Zelda: A Link to the Past

Zelda: A Link to the Past is one of the great classic SNES games in the Zelda series. The third installment in the “Legend of Zelda” series, it was released in North America in 1991. Though many games at that time were coming out with the now popular “Third Person” 3d perspective, this Zelda installment stayed with the favorite “Birds Eye” top down perspective that had worked for it so far. The battle system stays true as well, your sword and shield being all you ever need.

The game play is very similar to the other Link installments made before this, the only thing that’s changed is that the graphics got a bit prettier, the bosses got far more dangerous, and the world and storyline is much more involved.

I’ve played and re-played this game so many times, but it still offers challenges and pleasant surprises for me.

If you’re looking for this game to play again (and you don’t want to visit eBay and dig out your old SNES), it was re-released again recently for the Game Boy Advanced in a dual-game cartridge with The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords.

Graphics: 4 (could have used a bit more work, they’re a bit jumpy sometimes)
Sound: 3 (music is still the same, but still wonderful)
Gameplay: 5 (always fun, always challenging)
Storyline: 4 (surprisingly deep for a Zelda game)

(Note: All ratings are on a 1-5 basis, with 5 being the highest)

No Oblivion For Christmas?

Much to my and many friends’ dismay, it seems that The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, expected at first to be available for Christmas, won’t be out for this year in the end, but for a yet undefined date, somewhere between February and April 2006. This is bad news for those who were awaiting it with impatience, and a hard blow for MicroSoft, the game being one of the big titles planned for the launch of the Xbox 360.

Take-Two said that the game won’t be released until it’s fiscal Q2, which means some time between February and April of 2006. The company’s President and CEO, Paul Eibeler, says that the delay is to ensure quality of the product. According to Eibeler, the game’s developer, Bethesda Softworks, requires “additional development time to ensure the title meets gamers’ high expectations for this popular franchise”.

Rendez-vous next year, as we say in my country. And now, I need to find another Christmas gift for my boyfriend. Drats.

Renaissance Kingdoms

For these moments when you want to play a game online but don’t have much time to dedicate to it everyday, here’s one of these little “management/roleplay” games that will only demand you a few minutes of your time: Renaissance Kingdoms (also available in French at Les Royaumes Renaissants). It’s free (unless you want to take a paying account, in which case the character will be a Noble), it’s played online in a simple web browser, and you don’t need to do more than your share if you don’t want to.

The basics are simple: your character starts as a peasant in the Renaissance setting. The first goal is to feed him/her (simple bread is the poor peasant’s friend when starting!), and to find ways of earning money, the most common being hiring yourself at a mine, as soldier in the local army, or by cultivating your little parcel of soil. More interaction with other players and within the game is of course possible: you can put offers to hire people to work for you, craft items and sell them later on when you reach a certain level, chat with other players in the various taverns where you can also buy food, and so on.

So, as said, not very complex, not very demanding, you can stop whenever you want, and it can be fun to give it five minutes here and there (if you plan on not playing for several days, park the character at a church: at least he’ll be fed and you won’t find him dead from starvation!). At least it has lasted me for more than one week already, which isn’t that bad at all for such a little thing.

Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion

Everybody remembers Arena, Daggerfall and Morrowind? Yes? No? You should! Not only have these games marked their time, but the fourth opus of the Elder Scrolls series is now to come soon… very soon… on our beloved machines. I’ve seen a pretty snazzy demo of the game recently, and both my boyfriend and I were in awe while watching it. Not only were the graphisms stunning, but they also leave room to much interaction with the background and the items pertaining to it (even animals, too; the demo showed one NPC ’shooting’ her dog with some kind of calming spell, and it was quite funny to watch).

In any case, for more information about this sure-to-be monster of gaming, here’s what IGN published about it yesterday:

We played through much of the same areas we saw at X05, which is basically the training area for Oblivion. At the start you’ll pick your race and customize your character’s appearance, eventually you’ll pick a birth sign, and a little while after that you’ll be charged with selecting your major skills and attributes. When you go to pick all your final attributes you’ll also be given the choice to change any of the conditions you’d previously selected, right down to your character’s name.

As you select what kind of character you want to be you can pick warrior or thief presets from a list, modify them, or create and name your own class, much like in Morrowind. Unlike Morrowind, Oblivion gives you the chance to try out some of the game’s skills before you finalize everything.

On our way through the training catacombs we were able to pick locks. These sequences switch to a different screen where you’re tasked with tapping tumblers into an unlocked position. As the tumblers move upward you need to press A at their apex to correctly fix them in place so you can open the container or door. Your security skill determines how difficult the tumblers are to manipulate and how many tumblers you’ll need to tap. You can also tell the game to automatically resolve the lockpick sequence instead of doing it manually, but this seemed to result more often than not in broken picks.

An article a tad bit technical, about the various character and skills possibilities, but doesn’t it make you wish that it was already available? For me, it sure does.

