February-March releases

How are you people getting on with the current onslaught of videogame releases? Hyped for the Vita? Coping fine? Getting close to testing the bounds of your overdrafts like me? Anyway, I hope you've been doing well since I last posted (and promised to do a Vita post... sorry for the lack thereof)

We're kind of midway(or almost) through this really busy window of game releases and I've only picked up one so far to try and save some money. Note that some of these might be slightly different for North America. I'll post dates of the noteable titles if I can find them.

February


3rd February


Final Fantasy XIII-2 (PS3/360) This really interests me despite how much I hated XIII...
Ghost Trick: Phantom Detective (IOS)
Metal Gear Solid HD Collection (PS3/360)
Soul Calibur 5 (PS3/360)

10th February

Catherine (PS3/360)
Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning (PS3/360/PC)
The Darkness II (PS3/360)

12th February

Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood (PC)

16th February

Alan Wake (PC) It kinda sucks how long some games take to get the PC treatment sometimes...

22nd February (Oh god, the sound of bank balances screaming in unison as the Vita releases)

Vita Stuff- First-Party games:

Uncharted: Golden Abyss - €49.99/£44.99/$69.95 AUD/$89.95 NZD

ModNation Racers: Road Trip - €39.99/£34.99/$54.95 AUD/$69.95 NZD

Everybody's Golf - €39.99/£34.99/$54.95 AUD/$69.95 NZD

WipEout 2048 - €39.99/£34.99/$54.95 AUD/$69.95 NZD

Unit 13 - €39.99/£34.99/$54.95 AUD/$69.95 NZD

Little Deviants - €29.99/£24.99/$39.95 AUD/$54.95 NZD

Reality Fighters - €29.99/£24.99/$39.95 AUD/$54.95 NZD

Memory Cards:

4Gb Memory Card - €19.99/£17.99/$26.95 AUD/$34.95 NZD

8Gb Memory Card - €34.99/£31.99/$44.95 AUD/$59.95 NZD

16Gb Memory Card - €49.99/£44.99/$64.95 AUD/$84.95 NZD

Peripherals:

AC adaptor - €9.99/£8.99/$12.95 AUD/$16.95 NZD

Portable charger - €49.99/£44.99/$64.95 AUD/$84.95 NZD

USB cable - €9.99/£8.99/$12.95 AUD/$16.95 NZD

In-ear headset - €19.99/£17.99/$26.95 AUD/$34.95 NZD

Starter kit - €24.99/ £21.99/$34.95 AUD/$44.95 NZD

Travel kit - €29.99/ £25.99/$39.95 AUD/$49.95 NZD

[From Link]

And some other ones(some of which I'm not sure if they will be out at launch);

• Everybody’s Golf
• Escape Plan
• Gravity Rush
• Hustle Kings
• MotorStorm RC
• Top Darts
• Super StarDust Delta

[From Link]

24th February


The Last Story (Wii) This is the only one so far that I've preordered out of these games.

Hyperdimension Neptunia Mk.2 (PS3)
Syndicate (PS3/360)
Binary Domain (PS3/360)

8th March


Metal Gear Solid: Snake Eater 3D (3DS)


9th March


Mass Effect 3 (PS3/360/PC) Will be awesome, perhaps minus the multiplayer...
Asura's Wrath (PS3/360)
Street Fighter x Tekken (PS3/360)

13th March
Silent Hill Downpour (PS3/360) I'm wanting to get into this franchise but I'm a wuss...


14th March 
Journey (PS3) Interesting looking game from the developers of Flower.


16th March (Should be renamed Bit. Trip Day!)

Bit. Trip Complete (Wii)
Bit. Trip Saga (3DS)
Rayman Origins (3DS) Way later than this should have come out, is this date right?

Yakuza: Dead Souls (PS3)

22nd March
Angry Birds Space (IOS) A few more million copies to be sold?



23rd March

Armored Core 5 (PS3/360)

Kid Icarus: Uprising (3DS) Should really have been a launch title...or earlier in the year IMO
Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City (PS3/360)
Ninja Gaiden 3 (PS3/360) Don't know much about NG other than they like to release the same games


[Used info from Link]


There are a lot more, like Diablo III, Akai Katana and many others that I didn't include, so hopefully this is slightly helpful in keeping track of things...

Vanillaware E3 2011

Vanillaware are one of my favourite game studios that usually get overlooked a bit. I was recently on a stream of someone playing Odin Sphere and there seemed to be only a few people who had played the game or even heard of it. The games I've played from them are Odin Sphere and Muramasa: The Demon Blade. These games are 2D sidescrolling action games/action RPGs depending on how you look at it. I'd say that they have enough RPG elements to put them in that end of the spectrum. What makes them really interesting to me is the artstyle. The sprites and backgrounds have this really amazing stylistic, vibrant and exaggerated appearance. Couple that with some really amazing music and at least to me, you have some excellent games. Some critics might say that slowdown in places and slightly repetitive nature of the gameplay really detracts but I was just really engaged by the combat and just how amazing the game looks that those things never really bugged me at all.

Odin Sphere is primarily based on Norse mythology as you might be able to tell from the name, not quite as strongly as say Valkyrie Profile, but its definitely a strong influence throughout the game. It borrows from a lot of other legends, myths and stories as well, which really builds up a nice rich game in my opinion.

Muramasa: The Demon Blade has a distinctly Japanese feel. I'm not meaning that it looks like it was made by Japanese developers-I'm referring to the feudal Japanese history setting and plot that it has. Its all about ninjas, samurai, a bit of political intrigue and quite a good shake of mythology coming across in the various enemies you fight and characters you encounter such as the Inari Kitsune(fox deities.) Its got some really interesting areas you go through, such as the water dwelling boss who you fight in this really stylistic but dramatic backdrop clearly based on The Great Wave off Kanagawa, one of my favourite Japanese woodblock prints.

So thats a bit of a tangent into two of Vanillaware's older games (I'm not going to go into Princess Crown, Grimgrimoire or the games that didn't get brought over here as I've still not got those games.) What I was really wanting to talk about was the recently announced Vanillaware titles, Dragon's Crown and Grand Knight History. We've known about Grand Knights History for a few months I think, but this is the first we've heard about Dragon's Crown, what will be Vanillaware's first HD game, releasing Spring 2012 on the PS3 and Playstation Vita. Sure, these games won't be for everyone, as the artstyle, particularly in Dragon's Crown could be described as grotesque and overexaggerated. Still, it looks gorgeous in places I think. Just see how smooth and vibrant it will run on the PS3. Grand Knights History will change things up quite a bit-it will be turn based :) Hopefully it works well.

Finally, check this retrospective from last year by one of my favourite youtubers. I actually had an idea to do a big blog post about Vanillaware's games a while back (before I saw his video) but never got round to it. So I guess this post kinda says a lot of what I might have.

Oh, on another note my Now Playing 'column' is on a bit of a hiatus...I'm thinking of changing it to another day from Sunday, or maybe to fortnightly so I'll always have at least a couple of games to talk about. I'll think about what I'm going to do with it.