Guest Review: FFXIII

Well hey everybody it’s me, Faado, again - this time on a slightly older game all the way back from 2010. I would review a newer game but hey I’m rather skint so I’ll review what I have access to. And so today I give to you one of the most beautiful games I have ever played:

Final Fantasy XIII 

Epic battles, amazing worlds, great stories and fantastic music, these are just some of the things that I personally associate with the name Final Fantasy and this instalment in the legendary series doesn’t disappoint… for the most part. This instalment takes us to Cocoon, a shell world floating above the planet of Gran Pulse, in which millions of people live out their day-to-day lives with everything from energy to food provided for them by crystal beings called fal’cie. An almost Utopian world. Of course the peace of the world hides the fact that everyone living in Cocoon is terrified of Gran Pulse and everything that comes from there, especially the pulse fal’cie and their chosen l’cie, humans gifted with magic and assigned a task of ‘focus’ to complete with the promise of eternal life in crystal or being turned into rampant monsters if they do not complete their ‘focus’ in time. The story follows a group of Cocoon citizens who have been unwillingly turned into Pulse l’cie in their quest to deny their given focus of destroying Cocoon and instead free the people from the tyrannical rule of the Fal’cie, a task which will force them from their life long home to the dreaded Gran Pulse and back again before they have the strength and resolve needed to perform the task laid before them. 

As far as game play is concerned the world is, unfortunately for many fans of the series, fairly linear with very little room for open exploration, well for the most part anyway. The world doesn’t properly open up till quite late in the game but you should defiantly take advantage when it does. Some players on the other hand might prefer the linear game play as this means there is less chance of missing anything important and fewer tedious side quests (not to say that there are no side quests but they come in later). The battle system is an updated version of the active time battle used in the previous couple of games, but instead of waiting for the gauge to fill for your turn instead you stack a list of actions and when the gauge fills the character unleashes the stacked actions in one go. This gives combat a more dynamic feel than the rather static feel that came from many of the older titles. The nature of this ATB system means that you only control one character in battle while the others are controlled by the computer, now while this does mean that you are able to focus properly on what your leader is doing, you do have to rely on the computer controlled characters to do their job correctly, which as a credit to the development team they do the vast majority of the time. 

The new class system in XIII is the Paradigm system, which is interchangeable mid battle and is done so without much interruption to the flow of the battle. This allows you to be able to tailor your battle team for what you need when you need it which means you never have a useless team member. The levelling system for the paradigm classes is called crystogenesis with crystogen points gained from battles being spent to upgrade each class, which as more classes are unlocked for the each character allow the player to choose which classes to specialise in for each character, though they do have three main classes that will upgrade easier than the others based on the characters personalities. After each battle crystogen is given to all characters rather than just the ones your active party. This means that everyone levels up equally and you don’t have to keep swapping your team around to keep everyone balanced which was a great relief as with a full party of six people not everyone gets used (one person in particular for me). With this you might also find that if you are struggling with a specific part (say a difficult boss) then you can rearrange your team and go straight into battle again rather than having to go back to level people up.  

As far as the story goes in terms of gameplay, it is… disappointingly short, with you being able to move from one disc to the next in an afternoons worth of game play. This fact, for me personally, makes the linear world and lack of side quests all the more disappointing because it is very difficult to get as much play time out of each disc as you would like. The actual story of the game is not a bad one, with a group of heroes thrown together much more by chance than by choice, their struggle to come to terms with the fate that has befallen them and their decision whether to follow the task given them by the Fal’cie, or to defy their puppet masters and carve out their own destiny in a world where they are feared and hated by all. The characters are all quite well designed with each character having enough depth to make them feel believable without them turning into some depressing emo who looks on the bleak side of everything. Instead each hero has their own reasons for fighting and their own hopes that keep them going through the darkness, from the loving dad who just wants to see his child to the soldier looking for the next target to give their life meaning. Due to the lack of a primary protagonist the game often moves between different characters experiences which means that everyone gets their moments to show why they fight rather than just being stuck on one person all the time while the others stories happen on the sidelines. 

Next up is going to be the graphics and oh… my… god! Now as I have already said the story for this game in rather short which might leave you thinking “hey the Xbox version of this is 3 discs so if the story’s short… whats all that space being taken up by? Ha ha ha, well let me tell you. All of that room, 3 DVD discs worth of space (well the majority of it anyway) is taken up by the graphical quality. It is certainly a credit to the data size of blu ray discs that this game is able to fit onto a single disc with the quality of the game. Due to the fact that the game was designed for the PS3 and the blu ray discs the game designers were able to use the Final Fantasy budget to make a game that is a benchmark as to what is possible for the modern era and the 3rd generation consoles. There are very few games in which the quality keeps you intrigued and even when they do quite often after a few hours play you stop really noticing. But two replays later and there are still moments when I simply stop and admire the sheer beauty, and not even just the cut scenes (which might I say are utterly amazing) but the normal in game graphics which make me fear for the for the future of live action cinematography.  

