Recent Purchases #7 ~ DS collecting

Ok, so I've been pretty busy this summer, a lot of stuff has been happening; issues with university such as exams and dissertation topic for next year, finding a flat for next academic year and leaving the flat I was in, arranging two work placements with optician multiples (Boots Opticians and Specsavers), fitting in a summer holiday to Chamonix in the French Alps and then a few days in Brugge in Belgium and unfortunately having some relatives and family relatives passing away, so quite a hectic rollercoaster of a summer so far, and we're approaching winter pretty quickly it looks like...

I've not really done one of these posts since back in February 2013, I believe...I was planning on doing a post where I kind of went in to more detail about what I've been up to this summer, and I think I may do that, but I found that I had this post as a draft from a while back and thought I'd finish it off. That was quite a slippery slope however, as I looked through my backlog I uncovered more and more games that I'd bought since I last posted... So lets get into the games I picked up, and wherever I can, I'll talk about my history with the series, and thoughts on each games.

Ok, so first of all, forgive the grainy, blurry pictures, it is my Blackberry tablet that I took them on, and its kinda terribad for quality.. Then again, I couldn't be bothered digging out a camera or a phone with a decent quality camera.
So I named this post DS Collecting when I originally wrote it, this is because I've been picking up a lot of DS games as they appear to drop in price as more stores pick up 3DS titles. There are a lot of DS games that I either played briefly when they came out and never picked up or finished, or series that people were really enjoying and I just didn't get a chance to check them out. So a lot of these DS games are ones that I'd heard good things about or were really good deals. There are a lot more that I'm wanting to pick up when I can, some of which are included on my Backloggery wishlist.

Advance Wars: Dual Strike (DS) 07/15/13, £4 preowned, Game-Fort Kinnaird, Edinburgh
Advance Wars: Dark Conflict (DS) 06/04/13, £3 preowned, CEX-Edinburgh 

These two games I picked up for less than £5 each. Dark Conflict was 2nd hand in CEX as I had really been enjoying the Fire Emblem games on the GBA and wanted to check this series out. Its a series my brother had checked out way back and been trying to get me to play. I never did, so finally decided to start with the DS games. Ideally I wanted to pick up the GBA games, but I couldn't seem to find a good auction or buy it now deal on ebay for either of the games. So I'm very interested in getting into these games, and hopefully the storylines aren't too obnoxious...on a recent episode of RPGcast I wasn't hearing the best feedback on these DS titles..

Professor Layton and the Curious Village (DS) 05/08/13, £10 preowned, GAME-Inverness
Professor Layton and Pandora's Box (DS) 05/13/13, £5.98 preowned, ebay.co.uk
Professor Layton and the Lost Future (DS) 05/08/13, £10 preowned, GAME-Inverness

The Layton series is one that experienced great popularity back when they came out, at least in Europe. I played little bits here and there, helping people out with the puzzles as they played through them but as they were so popular, they held their value for a long time and I never picked the games up myself. I was up in Inverness visiting some family and saw Curious Village and Lost Future in a two for £20 deal, so I picked these up on a bit of a whim. I began playing the first game and managed to finish the story off within a day or two, and only a few play sessions, enjoying it quite a bit. This one had good pacing and puzzles. It was quite a breath of fresh air compared to long RPGs that I am normally playing, and after a while I went back to the second game, Pandora's Box and played through the story of this one. This took a bit longer to get through than the first one, and I felt although towards the end the story took quite an interesting turn, it just didn't hold up compared to the first game. It dragged in places and the story just was not as well designed. Although there was less backtracking and the puzzles were integrated into the story situations, it felt like a case of one step forward, two steps backward. Still a very good series however, and I'm looking forward to jumping into what I've heard is the best of this original trilogy, the Lost Future. After the at times mediocre Pandora's Box though, I'm taking some time to play some other styles of games.

Project X Zone (3DS) 07/15/13, £22.00 new, Amazon

Back when this game was being talked about on podcasts and forums, most people were under the impression that it would never come out in english. It came as a big shock to me and a lot of people when it was announced for localisation. I still don't understand how it could have been possible with all the characters from different series (some of which never even came out in Europe, Super Robot Taisen OG for one) owned by different companies. It must have been a difficult game to actually make money. People unfamiliar with RPGs or these various characters will just see this game and get kind of confused I'd imagine. Anyway, its a pretty awesomely made game. The character portraits are well drawn, the battles are quite fun at first (they start to get quite long and drawn out...and a tad repetitive later on). The story doesn't make a lot of sense, but there is a lot of fun to be had with this game. Its very long, with 5 prologue chapters and around 40 story chapters (each of which consists of 1 large battle, a fair chunk of dialogue and a sort of small introduction skirmish or battle.) From what I've heard, it clocks in at around 50-80 hrs long. So far, I've just finished chapter 25 I think, so I've still got a fair bit of the game left.
-Edit: Since starting the blog post, I finished this game off in 75 hours. Yep, that was just the story, there are no real side quests to speak of. Its a long, at some times repetitive game, and I would say its at least 20 hours too long.
However, its worth buying this game just to support these kind of stupid (risky, but awesome) business decisions I think. There is a market for these kind of niche games, even though its a small amount of people in the US and Europe that are interested, we need to show companies that it is worth while.

