Press "Enter" to skip to content

Tag: jrpg – general

A Pile of Braincrumbs Before I Go

Leaving on a trip tomorrow, and it’s going to be one of those rare times where I unplug for awhile. That said, I made sure that whatever I started playing in the past few weeks were things that I could beat before leaving. In the end, I played through four games and read a Let’s Play of Dare to Dream, an early effort by one Clifford Blezinski (thankfully, he’s improved since then).

That aside, here’s what I thought of those four games I played:

Time Limit Within 7 Days – Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor Overclocked

Even though my main gaming goal for the year is to beat as much of my MegaTen backlog as possible, I haven’t made much progress with that. After Persona 4, I didn’t play another SMT-related game until this one, which is a 3DS port-with-extras of the original Devil Survivor on DS. It’s also a strategy RPG, which is unusual for this franchise, but as I love the genre, I wasn’t going to complain.

During battles, the top screen features a ton of useful info.It was the SRPG elements, and the battle system in general, which proved to be the most fun part of the game. Characters move around on a grid and can attack and use special actions, but the twist here is that each of your party members can have a team of up to two demons tagging along with them, and initiating battle leads to a first-person turn-based affair that’s more typical of MegaTen. This mixing of traditional and strategy JRPG gameplay works really well, and is further augmented by robust customization options and demon recruitment and creation systems.

Despite this, the game is grindy on the normal difficulty, which wouldn’t be as bad if there were more than one or two “free battle” areas to level up in at a time. As for the story, it’s pretty good, though hardly original—much like The World Ends with You, the game takes place in Tokyo over a period of seven days, which is the time limit the main characters’ have in order to sort things out (it’s worth noting here that among Overclocked‘s new features are some unlockable “eighth day” scenarios, though I didn’t get one with the ending I chose). In other aspects, the plot is your standard boilerplate MegaTen, with a silent protagonist, characters with varied personal agendas, and multiple endings. Most of the time, it’s well-paced for a portable game, though the density of plot threads means that it can be easy to forget your place at times, which can lead to unintended (by you) consenquences.

The game is fully voiced (though the results are hit or miss), the music and graphics are decent… for the most part (I want to know what the hell is up with that strap on Haru’s dress), and the localized script is up to Atlus USA’s usual high standards. Strangely, there isn’t much use of 3D aside from the opening movie and demon fusing animations, but other than that, it looks great on my XL. As a MegaTen game, it’s a reasonably solid entry overall.

A Little Story in a Cave – Ikachan

That familiar Pixel aesthetic comes across clearly in <i>Ikachan</i>.By the time I beat Devil Survivor Overclocked, there wasn’t enough time to start something similarly lengthy, so everything I’ve played since then has been much shorter. First up was Ikachan, a 3DS port of a pre-Cave Story PC game by Studio Pixel. It takes place in an underwater cavern, and the main character is a squid. As in Cave Story, there are snaking passages, cute little regular enemies, deadly red spikes to avoid, strange beings to talk to (barnacle/anemone people, in this case), useful items to collect, and an atmosphere that ably blends the unusual with the mundane.

The story, however, is much simpler, and so is the game itself. There is only one area—the gigantic cave where the tale takes place—and very few boss battles. For Cave Story fans, Ikachan is notable for being the game that Ironhead, a large fish with an, er, iron head, came from. Ikachan is also easier; none of the enemies are as taxing as, say, Monster X in Cave Story. It’s cute, very short, and worth a look if you have a spare hour or two. The original PC game is freeware (note: some spoilers in link), though the 3DS version adds some new features, including a subtle layered 3D effect.

Blame Canada – Deadlight

I don’t normally play zombie games, but I do play platformers, and picked up Deadlight in a Steam sale awhile back. Unfortunately, my old Mac Pro couldn’t handle it, and so it was one of those games I shuttled off into my “Save for new compy” folder. As I now have said new compy, I’ve started digging into that folder. Sonic & SEGA All-Stars Racing was the acid test, and not long after playing through that, I found myself moving on to games like this one.

It ain't Canada, but it'll do.Deadlight takes place in early July 1986, in Seattle, in which it seems like pretty much the whole world has been overrun by zombies—sorry, “Shadows”—and what few humans are left in this one particular city try their best to survive. The main character is a scruffy middle-aged Canadian man (we know for sure he is Canadian because the game likes to remind us of this every so often, mostly through his diary entries and some comments on the items he finds during his travels) who is searching for his wife and daughter. He gets separated from his friends early on and is forced to make his way to a designated safe point on his own. This he does by running, jumping, climbing, walking, etc. all over the Seattle metro area in a linear fashion, occasionally solving puzzles and finding hidden areas. On a superficial level, at least, it’s pretty similar to Mark of the Ninja, but with much less stealth and a lot more zombies Shadows.

