Robocop avatar gear: I'd buy that for a dollar

post from Destructoid on 21 August 2011 11:05:26 PM. © Destructoid

Robocop avatar gear: I'd buy that for a dollar screenshot

In past weeks, publishers have announced copious amounts of avatar gear in support of their games. T-shirts, hats, pets, props, etc... but nothing truly worth the price tag. This, however, justifies the existence of avatar gear in one fell swoop.

If you are one of those Xbox Live users who have wondered why, exactly, there is gear for your avatar, this is your definitive answer. That said, if you don't buy the full armor when you partake of this, you're doing it wrong. Actually, if I don't see an army of armored avatars by week's end I'll be quite disappointed in all of you.

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Five bucks gets you Jamestown on Steam today

post from Destructoid on 21 August 2011 11:05:26 PM. © Destructoid

Five bucks gets you Jamestown on Steam today screenshot

You need to get your ass to Mars and buy a copy of Jamestown on Steam. It's down to $4.99 today, which is half off the normal going rate. For that money, you're getting a remarkably well-made indie shmup about 17th-century British Colonial Mars. You can't ask for much more, honestly.

In addition to Jamestown being one of my personal highlights for this year, it features my favorite game soundtrack of 2011. It's particularly worth grabbing if you can get a friend (or three) to play through the story and bonus missions in co-op mode. Either way, I cannot recommend this one enough.

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The Owlboy demo is both available and good

post from Destructoid on 21 August 2011 10:05:35 PM. © Destructoid

The Owlboy demo is both available and good screenshot

A demo for Owlboy, the much talked-about 2D platformer from Austin indies D-Pad Studio, is now available for PC -- a good sign for a game beset my development trouble, despite winning a visual design award at the 2010 Independent Games Festival.

In a sea of slick indie platformers, a few minutes with Owlboy is enough to mark it as a gem -- Otus, the game's avian protagonist, is a joy to control and D-Pad's vision is well-realized, complemented by a handful of savvy design choices and a diet-RPG inventory and upgrade system.

What's not to like?

And if a boy that's also an owl isn't enough to win your heart, keep in mind that this is the studio responsible for Vikings on Trampolines.

In any case, take some time to play through the 80 mb demo, found here, and we'll reconvene tomorrow for some longform thoughts.

Owlboy Demo Released [TIGSource]

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HurryCane

post from Escape Games 24 on 21 August 2011 09:06:02 PM. © Escape Games 24

Hurry Cane is another addicting and challenging adventure and platform type puzzle game developed by OnlyToughGames. In this game, you have to control the red ball and get it to the exit door. Avoid the obstacles and dangers and as you move forward it'll get more difficult and fun. Use the arrows. Good luck and have fun!Play This Game

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HurryCane Walkthrough

post from Escape Games 24 on 21 August 2011 08:05:45 PM. © Escape Games 24

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Review: 3D Classics: Urban Champion

post from Destructoid on 21 August 2011 08:05:40 PM. © Destructoid

Review: 3D Classics: Urban Champion screenshot

A 3D update of Urban Champion? How did this happen? Here's how I think it went down...

Nintendo President Satoru Iwata (the responsible one) heads over to the house of Nintendo creative mastermind Shigeru Miyamoto (the rambunctious one) on a bright and sunny Saturday, toting a briefcase. It's filled with notes and suggestions on all the aspects of the company that need to be assessed if Nintendo is to survive into the next era of gaming. Stuff like beefing up the online experience on Nintendo consoles, developing portable games that are competitive with smartphone games in both price and quality, creating new IP that captures the imagination of gamers brought up on Mass Effect and Halo, and a myriad of other things that gamers have been begging Nintendo to look at for years.

Cut to twelve hours later. The briefcase remains unopened. Miyamoto and Iwata are both in fuzzy pajamas, eating brownie ice cream, listening to Beatles records, lying on their bellies, staring up at a SD TV, playing old Famicom games on their original cartridges. After spending hours replaying Clu Clu Land and Gyromite, they finally hit upon Urban Champion.

3D Classics: Urban Champion (3DS eShop)
Developer: Nintendo
Publisher: Nintendo
Released: August 18, 2011
MSRP: $4.99

"This game is genius!" giggles Miyamoto. "If only people today understood how great it is!"

