Guardian's Crusade (Playstation, 1999)

North American cover artwork

Release: 1999
Developer: Tamsoft
Publisher: Activision
Genres: rpg, j-rpg, role playing, turn based combat, virtual pet

Here's yet another Playstation title I've wanted to mention, and now I'm finally getting around to it. Three years later. Better late than never I suppose. 

If there was one (1) genre the Playstation is known for, back in the day and in retrospect, it's definitely rpg's. Specifically Japanese rpg's. With Nintendo and Sega dropping the ball with their respective consoles, pretty much all big developers hopped on board the Playstation train. Squaresoft's Final Fantasy VII was a massive success and became many people's first exposure to j-rpg's. It sold millions of copies and naturally, other companies wanted to cash in on this craze. We saw a glut of rpg's get brought over, like Suikoden, Saga Frontier, Front Mission, and King's Field, just to name a few. Basically every big developer under the sun tried their own take on the genre to different levels of success.  

Which brings us to Guardian's Crusade. Published by Activision and developed by Tamsoft, who are pretty much known for just the Battle Arena Toshinden fighters and nowadays Senran Kagura, it was developed with the intention of being a "beginner rpg" for children, but it's adult friendly also. This is a pretty accurate description of the game, but it's got a few twists. 

The story involves the player character, named Knight, who must deliver a letter to another town, shortly after being woken up. Pretty typical stuff so far. Upon venturing out, he runs across a cute, pink, pig looking creature named Baby. An ominous voice tells the hero that Baby must be brought to a faraway landmark called God's Tower, and that begins the main quest of the game. Don't let the God reference get you, this is not a religious game whatsoever. 

Baby, in all his late 90's FMV glory. 

The 2 main members of your party will be Knight, and Baby. You are also joined by a fairy type character named Nehani, who acts as a sort of Na'vi from LoZ, except much less annoying. Battles play in traditional turn-based combat, however there are no random encounters. Like in Chrono Trigger, enemies are seen on the field screen and can be avoided by moving around them. Combat begins when you touch them. You can use items, attack, defend, and run. Again, very typical. There isn't necessarily magic or spells to learn, but in place of this is "Living Toys". These are basically familiars that can be found throughout the game, and each have different effects. They are summoned in battle, and you can usually have up to 3 LT's out during battle. Some act as healers, attackers to provide additional damage, or can play buffs or de-buffs during combat. Some aren't usable in battle, such as a map toy that you find, and as it might sound, provides you with a world map. With around 70 toys to find in the game, a "gotta catch em all" theme is present, so be sure to check every nook and cranny in the game. The toys are a nice little substitution for traditional magic, and it certainly adds to the kid friendly image the game is going for. 

Yes, GC has Comic Sans in it, but only during combat. Long before it ever became a meme.

Likely capitalizing on the Tamagotchi craze of the late 90's, there is another gameplay element to this, and that's taking care of Baby. Yes, there is a virtual pet to take care of. For the most part, this entire portion is really down played. Baby must be fed regularly, and must be given attention and praise for finding items or obeying you. If this is ignored, Baby will not function well during battles; Baby might attack you instead of an enemy, or ignore your commands completely! Sometimes he might even flee from battle! What an asshole! However, this is only if you don't treat him well. As long as you feed him every once and a while and give him some praise, you should be fine. Baby also features a power to morph mid-battle to do extra damage. As he levels up, he can morph into more powerful creatures. The whole virtual pet aspect is neat to see in a game like this, but there isn't much depth to it and it doesn't seem to have much impact on the main game. 

The presentation is actually quite impressive for the time. When travelling along the world map and entering a town and vice versa, it is completely seemless, without any load times at all. Everything stays scaled the same, and without a single loading time to be seen. The only time it loads is when you enter a dungeon or house. Other rpgs at the time would use a miniature version of towns and characters when travelling on a world map, and upon entering a dungeon or town would have to load. The graphics are quite colourful and clean, and the characters, npcs, and enemies all have a cute look to them. The camera is always placed above Knight, and can be rotated 360 degrees with the shoulder buttons. However, it's zoomed in slightly so it leads to the screen feeling cramped, as if there is always something just outside of view. The game has a ton of flavor texts. If you don't know what those are, it's those text boxes that pop up when you search stuff in games. Every little thing can be "searched", and you always get a unique text for each house, item, or thing you check out. Nehani even comments on this at one point, saying something along the lines of "Do you really have to search every corner in this game?" The texts are a small touch, but it's fun to see. The dialogue in general is pretty funny and light-hearted. The game doesn't take itself too seriously.

The music is alright. It's mostly traditional rpg music. Sappy upbeat songs, but with a kiddy feel to them. The final boss music is pretty badass, and some of the town themes are catchy. The soundtrack isn't bad at all but it's nothing that you're going to want to download. 

