong narrative, the horror experience is a little less focused in comparison to the first game, and so doesn’t manage to bowl over the competition.

2. The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker

One of the most fun Zelda games and most games, The Wind Waker proves that sometimes, a million fans can be wrong.

1. Earthbound

It comes as no surprise that this might top the list, as one of the most respected games in existence, Earthbound is one of few games that have managed to entice non-RPG gamers over due to transcending the conventional RPG design and game traditions, and somehow has still not been copied and unlike most games oversaturating the market.

If there’s one game that ought to be on your Xmas list this year, this is it.

Top 10 Old Games of the Year

Fathers and Sons

I’ve finally decided to plunge into my recommendations list, starting with the Russian novel, Fathers and Sons by Ivan Turgenev.

At only 235 pages this is the shortest Russian novel I have read yet, the character roster is still rather large and the novel is able to cover a huge amount of ground, while still being consistent and involved.

The history of Russia at the time is important to understanding some of the key background themes that inform the characters particularly the dynamic between generations. The emancipation of the serfs was in 1861, allowing freedom to the Russian peasants, meaning that landowners were no longer necessary and authoritative figures. The novel was written a year after the emancipation however, is set a few years before in 1859.

The story follows a group of people, whose relationships are fractured, most notably, as the title suggests, of fathers and sons. A young man whose new friend is a nihilist, decide to visit the former’s father, whereupon it becomes  apparent that the father and son have become distanced in his absence.

Unlike the steady prose of other Russian writers, the novel is more like a play, in that it is divided into scenes,  with character dialogue leading the narrative, as well as there being no definable main character. The descriptions are loose, with heavy attention placed on emotive responses to such, the style reminds me of Gogol, and could easily be classed as a Realism piece.

The characters are most unusual, unlike in Dostoevsky’s work, the main characters  are not peasants or exceedingly poor, nor by any means are they aristocracy, but more like landowners. The change in perspective is evident  in that it is less damning, but also less patriotic than other work.

The novel focuses heavily on the nature of intimacy between people, whether it is morals, actions or philosophy, each character undergoes their own arc, signalling change much like the era that it is written and the shift in views and the reconciliation between characters is not wholly uplifting, and some of the messages were too politically driven, ending up with a contempt for change, despite the compromises.

Although  not as thematic and narrative-driven as Dostoevsky, Fathers and Sons is probably the most quintessential Russian novel, offering a great insight into Russian culture, while also maintaining a beauty that is immediate and fulfilling, if not as memorable. Nonetheless it is shocking that he is not popularly known alongside Tolstoy and Dostoevsky as one of Russia’s greatest writers.

Fathers and Sons

Ni No Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch

As a huge fan of turn-based Japanese RPGs, when Ni No Kuni was announced in the west I was the most excited I have ever been for a game, I mean, it’s made by Level 5, who helped create one of my favourite ever games on the PS2, and the story and characters are of Studio Ghibli design, the very same who brought us Spirited Away and Princess Mononoke.

Ni No Kuni is a turn-based action RPG on the PS3 and DS, however only the Playstation version has been released so far, and is published by Namco Bandai. Turn-based action games are fairly rare, Kingdom Hearts and Tales of games, being the most famous ones that spring to mind, the combat in this leans more towards the RPG side, with limited necessity for advanced movement and action mostly revolving around basic attacks and magic instead of various moves.

The game features a spell book which is used frequently throughout the game for reference, in the UK a special edition was released which features a hardback version of this book, however due to many issues involving its release, I shelved it for a while.

After release there were some rather mediocre reviews, many people who haven’t played RPGs since the 90′s were hyped for the game and most were left unsatisfied, so lets unravel some of this, in the opinion of a cynical RPG fan.

