I ring out the last days of Black History Month with something truly spectacular. Not in an OMG this is amazingly good, but OMG this kind of sucks, but damn I can’t look away from it. Not really a great way to celebrate BHM, but I digress.
Kirikou released for the Game Boy Color on November 16, 2001 as well as the PlayStation and PC in that same time frame exclusively across Europe. Differences from these versions aside they are average platformers based on the 1998 animated film, Kirikou and the Sorceress. The film itself is French and originates from African folklore. Having not seen the film, or played anything aside from the GBC game, that’s pretty much all I can say on the matter. So relax and enjoy my friends and I stammering through this game together in another hilariously ignorant edition of Bizarre Bits.
Ys Origin originally debuted on Japanese PCs back in 2006. It was then released worldwide on Steam in 2012 and now Ys Origin makes its console debut exclusively on PS4 with a PS Vita port coming soon after. Does this eleven-year-old game still have what it takes? The simple answer is yes, but it’s not without wrinkles.
First of all Ys Origin, as the name would imply, is a prequel for the series nearly 700 years in the past. That said two new adventurers have replaced our mainstay hero, Adol. Yunica is a knight in training and Hugo is a lone magic user. Players can choose who they want to follow, but except for gameplay and minor story changes both campaigns are virtually the same. There’s a tower filled with monsters where two goddesses are residing wherein an evil group of rogues are trying to kidnap them for nefarious means. That’s the basic gist of things and they don’t go too far beyond that concept. Overall I favored Yunica more as her past had more oomph behind it what with trying to follow in her father’s footsteps while Hugo was kind of a drag.
Truthfully I’ve never been too fond of any Ys narrative as they tend to be long winded, cliché, and simplistic. Regardless of which the tight gameplay keeps me coming back more. As Yunica, or Hugo you’ll climb the tower with each floor designed with different aesthetics like one engulfed in lava, or one submerged in water. There are light puzzles involving some tricky platforming and finding items in order to progress like a key, or special scales allowing our heroes to breath underwater. Enemies are sprinkled throughout on the way to mid bosses and dungeon bosses each of which can be quite formidable. Gaining a single level can give you the benefit of victory making every experience point and fight matter even if you’re just hacking away endlessly.
Yunica is armed with an axe while Hugo has a wand and operates at a distance. Magical relics grant them elemental powers, which are the same items in both campaigns, but operate differently for either hero. For example the wind relic is a spin attack for Yunica while Hugo’s creates a shield. Armor and accessories adorn the rest of your equipment, which can be upgraded via social encounters or by channeling SP at save points. Abilities can also be acquired for SP like boosting recovery rate of your Boost skill, or lessening MP consumed by magic. Some are more expensive than others, but by the time you reach the end point of the game monsters will be glittering you with SP.
Even though the visuals have been crisped up on the PS4 there’s not much in the realm of awe-inspiring. There are a few minor glitches like music spilling over with sound effects into other scenes, but other than that it ran relatively smoothly. Ys Origin is repetitive and the story is drab, but completing each campaign will unlock some additional content that I don’t want to spoil other than to say it’s worth seeking after. It won’t take long to complete as Yunica and Hugo range around the seven-hour mark making everything in the game clock in around twenty hours depending on the difficulty and how good your skills are. Things about the game are dated, but this simple hack and slash RPG is worth tackling for both old fans and newcomers to Ys.
Score: 3/5 Stars
Special Notes: I received a review code for Ys Origin.
This year marks Contra’s 30th Anniversary globally, which is rare especailly for this era. There are no known dates for the North American and European releases other than 1987, but the Japanese version launched on February 20, 1987. I should mention the title in Europe and Oceania was changed to Gryzor. There’s no official reason why, but Contras were U.S. funded rebels in Nicaragua so to avoid political controversy that’s probably one of the more valid reasons why it was changed even though you’re fighting aliens and not a dictatorship. This name was kept for further European ports of Gryzor on the Amstrad CPC, Commodore 64, and ZX Spectrum in 1988. In that same year Contra was also ported, more importantly, to the NES in both Japan and North America. This version wouldn’t be released in Europe until 1990.
By this point Germany had laws against violent video games set by a fun little organization known as Bundesprüfstelle für jugendgefährdende Medien, or simply BPjM. It was essentially set up to monitor youth targeted products like video games. To avoid controversy a lot of Contra was altered aside from just the title this time. Probotector became the new name for the series going forward in the PAL regions until the first PlayStation game debuted, which I’ll touch on later. The heroes and enemies were transformed into robots because as everyone knows there are no laws against machine on machine violence. Shocking for our future generations who all have robotic spouses I’m sure, but regardless of which it was a smart move at the time.
