I Spent a Week with the 8BitDo SN30 Pro +. Here are my thoughts.

About a week ago I received my new SN30 Pro + controller in the mail. After spending about a week trying it out on various games, I figured I would share my conclusions here. Please note that my impressions are strictly limited to use on the Nintendo Switch. I haven't tested the controller with other applications. I've separated the review into two parts, so if you want to ignore the rambling and jump straight to conclusions, just scroll down to part 2.

Part 1: Impressions.


First, the quality and presentation. The Pro+ comes in a nice, thick cardboard box, just like you'd expect a new phone to come in. Opening the box reveals the controller sitting under a plastic protector, waiting for you to pop it out and play it. Picking it up, the Pro+ is made of a hard textured plastic. The buttons, triggers, and sticks all feel nice and clicky, with just the right amount of resistance. The D-pad, in particular, has a great feel. 8BitDo is known for high-quality D-pads on their controllers, and this one doesn't disappoint. The Pro+ has a nice weight to it as well. If you're used to the awful 3rd party controllers you would get stuck with playing video games at a friend's house, expect to be impressed.

Going through features, the Pro+ includes just about everything you should expect from a quality pro controller. Besides the great feeling buttons and D-pad, it includes analog triggers, vibration feedback, and gyro controls for motion. Another nice touch is the rechargeable battery pack. It can be easily removed and swapped with AA batteries, meaning if the battery runs out, you can just swap some new batteries in to keep playing, and recharge the battery later when you're not using the controller anymore. It also means that when the battery pack eventually fails, it won't stop you from playing.

A key selling point for the Pro+ is 8BitDo's new Ultimate Software. Using a PC or Mac, you can remap button layouts, add macros (a sequence of button inputs that play when pressing a single button), even adjust the sensitivity of the analog triggers or sticks. Certainly a nice option to have in order to get everything just right for you.

So what's it like to use?

Personally, I found the Pro+ to be quite intuitive. Looking from the top, it resembles a Super NES controller, right down to the long horizontal L and R buttons on the front. I'm very used to this layout, and I felt right at home as soon as I picked it up. If you're already used to PlayStation controllers, this setup will also feel quite familiar to you. I also found it fairly comfortable to hold. Not quite as comfortable overall as Nintendo's own Switch Pro Controller, but pretty good nonetheless. A contributing factor here is the distance between the face buttons and analog sticks. No part of it was bad, but the controller really shines when using either the sticks and triggers, or the buttons and D-Pad. It doesn't feel quite as comfortable to me when using a combination of both. A quick look through reviews online find that preferences vary here- some find Nintendo's layout to be more comfortable, others prefer the Pro+.

A comparison should also be made to the PS4 Pro controller, as the two share an almost identical button and stick layout. To my surprise, I actually found the Pro+ to be more comfortable in general than Sony's controller. Again, your mileage may vary here.

Overall though, it's a well made and generally comfortable controller, and in my opinion there's no way to rate comfort higher or lower than others from an objective standpoint.

While I didn't test the battery life of the controller, it's been claimed to run about 20 hours on the included battery pack, and I haven't seen anything to dispute this. With the quarantine keeping me at home, I've had lots of time to test this controller out, and I've never run into low battery during a typical day of gaming.

Some of the features do come with drawbacks for Switch owners, and these are worth mentioning. For one thing, analog triggers, while a premium feature, don't really do anything for the Switch, as the Switch registers all inputs digitally. The longer travel on the triggers can take some getting used to, if you're used to the joy-cons or Switch Pro Controller.  If you play fast paced games where timing of trigger presses is essential, this is something to be aware of. Having said that, I got used to it faster than I thought I would, and I barely notice it now.

While turbo is a nice feature to have, I wasn't able to turn it on and off without also taking a screenshot, as the turbo switch is mapped to the screenshot button. This can be disabled using the Pro+ software, but for me it's one of those things that's just enough of an annoyance to complain about, but not enough for me to actually do anything to change it.

One more drawback is the inability to wake the Switch up from sleep mode using the Home button on the Pro+. When I pick up my first party Pro Controller, I can turn the console on and start playing right away. With the Pro+, I have to walk over to the console and turn it on first. Unfortunately, Nintendo seems to have locked this feature to their first-party and licensed products, and there wasn't a way for 8BitDo to include it here.

