The Connoisseur's #1 Nintendo DS Game of All Time

The World Ends With You

The DS is loaded with great games, but there was no doubt which one would land at #1 for me. TWEWY was everything a DS game should be, and is easily one of the best JRPGs of this generation. The story was compelling, and far from the "typical" JRPG that makes us cringe. There is always a tension as the story progresses, and it's easy to empathize with the characters as they fight their way through the streets of Tokyo attempting to complete their goal. There are plenty of plot twists and a shocking ending that you don't want to miss. The game is also oozing with style, with its incredible soundtrack full of catchy tunes, and an interesting level-up system.

But the most remarkable thing is the game's combat system. You utilize both screens at the same time, using the control pad to fight on the top screen while slashing and dashing your enemies on the bottom screen. Once you get the hang of it, the combat becomes immensely addicting. This results in some incredible boss battles as well. And it only gets better as you gain more powerful and intricate attacks. TWEWY is the complete package that all DS gamers should own.

Up next for The Connoisseur: A few more roasts of popular games, and then a top 10 PSP list!

The Connoisseur's Top 10 DS Games of All Time: 4-2

4. New Super Mario Bros DS

 Screw that, let's go the other way.

Well, to put it simply, this game has everything you'd want out of a 2D Mario platformer on the DS. But you already know that because it's Super Mario. So, for those of you who haven't tried it, all you need to know is that this is one of the DS's best games and that you're missing out. Why isn't it higher on the list? Well, some of the levels are less lengthy than they should be, and I found it a bit easier as compared to some of the other entries in the franchise. But that's about it. You should play this game.

3. Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow

 Some of the bosses might make you rage.

This was the first of the great DS games that I played. I still regard it as one of the best. This is an excellent Castlevania, on even ground with Symphony of the Night, Circle of the Moon, Aria of Sorrow, and any of the rest. It's a good challenge, has excellent and varied boss battles, great combat and platforming, and much more. I sunk many an hour into this gem. However, I do admit that I haven't played Order of Ecclesia, which I've heard great things about, so perhaps the rankings could change in the future. I didn't try it because I was disappointed in Portrait of Ruin. Anyway, make sure to play Dawn of Sorrow if you haven't already.

2. Advance Wars: Dual Strike

 Jake is all like 'yo yo yo yo yo dawg'

The last two were incredibly difficult to place, but Dual Strike will have to settle for second. It's easily one of the best TBS games I've ever played. My problem with other TBS in the past has always been that they're too slow-paced, especially compared to RTS games. Advance Wars... not so much. The missions move briskly, with great-looking action and loads of strategy involved, whether it be in-battle tactics or choosing the best commanders for the job pre-fight. The only issue is that a veteran of these sorts of games might find the bast majority of the battles too easy. But it's a small issue next to just how incedibly fun this game is. There are plenty of missions to play, along with secret missions, a real-time combat mode in which you control one unit at a time, you vs the AI head-to-head matches with the option of multiple commanders on each team, a survival mode, and much more. There's also a mini achievement system, unlockables that can be purchased with money earned, and even plenty of customization (including map-making). Dual Strike is a game loaded with things to do, meaning there's a huge amount of replayability on top of the superb campaign, and easily deserves its spot so high on my list.

The Connoisseur's Top 10 DS Games of All Time: 6-5

6. Professor Layton and the Curious Village

 I've always had the feeling that Layton's a pedophile.

This is one of those gems that few people even know about and most just skip over at the store if they even notice in the first place. But man, is it a surprisingly good game. I love puzzle games, though my experiences with series like Brain Age weren't anything to write home about. Professor Layton puts those games to shame. You get a blend of old and new puzzles that are creative, innovative, and highly entertaining. Some are easy, some are very difficult. And through it all, we get a nice little mystery plot that makes us want to continue. There are plenty of extra puzzles to do, and we can come back to them all we want. The touch-screen controls are flawless, and there's a surprising amount of content. A puzzle gamer's dream.

5. Mario Kart DS

No surprise here. Mario Kart DS has been a fan favorite since the beginning of the DS's lifespan, and it deserves all its praise. Once again, there are plenty of tracks and races to complete playing by yourself, and that alone is loads of fun. Then you add arguably the best competitive multiplayer experience on any handheld, with endless hours of intense racing, and you've got the recipe for a top 5 all-time DS game. Throw in some good customization, and MKDS's place is my rankings is completely solidified. The only thing keeping this game from ranking higher is "snaking" online, which is highly annoying until you learn how to master it yourself. Still feels cheap regardless. A phenomenal game though, no matter how you look at it.

