#E32021 Summer Game Fest [Highlights]

Changed my mind, i will write small recaps/highlights of the various conferences, starting with this one.

Which is reall Geoff Khiley hosting “The Games Awards” by another name… yay?

Even more due to the event being sponsored by Prime Gaming…YAY.

Yeah, i didn’t miss this part of the E3 so much.

Continua a leggere “#E32021 Summer Game Fest [Highlights]”

Fist Of The North Star: Ken’s Rage 2 X360 [REVIEW] | You Should Have Left The Bronx

The first Ken’s Rage sold relatively well, and it’s Koei, so we got a sequel 3 years later.

Which would be fine, until you realize what it actually implies in this case, and i don’t mean it simply being released to coincide with the series 30th anniversary.

That is something else entirely that ultimately condemns Ken’s Rage 2, but the main issue is that you just can’t do what Dynasty Warriors does with Romance Of The Three Kingdoms, as the source material for that leaves it open to the real historical characters being reinvented or changed, on what of the many events (historical or pure fiction like the many uses of magic) focus more the narrative, while keeping focus on the essential battles and significant achievements of the warring factions, and their part in the path to the unification of China after the fall of the Han dynasty.

You can’t just re-imagine Kenshiro, his friends and foes, as they have all distinct personalities, distinct character designs, signature moves and Fist Of The North Star’s popularity never really waned in 30 and plus years, so people still are quite well aware of it. On the other hand, you could hardly justify making a sequel when the first game stopped at the end of the Raoh’s story arc.

Continua a leggere “Fist Of The North Star: Ken’s Rage 2 X360 [REVIEW] | You Should Have Left The Bronx”

Fist Of The North Star: Ken’s Rage X360 [REVIEW] | Ai Wo Torimodose!!

I’ve been wanting to revisit the Ken’s Rage series for a while, especially because it seems like a no-brainer to make a Warriors style game about one of the most beloved shonen series of the 80s, Fist Of The North Star, with Kenshiro and his cast of powerful, larger than life foes, with more post-apocalyptic muscle mountains and the array of martial arts that explode people from the inside, cure them from all ailments, and do whatever insane mystical, awesome bullshit they do.

Not that Fist Of The North Star lacks videogames based upon it, but aside from the first NES game (released without the FOTNS license as Black Belt), most of them never left Japan, or did reworked due to licensing into something else. In either case, here in Europe we almost got nothing of that for decades, so Ken’s Rage was actually a nice treat for starving fans that wanted to experience Kenshiro’s post-apocaliptic odyssey in videogame form on their modern consoles.

Continua a leggere “Fist Of The North Star: Ken’s Rage X360 [REVIEW] | Ai Wo Torimodose!!”

Hyrule Warriors: Definitive Edition NSWITCH [REVIEW]

This is like the 4th time i review Hyrule Warriors overall (and the second i review the Definitive Edition), but it IS the first time in english, and it IS Hyrule Warriors, so….

Since i also wanted to review Age Of Calamity, might as well do the previous iteration of “Zelda Musou”, one that was conceived as most Dynasty Warriors crossovers with other IP are, as in this is just a spin-off where we have an original story made pretty much to have most character from said license/series/brand appear together and fight in a hack n slash manner through opposing armies, through the power of the usual convenient “dimensional portals”.

Still, even there Nintendo was involved in the project more than previous companies “crossing” their properties with Koei’s trademark style of hack n slash, even Team Ninja (which survived the Itagaki exodus better than Itagaki’s career) helped in the development alongside ol’ Omega Force.

Continua a leggere “Hyrule Warriors: Definitive Edition NSWITCH [REVIEW]”

That’s the sound of 10 years of Ken’s Rage

Sorry to “interrupt” Dino Dicember, but i wanna talk a bit about Koei’s musou series based on Fist Of The North Star, dubbed Ken’s Rage. If you follow any gaming news site, you’ve might already know of this, but since we do have some preview footage running around, i feel the time it’s right to talk about what Koei did to celebrate the 10th year anniversary of Ken’s Rage.

(images taken from Siliconera)

Continua a leggere “That’s the sound of 10 years of Ken’s Rage”

Super Mario 3D All Stars NSWITCH [REVIEW]

I pointed this out in a previous post, and i have to yet again: the fact this was not only released with limited printing for retail copies, but with an expiration date of 6 months even for the digital version (still priced 60 bucks). It’s insane, even more since the collection doesn’t include Super Mario Galaxy 2, i’m pretty sure it would have fit in a Switch cartridge, but for whatever stupid reason is not in the collection. Maybe to be sold as a separate remaster for full price as well, who knows.

Only Nintendo could pull shit like this and get away with it.

Yes, i got a physical copy of it. No, i didn’t pay extra, i just placed my pre-order fast. Fuck scalpers.

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Review of Super Mario 3D All Stars coming later

I secured a physical copy of the collection, had to move fast, because i’ve been in this hobby long enough to have seen this happen before with my own very eyes, and i didn’t want to give money to Ebay scalpers. Which are already selling copies of the game for 120 bucks. As one could expected.

Still, the fact that even the digital version is priced 60 bucks and has an expiration date of 6 months it’s fuckin absurd. Only Nintendo could pull shit like this and get away with it. I understand those who decided not to bother with this All Stars collection, given the manifactured scarcity (if this doesn’t make that abundantly clear, nothing will), all the bullshit that follows in second hand marketplaces, the price, and the absurd lack of Super Mario Galaxy 2, which i would argue was even better than the first.

I guess that for another All Stars 3D Collection containing 3 games for 60 bucks, or a full priced port-remaster-thingie with extra content like for Super Mario 3D World.

I did want the collection as a physical cartridge, so i managed to pre-order it, and i will write a review once i got my hands on the game next week, and i play for a decent amount of times the games themselves. It will be one for the books, as in most of the people who have pre-ordered it are either collectors, people who already played the games on their original console releases and want to have them on Switch as well (because it’s easier than dusting off the Wii or Gamecube, even if you still have them at hand and working), and in general the “already converted”, so to say.

Putting this out now because i would like to focus on the collection itself more than the bullshit surrouding it, which of course i will address anyway.

True State Of Musou (As of 2020)

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Yeah, busting out this old gem.

I teased this with my comment on the Dynasty Warriors 20th Anniversary celebration video, and – as i said in the article – that was just the tipping point, the final push to make me write down an editorial on the musou genre/subgenre, one i had been ruminating about for a couple of years.

And to do that, i will have to start not from the beginning (i will eventually do a full retrospective, in time), but from the last numbered title in the main Warriors series, Dynasty Warriors, yes, Dynasty Warriors 9.

This is a long article, ready your beverage of choice. Continua a leggere “True State Of Musou (As of 2020)”

One Piece: Romance Dawn Story OVA (2008) [REVIEW]

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Director: Katsumi Tokoro
Writer: Tsuyoshi Sakurai

Here’s another quite nostalgic OVA, as in 2008, for its 40th Anniversary Shonen Jump held the Super Anime Tour, and Toei was commissioned a recreation not of One Piece, but of Romance Dawn, the one-shot story (the first version, in this specific case) Eiichiro Oda created and that eventually served as a base for One Piece, not only in premise but also character designs, and became a naming convention, so much that the first One Piece chapter is titled “Romance Dawn” as well. Continua a leggere “One Piece: Romance Dawn Story OVA (2008) [REVIEW]”