Pockets of Sanity

You want a piece of me? Well, go somewhere else!

I'm not talking about video games here ever again.

Since I've been blogging I've noticed that people really seem to dig when I talk about haircuts or dump trucks or how worshiping a dead NASCAR driver is retarded, but as soon as I mention video games, everyone just rolls their eyes and ignores what I have to say.  My audience, such as it is, enjoys the bad movie talk and my run ins with rednecks at gas stations, but whenever I start talking about gaming, it's a traffic killer.

Also around the time of this realization, I'd been itching to create something new.  Some of you might know that I ran one of the first movie/DVD review websites on the web that was worth a damn, from about 1996-2004.  Towards the end though I'd gotten to a rather dark place in my personal life and that coupled with a few other factors led to the site's demise.  It's been something I've regretted ever since.

Creating yet another movie review site was not something that appealed to me.  Been there, done that, and I just don't have the love for movies that I used to.  Don't get me wrong, I still enjoy the cinema, but when you've sworn off going to movie theaters entirely it severely limits what you can do.  And unfortunately the internet is still of the mindset of "If it's not a new release, we don't give a shit."

After ending my previous website I did some freelance work for DVD Talk and Video Game Talk.  Now I've been a member of their forums for over 10 years, and have grown to enjoy the group of people there quite a bit.  And in their video game community, for example, a lot of members were doing some really great work on their own, whether it be reviewing or podcasting or even creating game-based music.

When it seemed as though Video Game Talk was being abandoned, I made a push to take it over and rebuild it with content from all the forum members who were already creating content elsewhere.  The response I got to that was essentially "Yeah we're not going to do anything with it, and neither are you."

I still felt that these people's work was worth showcasing though, and so I created Gamers With Casts.  The goal is to showcase 4-5 regularly updated podcasts along with reviews and articles from myself and others, and to use everyone's individual followings to bolster the audiences of everyone else.  Share Twitter followers, YouTube subscribers, etc.

So now when I want to ramble about games, I'll do it there.  If you're one of the silent followers of mine who also enjoys gaming, I invite you to check us out.  Why not watch the promo I made for the site, then click on some linkage.

Site: www.gamerswithcasts.com
Twitter: www.twitter.com/gamerswithcasts
Facebook: www.facebook.com/pages/Gamers-With-Casts/354608111429

Thus ends Pocket of Sanity's coverage of the video game industry.  Thanks!

The Pile of Shame: ONECHANBARA-BIKINI SAMURAI SQUAD (360)

The "pile of shame" is literally a pile of unplayed video games that every true gamer has.  We buy games we want to play but then get caught up in something else and most of us never get back to the pile.  I'm stopping the cycle and playing through all my old games before I allow myself to buy new ones.

If you didn't already know this about me, I tend to be drawn to movies and games that no one else has ever heard of.  I'm not entirely sure why that is, I guess sometimes I just like trying to discover hidden gems instead of going with the flow.  Unfortunately this game is no gem.

Onechanbara is an ongoing budget line of games in Japan, two of which have been released here in the States.  And damned if I know what the hell is going on in the Xbox 360 edition, Bikini Samurai Squad.  While there are English subtitles, all the voice acting in the game is Japanese, and each mission is preceded by a loooooong, scrolling wall of text that might as well not even be translated because it never makes a lick of sense.  (You can read about the series here on Wikipedia, it's the best I can do.)

Basically here's the deal: you're a scantily clad zombie killer, and along with your equally inappropriately dressed kid sister, you roam the streets hacking and slashing zombies.  Lots of zombies.  Literally thousands of zombies in each level.  Sometimes you're on a motorcycle while you're killing zombies.  Sometimes the zombies are dogs or policemen who have grown to twice their normal size.  And the zombies always spawn from the ground, no matter if you're standing on grass or concrete or on the fifth floor of a building.  The zombies ALWAYS come from underground.  There's even a scene in a hospital where you're in a morgue, and instead of the zombies coming from the vaults they're coming from underground.  They'll just bury you anywhere in Japan, it seems.

