Too Little Too Late Episode 5: E3 2010: Wrap-Up: Games/Periphreals/Systems I am excited for. [Archived]

The magical event that comes once a year. The moment us gaming nerds eagerly wait for every June. I'm an Atheist, and I don't celebrate Christmas, this IS my Christmas. That's right, it's the Electronic Entertainment Expo! (Or E3). This is the only thing all year that has me jumping around in joy like I am a little kid again, and LIKE IT! If you're a serious gamer like myself, then you most likely know what I'm talking about. Hell, you may even do it too. Anyway, this is my entry on what I considered to be really cool announcements for E3. If you're looking for standard FPS's, you're not going to find them here since I pretty much hate them with a passion. ...Except one, which you'll see below.

Too Little Too Late: Episode 5
By Grover

Nintendo 3DS Handheld (Nintendo)

This by far has me to be the most excited out of everything that has been announced so far. The last main series of handhelds that Nintendo released was in 2004 and everything they have made has built on that old hardware, now this pretty much declares the birth of a new generation of Nintendo as far as handhelds are concerned. The processors are rumored to be as great as the Xbox 360 and Wii as well as the graphics (according to what I've seen in Kid Icarus) to be between the latter Gamecube titles and Wii titles. So far this will be ahead of the PSP (in my opinion) until the new iteration of Sony's handheld is released. Now, I know for sure that I'm getting one, as this promises to be very awesome.



(Is it me or has that girl never played a DS before? Explaining how the bottom is a touch screen... Anyways!)

Release Date: Before March 2011.

Final Fantasy XIV (PS3/PC)

The spiritual sequel to Final Fantasy XI, this next installment of the Final Fantasy series is going to be entirely online, but not be as medieval as its spiritual predecessor.

The setting looks like it's going to be very similar to Final Fantasy VI so I'm excited, that was one of my favorite Final Fantasy games.

Even though my PC doesn't pass the Benchmark test (only can get it to 1000 something. Ugh, Nvidia), I may end up purchasing a PS3 primarily for this game. It looks beautiful! I hope to see you guys in the game, as I will definitely be playing it from launch (if at least the retail launch).



Release Date: Retail: Late 2010. Beta: Summer 2010.

More info about Final Fantasy XIV can be found at its main website: www.finalfantasyxiv.com

Donkey Kong Country Returns (Wii)

One of my favorite platform series, this game is is the sequel to the game: "Donkey Kong Country 3: Dixie Kong's Double Trouble!" Though, it's not developed by its original development team Rare as they were bought out by Microsoft in 2003. This new iteration to the series is being developed by Houston-based Retro Studios who previously worked on the Metroid Prime series for Nintendo.



Release Date: Q4 2010

Goldeneye 007 (Wii)

This game doesn't need an explanation. It remains pretty much my only favorite FPS. I would play this game in multiplayer and single player for HOURS. I miss those days. >< This is a remake of another game made by Rare, but because of its acquisition by Microsoft, development has been handed to EA Studios which now possesses the license to the 007 series in terms of film-to-game franchise.



Release Date: November 2, 2010.

Twisted Metal (PS3)

For the end of the 1990's, Twisted Metal dominated the PlayStation as "the car battle game" for the console, until SingleTrac handed things over to Sony's in-house game development studio "989 Studios" which single-handedly raped the whole franchise with Twisted Metal III and IV. (Which are still good games mind you, just not in the Twisted Metal essence)

Development was then handed to Incognito Studios in the early 2000's which was made up of former SingleTrac employees to work on the new Twisted Metal: Black for PS2. Even though that studio is pretty much finished now since the main people have left the company, a new one made by Incognito team and the Twisted Metal creators are in "Eat Sleep Play" which will develop this new installment.






Release Date: 2011


Final Fantasy: The 4 Heroes of Light (Nintendo DS)

Matrix Software, the company that made remakes of Final Fantasy III and Final Fantasy IV for the Nintendo DS made their own FF from scratch. The musical director of FFXI, Naoshi Mizuta is doing the score for it too!



Release Date: October 8, 2010.

Sonic Colors (Nintendo Wii/DS)

Release Date: Holiday 2010.