Now as far as the rating goes I’m going to give this game GGGGGGGg (7 ½/10). Over all it is a fairly good game with a good story, a good control scheme, a magnificent world and some of the best graphics I have ever seen. The only real problems in the game are the unsatisfactory length of the story, the linear nature of the majority of the game and Hope who is THE most useless character in history. And so if you’re a 3rd gen gamer and you want to see what is possible in terms of graphics and play quite a good game at the same time then this is the one for you. If on the other hand you’re your looking to play a good RPG then there are better choices out there than this particular title and it may leave you feeling a little disappointed. But no matter what it is your looking for, I would most defiantly recommend that people play this game at some point just for its sheer beauty.   

Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword

A post from our guest blogger Faado. A massive thank you to him for this review on the latest Zelda game. - The Control Room. 

Ok so I was looking through the past reviews and I noticed that there was a review for twilight princess but not skyward sword. So I thought to myself “something must be done about this! Challenge accepted”   

And here it is:  

The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword 

Ok so by this point in life we should all know the main characters in the Zelda series and if you don’t then you need to get down to the local game store and buy yourself a Nintendo console ('cause you obviously don’t own one. How else can you explain the lack of Zelda in your life?). For this particular title you will be needing a Nintendo Wii and a Wii motion plus controller. But I digress; this is about the game itself not the amazing consoles. So the game starts as the hero Link (not Zelda, Zelda is a girls name) is waking up on the day of his final flying exam, but as with any teenager his first thoughts upon waking up are not ‘HOLY MOLEY, I HAVE AN EXAM TODAY!’ No his first thoughts were ‘right lets go chill with my mates for a bit, 'cause that’s just how epic I am” so he goes to find the most important person to him, good old, not so princess, Zelda. And what does she do? She does what any good girl would do - completely ignores everything he says and throws him off the edge of their flying island only to realise that something is wrong, dive off the edge to save him with her giant bird, and then break down in tears when she realises she almost killed her ‘best friend’. So then your left with one major question, “hey where the heck is my giant bird? I’m the main character, I need a giant bird!” and this is where you meet the most obvious character in the game. Obvious how? Well Link is effectively in school, and what does every good school need? That’s right, an overconfident bully. Enter Groose, the greatest idiot to have ever graced a legend of Zelda game. Turns out in an effort keep our man Link out of the final exam, which takes the form of a race, Groose and his boys have somehow managed to capture and lock away your faithful, flying companion. Of course this is no problem for our great adventurer and he quickly rushes of to free his bird and wipe the smug grin off Grooses face. 

Now it’s not too long after this that our heroes’ world gets casually flipped upside down and he is forced to watch as his precious friend is dragged down below the thick clouds that had been the edge of their world for as long as anybody had known. And so Link is forced to begin his search for a way down below the clouds, which inevitably leads to the acquisition of the titular, Skyward Sword, and the meeting with a character so annoying I actually cried for Navi at times. Once you’re stuck with Fi (and when I say stuck I mean there is absolutely no getting rid of her) then you're off for your first experience of good old fashioned Hyrule and you know what that means… your first dungeon, and more importantly your first boss; who is quite possibly one of the campest bosses in video game history and my personal second favourite character in the entire game. Now as stories go Skywards swords is pretty good, admittedly it can be a little predictable at times, but I found that those moments weren’t disappointing in the slightest - instead they managed to make you feel good about story and the way in which it was heading. 

Now as far as the actual game play is concerned the most difficult thing about it, in my opinion, was getting used to the motion plus controls. Being an unfortunately lazy gamer I found myself trying to play the game with just general swings of the remote - the kind required for twilight princess… or any Wii game before the motion plus. Of course once I realised that just wasn’t going to happen, I picked myself a seated position that allowed adequate arm swinging room and started playing the game properly, like a boss. My personal favourite feature of the game is the rather simple item upgrades, that’s not just the sword but pretty much everything from bug nets to the rather beautiful bow… well that, of course and the flying on a giant bird (can’t express how cool they are.). 

Next up is the graphics. Now as a hard core gamer and someone who had just transferred from the mighty Skyrim, there was something about the Skyward Sword graphics that weren’t quite the HQ games I was used to and at the same time weren’t quite the cell shading of the wind waker. Now at first the ever so slightly cartoony feel to the graphics made me weary, but after playing the game for a while I started to realise that they gave the game its own unique charm, like it had looked at the big high def games of the Xbox and PS3 and thought ‘you know what? No. I’m not gonna compete with them. Instead I’m gonna do what Nintendo does best. I’m gonna make you fall in love with me in a way that means once you’ve got bored of you Call of Duty and your Battlefield, you’ll come back to me and you’ll love me all the same.’ Now if you are looking for a Zelda game that will compete with the quality of the of the HD consoles then you have two choices. One, go play Twilight Princess or two, wait for the legendary Wii U and the beautiful Zelda that will be coming with it (hopefully). 

