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Backlog Whatever: Brave Fencer Musashiden

I'm kinda starting to loose count here, what with me buying new games every once in a while, so my numerical order has completely gone to crap, but at least the alphabet is still the same. I think.

SO, Let's have a look at another Squaresoft game here. Brave Fencer Musashiden is the name and to get right down to it. IT SUCKS. Balls.

Like I described in a previous review on a non-RPG by Square, the company seems to have the mistaken idea that they can make cool games that are not RPG's.
Well, technically speaking, Brave Fencer Musashiden (hereafter referred to as BFM. No, better make that SUX) has some RPG elements. It's an action RPG more than anything but that's still a world apart from regular RPG's which Square DOESN'T suck at.

So you play Musashi, a legendary hero, who is revived from his eternal sleep to save the Kingdom of Allucaneat (or Yakuinikku in Japanese) from the Evil Empire which name I have repressed. Only it turns out that this once legendary figure is now a snotty little brat with a mouth bigger than his brain and it's up to him to rescue all the lost villagers, and, oh yes, there's also a princess involved in this somewhere.

Being Musashi, you get two swords, one with elemental powers that lets you pull off special attacks, and one with absorbing powers that lets you take over enemy skills.
Sounds cool? Oh, it is, but that's about the only thing in this game.
Using your weapons and generally walking around will earn you experience points to make your character grow stronger, blah blah blah, RPG elements, blah blah blah, stupid.

No, let me get right down to it, this game is frustrating as HELL. No, in fact, HELL is generally considered less annoying than this game. I was talking to Satan the other day (he's my accountant) and he said he cried through most of this game and he wondered what he ever did to deserve this kind of treatment.
He was going to open up a special Musashi-corner in Hell but decided that even he had to draw a line somewhere.

And you know what, as usual, Satan is right.

But let me sum up all the good things first: The Voice Acting. Period.
And apparently they royally screwed this up for the Western version too. I read some reviews of the American version, and everyone seemed to agree the voice acting was atrocious, which is a shame, cos it's the only really good thing about the Japanese version. This game had me laugh out loud at some points, which is a good achievement.
The Humor is great, lots of puns and stuff, and very funny voice acting. It's good that this game doesn't seem to be taking itself too seriously. That helps. That is all though.

Now onto the bad.
Let's see what we have here.
First off, and I always HATE this in a game, there's a fatigue meter, which automatically increases whilst you do anything. If it gets too high you'll become tired and move slower, which is terribly annoying. Fortunately you can go to sleep anywhere you want, to recover some health. Your Magic meter will keep on decreasing though, and you will be open to attack, and let's face it, you have to SPEND TIME JUST WATCHING YOUR CHARACTER SLEEP. How fucking GREAT is that!?!?!?!
Thanks, Square, I can't wait for your next game: Brave Gardener Kusashi: The Growing of Grass.

Secondly, you have a very limited inventory. I always HATE that too. Having to deal with this in a survival horror game is one thing, but in an Action RPG? I mean, come on! What's worse you get a lot of useless shit from treasure chests, only you don't know what is useless, and what can be used to sell, or for sub-quests, so you're always carrying junk around, with little space left for food and healing items.
Speaking of which, food goes to waste over time. Oh yes I love that too. So stumble into a dungeon and take a little bit too long and your healing options are gone.
Oh, except for SLEEPING of course.

"Excuse me, huge Ice Bird Type Creature, I'm kinda low on health here, so I'll just take a nap now, if you don't mind."
"Wark."

Oh and you know what's REALLY bad? If you don't have any poison curing items with you. You see, poison is fucking EVERYWHERE. Absorb the wrong type of enemy and you can get poisoned, and if you don't have a healing item, you will be poisoned FOREVER, until you DO get one. Poison NEVER goes away. And you know what? It doesn't only make you loose health, it makes you incredibly, fenomenally, astoundingly SLOW.
Really, you have NEVER seen a video game character move this slow. Aya Brea? She's fucking Olympics material compared to Musashi on Poison.
And there's this one dungeon which is really FAR from the main (read: ONLY) village in the game, so if you get poisoned there, which happens a LOT, you have to go ALL the way back SLOWLY AS CRAP to get some healing items. Lovely.

And then! There's some extremely annoying events in the game. At some point, there's this big Mill or something, which is used to provide the village with energy and stuff using steam. At some point it goes haywire, and you have to close ALL the valves in this BIG tower thingy, all in numerical order.
And you know what? YOU HAVE TO DEAL WITH A TIME RESTRICTION.
Oh, and guess what again, when you close one valve, you have to deal with yet ANOTHER, SHORTER time constriction to get to the next valve. And valves can only be closed with very accurately timed button presses. Oh, and of course, since this is a big tower, there's plenty of opportunity to fall down and have to start from the bottom again. I love this. And I know Square must love this too, because later in the game, THEY HAVE YOU DO IT AGAIN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
This time you have to actually FIND the valves first though, cos someone took them off. Pure Gaming Brilliance.

Christ, I can tell you, I was screaming some very nasty things at this game around that point. And that's when I realised, Games are supposed to be FUN. Why the Hell do people make a game as fucking frustrating as this? Do they think we like it?
Do they think "Amusement is for pussies, They Must Suffer!".
I. Hate. This. Game.

Which is why I give it a big fat 4. Want to tell someone you hate his guts? Give him this game. Wanna break up with your girlfriend without having a long talk? Give her this game. Wanna cause Nuclear Warfare? Give Bush this game.

Bad Square. Satan doesn't like you.

posted by Ingen! @ 11:08 AM