It's funny, but to me, the console wars of the current generation never really seemed to get going. The 360 came out a full year before either Wii or PS3 and once those consoles did arrive the Wii pulled away so quickly I think it caught everyone by suprise. Especially Sony and Microsoft. What I have found interesting though is how the current wars are almost a reflection on the past, with arrogence being a key part in a system failure and how now, with games promised a plenty, how having an expected catalogue of great games wont make a scrap of difference to the end result. I know that sounds a little strange so I'll try explain it the best way I can.
Firstly though, Happy New Year. Hope everyone had a good one. I'm an avid video game player. The first game I ever played was Pong, the 2nd was Pac-Man. I've been a fan of games my whole life. I've grown through the Nintendo-Sega wars, through the golden age of the 16 bit era, through the mainstream age where video games became cool and to this point, where the line between casual gamer and hardcore gamer is so divided people hate the Nintendo Wii just because of what it stands for. What I did find interesting though, was how companies seem to go through the same patterns. Last year experts were predicting that the Wii would not be able to maintain the sale pace it had and would fall by the way-side. This didnt happen and the Wii went on to break every record possible. Offical sales figures show the Wii way out in front and has just taken over the PSP. When the Wii (and DS for that matter) were unveiled both Sony and Microsoft laughed. They turned their noses up and looked down on Nintendo. Why? Nintendo were once a giant of the video games industry. What happened to hurt them. The simple answer to this is their arrogence. Nintendo became suppremly confident with the victory of the SNES and their treatment of Sony was a good example of this when they cut off developing a console with them. Did THAT ever come back to bite them in the ass. It was only thanks to handheld sales that Nintendo were able to remain competitive and now, over 10 years later, have been able to get back to the top of the mountain. But what happened with Sony?
GENERIC INFO: GameSpot username: Allaroundfan_-1, Total Gaming Network username: randomduded12 * Please note that all insults are just poor jokes and as such do not deserve to be commented upon if you disagree with them, but please do comment upon anything else you think I missed or disagree with me on *
My information: My brawl fc is 0087-1981-1001 Call me rmdud or rdude And my Wii fc is 4835 1667 2054 0547 call me saberwolf My MarioKart Wii fc is 3093-9971-6105 Call me srensren PM me with your code, if you would like to play sometime.
If you are one of the few people left who has never heard of Nintendo's MarioKart series, you probably need to leave your house right now. I would like to start this planned weekly series of reviews by explaining what exactly I am going to do. I am going to review every game I own now or that I have owned/rented recently enough to remember the game more than just, "oh, so I press that button to shoot".
Randomduded12 Review #3- MarioKart Wii If you own a Nintendo Wii, you have no doubt been bugged by your friends or neighborhood kids to purchase this game. MarioKart is like a religion to some Nintendo fans , but to me it is more or less the most casual, yet competitive racing game I own. This game revolves around controlling your kart while picking up item boxes to attack your opponents; you need to drive carefully, but somewhat recklessly to win most of the time. There are 4 control modes that all work well: the GameCube controller, Classic, nunchuk wiimote combo, and the infamous wiimote steering wheel. All the controller types can be used throughout the whole experience that is MarioKart (keep in mind though how much money could be saved from not using batteries with your gaming experience, so play with the optimal controller: the GameCube controller! Note, the GameCube controller actually plays pretty awkwardly on this game (the tricks function is located upon the d-pad, so it is hard to do tricks actively, without some weird hand arrangements), so try the other options too, and pick the one that fits you best! (DÉJÀ VU yet?)
Generic List of Information: Characters: 26 including mii variants Stages: 32 Same # as MarioKart DS Karts/Bikes: 36 total Karts/Bikes. It is based on weight class though, so there are fewer original Karts and more standard vehicles. Another loss as MarioKart DS had some great original Karts and allowed all 36 Karts to everyone after beating the game completely. Modes: Grand Prix (Solely single player now.), Vs (online/offline multiple or solo), Battle (coin battle or balloon battle, multiple or solo), Time Trials (online ghosts/offline, leader boards for pretty much everything) Online Wi-Fi, License settings, rules, and the MarioKart Channel. If I missed any, go look at them yourselves.
EDIT: Above picture will not show, so I will attach. YouTube is comprised of fan boys, who cannot accept another person's opinion should it disagree with theirs, so my comments with my opinions will go into more constructive websites such as TGN. Lilkidd88 however, took the time to point out some flaws within my argument, but they too are partially wrong at least in their knowledge of the game and what I meant by my comments.
MARIOKART OVERVIEW
OK, MarioKart has been a staple of each Nintendo system since the Super Nintendo. There are 8 games considered in the MarioKart series, but two are arcade only, so I've never seen any of those games. The most recent console MarioKart was the DS version, which added online play to the same standard formula laid down by its predecessors. It was revolutionary for the series, but at the same time cut back on certain features that appealed to hardcore fans. It took away a fan favorite multiplayer mode, Bob-omb Battle. This mode only exists within the GameCube edition: MarioKart DoubleDash. DoubleDash also had another multiplayer mode called Shine Race, but that has been replaced by Coin Battle now. Bob-omb Battle was the reason I played DoubleDash for longer than a couple of days. It was pure outrageous fun with mayhem and colorful explosions engulfing you and your opponents. However, this title was also plagued by a problem that many other games had during the last generation of videogame consoles: it required other players than you. There were no CPUs that you could play whenever you wanted except in racing, so this game became a sporadic title to play only when my friends were around. MarioKart Wii follows in the footsteps of its handheld brethren, offering CPU battles and online modes that usually shine. However, it also neglected to include my favorite multiplayer mode, so no fun for me.
Past MarioKart games have included the option to control items, but the controls for this are incredibly vague. What does a strategic or aggressive setting mean? Why not allow the player to pick and choose which item they wanted similarly to Super Smash Brothers? This choice is a nice touch, but I never figured out which items were included with which option because I did not want to waste my time looking it up or experimenting with it until I could prove that this item was not included. A little more explanation here would be nice, but I have no doubt it is on the Internet somewhere.
OFFLINE/LOCAL MODES
The Grand prix has usually been an option for multiple players to participate in, but in MarioKart Wii, this feature is cut. Instead they make you race for x amount of times before saying this person won or this team won. These modes all work, but I quickly tired of them before I got anywhere near completing the game.
