Trine HD Collection Review

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It’s time to look at the Trine HD Collection. Unlike most collections this game actually brought 4 whole titles in it which was pretty cool. I wasn’t too familiar with the games before although I did know the name. Now that I’ve played all four of the games it’s like I’ve gone from novice to expert in one shot. The games are pretty fun side scrollers and I can see why the series got so many games. They’re fun and will test your problem solving skills while giving you a fun little plot. Lets look at this one game by game.

The first Trine introduces us to the 3 main character. You’ve got a third, a warrior, and a mage. The Trine brings these three together and gives them immortality. The catch is that they must stick together now. None of the characters are thrilled about this so they all set out to find a cure. There isn’t a whole lot of plot in the first title. The gameplay is also the toughest out of all 4 of the games with not too many advanced features being added yet. Each of the three characters have their own unique talents and you can switch at any time. The brawler is a good fighter and he can slice ropes or beat up enemies. The mage can create squares out of thin air and levitate objects. The thief can swing across pitfalls and connect objects together with rope. You’ll have to learn how to master each character to deal with the puzzles.

Some of the puzzles here can be quite difficult. The levels are all pretty straight forward as you go from start to finish so the puzzles aren’t about figuring out where to go. They’re about figuring out how to get to your destination. For example you may see an extra large hole and you need to get across it. You may try swinging across with the third of creating a path there. Most of these puzzles have more than one way to get across which is fun. I would always try to cheese it with the mage by creating something and jumping across as it falls away. I feel like a lot of the time this wasn’t the intended route, but as long as it worked that was good enough for me.

You’ve also got upgrades here. You can re-distribute the upgrades at any time which was handy. Typically I would give them to the mage because his let you create up to 2 extra objects which further helps with the puzzles. A fully powered mage on your team is really all that you need in order to clear most level. The gameplay was really quite sound. Some parts could be rather difficult, but never too crazy. This is easily the toughest game in the collection so it really starts you off on a hard note.

Then you’ve got the second game. The heroes are called back into action as a kingdom is being overrun by darkness. The princess may not be what she seems and there are goblins everywhere. The heroes will have to stick together and use their abilities as a team once more. From all 4 of the games the stretch between 1 and 2 is the only one where the gameplay doesn’t change all that much. It’s pretty similar to the first one but the game is a bit easier. The controls have been ironed out further and you won’t be cheesing quite as effectively with the mage but there is less of a need to. You’ll be able to blast through this game pretty well.

With the third game things get changed up quite a bit. For starters the game is in 3D now. It’s a 3D brawler with quite a lot of fighting involved. As a result this is definitely the easiest game of the lot. It also felt like the shortest, but I suppose they’re all close. The goal is to get to the end of the level as always, but this time you will want to make sure that you stop and grab as many of the collectibles as possible. You’ll need a great chunk of them to be able to unlock the final level. I’m never a big fan of games forcing you to grab all these things. I like being able to just blast through a level and I’ll pick up the pieces for the Platinum trophy later on if I feel like it. Fortunately the collectibles are pretty easy to grab and they aren’t super out of the way. As long as you know to grab them right away then you should be good.

The plot here is the most ambitious. Someone has stolen the Trine and we have to get it back. We’ve got a character who may be related to the thief and people running around with dark energy. The story opens up a lot of questions, but unfortunately it ends rather abruptly. It seems to me like it was cancelled early on or funding ran out and they just had to release the game. It’s too bad that the fourth game didn’t continue the plot either. At this point it’s just not likely to ever get resolved. I don’t believe the 3D part was a big hit with fans either which was also too bad. 3D is just so much fun for any game. It takes the experience to the next level if you ask me. It’s hard to say that this is absolutely the best game in the series but it was a lot of fun. You’ll miss the puzzle aspect but you’ll love the combat.

Then we’ve got the final game. This one is a return to form as it plays like the first two. The gameplay has been further streamlined though and some of the abilities you initially started out with in the first two games have to be unlocked gradually as you go through the story here. The puzzles are back and there is a much larger variety of them than the last few times so you’ll have to be extra careful. There actually were some pretty tricky puzzles here so you can’t sleep on them. Approach the puzzles carefully and then you should be okay. One change that was probably inspired by the third game is there are now beat em up sections where you have to beat all of the enemies to proceed. You can expect them in each level so I wonder how the people who aren’t crazy about combat felt here. I always like a good battle though so I was definitely fine with this.

