Dragon’s Crown Mini-Review

February 7, 2014 By Keri Honea Leave a Comment

When I first bought Dragon’s Crown, I could not put the game down. I was on the path to beat it within a couple of weeks (which is amazing for me these days), but then I got to a troublesome boss fight. So what did I do? Naturally I pouted and put it down for a few months. After finishing Ys: Memories of Celceta, I forced myself to pick the damn thing back up and get through it. After maxing out my character and yelling my AI comrades for being so stupid, I finished the game (the main story, anyway) and felt extremely pleased that I put it in my top ten games of 2013.

The game is a simple, side-scrolling dungeon crawler that offers various methods of play depending on which character you choose. To no one’s surprise, I chose the Amazon so I could hack and bash my way through enemies. Hanging back with magic and hoping no one gets close enough to hit me is not my style, and the game even suggest only “expert” gamers attempt to crawl through with the magic users. Even the nimble elf requires strategy and precision as she will run out of ammo. A massive character with a massive axe is just what I needed.

If the game only offered the main story, I admit it would be incredibly boring and the level-grinding would be a far more tedious affair than usual. While you will crawl through the same dungeons repeatedly, the side quests at the guild add a refreshing layer to break up the repetitiveness. For example, one of the early side quests requires you to rob some orcs while they sleep. You won’t find this bunk on the main path, forcing you to try to unlock any doors that you most likely overlooked while tromping through the corridors. Another requires you to use a large shield to reflect back the dark magicians’ magic to open a sealed door.

My biggest complaint about the game is the horrifically dumb AI partners. They’re basically damage sponges, and you can’t count on them to stay out of harm’s way, even when the Narrator warns everyone to take cover. The developer most likely wanted everyone to play online together instead of relying on them, but I never could get an online game lined up with my few friends that had it. This is exactly why it took me so long to defeat that particular boss (and then I beat the final boss on the first try…go figure). I’m sure if I had brought my friends in, and they were leveled up enough, they would understand what taking cover means. Idiots.

Oh and I wish it was cross-buy. I loved playing it on my Vita, but I think it would be so pretty on my big TV too.

Comparing the The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker HD Strategy Guide

January 30, 2014 By Keri Honea 3 Comments

I wasn’t surprised that Prima Games was releasing a new book for the HD version of The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker. Why reprint the original book when you can modernize its look and sell it again? That’s pretty much what Nintendo did; might as well jump on the same bandwagon. But what did surprise me was the differences in size between the books, as seen on the image to the right. The original is on top, and the new strategy guide for the HD remake is on the bottom. It’s roughly a 200 page difference.

If everything stayed the same save for an update to the graphics, why in the world is the newer book so much bigger? And more importantly, why should anyone buy the newer book?

After sitting down with both books and comparing them side by side, I will be honest with you–the original book will get you through The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker just fine. However, The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker HD strategy guide is the better book all the way around.

Let’s look at some comparison photos between the two.

From the table of contents on the first page in both books, you can already see the difference in the layout and design.

The original book compacted the entire TOC into a sidebar, whereas the HD book blew it up entirely and broke down each individual section to further help you find what you’re looking for. Case in point, look at the sections for “Islands of the Great Sea” for both books.

The layout of The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker HD strategy guide is far less compact and has more detailed information in regards to, well, everything. One part I had a ton of trouble with when I played Wind Waker on the GameCube was in the first “real” dungeon on Dragon’s Roost Island. Link had to kill a Magtail that patrolled a rock in the middle of a lava pool. If Link didn’t do this, then he couldn’t throw the pots of water into the lava from the rock and progress. To say I had trouble taking care of the Magtail would be putting it lightly. Check out how much more detail the HD book provides on getting through this part.

The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker strategy guide - Magtail

The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker HD strategy guide - Magtail

This is just the walkthrough for one little enemy in the middle of a dungeon. Imagine how much more detailed all of the information is throughout?

Care to see a few more examples? Here’s a side-by-side comparison of the same mini-game and collectible information from Windfall Island in the Islands of the Great Sea appendix:

Notice how everything just looks so bunched up in the original guide? The HD guide has it more spread out with larger screenshots.

Here’s a side-by-side comparison with the Triforce Charts appendix:

I think you can see my point, as well as why the HD guide is so much thicker than the original. When you spread out all that info that was in 4-5 columns per page to 1-2 columns, the book is going to get long in a hurry. A thicker book may seem like it’s less efficient, but I think it’s easier and faster to find what you’re looking for when information is spaced out instead of crammed into one page.

