The World Ends With You - DS Review

It's been a while since I've reviewed a "sqeenix" game. Actually for any of my hardcore devotees the last and only Square-Enix game I reviewed was Kingdom Hearts, an overated sack of bland, which is actually rather disappointing because Square-Enix have many great games under their belts like, for example, the whole Final Fantasy series and I have been quite happy to play them without going to any lengths to blog about them. Perhaps when they decide to fuck some of their shitty side projects off and decide to finally release Final Fantasy XIII I'll review that. I guess the main reason I haven't been reviewing them is because I'd inevitably end up mostly reviewing the story. Because let's face it, despite tweaks and refinements the gameplay in these games is all very much the same and doesn't leave alot to discuss. Even beyond gameplay there are alot of recurring themes and shit in JRPG's that I wouldn't mind seeing the back of for a while. That said, The World Ends With You is a refreshing take on the JRPG formula and coincidently I have just finished it. So shall I review it? I think I shall.


The World Ends With You see's you taking control of the introverted, society loathing Neku who has ended up locked in a parallel world with a handfull of other characters in a twisted game where first prize is the chance to not die. The story for the first half of the game is quite intriguing. I liked the idea of being one of many pawns in a game of chess that is totally tilted in the other teams favour in a world being manipulated by an omnipotent being known only as The Composer. The story get's less good towards the ending as the game decides to expand and develope the less interesting parts of the story. The ending is good enough but I felt it should've been so much more. I feel the same way about a lot of JRPG's that delve into nihilistic ideas and I suppose the reason is that the designers feel that the characters need meaning in their life in order to fight the antagonist. I mean what's wrong with the motivation of not wanting to die? JRPG fans are probably all familiar with this scenario; characters lined up in front of the final boss each elaborating on the lessons they've learned and the reasons they must win while the final boss ignores them and laughs. Why does a meaningless view of the world translate into not being motivated to live? I honestly would like game writers to consider that sometime soon.

The combat in the game is quite diverse when compared to the usual JRPG method of mashing A to select attacks from a menu. The top and bottom screen can be controlled simultaneously using two different control schemes. It actually feels a little bit like a rhythm style game during combat, akin to Dance, Dance Revolution. Using this control scheme can be difficult to pull off at times but luckily there's an auto-play option that automatically kicks in for the top screen controls if you stop using them for a while. Difficulty can be adjusted in a variety of ways by the player at any point in the game and players are rewarded appropriately for toughing it out by earning more, and better, stuff. This gives the game a replayability that is lacking in most JRPG's. It also gives the game an "easy to learn, hard to master" demeanor that works well and I instantly wished that more JRPG's had adjustable difficulty at any point in the game because it also does away with the need for heavy grinding sessions.


The main thing I didn't like is that the story and gameplay don't mesh, as with a lot of JRPG's. Oddly enough it's probably even more so for TWEWY because moving the story along inevitably involves navigating your character around the same old places. The combat, the dialogue and the world map all have different screens and so they feel disconnected. It's like you'll be getting into the story and then you're interrupted by a battle or required to go somewhere else which cuts everything up a bit. Outside of combat all you're really required to do is search the map for the next round of dialogue. It's all triggered depending on where you are so the game ultimately bloils down to searching and reading with small bursts of required combat tossed in as well.

But overall The World Ends With You is pretty good and certainly worthy of at least some of your time. While it ultimately falls into a few tired JRPG trends it does enough different and has a unique enough style to stand out from the crowd.

Christians Uncut - Bashing the Bible Bashers

At the risk of losing the support and loyalty of all my more religious inclined followers I've decided to rip on a poster I see around the university campus. The poster is a notice for a weekly presentation by the local churchies to try and make Christianity seem cooler and more relevant to the youth of today. I suspect these may have all been presented last semester however so it looks like I won't be able to rock up to any of them and stir the shit. So instead I'll bash the bible bashers on my secret blog so I can cause waves of anti-religious unrest online. Oh wait, I'm sorry. According to the title of Week 2's seminar "Christians aren't religious." Boy is my face red. I guess I was all wrong about the Christian community and as a result I'll just wrap this embarrasing post up right now.

Ok so now that I've reached my minimal sarcasm quota for the intro I thought I'd better attempt to replicate the poster so that it is easy to follow my rant. Everything in yellow is on the poster.

