Veteran Of The PSN Wars + The August Shakedown

Almost as a divine punishmen (or a reality check), 4 days ago the entire PSN infrastructure went down for an entire day, while Sony is still standing by their decision to abandon physical moving forward, and despite a remarkable backlash that hopefully will keep going, because it should be going and make the company reverse course.

Because, let’s be real, even Microsoft initially said that the X-Box One had to be online only (or how Kinect was gonna be mandatory for it), i remember them telling people off to “go buy a 360 instead, you peasants… and it all had to be walked back when it became both unpopolar and unappealing to customers.

This isn’t fuckin holy text, it’s business, and while i still wish people used half of this outrage for more pressing political issues instead of letting apathy steer us into an Orwellian novel, i’m not here to go on that soapbox… or so i would say if they didn’t immediatly made the gesture pointless by telling it has an expiry date, in a week they’re gonna stop.

As i said before, sadly “gamer boycotts” is a joke in itself for a reason.

I’m not here to tell you what i was obviously gonna think about the issue (of course i was gonna say this situation it’s shit, it’s beyond just “shit”, it’s far worse), i’m here to go full Abe Simpson, sit by the lemon tree and just think back to 2011, when the Playstation Network was hacked and Sony gave everyone a couple of free games.

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[EXPRESSO] Metal Slug Rush iOS | Survivors’ Front

I would like to thank the new SNK for choosing that subtitle, as it really is a gift to “do a gaming journalism” on, especially since it got released not so long after being announced alongside a supposed big return of the series on consoles and PC.

I wasn’t even sure if bother with this, since i don’t need 300 words to review or described Metal Slug Rush, as this is indeed the expected type of experience for a mobile spin-off of an old series, as in, clone what is popular at the moment, what’s easy and dandy to copy-emulate.

In this case, it’s Vampire Survivors, whose formula is now the go-to game type, i mean, they made a Hololive themed one, even that horror comedy, Renfield, got a “Survivors-like” tie-in game, and there’s even a Jujutsu Kaisen game with the VS formula coming up this year,

It is shameless, and it doesn’t really add anything of its own to the formula beside the fact the main weapons are guns and hence long range, plus as every MS mobile spin off ever released (aside from Metal Slug Awakening), it’s basically a giant self-asset flip as it reuses the old sprites A LOT, heck, they even recycled artwork of the Instructor from that Mission School extra mode.

But frankly MS fans might enjoy the old pixel art better, i sure do, and to be honest, it’s a decent VS clone, it’s alright, considered its a F2P gacha thing, one that opts more to force grinding/levelling gear more than other, and at least it doesn’t try to lull you into the extended early period where you’re given enough currency and materials to progress, but instead makes it clear fairly fast that there’s convenience and wares to be had if you have coin.

Disgaea Mayhem PS5 [DEMO] | FIRST IMPRESSIONS

So, yeah, NIS hasn’t been too vocal about it, but yes, they are doing basically “Disgaea Musou/Warriors”, just in-house, and it comes out on the 23th, in a couple of weeks, i’ve actually preordered the Limited Edition this time, but i’ve seen the demo pop up, might as well give it a whirl.

And let’s just say i wasn’t impressed… actually i was baffled, but for different reasons that you might think.

The reasons being that this is an AWFUL demo.

Like, it’s become clear NIS has no faith in this game, but a demo like this feels just short of self-sabotage, like they actually want this to fail? What the fuck is the point of even throwing this together?

The demo already befuddles on the first impact because there is no story or cutscenes at all, you’re thrown into an empty little hub with a single Prinny to talk to in order to access the three levels/stages on offer; so already if you wanted Disgaea’s style of comedy you’ll have to check the inventory for the “demo weapons, not for sale” bit in the info boxes.

What the demo does have is three special demo stages, but they sure don’t feel special, they are of slightly rising difficulty, but barely so, and they are so short that i was able to see all the content in the demo in about 15 minutes.

Some demos give away too much, but the one for Disgaea Mayhem is exactly the opposite.

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Earth Defense Force 4.1: Wing Diver The Shooter PS4 [REVIEW] | Bullet Ant Hell

To further prove how Earth Defense Force 4 port-expansion for PS4 and PC, EDF 4.1: The Shadow Of New Despair, was when the series really started getting popular worlwide, D3 Publisher figured just making DLC mission pack for the main game wasn’t enough, and so had developers Clouds Inc and Giga-Rensya Inc spun a spin-off game from EDF 4.1 assets, releasing first as a digital download on PS4 and then PC via Steam.

This being Earth Defense Force 4.1: Wing Diver The Shooter, which indeed focuses on the Wing Diver unit/class, presenting a “gaiden” story of sorts that has a Pale Wing/Wing Diver unit face off alone against swarms of enemies, but this time in a 2D vertical shmup fashion.