Fire Emblem Awakening (3DS) 04/19/13, £ new, G-Force, Glasgow

Fire Emblem is a series I've only recently got into, after seeing the original (well for me, I think of FE7 (the first GBA game us PAL gamers got) as the original, even though I know the series has a much deeper history. Any way, FE7 blew me away, with its brilliant localisation, intense permadeath difficulty (if you try to do things without losing any characters like I eventually managed) and fairly mature themes of war and politics. So after playing Fire Emblem: Rekka no Ken, I heard Awakening would be coming out in Europe and knew I would have to get it. The 3DS was quite light on RPGs, and I'd heard a lot of good talk about this game. So when it was getting close to release, I was surprised that I didn't just simply preorder on Amazon or some website like I normally do. I was really taking a risk in waiting and seeing if retail shops here would have copies of the game, as Fire Emblem games can become very hard to find and increase in value quickly. This was right after one of my final 3rd year exams, and I headed down to the shops to see if I could pick this up right away, and I was starting to sweat as I hoped somewhere would have this game in stock. I had read up on this game, watched a lot of videos from Nintendo and other sources and really hyped myself up for Awakening. Thankfully an independent game shop in Glasgow had this in stock, and I picked it up, eager to get into this game as quickly as I could. When I got around to playing it, it really didn't dissapoint me

Castlevania: Lords of Shadow - Mirror of Fate (3DS) 03/06/13, £29.86 new, shopto.net

This game, I was a little apprehensive to pick up..I've posted impressions of the demo back when it came out. You can read that here if you are interested. I was actually quite happy with how the game turned out, even though it seemed to repeat some of the content in places, from different perspectives of sorts, as you play through this fairly short 2.5D metroidvania platformer/action RPG with 3 different characters. It doesn't quite compare to the fun I had with the GBA and DS 'vania games, but its still a pretty solid title for the 3DS. 

Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate (3DS) 03/25/13, £31.86 new, Amazon

Oh man, I'm a big fan of the Monster Hunter games...I get way too addicted to them, farming new sets of armour and weapons, slowly progressing through the required quests. Its a simple, lite (or no) story, with really rewarding, satisfying gameplay that they have refined over the last couple of games. I've put a lot of time (over 230 hours) on and off over summer into MH3U, finishing off the village (single player) quests, and working my way to G-rank in the guild (multiplayer/single player) quests on my own (because I only have the 3DS version, and any friends I know with the game are too difficult to pin down to actually want to play the game multiplayer.) The 3DS version doesn't have any online facility to play with people like some of the other 3DS games like the new Mario Kart, but I still believe (for me) that it is the preferred platform. I like being able to take the 3DS on the train if I'm going somewhere (I take a lot of public transport because I can't drive yet) and I like the mobility of the 3DS. If someone is watching something on TV, I can kind of watch both (MH takes a lot of concentration at times though.) I know you can do something similar with the Wii U, but for me, its still not a good time to jump on board with the Wii U. I'm waiting for maybe one or two more games that interest me. So far, there is Monster Hunter 3U, which I would definitely rebuy, Earthbound on the Virtual Console, The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker HD, Shin Megami Tensei x Fire Emblem (its a Wii U game when it eventually releases...right? :s) So its slowly getting there with the games I'm interested to play. I will pick one up fairly soon, I have a few friends who are already way further than me in MH that I could finally play some quests with if I pick a Wii U up.

Infinite Space (DS) 06/03/13, £10 preowned, GAME-Perth
Time and Eternity (PS3) 06/28/13, £40 new, GAME-Perth
Okamiden (DS) 07/15/13, £10 preowned, GAME-Fort Kinnaird, Edinburgh
White Knight Chronicles: Origins (PSP) 07/31/13, €5 preowned, Free Record Shop, Brugge
Trauma Center: Second Opinion (Wii) £4 preowned, CEX-Edinburgh
Valkyrie Profile: Covenant of the Plume (DS) £5 preowned, Game-Perth
Contact (DS) £5 preowned, Game-Perth
Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones (GBA) 05/16/13, £10 preowned, ebay.co.uk
Etrian Odyssey III: The Drowned City (DS) 01/24/13, £24.99 new, ebay.co.uk

And a bunch more stuff I bought or got for my birthday:

Pokemon X (3DS)
Pokemon Black 2 (DS)
King's Field (PS1)
Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor 2 (DS)
Dragon's Crown (PS3)
Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor Overclocked (3DS)

I'll try and write some more impressions about these games as I go along. I've been writing this blog post for far too long now.

Artbooks from anime and video games are one of my smaller (some might say niche) collections, and I've picked up quite a few recently, notably the Death Note Obata Takeshi Illustrations, which normally goes for a lot on ebay. I found it in a shop in Brugge when we were on holiday aong with the Midori Foo artbook for really good prices. Some of these are really amazing artbooks. I recommend The Sky to any Final Fantasy fan, as it is now readily available..after that fiasco with the limited original run. Damn Amazon UK...

Obata Takeshi Illustrations - Blanc et Noir
Midori Foo's Book of Pictures
Yoshitaka Amano's The Sky: The Art of Final Fantasy Slipcased Edition
Devil Survivor Official Material Collection 
Dragon Age: The World of Thedas volume 1
A Reader's Guide to R.A. Salvatore's The Legend of Drizzt
Diablo III: Book of Tyrael

Recent Purchases #6 ~ Holiday haul

So I've not done one of these posts in a while it seems...the last one was many months ago, in August last year. I wouldn't say I buy a lot of games, compared to some collectors and youtubers I know online, but probably compared to the average dude, I buy quite a fair few. Anyway, this post is a little about some of the games I picked up recently, whether it be presents, games I've bought for myself or whatever. In some of the Recent Purchases, I've talked about the gaming merchandise I've picked up, for example video game artbooks (something I semi-collect outside of games) and at the end of this post I'll talk a little bit about one of the anime I've been watching. I quite like the idea of talking about some non-gaming stuff briefly in these posts. Apologies for the blurry photo...my Blackberry playbook can't take brilliant photos, and then the lighting in my room was really crappy.