The game is thick with zombie genre cliches and sports at least a couple of frustrating sections in the third act, plus pausing is sometimes buggy, but otherwise it is generally well made (as unbelievable as some of it seems at times) and appropriately gritty and moody. It’s the sort of game that isn’t going to change the world, but does provide some fairly decent entertainment for a little while.

A Hungrier, Toothier Kirby – The Maw

I beat Deadlight quicker than I thought I would, and still needed something to play! To satiate this hunger, I turned to The Maw, which is, like Deadlight, a PC port of an XBLA game. This time, however, you play a small blue alien who befriends a small purple alien shortly before the ship on which you are both imprisoned crash-lands. The blue alien finds a handy laser lasso gauntlet thing, and accompanies the purple alien, a walking eyeball and mouth called Maw, on a journey to do… something. Though there are parts where they have to outwit their former captors, it’s never made very clear what the protagonists’ specific goal is.

This transformation power, which only appears once, is my favorite.The Maw is a neat little piece of platforming goodness—the kind of lower-budgeted, but still polished, work you’d commonly see released on disk form throughout the PS2 era. The lasso gauntlet is the main character’s means of interacting with Maw and the various creatures and objects within the world they’ve crashed onto. Maw itself grows as it eats and, much like a certain famous pink puffball, can gain different appearances and abilities if it consumes certain creatures; for example, a large horned beetle enables Maw to do a ramming move, which can destroy boulders and surpass certain obstacles. There are only a handful of these moves, but the small number of them makes sense given the game’s brief length.

Unlike many other, older platformers, the challenge is dialed down a bit. There are no lives, and respawning takes you back pretty much to exactly the same spot you were at when you died (for example, structures that you had destroyed before will remain destroyed). This being the case, it makes me wonder why it’s been made possible to die to begin with. Although it lessens some frustration, it’s still a very odd design choice.

The version of The Maw that I played included all of the DLC levels, which were omitted scenes interspersed throughout the campaign. While this is a nifty use of DLC, for the most part, they stuck out like a sore thumb in that they tended to be longer and more intricate than the “regular” stages.

Aside from some camera issues when Maw gets to be on the big side, a soundtrack that’s sometimes too repetitive, and the aforementioned issues regarding the difficulty and DLC, there’s really nothing bad I can say about this game. It’s just long enough that it doesn’t wear out its welcome, it controls well, it’s stable, and it’s enjoyable. For a lot of games, I couldn’t ask for much more than that.

Not Sticky Enough

One subset of games I am hopelessly devoted to are the Mario RPGs. There’s the original Super Mario RPG, of course, but my fondness is mainly for the Mario & Luigi and Paper Mario games. Both series tend to be fairly consistent, quality-wise, making it hard to pick out a single favorite. I have fave characters across them all (Goombario, Vivian, Fawful, etc.), plus the level designs, writing, graphics, and music are all great. Even the most un-RPG-like of the crop, the Wii title Super Paper Mario, is a fun and engaging game, with much to recommend it.

Unfortunately, this streak has now been broken, as I have just finished playing a Mario RPG that would definitely not be in the running for my favorite—not even close. In fact, this game, Paper Mario: Sticker Star, is unequivocally the worst Mario RPG I’ve played to date.

Sticker Star by itself is unusual: it’s a 3DS game; in other words, the first and only portable entry in the Paper Mario series. I’m not sure why it wasn’t made for the Wii U instead, as that would seem to be a more fitting home for it, though maybe it has something to do with the fact that it looks great with the 3D effect cranked up. As for the game’s structure, it goes back to the turn-based battle styles of the first two Paper Marios, but this time, there’s no additional party members.

Mario is accompanied by a helper character, though: a silver crown sticker named Kersti. She is introduced shortly after the opening, where, during a festival in which a magical sticker comet receives the wishes that the Mushroom Kingdom makes on it, Bowser disrupts the activities, causes the comet to break up and disperse, and, of course, kidnaps Princess Peach. Kersti, a steward of sorts for the now-scattered Royal Stickers contained within the comet, appears before Mario and immediately blames him for the chaos. When he sets her straight, she doesn’t believe him, but changes her tune after he offers to help her find the Royal Stickers. From the very beginning, she is an ingratiating, pushy, judgmental presence in the game, and, aside from her many neutral moments, is more annoying than any other friendly character from previous Mario RPGs.