Getting back to basics Contra is a run and gun side-scroller highly inspired by classic films of the 80s like a splice between Rambo and Alien. Players can tackle the game alone, or with a partner, blasting away aliens, or robots my PAL friends, in order to save Earth. Powerups are dropped in-between giving us awesome weaponry like the spread gun. And, well, that pretty much sums up every game from here on out. Truthfully I’m not that familiar with the series, but everyone I knew that had a NES owned Contra and yet I didn’t know anyone who had the sequels. I wouldn’t touch Contra again until Contra 4, developed by the ever-amazing WayForward Technologies, on the DS in 2007 and it felt pretty much the same. That’s why for the purposes of this retrospective I played every single one. Well, all for one, which is renown for being one of the worst entries.
Contra: Legacy of War, which was the first PS1 title and the first to be developed outside of Konami internally. Appaloosa Interactive also worked on the PS1 sequel, C: The Contra Adventure. Now despite being a Konami property, one based in Japan need I remind you, both of these games were not released over there and C: The Contra Adventure was a North American exclusive. This wasn’t the first time this happened either. The fifth game in the series, Contra Force on the NES, was also a North American exclusive. It was slated to launch in Japan under the new name of Arc Hound, but was eventually canceled.
Not including remakes there are thirteen main games in the franchise across multiple platforms. The last game was a prequel to the sixth game, Contra: Hard Corps for the Sega Genesis, entitled Hard Corps: Uprising. It debuted in 2011 as a downloadable title for Xbox 360 and PS3 owners. True to the name of Contra, and the actual title, it’s hard, but also beautiful. Unfortunately that’s where the saga ends, but even though Konami is in a fragile state right now in terms of developing video games all hope is not lost. I’d love for WayForward Technologies to tackle the series again. I’d even enjoy a collection on current consoles. Please, for the love of Earth, just do something in celebration of one of your most classic franchises Konami. Groveling aside I bid Contra a happy 30th Anniversary.
Contra Series Timeline (based on NA names and dates)
Dragon Quest VII: Fragments of the Forgotten Past launched last year in September wherein I wrote a review over on GameSpew. It’s a great game with a lot of small issues that make it hard to recommend even though I scored it pretty high. My friend Shay joined me to discuss our many thoughts on Dragon Quest VII now that we both finished it. Enjoy!
I recently wrote about the localization differences between Power Blade and Power Blazer for GameSpew. Today I’m putting out my video on the subject. Enjoy!
As promised with my January update I finally have some words on Kingdom Hearts HD 2.8 Final Chapter Prologue. I just got done with it last night and I have to say it was a let down. The other two HD collections were fantastic to revisit, but I’d argue the games in those anthologies were better. Something was off here and it led me into a tangent regarding Kingdom Hearts III and the series overall. Suffice it to say there are spoilers in the video. Enjoy!
Double Dragon IV was an announcement that came out of nowhere and yet it made sense seeing as this year marks the series’ 30th anniversary. Instead of creating a new game in the vein of the last entry, Double Dragon Neon, Arc System Works decided to go the Mega Man 9 route by making a NES style sequel to Double Dragon III: The Sacred Stones. Unfortunately unlike Mega Man 9, Double Dragon IV leaves a lot to be desired.
The best way I can describe this game is slow. Players will scroll across the screen fighting baddies that take their sweet time getting to you in either tiny numbers, or overwhelming ones. Snail pace aside even fighting enemies isn’t satisfying. Like classic Double Dragons of yore Billy and Jimmy Lee can punch, kick, or use objects and weapons to ward off foes. If you get knocked down hitting one of the action buttons will produce a powerful counter, but animations are sluggish so falling down, counter or not, dampens the flow of the game. It’s boring and not fun to venture through even with a buddy. It feels too safe and uninspired as if this a beta of a game produced over a weekend.
On top of the ho-hum combat, there are platforming segments that are difficult due to the controls being unresponsive plus there are other bugs as well. One instance produced an invisible wall preventing me from jumping a gap and costing me valuable lives. What I will give the game praise for is its 8-bit, widescreen aesthetic. It looks and sounds good thanks to the remixed tracks. Aside from the main campaign there’s a 2-player fighting arena with a good cast to choose from, but I wouldn’t necessarily call it fun. It’s, I guess, a nice inclusion in an otherwise soulless package.
To hammer it home one last time Double Dragon IV is a shell of a game that lacks inspiration. I shouldn’t be surprised though as I wrote a retrospective earlier last month and was underwhelmed by the series as whole so another dud in the system was logically expected, but I had hoped for the best. A little more time in the oven with a dose of wackiness, could have made this game special, but even at $7 it’s hard to recommend.
Score: 2/5 Stars
Special Notes: I received a review code for Double Dragon IV.
It’s a new year, which means change is in the air for the Monthly Gaming Recap. Instead of having a quarterly video review of video games I’ll focus month to month from now on, but not just on games. I’ll discuss what I played, anything in the news that interested me, things I wrote, and so forth. I’ll be putting more stuff up on Game Jurk in February too. Why? All will become clear in March, hopefully. Until then I’ll try to be as entertaining as possible for Game Jurk and ReActionExaminer. Anyway enough teasing let’s see how my first month of 2017 went.
Game Jurk 