Please don't misunderstand, I'm all for totally over the top absurdity in video games.  In one of this game's cut scenes for example, you're trapped in the back of an armored car, and you escape by literally slicing the truck in half with your sword and jumping out.  I'm okay with that.  That's what made this game bearable, for a brief time.

Graphically the game is all over the place.  The cut scenes are decently done CGI (aside from some pretty bad screen tearing), and had the game looked like the cut scenes throughout it would have helped matters.  Instead the actual gameplay looks like a pretty Sega Dreamcast game. Unfortunately it also plays like a game from a few console generations ago too.

The main problem is that the gameplay is beyond repetitive.  Each level features at least one but sometimes more "zombie arenas".  You reach a certain point where spikes come up from the ground, trapping you inside with hundreds of constantly spawning zombies.  To get out of each area you eventually have to destroy a mini-boss zombie, but the game never tells you this.  So for the first few levels you could stay inside one of these things for 20-30 minutes wondering if the spawning will ever end.  Also, normal attacks aren't enough to kill these mini-bosses, you have to use combos that have you pressing two buttons on the controller at once.  Again though, the game never tells you this, or even that you CAN do this.

But my main question about Onechanbara: Bikini Samurai Squad is this... what the hell is up with Japan?  Certain japanese games seem to take being a pervert to a whole new level.  For example, boob jiggle.  Japanese game developers have almost elevated this particular type of physics-based coding to an art form.  What I want to know is if boob jiggle code programming is entry level grunt work or is it something you get promoted to.  I'm betting it's the top job in the programming department.  Something you strive for all your life.

Now watch this video, which is the game's first or second cutscene, and tell me if it doesn't just creep you out with how pervy it is.  In case you can't guess, it's NSFW:

Even weirder than that is the "Dress Up" mode in the game, where after unlocking outfits and makeup during the game itself you can dress up your character and have a little hack 'n' slash fashion show.  I'm sorry, I like skin and all, but video game skin just doesn't do it for me.

By around level six or so I decided life was just too short and abandoned the game.  The story was non-existent, the gameplay repetitive and frustrating, and the way the characters are being displayed was downright embarrassing.  And you only score achievements if you either finish the entire game or finish each level on three different difficult levels.  Fuck that noise, ain't happening.  Listed it on Half.com and within an hour I sold it for twice as much as I paid for it.  Silver lining achievement unlocked.

The Pile of Shame: GUITAR HERO SMASH HITS (360)

The "pile of shame" is literally a pile of unplayed video games that every true gamer has.  We buy games we want to play but then get caught up in something else and most of us never get back to the pile.  I'm stopping the cycle and playing through all my old games before I allow myself to buy new ones.

I am a fairly hardcore Guitar Hero and Rock Band player.  I play guitar/bass, almost always on Hard, and can play for hours at a time.  I realize I'm not a real rock star, but I enjoy the level of interactivity with songs that I enjoy listening to.

The reason I've embraced the Rock Band series over the Guitar Hero games is that Rock Band "speaks" to me more than the other.  What I mean by that is that Rock Band just feels right.  I feel like I'm playing along with lots of my favorite songs.  Guitar Hero, on the other hand, features a lot of songs from genres I cannot stand, and charts those songs in the most frustrating ways, seemingly catering to hardcore music gamers who end up building robots to play the game for them.  I'm not knocking Guitar Hero for this, I'm simply stating why one series works better for me than another.

Guitar Hero: Smash Hits is a collection of songs from the first three games in the series, along with a handful from GH: Aerosmith and GH Encore: Rocks the 80s.  All 48 songs now include full band support, and unlike in the past, all the songs are master recordings from the original artists.

I didn't start this series until Guitar Hero 2 came out for the 360, and therefore was never able to play the first game or the 80s edition since they were Playstation only releases.  Unfortunately, the bulk of the songs in the playlist come from the games I've already played to death, and considering that I only play guitar/bass, the game essentially offered me nothing new.