The Connoisseur's Top 10 DS Games of All Time: 8-7

8. The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks

Zelda has become a total bitch.

While it was Phantom Hourglass that really showed that touch-screen controls could work with Zelda, Spirit Tracks was simply the superior game. There were a couple of problems, like the method of transportation being tedious and resulting in linearity, and Zelda being transformed into a hussy Hannah Montana figure, but overall the game was solid. Not nearly up to my expectations for this franchise, but for a handheld game, it gets the job done. The music was great, excellent controls and good puzzles, and the bosses were moderately challenging (a step up from previous games for sure). It had its moments, and wasn't a complete blur like its predecessor. This won't, however, keep it from joining my hate list in the future.

7. Metroid Prime: Hunters

 You use the stylus on the bottom screen to aim your gun (like k/m controls, but shittier).

One of the first games I owned on the DS, and still one of my favorites. It's true that the campaign was underwhelming compared to others in the Metroid Prime series, but it was still lengthy and had some good fights. If you wanted more action in a Metroid Prime game, then Hunters delivered very well in this regard, feeling much more like a true FPS than the others. It also boasts some of the best visuals on the system, from both a technical and artistic viewpoint. Some of the maps, both single and multi player, were outstanding, and the competitive multiplayer was exhilarating. In that regard, MPH might not only be the best DS game ever made, but the best handheld game period. With rankings, stats, the ability to add people you've played, and excellent touch-screen controls resulting in innovative competitive gaming, Hunters is still a wonderful game that all DS owners need to play.

The Connoisseur's Top 10 DS Games of all Time: 10-9

10. Final Fantasy III

Awe-inspiring 3D visuals.

FFIII narrowly beats out its famed brother IV for a spot in my top 10. The main reason being that I was already so familiar with IV (previously known as II on the SNES), whereas III was a fresh experience for me. And it was certainly a good experience as well. FFIII is the kind of hardcore game that I like, forcing you to keep up with your levels and job types unless you wanted to get pulverized. A decent story and awesome boss battles made this a surprisingly good game for me, and even though it was difficult, the challenge felt highly rewarding by the end.

9. Pokémon Diamond/Peal/Platinum

POKERMAN!

Unfortunately, it's very possible that this will be the last Pokémon game to appear on one of my lists. The formula is getting jaded, but at this point in time, I still loved these adventures. And the fourth generation of this franchise, while not as awe-inspiring as previous iterations to me, delivered everything I could've hoped for. Dozens upon dozens of hours of gameplay, many new Pokémon to catch, and entertaining Gym Leader battles. On top of that, some online gameplay was added, meaning even more replay value. And of course, hours of chasing those legendaries.

The Connoisseur's Top 10 Nintendo DS Games of All Time

 After close to two dozen posts in which I bash games, I think it's about time for me to give some love.  Because despite how much I hate the direction gaming has gone in recent years, with developers aiming to please the teeming masses with easier, watered-down games instead of actually trying to create genuine masterpieces, I still fully realize that there are many superb developers who have released games that cater to the hardcore such as myself.  Therefore, I will soon begin listing my top 10 Nintendo DS games of all time.  Nintendo was the first company to bring us into the handheld "next generation" with the Nintendo 3DS, so now is a great time for me to look back and decide which games any handheld gamer shouldn't miss out on.  I will, soon after, follow with a top ten PSP list.

For now, I'm simply going to list the finalists and begin the actual list with my next post.  A few quick notes about my list (and all subsequent lists) first though.  I'm not going to add games that I haven't played.  It's impossible to judge such a game.  This goes for games that I hate on as well.  If it's on my blog, then I have had considerable time with it.  So my top ten lists only consist of games that I have actually played, and played enough so that I can accurately assess them.  If you don't see a game on my list that you think deserves to be there, then I've either: a. Not played it. -or- b. think it's overrated or not quite worthy of a spot on the list.  If you have suggestions for games that you think should be on here, then post them.  Ports will always be excluded.  I'll copy and paste this before every top 10 list.

All right, so here are the finalists.  There are still quite a few DS games that I want to play (Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia, Radiant Historia, Picross, Elite Beat Agents, etc), but for now, these will have to do.