In this game we learn that a prince’s powers are going out of control. He’s able to turn dreams into a reality and unfortunately one of his nightmares created a shadow version of himself. The heroes need to get his powers under control or the whole kingdom is doomed. Alas, they aren’t strong enough to beat an unlimited imagination so they will need to go and find an item that can aid them in this quest. The heroes are pretty well experienced by this point so they are definitely ready for this challenge.

It’s really tough to rank these games, but I think this is the best time to do it. So ultimately I’d rank the games as 3>4>1>2. 3 wins the tiebreaker because I really enjoyed the hub world and the 3D gameplay was just really good. I like to see a clear progression as well an the checkpoints/easy level access was great. Game 4 is the most polished of the 2D titles and 1 beats 2 because I did really like how the puzzles were constructed.

As for the soundtrack/graphics, those areas are a little less impressive. I remember the main menu themes really well, but not much else. The games are going for a very old look so it’s intentional that this game doesn’t pop out the way that something like River City Girls does. I think the 3rd game looked the most impressive to me though. I think that’s because the game could show off more of the backgrounds this way. It all just looked so fresh and new.

If the game has any weaknesses it is that the characters aren’t very interesting. The same can be said for the plots of the first two as they didn’t really pick up until the third game. Even though Zoya is a thief and you can sort of tell what they’re going for with her character, she doesn’t get a lot to do. You don’t really buy into the mystique around her. Pontius is your classic strong but not very smart guy. He also doesn’t look too impressive most of the time. Being able to fight is great of course, but you need more than that to be a really likable character. Finally you have Amadeus who is always having a lot of trouble with his magic. He can’t perform the fireball which is still his lifelong dream. Hopefully some day he will be able to do it. In the meantime he does his best to help out, but is fairly timid.

It goes without saying that there is a lot of replay value in a collection like this. Lets say you beat the 4 games in about 20 hours then you can probably double that for the platinums. The Platinum trophy requirements actually aren’t that crazy here but they will still take some time. You’ll have to really master each level and if you’re going to get them all I’d recommend starting with the 3rd game. That way you can then focus on enhancing your 2D platforming skills for the other 3 games. You’ll be in good shape at that point.

Overall, The Trine HD Collection is definitely a title you will want to have. Being able to attain 4 games for the price of one is really a steal. It’s also pretty cool that you can get the entire series in one shot. While the games aren’t particularly long on their own, they end up being a pretty good length when you combine them. You won’t just be beating this one in the blink of an eye. If you aim to get all of the trophies then you can extend the time even further. It’ll be cool if we ever get a 5th game. If we do then I want them to finish up the story from game 3. The cliffhanger there was too good to just let go. The game easily had the best plot.

Overall 8/10

Ski Party Review

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I’ve seen most of the old beach party films from this crew so I may as well see their skiing version as well right? It’s certainly not much better than the rest and makes all of the same mistakes. The characters may not be at the beach but they certainly dress as if they are. I would make the case that there is a little less fanservice here than in the beach versions, but I’m not invested enough into the series to do so. You certainly wouldn’t catch me defending this film. Well, let’s take a look at what we got.

The film starts off with Todd and Craig being down in the dumps because they are still single. They joined a bunch of sport programs but it was no use. Then they notice that Freddie is the star of the party and everyone is only interested in him. Perhaps the trick is that he is always skiing. The two leads quickly decide to go to the next big skiing event and are determined that this will put them on the radar. Will such a shallow plan really work or will the film test our intelligence by continuing to make the plans crazier and crazier?

There are a lot of issues here so it’s always hard to know where to start. I guess we should tackle the romance first. Romance was always a hard genre for films to really pin down and that can be especially true for this one. Part of the reason why the film kicks off is because both of the girls don’t seem to love the two guys straight away. They did go with them on two dates though so this is more about the main characters not being very patient. They want to immediately go further in the relationship while the girls are waiting. The guys are Freddie all the time and that really warps their expectations. You also can’t feel any sympathy for them because they would cheat on the two girls in a heartbeat. We have many scenes where they try to go after other girls so there is absolutely no loyalty here. They’ll simply go after the first one who accepts them.

