CrossCode

CrossCode is a game that I've been keeping an eye on for a while now. Just from looking at it, the game oozed retro charm with its very 16-bit aesthetic and overhead Zelda-inspired perspective. Actually sitting down and spending some time with CrossCode reveals that there's a lot more to it. The game isn't simply a retro throwback meant to tug at our heartstrings through the powers of nostalgia. There are a number of modern day conveniences and design philosophies at work that a lot more depth to the experience.

The basic premise of CrossCode is that players take on the role of a girl named Lea who is trapped in a virtual world that is part of a popular MMORPG. It's all rather reminiscent of anime series such as .Hack and Log Horizon. Complicating things is that Lea has lost her memory, so she doesn't really understand much about the world that she's in. Luckily, she has the help of Sergei Asimov, a human in the real world who is communicating with Lea, trying to help her with her memory. From what I've played so far, he hasn't helped a huge amount and has been mostly helping Lea regain her ability to speak, as she's been affected by a glitch in the game whereby she can't talk. She may not be a brilliant conversationalist but it's a convenient way of pushing forward the silent protagonist.

As one progresses, they experience more of the world and Lea meets other players in the MMO. She has to keep her background a secret, though, as they think she's a normal player just like them, not a person trapped in the game. As she meets all of these people and they get to chatting, we see various nods to the MMO genre. What's nice about this is that dialog doesn't linger on jargon that is commonly associated with the genre. Instead, it's more about player attitudes and behaviors. It's a nice change of pace, as it seems like various shows or games that make reference to MMOs get hung up on language and spend little to no time looking at what makes the genre special in the first place: all of the different people who play the games.

In terms of actually going around and doing stuff, on a base level, CrossCode has a lot in common with classic Zelda games when the series was all about the overhead perspective. This can be seen through the various zones connected together that are teeming with monsters, often with treasure chests in hard to reach places, enticing players to figure out how to get to them.

Getting to said treasure chests, not to mention doors / passages to other zones is where we see the game come into its own, as platform puzzles play a big role in players getting around. There isn't any actual jump button when Lea explores an area, but when she comes to a ledge or a bit of ground that isn't much higher than where she is, Lea will jump automatically. With that, players can explore a given zone and try to figure out which ledges are of the appropriate heights and distances from one another to traverse to hidden or generally hard to reach areas.

Things become even more complicated in dungeons where the platforming becomes even more difficult and the puzzles more complex, incorporating moving pillars, and switches that have to be activated in very specific ways. It's also worth noting that dungeons are extremely large and can take over an hour to get through, usually with a very tough boss at the end.

There's also a fairly decent amount of character customization in CrossCode thanks to the game's talent tree. Branching into four directions, each specializing in different aspects (melee attacks, ranged attacks, health, and defense), the branches give players the option to enhance various base stats as well as unlocking new abilities. On top of this, players slowly learn different elemental abilities which can be treated as stances that Lea can switch between, each of which have corresponding branches on the talent tree that become available when she learns these stances. As such, even more customization is unlocked.

As mentioned earlier, the game's visuals are quite reminiscent of what one would expect to find during the 16-bit era, especially games that were showing up on the SNES at the time. Character and enemy designs are of the cutesy variety, while zones are fairly different from one another ranging from lush forests to snow-swept mountains to high tech facilities. One thing that really stood out while wandering CrossCode's world was how vibrant and colorful the aesthetic is, The colors really do pop off the screen.

Meanwhile, the music has quite a bit of synthy melodies going on that reminded me of Phantasy Star quite a bit. Being a huge fan of the music in that series, this suits me just fine.

At this point, CrossCode has been available on Steam's Early Access for a fair bit of time. There's already a lot to do in the game, so I'm getting the impression that it will be quite long when it's finally completed. As of now, the game is only slated for the PC and Wii U, but who knows, maybe it'll get brought over to other platforms in the future. It's certainly looking promising and will likely gobble up quite a bit of time for people who like Zelda-inspired action RPGs.