Advance Wars: Dual Strike - Advance Wars is as good as TBS gets.  Dual Strike is loaded with content and a blast from beginning to end.

Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow - Quite possibly the best Castlevania since Symphony of the Night. Excellent design and boss battles result in a wonderful follow-up to the GBA's Aria of Sorrow.

Final Fantasy III - A new Final Fantasy for American gamers (and a from-the-ground-up remake), and a pretty good one at that.  A great class system combines with a fun soundtrack and excellent boss battles to make yet another stellar old-school Final Fantasy.  On top of that, it goes back to the olden days of hardcore gaming, with chains of boss battles and huge dungeons that you have to start over if you lose.  Be ready to have your patience tested.

Final Fantasy IV - Another remade Final Fantasy, though this one is more familiar to SNES owners.  Despite having been criticized on my blog in the past (with good reason), it's still a great game.  A tougher (but more balanced) difficulty helps solve one of my longtime problems.

The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks - While it's terrible for a Zelda game, it does a lot of good with the DS controls and is still one of the better DS games to be released, and definitely an improvement over Phantom Hourglass (though that might not save it from a spot on this blog later).  Its bosses are also significantly tougher than those in Phantom Hourglass (though not hard), another clear point in its favor.

Mario Kart DS - Mario Kart fans will have a hard time putting this one down, with great single-player, local multiplayer, and online multiplayer racing.  Lots of customization and thrilling online races meant this was the best Mario Kart to date at the time of its release.

Metroid Prime: Hunters - While the single-player is drawn-out and boring, the multiplayer, both local and online, is fantastic for a handheld game.  Nintendo misses more often than not when it comes to online, but this time they hit a bulls-eye.

New Super Mario Bros DS - No surprise here.  Another great, though relatively easier, Mario experience.

Okamiden - It takes a long time to pick up steam, but the ending quarter of the game is a poignant reminder of its lauded predecessor.

Pokemon Diamond/Pearl/Platinum - The Pokemon series needs freshening, but the first series of games to hit the DS are sitll very fun.

Pokemon HeartGold/HeartSilver - These remakes of arguably the greatest Pokemon games in the series took me back to the past on a nostalgic adventure.

Professor Layton and the Curious Village - This puzzle game is one of the generations best.  A wonderful interface and addicting puzzles will make it very difficult for you to put it down once you've began.

The World Ends With You - Unarguably one of the best JRPGs of this generation.  The combat is unique, fun, and takes quick reflexes.  The story is an interesting twist on Battle Royale and will have you on the edge of your seat from the beginning.  Even if you're not a handheld fan, this is a game that shouldn't be missed.

Crysis 2

You spelled "Crisis" wrong. Dumbass. 

Since I’ve already mentioned this game when it was selected as my most overrated game of 2011, I’ll cut straight to the chase.  One of the greatest things about the original Crysis was its drop-dead-gorgeous visuals.  There’s no way around it.  It’s an awesome game otherwise, but it wouldn’t have been the same without those stunning graphics.  So why the hell didn’t Crysis 2 look as good as its predecessor upon release??  C’mon, Crytek had to send out a DirectX 11 patch months after release because they were too worried about profits instead of giving us a completed game.  Granted, it looks wonderful now, but I’m too bored of the damned game for that to make a difference now.  And, screw it, the original still looks better.  And that’s pretty pathetic considering how relatively narrow the levels are in Crysis 2.

 The only thing more pathetic than the aliens are your friendly NPCs.

With that last point in mind, allow me to sum up the weakest aspect of this game.  That is, instead of continuing the trend of the original Crysis with large open-ended maps, Crytek decided to make yet another Call of Duty clone with hours of underwhelming corridor shooting.  Even when you’re fighting outside, the battlefield is noticeably smaller than in the original Crysis, and it rarely gives you more than one path to take.  The powers of your nanosuit have also been cut down to make it simple for console controllers (no surprise, PC games that are “consolized” are virtually always scaled back considerably in more ways than graphics).  There is no more “maximum strength” and “maximum speed” is now utilized through the sprint button.  Perks have been added, and if you choose to upgrade your suit with the best stealth options, even the hardest difficulty becomes a complete joke as you won’t have to fight 90% of the enemies, and most of the rest can be dispatched with a back-attack.  Shouldn’t a difficulty setting called “Supersoldier” be a… challenge?

