Games I've Beaten - February 9th, 2009

January 27th, 2009: The World Ends With You (Nintendo DS)
February 8th, 2009: Valkyria Chronicles (Playstation 3)

I'm going to start tracking the games I beat, because I play a LOT of games. I also had a rule last year that I was going to write something about every game that I played. I failed then, but I hope to succeed now. But I want to pick something more interesting than just "The World Ends With You is an RPG designed by Square Enix for the Nintendo DS, blah blah blah."

The World Ends With You: A Square-Enix-designed RPG for the DS... okay, okay. Today we're talking about the little things that TWEWY does right.

According to Wikipedia, 25% of the game's storage is taken up by the soundtrack. I don't doubt that at all; I don't think there's a DS game out there that paid more attention to the music. Each section of Shibuya has its own music, a contemporary J-pop piece that (I assume) accurately reflects life in the noise-drenched Shibuya district. While that would annoy me in other games, in this one it made perfect sense.

TWEWY is a very urban game, and I'm not using "urban" to mean "gangsta" or anything like that. It's set in modern day and fully embraces it. Neku, the main character, attacks by using Psyches granted by wearing certain pins. These pins come in one of thirteen brands, and they're all designed consistently, as are the clothes you can buy that are associated with each brand. For example, the brand "Tigre Punks" is designed around punk fashion, with ripped jeans, spiked collars, mohawks, and retro design, and their pins are dark and modeled after grunge art.

I almost didn't notice -- I admit, I got caught up more in the fact that these pants gave me +4 attack and +25 HP. But when I saw a duplicate of Neku's shirt in one of the stores, I went back to the other stores and started to pay more attention. The fact that each character has their own brand also adds to the immersion.

Valkyria Chronicles has the most satisfying ending since Skies of Arcadia.

When you beat the game, and during the credits, you see every main character pop up on screen, and then test flashes up next to them saying what they did after the war. I LOVE THIS. Skies of Arcadia did the same thing with its cast and crew, with results ranging from Enrique and Moegi marrying and rebuilding Valua to Drachma spending the rest of his life in peace as a fisherman.

When you load up Valkyria Chronicles again and go to the Personnel tab, every recruit you've hired during the game has their post-war biography up too. They're not all happy endings, which is a nice touch, but they're all satisfying in some ways. A few couples get together and are working on their happily ever after. Two guys become clowns and travel through Gallia. One sadistic shocktropper stays on to become the new drill instructor. The flamboyantly gay lancer starts a kindergarten.

It adds so much life to the game. Every soldier you recruited had a personality, and you started to get attached to certain ones. (I tried to keep Ted, Ramona, Lynn, Emile, Vyse, and Aika close at hand.) It's a really great touch to know what happens to them once the war is over and Squad 7 disbands.

Up next: Medieval 2: Total War, second play-throughs of Persona 3 and Uncharted: Drake's Fortune, and soon, a Sims 2 AAR and Empire: Total War.

Yeah, I don't really focus too well on one thing.

This is Matt, who never felt good keeping the masochistic cherub recruit in his army for too long.