Week: End Game: On 03.10.2012

What’s the staff playing in their free time this weekend?

By Eileen Cullen. Posted 03/10/2012 16:00 1 Comment     ShareThis

Now that the weekend is here, we all have time to do what we love: play some video games! If you’re wondering what we’re playing, then look no further! These Nintendojo staffers want to let you know what games are in their consoles right now. We also want to know what our readers are playing, so make sure to tell us in the comments!


Katharine Byrne

A part of me is still mourning having finished The Last Story last weekend, so I might, just might, start a New Game + this weekend and play through the first couple of chapters again pretending like I don’t already know all the punchlines. It’s been a while since I’ve actually missed a game this much after playing it so recently– it’s hard to “miss” something like Xenoblade Chronicles when you’ve been playing it for four months straight– and if you haven’t checked out my review of the game yet, I really, really liked it. I just wished there was more of it.

In lieu of my Last Story deficit though, I finally finished Final Fantasy: The 4 Heroes of Light the other day as well, after many agonising and gruelling boss battles. It took a leaf out of Capcom’s book and made you fight all those super-hard bosses I was having trouble with a couple of weeks ago AGAIN right at the end of the game– though defeating them once (and possessing an additional twenty levels of EXP) certainly made it a lot easier the second time round! The game as a whole was an… interesting experience to say the least, and while I’m glad it’s seemingly random battle system hasn’t caught on, it was definitely an intriguing experiment to help shake things up a little.

Now that I’ve finished 4 Heroes of Light as well, though, I’ve just started playing The World Ends With You for the very first time– it was either that or Dragon Quest IX. I managed to find a second hand copy of it not too long ago (an American version, incidentally), and so far I’m quite enjoying it. The battle system is unlike anything I’ve ever played before, and I’m only just starting to get my head round it. It’s so frenetic and fast-paced that I can barely keep up with it at times, but it’s always nice to have a bit of a challenge to sink your teeth into every now and again. I really like how it’s so tuned in to adolescent pop culture as well, and I’m really enjoying its take on “the game” and its concept of “players”, so no doubt I’ll also be playing it a bit more of it this weekend.

My playthrough of Half Life was also interrupted last week due to reviewing The Last Story, so I want to get at least a couple of chapters of that in as well at some point. There’s only so many JRPGs a girl can play one after the other, you know!


Joshua Johnston

Were Operation Rainfall not so successful, I’d probably be playing an imported copy of The Last Story. But since Nintendo played nice and XSEED is helping out, I’ll wait and play the U.S. version in the summer.

Instead, I’m knee-deep into Final Fantasy XIII. The game has been out for a while now (long enough that the sequel was released last month) but I got it for Christmas and am just now getting around to playing it. In the post-Xenoblade era, no RPG feels quite as satisfying, but the game is quintessential Square-Enix polish: the orchestrated music and absurdly perfect visuals scream blockbuster. It’s also pure Japanese convolution — I’m a few hours in and still barely know what the heck is going on. Did I mention Xenoblade’s plot was lucid and well-explained? It’s also a bit lighter on the RPG elements than I would like, and in some ways it is just barely more an RPG than Resident Evil 4. Its famous (or infamous) linearity isn’t quite as bad as its made out to be, though, as the early game really focuses on narrative and character development and the locations, however linear, are varied enough to make it feel like it’s more than just a single tunnel. (It’s a bunch of different tunnels, in fact.)


Nicolas Vestre

Just minutes before typing this, I beat the final boss of The Legend of Zelda: Link’s Awakening DX on my 3DS. The last time I played through the game was well over a decade ago, but I remembered much more from my previous experience than I thought I would have. Even though I recalled many things, I was never bored and still had a lot of fun. One thing I have to say: Even without knowing the weak points of the bosses, they’re almost ridiculously easy! The Nightmare in the last dungeon, Turtle Rock, can be beaten in seconds by spamming the A or B button. I’m still wondering if I could have hit a dead end at one point in Turtle Rock by using my small key to unlock the wrong block.

Now that Link’s Awakening is out of the picture, I plan to finish Giana Sisters DS, which I stopped playing after I got 3DS and Super Mario 3D Land as a present in late January. I’m probably 75 percent done, and I really want to finish it this weekend. It’s a fun platformer that blatantly rips off Super Mario Bros., and the original, The Great Giana Sisters for Commodore 64 ripped the plumber’s timeless classic off even more. To augment that game, I’ll be playing a lot of Super Mario 64, hopefully scoring a ton of Power Stars. In addition, I started up WarioWare: Twisted! for the first time since 2005, and I’ll be taking it everywhere I travel, eagerly playing some microgames if I find myself with a few minutes to spare.

To top things off, I very recently ordered Mario Kart 7 from Amazon for a very reasonable price of $30 and eagerly await its arrival. It’ll get here in plenty of time for me to take it to New Hampshire the weekend next and try out the multiplayer with my young cousins.

One Response to “Week: End Game: On 03.10.2012”

  • 1244 points
    lukas85 says...

    Im playing metroid in my 3ds, im very happy because this time im very far into the game, thanks to the save feature recently introduced. I started this game 20 years ago when i was six, im hoping i can finish this game tomorrow, defenitely one of the hardest games ever, well, at least for me.

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