Anyway, on with the post! Hopefully it doesn't look like I'm trying to brag about the games I've been picking up! I don't get that many and I know myself I have smaller collections than many others, but what I like to go for are games that I've been really wanting. You won't normally see me pick up copies of Madden 06 or Fifa 99 just because I can get them for 20p, for example. A lot of the games I pick up are titles I've heard very good things about, or are in certain sub-genres that are appealing to me at any one time. For example, sometimes I go through 1st person dungeon crawler RPG kicks, or times where I'm really into focussing on my Strategy RPGs. A good example of a game like this where I've had a massive interest in the game for ages would be Radiant Historia (DS). I live in Europe and unfortunately we never saw a release for this game. It has had such amazing hype and praise from critics for the most part, and only the price had kept me from picking this one up. Importing through Ebay is fairly pricey, with a copy normally running between £30 and 40. So Christmas this year and I tried to pick my brain for games that were in this ballpark...games I'd really wanted to try and were a bit outside my price range. In a toss up between Radiant Historia and Skies of Arcadia, I settled for this one, ordered it and was reimbursed by my parents. Definitely looking forward to playing this really beautiful looking RPG with an interesting looking combat system and story concept. Time travel in RPGs is quite often good-Chrono Trigger anyone? Then again...FFXIII-2 was a bit of a mess..

Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning (PS3) - This one was a bit of a surprise to me. My birthday was back in October and on the last day of term (December) one of my friends gave me this for my birthday. They'd apparently been trying to pick the game up on ebay for a while, with no luck from one seller on two occasions. Maybe it got lost in the post, or maybe he didn't send it. Either way, they ended up getting screwed out of a lot more money than they should have spent on me, for sure. Definitely looking forward to trying this game out. RA Salvatore is one of my favourite fantasy authors that I grew up reading, and he worked on the world design, or script, or some aspect of this game. The only thing that makes me a little wary is some of the design from Todd McFarlane (the Spawn guy) It looks a weird mishmash of styles in this game.

Zone of the Enders HD Collection (PS3) - This, along with Radiant Historia was the other game I had asked for over Christmas, and was really happy that I got it. My uncle had gone to a lot of trouble to get it, as it was really hard to find in shops it turns out :o I missed out on a lot of PS2 games as I never got the console until way afterwards, so in a way, these HD collections are perfect for gamers like me, who want an affordable and sensible way to pick up entire series, or trilogies. I've played the first Zone of the Enders for an hour or two so far, and I actually got stuck by the odd design and lack of direction. I'm at a bit where I need to knock out 2 forcefields, one on either side of something? Its pretty early on, but it kind of put me off because I was just backtracking to find passwords. I'll get back into this once I have access to my PS3 at some point soon. Currently I'm through at uni with only my DS, PSP and PS2.

Etrian Odyssey III: The Drowned City (DS) - I played the first Etrian Odyssey a couple years back and it took me a long time of on/off playing to get through, but I really enjoyed it overall. I originally purchased EO1 and EO2 from ebay (we only got the first game released in Europe...damn yous!) and I've really had the urge to play through more 1st person dungeon crawler RPGs recently, so picked up the reprint of the third game when I saw a fairly good price (preorder) on ebay. So this one will hopefully be with me soon. I suppose that means I have to play through Etrian Odyssey II: Heroes of Lagaard first though. Way too many games for my own good...

Solatorobo: Red the Hunter (DS) - I picked this one, and Magna Carta 2 (Xbox 360) up recently when I was away up to Perth for a dental appointment (yeah, my Dentist is away up North many miles away from where I stay: see my previous escapade) I was trying to burn some time and thought I'd have a look in Gamestation in Perth. Well...Game and Gamestation (the same company essentially) had some problems last year and had to go into administration, and closed a lot of branches. The Gamestation in Perth was one that had closed apparantely, and I hadn't realised that because I hadn;t been up there in months. So I thought, theres a Game branch over in the shopping centre, and from what I'd seen of the stores that remained open, the majority seemed to be in malls or shopping centre complexes. Well anyway, they were still open so I went in to check out the games they had. Turns out they had a lot of games I'd been after, for fairly cheap (either preowned or in the sale.) Some of the ones I saw that looked interesting were (with some rough prices): Dragon Age: Origins Awakening (£5, Xbox 360), Infinite Space (£10, DS) and Aliens Infestation (£5, DS). I didn't pick them up, but regret not getting Infinite Space...that game is really hard to find online... So far I've not played either of Solatorobo or Magna Carta 2 yet unfortunately.

Mass Effect 3 (Xbox 360) - I can't remember if I talked about this one on the blog just yet. But I held off on this one for absolutely ages to try and get it cheaper. It turns out that probably wasn't a good idea, as I heard all the hype and then rage about the story ending. I have somehow managed to remain spoiler free, and picked this one up after christmas in a sale in Game for £15. Really interested to see how the story will finish up. I liked the first two games, but I've been slowly losing interest in the franchise... a couple hundred too many DLC packs and stupid things like the Cerberus network. EA ruined Dragon Age and Mass Effect, which is so unfortunate...they had such good prospects..

