"The defense asserts that this game... is awesome."

A little over 2 years ago, a good friend introduced me to, "that one lawyer game." I had already been exposed to other games that were centered around "real" jobs like being a surgeon in Trauma Center or being a cook/mama in Cooking Mama. These games made it work, but I still couldn't imagine a "lawyer game." Being a lawyer requires the act of litigation, which requires speaking. Despite the fact that the DS has a microphone, I was pretty sure you weren't going to be citing legal precedents into it, and if you were, it would be one of the most realistic and boring games ever created. Instead what I got was a game not unlike the adventure games of old, but with a theme that centers around the courthouse. This particular courthouse, however, only sees murder trials, and every one of them is an intense legal battle with objections flying out left and right from the defense and prosecution. Every trial is exciting, and it's always a close battle between the defense and the prosecution. That's why the games are fun... they're NOTHING like the real courthouse.

Phoenix Wright: Trials and Tribulations is the third game in the Phoenix Wright series, and it fixes a lot of the the small qualms I had with the 2nd game. The dialogue is better, and has less of the typos that 2 had, the soundtrack is vastly improved over 2's predominantly disappointing soundtrack, and most importantly, the cases are better. Pretty much everything about 3 was an improvement over 2. 2 added some interesting characters, but overall I find the 3rd game to be far superior to the 2nd. Even so, I still can say I've thoroughly enjoyed the Phoenix Wright "trilogy," and am excited to play Apollo Justice and finally be caught up for the Edgeworth game coming out soon (supposedly February!) Despite all of 2's problems, it still has, in my opinion, one of the best cases in the entire series and sets up a lot of things for 3's epic closing case. Regardless, 3 is a better game overall, which brings me to my closing arguments. 3 was an excellent game, perhaps the best in the series. The series on the whole is a lot of fun, but 3 fixes 2's mistakes. I understand that the games may not be for everyone, but if you're a fan of the original, I can't imagine anyone not enjoying 3. The defense rests.

"Walkin' in a Winter Wonderland..."

I've decided to do this "main feature" of Silent Hill: Shattered Memories in 2 pieces. This way my posts aren't quite as long and I can share my thoughts as I'm playing before I've finished. It seems like a win-win situation for all.

The name, "Silent Hill," has been one of my favorite names in gaming for years. People joke that my interest in law is because of Phoenix Wright. Though partially true, if I only found law to be interesting because of Phoenix Wright, I would've taken 1 week of a Criminal Justice class, dropped it, and gotten back to playing Phoenix Wright. My interest in psychology, however, does stem a lot more from a video game... that being Silent Hill. I've been in love with the series ever since I played the first game. By no means is the entire Silent Hill franchise good, but if it bears the name, "Silent Hill," you can bet I'm going to at least try it. (Anyone know where I can play the arcade game?) Regardless, my love for the series comes from the first game. I play survival horror games because of the first game. I get goosebumps when I hear weather sirens because of the first game. I even like the name, "Cheryl," because of the first game. The first game is a huge part of my gaming life... and my real life as well. You can imagine my excitement when I heard about a re-imagining of Silent Hill, and said excitement being immediately crushed when I saw the "dark world" covered in ice. Regardless, as a man who gives almost any game a chance, I decided it would only be fair to give this one a chance, and I'm sure glad I have.

Now that I've established that the game is based off of the first one, let me say it's nothing like it. Sure, it's still Harry Mason, his daughter Cheryl, and Cybil Bennett... but this game is nothing like the first one. The game starts with you filling out a form about yourself at your therapist's office. After answering a few personal questions, the therapist expressed his disbelief of the integrity of my relationships, and asked if I had, "really never cheated on a partner." I nodded, so he simply shrugged and said, "Okay." ... In the game I mean.

That's one thing I love about Shattered Memories so far. It's very immersive. you direct the flashlight with the Wii remote and press the trigger to zoom in on objects of interest. No longer do you run up to a barely legible sign, press, "X," and wait for the screen to fill with text so you can read it. You walk up to that sign yourself, shine the light on it, and zoom in on it to make it easier for you to read. I have to say, I'm impressed. Unlike the original (as well as the other previous installments), you don't play as Harry Mason, you are Harry Mason.

