*returns!*
Yep, I returnz now. Felt like updating with reviews of Castlevania: Curse of Darkness, Chronicles of Narnia: Lion Witch and Wardrobe, and generally reminding people of my life in general. First, the gothy codfish game. As a rule, my reviews are spoilerriffic, so click on my lj-cuts with no pretense of coming out unscathed.
In the same vein as the much heralded Symphony of the Night, you take control of the Devil Forgemaster (and Alucard wannabe) Hector. Once gifted with the ability to "forge" and control demons, he has since given up the skill and his job as one of Dracula's many personal bitches. Due to nepotism and intrigue, he is forced by his rival and achingly obvious yaoi bait Isaac to take up his abilities again to break the Curse of Darkness laid upon the land by you know who. This is where the game starts you off, an Abandoned Castle, where you are heckled by a gay redhead leather fetishist with a demon and given, as your first monster, a fairy.
Yes, a fairy. With a huge chunk of pink crystal coming out its ass. This game is completely secure in its sexuality. Really.
From there you grind through wave after wave of monsters and attempt to not fall asleep in the empty hallways as you worm your way towards the boss room, nuke it righteously with any of the half-dozen or so types of weapons you can create, rinse repeat in the other huge eleven maps the game has in store for you.
One thing I will give this game: it is goddamn immense. It's not necessarily intricate in terms of level design, but it is immense and requires a good time commitment to find everything. There are enough stuck doors and Legend of Zelda-esque "cracked walls" that you'll have to backtrack at least once after getting all your Innocent Devils (discussed later). Hidden passageways, stuck gates, and truly beautiful landscape makes the journey fun to look at while you grind evil's minions into sploches of blood on that pretty landscape.
The other level of immensity is in the gameplay itself, or rather, the semi optional level involving your Innocent Devils (think gothier, more awesome Pokemon with pink crystals) and your weapon selection. Your Pokedevils go through some radical changes depending on what kind of weapons you use; for example, if you mix up your weapon selection you can end up with one type of monster, but if you stick to only swords you end up with another. It usually behooves you to change up your weapon selection on occasion so you can get the righteously powerful and awesome looking monsters. Luckily for you, not only are you given a progression chart, your monsters also lay eggs (pardon, "devil shards") so if you screw up and make a garbage monster you don't like, you're free and in fact encouraged to make a new one (monsters produced from Devil Shards inherit a small percent, around 10%, of the stats of the parent at the time the shard was produced).
The forces of evil also apparently are artisans with plenty of spare materials, so every time you kill something you have a chance of getting some materials to build and improve your weapons. With the advent of the Stealing system, you are forced to steal some materials from monsters rather than just kill them (must be they're too fragile and get busted when the blood splatters on everything). This leads either into the best and most challenging part of the game, or simply the most irritating. In short, half the time you play the game, you're likely to be fixing up new weapons and making your monsters badass.
The gameplay and controls are fluid even if the energy level and immerseion are a bit choppy at best. Because the levels are so huge and the weapon system requires serious attention to stealing and completionist backtracking, you can get lost and distracted very easily from the actual story; in contrast, the boss battles become so frenetic that the huge beautiful sprawling levels become dull in comparison. It feels more like a RPG than it is an action game given this "burst and slowdown" timing, though the story is a bit weaksauce from what I've seen; maybe it gets better later on but the characters are very similar to others in the series, all of which were better drawn and characterized than Hector and co.
Overall, it has been a good experience and I do recommend the game, but only if you don't mind flaming homosexuality and have a large time commitment you can use towards grinding bits of steel out of skeletons.
Controls: 9/10
Replayability: 9/10
Graphics: 8.5/10
Music: 8.5/10
Storyline: 7/10
Characters: 7/10
OVERALL: 8/10
For people who know nothing about the Narnia books, C.S. Lewis wrote this series as a child-centered Lord Of The Rings-esque adventure into a magic wardrobe linking WWII London to a frozen fantasy land called Narnia. The littlest of the children, hyperactive too-cute-for-words do-gooder Lucy, stumbles past the fur coats within the wardrobe and into a frosty forest while looking for a place to hide during Hide and Seek. After telling her siblings, sarcastic liar Edmund, logical yet remarkably worthless Susan, and cliche blond eldest brother Peter, of the closet, they treat her like she's making the whole thing up until they all are dragged through the magic of storyline convenience into the forest and shown their destiny: to defeat the ice queen and rule the land as the prophecised Sons of Adam and Daughters of Eve.
