Peter's 2012 Gaming Awards

What's this? Peter's making an update on PG's Game Room?! What is this madness?!?

Yes, I apologize for my prolonged haitus. I'm afraid there really isn't much I can do about that; college has been taking up a lot of time and I haven't found much enthusiasm for writing in a while. Still, with a few new games behind me and not that many projects for the rest of the year, I thought it'd be time for a 2012 Award-type article!

Yes, much like that thing I wrote back in February, this is a series of titles given to games that I played this year. So, without further ado, lets get into the best and worst gaming experiences I had this year.


Best Game I Played In 2012: Persona 3

Persona 3 was my first experience with the Shin Megami Tensei franchise, and I must say, I regret not getting into these games sooner. Despite my initial skepticism, Persona 3 proved to be one amazing game. Traditional RPG combat and roguelike dungeon crawling, combined with an incredible story with great characters and dark themes, Persona 3 is easily one of the best games I've played in a long time.

Runner Up: Radiant Historia

JRPGs, dead? Hardly.

Anyone who stumbles across this blog will quickly realize that I am quite fond of console-style role-playing games, or to use their current term, Japanese role-playing games. These ‘JRPG’s have provided some of the greatest moments in gaming for me, filling my world with imaginative characters and a unique kind of gameplay that I grew to love.

‘JRPG’s were once extremely popular in the gaming community. While never expressly un-popular, the genre exploded into the mainstream with the release of Final Fantasy VII.  The Playstation era of RPGs featured many classic games, but thanks to Final Fantasy VII, these games were explosively popular. Games like Final Fantasy VIII and IX, Xenogears, Vagrant Story, Legend of Dragoon, and others provided the cultural definition of video game RPGs. This popularity continued and expanded with the PS2 era, when Final Fantasy X introduced many more into the RPG fold.

Today, however, these wonderful RPGs, once the pinnacle of gaming excellence, are fading- or so we’re told. The rise of the ‘western role-playing game’ has crushed the Japanese variety, with their more involving plotlines and focus on personal freedom- or so we’re told. JRPGs, we are told, are a dying art.

This is wrong. To be even more frank, this is bullshit.

My Top 5 Gaming Wishes

Well, Thanksgiving has come and gone. Now that I'm back from my not-actually-that-long haitus from Turkeyland, I feel like prepping for the next holiday season. These five items are things I personally would love to see in the near future (not in any particular order). So, here you go.

5- Final Fantasy Versus XIII gets a 2012 Release Date.
A guy can dream, right? Seriously, though, this one has gone on long enough. Square has been teasing this game ever since Final Fantasy XIII was announced, and seeing as they've been saying they want to cut development times down, I'm hoping we can see their six-years-in-the-making action RPG sooner rather than later.

4- Kingdom Hearts 3 gets announced for current-gen consoles- specifically, PS3.
This is another one that may exist only in the realm of wishful thinking, but it's still a strong desire of mine. The Kingdom Hearts series has mostly been releasing spinoffs (Birth by Sleep being the closest thing to a 'main' title we've seen in years), and many fans are pining for a true current-gen Kingdom Hearts game for Playstation 3. The labyrinthine narrative of Kingdom Hearts needs to find some closure, but more than anything else, I want this game to be out before Square can be tempted to new hardware.

3- JRPG comeback
The classic role-playing games of yesteryear have been overshadowed of late by their Western counterparts, which is a shame, but not entirely unfounded. That's not to say we haven't gotten great JRPGs over the years, but few of them were truly innovative. I was disapointed with the gaming community's reaction to the delightfully experimental Final Fantasy XIII, but  I do feel that a truly great JRPG, one that will revitalize the genre, is just around the corner. As excited as I am for Level 5 and Studio Ghibli's excellent looking Ni no Kuni, which may be the best JRPG in years, I don't think it's the type of game to hit the innovative sweet spot the genre needs right now. We'll have to wait and see.

2- Operation Rainfall Is Successful.
If you don't yet know what Operation Rainfall is, look it up and support them. They are a grassroots movement petitioning Nintendo to localize three excellent looking JRPGs for Wii- The Last Story, Xenoblade Chronicles, and Pandora's Tower. Remember how I was looking for a great and innovative game that could revitalize the genre? Xenoblade could very well be that game, as could The Last Story (itself made by famed Final Fantasy creator Hironobu Sakaguchi). The fact that these games weren't instant candidates for localization is just sad.

1- Mistwalker makes a PS3 title.
Mistwalker studios is the company helmed by Hironobu Sakaguchi, and has made excellent RPGs such as Blue Dragon, Lost Odyssey, and The Last Story. Sakaguchi apparently has a grudge against Sony (he's mentioned this before), and all of his big titles have been on 360 (which shot him in the foot with regards to sales) or Wii. While I've been hoping for years to see PS3 versions of Blue Dragon and Lost Odyssey (ESPECIALLY Lost Odyssey), I'd settle for an original game from them. Think you and Sony can put your differences aside, Hironobu? For me? Please?

Well, that's that. What are your gaming wishes?

Personal Review Style

Just a quick blurb concerning how my reviews are organized. I'll have an example (one of my older pieces) later.