They also use rather underhanded methods in order to complete their mission. One such tactic is to dress up as a girl and sneak into the dorms. This is a pretty bad move for many reasons. It’s also one of the largest gags in the film and it gets old very quickly. Naturally Freddie falls for one of them in this form and nobody can put the pieces together. I think if you cut away this whole sub plot the film will still be pretty terrible but it would certainly have improve. This plot line just didn’t do anything to really help the film rise up. It drags on and on.

It goes without saying that there is a lot of fanservice here even though they are in the snow. Characters just don’t care about the storm at all. They’re dressed for the beach and they aim to keep it that way for most of the film. We get a lot of zoom ins and crazy dances reminding yo that the plot was not the movie’s first priority. At least the singing isn’t too bad, the series has certainly had worse songs at any rate. Then you’ve got the beach scene at the end just to mess with the audience even further.

There are moments in the film that can be reasonably funny. It’s not like the whole duration is one failed joke after the other. While a good chunk of the jokes don’t work, the surreal nature of the movie helps at times. The scene of the main character floating like a balloon was fun. Additionally I liked the Polar Bear scenes. It’s a pretty nice gag to have that guy running around. The problem is that the movie beats this joke into the ground by having the same joke show up around 5-6 times. You never want to spam a joke that often because it will inevitably get quite old. It’s going for the running gag approach but that works better in a series. If you cram it into a single movie then you are bound to have some issues.

There aren’t any characters to root for here either so you won’t be as invested in the film as you could be. The two main guys are chronic cheaters. The two heroines are too passive and ultimately try to say that the guys were right even though that is definitely not the case. Freddie starts out as a pretty intense guy but by the end he is total comic relief to make the other characters look better. The movie definitely could and should have had more restraint. Maybe make it so the heroes get a win but Freddie still keeps his dignity. The parental figure here literally goes insane by the end of the film and I couldn’t give him any consolation points either. It was rather mean of the main guys to mess with him the whole time, but it’s also partially his fault for falling for their gags. They absolutely should not have worked on him. I prefer the guardians who at least talk tough the whole time. This guy was a punching bag so you’ll sooner feel bad for him than find the scene overly funny.

Overall, Ski Party is definitely everything you expect it to be. The film is pretty straight forward on delivering everything it is advertised to be. If this is your kind of film then you’ll enjoy it. However if you want a film with good writing and an actual plot then I’d recommend staying far away from this movie. It will have nothing to offer you. At least the gang sub plot isn’t around to get dragged out forever. The car chase at the end is actually a little better without those guys around to slow the pacing.

Overall 1/10

NBA 08 Review

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It’s time to look at another NBA game. I bet you thought I had finished them all by now right? Well, I did temporarily get into some other sports like Hockey, but there were still more Basketball titles in the backburner. I believe I just have one left now so that’ll definitely be a good milestone to finish up. I actually only have 11 more sport games to go through and then I’ll be caught up. It’ll be sad to see them go but at the same time it feels like ages since I’ve had them around. Now when I get future sport games I’ll be able to dive in a little deeper.

There’s not much separating this NBA game from the previous ones. One thing that actually still confuses me is what the difference is between NBA 08 and NBA 08 Live. See, I played the latter before playing this one, but they both feel the same to me. One part of me thinks it’s like a game of the year edition, but another just thinks it’s a really slick decision of adding one extra feature to one version and calling it a day. Regardless I ended up getting both since back then I had lost track of which sport games I owned and ended up getting this version. Otherwise I’d be satisfied with just owning one.

The gameplay is pretty smooth and it hasn’t been super long since my last Basketball game so this time the fundamentals actually stayed with me. That was definitely a welcome surprise to be sure. I ended up playing the first 3 quarters of the first game and had a 6 point lead. Now you may wonder why just 3 quarters right? Well, the game froze on me in a rather odd glitch. I had just made a free throw, but then the ball fell to the ground and nobody went to pick it up. Everyone just stayed frozen and I did everything I could like calling a time out, substituting players, and switching sides, but nothing worked. Everyone was just completely glued to the ground and that was really curtains for me. It was too bad because I was looking forward to seeing my win and the nice presentation afterwards.

