Let me say straight out that I gave this game 45 minutes of my time.

Eternal Sonata, supposedly, is about the last living hours real-life composer Frederic Chopin, and the dream world he creates while dying of tuberculosis. While the premise is interesting — and I’ll probably have to atone for this one later — if this is what Chopin was dreaming, I can see why he ultimately let go.

The dialogue in this game is horrid. I can deal with squeaky anime voices — of which the game delivers heaping mouthfuls — and we’ve all waded through our fair share of banal, redundant or overly ornamental dialogue. (”It would be even better if that means he’s headed towards recovery. A full recovery,” one character says, articulating her thoughts.) The last straw, however, was the way each line of dialogue is followed by an unnatural pause of roughly one second. Maybe it’s a commentary on rhythm, or maybe it’s because of some loading glitch, or perhaps the developers just don’t think we can follow an actual conversation. Whatever the case, it’s a distraction, made worse when you’re still trying to figure out what’s going on.

Normally, I’d see a game through beyond these issues. The turn-based combat system and the colorful graphics seem to hint at decent game hiding back there, but the story of Eternal Sonata was what really caught my eye. Unfortunately, there’s no way it can be rewarding if all I want to do is make it stop.

If fans of the game are reading this, you’ve got 15 hours to change my mind (before the mailman comes). Otherwise, back to Gamefly it goes!

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At this point, this series could use a re-introduction. As my journalism work (currently) does not require me to play and review the latest games in a timely manner, I’m often in catch-up mode, writing about a game weeks, months or even years after their release. In a way, this provides some distance from writing actual reviews and allows me to focus more on critiques. In Late To The Party, you’ll rarely find me listing pros and cons. Instead I’ll look at particular aspects of a game and explain why they’re interesting — to me at least.

Straight to the point, Ninja Gaiden II is a Gamer’s Game, and slashing through it made me realize how long it’s been since I last played one. It’s got action, decapitation, linear levels with steady learning curves, a throwaway plot, terrible dialogue, scary bosses and objectified women, I spend a lot of time thinking about how repetitive and dull that stuff gets, but I sort of forgot that, when applied correctly, it’s still a lot of fun.

Before I go on, please know that I hated this game’s prequel. I bought a used copy, spent an afternoon with it and brought it back to Gamestop to take advantage of their “exchange it within seven days” policy. Mostly, this was because of one pet peeve that obviously bothers no one else: Ninja Gaiden combined Saves and Lives — two standard respawn mechanisms that, when combined, break the whole system. It forces the player to leave his state of immersion and wonder “Should I quit the game and load the last save point, or sacrifice a precious Life?” This happened to me in the second level. I had no idea whether to keep expending Lives to challenge the boss or load an earlier save point and try to preserve my stock. After going back and forth a half dozen times, my brain self-destructed and I decided Splinter Cell would be a better choice for my money.

Needless to say, I was not expecting much when I opened the Gamefly envelope this time around. But Ninja Gaiden II has a way of coaxing you into its world. The bands of ninjas that surround you at every pass are easy enough at first; with enough button mashing, you can sever all of their heads (and most of their limbs) and emerging from battle with only a scratch or two. After a couple levels, the enemies get bigger, slimier, more plentiful. It’s no longer sufficient to simply tap the “Strong Attack” button repeatedly. Slowly, the game forces you to change your methods and play with different techniques. As with the last game, you’re still stringing together combos, but the attacks have a natural flow to them, which takes some of the emphasis off memorization — another pet peeve of mine.

Hand-eye coordination is placed on a pedestal in Ninja Gaiden II. There are no puzzles to solve, and the storyline — some people released some demons — is negligible. The payoff for surmounting each challenge is implicit; it’s not so much “now I get to see what happens,” as it is “wow, I defeated all those bad guys.”

I’m into Chapter 5 now, so we’ll see how my interest in the game evolves. These balls-to-the-wall action games, however fun, tend to wear on me slightly past the half way point. I know, that’s another subject entirely, so we’ll save it for another day. For now, chef recommends!

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And now, a super-late entry to the series that’s bound to grow as I discuss games way later than everyone else.

Jared “No Dice” Newman, the middleweight from San Diego, Calif., is going through hard times right now. His arch-rival, Akira “Kid Dynamite” Sato, who throws cheap shots at the weigh-in and illegal head butts in the ring, just won the most crucial match in their heated history. There he is, smirking with the Middleweight Title Belt in his hand, rendering meaningless the previous three victories by No Dice. This time, Dynamite’s wild, swinging arms and steely resolve were too much, always able to turn the tables in his most desperate moments.