To try the controller out, I played 3 different games during the week I spent with the Pro+. If you'd like me to test any other games with the controller, let me know and I'll update the review. These are just the games I've already been playing throughout the week.

With Mario Kart 8, I found myself steering using the D-pad instead of the left stick, and found it worked surprisingly well. Conversely, trying to play it using the left stick felt a bit awkward to me.

Playing classic Doom on the Pro+ has pros and cons over Nintendo's Pro Controller. I prefer having symmetrical sticks for a twin-stick shooter, and this one fit the bill nicely. I think the sticks could be placed a bit further apart but that's my only real complaint. The sticks and triggers are pretty sensitive out of the box, but that's a preference thing, and they can always be adjusted using the software.

Animal Crossing also works fine. I slightly prefer the Nintendo pro controller here, as I feel the asymmetric layout suits the game better, but I can't deny that the ability to turbo the buttons when crafting or harvesting is a nice thing to have.

Part 2: Conclusions- Should you buy the SN30 Pro+?

If the Switch is your only gaming platform, and this controller will be your only controller besides the Joy-Cons, you may want to consider spending the extra $20 for an official Nintendo controller, or one of the cheaper wireless controllers from Power A. While the Pro+ is great at specific things, the layout of Nintendo's and Power A's controllers are just more versatile and comfortable for a wide variety of games, and the ability to turn your Switch on using the controller is a great quality of life feature.

If you're looking for a second controller, I recommend the Pro+. It's a unique controller that you'll probably find yourself preferring for certain games. Retro games, in particular, feel great on the Pro+, in large part due to the amazing D-pad, which is superior to anything Nintendo currently offers for the Switch. As mentioned above, you may also prefer to play twin-stick games on the Pro+ if you like symmetrical joysticks and a PlayStation-style controller layout.

If you're looking for a controller to use on multiple devices, again, consider the SN30 Pro+. The Pro+ is fully compatible with Switch, Android, Mac OS, and Windows, and apparently works with some iOS devices as well, when connected via USB cable. The ability to easily switch between multiple devices is great, and obviously PC and Mac games will allow you to take full advantage of the various features, such as the analog triggers. Unfortunately, the Pro+ is not compatible with PS4 or XBox One consoles, presumably due to complexity.

If you're looking for a controller for retro games, the Pro+ really stands out here, as I mentioned earlier. However, you may also want to consider one of 8BitDo's cheaper options, such as the SN30 Pro, which offers most of the same features, minus analog triggers, the removable battery, and access to the Ultimate Software. 8BitDo even offers straightforward wireless SNES, NES, Sega Genesis style controllers that work with Switch, Android, Mac, and PC, so if you're only shopping for a controller for retro and 2D games, these are worth taking a look at as well.

Final Word

I'm happy with my purchase, and I'll continue to use my Pro+ for various games on the Switch. However, I already have Nintendo's first party controller, and I won't be discarding it to use the Pro+ exclusively. While I'm glad I have it, I probably would have been just as satisfied with the standard SN30 Pro, as I won't be taking advantage of the analog triggers, and I don't mind the lack of grips when playing Link to the Past yet again. I'd recommend purchasing either of the two as a second Switch controller, and wholeheartedly recommend the Pro+ if you're planning using it for PC gaming as well.

Why You Should Play Animal Crossing New Horizons

I recently started playing Animal Crossing for the first time on Switch, and since I've begun, there's one thing I've struggled with more than anything else: How do I explain this to other people? I have friends who I think would love this game. I know people who are baffled by the appeal and I want to explain it for the sake of explaining it (I like explaining things).

But this post isn't about that. Not exactly, anyway. This post is a tiny bit more specific. This post is about why you should give Animal Crossing New Horizons a try Right Now, in the Spring of 2020, specifically.

The appeal of this series has long escaped me. Since the very first release, I've had friends try to explain the game to me, in an effort to get me interested, and my response has always been the same "That seems cool, but it's not for me."

It turns out, at least in this moment in time, I was wrong.

Aside from all the soothing busywork that this game provides, from paying off your home loan, arranging your furniture, hunting for bugs, or harvesting fruit, there's one thing that Animal Crossing has been able to provide that few other games can: A sense of community.

In a time where most of us are stuck indoors, and can't spend time with friends, loved ones, or even our co-workers, Animal Crossing has been a game that has allowed us to feel, on some level, a sense of connection with people around us.