Inazuma Eleven (DS) - this was a game I picked up right after Christmas. I received a gift token for HMV and decided to go for this one with it. It was a toss up between this and Ar Tonelico Qoga on the PS3 when I was in the store, and I'm definitely glad I went for this one. I havent played any of either series before this, and from what I saw of Ar Tonelico on the back of the box, I'm definitely happy with Inazuma. Its such an over the top game. Its like a good mix of anime like Beyblades, Yu-Gi-Oh and films like Shaolin Soccer. The only low point was some of the time it seemed to drag a bit at times(where you're just tracking across the map from area to area) and also...the horrendous English opening theme. But the game itself is really engaging and addictive once you get into it and realise how to control it best. The tutorials don't do a very good job so I ended up taking about 7 hours to master the systems (more or less.)

Eden of the East (Anime DVD) - This was a bit of a random pick up for me. I like to buy the odd anime movie or series when they release in the UK (but only at decent prices) We saw this one in a second hand shop "CEX" that has quite a lot of branches all across the UK. They do really well because they give cash for tradeins, and take anything from ipods, phones, computer components, games, dvds, and a lot more. Anyway, it was only a fiver. The synopsis sounded interesting, and I had heard good things. So, after a wee check of animenewsnetwork on my girlfriend's smartphone (I refuse to own one...FOR NOW! Gimme a break! lol) I picked this up. We've watched half of it so far, and its getting really interesting =) It has a dark edge, but its a lot more than just a dark, gritty anime. It has it's funny moments, it has a quite nice romance theme to it as well.

Recent Purchases #5 ~ Paycheck get!

Bleurgh, I've not posted in more than a month. Bad times... Well, to be more accurate, busy times...the aforementioned full time job has been taking a lot of my time up, as well as watching the London 2012 Olympics over the past two weeks when we had nothing else to watch in the evenings, or on my days off. There was some pretty amazing talent over the course of the tournament. Yeah its a bit cheesy to say, but I can see why it would "inspire a generation" like the motto says. Myself, I'm too lazy or old to try and take up a sport at this point I think, but some of the sports do look like they would be cool to do on a kind of casual basis at a university club, like fencing or swimming or something. Anyway, I am rambling a fair bit. So before I move on, well done to all the medal winners and people who devoted themselves to training for the Olympics (I'm sure a lot of them read my blog, lol... -_- aaanyways..)

Games are really annoying me at the moment though...Persona 3 FES has really been frustrating me... I'm near the start of the game (lv11, but up to the 25 Floor boss of 3 Crying Tables) so I can either grind on the
weakest enemies at the very start or the strong enemies of Block 2. I'm right in the middle, so that makes it difficult to grind against either option. Either get 1-3 exp for each battle against the weak mobs or fight really risky strong enemies. I've tried to grind against the stronger enemies, and have made good progress each time towards a level up, but then get wiped out by them exploiting my weaknesses or spamming Mudo and lose all the progress I made. I can't find good guides online either...they usually are designed for people who want to 100% the game. I just need some tips for the early game...if anyone reading has any good advice, lemme know please! I'd really appreciate it, because I'm so close to shelving this game.
Fire Emblem, which I started up so I had a portable game for a weekend where we drove down to Ayrshire for a wedding, has been really good fun and quite addictive, but the difficulty has suddenly upped at the chapter I'm at, a huge battle where I control 2 seperate groups of characters. Really simple at first, in fact, worryingly so, but they gradually tack on more little bits of strategy goodness to the battle system as you go through the first 5 or 10 chapters (yeah, there are a LOT of chapters in this game from what I read.)
I described this game as a really nice blend of Final Fantasy Tactics and Berserk (at least the manga.) Its a kind of (dark) fantasy epic with a lot of political intrigue, history and depth to the story and world. Very highly recommended from what I've seen so far. Persona 3 is good as well, but its shortcomings and difficulty have kind of dissapointed me so far...and I really wasn't expecting that from a game that comes so highly praised.


So my job has been taking a lot of my time...37.5 hrs per week to be precise (saying it like that, it doesn't sound like that much, but it has felt like a larger toll-its been really way too warm in the optician's departments, no proper aircon or windows means the air just collects and gets really stuffy) On the plus side, I've been gaining lots of experience for when I go back to uni to study my 3rd year of Optometry, and money! Lots of monies....

At first I didn't really spend much of my paycheck as I was figuring out what I should prioritise, maybe rare games I couldn't afford before, video game artbooks (an expensive niche collector's piece) or new systems like the NES or SNES I missed out on when I was younger ¬_¬ So I've kind of decided to pick up some more art books for games or series I like. At the moment I'm playing Persona 3 FES (and getting my ass kicked, as this is my first playthrough) and a bit of Disgaea 3 and since I really like the character designs and aesthetics of the games, I picked up a couple books for them.

DISGAEArt!!!

