Earth Defense Force 2025

Greetings dear readers, today I'm gonna review something much more recent than a 4 year old title.

ALOT more recent.

Quite.

Yes...you all remember Red and Green I hope. *ahem* Today, we are going to review Earth Defense force 2025 (or EDF 2025) for the PS3. Ah the EDF series, some backstory; I first came across this series way back on the PS2 when it was simply called Earth Defense Force. It was a Japanese game created by a company called Sandlot and was part of a range of Japanese indie games labeled the Simple 2000. Among the 2000 games was this little gem; EDF. 

The premise is simple: have you ever watched Ultraman as a kid? Do you remember those little guys in their planes and tanks and guns who back up Ultraman? Well EDF assumes a world without Ultraman and you control one of those back up soldiers who defend the Earth from ridiculous things like giant robots, Godzilla and giant insects. 

That game was so fuuuuuun! Everything was like *PEW* *BOOM* RAAAAAAWR!! SKREEEEE! AAAAAAAAAAARGH!! *RATATATATATATA* DIE INSECT SCUM!!!!

...

I would like to remind readers that this was long before I was fully formed and thus Black enjoyed the.....simple things in life.

Hey I still enjoy simple things now

Yes and we all know who's fault that is...

....what?

Nothing. Well anyway as Red so colorfully put it, alot of explosions happen in EDF. As stated before, you play as a soldier of EDF, charged with defending the Earth from whatever may come. And as it turns out, what came was aliens who bring giant robots and infest the Earth with giant insects. But fear not, as a member of the EDF, you are armed to the teeth with weapons fit to combat such menaces. From regular Assault Rifles to Snipers to Bazookas to Missilie Launchers, EDF had a hundreds of weapons to choose as each category got more upgrades and get increasingly ridiculous as you collect them throughout missions.

The game is played in a third-person perspective as you gun down, blow up, and burn countless numbers of giant bugs. The controls are very simple and it all comes down to your load out that you bring to battle as you can only have 2 weapons equipped per mission. Bringing the right weapons to mission can mean life or death. With over 50 missions and 4 increasingly harder difficulties that yielded better loot each time, EDF had a massive amount of playability.

And now to the real problem; technically, the game was far from proficient. With sloppy animation, a plethora of reused enemies, and 50 over missions had only one objective in every single one; kill everything. Where is the diversity? Where is the complexity? Did I mention that there is barely a plot as well? The controls are clunky, the physics are wonky and-

-and I wouldn't have it any other way!

What?

Theres a huge charm to this game that I just LOVE! The controls take getting used to but they work! And in the end, what other game lets you fight giant insects, robots and UFOs and bosses that fill up the entire SKY! Yeah thats right, as big as the SKY! Its just....fun!

Yes it is Red. Now you might be wondering why I've been going on so much about the first EDF and not about EDF 2025 (btw its also known as EDF 4 in Japan) and thats because the series has not fundamentally changed much throughout its many iterations save for more content, more enemies and more weapons. The same basic gameplay flow is still kept throughout every game. Kill bugs, collect loot and armor (HP upgrades), go to next mission, rinse repeat. This may sound repetitive-

Incredibly so.

Don't worry. Depending on the kind of player you are, this is one of those games where you just want to play more because its so fun. Whats new in EDF 2025 however is the addition of two new classes; the heavy hitting, slow moving, walking tank known as the Fencer, and the support member, turret setting, tank air dropping helper known as the Air Raider. These 2, along with the basic Ranger and the Wing Diver that has been there since the 2nd game, bring the total playable classes to 4. So there is a nice variety of playstyles to be had and a whole lotta weapons for each class.

One downside to an otherwise fantastic sequel is that the loading times are atrociously long. Depending on the mission, you could be waiting about 15-30 seconds or more for the mission to load.

One downside? You forgot to mention that  the plot is still non-existent, voice acting terrible, controls are still wonky and now with the addition of the Havok engine, the player character ragdolls to heaven and back at the slightest explosion!

But how funny was that one time we tried to blow up an ant and a civilian stood in front of us just when we fired and got blown CLEAAAAN across the map! And how bout the way the pieces of the insects just fly everywhere when you blow them up? It just adds to how fun and hectic everything can get!

But is fun enough anymore? Surely games these days demand more sophistication.

True, but we have alot of games like that these days. On the other hand, how many games let you do the stuff EDF lets you do? There was once a time where all the player needed was fun gameplay and nothing else. The player could've been an italian plumber jumping on turtles and mushrooms to save a princess from a giant turtle dragon and they'd still love it if it was fun. 

EDF 2025 still elicits that fun feeling, that pure sense of joy of just playing a game to do fun stuff. So if you can enjoy a game for its gameplay and not for its cinematic story or deep narrative and just want to blow up aliens in a variety of colorful ways, give EDF 2025 a try. This is Black saying EDF!