Animal Crossing as a series has always built a sense of connection into it's mechanics. The series creator, Katsuya Eguchi, has explained that was part his intention when creating the game. He has stated he got the inspiration from the lonely feelings he had when moving cities to work at Nintendo. He said he wanted to make a game where the player could feel like they belonged. Eguchi stated in an interview with Edge magazine: "Animal Crossing features three themes: family, friendship and community. But the reason I wanted to investigate them was a result of being so lonely when I arrived in Kyoto! Chiba is east of Tokyo and quite a distance from Kyoto, and when I moved there I left my family and friends behind. In doing so, I realized that being close to them – being able to spend time with them, talk to them, play with them – was such a great, important thing. I wondered for a long time if there would be a way to recreate that feeling, and that was the impetus behind the original Animal Crossing."

Besides being connected to the game itself, Animal Crossing connects you with your friends in all kinds of subtle ways, without having to coordinate schedules in order to play together at the same time. It's great to start your game up and find someone sent you a postcard, or left a message on your bulletin board the last time they were over. Animal Crossing finds small ways to remind you that even if there's no one on your island right then, you're not playing alone.Animal Crossing may not be the game I go back to for years to come (Then again, maybe it will be). It may not be the game I hold up as my favorite. But right now, in this moment in time, it's a game I'm very grateful for. And if you can spare the cash, and you're looking for something to do, I highly recommend you give it a try. As long as we're all at home, this game will be something you look forward to playing every day. And right now, that's a rare find.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to gather my fruit before the shops close.

Why You Should Play Xenoblade Chronicles X

What you're about to read is a stream of consciousness that I typed into a Reddit comment box when someone asked me on a random games thread to explain what I liked about Xenoblade Chronicles X. I kind of word vomited it out, but after posting the reply, I felt it was kind of a waste to just let it sit forever, so I tweaked it a bit, fixed some errors, and I'm posting it here. I'm hoping someone reads this and is convinced to go check out this game. Who knows, maybe with a bigger audience, Monolith Soft will reconsider a Switch port, or even a sequel. Please let me know what you think.

I've played all 3 Xenoblade Chronicles titles, and they all have strengths and weaknesses, but I'd have to say that X is probably my personal favorite.

All 3 games have lots of areas to explore, but X is the only one that's truly open-world. In fact, it's one of the only JRPGs ever that's truly open world. You're not gated from getting to new areas until certain points in the story. From the beginning, pretty much the entire map is available to you, save a few areas that you can't get to until you can fly. And this world is really big too. It's loaded with monsters and beautiful scenery. There's 5 distinct continents to explore, each with unique design and aethetics. There's a real sense of danger, as even the low level areas have the occasional high level beast that can totally ruin your day. 

Speaking of ruining your day, that's actually usually avoided, because Xenoblade games want you to explore. Dying simply throws you back to the last checkpoint you passed. You don't lose anything you collected, not even XP. So while it can be hair raising trying to sneak through a cave filled with monsters 20 levels over you, you never feel afraid to go check something out. You're free from the sinking feeling you usually get when you get taken out by something unexpectedly and realize it's been over 2 hours since you last saved your game. Which is totally plausible, since it's so easy to lose track of time when you're out in the world. You can sprint at high speeds, and there's no fall damage either. Everything has been designed to make exploring the focus of the gameplay. I once spent an hour just trying to see if I could jump my way to the top of a rock structure I thought was interesting, and at no point did I feel it was a waste of time.

As some have said, the main story for X is pretty barebones. There's some really cool twists, but if you're used to the typically long JRPG campaigns, this one is pretty short by comparison. The real meat of the story is the worldbuilding found in the sidequests, which often have a noticeable impact on the area that serves as your home base. People move in, start businesses, new buildings appear, etc. I don't think I'd like this in every game, but I appreciate it here. One of my main complaints about a lot of JRPGs is that they have cool sidequests and places to explore, but the main campaign sets such an urgent tone that it feels oddly wrong to pursue them. Like it breaks the immersion.

Like, yeah, I'm being told that we have to get to the demon's cave right now or he's going to literally summon Cthulhu and the world is going to be eaten and dragged into the hell dimension, but this guy lost his favorite buttplug. And dammit, he's really bummed. We gotta help him out! And hey, that waterfall looks really interesting, wonder what's up there? Wait, what were we supposed to be doing again? 

