Bayonetta

Bayonetta is one of the first new releases of 2010 and if this game is any indication, then 2010 should be a very good year for games. Bayonetta is an action game from Hideki Kamiya, the director of the first Devil May Cry game and the similarities are between the two games are striking. Most noticeably, both games are obsessed with style and have lengthy cutscenes showing the title characters showing off while you sit there wishing you could take part in that action. Both also have somewhat incomprehensible storylines. Bayonetta's story is confusing as hell on the first playthrough, but a little bit of sense on subsequent runs through the game. All you need to know is that Bayonetta is an amnesia-stricken umbra witch in the middle of a war between her clan and a holy group, that may or may not be evil, whose trying to resurrect a God who will remake the universe. Bayonetta's story is pretty inconsequential for the most part. Rather than playing up the religious and gothic themes, the game takes a hyper-sexualized, over-the-top approach. Bayonetta strikes poses, provides tons of ass and cleavage shots, swings her hips to ridiculous angles, pole-dances, and sucks on lollipops...all in beautiful HD visuals. Despite all her over sexualization, Bayonetta is a pretty likable character. She is a one-liner spouting, trash-talking, cooler-than-hell personality that I wouldn't mind seeing more of.

The main draw for the game is its combat. Bayonetta's combat is a mix of Devil May Cry's free-style combat with Ninja Gaiden's dial-a-combo mechanics which allows a certain level of freedom when mixing different combos. You can also equip melee weapons like swords at any time and there are always guns attached to Bayonetta's heels. Bayonetta can also conjure torture devices like guillotines and chain saw to finish off your enemies. The enemies can be pretty tough and are constantly on the attack, so you have to be on your guard to dodge at a moment's notice which is also a important part of the gamplay. The combat isn't entirely mindless, though. One of Bayonetta's most important gameplay mechanics is its dodging mechanics. When you narrowly avoid an attack, you'll activate “Witch Time”, which turns everything purple and slows the enemy movements down to a crawl. It's hardly an original concept, but it lends itself well to the combat. You can dish out tons of damage with little risk, which will prove vital in harder battles. This system rewards your ability to balance both offensive and defensive tactics and incorporate it into your playing style. Bayonetta's greatest ability is the power to summon hellish creatures to finish off the larger foes using her hair...which also doubles as her clothes...it's a lot of fun to execute and watch...

The only thing about the game that is particularly awful at is the quick-time events that pop-up without warning during cutscenes. They give you no time to react to time and often result in death which will worsen your end of the level score. Also, the PS3 version of the game was basically ported from the X-Box 360 and there some technical problems that result from this. The worst of these problems come from the loading times. Loading a level, traveling to the Gate's of Hell store, continuing after dying, and even pausing the damn game can sometimes take more than 30 seconds to fully load. Apparently a patch for this was released, but I rented the game a while ago so I can't really comment on it. Bayonetta is stylish, over-the-top, brutal fun that features a polished-to-the-core combat system that should satisfy any fan of the action genre. Despite a few flaws, I enjoyed the hell out of the game, and I have no problem recommending this to anyone who enjoys mindless action.

The Nightmare Before Christmas: Oogie's Revenge (Review)

It's somewhat interesting how The Nightmare Before Christmas became a mega-cult hit in America roughly over a decade after it's initial release. Now-a-days its the go to franchise for the emo/goth crowd and the movie itself has become a lot more noteworthy to casual audiences. I've only seen the film twice before, largely due to the interest from the film's inclusion in the Kingdom Hearts series. In Japan, the fandom of the movie never really died down so it comes to no big surprise that Capcom decided to make a game based off of it. The game acts as a sequel taking place one year after the events of the movie. Jack, still longing after something different, decides to go out in search of new scares again. Before departure, Dr. Finklestein gives Jack the Soul Robber, a gooey whip that can stretch out and change shape. But, when Jack returns to Halloween Town, he finds that the towns changed for the worse. While absent, Lock, Shock and Barrel have sewn Jack's nemesis Oogie Boogie together again and he is lusting for revenge(as you can tell from the game's title). The story and writting is pretty stale and bare-bones, but it is at least tolerable due to the admirable voice acting. A few of the the original VAs returned, Chris Saradon is Jack, Ken Page is Oogie Boogie, and the characters who have new voices are quite similar to the originals.

The game is a modified version of Capcom's own Devil May Cry series and the game doesn't do much to hide this. Like DMC, the levels are presented as a series of chapters, each of which is relatively short consisting nothing more than killing a horde enemies and maybe fighting a boss. There's a version of DMC's “Style Ranking”, where constant attack combos result in a “coolness title” that will increase upon scoring more and more hits on opponents. And at the end of each level, the game tallies up how well you did in four categories (damage, time, surprise, and max combo), then assigns an overall ranking. It doesn't do any of this as well as Devil May Cry, but it did it well enough to ensure I was at least mildly entertained til the end. The thing that really sticks out for the game are the Boss Battles which act as musical numbers...of course, what would Nightmare Before Christmas be without some singing and dancing? The songs are modified versions of songs from the film (only one song is brand new) and during the fight you collect notes as you hit the boss, grab enough and everyone will start dancing while you press onscreen buttons to inflict massive damage. The songs and dancing sequences are the only part of the game I really like and helped the game stand on it's own a little better. Mega-fans of the movie will get a lot more mileage with this game than most people. The game is solidly put together despite most of it being copy and pasted from others and it applies the Nightmare Before Christmas brand pretty well. It's just an overall good game.