So, right away, we have Mario and the self-appointed Nagging Sticker Mom going off on their quest. After dealing with their town’s destruction, the Toads are startlingly nonplussed about their Princess being kidnapped; she is pretty much never mentioned by any of them until near the end of the game. As for the rest of the game’s characters, Peach is mostly just a goal to reach, Luigi is reduced to a background element (literally), Yoshi appears only as a sphinx, and Bowser doesn’t even speak. Recurring flunky Kamek plays a role, as do Bowser Jr., a Wiggler, a Snifit, and a few of the Toads, but that’s about it for the cast. It’s as bare-bones an ensemble as there has ever been in these games.

<i>Paper Mario: Sticker Star</i>'s Fan sticker in action.The quest itself starts off well enough. The battle system is basically the same as in the other games, with the core attacks involving jumping or hammering, and bonus damage for getting the timing right. However, the twist this time is that all of Mario’s moves—attacking, healing, whatever—can only be pulled off by using a corresponding sticker. There are limits to the number of stickers that can be carried at any given time (these inventory limits are expanded during certain special events, such as when a Royal Sticker is collected), and some special stickers are bigger than others, which means that space management is a huge factor in getting through the game. Aside from your typical stickers which can be picked up at stores or on the field, there are also special ones made from “Things”, which are non-paper, three-dimensional objects that appear throughout the land. Once turned into stickers, these Things can carry out elaborate super moves, much like summon creatures in other JRPGs (my personal favorite is the Soda). Of course, there are limitations when it comes to these Thing Stickers—for starters, they don’t have in-menu descriptions like regular stickers—but this isn’t a problem most of the time.

However, some of the puzzles and other situations that require stickers can be surprisingly tough to figure out. This is especially true of the boss battles, where it is far too easy to lose because you used up all your stickers and the enemy is still alive. Conditional battles, such as many of those against bosses, are nothing new in JRPGs, but when one is completely reliant on items and inventory limits to fight them, that’s when problems arise. Sometimes, if you’re lucky and pace your attacks right, Kersti will appear and maybe even drop a hint.

One of the most convoluted puzzles in the game involves a giant Chain Chomp. It’s obvious that the goal is to guide the Chomp to a specific place, but every time Mario gets within range of it, a battle is triggered. Keep in mind that all Chain Chomps are invincible in Sticker Star, and thus, attack items are, for the most part, useless. The solution to this problem is a lengthy six-step process which I had amazingly somehow figured out myself over the course of much trial and error, though it was less of an “Ah-hah!” moment and more of a “Finally” one. Given how the whole scene is set up, it shouldn’t have been hard to craft a simpler puzzle that gave the same results, but instead, one has to execute a clunky solution for which only the barest hints had been given in advance.

"Paperization" in <i>Sticker Star</i>, using a Scrap.Aside from the sticker puzzles and boss battles, the levels are standard Paper Mario fare at their best—which is the majority of the time—and minor annoyances at their worst. The puzzles which require not stickers but “scraps” of the papery world tend to be both more sensible and interesting, and there’s the usual plethora of hidden areas and treasures to discover. Some levels are more entertaining than others, and most all of them encourage repeat visits. The levels are largely plot-free, but, unfortunately, the two areas that are story-heavy feature the most tedious bits of exploration in the game.

As for the more aesthetic frills, the writing (what little there is this time around) and localization is as witty as always, the music is pleasing and catchy, and the graphics look wonderful. Mario RPGs have always excelled in these categories, so these are just things to be expected.

Given my history with the previous Mario RPGs, I really wanted to love this one, but in the end, I just couldn’t. If this was another franchise, and another set of characters, Sticker Star may be seen as a great game with a few niggling issues, but this is Paper Mario, dammit, and as such, I expect a first-class experience. Part of me wonders if the reason that this installment is sub-par might be because Intelligent Systems wanted to devote more resources to Fire Emblem: Awakening and made Sticker Star less of a priority, but this is mere speculation on my part. As it stands, I know this developer can do better with this franchise, as it has in the past. Anyway, if you’re a fellow Mario RPG devotee, you might want to check this out, but keep in mind that it’s not as good as the previous games. For everyone else, I can safely say this is nonessential.