Dragon's Dogma: Dark Arisen - Goodbye Productivity

A few years ago, Capcom turned some heads with their own take on the Western action RPG when they released Dragon's Dogma. It was non-linear with a huge world to explore, fluid combat, an interesting method for NPCs to help the player, and an inexplicable buttrock intro. All-in-all, the whole thing worked and the game earned itself a respectable following. With the company porting quite a few of its games to PC a lot of folks were hoping that this one would be going that route as well, but for the longest time Capcom remained silent, and the game's lead developer went so far as to say that it would never happen.

So, imagine the surprise and elation when it was finally announced that the title's follow-up, Dragon's Dogma: Dark Arisen, would be getting ported to Steam. There were quite a few happy folk that day, and I was one of them. Now that the game is finally out, I've been pouring an ungodly amount of time into it. Really, just a disgusting amount of time. It's ridiculous. For the last few months, I've been quietly lamenting that there weren't any games out there that have really sunk their claws into me, but this is the one to finally change that.

The game starts with a little tutorial level where you and a growing team of adventurers are hunting a dragon in some old ruins nestled in the mountains. While it largely acts as a means to familiarize players with basic gameplay mechanics, the experience does get the ball rolling with the idea that the big bad of the game is a dragon, which makes sense since "dragon" is right in the name of the game.

After steamrolling through this and not actually fighting any dragons (but you do fight a chimera), the game fast forwards to the present where players create a character, going through a surprisingly deep selection of features for fine tuning its appearance. I went for a brunette country girl named Paprika, and made her a strider, which is a dagger and bow wielding kind of class (Note: players are able to change classes later in the game).

From there it introduced her as a villager in a small fishing settlement on the cost. People are just going about their business when out of nowhere a dragon attacks. My character, seeing one of her friends in trouble runs in to try and fight the dragon. Of course, she loses, then the dragon plucks out her heart, utters an incantation, and eats the heart. After this, Paprika passed out, coming to a time later in one of the village houses with other survivors. Somehow, she's still alive with a huge scar on her chest and whenever she touches it the voice of the dragon speaks, issuing a challenge for her to come and find him for a showdown.

With that piece of knowledge in mind, I proceeded to do just about anything but that, gathering my stuff and wandering around the countryside in search of adventure. Exploration hasn't felt as completely open as something like Elder Scrolls or Fallout, being hemmed in by cliffs and mountain passes in the opening areas, but there are still plenty of wandering goblin packs, bandit camps, and the occasional cave to tempt passersby. Taking the time to indulge myself in these for a bit, I proceeded to pound out a few levels.

Paprika wasn't alone in doing this, however, as the game has a system whereby NPCs called pawns who will join her. These are beings that look human but don't quite have the spark of life that a real person has. They come from another realm and enter this one via portal stones. Since Paprika's run-in with the dragon, they view her as someone they call "The Arisen" so they're more than happy to tag along with her on adventures. What's particularly interesting about this is that each player creates a pawn of their own, just as they would a normal character (I named mine Cecil, and made him into a mage). They'll continue to grow and become more powerful just as your character does, gaining levels while the player gears them up better. Why this matters is that they're all kept track of on Capcom's servers allowing players to recruit other people's pawns. You'll see them wandering around town and along roads on the world map where you can talk to them and, if you have enough space in your party or want to boot someone else, you can add them to your group. It's also possible to go through their portal stones and select potential pawns. Of course, they'll need to be in your level range, and one needn't worry about other players being trolls as what they do with those pawns stays in their own game and won't have any impact for good or ill on your own.

Currently, I have three pawns with me, a fighter and two mages. This has been proving a good mix thus far as the fighter acts as a tank while my mages cast healing, offensive, and support spells from afar and I have the option of hanging back, bombarding enemies with arrows, or running in knives ready for melee combat.

Surprisingly, the pawns are reasonably bright. In a lot of other games with NPC helpers, their usefulness can be debatable. Skyrim's house jarls are a fine example of this with those guys' legendarily poor judgement. In Dragon's Dogma, the pawns look like Rhodes' Scholars by comparison. My fighter will bang her sword on her shield to distract monsters so that everyone else can go after its weak point. On humanoid enemies, if she gets close enough, she will hold it from behind so that others in the group can get some free shots on it. Meanwhile, my mages are quick to figure out what elemental weaknesses a baddy has and exploits them. So, if it appears susceptible to flame, out come the fireballs. Even more interesting, if the same monster somehow gets soaked, say it fell in a lake, the mages will pick up on this and stop using fire spells since they'll be ineffective and switch to lightning or ice spells since they'll work better on the soggy foe. The pawns are very impressive in how well they can fight on their own. Players do have some basic commands they can issue like telling them to charge into a fight, follow the player, or help the player, but a lot of the time they can be left to their own devices without much trouble.

