Game Review: Metroid (NES)

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Metroid, Mother Brain, NES, Nintendo, Ridley, Samus Aran

As the third pillar of Nintendo’s big three alongside Mario and Zelda, the Metroid series has never wanted for a faithful fan following (alliteration not intended). With its thick atmosphere, balance between exploration and action and design that perfectly suited speedrunning the series has maintained a high level of quality for twenty-five years. That said Samus Aran has always lived in the shadow of her more commercially successful and mainstream brothers. Consider the eight year hiatus she endured following Super Metroid, her finest moment. Last year Nintendo did not miss an opportunity to celebrate Zelda’s 25^th anniversary. It was Metroid’s anniversary too but Samus barely got a mention from her creators. Looking back at the three series’ console debuts on the NES it’s fair to say that Metroid is the most dated but that doesn’t change the fact that it was one of the most important games of the 8-bit era and arguably video game history.

In a raid on a Galactic Federation ship Space Pirates have stolen samples of the lethal Metroid parasites. Created by the extinct Chozo race to eradicate the equally deadly X parasite (as outlined in Metroid Fusion), Metroids suck the life force from all other living things causing rapid death to anything that crosses their path, something the Space Pirates aim to use in their crazed campaign for galactic dominance by turning them into bioweapons on planet Zebes. Federation attempts to neutralise the threat festering on Zebes have been fruitless and so they turn to Samus Aran, the galaxy’s most renowned bounty hunter who was raised by the Chozo, to infiltrate the planet’s desolate caverns and eradicate the menace.

As Samus you are plunged into the lonely, isolated and desperately hostile catacombs of Zebes and asked to explore. Immediately the game’s first major innovation becomes apparent as your progress is barred forcing you to move in a hitherto unthinkable direction, left. Every sidescroller that came before stuck to uniform left-to-right traversal and Metroid was the first game that allowed the screen to scroll in all four directions. In the same year Zelda presented an open-world from a top top-down perspective Metroid did the same from a side-on point of view. Instead of the linear succession of levels seen in other NES shooters Metroid’s world is a sprawling and continuous labyrinth filled with secrets.

You progress by exploring in search of upgrades to your armour waiting for you in the welcoming hands of Chozo statues dotted around the map. In another bold piece if invention these upgrades were not temporary power-ups like the invincibility star in Super Mario Bros. but permanent additions to your arsenal. Some improve your offensive capabilities like the enemy-freezing ice beam while others assist exploration such as the very first suit upgrade which instantly became a trademark for the series. The Maru Mari or morph ball turns Samus into a sphere allowing her to roll through small gaps in the terrain, an ability that remains undeniably cool. As you gain more abilities larger portions of the map become open to you including the lairs of the two bosses, Kraid and recurring series villain Ridley who must be taken out before you can access Tourian where the Metroids lurk guarding the path to Mother Brain.

Gameplay is a straightforward affair that mixes the platforming of Super Mario Bros. with some intense blasting action. You will encounter a wide range of hostile indigenous creatures wherever you go some of which crawl along the floor and walls, others swoop down from the ceiling. Nowhere is entirely safe and the sheer volume of enemies you’re faced with is where the game places much of its difficulty. Just crossing through monster-infested corridors during your blind exploration is an exercise in survival and any gamers used to the level of challenge found in most modern games will be frustrated by frequent deaths and what feels like an unfair concentration of nasties. If you persist you’ll get to know enemy movement patterns and develop strategies for overcoming particular species and the suit upgrades will empower you to more efficient killing. You are restricted to shooting in just two directions, forward and straight up, something you’ll have to manage in order to progress. This places low-placed wall-crawlers irritatingly out of your range and you’ll curse anything that swoops down on you from an angle but although the game’s limitations can be irksome the controls are tight and responsive.

One thing that most certainly hasn’t aged is the game’s legendary atmosphere, which is achieved through a combination of eerie, echoing musical pieces and the cold, extensive design of Zebes’ caverns. The pitch black background, something seen in so many NES sidescrollers, has never been so effectively placed to convey a sense of darkness.

So you complete your power suit, beat the bosses, infiltrate Tourian and fight your way to and destroy Mother Brain. Game over right? Wrong, the game had another trick up its sleeve and the Space Pirate base self-destruct sequence initiates leaving you with a limited time to escape to the surface in one last platforming challenge. If you survive you can pat yourself on the back for a difficult job completed and sit back and watch the credits knowing that all the surprises are behind you. But if you were a gamer in 1986 and you’d managed to complete the game quickly enough there was a final sting in the tail that represented a seismic shift in the context of video game history.

Samus Aran wears a power suit designed by the same Chozo race that created the Metroids for protection and as an aid to combat and exploration but in the story it serves another purpose, to obscure the identity of its wearer. It was naturally assumed by mid-eighties gamers that the ass-kicking hero of the game was a man. The English language instruction manual for the game even referred to Samus as ‘him’ to encourage this but players that achieved a quick completion time were in for a shocking revelation. The final screen depicts Samus in the power suit which then disappears to reveal a woman.

It’s not quite true to say Samus was the first playable video game heroine. Ms Pac-man and Clu Clu Land’s Bubbles both came first but neither of them were actually human (pretty much just circles in fact) and before Metroid women traditionally fulfilled the damsel-in-distress role in video games. Samus paved the way for characters like Chun-li and Lara Croft and while the voluptuous Miss Croft might be the most well-known gaming heroine in popular culture, gamers everywhere will always regard Samus as the industry’s leading lady. Given that Metroid’s biggest reward for speedy play is a glimpse of Samus in a bikini (the game also introduced the idea of multiple endings) it’s a bit difficult to regard her as a feminist figure but on the other hand unlike most women in games she’s never usually depicted with gratuitously large breasts. More importantly she is genuinely bad-ass.

The revolutionary idea of making a woman an action hero is one of many ways in which Metroid borrows from the Alien franchise which was an influence on the development team. Having a woman as the main character of a science-fiction horror movie was an original concept in 1978 so you could say Sigourney Weaver’s Ripley is Samus’ spiritual sister. The dripping atmosphere and plot focusing on dangerous extra-terrestrial creatures inspiring the title is shared by both game and film. The closing act race to escape before a self-destruct timer concludes is also lifted from the movie and Metroid’s Ridley is, of course named after Alien director Ridley Scott. A notable difference between the two franchises is that Alien’s quality dropped off somewhat while Metroid’s never did.

Speaking as a gamer who never played Metroid in its heyday who has just completed the game for the first time I can confirm that the game does indeed show its age. There are some quirks in the design that are infuriating, such as the random appearance of enemies right on the other side of doorways making them impossible to avoid. The game also suffers from frequent slowdown and the gameplay is not as refined as Nintendo’s other major NES titles Super Mario Bros. and The Legend of Zelda both of which are more accessible generally than Metroid. In spite of that I thoroughly enjoyed playing through Metroid. The core design remains very strong and it’s addictive as hell. While it’s clearly been far surpassed by Super Metroid on the SNES and Metroid Prime on the Gamecube it remains a true NES classic, the significance of which in the history of the video game industry must not be ignored. If you’re a 3DS ambassador you can download the game for your handheld (which is how I played it this time) or failing that it’s available on the Wii’s Virtual Console. If you’ve never played the opening chapter in Samus Aran’s story I highly recommend you do.

Verdict

Presentation – 9

It’s all about the atmosphere which draws you in and holds you prisoner until the end. Only some wonky translation holds it back.

Design – 8

The world is massive and taxing to negotiate filled with secrets, dead-ends and wild goose chases.

Gameplay – 8

Solid run and gun action let down ever so slightly by technological restrictions. The ability to shoot in eight directions in Super Metroid was a significant improvement.

Graphics – 8

Stark and hostile. Alien landscapes really look alien and some of the enemy sprites are very detailed.

Sound – 10

A masterclass in musical arrangement used to build atmosphere and tension. Some tunes are simply classics.

Difficulty – 9

Unrelenting for newbies to say the least. Later suit upgrades do make things a bit more manageable though.

Longevity – 8

It should take a few hours to beat on the first attempt. The multiple endings are more than enough to inspire repeat plays.

Overall

A classic in every sense of the word not just for being a brilliantly designed and intensely engaging game but because it innovated in ways that had massive influences on the industry. Maybe a little archaic now in some respects but highly enjoyable nonetheless.