There isn't much difficulty with the game, which shouldn't be surprising. During my entire playthrough, I think I died only 2 or 3 times, and these were all towards the end of the game. If you're looking for a challenging game you won't find it here. It will be about a 20 hour game, which is short for rpgs on Playstation, but works well in the context of being a introduction to the genre. 

Because of it's simplicity and it's kiddy look, it's a bit hard to recommend this game. If you are an experienced, hardcore rpg player, you'll probably think this game is a giant piece of shit. But if you're a little more open, I think you will get something out of this game. The way you approach this game will probably determine how much you like it.  It feels nice to play an rpg where there is no  "angsty, quiet teenage boy and group must team up to save the world from evil" trope. 

It's unique and a bit quirky, nowhere near as much as something like Earthbound. It's certainly not the best rpg on Playstation, it's certainly not the worst. It's intended goal was achieved, it's very suitable for beginners and kids; it has an easy to follow plot, the combat and mechanics are easy to understand, and it doesn't drag on too long. If you're looking for something different from traditional j-rpgs, it's at least worth a try. 

Guardian's Crusade sold poorly upon release, perhaps because of it's cutesy kid look on the cover, or getting overshadowed by bigger releases at the time. Naturally it entered obscurity soon after. The only recognition it ever got since then was being released on the Japanese PSN store in 2009 (under it's Japanese title, Knight and Baby, an objectively inferior name) The game disc is a hot pink colour which makes it stand out a bit. Because of it's poor sales, it's very uncommon, but can be found anywhere from $20-$40. Check it out if you want a very simple rpg. 

Omega Boost (Playstation, 1999)

North American cover art

Release: 1999
Developer: Polyphony Digital
Publisher: SCEA
Genres: Rail shooter, Shoot em up, Sci-fi, Mecha

Welcome back, it's time for another review. It's yet another Playstation game we're looking at today. Let's start off with an introduction; Can you think of a time where a developer that typically makes games under a specific genre, but on a rare occasion they go outside that limit and make something completely different? And that new product turns out to be pretty good? Something like Squaresoft's Einhander may come to mind. A company known primarily for making RPG's but did a 180 turn and output a great title in the process. This is the same case with Polyphony Digital's Omega Boost. Known primarily for the Gran Turismo racing simulations, they are regarded for being able to push the limits in physics and graphical capabilities in video games. The first GT amazed gamers and critics back in 1998 and went on to become the best-selling PS1 game (a feat I still find hard to believe, considering my disinterest in racing sims). Though, later on in the system's lifetime, they worked on another game. This is where OB comes in. After doing some research, Polyphony has worked on racing titles such as Motortoon Grandprix, Gran Turismo, and more recently the Tourist Trophy series. All of them are racing games, whether kart racers or simulations. With this data, Omega Boost is in fact, the only non-racing game that the studio has ever worked on. And, surprisingly, it's good. Damn good. What lies in store is another rare case of a developer being able to go outside they're comfort zone and excel with their new idea. Let's take a look...

Omega Boost is a 3d on-rails shooter, released in 1999 by Sony Computer Entertainment America. You control a mech named after the title of the game, the story involving Omega being launched by a space facility to hunt down and destroy an imposing AI, named Alpha Core, who threatens humanity in the distant future. However the story should be the least of your concerns when playing the game. The game opens with a kickass FMV introduction blasting licensed music, and it actually looks really cool. You can fly around in open environments with 360 degree freedom, as enemies attack in waves. Occasionally there are some on-rails segments, ala Vanark. There is only one weapon at your disposal; a massive laser-machine gun sort of weapon. It can be used in two different methods; simply shooting in spurts or by locking on to enemies. You hold the attack button and hover the crosshairs over enemies and release the button to launch them. This will be the most the most effective way to deal damage. At the beginning you can only lock onto a couple of enemies at a time, but this number increases as you progress through out the game. Navigating in the worlds is a thrill as you can spin, rotate and fly around in all directions. It can become a bit disorienting due to this, but the controls work well enough so that you can always re-adjust your position. As you destroy more enemies, a meter builds for the special move, called the Viper Boost. When the meter builds up enough, you can press the L2 button to do a devestating attack on all enemies, and it looks really cool to watch OB annilhate everything. This attack should be reserved for only the toughest bosses, as some have huge health bars and the meter can take quite a while to fully charge. You can also use a boost at any time by pressing O, which is very helpful for dodging enemy projectiles.

With how the game plays in it's lock-on combat, it's time for another quick tidbit. During development, Polyphony called on outside assistance. They ended up calling in Yusi Yasuhara, who had originally been the lead designer and programmer for Sega's Panzer Dragoon Zwei, an on-rails shooter for the Sega Saturn. Hence the reason why OB turned out similar to Panzer Dragoon, but in a good way. This also marks one of the few times Polyphony has worked with external developers.

