The Uber Review Spree part 2 - Forum M

The Uber Review Spree – Part Two

By Mike Gwilliam on January 20, 2010 – 7:00 am4 Comments

Welcome to what shall be my second Uber Review Spree (the first one is here) in which I shall be taking a look at one of the most popular RPG franchises in Final Fantasy, the gritty toughness of Smackdown vs. Raw 2010 and an extremely bloody game in Prototype. Buckle your seatbelts and get ready to read, and if you like what you see / hear, don’t be afraid to pick any of these games up.

Final Fantasy: Crisis Core – PSP

Final Fantasy. Oh how I love you so. Final Fantasy 7 debuted on the Playstation One in 1997 and became one of the most popular games to ever grace gaming. Final Fantasy 7, which has no other relation to the other Final Fantasy games, is a universe of its own.

A full-length CGI movie entitled Final Fantasy Advent Children was released in 2005 and was well-received as being a sequel to the ever-popular game. Other games in the Final Fantasy 7 universe have also been released, showcasing a number of minor characters from the original game.

Final Fantasy Crisis Core is a prequel to Final Fantasy 7 and is a PSP exclusive. You play as a character named Zack, who is the lead protagonist in this story leading up to Cloud’s adventure later on. Think of it sort of like Star Wars. In the prequels, the main character is Anakin Skywalker, whereas in the original trilogy, aka, the GOOD movies, Luke Skywalker takes center stage.

Gameplay is a little different from most Final Fantasy games. There is no turn-based combat and instead, you are allowed to free-roam and attack enemies as you will. Summons still play a key factor in the game, allowing you to inflict maximum damage to an opponent and this is done via a slot machine.

No joke. A slot machine determines how much bonus damage you do to your opponent. This works good in theory and is somewhat effective in the game, but I would take a game like, again, to bring up Star Wars, Knights of the Old Republic, where you can still free roam and fight.

A lot of the voice acting is very well done and a lot of the special cutscenes look like they have been directly ripped from Advent Children. This is good stuff.

Sadly, as good as the cut scenes are, there is one issue with this game that makes me absolutely enraged. You cannot skip cutscenes. If you die, you have to watch the exact same five-minute cutscene over and over and over and this is not good. It gets annoying as fuck.

If you’re like me and you hate repetition, then you will be pissed off while playing this game. The bosses can be, at some points, quite difficult and having to restart with the same batch of dialogue and scene again will make anyone sick to death, even if it is Final Fantasy.

Because of this, the game gets a 2.2/10. Am I being too hard on it? How hard can it be to allow me to press “X” during the cut scene to allow me to skip it? Every other game does it. Why not this one? Why?!

Next…

Smackdown vs. Raw 2010 Xbox 360, Playstation 3, Wii (Different Gameplay experience)

Ah, pro-wrestling. You used to be so good in the mid and late 90s, but now look at you? At least in North America, you’re a shell of your former self. Your action has lost its bloodshed, you’ve disgraced yourself by changing to a PG rating and overall, you’ve become pathetic with fucking leprechauns winning more matches than people who should be main eventing. Instead, you push retards who rap and can’t sell moves to save their lives.

Good thing is, Smackdown vs. Raw 2010 is a decent game. I guess. Customization is a big theme this year and being able to download user-created storylines and wrestlers is amazing. I downloaded AJ Styles from TNA and KENTA from Japan’s NOAH promotion and it worked great.

There are some minor gameplay improvements in matches such as The Royal Rumble being able to eliminate people with finishers is pretty cool. The load times are pretty decent too, especially when loading a match.

I do, however, hate the soundtrack for this game. Whoever thinks it’s a good idea to use entrance music as a soundtrack: you’re an idiot and you should be shot. I want to rip off your shirt and carve my initials into your chest. It’s that damn horrible sounding.

Graphics are pretty nice, but Jesus Christ, I wish they would update their commentator track it’s been the same for far too long, since back in 2006 even. Not cool.

Now if only they would fire John Cena and go back to a more mature show. Give me more of what I want: hardcore action and hot chicks in sandals. Mmmm.

Anyway, Smackdown vs. Raw 2010 gets a 6.5/10.

Prototype Xbox 360, Playstation 3

Mindlessness, pointlessness, insanity, over-the-top chaos… how I love you. If you like all of those things, then you’re in for a treat when you pop in Prototype.

