Gamer--freakz

Been awhile since my previous post on greatest game character. Well, its time for dante to step down and introduce another great character! Today's greatest game character is the renowned black hammer from darksiders, ulthane!

Ulthane is badass, and hes probably the only badass character in the darksiders game. Sure the game had its fair share of cool looking characters, but none of them can compare to the all so awesome ulthane. Its a shame that ulthane doesnt play a major part in the story (though he does end up crafting the armagedon blade after war collects all the shards), but if he did, the story wouldnt be as interesting, since ulthane would probably end up smashing the destroyer with his bland looking but insanely powerful hammer.





War is downright puny compared to ulthane.


Your first encounter with ulthane will probably already reveal much of his badass-ness. While you are actually sent to kill ulthane by samael, theres a slight problem. Yep, thats right, when war runs into the black hammer himself, he doesnt know whats coming. War's fight with ulthane doesnt end very well, his attacks wont pierce him, and most of war's arsenal will barely scratch ulthane. Even with war lobbing cars, sign posts and poles at the big lug, ulthane just says that flinging stones at him wont work. To even  damage ulthane, war has to go all out and enter chaos mode, in which ulthane stated that it "stung" a little.

Basically saying, war, the already powerful and cool looking guy that he is (come on he is practically feared by almost everyone in the game), had to go chaos form to fight on equal grounds with ulthane. Well its fair to say that during that time, war only had part of his power with him, but even if the war at the start of the game were to fight ulthane, he still would need chaos mode to hit ulthane. If the fight dragged, Im sure ulthane would come out on top.

Personality wise, ulthane is very likeable. He seems like a cocky fella, but for his strenght, he definetely deserves it. Hes a lone wolf, and an awesome one at that. He lives alone outside of griever's lair, forging weapons in his house, and always tells trespassers to piss off. He looks down on people, in a funny way. While war is extremely feared as one of the 4 horsemen, ulthane just calls out to him "oy, horseman, over here" casually like nothing. Also, when his fight with war is interupted by the angels, he is NOT pleased, and goes on to kill the angels with war. "Shove off, pigeons!" is all I have to say. The angels are nothing but pigeons to him, just great.






This is exactly how ulthane treats wanabes like war.

  To say the least, ulthane is skilled with his hammer, he flings it with such force that its like a boomerang, and it able to shatter the hard ice blocks that war can destroy with his gaunlets. He is also strong enough to gap open shut doors that war cannot open. Hes also a renown blacksmith, and that before the war, he took part in the forging of the armagedon blade. This of course, makes him kinda wanted, but even as a lone wolf, no one dares to look for him, since they would probably fall under the might of his awesome hammer. He also crafts a sweet gun for war, known as the mercy, as a "reward" for killing the griver. When war threatens to shoot ulthane by pointing the mercy at him, he daringly puts his head on the tip of gun, and says that hes not afraid of death. Now THATS what I call a man.

Ulthane is one of the very few characters from such a tale that I am seriously interested in. Games like dragon age or warcraft have very little characters that appealed to me, but seriously, ulthane just reeks of awesomeness. I know that a darksiders 2 has been announced, and I seriously hope for some ulthane in that game. Great to see that games such as these still have amazingly appealing characters.


"Do I like like I'm afraid of death to ye?"-Ulthane, the black hammer

Opening songs
OP 1-Balance kiss

Genres:Comedy,ecchi,romance

I have ALOT of animes to catch up on, in terms of reviews. So I think I may have to speed things up abit. Whats more, Im watching anime at quite a constant pace nowadays (theres absolutely nothing much to do), I might even say my anime priorities are overtaking my gaming priorities, shit. Anyway, yeah, kiss x sis, your everyday comedy and everyday life anime. Why should you even bother about this show, theres really nothing interesting going on. Well, there is 1 reason why people watch this, such as myself. Who wouldnt like to see twin hot sisters fighting over thier little brother?

Ayana taketatsu hasnt been on my radar of j-pop artists until lately, so I didnt know balance kiss was sang by her. Anyway, compared to Help!!Hell side from MM!, balance kiss kinda pales out. Not that its a bad song....its just, too cutesy and pop-ish for my taste. Definetely not her best work.


Rating:7.0/10

To be fair, the show does not offer much. Sure its funny on a regular basis, and it does offer a shit load of fanservice (and GOOD fanservice to boot), but story wise theres nothing much going on. Its your typical harem which includes its own share of girls and ladies of big boobs/ flat chests and such. Sure there are male characters, but like most of these shows they arent paid much attention. Most of these everyday harem anime characters are pretty much the same as other counterparts of the genre, but the two sisters however...they are different. They are the 2 characters that keep the show funny and worth to watch. It always entertains me to think how the sisters will try ways to lure their brother over to thier side. Oh and that 1 teacher, shes funny, to say the least. 



Imagine if you were the brother of these twin sisters, hell yeah!

 So, the story revolves around another single lucky young man, by the name of suminoe keita. Keita, like most main characters, is an everyday normal high school student. He has friends to laugh, slack off and talk to about girl prefrences. However, keita has 2 very hot twin sisters and all his friends are jealous of him. In fact, his sisters are so hot that when they go from thier high school to keita's middle school, all the boys flock over to them. His twin sisters, ako and reko are so called "in love" with thier brother, and always try to get him to love them. Though he does on the inside, he just doesnt like to show it. Everyday, the twin sisters try to attract his attention with erotic methods, and in the episodes they each take turns to have a go at him. Of course, the anime isnt only about the 2 sisters (altough they ARE the main focuses here), there are others who want to have a go at our lucky boy keita, a freshman and her sister, a local teacher at the high school that ako and reko attend. Theres also a certain bespectaled girl who tends to pee herself (I know, what the hell) when she finds herself with keita. Its mostly coincidental, but yeah, kinda stupid.