Iwata presses pause on the game, grabs Miyamoto by the cheeks, forcibly turns his head towards Iwata's, and looks him dead in the eyes.

"I'm the President of the greatest videogame developer on the planet," he hisses. "I'll make them understand."

"I'll make the world see that it doesn't get any better than Urban Champion. On the 3DS, it will become the most popular portable game of all time."

"Damn straight, son!" bubbles Miyamoto. "Angry Birds can suck Urban Champion's chin-chin [Japanese word for penis]."

OK, maybe it didn't happen exactly like that, but there had to be some kind of non-logic-based Folie à deux at Nintendo for a game like this to be included in the 3D Classics line-up.

Have you ever talked to someone who hates fighting games? I sure have, and I'm usually quick to ask them why they don't enjoy the genre. Most often, they say something along the lines of "They're just stupid. One guy punches another guy until one of the two guys falls down and doesn't get back up. That's all. That's it. That's stupid." In the case of most fighting games, that bleak summation would be missing a lot of the fine details. When it comes to Urban Champion, it's one-hundred percent accurate.

Urban Champion is a versus fighting game with a grand total of one selectable character, who comes equipped with two types of attacks (high and low). That fighter comes in two sizes (weak/fast and strong/slow), giving you a total of four different attacks, spread across two glorious buttons.

As for defensive options, you can block (high or low) and dodge. That's all you get in Urban Champion; no jumping, no ducking, and there sure as hell aren't any Hadoukens. It's sort of like Punch-Out!! turned on its side, except even more simplistic. There aren't even any health meters. The winner of each fight is determined by who can knock the other guy off the opposing side of the screen first.

The combat plays out sort of like competitive rock/papers/scissors, except without the scissors. Rock (high punch) crushes paper (low guard) unless paper (low punch) hits rock (high guard) first, and vice versa. You could also say that Urban Champion is like that non-videogame game where you try to slap someone on the top of their hands before they can move them out of the way. It's game that wholly relies on reflexes and guessing games, rather than on dexterity or complex strategy.

There are a couple of other random elements thrown into the game to keep things from getting totally repetitive. Disapproving neighbors will try to drop flowers pots on you and your combatant. If they score a hit, you'll be dazed, giving your enemy an opportunity for a free attack.

The cops also come by every so often, breaking up the fight and causing the young, eager street toughs to head back to their respective sides of the block to avoid looking like criminals. That causes the fight to more or less start over from scratch, which can be a problem as you also have to watch your stamina and your time as the match goes on. If your stamina runs out, your punches will be much slower; if time runs out, whoever is closest to losing the fight will be hauled off by the cops.

And that's really all there is to the game.

Nintendo didn't add too much to the formula for this re-release. Of course, you get some glasses-free stereoscopic 3D. The game's world and characters are now made from polygons, though they stay completely faithful to the original game's low-res, sprite-based style.

The 3D here looks really good, especially with the angled camera mode turned on. Seeing old NES games remade with new visual pop via the 3DS' glasses-free 3D display still hasn't gotten old for me. I just hope that in the near future, we see more deserving NES games -- games like Kung-Fu, the original Mario Bros., and the previously mentioned Punch-Out!! would be great for this 3D classics treatment.

That's not to say I don't like Urban Champion. I know that I really should dislike it, as it is incredibly stupid, but I just can't help but enjoy it. The game asks so little of the player in terms of thought or effort, and is so quick to reward you for simple violence, that it's hard to not get back more than you put in.

It reminds me a lot of one of the many addicting micro games from the WarioWare series, except stretched out into a full, standalone title. There are a couple of catchy little chip tunes to keep you smiling, some simple and charming little animations, and constant moments of anticipation to keep you playing.

"Am I about to punch a man?", "Are the cops going to catch us being bad?", and most intensely, "Why am I still playing this?" are questions you'll be constantly asking yourself multiple times a second while playing the game. The action, as incredibly shallow and random as it may be, is still non-stop.

