(Issue 208!) JournalistMan.exe

[GrooveMan.exe]

Yay, I'm doing reviews again! Screenshots whenever!

Hey there! Do you want to be considered an awkward social oddity in both real life and on the Internet? Do you want to watch and learn physically impossible dance moves that will get you odd looks from the public? Do you want to want to listen to terrible pop songs - and love every second of it?

Then you should play Elite Beat Agents. But if that sounds like too much effort for you, then you can play the Dancing MMO 5 Street!

5 Street is... an experience, and you too can achieve the sheer pinnacles of flamboyant dress and bad dancing that only an imported Korean game can provide!

Step One: Take an existing idea, and bring it Online.
A whole bunch of modern-day Massively Multiplayer Online games are doing this as of late. Initially MMOs were the sole territory of RPGs (Who hasn't heard of World of Warcraft?), but since that market's getting saturated; there are a whole bunch of other game genres left untapped. 5 Street's main 'gimmick' is to be an MMO about dancing. Y'know, like the movies High School Musical and Step Up. But films are non-interactive, which isn't prime videogame material; so an actual game has to be cribbed from also.

The obvious choice here are rhythm and music games. That genre is pretty synonymous with the Guitar Hero and Rock Band series now (unfortunately), but stealing ideas from those two would be a bit too obvious; as would be taking cues from Dance Dance Revolution. So they copied the system from a dancing game called Bust a Groove, an old PlayStation 1 number with a small fanbase... and gameplay that had very little to do with rhythm at all. Unlike the aforementioned games, Bust a Groove requires no rhythm feeling or musical sense at all - just good reactions and the ability to tell left from right. What better system could be aimed at non-gamer preteens?

Step 2: Camp it Up to the Max
We're dealing with an audience the developers assume have the attention span of a flea on a sugar rush, and are naturally drawn to anything brightly coloured, amazingly pretty, and can be dressed in whatever they can get their hands on. Oh yes, and they must be girls. Because everyone knows girls will accept any and every game you give them as long as it has the Cute factor in unhealthy levels. In real life, this is how kitch fashion shops start up. In videogames, this is how you make a game bewilderingly silly in design.

Even from the initial loading screen (and what a loading screen it is), you are thrown head-first into a subculture of fashion that the average guy - sexuality notwithstanding, before stereotypes start flying around - would have never come across before; or would start running from very quickly in the other direction if they had. Everything stays relatively 'normal' if a female character is chosen, but... interesting things start happening if you play as a guy.

Although a lot of the functions in the game are gender specific (a lot of graphical changes, along with 'Lovers' dance mode being reserved for male/female couples only), the majority of the dance moves in the game are gender specific, leading to dance routines that are either hillarious or horrifying, depending on your sense of humour.

"If you wanna be my lover, you gotta get with my frieeeends~"

This extends to the clothing avalable in the game too. I have to credit the designers here - they went to some lengths to ensure you can create a vaguely cool-looking outfit, with new clothes appearing very regularly (you have to pay real money to wear 90% of them, though). But for every sharp suit or edgy dj getup, there's a leather vest and vinyl hotpants combo to offend the eyes.

"I must admit the clothes in this are styli- OH MY GOD WHAT"

The music you dance to is quite literally under the influence of public opinion. In what's probably the most blatant disregard of copyright laws in a videogame ever; players can submit their favourite songs to the powers that be, and sooner or later they show up ingame; including swear-heavy gangsta rap and lite-metal. Before you know it you're gyrating to tunes from Lady Gaga to Sum 41 to Easy E (the latter surprised me), with a smattering of Korean Pop left over from before the localisation. The genres are varied just enough to have you find a song or 3 that you honestly enjoy, even as a guilty pleasure.

Everybody do the Seizure! It's all the rage...

Step 3: Actually... enjoy yourself?
Despite all of this - despite the camp clothing, the stolen gameplay, and the arguably (if you're unlucky or hate Top 40 tunes) terrible music; 5 Street is inexplicably fun. Even though the dancing system has nothing to do with rhythm whatsoever, it can get genuinely challenging as you start performing better. The stunting system is extremely satisfying, as you pull of headspins, backflips, and the Worm in rapid sucession as cheering sound effects go off, sparkles go EVERYWHERE, and your score skyrockets.

Naturally.

The items you can buy for free are limited, but some look so good you're tempted to splash some loose change - before you realise you're broke. Some of the graphics look a little cheap, and there's next to no area for you to explore (it's not really that kind of MMO), it's well built, and some of the areas are honestly pretty.

As with nearly all free-to-play MMOs there's not enough addictive content to last you more than a week without paying some cash, and if any of your manly-man friends catch wind of you playing this, you'll be resigned to a life of mockery; but it's a silly, cheap way to waste an extended weekend.

Oh, and as a side note, despite the child-friendly arrangement of it all, if you decide to get a 'Lover' in-game, you may marry and then have sex with the significant other. In glorious, poorly modeled 3D. I've not seen it first hand (I'm a clean little games reviewer), but when I saw the item shop stocked condoms, the camp playing experience suddenly became a hell of a lot more awkward...

[Ravecat]

how is the first mmo to have sex a dancing one

[GrooveMan.exe]

Arguably the first mmo to have sex is probably Second Life, but that was coded in by the players. It says a lot when the in-house producers decided it was a good idea, yeah...