9.4

Film Review Roundup

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adventure, Amy Adams, animation, Bill Murray, Carnage, Cate Blanchett, Christopher Waltz, Fantastic Mr Fox, George Clooney, Hayao Miyazaki, Jason Segel, Jodie Foster, John C Reilly, Kate Winslet, Kermit the Frog, Liam Neeson, Matt Damon, Meryl Streep, Miss Piggy, Owen Wilson, Ponyo, Roald Dahl, Roman Polanski, Studio Ghibli, The Muppets, Tina Fey, Wes Anderson, Willem Defoe

I originally intended this to be a video game review blog with added film and book reviews but thanks to my dedication to review every film I see in the cinema and buy on DVD it’s the film reviews that have taken over. I’d love to give full reviews to every film I see but the workload has been building up and I’ve taken the executive decision to start relying more on roundups like this. I’ll still be doing proper film reviews but only for titles I really want to dedicate the time to.

In Cinemas

The Muppets

Jason Segel, a person not known for his family friendly movies was the man trusted with bringing the wonderful Muppets back to our screens after a long hiatus. The fact that Kermit, Miss Piggy and co have been languishing in obscurity for the last several years is actually rather cannily used as a plot point for this new movie in which Segel stars as Gary whose felt-faced brother Walter is obsessed with the Muppets and campaigns for them to reform. Cue a rich tycoon’s plan to destroy the Muppets’ studios to drill for oil and we have a race against time for Kermit, Walter, Gary and Gary’s fiancée Mary (Amy Adams in full Enchanted mode) to track down the old gang. It’s a real delight to see these great characters back on the big screen and many of the fourth-wall breaking gags and general silliness really hits the spot but the story doesn’t have the high entertainment value of Muppet Treasure Island or The Muppet Christmas Carol. The delegation of screen time for the characters doesn’t quite achieve the right balance (there’s not nearly enough of Gonzo and Rizzo is missing altogether) and some of the songs are overwhelmingly saccharine but that doesn’t matter in this case as much as it otherwise might. After all is there anyone who doesn’t love the Muppets?

Carnage

Two sets of well-to-do New York parents meet to amicably discuss a violent incident involving their eleven-year-old sons but civility gradually descends into childish bickering in Roman Polanski’s often hilarious adaptation of Yasmina Reza’s play Le Dieu de Carnage. The impressive ensemble cast (Kate Winslet, Jodi Foster, Christopher Waltz, John C. Reilly) have a ball with the script, revelling in the vitriol they get to spout at each other and the characters are all perfectly observed. The film’s downfall is its self-imposed limitations brought on by its genesis as a stage play. The single, cramped setting lends a not inappropriate sense of claustrophobia but the single continuous scene inevitably lacks any kind of variety. It’s a fine adap but it couldn’t be more obviously an adap if it tried.

On DVD

Fantastic Mr Fox

Wes Anderson’s stop-motion adaptation of one of Roald Dahl’s best loved stories (and my personal favourite of his) really stands out from the crowd. The idiosyncratically crude animation brings to mind those annoying Compare the Market adverts and the direction and script are wry, whimsical and offbeat. The story of a cocky and anthropomorphic fox (voiced by George Clooney) busting one last heist against the three fattest, shortest and leanest farmers capitalism has ever imagined manages to be both hilarious and touching with rounded character tension and depth. The star-studded cast that includes Bill Murray and Michael Gambon deliver brilliantly confident performances, making the grown-up script sparkle. It’s a cult film and that’s mainly because the script is very mature, loaded with swearing cynically masked by the word ‘cuss’ and a consistently bonkers mood. That this film in which the hero talks about existentialism could be taken on its merits and regarded as an adult’s animation doesn’t really hold water given that it’s adapted from the writings of one of the most important kids’ writers in history and many critics have not wrongly marked it down for this. In the film’s defence I’m sure that the odd tone and general sense of fun will not be lost on young ‘uns and as such it will still find its audience. Purist’s complaints at the story’s Americanisation and relative lack of fidelity is predictable. Maybe someday people will figure out the definition of the word ‘adaptation’ and that’s coming from someone who loved the book. Whatever complaints might be levelled there’s no denying that Fantastic Mr Fox is innovative and memorable

Ponyo

I’m reviewing Disney’s important take on Hans Christian Anderson’s The Little Mermaid soon but first is the matter of this bolder reimagining, Hayao Miyazaki’s most recent directorial feature with Studio Ghibli. Set in a modern day version of Japan that seems unperturbed by giant sea gods Ponyo is the fishy daughter of a powerful oceanic sorcerer who escapes from his supervision to explore the human world where she meets five-year-old Sosuke with whom she forms a strong bond. It’s a more creative vision of the story that paints a vivid and slightly perilous impression of the ocean complete with tsunami made of giant fish. As bold as many of the more exciting scenes are the film is equally strong in quitter moments such as the scene in which the tots enjoy their dinner which is laced with beautifully observed cuteness. The film is primarily aimed at younger kids, but, like with My Neighbour Totoro before it, Ghibli have created a film that should maintain strong appeal for children and adults of every age. The strong English language voice cast includes the likes of Liam Neeson, Cate Blanchett and Matt Damon, with the younger siblings of teen stars playing the nippers (Miley Cyrus’ sister, the Jonas brothers’ baby bro) but Tina Fey gets the best results as Sosuke’s hilariously tenacious mum. This is Ghibli very nearly at their best.

Film Review: The Artist (PG)

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Berenice Bejo, Drama, James Cromwell, Jean Dujardin, John Goodman, Michel Hazanavicius, The Artist, Uggie

The recent darling of cinemagoers of all types has been this multiple Oscar-nominated black and white silent film from Michel Hazanavicius, one I’d been meaning to take in for some time and finally got round to recently. And I’m very glad I did because it’s the best film I’ve seen so far this year. Okay, I’ll come clean it’s technically a 2011 film because it went on general release on the 30^th of December but it’s too late to include The Artist in my Top Ten Films of 2011 which it most definitely would have been good enough for so I’ll hold it over until next year. I can tell you now it will have to be one hell of a year for The Artist to be left off that list.

The Artist is a very self-aware film since its subject matter is precisely what it is. Jean Dujardin plays the charismatic and arrogant George Valentin a silent film god of the 1920s who plays to crowds, infuriates his co-stars and acts alongside his loyal Jack Russell (Uggie) in all his films. With the world at his feet he gives young hopeful Peppy Miller (a seriously appealing Bérénice Bejo) a leg up into the industry and sneers at his director’s (John Goodman) new interest in talkies. Betting against the fresh craze George’s career takes a nosedive to coincide with the stock market crash while Peppy’s popularity soars.

Part of the reason why the film is such a delight is in its beautifully judged tone which ranges from whimsical and light to downright Capra-esque sad as scenes demand. So much of this is achieved by the musical accompaniment which is present pretty much throughout and perfectly guides your emotions to compliment the masterful acting. Jean Dujardin has definitely earned his Oscar nomination by striking the right balance between charming and smug to create a deeply flawed character that is still very easy to sympathise with while Bejo is a delightful screen presence, lighting up every one of her scenes. Together they are the epitome of what made the silent era so popular, easy, charismatic and light. The supporting cast are all on fine form, particularly Goodman who seems to be having a lot of fun as the long-suffering director and Uggie is an immediate hit as the faithful pooch with a bright career ahead of him (Nintendo has already signed him up as their official spokesdog).

If you’re at all concerned that the lack of sound (other than that wonderful score) might inhibit your enjoyment of The Artist I can confidently reassure you. I’d never previously seen a single silent film in my life and had no difficulty whatsoever in enjoying the unique pleasures the classic medium has to offer. The use of title cards is actually quite sparing, reserved for moments in the script in which facial expressions and body language aren’t quite enough to tell the story. In one case in particular they’re put to extremely effective use as a clever piece of misdirection. There’s also a brilliant dream sequence to look out for that plays a beautifully-judged trick in a pretty direct reference to the quirks of the silent genre.