Ah well, I quickly went in and did half of a second game so I could at least feel like I did the whole thing. This time I had a much bigger lead at around 10 points. Part of why this happened is because the guy kept passing it to me and I would score. What I did was I positioned my guy right next to the basket. When I’d score the other team would try to pass the ball to their guy, but I’d intercept and score again. Honestly this seemed like a big weakness to the A.I. but it was hard to get it to work just right. Once it did work though, then it became consistent. I have to admit that it felt pretty satisfying.

The only part of the gameplay that seemed a little suspect were the 3 point shots. For some reason the players would never take a proper position with these. They would jump in the air and shoot as if off balance. All of the other NBA games I’ve played had proper 3 point shots so I don’t know what was up with this one. Perhaps there is an extra button or two that you have to press or it’s about the timing. I still landed a few shots so it’s not that bad, but it just looked rather off. I recommend going for slam dunks as much as possible anyway although the team definitely won’t make it easy on you. You’ll have to fight hard for each and every point.

As far as the graphics are concerned NBA 08 definitely isn’t holding back. The courts look really good and the animations for the throws are solid. Everything is very clear and no shortcuts appeared to have been taken in this arena. I can’t really speak to the soundtrack, but the sound effects were solid. You don’t really notice much while you’re playing with the music, but I believe the menus should have had some tunes going. Surprisingly the sport games do tend to pick up quite a few big songs to play in the background.

There is no end to the replay value as you may expect. While the online modes have long since been forgotten you can still test your skills in the various season and franchise modes. There are also in-game achievements to have fun with as well. They may not be quite as much fun as the PS3 trophies but it is a nice addition for those who still like to have some kind of incentives to playing. You can get this game for about a dollar so you don’t have to doubt the value at all. This will really work out quite nicely for you.

Overall, NBA 08 is really solid. I can’t say that there was really anything wrong with the game. It may look a little dated next to the newer games, but that also brings a certain level of nostalgia to it as well. It ended up making this a very balanced experience. I was also winning in both games which made the whole thing feel pretty balanced as well. The controls weren’t sliding away from me and I felt like the players were doing what I wanted them to do. It doesn’t get much better than that and if you’re looking for a cheap basketball game to test your fundamentals with…this is the game for you!

Overall 8/10

My Little Pony: The Crystalling Review

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It’s time to take a look at a comic adaption of the Crystalling two parter from the TV show. This is one of those comics that is basically a screenshot version of the show. It was always an interesting concept even if I don’t totally see the point of it. I suppose it’s a good way for fans who are unable to actually watch it live to still experience what the episodes are like. As a result it’s almost like I’m reviewing the two episodes. It’s a solid comic and if you did have to read this instead of watching the episodes you won’t be missing much. The key scenes are all here.

So Twilight is getting ready to head to Cadence’s palace for the Crystalling of the new baby. It’s effectively a ceremony using the heart of the kingdom. She also needs to give her student Starlight Glimmer a first lesson and figures that she can knock out two things at once. She instructs Starlight to seek out Sunburst as they used to be best friends before Starlight turned evil. Starlight isn’t thrilled with this mission, but she doesn’t want to let Twilight down. As such, she gears up for the meeting. Will she really be able to re-connect with Sunburst and will the Crystalling go as expected?

There are really two plots here which eventually merge into one. For the Starlight plot, you can definitely see how this is a hard mission. It’s hard to reconnect with someone you haven’t seen in many years. Twilight making this into a friendship lesson also puts a ton of pressure on Starlight. I think Twilight’s heart was in the right place, but I don’t think this was a great thing to turn into a lesson. Starlight did a really good job of adapting either way though. She went and met up with Sunburst even though it was hard on her and from there she went and helped save the kingdom.

It’s easy to see why Starlight would go on to basically become the leader of the group. She’s definitely the strongest pony around and she took to the friendship skills pretty quick. I was definitely a big fan right away. Meanwhile I was less impressed with Sunburst. I dunno, I never really liked the guy much. On his side he had far less reason to be cryptic about his past which inevitably leads to him blowing a fuse and not even trying to help save the world. It was a lot of pressure but it still would have been nice to see him stick up for the others and try to help even if it meant pretending to be a magician for a little longer.

