After a clean install of Windows, I finally got Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines working on my PC. I've wanted to play it for a long time as some of my friends here on GameSpot call it one of the best RPGs ever. I also happened to find Jade Empire for only several euros and decided to give it a shot. Now even with Vampire Bloodlines much richer RPG elements, I find Jade Empire a lot more compelling to play. Being a vampire is not what you get to do every day, but as a long time martial arts fan, I'll always take wuxia over it.

Now with EA taking over BioWare, there's a high chance of seeing a sequel for Jade Empire - and every other BioWare franchise for that matter. As strange as it may sound, I will actually be happy for the takeover if I just get some more Chinese goodness. We could argue whole day about Jade Empire's quality but it doesn't really matter when it has no real competition. In fact, Guild Wars Factions is next to Jade Empire the only role-playing game based on Chinese mythology I can name right now. There are a few free-to-play martial arts MMOs but I have my limits. I won't touch those grind fests again even with a long stick.

While Chinese culture is arguably the largest in Asia, it's not the only one. Japan, India and Korea and many others all have cultures stretching back over a millennium offering countless possibilities for developers. Even as popular as ninjas are, there aren't many ninja games. We've got the fantastic Ninja Gaiden series and dozens not so fantastic Naruto spin-offs, but that's where my knowledge of popular ninja franchises ends. Does it feel wrong that there are only two major franchises for such a beloved theme? Samurais get even less attention - only a handful of samurai games have ever made their way to western market and they are rarely any good. Maybe it's time for a western developer to show how a great game that appeals to the western market is done. Some of you might even be interested in Adventures of the Holy Cow.

It's safe to say the setting was a major selling point for Assassin's Creed. Medieval Middle East is as interesting as it gets and with over 3 million sold copies, customers seem to agree with me. Now those 3 million people are looking for more Middle Eastern fun. No doubt Ubisoft is already developing Assassin's Creed 2, but now is also the optimal time for other companies to get their share of the cake. Ubi proved that modern Iraq is not the only interesting time in the history of Middle East and now that the way is clear, other developers can take the idea forward. And hopefully ditch that horrible sci-fi side story.

It's been a while since the last time I was even slightly interested in a World War 2 shooter. What developers could at least try to do is find things from the war that haven't been done to death already. We've seen quite enough of Berlin and Omaha Beach for one decade; now give me some Iwo Jima and Philippines for a change. Fortunately Treyarch is doing just that and is focusing on the Pacific frontier of World War 2. It's not the first time we get to play as United States against Nippon but it's always refreshing from the usual Nazi slaughter.

Asian cultures and history have always intrigued me and I'm surely not alone. Like my long-time trackers might remember, I made a trip to China last winter and ever since it, I've hungered for more. It will take a long time until I travel there for a second time, so I have to find secondary solutions for my hunger. I'm already watching plenty of Asian films, but for me it's not enough. Like for many on GameSpot, gaming is my true passion and to truly satisfy my passion, I need something in game form. Please developers, take the risk and venture beyond your comfort zone. Shaolin monk and samurai action games may not be as easy money as World War 2 shooters, but surely you don't mind a small challenge.

Some of you might be familiar with the game

You can find it here.

As requested by WizzyKid, a speed run of Quest for the Crown.

Like I hinted in my previous blog, here's my review of Radiant Dawn:

Intelligent Systems Fire Emblem series has been around for nearly two decades dating all the way back to Famicom. Unfortunately it took 13 years before the series finally made its way to western markets. Over the several years it has been here, Fire Emblem has already gathered quite a large fan base, and now with the tenth installment (fourth in North America and Europe), can Intelligent keep the quality next to its predecessors or their other classics including Super Metroid?

Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn is a direct sequel to GameCube's Path of Radiance. While recommended, it's not necessary to have experience with it or any other Fire Emblem. Throughout the game, you will be often reminded what has happened in the past. Three years have passed since Path of Radiance's story ended with Daein loosing Mad King's War against Crimea. Now Begnion troops occupy Daein and try to maintain peace with an iron fist. You follow the story of Dawn Brigade, a group of Daein rebels fighting against the oppression. After that you quickly jump to Crimea to hastily see what's going on there, and then join the laguz fighting against the empire of Begnion. In each part you control a different group of characters, most seen in Path of Radiance - as a matter of fact all characters from the previous game make a comeback here, including a few dead ones. First the story feels very shallow and generic and regrettably it takes twenty hours before it finally starts to develop and twist. Of course you'll have to make it that far first.

If you've played Path of Radiance, the carbon copy gameplay won't have any surprises. Long-time fans may find it a good thing but for me the game feels out of place. What's the point of making a Wii game if you won't take advantage of the one strong point? You can use GameCube controller, CIassic or Wiimote sideways to play the game. In combat the system works well, but a click-and-drag system with the Wiimote pointer could have done wonders in the menus and point and click in battles should even be more fun. In the current state, it can sometimes take way too long to do the basic maintenance after every battle. Talking about menus, you may encounter strange stuttering in the inventory and shop screens once your team has grown larger and Wii's DVD drive does the best it can trying to keep up with the massive amount of items.

There are two human races in Fire Emblem, beorc and laguz. Beorc are the ordinary humans with warrior, mage, thief and archer cIasses. Laguz also known as the beast people don't wear armor, use weapons or cast spells, but rather shapeshift into animals. Unfortunately they can't stay in animal form forever and are completely useless in human form. Beorc have stronger nations and unsurprisingly find themselves superior to laguz bringing up the game ethics and philosophies. Laguz are divided to hawk, raven, dragon, wolf, tiger, heron (sort of angel) and cat tribes. Every cIass and tribe has their weaknesses and strong points and you'll have to keep a close look at the rock-paper-scissors system. Lance wins sword, sword wins axe and axe wins lance. The same method continues with magic as fire is superior to wind, wind to thunder and thunder to fire. That alone is enough for a newcomer to learn, but it's not all. Every turn you'll also have to think about terrain advantages, mounted and flying units, bows and counter-attacks. Fight against your weakness and you'll find yourself dead in no time. Even on the easiest difficulty, you can find yourself reloading after mistakes to keep characters alive as if someone dies, he is gone forever. Thankfully, an option to save in middle of battle has been added making the experience a lot more enjoyable.

There isn't much character customization going on except for choosing the equipment and few special skills. Though you can rarely get the gears you want because except for gaining money at predetermined locations, there is no way to obtain cash as the game is completely linear automatically taking you from chapter to chapter. As your characters gain experience and level up, they gain attributes in predetermined order. Once beorc characters hit level 21, they gain a cIass upgrade and start again from the beginning. As a change from Path of Radiance, the level cap for laguz has been raised to 40 and all beorc cIasses have gained an additional cIass upgrade. When certain characters have fought enough together, you can set them to support each other gaining a small skill bonus whenever within the range.

Graphics have never been the high point of Intelligent Systems' games and neither is it the case now. Path of Radiance was no beauty queen and strangely the graphics haven't improved at all. Some of the higher level magic effects are joy to look at but otherwise the game doesn't come even close to the best looking GameCube games and are simply dated on Wii. Intelligent hasn't even tried to mask how the game started off as a GameCube project - on any field. At least the cutscenes are still gorgeous, but now with more powerful systems available, I wish the game was on one of them so the whole game could look as good.

Besides the cutscenes, the whole story is told through long conversations with static cardboard cut-outs. The dialogue is vast and usually sharp. Ironically all of the characters remind cardboard cut-outs as none of their personalities go further than their cIass. Ike is your ordinary hero, Laura is ordinary priest, Soren your ordinary tactician and Skrimir your ordinary young lion prince. And as strange as it may sound, the conversations have no real widescreen support even though rest of the game does. It wouldn't be such a big problem if you didn't spend hours upon hours reading the dialogue. Widescreen could have really helped the presentation as if there is more than three persons in a conversation, all of them won't fit the screen at the same time.