The only possible downfall with going to see The Artist in the cinema is not a fault of the film as such. Since this is a silent film any noise in the theatre will be that bit more audible. I was lucky enough to have seen it as part of an impeccably well-behaved audience with only the odd cough puncturing the silence in the auditorium but my buddy Ryan’s viewing of the film was slightly spoiled by a pair of old ladies who evidently hadn’t grasped cinema etiquette and talked throughout. It’s a shame that this can sometimes be the case because the film deserves the full attention of audiences for being just the most breezy, well-judged and heart-warming backwards glance at the history of film. It’s a triumph and gets my highest recommendation.

Verdict

Short on spoken dialogue but long on uplifting entertainment, The Artist is an instant classic sure to inspire countless inferior copycats, a great homage to the early days of the medium and downright brilliant film in its own right.

Top 100 Games 2012

Tags

Banjo-Kazooie, Baten Kaitos - Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean, Disciples - Sacred Lands, F-Zero, Metroid Fusion, Nintendo, Streets of Rage, Super Mario Sunshine, Super Smash Bros., The Legend of Zelda - A Link to the Past, The Legend of Zelda - Twilight Princess, Top 100, Top 100 Games, Top 100 Games 2012

At last, my annual top 100 video games post makes its long overdue appearence for 2012. As usual this is the entire rundown of my 100 favourite video games to date. Obviously it differs from last year’s list in that it includes a handful of new releases including The Legend of Zelda – Skyward Sword, and also a number of existing titles have gained and lost places in my favour. Big movers include F-Zero GX and Fire Emblem – Radiant Dawn which has been awarded an even higher score than I gave it in my review last year and has finally taken its place in my all time top ten. Per tradition I’ve featured a handful of entries and given their score out of ten and have provided links to full reviews for every game I’ve written them for. Remember it’s a personal list of mainly but not exclusively Nintendo games so if your favourite is nowhere to be seen then chances are I haven’t played it.

100 – Baten Kaitos – Eternal Wings and the Lost Ocean – 8.8

An innovative and addictive card-based battle system and ridiculously pretty visuals make this Gameuibe RPG stand out. You are a spirit guide who must help Kalas in his struggle against an evil empire in a universe where everybody has wings and stores everything, weapons, food, whatever, in card form. A lengthy and compulsive title for sure, shame about the voice acting.

99 – Super Mario Bros. 2 – 8.9

98 – F-Zero GP Legend – 8.9

97 – Zelda II – The Adventure of Link – 8.9

96 – Donkey Kong Jungle Beat – 8.9

95 – Tales of Symphonia – 8.9

94 – Elite Beat Agents – 8.9

93 – Mario Kart 64 – 8.9

92 – Pikmin – 8.9

91 – Zack and Wiki – Quest for Barbaros’ Treasure – 8.9

90 – Professor Layton and the Curious Village – 8.9

89 – Mario Kart Super Circuit – 9.0

88 – Streets of Rage – 9.0

Sega scored a palpable hit with their answer to the SNES’ Final Fight in which a trio of former cops take on legions of thugs in a city overrun by a crime organisation known as The Syndicate. The fighting is arcadey and satisfying, the boss fights bizarre and the music moody and compelling. The best part was the backup attacks which called in a cop car to blast enemies off the screen.

87 – Professor Layton and the Lost Future – 9.0

86 – Mario Kart DS – 9.0

85 – Super Monkey Ball 2 – 9.0

84 – Mario Kart Double Dash! – 9.0

83 – Streets of Rage 2 – 9.1

82 – Professor Layton and Pandora’s Box – 9.1

81 – Donkey Kong Country – 9.1

80 – Fire Emblem – The Sacred Stones – 9.1

79 – Donkey Kong Country Returns – 9.1

78 – Mario Kart Wii – 9.1

77 – Fire Emblem – Shadow Dragon – 9.1

76 – The Legend of Zelda – Phantom Hourglass – 9.1

75 – Super Smash Bros. – 9.1

This ridiculaously entertaining fighter which spawned two massive sequels is notable not just for its roster of classic Nintendo characters but also for its groundbreaking battle system that focused on hitting opponents as far as possible. The game’s lack of options and average graphics betray its low budget but the gameplay speaks for itself and still sorts the men from the boys.

 74 – Paper Mario – 9.1

73 – Super Mario Bros. The Lost Levels – 9.1

72 – Mega Man – 9.1

71 – Warioland 2 – 9.1

70 – Yoshi’s Island DS – 9.1

69 – Warioland – Super Mario Land 3 – 9.2

68 – Super Mario 3D Land – 9.2

67 – Super Street Fighter II – The New Challengers – 9.2

66 – Mario Kart 7 – 9.2

65 – Super Mario RPG – Legend of the Seven Stars – 9.2

64 – Warioland 3 – 9.2

63 – F-Zero – 9.2

This early SNES title showed off the console’s unique Mode 7 tech and singlehandedly created the futuristic racer sub-genre. The speed is blistering but the tight controls make it easy to pick up. The ferocious design of later courses tag it with a meaty difficulty level making it essential for hardcore speed demons.

62 – Warioland 4 – 9.2

61 – The Legend of Zelda – Four Swords Adventures – 9.2

60 – Mario and Luigi – Bowser’s Inside Story – 9.2

59 – The Legend of Zelda – Spirit Tracks – 9.2

58 – Wario Ware Inc. Minigame Mania – 9.2

57 – Disciples – Sacred Lands – 9.2

One of the exceedingly few PC games I ever invested myself in Disciples is a relentlessly addictive fantasy strategy RPG featuring four races each with their own massive story campaign. You raise parties of heroes (or monsters) to explore the lands, fight foes, plunder ruins and pursue mission objectives. There’s even a fully functioning quest creator to take over your life.

56 – Pikmin 2 – 9.2

55 – Fire Emblem – 9.2

54 – Disciples II – Dark Prophecy – 9.2

53 – Soul Calibur II – 9.2

52 – Donkey Kong – 9.3

51 – Pokemon Silver Version – 9.3

50 – Metroid Zero Mission – 9.3

49 – New Super Mario Bros. Wii – 9.3

48 – Diddy Kong Racing – 9.3

47 – F-Zero x – 9.3

46 – Mario and Luigi – Superstar Saga – 9.3

45 – The Legend of Zelda – Oracle of Seasons – 9.3

44 – Super Mario Sunshine – 9.3

This Gamecube era platformer might not be the plumber’s best outing but it still offers its share of riveting platforming action framed by the opinion-dividing FLUDD water cannon. Presenting various resort destinations of the tropical Isle Delfino for your exploration this is Mario’s most believable world yet and the hunt for all 120 shine sprites is one of his most demanding targets.

43 – The Legend of Zelda – The Minish Cap – 9.3

42 – Sonic 3 – 9.4

41 – Pokemon Blue Version – 9.4

40 – Super Smash Bros. Brawl – 9.4

39 – Metroid – 9.4

38 – The Legend of Zelda – Oracle of Ages – 9.4

37 – Lylat Wars – 9.4

36 – Paper Mario – The Thousand-Year Door – 9.4

35 – Sonic the Hedgehog – 9.5

34 – Metroid Fusion – 9.5

The first Metroid game in eight years took Super Metroid’s template and transferred its peerless gameplay and structure to the Game Boy Advance. With almost everything that made the SNES classic great and a ton of brilliant new concepts, like the terrifying games of cat and mouse with the SA-X it holds its head high as the best created for the system. I have yet to come across a game designed for handhelds since to better it.

33 – Super Smash Bros. Melee – 9.5

32 – Metroid Prime 2 – Echoes – 9.5

31 – Sonic the Hedgehog 2 – 9.5

30 – GoldenEye 007 – 9.5

29 – Tetris – 9.5

28 – Banjo-Tooie – 9.5

27 – Sonic & Knuckles – 9.5

26 – F-Zero GX – 9.5

25 – Fire Emblem – Path of Radiance – 9.5

24 – Metroid Prime 3 – Corruption – 9.5

23 – Banjo-Kazooie – 9.6

Banjo-Kazooie stands out among the many Super Mario 64 clones for its brilliant graphics, hilarious characters, and huge, brilliantly designed worlds but mainly for its imaginative and varied duel-character gameplay, itself an inspiration for many imitators. The storybook aesthetic and comedic presentation give the N64 title a strong sense of identity.

