For today’s post I’ll cover a couple of fighters, doing (semi)quick hits of KOFXII (R1) and Blazblue (R1).
The King of Fighters XII (R1)
I’m sad to admit that this is just as bad as advertised, and possibly worse – no wonder stores everywhere are slashing the price on this. The graphics are pretty solid, as the animation is excellent despite things looking a little grainy here and there. But while SNK deserves applause for sticking to traditional 2D dot animation, developing KOF12’s graphics old school style seems to have taken a heavy toll: this game just feels totally unfinished in every other way. I’ll break it down for you:
There’s no story to speak of, just a vague dream match setup with no explanations whatsoever. The character list is quite small by KOF standards, and if you don’t force yourself to play as characters you don’t like, you’ll be getting really bored real quick as you’ll find yourself using the same guys. In addition, the traditional mega-hard SNK last boss is curiously absent, likely due to time constraints for doing his unique animations. You fight five teams, the game calculates your time, that’s a wrap. Kind of dry, don’t you think? Now, those flaws might still be sort of forgivable, but SNK forgot to mention that they absolutely gutted the movelists! Some characters have, I kid you not, ONE offensive move. I mean, what the hell am I supposed to do with one fucking move? A lot of charas also only have one super now, and the pyrotechnics for connecting with a super are much less flashy and “solid” feeling than before. Lastly, as per usual with KOF, there’s nothing much to unlock except a sad little art gallery with very little new content – there’s almost no incentive to play solo.
Offline: Absolutely terrible.
The online was totally unplayable before the patch (which, by the way, is close to a full gig in size) and is STILL semi-unplayable after the patch. The game moves at a molasses like pace when quick matching with people; post patch I was able to get one semi-decent fight out of five against random opponents. I haven’t tried playing versus a fellow PPSXer because I can never seem to catch anybody playing it online (the only one who has it seems to be AngryOnion, and he’s always playing Street Fighter IV); some people have said it’s much faster, but I haven’t been able to verify this.
Online: 2 Steps Below Absolutely Terrible. (What do you call something like that? Abysmal? Execrable?)
Overall: Mind-bendingly bad. I give this a 0.5 out of 5. This game is absolutely embarrassing, and the only way you could make it worse is if it also gave you AIDS. (BTW, take note of this. I didn’t pay much to get this game, as I got it in a trade in which I added cash… and yet I still thought it was a huuuge waste of money. Paano pa kaya kung binili mo to brand new? Ang sakit nun.)
Blazblue (R1)
I don’t know what I was thinking, buying Blazblue. (R1 pa!) I’m not good at Arc System Works fighting games, as I’ve always been a Street Fighter man. Siguro kinati lang ako because the DataBlitz lady (Ate Cris) told me that it was the last copy they had in stock.
OK, hmmm, so how do I say this?
On the one hand, I can appreciate its excellence, as anybody who spends even a little time with this game will readily see... pinaghirapan tong larong to. The gameplay is sound, to be sure: the fighting is extremely fast, the animation is superb, the movelists are long and take a lot of learning, and the character designs are appealing and fresh. And take note: the online fighting is the FASTEST I have ever experienced, as BB exhibited next to no lag whatsoever during my entire playtime – and I was playing against Americans! NO LAG, against people on the other side of the world! Amazing and very impressive. Extras are also very robust: there’s a story mode for each of the major characters to play through, complete with voice. There’s also cool, distinctly Japanese sidestories (presented in “chibi”, super-deformed mode, no less) you can unlock that serve to flesh out the world and the characters even more.
So why then did I trade my copy away, just a week later, for an R3 copy of Red Faction Guerilla and a half kyaw?
I guess I just don’t have the time and patience to totally relearn a fighting game anymore. And when I say relearn I mean master the movelists (how to use and how to defend against) for a bunch of unknown characters from the ground up. As I’ve stated, I don’t really play Guilty Gear so the “feel” of this game is pretty alien to me, and with the list of playable characters being very small (less than KOF XII, even) I got bored with the fighting pretty fast… I just didn’t have the patience to get the most out each character. I know BB is an excellent game (the number and activity level of the hardcore types crowding the PPSX Blazblue thread is testament to that) but it’s just not my type of game, not any more.
Overall: I won’t be giving this a score, as it would be unfair to grade it low just because I bought a game that I wasn’t even sure I really wanted. If you really like the Guilty Gear style and find the act of “studying” a new fighting game fun, buy this without fail as it’s technically one of the best fighting games your money can currently buy. If you’re like me though and prefer being able to just jump in and kick ass without thinking too much, I’d suggest borrowing muna to see if it’s your thing.
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