I write reviews in five sections. The first is an introduction, providing backstory on the game. The second is story, where I summarize the game's plot and then describe my thoughts on it. The third is gameplay, where I describe the game's systems and mechanics, and any flaws in them. The fourth is presentation, where I talk about the game's graphics, music, and voice acting. Finally, I have a concluding paragraph that summarizes the review. I do give the game a letter grade based on the number of flaws I find, but that's probably the least important part of the review.

I can't say any of the sections are more important than the others- story, gameplay, and presentation are equally important for making a game enjoyable. If one is lacking, the entire package suffers as a result.

If I'm posting an older review, I'll say so in the title, and I might include a small section before the review if my opinion of the game has shifted at all since I reviewed it. I also try to review a game as soon as I beat it, which on average takes me a month.

I should have my first review up on the blog soon.

Final Fantasy V- First Impressions

Final Fantasy V is one of the 'lost' Final Fantasies, one of three other games in the series that weren't localized when they first came out (the others being II and III). 16 bit RPGs are among my favorite games to play, so expiriencing the 'missing' counterpart to Final Fantasy IV and Final Fantasy VI (two of my all-time favorite games) is a real treat. The game has a few flaws, but so far it's very fun.

The story is pretty standard for the series- four warriors are chosen by the cystals to save the world from an evil force, so far so basic, but the story goes a bit further than usual for a game with this type of story. The main characters (Bartz, Lenna, Faris, and Galuf) are all very likeable and full of personality, making them far more fun to travel with than the cookie-cutter characters from III (the DS version). The game's writing is also very good, as well as quite humorous. The adventure is lighthearted, but so far hasn't degraded into complete silliness as many lighthearted RPGs so- it still is telling a good story, but the characters seem to be having fun with their travels, and so it becomes fun to experience their story. The game also looks and sounds great, as 16 bit games usually do to me.

Also very cool is the Job System, a class system that was introduced in III, but arguably perfected in V. In Final Fantasy V, characters can choose any of the Jobs currently available to them, and select one ability to use as well as the default ability the job has. Characters gain Job levels in battle, earning new abilities with each level and eventually mastering the Job. The great thing is, not only is there no penalty for switching Jobs, any ability learned by levelling up the Job can be selected for use by a new Job. For example, switching from a White Mage to a Black Mage doesn't mean you can't keep using healing spells- just have the Black Mage select 'White' as his skill, and he'll be able to use both 'Black' (his default ability) and 'White' magic.

One thing that I have noticed is that the game's battles have a LOT of lag. Usually the more enemies you're fighting, the more the game will lag- the ATB bars have frozen for almost twenty seconds once. I'm not sure if this is a result of the port to GBA or not, but it is a noticeable problem.

Final Fantasy V is so far a very enjoyable old-school RPG. I'm about halfway through it right now. More on it later!

Final Fantasy VIII- First Impressions

I've been a huge fan of the Final Fantasy series for years, but I've never had the opportunity to play most of the games until recently. This year has been a blitz of gaming for me, as I've obtained and played through most of the series this year. I got all three PS1 FF games over the summer, and now that I've beaten VII, I've turned my attention to one of the more controversial games in the series, VIII.

I'm about halfway through Disc 2 (out of 4) right now, and I must say that I'm enjoying myself quite a bit. I really love the RPGs of past gaming generations, and the three PS1 FFs so far (haven't started IX yet) are great games. Final Fantasy VIII does have some strange elements to it, though. Like most FF games, it almost completely reinvents the wheel, featuring a number of changes such as a magic-based character growth system and level scaling. Yes, every enemy in Final Fantasy VIII outside of a few rare exceptions will be at the same level as your party. This creates an odd scenario in which leveling up isn't a very good thing, as your stat increases will be minimal and every enemy will have leveled up as well, making things more difficult for you.  Characters also level up every with every 1000 experience points they earn, rather than an increasing amount. In order to combat the level scaling, mastering the Junction System is imperative. I won't go into too many details until I review the game, but suffice it to say that the Junction System, so far, is a massive headache. How it works is that every character stockpiles magic spells (up to 100 of each), and then, after equipping a Guardian Force (the iconic Summons of Final Fantasy), a character can 'Junction' a spell to any of their stats. The amount the stat is increased by is determined by the type of spell and how much of it you have (for example, 100 Curagas are good for HP Junctioning). That's all I'll say for now; the system is almost stupidly overcomplicated at times.

As for the story, Final Fantasy games are known for good stories, and Final Fantasy VIII still tells an engaging tale. I'm really digging the pseudo-modern setting of the game (sort of a cleaner version of FFVII's world, but not as sleek as XIII's), as well as the political situation concerning the evil Galbadian Republic. Having the main  characters be mercenaries (SeeD special forces) is an interesting touch which adds a unique flavor to the typical 'evil empire' storyline JRPGs are so fond of. What I don't like is that, so far, Squall is the only playable character to have a major character arc. Aside from Laguna (a playable who you control for brief flashbacks), the rest of the party has so far been strangely lacking in character development, which is dissapointing for a Final Fantasy game. Hopefully they'll have more to do later in the story.  I'm also rather dissapointed in what is arguably the most famous aspect of Final Fantasy VIII, which is the romance between Squall and Rinoa. Granted, I'm only two discs in, but so far Rinoa has got to be one of the least appealing love interests I've seen. Again, hopefully this aspect of the plot gets better, especially considering that the game's logo is the two of them embracing.

For now, I'm still enjoying FFVIII despite my criticisms. I'll have more on it later.