I’m going to go ahead and wrap this up by saying: what the FUCK did they do to everything laid down by the first Crysis?  These aliens don’t resemble the ones from before in the slightest.  They look like aliens from any other Sci-Fi FPS, and aren’t nearly as intimidating as the ones that would fly around and wreak havoc from above.  And the story… what the hell happened?  I mean, yeah, the plot in the original was terrible anyway, but this one doesn’t even seem to be related.  A character from the original is back and… uh… yeah.  That’s it.  And don’t ask me what the story was actually about because I wasn’t even sure right after beating it on Supersoldier.  Oh, but the multiplayer is marginally better than it was in the original, so there’s the game’s positive aspect.

 

The aliens spread some kind of virus thing and you've gotta do something to stop all the I don't know.

But seriously, just stick with the original and don’t even bother with this crap (don’t even click on the links below).

6/10

 

Super Smash Bros Brawl

Super Smash Bros Melee + shit online

Have I gone after a Wii game before this?  I think this is the first one.  Either way, I don't really care.  Maybe I should do a few posts on "Why Your Favorite Consoles Suck" and throw the Wii out there first.  Add some variety to this blog.  Anyway, I've always been a fan of Smash Bros.  It's nowhere near being a traditional fighter, but it's still a load of fun with friends.  Unfortunately for Nintendo, we're now in the age of internet gaming, so good offline multiplayer no longer cuts it.  And while Super Smash Bros Brawl has one hell of an offline multiplayer and is packed with content, everything else falls short.  I'm also willing to say it's a must-buy for its soundtrack alone, but...

She was asking for it.

Let's get straight to the two big, fatal problems present in Brawl.  We all know the game's strength is in its local multiplayer anyway.  That's still good.  We also get a plethora of single player modes, similar to what we saw in Super Smash Bros Melee, including a relatively long single player campaign.  A lot of these modes will hold your attention for a while, but the campaign, titled Subspace Emissary (where the hell did they get that name from?) might elicit more groans than anything else.  If you don't rush through it, you're looking at 10-15 hours on Normal difficulty (if I remember correctly).  And it gets really annoying too, as the checkpoint system is all over the place at the end, and sometimes unforgiving.  But really, you just run and jump for long periods of time, flailing around like a retard to beat up a bunch of repetitive enemies, just to get to some random boss that you'll beat handily once you figure out its pattern.  It's so goddamn boring.  Hours and hours of my life went down the drain just to see a bunch of half-assed cut-scenes.  Ugh.

 Not so funny now, huh?

And now, the second fatal flaw.  The online multiplayer.  To call Super Smash Bros Brawl's online system "bare-bones" is a disservice to the online multiplayer of games like Dead Space 2.  It's not just bare-bones, it's almost nonexistent.  You can play up to three other people in Free-For-All match-ups, and that's all there is to it.  You choose your character, everything else is picked randomly from the four players' settings.  Fucking amazing, right?  Maybe it would be, but Nintendo's online infrastructure is so abysmal that they can't even handle a certain amount of people playing online at one time, so you have to play your match in SLOW-MOTION due to LAG!  They knew this game would sell millions, how in the FUCK were they not PREPARED?  On top of that, you can't even talk or message people online.  Get real, Nintendo.  You can send in pictures and videos of stuff you do, and Nintendo will weekly send out their choices of the "best," so then you can see the creations of soulless nerds who spends dozens of hours creating one 10-second video, just so that Nintendo sends out their hard work (anonymously lmao) for everyone else to appreciate.  

 It's just not your day, Ike.

There's a bit more though.  They send out player-made stages that you can have for a limited time, but if you want player-made stages permanently, you're going to have to download them elsewhere, because you can't get them in-game.  The stage builder is laughable anyway, so whatever.  Casino addicts, there's a mode for you to gamble on online matches. You can watch a random online match (only thing more fun than playing a lag-filled multiplayer is WATCHING it) and then bet coins on who you think will win.  Which is quite literally like betting on a dice roll considering that you know absolutely nothing about the players in the match outside of their character.  Unless three guys inexplicably choose Jigglypuff, you'll have no idea who might be the favorite to win.  That's right, there are no stats in this game.  It doesn't count wins, kills, damage dealt, Final Smashes used, or anything.  There are no leaderboard rankings, skill levels, or even a point system.  So, it's a boring lagfest, and there isn't even a reason to keep playing.  Nintendo online in a nutshell.  

