Released: 1997 Genre: Racing Rating: ****1/4 stars
Best Moment: I love the intro video. The graphics still look great now, 20 years later, and I just loved watching it then and even now.
Ah, what a game Gran Turismo was. To be honest, I've not played many of the GT games in the series but overall I do still think they're probably the best racing games around, when it comes to the serious racing games anyway. And of course, as the series has gone on the graphics have just been stunning - every time a Gran Turismo game comes out they just look more and more realistic and it's just insane. Sure, looking back now on the first Gran Turismo game the graphics do look relatively poor, but I do remember back in the day I was blown away by how incredible the graphics looked at the time. And I have that same feeling every time. As a racing game Gran Turismo 1 is still phenomenal, and I still play it once in a blue moon now. I love the soundtrack, it's one of my favourite soundtracks because there's some fantastic songs by Feeder on this game. I love playing Simulation Mode and trying to win the Championships. The driving licenses are super tough though! But yes, overall, Gran Turismo is just simply an incredible game and I love it.
#72: "Dragula" - Rob Zombie Release Date: 1998 Director: Rob Zombie Fun Fact:
The song is featured in LOADS of soundtracks, including the films The Matrix and Paranomal Activity 4, and the video games Twisted Metal, Gran Turismo, Sled Storm!
Haha, this video is so bad and so good at the same time! It's, in a nutshell, a fucked up video. Fucked up yet typical Rob Zombie at the same time. As always with Mr Zombie, the video and song itself has loads of old horror film references, weird imagery and monsters throughout, and as always, it features a hot dancer. In a nutshell, that's what happens in the video! Rob Zombie pretends to drive his "Dragula" car with the monsters in the back and it's just lots of fun and lots of weird but it's just a fantastic video, maybe not for everyone but certainly for me!
Here's the video for your enjoyment!
Click here to see #71 on the list or here for #73!
Overall,
Final Fantasy 13 is a great game with a complex yet rewarding storyline and an awesome battle system.
Final Fantasy XIII was released nearly two years ago here in
the UK, in March 2010, and was released on both the Xbox 360 and the
Playstation 3. It is naturally, the thirteenth major chapter in the critically
and commercially successful Final Fantasy series. The game’s official sequel,
Final Fantasy XIII-2, is to be released next month.
Just in case you’re not too familiar with the series, Final
Fantasy games have been released since 1987, twenty five years ago, and are a
set of RPG games that have for long periods of time become the most influential
and widely celebrated role playing games of all time. Many recurring themes in
the series are the using of magic and summoning monsters, the use of airships,
travelling across a world, characters dealing with love or loss, characters
defying the powers of fate, religion or apocalyptic circumstances and the
inclusion of chocobos and moogles, two creatures the game series has made
popular. The highest point in the series was arguably the release of Final
Fantasy VII in 1997, which was released on the Playstation, which was met to
universal acclaim and has sold more than any other game in the series, at over 10
million copies and is only second to Gran Turismo on the console. Since then
the sales and reception of the Final Fantasy series has changed; some games
sold more than others and some games were better received. Final Fantasy XI
marks the first online RPG in the series, and was followed up by last year’s
release of Final Fantasy XIV.
Final Fantasy XIII follows Final Fantasy XII (that being
said, none of the major games are connected officially and are set in their own
styles and game universes), which was met with a decent response, with the main
criticism coming from the fact that the world was expanded across an immense
terrain with in some cases very little linear direction and large amounts of
battles followed by short spurts of storyline progression. What did Square-Enix
do with Final Fantasy XIII in response to these criticisms?
"He's behind you!" Ah... I love pantomimes.
FF13 (I’ll now abbreviate to numerals) in comparison to FF12
does exactly the opposite in terms of the world terrain and linearity. The game
is linear, to the point that you cannot travel back to previous areas at all,
nor is there varied places to explore in each area. The game, it feels, almost
holds your hand throughout your journey, which is completely different to FF12,
a world where you can go to so many areas so early in the game, even if the
storylines don’t require you to go there. FF12 and FF13 are complete opposites
in terms of how the rails of the story go; FF13 glues your hands to the rail
where as FF12 shatters the rail completely.
Moving onto the story, before I explain what the plot is,
I’d like to just say that the storyline is very confusing and hard to follow
first time round. It doesn’t help when you’ve entered a game in a fantasy world
that uses three different terms in fal’Cie, l’Cie and Cie’th all the time and
you barely have time to digest the terms and learn their meanings. It confuses
the plot from the off and it makes the story hard to follow at times, unless
you click straight away, something I personally didn’t do on my first run. The
second run through the game was a lot easier mind, and the story on this run
was much better to follow.
