Showing posts with label Video games. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Video games. Show all posts

Starward Rogue: AuGMENTED Expansion. Mech Themed Bullet Hell Rogue Like Action From Arcen Games

Posted by: Jason Silverain / Category: , ,


Greetings and Salutations I'm briefly breaking my hiatus today with the hopes that I continue to produce more posts in the foreseeable future, though I am still in hospital undergoing cancer treatment and preparing for possible Stem Cell treatment.
Before I begin I wish to thank Chris Lee and those at Arcen games for providing this pre release copy of their latest expansion Starward Rogue: AuGMENTED.
For those of you unfamiliar with Arcen Games it is a tiny video games company founded in March 2009 by Christopher M. Park – CEO, Lead Programmer and Lead Designer, the company is best known for its real time strategy game AI War: Fleet Command though in recent years the company has undergone financial difficulty due to poor sales in its last two releases, TheLast Federation (an absolutely fantastic Strategy in my option and one of Arcen's best see my first impressions and review Here & Here) and Starward Rogue a scifi themed bullet hell roguelike combination set in the same universe and with the protagonist of The Last Federation.
While both games were of excellent quality their low sales highlighted one of the many issues small companies face through digital distribution through platforms such as Steam and how difficult it can be to advertise. This was especially true in the case of Starward Rogue which had the unfortunate issue of its release coinciding with a time when the roguelike genre was been flooded with low quality, low effort Steam Greenlight games which swamped the front pages of Steam.
Thankfully Arcen Games returned to their diamond in the rough with regular updates and content patches cumulating with with this latest expansion.

Available from January 24th 2018 for $6.99 Starward Rogue: AuGMENTED boasts a new floor type named the gold floor with unique challenges and rewards and in addition also has:
  • 4 new music tracks composed by Pablo Vega and The Overthinkers.
  • 3 new mechs: The Zephyr, The Paladin, and the Warhog.
  • 90+ new items.
  • 30+ new enemies.
  • 125+ new rooms.
  • 8 new room obstacles such as the pulse trap and the flamethrower turret.
  • 10+ challenge rooms, a new room type exclusive to the gold floors.
  • 6 new minibosses.
  • 9 new bosses.
If you'd like to learn more please watch the video below or continue reading for a more detailed review 


Presentation

Arcan Games have always simple “less is more” approach to sprite design which is heavily evident in Starward Rogue, each player mech and enemy has been designed with bold simple colours and thick outlines which really helps them stand out from the darker backgrounds and glowing energy bullets.
Whilst it gives them a simplest appearance artistically from a design standpoint it is an elegant solution to a common problem within most bullet hell games, even so each of the mechs really stand out individually and the various droids the player battles whilst having a unifying theme are quite unique with a minimum amount of use of recolours by the designer (about 2-3 with most droids). Though if I have one gripe its that several of the invincible turrets don't really stand out from the droids to a new player.
The most identifying feature about each droid are their attack patterns and the variety of colours and shapes that make up the various attack patterns, resisting the current tend of over the top effects and giant particle effects Arcen has once again kept things simple. Instead the neon glow of the bullets is a suitable level with the effects not extending outside of the hitbox (something that far too many game do), also Arcen have not limited themselves to the typical circles, lines and triangle type of bullets there are some very large and weird shapes that you'll find yourself running from.

Focusing once more on those aforementioned backgrounds the artwork tends to be better shaded and detailed than the interactive elements of the game giving them a somewhat cartoony appearance in compression which may put off some but to me was very reminiscence of the run and gun games of the 80s and 90s such as Alien Breed for the Amiga but with much clearer HUD design that doesn't interfere with gameplay. 

 Again both these design choices seems to be focused on ensuring enjoyable bullet hell style of game play by minimising many of the common visual problems associated with the genre which I personally appreciated whilst playing. Believe me nothing is more frustrating in a bullet hell style shooter then dying because the bullets were not visible because they blended into the background or losing of the player character for similar reasons.