22 – Super Mario Bros. – 9.6

21 – The Legend of Zelda – 9.6

20 – Chrono Trigger – 9.6

19 – Okami – 9.6

18 – Super Mario Bros. 3 – 9.7

17 – The Legend of Zelda – Ocarina of Time 3D – 9.7

16 – The Legend of Zelda – The Wind Waker – 9.7

15 – Yoshi’s Island – Super Mario World 2 – 9.7

14 – The Legend of Zelda – Skyward Sword – 9.7

13 – The Legend of Zelda – Twilight Princess – 9.7

The race between this and Skyward Sword, both fantastic games held back by a few flaws, was perilously close but the earlier game got the nod on the strength of its superior dungeons. The game’s shadowy mood, vast world and brilliant arsenal of toys confirm it as just another Zelda classic and where Skyward Sword forget to be epic Twilight Princess excelled.

12 – Super Mario World – 9.7

11 Super Mario Galaxy 2 – 9.7

10 – Fire Emblem – Radiant Dawn – 9.7

9 – Super Mario Galaxy – 9.7

8 – Metroid Prime – 9.8

7 – Super Metroid – 9.8

6 – Super Mario 64 – 9.8

5 – The Legend of Zelda – Link’s Awakening – 9.8

4 – The Legend of Zelda – A Link to the Past – 9.8

The Legend of Zelda broke the mould but the third game in the series, A Link to the Past laid the foundations of the rest of the series to follow. Mixing the traditional dungeon exploration with a brilliantly detailed overworld and a staggeringly vast amount of content, not to mention sweeping story and the innovative light/dark world mechanic this immediately became renowned as one of the best games ever made.

 3 – Skies of Arcadia – Legends – 9.8

2 – The Legend of Zelda – Majora’s Mask – 9.9

1 – The Legend of Zelda – Ocarina of Time – 10.0

Game Review: Star Fox 64 3D (3DS)

Tags

3DS, Falco Lombardi, Fox McCloud, Lylat Wars, Nintendo, Peppy Hare, Q Games, Shooter, Slippy Toad, Star Fox, Star Fox 64, Star Fox 64 3D

Early Star Fox games had a bit of identity crisis in Europe. A trademark issue meant that the SNES original which was the world’s first true three-dimensional game had to be called Star Wing here while the cult classic N64 sequel Star Fox 64, another trailblazer (it was the first game to support controller rumble) bore the title Lylat Wars in PAL regions. Now Lylat Wars is getting a remake (in truth an enhanced port like Ocarina of Time 3D) and the title in Europe is Star Fox 64 3D just to confuse everybody.

If you’ve played Lylat Wars you should know exactly what to expect from this handheld reiteration. You play as Fox McCloud, the heroic leader of the Star Fox team of space mercenaries who are hired by General Pepper of the Cornerian Army to liberate the Lylat System from the forces of the evil Andross, a deranged scientist with ambitions to rule the galaxy. You must pilot your Arwing fighter craft through a series of stages blasting Andross’ assault fleets and taking out bosses as you make your way level by level to the hideout of the ‘maniacal scientist’ on the planet Venom.

Stages are a mixture of classic on-rails challenges filled with scripted events and relentless action and open dogfights known in-game as All-Range Mode. Controls are simple and intuitive and the action comes thick and fast. Accompanying you are your three team-mates Peppy Hare, Slippy Toad and Falco Lombardi to lend a wing and offer advice. The basic shooter action is great but the joy of the level design is the scripted events. You might be asked to bail a team-mate out of trouble or complete a secondary objective such as taking out searchlights that can affect your route through the game.

You will need to complete six levels before you are allowed to tackle Venom and with most missions lasting just a few minutes it makes the game possible to complete in an hour or so but seeing the credits roll once far from spells the end of the game’s lifespan. Perhaps more than any other N64 game Star Fox 64/Lylat Wars encouraged multiple repeat plays in which players must complete secondary objectives or find hidden exits to chart a different course through the game opening up previously unseen missions. Depending on how you finish them missions can either be ‘completed’ or ‘accomplished’ and achieving seven of the latter bags you the best ending.

Star Fox 64 3D repeats this process wholesale, with enhancements to the experience proving chiefly cosmetic. The original’s graphics were never tremendously pretty even in the game’s heyday but they’ve been hugely updated for this reissue featuring much bolder colours and a lot more detail in the character models, textures and backgrounds. The visual design of some levels has been improved so well to make them almost unrecognisable, the red hot fires of Solar and polluted oceans of Zoness being the most visually striking. The graphics don’t push the 3DS to its limits but they still serve as a worthwhile treat for fans.

The original’s sound was iconic, not because of its music or sound effects, good though those are, but because of the voice acting. Put simply it’s gloriously, hilariously, peerlessly cheesy, the script presented in bite-size chunks making every single line easy to remember. The quality of the recordings has received a noticeable mark-up here and while some lines have been detectably re-recorded most of it sounds very much the same as before. The most quotable script in video game history (‘Do a barrel roll!’) remains thankfully untouched, Slippy is just as annoying as ever, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

The game does offer some augmentation to the gameplay. You can play in either N64 mode or the slightly easier-for-newbies 3DS mode with or without gyro controls that are, to put it mildly, unusable. The stereoscopy helps to sell a sense of depth in the on-rails missions but does nothing for the gameplay.

Star Fox 64 3D retains what made the original a classic but the lack of any real attempt to update its general presentation or add any significant new content (new missions would have been nice) results in a game that is showing its age a little. That said fans will undoubtedly get a kick out of the nostalgia factor mixed with the modernised look and first timers should give it a try to see how great the franchise was before third party-developed titles like Star Fox Adventures and Star Fox Assault experimented with the formula with inferior results. More than this though it’s still ridiculously good fun and one of the most entertaining titles gracing the 3DS.

Verdict

 Presentation – 7

A tad basic in places but the peerlessly entertaining voice acting makes up for the shortcomings.

Design – 8

The on-rails missions in particular are an absolute blast and the locations are varied and imaginative.

Gameplay – 8

Fast, frantic and fun with straightforward controls.

Graphics – 8

A clear improvement on the slightly blocky original with an excellent amount of detail and charm.

Sound – 8

That unforgettable voicework is accompanied by a fitting score that really suits the space opera story.

Difficulty – 7

Depending on what route you take completion can be fairly straightforward. The real challenge is in earning medals.

Longevity – 7

Short but rammed with replayability both by merit of the game’s structure and how gosh-darned fun it is to play.

Overall

A winning update that keeps everything that made Lylat Wars such a favourite without really adding to it. Still a must for fans and a great history lesson for the uninitiated.

8.8

Film Review: The Secret of Kells (PG)

Tags

Abbot Cellach, adventure, Aisling, animation, Book of Kells, Brendan, Brendan Gleeson, Brother Aidan, Cartoon Saloon, Christen Mooney, Crom Cruach, Evan McGuire, Ireland, Kells, Mick Lally, Nora Twomey, Pangur Ban, The Secret of Kells, Tomm Moore

This is my 100^th post for this blog and I’m not the kind of person who lets meaningless milestones go by without celebrating them which is why I’ve chosen some very special subject matter to mark the occasion. The Secret of Kells is a film that I will always associate with the focus of my last review, Coraline for a number of reasons. I saw both for the first time on the same day. I bought both films on DVD at the same time from the same place. Both were released in the same year, 2009, the best year ever for animation. Both were nominated for the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature. Both lost out to Pixar’s Up, a film that would have been a deserving winner in any other year, but not ahead of those two. Both films were made by animation studios that are not household names. Both films have a young protagonist who ventures into a magical world. Both get pretty dark in the third act. Both feature a cat. And most importantly they are both astounding achievements. My DVD copies of the two films sit side by side on my animation shelf.

Most reviewers aren’t disposed towards grandiose statements about the films (or whatever) they love the most, instead offering measured praise in line with what their editors and readerships would expect. I’ve always written more personally for this blog sticking my neck out in elaborate commendation of creations I think don’t get the glory they deserve (such as Fire Emblem – Radiant Dawn). For years I’ve had no doubts about what my favourite game (The Legend of Zelda – Ocarina of Time) and favourite book (Redwall) are but I’ve never had a really firm idea of what my favourite film is. Contenders have come and gone, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade played on constant repeat in my VCR growing up, all three The Lord of the Rings films have enjoyed periodic status as my favourite film, while animations like Disney’s Beauty and the Beast and Toy Story 3 have also laid a claim but nothing has ever really stuck.

