Review: Dragon Ball Z – Ultimate Tenkaichi (PS3)

I am what I have come to describe as an “informationaholic”. This does not mean that I read books while sipping coffee in public, but it does mean that I will spend hours on Wikipedia researching useless information to a very strenuous extent. My friends and coworkers have come to rely on me for all sorts of knowledge that nobody should ever, ever know so much about. Because of my attempts to recover from this addiction, I no longer research absolutely everything I talk about. As such, I did not know that Nintendo’s Art Style series actually began as a series of Japan-only GBA games that are abstract puzzle games. I did, however, know that I have rather enjoyed Art Style: Aquia on the DSi, and this peaked my interest to the Art Style games on the Wii’s WiiWare service. I downloaded the lot: Orbient, Cubello, and Rotohex. My lack of researching however served to backfire on me as Orbient and Rotohex are straight GBA ports with haphazard Wiimote control mapping. Given that the Wii is infinitely more capable than the DSi technically, I expected the games to be at least as beautiful as Aquia. I was mistaken. Imagine if you took a GBA game, made it really fuzzy, and then put it on your TV. I will admit that there is still some intrigue to be had in each game’s gameplay mechanic, but the games are just downright ugly. I suppose I expected more from something with “Art” in the title. Cubello however was not a GBA convert but rather an original title, or so I have read. I have not actually played it yet as a result of my distaste for the other two. Perhaps I will. The process of random selection can sometimes cause me to save the best for last.

But do play Aquia. Its quite good. The sounds the game makes during gameplay can be truly appreciated with headphones and they haunt me at night.

I’m amazed that we live in a time where someone saying “We will show stuff at E3” can be considered an announcement, however when coming from the prolific id Software, I suppose that’s all that needs to be said. Curiously, Doom 4 in fact not only is it not a sequel of Doom 3 (don’t let that ’4′ trick you!), it is also not a reboot of the series! Oh the times we live in. This is all especially entertaining if you remember id dropping out of the ESA last year, and as such they will not be able to have an official booth at the new and improved E3. Awkward!

If you are interested in such things there is an insider account of Blizzard pre- and post-merger with Vivendi Universal, which caused the new offspring company Activision Blizzard. It shouldn’t be much of a surprise to anyone that things at Blizzard changed for the worst when the company with what is perhaps the most annoying CEO in the business took over. The entire business philosophy of Activision of late seems to be “do everything that made EA unpopular”. EA is on the rebound for sure in the eyes of gamers, but Activision’s constant slips of the tongue and ‘exploiting’ of beloved franchises has put them pretty high on my shitlist.

I think the constant rumors of a new PSP being released is the only excuse anyone has to talk about the PSP (unless you are John Koller of Sony, of course). I keep hearing these fantasies of a new sliding screen design that it will not have a UMD drive. I don’t know about all of these things but this newest bit would support at least the latter theory: Patapon 2 will not come on UMD. Supposedly the game will only be available through PSN and download cards at retail. Now all they need is a rumor that good games will be coming to the PSP on a more regular basis and we’ll be all set.

Oh and I suppose I should mention this. We are freaking metal, afterall. Hope to see some of you show up.