The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword (Wii)

The trailer for this game looked pretty damn awesome. Needless to say, the controls were unresponsive, but nothing ever goes well in a show now does it?



Release Date: 2011

Dragon Quest IX (Nintendo DS)

Work in progress.

Metal Gear Solid (Xbox 360)
Work in progress.

Fallout: New Vegas

Work in progress.

Golden Sun: Dark Dawn (Nintendo DS)

I never really gave the series a chance, but I really want to try out the series starting with this title. It's the third game in the franchise after "Golden Sun" and "Golden Sun 2" for the Game Boy Advance. Other than that, I really don't have any other details for it since I've not played the series.


Release Date: Holiday 2010.
Lufia: Curse of the Sinistrals (Nintendo DS)

Remake of the first RPG series I've ever played for the SNES. I'm eagerly waiting for a release for this!

Release Date: Fall 2010


Pokemon Black and White Version (Nintendo DS)
They said this would be mentioned in E3 2010, but didn't make it? I don't know...

Release Date: Spring 2011.


Mario Kart 3DS (Nintendo 3DS)

Announced for 3DS, but no major details for it were released. It's presumed to take advantage of the capabilities of the 3DS.
The Legend of Zelda: The Ocarina of Time 3DS (Nintendo 3DS)

Announced for 3DS, but no major details for it were released. It's presumed to take advantage of the capabilities of the 3DS.


Super Street Fighter IV (Nintendo 3DS)

Announced for 3DS, but no major details for it were released. It's presumed to take advantage of the capabilities of the 3DS.

Star Fox 64 3DS (Nintendo 3DS)

Announced for 3DS, but no major details for it were released. It's presumed to take advantage of the capabilities of the 3DS.

Pilotwings (Nintendo 3DS)

Announced for 3DS, but no major details for it were released. It's presumed to take advantage of the capabilities of the 3DS.

Too Little Too Late Episode 4: Super Mario Galaxy 2 [Archived]

I can't think of any serious gamer who hasn't played or heard of a Mario game. His 8-bit theme pretty much defined the sound of video games for decades. When a non-gamer thinks of video games, that catchy tune comes to mind almost instantly. Anywho, his newest installment came out for the Wii a couple of weeks ago now, and being the massive gaming nerd/geek that I am, not only did I play through it and rescue the princess, I wanted to write what I thought of the game. Now bear in mind, I didn't go for all 240 stars or all of that shiz. I will eventually. So far I've nabbed the princess back and I was on my way to getting all the extra green stars.

Too Little Too Late : Episode 4
By Grover

Introduction:

Storyline (20 points) -

The Super Mario franchise has had the same story throughout the whole series. You shouldn't expect any major deviations from the formula.

Mario loves Peach, Peach gets kidnapped by Bowser, Mario goes through levels to catch Bowser, Mario rescues Peach. They do unspeakable things to each other while the credits roll. Pretty simple.

The story is actually not as significant here as in Super Mario Galaxy 1. Rosalina's role is pretty much non existant in this one and it's just Mario going for Bowser.

You get a nifty hub area too, but that will be explained in the gameplay.

Score: 20/20

Gameplay (20 points)

The gameplay and controls are identical of Super Mario Galaxy 1. One uses the Wii mote and the nunchuk to control Mario. Shake the wiimote to attack enemies, and so on.

Attacking an enemy and killing them by shaking the Wiimote yields star bits which can be picked up by walking into them or pointing at them with your Wii mote.

Though the biggest change in the gameplay from Galaxy 1 was the addition of Yoshi. One can lick/eat enemies by pointing with the "tongue" (via Wii mote) and spit out star bits. Yoshi is also required for some of the levels.

Speaking of levels, some of them are pretty damn imaginative. See for yourself! The levels themselves use the same engine as Galaxy 1, but they've massively split the different galaxies into many different levels. In Galaxy 1, one galaxy would have 3-5 different stars. In Galaxy 2, with the more diverse set of levels, each of them only have between 2-3 stars. It's a welcome change (at least in my opinion) because I didn't like being shot to the same level four-five times for a slightly different objective.