Until recently that is. After being completely bowled over by both Coraline and The Secret of Kells I knew they had instantly become my two favourite films. The only question was which of them was better. For a long time I leaned more towards Coraline because of the enormous impact it had on the first watch but repeat viewings have caused some of that power to diminish slightly. The wonder of The Secret of Kells has not suffered any such effect. That being so I can finally confirm it to be my all-time favourite film.

We’re in seventh century Ireland and the Abbey of Kells (that’s two of my favourites set in an abbey, the other being Redwall). Brendan is a young novice who is always getting in trouble with his uncle, Abbot Cellach who is obsessed with building the Abbey walls as high and strong as possible to protect the inhabitants from Viking invaders. When Brother Aidan a famous inscriber comes to Kells with his white cat Pangur Ban seeking sanctuary he brings with him the Book of Iona, later known as the Book of Kells, a real religious artefact filled with the most incredible Christian iconography that is now on permanent display at the Trinity College Library in Dublin. The two form a strong friendship and Aidan encourages Brendan to contribute to the completion of the book so the boy sets out into the forest in search of berries to make ink. There he meets a playful forest fairy named Aisling.

What strikes you most about the film is its incredible stylised animation which is the most beautiful and inventive I have ever seen. The use of colour brings a mythic, fantastical Ireland to vivid life. The extraordinary backgrounds are sometimes minimalistic, sometimes loaded with minute detail, often created from patterns, impressionistic and pastel-shaded and ridiculously pretty. The direction of the animation is imaginative and playful. There are fun moments of split-screen in which we see Brendan running through different locations. Bees fly around in swirling formations. Wolves move in perfect unison. The unique shape of every falling snowflake is clearly visible. Every minute of the running time conjures some new delightful visual gimmick never allowing the look of the film to stray one iota below dazzling. If you have even the slightest appreciation for creative animation you should be absolutely stunned by literally every second of The Secret of Kells. That’s not an exaggeration. Even the prettiest animated films usually have moments or scenes that aren’t quite as eye-catching as others. Not so here, every frame looks amazing.

All the same the film would be nothing without a good story and while some people have remarked that a plot about the creation of a book is not the most exciting I beg to differ. Yes, the protagonist’s motivation is to help complete the book but there’s something very powerful about the faith he and Aidan put in the book’s significance. There’s a profound reverence that is actually quite stirring and the story of the book is a framing device that binds some wonderful scenes. There’s adventure when Brendan sets out into the forest. There’s peril when he is attacked by wolves. There’s comedy in the early goose-chasing scene. There’s tension in the impending Viking attack. There’s dispute in the Abbot’s resistance to Brendan and Aidan’s friendship. There’s haunting beauty in Aisling’s song to Pangur Ban. There are chills, there is horror, there is sadness and there is joy. And in the encounter with the monstrous Crom Cruach the film presents us with one of the outstanding moments in the history of animation, an inventive, scary and brilliant battle in which the hero fights with a stick of chalk, a scene that should never be forgotten.

Every aspect of the sound is also top-notch. The soundtrack is a mixture of uplifting Irish folk music, haunting melodies and powerful choirs. This is married to excellent vocal performances from the whole cast. Brendan Gleeson is the biggest name giving authority and sternness to Abbot Cellach in a nuanced performance that highlights the complex character’s depth in his obsession for security. Mick Lally makes brother Aidan into the most amiable old mentor you could hope for, frequently comical but providing notes of regret and sorrow when necessary. Evan McGuire absolutely shines as Brendan, filling his performance with boyish enthusiasm and wonder. However I’m giving top honours to Christen Mooney who weaves a whole mythology into Aisling in turns quirky, cross, playful, haughty, fearful and mysterious. It doesn’t hurt that they’ve all got awesome Irish accents too.

The Irish setting is the heart and soul of the film, the country’s rich mythology and history providing an ample backdrop for the story. It’s difficult to think of another country in which Christian and pagan themes can so naturally mix, the visuals are dominated by the greens of the Emerald Isle and the story hints at both the vibrancy of the people and the sorrow they have endured through history.

I’ve been waxing lyrical for over a thousand words now but you needn’t take my word for it. I showed this film to my good friend and discerning film critic Ryan and he absolutely loved it too, saying that it wasn’t just one of the best animated films but one of the best films he’d ever seen and he can be quite a harsh critic sometimes (he hated Hugo). He rightly pointed out that any single still from the film could be framed (I use the image of Brendan and Aisling looking at beetles for my desktop background) and the film inspired him to wrap all his Christmas presents in film stills. He also bought a copy on DVD and sent it as a Christmas present to his Irish family.

Whether you like animation or not this is a film that deserves to be seen and cherished by everybody. It’s educational about Irish history without ever forgetting to be fun. There’s a strong religious theme but it isn’t the least bit preachy. It is a film that celebrates the joy of art in every aspect of its creation, one that has the power to enrapture children and adults with its amusing slapstick, gorgeous colours, memorable characters and perfectly paced story. It is a remarkable creation that can be considered an ambassador for what can be achieved through the animation medium and an utterly wonderful film.

Verdict

The Secret of Kells is one of those films that not everybody has seen but those that have seen it adore it. I’ve yet to come across a negative opinion of the film and I never expect to. If you don’t like The Secret of Kells it’s hard to believe you like films at all, or that you have a soul. It is, in my humble opinion, the best motion picture ever made.

Film Review: Coraline (PG)

Tags

animation, Coraline, Dakota Fanning, Dawn French, Henry Selick, Ian McShane, Jennifer Saunders, John Hodgman, Keith David, Laika, Robert Bailey Jr, Stop Motion, Teri Hatcher

A few months ago I decided to take a day off from the soul-crushing monotony of job hunting to indulge in a day of animated feature films I had yet to see. The titles I got through that day include The Secret of NIMH, The Secret of Kells, Fantastic Mr Fox, Cloudy with a chance of Meatballs and Coraline. Having since bought all but the first of these films on DVD full reviews for The Secret of Kells and Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs are the way as is my verdict on Fantastic Mr Fox as part of an upcoming roundup. First though is my review for this astonishing film from the director of The Nightmare Before Christmas.

And I don’t mean Tim Burton. Henry Selick was the brilliant helmsman of the stop-motion classic, Burton assuming producer duties but not without creative input. With Coraline, another film released in the watershed year for animation that was 2009, Selick has surpassed even his most famous work by delivering a story at once whimsical and terrifying. Adapted from Neil Gaiman’s novella of the same name the film makes incredible use of tangible puppet-based stop-motion presented in a visual style of bold contrasts to tell its creepy tale.

Coraline Jones is a bratty but misunderstood girl perturbed by a recent house move who finds wonder in a fantastical other world. So far so Spirited Away but there the similarities to Hayao Miyazaki’s much-loved classic end. Coraline is as horrific as children’s films ever get combining its unsettling story with some seriously creepy visual design, not to mention spine-chilling use of sound, music and voice work. It might be the scariest and most brilliant children’s horror film ever made and one of the very best animated feature films period.

The key to its success is the slow build-up of tension. In the real world Coraline is a bored kid ignored by her workaholic parents trying to find something fun to do in the somewhat colourless, dormant world she lives in. An alluring splash of colour and warmth lights up her world and the film after she enters through a little door in her new house where she discovers a better version of her life on the other side. Her parents are attentive and fun, her other mother makes all her favourite food and her other father breaks into song in praise of her spontaneously. Even the neighbours are more entertaining but there’s one rather disturbing catch, everyone in this wonderful world has buttons for eyes.

As Coraline’s experiences of her new world go on the appeal of remaining there permanently builds but eventually the horrifying designs of her ghastly other mother become clear and that’s when the reasons for the PG rating start to show. Whether it’s the ghost children delivering the most chilling exposition scene in history, the sight of the other father becoming an unwilling puppet or the way the other world freezes over with death one bit at a time the final third is filled with unforgettable and sometimes disturbing (but still PG friendly) images. But at the heart of the horror is something far more frightening than anything visual can ever be. What is the most horrible thought a child could ever face? Losing their parents must be pretty high, but consider the prospect of one’s parents being translated into something altered, familiar yet different, something unsettled, something monstrous. Take it from me, this is the ultimate nightmare of childhood and the film exploits it with merciless intensity.

