Japanese RPGs seem to be getting stuck in a bit of a rut when it comes to stories and admittedly The Last Remnant is no different. As usual you play a young man, Rush, who slowly gains more and more powers. Oh and of course, he’s a bit cocky, even calling his King, Dave rather than David. He gets caught up in all the action due to his sister Irina getting kidnapped by a strange being, all very typical really. But then again do JRPG fans really care? No, of course not, they’re just happy to have a new epic to sink their teeth into!

The game instantly throws you into action from the word go and despite the many in game tutorials, it is a little intimidating at first. I’ve played a huge amount of RPGs over the years but the battle screens did take me aback slightly as initially they look extremely confusing and convoluted. Luckily, this is actually very far from the truth. Instead it’s fairly simple to get into. The turn based fighting revolves around choosing from some pre-selected commands. Rather than choosing the exact command, you’re given choices such as ‘Attack all out’, ‘Charge’ and ‘Attack using mystic arts’ (magic). This is where the double edged sword comes into things. It’s great for those intimidated by regular turn based systems and it is much more relaxed than other systems, but the hardcore RPG player may feel a bit restricted and like they’re not really in control. This is further compounded by the fact you can only upgrade the equipment of the main character, Rush. All other characters are referred to as units, or unions. They are swapped out regularly depending on what the quest requires, and whether you hire them in guilds which are located in the surrounding cities. It does detract a little from the story as most RPGs rely on you becoming attached to characters, but it also works in a strange sort of way. The combat itself feels very strategy orientated with the need for formations and various stages in the battle causing deadlocks which affect the battle. It is a little odd to get used to but works just about. At first I felt like I was just sitting watching the battles commence and occasionally pressing a button. However the inclusion of trigger chances, similar to Final Fantasy 8’s gunblade attacks; help make you feel more part of the action. The main downside to combat is sometimes it takes absolutely forever to finish a battle! One boss battle with a Dragon, not hugely far into the game, took over an hour for me to defeat. Other battles can take even longer, sometimes with three boss battles in a row and no chance of saving in between. Epic battles are great sometimes, but not really to this extent. The difficulty of said battles also goes up hugely very quickly, however far from it being a negative point, I actually find it refreshing. Some recent RPGs have been far too simple to complete and it makes a change to have a real challenge.

Besides the main storyline, there are also guild quests. These quests are more a matter of completing certain objectives such as slaying a certain amount of one type of monster, or a member of your party having a lot of strength, they make for some trivial distraction but at least you gain items from it. There are also other quests, often from NPCs with red speech bubbles hovering over their heads. The quests seemed initially really exciting, adding another dimension to the game. However, many of them seem to consist of talking to a person, getting teleported to a new location and then talking to a different person or if you’re lucky, fighting another monster. A lot of the time though, I still enjoyed it. It just could have been more imaginative. It is extremely nice to be able to save almost anywhere in the game and the fact that you almost always have a map available to traverse the dungeons you may be in. Another plus point for the novice RPG gamer!

Presentation wise, The Last Remnant is lacking in places. The loading screens are ridiculous; they just come about far too often. Installing the game to the hard drive did speed things up a bit but it was still rather irritating in places. Using the Unreal Engine (the game engine of choice at the moment I feel), the game looks amazing and in places truly epic. However it also suffers hugely from slowdown in places with some battles looking like it’s really pushing the 360 to its limits. I can’t help but think it could have done with some more optimisation before release as surely during testing, it was noticed as a problem. The voice acting however, is pretty faultless, certainly in comparison to other recent JRPGs. It makes a change to not be immediately irritated by the characters’ voices, although some lines are a tad dubious such as ‘let’s kick some a’ at the start of many battles. As is seemingly usual for a JRPG, the game starts out very slowly and persistence is needed. But it’s worthwhile in the end.

The Last Remnant is a funny old game. Every time it scores a plus point, it then does something that lets it down a bit. However, despite its many faults, I really enjoyed it. It manages to break from the norm slightly yet also have that traditional feeling to it. Unfortunately, once the big guns of Final Fantasy 13 and Star Ocean arrive, it will probably fall into the background, much like Enchanted Arms did when Blue Dragon arrived. However for now, it is an enjoyable stopgap for anyone who enjoys JRPGs. Just don’t expect too much from it. It likes to give with one hand and take away from the other.

Currently I’m busy reviewing Scene It: Box Office Smash and Lord of the Rings Online: Mines of Moria so expect those reviews in the near future. After that I’m not sure what’s lined up but I’d quite like a break over Christmas! Think I’m spending more hours reviewing than I do with my paid work at the moment!

It’s been a good week gamerscore wise. The AV Forums Xmas Challenge has done my motivation wonders! It’s also mainly thanks to Scene It: Box Office Smash which I’ve got nearly 700 points from just two evenings play. GRAW isn’t bad either and great for points. I’ve been using the invincibility cheat because I’m lazy but it’s quite fun. Can definitely see why it was so highly regarded at release. I’d be tempted to pick up GRAW2 when I can find it cheap enough.