When I finally got around to actually doing some of the main quest line, it became quite apparent that the game is not shy about pitting players against large enemies. In short order, my group found itself fighting off a cyclops and a host of goblins, then a massive hydra not long after. Big baddies like this actually feel like major battles as they have a ton of hit points and if there are a lot of other NPCs around they'll join in trying to stave the thing off. Best of all, you can actually climb up these things. If they have a weak spot on their head, it's worth it for a melee character to grab onto its leg, then try and leap to its back, and finally swing up behind its head in order to cling on and bludgeon it into submission. The thing won't just sit there doing nothing and will try to fling off anyone scaling it, but this can be offset by various stats on gear and unlockable abilities. In any case, these fights are pretty nuts.

After making my way through a few more of the main story quests, my party finds itself in the capital with a nice big stack of quests for them to get on. They've just now finished a jaunt into some old dungeons below the city that are normally watched over by the local pawns. There've been some strange goings on there that they haven't been able to deal with so it was up to us to go down there and see what was wrong.

At first, it felt like a fairly standard romp in a dilapidated dungeon with hordes of undead to fight through. However, when we finally got to the bottom and took a look at the area in question, we were set upon by these tentacles that kept coming out of the ground. After a couple of minutes, it became obvious that attacking them was pointless because all that would happen is more would come out of the ground. Looking around the room, there were no signs of levers, magic items, or anything else to deal with them. So, without any real idea of what to do about the things, I called over my pawns and got them to follow me so we could escape. Maybe I'd need to talk to someone about finding a relic or some such in order to defeat the things? As we neared the exit, it triggered a cut scene and my group finally made it to the safety of the pawn-held stronghold above. As it turns out, the correct way of dealing with the tentacles is, in fact, to run away. This surprised and impressed me because the vast majority of the time games just have players kill all the things and press on. Running away isn't an option, and in the rare case that it is, the whole thing is heavily telegraphed by cut scenes. Dragon's Dogma didn't imply this at all, with the pawns saying that attacking the tentacles was useless and nothing more. It's interesting that something like retreat can play such a major role in a quest, and the game leaves it up to the player to figure it out.

And that's where I am now. Figuring out to do about some out of control tentacles (I wonder if I could convince them to take up a career in the seedier side of anime), and a small army of other odd jobs I could be doing, but the only thing I actually want to do is venture off in some random direction and see what's out there. Normally, this is the approach I'd take to a game like Skyrim, but that feeling is ten times stronger here. There's something about the way the combat, aesthetic, and exploration works so well together in Dragon's Dogma that makes me like it far more than Elder Scrolls. Crazy talk? Maybe, but I'm just glad to have finally found a game that I really want to sink my teeth into after all this time.

Tons of RPGs are Coming in 2016

As a fan of role-playing games it can be an exciting / daunting thing when there are lots of games coming out in the genre that look interesting. Part of me wants to play all of them, but then I realize just how much of a time commitment that would be and quickly back down from the idea. Nonetheless, 2016 has tons of RPGs due for release that look like they could be fun, so let's run down the list and start getting sad that there's no way we'll ever have the time for all of them.

Note - This isn't going to be some utterly comprehensive list, as we'd be here forever doing that. I'll just be talking about the games that have caught my eye.

Darkest Dungeon

This one sort of has my attention, but not in a huge way. I'm curious how the whole gameplay mechanic of party members getting scared will impact the game. Darkest Dungeon seems to be reasonably well-received from what people have said of the game in its Early Access form, so it has that going for it. It's also a rogue-like, which makes it something I'd probably be more inclined to spend some time with since I find those sorts of games far more palatable these days than the notion of having to dive into a 50+ hour juggernaut of a game.

