A Beat-Em-Up Filled With References Everywhere... The Scott Pilgrim vs. The World: The Game Review (PSN)

Note - Videos are from the XBLA version, but the PSN version looks identical if you wanna compare.

When you have a movie coming out that is filled with video game references or reminds yourself of your gaming past time, it sounds pretty cool in concept. That is the case with Scott Pilgrim vs. The World starring Michael Cera as he dates Ramona, but he has to deal with her seven exes. All of this seems like a cool video game as well as Ubisoft Montreal decided make an old-school beat-em-up revolving this franchise. Being a beat-em-up of the glory days of the genre really fits the description well with Scott Pilgrim reminding you of those games when they were cool from River City Ransom, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and Double Dragon. Like the comic book and movie, this game is filled with video game references everywhere with the games you love in the old days as even some of the levels themselves remind you of those beat-em-ups as well. Despite all that fanservice to games in general, does the Scott Pilgrim game live up to those games' legacy? The answer to that yes even though there are still flaws that prevent it from becoming something special.

There are four characters to choose from with Scott, Stills, Kim, and Ramona as the select screen is straight up Super Mario Bros. 2 on the NES with the curtains and more. There is an overworld screen after that refers to the Mario games with pipes and multiple paths. Since there are seven exes to beat up, there are well, seven levels to traverse through, but it is no easy task especially alone. As an old-school beat-em-up, this game is clearly designed for up to four players at once to beat up the opposition and it can be done locally, but not online unfortunately, which is the game's biggest setback. I am not sure what the thought process was behind the developers deciding to not have online co-op, but you do have to consider trying to release the game in time for the movie's release and you also risk the potential of lag issues too especially with a game like this where chaos can be everywhere. However, if you do have three more friends locally to join along, then the game is a total blast.

River City Ransom was pretty much the big template behind the Scott Pilgrim game from the enemy design, shops to buy supplies and upgraded stats since there is a level up system for the characters gaining new moves as they gain more XP by beating up more enemies along with increasing your strength, defense, speed, etc. The controls are pretty simple as expected with light and heavy attacks, special moves like the Streets of Rage games, picking up various weapons, and so on. While not as fluid as the old-school beat-em-ups, Scott Pilgrim's gameplay is still solid. If playing solo, expect yourself to grind at previous stages if you're stuck at a certain point because you're not strong enough to go till to the end of the level where a boss fight awaits because this game is indeed tough alone even on the easiest difficulty. There are no checkpoints in the stages, so a game over after losing all your lives will result in restarting a stage from the beginning, but at least your stats will be saved which makes this game somewhat of a grind and the repetition does kick in. If playing with multiple people, you can revive fallen teammates if they lose health and you better so quickly before they lose a life. Also sticking to the beat-em-up tradition, the game is not that long to beat which is several hours solo, but obviously less than that with more players around.

Other than being an old-school beat-em-up, what truly stands out with Scott Pilgrim vs. The World: The Game is the graphics and sound. Graphically, the game looks very stylish as if you are playing a modernized 16-bit game in the current generation of consoles. The art on the characters, backgrounds, look pretty neat fitting to the retro look as well as setup scenes to the levels and boss fights. However, there are some little bugs where the game can hitch up for a bit as it takes a little longer to load up your status and move list when the overworld screen or the music doesn't kick in at the right time. Even the little things can disrupt a special experience from truly shinning as you just wish the execution was perfect on the developers' end. The soundtrack though is amazing blending in modern and 8-bit sounds together into one cohesive piece and another reason why you feel like you're in the 90s playing this game at some arcade. There are no voice overs, which is a good thing even though it is still a licensed game, as the game does do a good job of telling the straightforward story throughout.