Voice acting is quite rare in the game and you won't find it outside cutscenes and narration between missions. And frankly with the usual JRPG teen heroes, I couldn't stop laughing when I heard some of the characters for the first time. Especially the (very) young archer Oscar and Silver Haired Maiden Micaiah are quite something to listen to. Fortunately all of them aren't quite that bad and cutscenes only pop up once in five hours.

If there is a field where JRPG's usually shine, it's the score. Unfortunately in Radiant Dawn the music is rather generic. Some of the tracks have a chance to rise over the grey mass but lack the kick to become memorable. And the same problem continues with sound effects. A massive explosion that covers most of the screen sounds like a puff and attacking an enemy resembles bug squishing. Though this emphasizes the powerful critical hits which become more and more rewarding with flashier animations the longer you advance.

Radiant Dawn is a fan service. Old players of the series are hungering for more of the same, while newcomers may find the unforgiving difficulty and overall stuck-in-the-past feeling major turn-offs. Everything from the dated graphics to Game Boy controls and bad voice acting screams last-gen. Nearly everything from the gameplay to presentation could just as well be on Nintendo DS, only thing missing would be the beautiful cutscenes. The game still has the magical strategy feeling but all the small annoying flaws do a good job of burying it. As long as you can get past the first twenty hours, you'll get another good twenty out of it. It is often said that only Nintendo knows how to develop for Wii. As a first party developer, the lack of effort from Intelligent Systems is a real shame. Even though it's not a Wii game, it's the best strategy title on the Wii. If you don't count Path of Radiance that is.

Score: 7.6

Please recommend if you liked it

For some reason the store I ordered Mass Effect and Super Smash Bros. Brawl from decided to ship it on the release day unlike usually the day before. When the release is on Friday, it takes the whole weekend for the games to arrive. I wonder why I just didn't take a metro downtown to personally pick them up. Well, at least this gave me time to finish Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn before getting my hands on these two fantastic games. Now I just have to find time to play both of them. I'm probably going to start with Mass Effect tomorrow and the next day invite a friend over for some Brawl. Unless I get too hooked.

Like probably many of you, I dug up my copy of Diablo 2 and Lord of Destruction. Err... Not quite that literally but I wanted to show you the Best Seller series. I'm not sure if you have them in the States but here they are extremely popular. Vivendi's cIassics from Tribes to Warcraft at every major retailer. I'm probably going with amazon for my character, as except for assassin I've played every other cIass to death. I guess I don't like being a female in RPGs. I'm up for some Battle.net newbie fun if anyone is interested

PAJ89 asked me to tell my opinion of Radiant Dawn once I'm done with it, so I'm dedicating rest of my blog for it. First I have to make a confession. I've never played a Fire Emblem before, and so I played the game on easy as the game recommended. Even so I had a few frustrating moments when I had to reload the game over and over again for all the characters to survive even with my constant mistakes. As it turns out, it was a mistake. Truly the worst part of the game is the ending. It wouldn't be that bad if the game didn't have 66 characters and it didn't take 16 seconds to tell about each of them. Now it's nearly 20 minutes of boredom when very slowly moving text tells you what happened to every character afterwards. It didn't really come as surprise that the queen became a beloved ruler and neither do most of the rest. Fortunately all of them aren't that bad and I even laughed a couple times. Although I'm not sure if it was because they were actually funny or just because they were so bad. I'll leave some worse examples below. I'm not sure how funny or bad you'll find them without playing the game. The story even has a teaching: there must be balance between order and chaos... Please developers, leave philosophies out if you don't come up with anything better.

I never played Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance for GameCube but I truly feel like the series hasn't evolved at all and Wii is completely wrong place for Radiant Dawn. The beautiful cutscenes make you wish the game was on a more powerful system so the whole game could look like it and the traditional gameplay could just as well be on a handheld. The controls are solid but make no effort whatsoever to take advantage of the Wiimote. Click and drag could have done wonders to the menus. I nearly spent an hour struggling with them to get ready for the final battles. Peculiarly, with all the characters in the game together, the game stuttered in the inventory and at a merchant. How can a game stutter in the least graphically intense part?

