Geek vs Life

It’s happened before, and it’ll happen again. Something “new” comes out, which can range from a repackaging to a complete overhaul of the original. Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy anything, Evangelion, Hellsing, Chrono Trigger. Wait, did I just say Chrono Trigger again? Yup. And that’s because Chrono Trigger has received not one, but TWO rereleases. And number two came out today.

A bit of backstory, first. Back in 1995, Squaresoft released a game called “Chrono Trigger”, which was created by what Square called their “Dream Team”: Hironobu Sakaguchi, Kazuhiko Aoki, and Nobuo Uematsu from Final Fantasy, and Yuuji Horii and Akira Toriyama (yes, of DBZ fame) from Dragon Quest (technically, I suppose, you could call this the first “true” SquareEnix title). Masato Kato (who also worked on Ninja Gaiden, Xenogears, and FFVII) wrote most of the plot, and Yasunori Mitsuda (Xenogears) composed the music (until he fell ill and Uematsu took over). The game was for the Super Famicom (known in the US as the Super Nintendo), and was a huge hit (to date, over 2 million copies have sold in Japan, with an additional 290,000 copies worldwide).

In 1999, Square rereleased the game for the Playstation. This new release featured anime-style cutscenes, including one for an ending, which led into ’99’s “Chrono Cross” sequel. It also added in some bonus features that were available after beating the game and getting various of the alternate endings. This was later released in the US in 2001, alongside Final Fantasy IV, as part of “Final Fantasy Chronicles” (not to be confused with “Final Fantasy Anthology”, which is Final Fantasys V and VI).

And then came July 2008. An ominous website popped up, with nothing more than a swinging pendulum. This, however, soon alerted fans to today’s excitement: Chrono Trigger was coming to the Nintendo DS.

I haven’t gotten very far in it yet (I picked it up on my lunch break at work), but I can assure you, the game is gorgeous. The game keeps the anime cutscenes from the PSX version (although these can be turned off at any time in the system menu), and adds a dual-screen mode, allowing you to battle on the top screen unhindered, while you use the touchscreen to select your actions, techs, targets, etc. Much nicer than having everything on one screen. Outside of battle, you are given a map of whatever area you’re in, whether it be the world map or an area map, or even a map of the building you’re in! For those among us who are purists, Classic Mode is also available, which gives you a single screen to play on, and the touch-screen is used for statistics. Like the cutscenes, these are also changable at any time, as well as the original “active” or “wait” battle system option.

Unlike the PSX version, which did not include new in-game features (other than the cutscenes), CTDS includes 3 new areas. The first is the arena, which is available on the title screen after the first time you save. The arena mode (from what I’ve read, haven’t tried it myself yet) lets you raise a monster by sending it to train in any time that you’ve visited, and then battle it against other monsters. Wait, could it be? Yes indeed! This is a multi-player mode! You can either battle against NPCs, or you can have an “Interdimensional battle” via DS wireless communications (note that this is wireless communications, not Wi-Fi).

The second new area is the “Dimensional Vortex”, which only becomes available upon completion of the game. Talking with a friend in Japan, it seems that this means that it’s available only in a New Game + (or ++, or +++, or… you get the picture), not simply after beating the game and reloading the original file. The “Dimensional Vortex”, however, promises multiple new bosses, and, apparently, gives you a new final boss. I’m assuming that this new final boss is part of the method to get the game’s new ending, which apparently involves Chrono, Marle, and Frog in front of a Time Portal.

The final area, unfortunately, I know nothing of other than its name, “Lost Sanctum.” I could probably find out more if I went to GameFAQs, but I think I’d like to discover it for myself.

There is a “new” translation to the game, which seems to be more of “uncensoring” the original translation (i.e. the return of booze and such), or retranslating item names to better reflect the original Japanese names, and what most people would recognize (for example, “Tonic” is now the more-recognizable “Potion”).