7/10

Resident Evil 3

The 3 stands for how many hours it takes to beat the game.

I'm going back to the PlayStation to pick on another fan-favorite.  Resident Evil 3, following the gripping atmosphere and epic scope of Resident Evil 2, fails to do its predecessor justice in any way.  Outside of running like hell from Tyrant every now and then, there wasn't even anything that stood out about this game.

So actually, the reason Resident Evil 3 is greatly overrated is not because its mechanics are any worse than the previous Resident Evil games, but because it's just a watered down version of them.  You'll beat this turd in around 3-4 hours and then automatically assume that there's another scenario or character for you to play afterwards, and then you'll be horribly disappointed.  Yeah, you can only play as Jill, and unlike Resident Evil 2, there aren't any alternate scenarios.  What the hell?

 Aww... he just wants a hug.

 You get past that, and then you see that there was nothing added to make up for the lack of content.  The mini-scenarios after you win are even crappier than they were in Resident Evil 2, the tank controls aren't any better, and the dialogue might actually be even worse, back to the days of the original Resident Evil.  There are fewer puzzles, fewer bosses, fewer everything.  And the atmosphere has absolutely nothing going for it, a complete step back from Resident Evil 2.  The worst part is that Tyrant is supposed to make this game great by himself, and everybody raves about his chase scenes.  I still have no fucking idea why, because I never really had a problem getting around him and therefore was never even close to being scared.  So take that out, and why the hell was I supposed to buy this game?  Notice how short this "review" is.  I don't have much to say because there isn't much to this game.  

6.5/10

Final Fantasy X-2

The sequel that might ruin your great memories of Final Fantasy X.

 

 As promised, I will follow up on Final Fantasy X with its sequel, X-2.  I know this isn't a "favorite" game for most people, but I do think its critical reception warrants inclusion on my hate list.  I mean, 85% on Metacritic for this load of crap?  Proof that a game can get great scores just based on its title.  There is no real point in buying this game unless you want to see Yuna and Rikku in skimpy outfits.  

The first problem is, quite obviously, with the characters.  Square Enix knew their game was going to suck, so they put the three heroines in gaudy costumes, once again showing the universal belief that women can't succeed without good looks and sexual appeal.  I guess they're kinda right, but it's still annoying because Yuna was such a good character in Final Fantasy X without a revealing getup.  Rikku... do I even have to say anything?  You find out she's had a past intimate relationship with one of the men in the game.  Considering that she's 17 years old, you can safely assume that she was screwing this guy when she was 13 or 14, which is hilarious.  Then we've got Paine, who is a dyke.  Don't know where the hell she came from, but she should've been left out.

 

 The only good part of the game: some girl-on-girl action.

The story sucks.  Its linear progression is incredibly boring, and you pretty much have to play through it twice, doing absolutely everything right, to get the full ending.  Hell, you have to use a walkthroughs just to get the real ending your first time through because there's stuff you've gotta do without any clue at all.  Not to mention the backstory does very little to complement Final Fantasy X and is mostly pulled out of thin air.  A lot of people complain that Tidus comes back at the end and say the "bad" ending in which Tidus stays dead should be the true one.  I say Tidus should've never been seen in the water at the end of Final Fantasy X and that this game should've NEVER EXISTED.  There's your true ending.

 

 Sit down, LOSER.

The battle system is kinda cool, I guess.  It's similar to the old class-based Final Fantasy games, and it leads in to Final Fantasy XIII in a way.  My main issue is that the bosses aren't very tough, and I found Final Fantasy X-2 to be even more of a cakewalk than its predecessor.  The music is mediocre too, there are some good tunes, but the entire soundtrack pales in comparison to Final Fantasy X.  Also got to give a shout-out to this game's atmosphere.  It sucks.  If you remember the awesome lightning place from X, then you'll hate what Square has done to it this time around.  The frickin music doesn't even match!  Why were they so lazy with this game?!

5/10

Overrated: Final Fantasy X

Why is this fucker on the cover? I want Yuna!