CHRISTIANS
[UNCUT]

*picture of a hammer coming down hard on a small stereo system*
Smashing the Stereotype
(just wanted to interject here to give my nod of approval to the use of pictorial puns. Haw haw, jolly good)

[Week 1] Christians aren't perfect people
[Week 2] Christians aren't "religious"
[Week 3] Why is there suffering in the world? (feat. Bishop Muhima)
[Week 4] Christians love sex
[Week 5] Christians can drink
[Week 6] Christians who love science

Jesus non-existant Christ! They've sure got a lot of explanations here. First of all I would just like to point out that nobody who is against religion or Christianity thinks that Christians are perfect people. Who the fuck would? I'm pretty sure Richard Dawkins is atheist because he believes religious folk are counter productive, morally confused slaves to an ancient, incomprihensible text. So I don't really know what they would say in that sermon, something about everybody being sinners and all we need to do is prey for forgiveness. Some shit like that.

Second week has already been mocked by me but let me elaborate in a more professional way. Christians ARE religious because they have devoted their lives to the service of a Christ-based religion. It's akin to saying that apples aren't fruit or humans aren't animals or that Yes Minister isn't a really fucking awesome and clever television series. It's just plain old wrong. But just to let me put it another way. If Christains aren't "religious" then what the fuck are they, a cult? Or are they just a bunch of people who all like the same book a whole bunch, stunt the growth of humanity as a whole and enjoy getting up early to hang out in churches? So that week is shit. Next!

Ah yes the old athiest argument, "if there's an all powerful god who cares about us why does he let us wallow in our own misery and suffering so often?" This is where they bust out their "the lord moves in mysterious ways" and "God must test our faith" arguments. Let me be perfectly blunt, these arguments are shite. If God is such a fucking enigmatic character then how can the bible be considered accurate. The bible after all is written by a bunch of men vainly trying to understand God, so if it's still a mystery you might as well prop up your piano with it because it will inevitably be unreliable as a guide. Also God wouldn't need to test our faith if he actually made life good. If world hunger was instantly abolished tomorrow I might be more inclined to think that the bible might be on to something, but you know what? God's too busy trying to bully us into Sunday mass. So let's just say that God is as he is in the bible, then he is a bloodthirsty, merciless, self centred bastard who is in no way deserving of our time or effort. According to the bible God's death toll dwarves that of Satan's. So why does bad stuff happen? Because the universe is a place of random chance and undiscriminating chaos. Christians live and die by the same rules as the rest of us.

Christians love sex. Not just like. They LOOOOOVE it. Let me just say that most people do. But what they're trying to clear up here is the fact that sex is a gift from God for married couples. Christians tend to abstain up to the honeymoon point, or at least promote that value. That's why just about every Christian I know at the moment is engaged to wed at such a young age. There's only so much holding hands and dry humping a couple can do before they seal the deal. Now does this sound good to you? I mean you gotta be sure you're ready for marriage. You wouldn't wanna rush into things. Besides sex is one of the deepest forms of intimacy going these days, so how could you be sure about marriage without it? And I mean if you really want it what's the point of witholding it from yourselves? "Oh because it's with the right person and it's all the better because I saved it for the person I really love and blah blah blah." How could it be better? Sex is something you get better at with EXPERIENCE. Everyone's first time is going to be a massive lolnoob fml situation to a certain extent. So why not get good at it so that you can really impress your true love when the time comes? I'm not saying I think all people should have sex all the time with anyone they can but if you actually want to then don't let people tell you not to do it.

Christians can drink. Don't really care about this argument too much. Drink, don't drink, it really feels like I'm retreading the sex ground here.

Now this one is good, Christians who love science. This could almost be a whole blog unto itself. This is a weird debate to take up but ultimately I feel that the bible and science are incompatible. Science demands constant scrutiny, especially on itself. Religion is about excuses and coming up with defensive arguments against scientific progress. Christianity especially is obsessed with tarting up the church in order to make it appeal to the susceptible, vulnerable and confused youth (as this poster aptly demonstrates). So what about these people who sit on the fence and practice science but remain closet God followers? Well this is the part that's weird. There are so many degrees of religious devotion. You could believe every single word your minister serves up to you or you could take it all as vague suggestion and pick out the bits you identify with and leave the rest. Either way seems odd to me. The bible is a mass of contadictions and very strange passages that aren't in the slightest bit believable. Plus is you pick and mix your own parts of the bible then doesn't that sort of nullify that validity of the bible as a whole? If it's whatever you want it to be then why does it need to be there at all except to use quotes to back youself up when you're inevitably in a heated debate over the internet with a no good, indecent, morally abhorrent blogger.