Fire Emblem: Fates

It's getting to be that time again. With most people having gotten Awakening out of their systems, strategy RPG fans are getting thirsty for a new Fire Emblem game, and they'll be getting that with Fates. The game looks like what one would expect from an entry in the series with a fantasy setting, plenty of permadeath for those who like going that route, and a new Phoenix Mode for those who not only despise permadeath but want their characters revived by the next turn. The game is actually planned to be massive as it has two versions: Birthright/Conquest and Revelations. Both take place in the same story, but each has it's story focused on one of the two factions with side characters and the like tossed in. It can be handled by getting two physical games, but it looks like it may be cheaper to go a DLC route for folks that want to do all the things, however. Bare in mind that if you do want to experience every last thing to be done in Fates, I'm hearing the full game with both factions and such is expected to be three times the size of Fire Emblem: Awakenings, so that could take a while to get through.

Stranger of Sword City

I'm a sucker for dungeon crawls. From the moment I first played Wizardry: Proving Grounds of the Mad Overlord on the family Apple IIe as a kid, I was hooked. So, it should come as no surprise that I'm pretty hyped for this. It's a game that initially came out in Japan on the 360 a few years ago, but thanks to some Steam release leaks it's looking highly probable that we'll be seeing it later this year on PC. Give me some interesting races, monsters, classes, and weapons, toss me in a bunch of dungeons, and I'm happy.

Masquerada: Songs and Shadows

Like pause-able real-time tactical RPGs a la Baldur's Gate? Have a thing for stylistic art direction? I know I do. That's what we're getting with Masquerada. Toss in the fact that the game takes place in a Venice-inspired fantasy world where magic comes from masks, and we have a potentially quite interesting game here.

Horizon Zero Dawn

There are a couple of games coming out this year that would get me seriously considering picking up a PS4. This is one of them. While a lot of post-apocolyptic games take place in worlds shortly after a disaster, war, or some such happened, with mutants, deserts, and hopelessness everywhere, Horizon appears to be set in a world well after the fall of human society. There are still cities in ruin, but nature has long since retaken those places covering them with plant life. On top of this, it looks like machines are a major threat to humans, but they've taken the form of wildlife with strange, animal-like contraptions roaming in herds and being hunted by the humans. Now, slap all of this into a very pretty package with a big, open world and we have plenty to be excited about.

Nier: Automata

This would be the other game that could get me looking closer at the PS4. I liked the original Nier. It was a fun little action RPG with interesting environments and some impressive swearing. So, now, with a sequel on the way I'm kind of intrigued by it, especially with Platinum working on it. I'm a sucker for their approach to combat, so that has gotten my ears all the more perked for Automata.

Project Setsuna

Centering around a mercenary who is escorting a girl named Setsuna to be sacrificed in order to appease some demons, this game is sure to be a real heart warmer. The developers are going for a decidedly retro approach to combat here siting games from the 90s like Chrono Trigger as inspiration, so as someone who grew up on games like that, this is music to my ears. The visuals also look quite nice going for an oil paint aesthetic.

Torment: Tides of Numenera

It was probably wishful thinking that this game would get released in 2015, but now it's a pretty safe bet that we'll see the game out this year. Planescape: Torment is one of my all time favorite RPGs, so I've been pretty excited about this new Torment game for some time now. Sure, it's going to have a lot to live up to, but so far what's been shown of the game looks promising.

Persona 5

Well, I guess I better toss this in as one more game that could get force my hand in getting a PS4. I do quite like the Persona and Shin Megami Tensei games that I've had time to play, so diving into Persona 5 when it comes along is quite tempting. It looks like the developers are going with an "if it's not broken, don't fix it" approach with the game, and I'm fine with that. The Persona games have always had good dungeons and interesting stories, and it's hard to think of a reason to deviate from that formula.

World of Final Fantasy

This is a game more intended to introduce younger audiences to the Final Fantasy universe, but after seeing the trailer I can't help but feel that the game looks so charming. It's tempting to snap this up and wander the lands meeting all the folks from various Final Fantasies while going on an adventure. It also helps that the combat looks pretty neat.