EDF!

......no.

Oh come oooon!

Please, Green?

*Siiiigh* fine...EDF....

Bayonetta Review

Greetings dear readers, and welcome to my first review on MPR Syndrome. As a warm-up to writing reviews and as test for this idea, I have chosen to review a fairly old game that I have been replaying non-stop since I decided to replay it; Bayonetta. Bayonetta is a Character Action Game (akin to games such as Devil May Cry and Metal Gear Rising Revengance) created by Platinum Games and published by SEGA for the PS3 and X-Box 360 in 2010. It released to a slew of praise from various gaming review sites yet failed miserably in sales. Which means that it is quite possible that 4 years have past and still many people have probably not even tried this amazing game yet and I believe that is a shame-

Is it really?

Oh crap...

Its poor sales could be attributed to the fact that it simply didn't have mass appeal. No matter how good the game, if the player didn't fancy its direction or look then no amount of good gameplay would convince them otherwise. Since 4 years ago was the start of the Call of Duty craze, the majority were looking for more FPSs than Character Action Games such as Bayonetta. Furthermore, there were bound to have been several people who didn't buy it simply because it featured a female protagonist who the majority of the male audience simply couldn't relate to.

Now, well, you see-

HEY SHUT UP, GREEN!!!!

Siiiiigh.... 

Bayonetta has the BEST action and controls EVER! I have yet to see an action game with controls THIS responsive and action THIS insane! Its super simple on the outside but hard to master! Dodging feels AMAZING and the bosses, THE BOSSES! They are the HYPEST BOSS BATTLES EVER!!!

Good God Red, use you inner voice! Shouting won't get your point across to the readers when all you're shouting is hyperbole with nary an explanation!

HEY YOU STARTE-

GREEN! RED! Please, I'm trying to do something here so please keep it down! *Ahem* So anyway, lets slow down and explain the premise of Bayonetta. Bayonetta is the name of the protagonist who happens to be a hot, saucy Witch who uses four guns on her hands and feet-

THATS SO AWESOME!!

-right....along with many other weapons and channels magic through her hair which can summon giant fists and legs and even giant demonic dragons to eat her enemies which happen to be Angels out to get her. She also happens to use her magic to wrap her hair around herself like clothes. the controls are simple; a punch and kick button as well as a shoot button for offensive manoeuvres while there is a jump button and a very important dodge button for defensive actions.

What Bayonetta does different than other action games is that when the player dodges an attack at the last moment, time will slow down for a few seconds, giving the player ample time to counter-attack in the most stylish way possible. Every battle is has a ranking at the end that takes into account three things; combo score, time, and damage. Players who like to improve will find themselves driven by this ranking system to do better in battle, which the game handles very naturally.

Yet players who don't care about improving can safely ignore the ranking system without penalty as the rankings are merely shiny medals to brag about.

While that may be true to some, anyone who chooses to start paying attention to the rankings will be amazed at how everything the game allows you to do can be used to improve upon your ranking. Now one of the highlights of the game are definitely the bosses-

OMG THE BOSSES!! LET ME TALK ABOUT THEM PLEAAAAAASE!

Alright, alright, fine.

The bosses are BIG, they are BAD and they are EPIC! Each boss fight is big and memorable and left my jaw on the floor EVERY time!

They are memorable, I admit.

Indeed, now on to the story-

Oh don't even get me started on the "story" if you can even call it that. Nothing made sense in it! There was nothing intellectual or thought provoking about it and merely served as tool to connect the action together. It certainly isn't memorable nor is it going to earn any praise.

Now, now, the story of Bayonetta is certainly not one for everybody. Those looking for a serious tale will be disappointed but those looking for a fun, tongue in cheek romp while punching and kicking Angels in the face will feel right at home with the story and its hyper, over the top cutscenes.

In the end, Bayonetta is a wonderfully hyper and over the top action game with almost perfect controls with a ridiculously satisfying difficulty curve that is under appreciated by many. 

So under appreciated that the sequel is going to come out on a completely different console than the original; the Wii U.

YEAH THATS BULL! HOW COULD THEY BETRAY US LIKE THAT! HOW BOUT THE FANS WHO PLAYED IT ON THE PS3 AND 360!!!

Calm down, Red. Due to Bayonetta 1's abysmal sales on the PS3 and 360, no other publisher (not even SEGA) wanted to risk funding the sequel for fear of it not selling as well. We are lucky to even get a sequel thanks to Nintendo's decision to publish it for the Wii U.

So I hope this review has reignited your spark to give Bayonetta a replay before the sequel's release, or perhaps I helped you decide to find this 4 year old game and play it before the sequel releases. Thank you for reading this review. This is Black

Green

And RED!

Signing off