Tag: Wii U

#WeeklyGameMusic: Whetfahrt Cheesefunk (Bit.Trip Presents…Runner2: Future Legend of Rhythm Alien)

Posted on by Taro Omiya

You’d think a jazzy composition wouldn’t work too well on a game that requires paying close attention to the music’s rhythm, but the auto-runner Bit.Trip Presents…Runner2: Future Legend of Rhythm Alien (phew!), developed by Choice Provisions, throws away all common sense and just makes it happen. Whetfahrt Cheesefunk, composed by Matthew Harwood, takes a nice, soft swinging beat, and crescendos it to a deliciously chaotic composition. An interesting decision for a game that demands every single fiber of the player’s attention, lest they get hit, and be forced to replay from the beginning of the level.

The game’s album is available on Bandcamp, by the way: choiceprovisions.bandcamp.com/track/whetfahrt-cheesefunk

Runner2 is a bizarre side-story the happens between two Bit.Trip series entries, Runner and Fate. In short, series villain Mingrawn Timbletot fires a laser at Commander Video, thus whisking him away into a new dimension…the 3D realm! Tired plot point aside, this leaves Commander Video doing what he already does best in Bit.Trip Runner: keep running right in hopes of finding an exit out of this world.

While an auto-runner in the same vain as Canabult, Runner2 has multiple levels with a clear ending, collectibles, and even boss battles. Naturally as the music would imply, the audio design is the primary highlight of Runner2, making it a stand-out among other games in the same genre. Obstacles and collectibles are deliberately placed to create a sense of rhythm and memorization one would expect from music games. On top of this, each successful action is awarded with a note that, stung together, creates a procedurally generated music matching with the composition already playing in the background. In essence, the player gets to feel like they’re composing music.

Runner2 is available on Windows, OS X, and Linux via Steam; Playstation Vita, 3, and 4; iOS, Xbox 360, and finally, Wii U.

Leave a Comment on #WeeklyGameMusic: Whetfahrt Cheesefunk (Bit.Trip Presents…Runner2: Future Legend of Rhythm Alien) | Categories: #WeeklyGameMusic

#WeeklyGameMusic: Tarrey Town (The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild)

Posted on by Taro Omiya

Relax with this week’s #WeeklyGameMusic, and let your worries wash away. Even when exploring a post-apocalyptic universe, Nintendo still provides some unexpected optimism with tracks like Tarry Town, composed by quite a large team of composers and sound designers, including Hajime Wakai, Manaka Kataoka, Yasuaki Iwata, and Soshi Abe. As the game The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild demonstrates, it’s still possible to rebuild anew from the rubble of the past.

Much like past entries, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild begins with our hero Link being awakened from sleep. But this time, instead of a nice comfy bed, he gets up…from what appears like a high-tech cryogenic chamber. To add to the confusion, it turns out he’s amnesiac. Upon stumbling into an old man, the stranger helps Link catch up with some shocking details: he, the chosen hero, has failed to fulfill the prophecy. With the hero deftly defeated by Ganon and his army, the Hyrule kingdom has succumbed to his destruction. Fortunately, Zelda managed to temporarily seal the great evil, putting both into a century-long slumber. With only these scant details available to him, Link must travel across the vast, now-unfamiliar lands, and devise a plan to defeat Ganon before the seal loses its strength.

Taking notes from other open-world games, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is an Action JRPG that involves making use of whatever Link can find around him. This often means that Link steals food, weapons, arrows, and armor from other people, both living and long deceased (though it appears the living town folks don’t mind). In his large pockets include the Sheikah Slate, a handy tablet that can create useful tools out of thin air, including bombs, pillars of ice, and magnets. It furthermore doubles as a map, where useful mini-map markers can be manually placed. The game often starts like a survivalist experience, but it won’t take long for most players to master the elements of the game, and take on some of the most powerful monsters it throws at you.

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is available on the Nintendo Switch and Wii U. No other ports exists as of this writing, but a sequel is in works.

Leave a Comment on #WeeklyGameMusic: Tarrey Town (The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild) | Categories: #WeeklyGameMusic

#WeeklyGameMusic: Blue Chair (Cloudberry Kingdom)

Posted on by Taro Omiya

Let’s get those blood pumping with this week’s #WeeklyGameMusic! Blue Chair, composed by Blind Digital, is one of the many fantastic themes composed for Pwnee Studios’ procedurally generated platformer game, Cloudberry Kingdom. The indie game’s extraordinary algorithm can generate both reasonable Super Mario-like stages, and Kaizo-level, controller-breaking ridiculousness.

Oh no! The evil king, Kobbler, has kidnapped the fair (…and sarcastic) Princess! And to add to the insult, he stole the infinite level generator orb as well! It’s up to a brave…tired…middle-aged hero named Bob to save her.

You know…

That same, bland, sexist plot again.

Obviously poking fun at the usual paper-thin Super Mario plot, Cloudberry Kingdom plays like the Nintendo classic, but with more focus on flow rather than precision. The platformer’s algorithm always calculates at least one plausible path, meaning a lot of the levels are generated with constant movement in mind. To further add variation to the play, the game provides many different control variations, including inclusion of double-jump, jetpacks, Sonic-like momentum-based movement, no-gravity, always-bouncing, etc.

