Other than that I played through a majority of Xillia 2, and I keep changing my opinion of it. One minute I feel like it's a decent game, and the next everything about it really upsets me. Hopefully by the time I beat it I'll have a solid opinion.
Since the Inazuma Eleven games are long, and Xillia 2 is a million hour long RPG I didn't play a whole lot of other stuff this month, but I did manage to play a little bit of the InFamous: Second Son DLC. I like it so far, but I don't know how much longer I'll feel that way... It's got some interesting design choices.
InFamous First Light
I thought that Fetch was an amazing character in InFamous: Second Son. She was pretty much the only character besides Delsin that had solid development. She had gotten into some trouble with drugs, but was recovering. Plus, her neon powers were amazing. So it's only natural that I'd purchase the DLC where you play as Fetch and learn more about her backstory. Somehow I feel like I got swindled out of $15...
Yes, First Light has you playing as Fetch. It takes place months before Second Son when Fetch was first brought to Curdun Cay, the conduit prison. She's being trained to control her powers and in the process of doing so she's forced to tell the story of what happened to her brother. You get to play those sequences, and those are the best part. You get to run around Seattle as Fetch, who unsurprisingly has the same Neon powers that Delsin stole from her. The story is what I like, not so much the playing part...
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| At least it has a sick logo? |
When doing missions in Seattle you can do side missions, just like in Second Son, except that they're all super lame. In order for Fetch to get skill points you have to collect neon gas. You can just run around and collect it, or you have to chase it during race events. You can also do some sweet neon graffiti. It's not exactly the most stellar content, especially when it's been taken almost directly from the main game. Delsin couldn't run races, but who would want to do that anyways, because it's lame. Running around Seattle is lame, but the story missions almost make up for it.
What really throws me off about this DLC is that when Fetch isn't telling her story you have to play through battle arenas in Curdun Cay. Enemies will show up, and sometimes you'll need to run over a hostage in order to rescue them. These types of battle arenas are generally bad filler content in games, so the fact that they're one of the main pieces of content in this DLC is more than a little upsetting.
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| Fetch can make some awesome neon graffiti. |
I can see this being an amazing DLC for people who don't own Second Son, because it's standalone. If I hadn't done all of this same stuff as Delsin for around 12 hours earlier this year I might think First Light was an amazing purchase for just $15. However, since I did play Second Son when it first came out this just seems like a quickly thrown together cash grab I was tricked into getting because Fetch was a solid character in the main game. I'm interested in seeing her story through, but I can guarantee I won't be doing all the optional missions, and I'll fight in the battle arenas as little as possible.
Tales of Xillia 2
I had a lot of problems with the first Tales of Xillia, which you can read all about here. A lot of the problems I had with the first game are still present in Xillia 2. The story doesn't make a whole lot of sense, the areas are wide open (They're literally the same areas), and you're always told exactly where to go. On the other hand the characters are all marginally better, and the battle system is still super fun.
To me Xillia 2 feels like it's either cut content from the original game, or a very large story expansion. It has a brand new main character named Ludger Kresnik. For some inexplicable reason he can't talk. I'm a fan of silent protagonists in games, but in this case it's very out of place. All the other characters talk a whole lot. It wouldn't be as weird if characters didn't speak directly to him in ways that warrant a response. Apparently there's a story reason he doesn't talk, but I have seen no evidence of that and I'm around 40 hours in.
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| Ludger can't talk, but he can sure shoot pistols. |
Other than Ludger's weird silence the story characters are all pretty good. One of the new characters the game introduces is a little girl named Elle. Normally children characters in games are obnoxious, but something about Elle makes her very endearing. She is lost and was separated from her father, but is constantly trying to fulfill a promise to him. It helps that she carries around Ludger's super obese cat Rollo, who I am absolutely in love with.
What bothers me about Xillia 2 the most is that the writing in it is super inconsistent. The game had a strong beginning, but a few hours in everything fell apart. It was almost like a completely different set of writers were put on the game for a few hundred pages of the script. At some point the characters start throwing out all kinds of terms as if you should know them when in reality you don't know what the hell is going on at all. Within the past few hours it has gotten better, but I still feel like there's something missing. It doesn't help that the game has serious pacing issues. It's separated into chapters and at the beginning and end of each you're given a ton of sidequests to do. People like me will do them all, which takes around two to three hours. So you're taking breaks from the main story for hours at a time when you don't even know what's going on in the first place.