So guess which book I’ll be using whenever I find time to get into Wind Waker? I never finished the game when it originally released, but I hope with this newer, more informative, and easier to navigate (hahaha! see what I did there?) tome, I’ll be less frustrated while playing. Maybe I’ll actually finish a console Zelda game!

On the flip side, the tear-out Sea chart is the one thing that isn’t bigger in the HD guide than the original. Holy cow.

You tell me which one you think is easier to use while navigating through the seas of Wind Waker.

Authors: Stephen Stratton and Garritt Rocha
Publisher: Prima Games
Editions Available: Paperback and Collector’s Edition
Acquired via Publisher

Ys: Memories of Celceta Mini-Review

January 24, 2014 By Keri Honea Leave a Comment

I finished Ys: Memories of Celceta this week, and I was sad about finishing it for two reasons: 1) I didn’t want it to end and 2) I have to find something else to play when I’m feeding the baby.

My first foray into the Ys universe was when I was given Ys Seven to review for Kombo. The game was a bit repetitive, but I loved its combat and skill system and really had a blast, even though I had to traverse through the same dungeon a few times (not as bad as Phantom Hourglass, but still, it was annoying). I missed hearing about Ys: Memories of Celceta until the day it released, and then I bought the Collector’s Edition, as you may recall. This has been by far the best Ys game I have played, and it hit my top 5 games of last year.

It’s an action RPG, but its skill system makes it more than a simple hack-and-slash. It also introduced a really fun crafting system for upgrading weapons and building accessories. It’s not as humorous as Ys Seven, but the overall freedom in gameplay makes up for the lack in dialogue.

In fact, this is the big reason why I loved it so much. Unlike so many JRPGs, this one gave you no direct purpose in the beginning. It starts with Adol losing his memory, so his friend Duren talks him into agreeing to map out the forest where he lost his memories and hope something jars them back in place. In other words, you’re told to do nothing but explore. It’s not until you explore that a story starts to unfold and you learn what Adol must do to save the world (because that’s always the end goal of JRPGs, right?).

I honestly can’t say enough good things about this game, and if you have a Vita and like action RPGs, check this one out. If you really need to hear more of my thoughts on this game, as I feel like I’ve talked about it a lot as of late, you can hear it on the EvilCast GOTY episode and the SpawnCast GOTY episode.

Super Mario 3D World Strategy Guide Review

January 23, 2014 By Chris Nitz 2 Comments

Oh Mario, why do you have to be so friggin entertaining? Yes, the new Super Mario 3D World is a must own game for anyone with a Wii U. It blends nostalgia with new technology and then turns up the fun to 11. With such a bright and fun game, it is nice to see Prima bringing their A-Game with their Super Mario 3D World strategy guide.

After a brief introduction on how the guide is laid out, the authors dive into how the game plays. Anyone that has ever played a Mario game can pretty well skim this section as the mechanics are like meeting up with an old friend for coffee and instinctively picking up your conversation right where you left off. I do recommend stopping by the character and Power-Up/Form section as they do give good detail on how each character plays and what new items, such as the cat suit, do. For those that want to bring friends into the mix, the multiplayer portion will help keep things from getting too crazy!

The bulk of the book goes to the walkthrough. Each stage begins with an overall map of the stage with stamps, stars, 1-ups, rings, and bosses clearly marked. There are even arrows showing how the stage connects and progresses. More exploded views are marked and gone into later on in the section. This made it very easy to see where I was missing a stamp or a star as I made my way to 100% completion.

When can I have turn-by-turn directions?

I found the bosses laid out fairly coherent and easy to follow. There was just enough about the battle described to clue me into any sort of nuances that I might need to look out for, while not breaking down every detail as to take away from the overall challenge

Finishing the guide is a small area containing secrets and some artwork. The secrets are short, but they fill you in on how to obtain the Luigi 8-bit game, new playable character, and some of the Easter eggs scattered throughout. Let’s not forget the ever important warp locations and where to haul a shell to rack up massive amounts of lives.

I found that navigation through the guide was fairly easy thanks to the colored side markings on the pages. Each stage is its own color, and so if I wanted to work on world four, I just flipped to the brown/rust colored area and away I went.

