Once again, it is that time. YES everyone, it is THUMBS time! You may all rejoice at once. Now, everybody knows how wonderful and exciting this feature always is, BUT this edition may just top them all. In fact, this VERY edition that you are about to feast your anticipating eyes on will not only overjoy you, but it may open your eyes to some scientific breakthroughs! Don’t believe me, eh? Just read on!
Gladius (PS2)
Okay, well, remember all that hype I rambled on about a few lines ago? Well, this is the game that delivers it! Now, you must be thinking “WOW, this must be some rockin’ game, then!” OF COURSE you would be wrong, because this game may in fact provide medical science with one of its most major breakthroughs in eons! YES, EONS. That is because this game is almost certainly a cure for insomnia. TRULY, I dare anyone to try to play this game and remain awake! IT’S IMPOSSIBLE. This entire game seems to be engineered to make you drift off into dreamland. From its slow plodding combat and fighting styling to the mundane generic voice acting, they surely will complete their mission. The game seems to be a mix of turn-based and action games. However, this translates to long-ass-turns-to-swing-your-sword-once, which is always the first thing I want to do in any game I play! Besides the sloooow booooooring combat there is also the laaaamest story in the history of stories. It’s kinda like, Gladiator or Spartacus without all the entertainment and with a lot more fabricated dopey plot devices added. So kudos to LucasArts for nailing down a true remedy to all those poor people who cannot get a good night’s rest.
Captain Eric’s Super Thumbs Say… Thumbs Down.
Earthbound (SNES)
Now, this game has been around quite a while, and many people seem to love it, so I thought I would check it out. It’s a regular ol’ turn-based magic/attack kinda RPG, but with some nice humor and other cleverness thrown in. It also is one of the few RPGs not to be set in some ancient time, where you swing your ubermagicsword whilst wearing your shiny glitter plate mail to smash ‘dem baddies. Instead, it is set in a very modern time with a boy, his friends, and a baseball bat. I don’t know about you, but that just screams GOOD TIMES to me!
Captain Eric’s Super Thumbs Say… Thumbs Up.
Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars (SNES)
This is another one of those RPGs, as the title told me. YAY I CAN READ. This one has a slightly more conventional setting than Earthbound, but then again it does involve Mario, and there aren’t many swords or glittery plate mail in sight…so maybe that statement was a lie… ANYWAY! Since it has Mario in it, you know it has to be good. Because Nintendo erases all of our minds of any ill-advised Mario adventuring. The gameplay is just what you find in other RPGs, just with Mario twist and turns, and all those familiar faces. It added a few innovative ideas to the mix as well as some loathesome ones, such as a damn door that will not open no matter how many times I run into it… DAMN YOU DOOR; YOU WILL RUE THE DAY YOU SCREWED WITH ME.
Captain Eric’s Super Thumbs Say… Thumbs Up.
Nobunaga’s Ambition (SNES)
I heard somewhere that this game was beloved and worshipped by some… Well, uh yeah… I mean, I guess it might just be that it’s a dated game and was much better back in the day, but I am thinking that these people might also have a fondness for the bottle. The big one, too. It’s an interesting concept, I suppose. It reminded me a lot of the board game Risk. Now that’s not a bad thing, because, well, Risk is a fun board game, though I am not so sure I would run out and purchase a Risk video game. Some things are just better with boards and tiny shards of plastic. The game is about running a portion of a Japanese military/country where you have to govern as well as fight off oncoming attacks. Now the fights aren’t very detailed—it is more of a strategy game where you move different troop types into positions against your enemy and try to take out more of them then they do of you. It’s all fine and well… it just isn’t all that entertaining. Even if it was two-player, I think it would be almost better to just play some board games. So if you’re looking for a game that will make you yearn for the action of a board game, this is your best shot!
Captain Eric’s Super Thumbs Say… Thumbs Down.
Yu-Gi-Oh! World Championship 2004 (GBA)
Maaan, if you love the Yu-Gi-Oh Card game or even the cartoon, this is probably the game for you! It is, pure and simple, just a video gamerized version of the card game. No plot, no story—just card gaming vs. some stupid, then kinda hard, then cheap-ass cheating AI! Even if you never played the card game it isn’t very hard to pick up the rules, and as an added bonus, if you watch the cartoon, you can see how those all those cards they use on the cartoon do absolutely nothing when you actually have them. WOooo.
Captain Eric’s Super Thumbs Say… Thumbs UP.
Well, now I’m pretty sure that you’ve been blown away by the stunning content that the THUMBS has brought you, so I better stop now and give you a break so you don’t pass out before being able to read all the other wonders of GAMECOLA! Come back next month; perhaps I will stumble upon the game that is bound to cure your wicked case of the hiccups! Okay…probably not. But come back anyways…or your soul might accidentally get stuck inside a small piece of cardboard.
Hey, it COULD happen.