Sounds fun and frankly it’s perfect to make a spin-off in this style off a series that already has so much “arcade DNA” in it, there’s very little more arcade than 2D shmup action.

Sure it used 3D models from the mainline game of the era, but gameplay is classic 2D spaceship shooter that scrolls and for which “tate mode” is a thing…. which i have to admit feels weird, since you basically never miss the enemies even though they look more in the distance or foreground, there’s a bit of disconnect due to them reusing the 3D assets from the EDF 4.1.

from a technical standpoint, this is basically D3 doing the ol’ Tecmo Koei thing of fashioning out a new Samurai or Dynasty Warriors spin-off from an earlier mainline entry, it basically reuses old assets A LOT, the same enemy models, with some little new in terms of enemy variants or new stuff in general, aside from the mission dialogue, with the usual cheesy so bad it’s good english voice acting we’ve come to expect (and love) from the series to accompany the wafer thin plot that sees basically a Pale Wing/Wing Diver squadron on their own separated mission, one that runs concurrently to the events of EDF 4.1 story. Or something. Doesn’t really matter much.

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“We only used AI as reference”

Slippery slope arguments are ironically slippery slopes in themselves, but this clearly isn’t the case, as this isn’t the first time we have seen this disclaimer, but personally what set me off was it coming immediatly after the announcement of a new Crazy Taxi game, Crazy Taxi World Tour, rumored for months but now finally proper announced and arriving on current gen consoles and PC next year.

This should be a time of excitement as the summer reveals for upcoming titles are shown…. yet it’s all a parade of poisoned chalices, as the newly shown/announced Tomb Raider game, also has a similar, and it’s even worse as it’s a remake to boot.

I don’t blame the staffers, as this is 100 % a decision imposed by the corpo as they bought on this bubble that’s bound to burst even sooner than expected (and it should), forced upon the people that actually do the job instead of being handed golden parachutes.

Again, this new tech so good it has be imposed and made mandatory at every level to try and justify the use, again, because investors emptied gajillions on the new tech fad/buzzword that makes them sound “in touch”, fuck any expenses or impact it has on the world, the business doesn’t care, as abundantly shown, and nor do the people actually responsable for it.

I don’t like having to write this, i really do not, i’ve been wanting a new Crazy Taxi in forever, the little gameplay footage from the trailer does look good…..but not like this.

It’s shitty when the Let It Die sequel of sorts did, and i swore off on that, i’ve done the same with the new Layton (and other stuff of theirs) due to new Level 5 CEO being so adamant and obviously fellating in words and actions this new fad, it’s even worse (if a lot more expected) when big companies do this.

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Shark Listings & The Mini-Summer Of EDF

As previously announced, we’ll have the usual 6 shark movie reviews but this year they will be sliced with 2 every month until August, we already begun the month with the Hindi language shark-laden masala film, Aatank, and that’s literally just the antepasta, there’s plenty more of far weirder shark related shit to see and talk about.

Also previously announced in that previous article, it’s how we’ll have a mini “Summer Of EDF”.

A fun sized version because there’s simply nothing else bearing the name EDF left to review, aside from the PS Vita expanded port of 2017/EDF 3 that is stilly a digital only 30 bucks thing on PSN and what, the mobile autoclicker EDF 4.1 Tap Wars?

As much as i would love to keep talking EDF games, we have only the PS2 tactical spin-off and the EDF 4.1 shmup spin-off left to cover, so look forward to the reviews of those, and remember that the EDF will -inevitably- deploy.

Again. Not soon, as EDF 7 (thought it should be called X for reasons obvious if you played EDF 6) isn’t a thing, but we know that eventually Sandlot will make another one, and i’d prefer for the team to rest and come back with something even more stupid, crazy and fun than before.

I mean, D3 could still outsource a “boomer shooter” spin-off, they did one for Starship Troopers, so….

Mario & Wario SFC [REVIEW] | Bucket Mario Mouse Adventure

One of the Mario titles that have been long since been an exclusive to the Super Famicom (the Japanese version of the Super Nintendo), but last October it was rereleased officially, in this case as part of the Super Nintendo Classics app/service on Switch and Switch 2.

It’s has been a long sought after title that it would be logical to assume might have gotten a rerelease on Switch 2, since it has a mouse-style control set up for the Joycons, and it wouldn’t have required much fnagling as the game was already full translated in English in its original SFC release, kinda surprising it didn’t actually get a NA or PAL release, despite there having been plans at the time.

I guess besides Mario Paint there wasn’t much interest in games that used the SNES mouse peripheral, but regardless, you can now play it on Switch 2 or even Switch 1, for the latter you will need to connect an USB mouse… which is how i played it, with the old Switch 1 docked and with a cheap random USB mouse anyway, at first anyway.