Also, the hub area! It's much more accessible and straight to the point. In Galaxy 1, the hub area was this giant space station that took 5 minutes to get from one place to another. Galaxy 2, it's a small area which is in the shape of Mario's head. All you have to do is run to the cap (where you usually start off anyway) and then you go to a world map (reminiscent of Super Mario Bros 3, World and New Super series) where you can literally jump right into the action from there. It's a very welcomed change, and it puts way more emphasis on level creativity than ever before.

Also: You can play as Luigi, he's not too different than Mario, other than flutter while jumping instead of flipping around. Developer ghosts also appear if you clear the level with Luigi.

Score: 20/20







Music/Sounds (20 points) -As in Super Mario Galaxy 1, the music was done by the great Koji Kondo of all Mario music fame as well as Mahito Yokota and Ryo Nagamatsu. As with Galaxy 1, the Galaxy series has taken more of an orchestral influence to most of its themes rather than the traditional approach.

Some of my favorite music from the game:








Score: 20/20
Innovation to Genre (20 points) -

Although Super Mario Galaxy 2 set a new standard for all platforming games from here on out, I personally believe Galaxy 1 had a way bigger impact, before Galaxy 1, no platformer had such precision despite the massive change in physics in the game engine and how it worked. But in any case, it only is outranked by its predecessor, and that's really saying something.

Score: 16/20

Re-playability (10 points)This game is the poster child for re-playability. You only need 70 stars to "beat" the game, but there are so many extra stars to catch once the main quest is over, the total racks up to over 240! That's not to say it's easy, because it's not. You need 120 stars to even unlock the second half, and it only increases in difficulty from there. Needless to say, I'm not much of a completest myself, I'll probably come back and finish the stars once I've finished some other games I've been working on. But the challenge is still there.

Score: 10/10

Nostalgic Inclusion (10 points) -This game bleeds itself with nostalgia, two of the three themes I posted were from Super Mario 64, the game starts off and has many levels which takes place in a 2D side-scroller position, there are notes around the level that make up tunes to well known themes from earlier mario games. There's a nod to the series all around here, and that's not really a surprise there.

Score: 10/10
Conclusion:

This game is an absolute must have for anyone who has a Nintendo Wii. If you have a Wii and do not have this game, I can legitimately ask this question: "What the hell is wrong with you!?"
Final Score: 96/100 (A+ HIGHLY-HIGHLY Recommended!)

Too Little, Too Late: Episode 3 - The Legend of Dragoon (PS1) [Archived]

For those who have been tracking (or stalking) my Facebook status in the last couple of weeks, you would know that I recently finally finished off "The Legend of Dragoon" for the PlayStation. Now since it's Friday, and I have nothing better to do with my existence, I'm going to write my opinions about it, 10 years after the release.

Too Little Too Late Episode 3:

By Grover

A peaceful beginning, the legend was born 10,000 years ago. A violent uprising. A civilization of flying creatures enslave the human race. A bloody war. In a bid for freedom, the humans harness the spiritual forces of Dragons and triumph. Tranquility and harmony exist between all. But the past and the future are about to collide.

Unveil a fantasy of magnificence, deception, magical combat and retribution.

The journey that seeks the past ends. And the journey to discover today begins. Unleash that spirit of the Dragoons. And discover your destiny.

Introduction:

Storyline (20 points) -

The Legend of Dragoon's storyline is not that bad. I really enjoy the pacing of the four disc long epic.

Each disc is its own chapter. When the chapter is ended, and the next disc is inserted, it gives the illusion in game that considerable time has passed between the discs. Kind of like starting a new chapter in a book. And I really like how it's written.

However, some of the story is cliche though. Main character is a sword wielding hero who is in love with the healer chick. The healer chick has feelings for the main sword wielding hero from the start, but the main character is too macho to admit it until the climax of the game... Etc.

I won't spoil the rest of it for you, because this game has a lot of interesting plot twists that will have you saying "Damn, I never saw it coming". Well, unless you actually read the walkthrough... But that's cheating now, isn't it? But then again everyone knows Aeris dies in Final Fantasy VII.

Score: 17/20

Gameplay (20 points) -

The gameplay for Legend of Dragoon mixes the old with the new. Well, new as much as this game is concerned. (It was released back in 2000, so by new, I'm talking the games it was up against at the time.) Anywho, unlike regular attacks in role-playing games, an "attack" can be more than one slash. But what determines the slash is if you can time the pressing of the X (and in some cases, O if the monster is trying to counter) button. Other than that, the battles are traditionally turn based, and it's in essence a throw back to the old RPGs of the 80's and early 90's. In a ways, that is what makes it fun.

