Games and a Party

I've not been online for the last few days - Final Fantasy XII, Crackdown and Dead Rising arrived, and I've been playing those basically non-stop. Three amazing games, from what I've garnered so far.

Final Fantasy XII was always going to be excellent. I've not yet found a Final Fantasy game that doesn't kick ass (quietly ignoring certain spin-offs which didn't quite measure up, in my opinion). Having played nothing but 360 for a while now, the graphics do look grainy and pixelated in comparison, especially on the environments side of things; graphics didn't ever matter to me, though, and Square have really done a god job of pushing the PS2 to its limits.

Battles are a thing that bothered me initially. I mean, yay, no more random encounters, but it just doesn't feel like Final Fantasy without them. This feeling has waned a little now that I'm progressing through the plot; when watching the cut-scenes and FMV, I know that it's a Final Fantasy, but the actual gameplay is missing something. A weird cross between Vagrant Story and something entirely new, the whole real-time / turn-based battling thing doesn't do it for me in the same way previous versions did.

The Gambit system is good; I like not having to worry about healing myself so much, as the battles are far too quick paced for my liking. Even slowing the fights down via the Config menu is far too speedy. The Licences system is, for want of a better word, bad. It's clear that Square have tried to take the best features of Final Fantasy X's Sphere Grid leveling system and apply them here, but they've failed. There's just too much to choose from, and I feel that Square have over-customised the whole character development side of things. They got it right in VII with Materia - go back to that!

Despite it being, so far, my least favourite Final Fantasy in terms of gameplay, the story is what I'm really interested in. It's shaping up to be pretty damned cool. The characters, acting, voices, plot... everything is there, and it is brilliant. I'll give a more in-depth review after completing it, but right now the general feeling is "kudos to the writers, but the game designers need to sit down with FFVII for a while".

Crackdown is equally amazing, albeit in a different way. It takes what I liked about GTA (driving cars about like a madman, basically) and combines that with a really intuitive combat and exploration system. I can't describe how cool it is to jump off a ten floor building, firing an SMG at a perp on the ground, lobbing a grenade at a group of four others, watching them and their vehicles explode and then landing safely.

I've seen reviews that praise the game highly for the gameplay, but criticise its longevity. A lot of people are of the opinion that the game is far too short; I can't really comment at this stage, as I've not even defeated the first gang kingpin yet, but I'll get back to that after I've completed the game.

Dead Rising is a different kettle of fish. It's got what I expect to be a corny storyline, some really poor characters, the on-screen writing is far too small for anyone without a 42" HDTV to read... but I'll be damned if ploughing through a hundred zombies with a lawnmower isn't some of the best fun to be had on any gaming console today. I pick up a bowling ball, and I can smash their heads in with vim. I've taken to shouting "FACE!" every time I do so. It's just good, clean, zombie-killing fun from the masters of survival horror (Capcom, in case you fail at gaming entirely).

Aside from gaming, I got very drunk last night. It was the Vertex "End of Vodafone Contract" party, and it was a lot of fun. I had a very small but very nice meal (I'd eaten not long beforehand) and I imbibed copious amounts of alcohol before making it home at about 3am. Somewhere in there, I also managed to dance with a couple of very lovely ladies and have a very interesting conversation with another. I was a gentleman to the last, though, ensuring that one of the girls got home safely after a taxi or two failed to arrive.

Felt rank today, though. Had to stop by the roadside when I was getting a lift to work to air out my stomach a bit. Feeling just fine now, though... not sure if all of the alcohol is out of my system yet, but I'll live. But the good news is that I have an impromptu day off tomorrow, thanks to the Marks and Spencer training being so damned easy. For now, I think I'll install my copy of Command and Conquer: The First Decade (just arrived this morning) and see about giving one or two of the games a shot.