If that all sounds rather heavy fear not there are more than enough much lighter scenes to cut through the terror, among them a hilarious sequence in which a pair of old burlesque dancers put on a show practically in the nude for our heroine and an army of Scottie dogs. Or there’s the magical moment when she sees what the other world’s garden looks like from above. The film juggles light and shade very nicely but in doing so it toys with you in much the same way the other mother subdues Coraline, convincing us it’s all okay before unleashing the nightmare.

Enormous credit must go to the animators and design team for bringing this tactile, solid and fantastical world to vivid life. The attention to detail in the puppets, especially their clothes and hair is mind-blowing and the dynamic camerawork in some scenes is tremendous. All sorts of practical effects such as fog lend a brilliant sense of reality and detail while many of the more imaginative character and set designs will haunt you in all the right ways. The men and women working for Laika are a seriously talented bunch.

The voice talent does a magnificent job throughout. Dakota Fanning was a spot-on choice for the title role, breathing effortless sympathy into a complex and obnoxious character. Jennifer Saunders and Dawn French who served Henry Selick well for James and the Giant Peach are suitably eccentric as Miss Spink and Miss Forcible respectively while Ian McShane does his best Russian accent as bonkers circus master the Amazing Bobinski, but top marks must go to Teri Hatcher who pours enormous menace into the other mother.

Coraline is a singularly and unforgettably exhilarating film, one that surprises in every minute of its running time. Some parents would no doubt have been concerned that it was too scary as they left movie theatres with shell-shocked sprogs but they needn’t have worried. There’s nothing kids love more than having the bejeezus scared out of them and when it’s done this well it should be required viewing. Selick created in instant classic in A Nightmare Before Christmas, one of the best animated musicals and, until 2009, the best stop-motion film in existence. As great as it was and despite its clear horror-story theme it wasn’t scary, nor was it really trying to be. With Coraline he one-upped himself and made a film too terrifying to enjoy the same kind of mainstream success. So be it, cult status fits it much better anyway. Either way it’s absolutely peerless.

Verdict

Playing on the most basic fears of childhood is a seriously potent approach when mixed with absolutely glorious animation design. Henry Selick may not have directed a whole lot of animated features but between this, The Nightmare Before Christmas and the also excellent James and the Giant Peach he should be considered one of the greats and Coraline is his masterpiece.

Game Review: Super Mario 3D Land (3DS)

Tags

3DS, Bowser, Mario, Nintendo, Platformer, Princess Peach, Super Mario 3D Land

For all Mario’s roaring success in practically everything he turns his gloved hand to there’s one angle of video games on which he doesn’t hold the monopoly – handheld platformers. Game Boy launch title Super Mario Land and its follow-up Super Mario Land 2 – 6 Golden Coins were both quality titles but not the industry defining paragons his home console outings were and they were both overshadowed by his alter-ego Wario’s own superior handheld series. The lack of difficulty and length offered more recently by New Super Mario Bros. on the DS made a missed opportunity out of an otherwise excellent game. There’s one exception, the outstanding update of Donkey Kong released in 1994 for the Game Boy but that was more of a puzzle platformer created with a very different design philosophy from the main series. Now the portly plumber is having another shot at bringing goomba-stomping and coin-grabbing to a handheld.

The shape of Super Mario 3D Land is both familiar and new. Your goal in the three-dimensional environments is not to hunt for stars but to race through series of linear levels complete with flagpoles. The health bar found in previous 3D home console iterations is absent in favour of the three-tiered system seen in the 2D series. If normal Mario takes a hit he will shrink (and lose his cap) whereupon another hit will cost a life. Grab a mushroom and you’ll return to full size with another power-up, such as a fire flower, elevating you to the third tier complete with an offensive ability. This marriage of 3D worlds and 2D sensibilities is jarring at first but once you accustom your gaming brain to the idea it becomes second nature and allows an old-school and traditional Mario experience to live in three dimensions.

The levels themselves are a mixture of the usual jumping challenges and gauntlets of enemies with a thoughtfully-integrated selection of Super Mario Galaxy style gameplay gimmicks such as the red and blue platforms that flip over whenever you jump. There’s a good amount of variety but not to the same degree offered by the Wii games, Nintendo gets a lot more mileage from fewer concepts here. The other focus is on the power-ups, particularly the much-loved Tanooki suit returning from Super Mario Bros. 3 which was at the centre of the hype since the game’s announcement and takes centre stage in Super Mario 3D Land where it occurs very frequently. The raccoon-shaped power-up works slightly differently in this game, you can’t use it to fly any more but instead holding the jump button will slow your descent so empowering your jumping ability with far more range, rather like Yoshi’s flutter jump. It’s a sensible alteration and while the suit can still make progressing through levels considerably easier than usual it’s an exhilarating experience blasting through otherwise challenging sections. In addition to this you can press B to perform a tail-spin to take out enemies. It’s among the most useful power-ups Mario has ever had and even highly skilled players will have trouble resisting the urge to abuse it. A notable new addition to the arsenal is the boomerang flower which imbues you with boomerang-throwing abilities used to bash baddies and grab distant items Zelda-style.

The basic and addictive purity of Mario’s gameplay is duly present but the level and balance of control you have isn’t as flawless as it usually is. The major drawback in the gameplay of Super Mario 64 DS was the lack of proper analogue control for movement (you could have analogue control with the touch screen but it was a dog to use), this meant having to hold B to run at full speed which works fine in the 2D games but felt awkward in three dimensions. Strangely despite the presence of the fully analogue circle pad with the 3DS hardware it’s the same deal here. Having to hold B to run properly isn’t game-breaking by any means but it makes things just a touch more fiddly than you feel they need to be particularly when it comes to precise jumping. Other than that the controls are pretty tight.

The game is arranged into eight worlds made up of half a dozen or so levels, among them challenging airship and castle themed stages that throw back once again to Super Mario Bros. 3. Most veterans of the series should zip through these without much difficulty but there’s more. It’s prudent to issue a mild spoiler warning here but the fact is that the game is far from over when the credits roll after beating world eight. Anyone who completes the main story is given another eight special worlds which double the length of the game. Many of these new levels are essentially the same corresponding stages from the original eight worlds tweaked to make them more challenging, for example you might be given a tight time limit or have to complete it with a Shadow Mario following you, but just as many are completely new. This is an important point to raise in the review because these bonus levels are more than a reward for compltionists, they’re half the final game and transform what might have ended up another comparatively short and easy title into something much more long-lasting, difficult and ultimately worthwhile.

The additional objective of gathering three star coins in every level makes a welcome return to boost the game’s lifespan for those that seek 100%, and is tied to a new rating system that shows up on your StreetPass profile, Nintendo again extending the longevity of their games by playing on gamers’ desire to show off. StreetPass hits will send power-up gifts to Toad Houses for you to make use of as well as showing you the best times other players have managed to complete individual levels, introducing a competitive edge that speedrunners will relish. It doesn’t make StreetPass essential to fully enjoy the title but it’s nice all the same.

Super Mario 3D Land was always likely to be the poster child for the console’s stereoscopic 3D, which is made better use of here than any other game on the system so far, offering the best depth of field. Then there are the rooms that employ clever optical illusions for which you’ll need the 3D switched on to see how to reach the tantalising star coin but these are few and far between. What the 3D doesn’t do is improve the gameplay and as such it’s looking increasingly like stereoscopic 3D will struggle to do this at all, working instead as a purely cosmetic enhancement. The brilliantly colourful and crisp worlds of Super Mario 3D Land look superb as it is, flaunting some of the best and clearest visuals seen on the handheld and the 3D gives them a slight edge.

The only slight downfall in the graphical presentation is the game’s relative lack of character. Super Mario 3D Land is a far cry from the vibrant open worlds of Super Mario 64 or Super Mario Sunshine or the adventurous wonder of Super Mario Galaxy, which gave a sense of context to the playgrounds you explored. The old-as-the-hills story aside there’s little real purpose to Mario’s traversal of these rather cut-and-paste level themes which play out like purposefully designed collections of platforms arranged in a 3D space. Of course that’s exactly what they are as it has always been but the designers have done very little to mask this. The airship and castle levels convey a sense of place but they’re driven by nostalgia and not original creativity. Everything else is very generic and lacking in detail. It’s pure efficient video game level design, not a bad thing as such, there’s an unfussy simplicity to it that reminds you of the design philosophy that puts gameplay ahead of everything else, but a well-judged deeper context to the craziness would have been nice. The game is constantly striving to entertain, never to immerse.

