Bossa Nova Monday: Big Boss

The Notorious

What better boss to boss around the other bosses of Bossa Nova then Big Boss? He is quite possibly the most successful villain in the history of video games, seeing as he went on to star in two games of his own. (And no, I don't acknowledge the Sephiroth Dating Sim, nor Sephiroth Kart Racing: Lifestream Grand Prix.) Hideo Kojima's Metal Gear series is full of double-crosses, but nothing tops the first one: Your commanding officer, the distinguished leader of FOXHOUND, is actually the mastermind of the terrorist nation you were sent to infiltrate. !o.O! (Oh yeah, spoiler warning.)

I could, of course, go on and on (and on) about Naked Snake, but this feature is about bosses, and Big Boss was only the last guy of Metal Gear and Metal Gear 2: Solid Snake, even though his genetic progeny and military legacy influence much of the plot of Metal Gear Solid 1, 2, and 4. I chose to use art from the Metal Gear Solid era, however, because the original MSX/NES graphics purposely resemble Sean Connery, and that's just... weird.

Pseudonyms:	Naked Snake, Saladin, John Doe, Jack
Weapon:	Survival Knife; later Metal Gear
Signature Move:	Close Quarters Combat; later Pushing the Self-Destruct Button
Weaknesses:	Underestimates Solid Snake, lacks depth perception, flammability
Distinguishing Features:	Missing right eye (thanks a lot, Ocelot)
Difficulty:	6/10
Quote:	"Begin Operation: Intrude N313"
Similar Characters:	Albert Wesker (RE), Captain Blue (Viewtiful Joe)

Happy Mother's Day: Jenova

The one the Professor mistook for a Cetra . . . was named Jenova. That is the "calamity from the sky." We are all nothing more than Jenova's puppets.

Sephiroth says it best when he explains: "The Jenova Project wanted to produce people with the powers of the Ancients . . . no, the Cetra. . . . I am the one that was produced." An itinerant alien creature found sealed in a "2000 year old geological stratum," apparently dead: Jenova. A psychotic scientific experiment injects Jenova's cells into the unborn child Sephiroth. Is Jenova his mother? Sephiroth seems to think so, noting that "With her superior power, knowledge, and magic, Mother was destined to become the ruler of the Planet." But Sephiroth isn't alone. Without realizing it, the cast of Final Fantasy VII and many of the various people and creatures that they meet are being drawn to the Knowlespole (i.e., the Northern Crater), for Jenova's Reunion. Although they believe they are willfully hunting down Sephiroth, the truth is that the alien Jenova cells within Cloud---as well as those within the many black-cloaked figures they encounter---are being inexorably drawn toward Sephiroth's body---the largest concentration of Jenova cells---to reform the creature Jenova.

Throughout the game, whenever the player's party fights Sephiroth, Jenova appears to battle immediately afterward. Later on, as the plot unfolds, it becomes apparent that Sephiroth has been ensconced in the Lifestream, frozen deep within the Northern Crater, the whole time. What you've been fighting are pieces of Jenova under Sephiroth's control impersonating Sephiroth (as Sephiroth says, "The ability to change one's looks, voice, and words, is the power of Jenova"). The fascinating aspect of this Madonna-and-child dynamic is their reciprocal symbiosis: Jenova's cells exist and act from within her son and host, Sephiroth; meanwhile, Sephiroth---frozen and incapacitated beneath the Knowlespole---can only exert his influence in the world by controlling the Jenova cells in others. Although Sephiroth emerges as the primary antagonist of Final Fantasy VII, all of his actions are designed to promote Jenova's agenda: to effect the "Reunion" that will allow her cells to reform, and then to take back the planet in her name.

In the final event of Final Fantasy VII, the Sephiroth > Jenova pattern is reversed: As any mother would do (and, we realize toward the end of the game, as she has done all along), she comes between the player's party and her son, Sephiroth. Only when she has finally been defeated can you battle the real Sephiroth at last and end the game.

In Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, the characters Kadaj, Yazoo, and Loz are introduced as children of Jenova, striving to complete the Jenova Reunion that was foiled during the events Final Fantasy VII. In Advent Children, the trio places a special emphasis upon Jenova as the "mother" of any creature that is infected with her cells (including all of the children experiencing the Geostigma illness). Kadaj and company, oddly enough, don't carry any Jenova cells within themselves, which is why they are so desparate to find the missing head of Jenova (remember that Sephiroth carried it off during the Nibelheim event in FFVII) so that they can infect themselves with her cells and join in the Reunion.

Happy Mother's Day: The Boss

For the Mother of Special Forces...

I raised you, and loved you, I've given you weapons, taught you techniques, endowed you with knowledge. There's nothing more for me to give you. All that's left for you to take is my life.

The Boss, the Joy, Voyevoda; Known by many names, she is one of the most maternal characters in gaming mythos. She can be considered the mother of two of Metal Gear's most central characters; She bore Ocelot on the battlefield via cessarian section (leaving an atrocious serpentine scar) at the Battle of Normandy, and also mentored and loved the most genetically perfect soldier ever born, and the man who would ultimately surpass her, Big Boss. One can infer that she was raising the son she never knew (or never knew she knew).

Look at this scar. This is proof that I was once a mother. I gave up my body and my child for my country. There is nothing left inside me now. Nothing at all. No hatred, not even regret. And yet sometimes at night I can still feel the pain creeping up inside me. Slithering through my body, like a snake.

Soldier, commander, astronaut, teacher, patriot. The part that seemed to anger her pupil Naked Snake the most was that no one would ever know that it was her mission to defect, a ploy to obtain the Philosopher's Legacy, the infathomably enormous war chest that the superpowers had hidden at the end of World War II. When Colonel Volgin used her offering, the mini-nuclear device Davey Crockett, plans changed. Snake was sent in again to rescue Sokolov, destroy the Shagohod, stop Volgin, eliminate the Cobra Unit, and kill The Boss.

And it was her mission to be killed, and to be remembered as a traitor to the country for which she sacrificed absolutely everything.

Jack... or should I say Snake... you're a wonderful man. Kill me now. There's only room for one snake and one boss.

The Liberal Application of the Word "Super"

Super Mario Brothers. Super Street Fighter. Super Metroid. Super Contra. Super Bomberman. Super Double Dragon. Super Robot Wars. Super Monkey Ball.

Super Rub-a-Dub?!

Killa didn't quite believe me when I told him that there was a "rubber-duck-based" game on PSN for download and that I had grabbed the demo. "No," he said, "You're confused. That's the PS3 tech demo; it's not a game."

"It's a game, yo!" I eloquently insisted. A little research turned up an interesting back story: At E3 in 2000, Sony used the "ducks demo" to display the awesome power of the PS2, specifically it's capacity for rendering water and the physics of the single rubber duck that interacted realistically with said water. In 2005, a new ducks demo was shown for the PS3 that featured, among other things, many rubber ducks in the tub to demonstrate the PS3's ability to handle the advanced physics of so many objects interacting. Apparently, someone realized that Sony was missing out on a golden money-making opportunity and subsequently turned the demo into a game (available on PSN for $6.99), and then produced a demo of the game (available for free on PSN).

The game makes use of the sixaxis's tilt function so that play requires no button-pressing at all. You start with a rubber duckie in a bathtub. Tilting the controller tilts the tub, causing the duck to move around. The goal is to (A) Collect smaller rubber ducks from around the tub (which then paddle along behind the main duck in a chain); and (B) get the baby duckies safely to the exit, without (I) jumping out of the tub; or (II) being eaten by deadly, deadly bathtub sharks. Bonus points are awarded for beating a goal time and for getting the longest string of ducklings to the goal at the same time (e.g., picking up ten ducklings and dropping them off at the exit will result in more points than picking up five, dropping them off, and then collecting the other five).

