EXTERMINATION（エクスターミネーション）

I wrote in an earlier post that I'm not getting any younger and that I should probably stop wasting time playing obscure and mediocre games with the time I have left before I kick the bucket. So what better way to listen to my own advice by playing EXTERMINATION for the PS2?

These little buggers are so annoying

To be fair, this is an early PS2 title and the first survival horror game on the console. If you consider that the PS2 was still fairly new at the time, the graphics are impressive compared to say the Biohazard series on the PS1. However, it's not 2001 anymore, and I'm assuming Biohazard 4 is way better. I dunno because for some reason I could never finish games in this genre. The only Biohazard game I was able to beat was 5 which is definitely NOT survival horror.

In that sense, I guess EXTERMINATION is a good starter game for people like me who can't handle a limited number of saves. In this game, as long as you can get to certain areas, you can recharge your battery and save as much as you want and even refill all your regular ammo. I also found the number of health packs were adequate to get through the game without too much difficulty. I did feel I was running a bit low for the last boss but was able to make it after a couple tries.

It's like a ribbon but rechargable! Technology!!

For a survival horror game, it's pretty low on the scare factor. You are exploring a base or lab or whatever near the South Pole that's being infected by some kind of bacteria. I dunno if it's just me but like Corpse Party: Blood Drive, I never found organic goop to be that scary.

Eww, did you try ingesting disinfectant or shining a flashlight on yourself?

The camera is pretty crappy typical of this era and you have to rely pretty heavily on the auto-aim to shoot. At the beginning, I was killing everything but then figured out that it was a waste of time. All the enemies just respawn so a couple hours in, I realized it was much faster and easier to just run around everything.

I beat this game in a little under 6 hours and was so glad when it was finally over. For such a short game, it felt pretty long. Basically, imagine about 4 hours of running around and dodging everything you see except for the occasional boss fight. Not only was the gameplay fundamentally pointless and flawed, the story was bad as well. Minor spoiler here but when you finally beat the game, you get friend zoned. WTF?!

Score: 2 I don't get the story. Why didn't he just wait for the bacteria to disappear one day like a miracle? That's totally a valid strategy! #MAGA (6 hours to beat)

Scale
0 - Awful
1 - Bad and not worth your time
2 - Has some flaws but still enjoyable
3 - An average enjoyable experience
4 - A great game
5 - Masterpiece of a caliber only found very rarely

Sampaguita（サンパギータ）

I have not been in the mood to write about video games lately mainly because of how fucked up things are but oh well, what else is there to do these days? Go outside? Ya right.

So here we go, Sampaguita, the fall-themed 3rd entry in the Yarudora series. Once again, you play a random dude that happens to meet a girl that lost her memories for some reason or other. This time, it's a brown immigrant from the Philippines and thankfully in this fictional world, she doesn't get brutally beaten or killed for no reason by the police. (Did I mention I'm not in a great mood?)

You see any south east Asians... or any other suspicious colors...?

Overall, I think the Yarudora games are one of the more higher quality interactive anime series out there and this one is no exception. One big departure is that the male lead is voiced as well though you can turn it off if you're one of these weirdos that don't feel "immersed" when a character is voiced by well... obviously not you.

Damn accurate depiction of the real you, no I mean you, not me

Another interesting change was the addition of hints after you reached a bad ending that will successfully lead you to at least the first of the good endings. It won't help you reach all the other endings though cause it wouldn't be much of game at that point, now would it?

Based on a few Japanese reviews, this 3rd entry seemed to be viewed more favorably in the series due to the hard boiled story or whatever. Personally, I preferred the previous game's emotional drama even if it was more "galge". Maria's voice acting was very well done considering it was a Japanese person acting as a Filipino with supposedly 6 months of Japanese lessons.

Realistically, she should be like, "What the fuck you saying now?" half the time

Overall, I personally thought the story was not that super interesting. Well, I think the endings were pretty good, but the main events were nothing unexpected. I like the character design. I think someone from Ghost in the Shell was involved (dunno the details).