This fairly unimportant point aside what Super Mario 3D Land does it does very well indeed and delivers a richness of content and challenge that the character has never seen in a traditionally ordered handheld platformer before. This is the kind of game that gets into your brain becoming second nature. It’s got that one-more-go factor that perfectly offsets the level of challenge, never making success seem impossible or too tough to make its pursuit fun. The last levels can be absolutely devilish but the adrenaline associated with beating them overwhelms. Once again Nintendo have exploited their golden balance of appealing characters, gameplay simplicity and fiendish design to craft a must-have title that can satisfy the casual and the hardcore. It’s been a cliché for a long time but one of the best games on the console is a Mario game.

Verdict

Presentation – 9

Clear, concise and well-ordered. The map screen is particularly reliable at showing all the relevant information completionists need.

Design – 8

Excellent use of platforming gimmicks and a faithful regard for the series’ history combine to great effect. It could have been more detailed though.

Gameplay – 9

That a game this addictive and fun is actually one of the loosest in controls should only be taken as a mark of the franchise’s enormous standards. It’s top-notch stuff.

Graphics – 9

Approaching a home-console level of colourful crispness. The visuals don’t show off, they just get on with the job of looking pleasing.

Sound – 8

The effects are all age-old classic chimes, bounces and thuds, the soundtrack an appropriately chirpy mix of old and new.

Difficulty – 8

A Mario game as rock-hard as the NES days wouldn’t really be appropriate for modern audiences but this still manages to provide something robust for veterans.

Longevity – 8

Beating every level should take you at least ten hours. Then there’s finding 100% and replays.

Overall

The long wait for a classic Mario platformer on handhelds is over. With its excellently judged marriage of styles, superb design and satisfying amount of content 3DS owners finally have an original one-player experience to shout about. Was it ever in any doubt?

9.2

Game Review: Mario Kart 7 (3DS)

Tags

3DS, Bowser, Luigi, Mario, Mario Kart, Mario Kart 7, Nintendo, Princess Peach, Racing, Retro Studios

One of two late 2011 releases that the 3DS badly needed to bring its underwhelming sales figures up (the other being Super Mario 3D Land) Mario Kart 7 was a timely release for Nintendo but not just as a system seller. The latest in probably the most popular series of spin-offs in video games and the first to reflect its position in the chronology by sticking a number in the title is a watershed publication for many of the handheld’s features including its online play. Its success was a foregone conclusion, as was its ability to ship hardware, more important is its status as the best of its kind Nintendo have produced.

You know the drill, choose from a host of Mushroom Kingdom regulars to race around various colourful and creative courses in 50, 100 or 150cc. You get ahead of the pack by exploiting cunning shortcuts, drifting round corners for a boost and making strategic use of randomly acquired power-ups. It’s a tried and tested formula that still works. Other than Grand Prix runs and time trials there’s little for lone players to get stuck into but the real value is found in the multiplayer.

The lack of single player depth is something I’ve always rather taken issue with in the Mario Kart series. Rare’s Diddy Kong Racing, one of many imitators of the franchise introduced a tremendous adventure mode that gave the racing the kind of depth, context, lifespan and replayability that Mario Kart has never achieved. That game remains my favourite in the genre and while I would have liked Mario Kart 7 to finally offer something similar I never expected it to. The good news is it didn’t need to to take its place as the best game in the series to date.

To clarify that bold statement, it’s the best in the series that I have played, which is every one but the trailblazing SNES original Super Mario Kart, a game that still commands massive respect among those who were there to experience it in the early nineties. One day I’ll get round to downloading it but until I do I can say with confidence that Mario Kart 7 rules. Much of that fact is down to the gameplay, which is tighter than ever and empowers a skilled player to feel like they are in total control like the series has never managed before. The best way I can illustrate this is by pointing to a particular shortcut in Dino Dino Jungle, one of the retro tracks included here. There’s a wooden bridge that features a couple of branching paths one of which can save you time but is very narrow to negotiate that the game’s heavy handling put me off from ever using but I made a beeline for every time in Mario Kart 7 which makes it easy.

Drifting has been tweaked so that boost sparks appear far more quickly when turning into a corner than powersliding sideways. This has been done to eliminate snaking, a technique not intended by the devs that experts at finger gymnastics abused in Mario Kart DS, which slightly spoiled that game’s online multiplayer. Now you have to put much more strategy and forethought into your drifting to reap the rewards of the stronger boost which can only really be achieved on corners of ninety degrees or more. Once you’ve mastered drifting it will become an obsession as you strive to make the best use of the technique possible to gain that tiny advantage over your competitors.

Of course mastery of the weapons remains paramount as failure to do so can cost even a skilled player. All the usual favourites return including bananas, red and green shells, invincibility stars and go faster mushrooms and they are joined by new additions such as the fire flower, a mainstay of the platforming series making its karting debut (Mario and Luigi’s unique character weapon in Double Dash!! doesn’t count as that was just a fireball) giving you a few seconds to throw flames forwards or backwards. The Tanooki Leaf which takes centre stage in Super Mario 3D Land also makes an appearance here imbuing your cart with a tail that will protect you from shells for a short time. Better still you can perform a tail spin with a tap of L to take out rivals, an act that commands great satisfaction. The wildcard is the rare Lucky 7 which gives you a septet of toys that rotate around you and are used in turn. It’s tough to judge which item you’ll use each time making it hard to use strategically and other racers can grab weapons off you but it’s a lot of fun all the same. And the dreaded blue shell returns more devastating than ever in that it no longer flies to its first placed target but runs along the ground bashing other racers like it used to. It can still rob a superior driver of a deserved first place but doesn’t appear as often as in previous games. Overall the weapons are excellently balanced and enjoyable as ever.

The major new gameplay draw is the addition of airborne and underwater sections which shake things up with mixed results. Mario and buddies can now soar through portions of courses by attaching gliders to their carts or take a dip and play submarine complete with propeller. This is one way in which Mario Kart 7 does mimic Diddy Kong Racing which allowed you to race in planes and hovercraft although here rather than letting you choose your kart essentially transforms in the appropriate places according to the design of the course. Once you’ve got used to the controls, gliding becomes a superb addition to the gameplay allowing for some very strategic play and the scope for finding shortcuts whilst airborne is irresistible. The underwater sections on the other hand are sluggish and lack nuance adding nothing to the experience other than a bit of variety.

The other major new feature is the ability to customise your cart, which leads me to another returning feature. The coins previously seen in the original and the GBA’s Super Circuit are back to increase your vehicle’s speed the more you collect with a limit of ten. The game also counts the number you accumulate and new vehicle parts including bodies, wheels and gliders are randomly unlocked once your total hits certain milestones. Your selection of parts affects every aspect of your kart’s performance, including speed, acceleration, handling and weight allowing you to mix and match to find a combination that suits your style of play. After some experimentation I settled on the Blue Seven body with Sponge wheels and the Parafoil with Toad as my driver. It works well and unlocking every part will necessitate hoarding a hell of a lot of coins thereby increasing lifespan.

All these features don’t mean much unless the racecourses are up to snuff and Mario Kart 7 doesn’t disappoint offering some of the best designed tracks in the series. There are plenty of basic Mushroom Kingdomy courses such as early offerings Toad Circuit and Daisy Hills that are good value but the more creative ones stick longer in the memory, among them the musical Melody Motorway, the Arabian Nights-themed Shy Guy Bazaar or Wario’s Galleon which is easily the best course to make heavy use of the aquatic sections. Most races are split into three laps as usual but three are structured as one long continuous road split into three sections, among them two courses imported from Wii Sports Resort, Wuhu Island Loop and Wuhu Mountain Loop, both welcome inclusions. The other is none other than the new Rainbow Road, which might be the best example of the recurring course to date, as twisty and dangerous as ever with good aerial sections and planets and moons to traverse along the way.