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| All hail our lord and savior, Rollo. |
Just like with the first game this makes it sound like I totally hate Xillia 2, when I don't. The battle system is super fun and action oriented, but everything surrounding that needs a lot of work. The fact that Ludger can switch between dual blades, a sledgehammer, and dual pistols is cool, but it doesn't change anything drastically. All of the exploration and sense of discovery is gone, which is something I really hope they fix in the next Tales game. It will help that they're not going to be reusing all the same assets again...
Inazuma Eleven 3/GO
I played and beat the first two Inazuma Eleven games in July. I then continued to play Inazuma Eleven 2 until all of my players were level 99, which took around 85 hours. For some reason I then decided to import a 3DS from England in order to play Inazuma Eleven 3, and Inazuma Eleven GO. Inazuma Eleven 3 continues the story of the first two games and acts as a finale to the trilogy. It's mostly the same as the previous two, but layers a few new mechanics on top of everything. Players get tired more quickly and the amount of TP players have for special moves was greatly decreased. It also added the ability to chain shots together, which was very handy in a lot of situations.
My favorite part about 3 though is that it's about an international soccer tournament, so you get to see the game's representation of countries other than Japan. The British team is super fancy, the American team stays in a junkyard, and the Italian team all sound like they're trying to impersonate Mario. It's an amazingly harmless view of the world's countries that only comes off as slightly offensive. It helps that since it's pretty much an anime version of soccer, so it takes itself very seriously. There's no chance they were trying to make subtle jokes or anything.
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| In Inazuma Eleven 3 the story team is the best! |
From Inazuma Eleven 3 I moved right on to Inazuma Eleven GO, which focuses on a mostly different set of characters. Ten years passed after the original trilogy, so now all the characters I thought were cool from the first game have grown up and are around my age (24). What's cool is that they are actually an integral part of the story, because they have to pass on their knowledge to the next generation of players. What sucks is that I'm not really a fan of most of the new characters. The main character in particular I find to be insufferable. His name is Arion Sherwind, and he's super upbeat like Mark was. Unlike Mark however, Arion is super emotional. He truly believes that soccer as a sport has feelings, so he's always worried about making soccer sad. Yeah, that's a real thing.
There are a few characters I like though like Viktor Blade, who inexplicably has a Russian accent. In fact all of the characters talk with accents. These kids all live in Japan, so why does each one have a different accent? Maybe they were like that in the original Japanese, but even then it still wouldn't make sense. It also helps to make the voice acting extra awful, when it wasn't even that great in the first place.
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| I really wasn't feeling the players in Inazuma Eleven GO... |
Inazuma Eleven GO changes the series completely, because it was the first game made specifically for the 3DS. Instead of being sprites everything is completely in 3D. It makes everything look awesome, but there are far less special moves for your players to learn. I've heard that Inazuma Eleven GO 2 has a whole lot more special moves, so I hope the lack in this game is because of the hardware switch. Due to the shift to 3D the actual soccer matches feel and play a lot differently as well. You can no longer pass to anyone, because the ball won't pass right through opposing players. You have to hold the stylus down in order to kick it over their heads. They also added a mechanic that gives certain players access to fighting spirits. They are literally spirits that the players summon in order to become much stronger.
When you have a fighting spirit summoned on a player it's almost impossible for them to lose the ball, and their shots are far stronger than they normally would be. The downside is that the players can only have the spirit summoned for a certain amount of time, and while the spirit is summoned they become tired much more quickly. It adds a new dimension to the game, because you not only have to worry about the stats and elements of an opposing player. You now also have to worry about the stats and element of the fighting spirit that player has as well. When you go against the computer the AI isn't the best, so you can usually steamroll them with whatever you have. However, I think that once I can play a human being the fighting spirits will be much less effective.
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| Fighting spirits are a cool new addition to Inazuma Eleven GO. |
I have now beaten all of these Inazuma Eleven games, but I am still leveling up my teams in both 3 and GO. You'll probably hear me talk about the games a lot more in one form or another, because I still think about the series far too much for my own good.
The Storm Begins
It's a good thing I beat all the Inazuma Eleven games, because the fall game storm is upon us. From September up until around March there is a nonstop stream of games coming out that I don't know I'll be able to keep up with.
I still haven't beaten Xillia 2 and Dangonronpa 2 for the Vita will be arriving at my house tomorrow. Then a week after that I'll have Destiny. The trend continues from there when a new game comes out weekly, and sometimes two games come out a week. It's going to be an action packed fall and I'm very excited for it.
I'd keep going on, but I really have to get on Xillia 2 or it's never going to get finished. See you all next time!
-Manny
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