With only 4 music tracks for the levels (not including the boss battle theme) Starward Rogue did need some additional tracks, while the small number of floors for each run (5 & 7 respectively) did mitigate this somewhat it does become noticeable if doing several games in a row.
Starward Rogue: AuGMENTED addition of 4 more tracks is very welcome and personally prefer these new songs to the originals with EMT-ChillBronze been a particular favourite, but overall when playing you'll usually be too busy with the action to truly listen to the music and instead the rhythm encourages a fast paced style of play.
Gameplay

As you may have gathered from the review so far Arcen have tailor the experience of Starward Rogue to focus on smooth fast paced gameplay and the attention to detail really shows.

More insane than Boatmurdered is a claim not to be taken lightly
The controls are responsive and intuitive whether using keyboard and mouse or Xbox controller, a failure to evade is always in the hands of the player (or bad luck) and if a weapon is slow to fire then it is a purposeful property of the weapon. There is no artificial difficulty via slippy movement or button delay which is a welcome relief from some of the other examples of the bullet hell genre I've played, difficulty comes at less player health and fast complex bullet patterns. (Don't let the video fool you I was playing very easy mode and the enemy bullets are slowed at that setting.)
With the three new mechs the Zephyr, the Paladin and the Warhog bringing the total number of available mechs up to a total of 12, each with a unique set of abilities and level up options. Those wanting to challenge themselves will find plenty of new opportunities to experiment with play styles for these new mechs as each takes an existing play style and adds a twist to the gameplay.

The light armed and armoured Zephyr emphasizes fast gun and run game play ideal for speed runners, the beginning each level with a slew of bonuses that slowly tick down each minute until they are completely gone after 5 minutes forcing fast reactions and a rush to the boss.

The poster boy/mech of AuGMENTED the Paladin is another close range fighter to join the Flame Tank though its energy sword allows for greater range with its beam projection actually striking the enemy with the sword does far greater damage. Its secondary weapon is an energy shield to soak up the hits as you move in closer to engage and each floor you begin with an healing item however you lose 10% of your credits, making it difficult to save up for various upgrades.

Last but not least is the Warhog who sacrifices speed for attack power and begins play with a powerful shotgun, the ability to place a pair of turrets and a single missile launcher attack that grows more powerful with each missile collected before its ability of reducing all damage by 1 is taken into account. This allows the Warhog to steamroll its way through easier early levels however in the later game or harder difficulty settings where evasion is key to survive the Warhogs reduced speed makes surviving a difficult challenge.
This is not taking account of all the various weapons and upgrades that be found in the game, Starward Rogue already had an impressive array of available weapons and items and AuGMENTED simply builds upon this whilst also patching several of the more buggy items (range extending/reducing items have all but been removed).

I personally highly approve of the energy system that the game implements for its secondary weapons, in many shoot em ups special weapons are things to be conserved but in Starward Rogue the energy for these secondary weapons replenishes each floor which actively encourage experimentation and replayablity.
Likewise the new enemies and floors some of which were designed by Arcen games own Starward Rogue community all further this aspect which is Starward Rogues greatest strength though this does come at cost.
At its heart Starward Rogue is a very short roguelike favouring short gaming sessions rather than the long playtimes or endless grinds other roguelikes often prefer, only 5 floors of action or 7 once the game has been successfully completed three times. This one huge unlock contains lots and lots of new content within the game but then there are only a few other things with no visual feedback when the player finally unlocks them.
However this new content is most focused on additional enemy variants and the developers are on record stating “ That's something we'd like to improve in the future, if we can.” AuGMENTED fills the gap with its new golden floors and new challenge rooms but overall there are still a few weaknesses.
While the story for this style of game is usually a excuse plot Starward Rogues initially builds up to be something more, unfortunately this suffered from the funding issue during the development and now there is still no real plot or explanation within the game of Rodney or the monolith even to the ending which was lacking. The developers had expressed a desire to fix this with AuGMENTED if time and funding allowed but from my experience no development has been done however if sales do well I certainly see Arcen games returning to Starward Rogue to finally fix this detail due to their respectable history of support for their older games.
Overall Starward Rogue is a game that wants the player to enjoy the journey than focus on the finish, players expecting a grand epic of a roguelike may be disappointed by the lack of story detail and simplistic level system but those wanting a arcade style of play more reminiscent of the bullet hell genre will not be left wanting. This latest release of AuGMENTED really does help fuel the adrenaline fuelled action in this quirky combination of genres.
Pros
  • Well developed blend of genres taking best elements of the bullet hell and roguelikes while removing the worst.
  • Unusual genre combination (originally) and is still one of the best examples of the style to date.
  • Wide array of weapons and foes to test them on without the worry of ammo constraints.
  • Catchy fast paced music that suits the games theme and feel well.
  • Great for short gaming sessions.
  • Good modding community with developer feedback.
Cons

