Up Next: Mario Kart 64

With the recent release of Mario Kart 7 on the 3DS, I thought it would be a good time to take a look at Mario Kart 64.

The majority of my Mario Kart experience comes from Double Dash on the GameCube, and MK64 is quite a different beast. Not to say that the basics are changed - you're still racing around colorful cheery tracks and using items to smite your opponents - it's the driving and steering mechanics that feel completely different.

It has taken some adjusting, but I'm starting to get a handle on it. So far, I got a gold trophy in every circuit for the 50cc class - which is child's play as far as I'm concerned. I've got 100, 150 and Mirror Mode to take out. And with Mario Kart's classic move of destroying your first place victory right at the finish line, I'm quite certain there will be a spiked controller or fifty.

Alright let's do it. Mario Kart 64 for Nintendo 64. (Playing on Virtual Console)

Review: Ico

Close your eyes and think about the strangest dream you've ever had.

Got it?

The fear and confusion over the unknown. The wonder and mystery of a corner unexplored. The rush of excitement from seeing something you thought impossible. This is what Ico manages to create for you. And it is a joy to play.

Story

This development team loves the light handed approach to storytelling. However, they are by far the most effective storytellers in the medium of video games.

You are Ico. You have horns, and these horns are considered a bad omen by your village. You're sent to a fortress prison where you're destined to starve to death in captivity. A stroke of luck allows you to escape from your cell and you shortly come across another prisoner - a ghostly, almost other worldly looking girl named Yorda who speaks an indecipherable language. Freeing her allows the two of you to explore the castle together to try to find the exit.

Ummm...what?

The rest of the game is all "environmental storytelling". You and Yorda form a visible bond, punctuated by the fact that you often have to hold hands or lead her across hazardous areas to get her through to the next room. When the two of you are separated, Ico can call her and there is an audible panic in his voice if you two are far apart.

The final element to the story is the shadow creatures. Periodically throughout the game, a group of these dark beasts bubble out from the stone floor of the fortress. Their single-minded goal is to capture Yorda, only attacking you if you're in the way. And with Ico being an underpowered boy armed only with a stick, Yorda is easily captured most times. If they pull her into the black hole they came from, the entire world turns to gray stone, Ico included. The fact that these creatures only go after Yorda makes the bond between you and her all the stronger. You are forced to bravely defend her at all costs, and when you rescue her from the clutches of one of these beasts you can feel the emotional closeness between the characters.

The Shadow Monsters.

Ico's story is one that exists mostly in the mind of the player. With no translation for Yorda's speech and minimal dialogue, you fill in the holes about the history of the castle, who the queen is, why she won't let you leave and so on. The ending definitely provides some closure, but the joy of the story lies within your own imagination.

Gameplay

The best way to describe Ico's gameplay in today's market is to first reveal what it does NOT do.

- There is no tutorial level
- There are no secret items to collect or side quests to complete
- There are no achievements or trophies
- There is only one enemy type
- Your only weapon is a stick for the majority of the game

The genre that Ico would fall into would be environmental puzzle game. Think Portal without portals. The goal of each area is to reach an exit that leads you to the next area. This is done through various combinations of climbing, jumping, moving blocks, flipping switches and opening doors. The solution is always staring you in the face, but it's up to you to figure it out - and often when you do, you have the all too familiar "Oh DUH!" moment. The puzzles are devilishly simple, and if you find yourself trying to pull off a series of daring acrobatics to progress, you're likely doing it wrong.

 

The iconic windmill puzzle.

What Ico essentially boils down to, however is a six hour escort mission. You and Yorda must escape the castle, but while Ico himself is generally nimble and quick and able to traverse the many traps and pitfalls, Yorda is kinda stupid and weak and really slow. So you are forced to wait for her or call her back to where she was supposed to be standing or make her wait while you go around and open an alternate path for her or literally drag her by the hand to get away from the dangers of the castle.

This is where most gamers would check out, and likely why I got frustrated in my first playthrough. But if you take a step back and realize that Yorda's slowness and forgetfullness are very much intentional on the part of the developers to not only give her a sense of  her own identity (i.e. not just an inanimate object for you to move from point A to point B), but to force you as the player to slow down and take the game at the pace that it was designed to be played at. This is not a balls out, rugh through it kind of game, the dev team wanted players to experience the architecture and appreciate the brilliant simplicity of the puzzles. And forcing you to wait for Yorda made me do just that.