The Final Hours of the Jeff Goldblum Marathon - The Big Chill

I'll bet some of you will be glad to see the end of this review as it signifies the end of the Jeff Goldblum movie review marathon that has been going on for a while now. I decided to end with The Big Chill because although it is not quite as good as The Fly it is an interesting, surpirisingly deep comedy and for once old Jeffy is not, I repeat NOT, a scientist but a journalist which on the surface would be sorta like if Morgan Freeman played a nazi. But there are two compensating factors for this. Firstly Jeff is once again a sly, sexy, quirky motherfucker with some solid dialogue that's well delivered. Secondly is that he stars alongside a cast of about 8 others who are all interesting and well developed in their own right. So basically there's less screen time for him.

The plot of the movie is fairly light. Nine college friends are reunited for the funeral of the tenth friend who killed himself for some reason and catalyses the coming together and healing of these once close but now estranged aquaintences. So they spend a weekend together and that's about it for plot. Instead of playing the story card the movie decides to go for the character developement and it pays off. It's like watching real people with real feelings and real lives. Even the characters in danger of becoming stereotypical are well realised and fleshed out. That's pretty much the movie in a nutshell, just some guys doing stuff. There's no answers, no closure but that's the intent. It reminded me of a weekend I'd recently spent with my friends for a 21st. We all got togther, hung out, traded stories and partied. Then when it was over we went our seperate ways vowing to keep in touch until next time (which incidently is this weekend). The movies end conjured up the same feelings as though I'd actually spent the weekend with these people, comparing their lives and wondering what changed. I gotta say it's pretty impressive to be able to claim that as a movie. I didn't walk away from Spiderman and think to myself "I wonder what Peter's doing right now?" It's like escapism that not all of you returns from.

Now onto the bad points, or point I should say "point" because there is really only one. Sex. There are nine thirty-something adults staying in a big house and somehow it turns into a lusty, sex romp. These characters are married to characters outside the party but they hook up. One character wants to hook up to harvest some sexy man-juice and get a baby. Even the suicide victims girlfriend doesn't give a second thought to boarding the greasy meat train of one of the greiving friends. I'd say it reminds me of highschool parties but then I realise that in comparison highschool hookups were a minor thing. Is this really necessary guys? Then to top it all of Jeff's character tries so hard to get some but comes up short everytime. It's funny. It's painful. But most of all I don't buy it for a second. I mean if young Jeff every came on to me and delivered his sexy wit directly into my excited ear canal then I'd just...*ahem* anyway sorry I guess I started sleep typing or something there. I just blanked out and it turns out I'd written a bunch of...stuff...can't quite understand it myself.

Tune in next time for something a bit more ranty and mundane.

Resuming the Evening with Jeff Goldblum - The Fly

This evenings review is going to be a shorter one for 2 reasons. One, it's a good movie and gushing isn't funny and two, if I discuss it too much I'll spoil it. Anyway, enough excuses, on to the review.

In The Fly a much younger Jeff Goldblum plays (can you guess?) a quirky scientist. I wonder if it was this role that sealed his fate to play eccentric genius characters for the bulk of his career? I certainly wouldn't be surprised as this movie good enough to try and immitate for years to come. But then again he plays a much more tragic, romantic and sympathetic character than his other roles in which he is the wise-cracking smart arse to play off the "straight man" which is usually more the tense situation than another person. "Romantic?" I hear you ask, yes that's right playing the role of Jeff's penis recipient today is his future ex-wife Geena Davis, who is also much younger and looking quite appetising indeed (if I focus on her I can tune out the fact that a young, muscle-bound Jeff Goldblum is doing pull ups without a shirt on). The film is often described as a romantic horror and I think this is a pretty good way of pigeon-holing it. As all horror films do The Fly does really cool special effects. It has that organic wonder where it looks both fake and convincing at the same time. Parts will gross you out and horrify you but all the while you'll be thinking "how'd they DO that?" Now I've already stated that I like the movie, BUT that said I wouldn't go about just recommending it willy nilly. It's sad, it's themes get a bit heavy and it's graphic on several occasions. In other words, it's not for pussies. But it's these things that make it great. On top of that it's very human. Humanity really doesn't pop up in movies as much as you'd think. You only really notice it's been absent after being exposed to it and when you are it's fairly refreshing. So that's about all I can say really, The Fly is good if you've got the balls to stomach it.