Sounds easy enough right? 'Specially when you see the size of the anthropomorphic army that Liam Neeson has raised for the lil' brats. Holy crap that's a lot of digital monsters.
Anyway, typical "we aren't the heroes you're looking for" nonsense follows, as well as the amazingly obvious black sheep Edmund fucking everyone over for most of the movie, only later to be redeemed by the sacrifice of Liam Neeson in equally blindingly obvious fashion (gee, I bet he wishes he coulda done that in Star Wars eh? OH WAIT HE DID. Crazy Liam Neeson. /digress). EPIC CLASH OF SWORDS AND NEAR MISSES! STORYLINE DEATH! HAPPY ENDING (with a really annoying twist)! The end.
I was not disappointed in terms of the graphical epicness of the movie, I was disappointed in the flatness of the characters. Holy crap, it looks nice, it's all pretty shiny and must have taken some animators a hell of a lot of time to finish.
But that does not excuse how horrifically flat the four main protagonists were. They were boring and only vaguely changed through their experiences. They were picked because they were the right ages and because they looked like they could be siblings. Simply put, these four should not have been cast or even given a second callback. Liam Neeson is entertaining as always, Micheal Madsen as the alpha wolf is delightfully hateful and gravely as always, and the woman who plays the ice queen is at home in the maniacal and overdramatic villaness role. These people and the others involved definately loved every single second of their parts. The children did not. They seemed more afraid, perhaps, overwhelmed to the point of becoming wooden and static. I suppose I can't blame them as this is probably going to be the one thing they'll be remembered for forever, but it doesn't help the movie at all.
Overall, good movie, great graphics and A list support characters, but I can't stand the smarmy kids. Try again, filmmakers.
Sets/Landscapes: 9/10
Special Effects: 10/10
Actors/Voice Acting: 9/10 for everyone but the kids, 5/10 for the kids
Storyline: 7.5/10
Characters: 9/10 for everyone but the kids, 5/10 for the kids
Overall: 8/10 if this was a regular movie, but 7.5/10 cause of the kids. Damn kids get offa my lawn!
Word.
Yeah I'm full of opinions. Some of which actually matter. I'll put up more as I come up with them.
In the same vein as the much heralded Symphony of the Night, you take control of the Devil Forgemaster (and Alucard wannabe) Hector. Once gifted with the ability to "forge" and control demons, he has since given up the skill and his job as one of Dracula's many personal bitches. Due to nepotism and intrigue, he is forced by his rival and achingly obvious yaoi bait Isaac to take up his abilities again to break the Curse of Darkness laid upon the land by you know who. This is where the game starts you off, an Abandoned Castle, where you are heckled by a gay redhead leather fetishist with a demon and given, as your first monster, a fairy.
Yes, a fairy. With a huge chunk of pink crystal coming out its ass. This game is completely secure in its sexuality. Really.
From there you grind through wave after wave of monsters and attempt to not fall asleep in the empty hallways as you worm your way towards the boss room, nuke it righteously with any of the half-dozen or so types of weapons you can create, rinse repeat in the other huge eleven maps the game has in store for you.
One thing I will give this game: it is goddamn immense. It's not necessarily intricate in terms of level design, but it is immense and requires a good time commitment to find everything. There are enough stuck doors and Legend of Zelda-esque "cracked walls" that you'll have to backtrack at least once after getting all your Innocent Devils (discussed later). Hidden passageways, stuck gates, and truly beautiful landscape makes the journey fun to look at while you grind evil's minions into sploches of blood on that pretty landscape.
The other level of immensity is in the gameplay itself, or rather, the semi optional level involving your Innocent Devils (think gothier, more awesome Pokemon with pink crystals) and your weapon selection. Your Pokedevils go through some radical changes depending on what kind of weapons you use; for example, if you mix up your weapon selection you can end up with one type of monster, but if you stick to only swords you end up with another. It usually behooves you to change up your weapon selection on occasion so you can get the righteously powerful and awesome looking monsters. Luckily for you, not only are you given a progression chart, your monsters also lay eggs (pardon, "devil shards") so if you screw up and make a garbage monster you don't like, you're free and in fact encouraged to make a new one (monsters produced from Devil Shards inherit a small percent, around 10%, of the stats of the parent at the time the shard was produced).