  • Visual style can be unappealing to some with its simplicity.
  • Story features not implemented due to lack of funding during initial development but may be patched in depending on success of latest release.
  • Due to point 2 completion of game may feel unrewarding for those wanting more beyond the gameplay.
  • Success can be luck based.
  • Level up system may feel primitive to those wanting or used to a more in depth system
  • Relatively short gameplay for each individual run with no apparent unlocks for completion of the runs (beyond unlocking a 7 floor run).


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Silverain Reviews: SakuraGame: Hell Girls

Posted by: Jason Silverain / Category: ,

Greetings and salutations over the last few years Steam either listening to its maturing user base (or simply motivated by money) has become slightly more lax in regards to more adult rated games that focus on sexual rather than violent content.
In this series of reviews I am going to be focusing on a small publisher SakuraGame (not to be confused with Winged Cloud who create the Sakura series of games), this small publisher has released a variety of cheap content of various genres ranging from simple erotica to undoubtedly a hentai game with quality wildly fluctuating between its smaller developer studios. 

Hell Girls is a R18 puzzle RPG created by SakuraGame that prioritizes match 3 strategy over speed, in a similar vein to other match 3 games such as Puzzle Quest the game is heavily focused around turn based combat by matching icons to perform certain attacks.
Coining a term from a fellow reviewer Athravan Hell Girls match system could be described more accurately as link & match in that you can make long chains of matches going in any direction with a simple premise of longer the chain, greater the effect. However simply creating a long chain is not enough each of the three available characters has a unique bonus that triggers from the special spellbooks that are created from long chains and often it is more tactical to make chain the length of the spellbook you need.
I certain agree with Athravans own comment that 'Making combos and setting up the board for something massive is genuinely entertaining', it adds a level of tactical depth to the match 3 genre that is often lacking. In addition each character is focused on a element and attack style theme with the ability to learn and equip various usable skills which add further options and variety, this also applies to the various mixture of foes who usually have 2 to 4 different methods of attack each making each monster encounter tactically varied and rather challenging when these monster types are grouped together in a string of fights in a single encounter.

Not all the mechanics are great however, the additional RPG element comes in levelling which increases your stats such as defence and damage as expect, as experience points are spent individually by each character while supporting varying ones play style it leads to a long grind for Soul and Money. It is also responsible for the sudden spikes of difficulty where certain encounters are simply impossible until the character has progressed several levels forcing you to replay levels even further.
Each level does have a series of typical challenges such as moves taken, items collected and number of enemies defeated so occasionally this does force a player back to these levels once their characters have developed to achieve a better rating. 
Further unlocks include alternative costumes mostly in the design of bikinis and other fan service outfits though each has its own powerful effect and downsides. There is no mandatory requirement to use these however and the default armour will serve quite fine.
The story in game is told sporadically and honestly rather badly if it wasn't for the steam store description I really would not know anything about it and even then it is rather vague:
Three mysterious families are blessed by the gods to give birth to girls with powers over fire, ice, and lightning every century.
Their powers are unknown to others, but they will be called by the gods to travel across Hell and Earth, slaying monsters to save the world from being swallowed by Hell’s corruption.
In game they have been referred to as angels by various NPCs or just hired as mercenaries by more eccentric ones. The little dialogue is cliché with cumbersome attempts to add sexual undertones and humour. One NPC I encounter was a budding alchemist who needed Orc 'fluids' with heavy suggestions that they fluid was semen. Given the (admittedly tame) fan service in the game I half expected one of the six images in the game to be of this 'collection'. Instead I was pleasantly relieved that after defeating the orcs she simply said thank you and taught my character a skill (though that adds all new questions of if these girls are the only ones with magic how are other teaching them magic skills).

