I am an easily hyped person, in many ways. There are several games that always get me interested and excited when they're announced but leave me cold when I play them. Castlevania is this way for me. I've grown seriously bored with the Metroidvania formula but somehow I always find myself interested in the upcoming games. I have Order of Ecclesia pre-ordered. The combat system changes seem cool and I love the new art style. This month's EGM arrived yesterday and Castlevania was reviewed. The reviewer gave it an A-. His biggest complaint? There are lots of required side quests in order to move on to the last level. Required side quests? No thanks. Here's a free idea for Konami and Iga: Apply the beautiful art style and animation of Order of Ecclesia to a retro Castlevania game. I want an old-school, straight up side-scrolling platformer. One of those kill everything in the stage; reach the boss; defeat the boss; go to the next stage type of games. See Super Castlevania IV for reference.



Fighting games always get me hyped, especially if it's a new fighter from Capcom or SNK. Needless to say, Tatsunoko vs. Capcom has had my attention since it was announced. Chris Kohler at Wired posted some impressions of the Wii port of the game after he played it at TGS. The game was a let down for him due to the extremely simplified control scheme. It seems that the game uses 3 buttons: light, medium and strong attacks. He doesn't think the game randomly chooses what each button does but he seems unsure about how that's controlled. One of my favorite fighters uses a context sensitive button: Fatal Fury Real Bout Special. There are 4 buttons - light punch, light kick, hard attack and plane shift. The hard attack button mimics the last attack used. For instance, if you throw a few light punches and hit the hard attack button, the character throws a hard punch. With special moves, the hard attack button only activates specific moves. In Terry's case, the hard attack can be used for the Burning Knuckle or Power Wave; this leaves him without a strong Crack Shoot. I cannot imagine playing a fighter with 3 contextual buttons. Why must every game be dumbed down? Players can be very successful in fighters using only strategy and the basic attacks. I don't think it gets much easier than that.