Kiss x sis is very typical, but the twin sisters ako and reko make the show a good watch. Its entertaining to see them just take turns to grab keita's attention, or just go at each other to fight over trivial things, such as a pair of boxers (that belong to keita), or just to see who gets to sleep with him. Its entertaining to an extent, making kiss x sis not that bad of an anime. Still, there are better harems out there.

Peace.

Gamespot score:8.5(great)

my score:8.3

(+)Pros:-Superb fighting engine,-amazing visuals that look flashy and impressive,-mind blowing soundtrack,- great character roster,-online play rarely lags and plays quite smoothly,-well suited for both beginners and veterans alike

(-)Cons:-Story mode is non-existant,-game feels half-finished

gameplay time:50 hours+

Been awhile since marvel 3 made its debut in stores, and its been awhile since I posted my review on gamefaqs. Im tempted to just copy and paste the whole chunk of text here but...meh, its all good. I'll write the review anew, but I won't state as many facts as I did in the gamefaqs since that was a whole fk load of text ( I think over 2000 words?). Anyway, back to the game, marvel 2 was always one of the most competitive games in the fighting game community, with marvel 3 out, many will expect alot out of it, being the successor to the 10 year old monster which was marvel 2. Does it live up to the name, hell yeah it does, but for a game that took so long to develop, we sure are missing a damn lot of stuff.



Story wise.....theres nothing to talk about. We were promised a good story from capcom, and that it would even be written by frank tieri(I think?), one of the genuises behind the marvel comics. But what we ended up getting was no way close a story....Anyway, the gist of it is that wesker teams up with doom, who recruits some of marvel's most sinister minds to join the worlds of marvel and capcom in an attempt to conquer them. Mind you, none of this was even mentioned in the game, this was the wiki explanation. In the game, all we get are the 4 cool ass episodic trailers that explain more than the game's main story endings. Each and every character gets an ending, 2 comic planel illustrations with text. Cool huh? I know right. And the thing is, those illustrations hardly explain anything related to the story, its just random stuff like meeting with other character cameos and talking about some random crap.




Yep, sorry everyone, sent's back, and theres nothing you can do about it.

Despite the very pathetic excuse for a story, marvel 3 excels in its fighting engine. Yep, its one of the best out there, it takes the marvel 2 engine and improves upon it to make it a superb fighting game. There are a total of 38 characters, inclusive of 2 DLC characters (yea its capcom, deal with it). Of the 36 character roster there are quite alot of familiar faces. Wolverine, Ryu, Morrigan, Hulk, Doctor doom, magneto, chun-li and some others should be no strangers to the MVC players. There also also new added characters, some of which are realy cool. Among the newcomers we get cool characters like dante, zero, wesker, deadpool and others. Of course, we have the weirder new comers, such as M.O.D.O.K, she-hulk, amaterasu and others. Even the infamous MSS team makes thier comeback! But nonetheless, the roster is good, and all 38 characters have distinctive play styles and assists.

You can mix and match around to make the perfect team, you have alot of choices, the assists especially, all characters have 3 assists each, and you can work out which assist is best to hook up with your team. Add all these up with the fighting system, you get a fighting game with alot of depth. Theres alot you can have, air comboing with your point character, using assists to OTG for longer combos is one popular choice. Or theres also using assists to either help put pressure on your enemies or make it easier for your point character to get in. Theres alot of depth, and each individual character has long and impressive looking combos of thier own, provided you learn them.




Spencer gives magneto a tase of the bionic arm.

 Marvel 3's fighting system doesnt end there. Theres alot to the game, snap backs, aerial exchange, team counters, DHC, blah blah blah...Throw them all in and you got one complex game, though the button scheme is relatively simple. 3 attack buttons and 1 special button. Its really simple, noobs can easily jump and get the hang of the game real quick. But veterans wont feel left out, since the in-depth fighting will keep them occupied. Still, capcom even threw in simple mode, which is....stupid. The game is simple enough, simple mode simplifies the game even more for babies to play. Its an okay addition...but its not needed. Theres training mode (self explanatory) to test combos, and mission mode to discover new combos. Mission mode is boring but its a good place to learn bnbs. After you get your combos and bearings straight, you can have a go at the online mode, which may I add, runs smoothly.

Button input lags may still be bad, but the net code isnt as bad as lets say, tekken. You will rarely run into matches that give you 2-3 second button input lags, provided you search matches in your own region. You will spend most of your time in online mode, so this makes your experience alot better. There are both ranked and player matches, ranked of course, affects your win/lose record, while player matches are matches you play for fun. Player matches are of course, more recommended, since everyone plays for fun. Ranked matches are filled with spammers and tier whoring faggots (such as myself), its play to win here, so dont be suprised seeing same teams of overpowered characters over and over. All in all, its a great experience.




Poor deadpool, having to eat darkness illusion head on.

Flaw wise, I can name quite alot. The game is practically half finished. The story mode is bad, as I said, its practically non existant.  Whats more, theres too little single player content. Just arcade, versus, training and mission mode wont cut it. Theres alot of stuff that could be here are missing, and thats just sad. Survival and time attack, just to name a few, altough there are people who dont play these, there are always casuals who dont want to play online to get thier asses kicked, and when they turn to offline and theres nothing to do, its a sad case. Online mode has only one flaw, but its a critical one. The lobbies, they have lack of spectator mode. Now this is ridiculously stupid, all fighting games with online functions up to today have spectator modes, MVC 3 doesnt have one. Thats just nonsense. If you join lobbies, while waiting for your turn, you see other players' liscense cards bang each other and a bunch of life bars going down, sure, thats exciting. And if you happen to join an 8 player lobby match...god help you.