Finally the visual in the game are quite good in all honesty, the 3d models for both the girls and the enemies are quite detailed with minimum clipping observed. The few scenes with artwork are of high quality but it is just a shame its all fan service and drives away more customers than it attracts.

Pros:
  • Good quality if cliche artwork and character design, with impressive 3d model detail for its production value.
  • Enjoyable and varied mechanics with various levels of customisation.
  • Art gallery options.
  • Reasonable game length.
  • Easy to pickup and play, no punishment for failure.
  • Energetic and upbeat music.
  • Variation on the match 3 genre.
  • Publisher gives acknowledgements to those who helped with the game.
  • Steam Cards and Achievements.

Cons:
  • Fan service is laughable and sadly stereotypical in design, too much and embarrassing for the average player and too little and tame for those looking for a more adult game.
  • Level grinding required.
  • Mechanics have variety but are rather shallow and many enemies are recolours with higher stats.
  • Sudden difficulty curves due to RPG elements.
  • Game occasionally forces you to play as particular characters against enemies that their playstyle is weak against.
  • Steam recommendations feed changed to focus on anime from playing this one game.

If you'd like to see more check out my video below:


If your looking for the decensor patch it can be found on the download page.


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Silverain Reviews: Cherry Tree High Comedy Club

Posted by: Jason Silverain / Category: , ,



Created by 773 Cherry Tree High Comedy Club mixes up the RPG Maker formula creating this RPG/Visual Novel crossover. Indeed Cherry Tree High Comedy Club is all but unrecognisable as an RPG maker game and is regarded as one of the most impressive examples of what the software can be used for outside of its more traditional game styles.

Comedy fanatic and high school student Mairu Hibisu has decided to set up a comedy club in her school, but the school rules require a minimum of 5 students to set up a new club and Mairu is 3 people short! Spring break has just started and Mairu has until the end of April to recruit the 3 new members she needs to start the club or her rival Chitose will have the last laugh! 
 Hard to believe this is a RPG Maker Game
The gameplay focuses on story through character interaction as you walk around town, meet people, and try to talk to them and make friends. Mechanically this is done by levelling your conversation skills in different subjects by reading magazines, attending talks or watching television/movies. Each of the 6 possible candidates that are introduced throughout the month the game takes place in have their own preferences in topics with some topics earning their friendship quicker while others simply waste the little time you have.
It should be said though that the conversation system is somewhat simple and in some ways quite unfair, the method of learning which topics are worth while for each person is down to a mixture of random chance through causal conversation (e.g. chatter that does not take time or contribute to friendship), educated guesswork from observing the various cut-scenes or simply using the option after which the result is recorded on the persons profile page in the options.
However as each major conversation option can only be used once per person other than the gossip option which can be used repeatedly (and is nearly useless) this information only helps in subsequent playthroughs, though the new game+ option is only accessible if a minimum of 3 people are convinced to join the club otherwise its a simple restart after 3 to 5 hours with none of the conversational skill levels or information gathered.