Mario & Luigi: Dream Team is now the only Mario RPG I’ve yet to play. Here’s hoping it’s better…

Welcome Back to Brainscraps

I’d been neglecting this place, and I’m still not completely sure why.

Perhaps it was disinterest, or some medical problems I was having (I won’t get into that), or that I was fine just talking about what I was playing on Twitter or various forums. I also suspect that my approach to this blog was part of the problem, and that’s why I’ve decided to refresh the site’s look, rewrite most of the “About” page, and start posting here regularly again.

So, welcome back. It’s been too long, hasn’t it—well over a year! I’ll do my best not to let this project fall by the wayside again, and part of how I intend to accomplish that is by writing about more than just games. In other words, now that I’m no longer active on LiveJournal, this is my main blog. It’s been awhile since I’ve had one of those, too. Figure reviews and most other collecting-related posts will remain on Tsuki-board, but everything else? Here.

Opoona stands in front of one of many artworks. Source image from Giant Bomb (giantbomb.com).The new theme I’ve come up with, or rather, frankenstein’d together from other WordPress templates, is something I call Tizia, after the homeworld of Opoona, the main character of the Wii game of the same name. I played Opoona this summer; it had problems (most notably a very-bad-by-modern-standards localization), but was unique and charming. It is also probably the only game I’ve ever played where art appreciation is a core part of the world. Hell, art in general is; one of Landroll’s towns is entirely devoted to the arts, and art-related careers are among the many jobs Opoona can pursue while on this planet.

Opoona has lingered in my mind ever since I beat it, in a good way; this is particularly true of the soundtrack, which is composed by Hitoshi Sakimoto and others at Basiscape, and which I have recently finally ordered a copy of. It’s not the best game I’ve beaten this year (that would probably be 10000000), but it’s certainly among the most memorable. I’m not going to ramble on at length about it, since it’s been months since I’ve beaten it, and as such, it’s no longer all that fresh in my mind. However, it’s a curiosity worth checking out if you like charming games as much as I do.

When a game leaves that strong an impression on me, I usually do a piece of fanart. In this instance, it’s a crossover with another memorable game, Ghost Trick, which was one of my favorites from last year’s stack of playthroughs. I’ve also (and this is a first for me) posted some of my process in creating this piece at my new Redirectorium at Tumblr. Yeah, I finally broke down and created a Tumblr like everyone else. I predict that a few years from now, everyone will have moved on to the New Internet Hotness and I, once again, will drag my feet in getting there, but for the time being, yep, I’m on Tumblr.

Holiday Games, Motion Controls, and Alla That

Just added Rune Factory 3 to the ol’ backlog this week. Can’t wait to dig into this latest localization in my beloved hack-and-slash meets Harvest Moon series, but it’s going to have to wait until I’m done with Etrian Odyssey II‘s main quest—which will be very soon, if all goes well. Maybe Eternal Sonata, too. Can’t be playing too many RPGs at once.

Even with the new addition, my backlog’s looking pretty good. Looking at the pic I took in January and comparing it with the current stack, it’s noticeably smaller: by eight game cases, to be precise. I’ve only beaten half of my 2010 Must-Plays, though, and will likey have room for just one more before year’s end; I’m currently leaning towards Tales of the Abyss to fill that slot. Then, there are all the games that have been/will be, coming out this season.

Rune Factory 3 was my last “must preorder” of the year, but there are many more I’d love to get at some point. Kirby’s Epic Yarn is chief among these, of course, but Epic Mickey looks really good, and recent positive press for Sonic Colors have renewed my slight interest in that game; on a similar note, Goldeneye‘s reviews have got me interested in that title at all. Even the new Super Mario All-Stars collection is pretty tempting. Strange that the Wii has so many top-notch games this holiday season, but the only reasons I have to complain are time and money. Otherwise, I’m happy to see all this Wii love.

Also, what's up with the SyFy Kids branding?