If you are playing this offline, the CPU can kick your behind even when on Normal difficulty (Anecdote time: One fine, glorious day, a group of friends came over to the magical land of good games. In this land, they decided to play MarioKart Wii. Now, this was their first time playing this game and they had rarely played previous incarnations, but they figured how bad could it be? Pretty damn bad. They played a few games that allowed them to adjust to the controls, but dove head first into the maelstrom of evil that is Team Battle mode. Naturally they wanted to start off on the same team, so they entered their first match. They were quickly shamed, with a results score of 25 to 12. Their CPU teammates got 0 points while just two opponent CPUs got 11 pts apiece. Nintendo, I don't understand what is wrong with you (I know they are already on shrooms (Mushroom Kingdom, biggest euphemism for drug use ever?), but this is just plain messed up).). Offline/local modes aren't anything special, but they work and they all include CPUs now, so you no longer have to wait for friends, so for all the readers without any friends (That's all of you) can still enjoy the game.
ONLINE MODES One highlight many people give is the online. It's free, it works, and it is typically fun. However, many times people will disconnect randomly or sometime your internet will screw up too. This will vary, but you will run into this problem as well as some slight lag that can cause you to screw up, but not nearly as bad as lag in Super Smash Brothers. One thing that surprised me was an online challenge/tournament mode that reminds me of MarioKart DS's challenge mode, which was incredibly fun and unique, so this definitely something to look forward to. Joining matches is easy and fast, but then you have to wait until the current round is over, so the wait can last longer than a couple of minutes, but it isn't too boring as you are allowed to watch your competitors race/battle. There is also the option to download ghosts of other player's time trials, trying to outrace various online players is more fun than you would suspect, but eventually most people will tire of this mode. The battles are hectic and interesting, but you cannot battle on your own; no free-for-all at all. Nintendo offers so much leeway regarding the other modes, but it enforces this silly regulation? I was already disappointed by the lack of Bob-omb battle, but this requirement pretty much put me off battle mode entirely. Typically, your team will comprise idiots and the one skilled player who has to provide for the retarded nimrods that play this game. The online works better than Brawl's mangled mess and it offers a huge step above MarioKart DS, so all players should at least give online a chance.
PROBLEMS/OPINIONS (There are tons. A lot of these are opinions though. There are also repetitions of previously stated issues)
You cannot play with two people in a kart, this was another reason why DoubleDash is one of my favorite MarioKarts. It allowed for extra strategy, some great Co-op play, and more fun multiplayer battles. Neglecting Bob-omb battle, many people won't care about this, but that was my favorite part of the old MarioKarts. Took out the small span of invincibility that prevented you from being put into a combo by repeated attacks from your opponents (Combos are a horrible idea in a racing game Nintendo). You can literally go from 1st to last place from an extended combo or just the rubber banding AI. Rubber banding AI is AI that will essentially cheat, so it can recover perfectly from a combo and return to 1st place with the snap of a finger. They also tend to return with items that seem impossible for the player to maintain in first place. Because the AI is rarely far behind you, this problem plagues the whole game. Disconnects still occur for everyone, but at least they occur far less often. (should this be a plus or minus? Paradox time!) Speaking of paradoxes, the opening intro makes no sense. Mario and Luigi are apparently playing MarioKart Wii with two Wii Wheels. This isn't possible and it just made me cringe. The intro team must have had only a day or two to put this together, but I somehow understand their original intent. They wanted to catch the spirit of two friends/brothers playing the game competitively. Stick to humans for the cheesy Wii commercials/intros, Nintendo or just make a game montage of epic moments. This was just bad.
Items, I would like more information on the item choices or a Super Smash Bros. style option that simplifies picking each item. Speaking of Smash bros., this game also doesn't include any way to alter your controls, so this takes away from the game if you dislike placement of a certain function such as the tricks located on the d-pad on the GameCube controller. Some classic items were taken out (ghost boo, feather still isn't back, also many of Double Dash's special items don't make a comeback.) Some characters from previous games are no longer included even though they were fairly interesting and unique. To unlock everything, there are limited ways to do so, but some of the requirements are out of reach for certain players. What if the player doesn't like the Grand Prix or isn't good at it, but they want all the characters? In MarioKart Wii, they probably won't be able to unlock a large portion of the game if this is the case. Nintendo, this is unfair to them as they still paid the entrance price of 50 dollars, but are only getting half of the experience. Certain items follow you leading to your doom. Ex. Blue shells will strike during midair jumps and will cause you to fall to the ground, thus losing your lead and having to collect any items you had collected again. The item placement is incredibly unfair. In first place, the probabilities for anything useful are incredibly low, so you are stuck with bananas , just one green shell, etc.. Allow me to defend my title against the behemoths with Bullet Bills and Blue Shells, then I will respect you Sir Nintendo. Online players can vary from dumber than stumps or more evil than Satan himself. Some players literally can not steer while others will purposely try to knock one person off the track. Thankfully, most players are nowhere near this bad and allow all players to enjoy their online experience. The voice acting reminds me vaguely of a sexual experience with certain characters. (Daisy sounds like she is coming to fruition every time she gets a boost or does a trick.) Voice acting that will repeat hundreds of thousands of times will torture your head continuously until you explode grey matter all over your Wii and TV screen. The Wii motion sensor will not always recognize your turns or may overcompensate, especially if you are farther away. Batteries, this is a problem with all the systems though, so how can I really complain. I would have loved replays similar to Brawl only with an extended time limit, but the game is fine without it.
FIXES/GOOD ASPECTS
Snaking (repeatedly boosting to gain the lead, think constantly getting a mini turbo, so you win and keep your ranking high) has become much harder to do, so this is a definite plus. Albeit, some people enjoyed snaking, so this would be a minus for them. The new boost system is well designed. Two kinds of vehicles: karts and bikes (new vehicles are always a plus). Two modes of control for each bike/kart (automatic and manual: latter for more advanced player, first for players who do not want to worry about controlling turbos and just want to race without extra distractions). Good amount of tracks, characters, items, online options, tricks, etc. In matches between just a few players, the items lose their edge because Nintendo wisely chose to limit the amount of aggressive items and focus on providing a fair and fun experience. Tricks are fun and usually simple to pull off. Uses Miis from your Wii inside certain tracks, which is disconcerting at first, but interesting to see your friends willfully try to pummel you. A ton of retro tracks and new tracks, all are pretty well designed and fun for a while. More tracks for battle mode, but they didn't bring back some of my favorite older battlegrounds and some of the new levels annoy me, so I'll put this as a neutral. Online works really well. Leaderboards, this finally proves to me that Nintendo is keeping pace with their competitors.