 I do like the various menus and huds in the game, the various comments often brought a chuckle
Speaking of skill levels even if you guess the favoured topics of your would-be members if the topics level is rather low you will have little gain in friendship making the most ideal method of play spending the early game addressing the additional minor needs such as completing homework on time, earning money while minimizing your fatigue level, and taking advantage of free methods of levelling topics before focusing on just 3 people to join the club.
The result of this is a average of 2 to 3 playthroughs to get the best ending where all six candidates join the club though as there is no player input to the story the player will be forced to repeatedly watch the same cut scenes and dialogue. 
The story isn't bad by any means, each character has their own goals and personal issues that they want to address but what stood out was that our protagonist Mairu Hibisu (or Miley Verisse in the westernised version) doesn't magically solve everyone's problems. In fact in most cases problems still exist but the various characters take their own steps towards fixing them, Mairu simply acts as a catalyst through her actions or occasionally a throw away comment that has a deeper affect than she realises. Its a nice alternative to much of today's story telling but does have the affect of making the game feel a little shallow and short with the Player an observer rather than having any actual effect.
For a game about Comedy and whose menus and descriptions are filled with small titbits of amusing descriptions the dialogue itself is relatively lacking in these regards in both the original and westernised versions with Mairu's outlandish behaviour often been used as a source of comedy (like most high school animes) but often falls a bit flat of the mark. In the westernised version is in the same vein as the Ace Attorney games more effort has been put into gag names and hand waving why obviously Japanese elements such as a shrine are in 'America' which might amused some players but personally this has always been a particular pet peeve of mine.   

Pros:
  • Nice visual art style through the game and a clear informative hud with lots of little details that contain much of the games humour.
  • Visually attractive and clear in design for menus and most mechanics are explained adeptly in easy to understand tutorials.
  • Unique gameplay, suitable for younger audience.
  • Choice between westernisation version and original names and references.
  • New Game + Option (if completed with minimum requirements)
  • Steam Cards.

Cons:
  • Music is short, lacks variation and obviously loops.
  • Average playthrough length dragged out by skill grinding, this is also made further problematic by the fact that certain conversation topics are far less useful than others and certain actions are quite pointless with little benefit.
  • Appalling westernisation version in spite of Ace Attorney inspiration.
  • Very little actual gameplay beyond "Go to location and select option" which quickly grows repetitive.
  • Very limited re-playability with the game easily completable in two playthroughs depending on which skills have been improved in the first playthrough.
  • Player feel like an observer to the character due to having next to no input on story events.
  • Money and items do not carry over in New Game +

TLDR: A wonderful example of what can be done with RPG Maker but with limited replay appeal and gameplay. Recommended as sales purchase.
If you'd like to see a more example of the game check out my video below:



Or alternatively the Lets Play can be be found Here


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MCM London Comic Con 2017: Part 2

Posted by: Jason Silverain / Category: , , ,



While I have already mentioned some of the games I came across at MCM London Comic Con 2017 there are quite a few more I simply can't discuss in any real detail, there was a distinct lack of advertising material this year with few flyers or leaflets and many others were on handhelds with mixed advertising around them so there wasn't much to take a photo of.

So here is a quick run down of what else caught my eye:

Cooking Mama Sweet Shop, Harvest Moon Lil’ Farmers and Drive Girls by Rising Star Games

With Cooking Mama on the 3DS it seemed business as usual with the new game focusing on sweets and deserts though I was unimpressed by limited choice 60 different recipes to create though its boast 160 different mini-games did catch my eye (though I personally hate any mini game that requires blowing into the microphone).


Harvest Moon Lil’ Farmers on the other hand was quite unexpected, going in blind I quickly discovered that the game was a collection of stripped down and bluntly dull mini games aimed at young children presumably toddlers given the simplicity.