Final Fantasy: A Look Back

I love the role-playing video game genre. The Final Fantasy games are as much a staple of the role-playing genre as good old fashioned Dungeons and Dragons. Some of the FF games are much better than others. I think the most beloved of all the Final Fantasy games is Final Fantasy III (or FF VI in Japan). Other great FF games are VII, VIII, and X. Here is how I rate them:

1.) Final Fantasy III- The most engaging storyline, the most memorable characters, and the most excellent gameplay of all the Final Fantasy games. Just imagine if this one had graphics that were worth a bean. One of my most favorite things about this game is that there are 15 playable characters, and it seems like most of them have a pretty neat story as well as cool abilities. This video game would make a pretty fantastic movie (when I make my millions, that is my first order of business, to make this into a story).

2.) Final Fantasy X- This game has a great magic system, which is much like Final Fantasy III (probably why it is so great). It has a great story and memorable characters. Although, I felt like the ending was disappointing. It had excellent side quests. The final bosses were not too challenging (that may have been a tribute to my time spent leveling up, but I wasn’t too impressed, regardless). Overall, though, I had a blast throughout the entire game.

3.) Final Fantasy VII- This game had pretty decent graphics (if you look past the outrageous polygon-pop). The story is quite good. The magic system is pretty interesting (though a little tough to learn at first). The characters are lovable and enduring.

4.) Final Fantasy VIII- This game had great graphics, and neat movie sequences. However, it had a very confusing story. It was difficult to identify with the characters, and the magic system absolutely stunk. Since the magic system stunk and the Aeons were so powerful, I would give up on my magic attacks and regular attacks and just use my Aeons over and over again (it would take forever to watch the little Aeon video clips, so after awhile it would get quite tiresome). If you have the opportunity to buy this game, don’t; rent a movie instead. The only redeeming feature of this game is its cool graphics and beautiful movie scenes.

Fable Going Gold For PC

I had already blogged in here about the “good vs evil” choices in video games, giving Fable as an example (and an interesting one). Well, PC owners, rejoice, for this game is now going to be available on our dear computers, and not only on Xbox anymore: on September 20th, Fable indeed goes gold, as announced by GameSpot, and not only in its original version. New spells, quests, armors and regions to explore have been added, to answer the often-voices reproach that the game wasn’t of “epic-length” enough.

Last year’s ambitious “choose your own adventurer” role-playing game, Fable, is about to complete its long journey from the Xbox to the PC, as Microsoft Game Studios today announced that Fable: The Lost Chapters has gone gold and will hit stores September 20.
[…]
Though it was fairly well received, one of the common knocks against the game was its less-than-epic length. This prompted developer Lionhead to go back to the PC release and add new spells, quests, armor, enemies, and regions to explore. An Xbox version of Fable: The Lost Chapters is expected before the end of the year as part of the Platinum Hits line of games with a $19.99 price tag.
[…]
Fable: The Lost Chapters is rated M for Mature and will retail for $49.99 on the PC.

Here’s something that definitely needs to be kept under the eyes—at least by myself, and probably by lots of RP gamers out there.

World Premiere: Elveon

As seen on Gamesindustry.biz, 10TACLE STUDIOS Slovakia has unveiled their current project, “Elveon”, on the Games Convention in Germany.

“Elveon” means “The book of elves” and is based on a comprehensive fantasy saga which goes back to the times of the rise of the advanced Elvish civilization. The gods have left the world of Naon in a rush, it is the place they had wanted to transform into their paradise. The Neamas, the elves of the ancient times and fellows of the gods have remained there all alone. A smouldering conflict is gaining more and more importance and a new era starts which is marked by envy, malevolence and relentless wars that prevent the gods’ descendants from entering upon their inheritance.

More information is available on the official website, www.elveon.com.

Heretics Kingdom 2: Revealed?

Found on Chris Bateman’s blog, in the middle of his Where Next With CRPGs entry:

We’re still working with 3D People, and a new Heretic Kingdoms game is in the works. For this one, we’re working on it from the beginning, so we are able to attempt much more. We’re keeping several of the factors that worked well in the first one, such as the simplified healing system, and the Attunement system - although the latter is being improved. The new system is broken into streams of development - it gives the player greater control over how and which Attunements the player learns. In effect, it provides a bespoke class system which the player has control over.

One thing that we’re taking a step backwards on is the character attributes. In the first game, we wanted to keep it as simple as possible. But one thing has become apparent from post-release feedback - the core audience (which is inevitably a Hardcore audience) for these games actually enjoy a little bit of the “spreadsheet full of numbers” - perhaps because it allows them to identify the character in an easy to understand fashion. So we’re providing more of a conventional attribute system, although it will remain simple and accessible.

The next Heretic Kingdoms game will have an open world. We always wanted it for the first game, but it was always going to be too expensive. This time, we can make it happen. The linear structure has its place, but it’s nice to be able to offer the player a world to explore. And similarly, we’re able to give the player more choice as to their starting character. There should be a choice of gender at the very least. We’re also exploring ways to make the world more dynamic… I shouldn’t say too much about this, because at the moment we can’t be sure which elements of this will work.

This, of course, is far from being an official announcement, and the game would still be a good year away or even more than that, but still, it’s something.