The story routes seemed a lot simpler this time around, most of the choices leading to the same overall plot with minor variations or just a bad end. It didn't have those side "what if" paths like Double Cast nor the complicated piecing together various events to figure out the truth in Kisetsu wo Dakishimete. Oh well, that just means I can move onto the next game even sooner!

Hey, are you going to buy me that animal crossing?

Score: 3 sitting here depressed that 40% of American STILL approve of Trump out of 5 (7 hours played, all endings)

As usual for this series, the music was pretty good but I don't think I'll be holding onto my PS1 copy of this game. I need to make room in my closet for that tiny Game Gear! (not)

Scale
0 - Awful
1 - Bad and not worth your time
2 - Has some flaws but still enjoyable
3 - An average enjoyable experience
4 - A great game
5 - Masterpiece of a caliber only found very rarely

Kisetsu o Dakishimete（季節を抱きしめて）

Some of you may recall that I didn't like the first Yarudora game Double Cast that much. After all, that's a post currently tied in first place for the record of most number of people to leave a comment. Unfortunately, it was not able to reach what would have been a record at 3 people but at least I know 2 people know what I'm talking about.

Would it kill you to leave a comment? Anybody? Hello?

Maybe this post will finally reach the record because I'm happy to report that the 2nd game in the series was much more to my liking. It may not be everybody's cup of tea as it's not suspenseful like Double Cast but I like these sweet, wistful love stories. This old man remembers back when I was young lad, playing FF7 by myself, holed up in my room. Back then, we jerked off to Tifa even if her boobs were a single triangle polygon, none of this complaining about sports bras. Ahh, to be young again!

Ack, the sun... and a girl! That's like gamer kryptonite and garlic!

Even if you prefer a more dramatic story like the first game, I'm sure all (three) of us can agree that the animation is much improved in this game. The PSP version constantly nags you with trailers of the other games when you reach an ending so I was reminded of how bad the first game looked every time I saw the trailer.

The story is about a young girl you run into that appears to have lost her memories... AGAIN. Yeah, I guess if you're going to make a sequel, might as well keep the same theme? However, this time, it's just a cute girl in a school uniform that thankfully isn't violent (except for the panty shot kick to the face).

This plot has a twist: normal brain functions!
Ah wait, nope, false alarm. Amnesia again.

You know, normally ADV games have a separate system save file that tracks what choices or endings you've seen and how many hours you played across your various saves. This allows you to save at what looks like an important point and then try both ways without having to play again from scratch. Unfortunately, these Yarudora games require you to keep saving over one file after you reach an ending. Even though the skip function is pretty good, it was annoying to have to start over and over again.

Fortunately, at least this game makes use of that annoyance by having some clever variations and endings depending on the last ending you saw. For example, if you make the right choices to make Tomoko happy in the beginning of the game, she offers to show you her legs. Like any normal gamer, I wanted to see that again, but on the subsequent playthrough, even if you make the same choices, and you're like, ok time to show your legs, she's like, "What the fuck you talking about?" I thought that was pretty clever. My translation may not be totally accurate. The only Japanese words I know are "Rasengan" and "kawaii" after all.

巨乳死すべし？ I'm fine with any size.

In fact, the last ending I unlocked was Bad Ending 12 because it requires 3 consecutive playthroughs. First, you have to slap Tomoko, then the game asks you at the beginning of the second playthrough if you're ok with violence towards women and if you respond, "Yes, the bitch deserved it." (again paraphrasing), you unlock Bad Ending 17. Then, you have to slap Tomoko again, and she fucking knocks you out with 3 hits to unlock Bad Ending 12. I think there's a lesson in there somewhere but I sure can't figure it out. After all, I'm just a normal, cruel, cisgender, white male with no perspective on anything other than how awesome life is.

Huh? Doesn't white privilege mean I get all the Japanese girls I want?