That brings to mind one last thing I want to talk about in this first part. The cell-phone. This is one of the best aspects of the game in my opinion. Your GPS in your phone replaces the map you would have found in previous titles. Your camera in your phone can be used to uncover only partially visible "spirits" not unlike the Fatal Frame games. On the other hand, it's also just a camera in your phone. Nothing stops you from taking pictures of whatever you feel. Not to mention, it's a phone. You just had a car accident and your daughter has run off and gone missing. Nothing's stopping you from dialing 911, or that phone number on that police car you see in the distance. As a friend of mine says, "It's on you, chief." Though reluctant to give this game all of my praises, it is a very compelling game. So much so, that I can't wait for nightfall so I can once again become fully immersed in Silent Hill.

A Remake of a Remake of a Remake of a Classic

If you think I'm exaggerating that title, I'm not. Going backwards, there's this PSP version, there's the GBA remake: Dawn of Souls, then there's the PSone remake: Final Fantasy Origins, and finally there's the original source material on an NES cartridge. Actually, it gets even more complicated if you really want to dig into it because there was a WonderSwan Color remake and a Final Fantasy I & II compilation on Famicom. The point is, this game has been around. I'm referring to the PSP version in this post.

Has Final Fantasy withstood the test of time? Well, as this remake illustrates, aspects of it have. Other aspects, however, have simply been dropped for the sake of modernization. This game meshes new and old very well. So well, in fact, that you don't really get one or the other. Whether or not that's a good thing is subject to debate.

The main HUGE change is that this game is much, MUCH easier than the original. In fact, it's beyond, "easier," it's just plain, "easy." You can pretty much coast through the game only battling whatever you encounter on your main quest without having to level-grind. That's the "newer" feeling part of the game. The older feeling is the high encounter rate and large areas that you have to explore without a map. At least the battle with Chaos was still pretty satisfying.

Now, while I say the game is easy, I should clarify that the bonus dungeons really aren't that easy. To be honest, because of how many other games I plan to play, I just skipped them. The 2 that I explored a bit of seemed to go the same way: Lots of random encounters, all pretty easy and then BITCHSLAP TO THE FACE Boss. You're dead. At least when you died in these situations, the game just threw you out of the dungeon back into the overworld. This was appreciated because when you enter these bonus dungeons, if you don't have the "exit" spell, you're either going to be leaving the dungeon triumphantly victorious or in a body bag. Unlike every other location in the game, the moment you set foot in one of these bonus dungeons, you're trapped in it. I wish I would have known that.

I've decided to keep this "review" fairly short since everyone already knows what Final Fantasy is. Plus, I need to get on to some more games. In short, this was a lot of fun in that classic "save the world" kind of way. I feel like I haven't really payed my dues though since I haven't played through the original NES version, so I intend to do so at a later date. Keep your eyes peeled for my frustration! I'm already swearing in anticipation of that damned Warmech... which if you didn't know, randomly appears right before you encounter the 4th and final elemental fiend and is nearly as tough as the final boss. Of course, your journey to get to this elemental fiend was fairly long, so if this warmech comes and nukes you, you're going back to the last town you saved at. I can't fucking wait.

"Shit sucked." (AmiYumi Part 2)

And there it is. If asked to describe my experience with Hi Hi Puffy AmiYumi: The Genie and the Amp in two words, I would nearly instantaneously reply with, "Shit sucked." However, I feel that to truly comprehend the intensity behind that statement, you have to realize the subtle nuances of shitfuckery that make up this game. My friend, who I completed the game with, said, "This is the worst game I've ever completed." I think I may have to agree with this statement. Sure there are worse games out there, but I rarely waste enough of my time to complete these gaming abominations.

Why is this game so bad? Well, considering this a 2-part review, there's a whole mess of things I could say (and have already said). However, to sum up the biggest problems with this game, I need not say more than, "It doesn't work," or, "It's broken." Now, granted, I'm not talking CheetahMen 2 broken, because we have proven that it is actually possible to beat this game, but not without a fight. "Oh," I hear you say, "You mean, it's difficult, right? You mentioned that in the first part of your review." No no, your fight won't be against the enemies in the game. You have to try and tackle the much stronger foe of shitty programming. I didn't mention this in my first review because I hadn't encountered it yet.