Doing All the Things: Skyrim Edition Pt. 5 - Parenthood

Earlier today, I finished off the Thieves' Guild main quest line, and with that was leader of of the Companions, the College of Winterhold, and now heading up this group as well. I was feeling pretty good, with a swagger in my step. Figuring it high time to head to my homestead, I made my way there. While dumping an ungodly amount of gems and ebony items into one of the nearby chests, my adopted daughter Lucia ran up shouting, "Mama, you're home!" She does this every time I swing by, and on this occasion she wanted to give me a flower she'd found. Such a sweet girl. It was while she was beaming at me, radiating an aura of unconditional love that a rather unsettling thought occurred to me: Am I an absentee parent?

Review: The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing III (PC)

The Incredible Adventures of Van Hellsing III is the final game in a trilogy of action adventure games utilizing the isometric view of combat that the Diablo series has perfected. The respect and reverence that Hellsing III holds up Diablo is quite evident with the frequent "homages" and downright borrowings in some places. Besides some rather hot and furious combat in places, the game writers definitely did their best to keep themselves entertained by including a ton of horror/gaming/nerd jokes and Easter Eggs for those amongst us who have to click every imaginable surface or game texture. Myself, I averaged about one third of the available "surprises" in each area.

Doing All the Things: Skyrim Edition Pt. 4 - The F Words

As far as I'm concerned, there are two F Words in Skyrim: Falmer and Forsworn. While I may have spent a good amount of time railing against the terrible spider menace threatening Tamriel, at least the creatures add an element of tension to the game. Any time a dungeon starts showing signs of webbing gathering on the walls, a sense of dread begins to well inside me. Meanwhile, coming upon a Forsworn occupied fort, or spotting the tell tale signs of a Falmer encampment elicits a bored sigh as I prepare for a good 20-30 minutes of tedium, clearing an uninteresting area of uninteresting enemies carrying uninteresting equipment.

What got me thinking this is a quest that I did while finishing up the Dawnguard arch. Before facing off with the vampire lord Harkon for a final showdown, players need to find a legendary weapon called Auriel's Bow in order to prevent the prophecy he wants to fulfill from ever reaching fruition. This requires exploring a cave containing some ancient ruins which are guarded by a Snow Elf, one of the last in Tamriel. He goes on to explain how his people were tricked thousands of years ago, and twisted into what are now known as the Falmer. It seemed a tad out of place. Here was the game giving me a vaguely interesting back story to a race that often times feels like filler meant to add padding to a dungeon.

Doing All the Things: Skyrim Edition Pt. 3 - Of Werewolves and Vampires

Here we are, another week has passed, and I can't believe how much content I've managed to play through since last I popped by to chat about Skyrim, not just for the sheer amount of things I did, but for how I managed to find the time to do them. The laundry list of adventures I went on include going to the Soul Cairn, helping the Companions with all their troubles, joining the Thieves Guild, and I even built my own house.

Doing All the Things: Skyrim Edition Pt. 2 - Picking Sides

It's been a while since I last checked in with my magical romp through Skyrim, and I have good news! Run-ins with spiders have been far and few between since then. Sure, there has been the occasional one to show up at the most horrible time ever (I'm looking at you, dropping-down-from-the-ceiling-spider in that one room in Hag's End...well, not looking looking, because ew...), but other than that it's been surprisingly arachnid free, so hurray! Instead, I've had an exciting week of exploring Dwemer ruins, collecting more books, and even picking sides.

Doing All the Things: Skyrim Edition - Getting Started

When it comes to big, open world, sandbox-like games, I have a tendency to wander around, poke some stuff with a stick, maybe drive around town for a while if possible, then merrily be on my way. Imagine my surprise to find out that games like Skyrim, GTA V, and the like have actual endings, never mind the scores of optional content. It's gotten me thinking of late, and I reckon I may actually want to give it a go at doing everything in Skyrim. This is going to be a mammoth undertaking (no puns intended), given the sheer size of the game, and made all the more daunting a task since I also have Hearth Fire and Dragonborn. Nonetheless, I want to give it a go. I will do it on a single playthrough, so a few sacrifices will need to be made, such as choosing between the Imperials and the Stormcloaks during the civil war, but other than that I plan to explore every nook and cranny of the game, find every goody, and I may even read every book too.

Review: Diablo III: Reaper of Souls (PC)

"Ready for round 2?”