There’s not really anything left for me on the DS front until next year, when I’m looking forward to Ghost Trick, and awaiting US release dates for Ace Attorney Investigations 2, Dragon Quest VI, and (hopefully) Dragon Quest Monsters: Joker 2. The same goes for other platforms: Portal 2 (it would be crazy not to play this) and Duke Nukem Forever (it would also be crazy not to play this, but for obviously different reasons) on PC, Rune Factory Oceans on Wii, and… I can’t think of anything off the top of my head for 360. Then there’s the sequel to my favorite Wii game, de Blob: The Underground, which I only just learned recently is multiplatform like whoa, and have been, since its unveiling, incredibly skeptical about, for gameplay-related reasons.

de Blob 2‘s presence on non-Nintendo platforms seems to be a symptom of the motion control onslaught that’s been happening as of late. Sony’s PlayStation Move isn’t something I’ve followed all that closely, but I haven’t heard much bad about it. Kinect is a different beast altogether—even though I don’t plan on getting one, I have been curious about this controller-free device. Microsoft’s thrown a lot of money at marketing the thing, but at the same time, there’s been this caginess, first with the price, and more recently, with the review embargo, which was only lifted once it went on sale. Given the few reviews I’ve read, it’s not surprising: Kinect was made to be divisive. It does some things amazingly well, but lacks in other key respects, and the general takeaway is that it’s an amazing but unrefined bit of technology, plus you need a lot of space just to use the thing. Me, I’m still skeptical about what the Kinect holds in store for future games that aren’t Dance Central sequels. The Wii and the Move are both capable of sophisticated types of motion-enhanced gaming (my favorite being first-person games—finally, precision that can rival a mouse!) and can offer solid experiences with simpler ones because they involve controllers. Microsoft’s early investments have paid off very well before, but it remains to be seen whether this will be the company’s latest success, on the scale of Xbox Live.

In the meantime, there’s a shit-ton of games to play, catch up on, and keep an eye out for. Just like last year, it’s a great time to be a gamer, even with those ever-present backlogs.

My Fan Translation Wishlist

Yuna Kagurazaka, Guardian of the Light. Forgot where I originally got this image from.Remember that huge stack of game soundtracks I bought awhile ago? I’m still working my way through them. Have managed to listen to most of them, but one I haven’t touched at all is Front Mission 5 ~Scars of the War~ Original Soundtrack. A big part of this is because, as I said before, I haven’t played the actual game. Although this sort of thing hasn’t stopped me before, this is Front Mission, and therefore, special in my eyes.

Front Mission 5 was, apparently, briefly considered for an official stateside release. However, this never panned out, and thus, fans took it upon themselves to do what very few (if any) had done before: an amateur translation of a PlayStation 2 game. Thus was born the Front Mission 5 Translation Project, which has since become the Front Mission Series Translation Project, as they are now working on patches for Front Mission 2 and Front Mission Alternative.

The group completed the beta translation patch of Front Mission 5 in December of last year, so all I would need to do is to hunt down a copy of the game and the necessary PS2 modding tools to get it to run. However, this brings me to the one criticism I have of the project. If the group’s goal is to draw Square Enix’s attention to English-speaking Front Mission 5 fans, then why make it so the patch works only on the non-Ultimate Hits verion of the game, which has long been out of print? I think a spike in sales of new copies of FM5, rather than secondhand ones, would push Square to consider an official release even more. For historical evidence, I point to Capcom, who localized the DS port of Gyakuten Saiban in North America (as Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney) after noticing all the sales of the bilingual game that were coming from outside of Japan. Anyway, I know the fan translation team is well aware of this issue, and I hope they make an Ultimate Hits version of the FM5 patch a priority for future releases.

With FM5 on my mind lately, I got to thinking about what other Japanese games never made it over here that I would like to see complete translations of. There are some games that are “import friendly” in that you don’t have to know a lot of Japanese—if any—to be able to enjoy them, so those aren’t a problem. There are also those like Tales of Graces, Front Mission 2089: Border of Madness, and Game Center CX: Arino’s Challenge 2 that are still recent enough to have a chance of localization, slim though they may be. What’s left are the text-heavy titles which are on dead systems and have small cult followings, if they’re lucky. What’s left, in other words, are games like those on my wishlist.

Ys V: Lost Kefin, Kingdom of Sand, Super Famicom – I’m cheating a little bit here with a couple of them, including this first one. You see, a fan translation of Ys V was started several years ago, but the patch is currently incomplete. This leaves Ys V as the only main-series Ys storyline whose translation has never been made available. Rather frustrating if you’re interested in the Ys canon and don’t read Japanese, but even after all these years, the patching project is not dead, so there’s still hope.