The other plot had Cadence and Shining Armor being out of their depth once more as Flurry Heart took center stage. It’s always nice to be born with incredible powers and that’s exactly what happened for Flurry. This time Pinkie Pie did a good job of distracting her while the others went to work. Twilight may not have been able to solve this by herself this time, but she was definitely necessary in saving the world. Without her the heroes wouldn’t have even had a book to start solving with in the first place. We also got to see Celestia and Luna fight off the clouds a bit. Not the most exciting action scene, but it’s still an action scene nonetheless.

The writing is sound here and the cast of characters are good. There’s not a whole lot more to say because the comic is so short. You’ll be done reading it in the blink of an eye and then you’ll be ready for the next saga. In retrospect it is a little surprising that no villains were present in this story, but I suppose you can always get a little tension in with natural disasters rather than relying on a villain to get things moving every time. At the very least it makes sense why you would want to mix things up every once in a while. I would have been game for a quick Twilight vs Starlight battle due to a misunderstanding or something though.

Overall, The Crystalling is a fun two part event. There aren’t any villains here, but it’s just a fun story where we get to see the whole gang of MLP fighters. All of the ponies contribute to the plot and make for a fun team up issue. The Mane 6 certainly have less of a role next to Twilight and Starlight, but they still get their contributions. The format of the comic makes it easy to take on the go and read. It’s also a decent enough size where it’ll last you a good batch to read through. I don’t expect I’ll be getting more of the episode adaptions (I got this one by mistake) but they are good. They’re as good as the episode versions and most of those get a 7 as well. It is always nicer to read a brand new story, but nostalgia goes a long way. It’s been ages since I saw this episode.

Overall 7/10

Teen Titans Go! vs Teen Titans Review

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It’s time to look at the most recent Teen Titans Go! movie. This one brings back the classic Teen Titans for a quick crossover event. While the film doesn’t manage to be quite as fun as the first Titans Go movie it’s definitely still a quality film in its own right. You’ve got action, comedy, and a final boss. What else would you even need right? One thing to watch out for is the opening credits makes the interesting decision of spoiling the entire film. It literally goes section by section from start to finish and shows all of the big scenes. It’s a very odd choice.

The movie starts off by showing us that the Teen Titans have still got it as they beat the Gentleman Ghost. People may doubt their abilities, but they shouldn’t because these kids are the real deal. Things get a little hectic when a portal appears and they’re all kidnapped. It turns out that the Master of Games is kidnapping Teen Titans from various universes to make them fight. The Go Titans are eager to start the battle while the modern ones just want to find a way to save their world. It looks like both of them may have to team up, but can the two groups possibly learn to work with each other in time?

Going forward I’m going to call the original Titans the Gen 1 crew and the others will just be referred to normally since they are the main characters here. The Titans act about as well as you’d expect them to. They’re still treated like comic relief because even they acknowledge that they aren’t serious the way that the Gen 1 guys are. They can’t help but constantly be at the center of the gags. The only one who tries to be serious is Robin and even then he is constantly overshadowed by his Gen 1 version. I’ll give him points for effort though and he’s the only Titan who really understands the gravity of the situation. He needs the portal device and he needed a win to secure the team’s confidence. It’s just a shame that he isn’t able to fight quite as well as the others. The other Titans are all on point except for the fact that Starfire was not taking this seriously enough. None of them were all that serious, but at least they tried in the tournament. Starfire was too busy trying to make friends to do much of anything which was disappointing.

As for the Gen 1 crew, it was fun to see them again. Robin and Raven probably get the most to do here. Raven has a lot of experience with the demonic realm so she coaches the kid version on this. Meanwhile Robin is ready to lead the team and he definitely does not like the baby titans. He’s constantly belittling them and when they don’t listen to reason he is quick to put them down. Gen 1 Robin certainly enjoys being the leader and makes sure to stretch things out when possible. After all this is his chance to lead two different teams to victory so you can bet that he is going to milk this as much as he can. It’s just an opportunity that he cannot miss.