Marvel vs capcom 3 is a half finished package that could have been alot better. The gameplay is top notch, definetely, IMO it easily beats games like blazblue or tekken, easily. The fighting is flashy and the visuals are awesome, its too bad that theres so much missing for it to be one of the best fighting games of all times. Word is that there is a super MVC 3 coming out, thats just dumb, we'll see how that goes.



Happy gaming!

Gamespot score:9.0(Editor's choice)

my score:7.8

(+)Pros:-Great multiplayer,-story is unexpectedly clever,-impressive visuals,-variety of weapons give players more options,-well made maps,-zombie mode is incredibly addictive.

(-)Cons:-Core shooting mechanics are derative,-campaign is stupidly short,-plays and feels exactly the same as MW 2

Gamepay time:20 hours+

Call of duty is one franchise I do loathe a lot. There are a lot of results for this. The online community is bad, people who yell at you over the speaker for killing them over and over, or scolding your parents just because you suck. Pathetic, really. Plus, ever since call od duty:MW, nothing has been done to improve it. Every year around november, they release a new COD game with new weapons and a new campaign, and somehow it gets good reviews. Seriously, this is getting very stupid. While COD as a franchise is good, the developers should seriously step up thier game and make something new, instead of creating the same game over and over. Still, black ops isnt bad, but it wasnt as great as MW when it 1st debuted. Heres the letdown.



The story is black ops is one of its stronger points. It pits you in the shoes of Mason, an agent who constantly after a group of evil schemers. Ever since he is captured and sent to vorkuta for imprisonment, he has been dead set on returning the favour, especially to thier leader, dragovich. The story is very short, but  even if its short, its a good ride. You are sent around the world to beat out the organization and play as different characters. But all in all, the story is cleverly planned out, and I cant really tell you the important parts without spoiling the story's true suprise. It may seem very simple and derative, but once the big suprise unfolds, its one huge mind fuck.

Shoot your enemies the same way you usually do all the time.

If you have played another call of duty before in your life, you should fairly know how black ops plays. As usual, you go around shooting others up, get points and such. Blah blah blah, its all been done before. Luckily, theres a bunch of weapons for you to use, ranging from rifles to crossbows and even grenade launchers. Most of the in-game weapons are accessable in the campaign, which means that just playing the arcade will already get you opened up to what cool weapons you get to expect, and what you get to use in the multiplayer( which is probably the game's main focus anyway).

Visually, the game does impress. Environment and enemy details are great, and setting of icy mountain bases and cities getting blown up really do well to provide some flashy eye candy. The game's characters, though little, provide good dialouge, though as AI, they dont do really well since they seem to be shooting air 90% of the time. Though it doesnt really matter since they cant really die, they constantly shout at you to take cover while they constantly get shot up and jus keep standing there.

Gun your enemies from a distance.

The multiplayer is black ops, or in fact, any call of duty's strong and main point. Yes, indeed, the multiplayer is great. The maps are well varied, and having the excitement of gunning down another human player while keeping your streak is entertaining. The streak system still works here, like how you get enough kill streaks and you are granted a free support, such as radar, helicopter, or the new ridiculously well made remote control toy car. As usual, gaining a kill streak and having it keep going feels great. Of course, the class system makes a return. Before every match, you are allowed to pick either a preset class or a custom class that you made yourself. Custom classes are obviously preferable but for those who dont know what to make of in thier dream character, the preset provide a good start.

You only get a few preset classes at the start and unlock more as you rank up. There are also the basic assortment of modes that you get in the previous COD games, but many can agree that the best modes are still deathmatches and team deathmatches, since nothing beats core killing shooting without having any objectives. And lets not forget the incredibly addictive zombie mode. Zombie mode pits you in 1 of 2 maps, playing as one of four playable characters that either friends or online strangers play as. In this survivial mode, you fight off against a horde of zombies that come at you in waves, of course with each wave getting even move instense. Be it alone or as a group, zombie mode is fun as heck.





Flying helicopters and many other vehicles help stray from the derative shooting.

 Black ops is fun, but its no different from the MW 2 released the year before it. They just threw in a few new guns, a new campaign and name give it a new game, its so ridiculous its not even funny. The shooting too, its incredibly derative. Theres nothing to it besides pointless shooting with just different weapons, luckily in the campaign, control of vehicles stray away from that. Plus, for the whole game, you will be just killing soldiers, nothing more, and thats just lame. The soldiers dont even have variety to them (except for those armored dudes in vortuka, they were cool). Finally, the campaign. It is good, dont get me wront, but it doesnt take a genius to figure out how incredible short it is. Even on my 1st run, it took me no more than 5 hours to finish it.

Black ops is just another entry to the COD franchise. Nothing really new, innovative, or mind blowing about it, its just your run of the mill COD game. Theres a third one coming this year, good god, how much worse can this game. As I said, black ops isnt bad, but if they dont throw out something really new this year for MW3, the game will seriously start to bore.



Happy gaming.

Boss health

Maiden Astraea
HP:3055
Skills:Heal, God's wrath

Garl vinland
HP:varies*
Skills:Attack, Parry and riptose*, God's wrath, Heal

Depraved ones
HP:200+
Note:Does nothing

Plague babies
HP:varies*
Skill:Attack

Difficulty:1/5
Times died on 1st playthrough: 2

Ok, been a long time since the previous boss profile, but here we are. After taking down the ridiculously easy dirt colossus, you are given a path downwards, take it to find yourself in front of yet another fog gate, which contains maiden astraea, IMO the easiest boss in the game. Maiden astraea is the boss of 5-3, dirty colossus archstone.