Ico is an odd bird in the gameplay spectrum. Where most games set out to fulfill some sort of adolescent power fantasy, Ico seeks to make you feel completely powerless. The fortress is the powerful one - but this makes you feel all the more powerful for overcoming the wildly unfavorable odds, making for an extremely satisfying conclusion.

Presentation

Ico's presentation is one of the finest on the PS2. Not because of it's polygon count or framerate, but because the developers knew what they had to work with and made the best of it by employing a unique art style. The slightly overblown highlights and glowy nature of the pictures above are present throughout the game, even furthering the dream comparison.

Like I've said before, the presentation only gets poor marks from me when it takes me out of the fantasy. Corny voice acting or a blatantly awful texture or character model will kill it for me, but Ico does everything with such grace and style it's impossible to knock anything about it's looks.

Audio is sparse and once again this is intentional. The desired effect of solitude and being stranded is only compounded by the fact that the only sounds are the wind whistling through the castle and the clap of your own footsteps. The only bit of music comes when the shadow creatures appear and this is only single, dischordant piano notes, just giving it that little creepy edge that those scenes needed. 

-- -- --

Ico is a fantastic experience that should not be missed by anyone who cares to venture outside the annual Madden and Call of Duty dribble. It won't get the adrenaline pumping, but it just may change your outlook on games in general.

Review in Ten Words or Less: 
A dream-like, wondrous slow paced puzzler.

Finished: Ico

Completion Time: 6:22

What an excellent game. For a game released so early in the PS2's lifespan, this little game really holds up. It is environmental puzzle solving at it's absolute finest, with what I'll call "environmental storytelling" as well.

The game plays like a dream - and I mean that quite literally. It is extremely ethereal and dream-like to sit down for an hour with Ico.

Review coming shortly.

Up Next: Ico

Ico is one of those games that's like your favorite book. It's one of those possessions that makes you feel good about your life. You look at it on your shelf and say "Yeah, I'm alright"

The game is pretty simple in its premise - in fact, it is intentionally simple. You must escape the castle in which you've been imprisoned. But the designers wanted to make this game stand out with the old 'less is more' mantra. There are no powerups, no bonus stages, no hidden extra lives - just you, the castle and this mysterious girl.

Let's go, stupid.

The fact that there's no distractions like bonuses or powerups makes for a shorter game, but a more focused one. I don't find myself killing hours upon hours digging through every corner of the game looking for little trinkets. Instead I'm focued on getting out of there. And it creates a real sense of immersion for me as the player.

Why I Never Finished It: 
As much praise as I just heaped on this game, I do find it to be a bit of a slow burn. The joy of solving the games environmental puzzles is fleeting without any EXP boosts or flashy achievements. Honestly, the game does get boring if you don't allow yourself to get wrapped up in it, but that's just what I intend to do this time. 

The letters are made out of horns. I know. Mind blown.

Review: Kirby's Adventure

The Super Nintendo came out in 1991. Kirby's Adventure came out in 1993 - for the NES. Two full years after Nintendo's updated, more powerful console was released. This not only shows incredible support for an aging system, but it also allowed the developers to take lessons and skills learned from developing on the SNES to make this little title shine.

Gameplay
Kirby's Adventure looks like a simple platformer on its surface. Walk to the right until you reach an exit while avoiding traps and killing bad guys. Yes, this basic structure is still true, but its how you avoid traps and kill bad guys that makes the game interesting.

Kirby's primary attack is his ability to suck his enemies into his mouth like a vacuum. Once a baddie is trapped in the little pink puff ball's cheeks, Kirby can either spit him out as a high speed projectile, or swallow him and gain his ability. There are over a dozen abilities to be copied from spitting fire to wielding a sword to turning into a stone, each is wholly unique and each is more fun to use than the last. Some situations call for specific abilities, like lighting a fuse with fire, or pounding a peg into the ground with a hammer. These situations are usually relegated to obtaining bonus items or reaching secret areas, but it is rather satisfying to come across something which requires one specific ability and you happen to have it.

Kirby sucks.