For the game itself, it’s a faithful port. I haven’t played the original in years (and even that was just an emulated version), but I’ve gotta say, this is certainly very nostalgic for me. Basically, you remember when they took the original Star Wars movies and remastered them and prettied them up (discounting the new scenes they added in)? That’s what this feels like. They took the original, old-school Chrono Trigger, remastered it, and prettied it up for a new generation. And it is awesome.

Before I forget, and send ya’ll off to go buy your own copies, note that there is a poster (the same image as the cover) included inside the first printing, and the pre-order bonus is a 2-track CD of orchestral versions. The second track, the medley, is a medley of tracks from each time period, and is really neat.

So last night I picked up Mirror’s Edge for the Playstation 3 and subsequently beat it in 5 hours. For most, this is a sign of a bad game. I mean, I traded in Halo 3 and Civ: Revolutions for it, which between the two gave me endless hours of playtime and 3 hours of god awful single player in Halo. But honestly, without any remorse or rethinking, I can say it was worth it.

The overall synopsis is that you are Faith, a runner. Your sister Kate has been framed for a crime which she did not commit, and you are in a world that would make George Orwell blush. Imagine the anarchy that comes when you take a peice of evidence from the crime scene… oh my… then of course, hilarity ensuses.

In this world, a runner’s job is specifically to move information from one place to the other using the rooftops and sewers as your path. So you do this, through 9 chapters and ever single moment is breath taking. The game’s use of the first person camera and in game cutscenes keeps you invovled and flowing. You may even find yourself holding your breath durring particularly scarey jumps or panting with releif after each near miss. I know I did.

Basically the game is streamlined and beautifully presented. On the right TV and the right system (cough cough getitrightforoncemircosoft cough cough) this game is pretty hard to beat. However, i’m a mean and hateful person so I did have some things to say against it. The game is wonderful but it’s short, its pretty but it had better be with all the pushing back, the soundtrack is amazing but could stand for a litle more flavor (more of a personal thing than anything else), and i’ll say that as good as the game is, it does feel a little like a tech demo. A very well done one, but it feels like with another month or two of development they could have given a bit more.

My last complaint I wanted to give it’s own paragraph. The combat system is good but not great. It works and it gets the job done, but it’s a little limited and doesn’t really ever change. You can link moves durring your runs but it’d be nice if you could with the fighting system as well. It feels like the Chronicles Of Riddick system in a game that is many years past that point.

The story leaves you wanting more and with a little stronger fighting system it would be amazing. Heres hoping for Mirror’s Edge 2.

All in all, 8.75 out of 10.

Oh and the punchline? Mirror’s Edge and an HDTV are better than sex because it’s cleaner, always looks good no matter what the light, and having a cigarette afterwards not only calms your heart from beating… but it only MILDY takes care of it. Oh and no squishy noises or clean up. All in all… if you’re not in the mood to swoon some gal or guy… try this one out. You’ll be glad you did.

http://snagwiremedia.com/prison-inmate-escapes-jail-using/

In true gamer fashion a Turkish man has escaped from a German prison Solid Snake style by making use of a cardboard box.

The man hid in the box at the end of a shift of his prison job of making stationery and was carried out by a courier service along with other boxes. The inmate then cut through a tarp in the truck and jumped out shortly after the vehicle left the prison grounds. The driver eventually noticed the tarp flapping in the wind and reported the cut to the police.

Beate Peters, the warden of the Willich prison presumes that the man had accomplices outside the prison, and a manhunt is underway throughout western Germany.

This pretty much made my day… and I needed to share it with you all.

Alright, Day 2 of Aki-Con… Got there just in time to catch the “Special Guests Q&A”, which was great. I was laughing so hard. I might type up my notes from it separately (I’m really tired, so I’m planning on going to bed as soon as I finish this and take a shower), but for right now, know that it was awesome.