Reviews:
http://www.otakustudy.com/2012/08/disgaeart-disgaea-official-illustration-collection-review/

http://parkablogs.com/content/book-review-disgaeart-disgaea-official-illustration-collection

Shigenori Soejima SC

Reviews:

http://parkablogs.com/node/8318
http://www.nattoli.net/entry/195/shigenori-soejima-shigenori-soejima-art-works-2004-2010

Persona 3 Visual Works

Reviews:
http://www.otakustudy.com/2012/06/persona-3-official-design-works-review/


Shadow Hearts (PS2)

I saw this one for £20 in a preowned shop that sells dvds, electronics stuff, gadgets and games. In fact its the only place that still has a decent selection of PS2, Gamecube and Xbox games onwards. This game is really getting quite rare now, at least in PAL regions, so after checking on my girlfriend's phone (I have no smartphone with free access to the internet on the go) to see if 20 was a good price, I decided to pick this up after hearing a lot of good stuff about this series. Walking out the shop, I checked the box to see what the condition was like to find it had no manual with it. Bah...maybe 20 wasnt such a good price, but I'm not one of those collectors who has to have things complete all of the time. If I see a loose manual show up on ebay, I may buy it, but I'm not hugely bothered really. Anyway, the game is a really interesting looking RPG. I played like 10 minutes before realising the time was getting pretty late. It has a dark, horror aesthetic to it. Lots of cutscenes, which are in that early PS2 era 3D style (which I'm not very keen on, it should be said) but its good to see a game which intersperses lots of cutscenes in with dialogue and fast moving scenes.

I figure I should include a wee section at the bottom for stuff I've recently preordered since Amazon has so much stuff I usually preorder months in advance and end up forgetting about... My wallet hates me for it but whatever =p

Ni No Kuni: Wizards Edition

- http://www.amazon.co.uk/Ni-No-Kuni-Wizards-Edition/dp/B008MLSNOY/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1345032535&sr=8-1


This one is currently sitting at £69.99, a fairly high price, and that will actually make it one of the most expensive games I've bought at launch, so hopefully the price drops a bit on this one before its release next year in January. Then again, I'll probably have a little bit of Christmas money to put towards it if need be. I'm really stoked for this game, even though it sold pretty badly in Japan from what I remember. Studio Ghibli/Level-5 Dragon Quest-esque role playing game, sign me up!

Tales of Graces f: Day One Edition

- http://www.amazon.co.uk/Tales-Graces-Special-Day-Edition/dp/B007X13MJ0/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1345101548&sr=8-1

I actually preordered Tales of Graces f way before Namco Bandai had mentioned this set for day one releases, so was really happy to hear about it. You do look like you get a lot for your money, but it does look like standard collectors edition stuff. Then again, it has an artbook, which I'm always keen to get more of =) I've played the japanese demo of Tales of Graces f and it looks actually amazing, with the graphical style and the battles moving really quickly. Hopefully I'll like this game (and hopefully we get something similar for when Xillia comes out in PAL regions.)

The Sky: The Art of Final Fantasy Boxed Set 

This is currently sitting at £55.65, which is around about 50% of the RRP. I'd definitely recommend preordering it as early as possible if you are interested so you can save as much as possible.


- http://www.darkhorse.com/Books/14-856/The-Sky-The-Art-of-Final-Fantasy-Boxed-Set

- http://www.amazon.co.uk/The-Sky-Final-Fantasy-Boxed/dp/1616550392/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1345031948&sr=8-1

This is a REALLY nice set of 3 of 4 (which, I admit, I don't know much about at the moment) artbooks from Yoshitaka Amano, who has done a lot of art for the Final Fantasy games. I've never been a massive fan of his work, well...to be more accurate, I like his stuff, but some of it seems creepy and awkward, almost otherworldly. I think that is the point, but something about is a bit too discordant (is that the right word) at times. Its really kind of interesting though, and hopefully taking a punt and buying this artbook set will convert me to a fan of Amano =p It looks like a really good set for the money.



I've been writing this post for days, so I should probably just publish it now I reckon.... I hope I don't go through my paycheck too quickly lol...

Recent Purchases #4.5 Photo ver.

As you can see, I like my RPGs...this is why I have such a big backlog of games. They are really awesome as a genre, but they often require a significant amount of time to get through and finish. I did a couple of these posts back a while ago, and this is more in the territory of youtubers, but thought I'd do a little post with some of the stuff I've picked up over the past few weeks.

I went back home the other week and ended up getting to see all the stuff that had arrived in the mail for me, some of which was preordered, some of which was traded for, and a couple of these things I got were just from looking round town for games. So I picked up all of this stuff over the past couple months (maybe this is why I don't have much money...)

Final Fantasy XIII-2 and preorder DLC, steelbook and stuff (PS3) - Got these off ebay for a pretty decent price for a game that recently came out. The preorder stuff was selling on ebay for around £10-12, so I got the game and the preorder stuff in the same auction for around £22 including shipping. I think it went unnoticed because the seller worded things a bit weirdly. Good for me I suppose! =D




The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (PS2)
The Lord of the Rings:  The Two Towers (PS2)
The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (PS2)

I remember playing through these games back when they first came out and having a lot of fun with them, especially in multiplayer. So, when having a look round one of the second hand electronics shops in the UK, CEX, I found all 3 of them for £5 preowned and decided to give them a shot again =p

 

La Pucelle: Tactics (PS2) - Got this in a trade along with Tales of the World from a friend in NZ. Thanks very much if you read this! =D I was thinking I'd start collecting the NIS RPGs other than the Disgaea games (which are awesome for the record.)



Tales of the World: Radiant Mythology (PSP) - I've not heard brilliant things about this game, but I wanted it for my Tales collection, and it looks like a big departure from the Tales formula, so I'm interested to try it out soon.



