Date played: February 14th
Platform: 3DS
Session fun rating: 9/10
No one can justify upgrading from the regular 3DS XL to the New 3DS XL. No one. It's a luxury at best. Yet, I still bought one. I mean, it has some cool new features, but nothing that would justify the price. Honestly, I wasn't that interested in it when it was first announced, though the improved 3D, faster CPU and second analog control were appealing, they weren't enough. Then I saw it. The Majora's Mask Edition.
I think it's very beautiful. The color scheme and the great art work on the cover mesh together well and I just HAD to get one. It was a frustrating experience though. I had dozens of tabs open after the announcement, trying to find a place that would take pre-orders for it, but I just couldn't find one. I decided to take a chance on my lunch break and go to the best EB Games in town, where I managed to score a pre-order. As of this writing, it goes for a bit more than 500$ on Ebay, from a retail price of 230$...
I got Majora's Mask 3D with it, but after doing the whole system transfer thing, I decided to just download a bunch of demos. I played Code Name S.T.E.A.M., Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate, Theatrhythm Curtain Call, Sonic Boom, Ace Attorney Dual Destinies, European Conqueror 3D, Fishdom H2O, Asterix The Mansion of the Gods, Glory of Generals, Color Zen, AiRace Xeno and WRC FIA World Rally Championship.
The improved 3D is very noticeable and works extremely well. It basically tracks my face to make 3D much more stable. The faster CPU also makes everything load faster, which was very much needed...
Fishdom H2O is a hidden object game that I thought my daughter could play, but it's so badly made that it couldn't even entertain a 4 year old. Asterix The Mansion of the Gods is another piece of shit game... The demo had one mini-game where Obelix must throw rocks at animals and Romans with the touch screen. Boring as fuck. Glory of Generals looked like a relatively competent turn based strategy game set in World War 2, but it's systems were too obscure and hard to understand for me...
AiRace Xeno is a weird obstacle race course where a spaceship must speed through tunnels and such. It's pretty good honestly. It's fast, controls well and looks good. WRC is a rally game that I was really excited to try, but the horrible handling ruined it for me. It runs well enough and looks decent, but the car just doesn't handle "right". Too bad...
European Conqueror 3D is another turn based strategy game set in World War 2...but this one was fun and held my attention for a long time. Using Britain, I conquered the entirety of Europe with infantry, tanks, artillery and air strikes. It played very well and the systems work well together.
Sonic Boom was a very average 2D platformer... I mean, it's not that bad and kept my attention until the end of the level, but it didn't do anything great either. Color Zen is an awesome little puzzle game that is impossible to describe here, but also would be best on a phone or tablet instead of 3DS.
It was my first time trying a game in the famous Ace Attorney series and I kind of liked it. It's a bit like an interactive novel where gameplay is largely text based. I had to point out inconsistencies in people's testimony during a court hearing. It was funny, extremely well animated and quite satisfying to play.
Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate is a big deal for a lot of people, but I've never been able to enjoy Monster Hunter. Every time I tried, I find the combat clunky and weird. Maybe that's the big appeal and I'm just not seeing it... I killed a large dinosaur thing with a giant hammer. It looks great at least. It was also the first game where I could try the new analog nub and it worked very well to control the camera.
Theatrhythm was the biggest surprise of the demos I played today. It's a rhythm game featuring music from Final Fantasy. It's possible to play with the stylus or the buttons so I tried both and found myself liking the buttons a lot more. Using a combination of button presses and analog stick movements, I played through a song from Final Fantasy VI and one from the Advent Children movie. I loved every second of it... Maybe I should buy this game sometime...
Finally, the game I was most excited about is Code Name S.T.E.A.M.! It's from Intelligent Systems, a studio that always seems to make games I love, like Super Metroid, Paper Mario and Fire Emblem and so far, I'm loving this game too! Honestly, it's pretty much just XCOM but with a comic book art style, a steampunk theme and some wacky shit. The demo is quite long and eventually, I was able to play with 4 characters at once. I will definitely be buying this game when it comes out next month, turn based tactical games fucking rock and this one is promising.
Platform: 3DS
Session fun rating: 9/10
No one can justify upgrading from the regular 3DS XL to the New 3DS XL. No one. It's a luxury at best. Yet, I still bought one. I mean, it has some cool new features, but nothing that would justify the price. Honestly, I wasn't that interested in it when it was first announced, though the improved 3D, faster CPU and second analog control were appealing, they weren't enough. Then I saw it. The Majora's Mask Edition.
I think it's very beautiful. The color scheme and the great art work on the cover mesh together well and I just HAD to get one. It was a frustrating experience though. I had dozens of tabs open after the announcement, trying to find a place that would take pre-orders for it, but I just couldn't find one. I decided to take a chance on my lunch break and go to the best EB Games in town, where I managed to score a pre-order. As of this writing, it goes for a bit more than 500$ on Ebay, from a retail price of 230$...
The improved 3D is very noticeable and works extremely well. It basically tracks my face to make 3D much more stable. The faster CPU also makes everything load faster, which was very much needed...
Fishdom H2O is a hidden object game that I thought my daughter could play, but it's so badly made that it couldn't even entertain a 4 year old. Asterix The Mansion of the Gods is another piece of shit game... The demo had one mini-game where Obelix must throw rocks at animals and Romans with the touch screen. Boring as fuck. Glory of Generals looked like a relatively competent turn based strategy game set in World War 2, but it's systems were too obscure and hard to understand for me...
AiRace Xeno is a weird obstacle race course where a spaceship must speed through tunnels and such. It's pretty good honestly. It's fast, controls well and looks good. WRC is a rally game that I was really excited to try, but the horrible handling ruined it for me. It runs well enough and looks decent, but the car just doesn't handle "right". Too bad...
European Conqueror 3D is another turn based strategy game set in World War 2...but this one was fun and held my attention for a long time. Using Britain, I conquered the entirety of Europe with infantry, tanks, artillery and air strikes. It played very well and the systems work well together.
Sonic Boom was a very average 2D platformer... I mean, it's not that bad and kept my attention until the end of the level, but it didn't do anything great either. Color Zen is an awesome little puzzle game that is impossible to describe here, but also would be best on a phone or tablet instead of 3DS.
It was my first time trying a game in the famous Ace Attorney series and I kind of liked it. It's a bit like an interactive novel where gameplay is largely text based. I had to point out inconsistencies in people's testimony during a court hearing. It was funny, extremely well animated and quite satisfying to play.
Monster Hunter 4 Ultimate is a big deal for a lot of people, but I've never been able to enjoy Monster Hunter. Every time I tried, I find the combat clunky and weird. Maybe that's the big appeal and I'm just not seeing it... I killed a large dinosaur thing with a giant hammer. It looks great at least. It was also the first game where I could try the new analog nub and it worked very well to control the camera.
Theatrhythm was the biggest surprise of the demos I played today. It's a rhythm game featuring music from Final Fantasy. It's possible to play with the stylus or the buttons so I tried both and found myself liking the buttons a lot more. Using a combination of button presses and analog stick movements, I played through a song from Final Fantasy VI and one from the Advent Children movie. I loved every second of it... Maybe I should buy this game sometime...
Finally, the game I was most excited about is Code Name S.T.E.A.M.! It's from Intelligent Systems, a studio that always seems to make games I love, like Super Metroid, Paper Mario and Fire Emblem and so far, I'm loving this game too! Honestly, it's pretty much just XCOM but with a comic book art style, a steampunk theme and some wacky shit. The demo is quite long and eventually, I was able to play with 4 characters at once. I will definitely be buying this game when it comes out next month, turn based tactical games fucking rock and this one is promising.
