Dec15
Gamer’s Digest: 2012 Gaming Favorites
Pokemon Black & White 2 | Virtue’s Last Reward | Xenoblade Chronicles | The Last Story | Kingdom Hearts 3D
| POKEMON BLACK & WHITE 2 | |
 Nintendo shocked everyone when they announced the first ever true sequel to a Pokemon game. Instead of announcing something like Pokemon Gray or some third colour to fit with the usual trend, they decided to do a little bit more. There are new gym leaders, new cities, a couple of new pokemon and a new storyline just to name some of the new features. I started off playing at a feverish pace until I reached a handful of areas that I recognized from the original Pokemon Black I had played maybe only a year or so ago. The parts where you have to re-trace your steps aren’t so exciting, unfortunately, for those of you who have played Pokemon Black/White already. Especially caves, which no one even likes in the first place. It’s still a great game and the intricate battle system is as wonderful as ever – I’ve just played these games for so long that it’s starting to get old. For newcomers and people who’ve never touched the original Black/White, this should be pants-wetting exciting stuff. If there’s someone on your Christmas list who hasn’t been playing Pokemon for a while then this is how you’ll reel them back in! As for myself, I’ve been playing these things since the era of Pokemon Yellow for almost 1000 hours of cumulative playtime. People like me need something new. Now that we’re nearing 700 Pokemon and running out of colours to name these things, maybe it’s time to completely change the way the system runs and spice things up. Scratch that maybe. It is time. |
———————————
| VIRTUE’S LAST REWARD | |
 I am not a puzzle person in the slightest and I never played 999 (though I did take the effort to read a full summary of the plot) before Virtue’s Last Reward, but it was pretty enjoyable nonetheless. Gameplay wise, it’s a cross between a puzzle game and a visual novel, and while decision making is basic for pretty much any visual novel, this one is never just a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ decision. …Well, I guess the choices are all ‘yes’ or ‘no’ decisions, but you’re playing with life and death here every time. The game tries to involve you emotionally and tests your morality. The story line is incredibly cool and complex though and even though there are at least double the bad ends to every good one (if you want to call them ‘good’), I can say that absolutely EVERYTHING is important to the plot overall. You’ll betray, you’ll be betrayed in return, and you’re going to feel like an asshole multiple times for your actions, but that’s all part of the fun. The ending was absolutely full of plot twist after plot twist and it was headache inducing, but really worth it when you realize how every single event that happened worked together. I wish I could spoil it all for you, just so you all know just how awesome and well thought out the plot is, but I’ll let you figure that out yourself. The gameplay is pretty linear between dialogue and room solving, and you can’t really go back and redo puzzles after you’ve finished them, but the game does let you go back to every decision you’ve ever made whenever you want, which is great if you’re really stuck on decisions. As for the technical part of the game, someone put a ton of work into the soundtrack and should be congratulated for it. It just added with the entire feeling of creepiness and anxiety that the storyline creates. The 3D models added a bit of animation to the regular dialogue and the option between English and Japanese voice acting was a nice move by Aksys. Both languages gave you pretty great voice actors (Noto Mamiko, Daisuke Ono, Laura Bailey, Travis Willingham, the list goes on). The puzzles? …Yeah, I was too stubborn to take things in easy mode (where the characters hand you answers), so this probably took a lot longer to finish than it should have. They do require you to think and while I did have a few lucky guesses, there was a lot of problem solving involved. Long story short, this was probably the best game I’ve played all year. |
———————————
| XENOBLADE CHRONICLES | |
 Without a doubt, this is the best game on the Wii. The best. Do you hear me? If you own a Wii, this is the only game you need, and the only thing you need to buy anyone for Christmas. Xenoblade is everything you could ever want or need in an JRPG and more. It may not boast the most beautiful graphics, but the environments are so breath-taking that you will just stand there and gape at it just to take it all in. Xenoblade encourages exploration above all– rewarding you with experience points for finding new areas, items littered all around hard-to-reach places, and hundreds of sidequests to complete at your leisure. You are literally walking across the dead bodies of two massive – almost planet-sized Gods – and Xenoblade does an excellent job portraying the world as expansive yet inviting.
