First off I have to say this is another game I didn't finish to completion so I will not be giving it a score as I feel it is unfair to the game itself. Now the main reason I did not finish this game was lack of time to play it properly. A lot of things have been going on with me and I didn't have time to finish it fully. I got the game from GameFly and since the service is $25 a month and I've had the game since April I figured I had fun with the game and wasn't like to be able to finish it quickly.
If you aren't familiar with Patapon it is a strategy/rhythm game that came out on the PSP. You are in control of the creatures called Patapon. You control them beating on drums. Each different drum is mapped to one of the PSP buttons. Beating them in different patterns to the overall beat of the game will make them do different things like move forward, attack, retreat and defend. This is a neat concept and once you get the pattern down you can string together long combos.
The game is done a real unique art style. The Patapon themselves look like walking eyeballs with arms and legs. And the rest of the world has this look that is made up a lot of standard shapes like squares, rectangles and circles that have been pieced together to make the world. The color scheme of the game has been put together using mostly blacks and other dark primary colors. There are some flashes of bright colors but those don't show up too often. The style of the game fits very well with the portable nature of the PSP.
As for the gameplay it is pretty simplistic overall. As I said you beat the drums in different patterns to make the Patapon do what you want them to do. When you do enough of them in a row they enter fever mode where they will act more effectively and do more damage with their attacks. But there is some strategy involved and sometimes it might be best to not enter fever mode or to drop out of it at the right time.
The enemies you fight in the game are pretty varied. For the most part you will fight against characters that look like you but just wear different colored outfits. But the meat of the combat lies in the boss battles. Most of the bosses are very large and take quite a bit of strategy to take down. Thankfully if any of your Patapon die you can resurrect them later. When one dies they drop a little crown and picking this up means you can resurrect them for free. If not then you can make a few different combination of items to resurrect them.
As you go along in the game you can upgrade them with different types of weapons and armor. There is some strategy involved in this as you obviously don't want to outfit the guys in the back with the heaviest armor if you are going against a boss that will mostly attack the guys in the front.
There are several different kinds of Patapon to choose to take into battle. There are the your soldier melee fighters that use axes and do quite a bit of damage. Then there the ones that throw spears and are about medium range then there are your long range archers. You can mix theses up to suit the battle you are going into or your play style.
One thing this game has going for it is a really unique soundtrack. Now the meat of it is made up of the different drum beats that you use to command your characters. But behind that there is a really good soundtrack that is made up of different flutes and other kinds of drums and it gives it a very tribal sound. But one thing I can is get very used to hearing the same beats over and over again because you will have to use them a lot. I think is one of those games that is best played with headphones so the people around you don't have to hear the same rhythm over and over again.
The game can get pretty difficult at times but if you use the right strategy you can get through it without too much trouble. The hardest thing I found to do was to perform some of the miracles. You earn different miracles to make it do things like rain. Once you are in fever mode you hit a specific combination of buttons, providing you have that particular miracle equipped. Then you enter a quicktime like mini game where you have to match up the beats. This is tough to pull off the first times but once you get used to them aren't too hard.
One big complaint about this game are the hunting stages. You will need to hunt to earn meat to resurrect characters or gain upgrades. But you will have to do this over and over again and after a while it feels like RPG grind and gets a little annoying. But this isn't enough to make you not want to play the game.
Overall Patapon is an entertaining and lighthearted game. It is one that you can pick up and play for 20 minutes or sink hours into. I have returned my rental but if I get a chance I'd like to pick it up used for $15 or $20 and finish it someday.
Monday, July 20, 2009
Movie review: Terminator Salvation
The Terminator series began back in 1984 with James Cameron's film of the same name. It was a pretty decent box office hit and helped to establish Arnold Schwarzenegger as of one of the biggest bad asses in movies at the time. Then in 1991 Cameron brought us Terminator 2: Judgment Day. A movie that by all accounts is not only better than the original but ranks as one of the best movie sequels of all time. The franchise was continued with 2001 with Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines. But this movie was a big disappointment. First off Cameron didn't direct it so the style he brought to the previous films was missing. Recently the concept was turned into a television series with Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles. I personally liked this show quite a bit but as is the case today it was canceled after only 2 seasons.
Now we have the newest entry in the series with Terminator Salvation. This one is again not directed by James Cameron and is instead directed by McG (We Are Marshall, Charlie's Angels).
The film starts off in modern day but quickly jumps to the post Judgment Day world were humanity is at war with the machines being controlled by Skynet. Now in the previous movies you would get to see this future world but only in brief glimpses. This movie takes place almost entirely in this time period. So you will see a lot of destroyed buildings and there is even a shot of the ruined skyline of Los Angeles (not that it probably looks much different now).