Yes, this has become a huge cliche, and all the jokes about it have been done to death already, but X actually avoids this, and I'm honestly kind of surprised it hasn't gotten more recognition for doing so. Story chapters in X are pretty much self-contained. You head into your barracks for a mission briefing, and the chapter starts there. Once it's done, you're free to do whatever you wish. No guilt for ignoring the plight of the world needed. As someone who like to feel immersed in the world I'm exploring, this is awesome.

Combat in X is great, once you get used to it. You can get by fine by leveling and just buying whatever the shops are selling, but the potential for disgustingly broken character builds is there too, and if you like a challenge, the postgame content pretty much requires them too, with enemies to fight that are way over your maximum level cap. There's also some online features that, as I understand it, are still active. You can even put together a party and take on bosses with other players.

Oh, and have I mentioned you get a mech? That you can fly? It's seriously the coolest thing. Although I'd recommend not just rushing to get it as fast as possible. It does make the world start to seem a bit smaller when you no longer have to traverse it on foot.

Well, I think I've rambled on long enough. I hope I've given you enough info to at least pique your interest. Hope to catch you in New LA!

A Review of Xenogears

Welcome to my review of Xenogears! In this review, I'm going to do my best to give an honest impression of how I felt about the game, as a modern gamer going back to look at a now 20+ year old PlayStation game. This is, admittedly, going to be very difficult to do. Xenogears is a game so loaded with controversy and strong opinions at this point that I'm going to go ahead and say this now before continuing with this review: If you've been interested in the game but on the fence about it, no review is ever going to be able to properly convey the game in a way that will let you decide. There isn't truly anything to say about Xenogears that hasn't already been said, probably more eloquently, by someone else. This is something you will have to play and decide for yourself. I just like to write reviews for fun.

My first experience with Xenogears was years ago, back when the PlayStation 2 was king. I'd heard tons of talk from friends about this crazy game with theological and psychological themes, and I had to try it out myself. I managed to get my hands on a physical copy, and played all the way to somewhere in the infamous Disc 2, where I got stuck, took a break from playing, and my save file somehow got deleted. Until now, I'd never returned to the game, and it pains me to say that I have no idea where my physical copy went. I'd love to have it back at some point.

When replaying older games, I usually prefer to play on either the original hardware, or something close enough to replicate the experience in a modern setting. In this case, I made an exception that ended up making my play experience much more enjoyable as a whole. I downloaded my copy of Xenogears onto my PS3 from the PSN store for $10US, and then used that to install it on my PSP as well. Many PlayStation Classic titles available on PSN allow you to take advantage of this, and you can even swap your save file back and forth from the home console to the portable. It almost functions as a proto-Switch in this way. In my opinion, this is the ideal way to play a lot of older games. I usually used the PS3 to play through bigger story sections, so as to give an (in my opinion) more immersive experience, while using the PSP to play when away from the TV. Using the portable format also makes grinding levels, special moves, and money a lot less tedious, if you feel the need to grind. One added advantage is that the blocky 3D graphics look great on a tiny PSP screen, making the overall transition of switching back to an older title after being spoiled on modern graphics a lot less jarring.

At the time of release, Xenogears stood out from it's JRPG peers with it's battle system, which was sort of based on Final Fantasy's ATB system, with some really great additional features, like the ability to chain attacks together with button combinations to make special moves called Deathblows. It's almost like if a fighting game used turn-based battle mechanics. This system, while innovative at the time, isn't always explained well (although some would argue that's a feature, not a bug) and some options, like the ability to combo different deathblows together to unleash huge amounts of them at once, are markedly inferior to just using your best deathblow or ether attack every turn, except in a couple very specific situations. Combat is split between in-character, and inside character-piloted robots called Gears. Gears also have some unique mechanics, but like the character combat, the best option just tends to be repeating the same level 1 Deathblows or the best ether attacks over and over. I was also fairly disappointed that the final stages of the game occurred pretty much entirely in Gears, making me feel like I had wasted a lot of time building up my characters to fight on foot, only to end up having my endgame character builds centered around buying a bunch of expensive gear parts.

In it's defense, if you find making absolutely broken character builds satisfying, a bit of research is all you need to make quick work of anything the game can throw at you. It's not that hard to build characters that can easily hit the damage cap every turn. Just don't expect to be able to piece them together just from what the game tells you. There's a fair amount of hidden stats that aren't explained that well, and have only been revealed after the fact from a lot of experimentation by dedicated fans. Expect to be reading some guides online if you want to make the most of the combat system.