Even if exploring isn’t your thing and you just want to run-and-gun through the main story, you’ll have a great time. The combat system is really fun, and everyone you talk to has their own preferred party set-up. For example, mine was Dunban, Shulk and Rikki. Dunban accumulated all the aggro for me to keep the heat of my main trump card, Shulk. Dunban’s not a pure tank like Reyn, but he can dodge almost anything with his ungodly speed, so he’s an ideal target. I controlled Rikki in the meantime to buff and heal everyone as well as inflict lots of nasty damage over time spells for those lengthy boss battles. It takes a lot of tweaking to find what works for you, but that sort of personalized strategizing makes me feel really good. You have to pay attention to your teammates in order to follow-up their attacks with the right one |
——————————————-
| THE LAST STORY | |
| I have mixed feelings about The Last Story. It’s an alright game, but it went against my expectations so strongly that I felt a bit betrayed. I was expecting a JRPG with real-time strategy element that would make me have to always stay sharp to beat my enemies. Unfortunately, the combat system is lacking in that regard. First of all, even fiddling with the options so Zael’s attacks are set to manual does little to make me feel like I’m actually doing anything in the battles. It’s a “one button does all” sort of thing and the game really holds your hand through everything. There’s a strategy system…but you don’t need it. Running in guns abalazing works just as fine, making the “strategy” part of the game a joke. Even if you try to follow the tactics your party suggests, all the fights quickly devolve into a chaotic mob. When you are not engaged in the chaotic free-for-alls, you are walking down grey corridors to enter grey rooms to fight grey monsters. The dungeons are all extremely linear, contrasting harshly with how inviting and open Xenoblade was.
If you are able to look at it as a hack n slash, dungeon-crawling affair, then I imagine the experience would be a lot better. However, as a huge tactics/strategy game fan, I was crestfallen. The reason I think there’s actually hope despite not being so fond of the main part of the game (fighting) is that I still feel like The Last Story has some charming points to it. The story is great, exploring town is fun, and there’s a lot of care and effort I can feel that was put into this game. You can even customize your party’s armour to look nice without it affecting stats. The novelty of forcing Zael to parade around topless with hot pink pants never wears off. Ever. |
——————————-
| KINGDOM HEARTS: DREAM DROP DISTANCE | |
| Ah yes, Kingdom Heart’s response to Inception. New to the KH franchise? This game actually took the time to summarize the ones before it. …And they actually explained the overall plot more clearly than playing the games ever did. I was kind of disappointed by this game since it was pretty short compared to the others (16 hours for one play through) and I had no real desire to play it again after I beat it. It did make me excited for the next game though, so there’s something. The 3D actually worked surprisingly well. Sora’s hair in 3D actually looked pretty cool. Now for gameplay, most of it was standard Kingdom Hearts. The added a few things from the other games though, including the concept of Dream Eaters, which were basically Donald and Goofy’s replacements in battle partners. You could customize your team of these depending on what kind of battle strategy you wanted to use since some where better at healing, some were better at magic, etc. Also, the game had a mini section where you could bond with your virtual pets. …Though I admit to ignoring this part of the game most of the time. They also added something called the Flowmotion System, for those too good to walk on the ground like normal people. Kingdom Hearts has blatantly ignored the laws of physics before, but Dream Drop Distance takes it one step further and allows the player to bounce off the walls like a human pinball and fling oneself into the air after grinding on railings and such. One new thing that was slightly annoying though was the Drop System, where you had a time limit between playing as Sora and Riku. Normally this wouldn’t be too much of a hindrance, but you could only progress the storyline if both characters had reached a certain point in the plot. So if you were stuck at one level as Sora, you weren’t going anywhere as Riku until you finished that one world (provided that you were done Riku’s plot up until a new world became playable), but the system would Drop you anyways. Also, the Drop System didn’t even go away once I beat the game and was even present during boss battles. I suppose it’s not that big of a deal, but it was certainly annoying. Like the rest of the KH games before this, this was actually more relevant to the overall plot than it sounds like and Dream Drop Distance seems to have set up the ‘final battle’ type mentality for whenever 3 comes out. …Oh and there was also an unexpected plot twist regarding Organization XIII, but I’m not going to spoil it. |
About Meta Collab ♥
The combined forces of Metanorn and their buddy sites. We come together on special occasions to celebrate, discuss and share fandom love.
