Gotta catch some more.

So, Pokémon Black and White came out in Japan about two weeks ago. And since the a deluge of information has come out about them. I’ve looked into it and tried to decipher what I can.

I’m going to assume that people reading this know the basics behind Pokémon. I don’t feel like explaining it right now, and want to get into the new stuff. I enjoy Pokémon. I do. It’s mix of strategy and hidden mathematics interest me greatly.

This first thing to notice is that the graphics are slightly better. Including some face sprites of certain characters in certain situations, and large detailed environments. Still nothing amazing though. The main changes are a lot more exciting. At the start, and for most of the game, you will only be able to find and catch the newly created Pokemon. None of the old four hundred and sixty odd Pokémon will be found. You’ll have to rely on the new cast. This means a refreshed experience. Having to catch Pokémon to find out their types and moves, rather than falling back on old favourites. Not that you don’t get to find them. Once you obtain the national Pokédex, you’ll be able to find and catch your old favourites, as well as transfer them from previous DS titles through a sort of minigame.

The battles are different as well. There are new triple and rotation battles, where three Pokémon fight at a time. The Pokémon move during battles, bobbing their heads, or moving their tails, no longer the static sprites. TM’s, once a one use item, are now reusable. Whether or not this makes them harder to get, I can’t tell. There are also plenty of new moves and abilities to get to grips with, and when an ability becomes active in battle, a bar appears.

I have been playing it a little, but, it being in Japanese, I have no Idea what’s going on. There’s a new evil organisation to stop, 8 new gyms, and of course, an Elite four, but I’ve not gotten to far due to language barriers. Playing it in Japanese seems to annoy me, so I’ll wait for the English release in Spring.

(Also, the fire starter becomes fire/fighting again. This annoys me.)

I shouldn't type when drunk

As I’m typing this, I am drunk. Very drunk. In fact the only reason it’s pretty grammatically correct is because I’m that anal. I’m drunker than I’ll probably ever get in Newbury, My home town. Why? Because I’ve just moved back in to Aberystwyth. (try spelling that while drunk.) Over the coming days, I shall be posting the recipes and or pictures of my favourite drinks along with photos when I go on these fun nights out. Such drinks as the death star, pan galactic gargle blaster, the denominator, brain tumour. I’ll create a little review about these and more as I get drunker. Along with the usual reviews and opinions about games.

However. My house has no internet. Any downloadable games will be missed by me until the summer period. And these posts will be uploaded whenever I go up to the University. And expect more posts about how mathematics is fucking hard.  It’s all going to be good times from here. Especially when I have to kidnap a fresher. They will be taught the ways of welsh student drinking. And enjoy it.

Until then, goodbye.

Midnight launches should be fun.

So I went to the midnight launch of Halo Reach last night.

Before I continue, I'm going to state that I don't play many FPS's, I don't own a 360 and I don't have much interest in Halo. I know that it's one of the best things to get if you have a 360, but most games on that thing involve shooting other things in some context. So why was I at this launch? To provide support for a friend. (He didn't want to be alone) and also to see what was going down.

There where two events going on in my town. One at Game, the other at Gamestation, also owned by Game. Both seemed as lively as the other. By which I mean it wasn't. People were there to just line up, get the game, and go. No interaction between them to be had.

If a bunch of people are going to gather for a common cause, at least interact with each other. Discuss the game. Get each other excited. Talk tactics. Make funny references. Exchange gamer tags for online matches.

Maybe it's just a different type of gamer. It doesn't require much to blow shit up, but there is skill in not dying while you blow shit up. But the type of gamer who plays Halo, I'm sorry to say may be the type of gamer who looks down on those who play Dragon Quest or Pokemon.

Pokemon has had loads of mid night launches. and the bigger ones that I've seen coverage of were full of people trading, battling, discussing tactics and breeding and what not. But people seemed more lively. I went to the Arceus event and battled a few people. I lost a fair few times because my team isn't perfect, but people were friendly and I learnt a few things.

Maybe it's just easier for hand held releases. Maybe it;s because I live in a smaller town which I never even knew did midnight launches. But I feel that the whole thing could have been more lively.

However I did pick up a copy of Tetris Party Deluxe while I was there. I felt better after that.

A team ninja game...without boobs?

New Metroid came out last week. I spent a few days playing it. In that time, I completed the main story, and then got all the items, and then cleared the bonus story. I have yet to touch hard mode, but only for my sanity.

Yes, for those who don't care much for a second run through straight away, Other M is a shortish game. I blasted through the whole thing in about 10 hours. But then Metroid games have always been about clearing them quickly. Only the fastest got to find out about Samus' gender in the first game. And there are those who may take the game at their own pace. I tend to feel better when I'm doing things faster.