 Ok, for the first time, the Gaming Connoisseur is not going to bash a game that sucks.  In fact, I think Final Fantasy X is pretty good.  However, I do believe that it's overrated by both fans and critics.  It's linear, the story is average, and there are a lot of cheesy moments.  But for some reason, it just has that "It" factor that makes it a really entertaining game.  But with the problems I mentioned, and considering that it's one of the highest rated games of the PS2, GameCube, and Xbox era, I do feel the need to add it to my list.  Oh, and this time I'll go ahead and warn you that there will be spoilers.

The first thing I'm going to go back and forth on is the cast of characters.  Tidus (pronounced TEE-dus lmfao) looks and acts like a total pussy.  He's a high-energy guy, which is better than some previous Final Fantasy main characters like emo Cloud and Squall, but in combination with his colorful get-up makes him look like a gay (ok I'm not a homophobe, so the reason this is bad is because he falls in love with a girl, leaving me confused).  He does not deserve to be the main character.  The story is about Yuna's trip as far as I'm concerned, and he's just along for the ride.  Yuna is awesome.  And then everyone else sucks.  Rikku is the high-energy female who never loses her good spirits.  Even when Tidus is disappearing (spoiler alert) she is jumping and waving while everyone else is sad (seriously, wtf).  Wakka is a Hawaiian guy, which is pretty cool, except he's the captain of a merry band of loser blitzball players, like a video game version of the Mets' David Wright.  Then Square Enix needed an emo, so they added Lulu.  Then there's a cat thing, and Auron, who is pretty cool.

 DURRRR.. HURHURHURHURHURHUR!!!!!!!

The story has its good and its bad.  The good is that Tidus is actually not alive lol.  I also like how it's not based on a war with the good guys hopelessly outnumbered.  That's always a plus.  And Yuna's sending in Kilika is one of the most iconic moments in gaming.  The bad: literally every fucking moment with Tidus.  Ahem *clears throat* ... HAHAHAHAHAHAHA.... HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.... HAHAHAHAHAHAHA... HAHAHAHAHAHAHA.... HAHAHAHAHAHAHA... HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA.... HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA... HAHAHAHAHAHAHA...  Btw.. what's up with godawful lip-syncing?

 Wakka's merry band of losers before a match.

 The only other problem is that Final Fantasy X was the beginning of Final Fantasy's turn to linearity.  While the pacing is actually really good, there's virtually nothing for you to do outside of continue walking straight ahead to continue the main quest.  This really sucks considering that Spira actually has an interesting world that would be very fun to explore.  But NO, we can't have exploration in games anymore, because developers think most gamers are too stupid and won't know what the hell to do if they don't lay everything out in a straight line.  While they're totally correct, that doesn't mean it's ok.  This continues until the very end of the game, in which we can be transported to various parts of the world map.  Yay...  

8.5/10 - And you can expect me to follow up with Final Fantasy X-2 in the coming days....

Call of Duty: Black Ops

Call of Dooty: Black Ops

Yeah, another Call of Duty, I can't help but go after all the recent games in this series.  They're all shit.  Their intense popularity pisses me off because it reminds me of how stupid the general masses are.  It doesn't matter if it's the same game every year, if they market it hard enough, people will buy.  If they sold Black Ops with a big black dick that raped you every time you opened the case, people would still buy it.  At least Black Ops has one thing going for it; it's not as hilariously retarded as its predecessor, Modern Warfare 2.  But it's still pretty fucking stupid.

I'm not going to waste much of my time with the multiplayer or core gameplay.  If you don't know/think it's the same game as Call of Duty 4, World at War, and Modern Warfare 2, then you've had your head up your ass for a long time.  The multiplayer is the same exact thing as Modern Warfare with its (mostly) tiny maps and lack of team coordination.  You can roll now.  Woo-fucking-hoo.  Black Ops is a linear corridor shooter like the previous games, with rehashed mission design and a load of pointless set-pieces.

 Guess which orifice I'm going to stick this in.

The game starts off with the main character in an interrogation room, and you'll have to put up with this shit in between many of the missions.  Then you find him going to attempt an assassination of Fidel Castro during the Bay of Pigs.  Mason seemingly succeeds in assassinating Castro, but of course it was actually a double.  Then Mason gets captured and sent to the Soviet Union where he's thrown in prison and befriends some Soviet guy named Reznov.  The Soviet guy just happens to be a former partner of the men that tortured Mason after his capture.  What a coincidence.  They start a prisoner revolt and Mason is able to fight his way out despite the presence of Soviet troops (lmao).