Looking back at the graphics, I'd say it's hit and miss in terms of what holds up and what doesn't. All characters are hand-drawn 2D sprites, set on a fully 3D environment. No pre-rendered backgrounds here. I think the aesthetic looks great. Animations, especially in combat, are fluid and entertaining. It can be great fun to spin the camera around and look at the details of the of the environments from every angle. However, the 3D animation, especially in cutscenes and gear combat, can be jarringly blocky. It's very much up to or even above the standards for JRPGs of the PS1 era, but for those going back to play now, the transition can be a shock. As I said before, things definitely look much better when played on a PSP, which does a lot to smooth out some of the rough edges. In any case, the graphics, even when they're not at their best, are perfectly serviceable and aren't anything you can't get used to.

As for exploration, Xenogears uses the tried and true overworld exploration format familiar to just about anyone who's played classic JRPGs. The environments have a fairly varied feel, and to fans who have played Monolith Soft's later Xeno titles, it can be great fun to see the same aesthetics at play here, with a variety of bustling renaissance themed cities, futuristic facilities, and of course the mandatory "ruins of ancient civilizations with still functioning hyper-advanced technologies." If you've played a Xeno game before, you probably know what you're in for. It can be great fun to see the roots of the aesthetic so commonly used in these games (Boy, Takahashi sure does love round rooms and randomly placed circular elevators, doesn't he?) All environments are fully 3D, and feature a rotating camera, which, when used often, can reveal hidden pathways and treasure chests. My one complaint is that the camera has a fixed height, with no way to raise or lower it. After playing the later Xenoblade Chroniclesgames, I found Xenogears camera to be often annoyingly zoomed in, to the point where it sometimes felt claustrophobic, as I couldn't zoom it out to see what was around me.

As the game progresses, however, some environments get pretty tedious. There's a lot of areas with long, branching, identically designed passageways, and it's easy to get disoriented and lost. Meanwhile, a high rate of random encounters can make these areas seem even longer and more tedious than they actually are. As a classic JRPG, there's no option to quicksave and take a break either. You're stuck in the game until you can find a save point. If you're like me and get frustrated easily in situations like this, there's no shame in looking up a walkthrough to get you through these areas. Just make sure to find one that's spoiler-free.

When it comes to story, well, I've said this before, but everything that you may have heard about Xenogears plot, both good and bad, is true. It is both impressively massive and annoyingly broad in scope. It goes in great detail over certain things, while leaving other elements unexplained. There's even a published book, called Perfect Worksthat provides a ton of detail into the background of the story and characters to make up for what was left out of the game. As this is primarily a review of the game itself, I'm not going to go into the now well-known story of the troubled development cycle of this game, but suffice it to say that the development team ran out of time and money, and the second half of the story takes place as massive text dumps, interspersed with the player getting dropped into occasional dungeons and boss fights, with only one final chance to explore the world and finish character builds before facing the final dungeon and boss. Personally, I didn't mind this approach, but it's something new players should be aware of going in. Be prepared to take in large amounts of information that can drastically change how you viewed certain characters or the world of the game, only to have more information revealed shortly after that will change things yet again. It's a lot to process.

I think one of the biggest strengths of the game, that gets somewhat overshadowed by the story everyone loves to talk about, is the music. Xenogears has a variety of memorable scores, ranging from triumphant sweeping orchestral themes to moody, ambient tones that feel like part of the environment you're exploring. As I mentioned earlier in the review, I first played Xenogears a long time ago, probably 15 years ago at this point. I remembered some overall story themes, who the characters were, and some basic plot revelations, but overall I remembered almost nothing about the story. When it came to the music, however, I had the songs running through my head before I even entered areas I hadn't yet been to in my playthrough. Every track was still in my mind as if my last playthrough was only last week and not over a decade ago. This is probably one of the strongest game soundtracks I've had the pleasure of experiencing, and it's up there with the likes of Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy IX, and Xenoblade Chronicles. This is of course my personal opinion, but I think the strength of a game's soundtrack is more than just the songs themselves, but how well they fit the world that they're set to. Xenogears definitely delivers here.

