August 25 - August 29

Section: 

While this final week of August offers no significant big budget stand out title like many of the coming weeks will, the release list of the next few days is actually quite strong. There may not be much here that you will have likely lusted after for months, but several titles strike me as intriguing at the very least.

Most notable, EA Sports brings you pretty much all the Tiger Woods you'll be seeing the rest of the year. Though it is both unfortunate and doubtful that they've included a mode where you still manage to win a major tournament on wounded knee before dropping out for the rest of the season leaving people with no reasonable excuse for watching golf on television, this is still a reliable renter year after year. PS3 fans have a new Disgaea game. The Sims train keeps rolling along with the Apartment Life expansion, which I can only assume will be followed by a tenement housing and sub-prime mortgage crisis expansion. The DS offers more Harvest Moon fun, and the Wii offers some hastily slapped together Mario sports title.

But, our game of the week is Tales of Vesperia for the Xbox 360. I think it's fair to say that one of the sleeper surprises of this console generation is the 360's emergence as a strong role playing console. This distinction, which once seemed the inapproachable domain of Sony exclusively, was solidified early this year by the heist of Final Fantasy XIII's release on the Microsoft system. Among the many prognositcations going into this console cycle, I doubt serious that many people saw this one coming. I sure didn't.

PC
- futureU: The Prep Game for SAT
- GTR Evolution
- Prison Tycoon 4: SuperMax
- The Sims 2 Apartment Life Expansion Pack

PS2
- Ferrari Challenge Trofeo Pirelli
- Tiger Woods PGA Tour 09

PSP
- N+
- Tiger Woods PGA Tour 09

DS
- Digimon World Championship
- Ferrari Challenge Trofeo Pirelli
- From the Abyss
- Harvest Moon DS: Island of Happiness
- MLB Power Pros 2009
- My Chinese Coach
- N+
- PictoImage
- The Sims 2 Apartment Pets

Xbox 360
- Tales of Vesperia
- Tiger Woods PGA Tour 09

PS3
- Disgaea 3: Absence of Justice
- Ferrari Challenge Trofeo Pirelli
- Tiger Woods PGA Tour 09
- Vampire Rain: Altered Species

Wii

- Ferrari Challenge Trofeo Pirelli
- Freddi Fish: Kelp Seed Mystery
- Mario Super Sluggers
- Pajama Sam: Don't Fear the Dark
- Rebel Raiders: Operation Nighthawk
- Spy Fox: Dry Cereal
- Tiger Woods PGA Tour 09 All-Play

Comments

Finally, a Tales game on Xbox 360... I'll be picking it up!

I was almost excited to see a new RPG on the 360, then I realized it was a JRPG. I propose we have to affix a scarlet J in front of all JRPGs from now on so we can tell the difference.

I have my copy pre-ordered.

Oh wait N+ is coming out too? Why did this have to happen the week school starts?!

Luckily there are a lot of good games out / coming out for the PC, else I'd have to be very sad that the 360 passed the PS3 as the RPG console a long time ago.

As it is I can play some of the 360 games on the PC, and never (hardly ever) mind that some RPGs are forever out of my reach. Note this is because I'm too cheap to buy a 360 right now, not out of fanboyism.

Tiger Woods on 360. C'mon folks, let's get a few foursomes going!

Mystic Violet wrote:

I have my copy pre-ordered.

Oh wait N+ is coming out too? Why did this have to happen the week school starts?!

N+ is totally on my Christmas wishlist for this year. I played the daylights out of the flash version (I got the standalone copy so I could play it on my laptop without internet access). The Missus likes it too, but she feels bad for the ninja dude every time he gets blown to smithereens, which then get blown to further smithereens, and so on.

I can feel the age-old tug of picking up CURE potions and having melodramatic adventures.

JRPGs, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. I will never finish you.

The GFW crew had some pretty hilarious comments on Prison Tycoon in their latest episode. Played a bit of Tales of Vesperia at Comic-Con, enjoyed the combat system so I might give it a try.

PyromanFO wrote:

I propose we have to affix a scarlet J in front of all JRPGs from now on so we can tell the difference.