Space Chimps is ok, usual easy 1k platformer aimed at kids but it’s quite good mindless fun. As you can see, all these games helped me hit 69k. Only 1000 points off my target for the end of the year which should be quite possible. Mixture of Madden 09, NBA2k9, Scene It and whatever is the next rental I receive should certainly do it. Not forgetting games like Quantum of Solace and Fallout 3.

I also treated myself to a new faceplate:

It looks much better at night but still looks cool. The website address on it is a bit tacky unfortunately. Oh and yes I know the cables are a mess, really must get round to tidying it! Although not right now as my elbow’s well and truly knackered for now.

As regular readers may have seen in my previous entry, my elbow was swollen and slightly infected due to a fall. Now it’s properly infected and I’m on 2 types of antibiotics 4 times a day for a week as well as some stronger painkillers. If it doesn’t improve I’ve got an appointment for the end of the year (literally, it’s New Year’s Eve) to see a different doctor (presumably the last Doctor has run out of ideas if the antibiotics don’t work) who will assess it. Then possibly I have to have a steroid injection in my elbow, pleasant. Anyways, it bloody hurts. More than it did last week. My elbow is now about twice the size it was, it switches between burning and stinging. It’s always red and hot and even brushing against my own clothing, it hurts. Bending it hurts…..well you get the idea, it hurts! It’s crap only being able to use one arm most of the time, I can’t even use my left arm to pick up the remote because it involves twisting, grrrrr! Plus the antibiotics are making me feel crap both mentally and physically. Luckily no work till Sunday so hopefully it’ll have improved significantly by then as I really couldn’t do work without lots of pain at the moment.

And on the plus side, there will be a new addition to the household soon! No it’s not a baby *gets scared at the very thought*, although it’ll probably need nearly as much care as one :p
It’s a puppy!

Meet…….puppy. There is a fair chance he will be called Rufus, but for now, puppy

He’s 10 weeks old and a rescue pup. Him, his 3 brothers and sisters and his Mum are at my local RSPCA. We actually went on Sunday to go dogwalking as we’re volunteers there, then promptly fell in love with him! We’ve got to visit him a few more times and be home vetted but fingers crossed it all goes fine and we get to take him home soon And wish me luck with house training :p Having never done it before!
Feel free to try to guess his heritage. So far I think people have counted about 7 different breeds in him which sounds about right!

By this time next week, there’ll probably be another one too. It’s been a very busy time. I’ve got The Last Remnant, Scene It: Box Office Smash and Lord of The Rings Online: Mines of Moria to review at the moment. Although I’ve not had a chance to start The Last Remnant yet, I need to get on with it as soon as possible so that will be mostly done by next week. Looking forward to playing Scene It, I loved the first one. I’m still not keen on the reviews layout so when I get a chance, I’ll have to sort that out somehow.

Anyway it’s been a tricky week for my personal life. I suspect December on the whole is going to be rough. I’ve also managed to damage my elbow somehow which is nice, not. I’m not sure how exactly, I think maybe it’s from when I fell down some stairs a couple of weeks ago. At the time I thought I was ok despite banging my elbow. But since last Thursday, I’ve had a big painful lump on the side of my elbow. According to the doctor it’s slightly infected and to come back in a week if it hadn’t healed by itself. It hasn’t so I think I’ll be off to the doctor again soon Makes using my left arm a bit awkward at times as I can’t lift it very high without pain and it’s hot and painful on the whole really. Bloody irritating!

With my relatively limited gaming time (I’ve also been working quite a few evenings lately), I’ve played a fair bit of Gears of War 2 Horde with friends which has been a great laugh and some excellent stress relief I’ve had a few rentals arrive, namely BF: Bad Company and Madden 09. Madden is purely for point whoring which is a bit slower than normal as I can never figure out American Football games very well :p BF: Bad Company seems pretty good but I’ve sent it back as I think I’d rather buy it cheap at a later date. I’m trying to whore a fair amount of points at the moment as the AV Forums Xmas Challenge has kicked off and I’d like to do quite respectably. Therefore I’ve bought some cheap games thanks to actually having some spare money for once. From work I bought Just Cause, Saint’s Row, Blitz The League, Stranglehold and PES2008 for £25. No easy, quick 1ks but hopefully enough points to help me along the way. I’d certainly like to reach 70k by the end of the year. I’ve also bought Space Chimps for £7.99 as I figure if I hit it hard, I should be able to sell it for the same sort of price quickly enough. Also just rented Crash of the Titans and Conan from work for the week.

I’m still trying to get into Fallout 3, but I just can’t I’ll keep perservering but it’s not looking good for me! Guess I could always whore points from it if I get desperate and I still can’t get into it.

Anyway, no huge update. Not really got anything exciting to say so apologises for the emo bloggyness of this post