So, is Xenogears worth revisiting? Well, there's more than one answer to that question. If you're already used to classic PS1 and SNES-era JRPGs, then I'd say yes! If you haven't played this one yet, you're missing out on a standout example from that time period. However, I know a lot of people are now interested in trying out this game after being introduced to modern entries in the series like Xenoblade Chronicles 2 and don't necessarily have a lot of experience with these older games. If this describes you, it's worth knowing that this game is a big time commitment, probably between 70 and 80 hours, and it will not be as accessible as the modern entries. With no quicksaves, constant random battles, etc, this can be a hard transition to make. This game is definitely not for everyone, and if you try it out and feel early on that it's too frustrating for you, please don't feel ashamed if you want to look through a walk-through or two, or even just read/watch let's plays if you 're mainly just interested in the story. Games are supposed to be fun. If you're not enjoying this one, it doesn't make you a bad Xeno fan. Don't force yourself.

Well, I hope this review was helpful and at least a little informative. I'm always looking for feedback and comments, so please feel free to leave a comment. I looooove discussing game design and story, and this game has a lot in it to discuss. Please be careful to tag spoilers, as I did my best to keep this review spoiler free for new players. I'm currently working on a review of Xenoblade Chronicles 2, and I'm about to replay and review the first Xenoblade Chronicles, so I hope you'll give them a read when they're ready!

Last Minute Tips for Legendary Raids

Over the last year I've been playing a looot of Pokemon Go. I've seen rebalances, legacy movesets, events, and now, most exciting of all, Legendary Raids.

I think raids are probably the most exciting addition to the game so far. I often find myself joining nearby raids just to lend a hand and maybe get some TMs or rare candy. I think it's really brought the community together, and it's been fun to meet new players.

However, I know some people haven't had the best luck in raids for the current legendary in the rotation, Articuno. Be it plain old RNG or just not being able to make many raids, some players are getting a little worried that they may not get one before time is up.

In light of this, I've put together a quick guide for those of you who may be having some trouble with raids or just want to make the most of the last day of Articuno. Hopefully this'll give you guys a bit of an extra edge in ensuring you can finish those raids that have a small number of people, and maybe help you get a damage bonus for a couple extra balls too. Let's begin:

 Don't use the autoselect!

When you first enter the raid lobby, 6 Pokemon will have been selected for you. Convenient, right? Actually, it's about the most frustrating aspect of raiding (From a game mechanics perspective anyway). Long story short, PoGo picks your lineup based on which Pokemon will have the best endurance in the raid, which would be great, IF you didn't have a time limit. Going into battle with Chansey or Blissey in your lineup puts the whole raid at risk of running out of time before you get your target's HP down to 0. Plan in advance which Pokemon you're going to use before you enter the lobby so you're not stuck rushing to figure it out. I'd recommend changing the name so they're easy to find in a search too. I'd do at least 12 so you have backups if your first group faints.

Speaking of which pokemon to use...

Learn Your Counters!

By now, most people have a good idea of type effectiveness, but some Pokemon, and some Pokemon moves, are more effective than others. Studying this list is a great way to get started. However, if you don't have the right mons or moves, just remember, there are other Pokemon that will work in a pinch, just check the moves to make sure they have ones that counter the type of the Pokemon you're after. In Articuno's case, most Fire or Electric will work in a pinch. You can use Magmar, Electabuzz, even Rapidash or Raichu. Just make sure they have the right type moves.

If it's other Legendaries you're after or even lower level raids, the same idea still applies. Take some time to look in your Pokemon storage to find some mons with the right type of moves in advance to fill out your lineup going into the raid.

Now that you have your counters set up, it's time to talk about...

Getting the Damage Bonus.

I'm sure you've noticed that you can get bonus Premiere Balls depending on how you and your team perform during the raid. Having a few extra balls can really increase your chance of catching that Legendary, so it's important to try to get those bonus chances, not to mention better rewards like TMs and Rare Candies.

Something you should know about the way damage is calculated: If your team faints and you have to re-enter the battle with a new team, your bonus damage is reset to 0. What's this mean? Well, this means an experienced player can go in with six of the best pokemon, fight almost all the way to the end, and if he or she ends up fainting out and needs to re-enter, they'll get almost no bonus at all! What to do? Well if you're in a big group (12 or more), you can put your tankiest Pokemon in the last slot to help you hold out until the end. However, if you have a smaller group, you run the risk of not completing the raid at all! Instead, assume you're going to faint out, pick your 6 weakest counters to run in the first time, and then pick your six toughest after they faint. This will help make sure that you get credit for as much damage as possible while still contributing enough damage to complete the raid before the time limit is up.