It begins with a young boy named Oliver who lives in a town called Motorville, that looks a lot like Pleasantville and undoubtedly is set in our world. However, Oliver’s life is turned upside down when his mother tragically dies leaving him all alone. Until he cries on a stuffed toy which morphs into a small creature and tells him that there is a way to save his mother, by saving another version of her in another world, namely, his world. However, the soulmate of his mother has become trapped by an evil entity known as Shadar who plagues the other world, so he must learn magic and become a great wizard if he hopes to defeat him.

The game is astoundingly beautiful, it is no doubt the greatest asset, there were minimal graphical errors and throughout it was a picture of perfection, it’s cel-shaded so it will probably look fantastic in about 10 years too. The world map is detailed however the camera is zoomed out, so the immersion is unfortunately lost on it, however, towns and dungeons are up close and personal, and creatures are featured in game instead of being random encounters which feels more believable.

Everyone knows it looks great so lets no linger on the painfully obvious.

The battle sequences are somewhat cluttered, there are lots of characters running around and lots of niggledy piggledy things to keep your eye on and to be thinking about at the same time. This can be rather difficult in boss battles when characters get in the way or you can’t focus on enemy attacks due to cast spells and maintaining your team, which you spend a lot of time doing because your allies’ AI has a death wish.

At first it is very hard to get used to but is rather fun when you have, however the lack of action does mean that it isn’t as intrinsically fun during battles as perhaps other action RPG games. The difficulty is higher than your Final Fantasy but is overall about average in other Japanese RPGs. Bosses seem to dip in difficulty while enemies wear down the MP and HP of you and your characters unnaturally fast, making the replenishment upon levelling much needed.

Tutorials in the game aren’t… well, in the game. They usually consist of text boxes which are very tempting to disappear when they pop up, which leads to you being a little clueless about how something works. At the same time, the game also gives you too much information, with all the next objectives being clearly marked on the map and a piece of text at the top telling you what you have to do, one of the game’s features, restoring people’s lost hearts is made further obvious by them telling you which emotion they are lacking, instead of letting you figure it out for yourself. There is an option to get rid of the map markers, but it’s hard to feel the desire to turn them off, knowing they are there and are default. The random characters in towns have a flashing circle identifying that they have a quest for you, this means that you end up associating villagers with either being useful or useless, so I didn’t speak to many NPCs.

The world feels rather small and the game lacks a lot of scope both in the world building and in the story, there seems to be something entirely unepic about it, and with some of the characters coming across as one dimensional the whole atmosphere is a bit stoic and rigid. The story has no real flow to it, with many characters existence being entirely pointless outside of game related things like quests or boss fights, eventually it picks up towards the end, but the ball gets dropped again leaving the ending note a little bit unfulfilling.

Ni No Kuni is a good game, the numerical values ascribed to it aren’t low, but there are many problems, mostly small which all add up to a bigger picture which is a little disappointing, where Dragon Quest dominates the video game market, so does Studio Ghibli with animé, both have the same feel to them in their respective mediums.
But this is a video game, and Studio Ghibli have made it clear that this isn’t an area they have experience in.
It doesn’t feel like an epic adventure, it just feels too… gamey.

Ni No Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch

A Shadow's Tale

A Shadow’s Tale, or “Lost in Shadow” if you’re from ‘Murica, is a platform game released on the Wii in 2010, by some freak occurrence this game was localised by Konami here in the UK but was originally developed by Hudson Soft, the folks behind Bomberman.

The game is simple enough in concept, you play as a shadow with seemingly no name who was stripped from his body and must climb a tower to get it back, the issue of being a soul mightn’t have been too bad but there is also a monster knocking around that can devour him, so there’s a pretty immediate incentive.

Adventure with a Spangle – A Spangle? What the shit is that? How is the average person meant to know your quirky fairy’s name?!
Complete your quest. – Well, no shit.
Why on Earth does this have these two things as part of the features?![/caption]

The gameplay involves using the shadow realm in the background of the screen to negotiate a path through the level, collecting 3 orbs in order to pass the gate at the end, it works like a puzzle platformer with tasks revolving around the unique aspect of being a shadow such as light and shadow play. There are shadow enemies which attack the boy as he makes his way through levels, which are dealt with the basic attack with the sword that he finds early in the game. The health system is rather innovative but the implementation is not too unique, the boy must collect various “memories” throughout the level in order to gain “grams” for his soul, the more weight he has the more health, these were inspired by Duncan MacGougall’s soul theory.