Overall I was happy, but there were two things that got to me. First was that some of the maps get pretty cluttered due to the amount of stuff they are trying to show off. Between all the rings, items, costumes, collectibles, and such, some maps look like the cartographer sneezed detail all over the place and was too lazy to clean it up. These are rare occasions, but something to be aware of.

The second issue I have comes with that extra art section. This book is beautiful. The cover is gorgeous, and the typography keeps the pages feeling fun and tie it into the game rather well. The added art area, while a bonus, just felt weak as it is renderings of the Mario cast. I would have loved to see something a bit more, such as painted worlds, artist sketches, or even fan art from a contest. It just felt like this was thrown in to say it was there, but the opportunity to capitalize on it was squandered.

While I understand that Mario games are typically not that complicated, I found Super Mario 3D World that much more entertaining with this guide. Not having to scour every nook and cranny for that one missing star was great. Also, let’s face it, this book just looks damn nice on a bookshelf or coffee table. Fans, you owe it to yourself to snag this!

SGR Rating 4.5/5

Author: Alexander Musa & Geson Hatchett
Publisher: Prima Games
Editions Available: Hardcover
Acquired via Publisher

The Wonderful 101 Strategy Guide Review

January 15, 2014 By Keri Honea Leave a Comment

With Platinum Games’ titles, they’re more about finishing each level with flair on the hardest difficulty known to man and collectibles than they are story. In other words, it’s gameplay, gameplay, gameplay with them, and you better be prepared for some fast action, nimble fingers, and a lot of patience as you fail…A LOT. If you want to cut out the middle steps and go straight to big profit, that’s when you pick up the strategy guide. The Wonderful 101 strategy guide from Prima Games focuses on helping players earn those platinum medals on the 101% Hard difficulty their first time, not their 101st time. At the very least, players can find all of the collectibles and unlock all of the secret missions in one go.

I am downright terrible at Platinum Games’, uh, games. They move at insane speeds, button mashing never really works, and you have to have patience due to a high death rate. All three of these elements pretty much requires me to have a strategy guide so I don’t hurl the Game Pad across the room in frustration. You might wonder why I even bother with this studio’s games, but that’s a debate for another day. The point is I couldn’t have gotten through this game without the strategy guide’s help; it was practically as glued to my hands as the Game Pad during each session.

Each mission is framed with the medal requirements for each difficulty, a list of enemies for each difficulty, and then the walkthrough complete with screenshots. The screenshots were fantastic for seeing the ideal moment when to execute a certain attack, defense, or Unite Morph. They also helped me find exactly where I needed to be heading as I occasionally got a little confused and lost (it didn’t happen often, but when it did, I was very, very lost). This presentation and layout made it very easy to quickly find where I needed help when I wasn’t following the strategy guide letter by letter.

Of course, if I wasn’t following The Wonderful 101 strategy guide letter by letter, I missed out on many, many collectibles. Instead placing collectibles in call-out boxes on the pages, the collectible pickups were mixed in with the written walkthrough. At least the collectibles are printed in bold, making them easier to see when glancing at the page. At the same time, the book has collectibles that can only be earned when replaying the mission in call-out boxes, which helps you plan when you will replay a mission and how often.

The only other issue I had with the strategy guide was the occasional misnumbering of missions. The game would tell me I was on mission 14, but the strategy guide had that mission set as mission 12. It didn’t happen often, but again, if I wasn’t following the guide by the letter, I would have to pause the game to find what I was looking for in the book. I also wish the strategy guide explained what a Unite Build was in the command portion of the book, because I unfortunately wasn’t able to play the game for a couple of weeks after playing the tutorial, and it wasn’t for several missions that the game required a Unite Build. I was completely lost at what to do, the strategy guide didn’t explain it, and I had to look it up online. Of course the command was super simple and I felt silly for forgetting how to do it, but it still should have been explained in the strategy guide. It wasn’t even explained in the tutorial walkthrough.

Even with these minor, minor complaints, The Wonderful 101 strategy guide was my security blanket during my entire insane acid trip down The Wonderful 101 road. Those who want to just burn through the story on Very Easy mode may not need what the strategy guide has to offer, but if you’re a completionist or want to get through the game as efficiently as possible, do not forget to pick up a copy of The Wonderful 101 strategy guide.

SGR Rating: 4/5

Author: Alexander Musa
Publisher: Prima Games
Editions Available: Paperback
Acquired via Publisher

SGR Rating 4.5/5

SGR Rating: 4/5

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