Garl vinland protecting Astraea.

Main astraea is probably the one and only boss in the game you can sympthatize with, story wise I mean. While most of the in game bosses are just big baddies that stand in your way, astraea actually has a notable background. She learnt the truth, and thus, wants to give hope to those who have abandoned thiers. For that she intook a demon soul, and garl vinand, never leaves her side, and is most likely her protector or gurdian. It is also hinted that garl vinland perhaps loves astraea, so killing garl probably will make you feel bad. She even offers herself up after you have killed garl. Such a sad but unpreventable fate.

Heal- Both astraea and garl have access to this. Nothing much, just a simple healing spell that heals about 20% of thier HP.

God's wrath- Again, both bosses have access to this. Nothing much, once again, since it has a relatively slow casting time. Still, it does alot of damage, so do avoid it.

Attack- Something both garl and the deadly plague babies do. Garl just slams his Bramd down, and will do some good damage, but its slow, meaning that its easy to avoid. The plague babies just maul you, but if they successfully do so, you will get severly stunned and all the surrounding plague babies will get a go at you. Combine this with plague status effect and you got yourself a deadly combo.

Parry and riptose*- If you unlucky enough to get caught in this, then too bad. Garl parries your blow and returns with a hit painful enough to one hit kill you.

When you first enter the area, you will get a speech from astraea herself, pleading you to leave. Sadly, we cant do so, as much as you sympathize with her, we have to kill her for the demon soul, plus the fog gate just closed on us.There are alot of other enemies in the area, but you dont really have to kill them. Astraea is completely killable with arrows alone. Just head right, kill all of the depraved ones( who do absolutely nothing to stop you), stand at the ledge, and let astraea have it. She cannot and will not fight back, but she will heal herself, meaning you will need alot of arrows to kill her. Just keep shooting until she goes down, and you will automatically win.

If you want to do this the normal way, just head left instead of right. Keep moving along the platform and you will face garl vinland, who talks to you as well, telling you that he will not let your harm astraea. Hes really easy, just think of him as a normal knight with a lot of HP. He's able to attack, cast gods wrath, heal and parry you. Normally, he just attacks, and since hes using such a huge weapon, expect his blows to be slow ones. But of course, expect them to hurt. When you see him prepping an attack, just roll back and strike him with a quick weapon. Rinse and repeat, he will fall soon. Of course, you should only attack after he does, since blindy attacking him just wastes your stamina, as he likes to block. Also, attacking blindly always increases the chance of getting parried and riptosed, which is how I died on my 1st try.

Garl also has the ability to perform miracles. When you see him take out his talisman, he will try to either heal, or cast god's wrath. Both are relatively slow, so you can act accordingly. When you see him cast heal (yellow aura), give him a few good smacks. When you see god's wrath coming (blue aura), move away. Whats more, if you knock him to a low health amount, he starts to duel wield his bramd, making his attacks more pain staking. Still, when you see this happen, be happy, since he cant block anymore, just hammer with fast attacks and he will fall. A small note, sometimes if you get hit by garl, you will fall into the swamps below....and you will die by the hands of the plague babies. Thats how I died a second time.

Anyway, after killing Garl, the battle is as good as done. Garl apologizes to astraea for not being able to protect her. After garl's death, just walk over to astraea and talk to her. She automatically breaks down after hearing garl's death, and states that she has no means to defend herself anymore. She commits suicide and gives you her demon soul.

This is a sad battle, but you do not have a choice. Still, the fight is very easy. Garl isnt even technically a boss, just a knight with better stats and the ability to cast miracles. Astraea herself practically doesnt do anything. Astraea will drop the pureblood demon soul, use it well.

Peace.

Gamespot score:6.7(fair)

my score:7.3

(+)Pros:-Fast and intense combat that constantly keeps you on your toes,-great dungeon crawling mechanics,-characters have hilarious personality,-intense satisfaction upon beating bosses,-izuna is just hawt :)

(-)Cons:-Difficulty can be ridiculously hard,-lack of attack variety,-talisman system can be hard to learn.


gameplay time:10-20 hours

So....blogger went down for abit, another good reason why they shud step up their game. Anyway, for today's game, its an old one. Enter Izuna, one of gaming's hottest chicks. She's the star is her own game, which features intense old school dungeon crawling thats hard enough to drive away the weak hearted gamers who got the game just cause izuna looks cute. Though I did get the game based on izuna's appearance alone (I know, stupid me), the game did push me alot, almost to the point I wanted to fling my entire DS, but hey, Izuna is a good game, if you got the balls for it, its really satisfying.



The story is mostly comical, and based on something really straightfoward and simple. Izuna is simply an unemployed ninja, following her grandboss, along with 2 of her colleagues, her "sister" and a perverted ninja, all four ninjas mix together well and easily comprehend each other. One fine day the 4 stumble unto a humble village, and while sightseeing, izuna, being her greedy self, goes on to temper with a floating crystal in the village, and that caused the entire village to go haywire. Everyone except izuna goes crazy, including her 2 companions and grandboss. She wants to leave the village, but grandboss refuses, so she has to fix this. Apparently, it was "the wrath of the gods", punishing the land, so izuna travels to the 5 lairs of the 5 gods surrouding the village, to "convince" them to put out the curse.




Isnt izuna adorable?  But being adorable simply isn't enough to survive the harsh dungeons of the land.

 Izuna is a dungeon crawler, and old school dungeon crawler that punishes even the toughest of hardcore gamers. There are 7 dungeons in the game, and all of them are punishing, and when you enter the 1st dungeon, you can immediately feel that the game is not suited for light hearted gamers. Casuals may suffer from countless deaths, and will give up not long after. The moment you enter a dungeon, you are immediately thrown at a random position in an ever changing floor. The dungeons in izuna change constantly, so theres no way to remember the floor layouts or enemy positions. Each and every floor in the dungeons of izuna always change, so its very hard to adapt.