For ten dollars, Scott Pilgrim vs. The World: The Game is a worthy pick up if you love old-school gaming especially beat-em-ups like River City Ransom and Double Dragon. The gameplay is solid even though it might be slow at times, but that's probably the case when you're starting to level up a character as stats will increase by gaining levels and buying CDs, books, and other goodies. The shining point of the game is living up the franchise's source material and references to video games in general from Mario, Mega Man, and more as the fanservice is everywhere even to the hidden material such as similar codes to those games unlocking something similar to when you input them back in the day. It also looks great as a stylish beat-em-up that looks like you were playing a game in the 90s and the soundtrack fits along that description as well. The lack of online co-op and little bugs prevent this game from perfection, but if you have local friends along for the ride, then you would enjoy more out of the game than playing it alone grinding it out with certain characters to make them become stronger. All in all, you feel like you're playing a love letter to gaming culture as a whole with Scott Pilgrim vs. The World: The Game.

Score = 8/10

Pros:

• Solid beat-em-up gameplay
• Lives to the franchise's source material from the story to the presentation
• Amazing soundtrack mixing in modern and 8-bit sounds
• More fun with three more players into the mix

Cons:

• No online co-op
• Little bugs disrupt the experience
• Can be difficult alone, which makes the game a grind to level up characters
• Since the game can be a grind at tough moments, repetition does kick in

BioShock goes Infinite...

Irrational Games returns to the BioShock franchise announcing BioShock Infinite today in an anticipated reveal for Xbox 360, Playstation 3, and PC. Even though they still got X-COM coming out this fall (I think they're developing X-COM), this looks like their next game and its somewhat surprising they are coming back to a franchise they started yet others are wandering why BioShock again by these guys? Leave it to Ken Levine and his crew to take things to the next level in the franchise ditching away Rapture and coming up with a completely new setting, which is in case for this game, the skies with a floating city. The reveal trailer is pretty crazy stuff showing off what can we possibly expect with this next entry in the successful franchise even though BioShock 2 by 2K Marin didn't really do that well (I didn't play it). I do expect Irrational to go crazy again with an epic story filled with lore and secrets just like the first game and hopefully take moral choices to another level if they are leaning towards that position again. BioShock Infinite is still a long ways off coming out in 2012, but I'm already excited for it.

Here's a Shacknews preview for more stuff...

PSN Demo Showcase for 8/11/10 (The Mafia II Edition)

This time on the PSN Demo Showcase features a long-awaited sequel to one of the best open-ended action games ever... (The Mafia II video is NSFW for language and violence)

Mafia II will finally be out at the end of the month and so far its living up to be a satisfying sequel to the critically acclaimed original. Even though I didn't play the first Mafia, playing this demo does get a little taste of what the mafia is really like and it won't have any Grand Theft Auto-like shenanigans. The demo is pretty much one simple mission of driving and then a shootout sequence in a distillery. The driving is what you expect out of a game like this with vehicles handling like the good old mafia days. The shooting controls may take a little time to get used to if you have been playing first person shooters on the PS3 as aim and fire are on the L2 and R2 triggers instead of L1 and R1, but they are changed according to your preference. The cover-based shooting does work for the most part, but going guns-blazing without a plan of sorts will get you killed even though there is a health regeneration system. Vito can die in a snap if caught in a difficult situation especially in a mission like the demo above. Graphically, Mafia II looks pretty good as I didn't notice any glaring issues as some people would compared to other versions of the demo. I enjoyed my time with Mafia II as it will be worth a purchase if you love open-ended action games with a deep story.

Been in a La Roux mood lately...

For the past day, I have been in a La Roux mood because its finally time their songs reach on to other outlets like Rock Band with "Bulletproof" now out for download. This is another song I would download in a heartbeat if I still had the game and rock it like no other. There's also an appearance of "In For the Kill" (Skream Let's Get Ravey Remix) during the closing credits of last night's episode of Entourage and it was a fitting song to end on if you seen it.

My Brief Hands-On Experience with King of Fighters XIII...