SCORE I've gone on long enough, MarioKart Wii gets a hearty recommendation for the newcomers to the franchise, but for the veterans I give the game at least a rental, more likely a purchase. Newcomers will readily accept many flaws with the game, but veterans have already played and experienced some of the best racing the series had to offer, so our expectations are a little higher. Besides, this game seems to stagnate because it takes small steps forward while eliminating many things that made the series great and original in the first place. The main reason to buy this game is the online, so if you don't have online Wi-Fi don't put this too high on your priority list. Either way, check out the game and I guarantee you will find something you like about it. Nintendo's head has begun the torturous retraction from their "hidey hole".
GENERIC INFORMATION GameSpot username: Allaroundfan_-1, Total Gaming Network username: randomduded12 * Please note that all insults are just poor jokes and as such do not deserve to be commented upon if you disagree with them, but please do comment upon anything else you think I missed or disagree with me on ( I only covered the major sections of the game because frankly there are too many parts and the majority of what I didn't cover only disappointed me further (except the music, that pretty much could not have been better.)) *
My information: My brawl fc is 0087-1981-1001 Call me rmdud or rdude and my Wii fc is 4835 1667 2054 0547 call me saberwolf PM me with your code, if you would like to play sometime.
If you are one of the few people left who has never heard of Nintendo's Super Smash Brothers series, you probably need to leave your house right now. I would like to start this planned weekly series of reviews by explaining what exactly I am going to do. I am going to review every game I own now or that I have owned/rented recently enough to remember the game more than just, "oh, so I press that button to shoot".
Randomduded12 Review #1- Super Smash Brothers If you own a Nintendo Wii, you have no doubt been bugged by your friends or neighborhood kids to purchase this game. Super Smash Brothers is like a religion to some Nintendo fan boys, but to me it is more or less the most casual, yet hardcore fighting game I own. This game revolves around timing, you need to pick attacks that will hit your enemy, but also give you enough time to evade if necessary. Your attacks will incur damage on your opponent as you duel to the death. When your enemy is weakened, you can knock them further and further, in proportion to their damage and how you attack them. The only way to kill characters outside of stamina mode is to utilize Brawl's semi-realistic physics to send your opponent flying off screen. There are 4 control modes, but to be honest only three options work really well: the GameCube controller, Classic, and nunchuk Wiimote combo. All the controller types can be used throughout the whole experience that is Smash Bros. (keep in mind though how much money could be saved from not using erroneous batteries with your gaming experience, so play with the optimal controller: the GameCube controller.)
Generic List of Information: Characters: 35 Stages: 41 + user created stages Stickers: 700 Trophies: 544
Modes: Solo (can also be co op) consists of Stadium minigames(home run contest, target test-5 difficulties, boss battles, multi man brawl), Subspace Emissary, Collection options- stickers, trophies, coin launcher, Masterpieces ( a poorly thought out idea where they think 40 seconds of Donkey Kong will cause you to salivate all over yourself and purchase a copy from the virtual console. Nintendo you are officially comprised of drugged up fools.) , Brawl, Online, Options, and blah blah blah. If you want to see the rest, go look at them yourselves.
Masterpieces: (One of my friends and I came up with an idea similar to this to be included with Brawl, but it didn't suck. It was essentially a collection of Brawl and a full background game from each character (ex. Mario- Super Mario world), but it would have cost far more.)
SOLO MODES/STORY The main game is called the Subspace Emissary and revolves around an extremely farfetched plot that includes probably the greatest amalgamation of Nintendo characters excluding fan rpgs. The main story lasts around 10 hours if you just want to beat it and get all the various characters, but for the dedicated gamers, there are secrets placed throughout every level of the game. The secrets vary from trophies, stickers, new characters, or just another crown meaning you got a little closer to 100% completion. Some new additions are bosses (other than master Hand or Crazy Hand), so this is a new feature to the franchise. They are well-designed, fun to fight, have a set pattern, and just in general great. They also drop stickers or a trophy every time you kill them, so they are an easy source for collection. The controls work well, but at the same time do not. It doesn't pretend to be a Mario platforming game, but it wants to play like one just with extra fighting tacked on. This kind of weakens the story mode for me, but the controls do work. The story proceeds along pretty well, until you get to about the last 4 levels. These last 4 levels rank among the worst things Smash Bros has ever done to me. They make you essentially play through the whole goddamn game again.
Another thing the game did that bugged me, was take away any items I was carrying when I entered a door to another section of a level in the Subspace Emissary. I worked hard to get that silly little trophy stand, but you are going to just take it away? Why Nintendo, is it really that hard to allow a player to keep their items? The answer, quite simply no. Nintendo was just being lazy. Other than this serious blight on the fun factor for adventure mode, the story serves its purpose, never exceeding expectations except for the quality of the cinematics, but never getting in the way either. Don't expect much dialogue (think Zelda without text and a more random story). Some cool character and enemy designs remind me vaguely of Kingdom Hearts's heartless, but they are pretty standard enemies with little distinguishing them from other game minions (one weird extra Sora threw in was the enemies will have different facial expressions every time you turn your Wii on, so see if you can spot them all!). The story is enjoyable the first or maybe even second run through if you care to serve as Nintendo's generic whore just to get a few unnecessary alternate cinematics, more stickers/trophies, or just to use your mouth to please your overlord. The story mode and the returning extra single player/co op player features such as home run contest or target smash and the new Boss Battles mode, frankly just don't retain any sense of fun for me after the first run through and making me play the game twice just to beat it once is a poorly planned move Nintendo.
MINIGAMES/COLLECTION ELEMENTS The same applies to the minigames. Their appeal lasts for a while, but eventually most people will abandon it in favor of brawling. Some people will dedicate themselves to mastering this mode and it is an interesting skill based platform, but the five levels are the same for every character, so technically the last two Smash Bros. games had more unique stages. Each character had their own set up and best strategy, but Nintendo decided to cut corners here and standardize the levels. Nevertheless, to collect everything you have to go through with every character in each mode. Nintendo's new slogan- Wii don't know how to make a good game! I only went through trying to get more stickers/trophies because yes, I am a collector (no, I was not going to say Nintendo's whore because if anything, I am the overlord because I decide what to purchase).
