The Shrine

Yes, I'm talking about the original game here. I FINALLY got around to playing it and just finished it tonight.

I originally fell in love with this game when I got that demo of it a few years ago. Everything I loved about it then was there in spades throughout the game. I love the graphical style of the game, the tongue-in-cheek storyline (even the voice acting is pretty good; why can't they give Mega Man this audio love?), the funny cutscenes, the humour, the variety of moves and how you use those moves to progress through the game. And the 7 chapters provide a pretty decent length to the game as well. It felt just long enough; any longer and it woulda just gone on too much. Basically, it's a 2 1/2 action/platformer and it's a ton of fun to both play and watch. It's got an awesome gaming experience overall and manages to deliver a pretty unique and hella entertaining experience on the oldest genre of all.

The only real downfall I had with the game was the insane difficulty. I can see why people thought this game was so fucking hard; goddamn it, it is. I only beat it on Kids mode (about 9-10 hours total) and it was a pretty freakin' strong challenge near the end (Chapters 6 and 7). I love a good challenge, but kinda like Mega Man Zero 1 and 2, it's actually TOO hard and it detracts from the gaming experience. So as to not spoil it for anyone who wants to pick it up, you have to do very specific moves in a very specific order and the game forces you to take substantial time to beat some of the parts and bosses (I checked the FAQs afterwards to see if I was just doing it wrong; I wasn't), even when you have a freakin' timer! There are some sadist bastards at Clover (maybe that's why they got disbanded?) that came up with some of these enemy combos and bosses. And this was on the easiest mode! There are three more levels of difficulty where you can unlock three more characters and actually have a different storyline with them. Now that I want to see but I'm not really that much of a masochist.

After beating the game, I'm willing to bet that the difficulty actually hurt the sales of the sequel (it basically bombed; in Japan, they re-released the original game with two easier levels of difficulty over the flack they got and in a hope to increase sales) and may have even killed off the series. I'd personally love this series to go on, but I think it's dead in the water and the difficulty likely had a lot to do with it.

So, I'd definetely recommend the game, especially now that it and the sequel can be found for $10US/$15Cdn brand new at EB. Tons of fun and definetely an excellent and unique take on the 2D action/platformer genre that's been beaten to death. But be forewarned, it is probably one of the hardest games to master (all levels of difficulty) since Super Ghouls 'N Ghosts. I'm not even gonna bother, I just don't have that kind of time to game anymore.

I beat the game with Sylvia on V-Rated...

For those who don't know the game, you unlock both Sylvia as a playable character, and V-Rated Mode as a playable mode, after beating the game on the difficulty level Zoosey was just crying over. Sylvia takes twice as much damage as Joe, and choosing V-Rated mode doubles the damage again, as well as adding very difficult extra enemies on every stage.

Obviously, you are just a subpar Viewtiful Joe player, Zoos. And a bad person, too. But don't feel bad...not all of us can be superstars, you know?

Wait, you only beat it on Kids mode?!?!!? Not even Adults??!?!

I retract my earlier statement, now I think you should actually feel very bad, and inadequate.

That's what I meant, I only beat it on Kids. The first 5 Chapters weren't too bad, but the last couple took a quite a bit of effort, mostly on Leo and a couple of the sequences with the Metal Leos with the clock and all the freakin' fire.

I'm sure I'll eventually beat it on Adults, V-Rated, and Ultra V-Rated; if I can beat Super Ghouls 'N Ghosts fully, I can beat this. But it's just not worth the effort. And the game's much harder than the vast majority of games we've seen in the last couple of generations. Like I said, they had to release an easier version in Japan hoping to boost sales.

Humor is not a substitute for the game. Parodies also become cliche in their own right when it is done in an obvious way. For example, in high school we were asked to write a parody on Hamlet and just about everyone came up with the idea that the king faked his death to spy on his wife. Viewtiful Joe is just another outdated platformer without the humor, and whether it is funny or not doesn't really matter. I have a platformer on NES that is basically the same thing (hit up/down/forward to avoid hits and then counter attack). I don't think it's necessarily bad, but it's got game mechanics that wouldn't be new even back in the NES days, and nothing else particularly innovative besides maybe the graphics.

