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Welcome to Untitled Gaming, repository for unfiltered, uncensored opinions on all things related to games, and best of it all, it comes from two adults that don't live in their mothers' basements. Additionally, we do not think it's the coolest thing in the world to scream racist and homophobic slurs, all in the name of drawing attention to our sad, little lives. We do other less obnoxious things to draw attention to our sad, little lives.

Oh, and we've been accused of podcasting from time to time. You can check out the most recent one just to the right of the blog.

We're here to have discussions, so please enjoy and engage us in the comments!

thanks to Laurance Honkoski for the book banner!

Blaine's Other Blogs

20100422

The FUTURE! (of Bioware DLC)

First, and most importantly, we did podcast recently, if you'd like to partake of our dark ... something or whatever.

That being said, I keep checking my damn RSS feeds because there is, for the first time in months and months, no forthcoming Bioware DLC announced. That's just damn peculiar. OR IS IT?

Words can't describe the disbelieving chuckle that fell out of mouth when their super-secret announcement a few weeks ago turned out to be the Bioware Bazaar. What the fuck were they thinking, hyping that up like that?

Anyway, I enjoyed both Stolen Memory and Awakening, as both showed promise, and teased some amazing characters, but I felt both fell short in fleshing those characters out as well as they could have. I'd like it if future Bioware DLC/expansions actually focused more on building characters (and less on sullying our HDDs with horrid platforming vehicles.)

Of course, I would argue that DLC is problematic for RPGs, unless it takes place after the core adventure. This isn't to say that it will never work properly, but I would've much rather had my first experience with Return to Ostagar be in the context of the initial playthrough, whereas much of it fell a little flat dramatically when played after the core game, when I knew that my warden was dead, and Alistair had ascended to the throne, and I was playing in some weird pseudo-context that existed outside of the actual game that I'd played.

Within the game, it works pretty nicely, After the game, kinda like Stolen Memory, it doesn't quite work. It's hard to get nearly as worked up when a) the world in which you're playing is in some weird 'frozen' state, and b) the overarching stakes are no longer raised.

Expansions, though, work quite well, even if Awakening totally dropped the ball on the dead warden import. Instead of being able to import your world, and start a new warden, they instead imported your dead warden as being alive, thus disregarding the great sacrifice he/she made.

Anyway, as I was saying, it's my belief that I'd rather play a 30-40 hour expansion with full characters rather than a mission at a time.

I do like the ME2 guns n' armor downloads, though.

Also, I should mention the Lost Odyssey DLC, Seeker of the Deep. THAT was an interesting way to do RPG DLC. While it could only be played in an active save, it was pretty much a balls-out hardass dungeon, and totally awesome in terms of challenge. It's the kinda shit that RPG vets live for. It got so insanely hard, I never finished it.

Honestly, when it comes Bioware games, I think I'd be okay with nothing but massive expansions a la Awakening, but I'd like them to be more fully integrated with the original world. By that, I mean, import the dead warden as dead, have the maps stitched together and allow movement between the worlds, import all the DLC stuff, etc.

What about you? How do you like your RPG post-release content?

-Blaine

20100416

New Untitled Podcast!

We talk about everything from God of War III to Final Fantasy XIII to Again to Mass Effect 2: Stolen Memory to just about everything that's come out in the last month that matters. We also make fun of Apple apologists.

Grab it now!

As always, thanks for listening, and please let us know what you think. Unless you're retarded.

-Blaine

20100415

TOPIC TIME!

Untitled Podcast: Collector's Edition returns tomorrow night, and due to the lack of meaningful releases and slow gaming news cycle, we're going topical again.

Personally, these used to be my favorite podcasts, back when we were weekly. Ah, such fond memories.

That being said, since we used to be weekly, we've exhausted nearly every obvious topic, so we're throwing up our hands, saying 'fuck it,' and asking you.

What do you want as the topic?
What news stories do you wanna hear about?
What new-ish games do you want us to discuss?

Let us know, and maybe your idea isn't so awful that it makes it!

-Blaine

20100404

Final Fantasy XIII - After Completion Thoughts

First off, this will have spoilers here and there, but I will try to be generic on character names, etc until I get to my ending thoughts. If you have not finished the game, you may want to only read until then.

I want to start off saying I enjoy the game and have 65 hours or so into it, with plans on at least finishing all the hunts (though trophies is probably a big HELL NO). What I want to touch on are a few points I made in the podcast and a few additional points now that the ending has come and gone.

The gameplay is something that I have gone back and forth on, and now that I have unlocked all the abilities I find that the biggest issue lies with how STUPID the AI is. We are not quite at RE5 Shiva level, but it isn't as far off as you might think, and even taints your auto battle option to the point of ineffectiveness. It gets to the point where you are actually surprised when your teammates use area of effect spells properly. Oh, and those shiny new 5-level skills you just unlocked? If you ever want to see those, better make the character the leader and use the ability list, otherwise they will happen 0% of the time.