Another strange flaw is the lack of widescreen support in conversations - which have no voice acting by the way. I guess the developers were busy porting the game from GameCube to Wii and decided to add decorative (read: plain) borders for the 16:9 users to save time. There is a lot more I could nag about but I'll leave that for a review. The game is not all bad though, fighting itself works well but I was too busy with all the minor flaws to actually appreciate it. It's not a bad game but it doesn't shine on any field. Like most reviews already say, the game is for fans of the series (like PAJ89 is) and I'll stick with Final Fantasy Tactics and Heroes of Might and Magic until Intelligent Systems comes up with improvements.

WARNING: CLICHED SPOILERS BELOW. (spoiler warnings don't work)

Laura returned to her home's church and became a mother to many orphans, all of whom loved her gentleness.

Meg had an ordinary marriage in her village and an ordinary family. Her house was always full of laughter.

Rhys served as a healer and opened a small chappel in a corner of their old keep, where he set up a school. (busy man)

Once he saw stability returned, Ike [the protagonist] left on a journey to lands still unknown. He was never seen again.

I especially wanted something more from Meg. She was the most useless character in the game and I had sometimes serious problems keeping her alive while still getting her few kills in hope of improvement.

All you old Diablo fans, it's time to scream like little girls. Now eight years after the last game, Diablo 3 is finally announced. I've been waiting for this the whole week - well, actually for years.

People have been following closely the splash screen on Blizzard's official site for the past week now and along the official announcement at Blizzard Worldwide Invitational, the splash has been updated to this. For a while, I almost lost my hope for a sequel when the splash looked more like Death Knight from Warcraft or Protoss from Starcraft.

Now, where's my battle axe?

UPDATE:

Here are screenshots and videos.

First of all, I want to congratulate all of my friends who just made it to the Top 100 and 500 reviewers. Seeing all you getting there has me motivated to do the same, so I removed all my pre-No More Heroes ''reviews'', except for World in Conflict and Dark Messiah. I've played both of then recently so I decided to update them to my new standards. If you want to read them, click the images below. The reviews are by no means as good as my review of Age of Conan but a lot (emphasis on lot) better than they used to be.

Now that I'm done with the Champion's Road of Pro Evolution Soccer 2008 and I'm cancelling my Age of Conan subscription, I can finally start Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn. I actually bought the game a month ago but it has been unopened and collecting dust for the whole time because I made a promise to not touch the game before I'm done with most of my other projects.

I happened to find out that one of my friends has all the Sopranos DVDs. He lended me the first three seasons and now I have only three episodes left of the second season. I have to say that so far the series has been pure gold. As a question to those who have watched the whole series, is it going to get even better?

Like probably most of you, I'm soon on a full-time vacation. Now that I'm done with most of the new PC games I own, I'm going to make my annual Windows clean install. I always have a good reason to do it every year and this year it's because I can't install Service Pack 1 for Vista. With Microsoft customer service, I've tried dozen different ways to fix it but it seems like my Windows files are too corrupted to even fix themselves. And if this doesn't help, I'll be transfered to the international consultation service. But reformating isn't really a bad thing, I always enjoy it, and it was me who even suggested it.

As a warning, I doubt that I will blog at all in July. I will be out of town for most of the month enjoying the hospitality of my friends and relatives. I even have a cousin's wedding to help with and like every year, I'm attending Ilosaarirock. They never have the biggest bands but the atmosphere is fantastic. And it won't really matter which band is playing after a twelve pack and a cup of vodka.

Happy Midsummer! I know it's not celebrated outside Europe and not even in most European countries but it's the biggest party time of the year next to New Year. I've always thought summer is a better time to party than winter. Rather than die to hypothermia, we can drown in a lake.