Njiska v2

As promised I'm finally getting around to updating the site. Last weekend I upgraded the publishing system to MT 5. This weekend I'm hoping to get some work done on the new layout and if at all possible have a basic design up by the weeks end.

From Wikipedia:

"Antidisestablishmentarianism" is the longest common example of a word formed by agglutinative construction, as follows (the numbers succeeding the word refer to the number of letters in the word):

establish (9)
to set up, put in place, or institute (originally from the Latin stare, to stand)
dis-establish (12)
to end the established status of a body, in particular a church, given such status by law, such as the Church of England
disestablish-ment (16)
the separation of church and state (specifically in this context it is the political movement of the 1860s in Britain)
anti-disestablishment (20)
opposition to disestablishment
antidisestablishment-ary (23)
of or pertaining to opposition to disestablishment
antidisestablishmentari-an (25)
an opponent of disestablishment
antidisestablishmentarian-ism (28)
the movement or ideology that opposes disestablishment

When the original No More Heroes came out I was so excited I drove all the way to upstate New York just to buy a copy before it was available in Canada. When I got home I popped that sucker in and spent the next 3 days touring around Santa Destroy having the time of my life. Sure the game had it's many flaws, but it was steeped in character. A true Suda51 game, through and through. Naturally a property this hot deserves a sequel and sure enough, they made one. It's just, unfortunately, a bit of a disappointment.

What I'm Diggin'

Controls
Motion controls are still some of the best and most fitting the console has to offer, but now you can play with a classic controller as well. Personally I feel it takes away from the experience, but a lot of people requested the option and it's nice to see Grasshopper Manufacture follow through. Presumably this is the control scheme used by Heroes' Paradise and it works well.

The opening cinematic
It's fantastic, does a great job of setting the plot, without wasting time recapping, and hooks you with it's plot of vicious revenge. There's just enough information there to get a new player up to speed without boring an old player to tears. And yes, there is a shit-ton of blood.

Ranking Battles are Free
The biggest complaint I had about the first game was the ridiculous amount of side missions one had to go through in order to earn enough money to start a ranked fight. For Desperate Struggle the battles are now free and the money you earn from side missions goes towards powering up Travis and buying new and exciting Beam Katanas.

Retro Side Missions
Speaking of lame designs ditched for the sequel, motion based mini-games are out. Perhaps it's owed to the new Classic Controls option, but all side missions are now 8-bit arcade rips offs. Each contains multiple levels of play and are generally a lot of fun.

Bizzore Jerry 5
An anime inspired SHMUP replacement for Pure White Glastonbury; Bizzore Jerry 5 feels like Shikigamai no Shiro 3's opening stage, only with very simple, yet traditional bullet patterns. Well worth the time to play.

What's Gone Wrong

The Characters
Dear god, what did they do to the fucking characters. All of Suda51's games have been about whacky and intriguing characters, even Michigan, yet here they feel hollow and empty. Every assassin in the first game was fleshed out with a rich back-story, an amusing introduction cut-scene and a funny, or serious, end of battle cut scene, usually with some additional dialog. Here you get a paltry cut-scene that barely gives you any details and a death scene that's basically just a killing blow. No. 25 is only memorable for the line, "You're going to battle me with all your Hos?", and the rank 24 assassin doesn't even have a real introduction or finish. The series biggest strength is now it's weakest asset and I couldn't be more disappointed. Hopefully this will change in later level

Menu Based Movement
While some player's were annoyed by the original's open world, I personally loved the idea. Granted it was just a hub level, but it was a hub level that made Santa Destroy feel like a real, albeit fucked up, place. Now that's gone, replaced with a cheap menu system. It's not even a creative play on an old over-world map design, it's just a plain menu simple menu that warps you from place to place. It would've been nice if this was added as a feature in addition to a newly fleshed out free-roaming world, but alas that's not the case.

So that's it. Two hours in, four bosses down, ranked 24th and although I had a lot of good to say; the con's out weight the pros. I went in with high hopes, but what I loved the most about the original appears to be heavily neutered. Maybe that will change in time.

For more on No More Heroes: Desperate Struggle check out Multiplayer Chat #106

So lately I've been playing Operation Darkness, a tactics RPG by Success Corp. set during World War II. For the most part the game has been fun, but there's one stupid little repeated mission requirement that's just driving me crazy. You see the game requires that certain story characters survive each battle and while that's a perfectly normal objective, it should become moot when it's revealed one of your team mates is a god damn necromancer. That's right, you have a character that can bring people back from the dead, but if any one important dies the mission ends anyways. It's a not like there's any logical reason why you could resuscitate them. I mean if your necromancer dies, fine, everyone will stay dead, but as long as he's alive it just makes no sense. It's a stupid, frustrating, arbitrary design call that should never have been made. And when you add this idiocy to a gameplay system that forces hour long missions you get more profanity than I've needed since the NES days. Too bad I'm not smart enough to quit. Expect a full review in the coming days.

To fill the void left in my life by working at the ungodly hour of 5am, i'm decided to start blogging again. Look for regular updates soon.

In the mean time check out my lastest BC Reviews:

Raiden IV
God Hand
Sin and Punishment
Mushihime-Sama Ver 1.5

Presale sometime before thursday. Debating getting GA again.

Apparently this was announced yesterday, but it's just now come to my attention. Inbev, the worlds second largest brewer and owner of practically every brand I drink, has made an offer of purchase to Anheuser-Busch and the offer has been accepted by the companies Board of Directors. The price paid for the world's third largest brewing company? $70 a share or approx. $49.9-52 Billion.

Granted the deal is still no final until it is approved by the share holders, but given that the offer is $4 more then today's closing price, I can't see it being rejected. Looks like Anheuser-Busch Inbev is going to be the new top dog in the world's beer market.

Sources: Bloomberg, New York Times
Photo by John White, Wikipedia

It's been a busy week for me, what with losing my job and all. But now that i've got some free time i'm hoping to get some more articles and some new reviews done. Also need to do that whole looking for a job thing... Expect updates in the near future.

What rotates around the earth?

15% of Britons can't locate the UK on a map

Dumbest Blonde EVAR!

I think i was pretty week in this debate. Was kind of exhausted, but it picked up later on. One of our highest rated shows.