The Rhythm of Fighters Review

When SNK Playmore announced that their next game would be a rhythm-based smartphone app, fans got a little agitated that they were spending time on something not related to The King of Fighters 14.  I meanwhile was excitedly imitating Hibari’s victory pose.  Recall in my review of Theatrhythm Final Fantasy when I said that there should be a rhythm game like it, but with KOF music.  With The Rhythm of Fighters, SNK Playmore gives us just that.  It’s like making a Rock Band game all about the Beatles; it's a good idea from the start.  Up until The Rhythm of Fighter’s sudden release onto the app store (with little fanfare, I might add), all I asked for was for them not to screw this brilliant concept up.

My prayers were answered.  For the most part, it’s just what I wanted.

Fighting Game Camps: Skullgirls, Part 2

Continued from part 1.

Music

Skullgirls keeps its music simple, but catchy.  One of the key composers is Michiru Yamane, who’s best known for her work on the long-running Castlevania series, so the catchiness is to be expected.

To fit with the 40s motif of the game, the music is largely comprised of jazz-like scores and softer melodies, with lots of saxophones, pianos, and soft drum beats.  Skullgirls uses stage themes instead of character themes, and many of them feel like something you’d hear in a game while exploring a world in an adventure game instead of all the guitar-rocking of Guilty Gear and King of Fighters.  This works nicely and makes the different, well-imagined locations around the Canopy Kingdom more memorable.

Fighting Game Camps: Skullgirls, Part 1

I don’t pay much mind to a lot of indie games.  It’s true that creative ideas can come of them, but too often they end up being 8-bit, pixilated, platformers lacking in sufficient polish or all three, unlike the big-budget super games I usually play.

I want my tax dollars to go into that thing!

That’s not to say I just brush indies off entirely.  Indie games have allowed for some great titles reminiscent of an earlier age without going as far back as the archaic age of 8-bit graphics.  I had a lot of fun with Shank 2 and Castle Crashers, and even with its pixilated presentation Retro City Rampage’s clever humor and gameplay flow kept me in the experience.  However, as fun as indie games have been, none of them have absolutely wowed me.  They’ve always been at least good, but not great.  7s out of 10, but not 8s.  Recommended, but not must-buys.

I got this for Christmas.  That Phil always knows what to get.

I say this because there may be points in this article that come off as complaints or condescension by comparing it to the other much bigger-budget games.

Part of the reason for this may be because Skullgirls is not exactly a big franchise yet.  Not counting its update, Skullgirls Encore, there has only been one game.  With the other franchises, all the many games that have come out have had their ups and downs that can be glanced over in the grand scheme of things, but with Skullgirls, we have only one game to go over, so in a manner of speaking, what I say about it applies to every Skullgirls game there is.

Street Fighter X Tekken Minimate Fun

Some time ago the Toys R Us I work at had some Street Fighter X Tekken Minimates on clearance.  Being the fighting game fanatic I am, I bought some of the little posable dudes for about $2 a pack (quite a bargain considering what they go for online).  Some of them were even Toys R Us Exclusive.

Tragically, we didn't have Rufus.

Their little size and posability gave me an idea.  I could have them interact with Nintendo's own cutesy little creations, the Miis!  With the Nintendo 3DS' Augmented Reality, I did just that and started posting pictures of Miis of various people I follow on Twitter with the Minimates.  For those of you who don't follow me on Twitter or don't even have a Twitter account, I'm making this post to put them all in one place.  I hope you like them.

A Look at Kanji de Manga Special Edition: Yojijukugo

This last weekend there was a local clearance blowout sale for used media.  An entire convention center was rented out to pack wall-to-wall DVDs, games, music, and books.  Naturally I was drawn to the manga section, where I got a volume of Yu-Gi-Oh R and an old issue of Shonen Jump in addition to a collection of The Far Side.

But as I looked further there was one more book that caught my eye: an educational manga called Kanji de Manga Special Edition: Yojijukugo.  When it comes to kanji, I need as much help as I can get, so I picked it up and after giving it a good look, I thought it was worth sharing.