Now as for ratings I give Skyward Sword 9/10 my only real problems with the game were the fact that Fi obviously thinks we are all total morons, and that the final boss left me wishing for so much more. But it did manage the incredible feat of keeping me away from Skyrim for a full 2 weeks which is no easy feat (just ask any of my four characters) and it’s the kind of game I will happily go back to weeks, months even years later and love it just as much as ever. The legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword is most defiantly a game the series and the fans can be proud of.  

Guest Blogger!

Merry Christmas, readers, today we have a guest blogger! Take a look, we quite like him.


Hey, Tanky here. I guess a good opener would be to explain who I am (I'll try to sound as if I don’t love myself too much). I’m the latest competition winner Nathan Davidson and I thought that as these guys have rewarded me for merely following their concise adventures into the electronic world of gaming (wasn't really that hard, the trick is too be a closet nerd like myself who cant openly talk about these things with college friends without getting funny looks).

Tanky

So, I'm going to go into depth about my recent influx of overly enjoyed gaming since I started again a few months back, kick started by one of the most anticipated games of 2011!, (yes, you've probably already guessed it by now) SKYRIM!

With merely a few hours before release my girlfriend announces that “I don’t want you to have to wait until Christmas to play Skyrim”, Which to any gamer, Is like a dream come true, So never the less I began my adventures and in no less than 48 hours the main quest, the dark brotherhood and the thieves guild were finished. Due to an added feature known as ‘Shouts’ and the fact all games are becoming ever more user friendly (known to us gamers as ‘being easier’), I found my adventures in Skyrim more fluid and there was very little in the way (other than a few puzzles that anyone with the cognitive strength of a slug could figure out). But, I would like to continue this post by adding the many aspects of the game I have enjoyed…

Lycanthropy
(the werewolf curse)

(best bonus) Immunity to disease including the most annoying of the Elder Scrolls universe Sanguinare Vampiris (the vampire curse).
(Bonuses while in beast form) Increased melee damage with a range of +5 to +60 when in beast form depending on level.
Increased dexterity with the opportunity to run on all fours in beast form.


Shouts
(the utterance of words of power and the resulting effect)

On completion of the game you now get to use 2 very useful shouts when in a stcky situation such as being cornered…
Call Dragon- Od (snow) – Ah (Hunter) – Viing (Wing) “Odahviing! Hear my voice and come forth. I summon you in my time of need.” This summons the dragon Odahviing (aka Alduin’s sidekick) to help you in battle.
Call Of Valor- Hun (Hero) – Kaal (Champion) – Zoor (Legend) Each level of this shouts summons a different hero of Sovngarde (The ones that banished Alduin into the future). Hun – Gormlaith Golden-Hilt (who wields bows/sword/shields and shouts) Hun, Kaal – Felldir The Old (Who wields a Great sword and a number of damage inflicting shouts) Hun, Kaal, Zoor – Hakon One-Eye (who wields a Battle Axe and uses Melee Shouts)

Mining

Although this may seem like a pointless nod of appreciation to other fantasy veterans such as the ever popular but underrated Runescape or the classic and the modern MMORPG versions of Warcraft. Mining has become a useful tool in Skyrim due to two simple facts, The mines are everywhere and Pickaxes are light to carry (Which basically makes this like finding a ten pound note on your way to earn money. A HAPPY BONUS). This was the contributing factor to why I was probably one of the first people I know to achieve the 100,000 gold achievement on my Xbox 360. Along with this goes the ability to smelt your ore into bars, and in turn create items to sell for a higher price. Your patience really does pay off in Skyrim.

Cooking

Throughout my journeys in Skyrim, I discovered my favourite recipes for a useful item and through the most un-used skill at my disposal, Cooking. The Two I would like to share with you are:

Elswyr Fondue
(Ale,Eidar Cheese Wheel, Moon Sugar) Which fortifies magicka 100/12m and regenerates magicka 25%/12m
Horker Stew
(Garlic, Horker Meat, Lavender, Tomato) Which restores 15 health and 15 stamina and also regenerates health 1/12m


Now for a little summary of the ever popular and my favourite aspect of the elder scrolls games, The Dark Brotherhood. again filled with deception, plot twists and this time …. brace yourself… YOU MEET THE NIGHT MOTHER AND WORK DIRECTLY FOR HER!
For those of you that wish to seek this quest line the first meeting that may occur is by a small farm North of Whiterun, The meeting is strange your are confronted on your journey by a weird man, who talks like a psychopath and is dressed accordingly in a medieval court jesters apparel and his carriage (WHICH HARBOURS THE NIGHT MOTHERS BODY).

That is all for today.

PEACE