The extras within Brawl can take freaking forever to unlock, so do not expect immediate completion of the game. This is my most played game on the Wii with around 250 hours put in on online matches, local matches, and story mode, but I am still missing some of the collection. However, Nintendo did include a couple ways to help you, namely golden hammers and coins. You can use hammers to unlock tricky challenges like collect all freaking 700 stickers. Please note that Nintendo in their omniscience decided to prevent certain challenges from unlocking with hammers for example Intense boss Battles. Nice going Nintendo, making a perfectly good compromise between hardcore and beginning gamers as useless as the Gamecube's online functions. I managed to beat Intense Boss Rush because I rock, but the majority of my friends who play the game cannot. They want to complete the game too, you self absorbed conglomerate that need to take its head out of its "hidey hole". If they had juse allowed hammers or multiple lives, I believe this would qualm my disapproval of these "unbreakable" challenges. Throughout your exploits, you will earn coins you can use to earn new trophies and stickers in the revamped coin launcher. The original coin game involved simply putting a coin into a virtual trophy dispenser that would release new trophies based on probability determined by how much money you put into the machine. The new one allows the player to aim at whatever they want, but also puts the probability at freaking excessively low, and leaves the player in a quasi arcade style shooter. While this is indeed more fun, the experience quickly becomes more monotonous than previous incarnations because of the extended periods necessary to earn all the trophies and stickers. I have literally gone through thousands of coins trying to find one new trophy or sticker, but when I left the game all I received were another freaking 100 duplicates to trophies and stickers I already had. Same with the possible exploit, where you design a stage to get extra stickers and trophies. I have played battles on those levels for 1 hour just to get stickers, but all I got were repeats. This is a problem Nintendo. Collection elements fun factor depends on the reader and you do not have to pursue completion of everything to enjoy this game, so try them, but remember I warned you. In my opinion, they were exceedingly annoying or boring, so only invest time in this if you are willing to deal with the bugs that Nintendo has left in.
CHARACTER ROSTER/STAGE DESIGNER Speaking of unnecessary stuff Sora put in, who honestly cares about half of the characters that they added to the roster? I personally do not, because I would rather have had a character creation system that would allow me to create any obscure character I wanted from Biggest Glutton ever (Pac-Man) to Generic Space Hero #1 (Master Chief) or even just a better stage designer. Now, understand this, I am not bashing new characters, but I would prefer characters I am actually interested in instead of ROB, Pit, or a *changed* Ganondorf that still leaves his sword behind. *Coughs obscenely loud- retard*. I typically pick characters whose games I have played, so people like Marth, Mario, Link, Fox, Kirby <('-'<), really anyone as the concepts apply to all the characters, but I prefer certain fighting styles to others. Maybe they could have taken out the excess collection elements and put in the aforementioned character creation system or improved upon the stage designer with the reopened memory. The stage designer works, but can cause the CPU AI to fail miserably on certain types of stages. It is user friendly, but it only interested me after I learned about a hack that allowed you to put two pieces in conjunction allowing for infinitely more interesting designs and fun stages, but again this is an unofficial hack, so no props to Nintendo for this. Therefore, the character roster and stage designer did provide me with a sense of customization or fun that other modern fighters typically neglect, but there are still problems that should be fixed.
A note about the stages, I do not agree with how Final destination was designed. The curves on the outside of the stage have caused many unintentional suicides and for a neutral stage (one that doesn't try to attack you ) this makes the ledges unfair to certain characters. I also think that too many of the stages include gimmicks that try to attack you, there should be a bigger base of neutral stages instead. One example: I don't like being killed by a lion tamer in Flat Zone 2 simply because my enemy managed to knock me back into one of them, they decided to play a professional match of tennis with me before serving an ace out of the court. Most of the stages are well designed and fun, but some just aren't. Good thing there is still a stage choice function, so you can say no stages I don't like for random.
ITEMS However, if there is one thing that Smash Bros has always dominated, it lies with item usage and customization. In Brawl, items are plentiful and varied, but at the same time, they took out some old favorites (red shells, etc.) to make room for newer items (golden hammers, smash balls, etc.). These new items are the one aspect of the game that I think has actually improved significantly upon the predecessors of Brawl. Many people claim they break competitive play, but so what? This section is great even if you don't like items because you can still appreciate the depth and intricacies to each item, Besides, if you don't like items, you can turn them off or just set which items you want on. One of the greatest concepts ever in anything. Never playing this game with items on is blasphemy. Simply put, items make the game more than good. It's great!
COMBAT/ ONLINE MODES The backbone of a fighting game. In brawl, the combat has been improved slightly, but some problems have come to my attention. You can now air dodge repeatedly which is nice, you cannot wave dash without altering the game through the use of a USB device/ cheat device which is also pretty good because the hackers can use their cheats against other hackers online while the fair gamers will normal game play to beat their opponent to a pulp (however, I'm sure some jerk will try to play against unsuspecting players with their cheats turned on, and thus break the game of all fairness), the overabundance of glitches, tripping (Can I kill you person who thought of this horribly retarded idea?), and the online play. The first two help this section tremendously, but the glitches that are typically permitted in official tourneys can make the game incredibly unfun to new players. There are a variety of inescapable glitches that just do not favor beginning players because they are susceptible to falling into a trap. Ex. Dedede's chain throw or the fact that you can try to hit two players when they are trapped in a throw, but you will typically just hit the one closer to you, even if everyone is playing a free for all.
Extended Tripping information: I once cared enough to try to get a no hit run of the Boss Battles mode on Intense, then I discovered tripping would ruin a thus far perfect run and force me to start all over again. I immediately threw away my controller in disgust and have not returned to Boss Battles since completion of the mode with all the characters.