After the panel, I killed time for an hour and a half by going into the dealer’s room (btw, I’ve spent $70 in there, and all of it is for other people, who are paying me back… there’s just not much in there for me to be interested in), and then watching some Ouran Host Club subs (and I do mean subs… I could barely hear the audio until I moved up next to the DVD player). After that, I went to Vic Mignogna’s Q&A, and he played an AWESOME video. And that’s all I will say, as we were requested not to spoil it for people. I’ll just say that it’s a “fan-film” he made (well, he is a professional video editor, so you can’t exactly say “fan”), and that is of dubious legality, and he only shows it at cons, and he wants it to be special for cons. But it is awesome, and if you guys get a chance to see him at a con, go see his Q&A and hope he plays it.

After his panel got out at 1:30, I figured there was a semi-interesting panel at 2, but there was really nothing to do. The Dealer’s Hall I’d gone over too many times, I wasn’t interested in what was in the other panel room, nor the viewing rooms. And since I was pretty much on my own, with no one to hang out with, I left. I spent an hour walking around 7 blocks each way to the Jack-in-the-box to get food and back.

By the time I got back, I peeked in on that semi-interesting panel (it was the people who do those “abridged versions” of anime). The panel might’ve been interesting (it looked like there were about 4 or 5 of them there, and more on a conference call via laptop), but there was no sound system in the room, so all the sound was coming out of the laptop. Given that I was sitting next to the un-closable door (those nice torii gates around the doors? They were tied to the door workings, in a not-fire-code way, according to my friend, and made the doors unclosable), I couldn’t hear anything. And it didn’t help that people would walk by, peek in, not know what was going on, and start shouting out the door to friends of theirs. Where was someone to tell them to quiet down or leave, they were interrupting a panel? Oh, wait, Aki-Con isn’t running the panels room… Another panelist actually came in, during a video, went to the front and said that their panel would be running late. Umm, it’s only halfway through this panel? Later, they came by, and from the door called to ignore what they’d said earlier, the panel was in a different room (main events).

After that, I hung out with some friends for a bit, since I had nothing else to do. I also pulled out my piccolo and played in the lobby. I’m gonna have my flute out tomorrow (since there’s really nothing I’m interested in Sunday until Soul Candy’s performance), and see if I can get some people to make donations to “feed the poor Otaku” (I can try!). I did go to the “How to get into video games” panel, which, ironically, was run by a graduate of my own late college (college ran out of money and closed… poor Henry Cogswell). After that, there was nothing else to do, so I came home.

Wrap-up will be tomorrow, and hopefully I can get my roommate to offload my pics from my camera, so I can get some images up.

So, like many of you are aware, I’ve been traveling to visit my friends out here in the eastern wastes know as Spokane. Much to my pleasure however, there is more to do here than just drink and look at dirt all day. One such fun activity is to go out and see art openings that happen here from time to time. Last night (11/07/08) I had the pleasure to witness the opening of Harrell Fletcher and Marc Dombrosky’s art.

Mr. Fletcher’s medium was a video they had playing in the main lobby. At first glance it seemed to be a bunch of elderly folks speaking nonsense with REALLY close shots of their faces. However, I feel that the simple look of the piece was intentional because it definitely drew me in and I discovered that the people were actually quoting James Joyce’s adaptation of Ulysseys. The video is called The Problem of Possible Redemption and an excerpt can be found on his website. I highly recommend checking it out at this website you’ll love it.

The other artist who was featured was Mr. Dombrosky. His medium was found cardboard and embroidery. Basically, this collection is a gathering of signs from the homeless of Seattle and Tacoma and he embroiders the sayings and phrases. Now I don’t know a heck of a lot about art, but I do have to say that the dichotomy of sad and beaten cardboard with nice embroidery is very eye catching and very moving at the same time. This picture is one of the many signs he had on display.

Of course, all of this could not be possible without the space to show it all in. So I have to give special mention to Saranac Art Projects here in Spokane. It is a great place to show off art and is totally not for profit. You walk in and you look around. It’s pretty nice that there are still places like that around, especially if you’re like me and from Seattle, seriously, when’s the last time you saw art that is awesome for free? So if you’re out here look them up!

Their website:  http://artocracy.blogs.com/saranac_art_projects/

Their Address: W. 25 Main Street

Spokane, Wa 99201