Playing through the career mode quickly became a tedious chore, as the songs got worse and worse as I progressed, eventually becoming nothing but the finger-melting squeal-fests that I can't stand.  And of course the game concludes with "Through the Fire and Flames" which if that song was a person I'd punch it in the ovaries.

For a small fee there is an export feature where you can download 21 of the 48 songs to your hard drive to play in newer Guitar Hero games, and that was fine for me.  I got to export "Freebird" and "Nothin' But a Good Time", which is probably all I would play anyway.  After the export, there was no reason for me to keep the game, and I managed to sell it on Half.com for three times what I paid for it.

So yes, this became the first Guitar Hero or Rock Band game that I didn't keep in my library.  I think that says it all.

I admit it, I'm a cheater

My only New Year's resolution this year was to play through games in my pile of shame and sell them off before buying more.  And well, technically I've done that.  But I might have screwed up the ratio a little bit...

First off I totally blame my spouse, who bought me both Mass Effect 2 and Bayonetta for my birthday / Valentine's Day.  But then I also got some birthday cash in the mail, and well there was a sale at Gamestop and New Egg, and so purchases had to be made.

But worthwhile purchases!  Games that sound so absurd that there was no way I could NOT play them!  Games like 50 Cent: Blood on the Sand, which finds Fiddy in Iraq trying to get paid for a concert.  Or Operation Darkness, which takes place during World War II but features Hitler, zombies, werewolves, vampires, Jack the Ripper and dragons!  Holy shit!

The most absurd purchase though looks to be Onechanbara: Bikini Samurai Squad.  Just look at this video!

The Pile of Shame: Halo (Xbox)

The "pile of shame" is literally a pile of unplayed video games that every true gamer has.  We buy games we want to play but then get caught up in something else and most of us never get back to the pile.  I'm stopping the cycle and playing through all my old games before I allow myself to buy new ones.

Yes that's right, Halo.  As in the biggest scf-fi shooter of the modern gaming era.  As in the reason people bought an original Xbox.  Hell, it was the reason I picked up an original Xbox.  I've had it and Halo since launch actually.  And I'm just now playing it.

The Halo universe spans multiple games, books, videos and various other media.  As a result, the story is probably pretty fleshed out by now.  Please understand that the original game is all I know of the Halo-verse though and so forgive me when I say that the story of Halo is actually a little confusing.  Don't get me wrong, it's not headbashingly stupid or anything.  It's just that, at times, the story seemed to either wander off or throw out a ton of details in a fit of fury. 

Also, it didn't help that every time there was a cut scene someone wanted to come in and talk to me, and so I wasn't able to entirely focus on the story.  So, you know, not faulting the game really.  What I could gather though was that you're this revered dude named Master Chief and you kick ass and take names.  With bullets.  I'll allow it.

One thing that bothered me during the first half of the game were the enemies that you're mowing down at regular intervals.  The majority of your kills come from this little cowardly alien race that quite frankly sound like you've walked into a preschool and started blasting the children and their mogwai pets.  It was a little disconcerting at times, and I don't even like kids.

And I admit that for a time I wasn't being blown away by the game, until I got to the stage known as The Flood.  From there on?  Awesomeness.  Pure awesomeness.

Now here's the main reason why Halo is justifiably as acclaimed as it is.  It works.  Everything about it works.  Even if this is (or was) your first time playing a first person shooter, everything about it feels just about as it should.  The controls (although a tad floaty) feel right.  There's nothing too complex going on.  You're not worrying about leveling up or juggling inventory or weapons.  Checkpoints auto-save you at regular and appropriate intervals.  And to think this was an Xbox launch title.  They nailed it right out of the chute.  And I'm guessing one could argue that except for Halo 2, no one else got anywhere close during the console's entire lifespan.

Speaking of Halo 2, I guess I have to play it now.  Good thing I've also owned that one since the day it was released...