Online is in shambles. Matches take forever to load and connect with other players, there is typically lag, you can try to connect online and be given a crappy message along the lines of "Wii sucks, so try again until our poor online decides to ante up for once" Literally, they say error with the internet and please try again (this occurs pretty sporadically, but it has happened at least 20+ times in the span that I have tried to play the game online, so, I would say it's a major problem, but it has improved over time thanks to more servers by Nintendo. Nintendo did something right? yeah, they really did.), and you cannot customize matches with random people (it seems as though the match takes one player's settings and applies it to all the other players, so hopefully your settings will come up too. However, the friend code rule applies here. With an FC, you can customize and play modes other than brawl such as Home Run Contest or Multi man melee with your friends. One major disappointment though is the lack of the ability to play the story mode online co-op. This would have been intelligent and maybe kept me interested in the story, but no Nintendo neglected this as well).
You can only record 3 minutes of a fight (online or off) (Anecdote time: when I was at a friend's house, we were playing some Brawl and something incredible occurred. Our match started off as a 4 player free-for-all, but evolved into a tense battle between two players. One of the deceased players was Snake, and in his wisdom, he chose to place a detonation mine before dying. Now, let's proceed back to the close match between my two other friends. They were neck to neck in damage, and it seemed as though victory could go to any side. Then, Snake's mine exploded because after a certain amount of time of unuse, they tend to do that. Unluckily for one of the surviving players, he was standing on top of this spot and immediately flew out of the screen faster than Team Rocket does in Pokémon. It was epic and hilarious at the same time, so naturally we went to try to save the replay. Guess what? The match was too long to save on the Wii or even a memory card that had multiples of the Wii's space. Now, this has more to do with the Wii's lack of memory, but this just plain made me angry. The best moments typically come after three minutes, but there is no way to record this without a camera/recording device set up. I just wish the time for recording could be extended, other than that, this mode is fantastic).
One more problem that has harped upon my mind about Brawl is how some moves will cause suicide, but others are prevented. Ex. Ike's side b will only travel to the edge of a stage, so he can only die on stages that have continuous ground such as Flat Zone 2. However, Fox/falco/wolf's side b or up b can easily cause an unintentional suicide. I think this is more of an opinion, but I would prefer that my move had the same limitations as Ike's side b. At least this way, some deaths and face (honor) could be saved.
Online wait times are excessive and on the with anyone modes, it will reset back to 70 seconds when a new person joins your party. At least with the team battle mode, you know how long you have to wait. People are not always on the Wii, but they leave themselves in the game, so their character will still be around to provide cheap kills for all the douche bags on the internet. I want a patch Nintendo, one that fixes our poor online, but alas, this is just a chimerical dream.
The sheer number of issues just plain shocks me when they took so much extra time to develop these modes (Brawl was delayed for about a year people and they specifically mentioned they would try to improve upon these modes in particular the online). In addition, there seems to be a glitch with shielding where you can still get hurt when shielding, perhaps it is graphical error, but it is still a glitch that weakens combat.
Let's get a couple things straight, the combat is still riotously fun, fast, challenging, intricate, and well designed. The online works, it's free, more than a couple of modes online, and some interesting options such as the Smash Service (Nintendo sends you cool videos/photos/stages from other Brawl players) make the online worthwhile, just buggy. I just wish we could keep some of those videos, photos, or stages because some are incredibly well made and intricate, and others are just plain cool.
RANKINGS/SCORES/NOTABLE THINGS One thing that I forgot to mention was the ability to unlock characters/stages through multiple methods of game play. This idea works well because not everyone will want to play the single player, but they want the characters so, as they battle, they will still unlock the most important aspects of Brawl. So, nice job Nintendo. Another great option is the ability to change the controls to whatever you want, so you can truly feel comfortable with all the controllers. There is one drawback, you will have to bring your profile (option with Wii remote controls only) over to a friend's house if you want to keep the same controls in local matches. Otherwise, you have to deal with your controls or reset them again.
If I have to rank the Smash Bros Series in order of greatness, I would put Melee first, Brawl a fairly close second, and SSB 64 in last place. Brawl innovated many things for Nintendo's stalwart series (video replays, online, stage creation, new modes, and a story), but frankly it disappointed me when I took into consideration the amount of time taken by Nintendo to fix the game. Melee was produced in far less time, had a ton of glitches (Wavedashing, black hole glitch), repetitive modes, but it added so much to the great backbone laid down for it by 64 that if it had online, I think, my time would be equally spent between the two. 64 is only last because it has the least features and plays the most awkwardly now, but I own two copies of this one because in the end I am most nostalgic about my favorite Nintendo 64 fighting game.
Brawl somewhat impressed me because Nintendo has stepped up to the enormous plate set by other companies. They did not "innovate" anything, but they have taken some major steps to ensure Brawl keeps the pace with other games. I suggest rental before purchase, but in all likelihood, you will want to keep it around for longer. It's an enjoyable game, but longtime players will find many extended problems that should not exist in a game that was delayed repeatedly to fix issues such as the ones listed above. The other consoles and the lead games have shown Nintendo that it needs to change to remain competitive in the videogame business. Instead of focusing on changing too much of an already great game, focus on keeping the experience as fun or more fun than previous installments. Also, get some more bug testers because the sheer number and audacity of some of these glitches is just insane.
IDEAS FOR NEXT GAME I would also love leader boards, but I understand they did not want to lose casual appeal with an actual ranking system, which would cause successive waves of hackers and cheaters trying to boost their scores.
Videogame testers.
A Character creation system and personalized characters similar to Mugen, where the owner can select which characters they desire from a cast of hundreds to thousands. This would include quite a few non Nintendo characters as well.
There are multiple parts, for anyone who wants to see examples of many glitches or tricks in Brawl go there.
Thanks for reading and please subscribe! Next review : God of War (PS2) __________________ Feel free to repost on other sites or whatever, even if you just want to point out I committed a solecism on page three line 8, you smarmy grammar Nazi. One condition: maintain my username within this review/article under any and all circumstances. Contact me with a PM for information regarding online gaming with me or other accounts I have. Don't hate on videogames, they suck more than they should anyway. "I'm a hypocrite" -Randomduded12 "LOGIC IS GOD!!!11!"
GENERIC INFORMATION GameSpot username: Allaroundfan_-1, Total Gaming Network username: randomduded12 * Please note that all insults are just poor jokes and as such do not deserve to be commented upon if you disagree with them, but please do comment upon anything else you think I missed or disagree with me on ( I only covered the major sections of the game because frankly there are too many parts and the majority of what I didn't cover only disappointed me further (except the music, that pretty much could not have been better.)) *
My information: My brawl fc is 0087-1981-1001 Call me rmdud or rdude and my Wii fc is 4835 1667 2054 0547 call me saberwolf PM me with your code, if you would like to play sometime.