Oh, and a pretty interesting fact ; Shoji Kawamori, a mecha designer most well known for his Macross, and Eureka Seven work, designed the mechas for this game! Pretty cool to say the least. 

Levels are structured as "zones" and each zone has waves of enemies to fight, as well as a mid-boss and end boss. The zones set in space tend to be a little more disorienting because there is no true "ground" to calibrate to. Though the controls may be funny at first, after about 10 minutes you should have it down. 

There's one thing that has to be stated about the visuals; they look absolutely stunning. All the textures look good, though a little dark, but the game is just a treat to view. I will say it's possibly the best looking game I've ever seen on the Playstation. Seriously, it looks that good. Character and enemy models look great, as well as having particle effects and transparencies that stand out. The levels themselves are a bit lacking though, they usually just take place over basic voids of space or somewhere on a planet high in the sky with not much to look at. This doesn't detract from the game, because you're not going to play this just for backgrounds. A majority of the game also runs at 60 FPS, something rarely seen on the platform. The frame rate only enhances it even more, without slowdown or stuttering to be found anywhere. It's silky smooth in action. 

I really need to start capturing my own footage/screenshots. 

The music is... interesting to say the least. It's a mix of techno, metal music with a bit of tribal thrown in. There's also two licensed tracks featured, from Loudmouth and Static-X respectively, both bands I'm not fond of, but there music sounds okay. It fits the mood of the game, going for a tough, gritty kind of feel. The music is nothing that you'll want to download to your iPod, but it works fine.

Your presented a decent challenge here, as there are 9 stages in total. The game can be beaten rather quickly because of this, and that's the biggest criticism I have. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, in fact it makes for a great title if you're looking for something easy to get into that isn't too long. A perfect pick up and play game. Like the Gran Turismo games, there is a replay feature in the main menu if you wish to watch yourself play through levels. Not really important for this type of game, but it's there. 

Due to poor marketing and under-performing sales, Omega Boost quietly faded away, becoming a sleeper hit. The game must have been somewhat popular enough, though: The official soundtrack was released on CD in limited quantities, which have since become incredibly rare, and even action figures were released by Blue Box Toys. They only released figures of Omega Boost and Beta Boost, and a third one of Herbacher was planned, but never ended up being released. Just like the soundtrack, they too are incredibly rare and incredibly expensive, which is too bad, I would love to have one of these.

As for the game itself, it's uncommon, but can be had for around $20-$30. Or just emulate it, burn an iso, however you play your games. It's certainly the best mecha game on Playstation, and deserves to be tried out if you call yourself a fan of shooters or mecha at all. It would have been cool to see this on the upcoming Playstation Classic Console, but because of the licensed music, it's general obscurity, and on top of the fact Sony is generally stupid and cheap, there's no way this will be on there. One can dream I guess.

Vanark (Playstation) Review

North American cover art

For my first review, I've decided to pick a little known, obscure game, called Vanark. Whether you're a collector or just enjoy playing retro games, there's a very good chance that you've never heard of this one, and it's part of a sub-genre that is quite few and far between when it comes to the amount of games available. Enjoy.

Vanark is an on-rails shooter developed by Bit Town Inc. and originally published in Japan by Asmik Ace Entertainment in 1999 for the Playstation, where it was titled Astro Trooper Vanark. Later on it was released by Jaleco to North America in 2000, as Vanark. Even with the slight name change, it still says "Astro Trooper" at the title screen. It plays similar in fashion to other rail shooters like Sega's Space Harrier and Nintendo's own Starfox series. To start, I would go as far to say it's the Playstation's equivalent of Starfox 64 (which, by the way, is one of my all time favourite games). But this isn't a bad thing at all. It may come off as a late release budget title, (which in some respects it is) but it gives a quick, fantastic shooting experience. You play as aspiring pilot named Shun as he and his crew members must protect Mars against a rising biological alien army, a pretty cliche story, but in this tale the plot takes backseat. 

As in any traditional space shooter, you control a spaceship that can move in all directions on the screen, as you shoot up enemies and dodge any environmental objects. Your ship can equip 2 different weapons, a simple laser shot and a selection of missiles, which are able to lock-on to a certain amount of enemies, depending on how many upgrades you've gained. Both of these are selected before beginning a mission. Also, you choose a different crew member before each stage, each can help you out during battle, such as giving you weak points during boss fights or show you alternate routes to take during levels. The ship can slow down, and boost to speed up, like Starfox, however barrel roll maneuvers can't be performed (Peppy would be so sad). The game begins with a quick training stage, however the mechanics don't require much learning, it's basic and easy to pick up. The controls are silky smooth and there's never an issue maneuvering throughout a stage. 

SPOILER ALERT: First mini-boss.