Mason and a few other men go to the Soviet Union to fuck up the Soviet space program, led by Dragovich.  They blow up a spaceship (pretty awesome, actually) but Dragovich escapes.  Then they go to Vietnam, and after fucking up some squints, they meet up with a Russian defector who happens to be... you'll never guess... Reznov (or... appears to be Reznov...).  They go to Laos to find a wrecked plane, but are overwhelmed by commie bastards.  Mason and Reznov are the lucky two to escape. Hudson and Weaver, other dudes accompanying Mason, are fighting elsewhere and discover some plot to release poison in America, or some shit like that.  They need to find some station and stop the broadcast of.. instructions?.. that would release the poison.  How convenient that the Soviets had no other way of releasing the poisons.

 Fuck you, Legos.

Well, it ends up that Mason was brainwashed the whole time, Reznov was dead, and a whole bunch of other shit that I don't even want to try to comprehend because it's so goddamn stupid.  Hudson and Weaver had Mason strapped up to the chair in the game's present time, though it also ends up that Reznov had brainwashed Mason to kill the Soviet guys.  The numbers base is underwater and they go there and kill Dragovich, and America wins.  It's implied that Mason assassinates JFK.  Why can't we just have a regular Vietnam shooter without all the brainwashing, secret poison, space ship, conspiracy BULLSHIT?  Even World at War blows this inane garbage out of the water. 

5/10

Mass Effect

Pass Defect.

Mass Effect is yet another game I just had to buy because everyone said it was one of the greatest games of this generation.  I really need to stop listening to people and just rent before I buy.  The second game in the Mass Effect series might be one of the greatest games of this generation, but this one is a big nasty fart.  First of all, Mass Effect is NOT an RPG.  It's a TPS with RPG elements.  If you think it's an RPG, then you either didn't PC game during the glory years of the PC RPGs, or you've only been around for the last two generations.

Since Mass Effect is a TPS, the first thing to complain about is the god-awful combat.  It's very similar to Gears of War, but the shooting mechanics (even if your character is an expert with the gun you're using) are slightly off, and the aiming isn't nearly as tight as in Gears.  The cool thing about the guns is that they don't have to reload and instead need to cool down if fired too much, an interesting change.  But that's the only positive feature about the combat.  Your characters' movements are nearly as loose as the aiming, and the cover system sucks total balls.  Shepard automatically moves behind cover, and when enemies are swarming, you'll get pelted from every which way as you try to maneuver the crap controls for a shot (no blind fire).  Your AI partners are worth shit as well, and typically you'll find yourself telling them to find cover far behind the battle so they don't all get slaughtered instantaneously.  If you don't tell them to hide, they rarely find cover themselves and stand out in the open, soaking everything the enemy throws at them.  Talk about a royal pain in the ass.

Play your cards right, and you might get some alien booty.

Often, whether in the main quest or side quests, you'll find yourself driving the Mako, the most durable ground vehicle ever made.  This thing can take a lot of missiles, and is not affected by gravity whatsoever.  Another fact BioWare never seemed aware of: there's no way a planet many times the size of earth should have the same gravity as the moon.  What the hell were they even thinking?  You'll see the Mako going up mountains at near-90 degree angles or rolling off them to little effect.  The Mako combat is also atrocious; wait until the Thresher Maul gets a hold of you.  It will show exactly how loose and unmanageable the vehicle controls are.  For side quests, the planets you can drive on are sparse with little to do, and finding your objective can be extremely tedious.  There's little variety in the environments outside of sometimes finding a very cold or very hot world.  And the side quests are so mind-numbingly repetitive that you'll probably quit doing them after only a few.

Then there's the actual quests in the main storyline.  There's a lot of exploring and dialogue followed by periods of combat. While some of the exploration is cool and there are some neat environments, the main storyline missions can be awfully drawn-out and boring.  Like the side quests, these can get annoyingly repetitive as well.  As for the dialogue, I can say BioWare at the very least did better here than they did with Dragon Age later on.  You'll probably need to work on paragon, but Shepard sounds like such a pussy that way.  Still far beats out his dialogue as a renegade though.  He doesn't sound like a badass at all, more like an immature dad at a high school soccer game.  I guess guys that work on video games would have no idea what badass is though, so I can give them a pass.

 Shepard.. I.. I am your father.