POWUH: Beginner (20-35) with 20 comments
now I really wanna play Spec Ops: The Line
POWUH: 1000-1099 and Pirate King with 1048 comments
Looks like I’ve almost pushed you over that edge. Now, I take my index finger and give you that last little push to try it out. 🙂
POWUH: Occasional (51-75) with 68 comments
“roll a panda”
Oh, You Fosh
Sadly, the games I’ve played are only on pages 3 and 7 ><
Still, they were good games and this a good review. Nice work guys!
POWUH: Meta Team and PreCure Mastah with 9203 comments
Rolling pandas are the best ever!
Yeah I plan on playing more PS3 games because my brother finally got one for his birthday! So that is cool now I can play all the games I missed <3
POWUH: and Vampire Lover with 11746 comments
LOL. Looks like a perfect opportunity has presented itself to you, Fosh. Use it to get hands on as much games as you can. Just make sure you make a budget beforehand. We tend to lose ourselves when we see a sweet chance like that.
POWUH: and Vampire Lover with 11746 comments
Playstation Vita: Being a fanboy of Sony since the original Playstation, I’m totally into the PS Vita and have a list of games I’d go after as soon as I get my hands on one (Gravity Rush, Assassin’s Creed III: Liberation). Jrow’s opinions on the system are just icing on the cake.
Pokémon Black & White 2: The first continuation to an arc for the Pokémon series is, indeed, a first and it’s not bad. What is different about the franchise since the original Black & White are that the use of TMs have now become unlimited and you’ve become very susceptible to status effects during the battles (Poison, burns, paralysis). And the twists for Black & White 2 are that there’s a gym in the player’s home town and the impression of fusion Pokémon with Black Kyurem and White Kyurem on the cover art.
Virtue’s Last Reward: One of the games on my list for PS Vita. I’m not sure what the game is about but it looks interesting.
Assassin’s Creed III: I’m also a big fan of the franchise and have played all the previous installments. The announced flaws seem so small compared to the good parts of the game so I’m hardly worried about enjoying it when I get the chance. The notable thing about the franchise is its variety of lead characters being Assassin ancestors of different nationalities and Connor Kenway is the most unique being half British, half Native American.
POWUH: Beginner (20-35) with 22 comments
Conner wasn’t a bad character, but he just wasn’t all that interesting. The best part of the story was when he was interacting with his father, but that ended with a flop not a bang. His story was too much like Ezio’s, but he didn’t have the same personality and charm as him. He would’ve been more interesting if there was more of a twist with his character or maybe he could’ve been more revengeful which lead to bigger more steep consequences due to the revenge he was seeking.
POWUH: Meta Resident and Yōko Fanboy with 1246 comments
I can’t say much since I’ve only played Assassins Creed 3 from start to finish (I helped my bro out from time to time with 1 and 2 but I wasn’t playing the games myself).
Conner to me didn’t feel like a great protagonist at all. The reasoning behind him joining with the Assassins was mainly due to revenge than to protect the world from Templars. In a way, his actions at times felt like “I don’t care about the world, I just want to get revenge”. It was too selfish in my eyes and maybe because Conner got away with it more easily than I’d expect (like what Steev mentioned), his development as a character is still raw.
Also, the story felt… short. In a way it felt rushed and there are multiple times where they could’ve expanded certain scenes for better character development. There was one scene between Conner and his father where they talk about his mother and the whole confusion “oh I didn’t know that” kinda situation. Instead of expanding on it, the story moved on and forgot about it… there was potential, but it wasn’t harnessed.
I like how they included the ship battles and the tree climbing but everything comes at a price. The fighting has been made to feel ‘too’ simple, where you can win the game with the weapons you start off with. Actually, there’s hardly any weapons to get and the whole armor thing? That’s just for appearance now. There’s also a tunnel system I’m pretty sure no one uses. In other words, the content was lacking and was way too simplified compared to the previous installments but as negative as this comment is, overall I still enjoyed it for the fighting. The game didn’t reach my expectations but it was still a fairly fun game.