In some respects, this is the question asked by expansion packs more often than sequels, these days. Sequels usually make changes, sometimes massive ones, that make them a distinctive entity despite being part of a series.  Expansion packs generally stay within the framework of the existing title, maybe making a few tweaks here and there to compensate for the original game's shortcomings.  Of course, some games need more than just a few tweaks when putting out an expansion. Diablo III was arguably one of those games.

Two years after its release, plenty of changes have been made incrementally, but Reaper of Souls puts everything in one nice neat package for those who abandoned the game long ago.  The end result is still not the game we could have gotten, but it goes a long way towards making it playable and even enjoyable in spots.

Review: The Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing (PC)

Say the name “Van Helsing” and you think of a scholarly looking monster hunter out to slay vampires with his intellect, his faith, and a great big gnarly stake.  Alternatively, you may think of B-movies with Hugh Jackman.  Nonetheless, the name is almost archetypal by this point.  Say it and you know you're dealing with a character with a burning desire to put down the things that go bump in the night and a nearly reckless disregard for their own safety, all dressed up in the finest of Victorian fashions.  Neocore Games decided to move away from the classic Van Helsing of Bram Stoker and go with a more steampunkish version that borrows elements of the 2004 movie and casts the player as the elder Van Helsing's son on a trip to the fictional country of Borgova for plenty of monster slaying and fiendish plot thwarting.

Review: Black Rock Shooter - The Game (PSP)

The first time I saw Black Rock Shooter was at an introduction to Vocaloid panel at a large anime convention years ago. Supercell’s entrancing electro beats played over the elegantly animated illustrations by Ryohei Fuke a.k.a. Huke, transporting me to an excitingly mysterious new world. When Black Rock Shooter: The Game hit the PlayStation Network in North America, I picked it up hoping for a more interactive trip down the Black Rock rabbit hole. Though lacking the visual visceral magic that made the music video so enchanting, the game succeeded in pulling me in.

Revisiting Soul Blazer (SNES)

Combining city building with an RPG isn't necessarily the most obvious choice when super gluing two genres together, and calling it a game, yet it has worked on several occasions. The Dark Cloud games would be an excellent example of relatively recent games to accomplish this. However, there were games that came along much earlier and took a stab at this sort of thing. One of the earliest that I ever played was Actraiser on the SNES. This combined a city building element with an action game. It was something that I'd never seen before, but my curiosity was peaked. So, when a new action RPG came along a few years later that combined rebuilding cities with, well, an action RPG, I decided that it was something that I'd like to try.

Review: Darksiders II (PS3)

Hard to believe that the first Darksiders was released back in 2010. Inspired by games such as God of War and Zelda, the original Darksiders was met with much praise and acclaim. Often times sequels tend to fall short as they feel more like expansion packs than a full flushed out game. Which one is Darksiders II? A full-on sequel or an expansion?

Darksiders II story parallels that of the first game. The story focuses on Death's side of the tale. Death's brother War, has been charged with committing a crime and it's your job to prove your brother's innocence

Review: Diablo III (PC)

After StarCraft II, it's no stretch at all to say that Diablo III has been the most anticipated sequel in Blizzard's long history of game franchises. It is a title whose development has taken several years, with details dribbled out with the precision of the Chinese water torture. It has courted controversy practically from the first announcement of its existence. And now, it has finally come out. Was it worth the wait? Did the naysayers have a point? Was the hype and the controversy overblown and unfounded?

News: Diablo III Sells an Absurd Number of Copies

To be filed under "Super Popular Series' Sequel Sells Super Well".  Blizzard sends word that their latest loot fest has sold a gargantuan 3.5 million copies within the first 24 hours that it was available.  These are actual new sales, and do not take into account all of the people who got a free copy of the game for subscribing to WoW for a year, which account for another 1.2 million owners.  Also, by Blizzard's reckoning, Diablo III has sold about 6.3 million copies in its first week.

News: Diablo III Stricken by Hacking Onslaught

So, it looks like the problems just keep on coming for Blizzard's latest installment in their Clicky Mc Loots-a-lot series, as the company is now acknowledging that Diablo III is getting hit by a number of hacking issues.  Many players have reported gold, items, and even characters disappearing because of this, and only now has Blizz acknowledged that this is an issue.