In the majority of the video games that I ENJOY playing, when I hear the word, "glitch," I tend to think of things like silly graphical glitches (i.e. seeing through Mario's head in Mario 64 with those awful camera angles). I had heard of more serious "game-breaking" glitches in other games, but I hadn't really personally encountered one before... until now, whereupon instead of merely encountering one, I encountered about 3. The first one we ran into was pretty baffling. My friend and I were fighting hard. He was almost dead, but I had nearly 75% of my life, so it seemed like we would be fine. He died, rendering him a ghost that can only do a tiny fraction of the damage a living character can do. I was still alive and kickin' until suddenly WHAM! My life disappeared, my character fell to the ground and immediately vanished into thin air. This wasn't the result of a magical item or a secret move... my character just disappeared. After a brief swearing session, it had come to our attention that we didn't actually get a "game over." My friend had to continue to fight the mid-boss as a ghost and my character was unaccounted for. Needless to say, this took forever and absolutely should not have happened. Upon reaching the next checkpoint, my character reappeared and we were eventually able to clear the level, but this is a pretty HUGE glitch (and actually happened at least one other time throughout our play-through). "How could it get any worse?" I thought. I simply had to keep playing to find out.

How many beat-em-ups have jumps that impede your progress and will take your lives if you fall in them? Albeit not a lot, there certainly are a few that come to mind, such as that obnoxious bridge jump in Double Dragon. I was a little surprised to see this happen in this game, but it wasn't something I hadn't seen before. Upon sinking into a tar pit, we found ourselves being sent back to the beginning of the section of a level. It was pretty weird since neither of us had fully "sunken" so to speak, and generally being in tar up to your knees wouldn't constitute a death in a video game. This game likes to break the rules... regardless of whether or not it does so intentionally. Despite finding this to be bullshit, it wasn't unreasonable. At least it wasn't the beginning of the whole damned level. We repeated the section, carefully jumping over the pits and rapidly jumping out of them to avoid knee-high tar fatalities. We made it past them and got into one of the usual brawling sequences. Much to our surprise, pleasure, and displeasure, we were actually playing well and not receiving much damage. Suddenly, without rhyme or reason, we stopped moving, and were sent back to the beginning of that section of the level, just like when we'd "died in the tar pit." Ahhh... "And there it is." It all made sense now. We never died in the tar pits, and you can't die in the tar pits. The game randomly glitched and sent us backwards. My friend and I literally stood up and started shouting, "What the fuck?!?!" for nearly 5 minutes.

I believe there's only a few possible explanations for this occurrence. The obvious answer? This game had some terrible programmers and evidently even worse testers. I think the true answer lies beyond this though, as this game is clearly a product of evil forces. It is my presumption that this "reversing" glitch is intentional. I believe that on the easier difficulty, this wouldn't happen. However, knowing that the only people who would bother to beat this game on the hard difficulty already have some seriously masochistic tendencies, the programmers decided they would torture these poor fools further by randomly, but intentionally, throwing players backwards in the game forcing them to repeat various sections.

The other, more optimistic way of looking at these glitches is the "Divine Intervention" theory. This theory states that there is a kind and loving God who tries His very best to ensure no one suffers the entire duration of this game. Throughout the game, a higher power has been constantly trying to get people to stop playing. He works in mysterious ways, sometimes actually causing pain by continuously making players lose. When Satan's power is strong, however, some individuals will continue to play regardless of these frustrations so the higher power attempts to make players believe the game can't be beaten by causing repeat glitches that force players backwards. Unfortunately, there are rare occasions in which His glory is left unseen, and the power of Satan prevails, leaving lost souls doomed for an eternity (10 hours or so) to suffer in the Hell that is, "Hi Hi Puffy AmiYumi: The Genie and the Amp."

Whichever theory you believe in, just remember one thing. The only way you can truly beat this game is to never play it.