Unlike in most real fighting games, there are no moments of breaks between "big moments." There's no waiting out a turtling opponent, no sense of deflation after failing to pull of a big combo, or feeling as though you are incredible outclassed by your enemy. There's also no bordom in being pitted against an opponent you can easily beat the crap out of. With Urban Champion, all you get is non-stop, stupid violence. The enemy A.I. in single player mode also ramps up considerably. I've only been able to get to round 61 (which took about an hour, and earned me the in-game achievement of "Village Champion"). By that point, I was really getting my ass kicked.

A quick save feature allows for you to put the game down if you don't want to slog through that many rounds in one sitting. There is also local multiplayer, though I haven't been able to test that out, as I don't actually know anyone else in real life who is willing to purchase the game. I have played "competitive" Urban Champion on the NES plenty of times though, and assuming that this 3D port is faithful enough, I can wager that the Vs. mode is just as stupid and compelling as the single player "campaign."

All in all, Urban Champion is almost an ungame. There is nearly no design here. I'm sure that most of you will hate it, but I know for a fact that few like-minded readers of Dtoid will have a good time with the game. In fact, I've already gotten a few private messages requesting that I fight them online. The game doesn't actually support online play, which shows just how weirdly enthusiastic fans of Urban Champion can be.

This is an extremely acquired taste. Even fans of the game will likely admit that it is technically shallow and idiotic, almost to the point of self-parody. That said, if you have similar tastes as Miyamoto, Iwata, and myself, you'll find yourself enjoying Urban Champion much more than you rightfully should.

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Retro Game Challenge 2 fan translation lives on

post from Destructoid on 21 August 2011 07:05:41 PM. © Destructoid

Retro Game Challenge 2 fan translation lives on screenshot

We haven't heard anything about the fan translation project for the DS masterpiece Retro Game Challenge 2 (known as Game Center CX 2 in Japan) since February. I was beginning to fear that the project was dead. Thankfully, it looks to be moving forward. The team behind the patch has put up some new screens and soundtrack samples on the official site to prove their dedication to the project.

I imported this game a while back, and I loved it so much that I ended up buying it a again for a few friends. The original Retro Game Challenge was great, but the sequel is so much more expansive and multifaceted. Where the first title looked solely at the evolution of games on the NES/Famicom, the sequel works as a study/parody/tribute of Gameboy games, Gameboy Color games, NES/Famicom games, early PC games, and even climaxes with the the release of the (fake) SNES/Super Famicom.

It would be highly appropriate for this love letter to the dawn of the 16-bit era to make it Western audiences just in time for the 25th birthday of the SNES.

Retro Game Challenge 2 translation update! [TinyCartridge via GoNintendo]

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Preview: Wargame: European Escalation

post from Destructoid on 21 August 2011 06:05:39 PM. © Destructoid

Preview: Wargame: European Escalation screenshot

R.U.S.E. was a pretty fun game to play on the PC, but it felt a bit like Eugen Systems had to hold back on depth to also make it work on the console version.

For Wargame: European Escalation, the developers have seemed to go all out on creating an incredibly realistic, deep, but still fun real-time strategy game that uses an updated version of their IRISZOOM engine used in R.U.S.E.

Wargame: European Escalation (PC)
Developer: Eugen Systems
Publisher: Focus Home Interactive
Release date: November 11, 2011

Wargame is a title about war, set in Europe during an alternate Cold War 1975-1985 era where things escalate. The new version of IRISZOOM features better forests, a much larger draw distance, the ability to zoom in to a unit and see every little detail on a T-72 tank, and it looks like you'll want to see it on as large a display as possible.

Just like in R.U.S.E. you can seamlessly zoom out from the closest zoom level to a strategic map view. Being at the closest -- or closer -- levels of zoom doesn't mean you can't have battlefield control though. Simply move your mouse over the unit you want to focus on in the distance, scroll the mousewheel up, and snap the camera to that unit.

The game looks really impressive, what with the scale of the maps you play on and the amount of detail that's there, although RTS veterans will probably stick with switching from the strategic view to a moderately zoomed out level that lets you easily order units around.

Realism plays a large part in Wargame: European Escalation. Not only because it features a ton of military vehicles and aircraft modeled after their real-world counterparts, but also with respect to the gameplay. Infantry can enter houses, buildings in towns can be destroyed, and because there is no fog of war, all unit intel has to come from line-of-sight. Enemy units can be spotted at range which shows a silhouette of their unit moving around, but you'll have to get closer to identify them fully. That is, unless you can make out the exact vehicle just by the silhouette -- something that can be pretty hard given the amount of units in the game.