You play as Alex Mercer, pretty much, your hero and your badass buddy who you will be annihilating people and monsters alike with. Alex was the end result of an experiment and now he’s capable of destroying anything in his path, ranging from helicopters and tanks to goddamn buildings.

Your goal is to find out who did this to you and why. Sounds simple, huh? Not really, when you have no idea what you’re up against. Luckily, you’re capable of absorbing other people and taking their identities and their thoughts. Think of it sort of like the T-1000 from Terminator 2, only you’re trying to kill everything, not just one select person.

Gameplay has you pulling off combos, roaming around the futuristic, war-torn city, fighting people, a lot of routine stuff. The game is open-ended, which means it borrows a lot of things from Grand Theft Auto.

Missions get repetitive quite quickly, but hey, at least you can skip cut scenes. This doesn’t earn any points because it should be in every game, but it’s nice to know some people don’t forget things such as that.

The graphics are actually quite poor. No joke, these look like PS2 graphics. Regardless, if you want to have a nice weekend, give this game a rental.

7.5/10

Mike Gwilliam brings you up-to-date reviews, previews and news about video games, the internet, and technology. He's bold, out-spoken and pulls no punches. If you ever had a reason to trust someone's opinion on a video game, Mike Gwilliam will tell it how it is. Whether it's a masterpiece, overrated, or just downright sucks, Mike will let you know. His favourite games range from Star Craft, Final Fantasy VII, Grand Theft Auto, and Skyrim to Zelda, Max Payne, God of War, Uncharted and Batman: Arkham Asylum. In addition to game reviews, he'll also preview upcoming TV series and special gaming events such as E3, which, he'll be going to in 2012.

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Damon picard

Mike I agree with u in the last two games… But u have to admit, just because u can’t skip cut scenes in final fantasy 7 crisis core doesn’t mean anything u have to watch them it will help u understand the story more.. But… It would have been better if you just needed to watch them once that way if u die u could skip them then… In my opinion I think it should get at least a 9.5 rating (yes I am a major final fantasy addict) but a 2.2 rating is just stupid srry but it’s true.
Mike

Hey Damon, I appreciate your reply. I understand your concern over the low score I gave Crisis Core. What I want to ask you is this: if you weren’t such a big Final Fantasy fan, then would you still like to watch 10 minute long cutscenes over and over even if you already understand the story?

The reason I rated it so low was that it became unplayable, and downright annoying. I understood the story perfectly, but wanted to progress in it, not go back to the same thing again.

9.5 is probably the score it would have been given if I could skip cutscenes. As you said, you are a big Final Fantasy fan, but even X-play gave this game a 1/5, which translates to 2/10, meaning I liked the game .2 more than a well-established video game show.

Take that as you will.

Mike.
http://www.literary-planet.com Wowfood

I have to disagree on the first two games, and agree on the third.

Crisis core, was a good game, not amazing but not poor, I just don’t believe that the cutscene part should have such a negative impact. Personally i’d say that it deserves about a 5.5 / 10

Far as smackdown is concerned i think you gave it too high of a score. i mean the soundtrack was appalling, the graphics, sound-effects and sound-bites were just rehashed from the past well, smackdown since 06

Add to that the only real improvement was the create a finisher mode.

Personally i’d say that at most the game deserves a 4/10 purely because it is simply a rehash of the previous games, no innovation nothing.
Mike

Hey Wowfood. As far as cutscenes having too big of a negative impact: the fact that skipping cutscenes is in pretty much every single game — even in games with very short cutscenes — the fact that you have to sit through the same thing for 10 minutes is annoying. I don’t play a game to watch the same scene over and over.

Most games that don’t allow you to skip a cut scene only have it so that you have to watch it only once. Which I can tolerate. In most games, I will watch the cut scene. Maybe once or twice even, depending on how good it is. But 10 minutes? Five times? That translates to fifty minutes. 50 minutes. Nearly an hour.

As far as Smackdown goes: the ability to download user-created wrestlers is a big deal for me. I played a lot of wrestling games for the Gamecube and printed off instructions for how to make people such as Spider-Man, Link, Michael Jackson, etc… and it was a blast. But it took forever. The Create-A-Wrestler modes were amazing though.

Seeing as you can download movesets too, along with your own storylines — again, user-created… the game is different enough from most wrestling games. I hated 09, but I think 2010 really set the bar high.

Once again, all comments are welcome. Keep them coming.

-Mike.