The extra puzzle features are some of the game’s highlights for the Shadow theme, following “Boy 1″ is a small butterfly-thing called something vaguely unmemorable, that can change the light source and skewing the shadows in order to reach different platforms, or just activating different objects to move into the correct path. Each level has a door located that takes the protagonist to an enclosed puzzle area which must be completed to pass beyond, upon completion your health is fully restored. Further into the game you can find gates which can allow you to temporarily gain a body and manipulate the physical objects instead of shadows.

The presentation is the most striking thing about the game, similar to Ico it has similar green/yellow filters and detailed realistic environments that are set in a sandstone architecture with mechanical devices. The music atmospheric and complements the art style, by being rather quiet most of the time. The boy doesn’t really have a voice and his entire character development is made through text and finding the memories he lost upon becoming a shadow. Unfortunately it is hard to get invested in a character which attempts to pull of the contemplative depth of Ico, when he speaks so much all of which revolves around “I miss my body” and “I want my body back”.

The visuals are in places well-designed and the disguising of game objects is masterfully done, however the game appears content on being a poor man’s Ico and it is obvious this was a big inspiration. The graphics are too sharp and bearing in mind the game is based upon and named after shadows, one would expect them to be the better looking part of the game, unfortunately the shadows suffer from what most games of the past generation have where the resolution is horrendous and choppy.

The puzzles are fun but rather overwhelming in a less than linear platform game, with the required three orbs to get it can become more tiresome to backtrack than it is fun. The gameplay as a shadow is controlled through the analogue stick on the remote and the activation using the fairy thing through the Wii-mote by aiming, it’s not as smooth as could be, sometimes the jumping sticks and it takes a while to move after getting up from ladders, these can cause enemies to get more hits on you and can be infuriating.

The difficulty bounces around, mostly stemmed from enemies being clumped together in too short intervals, whereas the puzzles are simple, easy and tedious, merely being a test of patience rather than skill. Over the course of the game the difficulty becomes harder and the game includes an annoying segment where you have to backtrack around the tower, however overall the experience becomes more enjoyable whether it be entertainment through attrition or becoming better in general. It takes quite a lot of enemies to kill to refill the health gauge and when the boy dies, you can either turn the game off and go back to the start of the level with nothing collected or you can continue and go back to the start of the level with what you have collected and the file now being called Boy #2. Every time you die, this number increases and you have little choice but to allow it.

Overall the game is held back by its numerous flaws of level design and gameplay management, it also goes on for too long with segments becoming tedious and all of the wonderful and interesting quirks becoming tired before being put to rest. There are many times that I wanted to just give up due to the effort being too much, or the levels becoming too boring. It takes ages before there is a change of scenery and even then it wasn’t terribly different. The game flow is mostly monotonous but is lifted by moments when you can explore something interesting or new, like the cart section. The boss fights consist of running away and was fairly fun and the end boss fight was a little long but brought some interesting concepts to the already established game design. The 3D segments handle like hell, it feels like the game was probably initially designed in 3 dimensions but was dropped for the shadow idea, unfortunately you can feel it with the strangely floaty and clunky way it controls when the boy is in the real world.

The Wii hasn’t got many good new IPs and with a distinct lack of console platfomers it is worth having a try if only for the novelty of the first few levels. It looks fairly nice and is the closest we’re going to get to another game like Ico, even if it isn’t as rewarding. A Shadow’s Tale is a game with its ups and downs but doesn’t fail to deliver an entirely new experience, making for a fairly average title that’s good to fill your time.