The Last Story (Wii) - I reckon this has the best cover art to it out of the three Rainfall titles. £38 for this one. Its got some really good reviews since it came out fairly recently. I am a big fan of Mistwalker and Lost Odyssey was one of my favourite games this generation, so hopefully I'll enjoy this. It looks a lot more forward thinking than LO somehow.



Pandora's Tower (Wii) - the third of the Operation Rainfall RPGs to come out in the UK, completing the set. Very happy to finally get all three. The black Wii box for this game and the art are just awesome. Even though it cost me goddamn £36 from Amazon. I suppoooose its cheaper than what PS3/360 titles would retail for at launch.

Hopefully this wasn't too inane or boring to read... I'll try and update some more meaningful content as my exams go on (and I look around desperately for more methods of procrastination.)

Apologies for all the unneccesary pictures I updated the post with. I figured I might as well because I had them on my computer. I might tone down the size of them if it makes the post look stupid and the text harder to find...

Recent Purchases #4 - In which I travel halfway across the country

OK, before you go thinking I'm absolutely crazy and went halfway across Scotland to look for games, nope..thats not the case. I just happened to have to go on a bit of a wild goose chase...so to speak.

So here are some of the games I picked up recently, as well as a bit of a rant. A month ago, I had been at the dentist for a routine checkup and an appointment with the hygienist they have at the practice as well. Everything was fine apart from the fact that I had a bit of minor gum disease again, gingivitis I think it is called. It is the early stage which can be treated and if kept at this stage of things, it isn't too serious. Still, I am paranoid about losing my teeth So I was told to brush my teeth more effectively and use a daily mouthwash that they sold me for a month, and then come back for an appointment after the course of mouthwash to see how things were. These appointments with the hygienist usually last about 10 or 15 mins at most. 

Our dentist is a friend of my mum's, they have known each other since school I think. They came from the same area up north and knew each other ever since, so we still go to this dentist now. Makes sense, even when you take into account the fact that we live in Edinburgh, and the dentist is located a bit further north, near Perth. I've put in a map for those who don't know Scotland well.

So anyway, my appointment today was sometime between 11 and 12 ( I could'nt remember) so I got up at around 7ish, aiming to get up north for 11, got a train from Edinburgh at 9:03 which went via Falkirk and stirling (where I had to change train) and eventually on to Perth. There, I got a bus up to Scone, where the practice is. So around 2 hours to get up there in total, a bit more than that. Anyway, I get there and they tell me my appointment is next Wednesday, on the 27th. -_- Argh...I felt like such an idiot. So frustrating! They were also fully booked so couldn't see me today either, apparantely. The appointment only takes about 5 mins! 

So, I gotta go back next week now. Such a hassle...

Anyway, onto the more interesting, less frustrating part. I decided to just have a look round the shops in Perth, in fact, just Gamestation and Game to see if there were any games for cheap. I had said to myself that I wouldn't buy any games until Mass Effect 2 comes out at the end of the month, as I've got a lot to get through, and I would be spending a bit more than usual, because I'll be getting the collector's edition of the game.

However, I couldn't resist the temptation when I had a look in the game stores.

First thing I saw, it seemed to jump out at me, was God of War (PS2) (black box, not the platinum version). I had considered waiting for the God of War collection on the PS3, but a) I don't know when I will get the console (although I have a feeling it will be some time before FFXIII comes out, or when it does.) and b) God of War Collection isn't out in the UK yet. But for value, I was really tempted to get this now, as it was in the Preowned 3 for £10 deal in Gamestation, which seemed like awesome value. I checked the price of the black box versions when I finally got back here today, and was surprised, on amazon it is £50! =D

The other games I got in the 3 for £10 were Castlevania: Curse of Darkness (PS2) and Beyond Good and Evil (PS2), both preowned. I knew that Curse of Darkness was different from the metroidvania and 2D platformer outings of the series I love, it is 3D and slightly more action adventure-ish, but thought I'd take this chance to add another Castlevania title to my collection. Its one of those games that I really don't see often in my area, and when I do, it is around £15, so based on that, I thought I had to get it. It has amazing art as well, with such a cool cover, check it left/below.

Beyond Good and Evil, I remember hearing great things about the PS2/Xbox/Gamecube game for a while now. 

It apparantely didn't sell massive numbers, but its got quite a cult following, and I've heard some things about a sequel, but I'm not too sure if it will be coming out, or whether it is on hold at the moment. Its an action-adventure game, which I don't have many of, but do like them from time to time. I'm intrigued to see what this will be like, and the other games I bought today.

I almost forgot about the last game, which is Disgaea 3: Absence of Justice (PS3). I don't actually own a PS3, so why did I buy this? I LOVE the Disgaea series, or what I have played of it (which is the first one, on the PSP.) I got this for when I eventually do get a PS3, I was very tempted to get one today as well as this game, as there were some good bundle deals-like a 250 Gb PS3 slim, with Uncharted 2 and Infamous for £285 or so. 

Anyway, there is so much to do in the Disgaea games in terms of gameplay, customisation and replayability options. I like the quirky, zany humour as well. Reviews have shown that while this one isn't perhaps as good as the first, it is still solid. More of the same as the first 2 essentially. For the good price that they had in Gamestation, £12.99 preowned, I felt like picking it up now as I've seen it in shops for £15+ and on amazon for around £30 or so.