Finally the strangest game released for the PS Vita by Rising Star Games Drive Girls, an action and driving hack ‘n’ slash hybrid uou can play as one of five different Drive Girls and transform from superheroine to supercar and back again, as you smash through wave after wave of mechanised Bug enemies in both arena and race course based combat.
Featuring a single player campaign it also boasts local and online multiplayer for up to four players, players can boost the Drive Girls’ stats in the garage by tuning and customizing their ride with new parts and decals using the currency earned after every mission. The tighter your tuning, the more protected the Drive Girls are against losing their armoured clothing in combat though if this feature remains in the Europe release I will be most surprised.



Farpoint VR by Impulse Gear

Alas I was unable to play this due to my unfortunate motion sickness that I get whenever I play VR games but the display was rather impressive (though I refused to take photos of those playing as I was unable to obtain permission from them beforehand) and it looked like an excellent first person shooter from what I observed. The controllers have a rather cheap plastic look to them but I can't deny they seem functional.

 

Star Trek Bridge Crew by Ubisoft
 
The second major VR game been advertised I was significantly less impressed by its fiddly looking controls and game making features (thus this may have simply been a result poor set up by those running the display.) The gameplay certainly seems to revolve around playing with friends and learning the various orders in which the ships systems need to be implemented, as the trailer was rather uninformative I've placed a link to Ubisoft's Lets Play below:


As you can see this is an example of the game play in its best conditions but I certainly think that much of the charm would be lost playing with strangers, for anyone looking for a non VR alternative to this then I recommend Artemis Spaceship Bridge Simulator.

ARMS By Nintendo
ARMS is a fantasy boxing game which is seen as many as a spiritual successor to Wii Sports Boxing due to similarities in controls and playstyles. In ARMS the left and right Switch JoyCons are your boxers left and right arms respectively, this control method can be affect your play style as weapons on each arm can be differently equipped. For example a Boomerang on your right arm and glove on the left arm.

Unlike earlier available demo's there are now 5 characters to select from and after a small tutorial you are put into battle with a choice of 3 weapons per arm.
Punching like Wii Sports Boxing is done by moving one’s hands in a similar fashion, with the position of fists contributing towards techniques, such as movement, blocking, and even the direction of blows like curving your punches. During your fight you can build up a meter which enables you to use “Flurry Attack” by pressing ZL and ZR.

The trailer while amusing is rather uninformative of play so the link below is the 2017 E3 presentation on ARMs:


Splatoon 2 By Nintendo

 Admittedly the first I had heard of its release, the sequel to the popular Splatoon was on demonstration at MCM Expo and was set up to have up to 8 players per single match.
Chatting with a few others who took a moment to try the game, Splatoon 2 feels more like an expansion than a sequel to the Wii U original as the graphics are only slightly touched up (though the fluid effects are impressive as ever) though it also boasts some new weapons and some new arenas.
Now if it included local coop or V.S. then I may consider it an improvement on the original.



Mao Mao Castle by AsobiTech

Those older gamers amongst us may remember the Space Harrier series of games which for a time in 1985 dominate the arcade and home consoles, Mao Mao Castle harkens back taking heavy inspiration from the games design whilst modernising it and making it non violent.

Trying my own hand at the game I attempted to match some of the high scores in order to win a copy of the game, Asobitech had the LEAP motion controller on show to play the game, which you hold your hand and move it over the sensor to move the cat and make a fist in order to use the dash features. Unfortunately I was both too tired and completely clumsy with this method of motion control to get anywhere near the top scores but it certainly let me appreciate the games mechanics. 

Winner of the Castle Game Jam 2016 Mao Mao Castle is expecting release on Android and iOS and the demo is available on their website.



Agents Of Mayhem By Volition

Agents of Mayhem is a spin-off of the Saints Row series, taking place after the "recreate Earth" ending of the Saints Row IV expansion, Gat out of Hell and frankly as a Saints Row Fan I found myself eventually despising it shortly after playing through the two mission demo at MCM London.

I won't go into too much detail here as I have enough to make an article and a half of criticism but ultimately I found myself bored senseless while playing as did my friend who actually left halfway through their play through unable to stick it out until the end. The combat was over the top visually flashy but mechanically poor to control, confusing and tedious compared to the Saints Row games but it wasn't until making several of the characters PREORDER DLC BY SUPPLIER it finally earned my utter disgust and hatred.   