Score: 3.5 "Best not to think about how old Mayu looks like" out of 5 (9.5 hours to unlock all endings, 93% complete)

Ahem, joking aside, I thought this game was well done overall. The animation was good, both Tomoko and Mayu were cute and well voiced, and the music was great. At the very least, my plan to purge this game to make room was thwarted and I'll likely be holding onto my PS1 copy for now. Out of all the interactive anime games I played so far, if I were to recommend just one, this would be the one... at least for now. I'm not the only one that dug this game and the soundtrack as there's a theme song cover from Saekano, a reference I totally didn't get till now. (This old man still prefers the OG version, but cool cover for the kids.)

Oh I get the reference now! (Official anime game expert here)

I don't remember if there was a direct reference to this game in Saekano. It's been a while since I watched both seasons. Maybe playing the Saekano game will jog my memory (yet another game in my ever growing pile of games).

Scale
0 - Awful
1 - Bad and not worth your time
2 - Has some flaws but still enjoyable
3 - An average enjoyable experience
4 - A great game
5 - Masterpiece of a caliber only found very rarely

Double Cast（ダブルキャスト）

Long time readers of the blog (all 2 of you) may have noticed some recurring themes. Honestly, I'm running out of timely and topical material to keep these posts interesting. After all, there is nothing more boring than reading somebody's breakdown of a video game in a "traditional" review.

One issue is that YouTube is now a pedophile infested commercial sell out and I'm no longer interested in watching  "collectors" engage in their unhealthy obsessions. Speaking of unhealthy buying habits, there are going to be lots of anime games coming up. As I found out with Momotenshi, these games are great to blast through in about 5-10 hours and are easy to purge from the ever growing pile.

So why don't I start by giving a quick summary of the story of Double Cast, follow it up with my thoughts on the gameplay, and conclude with the good and bad points about the game... BOOOORIIIING!!

Wake me when you're finished or if Shitaku shuts down

Double Cast is the first title in the Yarudora series of anime games that I'm working on purging. As an anime, the animation is a bit rough at times and it's definitely not as well produced as Momotenshi. There were several scenes where it looked it was drawn by different people. However, it has a skip feature so that's a big advantage. Unfortunately, the skip option is buried in the option so I actually slogged through it 10 or so times before discovering the feature.

Not very automatic if you have to press △ IMO...

I played the PSP version as I owned the UMD (emphasis on the past tense). Fortunately, there is no real issue with the aspect ratio because the original PS1 game also had widescreen with a big black section for the text. You can either choose to view the text on top or adjust the aspect ratio to make room on the bottom. (why would you do that?)

I swear, this is like the 3rd WicDonalds I've seen in a anime/game.

Unlike some of the more "anime" type of anime games, this is definitely an ADV game with a whole butt load of endings and a fair number of dialogue choices. For the life of me, I couldn't figure out which choices mattered and I got stuck on a couple of bad endings. After the frustration of getting the same ending a few times, I eventually resorted to looking up a guide. The guide, by the way, has a whopping FORTY-FOUR playthroughs to get 100% completion. Like, fuck that shit, I played through it enough to watch all the endings and even then I only got like 93% or so. Good enough for me, I say.

These black screens show the MC's emotion without showing his face

Some saavy gamer who's played this game might catch me in the act and say, "Hey, these screenshots are from like the first 5 minutes of the game! I bet you didn't even play it!!" Oh my, you got me! Time to make an apology video on YT. I'M GOING VIRAL!!! Actually, I just loaded this up in an emulator to post some screenshots after I played it for like 15 hours (most of it spent watching it skip forward). I never could bother to figure out those plugins or whatnot on my PSP to take screenshots.

Trigger warning! There are a couple panty shots. (Spoiler: Pure white)

Score: 2 the panti is pure white but the girl... not so much out of 5 (15 hours played)

Kidding about trigger warnings aside, this anime/game is not super gory like Elfen Lied but the fact that I even compared the two might be a sign that some shit is going to go down. By the way, am I crazy or is Elfen Lied not even that great an anime?