In battles, the characters can turn into Dragoons which are pretty much super powered versions of the characters. This is also the only way the characters can cast spells, as magic cannot be used when the character is not in Dragoon mode.

One of my complaints is that if you link attacks together, they make a voice acted saying, and it gets fairly annoying- especially in longer battles.

Another thing about the gameplay: The world map and actual map design is very interesting, and strays from most RPG concepts. The world map is not open. It's a very linear path. I mean literally, you run in a line.

In terms of how regular monsters are encountered, there is a pointer above the main character. When a random encounter is far off, the pointer above Dart's head is blue. As you run, the pointer will eventually change to yellow, and when the pointer goes to red, that means a random encounter is about to start. I like this system because it ensures that progress is actually made before a battle. I hate how in some games, you take one step and it triggers a battle. What's up with that? Ugh!

Another minor complaint I have is once you get to disc 4, if you want to visit some older areas from Disc 1-3, you'll be swapping discs in order to go there, it's a minor inconvenience if you want to do some side-quests on the world map.

Score: 18/20

Music/Sounds (20 points) -

The music in "The Legend of Dragoon" is pretty well done. There is a whopping six battle themes. (Three battle themes, three boss themes) and then there is the final boss battle.

Since there are actually so many themes, I'll pick some of my favorite music from the game.

Score: 16/20

Innovation to Genre (20 points) -

Pros:

Innovative Map Design.

Innovative Encounter System.

Extremely good graphics for its time. Compared to FFVIII and FFVII which were released shortly before and had considerably worse graphics, Legend of Dragoon set the standards for the end of the PS1 and put it to its capabilities.

Cons:

Terrible voice acting alignment. It feels like an old movie in the 1930's.

Long loading screens, especially for the FMVs.

Drawn out battle transitions. The waterfall transition gets old around disc 2.

Score: 17/20

Re-playability (20 points) -

Depends, really. If you want to go to the final dungeon, you better make two save files. Because in the final dungeon, once you go in, you can't leave. Plus there are save spots in there. So you get that feeling if it's worth it to either go back and do all the extra stuff, or waste the one block of memory space to have the option in the future. OR just not do it at all.

Anyway, some of the sidequests are actually well designed, but the way the final dungeon is structured, it just doesn't allow for a lot of re-playability, just from the way it's poorly designed at the end. That's not to say that the ending is good, but the way that you're trapped inside makes it distasteful.

Some other RPGs do it too, notably Lunar 2: Eternal Blue and Final Fantasy VIII. It's really annoying.

Score: 16/20

Conclusion:

If you're a RPG fan like myself, The Legend of Dragoon is definitely worth a purchase if you can find a copy. Finding one not online is pretty rare, unless you scrummage through rummage sales or Swap Meets like I do. You'll probably not even find one at GameStop anymore. It's a must-have to a game collection. I kind of wish they made a sequel, but apparently Sony saw the game as a failure. I see it as bad marketing because the game came out like right before the release of the PlayStation 2, so I don't feel that this game ever really got a chance to shine like it should have. Maybe it should be released for the PlayStation portable, now that would be pretty awesome.

17+18+16+17+16

Final Score: 84/100 - ( B ) Recommend!

Next episode of "Too Little Too Late" will be on the Chrono series. ...Whenever I get around to finishing both games.

Too Little, Too Late: Episode 2 - Pokémon Heart Gold & Soul Silver Review [Archived]

Too Little Too Late

Episode 2

By: Grover Wimberly IV

Note: This is a review of the SoulSilver version. The HeartGold version is largely identical in structure save for the appearance of some pokemon and the legendaries that are obtained in each game. In the case of SoulSilver, Lugia is encountered at level 45 where as Ho-Oh is encountered at level 70. HeartGold is reversed.*

*I'm not reviewing the Pokewalker. I am considering it a separate peripheral.