The story follows the theme of fate, and how these six
playable characters are chosen as servants of the fal’Cie, the game’s
equivalent of gods, to complete a task (called a ‘focus’) to destroy the world,
and how if they fail in their task, they’ll turn into grotesque monsters
(‘called Cie’th’). If they succeed and complete their ‘focus’ their fate is
potentially just as bad, as they will be granted crystal stasis, for as long as
eternity. The name given to these servants is the ‘l’Cie’, and they are capable
of using magic, and therefore the general citizens of the land of Cocoon are
afraid of them. It’s a harsh fate that is given to these six individuals, and
it takes them all on an emotional journey of deciding to give up on their task,
to embrace their task, to run away from it and try to shake it off, or try
even, defying it. It’s a great storyline once you understand it, one of the
best storylines in recent Final Fantasy titles in my opinion, and one I’ve
enjoyed more than any storyline since FF9.
These six characters naturally all have different
personalities and views on their situation. The main protagonist is Lightning,
who’s sister Serah became a ‘l’Cie’ before the game begins, and at the start of
the game turns into crystal stasis, having completing a focus that is unknown
in task. Lightning, an ex-soldier, is seen as a very harsh character whose upbringing makes her take a bold and frank approach to these dire circumstances and often has
the party she accompanies upset. Serah’s boyfriend, Snow, also is a main
character, and only met Lightning days before the game starts and had a frosty
reception from the ex-soldier, which leads to Snow often, get the brunt of Lightning’s
frustrations. Snow himself, sees himself as a hero of Cocoon and uses his large
stature and loud voice to carry him through his troubles of losing his
girlfriend to crystal stasis and his refusal to accept his focus of destroying his home land. In an attack at the beginning of the game, Snow attempts to save a load
of prisoned victims and the death of one particular person
has significance to the plot. That is because it’s the mother of Hope that
dies, who’s another main character. Hope has had a normal life on Cocoon and
lives a life where Cocoon’s political pressures brainwash most of the citizens,
especially when it comes to ‘l’Cie’ being hostile and basically, evil, so the
despair that Hope goes through not only to accidentally become what he was
thought to as evil, but to have to live with knowing who was arguably
responsible for his mother’s death in Snow, leads to an interesting extension
of the story.
The other three characters also have great story arcs; Sazh
is a father whose son had also become a ‘l’Cie’ prior to the game’s beginning
and has other issues too, but deals with them with a heavy heart but a happy
smile. Sazh is an excellent character, definitely my favourite, and is probably
the funniest character in the game. Fang is as forceful as Lightning is, yet
shows a softer side to her much more often than the main protagonist does. She
will do anything and everything she can to protect Vanille, who come from the
same location in game and have a history together. Vanille is the hit-or-miss character of
the game; she’s cute and bubbly and has all the traits of similar characters in
Rikku of FF10 and Selphie of FF8, so you’ll probably either love her or she’ll
probably either annoy you immensely. Vanille also operates as narrator of the
game, and her significance to the plot is discrete but ultimately vital when
the puzzle pieces all align. Without mentioning the main villain by name, the
main antagonist in FF13 is absolutely fantastic, a much better villain than
Vayne from FF12, and my favourite Final Fantasy villain since Kuja from FF9.
"RUN VANILLE! They're going to asplode!"
The game play has also dramatically changed this time round
in comparison to FF12. We once again return to the ATB (Active Time battle)
system used in most of the FF titles to date, but it’s a much-changed variation
of it. The best way to describe this system is that it’s like the one used in
FF10-2 but with much more action involved. So much action in fact, that you
only control what is called a ‘party leader’, meaning this is the first Final
Fantasy title where you can only control one character in battle, rather than
the entire party. A usually very competent AI controls the party in support.
Basically you can either use the battle system manually, where you can choose
your actions, or you can use the very useful “Autobattle” command, which
selects an option to you based on your enemy and any potential weaknesses, or
in turn, any healing you may require if you are of the party support systems.
But unlike a lot of the old traditional Final Fantasy titles, you have combos.
You choose your commands either manually or automatically, and you can build
your combo up to do multiple attacks in one go, in turn leading to a more
smooth and sophisticated system which also looks good to watch and play. Your
combos increase as the game goes on from two to six.