The story is highly overrated like the rest of the game.  It's similar to the many B-rated sci-fi movies you could see over the years.  Humans are colonizing large portions of the galaxy, there are aliens and politics, and then a huge threat appears that is likely going to destroy everything.  Hopelessly outmanned and outgunned, it's up to a human and his crew to stop the invasion of machines.  Whatever.  The problem is that your choices mean virtually nothing, other than potentially losing some of your crew along the way.  At the end, you can choose to save the Council or not, that's the extent of your choice and consequence.  Oh, and before I forget, this game just looks average, with constant visual glitches (like screen tearing) and slow-downs.  Not impressive considering that this game isn't even that detailed.

6.5/10

The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass

Why.. just why, Nintendo?

Once upon a time, handheld The Legend of Zelda was anticipated with similar fervor to the console behemoths.  This was seen as recently as 2005, when The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap was released.  That might never again be an issue, thanks in large part to Phantom Hourglass.  Despite raving reviews (though, as has been alluded to on here time and again, it's not difficult for games to receive universal acclaim anymore), Phantom Hourglass was a joke from the very beginning, for an assortment of reasons.  The first being that it just sucked.

The first thing you'll notice about Phantom Hourglass (outside of the fact that it looks like shit) is that you have to control Link by using the stylus.  You poke where you want him to walk and constantly poke everything to make him do stuff.  While it works, at times, it's a total pain in the ass compared to traditional controls.  Especially when you have to do stuff really quickly and Link is slowly reacting to your pokes.  Not to mention your hand will probably get stiff within a half hour, which sucks ass when you're playing a long(ish) adventure game that takes time to get through.  Why couldn't they even give you a fucking CHOICE as to which control method you would use, what the FUCK?  And about the only innovation we actually get from this is the ability to write notes in the dungeon.  That's about it.

Decisions, decisions...

Phantom Hourglass follows soon after the events of the epic GameCube Zelda, The Wind Waker.  You'd think that maybe they could draw from the excellent storyline we experienced then to craft this game's plot, but you'd be horribly disappointed.  Nothing about this game is remotely memorable, and I had to look on Wikipedia to even remember what happened in this game.  After reading it, I have again forgotten exactly what the fuck happened.  Let's see, they come across a ghost ship and Tetra (retard) jumps on board and something happens.  Link ends up on some island, and there's a fairy or some shit, and then he meets Linedick, who is a total pussy.

Tetra is somehow turned to stone and needs to be rescued (surprise), and Linedick leans against her frozen form and nearly breaks her (which would've been fucking hilarious and made the game so much more interesting).  While there are many dungeons for you to complete, you constantly have to return to the same goddamn dungeon over and over and do the same puzzles over and over again.  Why a Zelda game needs such filler is unknown, as the games already have a shitload of puzzles.  Anyway, some plant thing is behind all the evils, and Link has to kill it.  Then Nintendo fakes us out with a Link's Awakening it-was-all-a-dream ending before showing Linedick's ship and proving that it actually did happen.  Assholes.

If only....

What really pisses me off about the game is that they cut out almost all of the adventuring that made The Wind Waker so awesome.  A lot of fans (retards) complained that the sailing was too drawn-out and boring in The Wind Waker, so they decided to let you draw out the path of your ship in Phantom Hourglass and let it move on its own, effectively leaving the game to play itself.  You get to shoot a cannon some.  A grand adventure, right?  Most of the islands are fairly worthless though, so you won't even find yourself free-roaming much anyway, because Nintendo apparently thinks its fans are too stupid to figure out where to go if they're not given a straight path all the time. 

Linedick forces a favor from our hero.

Phanton Hourglass also follows many of the recent games in the series in that there is nothing remotely difficult about this game whatsoever.  The bosses don't take much thought, nor many hits to kill, and they certainly don't do much damage to Link (which is really pathetic because even that pussy Linedick rapes Link, as pictured above).  The puzzles are a breeze, save for perhaps some of the ones in the annoying Temple of the Ocean King.  We do, however, get The Legend of Zelda's first-ever competitive online multiplayer mode.  Which is pretty fun, but suffers from the same weakness as most DS online multiplayers: there is no punishment for quitting mid-match, and you're not awarded for your opponent's rage-quit.  Therefore, most of your wins will never count because just before victory, your opponent disconnects, meaning the match never happened.  Get with the fucking times, Nintendo.

5/10