Finally below are some of my favourite cosplays of this year:

Optimus Prime:




Shovel Knight:


Monster Hunter:



Legend Of Zelda: Windwaker:


And finally anyone there may have seen myself and my friend from Buzy Bobbins as the Sorceress and Rannie from Dragons Crown.



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MCM London Comic Con 2017: Part 1

Posted by: Jason Silverain / Category: , , , , ,


Greetings and salutations once I again I return from MCM London with mixed but mostly positive results, for you long time readers you may remember that last year was my first time attending.

For those of you unaware of MCM, the MCM London Comic Con is a multi-genre fan convention held in the London Borough of Newham twice yearly, usually on the last weekend in May and October. Interests range from Anime to video Games, tabletop roleplay games to cinema it really is a varied event with talk panels, video game previews, various celebrations of eastern culture and more cosplayers than you can shake a stick at.

 A quieter moment of  MCM
   
Let me say now that I had intended to post this a little earlier in the month but upon my return home from the comic con left me wiped out and the growing stress on the election was a distraction to say the least.

Arriving at London unable to secure our previous hotel our group was staying at a shared apartment which in all honest turned out to be not only cheaper but also far nicer and closer to ExCeL London.
Now it must be stated that after the Manchester Bombing things were a little more tense on arrival this year with additional security everywhere but to their credit this did little to interrupt travel through the London.

Travelling to the ExCel via DLR on the Friday did come with its own set of problems with works under way at the Custom House stop, thankfully the organisers had foreseen this and arranged staff and directions at the following stop Prince Regent. While this was highly effective there was some confusion in staff instructions regarding allowing visitors to "Swipe Out" at the station causing issues with travel payments resulting in some overcharging costs for many people initially myself included.

This was thankfully rectified by some very kind and helpful people at Transport For London who had a brilliant support number and we highlighted the issue on the MCM facebook page with advice for others in the same predicament.

 The bag checking queue...

The security staff inside the ExCel were organised extremely well, courteous and generally well humoured to those in costume, even with hundreds of people streaming in the queues were kept short and were no more than 15 minutes. Later we discovered that initially there was intended backpack ban but with the hot weather the health risk of people not carrying bottled water and the general inconvenience to the public it was decided against. 

and the rest of it on the quiet Friday start.


Now to avoid simply reiterating my post from last year I am going to make a few comparisons to my previous experience:

The Map
  
Just to highlight what I said last year: 
 
I found the map near useless apart from from a general gist of the layout, just look below to see what I mean:

Front with map
 Back with panels and events
Now the astute amongst you may already notice something important missing from this map, that's right there is no key referring to the numbers listed on the stalls apart from the big name logos. In addition there is no reference to the ExCeL London own hall numbers or the entrance area so it is extremely easy to get turned around and disorientated due to the similarity of the stalls and lack of directions posted about.

There is a key but its inside the 140 page advert and article event magazine which also has a copy of the map located between pages 62 and 65, after another advert the key is listed BY ALPHABETICAL ORDER OF THE STALLS which is bloody useless unless you already know what stall your wanting to find beforehand. I'm looking at the damn key to find out what 471 is not the other way round. The panel event program is also a nightmare to find and read through in the magazine with information scattered between articles so at least the map was an improvement in this regard.
 In short just as bloody useless this year with all the same problems.

Stalls:

Thankfully far more variety this year, only a single major stall focused in Pop Figures much to my relief and while many of the stalls of the previous year returned there was far more variation between their stock. A few stalls did earn my ire however with blatant absurd pricing and lets just say if I was selling my PS1 game collection for the amounts they were charging  I would be a few thousands pounds better off.