 Enemies flood each and every floor, hampering your exploration. These enemies have quite some variety, and mostly look funny. Though, they are seriously not to be fooled around with, izuna has a very punishing "turn by turn" system. Everytime you do something, such as take a step, use a talisman, or eat a potion, every enemy in the map gets a move too. So if you are being cornered by 2 enemies, good luck, since while you constantly hit one monster, both monsters will be constantly clobbering you for some painful damage. And if you take too long to beat them and other monsters come along... you can be prepared to find yourself in front of the inn not too long after.




Kagen is hungry, and he wants to eat you. Be prepared to die.

While getting clobbered by mere enemies is commonplace in izuna, there are other things that make the game even harder. In the later dungeons, invisible traps make their appearance, and getting hit by a monster trap or a teleport trap isnt cool, belive me. While you encounter many things that can practically destroy you, its all not that bad. If you can adapt yourself to the battle system, you can easily survive a few floors (of course you will be hit, dont expect to go off unbruised). Everytime you die, you lose all money and items, but that can be avoided if you play well. Izuna is made so that the game isnt really cheap, but if you died...it just means you screwed up.

Carefully make desicions and if you get hit by a trap or get cornered by monsters, using appopraite talismans or taking appropraite precautions can get you out of these situations. For one, you can "skip" turns. This means you waste one turn doing nothing but recover HP. Holding L and R lets you skip alot of turns constantly to recover your HP real quick. And if thats not enough, HP healing items are there for you. Also, you get items and talismans to aid you. Items such as bombs or shruikens make your enemies take damage per step or just straight out explode off a huge chunk of thier HP. Weapons either make your damage significantly higher or increase your defense, making your journey abit easier. Talismans have alot of effects, such as teleporting you out of a dungeon, calling forth a huge inferno, blowing enemies away and many more. Some even prevent your weapons from breaking. Combining all knowledge you have can help you survive even the deadliest of dungeons, and those bosses, yeah. Bosses are great, and if you beat them, you can clearly tell yourself you have mastered that dungeon, since most of them are really punishing.




Izuna likes to flirt her way out of situations such as this.

 It doesnt take a genius to tell that izuna's crazy ridiculous difficulty will turn many players off. It allows for almost no mistakes at all, and theres no way memorization of levels can help you out. Also, theres a lack of different attack variety. Most of the time, you are stuck hitting an enemy right straight in their face. Though there are times when you stand afar flinging stuff, but that isnt really an attack style. If would be more interesting if they add attacks that maybe extend to 2 spaces like a spear, or a bow which lets her attack from afar indefinetely. Also, most of the talismans have confusing effects, and learning so many talisman types can be very confusing. It really sucks when you are at a dungeons 15th floor and when you try to save your ass with a talisman which you know nothing about (you are out of options, either die or use that talisman), and it still ends up getting your ass handed.

Izuna isnt a bad game, its quite underrated. Those looking for a hardcore dungeon crawling experience can find that this game has alot of fun to be had. Izuna is so hawt, and whats better than playing as a sexy kunoichi? As I stated, the game may be hard, but if you come out on top of a dungeon after dieing so many times, you will feel very satisfied, the level of satisfaction is really something else. If you excuse me, Im off to play the 2nd game.



Happy gaming.

Gamespot score:8.7(great)


my score:9.0


(+)Pros:-Has everything in the first game, only better-great battle system that has been significantly improved upon,-tons of cameos from both square and disney make the journey very exciting,-incredibly lenghty main story mode that can take at least 40 hours,-gummi ship travels are now tons of fun instead of monotonous rides,-organization XIII makes for a bunch of awesome antagonists.


(-)Cons:-Standard difficulty is far too simple.


gameplay time:40 hours+

Alright, time to do my final PS2 game review. Since we can all confirm that the PS2 is officially dead now(no releases). Closing off PS2 we have an awesome game to end it. Kingdom *fking* hearts 2. The kingdom hearts series has expanded like hell recently, but we aint got a fking sequel. Im talking about a true legit sequel, a kingdom hearts THREE,3!!!! Kingdom hearts 1 was great, kingdom hearts 2 is awesome as hell, now we need a 3 to make the perfect kingdom hearts. The spinoffs were alright, but we need a legit sequel! Now, to one of the best games ever made. I played this game more than 3 times, and even now it still entertains me. Kingdom hearts 2, is in my opinion the best kingdom hearts game up to date, and I have yet to see a kingdom hearts game surpass it.






Story wise theres alot going on here. It takes place after the story of chains of memories (which is technically a sequel since it takes place after kingdom hearts 1, but they labelled it under spin offs). Sora goes into an unending sleep to restore his memories after the events at castle oblivion. During this time, his nobody roxas is experiencing summer vacation, but eventually becomes one with sora when he awakens from his sleep. During sora's sleep, the heartless are still running around, and things have yet to be fixed. He meets up with old friends with his trusty companions, donald and goofy, while trying to locate his friend riku. During his journey, he is confronted by the malevolent organization 13, whom send new enemies known as the nobody to track and bring down sora.

Flashy attacks known as limits are all the rage.