A Shadow's Tale

Stranger In A Strange Land

Yet again, I’m pipping at Heinlein’s novels, I’ve got a whole box of his stuff and I’m not going to let a little thing like disliking his books stop me from reading them. When I first started up this site I read Starship Troopers, which I couldn’t even finish and since then I read Methuselah’s Children and Orphans of the Sky. This time round, I decided to read his magnum opus, Stranger in a Strange Land, which won tonnes of awards and, according to the book cover is “the most famous Science-Fiction novel ever”, which I asked a number of people whether they had heard of it, all of whom replied in the negative. I’m giving him a good chance here, let it be known that I tried.

Set on Earth, the first human-occupied trip to Mars was fairly unsuccessful, all of the colonists died except a child, yielding a human orphan who is raised by Martians and taken back to Earth when a second trip lands many years later. The arrival of the martian human, Michael Valentine Smith or Valentine Michael Smith, which I wasn’t able to discern whether the text or the back cover was correct, has raised some legal problems for the government as to who now “owns” Mars, his property that is now his on Earth, as well as the issue of handling him and extracting information in order for good relations with the Martians to ensue.

The novel was initially conceived as a futuristic Jungle Book, but upon looking at the final product, it differs greatly, especially towards the end. Unlike Jungle Book’s themes of acceptance, the recurring motif is transcendental thought, keyying in themes of Culture, Philosophy and Religion.

The book mostly features a woman called Gillian as the protagonist, and was picked up a part of the feminist reading list of the time as well as widely read by hippies due to the “Free Love” element of the novel. Unfortunately by today’s standards it’s not exactly feministic - ”9 times out of 10, if a girl gets raped, it’s partly her fault”. This wonderful gem was uttered by our lady hero, it’s hard to take an idea like free love and promiscuity seriously when the author thinks that rape is nearly always the victim’s fault, more like Forced Love, mate.

The characters are fairly typical 50/60′s, in that the men joke about women’s social power, while wryly smiling aside’s of ‘knowing better’ and the women prance around the way ‘a person who has no idea what non-prissy women are like’ (AKA a regressive idiot) would conceivably write them. The one character I thought was the best was actually like this a lot, but he also echoed the similar feelings of despair and fatigue that I experienced while and because of reading this book.

The theology that is expressed throughout the book is undoubtedly well thought out and feels sincere, unlike many religions and philosophies of Sci-Fi TV shows, such as Stargate, where nothing seems feasible or remotely believable. Unfortunately sincerity doesn’t lead to compatibility and Heinlein’s beloved theology remains flawed and sour, with free love permeating the very core of the religion, when characters appear to remain homophobic and believing what can only be assumed that rape is okay because women lead it on, where does this leave the already promiscuous free people of this circle? Doesn’t every woman of the religion deserve rape then? How can one treat one sex one way and the other differently when the idea of equality and love is rule?

It fucking doesn’t that’s what. This book is another symptom of the morally fevered mind of Heinlein, it’s ideas are idealistically insecure and the undertones of racism, homophobia and sexism are repugnant. Where Starship Troopers deigned to preach how to rule, this book preaches how to love. Is there any aspect of modern living that Heinlein hasn’t barbarically attacked with his awful literature?

Unfortunately plot and holes together could be elevated by terrific writing, somewhat of a rarity in 50′s/60′s Sci0Fi world, and Stranger serves to remind us of that, by being incomprehensibly simple and lacks any kind of written interest whatsoever. No imagery, no complex plot or character arcs, repitition of themes is boring and doesn’t equal exploration and finally the dialogue and characters are flat and dull.

Stranger in a Strange Land is undoubtedly Heinlein’s best work, but that really isn’t saying much when it’s qualifying criteria was the fact that it strung together loosely as a set of events and thus was less confusing and paceless than other novels and the effort into the hypocritical religion actually felt genuine. Overall it has nothing to say about transcendental thought that other, better and more fun books like Left Hand of Darkness have done. Well you didn’t expect a positive review from me, did you?

Stranger In A Strange Land