I tried that but i guess my USB mouse was too shit, since i later tried the mouse mode on a Switch 2 joycon (both in docked and handheld mode), and that was actually WAY better, like usual an actual proper modern mouse, even with the game mouse speed set to low, so i stuck to that for the rest of my experience.

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Raging Blades PS2 [REVIEW] | Arcade Axe

Yet more fuel for the bargain bin PS2 bonfire with an arguably even more obscure niche hack n slash title from an even more forgotten ilk, as Bujingai was at least co-developed by Taito and Red Entertaiment, the latter being behind the PS2 Gungrave games as well as Sakura Wars So Long My Love, the Fossil Fighter games, or much of the Record Of Agarest series.

Instead Raging Blades (originally called Raging Bless in Japan) comes from a developer pretty much unknown, Pacific Century Cyber Works (PCCW), whose portfolio mostly consist of this, something called Dream Audition and some racing or idol games that never left Japan, and was distributed by Wanadoo, one of those European publisher that no one remembers but did have a presence back in the day, though i remember them mostly for their logo on PC graphic adventure like the Necronomicon titles, and later a lot of tie-in shovelware… but also the PS2 reboot of an old Tecmo series, Rygar The Legendary Adventure, which i will eventually feature here.

That aside, this is even more distant, because while Bujingai was surprisingly pretty nifty and complex for a 2003 release, Raging Blades also released the same year yet it’s at the complete opposite end of the spectrum, being pretty much a 3D styled take on Golden Axe, its roots in the arcade years of the genre pretty much unfazed by how the genre evolved in the third dimension and especially from Devil May Cry on forward.

It’s so arcade there’s no “Continue” option from the main menu, because you’re expected to beat the story mode in one setting.

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[EXPRESSO] Mortal Kombat II (2026) | Sequel Syndrome

It would have taken some actual fuckin effort in actively trying to sabotage the film for this follow up to the 2021 Mortal Kombat to be worse than that… well, that film wasn’t really horrible, but it was an ensemble of random, unpopular and ineffective – at best – narrative choices made just so the film based around a fighting videogame series revolving around a mystic deadly fighting tournament could put on the side doing the titular bout of Mortal Kombat.

It all felt like it was just someone at WB mandating it to be so in order to lure doing the actual MK plot in a sequel that was actually about what people wanted to see… and Mortal Kombat II is indeed that, as Shang Tsung’s plan to kill Earthrealm champions before the tournament could begin fell apart, so now Earthrealm has to compete against Outrealm, commanded by the tyrant Shao Khan (served also by the necromancer Quan Chi), and a new warrior has been chosen by the gods to fight for Earthrealm, a washed up 90s action movie hero called Johnny Cage…

And yes, Karl Urban as Cage already makes this one the better film, but yes, overall this is actually what people were expecting from a MK movie, lots of fights, the tournament, lots of gore, fun videogame-fantasy nonsense, absurd characters duking it out in mystical realms, going to Hell, the effects are better and the plot is actually okay, doesn’t have pacing narcolepsy or occasional tone issues the 2021 had, this time around embracing wholeheartedly its inherent trashy nonsense.

While i had have honestly a very fun, silly time with this one, i will have to dock the rating down a notch because.. well, because this is the film they should have made back in 2021.

Mortal Kombat (2021) [REVIEW] | Kombat Set-Up

Preface: i never saw the old MK movies, i really never cared about Mortal Kombat back in the day , but i do like gore, the old theme song, known the basic premise of the series, and some stuff i’ve absorbed by cultural osmosis, so why not?

Helps this is also a reboot of the MK film series.

The premise centers about mystical deathmatch tournament between the Outworld and The Earthrealm, as the chosen fighters of each factions engage in the titular “mortal combat”. As the Outworld has won nine of the previous tournaments and it’s set that the Earthrealm will be conquered by the Outworld if they lose the 10^th tournament as well, but there’s a prophecy about a new generation of Earthrealm fighters that will be united by the “blood of Hanzo Hasashi”.

So both sides try to locate the new chosen fighters for Earthrealm (recognizable by the dragon marking on their skin) to either eliminate or assist them before they can enter the tournament.

This “united by the blood of Hanzo” is an excuse to start off the movie in 17^th centhury Japan with a flashback about chinese assassin Bi-Han (aka Subzero) killing Hanzo and his family.

Its a strong opening, but after that we’re in a modern day America, following this Cole Young fellow, a now washed up MMA fighter, whose life gets even worse as he too is targeted by Bi Han/Subzero, now working for Outworld’s mystic sorcerer Shang Tsung, as he sending his underlings to preemptively kill all the Earthrealm champions so the next Mortal Kombat tournament won’t even be taken, and Cole indeed sports the dragon marking, unaware of his heritage and thrown into this when he just wants to protect his family…

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