Overall, I found the story pretty cliché and mediocre. I mean, it's a group of college kids making a movie and the title is Double Cast. Not so hard to guess what the game is about. The OST at least was pretty good. I jammed to a few tunes.

Granted, I haven't played a ton of these interactive anime games but the mechanics at least were ok provided you looked in the options menu. I can only hope that the later games offer up a better story and animation. However, watching the same anime over and over with a few scene variations is not exactly my cup of tea so maybe this isn't my type of genre. At the very least, I was able to sell this one on the ol' eBays to pay off 1% of my latest payday loan. #MAGA (obligatory hashtag)

Scale
0 - Awful
1 - Bad and not worth your time
2 - Has some flaws but still enjoyable
3 - An average enjoyable experience
4 - A great game
5 - Masterpiece of a caliber only found very rarely

GRAVITY DAZE/重力的眩暈：上層への帰還において、彼女の内宇宙に生じた摂動

So it only took me 2 years but I finally finished GRAVITY DAZE on the trusty ol' Vita. The reason why I finally got around to finishing it is of course, the impending shutdown of the online portion of the sequel. So I need to get on that soon before I miss out on the exclusive online currency redeemed costume shit. Ugh, gaming nowadays...

But enough about shitty modern gaming practices. As is Jhipster custom, let's first look at the title: GRAVITY DAZE/重力的眩暈：上層への帰還において、彼女の内宇宙に生じた摂動. Why did they have to change the title to Gravity Rush? "Daze" was clearly chosen to reflect confused, dizzy, and starry (look at the cat). I mean it says fricking "gravity dizziness" RIGHT in the subtitle (重力的眩暈 for the non-Jhipsters). "Rush" sounds like some sort of jacked up endorphin/pharmaceutical induced high. Huh, I guess that is a pretty good localization choice after all. GO USA USA USA!!!

OH NO BIGLY WORDS! We have to "localize" that away, ASAP!!

Speaking of the subtitle, hot dayum look at all dem words! I wonder how they localized that? Oh... they just... removed all the scary, bigly, liberal elitest words. I see.

I guess vidya games DO teach you something! Well for Jhipsters at least...

Ok, on to the game itself. Gravity Rush holds a special place in my gaming history (LOL) because the demo was the very first thing I ever played on my sister's Vita way before I would purchase my own. I have to say, if you saw this thing on an OLED for the first time around when it came out, the graphics were mind blowing (insert obligatory firework gif here). The cut-scenes, the character models, and that intro with the apple, my gawd.

Dayum, what is this Nintendo Switch? Cause you know, portables didn't exist before Switch.

While the game is definitely less impressive by the time I finally finished it yesterday, I have to give it huge props for the technical achievement of its time. The fact that you had an open-world game where you can literally fly (or more accurately fall) from one city to the next is truly amazing. Sure, the long load time is annoying when the game starts and the draw distance is blah blah blah but still, I was amazed at how far you can go after you open up the other areas with almost no additional load time. I especially loved the part where you go down to help someone pick up a dropped letter and you end up going down, down, and down and it keeps going and going. Though unfortunately that area is closed off afterwards.

Seriously, this is a Switch game, right?

So while the game was technically amazing, as graphics usually go, the wonder quickly wears off and you're left with a pretty decent action game. This was obviously made as a showcase for the Vita as it uses every possible hardware feature except for the camera and back panel (thank god!). The gyroscope may be kinda cool for AR games or whatever but it's very awkward to have to move your Vita from side to side for the Gravity slide challenges. Speaking of challenges, they felt a bit like a Ubishit type of filler though obviously not nearly as bad. Overall, I thought it was a fun game but I'm not exactly an action type of guy. It was aight, I guess (shrugs). It would have been nice if there was an indicator for which way was up as it can get quite disorienting. At least the environments were varied and interesting.

The cities are detailed even if you're gonna fly right past it.