There’s more to add to this battle system. There’s something
called a “Paradigm” system, where you can chop and change battle formations
with different job titles. There are six different job titles, Commando, which
uses mainly physical attacks; Ravager, which uses damage dealing magic, a
Medic, which primarily uses healing magic, a Saboteur which weakens and debuffs
enemies, a Synergist that buffs allies and the Sentinel who absorbs damage and
protects allies. Towards the beginning of the game the characters start to
acquire access from one to three of these titles and towards the end the
characters can gain access to all six, although the three titles they acquire
later can only be strengthened minimally. When the game is complete, you have
full access to all six titles and can be strengthened fully. So the “Paradigm”
system means you can mix these job titles to work in your favour, for instance
if you have three characters you can have a Commando, a Medic and a Synergist;
one character physically attacking, one character healing and one character
strengthening the party. You can then change to a completely different system
with the “Paradigm” system, to a defensive one, for instance having two Medics
and a Sentinel gives you a lot of healing power and some defensive cover too.
The “Paradigm” system really does battle tactics in a Final Fantasy game in a
way that’s never been done before and I think it’s fantastic.
While you have these six job titles, naturally you have to
strengthen them and strengthen your characters. This game doesn’t use the
traditional levelling up system like most Final Fantasy games do, and instead
lets you increase your character’s stats on something called the “Crystarium”.
After battles characters earn Crystarium Points, or CP, and you use CP in the
Crystarium to activate nodes that give you character abilities or stat
enhancements, not too dissimilar to FF10. After certain segments throughout the
game, you gain access to another level of the Crystarium, further advancing
your characters abilities and stats. So you have the six job titles, if they’re
unlocked at that point in the game, that you can increase your characters stats
and abilities through, and in turn they make your characters stronger.
Final Fantasy XIII’s graphics are absolutely gorgeous. The
motion videos are as great looking as any game on the new generation consoles
and the landscapes of Gran Pulse, the other location other than Cocoon, in
FF13, are utterly stunning. The characters look good, the enemies look even
better and some of the bosses in this game, particularly the ones very
significant to the plot later on, look tremendous, particularly the designs
main antagonist. The sound in FF13 is as good as the series has always been and
while the quality of the soundtracks of recent Final Fantasy games don’t match
the amazing tracks of FF7 and FF9 in particular, FF13 does a decent job of
getting the mood set for each location and event that occurs. I once again,
prefer the soundtrack of FF13 than that of FF12, to compare.
FF13 on the whole is absolutely stunning, particularly Gran Pulse later on.
Now I’m sure you’ve noticed but I’ve compared FF12 and FF13
a lot in this review. There’s a simple reason why – they’re polar opposites of
each other. Final Fantasy 12 concentrates a lot on the exploration of the world
map, and lots and lots of battles. The story lacks in FF12 and its basic
premises is stretched across the incredibly large open maps and battles. FF13
does the opposite. The game is so linear, and the cut scenes and story is to
the brim in terms of depth and development. Once you get over the confusion of
the storyline you’ll find a great tale to be told here, and while the ending is
not as good as other titles in the series, you still get the satisfaction
expected from completing a Final Fantasy game. But the linearity of FF13 is a
problem. There are a lot of places in FF13 that you go to only once, and never
to return. In fact, the game is split into thirteen chapters and you can only
revisit the places in chapters 11 to 13. 3 out of 13 chapters are capable of
revisiting. That’s pretty poor. And like FF12, there’s very few mini games, if
any, in FF13 although there are one or two decent side quests. The game does
open up replayability by giving you full access to each character’s Crystarium at
the end of the game, for you to continue to develop your characters and take on
the biggest and baddest battles in these side quests. And I said, you’ll
probably enjoy playing this game a second or third time just because the
chances are you’ll appreciate the great story more.
It is for these reasons why overall, FF13 for me is a great
improvement on FF12, and my enjoyment of it is probably on par with FF10,
although for different reasons. What keeps FF13 together is it’s great
storyline and decent set of characters, combined with an ultimately unique
battle system. Sure the game is really linear but in the end, you can get over
that, especially as the areas that are revisitable are probably the most
strikingly good-looking places in the game. Another flaw would be that I don’t
like the fact that you only control one character in battle, I like taking a
party of characters into a battle and using all of them to beat my enemies. But
overall Final Fantasy 13 is a great game, with a complex yet rewarding storyline
and a great battle system. If you want my recommendation whether or not to buy
or rent it, well, look at the general consensus of what I and most other people
have said, and make your decision from there. If you can get over the game’s
flaws, you’ll find a brilliant game in FF13, its’ one of the best RPGs in
recent years.
Rating: ****1/2 stars
For the latest updates on my work, 'like' me on Facebook here!
Fancy listening to something new? Get this album; it’s worth
the risk.