With a sequel comes improvements, and boy does kingdom hearts 2 suceed in that compartment. The game is almost overkill, they enhanced everything. Presentation, battle system, environments, character developement, voice acting, music.....everything is just so much better than before. The mechanics remain mostly similar. The start of the game features you in contorl of roxas, sora's nobody. Playing as roxas at the start is refreshing for most players, and as a prolouge scenario, it pits you in roxas's daily life and throws you tutorials on game mechanics and such. Its a great start, and your journey with roxas may last you a good 3 hours or so, and after your run with him, seeing that gigantic KINGDOM HEARTS 2 logo that pops out makes you go,"Woah, so all that was just an intro?".

The main game, of course, features our hero, sora, where he retains his keyblade wielding abilities into another awesome hack and slash adventure. The main story is much like kingdom hearts 1, where you visit worlds, solve their problems and move on to the next. In the various worlds you will visit (which my I add, are many. You visit old and new worlds alike, like land of the dragon/pride rock for new worlds, and agrabah/atlantica for old worlds). Theres quite alot to visit, and seeing your favourite disney heroes in the game as cameos sometimes feel just great.




The infamous thousand heartless charge, can you stop their rampage?

 The battle system in the game is as jumpy as ever. You face two kinds of enemies in this game. You still get heartless (which I may add, come in much more variety than ever now), but you also get nobodies. Though you will still fight heartless for the majority of the game, having 2 enemy factions really spices things up a little. The nobodies usually only appear at story events or at the final in-game world, because they are significantly more powerful. When fighting your foes, you get the basic attack/magic/item/command, as with the first game. Like before you can still customize your spells or items into shortcuts to make battles more smooth and accesable. As you fight and level up, you gain more passive abilites that either make you stronger or extend your combos. Soras combos in this game can be outright long and devastating, and its good to see your opponents get deciminated by your awe-inspiring lenghty and flashy combos.

Theres alot more to the battle system this time round. Sora gains a new garment in KH 2, and it not only makes it look good on him, it lets him change forms. These are awesome looking outfit changes that temporary change sora's playstyle. For example, valor form gives him 2 keyblades and makes his combos more lenghty, wisdom form lets his play a more effective range game, master form lets him wield 3 keyblades and make his combos even more devasting....etc etc. Forms are a good new feature, but theres more. Introducing limit breaks. When sora synchs with one of his teamates, he performs an exclusive limit with the party member, temporary changing his attack style to match that of the synched party member, adding an awesome looking finisher. Theres alot to the battle system, but another great enhancement is the gummi ship travels. The old gummi ship travelling in the 1st game can get monotonous and linear, in KH 2, it looks like an awesome ace combat game! With hectic looking maps and visitable areas, gummi ship travels are much more enjoyable, and rather than just being a form of transport, you can look foward to revisiting the levels and replaying them, because they are so much fun!




THIS is the new standard of gummi ship travelling.

Kingdom hearts 2 is almost without flaws, but there is one. The standard difficulty, it is far too simple. To get the most out of the game, you have to play proud mode. In kingdom hearts, the game was great because its difficulty actually played a part, the boss fights were challenging, and even some normal enemies can kill you. In kingdom hearts 2, they simplified things too much. Enemies may not even prove challenging, but the bosses too, most of them dont take retries to win. You take far too little damage, and the damage you deal is far too much. Even the final boss, I expected to die at least once since I was underleveled, who knew I could win on my very 1st try. My thoughts were this, "Hey, Im supposed to lose! Why did I win?!"

Kingdom hearts 2 is an amazing game on its own, pity that it was too easy on standard difficulty. Hopefully we can even expect a kingdom hearts 3(come on, we all know it will happen, its only a matter of time). Like I said before,  square should fk all the spinoffs, theres even a kingdom hearts coming for the 3Ds now. What we need now, is a true geniue, sequel. Square, please make it happen.


 
Happy gaming!

Gamespot score:n/a

my score:7.5

(+)Pros:-Comprehensive song list for any J-pop lover,- e amusement card works here and can save progress for more goodies,-great versus based gameplay,-awesome presentation.

(-)Cons:-Level 5 and up songs can be hard to grasp with the addition of arrow buttons,-based on versus and ONLY versus,-bad matchups online.

Gameplay cost:2 tokens

Arcade releases have never really interested me until recently, when the bemani craze took me over. So yup, heres reflec beat, the beami series's latest release, and also my first bemani game. I was intruiged by the songs played when I walked past the machine. I heard 2 songs, level 5 judgelight and super driver. As an anime fan, I freaked when I heard these 2 songs, and thats when my journey into reflec beat began. Being a music game lover as well (djmax,stepmania,guitar hero and rock band are my friends), I jumped in without hesitation. Heres the letdown.

When this was just released, the token cost was preposterous. It cost 4 tokens back then, but after a month or so, it dropped to 2, so it was all good. For a music game here in singapore, the default cost for music games as such were at least 2-3 tokens, or 4 tokens to those really impressive ones. For 2 tokens in reflec beat, you are given 3 stages(like in all the bemani games I have played), and 3 songs of your choice, with the 3 difficulties. Each song is about a minute and a half, the lenght of an anime opening. So multipy that by 3, plus song selection and online connectivity, you get roughly about 5 minutes or so of gameplay.





Gameplay looks hectic,but belive me, its fun.

Reflec beat has a gameplay system very similar to air hockey,only more fun. The whole game is touch screen.You have 3 choices, to play with a friend via local, play with an opponent online, or if neither are available, you play with AI. Relfec beat is a very versus based game, and for that, its great. Every song you pick has a set amount of notes (like in every music game, I imagine), but the notes dont come in certain order like in most games. That means, you cant play the game and perfect a song by pure memorization, the game's main aspect is reflex.