Which is why Metroid Other M is so entertaining for me. In other Metroid games, it was a perfectly good strategy to stand far away from what might try and kill you and shoot it first. Here, more often than not, the enemies are more likely to ambush you or run straight into you as soon as you enter the room rather then follow a set pattern. Making contact hard to avoid. But the combat style calls for it. Your beam is weak. But the charge shot is much more powerful. But that takes time. However, if you dodge enemy attacks by tapping the d-pad and holding 1, you get a boost to your charge, making it fill almost instantly. This is the way to kill almost anything. Dodge, shoot, dodge, shoot. In later parts of the game, you have to dodge a lot more.

It's also a lot more physical. Samus has a few heavy damage moves up her sleeve when she gets the chance. If the opponent has a back that;s safe to land on, you can jump on it and fire a nice ball of plasma down it's spine. Or for the quick kill, stun it, then run towards it while again charging your beam. Samus will shove her arm cannon into the nearest available orifice and fill it with PAIN. The last bit of power you have in your arsenal is your trusty missiles.

Now, for most of the game, you're in 3rd person. This works better than you'd expect. Most of the map layout is built for d-pad navigation, and it never gets in the way of things. However, point you remote at the screen and you go into 1st person mode. Used for two things. Looking for points of interest, and blowing stuff up with missiles. In combat, this becomes a slight issue. The movement is fluid enough, but I found it tricky to dodge attacks. So I found it best to use it on stunned or far away enemies.

Now the main point of Other M is that it has an actual plot. With voice acting and emotion and all that. And this is delivered brilliantly. It starts where Super Metroid ended. The death of Mother Brain. After her report at the Galactic Federation, the people who hired her and law enforcers of the Galaxy, she gets a distress signal from a ship. Heading there, she finds the place deserted apart from a GF squad, who had arrived before her. She decides to join them and get to the bottom of what happened on the ship. Included in the squadron are two characters of note. The first, is Anthony Higgs. He's the first to recognise Samus, and the first to greet her. And old friend, he calls her princess as a jibe. He's also the token black guy. You know the one in every space adventure with marines. He also has a big gun. It shoots lasers.

The second guy is the more important one. Adam Malkovich. The plot is mostly about the relation between Samus and Adam and Samus' past. However, he instantly comes across as a dick to the player, because he's also the guy who get's to decide what weapons you use and when you get to use them. Most of the time, it's pretty reasonable. But one example stands out as pure stupidity on his part. As par with the course, there's and area with high temperatures. You have the Varia Suit, you just haven't been authorised to use it yet. So you run through three lava filled rooms, and up the inside a volcano before Adam tells you to turn it on. I'm not sure who's at fault here. Adam, who's only reason to prevent you from using some weapons is for the others safety, (which is confusing, because the Varia suit can't hurt a thing) or Samus, for taking Adams orders too seriously. It's annoying, but it's at least a change from losing all your items at the start of the game plot.

One final main change to the game is that the enemies don't drop health or missiles any more. Missiles and health are both restored at save points, or by holding the remote up and holding A. Missiles can be refiled at any time and takes about a second to do so, while health can only be restored while it's "critical" and only back up to a certain amount. While you may think this makes the game easy, you;re a sitting duck while recharging, health taking about three second to restore. More than enough time for something to hit you, cancelling the whole process. It all encourages you to not get hit in the first place. As for hard mode, this removes all expansions in the game, leaving you with only 5 missile and 99 health throughout. Best practice that dodging.

The voice acting works really well. At first, I thought Samus voice was wooden, and monotone. A sure sign of bad acting. But it soon dawned on me that the whole thing was intentional. It all adds to who she is and what kind of person Samus has become. This is one of the few good games, that also has good voice acting. The emotions really come through, and you find yourself feeling for the characters.

So, team ninja made a great Metroid game. And without the use of "jiggle physics" either. And I recommend you get it.

I know nothing about the world of music.

Last night I went to what can be best described by me as an open mic night for musicians. The only reason I attended this thing was because I have a friend who was playing and his music is good darn it. Some of the little music I actually enjoy listening to that isn't adapted from video game soundtracks or from Japan. I can't even tell you why that is. It may be his ability to cover music I'd usually find annoying (She Wolf, Telephone) and make them nice.
The night was filled mostly with guys with guitars singing about an emotion of some sort. Usually love lost or love unavailable (whiny dicks). There was a guy who had written his own humorous poetry about praying mantis sex and feline castration, which held more puns than an average conversation with my groan inducing father. There was also a guest appearance from my old battleaxe of a French teacher. Who shocked me by playing guitar and singing well. It was surreal. Only other artist that stood out was the one with the accordion. Mostly because she could play an accordion and I felt like I was in a poor area of Paris. In the past.


Also, I finally completed Portal. Oh. And Duke Nukam Forever still exists. What's up with that?