The returning retro tracks are an excellent selection all told, many of which have been chosen for the opportunity they afford to be altered to include aerial and underwater sections, such as standout Wii courses Maple Treeway and Koopa Cape. Other highlights include N64 favourites Koopa Troopa Beach and Kalamari Desert, as well as Luigi’s Mansion, Waluigi Pinball and Airship Fortress from the DS iteration and Daisy Cruiser and the aforementioned Dino Dino Jungle from Double Dash!! not to mention the original Rainbow Road. Aside from the rather dull Luigi Raceway from the N64 and the odd lack of GBA courses (Bowser Castle 1 is the sole inclusion, I’m still holding out for the return of Ribbon Road) it’s a great range and they all look wonderful having been put through the modernising machine by the masterly Retro Studios.

I’ve never found the desire to invest myself in online gaming much in the past but Mario Kart 7 changed that. The DS version suffered from issues such as snakers and races forcibly halted by someone quitting while playing the Wii version online always seemed a little pointless given the ease and accessibility of local multiplayer, which I have always maintained is a lot more fun. The new game being a handheld one is at a disadvantage in that local multiplayer obliges multiple console ownership among players which makes online a better bet for multiplayer. It looks like Nintendo are finally branching out from Friend Codes, a welcome move they seem to be maintaining judging by the limited details of the recently announced forthcoming Nintendo Network online infrastructure. The more freely organised options of Mario Kart 7 allow continuous play against anyone in the world with matchups based on a personal ranking system that increases or decreases your score based on your performance. Otherwise you can create or join any number of online communities with customisable rules or take on friends or opponents you meet via StreetPass.

Playing the game online is extremely addictive and really boosts longevity and not just because it makes you want to race and beat people from all over the globe. If you can achieve perfect ratings in all of the single player Grand Prix challenges your achievement shows up online which makes pursuing the previously less rewarding status of perfect ratings more appealing so you can show off to people in Mexico. There are only two faults I can detect with the online options. The ability to customise rules for communities could do with a wider range of options such as the ability to swap out exactly which weapons you want. The other thing is a glitch that shows up in Wuhu Mountain Loop where falling off the track in a particular place sees you put back on much further on, something that everybody exploits online. The glitch itself isn’t such an issue – once you’ve figured out why everyone keeps dumping themselves into the drink in the same place and ending up winning by miles it’s easy enough to do the same thing and level the playing field. The only trouble is that a disproportionate number of players habitually choose the course every time in worldwide play making Wuhu Mountain Loop by far the course you’ll end up playing most online. It’s the lack of variety this can cause that irritates but it’s more of the fault of the players than the developers. In truth it’s a fairly minor point but one worth noting. On the whole the online experience is excellent.

Mario Kart 7 also makes good use of StreetPass and SpotPass both of which deliver plenty of ghost data to test yourself against in time trials which breathes new life into a mode usually only pursued by bored solo players. You can also collect people’s Miis and find them showing up in Grand Prix mode or else race against them for real online. You can access all the relevant data on the Mario Kart Channel located on the main menu.

Mario Kart 7 is an overwhelming success and the most continuously engaging game in the series. Even without local multiplayer I’ve clocked up more than thirty hours with the game and counting. It’s a quality package very well presented with some of the best and crispest graphics yet seen on the system. The stereoscopic 3D brings decent depth to the racecourses but doesn’t offer much improvement in the gameplay department – aiming those green shells is as tricky as ever. And although the frame rate doesn’t suffer with the 3D slider at max I ended up mostly playing in 2D, mainly because maintaining the 3D sweet spot on crowded tube trains is a bit tricky. The only minor quibble I’ve yet to mention is the reduced size of the character roster which drops several characters in favour of such newbies as Wiggler and Super Mario Galaxy’s Honey Queen. Bringing in these creepy crawlies ahead of more obvious choices isn’t a major crime exactly but the omission of Waluigi is puzzling given the inclusion of Waluigi Pinball among the retro tracks. Other than that it’s a brilliant package that introduces a lot of successful new features and has rightfully given its host machine the boost it needed.

Verdict

 Presentation – 8

Clear menus and balanced arrangement of modes allow appropriate ease of access for players of all skill levels.

Design – 9

A great set of courses packed with the greatest variety of shortcuts yet to be found in the series.

Gameplay – 9

Extremely tight, addictive and satisfying to play with perfectly judged handling controls. Only the underwater sections are a slight let down.

Graphics – 9

Every bit as colourful and polished as you’d expect from Nintendo and Retro. The new courses are all lovely and even the most old-school tracks have received a good makeover.

Sound – 7

Generally to a high standard but most of the tunes aren’t memorable, the odd little accompaniment for Rosalina’s Ice World and the stirring Rainbow Road tune aside.

Difficulty – 7

The relative ease of one player Grand Prix modes is remedied by the much greater challenge to be found online.

Longevity – 8

The absorbing nature of the gameplay and addictive online experience give the game serious legs.

Overall

Despite a few small quibbles Mario Kart 7 is the most complete experience the popular series has yet produced with the online features taking centre stage. If this game had been available at the launch of the 3DS one suspects the console’s early sales might have been considerably healthier.

9.2

Film Review Roundup 1st February 2012

Tags

A Monster in Paris, animation, Coriolanus, Daft Punk, Interstella 5555 - The 5tory of the 5ecret 5tar 5ystem, Jude Law, Leiji Matsumoto, Mark Strong, Ralph Fiennes, Robert Downey Jr, Shakespeare, Sherlock Holmes, Vanessa Paradis, Vanessa Redgrave

I’d like to be able to give full reviews to every film possible but the backlog has really been building up lately which can only mean one thing, roundup time and four mini-reviews for the price of one.

In Cinemas

Coriolanus

I saw this one with Ryan and Tom’s sister Harri, or rather most of it as I confess we were rather late to the cinema, our bus having not stopped where it was supposed to. Ralph Fiennes, who I’ve always greatly admired for his performance as Amon Goeth in Schindler’s List stars and for the first time directs a lesser-known Shakespearean tale about a Roman war hero who struggles with the position of power he is given. Removed to the modern day and a vaguely eastern European setting that fits the story well the film’s triumph is in making one of the Bard’s obscurer plays extremely easy to follow, understand and appreciate. Fiennes is as intense in the title role as you’d expect from him, Vanessa Redgrave soars as his fierce and loyal mother and the supporting cast are all on fine form. Gerard Butler’s never been better.

A Monster in Paris

This fairly unambitious French CG toon makes good use of clean animation and some catchy musical numbers to elevate the 1910-set story about a cocky delivery driver and his timid cinema projectionist buddy’s accidental creation of a giant singing flea. Vanessa Paradis voices glamorous nightclub singer Lucille (who goes straight into the cute animated ladies hall of fame) and literally takes centre stage casting the flea in her musical show. A likeable bunch of characters and decent script give this one some credit and there are some great sequences to accompany the tunes but it’s not ultimately that memorable. Nice though and one animation connoisseurs like me should definitely give a look.

On DVD

Interstella 5555 – The 5tory of the 5ecret 5tar 5ystem

My surprise Christmas present from my cool flatmates turned out to be a DVD copy of this unusual film that combines two of my favourite things, anime and Daft Punk. The French house band approached their favourite Japanese animator Leiji Matsumoto to create a sci-fi silent film for their album Discovery. The story follows an alien music band who are kidnapped and brought to Earth to be a maniacal record producer’s next big thing while loveable spaceman Shep sets out to rescue them. Some of the story sequences fit the thumping tracks better than others, the standout would be Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger but there are plenty of other highlights. As a film it’s an interesting curiosity that works reasonably well but is unlikely to demand any repeat viewings among casual audiences. If that’s you subtract a star. For anyone like me, who loves both animation and Daft Punk it’s a tremendous treat.

Sherlock Holmes

Having reviewed this film’s sequel A Game of Shadows HYPERLINK #1 not took long ago it seemed a bit redundant to give a full review to the original too so here it is in the roundup instead. Robert Downey Jr’s Holmes and Jude Law’s Watson successfully apprehend Mark Strong’s satanic Lord Blackwood who is hanged for his heinous crimes. But when he seems to rise again from his tomb London is gripped by paranoia and history’s most famous consulting detective must put an end to his chaotic plans. The character chemistry and CG recreation of Victorian London charmed audiences and the film remains better than the recent follow-up.