Anyway, thats about it for now. I'm working on a review of Final Fantasy VI Advance, not sure when I'll have that done...maybe before the weekend but probably not.

Oh, and check this out. Collector's edition Final Fantasy XIII will be coming out, hopefully. It looks like leaked details. Hopefully we do get that, because the 'freebies' (nothing is free) look quite enticing! =p

Recent Purchases #3 ~ Christmas games

I thought I'd do a quick roundup and talk a little bit about some of the games I got given, or bought with the money I was given over Christmas in a 'Christmassy' edition of this not-very-regular column of mine, Recent Purchases.

Fallout 3: Game of the Year Edition (Xbox 360)

I've been wanting to play this for ages, like since it came out and never really got the game. So when I heard there was going to be a 'goty' edition released, I thought I'd wait for that. In fact, it kind of dropped off my radar for a couple months, so I don't know when it actually got released, but thought it would be one of the games I'd ask for. (I purposefully tried not to ask for many games cos I've got so many still to beat)

Definitely looking forward to playing this quite extensive edition of the game, with 5 of the DLC packs.

Castlevania: Judgment (Wii) My bro knows I love Castlevania games, so got this for me. So far I've just tried a couple battles in a few of the modes. I'm liking what I've played so far, apart from the graphics looking a bit odd and fuzzy, and some bizarre character designs by Takeshi Obata of Death Note fame. But the uniqueness and extravagance of these characters kinda interests me. They are like different takes on the original characters. There are some cool features in this game, like the wifi multiplayer options (I have no idea what it is involved) and the DS connectivity with Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia, which I just ordered the other day.

Okami (Wii) 

I've wanted this game for ages, so was quite happy when my bro got me it for Christmas. It looks amazing, and I've heard really good things about it. Still not had a chance to start it. (I don't like playing too many games at one time, so my preference for RPGs causes me to get through games REALLY slowly lol)

Pikmin (Wii)

I loved this game when I played it on the Gamecube what seems like ages ago...I think it was the first Gamecube game we got. I think its pretty short, so I'll take a look at this soon when I get a chance. Along with Okami, think my bro might be playing one of them at the moment, so I'll finish off a couple of the games I'm playing first.

Alone in the Dark (360)

I've not played any of this series before, but having watched my brother play this a bit (its a shared present) I saw that the game has a few nice ideas, like the fire, but the camera angles seem a bit annoying at times, one aspect I think plagues these kind of games (then again, I have a limited experience of them)

I reckoned my Wii was a bit neglected, so when I got it back from my brother just before Christmas and set it up on my new TV I got for Christmas, I decided to buy these other Wii games:

Little King's Story (Wii)

Still not started this, but it got some really good criticism on RPGamer and a lot of other sites and it is pretty hard to find where I stay, so when I saw it in the shops, I picked it up just after Christmas along with..

Muramasa: The Demon Blade (Wii)

This game is really cool, its very like Odin Sphere, which kinda makes sense seeing as how it is also by Vanillaware. Its a very short game, I beat it in around 15 or 16 hours for both stories in the game, Kisuke's and Momohime's. Its really well drawn graphically, I love 2D stuff when it is done well. There is a fair amount of backtracking and because the enemies aren't very common, a lot of the time you will be running through empty areas, albeit very impressive ones graphically. It has a similar system to Odin Sphere, with the forging of swords. You get Spirit for eating food, and with the souls you get from beating enemies, or collecting in the areas (like Rings in Sonic or something), you can Forge more powerful swords. There are 108, and I only got around 70 or so, so I think there is quite a bit of replayability, and a few different endings depending on what swords you have equipped at the end. Its a really cool game, but if there was a bit more variability and maybe a bit longer it would have impressed me even more. I mean its good, but I think I preferred Odin Sphere slightly.

And now, I've just bought Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver and the sequel on the PS2, because I saw someone on Backloggery playing them, decided to watch a couple Let's Play videos and then got that wave of Nostalgia, so picked them both up on ebay for less than £6.50 inc shipping! Soul Reaver only cost me £1.15! :D They should be on their way in the post soon, and I'll definitely look forward to playing them again.

I also finally decided to pick up Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia, as it is the last metroidvania game I need to play post Symphony of the Night. Some people have given it amazing reviews, even saying it is the best Castlevania! Wow, I'll have to wait and see.

I'm running out of stuff to say, so I'll leave it at that for now. I'll be talking a bit more about the games I've been playing(and beating! :D) over Christmas next.

Recent Purchases #2

I picked up a few more titles I had wanted for a while. I'm paranoid when it comes to rare titles that I if dont get them they will become really expensive. Take the Tales games, Namco don't seem to print many of them for some reason and some of the games have become quite hard to find, Tales of Symphonia for example sells for anywhere between £35-60. There are a few Gamecube games that are quite rare now, ToS, Skies of Arcadia, Twilight Princess, and quite a few others. Anyway, here's some of the stuff I picked up~Its a bit of an action rpg fest!

Baroque (Wii)

I had my eye on this for a while, but having heard good things and (mostly) bad things about the game, I wanted to find out for myself what this is like. It is a port of the Sega Saturn roguelike, which also appeared on the Playstation and PS2. A lot of the criticism seems to focus on how hard the game is. Having not played many roguelikes I'm not entirely sure if I will like it, but I definitely like the look of the style of the game. Its nice and twisted =p

Anyway, I got it for relatively cheap (£7) so even if I dont like it, my pocket isnt hurting TOO much I guess.
The World Ends With You (DS)
I'm really liking this one, its quite hard to find in shops here from what I can tell. I got it over ebay for around £12 or so. It got a lot of game of the year and other rewards when it came out a few years ago and some people say it is among the best DS games. 