Galaxy Fraulein Yuna and Galaxy Fraulein Yuna 2, PC Engine – And now for something completely different: visual novels! My initial exposure to Galaxy Fraulein Yuna came in the form of the first OVA series; later, I saw the much more coherent second series, Galaxy Fraulein Yuna Returns. Each storyline follows the adventures of teenage Yuna Kagurazaka, who is the savior of the universe, a popular celebrity, and a regular girl all at the same time. It’s a pretty wacky series, with some amazingly good character designs, all courtesy of mecha designer and Gundam Girl artist Mika Akitaka.

Some years ago, I learned that these anime were based on a “digital comic” game series, which gave me a better perspective on the character-stuffed OVAs. However, aside from the Sega Saturn’s Galaxy Fraulein Yuna 3 these games have never been translated into English, by anyone. The Yuna games have shown up on several systems, but the first two in the series are on the PC Engine, thus, my wishlist request. A PSP collection of the first two Yuna games as well as a related title, Galaxy Policewoman Sapphire, was published only a couple of years ago, so it seems there’s still interest in these oldies, at least in Japan.

Chocobo Stallion, PlayStation – Unlike the others on this list, I actually own this game. If I recall, I first learned about Chocobo Stallion while reading some information about a different Squaresoft-related thing. The idea of a chocobo sim racer intrigued me, and I later picked up a cheap copy on eBay, only to find that this was not an import-friendly game in the least. There are no English-language guides of any sort on GameFAQs or anywhere, and, naturally, no translation patches. I’ve long had the idea to make a rudimentary guide of my own, but have yet to get around to putting something together.

Segagaga, Dreamcast – A translation of this navel-gazing RPG/sim is the dream of every English-speaking Sega fan ever, and as with Ys V, is an actual project that has been ongoing, with occasional updates. Started in 2006, the project lead is still pushing forward with it as of September 2009. Will it ever see the light of day? Let’s hope it does!

Non-QTEs, Less Linear JRPGs, and Other Stuff

Beat Devil May Cry 4 last week. Not the best game in the series, but certainly had its high points. All the hallmarks were there: bishies, hot chicks, gothic interiors, death metal songs that play during battles, and occasional violations of the 180° rule when moving from place to place. Unlike the others, Dante is not playable for much of the game. Instead, the player takes the role of Nero, a young man with similar fashion sense and slightly less campiness than Mr. Sparda. He also has a glowing arm, which can be used to grab far-off enemies and unleash brutal attacks on them. These attacks vary depending on the enemy, reminding me of Quick Time Events, though not in the traditional sense. As such, Nero is a fun character to play. Dante controls much the same as always, and is also tougher to control compared to Nero, due to the lack of Glowing Hand.

Although <i>Rune Factory Frontier</i> is mad addictive, <b>this</b> is what I'll be playing today!
Although Rune Factory Frontier is mad addictive, this is what I'll be playing today!

As for Rune Factory Frontier, I’m still plugging away at it, and passed the 100-hour mark this weekend. All that has been ever said about JRPGs and linearity doesn’t quite apply to the Rune Factory series. Yes, there is a single storyline and a set progression in terms of unlockable areas, and no, you can’t fully customize your hero character, but everything else is wide open. There’s tons of things to do—farming, fishing, crafting, cooking, and much more—and like any good Harvest Moon, there’s also a wide range of girls to hit on, and eventually, marry. It’s rich and immersive in a way that JRPGs traditionally aren’t, and despite the glaring flaws, I’m as hooked on Frontier as I was with its DS brethren. Can’t wait for Rune Factory 3‘s localization (please let this happen!).

Apart from games themselves, I’m getting a little weary of CAG’s forums again and am ready to take another hiatus from them, largely due to the fact that there’s hardly any humor in them. This seems to be a problem with many gaming forums, where games are Serious Business and there’s little to no room for levity. Perhaps this also explains why Shimrra won Best CAG Blog in this year’s Cheapy Awards, even though his regular Daily HaHa posts are mainly just images ganked from the likes of 4chan. Humor is in very short supply amongst gamers, it seems.

Anyway, looking forward to PAX East at the end of this week, and have been going over my options for what to see and do. Meanwhile, I will be playing Cave Story. On my Wii.

Best gaming week ever? It’s looking that way.

Special Stage: Cracked‘s gaming articles are funny, but also tend to contain nuggets of truth. Thanks to my husband for linking me to “5 Creepy Ways Video Games Are Trying to Get You Addicted”, which is one of the latest, and chock-full of said nuggets.