The year 2000, hard to believe it was ten years ago. But if you're like me, the hottest handheld game at the time was Pokemon Gold and Silver versions for the Game Boy and Game Boy Color. I have fond memories of 5th grade where we would all bring our Game Boys (and the link cables) to recess and play multiplayer battles on the picnic tables after lunch. It was a simpler time, but it was a fun time. That's for sure. These two games have pretty much accurately brought that feeling back even after the first time of turning my DS on with the game inside. It's that good. But perhaps I should grade it by the guidelines, shouldn't I? I did make them after all. c.c

For fairness sake, I'm going to be showing a lot of footage from the original Gold and Silver and compare them to the gameplay within the new. For people who are on the edge of getting it.

The introduction:

_______________________________________________________________

Storyline (20 points) -

The storyline in Heart Gold and Soul Silver takes place chronologically three years after the events of Fire Red and Leaf Green for the GBA. For people who played the older versions, Gold and Silver took place three years after the original Red and Blue. So in essence HeartGold and SoulSilver are the chronological sequels of Red, Blue, Yellow, FireRed, and LeafGreen.

Not much has changed storywise from the original Gold Silver to HeartGold and SoulSilver other than the enhancement to the storyline from Pokemon Crystal. (Suicune story and what not) and its inclusion into the game.

As in Gold/Silver, the player must traverse the Johto Region, eradicate Team Rocket, investigate the Lake of Rage and claim/fight Red Gyarados, help the kimono girls in Violet City capture the legendary pokemon of the respective version, beat gym leaders and the Elite Four, beat the Kanto Gym Leaders, and then beat Red atop Mt. Silver.

The story is much more indepth than recent versions of Diamond, Pearl, and Platinum and I'm very happy that Nintendo and Game Freak went to their roots and re-released this marvel for the DS.

They did clear up some things, however, and I'd like to mention them.

In the case of Team Rocket, they added four central executives to the story. Back in Gold/Silver they were simply called Executives, but they now have their own names, hair colors and personalities.

In the original Gold/Silver, Giovanni was rarely mentioned in the game. Due to a better translation, he is now officially mentioned in the game by various Rockets, but he is not seen unless you obtain a Celebi from an event and go to the Ilex Forest.

Mentions to new regions Hoenn and Sinnoh are referenced and alluded to by various NPCs, and a lot of missing points were patched up.

Here is some gameplay of the storyline:

Score: 20/20

_______________________________________________________________

Gameplay (20 points) -

Needless to say, the gameplay presented in HeartGold/SoulSilver is way improved from its original counterparts.

My only complaint is that the frame rate is slower than its GBA predecessors. It's very noticeable if you use the Pal Park, or if you're trying to complete the GBA versions concurrently. Ruby/Sapphire/Emerald/FireRed/LeafGreen run at 60 frames per second where as HeartGold/SoulSilver only run at 40 frames per second. It's nothing huge or game breaking, but it offers noticeably slow gameplay for the game.

They also added 2v2 gameplay from the newer games that were not in the original Gold/Silver.

Here's some comparisons:

Original Falkner in G/S

Score: 19/20

_______________________________________________________________

Music (20 points) -

The music of Pokemon HeartGold/SoulSilver was done by Junichi Masuda and Go Ichinose. The music team never changes from game to game, and I think that is great because despite different themes being used for different regions, it gives the games a feeling of consistency between them.

My only gripe for the music is that the new legendary pokemon battle themes seem uninspired, but fortunately they do not play that often.

Another comparison between the original and the new.

Oh, I forgot to mention, you have the option to change the music back to the original beeps/bloops of the original if you want. You'll need a special key item though.

Score: 18/20

_______________________________________________________________

Innovation to Genre (20 points) -

This game didn't really innovate anything into the RPG genre. Everyone knows how Pokemon works by now. This didn't add anything too significant that I would consider innovative. This is a remake, after all.

Score: 16/20

_______________________________________________________________

Re-playability (10 points -- 20 if not a sequel) -

It's Pokemon. These series of games are re-playable by default. That's the great thing about them, you'll be playing them long after the main story is beaten. HeartGold/SoulSilver has online battles against friends or random people world wide in the Battle Tower, and also has a Wi-Fi plaza, and you can climb up the battle tower with a friend. You'll be playing for hours and hours, and hours.

