Category: Games

I Am Now Playing A New Wizardry!

June 3, 2011

Yesterday the PSN store came back up after 5+ weeks of being unavailable, and amongst the new offerings on the PS store was a Wizardry: Labyrinth Of Lost Souls ($15), a brand new Wizardry game!

It’s been quite a few years since I have played a new Wizardry game, and even then the one I played wasn’t in English. The last time a new Wizardry game was released in English was way back in 2001, when Wizardry: Tales Of The Forsaken Land was released for PS2 (it was a great game, by the way, and notable for featuring art by the now very famous illustrator Shunya Yamashita). So I’ve been eagerly awaiting this new, download-only version.

So how is it? I played for several hours yesterday, forming a six-person party (2 Fighters, Thief, Bishop, Priest & Mage) and fully mapping the top floors and half of the second floors of the two available dungeons. It’s as grindy and ominous as all previous games in the series (which is a good thing) and is also very low-budget in that it lacks monster animations and a lot of flashy effects. That said, the graphics are probably the best I’ve seen in a Wizardry game and the gameplay is every bit as good (and Wizardry-ish) as I hoped for!

Although the game is translated (unlike the screenshots in this post), the voices are not. Furthermore it lacks even the barest minimum of a manual, so unless you are experienced with the series prepare to be confused a lot, at least initially. This is not a beginner-level Wizardry game by any means!

Overall I’m loving it so far, and can’t wait to delve deeper into the dungeons to see what grim fate befalls my stalwart group of adventurers!

In Japan this game was called Wizardry: Torawareshi Tamashii no Meikyuu and it was also a downloaded game via PSN. However a sequel was released (‘Wizardry Twin Pack‘) on disc, which contained this entire game. I have heard there is some hope this sequel may be released in the US as well, possibly on disc. Let’s hope that happens.

If you’re a bit confused by the lineage of the series (“What are all these Japanese Wizardry games?”), you may be surprised to know the Wizardry series has been a hit in Japan for many, many years. Even during it’s heyday in the west (around the time of Bane Of The Cosmic Forge and Crusaders Of The Dark Savant) the games were being released in Japan and doing well. Even when the Wizardry brand ended in the west (Wizardry 8 was the last – great – game) it continued in Japan, mostly on portables and game consoles.

Incidentally, some of the recent Japanese Wizardry games can be a real beast to acquire, especially for westerners. Not only are they produced in low print runs (mostly because of piracy, sadly), but some of them have also been retailer exclusives (such as a recent DS Wizardry) themselves in short supply.

These days I don’t know exactly how many Wizardry games now exist (hrm, I smell an upcoming blog post), especially beyond Wizardry 8. I do know however that the Japanese ones I have played are all superb, absolutely keeping the tradition of Wizardry alive. Unfortunately it is very rare they get translated for us to enjoy in English, so we must savour the chance when we can.

Tydirium

June 1, 2011

I suppose one of the hallmarks of being a Star Wars fan is to have a favourite spaceship. For me, that has always been the shuttle Tydirium.

This was the imperial shuttle stolen by the good guys on used to sneak onto Endor to disable the shield in Return Of The Jedi. Another of the same ships was inserted into the special edition of The Empire Strikes Back as The Emperors personal shuttle.

I’ve always loved the design of the ship, and was therefore astounded when Lego released this product last Christmas:

Happily, I received the above for my birthday this year, and yesterday finally completed assembly.

Here’s a shot of the contents of the box:

Observe the four instruction books, which are loosely separated into one for the body and cockpit, and one each for the two wings and sail. The pieces on the other hand are not sorted in any way (as they are in some Lego kits), which means almost all of those bags were opened within only a few pages of the first manual.

That’s 2503 pieces to sort through from virtually the very start! Believe me when I say that makes for a very slow assembly.

Construction starts with the body of the shuttle, which contains an elaborate mechanism to move the wings:

This was challenging. Not hard, just fiddly. Some of the gearing is most definitely at the Lego Technic level, and I’d say this portion alone is enough to make the kit overall not for beginners. Aligning the gears to be level and move in unison took a bit of fiddling, and the completion of the body + cockpit took quite a few hours in total over a few days.

I did have a friend helping…

Next was the sail on top of the shuttle:

That shot should give you an idea of the sheer size of this model… but more on that later. When I was attaching the sail I dropped the kit and a large section broke off. Luckily the interior gearing was not damaged, else I may have had to start again from scratch. As it was I only had about 30 minutes of repairs 🙂

It would be difficult to attach the wings without the body off the ground, so the landing gear came next:

You can see (click on the image to enlarge) the mechanism for attaching the legs. Seems easy in principle doesn’t it? Well in my case it absolutely was not, and one of the pegs just wouldn’t go it without a lot of tinkering. There are two ways to display the finished kit – either on the legs shown above or on a stand with the wings swept down. I will likely go for the latter, but I’m not looking forward to removing the legs!

I was up to books 3 and 4 now; the wings. I’d say total build time up to this point was 7-10 hours (working at a slow pace to enjoy the process).

The wings may look fragile but they are rock hard, reinforced as they are throughout with crossbeams and ‘rivets’. This would be an extremely time-consuming kit to disassemble.

Attachment of the wings to the wing struts was the final frustration point, mostly because of the weight of the wing and the fiddly-ness of the attachment point (remember what I said about gears aligning?). Once the rods were inserted though, the wings are on there forever!

A 75% completed shot. By now (> 10 hours build time, over a few weeks) you can see that Sausage had found herself a sleep spot. 95% of the time I was building she was right where you see her in that photo. In the background (just above right from Yoss) you can see the next Lego kits on my ‘to build’ list, and above Yoss (on the chest) you can see a pile of jigsaws (one of which I will build this weekend) and Gundam kits.

So the shuttle is now complete, and here’s what it looks like to scale:

No, that is not an illusion. Yes, it really is that big. And heavy. This is hands down the biggest Lego model I own (even including the Death Star) and probably the heaviest as well. But I love it! It was enormously entertaining to build and looks absolutely amazing. Even though I don’t know right now where I’ll put it, you can bet I already treasure it 🙂

The Star, The Tower, Judgement

May 11, 2011

I recently started playing the amazing Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together remake for PSP. When I bought it, a freebie deck of Tarot cards came with it. “Why not”, I thought, “do my own Tarot?”

So I did. I shuffled the 22 card deck and went with the relatively easy 3-spread reading. This entails drawing 3 cards randomly, where the first represents the past, the second the present, and the third the future.

Here are my results:

The Star (my past)

Keywords: Calmness, Tranquility, Hope

This card designates renewal of body and soul, and hope for the future. In the years past, it seemed, my future was bright!

The Tower (my present)

Keywords: Chaos, Crisis, Downfall

This card is an ill omen, foretelling calamity. This is my present, thus the future looks grim.

Judgement (my future)

Keywords: Forgiveness, Salvation, Absolution

This card may represent the imminent resolution of decisions delayed or put aside. It may also represent the return of old friends, or even old situations. However, some believe it represents a preoccupation with the past. This is my future. Will my future be my past?

I am a man of science, and do not believe in mysticism. However I must be honest with you, my dear reader: before doing this reading I removed two cards from the set of 22.

Robot Claw