Solatorobo

Top 10 Games of 2011

/ skoce / 1 Comment

With 2011 coming to a close, I am looking back on the games that I played this year and like all great minds, I am making a top 10 list of my favorite games. Now, I am limited to only Wii and handheld games, since those are the only systems I own and I only played about 20 new games this year. Most of what I played was several years old at least. So this is a somewhat limited list. Let’s get on with it.

10. The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D
This is still a phenomenal game, even after 15 years. The only reason it isn’t higher on the list is that it is an only barely touched up port of a 15 year old game. Still, it is a good port of a great game. If you haven’t played Ocarina of Time, what is wrong with you?

9. Okamiden
If I had stopped this game halfway through, it would probably have been 4 or 5 spots higher on the list. Okamiden started out a delightful romp, but the longer it went on the less fun it was. It looks and sounds great, but the early simplicity is replaced not with increasingly complex difficulty but with sheer tedium. It is hard not to compare Okamiden to the DS Zelda games and find it lacking. It has a cohesive, explorable over world, but it stumbles nearly everywhere else in comparison. Still, it is a very good game, if not a great one like its predecessor.

8. Pokemon White
It is a new Pokemon game. There are a number of changes on the periphery, but the core gameplay remains unchanged. I plowed through to main game right as I got this, but haven’t felt the need to go back for the post game yet. Still, it’s a Pokemon game, you already know it you like it or not. I do like it.

7. Kirby: Return to Dreamland
This doesn’t quite reach the magical heights of Nintendo’s best games, but it is still a terrific co-op plat former. This is the game Kirby fans have been waiting for since Kirby 64 and it didn’t disappoint.

6. Professor Layton and the Last Spector
More Layton is always good. There is little new in this fourth entry (except for London Life, which I’ve barely touched) but as long as there are new puzzles, I’ll buy new Layton games. Plus, newcomer characters Emmy and Inspector Grosky are some of the best new characters of the year. Good, good stuff.

5. Solatorobo: Red the Hunter
Solatorobo is a game that whatever its faults, of which there are several, it is so earnest and heartfelt that is it hard to hold it against the game. It is a delightful romp through a charming, fantastical world. Sure, the game never really moves beyond picking up things and throwing them at enemies and the plot goes off the rails near the end but the bulk of the game is pure cheerful fun.

4. Kirby: Mass Attack
While Return to Dreamland was a classic Kirby platformer, Mass Attack is one of the pink blob’s experimental games. One that worked out better than most. It is a surprisingly intuitive combination of platformer and RTS that is simply a blast to play. If you own any sort of DS you should own this title.

3. Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective
This comes from the makers of Ace Attorney, and obviously so. It has the same wacky yet dark story and some top notch writing. The story is really great and the puzzle-y gameplay is nearly perfect.

2. Tactics Ogre
I love a good TRPG, and this remake of Tactics Ogre may be the best I’ve ever played. It comes from the same stock as the classic Final Fantasy Tactics and it shows. I put more than 60 hours on this thing and didn’t quite beat it. This game is nearly perfect.

1. The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword
This isn’t even close. I loved Skyward Sword. I loved every part of it. The new run button, the motion controller sword fighting, you name it. Plus, Groose is the best new character of the year. Every part of this game is great.

Its Secret is Sincerity

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The game I’ve been playing for the last 2 weeks, Solatorobo, is a late gem for the slowly fading DS. I’m just having some trouble articulating why I like it so much. In many ways, it is exactly the kind of game I don’t tend to like. It is very shallow. All fights play out basically the same, with in the way of difficulty or design. At the same time, it goes out of its way to hold the players hand. Everything gets a tutorial or an explanation from the characters. The game doesn’t allow, let alone expect, the players to figure out anything on their own. This ties into the last big problem, that the game is terribly talky. Characters won’t shut up. The players every action prompt more dialogue from somebody. Despite these problems, and more, I still really like the game, though. Somehow, a piece of quality shines through the crap that might have drowned this game.


One area is shines is in the graphics. This is a fine looking DS game, especially for one with 3D graphics. It honestly gives Final Fantasy: 4 Heroes of Light a run for best on the system. The sound is likewise excellent. There are still some problems, though. For all that there is a beautiful world to explore, the game denies the player that exploration. The areas available to venture into are usually cramped walkways, sewers and caves and the like. It tantalizes with beauty, but hides it.