We used to have one:

IMAGE(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/d/da/Wdlogo.gif)

I guess we need a redesign...

Certis wrote:

JRPGs, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. I will never finish you.

This quote goes really well with the apparent age of most JRPG heroines.

Have to say, I'm probably more interested in Disgaea 3 (although I never finished the first one and never played the second I really enjoyed what I *did* play of it. Plus - zombie penguins).

That said, I'll probably give this "tales" game a try if it turns out to be reasonably good. Even though I can scarcely bring myself to call these games RPG's....

Also...

- Freddi Fish: Kelp Seed Mystery
- Pajama Sam: Don't Fear the Dark
- Spy Fox: Dry Cereal

0_o

WipEout wrote:
PyromanFO wrote:

I propose we have to affix a scarlet J in front of all JRPGs from now on so we can tell the difference.

We used to have one:

IMAGE(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/d/da/Wdlogo.gif)

I guess we need a redesign...

To Working Designs' credit, their translations were pretty good at making the characters more accessible to western audiences. (Although I've learned to embrace the scarlet "J" and look forward to Vesperia almost as much as Infinite Undiscovery.)

The current closest equivalent would definitely have to be Atlus, huh?

I think my biggest problem with JRPGs is that I honestly can't tell what differentiates one from the other. I used to like them, I swear - but Bioware and Bethesda just ruined them for me.

That being said, i'm stoked for N+. Perfect PSP game.

So, Prison Tycoon just got its 4th installment. That's one more than my beloved Rollercoaster Tycoon. Is it really that great a franchise? Anyone played any installment? Any opinions? I mean, it looks like Final Fantasy of tycoon games.

This week is pretty good for the Wallet. Nothing I'm even remotely interested in except Tales but that's more a game my girlfriend would buy.

JRPGs I buy inevitably end up in the pile

Certis wrote:

I can feel the age-old tug of picking up CURE potions and having melodramatic adventures.

JRPGs, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. I will never finish you.

But can you quit them?

Tales is the reason I went with a 360 instead of a PS3. Not soley, but the main reason is the JRPGs. I like them, my girlfriend likes them, and they are a good kind of game that it's almost as fun to just watch. Watching my girlfriend kick all kinds of ass on Kingdom Hearts is still fun. And I've beaten I and II over 20 times. (JRPG, with amazingly well done disney characters, and the combat system is a blast.)

Really, I hope that KH3 comes out for the 360 as well. Also: Rock Band 2.

I am saddened by not being able to get Disgaea 3 for awhile. But I haven't even beaten it on the PSP yet. Besides, I know someone that'll pick it up soon.

stevenmack wrote:

Also...

- Freddi Fish: Kelp Seed Mystery
- Pajama Sam: Don't Fear the Dark
- Spy Fox: Dry Cereal

0_o

All those old Humongous Entertainment adventures were some of the best kids (6-12 years old or so) games produced, in my opinion. I was sorry a few years back when HE stopped doing these and only kept doing the Backyard Sports games. The HE adventure games had real replay value, too, since they had a randomly selected set of tasks/objects (from a small set) needed to get to the end.

Hopefully their ports to the Wii haven't lost any of their charm and replayability.

Nyles wrote:
Certis wrote:

JRPGs, light of my life, fire of my loins. My sin, my soul. I will never finish you.

This quote goes really well with the apparent age of most JRPG heroines.

LOL, that is priceless.

I'm debating on this one, and I was wondering what peoples impressions are? Does the game have the standard JRPG poorly written story, childish dialogue, and with annoying kids saving the day? I know that this is probably just that, but I keep hoping one day will get a mature JRPG.

Slytin wrote:

I'm debating on this one, and I was wondering what peoples impressions are? Does the game have the standard JRPG poorly written story, childish dialogue, and with annoying kids saving the day? I know that this is probably just that, but I keep hoping one day will get a mature JRPG.

You should try Lost Odyssey then. There's only two kids and the rest are adults, and not adults who look like kids. 1000 year old adults. The story is good, while not being great, and the gameplay is fun.