Best if you try it out yourself because a friend of mine keeps harping on about how great it is (only… he harps on about the ship battles and tree climbing…)
POWUH: 1000-1099 and Pirate King with 1048 comments
There’s two camps for Gravity Rush: Those that enjoy it and those who think it’s just awful. It seems like people are on one side or the other of whether or not Gravity Rush was a good game. I know myself & Amuro enjoyed it and got used to how the game handles gravity.
But yeah, when you get that Vita man, you’ll run that battery dry from so much playing of it.
POWUH: Meta Team and Ringleader Extraordinaire~ with 6433 comments
Thanks for this detailed list guys. I am sure, this will be helping a lot of people during holidays and in general selecting the games that they might have missed for 2012. ^^
POWUH: 1000-1099 and Pirate King with 1048 comments
Sure thing. Somehow my amateurish HTML and graphics stuff worked out alright, though this is merely me adopting design styles of you & steev.
Also, March 5th. Tomb Raider. F YEAH!
POWUH: Meta Team and Spammy Tamer with 7115 comments
I used to be such a big gamer, and I’ve played none of this besides WoW. I’ll probably play Halo 4 after Christmas, but all in all, FPS games don’t interest me, big time investments don’t interest me (cause I’ve already got the time allotted to other things), and I just have other things to do.
POWUH: Metanorn Lover with 207 comments
I’ve heard of all these games! Too bad I’m poor so I haven’t gotten a chance to play all of them! Only some… DX
Playstation All Stars Battle Royale – It is seriously one of the most funniest games played with other people all the way! I get so intense when playing that game! Usually I use Nathan Drake or Dante lolz. Mostly I was just sad there weren’t any Square Enix characters. Such a fun game still, though I too hope that we get DLCs with Cloud and Lara too! XD
Persona 4 – Golden and Arena??? I just want both now with my Fsteak.
Though I really want to play everything else, especially Journey, so Beautiful 0-0
I really want to play most of those games though! Especially
POWUH: Metanorn Lover with 207 comments
…Journey so Beautiful 0-0 (Sorry for the cut-off)
POWUH: Metanorn Lover with 207 comments
Ah crap sorry I meant to say was to delete the bottom aghh >.>
POWUH: 1000-1099 and Pirate King with 1048 comments
Lara Croft would be fun DLC, so would Cloud. I’m looking forward to when Kat comes out as DLC and the new levels get released.
Golden/Arena are awesome. Arena deserves fighting game of the year mentions and Golden is no doubt the best game you can buy for Vita today.
POWUH: Beginner (20-35) with 27 comments
Thanks for inviting me to throw some words together here. It does the body good to stretch that muscle every now and again. You know, the one responsible for making with the writing and what not.
As for the list of games, it really makes me look back on 2012 in a more positive light. It’s easy to say that it was a weak year for gaming, but there was plenty of great stuff. It’s also the year I got my Vita and finally ditched my fat ass launch 60gb PS3 for the new hotness of the 500gb Super Slim PS3. I even made the jump to PS+ and I’m not looking back. Will next year be the advent of Sony and Microsoft’s new consoles? Who knows, but if next year can surpass 2012 in gaming goodness, then it will truly be an exemplary year.
POWUH: 1000-1099 and Pirate King with 1048 comments
It did seem to me that 2012 wasn’t an amazing year prior to us doing this post, but 2012 was just fine by the end. I do think because there was a lull around summer time where no real AAA titles were coming and that it wasn’t like 2011 where good games were coming out once/twice a month, that my initial thought of 2012 was a very “7.9” situation… I’d rate it higher now in retrospect.
I do think that when DmC, Bioshock and Tomb Raider come out in Q1 of 2013, people like me will have already declared 2013 > 2012.
POWUH: Meta Team and The Mad Scientist with 5525 comments
Not a bad year, indeed! Xenoblade and P4G alone made it worth it for me. It’s easy to forget what actually came out during the year until you actually look at a list. I had to be reminded too.