The Eighties Matchbox B-Line Disaster (abbreviated now to
TEMBLD) returned this summer after a 6-year album hiatus with Blood and Fire.
One again this band has failed to captivate a wide audience, sales weren’t
great, they’ve barely been on the telly, and there’s been no advertisement. But
hey, TEMBLD never make it easy for themselves do they!
Before I get into the meat of this review let me give you a
quick biography of this band, if you have never heard of them. TEMBLD are a
gothabilly band, it’s probably the best bracket to place them in. They’re like
a fusion of The Birthday Party and The Cramps, revved up and spat out into
today’s indie music scene. They are a breath of fresh air, mixing roaring
vocals, chainsaw guitars and almost indecipherable lyrics. This band kicks
fucking ass. But unfortunately for them, their influences are coming up to
thirty years old (jeez it’s really been that long…) so they aren’t popular. It
also doesn’t help that they really publicise their great music talents and
inspirations, and love their hometown of Brighton too much and gig there very
often.
They have had a few chances to make the big time, they have
toured with some damn good bands, being System of a Down and The Queens of the
Stone Age (TQotSA). Hell, The Royal Society (their second album, released 2004)
was produced by a fine producer named Chris Goss, who has produced great albums
by TQotSA as mentioned before, Kyuss, Auf der Maur, The Cult, and U.N.K.L.E..
“Shaun of the Dead” actor Simon Pegg’s a big fan, and has “Mister Mental” in
said film. They are also on the Gran Turismo 4 soundtrack, a very popular video
game at the time, with “Psychosis Safari”.
Yet is hasn’t happened. It’s a double whammy of
disappointment, they don’t try hard enough to get their name out there, and not
enough people are interested in seeking them out. Shucks. But for the people
who are interested, they have now released attempt #3 at “making it”.
Unfortunately it seems this attempt isn’t third time lucky, but once again,
it’s a solid outing. That’s three in three in terms of great albums, but three
in three in terms of commercial failures. Some bands just don’t get their
break!
We start the album off with “Love Turns to Hate”, a song I
was quite familiar with beforehand, as I heard their demo of the track a good
four or five years ago. This is a crisper, more complete version of that demo,
and is also their staple single. If you have heard their material before, quite
simply, you will like this, the familiar sounding buzz guitars are evident
whilst singer Guy McKnight howls the chorus. It’s a great opener that sucks you
into the album straight away.
It’s only when we get to “Monsieur Cutts” when we get this
band’s old sound back. And what a song it is. If you have ever heard “Horse of
the Dog”, their first effort, and loved it, you’ll feel right at home with this
track. Guy screams the lyrics to a frenetic baseline; it’s a fantastic homage
to their old self. But then the album reverts back to the new sound. It doesn’t
take long until we get to “Man for All Seasons” which a bizarre way of
describing is a like a combination high school disco and moshing. It’s just a
sweet track, definitely my favourite on the album, it’s hard not to move to it,
which is something you don’t get often with this band. The album finishes with
“Are You Living”, which is another slower (I wouldn’t ever say the word slow
for any of their songs!) track by the band, which brings the album full circle
with their new style.
TEMBLD’s third effort is not like their second, or their
first. They have made three very different albums, each with a slight diverse
feel, but all as great as each other. You could argue that this is their most
polished album yet, it’s the closest the band have got to an album that should
please a casual audience, but this audience just don’t want to know them, which
is a shame. “Blood and Fire” is definitely worth a listen; all the tracks are
currently on Youtube for free (they might get taken down in the future), so
give a few songs a go. If you have never heard this band and fancy listening to
something new, please, support this band; they’re more than worth a punt. I’d
recommend this band to anyone who likes rockabilly, psychobilly, goth,
industrial, punk, indie, new wave, and the obscure 1980’s sounding bands. They
really do mix all the above genres brilliantly. Below is the video for the
video for the first single, “Love Turns to Hate” (please excuse Guy McKnight’s
Nick Cave moustache!) to start you off. Support this band!
Rating: ****1/4
Stand out tracks: Man for All Seasons, So Long Goodnight,
Monsieur Cutts
For the latest updates on my work, follow me on Facebook and Twitter here!
Ah, what a game Gran Turismo was. To be honest, I've not played many of the GT games in the series but overall I do still think they're probably the best racing games around, when it comes to the serious racing games anyway. And of course, as the series has gone on the graphics have just been stunning - every time a Gran Turismo game comes out they just look more and more realistic and it's just insane. Sure, looking back now on the first Gran Turismo game the graphics do look relatively poor, but I do remember back in the day I was blown away by how incredible the graphics looked at the time. And I have that same feeling every time.