After your performance on a particular tub (level) is scored, the game will either praise you (e.g., "You Quacked It!") or chastize you (e.g., "Featherbrain!") based on your score. The demo includes five different tubs that can be played solo; the full version includes sixty tubs, supports up to four players, and features online leaderboards with viewable replays of the most skillful rub-a-dubbing. Killa and I played through the five demo tubs several times, learning new tricks and trying to beat our best scores. Here's a tip: "Popping" the tub (rapidly jerking the sixasis upward to make your duck "jump") can flip sharks onto their backs, rendering them temporarily harmless---but it can send your ducklings flying out of the tub, too, if you're not careful!

The controls are intuitive, the graphics are colorful and friendly, and the cute duckies have a broad appeal. I had some difficulty getting into the tilt controls of previous PSN darling flOw, but I had no such problems with Super Rub-a-Dub. This is the game that I'm going to have my non-gamer friends play when they come over to visit. I imagine that this cuddly bathtime adventure could bring a whole lot of hesitant would-be gamers over to the dark side.

Bossa Nova Monday: Yunalesca

Reaper of Souls

For 1,000 years, the summoners of Spira have traveled on a pilgrimage to Zanarkand to receive the final aeon, needed to defeat Sin. For 1,000 years---ever since defeating the first coming of Sin and dying in the process---the unsent spirit Yunalesca has waited in the ruined city of Zanarkand with a terrible revelation: There is no final aeon. In order to defeat Sin, not only must the summoner sacrifice his life by performing the final summoning, but he must also sacrifice one of his guardians to become the final aeon. After defeating Sin, the sacrificed guardian will then take its place, becoming the next Sin. Unwilling to make this terrible choice and perpetuate the cycle of destruction, Yuna and her guardians instead undertake to battle Yunalesca and send her to the Farplane for good.

Yunalesca is a classic multi-form boss; each time you defeat her she comes back in a scarier, stronger form (until you defeat her third and final form; then she's really done). Her second form spams curative magic on your party, which would be nice except that she's turned your characters into undead zombies with her Hellbiter attack, so the Cures hurt rather than heal, and the occasional "Full Life" spell can mean instant death. But don't break out the holy water just yet---her Mega Death special casts instant death, killing the entire party . . . unless they happen to be zombies, in which case the attack is harmless (death spells, instant death attacks, and items are traditionally ineffective against the undead).

Weapon:	Absorb (1st form); Curative Magic (2nd & 3rd forms)
Signature Moves:	Mega Death; Mind Blast
Weakness:	Holy Magic
Distinguishing Features:	Her sexy bikini body is hiding a terrible tentacular monster!
Difficulty:	7/10
Death Quote:	"Ah . . . Zaon . . . Forgive me. . . . Spira has been robbed of the light of hope. . . . All that remains is sorrow."
Similar Characters:	Jenova (FFVII), Medusa (Kid Icarus)

Nu Gamma Sigma

Not just an honors society anymore.

At long last, I downloaded the demo of Ninja Gaiden Σ.

Before saying anything else, I want to make a few comments on my downloading experience. Before grabbing the demo I had to update my PS3 with the latest firmware (1.70, I think), which then allowed my PS3 to download things in the background while I do other things with it. This is great because Killa was over for the evening to play some FFXII, and we would have had to stop the download when it became apparent that it was going to take forever. So we have background downloading going on. The download made it to 10 percent in approximately 30 or 45 minutes while I was waiting for Killa to arrive. We then played Tekken DR for another 45 minutes or so while the demo was downloading in the background. I must stress that Tekken has no online component that I'm aware of. During the 45 minutes we were playing Tekken, the download only crept up to 12 percent. Strange. We then spent an hour or two collecting my husband from the subway station and then eating some dinner. The download progressed to 45 percent during that time. Then we played FFXII for the next 4 hours (download still going in the background). At the end of those 4 hours, we shut down FFXII and the NGΣ demo was at 58 percent. What the hell?

If I was going to have to download it overnight anyway, then I have reaped no benefit whatsoever from the background downloading function. I hope they shore it up in the future so that it doesn't require the PS3's undivided attention to, you know, function.