The Pile of Shame: Tom Clancy's H.A.W.X. (Xbox 360)

The pile of shame is literally a pile of unplayed video games that every true gamer has.  We buy games we want to play but then get caught up in something else and most of us never get back to the pile.  Well I'm stopping the cycle and playing through all my old games before I allow myself to buy new ones.

I'm not a hardcore Tom Clancy video game fan so I don't know exactly where H.A.W.X. fits in with the whole Clancy-verse.  The story does seem to flitter through other storylines from what I can tell, but of course that meant nothing to me.  The story I was able to follow though was that you're an elite pilot who goes to work for a private army contracting company that (shocker!) sells out to the highest bidder and turns on the United States.  Your loyalty remains with 'Meric-Uh though, and you rejoin your former not-as-elite-as-you military buddies to stop the invading contractor asshole douchebags.

Sounds just like what I went through at my job a couple months back.

Anyway, as it turns out I'm not a fan of the flying sims and air combat genre, so I don't really know why I picked this one up.  That being said, I've still played those games here and there over the years and I think it's safe to say that H.A.W.X. is probably the best of the lot. 

The controls take some getting used to but the game gives you plenty of time to do so.  The difficulty seems arbitrary though, and I'm convinced that this is one of those games that just lets you win after a few failed tries.  There were missions where I just kept dying and kept dying over and over and over again, and then suddenly I'd win, even though I'd done nothing differently.

Achievement-point wise I was able to grab 275 points out of 1000 playing through the entire game on the easiest difficulty.  There are a great deal of multiplayer achievements and a couple off fucking retarded ones like "Fly at MACH 2 for One Hour During Campaign Mode". Uh, no game, I'm not doing that.  Ever.

There were parts of H.A.W.X. that I enjoyed but it did get rather tedious and I was hoping it would end a lot sooner than it did.  If you're a fan of the genre though you'll probably dig this one a lot more than I did.  It's a pretty solid game, just not my thing.

Playing Through the Pile of Shame: Fracture (Xbox 360)

After finishing up Shellshock 2 I loaded up Fracture, a game that had always been on my radar but got mediocre to poor reviews and didn't sell well at all.  That's a shame really, because it's a LucasArts title and I've usually associated LucasArts with some decent games.

And believe it or not, Fracture does indeed turn out to be a decent game.  It's a third person shooter with some mild puzzle elements set in the not-too-distant future, after the United States has been FRACTURED (tee hee) in half by devastating floods in the midwest.  As a result, two separate countries emerge, and then that's where things get wonky storyline-wise.

One side of the former US loves DNA splicing and cyberbiotic implantations and whatnot, while the other side doesn't much care for all that noise.  The obvious result is war!  With guns and bombs and kabloomy!

But that's all well and good.  Most video game stories don't make much sense anyway.  The problem comes in with the character you're playing, Jet Brody, the most generic video game hero I've seen in just about forever.  No backstory, no personality, just a flat-topped grunt soldier in a super suit.  And Jesus Christ, did I mention your name is Jet fuckin' Brody.  Ugh.

The amount of levels/checkpoints in the game is a little frustrating as well.  The game features three "acts" to the story, but each act feels like it goes on forever and they each come to what feels like logical conclusions several times throughout.  I'm the kind of gamer now that likes playing a couple levels of a game before bed, not part of one huge level and just saving at some random checkpoint, only to jump back into it the next day not knowing what exactly I'm supposed to be doing.  The pacing could have been done better.

The game's music is worth noting because at times it's quite good.  It's courtesy of Michael Giacchino, who also scores Lost and did a kick-ass job with the music for the Star Trek reboot.

Achievement point wise I picked up 405/1000 on a single playthrough on the easiest setting.  Could have done better had I used some of the specialized weapons more, but I basically settled into using the one weapon that had ammo lying around in piles everywhere instead of crippling myself by carrying around the gun with only three bullets for it on the entire planet.