So here I am, disgusted with myself, unable to pick up the controller again, thinking about retiring No Dice and starting another career with a fresh face. On the other hand, the road to the title is long. Hours — or years, depending on which Newman you’re talking to — were spent cultivating the lanky middleweight into a speedy power puncher with an unbelievable KO record. It’s hard to let that go, especially when the guy was modeled to look exactly like me. We both know there are more challenges ahead. We’ll just have to train harder.

Fight Night Round 3 has that intoxicating effect, the human drama inherent in seeing two guys risk debilitating injury or death for a fistful of dollars and some pride. In part, it’s the “features” that make this possible. 1UP reviewer John Davison rightly points out that the lack of health bars and status meters brings you closer to the fight, requiring you to look at your boxer’s posture and facial features to know how he’s holding up. And the control scheme, self-righteously dubbed “Total Punch Control,” lends a sense of movement as the player rolls one joystick to lean and the other to launch a variety of punches.

But what strikes me the most about Round 3 is the way it deftly appeals to both the strategy and brutality of boxing. Chess-like maneuvering begins as soon as the bell rings. You size up your opponent. Is he fast? Will he take mostly big swings or will he work the jab? Should I wait him out or start throwing punches now? Will this fight go the distance? You need to plan accordingly, lest you run out of gas in a stamina contest or find yourself out-bludgeoned in a slugfest.

Not neglected, though, is the bloodsport appeal. When you misplace a punch, you can almost feel the impending haymaker as your opponent winds up. Bones crunch and bodies twist with every counter blow. The audience roars as the announcers howl with joy, and if one of these crucial punches happens to be a knockdown, you’ll see contorted faces in excruciating slow motion, blood and spit flying toward the camera. When you’re on the winning side, it’s hard not to grin at the spectacle of it.

At first, these moments are easy to come by. Your boxer will plow down most of the amateurs within a round or two. But as your competitors get stronger, these knockouts take a bit more work. If your fighter is anything like “No Dice” Newman, the knockouts still come, but only after seven or eight rounds of consistently smart boxing. The visceral expression of pain is less a punishment to your foes than a reward to your boxer after a hard day’s work. That’s when the two sides of boxing — strategy and brutality — unite.

By the time that happens, you’re hooked on it.

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Hooray for Google Analytics, reminding me that 3 months without any posts begets no visitors. If you don’t know me, you probably don’t know I am moving to San Diego in a couple of weeks. I already quit my newspaper job and will be heading across the country after a brief respite.

So, the arts department at the paper never got to publishing that GTAIV article I mentioned earlier, because I never got to writing more articles to prove that I was a consistently capable writer. (I guess they saw the blog. Sigh.) So here we are:
—

If I worked for a publication that exclusively covered video games, I’d probably be excited to review Grand Theft Auto IV. It’d be a chance to state an opinion that really matters, not just to gamers, but to all the concerned parents, casual players and culture junkies who might be reading.

So it’s not surprising that when reviews finally dropped for the latest installment in the series, which requires players to commit many felonies in the service of organized crime, out came the “games are art” argument and comparisons to Goodfellas and The Godfather. Perfect review scores abound on several gaming Web sites, and one critic for GameZone even called GTAIV “the masterpiece of this gaming generation.”

Look, I’m firmly in the “games aren’t second-class media” camp, but if you believe all the lavish praise, you’re missing half the equation.

Popping in the disc, I found the shimmer of the opening scene, the sweeping score, the dialogue, mesmerizing. When the plot advances, it seems GTA has matured, leaving behind the senseless violence and murder for which the series is known.

But when you’re left to wander the city on your own, it’s the old GTA. I needed to travel, so I stole a car. I’m not a great driver, so I hit a few lampposts — and people — along the way. Just to see what would happen, I shot a homeless person. The main character, Niko Bellic, who seems so likable in cutscenes, can also resemble the nameless, faceless, morally empty character that starred in Grand Theft Auto III.

I thought about criticizing Rockstar, the series’ developer, for giving us two completely different games in the same package before I realized it had to be this way. Without the version where you can blow up cars, shoot innocent people and jump off buildings, you could never sell the one where the characters talk about their feelings and develop relationships.

You wouldn’t have the media hype either. I know this, because my non-gamer friends know nothing of the games that really do have artistic merit. In a way, it works out; the mainstream media frets over the violence, sex and drugs and how your kids will probably do all those things because they played a video game, and the gaming press responds by pulling the “games as art” card.

If I were one of those critics, I’d probably do the same.

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Welp, I just turned in a tight little column (420 words) on the concept of “two GTAIV’s” to the assistant features editor at The Hour, where I’m a news reporter. This is some form of trial column, I understand, for video game musings, similar to the “Late to the Party” kinds of reviews I’ve had before. Hopefully it works out and I can get the good gaming word out to the common folk.

If they’re not pleased, of course, I’ll post it here, and if it’s published I’ll post a link.

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