Another innovation the game provides is actually having a demo-mode where an AI demonstrates how to complete a level. This is particularly impressive when one drastically ramps up the complexity of the game to generate levels that are absurdly difficult. One would think like Nintendo’s assist mode, this would help the player to understand the level better, but…

Cloudberry Kingdom is available on Windows via Steam, PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and the Wii U

Leave a Comment on #WeeklyGameMusic: Blue Chair (Cloudberry Kingdom) | Categories: #WeeklyGameMusic

#WeeklyGameMusic: Toad Café (Paper Mario: Color Splash)

Posted on by Taro Omiya

Ah, yes, time to return to the good old classic Italian plumber in this week’s #WeeklyGameMusic. This time, let’s chill with the Toad Café theme, composed by Takeru Kanazaki, Shigemitsu Goto, and Fumihiro Isobe. The track is from…*shuffle, shuffle*…uhhh…the fan-disapproved game, Paper Mario: Color Splash, developed by Fire Emblem series game, Intelligent Systems?

Before, uh, I get any comments from fans of the Paper Mario series (this writer being one of them), I guess I should cover the paper-thin story. On a faithful day, Princess Peach approaches Mario to deliver a letter. Or a folded, completely discolored Toad, to be more accurate. Struck by this tear-agic discovery, Mario and Co. travel overseas to investigate where the letter was delivered from: Prism Island.

Upon arrival, Mario and Peach learns the truth: the sucky Shy Guys has been slurping up all the color out of this colorful resort. Including Toads, apparently. Crumpled, but undeterred, Mario teams up with the Prism Island guardian (and all-around a floating, hammy bucket) Huey to bring color back to the decorated world.

Much like prior entries, Paper Mario: Color Splash is turn-based JRPG. Similar to the misaligned series entry, Sticker Star, Color Splash also has a TCG-like aspect where Mario needs to collect cards to attach enemies. The power of the cards is determined by how much paint Mario applies to them, which in turn can be permanently powered up by collecting power-ups from defeated enemies. And of course, the trusty cardboard-hard hammer can be used in the regular exploration levels to color any blank spots, restoring Prism Island to its former gay glory.

Paper Mario: Color Splash was developed for the Nintendo Wii U. No other ports exists as of this writing.

Leave a Comment on #WeeklyGameMusic: Toad Café (Paper Mario: Color Splash) | Categories: #WeeklyGameMusic

#WeeklyGameMusic: Lone Survivor (Lone Survivor)

Posted on by Taro Omiya

It’s been a couple of weeks now since you’ve locked down in your own apartment. How long can you go like this? To ease your mind, you turn on your favorite music collection, “#WeeklyGameMusic.” Superflat Games’ melancholic theme song for their game, Lone Survivor, plays. A fitting theme by composer and game designer, Jasper Byrne.

As you settle down, you think to yourself, where does it all begin? It started with a contagious infection. At first, it was just on the news. But you then hear a friend of a friend catch it. Then your neighbors. And now it’s just you. You, a lone man with a surgeon mask on at all times so as to not catch the virus. All of your friends, now violent monsters…

You snap yourself out. No! Focus on surviving through this terrifying apocalypse! What do I need to do? Well, obviously, you need to collect some food. With monsters infesting your neighborhood, that’ll mean stealthily crawling through every nook and cranny to find what limited resources you can find. Fortunately, you have a pistol to incapacitate the monsters. It’s not much, since you’re a bit short on bullets…and said monsters are probably your friends…and you’ll probably lose your sanity shooting them…but it should help.

Well, you have to start somewhere. Saving at the bed all day isn’t going to get you anywhere. Time to open the door, to the sanity-slipping outside world…

Lone Survivor is available on PC and Mac via Steam. It’s also downloadable on Playstation 3, 4, Vita, and Wii U.

Leave a Comment on #WeeklyGameMusic: Lone Survivor (Lone Survivor) | Categories: #WeeklyGameMusic

#WeeklyGameMusic: MNN+@0・ (Xenoblade Chronicles X)

Posted on by Taro Omiya

#WeeklyGameMusic: New week, new music. Time to talk about a track that is frankly very difficult to spell. I’m talking, of course, about MNN+@0・, composed by Hiroyuki Sawano of Attack of the Titans fame. This is probably one of his early music debut in video game context; too bad it was introduced in the ill-fated Wii U game, Xenoblade Chronicles X, by Monolith Soft.

Like a true action JRPG, Xenoblade Chronicles X has quite a length story, loosely inspired by the Tower of Babel. In the future, a mega-space-battle between two advanced alien races takes place, destroying Earth with it. As a last-ditch survival effort, a bunch of ships carrying humans are launched, in hopes of landing on a habitable planet. You — yes, a customized hero designed by you yourself — are awoken from suspended animation by Elma, who introduces you to the sprawling world of Mira that your colony’s ship has crash landed onto. But first, she hands you a laser gun and knife. That’s right, the native alien species on this planet aren’t too fond of visitors!

Exploration is Xenoblade Chronicles X‘s name of the game, as planet Mira is absolutely massive. Much of your time will be spent on uncovering landmarks, tackling both main- and side-quests, and grinding for materials. Mid-way through the game, your party gains access to mechs that fly, opening the world up even further. Battles are held in real-time as you designate what special moves your hero or mech should execute, and at which enemy body part. On a more clever twist, the touch-pad on the Wii U controller can be used to setup mining stations, allowing the player to both make money and materials over time — similar to Universal Paperclips and other idle games. The feature also doubles as a way to buff your party members in specified areas of the map, ideally where more difficult enemies are crawling over.

Xenoblade Chronicles X is available on the Wii U. No other ports exist as of this writing.

Leave a Comment on #WeeklyGameMusic: MNN+@0・ (Xenoblade Chronicles X) | Categories: #WeeklyGameMusic