Overall I had fun with Fracture.  The difficulty never seemed to fluctuate wildly as it seems to do in other shooters either.  It never really frustrated me and never felt broken or rushed out before being finished.  High praise, I know.  Granted it only cost me six bucks, so I guess my expectations were already pretty low anyway...

Playing Through the Pile of Shame: Shellshock 2 Blood Trails (Xbox 360)

As you may or may not know about me, I am a gamer. Have been ever since we received an Atari 2600 from Santa back in 1981 or so. But lately I noticed that my gaming tastes had changed. No longer was I playing one game for days and days and days, trying to get to the end and find every secret passage along the way. Nope, I'd become a very casual gamer. Playing a few tunes in Rock Band one night, playing a game in my season of Madden another, then not playing anything for a week or two.

And while my gaming habits had changed, my gaming purchases had not.  I was still buying story-based games that I sincerely wanted to play through.  But once I got them home and on the game shelf, they'd be ignored.

Well, no more.

I did what any hardcore gamer would do.  I went out and purchased a second Xbox 360 for the bedroom, so I can game at night when I'm not in the mood to watch old Doctor Who episodes before sleepy time.  And I justified this purchase by making myself this promise: Play through these time-intensive games and then sell them off.  Once you're done, you're done.  Get 'em out of the house.  Make some cash.  When you're done with five games, you can get a new one.

So I started this master plan with a game I'd picked up recently (and cheaply) at a Blockbuster that was going out of business.  It's called Shellshock 2: Blood Trails, and the quickest way to describe this first person shooter is "The Vietnam War... with Zombies".

I played the first Shellshock ever so briefly on the original Xbox and remembered nothing about it.  That's probably fine since I'm not sure how well connected this second one is to the first.  Basically you're a Edward Norton-sounding guy looking for his brother (the lone survivor from the first game) who is infected with the zombie virus. You have to find him all while battling both the VC and zombies.

The Halo series and the Call of Duty games have set the bar so high for shooters that it's easy to simply say this game sucks and move on.  That would be unfair, because it doesn't outright suck.  It's not broken, like many smaller titles end up being.  It's competent, and the sound design makes this a pretty disturbing experience, especially if you're playing with headphones on, as I do.

I mean, the Vietnam War was by all accounts one shitty, disturbing experience to begin with.  But throw in hordes of zombies and the constant sound of screams, babies crying and dogs whimpering and you get one seriously upsetting vibe.

The gameplay works as it should for the most part, although it's tricky to get the aim sensitivity just right and reloading your gun is a cumbersome chore that will always get you killed if you're in the middle of anything.  Enemies seem to know telepathically when you're reloading, because as soon as you do, they swarm you and start smacking you in the face.

One unfortunate aspect of the graphics, which were otherwise pretty decent, is that there are only 5 or 6 variations of zombies.  There's a black soldier, a woman, a japanese gardener guy, a skinny bald zombie, etc.  This becomes all too apparent when you get to the game's final level as an entire army of these things are thrown at you.

Speaking of the final level... I hated it.  Hated it because all of a sudden the game's difficulty was ramped up to absurdity and I wound up at the final checkpoint with one of the game's lesser weapons, making it even more difficult.  I played that level over and over and over again for what probably added up to 2-3 hours, and was almost ready to throw in the towel and abandon the game until I decided to jack the contrast levels of the game up to max so I could easily target everything.  Yes, I pulled a Mark McGwire and cheated.  But I cheated to win.  And that's all that matters, right Mark?

As an achievement whore, I saw this game as a good opportunity to rack up some points since there's no multiplayer.  Basically you just gain points as you play through and finish each level.  Sometimes I don't mind lazy achievements when the game becomes a chore to play through.  Unfortunately you can only get around 500 out of the 1000 points on a regular playthrough, unless you're just insane and always play on the hardest difficultly first.  You get the biggest achievement for playing through the game twice, but I'm afraid that just wasn't going to happen.  Off to Half.com with you.