Tanks can be positioned in forests or hedgerows where they receive bonuses and stay hidden until spotted -- usually too late to escape the ambush. Traveling through a forest might cause tracked vehicles to de-track, however, and it costs more fuel to drive through.

Using the terrain to your advantage can make all the difference if you take line-of-sight into account, but the enemy will do the same. Hedgerows act as "curtains" to make sure you can't simply see everything on a map with flat terrain. When used properly, a group of tanks in a forest can be hard to get rid of, even if you know they are there. Luckily, forests can be set on fire -- which then spreads depending on weather conditions -- with a flamethrower tank or a volley of missiles from a group of MLRS units. The resulting fire will then potentially spread, depending on the situation.

Using the latter option, you'll have a pretty wide target radius for the MLRS missiles to land in, but if the targeted area is within your own units' line-of-sight, this radius becomes a lot smaller. You might still not make a lot of direct hits with your missiles, but that isn't a huge problem since the enemy units will panic and route because of the sheer force of your barrage. Likewise, you can use scouts to spot enemy units that are just out of range for your tanks to be effective, which increases their hit percentage.

This system of routing works through morale that decreases if nearby units get destroyed, or if a unit comes under sustained heavy fire. If you hit a BMP-2 personnel carrier with a Leopard tank, for instance, it will get stunned as the crew has to recover from the shell's impact, and will probably route shortly afterwards.

Should you make a critical hit on an enemy tank, you can even temporarily disable one of its tech components -- such as a firing computer. Soviet tanks are not very heavy on tech so you might disable a component in a few more advanced models, but making a critical hit on the more advanced NATO tanks can disable them for quite a while.

Every unit has its own fuel and ammo, which need to be resupplied by supply trucks or special Chinooks that share their limited supply with units inside its radius -- with more expensive units eating up supply faster -- or at a Forward Operating Base that has more supply.

In the campaign, you'll have maps divided into regions and something there will be a central location that acts as a victory condition. You start out with a set amount of resources and buy a starting team before the mission begins. Because there are around 320 units in the game, you'd be forgiven for thinking that selecting the right units might take you quite a while. It's not too hard though, as everything is categorized by unit type and every unit has a lot of variations.

A Leopard tank can have around 5-6 types of models to choose from, and every model can be upgraded in veterancy to make it more effective. This costs a lot of money, so you have to choose wisely and decide whether you want a cheap-yet-large army that you need to swarm with, a small-but-powerful and high-tech army, or a balanced mix.

The sheer amount of detail that goes into Wargame: European Escalation is impressive and so are the graphics that make you feel just like you did when you saw World in Conflict for the first time. Even more impressive is how accessible all the information is. All data for hit percentages, effective distance, fuel, ammo, line-of-sight, etc., is displayed in such a way that anyone can understand it after a short tutorial.

I liked R.U.S.E. well enough, even though the "Ruse" system itself wasn't that much fun to use in the campaign, so the major shift to accessible realism in Wargame: European Escalation that turns it into a pure PC RTS left me quite impressed. Definitely one of the RTS games to look for this year.

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Playing dress up in Gotham City Imposters

Playing dress up in Gotham City Imposters screenshot

video details and more

When you leave behind the dark and gritty feel of the current Batman games and add some tongue-in-cheek humor, gameplay and graphics you are left with Monolith's new game, Gotham City Importers.

Gotham City Impostors will be available on PlayStation Network and Xbox Live Arcade next year, and allows players to create their very own Batman (or Joker) with whatever random bits of costume they can unlock (or create), in a delicious online first-person shooter match.

I took some time at gamescom to find out about the game's style, extremely deep customization system and pricing.

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Eight great SNES games that never made it to the
U.S.

Eight great SNES games that never made it to the U.S. screenshot

_{It’s the 20th anniversary of the release of the Super Nintendo! To celebrate, Destructoid is offering a week's worth of SNES-related content. Join us for “Seven days of the Super Nintendo!”}

Given that the Super Famicom has literally twice as many games in its library as the Super Nintendo, it shouldn't come as a surprise that many classics never reached the States.