Once the song starts, both you and your opponent releases a bunch of notes, and they flow in the opposite direction. When your opponent's notes come to you, hit them to change them to your notes, and they will be automatically sent back. You also get points for doing so. As you hit notes, they multiply and soon the number of notes on screen can be terrifying. And of course, if you miss, you lose some points, but the missed notes still bounce back to the opponent as your notes. There are your common day variety of notes in this game, pair notes, hold notes and a super speed note, all to spice up gameplay. Finally, the end result of each match is obvious, the side with most points wins.

Thats alot of songs...and is that super driver I see at the right side?


As mentioned before, you can get matched with 3 kinds of opponents during gameplay, local is playing with your friends, and the fun factor is there, since you are kinda competing with your friend. Online opponents are based on luck. If you run into an opponent that is weaker than the AI, then you're defientely in luck, be prepared to do some trashing. If you run into some pro, then good luck to you, since you are the one to get trashed. Finally, if you local (but have no friends to play with) or have no online opponents being matched up with, you pit against the AI, which in most cases, is best.

AI is easily the best opponent to fight against, since they go by difficulty curve. On stage one, they are cake, stage two, they step up thier game a little, and on the last stage, they can be pretty good. The song list in reflec beat can be pretty awesome, for anyone who digs J-pop. When you are dazzled by the amazing in-game presentation, you can choose from a list of pretty awesome tracks, including go-on by uverworld, heart and soul by AAA,one more time by daft punk and many more. Whats more, if you have e amsuement, you can unlock more songs to add to your already awesome song list!

Can you spot level 5 judgelight? Oh, and that hayate no gotoku song too.

Reflec beat is fun and all, but it can be terribly hard when you play level 5 and up songs, when the arrow keys get thrown in. It gets hard tp keep up, and kinda destroys momentum. Those who cant keep up are forced to play low level songs until they can act fast enough on reflex to beat those pesky arrows. Also, since this game is always based on versus type gameplay, one person will always be knocked out, be it your friend or some other noob around the world. The competition is fierce, and if you want to get the most out of your 2 tokens, you have to do your very best. Plus, combine this with bad matchmaking that most of the tme pairs you up with pros, you are gonna die.

Being my very 1st bemani game review, I'm quite pleased. Reflec beat is a good experience, and though Im still quite a noob ( im only level 9 or so), I would say that reflec beat has served me well. Those who love japanese songs will love reflec beat, but may get turned off by online matchmaking. Overall, its a good game, but jubeat is still far superior :).


Happy gaming.

Gamespot score:n/a

my score:7.5

(+)Pros:-same great gameplay,-character portraits are given a good new overhaul,-more accessable areas than tag  force 4,-much larger variety of characters to choose from to be partners with,-good sountrack.

(-)Cons:-almost nothing new,-tag duels are overshadowed,-tag duel AI is still terrible.

gameplay time:20-30 hours

Moar game reviews! The yugioh franchise has been a suprisingly active one. Konami releases yugioh games twice per year at least, one for PSP and the DS, more precisely, the tag force series and the world championship series. Which series is better? In the earlier games, tag force outclassed the world championship series in so many ways, 2007 and 2008 were good games, but the early tag force games were slighty better. When world championship 2009 came out, the world championship series suddenly became alot better. Tag force is still good, with tag force 4 showing alot of promise, but now with tag force 5, we can expect everything great from tag force 4 and more, right?




As with all other yugioh tag force games out there, the story is as usual, the one that follows the anime. The arc that takes place in TF 5 is the grand prix arc. Nothing special to note here, I stopped the anime after the dark signers arc, so theres nothing here I can provide.





Yup, the CG cutscenes when summoning some monsters still look good and spiffy.

 Tag force 5 follows the very common tag force system that we have seen before, and though its not that impressive by now, its a safe route for them to take. There were no unnessecary tweaks made and the game still played well. The duel system and hearts system remain untouched with almost nothing added in. For the hearts system, you can do everything you were able to do in TF 4 to raise it, talk, duel, give gifts, etc etc. Of course, fail in any of those above or give your partner lousy gifts, they get unhappy and the hearts go down, simple as that.

There are alot more characters in this game than the previous, including new minors, so theres variety when it comes to partner choosing. Plus, the area system present in TF 4 is present here too. Each area contains a set amount of duelists, and depending on the area you visit, that area may or may not have powerful duelists. Visiting satellite related areas pit you against weak duelists, while city and duel academy areas are filled with much more skilled duelists. Also, most of the in-game story characters had redone potraits, which of course look great.

Duel system remains untouched, as always.

Dueling, as always, remains unchanged. This is as it is, no complaints here, since changing dueling is changing the very way of yugioh itself. Still, giving the duel field a new look wouldnt hurt. The music and sound effects are still great though, and at least the music changes. Dueling animations are still great, the exact way they were in TF 4, but the censorship on aki's cleavage is saddening. As with dueling, tag duels remain unchanged, you take turns and switch hands and controls. Duels are the primary tool in increasing hearts and DP, which are used to buy card packs, as well as being the main focus of the game itself (Why would you even touch a yugioh game if you dont like dueling itself?). As a side note, them synchros are still dominating, which is very annoying.



Yep,everything looks great, and at the same time,exactly the same....

  If you noticed, my review wasnt very long, beacuse there was nothing new to comment about. Seriously, almost nothing changed. While the tag force 4 overhaul was great and many things changed, tag force 5 didnt really throw in anything to suprise or impress us. And as usual, tag duels and overshadowed by normal duels. Ask half the population of yugioh game players, they would very much prefer to duel normally than play a tag duel. And, as usual, the tag duel AI is pathetically stupid, as in all of the other TF games, and this ruins story duels, since they are mostly tag duel based.