This time around the character of John Connor is being played by Christian Bale. But even though he is usually the main focus of the series he doesn't have as much screen time as the character of Marcus played by Sam Worthington. We see the character of Marcus at the beginning of the film on death row and then he is put to death by lethal injection. Then he wakes up in 2018 having no idea of what happened to him. Now I won't give away anything about him but if you've seen the trailers for this movie you already know.
Most of the movie follows Marcus as he is looking for someone. On the way he runs into a young Kyle Reese, who you may recall becomes John Connor's father after he is sent back in time to protect his mother in the first Terminator film.
Alongside this Connor and the other members of the resistance are working on a way to take out the Terminators and end the war. Of course with any movie set in war you always have to have the commanding officer that never listens to what the main character has to say. In this case that particular character is played by Michael Ironside.
Again I won't go too much into the plot but even though it is a bit predictable at times it is real good overall.
Now with a movie like this you pretty much have to talk about the special effects. The effects in this movie were done really well. Most of the Terminators you see have this real gritty look to them as supposed to in the previous movies where they always looked very shiny and brand new. You also get a good variety of kinds you've seen before and a few new ones. There is even a nice car chase scene where Marcus and Kyle are being persued by motorcycle Terminators.
As for the action scenes those too were done really well. There are a few that are kind of slower and more intense and then there are scenes that are much more fast paced like the chase I mentioned earlier. It would have been nice if there had been a few more action scenes in the movie but thankfully they are spaced out enough to keep the movie from dragging.
One interesting side not is Arnold Schwarzenegger kind of makes an appearance in this movie. At one point a door opens and a Terminator steps out and the camera pans up and we see Arnold's face. But you instantly know this isn't really him because it is the face of Arnold as he looked in the original Terminator movie. I did some research and found out that, as I figured, they used a body double and digitally put Arnold's face over the other guy's. I think it's kind of cool that they found a way to put him in the movie but it seemed a bit frivolous.
Overall this is a good action movie and a good entry in the Terminator franchise. It definitely makes up for the mistakes that were made by Terminator 3. There are plans now for a Terminator 5 in 2011 and odds are Cameron won't direct it as he is working on Avatar and its sequel right now. But if you are a fan of the Terminator series of just a fan of action movies in general you should give this one a watch.
My score: 8.0/10
Now we have the newest entry in the series with Terminator Salvation. This one is again not directed by James Cameron and is instead directed by McG (We Are Marshall, Charlie's Angels).
The film starts off in modern day but quickly jumps to the post Judgment Day world were humanity is at war with the machines being controlled by Skynet. Now in the previous movies you would get to see this future world but only in brief glimpses. This movie takes place almost entirely in this time period. So you will see a lot of destroyed buildings and there is even a shot of the ruined skyline of Los Angeles (not that it probably looks much different now).
This time around the character of John Connor is being played by Christian Bale. But even though he is usually the main focus of the series he doesn't have as much screen time as the character of Marcus played by Sam Worthington. We see the character of Marcus at the beginning of the film on death row and then he is put to death by lethal injection. Then he wakes up in 2018 having no idea of what happened to him. Now I won't give away anything about him but if you've seen the trailers for this movie you already know.
Most of the movie follows Marcus as he is looking for someone. On the way he runs into a young Kyle Reese, who you may recall becomes John Connor's father after he is sent back in time to protect his mother in the first Terminator film.
Alongside this Connor and the other members of the resistance are working on a way to take out the Terminators and end the war. Of course with any movie set in war you always have to have the commanding officer that never listens to what the main character has to say. In this case that particular character is played by Michael Ironside.
Again I won't go too much into the plot but even though it is a bit predictable at times it is real good overall.
Now with a movie like this you pretty much have to talk about the special effects. The effects in this movie were done really well. Most of the Terminators you see have this real gritty look to them as supposed to in the previous movies where they always looked very shiny and brand new. You also get a good variety of kinds you've seen before and a few new ones. There is even a nice car chase scene where Marcus and Kyle are being persued by motorcycle Terminators.
As for the action scenes those too were done really well. There are a few that are kind of slower and more intense and then there are scenes that are much more fast paced like the chase I mentioned earlier. It would have been nice if there had been a few more action scenes in the movie but thankfully they are spaced out enough to keep the movie from dragging.
One interesting side not is Arnold Schwarzenegger kind of makes an appearance in this movie. At one point a door opens and a Terminator steps out and the camera pans up and we see Arnold's face. But you instantly know this isn't really him because it is the face of Arnold as he looked in the original Terminator movie. I did some research and found out that, as I figured, they used a body double and digitally put Arnold's face over the other guy's. I think it's kind of cool that they found a way to put him in the movie but it seemed a bit frivolous.
Overall this is a good action movie and a good entry in the Terminator franchise. It definitely makes up for the mistakes that were made by Terminator 3. There are plans now for a Terminator 5 in 2011 and odds are Cameron won't direct it as he is working on Avatar and its sequel right now. But if you are a fan of the Terminator series of just a fan of action movies in general you should give this one a watch.
My score: 8.0/10
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