Although some of the best have been reborn through late-ports (Megaman & Bass, Final Fantasy V), many titles remain in obscurity. Some have yet to even receive a fan translation.

Read on to discover a few.

The below eight titles are by no means the very best of what is out there. However, these picks will give you a good head-start into the world of imports and fan translations and, hopefully, renew your interest in the Super Nintendo/Famicom.

Along with a brief description, I give information on current availability and language barriers for each title.

The Firemen
Developed by Human Entertainment
1994

Human Entertainment never gave much of a damn about the West. Its most acclaimed series -- Clock Tower, Fire Pro Wrestling and Twilight Syndrome (which launched Suda51’s career) -- passed on Western releases for many (or all) of their series entries. You can add The Firemen to that list. Although the SNES debut did reach Europe, its lackluster PlayStation sequel did not.

Before Ignition Factor (which came out two days later) and Burning Rangers, The Firemen was the definitive firefighter-themed action game. You and a buddy are tasked with putting out a fire devouring a highrise. Each level takes place on a different floor, taken over by flame monsters and robots.

You and a surprisingly effective A.I. partner eat away the flames with your water house and (magical?) fire axe. The game is redundant, but oddly addictive considering its subject matter. The level design links all the floors together nicely, recreating the "How the hell am I going to survive this night in this crazy ass building" feeling of Die Hard. Unfortunately, you don't kick anybody out of a window.

Japanese Required?: No. An English version was released in Europe and Australia.

Availability: No ports. Original carts are rare and go for $20-50.

Jikkyou Oshaberi Parodius
Developed by Konami
1995

Other than a Game Boy release and an arcade cabinet, Parodius never made it to the U.S., which is too bad. In addition to being a great companion to Gradius, it’s one of the most colorful, humorous series to come out of Japan.

It’s debatable whether Jikkyou Oshaberi is the best of the series, but I selected this one due to its wacky presentation that outdoes any of its predecessors (the following games in the series were released on disc-based consoles). The game has 16 playable characters that range from a traditional spaceship to a penguin with a 9mm -- there are stranger options but I find them much harder to describe in text. A paper airplane with stick figures chillin’ on top?

The greatest thing about the game are the levels. While you start off fighting a flamingo-dressed panda at a disco, you’ll eventually fight your way through levels and bosses that pay direct homage to other Konami titles. Most memorable has to be the Lethal Enforcers segment of Stage 6, where you shoot down gun range targets while a background depicts penguins driving police cars.

Japanese Required?: No. It's a shmup about penguins and anime girls.

Availability: Sadly, no US release. Parodius Portable (PSP) used to be the best option, but now that it's out of print it's not much more affordable than an original SFC cart ($20-40). The good news is that it's on a lot of systems (SS, PS) so you may get lucky ... one day.

Marvelous: Another Treasure Island
Developed by Nintedno R&D2
1996

Although Nintendo Power dedicated four pages for an extensive preview (issue 93), Marvelous never was released outside Japan.

Most notable for being the first project directed by current Zelda series producer Eiji Aonuma, Marvelous is an adventure-RPG hybrid built-on the Link to the Past engine (borrowing plenty of sounds and assets). The game received positive reviews in Japan and eventually landed Eiji on the Ocarina of Time development team.

Without having played the game (my Japanese isn’t good enough yet), it looks like a mix of A Link to the Past with The Lost Vikings and Earthbound. It’s not surprising Nintendo didn’t bring it out, since they wanted the focus to be on the upcoming launch of the Nintendo 64 (much like Mother 3 with the Nintendo DS). It is surprising, however, that the game hasn’t received a fan translation yet.

Japanese Required?: Yes. Very text-heavy adventure game. This is for those fluent in Japanese or those very patient kanji dictionary owners. There are a couple Gamefaqs.com guides that may provide help, however.

Availability: There are some Japanese ebay users selling carts for around $10. If a rom translation should ever arrive, expect those prices to shoot up. I'm not foolish enough to think this article can have that effect though. :checks price listings: Nope.