 Pokemon plush were everywhere this year

CEX also didn't make a reappearance this year which was for the better, last year they had annoyed me with their loud music blaring out over the hall drowning out the various talks and panels and while GAME was there they didn't take up nearly as much space this year. Unfortunately also missing were table top roleplay stands as not a single one was available this year, but in their place the Lincoln Steam Punk Society had turned up much to my surprise and were advertising The Asylum Steampunk Festival later this year.   

All in all a major improvement from the year before especially since more of the hall was available this year there was far more space between the stalls so the horrible overcrowding of last year wasn't an issue at all much to my delight.

 Just a small amount of the manga on offer

I also ran into some old acquaintance from the Sheffield Space Centre, this was my main source of anime and manga growing up 15 years ago and it was great to see them still going strong today as they always stocked a large variety of comics, manga, anime, even figures, model kits and table top roleplaying games. It was great to see them with a stall at MCM London this year and I discovered yet another niche manga series through them Monster Hunter: Flash Hunter.
I highly recommend popping to their store if in Sheffield or checking out their website.

Video Games:

This year there were no major video game talk panels though a smaller stage had been set up by Rice Digital covering a handful of games, when generally this layout worked well the sound team really dropped the ball on the Saturday and a lot of the commentators were inaudible.

It would of also been easier to hear if the esports commentator just behind the panel had shut up for 5 minutes.
  
With this said there were two games there were two games covered that stood out to me:

Akiba's Beat:
Akiba's Beat is an action role-playing video game for the PlayStation Vita and PlayStation 4 video game consoles, a spiritual successor to Akiba's Trip: Undead and Undressed and the third game in the Akiba series its focus is to highlight the music culture of Akiba during its story.
In all honesty after the highly quirky arcade action and self acknowledging parody humour of the second game Akiba's Beat just came across as dull, slow paced and honestly rather boring in it mechanics, with very little originality that the series had previously been know for.
It seems that many other reviews agree with this observation.

      Advised Strong Language.


Project Rap Rabbit



Project Rap Rabbit is a global collaboration between Japanese developers NanaOn-Sha (PaRappa The Rapper, Vib-Ribbon) and iNiS Corporation (Gitaroo Man, Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan), and UK-based publisher PQube Ltd.

Having developed some of the most revered music games of all time, they're committed to creating the greatest rhythm-action videogame in history with a new rapping adventure than infuses the best ideas from their past with innovative mechanics that  they hope will go on to shape the genre's future forevermore.

However not everything is going as planned as the Kickstarter for the project is woefully underfunded even with 2,549 backers only £129,806 of £855,000 goal has been reached and with only 10 days to go they have finally releasing a gameplay video of Rap Rabbit which is too little too late.

As one backer states:
Here's how this will go.
There will be this big unveiling of the gameplay video tomorrow. People from all over show up on this KS page as a result. They'll immediately notice that, after 3 weeks, the game is not even 20% funded, and that there's only a week and a half left to raise the remaining 80%. Maybe they'll hit that Remind Me button, but at the end of the day, they aren't gonna pledge.
Building up the Thunderclap, and hyping up the unveiling of the video, are both things that should have begun weeks before the campaign launched. Matsuura-san, Yano-san: PLEASE relaunch this campaign. Suspend it early so whatever resources you allocated to this one can be reallocated to the next one. But unless you have a massive E3 presence planned, there is no way this game is being funded with this particular campaign.

As a backer myself I totally agree with this prediction, there has been a complete failure to market the game to the community or the gaming media, I MYSELF have made seeming the only post on Reddit about the project (at the time of my posting) and I can help but feel that somewhere along the line the PR just flopped.


Just behind the Digital Rice Panel

Other than Digital Rice the Esports community really were making a hit with Tekken 7 with a massive set-up and tournament over the weekend and Guilty Gear XRD Rev 2 was making its own impact on its admittedly much smaller collection of consoles. The halls also boasted various arcade machine set ups with a one company selling the cabinets it was displaying, though I think the real moment that stole it was the Gandalf V.s. Gimli on the dance machines.



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