Oh, and as a final thought, here, enjoy the trailer for the game which features a narrator doing his best Nick Nolte impression and the song Freebird, which also plays over the closing credits of the game and as a result has been stuck in my head for days now.

In defense of: The Beatles Rock Band

Let me get this out of the way first: The Beatles: Rock Band gets five out of five stars from me. No amount of nitpicking will detract from the overall joy, wonder and amazement this game has provided already and will continue to provide over the days, weeks and months that I'll be playing it. Nothing is perfect, not even The Beatles. But for what this game sets out to accomplish, it succeeds in every possible way.

I've read glowing review after glowing review for TB:RB, and for the most part I agree with them. But every review has fit that same kind of "review mold", many just saying the same things... echoing the same complaints. Let's address some of those gripes, shall we?

"The game is easier than regular Rock Band." In some ways yes and in some ways no. I started my first run through Story Mode playing hard guitar, thought the first song was too easy, and promptly bumped up to expert for the next song. It promptly handed me my ass. So back down to hard I went and that's how I played through Story Mode. Some songs are harder than others, and the charts get tougher as you go. Just like Rock Band. If you're one of those Dragonforce freaks then yes, you'll probably find the game fairly easy. Some of us just want to play the songs.

"Only 45 songs? There were 100 songs in Rock Band and 85 in Guitar Hero." So? IT'S THE BEATLES, not Nelson. Look if you want quantity over quality then go grab Guitar Hero: Aerosmith for $15 at Best Buy. The work and dedication that went into this project is worth paying a premium for.

"Where's this song?  Where's that song?"  I too am a little perplexed as to why rockers like Help! didn't make the cut.  It never struck me when I was playing through the game last night though.  I gained new appreciation for songs like Dear Prudence, one that had never really been on my radar much. The same cannot be said for I Want You (She's So Heavy) though... a song that still grates on my nerves like someone chewing on aluminum foil. (See? Like I said, The Beatles aren't perfect either. But I don't dock them a point and a half for that.)

And yes, while incredibly cool, the final set on the roof of Apple is a bit anti-climactic. The true finale of the game should have been the entire final medley from Abbey Road, but it's coming via DLC, as are many of your other favorites. So no worries there, really.

I'm not even going to get into the whole "But Paul didn't play bass on that song he plays drums because Ringo quit that day and blahbiddy blah blah" nitpicky nonsense that the hardcore types out there are engaging in right now. History isn't being re-written or anything. Calm yourselves.

Please don't misunderstand... I'm not trying to say that the game necessarily needs defending. Clearly it's getting great reviews across the board. But people feel compelled to dock points for little tiny nothings that don't detract from the experience whatsoever. And that's what this game ultimately is. An experience. One that looks amazing, sounds amazing and plays amazing. And one that you should share with as many people as possible.

The Beatles: Rock Band is now the standard that all future music games will have to attempt to match or exceed, just as The Beatles were the standard that all future bands attempted to match or exceed. One could argue that they've never been equaled. You have to wonder if the games industry can now do what the music industry couldn't.

20 Post Beatles Songs for the Expansion Pack

Okay, so you've got 20 tracks to pick for the Rock Band: John, Paul, George and Ringo Track Pack expansion disc featuring the solo work of the Beatles. No, there isn't such a product coming out... but it's a good idea. Try to keep in mind songs that would be fun to play as opposed to their biggest hits. For example, I didn't pick Imagine because it's mostly piano. And I didn't pick How Do You Sleep? because, well, it's just so damn mean spirited. Go. John Lennon - Gimme Some Truth, Instant Karma, Isolation, Working Class Hero

Paul McCartney - Band on the Run, Jet, Live and Let Die, Maybe I'm Amazed, Old Siam Sir, Sing the Changes, Tug of War, Venus and Mars/Rock Show

George Harrison - All Things Must Pass, All Those Years Ago, Blow Away, Got My Mind Set On You, My Sweet Lord

Ringo Starr - It Don't Come Easy, Photograph, Weight of the World