The movie moves pretty quickly through the different phases to the climax so it never drags on. I didn’t feel like any of the humor was all that bad either. I would consider this to be one of the stronger Teen Titans Go episodes if it was on TV. The return of Santa Claus was also a lot of fun. It’s always great to see him as an antagonist and he is one of their tougher opponents. Of course taking on a group this large would be difficult even for the greatest of villains.

Then we’ve got more crossover appeal towards the end of the film. If you managed not to see who was included already then I won’t spoil it for you. Needless to say it’s a pretty solid lineup. I would have liked to have seen them all a little more to be honest, but what we got was pretty neat. Imagine if the whole film was the tournament though and we got to see a lot of different verses duke it out. That would have been really cool and then this probably would have beaten the original film. The animation here does look pretty good, but more standard than the first movie. The colors are a little brighter and there is extra detail either way. There’s no super catchy theme like we got in the first film, but I guess it’s hard for Lightning to strike twice.

Where the film really shines is in how absurd the whole thing is. The Go characters are in full parody mode and they just don’t care what the Gen 1 group thinks. They’re here to have fun and nobody’s going to stop them. That straight forward goal really keeps the film going and it’s why you don’t even need the crossover aspect for this to be a success. The group can hold their own as is. If anything I’m just glad that the Gen 1 group weren’t too obnoxious in trying to question the Go characters at every turn. They quickly learned that the Go characters weren’t going to change and just rolled with it.

Overall, Teen Titans Go vs Teen Titans is a fun film. While it’s a versus title there isn’t a lot of action between the two teams. A good chunk of the action scene is just comedy, but to an extent that is to be expected with these guys. It’s probably the only vs title I would give a pass to because of that. Whether you’ll enjoy this film or not is completely dependent on whether or not you enjoy the Go series. If you like the TV show then you’ll like the film and if you don’t like the show then the movie won’t be for you. This basically feels like an extended few episodes and it’s really a movie for the fans. It brings all the best qualities of the show together.

Overall 7/10

River City Girls Review

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It’s time to look at a pretty recent beat em up game for the PS4. The game always did look pretty solid ever since the first promotions for the game came out. WayForward and Arc SYS working on the game also ensured that it was going to be a great title. It does not disappoint. The game may be rather short but I think you could reasonably expect that based on the arcade style. It’s definitely a really fun game that doesn’t cut any corners.

The plot involves Kunio and Riki getting kidnapped by someone. Their girlfriends Misako and Kyoko get a text letting them know what’s going on so they quickly break out of school and will stop at nothing to find the guys. They may have to tear down the entire city to find them, but that’s fine by them. Whatever it takes they aim to get to the bottom of this. You’ll get a lot of fun backdrops as a result. The heroes go through the school, a mall, a boat, a music show, and more. Each location brings new enemies to beat up.

The gameplay is a very classic beat em up. You won’t have a ton of different moves so it’s about making the most of the ones that you do have. I bought a few moves near the beginning of the game, but I didn’t get anything after that. I’m sure the extra moves after that can be handy, but at the same time some moves will hold you back so watch out. I’m not sure if this is intentional, but take the move where you can pick someone off the ground and hit people with him. This one’s more of a hindrance than a help because it’s the same button as your standard punch. A lot of times I would be getting ready to punch someone and suddenly I’d be picking someone up instead. It’s not exactly a welcome surprise in those cases. Likewise while the Dab looks cool, it does mean you have to be extra precise with your kick so you don’t use this attack instead. I suppose it adds to the strategy although it’d be nice if you could turn off some attacks. Perhaps it’s possible to do so in the dojo or something.

The gameplay is pretty straight forward so you should get the hang of it very quickly. You’ll also see loose weapons on the ground that you can use to slam people with. I feel like the damage is pretty much the same as just whacking someone so you’ll rarely ever want to use it. The best combo actually seemed to be your standard 3 punches into a kick routine. I used that to great effect against every enemy and boss. It certainly paid off. When you’re surrounded by multiple opponents I recommend a tactical retreat. They’ll just land way too many blows if you stick around. Your best bet is to get out of the way and then make your way back towards them. If you hit them all at the same time you eliminate the risk of a counter attack. Dash combos will be your friend.