So far I've been really impressed with the style and hope to put more time into the story-its quite interesting, even if the main character is a bit of a douche! He seems like one of those cliched pseudo-antiheroes.
Tales of Eternia (PSP)
Its got some of the ugliest cover art I've seen recently, but I'd heard it was actually quite a good game and I'd seen it a while back in a second hand pawn shop, £11.95 or so was around about what it went for on ebay. It didnt get released in the US which adds to its value and it is quite a hard to find game, so I finally caved in and got it one day, cos I knew it wasnt gonna get put down in price, even if they werent going to sell it to many other people at that price...I should stick to actual game shops...

Anyway, its an action rpg on the psp, similar to many of the other Tales games. The character design doesnt look particularly nice, but I hope I like this one.
Tales of Vesperia (360)
I was saying that I was paranoid about games going up in price too much, which was mainly referring to this one. Its already worth about £35-40 or more and it didnt even come out that long ago here. 

 I quite enjoyed what I played of Tales of Symphonia (even though I got stuck and didnt complete it) and I've had my eye on this one for ages!
I more or less bit the bullet on this one, shelling out £30 for it from ebay. I've got a feeling the rarity of this one will make it worth quite a bit more than that in years to come. So I picked it up now to shut my paranoid self up.
It looks amazing on an HD screen and I cant wait to play it. I'll really need to play some of these games because my unfinished pile is growing and a lot of them i wont get around to playing for a while... T_T
There are a few titles though, that I must have! heheh, here's some of those that I will more than likely pick up at some point:

A Witch's Tale, for the DS-I just kind of like the style of this one, its cute but got a dark edge to it. Quite cool, even though its apparantely very easy. Thats not gonna dissuade me though, I played Magical Starsign which was very easy and I still enjoyed it. I kinda want to get FFIX as it would fill that gap in my Final Fantasy collection. I've been told I would like it, I probably will-it has Vivi! :3

Recent Purchases ~ J-culture ftw!

I've been trying to spend less money on games and get through my pile of unplayed ones, but sometimes I can't resist a good deal when I see it.

I picked up a few more games that I've wanted over the last few weeks. Thought I'd just say a little about some of them. 

Dissidia: Final Fantasy (PSP) I've kinda talked about this one enough I think. Got it a while ago off Amazon and got quite addicted to it for a straight 10 days in which I beat the main game..and unlocked a whole load more stuff to do. Its a really cool action RPG/Fighting game which although I'd recommend for fans of Final Fantasy series, it does eventually get a bit repetitive. There are flaws, but its a quite awesome game.

Atelier Iris: Eternal Mana (PS2) Now that I finally got a hold of this from ebay for under £20 (I think) I have the 3 Atelier Iris PS2 games (which are quite rare here) and can start to play them at some point. They are quite cute sprite style turn based RPGs on the PS2.

No More Heroes (Wii) I picked this one up today for £6 used as I had my eye on it for ages since before it came out and for some reason my stingyness got the better of me and prevented me from buying it before it dropped in price enough. 

I love the look of the game, with it's crazy anime and j-culture references, insane style (the main character wins a beam katana in an ebay auction XD) and frantic action, I am really looking forward to playing this one. This, along with Okami and Muramasa, is one of the few games that I really like the look of on the Wii. There are quite a few others, but I'll not bother going into that just now.

Jeanne D' Arc (PSP) This hasn't arrived yet, as I just payed for it today and it is located in the USA. I'm pretty sure it hasnt seen a PAL release anywhere yet, and dont know if it will. However, I've heard really good things about it from a lot of sources on the net. (It must be true then.. ¬_¬) Its a turn based rpg essentially about an alternate retelling of Jean D'Arc's story. I'm expecting something quite similar to Final Fantasy Tactics with the religion themes etc. Looking forward to playing this one. [Hoping it doesn't get lost in the post]

I payed about £14 in USD for it, which I was quite pleased with. I thought it would go for more, but maybe it isn't as in demand as I thought.

Ah, I almost forgot. I think I'll make this "Recent Purchase" thing into a column that I'll do more of when I get a bunch of games I decide to talk about. So you might see more of them, but not that often (as I'm trying to buy less games)

As for what I am tempted by currently and might end up buying at some point...

Shin Megami Tensei: Persona on the PSP is looking pretty appealing to me right now, as is Okami either on the Wii or PS2. From what I've heard the Wii version, although it has slightly better graphics, has waggle and some glitches and bugs. But I really want to get Okami, it looks beautiful. Speaking of which, I can't wait to get Muramasa: The Demon Blade on the Wii, from the makers of Odin Sphere, it looks similar, but with a Japanese setting. It looks gorgeous! I must have a thing for eye candy in games, because I've recently been wanting to get a hold of Tales of Vesperia on the 360, the character designs and graphics look very nice. Its quite a rare game from what I can tell in the UK, and its going for £40+ May have to bite the bullet and get it before it goes too high. Also the Mana Khemia: Alchemists of Al Revis limited edition on the PS2. I've had an urge to get that for a while, but I think I might hold off until I try out the Atelier Iris games first.