As far as strict platforming goes, the controls are misleadingly simple. Kirby has the ability to float through an entire level by filling his body with air. This would make the player think that you can just breeze through every level by keeping to the top of the screen and never even bothering with enemies or powerups. You'll find that very shortly into the game, this tactic is discouraged and in most situations, made impossible. The developers designed the levels in such a way to perfectly balance Kirby's abilities with the challenge.

Down here, we all float

Level progression consists of making your way through seven themed worlds with six levels and a boss battle in each. Levels can be revisited to try to find secrets and items and unlock bonus stages. The bonus stages are actually fun and a real motivator to seek out hidden sections of different levels. They consist of a crane game, a quick draw showdown, a random boss battle, and an egg catching game. If successful, each one will give you multiple 1-Ups.

Overall the game is fairly easy - it's super generous with extra lives, and you have infinite continues. There is definite replay value if you're one who likes to unlock everything.

Presentation
This being eight years into the NES lifecycle and two years into the SNES, the developers had more than a few tricks up their sleeves. In fact, the only that convinced me I wasn't playing a Super Nintendo game was the limited color palette.

The graphics and animations are literally top notch. It's like nothing that had ever been seen before on Nintendo's original home system. If you played this and the first Mario game back to back, you would think they were on completely different systems.

Sound is equally impressive - with cheerfully catchy chiptunes soundtracking your adventure and convincing-for-what-it-had-to-work-with sound effects. Overall, this is probably the best looking and sounding game on the NES.

Manliness.

Kirby's Adventure is a fantastically fun game. It's got a slightly "guilty pleasure" element to it in that if your bro caught you playing it, you'd make up something like you were trying it out before giving it to your idiot sister who likes stupid stuff like this. My advice? Lock the door and blast the Madden sound effects while you enjoy the hell out of one of the best platformers ever made.

Review in Ten Words or Less
Relentlessly imaginative and wholly satisfying, if a little easy.

BOOM!

Finished: Kirby's Adventure

Completion Time: 5:29
Completion Percentage: 79%

This is a fantastic little game. It was somewhat easy to see through to the end with infinite continues and generous powerups, but nonetheless challenging enough to keep my attention.

I'm happy to have this one in my completion pile. It's a piece of the NES's "classics" catalog.

Review coming shortly.

Up Next: Kirby's Adventure

With the recent release of Kirby's Return to Dreamland on Wii, I thought it might be a good time to dig into the little pink ball's first adventure.

Kirby's adventure is a really unique game for it's time. On the surface, it looks like just another early 90s platformer, but once you start playing you'll see how original it really is. Kirby's main ability is sucking in enemies like a vacuum - once in his mouth, he can either spit them back out as  a high speed projectile, or he can swallow them. Swallowing enemies gives Kirby that enemy's attack - so swallowing a little swordsman gives you a sword, swallowing a fire breathing dude let's you breathe fire, and so on. It's a really fun mechanic that lets you experiment with different abilities almost at will. At some points you'll need a specific ability to access hidden areas or get bonus items.

The game is also a lot more challenging than it initially seems. Especially if you're going for 100% completion. Some of the secrets are devilishly difficult to find, and quite a few bosses sent me to the continue screen more than once.

It's a fun game that I'm about 75% done with already! Looking forward to crossing this one off my list quickly and getting some momentum going again.

Hiiii

Review: Bioshock 2

Every sequel has the unfortunate task of living up to its predecessor. Especially when the original was so ridiculously good. The second adventure through the horrific halls of Rapture doesn't quite match the excellence of Bioshock 1, but on it's own merits, it is a magnificent game.

Story

The first game saw you playing as the mostly blank slate of Jack as he is introduced to the underwater dystopia of Rapture. Tracking down and killing the man behind the city and unraveling one HELL of a twist. All the while confronting the most interesting bosses in recent memory - the Big Daddies. These mammoth walking tank-men fiercely protected little sisters. Little sisters are young girls who are conditioned to find dead bodies and drain their life force called "Adam" and Adam is used to splice one's genes to give the user super powers called Plasmids. These include the ability to throw lighting or fire or various other things from your hand.