If I am trying to juggle an enemy in the air who is weak against magic, why does auto battle decide to alternate spells/strikes? Is it to show me how one does 1/10 the damage and lets the enemy fall? This was probably the first giveaway that the auto battle system is broken, but there are many more. Are you a medic and everyone is missing ~1500 HP? Here is a singular cure spell to a random character! 2 Cura, why would you do that??? It would make too much sense.

What I DO really like is the overall feel of the battle. When your teammates are using the right spells and attacking the right character (Hope seems to get absent minded from time to time) the flow of battle is quick and fun. The only problem I have is that there really aren't that many strategies to use - I found that Relentless Assault is still the best to start out with if you are fighting easier foes, Strategic Warfare (COM-SEN-SYN) if you expect a tough match, and Aggression (COM-COM-RAV) once staggered to do enormous (potentially huge) damage. Part of this issue lies with only being able to control a single character, where I think the most apt game to look at is the previous entry, FFXII. Give me the option to pause, queue up options, or at least set some AI rules of the road PLEASE. Sure, keep the current auto battle features, but give me the option of being anal with my battle choices. Hell, after 65 hours I would appreciate the computer just taking a cue on the previously mentioned single vs area of effect skills.

With the gameplay taken care of, I have to say the overall structure of this game is about as strange as it gets. Completely linear for the first 30 hours, then opens up a bit, then completely linear for the last 5 hours, then open world. What? Also, they aren't kidding when they say the end of the story is only about half of the gameplay hours you can get out of FFXIII. I'm not sure if it comes from a deep desire to limit your strength on the last boss battle or what, but having the last Crystarium level only unlock after beating it is questionable. There is also the ability to teleport and the Chocobo riding that I would imagine many players would miss completely.

Just as haphazard are some of the design choices, both on characters and locations. Until I hit Gran Pulse I really thought the game was kinda bland and ugly, and from there the locations get a LOT better, especially a certain town you go to. The entire end story area would have been cool as well if it didn't drag on for as long as it did. Then again this will be true of most games - there will be strong locations and weak ones. The quality of the summons being all over the place is a little more confusing though.

OK, someone REALLY liked the Transformers remake, I get it. At least stick with some sort of theme though. Shiva makes a motorcycle and Brynhildr turns into a hot rod, OK. Then Odin is more classical and turns into a horse. Then there is the giant turret thing Hecatoncheir and the somewhat goofy version of Bahamut. How can it be that the behemoth (all 10 or so pixel swap versions of it) normal enemy looks cooler than the summon I have grown to love??? Then we have the overly simplified bomb enemy design versus the goofy organic goblins that have a hole in the middle of their body. This game is more hit and miss than any FF game I can think of, almost like completely different people designed each enemy. This would also be forgivable if it was themed by area, but enemies are all over the place, and you will encounter 3-5 versions at least of almost every foe, differing only in name and color. In the end there are some really cool designs - the giant creature eating thing on Gran Pulse, the huge elephant-like enemies, behemoths, and Odin all stand out. There were too many misses though to make this trump even the design of the last entry, FFXII.

Now onto the story, which is just... well, one of the weakest in the series. FFVI, FFIV, FFXII, FFIX, FFVII, all these had gripping tales that pulled you along. This one has its moments, but overall takes a large step back from the last entry. After beating the game, just stop and think about the whole thing beginning to end.

***ENDING SPOILER********************************************

So during the last battle, when your characters die, then one becomes Ragnarok, then the boss wants you to kill it after it kills you, but then your characters are alive again for reasons they don't understand, and then you kill the boss that wants to die (so fighting back makes no sense). WHAT?!?! And the BIGGEST problem is that a game built on the endgame as much as this one forces you to beat it, watching 2 characters die, but has it continue BEFORE THE LAST BATTLE. So we rewind time to do the endgame, except I have the rewards from when I did beat the game. Was there an open bar just feet away from the writer's desks???

***ENDING SPOILER END***************************************

All that being said, the game has done something right when I have put 65 hours into it. I think this may now be the most polarizing game of the series though, even if the truth places it somewhere in the middle of the series as far as overall quality. There is no HUGE weakness, which helps it overall, and the hunts are much more enjoyable than a card game/chocobo race/blitzball/dodge lightning strikes crap that normally fills out a Final Fantasy game. Upgrading weapons is also a nice touch, and I like how the characters have the ability to do everything but are clearly better at a few roles in battle, if not just one or two. At the least I have gotten my $$$ worth and then some, even if it wasn't the evolution of FFXII I was hoping for (in many ways it was a step back - it is quite silly as seeing your two other characters brush against enemies undetected, btw). This is always the risk in a series that has each release have a Cid, a chocobo, and that's about it as far as common ground.