Score: 10/10

_______________________________________________________________

Nostalgic Inclusion (10 points -- 0 if not a sequel) -

Pokemon HeartGold and SoulSilver effectively recaptures the Johto and Kanto regions in a beautiful rendition of 2.5D. Every dungeon from the original as well as ones that didn't make it into Gold/Silver from Red/Blue are included as well. This includes places like the Power Plant, Seafoam Islands, and Cerulean (Mewtwo's) Cave.

Score: 10/10

_______________________________________________________________

20+19+18+16+10+10/100

Final Score: 93/100 A (VERY Highly Recommended)

I highly recommend this game to anyone who owns a Nintendo DS. In short, it's worth every freaking dollar. It's very fun and addictive. I had to force my DS to die just so I could focus on studying for my finals and writing this review. (I'm not lying. I this game. XD)

Too Little, Too Late: Episode 1 - FINAL FANTASY XIII Review [Archived]

Too Little Too Late
Episode 1

By: Grover Wimberly IV

Note: This is a review of the Xbox 360 version. The PlayStation3 version is not much different other than the fact that the 360 version requires the swapping of disks and a higher resolution that takes advantage of the PlayStation 3's capabilities.

Storyline (20 points) -

The storyline for Final Fantasy XIII attempts to establish a story about the Crystals, which is a common theme in most Final Fantasy games. However, there hasn't been a story that revolved around crystals in a futuristic sci-fi setting, and Final Fantasy XIII pulls it off, and establishes it very well. It mixes classic storyline themes from older titles with the setting and futuristic elements of the newer ones.

You can really sympathize with some of the characters too. Without spoiling the story, there are some scenes that really play with your emotions, so to say, and it feels almost real.

I found parallels in this story to books such as Fahrenheit 451 and 1984. The story in this game always has you thinking that Big Brother is watching, and I even found some parallels to the real world and government. It's kinda creepy if you think about it.

Also seeing as Final Fantasy XIII is supposed to be part of a collection of many games in the Fabula Nova Crystallis collection, I'm anxious to play the other games to try and find a connection in mythology and the lore of the setting in this game with the upcoming related titles in the series.

Score: 18/20

Gameplay (20 points) -

The gameplay in Final Fantasy XIII is straightforward. ...Literally. Until the end of the game, the game is extremely linear. So linear in fact that treasure boxes are set off to the parts that aren't. A majority of the dungeons in the game are just long lines of ledges and walkways and that's it. Expect to see very few branches off the main road, and if you do, it doesn't go anywhere worthwhile. That was really disappointing, in my opinion, but it makes up with the amount of cutscenes in the game, and there are a LOT of them. Consider the game a video game Avatar, and I'll probably mention it again later down the line.

The battle system is very fluid, and I like how they brought back the "transition to another dimension" feel that is reminiscent of older role-playing titles.

The battle system does have its flaws though, and sometimes the AI will not do exactly you want it to do and end up getting you killed which leads me to my next point.

If your main character (leader of the party) dies, it's game over. It doesn't matter if person 2 or 3 in your party has HP coming out of their bunghole, if the leader dies, it's automatically over.

But the cool part is, you have the option of exiting the battle and being thrown right before the battle you lost, instead of going back all the way to the last save point which matters little anyway because the area is littered with save points. I'm serious, never have I seen so many save points in a game. Since due to the storyline, the protagonists are not welcomed to towns in general, the save spots also act as Weapon and Item shops which is pretty nifty.


Anyway, back to the battle system. The game does away with the "save your HP until the boss" endurance feeling that usually arises in role-playing games and your HP is automatically recovered at the end of each battle. This is a welcomed change because battles are very difficult (and frequent) in the game, and it disallows running away from a fight if you've already engaged due to what I've explained above about losing battles and boss fights.

Also, the summoning system in this game is freaking amazing. Take a look for yourself:









The summons also act as vehicles or a personal aide to the characters in the story. Since there aren't any specific character specials or limit breaks, the summons act as them pretty much. The animations are flawless and the summons themselves are not overpowered like in FFX and not totally useless like in XII. It's very balanced and fits with the battle system extremely well.

The things I do not like about gameplay in Final Fantasy XIII is that it has a very long drawn out tutorial. I mean expect to keep learning how to do things by the second disc.