Hopefully this extra info will help you catch that legendary Pokemon. Good luck out there!

Game Boy RPG Series: Final Fantasy Legend II

I play a lot of handheld games, and I love RPGs. I've made it my mission to play and review every RPG released in the USA for the Game Boy and Game Boy Color consoles. My goal is to be able to experience these games and enlighten my fellow handheld collectors on their strengths and weaknesses. These games will be played in the order I find and acquire them. If you have any suggestions for games I should be on the lookout for, let me know.

 

Final Fantasy Legend II

What's about to follow is a review for a game that took me 5 months to complete. A short time playing in my spare time at work to complete about 99% of the game, and the remaining four months of ignoring the game when I got stuck in the infamous final dungeon. So if you've read any of my previous reviews and you're wondering where I've been? There's your answer. Sitting with my arms crossed and feeling too guilty about not finishing it to start up a different Game Boy game instead. (That's not totally true I've also moved to an awesome new apartment). Now that I've successfully completed the story, I can finally move on.

Final Fantasy Legend II carries a lot over from the first game. Your 4-character party must travel upwards through a vertically stacked universe, visiting various worlds as they climb the central tower towards their final goal. The graphics, while a bit more polished, still have the same aesthetic and art style. The battle system is also very much the same, with each character in your party equipping weapons with a limited number of uses that calculate damage based on the characters Strength, Agility, or Mana stats.

Each character class has unique ways of gaining stats as they progress through the game. The delightfully morbid Monster system, where your monster characters transform by devouring the flesh of their fallen foes, is carried over from the first game, with more depth and stronger monsters to potentially create. Unfortunately, the ability to eat humanoid enemies has been removed for some reason :( Mutants and Humans have a potential to gain stats at the end of battles, and Mutants can gain spells to cast as well. One neat addition is the Robot class, which can carry up to 8 pieces of equipment with no limit on type. Robots get crazy potential combinations like a jacked up strength stat from equipping 8 swords at once. It's fun to play around with and something I haven't really seen in modern RPGs.

One issue I have is the complete lack of information on the different weapons. For example, if I have a character with high agility stat, I would naturally want to equip a weapon that deals agility-based damage. Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be any way to know a weapon's damage base without a guide. This didn't affect me too much personally, as I have no issue at all using guides to help me through a game, but I do think it is a design flaw. Those of you who prefer unassisted playthroughs should be aware, it's not going to be impossible to get through the game, but you're going to have to spend time with different weapons to figure out how they work, especially in the late game when you start needing every advantage you can get.

Speaking of brutal final dungeon, the sudden and punishing spike in difficulty towards the end of the game needs to be mentioned. You're really going to need to understand the mechanics of the game if you want to make it without getting wiped out consistently. I ended up with a party without enough agility to escape from battles, and it was an ordeal to make it to the end. But make it through I did, and having completed the game, I'm glad I did.

Now that I have completed both FFL2 and it's previous installment, I think Squaresoft really knew what they were doing when it came to releasing RPGs on the Game Boy, at least when it comes to this franchise. The FFL series has all the features you'd want in a portable title- the ability to save anywhere so that you can play for short intervals, simple and easily differentiated sprites and backgrounds, music that works well using the tones available on a Game Boy Speaker and sound chip, dungeons that are just the right size. It all adds up to a game that feels complete. It's surprising that games coming out years later still lacked these basic design elements that made deep games like RPGs playable on a handheld.

Actually, speaking of dungeons, I want to take a minute to spread appreciation for just how nicely the dungeon maps were designed. Take a look here. Maybe it's just me, but I love how each map segment fits neatly into the next, and even creates coherent shapes that can't necessarily be seen while you're playing, almost like wandering in a corn maze that forms a picture in an aerial photograph (I don't know how many of you have been to a corn maze :P). Anyway, sorry, enough nerding out, I just think it's a cool bit of extra info that a lot of developers don't bother with.