You can see why I felt I should keep it short now, right?

An Evening with Jeff Goldblum - The Coffee, Snack and Toilet Break

Ok so we've watched/reviewed 3 movies in a row now and I think it's time to have a little break so we can go to the toilet, have a stretch and stock up on snacks. I also thought it'd be a good time to let you know that after I smash out the rest of this Jeff Goldblum mini-series of reviews (which will be soon enough my love slaves) I will work to a far more rigorous deadline with Infinite Possiblogities. From now on there will be a new I.P. up every Friday at the very least. On the odd occassion I can't make the deadline (curse you higher education) then I'll do my best to let you know in advance and will do my best to get the delayed post up quickly. If I'm feeling particularly clever and find myself basking in an excess of leisure time you may even get the odd extra post. Anyway, you'd better finish up and grab whatever you need for the next movie...it's about to begin...ssshhhhhhhhhhh...

An Evening with Jeff Goldblum - Independence Day

Jeff Goldblum once again plays a leading role as an eccentric scientist in a movie that is, at best, good looking. I saw this movie as a child when it first came out and have seen it many times since and I have come to the conclusion that it is almost complete rubbish. I say almost because of two things, Jeff Goldblum and Will Smith. Jeff and Will seem a rather odd choice to pair up and if I'd been the skeptical douche I am now when Independence Day first reared its' ugly head I'd have said "it won't work." Finding out what a fantastic on-screen pair they make is like finding out Coco Pops go well with Coca Cola (of which I have no idea, so don't ask). It's a shame that it's really only at the end that the two actually talk to one another and exchange their odd-couple bickerings and witty retorts because it stands as a massive plus in a movie that is far-fetched, overblown and sickeningly patriotic. On that note I feel it necessary to say this, the American President is never, I repeat, NEVER a good character for an action movie. Why? Because then the movie inevitably becomes self-indulgent, nationalistic tripe churned out to wring the money out of your average, white trash American patriot in between watching WWII movies and a documentary on the civil war. The President manages to give a particularly moving/disgusting speech at the end that really nails the last nail in his characterisation coffin.

Moving on from the disgusting characters comes the semi-retarded plot. It's not particularly complex so listen up. One day some alien ships come to Earth and place themselves strategically over all the Earth's major cities. Nobody seems to know what to do at this point but if I were in the movie I'd guess that maybe they were setting themselves up for the Guiness World Record for the World's Most Epic Checkmate? Am I right? Of course I'm fucking right! It's a disaster movie, the aliens won't come in peace. The first to go are the nutjobs and losers who are greeting the aliens in order to dick suck their way into a better life. Most of the plot consists of over dramatised "what's our next move." Their next move is retalliation but apparently the super intelligent beings are well and truely prepared and give the pitiful U.S. Airforce the ego bruising arse-rape it so dearly needs. A whole bunch of blah-de-blah later and Jeff and Will are in space in an enemy/alien ship that crashlanded 50 years ago to deliver a computer virus to the alien mothership before the human race is exterminated to make way for an intergalactic superhighway. Oh wait sorry, that would be far too humorous for this drab, takes-itself-way-too-seriously action wank. Naturally they are an evil race akin to parasites who travel time and space exploiting all natural resources they can find and moving on, leaving a destroyed habitat and many extinct species as their legacy. Naturally this goes against the grain of our very existance as human beings and so we vow to end it. So yeah the plot is shit, although I am ready to admit that the computer virus twist is perhaps a hint at genius in amongst the tired stereotypes and loud bangs.

Another thing I am prepared to admit to liking is the presentation. The alien ships as well and the aliens themselves look genuinely menacing. Most of our impressions of the aliens come across in their large, dark and forboding ships as the aliens themselves get very little screentime and this, I feel, is for the better. It's not that the aliens look silly or that you can see them wearing a wristwatch or anything like that, the aliens actually look very cold and creepy. But they are far more sinister, ominous and oppressive when we can only make guesses about them based on their ship. One gets the inpression that the ship "sees all and knows all" as it hovers above the city, monitoring the tiny world below.

So what's to say about this movie overall? When it's all said and done Independence Day is impressive on an explosion and effects scale but fails tremendously in every other area. The brilliance of Will Smith and Jeff Goldblum bump up the movie, but only from an F to a D.