It very slowly adds new things over the course of the story, but there is a lot of things to remember.

I also like how you must constantly switch roles in battle via Paradigm Shift. (Paradigm shift replaces switching out party members from X and XII so characters can perform different roles as to see fit). Even though you can only control the leader, you can give generic party commands to the party members, but you can never control them directly, not until the end of the game at least when you can switch leaders freely at will.

I also applaud the game designers for allowing you to juggle monsters in the air. For an extended amount of time, now that is really fun!

Here is a video of some gameplay of the protagonist sneaking through town.







Score: 17/20

Music (20 points) -

The music of Final Fantasy XIII was done by Masashi Hamauzu. This was not his first Final Fantasy composition, as he did work on some themes for Final Fantasy X. But this is the first time he has composed a Final Fantasy by himself. XIII also marks the first game in the main Final Fantasy series that did not have any input from long time FF composer Nobuo Uematsu.

Anyway, the score in Final Fantasy XIII is actually done quite well, the battle theme is very well done and matches the feel of the battle system.

However, my complaints with the music is that a lot of it is forgettable. This also had a similar effect in previous installments such as XI and XII. Off the top of my head the only themes I can even remember as I type this are the Battle and basic Boss themes.

Another complaint I have is that a lot of the music is repetitive, especially with the dungeons, it kinda gets old when you're hearing vocals music loop over and over with the music. I'm not saying it's bad music perse, but when it begins to loop, it loses its listening value.

All in all I would have to say the music in Final Fantasy XIII isn't bad, but it's not anything over impressive. It doesn't have that memorable feel to it as the older installments do and the songs are very forgettable and repetitive.

One grip I have about the main theme is that there should have been an option to have the Japanese theme as well as the English one. Trading out the original theme for Leona Lewis was kind of trying to go too mainstream in my opinion, and I didn't like that too much.

Another grip I have is that they dropped some music that was notable to the FF franchise, but to keep this review fair, that's in another category.

Score: 16/20

Innovation to Genre (20 points) -

I would have to say Final Fantasy XIII did a hell of a lot to change the RPG genre. I've really never played a role-playing game before that went to such lengths to get a well known music artist in Japanese and English and get two incredibly different songs to match the main theme.

I've also seen comparisons to the recent blockbuster film Avatar when comparing XIII in the video game, and I would have to agree. It would be very difficult to top how innovative this game is and it's influence to modern single role-playing games for next-generation consoles after this.

Score: 20/20

Re-playability (10 points -- 20 if not a sequel) -

Although the game lacks any form of a NewGame+ mode (like most Final Fantasy titles do), Final Fantasy XIII has a hunts system which can be undertaken near the ending of the game.

Like Final Fantasy XII, this encourages players to come back to the game later on or before the end game to try out all of the miscellaneous monsters and hard to kill optional bosses for items and equipment. The concept is pretty solid, and from what I've seen the rewards are fairly decent. I haven't progressed this far in the game as I am only on chapter 8 of this post so the score is pending and may be adjusted as I see fit later on.

Score: 10*/10

Nostalgic Inclusion (10 points -- 0 if not a sequel) -

I have a lot to say about this one...
If you're a Final Fantasy veteran like myself, you will be very disappointed to know that they completely dropped the Prelude, Prologue, and Victory Themes! Like I've said though, it's not like the music is bad, but they dropped some series renditions that I wish they would have kept, even as if it were to be a homage.

XIII Prelude:






Like I said it's not anything to really serious bring the score down, I was just kinda disappointed in it. As for the Victory theme, that's been scrapped for a much smaller one, but I think the newer one fits the pace of the battles, so I don't see that necessarily being a bad thing, but the classic one should have made a cameo appearance or something.
The chocobo theme remains the same, though it was remixed for the new game as they have been in the series since its debut in Final Fantasy II.

Summons:

For series veterans, they will be happy to know that Odin, Shiva, Alexander and Bahamut do make an appearance as playable summonings.

Carbuncle, Ifrit, and Ramuh make appearances but aren't playable.

Score: 6/10



18+17+16+20+10+6
Total: 87/100 points - Grade: B+ (Highly Recommended)