As I said before, Solatorobo is quite shallow. All fighting generally boils down to dodging the opponent’s one attack, running behind it, picking it up and throwing it. Ad naseum. There are some flying areas, both sort of explore-y spots and races, but neither of those adds much. Playing the game becomes somewhat rote after a very short period.

If I have all these complaint about the game, how can I saw I like it so much? I think it comes down to the games attitude. This is a bright, optimistic game. Its outlook is more like Skies of Arcadia than Final Fantasy 7. Sure, many of the elements that make up the game world are perfectly designed to appeal to me. I love airships and floating continents. And the fighting robots look like they came straight out of Miyazaki. Much work has clearly gone into the world on which this game takes place. It feels less like the usual checkpoints of places to go in a game, here is a snow town and there a tropical island, and more a cohesive world. There is a history and sense of place that most games miss.

However, that alone would not be enough to buoy a lackluster game. Somehow, Solatorobo is more than the sum of its parts. It is talky, but the story is much better than the usual fare. It is not great by any means, but its tone is so different, so optimistic and bright, that it distinguishes itself. Many times, I sit grinding my teeth every time a game interrupts my play to let some douche-y characters jabber on. (I’m looking at you every Tales game ever!) In Solatorobo, the dialogue, while rarely essential, is usually worth hearing. The picking up mechanic has some life to it, though it is too simple to really power a whole game, but combat is infrequent enough that it is rarely a problem. The game is relaxing. It is a stress free, frustration free romp through a colorful world. Solatorobo is not a great game. It is not a game that will go down as one of its systems best or something essential. What it is is an easy, cheerful diversion. It has its problems, but it is hard to hold those problems against a game that so firmly has its heart in the right place.

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Tap, Tap, Tapping away!

/ skoce / 2 Comments

Still playing my DS all the time? Damn straight. After I positively devoured Kirby Mass Attack, I expected to get to jump right into the second of the three DS games I am anticipating this fall, Solatorobo. Unfortunately, for some reason Amazon did not ship the game until Thursday, though it was released on Tuesday. No big deal, but I don’t pay for Amazon Prime to get my pre-ordered games a week after they come out. (Actually, I don’t pay for Amazon Prime at all, but that is beside the point) During the interminable wait, I had to play something, so I broke out Elebits: The Adventures of Kai and Zero, a game I picked up out of a bargain bin, probably during one of GameStop’s “Buy 2, Get 1 Free” sales.

I am enjoying it much more than I expected. There is no escaping the fact that this is primarily a kid’s game, what with the childish graphics — by which I do not mean 2D, but that the sprites are large, simple and big headed — and complete lack of difficulty, but there is enough substance under the candy coated exterior to keep me playing. Elebits is a rather clever mix of Pokemon and The Legend of Zelda tied around an annoying central mechanic. I cannot fathom why the game is built around tapping the DS’s bottom screen constantly, over and over and over. In order to power special skills and various contraptions around the game world, the player must collect charge. This is done by tapping on little creatures, the titular Elebits, which pop out from under rocks and out of trees. It isn’t hard, but it is tedious. It is like a Zelda game that is half collecting Rupees that try to run away from you. This stupidity drags the first hour or two of the game to an anti-fun halt.

The rest of the game has been fun. Easy but enjoyable nonetheless. Despite not having actual dungeons, Elebits plays like a Zelda game. That is a huge compliment. The biggest difference is that instead of finding new tools and magical items, the player finds Omega Elebits. These Omegas function identically to Zelda’s tools, with each one having a unique puzzle-solving ability. The Fire Omega, for instance, can spew fire clearing away path-blocking brush and the Ice Omega can create ice platform to let the player cross rivers. To further add to the Pokemon-ness is the fact that the player can evolve most of the Omegas, provided you feed them enough charge, that is.

You will be constantly interrupted from your pleasantly easy Zelda-clone to poke at the little Elebits on the bottom screen. The emphasis on charging does lessen as the game goes on. Your collection tank gets bigger, evolved Omegas cost less to use and the game start providing you with more high charge creatures to capture. Still, front-loading tedium is never a way to hook players. I put Elebits down when Solatorobo arrived in the mail, but one I finish that, and probably Professor Layton 4, I will be back to take on the last third of Elebits.