In Bioshock 2 - you play as the first Big Daddy ever created who is known as "Delta". From the opening cinematic you are immediately aware of your actions in the first game as you see first hand what its like to be a Big Daddy and protect a little sister from raving lunatics, and what it's like to be attacked with Plasmids. From the outset, your little sister is taken from you, and your main objective is to get her back. Throughout your journey, you will learn a lot more about the history of Rapture and more importantly, the history of the Big Daddy project and how you ended up in the position you're in - giving you two main motives: rescue and revenge.

The fantastic opening scene

Just like the first game, the majority of the story comes from the environment. The developers of both games really captured the feeling of a deteriorating underwater city, and a lot of story just sort of organically grew in the player's mind just by looking around. The critical path story was delivered well through audio diaries and direct communications with the villains, but overall it's the feeling of being in a city under the sea in a perpetual state of the 1940s that makes this game's story stand out.

Hey! He's not sleeping at all!

Gameplay

Most would agree that the story of the first game outshines the second, but the gameplay in Bioshock 2 is a huge improvement over the first. The basic structure remains the same with a large arsenal of physical weaponry and Plasmid trickery at your disposal. The biggest and most interesting change is your default weapon which is now the iconic drill. Unlike the wrench in the first game, the drill is brutally destructive at close range and can be leveled up and modified to unleash extra damage and bonuses.

The other big addition is the "Big Sister". Since ten years have passed since the first game the little sisters you encountered in 1960, are now 16 years old - and they are mother effing PISSED. Designed to be a counterbalance to the Big Daddy's slow and powerful build, the Big Sisters are lightning fast and rabidly vicious. It's not really clear why they're attacking you, as they usually come out after you save every little sister in a level, but they put up one hell of a fight, man. I was sent to a Vita Chamber like 15 times in an early fight against one of these beasts.

Big Sister is waiting...

In terms of actual gameplay - you'll find yourself employing a multitude of play styles. First and foremost, you need to play the role of a scavenger. Just like the first game, you are constantly low on resources for the majority of the game - breathing a sigh of relief with every round you pick up and every medkit you stockpile.

Next, you'll play the role of a hacker. Nearly every piece of steam-punk inspired machinery in Rapture can be hacked. From security cameras to vending machines, nothing is off limits. The hacking minigame is another thing that has seen a huge improvement in this one. In Bioshock 2 you must hack machines in real time - this is done by timing a needle to land in the green zone rather than the red zone. A little less creative than the old model, but infinitely less time consuming and monotonous.

The hacking minigame

You'll likely play the role of what I like to call the "Battletank". There are areas where you simply need to unload every bullet in every gun you own. Quick reflexes and conservative saving will be your best friends in these situations.

Finally, in the most interesting role, you'll play the protector. One of the most interesting new elements of this game is the ability to adopt a little sister and have her gather Adam for you. The kicker here is that you can only gather Adam from specific corpses which the game predetermines. These are usually set in a wide open area or a room with four or five entry points. In other words - not easily defensible. What this does though is forces you to think strategically. You look for every possible portal of entry and take special care to make use of your new Plasmid-based traps and "land mine"-esque defenses. So you create your defense perimeter and then set your little sister down to gather - which your enemies can smell - and boy do they come a'runnin. Think of it like intentionally calling the horde in Left 4 Dead. Now you have to protect yourself and your little sister while she gathers the precious Adam in a horrific two minute battle that feels like 20 minutes. These are easily the most exciting and memorable parts of the game. 

 

Presentation

The guys behind the Bioshock series know how to present a game. Every single element of graphics, dialogue and music were flawless. Characters voice overs were extremely believable, the 40s-era score was beautiful and added to the immersion of living in another time period, and the graphics and design were simply immaculate. I must have added over two hours to my play time just looking around at the architecture and art that made up Rapture. Every area was wholly unique with no repeat areas from the first game - and each one was beautifully designed in classic Art Deco fashion. Vibrant colors and interesting lighting populated the landscape, making this game stand out amongst the brown and tan shooters on the market. 

Dionisus Park

Bioshock 2 didn't dethrone the original in terms of story shock value, but in terms of gameplay it blew the first one out of the water. It is immensely fun to play throughout the entire length of the campaign. And there's cool and interesting multiplayer if that's your thing.Would totally play it again and would definitely recommend you pick it up.

Review in Ten Words or Less: A more refined, fun but less shocking experience.