Away game special: A phantasy ended

It is done. With the power of three, Phantasy Star IV was finished in the space of a weekend. At a guess, the whole game took us about 20 hours to complete.

At that time, the game comes  up a bit short for a 16-bit JRPG. A lot of comparisons we're made to Chrono Trigger (another short game if you know it well) and I think the two games share more than relative shottness.

Both games have a sleek, slim main plot line. Both also use intuitive, pace-quickening combat mechanics. However, the games differ wildly in the range of their extra content.

Chrono Trigger has a quest or event for each character's best weapon (at least); Phantasy Star IV really only has quests to outfit two of your four core characters. We probably would've cared more about Gryz (the butt of nearly all of our jokes and riffs) if we could've walked through a chapter of his life for something to make him a worthwhile addition to our battle party.

Stepping away from matters of combat efficiency, we never really learn much of anything in-game about Phantasy Star IV's four non-core characters. The priest Raja is something of an exception here, but jovial, life-loving priest characters always have a tremendous presence.

Nonetheless, the game is, overall, something to experience (though, nostalgia aside, once is enough). Plus, Phantasy Star IV does something no Final Fantasy game has ever done: it effectively (and, a little affectively) ends its series' saga.

Away game special: A phantasy of stars

Phantasy Star IV is a great game from my past. I originally played it with an emulator when those and roms were to be found in the shadiest corners of the internet. That was a solo playthrough, though.

This time around the game's being triple-teamed: two friends I've had since high school and I are playing it on the Wii's Virtual Console. Currently we're on our way to fight Zio and rescue the android named Demi.

Aside from now being aware of the ridiculousness of the games' abbreviations, it's quite a bit more drawn out than I remember. Also, there are a lot of towns for the early part of a JRPG.

I point out the panoply of towns because it gives the game's world a very realistic feel. Like the future before Lavos in Chrono Trigger, the array of towns makes it feel like the world is actually populated in a natural sort of way rather than for story or gameplay convenience.

Having so many towns around so early might not make sense in other games, but it's one aspect of Phantasy Star IV that remains fresh.

Away Game Special: Sonic 3

A Genesis gem, a Sega super-game, a Sonic speed-course. Sonic The Hedgehog 3 is all of these things. It's also an incredibly restrictive game that forces you onto a linear path through levels that are anything but. Of course, it's possible to get everything secret and hidden within the 10 minute time limit. But, without a guide and/or a full day to play through, the game doesn't lend itself to exploration.

And this really bothers me.

It seems that Zelda games and RPGs have really soured me on time attack platformers. So it goes.

What bothers me about this turn in my gaming tastes, though, is that the Sonic games were childhood favourites. Maybe the GameCube controller doesn't offer as smooth an experience  as the original Genesis one did? Maybe it's just that I didn't play many platformers between my late elementary school days and now? Whatever the case, Sonic 3's just not the game I remember it being.

Hopefully my more recent backlog holds more titles to my taste.