Game Journal: The Vast Star Ocean

I'm still thoroughly engrossed in Star Ocean: The Last Hope. I'm finding that the closer to the end of the game I get, the more there is to do. There isn't much I skipped in the first half of the game, but I have yet to step foot in the coliseum on Roak for anything other than continuing the story. There's also a handful of shop orders that I didn't finish on Roak and a metric crap-ton of quests and shop orders that I have to finish on En II. (None of that will make sense if you haven't played the game quite a bit.)

This isn't even beginning to mention the new quests and private actions that are now available on all the available planets, or the crafting I'd like to do to outfit my characters with the best weapons possible before the post-game dungeons. Its like an RPG overload, but I'm determined to work through it and at least have a crack at those uber-hard bosses and areas that are only available after you beat the main game.

At the same time, I'm poking around in Chrono Trigger (DS). I know it’s a sin among RPG fans, but I never played the game in any previous incarnation and am actually starting to believe a handheld platform is one of the best ways to experience some of these old-school RPGs via remakes and ports. I'll talk about this more in my review, but it lends itself very well to the whole idea of portable gaming, given the frequency of places you are allowed to save your progress (unlike some new handheld RPGs).

In addition to all that, my brother an I worked through a few levels on Braid the other day. That game hurts my head with its complex puzzles, I'm beginning to thing its too hardcore for my tastes. Perhaps hardcore isn't quite the word - too flat out confusing (although I'm sure my brother would disagree). While it introduces a new and often-praised mechanic, it seems to me that its just a different, slightly less annoying way to fit a "trial and error" system into the game. Instead of "start from the last checkpoint" its "rewind time and do it over until you figure it out". In fact, sometimes I think a "start from the last checkpoint" mechanic would have been quicker and less tedious. (Review inbound for this title, as well.)