Each of the bosses also have a set pattern so once you learn that you should be good to go. The bosses are stil pretty tricky though and I needed food items for some of the latter ones. Surprisingly the final boss is pretty easy so I didn’t need any for her. Just keep on hitting her and try to dodge the kick counter attacks. It’s really not that hard to do so and then you’ll have made it through the game.

The story is pretty short and you can beat the game in about 4 hours. Granted there is still a lot of bonus content to explore here. You can go and deal with some extra fights to help your next door neighbor out. Additionally you can break a bunch of statutes and buy all of the collectibles. The platinum seems pretty achieveable here so you’ll just need to invest some extra time in and it’ll be yours. One thing to note is that when you switch characters your levels don’t transfer over so if you’replaying by yourself then I recommend sticking to one character.

As far as the graphics are concerned this game is top notch. Not only are the in game models and backgrounds really great but the game even has fully animated cutscenes. The comic book ones are also really shark and work extra well for the emotional bits. This is an area where the game really excels and the fact that it has full voice acting is really fun. I always feel like that helps to enhance the game even further. Then you’ve got the dynamite soundtrack. There are a lot of great songs to be found here and the sound quality is top notch. The game was basically booming out of my TV in every scene to the point where I’d have to turn the volume down a few notches. The game is incredibly high energy and you can’t go wrong there.

Then you’ve got the writing which is a lot of fun. As you’ve probably guessed the story isn’t 100% serious. You can see how the game pokes fun at the premise quite a bit here and there with the main characters’ proof on why Kunio and Riki have been kidnapped getting slimmer and slimmer. This leads to an incredible plot twist as the game ends which I did not see coming. It really threw all of the classic tropes out the window and flipped everything you thought you knew about the game upside down. It’s just brilliant and the script is really solid throughout the game. With the exception of the next door neighbor all of the characters are pretty solid.

Misako is the tough character of the group who is always threatening to beat people up. She’s actually a bully which several characters comment on. Nobody wants to mess with her because she’ll definitely take you to the hospital. Misako is a fun character to follow even if she may not be a traditional hero. At the very least she is trying to help the guys out so her goals aren’t so bad. Kyoko is a lot nicer but also a little dense in comparison. Things tend to go over her head. She can fight as well as Misako but isn’t as aggressive. Naturally I liked Misako a lot more, but I chose Kyoko at the beginning of the game so I ended up being stuck. From the way the menus looked I assumed Kyoko was gonna be the tough one. Ah well, lessons were learned.

Throughout the game you meet a lot of supporting characters and villains that you have to take down in each chapter. They’re all fun and quirky. I could see a full manga or anime being based around this game and it would be a lot of fun. While you won’t feel bad for the bullies or the villains, you will probably have some sympathy for the school girls who believe they are friends with Misako and Kyoko. They’re really nice at times and help us in our quests, but get absolutely no gratitude. Again this is partially foreshadowing for the twist ending I’d say but you hope they end up finding new friends soon.

Overall, River City Girls is a great game. It is really short which is the only tag against it, but it’s just so high quality that you can overlook this. It reminds me of the average Platinum game which tends to be fairly short, but gives you a lot of quality in that experience. (They do a lot of long games too, but I’m thinking along the lines of Transformers Devastation or the TMNT game. Their franchise titles are usually short) Where else are you going to get such smooth animations and gameplay? The humor is on point here and this is the kind of game that you won’t be forgetting anytime soon. I’d definitely recommend getting it right away. Look at it this way, even if you don’t like it quite as much as I did, it’s not like it’s going to last all that long right?

Overall 8/10

Robin vs Nemo

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This is a tribute to Teen Titans Go! vs Teen Titans. Robin definitely looked pretty good here. He may not have won every fight, but he never lost his confidence and stood up to the bigger heroes time and time again. Nemo is used to standing up to bigger opponents as well, but he doesn’t have the combat skills needed to pull off a win. What Nemo needs is a bunch of gadgets, now that would put him back into the conversation. Robin wins.

John McClane vs Nemo

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This is a tribute to Die Hard 2. John McClane continues to foil terrorist plots left and right so he definitely earned another win. Nemo can swim really well which is always handy, but all it’s going to do in the end is buy time. Nemo can’t actually land any real hits here so his swimming abilities won’t really be a factor. The difference in power and size is too vast. John McClane wins.