As far as difficulty goes, Capcom is pretty bad at pacing the difficulty correctly. The only game they've got it right is Megaman Legends 1 & 2, which have insanely difficult bosses (especially on hard) but relatively easy access (no long stuff to slog through if you die) and, if all else fails, you can treat it like a RPG and just brute force level up past it.

Yeah, I sucked so bad at that game that I couldn't get past the first few levels. I said screw it and moved on!

I found it to be challenging, but certainly not impossible. It was very refreshing to finally have a post NES game that wasn't a simplistic cakewalk.

Don, I agree, but for one thing: it's not an outdated platformer. With the use of the slow down, zoom, and mach speed and the way you can and must use them to get past the game (not to mention the dodging being used as an actual strategic move), it's a fresh take on an old genre.

I thought it was an incredibly well done game. It was fun until I couldn't win after weeks of trying.

Lox wrote:I thought it was an incredibly well done game. It was fun until I couldn't win after weeks of trying.

It's like Battletoads all over again =)

Like I said I've seen the same game mechanics that involves dodging on an obscure NES title that you probably never heard of (Fist of the Flying Dragon or something equally generic like that). Game mechanics-wise, the slow/FF/zoom is certainly doesn't accomplish anything that isn't possible before. But in this case, you also have the parody factor working against you. It is cool to dodge bullets in some Matrix-like fashion once in the zoom in mode. However when you end up having to use it on everything, it gets boring really quick. Since the slow/FF/zoom is pretty much integrated in the game to be used for everything, the novelty factor wears off really fast.

I hate the difficulty in Capcom games. I seriously want to shoot Capcom in the face for how hard their games are. Why can't they start making RPGs this hard? Then I would actually enjoy the strategy involved.

Don Wang wrote:Like I said I've seen the same game mechanics that involves dodging on an obscure NES title that you probably never heard of (Fist of the Flying Dragon or something equally generic like that). Game mechanics-wise, the slow/FF/zoom is certainly doesn't accomplish anything that isn't possible before. But in this case, you also have the parody factor working against you. It is cool to dodge bullets in some Matrix-like fashion once in the zoom in mode. However when you end up having to use it on everything, it gets boring really quick. Since the slow/FF/zoom is pretty much integrated in the game to be used for everything, the novelty factor wears off really fast.

On this one, I disagree to a large degree. Yeah, they do force you to use it quite a bit, but it really doesn't get annoying 'til Leo. There are multiple ways to beat every section or boss, so it becomes a strategy. With Leo, you're forced to use the slow down and zoom in certain ways otherwise you just can't do anything; that's where it became irritating. But, for most of the game, I just used it at my discretion. Now, it may be different for different levels of difficulty, but on Kids, it only got irritating near the end in a couple of spots.

Grandia is the only RPG series I can think of that you can even use 'hard' to describe the difficulty that isn't rested solely on just tossing out big numbers and requiring you to heal every round.

Xenosaga Episode 2, Vagrant Story, and Riviera are three more RPGs that are difficult for reasons other than pumped stats. Not to mention any strategy roleplaying game such as Fire Emblem, Tactics Ogre, and Ogre Battle. In fact, the Grandia games are probably easier than all of those which I have mentioned.

Err Ogre Battle is the definition of throwing huge numbers to make stuff hard which is why you can swarm a boss with so many units, because it flat out outdamages anything you could have.

Fire Emblem is also pretty big number difficulty with some RPGish twists, like only Yuria can beat Yulius which you're supposed to infer based on the story.

Don Wang wrote:Err Ogre Battle is the definition of throwing huge numbers to make stuff hard which is why you can swarm a boss with so many units, because it flat out outdamages anything you could have.

Fire Emblem is also pretty big number difficulty with some RPGish twists, like only Yuria can beat Yulius which you're supposed to infer based on the story.

Sorry, I should have said Ogre Battle 64, strategy is of the essence unless you want a poor ending and poor quality units throughout the game. Defence of towns, and liberating with the right types of units. You could just go through and smash through the early levels with brute force, but unless you know what you're doing you're going to have a very rude awakening about midway through the game.