The story was honestly the least compelling part of the package. Without giving away any details, this was obviously intended to have a sequel and while the Vita flop probably delayed that (FU mobile), even a game with a sequel should have its own climax and complete subplot. The story here is lacking most of that though I loved how the cut-scenes moved around with the gyroscope. Now that was a great use of the feature. It's kind of hard to convey without seeing it for yourself but it had a really neat effect.

This is the story section tilted at an angle. You have to see for yourself.

However, despite the rather incomplete story, I really liked Gravity Kitten as a character. I much prefer Kitten's more innocent and naive personality as opposed to the more typical sassy Kat English localization take. Like other Japan Studio games, the characters speak a fake language that is neither Japanese nor English but I still prefer the Japanese "translation".

I bet Kat has the typical angry retort regarding breast size but Kitten plays it cool.

I do have to point out that there's quite a bit of text I may want to read one of these days that goes over the story from Kitten's perspective. I wish there was a way to re-watch the cut-scenes too. Either that feature is not there or I haven't figured it out (manual wut?).

Blah blah blah bigly best words words words

Score: 3.5 I swear it was amazing for its time! out of 5 (27 hours for 100% completion)

Given how amazing this game was technically back in 2012, I REALLY wanted to give it a 4 as a great game. However, I feel like most of my time was spent hunting down gems and trying to complete the challenges to get... more gems for upgrades. Combined with the rather lackluster story, I have to say this was an above-average game but not a GREAT one.

You're going to be doing this A LOT.

I was a sucka and bought the DLC as well because it was on sale. Obviously you can get it on disc now with the PS4 HD edition though I guess non-Jhipsters will need to pay up the wazoo for a physical copy. Was the DLC worth it? I guess? I'm a sucker for cat suits.

Ah fuck, ok, take my money. Just fucking take it.

Scale
0 - Awful
1 - Bad and not worth your time
2 - Has some flaws but still enjoyable
3 - An average enjoyable experience
4 - A great game
5 - Masterpiece of a caliber only found very rarely

PaRappa the Rapper（パラッパラッパー）

I'm not exactly a expert gaming historian (if you haven't noticed by now) but according to Wikipedia, PaRappa the Rapper is supposedly the first modern rhythm game. I guess that's why I can't fault it too much for being such a SHITTY GAME.

First of all, the entire game has a total of 6 songs and I was able to beat it in under an hour if not closer to 30 minutes. Not only is the game incredibly short but the biggest problem is that the small amount of content ISN'T EVEN FUN!

I've played my share of rhythm games and this is the first one I've played where I don't even know why I'm sucking. The correct timing is still a mystery to me but I can say for sure that it's not based on the buttons on the screen. I mean, it's cool that the button presses actually make PaRappa rap but don't bother trying to do it according to the timing bar. The interface is awkward as well when the buttons are on two lines. The 6th and last song even has spots where you basically have to memorize the next button since it just pops up out of nowhere.

It's almost criminal how many better rhythm games there are (*cough DJMax cough*) that don't have nearly as much name recognition as this pile of poo. And yet here we are with an upcoming PS4 HD remake of so far the worst rhythm game I have ever played. If you don't believe me, try the demo available on PSN right now.

The HD remake nobody needs but hipsters will still buy I'm sure

Also, as a Jhipster, there is absolutely no reason to import this one as everything is in English. Unless for some weird reason, you wanna see the translated Japanese lyrics.

I'm not a weeb! I just thought there would be a Japanese song version!!

Score: 1 I hope I get my money back selling on ebay out of 5

While I don't condone piracy, I really should've checked out an ISO or something before wasting my money on buying this sucker. Thanks to it's totally unfounded name recognition, at least I hope I can sell it for as much as I paid for it.

Just trying to point out the title for my ebay listing

Scale
0 - Awful
1 - Bad and not worth your time
2 - Has some flaws but still enjoyable
3 - An average enjoyable experience
4 - A great game
5 - Masterpiece of a caliber only found very rarely