Nopurpose.org » .hack

.hack//G.U. Volume 1: Rebirth Mini-Review

Jason — Thu, 02 Nov 2006 11:46:03 +0000

I finished .Hack//G.U. Volume 1 last night and I figured I’d write a little mini-review thingy.

First of all, .Hack is a RPG for the Playstation 2 which simulates the experience of playing a MMO game, complete with people calling you noobs, misspelled character names and people who type in all caps. In the “simulation of a MMO” concept, it does fairly well. You can walk up to anyone in the game and try to trade with them. I didn’t find being able to trade with everyone all that useful in the grand scheme of things, but it was a nice touch to have it there.

The main story revolves around Haseo (the main character) having his girlfriend placed into a Coma after being PKed (Player Killed) in the game by a person named Tri-Edge. You set out to find him, however during the confrontation, your character gets “data drained” back to level 1 from level 133. Haseo then sets out to level up and get his revenge.

The story is pretty good. It’s obvious that it’s a multi-part game and the pacing can move a little slow at times due to how much space they’ve got to play with. This episode is, obviously, going to be mostly character introductions and setup for later episodes. Even so, I found myself empathizing with Haseo. I thought he was a jerk a lot of the times and did things the exact opposite of how I would have done them, but when it’s all said and done, he had motivation for his actions. The story plays out through in-game cutscenes as well as some full motion video stuff. Characters also send you e-mails which you can reply to in order to learn more about them and the games story.

If there’s one thing that the game falls down on, it’s the lack of interesting enviornments to explore. True to MMO fashion, there’s a limited number of dungeon tilesets, and rooms which seem to be randomly generated. You can only see a cave so many times and think it’s interesting looking. The combat system is entertaining, but limited in it’s depth. It’s still fun for mindless action though. You can have up to three characters in your party at a time, however you only have direct control over one of them. The AI does a good job directing the other two, based on general instructions you can give it in the menu.

Overall, it was an OK game. It took me about 22 hours from start to finish which was about what I was expecting. It wasn’t the best RPG I’ve played recently, but I felt like I got my money’s worth at the end and I eagerly await the second game in the series to see what happens.

Too…Windy…

Jason — Mon, 30 Oct 2006 01:24:34 +0000

It’s been incredibly windy out today. The power has gone off twice as a result, which is kinda annoying. I got lucky the first time. I was playing some .hack on my PS2 and had just saved the game. 2 seconds later, the power goes out.

Today was the big Toys R Us Wii preorder thing that my friends were camping out for. They were first in line for it, and they got their preorder, after standing a couple hours outside in the freezing cold wind. They also apparently got caught in the crossfire of the people rushing to buy the new Tickle Me Elmo. Just figured I’d mention what happened since I brought it up earlier.

I went over to my parents briefly today as well. My mom was showing me this Hallmark christmas thing she bought that moves and sings some carol or something. I’m just glad I don’t live there anymore because I know my sister would be running by there every 5 minutes and punching the button to make it sing and dance.

Why are they selling christmas stuff already anyway?? It’s October! I swear, the holiday shopping season comes earlier every year.

Delivered!

Jason — Thu, 26 Oct 2006 20:52:48 +0000

.hack//G.U. was delivered today. Now all need to do is swing by my parents (I send all my large packages there) and pick it up.

I’ll be glad to get something new to play with. Today’s been quite the long, frustrating day, as has been the custom recently. I dunno if it’s really getting frustrating or if it’s just because of the same things grating on me and stressing me out after a while. That probably didn’t make a whole lot of sense, but I’d really rather not get into it in too much detail.

By the way, the friends that are going on the Wii campout on release day keep trying to get me to join them. Ain’t happening! First I’m not crazy, second I don’t have the money for a whole new console system plus games right now. But that’s not going to stop them from trying to convince me

5 more minutes and then I’m out of here.

Mechanical Failure?!?

Jason — Thu, 26 Oct 2006 10:48:06 +0000

Arrgh! My copy of .hack//G.U. was just delayed by a mechanical problem on a UPS aircraft. Hopefully they can get it out to me fast-ish.

I guess that’s not too bad since I was trying to finish Final Fantasy IV Advance before it got here and it just gave me another day to do that.

Still kinda frustrating though.

Update: Oooh, nevermind, it looks like it’s going to make it in time… *crosses fingers*

RPG Cravings

Jason — Wed, 25 Oct 2006 19:43:12 +0000

The November game rush has started for me a little early this year. Just put in an order for .hack//G.U. Volume 1: Rebirth for the Playstation 2. I was actually out last night trying to find it in stores, but I guess the supply chain hadn’t caught up with the release schedule yet since nobody had it.

I’ve been craving a Japanese style RPG for a little while now and this happened to be released. I’ve heard some mixed things about it in the reviews, but overall it’s positive. Hopefully I’ll like it. I love games with really good stories and this one, by all accounts, has a pretty good one.

In other video game news, I placed a pre-order for Guitar Hero 2. There’s a video floating around of Free Bird from it being played on the Hard setting. That song is going to be fun to play.