King of Fighters XIII has been out at Arcade Infinity for about a month already and I was only able to play it three times, but spent more time watching better players than me do work. Once you see the game in action at first glance, it is a beautiful looking 2D fighting game with great backgrounds and sprites for the characters. KOF XII was a start of a new beginning for the franchise and established some foundations like the graphics style seen above while retaining that KOF flavor we have seen over the years with the gameplay. The basics were there for the fighting, but it just needed a bit more to be a deeper fighting game again, which KOF XIII improved on significantly. In addition, the roster got better adding in franchise favorites that were missing in XII ranging from Yuri, Mai, K', Kula, and more. In a nutshell, King of Fighters XIII is what XII could of been, but it looks like SNK Playmore needed a game to reboot things over before going crazy again, which is the case here.

In my playtime with KOF XIII, I haven't grasped some of the newer gameplay additions yet to the game since XII as I relied on tactics I knew from that game rocking my team of Ash, Kim, and Andy. Speaking of Ash, there is actually a story this time around with XIII revolving around her as some evil version of her is the last boss of the game and in typical KOF/SNK fashion, she is tough to defeat being cheap like no other. Along with everything from KOF XII other than the removal of the gimmicky critical counter system, KOF XIII's core fighting remains the same adding in EX special moves a la Street Fighter IV where you both press both punches and kicks along with the direction to execute. Super specials remain the same, but the dream-like supers from XI make a return that sort of remind you of the ultras seen in SF4 even though not as climatic. There is also a drive cancel-like maneuver when you cancel a special move into another special move such as Ash's Flash Kick-like special to her charging hand as an example. The guard gauge is pretty self-explanatory, but also characters enable a white glow to continue combos almost like custom combos seen in Street Fighter, but for a short time. These combos are basically the big damage ones similar to critical counter combos in XII. In traditional KOF fashion, execution is still key especially there are motions for certain moves that are fairly uncommon for the casual fighting game player, but if you know SNK fighting games, you should be used to this by now.

So far, I have been enjoying King of Fighters XIII despite my limited time with it at the arcade. Hopefully, I can come by that place and play around with it more learning the new stuff other than getting owned by players that are already good at the game as seen in the videos. If so, maybe a more detailed hands-on blog will come soon if I spend more time with the game even though I'm still at Arcade Infinity playing Super Street Fighter IV mostly when I'm there. I think XIII is a worthy addition to the franchise and way better than XII easily, so I hope more people get into the game more by the time it comes out on consoles soon as the fighting is more deeper now that SNK Playmore is able to get the ball rolling after how bare-bones XII was. In the meantime, enjoy the videos of high-level gameplay demonstrating the new additions.

Oh Hey... COD Black Ops MP Footage!

So you might be wandering why I would still post Call of Duty stuff on this blog considering I don't really play shooters that much anymore, but here is the new footage of Black Ops multiplayer with a full reveal on September 1. Honestly, I still don't own a copy of Modern Warfare 2 to this day and its arguably one of my biggest gaming regrets of the past year, but I don't mind that moving on to the whole Street Fighter thing. I still played the demo that finally came out on the Playstation Store last week and enjoyed it, but it didn't really make me wanna go back to the shooting business that bad. Despite my current feelings about the FPS genre, Black Ops still looks pretty good retaining that Call of Duty flavor gamers love now and looks like Treyarch is adding some replay system as well. I also recently watched GameTrailers' latest Bonus Round talking about the big fall shooters and it seems like they are still praising Black Ops despite possibilities of franchise fatigue by serious shooter fans. Especially on the 360, it might be hard for those guys of whether to stick with Black Ops or Halo: Reach this fall as the shooter to play and get, but knowing gamers, we would just buy both because both shooters offer different experiences. In the meantime, Black Ops will be out this November and hoping to repeat the same success as Modern Warfare 2 had, but I doubt it.

The Boys are Back and I Can't Wait!!! Bring on Jackass 3D!

Since I watched the first two movies, the show a lot, and bought some of the DVDs, I'm pretty excited for Jackass 3D. Hopefully, a 3D movie that will be truly worth it rather than some epic action movie. There is nothing much I can say other than the boys are back and we'll see what crazy shenanigans they pull off this time.

Also, high five!!!