If you are one of the few people left who has never heard of Nintendo's Super Smash Brothers series, you probably need to leave your house right now. I would like to start this planned weekly series of reviews by explaining what exactly I am going to do. I am going to review every game I own now or that I have owned/rented recently enough to remember the game more than just, "oh, so I press that button to shoot".
Randomduded12 Review #1- Super Smash Brothers If you own a Nintendo Wii, you have no doubt been bugged by your friends or neighborhood kids to purchase this game. Super Smash Brothers is like a religion to some Nintendo fan boys, but to me it is more or less the most casual, yet hardcore fighting game I own. This game revolves around timing, you need to pick attacks that will hit your enemy, but also give you enough time to evade if necessary. Your attacks will incur damage on your opponent as you duel to the death. When your enemy is weakened, you can knock them further and further, in proportion to their damage and how you attack them. The only way to kill characters outside of stamina mode is to utilize Brawl's semi-realistic physics to send your opponent flying off screen. There are 4 control modes, but to be honest only three options work really well: the GameCube controller, Classic, and nunchuk Wiimote combo. All the controller types can be used throughout the whole experience that is Smash Bros. (keep in mind though how much money could be saved from not using erroneous batteries with your gaming experience, so play with the optimal controller: the GameCube controller.)
Generic List of Information: Characters: 35 Stages: 41 + user created stages Stickers: 700 Trophies: 544
Modes: Solo (can also be co op) consists of Stadium minigames(home run contest, target test-5 difficulties, boss battles, multi man brawl), Subspace Emissary, Collection options- stickers, trophies, coin launcher, Masterpieces ( a poorly thought out idea where they think 40 seconds of Donkey Kong will cause you to salivate all over yourself and purchase a copy from the virtual console. Nintendo you are officially comprised of drugged up fools.) , Brawl, Online, Options, and blah blah blah. If you want to see the rest, go look at them yourselves.
Masterpieces: (One of my friends and I came up with an idea similar to this to be included with Brawl, but it didn't suck. It was essentially a collection of Brawl and a full background game from each character (ex. Mario- Super Mario world), but it would have cost far more.)
SOLO MODES/STORY The main game is called the Subspace Emissary and revolves around an extremely farfetched plot that includes probably the greatest amalgamation of Nintendo characters excluding fan rpgs. The main story lasts around 10 hours if you just want to beat it and get all the various characters, but for the dedicated gamers, there are secrets placed throughout every level of the game. The secrets vary from trophies, stickers, new characters, or just another crown meaning you got a little closer to 100% completion. Some new additions are bosses (other than master Hand or Crazy Hand), so this is a new feature to the franchise. They are well-designed, fun to fight, have a set pattern, and just in general great. They also drop stickers or a trophy every time you kill them, so they are an easy source for collection. The controls work well, but at the same time do not. It doesn't pretend to be a Mario platforming game, but it wants to play like one just with extra fighting tacked on. This kind of weakens the story mode for me, but the controls do work. The story proceeds along pretty well, until you get to about the last 4 levels. These last 4 levels rank among the worst things Smash Bros has ever done to me. They make you essentially play through the whole goddamn game again.
Another thing the game did that bugged me, was take away any items I was carrying when I entered a door to another section of a level in the Subspace Emissary. I worked hard to get that silly little trophy stand, but you are going to just take it away? Why Nintendo, is it really that hard to allow a player to keep their items? The answer, quite simply no. Nintendo was just being lazy. Other than this serious blight on the fun factor for adventure mode, the story serves its purpose, never exceeding expectations except for the quality of the cinematics, but never getting in the way either. Don't expect much dialogue (think Zelda without text and a more random story). Some cool character and enemy designs remind me vaguely of Kingdom Hearts's heartless, but they are pretty standard enemies with little distinguishing them from other game minions (one weird extra Sora threw in was the enemies will have different facial expressions every time you turn your Wii on, so see if you can spot them all!). The story is enjoyable the first or maybe even second run through if you care to serve as Nintendo's generic whore just to get a few unnecessary alternate cinematics, more stickers/trophies, or just to use your mouth to please your overlord. The story mode and the returning extra single player/co op player features such as home run contest or target smash and the new Boss Battles mode, frankly just don't retain any sense of fun for me after the first run through and making me play the game twice just to beat it once is a poorly planned move Nintendo.
MINIGAMES/COLLECTION ELEMENTS The same applies to the minigames. Their appeal lasts for a while, but eventually most people will abandon it in favor of brawling. Some people will dedicate themselves to mastering this mode and it is an interesting skill based platform, but the five levels are the same for every character, so technically the last two Smash Bros. games had more unique stages. Each character had their own set up and best strategy, but Nintendo decided to cut corners here and standardize the levels. Nevertheless, to collect everything you have to go through with every character in each mode. Nintendo's new slogan- Wii don't know how to make a good game! I only went through trying to get more stickers/trophies because yes, I am a collector (no, I was not going to say Nintendo's whore because if anything, I am the overlord because I decide what to purchase).
The extras within Brawl can take freaking forever to unlock, so do not expect immediate completion of the game. This is my most played game on the Wii with around 250 hours put in on online matches, local matches, and story mode, but I am still missing some of the collection. However, Nintendo did include a couple ways to help you, namely golden hammers and coins. You can use hammers to unlock tricky challenges like collect all freaking 700 stickers. Please note that Nintendo in their omniscience decided to prevent certain challenges from unlocking with hammers for example Intense boss Battles. Nice going Nintendo, making a perfectly good compromise between hardcore and beginning gamers as useless as the Gamecube's online functions. I managed to beat Intense Boss Rush because I rock, but the majority of my friends who play the game cannot. They want to complete the game too, you self absorbed conglomerate that need to take its head out of its "hidey hole". If they had juse allowed hammers or multiple lives, I believe this would qualm my disapproval of these "unbreakable" challenges. Throughout your exploits, you will earn coins you can use to earn new trophies and stickers in the revamped coin launcher. The original coin game involved simply putting a coin into a virtual trophy dispenser that would release new trophies based on probability determined by how much money you put into the machine. The new one allows the player to aim at whatever they want, but also puts the probability at freaking excessively low, and leaves the player in a quasi arcade style shooter. While this is indeed more fun, the experience quickly becomes more monotonous than previous incarnations because of the extended periods necessary to earn all the trophies and stickers. I have literally gone through thousands of coins trying to find one new trophy or sticker, but when I left the game all I received were another freaking 100 duplicates to trophies and stickers I already had. Same with the possible exploit, where you design a stage to get extra stickers and trophies. I have played battles on those levels for 1 hour just to get stickers, but all I got were repeats. This is a problem Nintendo. Collection elements fun factor depends on the reader and you do not have to pursue completion of everything to enjoy this game, so try them, but remember I warned you. In my opinion, they were exceedingly annoying or boring, so only invest time in this if you are willing to deal with the bugs that Nintendo has left in.