…2013 does look pretty damn good though. I’m already excited for DmC and Ni no Kuni :3
POWUH: 700-799 and Horror Expert with 701 comments
@Overcooled, would you say Last Story is worth the pricetag for an RPG fan? The negatives you mentioned seem to outweigh the positives (especially the lack of real strategy), and though I love RPGs the linearity seems kind of boring. OTL
I was really excited for the game originally, but now I don’t know if I still want to get it. Oh the indecisiveness!
POWUH: Meta Team and The Mad Scientist with 5525 comments
I can see how some people would really like it, but I’d hesitate to say it’s worth the money. You might wanna hold off on this one. :/
POWUH: Meta Resident with 1557 comments
I’m a huge RPG fan so I’d say every RPG is worth it (I buy most at full price at release). But it’s on the Wii and I hate the Wii, so I haven’t had the chance to play either The Last Story or Xenoblade Chronicles.
POWUH: Metanorn Lover with 151 comments
Great overview of 2012 in games. Definitely agree in Borderlands 2 being Game of the Year, I had already accumulated almost 120 hours in the main campaign. Dishonored being a close second favourite of mine but sadly it has been a slow year in gaming compared to previous years (for me at least). Let’s hope that 2013 gives us a much better offering.
POWUH: Lovely-pyon~ with 304 comments
So I bought Xenoblade over the summer and IT’S SO FREAKING GOOD. I adore it. It’s my favorite game ever. The environments are tremendous and beautiful, the soundtrack is amazing, and the story and characters are great too.
I don’t think I can even pick a favorite place in the game. Eryth Sea at night during a meteor shower was probably the most beautiful to me, but Bionis’ Leg was probably the most fun for me to explore. Either that or Makna Forest.
My favorite team was Shulk/Dunban (shirtless of course)/Riki with me controlling Shulk. I also really liked controlling Melia. That girl can deal out some damage. The characters are so great. I love them all, but Dunban (especially when he’s not wearing a shirt) is my favorite.
I really have to thank your post in Spring for this, OC. I had been interested in the game before, but you absolutely convinced me to buy it.
POWUH: Meta Team and The Mad Scientist with 5525 comments
I’m so glad you liked Xenoblade! It’s the best game on the wii and one of my new favourite RPGs. Words just don’t do it justice because it does almost EVERYTHING right.
I love all the game areas. Eryth Sea during a meteor shower was a rare treat, but I have to say Satorl Marsh took my breath away. During the day it’s pretty ugly, but at night it’s phenomenal. Seriously, the level design is absolutely fantastic!
Looks like we have the same team set-up, although I preferred to control Rikki since his HP was through the roof. I actually never got the hang on Melia…mostly because I rarely ever use mage characters. I hear she’s supposed to be crazy strong, but I just couldn’t do it lol. Topless Dunban is always great. I love how he climbs up freaking walls with only one hand.
Ahhhh, thank you~ So far I’ve gotten about 2 or 3 others to play Xenoblade thanks to my post nudging them (and their own drive to buy it, of course) and it seems to be overall really well-liked. Not many people have played it, but those who have tend to love it. It deserves all the advertising it can get.
POWUH: Meta Resident with 1557 comments
I agree with the DLCs for ME3 – they were great, especially seeing all the back story of the Prothean race. Actually, the strong suit of ME is the rich characters and their history as well as the excellent script/voice actors.
I enjoyed all parts of ME1. ME2 was great to play, but the ending was just horrible. Seriously? It’s like a trailer for an upcoming movie than an ending. And don’t get me started on ME3’s ending. It was utter crap in my eyes, but I went in knowing that ME endings were horrible and the play experience is what makes the series worth it, so I wasn’t totally surprised.
In that entire list I’ve only played ME3… I’m so far behind in my games ><
Currently playing Disgaea 2, Torchlight 2, Devil Survivor 2, Pokemon White 1, and Xenosaga 3. I think only Devil Survivor 2 and Torchlight 2 was released in 2012, haha. I really have too many games in my backlog (I'm still clearing out my PS2 games – I got some PS1 games I've always wanted to play last year and haven't got around to them… FFVIII, Tactics Ogre, and FF Tactics). Sigh.