Terranigma
Developed by Quintet
1995

Up there with Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy VI and Secret of Mana, Terranigma is just as ambitious, beautiful and well-designed as the best of the Super Nintendo’s RPG epics -- but in many ways, it feels like a game that was too big for the SNES.

This is not a complaint about the game, as much as it is a testament to its massive scale and aspirations. The game begins as an underwhelming take on Soul Blazer, as you essentially revive a dead world by battling your way through five unimaginative dungeons. After the first act of four, the game becomes the true successor to Illusion of Gaia as you travel a world filled with color and variety. By the third act, Terranigma truly becomes an adventure beyond compare.

Terranigma is unique in many ways, but what stands out is the game's overarching world which is, literally, our own. Once you break free of the underworld within the game's opening hours, you find yourself on a dead Earth -- the planet we know and (maybe) love, except with all its life sucked out. Without giving away too much, you find yourself on a journey through Earth's history as you travel from ancient tribes to a future vision of Tokyo.

I’m going to stop here because I can go on for paragraphs and already have gone on for paragraphs about this game. There is no other game like this one and few action-RPGs greater.

Japanese Required?: No. An English version was released in Europe.

Availability: A cart will set you back at least $100. This is really one of those games people need to demand to be released on Virtual Console.

Maka Maka
Developed by Office Koukan
1992

I think the video sells itself.

Japanese Required?: Yes. Text heavy RPG, although I get the feeling it wouldn't make much more sense if you knew Japanese.

Availability: Original copies are somewhat rare, but go for cheap: $20 or so.

Seiken Densetsu 3
Developed by Squaresoft
1995

The spiritual successor to Secret of Mana, Seiken Densetsu 3 is a complete mess of a game. But, a very enjoyable and ambitious mess.

Yes, I know: These are the words of someone who favors Secret of Mana (by a long shot, no less). Yet, even I appreciate the dense, intertwined storylines that far predate those of Dragon Age. At the start of the game, you get to pick your three main characters out of a selection of six. The story, combat and events of the game will be different according to who you pick. Back when the game came out -- or even, 2000, when the game received a fan translation -- thinking about what changes occur depending on your selection boggled the mind.

Where the game shines is in the combat, which does away with SoM’s power meter and unreliable hit-detection. It’s not as good as Terranigma (God, I love that slide), but it’s a step-up from SoM. I also love the class-based system that lets you change your role throughout the game, further expanding on crafting your individual playthrough.

All of these options, along with inferior music and art direction, make me prefer the more cohesive, linear Secret of Mana but this is a great sequel that doesn’t rest on the series’ laurels.

Japanese Required?: No. Fan translation rom exists.

Availability: No ports. Original carts are fairly common and go for $10-30.

Star Ocean
Developed by tri-Ace
1996

During the development of Tales of Phantasia (another great Japanese game lost in translation), developer Wolf Team had a falling out with publisher Namco. Half of the team left to form tri-Ace most well known for its Star Ocean series.

The original Star Ocean is most similiar to Tales of Phantasia; it even borrows a lot of the tech introduced in that title, such as voice samples and advanced compression techniques that let Wolf Team fit 48 megabits onto one cart. For comparison, Final Fantasy VI was 24 megabits.

Although the game’s story is full of cliche -- feeling like a anime-themed Star Trek episode at times -- the graphics are some of the best of its era and the game is full of innovative systems. The real-time combat keeps things interesting, while the skills and item crafting offer depth. The story is dull, but the multi-path narrative, party selection (you get to recruit 8 of 11 characters in a single playthrough) and emotion system, that lets party members react to your decisions, give the game some maturity.

Japanese Required?: No. You have fan translations and the PSP remake.

Availability: The PSP remake is a different beast but a much more affordable option. A SFC cart will cost you about $20-30.

_{[Header image credit: Rain or Shine]}

---------------

Eight is an oddly confining number that doesn't even touch the surface of what great Japanese games we never received, which is why I will be launching a series next month that will cover obscure, Japan-only games for the Super Famicom and other now-ancient systems.

If you have any questions about the above titles you felt weren't answers in the post, feel free to post in the comments below. I'd also love to hear what your favorite SNES games that never received a US release are! Who knows, maybe I'll cover them in an upcoming feature?!