CHARACTER ROSTER/STAGE DESIGNER Speaking of unnecessary stuff Sora put in, who honestly cares about half of the characters that they added to the roster? I personally do not, because I would rather have had a character creation system that would allow me to create any obscure character I wanted from Biggest Glutton ever (Pac-Man) to Generic Space Hero #1 (Master Chief) or even just a better stage designer. Now, understand this, I am not bashing new characters, but I would prefer characters I am actually interested in instead of ROB, Pit, or a *changed* Ganondorf that still leaves his sword behind. *Coughs obscenely loud- retard*. I typically pick characters whose games I have played, so people like Marth, Mario, Link, Fox, Kirby <('-'<), really anyone as the concepts apply to all the characters, but I prefer certain fighting styles to others. Maybe they could have taken out the excess collection elements and put in the aforementioned character creation system or improved upon the stage designer with the reopened memory. The stage designer works, but can cause the CPU AI to fail miserably on certain types of stages. It is user friendly, but it only interested me after I learned about a hack that allowed you to put two pieces in conjunction allowing for infinitely more interesting designs and fun stages, but again this is an unofficial hack, so no props to Nintendo for this. Therefore, the character roster and stage designer did provide me with a sense of customization or fun that other modern fighters typically neglect, but there are still problems that should be fixed.
A note about the stages, I do not agree with how Final destination was designed. The curves on the outside of the stage have caused many unintentional suicides and for a neutral stage (one that doesn't try to attack you ) this makes the ledges unfair to certain characters. I also think that too many of the stages include gimmicks that try to attack you, there should be a bigger base of neutral stages instead. One example: I don't like being killed by a lion tamer in Flat Zone 2 simply because my enemy managed to knock me back into one of them, they decided to play a professional match of tennis with me before serving an ace out of the court. Most of the stages are well designed and fun, but some just aren't. Good thing there is still a stage choice function, so you can say no stages I don't like for random.
ITEMS However, if there is one thing that Smash Bros has always dominated, it lies with item usage and customization. In Brawl, items are plentiful and varied, but at the same time, they took out some old favorites (red shells, etc.) to make room for newer items (golden hammers, smash balls, etc.). These new items are the one aspect of the game that I think has actually improved significantly upon the predecessors of Brawl. Many people claim they break competitive play, but so what? This section is great even if you don't like items because you can still appreciate the depth and intricacies to each item, Besides, if you don't like items, you can turn them off or just set which items you want on. One of the greatest concepts ever in anything. Never playing this game with items on is blasphemy. Simply put, items make the game more than good. It's great!
COMBAT/ ONLINE MODES The backbone of a fighting game. In brawl, the combat has been improved slightly, but some problems have come to my attention. You can now air dodge repeatedly which is nice, you cannot wave dash without altering the game through the use of a USB device/ cheat device which is also pretty good because the hackers can use their cheats against other hackers online while the fair gamers will normal game play to beat their opponent to a pulp (however, I'm sure some jerk will try to play against unsuspecting players with their cheats turned on, and thus break the game of all fairness), the overabundance of glitches, tripping (Can I kill you person who thought of this horribly retarded idea?), and the online play. The first two help this section tremendously, but the glitches that are typically permitted in official tourneys can make the game incredibly unfun to new players. There are a variety of inescapable glitches that just do not favor beginning players because they are susceptible to falling into a trap. Ex. Dedede's chain throw or the fact that you can try to hit two players when they are trapped in a throw, but you will typically just hit the one closer to you, even if everyone is playing a free for all.
Extended Tripping information: I once cared enough to try to get a no hit run of the Boss Battles mode on Intense, then I discovered tripping would ruin a thus far perfect run and force me to start all over again. I immediately threw away my controller in disgust and have not returned to Boss Battles since completion of the mode with all the characters.
Online is in shambles. Matches take forever to load and connect with other players, there is typically lag, you can try to connect online and be given a crappy message along the lines of "Wii sucks, so try again until our poor online decides to ante up for once" Literally, they say error with the internet and please try again (this occurs pretty sporadically, but it has happened at least 20+ times in the span that I have tried to play the game online, so, I would say it's a major problem, but it has improved over time thanks to more servers by Nintendo. Nintendo did something right? yeah, they really did.), and you cannot customize matches with random people (it seems as though the match takes one player's settings and applies it to all the other players, so hopefully your settings will come up too. However, the friend code rule applies here. With an FC, you can customize and play modes other than brawl such as Home Run Contest or Multi man melee with your friends. One major disappointment though is the lack of the ability to play the story mode online co-op. This would have been intelligent and maybe kept me interested in the story, but no Nintendo neglected this as well).
You can only record 3 minutes of a fight (online or off) (Anecdote time: when I was at a friend's house, we were playing some Brawl and something incredible occurred. Our match started off as a 4 player free-for-all, but evolved into a tense battle between two players. One of the deceased players was Snake, and in his wisdom, he chose to place a detonation mine before dying. Now, let's proceed back to the close match between my two other friends. They were neck to neck in damage, and it seemed as though victory could go to any side. Then, Snake's mine exploded because after a certain amount of time of unuse, they tend to do that. Unluckily for one of the surviving players, he was standing on top of this spot and immediately flew out of the screen faster than Team Rocket does in Pokémon. It was epic and hilarious at the same time, so naturally we went to try to save the replay. Guess what? The match was too long to save on the Wii or even a memory card that had multiples of the Wii's space. Now, this has more to do with the Wii's lack of memory, but this just plain made me angry. The best moments typically come after three minutes, but there is no way to record this without a camera/recording device set up. I just wish the time for recording could be extended, other than that, this mode is fantastic).