Anyway, the 983 MB download is finally complete and I had a chance to play through the demo yesterday. I was pleased with how responsive the controls are. Ryu handles like the Prince (of Persia, that is), although Rachel, once you get her unlocked, handles more like a Mack truck. Mission mode (featuring Rachel) and hard mode were both unlocked by beating the demo once, which took me a couple of tries. The demo includes a robust set of weapons for Ryu (the quintessential dragon sword; nunchaku; a larger, heavier sword; a staff; and dual-wielded katanas) that you can use from the start to vary the gameplay. I am particularly enamored with the Lunar, a large bo staff useful for mowing down multiple enemies at a time. The entire first chapter seems to have been included and took me approximately 20 minutes to run through on my winning attempt.

The graphics are rich, detailed, and beautiful, especially the backgrounds. Ryu and his many foes are generally moving too fast for me to get a good look at them. The action was very smooth and I found it pretty easy to string moves together to make impressive combos, although I can already see that this game relies more on precise combo input than, say, God of War, in which any combination of button presses will yield the requisite carnage. I'm a little concerned that my skills are going to need a lot of polish before I can expect to succeed at the final version of the game. Apparently there's a tank battle that emasculates all comers. We'll see. This demo is a great move by Tecmo; I was a little ambivalent about Ninja Gaiden Sigma before I played through the demo, but now I'm sure I'm going to buy it at my earliest convenience.

Finally, I'd like to express my feelings of distaste for the numbering system of this series. Ninja Gaiden 1, 2, 3, 4, and so on, would be acceptable. Alternatively, how about Ninja Gaiden I, II, III; or A, B, C; etc. But the series goes: Ninja Gaiden 1; Ninja Gaiden 2; Ninja Gaiden 3; Ninja Gaiden; Ninja Gaiden: Black; Ninja Gaiden Σ. Listen: "1, 2, 3, Black, Σ" is not a sequence! Here are my suggestions for the next next gen: Ninja Gaiden: Gaiden of the Ninja for the DSMicro; Ninja Gaiden ₤ for the PS4; and Ninja Gaiden: Plaid for the XBox 720.

Rumor Mongering

Ever since I began writing this blog, I've managed to stay pretty up-to-date on industry news and trends by keeping abreast of the major sources of news and rumors (e.g., Penny Arcade, Kotaku, Joystiq). I know that prior to this great undertaking, I didn't have the knowledge base that I do now. If, a year ago, someone had told me something along the lines of, for example, "The next God of War game is going to come out for the XBox," I may not have seen the obvious flaws in that equation; most notably, that Sony owns the God of War IP and therefore no God of War game will be released on a Microsoft console as long as Sony is still in the business of making consoles for itself. These are the sorts of distinctions that might not be made by a layperson who doesn't spend all of their time combing gaming-related web sites and their affiliated message boards. Suffice it to say, that type of rumor will never prove to be true; it stems from misunderstanding and is primarily harmless.

Another kind of rumor, more devious, is that created or perpetuated by those with a good working knowledge of the industry and its idiosyncrasies. A good example of this would be, for instance, "Final Fantasy XIII is going to come out for the XBox 360." Since FF is developed and published by a third party company, it's entirely possible that it could come out for multiple platforms. In this iteration of the series I think it's unlikely to happen for other reasons, but it isn't a logical impossibility based on property ownership and rights management. These rumors are harder to discern, and they sometimes end up being (or becoming) true. For example, there were rumors that DMC4 would be multiplatform, and lo, so it has become.

Then there are the rumors that don't make any sense at all. I was at a baby shower (of all places) on Sunday and found myself engaged in conversation with a gentleman on the subject of the 360, Wii, and PS3. When I mentioned to him that I own a PS3, he urged me to sell it on eBay or otherwise try to recoup some of the money I spent on it. He explained to me that Sony has stopped production on the PS3 and is discontinuing the system, and, moreover, that only five games are going to be produced for the system before Sony stops supporting it entirely. Unsure of how to respond to so much incorrect information coming in at once, I simply observed: "That information is incorrect." He shrugged his shoulders and responded, "You'll see. Don't say nobody warned you six months from now when your PS3 is completely obsolete." Ouch!

Fortunately, no one will have to miss out on God of War III, because I hear it's coming out for the XBox 360.