If you like old-school JRPGs, or you're just curious about the roots of gaming (The Final Fantasy Legend series was a big inspiration for Pokemon) you're definitely going to like FFL2. It's got plenty of charm, a neat aesthetic, an interesting setting, and a combat system that is ripe for a bit of tinkering. Just don't be afraid to do a bit of reading on the mechanics and the way items and weapons work. It will reduce a lot of stress down the line. FFL2 is a fantastic example of how to make a handheld game that plays to the strengths of the medium.

Game Boy RPG Series: Ultima: Runes of Virtue

I play a lot of handheld games, and I love RPGs. I've made it my mission to play and review every RPG released in the USA for the Game Boy and Game Boy Color consoles. My goal is to be able to experience these games and enlighten my fellow handheld collectors on their strengths and weaknesses. These games will be played in the order I find and acquire them. If you have any suggestions for games I should be on the lookout for, let me know.

Ultima: Runes of Virtue

It's time for another review of a Game Boy classic. Fans of Ultima take note; Runes of Virtue was developed by a Japanese studio looking to make a completely different game as a spinoff of the main series. While Ultima: Runes of Virtue (Or URV, as it will be referred to from here on out) is an adventure puzzle game that more closely resembles the original Legend of Zelda than it does it's RPG counterparts on the PC, URV has made it onto multiple lists of Game Boy RPGs online, and thus it and it's sequel are going to be featured on the Game Boy RPG Series. 

URV begins by giving you a choice between four heroes, Mariah, Iolo, Dupre, and Shamino. Each character has their own unique combination of strength, intelligence, and dexterity - along with a different starting weapon. Once your character has been chosen, Lord British fills you in on the story- The Black Knight has stolen the eight Runes of Virtue and it's up to you to travel Britannia and get them back.

The gameplay of URV is where the Legend of Zelda influence becomes very clear. Leave the castle, find a dungeon, move from room to room solving puzzles until you reach the rune at the end, which grants upgrades to your stats. Rinse and repeat. As you go you'll find weapons and armor, along with items that allow you to move to areas you couldn't access before. The world is also dotted with occasional NPCs who leave cryptic hints to help you along. Sound familiar? Of course, the games aren't identical. One of the big differences between the two is movement. URV uses a tile-based movement system where your character moves from space to space like a lot of more traditional RPGs. I think for this game it was the right choice. With the sheer amount of puzzles to work with and enemies to fight, it helps to know exactly how far your character will travel with each press of the d-pad. 

The standout feature of URV is it's punishing difficulty. This game is mindtwistingly, headsmashingly, Game-Boy-thrown-across-the-room-and-putting-a-hole-in-the-wallingly challenging. Most games of this type focus heavily on the trial-and-error aspect. Once you figure out how to get through a room, you can get through it pretty easily the next time if you have to backtrack. Not this game. No sir. On top of the headscratching puzzles are hordes of powerful enemies that will end you in a heartbeat. While the early part of the game wasn't too bad, the last few dungeons were nothing short of an ordeal to get through.

But enough about the difficulty and how it almost put me off playing games for the whole summer. Let's talk about graphics. For a puzzle-based game, URV's graphics do the job. They're simple and clear enough that objects can be easily distinguished. While they're nothing to write home about, they're about on par with other Game Boy titles released in 1991. The music and sound effects are also passable. Nothing too memorable, although the dungeon theme is still repeating itself in my head as I type this.

When reviewing a Game Boy game, it's important to take note of how well the developers built the game around the medium of portable gaming, and in this area URV has one feature that I wish more games had implemented: auto saving. Every time your character travels to another room or area, the cartridge saves your progress. There are no save points or menu saving. For a portable game this is a huge convenience. I never to think about how much time I'd be able to spend playing. I could play for two minutes or twenty and be confident that I wouldn't lose any progress. Curiously, the developers decided that dying in URV would restart the character at the beginning of the dungeon rather than at the beginning of the room they were in, leading to a strong incentive to just turn the game off every time the game over screen popped up. I think this was the wrong choice. With the sheer difficulty this game presents, starting over every time I died was just too daunting for me. I think that starting from the beginning of the room would have been an appropriate choice.

So... is URV a good game? Well, yes, maybe. Despite the poor review scores from it's 1991 release, I was impressed by the sheer amount of creative puzzles packed into the game. While it becomes extremely difficult, it never felt repetitive. However, it requires a lot of patience and determination to complete a full playthrough. This is not a game I'll likely be replaying, but if your main complaint about Legend of Zelda was that it was too easy, this might be the game for you.