One more problem that has harped upon my mind about Brawl is how some moves will cause suicide, but others are prevented. Ex. Ike's side b will only travel to the edge of a stage, so he can only die on stages that have continuous ground such as Flat Zone 2. However, Fox/falco/wolf's side b or up b can easily cause an unintentional suicide. I think this is more of an opinion, but I would prefer that my move had the same limitations as Ike's side b. At least this way, some deaths and face (honor) could be saved.
Online wait times are excessive and on the with anyone modes, it will reset back to 70 seconds when a new person joins your party. At least with the team battle mode, you know how long you have to wait. People are not always on the Wii, but they leave themselves in the game, so their character will still be around to provide cheap kills for all the douche bags on the internet. I want a patch Nintendo, one that fixes our poor online, but alas, this is just a chimerical dream.
The sheer number of issues just plain shocks me when they took so much extra time to develop these modes (Brawl was delayed for about a year people and they specifically mentioned they would try to improve upon these modes in particular the online). In addition, there seems to be a glitch with shielding where you can still get hurt when shielding, perhaps it is graphical error, but it is still a glitch that weakens combat.
Let's get a couple things straight, the combat is still riotously fun, fast, challenging, intricate, and well designed. The online works, it's free, more than a couple of modes online, and some interesting options such as the Smash Service (Nintendo sends you cool videos/photos/stages from other Brawl players) make the online worthwhile, just buggy. I just wish we could keep some of those videos, photos, or stages because some are incredibly well made and intricate, and others are just plain cool.
RANKINGS/SCORES/NOTABLE THINGS One thing that I forgot to mention was the ability to unlock characters/stages through multiple methods of game play. This idea works well because not everyone will want to play the single player, but they want the characters so, as they battle, they will still unlock the most important aspects of Brawl. So, nice job Nintendo. Another great option is the ability to change the controls to whatever you want, so you can truly feel comfortable with all the controllers. There is one drawback, you will have to bring your profile (option with Wii remote controls only) over to a friend's house if you want to keep the same controls in local matches. Otherwise, you have to deal with your controls or reset them again.
If I have to rank the Smash Bros Series in order of greatness, I would put Melee first, Brawl a fairly close second, and SSB 64 in last place. Brawl innovated many things for Nintendo's stalwart series (video replays, online, stage creation, new modes, and a story), but frankly it disappointed me when I took into consideration the amount of time taken by Nintendo to fix the game. Melee was produced in far less time, had a ton of glitches (Wavedashing, black hole glitch), repetitive modes, but it added so much to the great backbone laid down for it by 64 that if it had online, I think, my time would be equally spent between the two. 64 is only last because it has the least features and plays the most awkwardly now, but I own two copies of this one because in the end I am most nostalgic about my favorite Nintendo 64 fighting game.
Brawl somewhat impressed me because Nintendo has stepped up to the enormous plate set by other companies. They did not "innovate" anything, but they have taken some major steps to ensure Brawl keeps the pace with other games. I suggest rental before purchase, but in all likelihood, you will want to keep it around for longer. It's an enjoyable game, but longtime players will find many extended problems that should not exist in a game that was delayed repeatedly to fix issues such as the ones listed above. The other consoles and the lead games have shown Nintendo that it needs to change to remain competitive in the videogame business. Instead of focusing on changing too much of an already great game, focus on keeping the experience as fun or more fun than previous installments. Also, get some more bug testers because the sheer number and audacity of some of these glitches is just insane.
IDEAS FOR NEXT GAME I would also love leader boards, but I understand they did not want to lose casual appeal with an actual ranking system, which would cause successive waves of hackers and cheaters trying to boost their scores.
Videogame testers.
A Character creation system and personalized characters similar to Mugen, where the owner can select which characters they desire from a cast of hundreds to thousands. This would include quite a few non Nintendo characters as well.
There are multiple parts, for anyone who wants to see examples of many glitches or tricks in Brawl go there.
Thanks for reading and please subscribe! Next review : God of War (PS2) __________________ Feel free to repost on other sites or whatever, even if you just want to point out I committed a solecism on page three line 8, you smarmy grammar Nazi. One condition: maintain my username within this review/article under any and all circumstances. Contact me with a PM for information regarding online gaming with me or other accounts I have. Don't hate on videogames, they suck more than they should anyway. "I'm a hypocrite" -Randomduded12 "LOGIC IS GOD!!!11!"
Greetings. This is my first time blogging here so what better way to begin a blog than to start with a subject of this calibur. Here we are once again enjoying the events that come to pass during the changing of the seasons. I am not sure about the rest of you but I've missed the smells of wood stoves burning and the rustle of leaves as they make their way down to the ground. And during this time of year we once again turn to the more primal aspects of our humanity and try to do our best to enjoy a good scare every now and then. Usually at this time of year I'm a bit "spookier" than usual and I'm sure we can all relate in preparing for our usual October night's activities. And once again like much of the rest of the entertainmint industry, they are hegding their bets to cash in on the event that gives us an excuse to dress up: Halloween.
And once again I've gone thru the bargin bins and my personal tastes/library to not only find the finest in hallowen inspired gaming, but to also enlighten thee in some games that might've fallen by the wayside and sadly were not given their moment in the spotlight. I'm still sticking to my usual style of a list: Only one game per franchise, two games per system and one wild card game for good measure. But why go to 11 again? Well, not only in honor to the online talents that are thatguywiththeglasses and thatdudeinthesuede, but to also pay my respects for the late great game publisher/localizer Working Designs: Because their games go to 11! (RIP) So with that said, lettuce begin!
Yeah I wish it was Wii video game, but sadly we're stuck with what we've got. Now before I go any further I want to introduce my guest speakers whom I revived from the graveyard. Introducing the girl that got smashed by a car at eleven o' clock, the young dead soldier, and that kid who has a tree outside the school that serves as a memorial. I've been practicing necromancy. Welcome lady and gentlemen.
Now you're probably wondering what this blog is about. Well it's about the Wii and its severe lack of actual video games. You see I view the Wii as such:
WIi
Please note that all insults are just poor jokes and as such do not deserve to be commented upon if you disagree with them, but please do comment upon anything else you think I missed or disagree with me on *
KWING (in general, not always).
"I'm a hypocrite"