Tag force 5 is still a good yugioh title for yugioh fans to pick up, but only if you are in for the gameplay. If you are looking for changes, you will be drastically disappointed. As with most of the TF games as well, if you are newcomer to the TF series, tag force 5 is a good game that will eat up a lot of your time. But if you have played TF before, more particularly, TF 4, your play time will be obviously lesser. Still, tag force 5 isnt bad, its nowhere close to that, and can still provide enjoyment for any yugioh fan.


Happy gaming.

Its been awhile since the last villians post for anime, so here we go! Expect villianous villains along with descriptions of why their here. Oh and expect them to have at least a tint of badasstitude, either that or just villiany. Anyway, it seems like Im talking crap here....so lets just get started.

Oh, and spoilers ahoy.

Being cute doesnt stop you from being evil, chump!

5.Liselotte
From: 11 eyes

Up for 5th position today is 11eyes's unexpected main antagonist, Liselotte! She may look like your everyday damsel in distress, but woah, look at her expression in the final episodes, scary!

At the beginning of the show, satsuki and yuka were brought into the red night, with no warning whatsoever. When they met with lisette, a girl in the crystal, she told them to rescue her. Thats cool and all when a bunch of dark clad dudes appear and try to chop them up, saying that they have to kill satsuki to prevent them from rescueing lissete. Now any thinking person will of course think that people trying to kill them were the bad guys, so satsuki and crew eventually took verad's crew, only to weaken the crystal that sealed lisette, and free her.

When viewers have been so preoccupied watching satsuki and his friends beating on the other bad guys, they totally forgot that verad's true purpose was the stop liselotte's resurection. When they finally "save" the girl known as lisette, she immediately warps herself into liselotte, becoming a great being of destruction. In the alternate future kakeru saw, liselotte kills everyone with exception of misuzu and kakeru.

Points for looking badass.

4.Xanxus
From: Katekyo hitman reborn

Number 4 for today is a more familiar face, the great lord xanxus from katekyo hitman reborn. Just look at him man, b-a-d-a-s-s.

Xanxus isn't very special as a villian, though he is memoriable. His thirst for power and authority is quite admirable among villians. For one, he is supposed to be the rightful successor of the vongola family, and to get the vongola ring, he stops at nothing. Being the leader of varia, he is more than ready to toast tsuna and his friends.

Xanxus and his team of already memoriable villians challenge tsuana and his friends to matches for superiority to hold the vongola rings (which I might add, is IMO the best arc for the show). In the actual fight xanxus is really powerful and puts up a really close and intense fight against tsuna, but of course, good guys always win. He repents and gives way after the fight, to show that he still has dignity. He fights with a pair of badass guns and is able to summon a fistful of explosive power. He also put the vongola IX to power up gola moska, which is pretty cruel, considering how old the vongola IX is. Evil and badass, what a villian.

Norose himself going head to head with takumi.

3.Genichi norose
From: Chaos head

Third place for today goes to genichi norose, main antagonist for the show chaos head.

Norose is one evil son of a bitch. Though throughout the show he seems to be nothing special, he takes the cake for being one twisted motherfker. Norose is the head of the group NOZOMI, and is responsible for the construction of noah II, which's purposes are to manipulate brain waves. He seeks out takumi, the true maker of the equation that comprimises of noah II.

Norose captures a bunch of pyshic kids and tortures them, all to further his understanding for the noah II equation. Also, in the anime, he is challenged by sena,kozupi and that singer from phantasma, but didnt fall. He kidnapps nanami and rimi later on, and is only defeated at last by takumi during the final battle(which, may I add, is full of mind fuckery).

You do not want to piss her off.

2.Nao yuki
From: Mai hime

Now for my personal favourite girl of mai hime, and favourite villian as well. For today's 2nd place villian, we have nao yuki.

Nao is no main antagonist, but shes evil, and one of the most badass chicks I have seen in all of my anime knowledge. For one, she likes to go out and seduce men, then when they go and have a "good time" in an alleyway, shes then proceeds to punish them. While mai and co have no personal grudge against her, she tends to stand in thier way quite some time.

Nao later gets tricked into being an enemy of the himes later on, and when that happens, she never did even protest to being the enemy, and just jumped into the fight, becoming an enemy straight out. Nao also gets into a fight with all the other himes, and gets her eye cut, which then turns her into a revenge-driven girl. She also has a personal against natsuki, and tends to attack her when shes alone. A chick driven to such personal gain is one of the best kinds of villians out there.




The new standard for sadists. Meet accelerator.

 1.Accelerator
From: To aru majutsu no index

Finally, today's number 1 villian, is my favourite character in to aru majutsu no index, the almighty accelerator.

Accelerator in index 2 isnt that much of a villian, the accelerator Im refering to here, is the accelerator of the 1st season, when he 1st challenges touma and wants to climb to level 6. Accelerator is the strongest esper in academy city, but to him, it isnt enough. Accelerator suffers from the same thing as xanxus, thirst for power, but accelerator does it to a much much more cruel and extreme extent.

Accelerator, though being the strongest in academy city, wants to be known all throughout. He wants to rise to level 6, and to do that he needs to kill 20000 misaka sisters. He has no qualms AT ALL for that, and everyday he kills the misaka sisters in daily appointments in the cruelest ways. He tends to overkill his targets, he is seen in one particular episode reversing the blood of 1 misaka sister and causing her to overbleed. He is sadistic in any possible way, and enjoys killing like no other. In the manga of railgun, he kills one of the misaka sisters but tearing out her leg through sheer force. Unfortunately, hes reign didnt last long, as all it took were a few good punches from touma to crush his "dream". While the present accelerator doesnt thirst for power anymore, he wont hesitate to kill, and you can see him turn into "sadist mode" when he is attacked in the more recent appearences of him. He will kill, and he will do it in the most violent way possible.

Thats all for now, peace.