The forces of evil also apparently are artisans with plenty of spare materials, so every time you kill something you have a chance of getting some materials to build and improve your weapons. With the advent of the Stealing system, you are forced to steal some materials from monsters rather than just kill them (must be they're too fragile and get busted when the blood splatters on everything). This leads either into the best and most challenging part of the game, or simply the most irritating. In short, half the time you play the game, you're likely to be fixing up new weapons and making your monsters badass.
The gameplay and controls are fluid even if the energy level and immerseion are a bit choppy at best. Because the levels are so huge and the weapon system requires serious attention to stealing and completionist backtracking, you can get lost and distracted very easily from the actual story; in contrast, the boss battles become so frenetic that the huge beautiful sprawling levels become dull in comparison. It feels more like a RPG than it is an action game given this "burst and slowdown" timing, though the story is a bit weaksauce from what I've seen; maybe it gets better later on but the characters are very similar to others in the series, all of which were better drawn and characterized than Hector and co.
Overall, it has been a good experience and I do recommend the game, but only if you don't mind flaming homosexuality and have a large time commitment you can use towards grinding bits of steel out of skeletons.
Controls: 9/10
Replayability: 9/10
Graphics: 8.5/10
Music: 8.5/10
Storyline: 7/10
Characters: 7/10
OVERALL: 8/10
For people who know nothing about the Narnia books, C.S. Lewis wrote this series as a child-centered Lord Of The Rings-esque adventure into a magic wardrobe linking WWII London to a frozen fantasy land called Narnia. The littlest of the children, hyperactive too-cute-for-words do-gooder Lucy, stumbles past the fur coats within the wardrobe and into a frosty forest while looking for a place to hide during Hide and Seek. After telling her siblings, sarcastic liar Edmund, logical yet remarkably worthless Susan, and cliche blond eldest brother Peter, of the closet, they treat her like she's making the whole thing up until they all are dragged through the magic of storyline convenience into the forest and shown their destiny: to defeat the ice queen and rule the land as the prophecised Sons of Adam and Daughters of Eve.
Sounds easy enough right? 'Specially when you see the size of the anthropomorphic army that Liam Neeson has raised for the lil' brats. Holy crap that's a lot of digital monsters.
Anyway, typical "we aren't the heroes you're looking for" nonsense follows, as well as the amazingly obvious black sheep Edmund fucking everyone over for most of the movie, only later to be redeemed by the sacrifice of Liam Neeson in equally blindingly obvious fashion (gee, I bet he wishes he coulda done that in Star Wars eh? OH WAIT HE DID. Crazy Liam Neeson. /digress). EPIC CLASH OF SWORDS AND NEAR MISSES! STORYLINE DEATH! HAPPY ENDING (with a really annoying twist)! The end.
I was not disappointed in terms of the graphical epicness of the movie, I was disappointed in the flatness of the characters. Holy crap, it looks nice, it's all pretty shiny and must have taken some animators a hell of a lot of time to finish.
But that does not excuse how horrifically flat the four main protagonists were. They were boring and only vaguely changed through their experiences. They were picked because they were the right ages and because they looked like they could be siblings. Simply put, these four should not have been cast or even given a second callback. Liam Neeson is entertaining as always, Micheal Madsen as the alpha wolf is delightfully hateful and gravely as always, and the woman who plays the ice queen is at home in the maniacal and overdramatic villaness role. These people and the others involved definately loved every single second of their parts. The children did not. They seemed more afraid, perhaps, overwhelmed to the point of becoming wooden and static. I suppose I can't blame them as this is probably going to be the one thing they'll be remembered for forever, but it doesn't help the movie at all.
Overall, good movie, great graphics and A list support characters, but I can't stand the smarmy kids. Try again, filmmakers.
Sets/Landscapes: 9/10
Special Effects: 10/10
Actors/Voice Acting: 9/10 for everyone but the kids, 5/10 for the kids
Storyline: 7.5/10
Characters: 9/10 for everyone but the kids, 5/10 for the kids
Overall: 8/10 if this was a regular movie, but 7.5/10 cause of the kids. Damn kids get offa my lawn!
Word.
Yeah I'm full of opinions. Some of which actually matter. I'll put up more as I come up with them.