Let's get to the gameplay, this is where Vanark truly shines. It is fast paced, loaded with enemies and there is always something to keep you on your toes. A lot of the boss fights are intense, and each is unique with their own attacks and patterns, which are fun to learn. The level designs are nothing that special; your typical water, lava, space, and desert themes, but I can let that pass, regardless they all look great, and I don't mind seeing this in shooters - in fact, this is something I almost expect. Some of the levels do have different paths to take as mentioned earlier, so that can add a bit of replay value. The challenge is a little high but never too frustrating, it's just right. There are no health pick-ups in game, and three difficulty levels to choose from. You're given 5 continues and then it's game over.

Graphically, the game looks amazing for a late, low-profile release on the aging Playstation. Bit Town knew what they were doing when developing this and certainly knew their way around the system's architecture to produce great aesthetics. The textures look good, with little amounts of noticeable pixels and jagged lines, a trait the PS1 is notorious for. The game runs at a very smooth frame rate without any slowdown or hiccups to add on. The lighting effects are also well done and add a great touch, especially in stage 2 where you are transitioned underwater and sunlight shines through the water surface down to the ocean floor. It adds a great sense of realism to these alien worlds as you destroy everything in your path. All of the enemies and environments look great, with each stage having it's own sort of theme.

The audio is decent for the most part. The music is fast and upbeat. It's nothing very memorable, but it gets the job done. The sound effects are solid. Lasers, explosions, and crashes are loud and intense. It's always satisfying to hear a huge explosion after destroying a tough enemy. However, an annoying sound plays whenever your laser hits a target, it's like a weird metallic-y pipe sound. Another noise, what sounds like a loud humming noise, plays whenever your laser hits anything that isn't a target, such as the environment. After a while these sounds only get slightly annoying, but that's really my only complaint with any of the audio.

Vanark plays as good as it looks.

One thing that should be noted about this game is what happens in between flying stages. After completing a stage, you are brought back to your crew's mothership for briefings, watch some story scenes, and even explore the ship. This is done in a Resident Evil fashion, by controlling polygon characters in front of pre-rendered backgrounds. It's pretty bizarre to see this in a shooter game. Hell, you could see this style used in almost any other genre but shooters. These sections do ruin the pacing of the game, because after sifting through dialog you're left to wander the ship, where you will walk around in frustration just trying to advance to the next stage. Luckily the ship isn't very big so you shouldn't get lost easily. The pre-rendered backgrounds look good, with nice touches in the lighting and details. The characters themselves look kind of bad, especially when compared to the flight stages. They don't have much detail, and are rendered with a low polygon count, additionally Shun's movements seem stiff and kind of jerky. There's even a minigame to play, where you have to disable a bomb on board the ship, by guiding a very small dot through a maze. And trust me, this is much, much more difficult than it sounds. If the dot touches any of the walls, the bomb goes off and it blows up your ship and you lose! Actually, it just takes away all weapon upgrades you had gained up to that point. The dialog between characters is kind of boring and uninteresting, however it does have some bad Engrish sprinkled throughout. The text translation overall comes off as poor. Just be glad there's no voice acting, because that probably would have turned out just as choppy as the text translation.

Earthworms become mutated in the future. Wait, would
they be earthworms if they're not on Earth?

Unfortunately, Vanark doesn't stay it's welcome for very long. There is only 6 stages, and the game can be completed in under an hour, with little reason to go back. However there is some variety; such as the choice of weapons, your crew is customizable, as well as branching paths during levels, so those can add some replay value. You even pilot a speeder-bike vehicle in stage 3 for a change-up. The Resident Evil style segments should have been scrapped entirely as all they do is slow down the pace of the game, and feel like they were added in at the last minute to artificially increase the length of the game. It would have been better to add another flying stage or two instead.

To sum it up, Vanark is very decent. It excels in delivering an action-packed shooter while pleasing to the eye. I think if it was a little bit longer I would like it much more. It's the perfect game to pull down from the shelf and play once in a while. However due to it's late release on the system, (Playstation 2 was just around the corner by the time this released), as well as low sales, it quickly faded into obscurity but should be remembered as an interesting take on the shooter genre. It's very, very uncommon and I would even say it's rare, considering copies of the game almost never show up in ebay auctions; a huge indicator of a truly rare game. (As of this review, the most recent ebay auctions for a complete copy have ended at over $80 CAD) So if you see this for cheap, go for it. You'll get to enjoy one of the finest hidden gems the Playstation has to offer.

Later days.

CGCC Game Swap this Sunday November 15

So this is happening November 15 and I plan on going. It's taking place in Cambridge and it's open 1-4pm. I'll be bringing a lot of stuff to trade so hopefully I can use that without spending a lot of cash. Never been to this swap before so it should be a good time.