Actually I think you have to pay IRL money for the privaledge to tap digital ass. Art imitating life.

[Ravecat]

haha

do you actually see it happen or what

is it a minigame
oh god is it

[GrooveMan.exe]

I've seen .gifs. A moderator being boned by some random. I'm not posting them, despite it being rather tame. You should be able to google it if you're that depraved.

I'll say that the attention to detail in the dancing animations carries over to these, even if the models and texturing are just as bad.

[Alpha Six]

I'm not going to lie; I'm extremely curious about these sex GIFs. Just to see how bad it is.

I've seen screenshots of this game. It doesn't look very enjoyable.

[Dazz]

Well from what I can tell from searching about this game is that it's hard to put a condom on...

[GrooveMan.exe]

I'm not going to lie; I'm extremely curious about these sex GIFs. Just to see how bad it is.

I've seen screenshots of this game. It doesn't look very enjoyable.

It's just as enjoyable as the PS1 game, if not more (considering it has a larger song list and more modes).

But as with all MMOs, it sucks dick if you try and play it on your own. Get on skype and tackle it with friends.

[GrooveMan.exe]

BUMP FOR SCREENSHOTS (I'm terrible at taking screens while still playing)

Oh, and also

Spoiler

[Shawn]

hey who wants to have cyber sex cuz im def. down for it

[GrooveMan.exe]

Longest one I've written yet. Brace yourself.

Games have progressed a hell of a lot over time. That's something of an obvious statement when you look at the complex and powerful capabilities of the current-gen consoles compared to the Ataris and the Commadores of old, but the way we look at game design has changed also.

Due to a combination of limited graphics, sound, and memory, the earliest games couldn't show or tell you much. If a game was to have a plot, it was all told via text - usually in the instruction manual. As such, all early games had very simple objectives, and simple reasons for doing so. Why shoot the undulating blobs of pixels in Space Inavder? Because they're invaders! From Space! It's hardly the work of Dickens.

In a bit of nerd-culture overlap, tabletop RPGs (Dungeons and Dragons being the flag-bearer of the genre, to... mixed responses) were often used as examples for how early games with a limited ability to "show, not tell" could generate a game world for the player to experience. In Japan, this is the initial concept (along with the graphics push the Nintendo Entertainment System provided) behind both Dragon Quest and Final Fantasy, but before that there were games like Wizardry.

While Wizardry wasn't the first digitised Tabletop RPG (that would go to the 1980s game Rogue, a game represented entirely in ASCII, and shared a few similarities with the games at hand), it was definitely one of the most popular series of its time. Back then, Wizardry was famed for the way it was involved in the conception of a one-day extremely popular genre, creating many, many gameplay devices still used today. Now, Wizardry is immortalised for being SOUL CRUSHINGLY HARD.

This is just conjecture on my part, but I would wager that the difficulty of the Wizardry games (all 8 of them, with the 4th being especially ball-busting) was to extend the lifespan of the game. Not everyone can afford (or even want to) buy a game regularly, and having a game be rediculously hard is a very efficient if sadistic way of achieving that. The games boasted such wonders as missable items that're required to progress in the game; foes and traps that can kill you with little to no warning or respite (with your save game being deleted if you die); and even a hidden timer that will kill the player's party of adventuers of old age if you took too long to complete it.

Needless to say the series was a mega hit in Japan, to the point where a spin-off company started producing remakes and new games under the Wizardry name, actually outliving the American company. One of the hardest and most unfair games series in history had changed gaming forever.

But wait! The tale does not end there. Atlus (who I've mentoned before as one of the primary RPG publishers) recently released what can only be described as a love letter to the halcyon days of extremely difficult dungeon exploration. That love letter is The Dark Spire for the Nintendo DS. It's Wizardry in almost every sense of the word (Wizardry 2, if you want to get specific); right down to the way characters are created, the complex and very retro battle mechanics, and the Excuse Plot to rule them all (There's a tower with a wizard in it. He stole some royal jewelery, so go kick his ass! Who cares if he's actually doing anything with it!).

However, they've gone to some lengths to modernise; and honestly, they'd have to. As old games were limited by their hardware; with no such limitations present, it'd be a total waste to not make use of them. The game has 2 'modes'. A 'Modern' mode with brooding, gothic graphics offset by a trippy neon colourscheme; and a 'classic' mode that drags things right back to their roots - The graphics become 8-bit and almost entirely monochrome. The impressive soundtrack also changes between full capability and 8-Bit chipsets, which continues to impress me. Every time I heard a new song, I switched the mode to classic to hear the retro version.

Of course, the battles and the way the dungeon exploration works changed extremely little from the games it's birthed from; but that's not necessarily a good thing. While the sillier rules such as dying of old age are removed for the sanity of the masses - unfair fights and swift deaths still run rampant. Death of a party member is a very significant loss - reviving a dead character is extremely expensive; money is hard to come by, and you need every penny to be able to rest at the inn when needed. Poison traps are introduced as early as the tutorial dungeon, and will kill a character in seconds (you take damage for every 'step' you make in the dungeon) if not immediately treated.

While the first few floors do contain weak monsters to fight, the game will (at complete random) throw a significantly harder fight at you, usually as punishment for exploring (you seem to encounter stronger enemies more often when discovering new ground, rather than treading old areas). It's usually hard to run from these, and if you're caught off guard - such as when you're heading to the dungeon exit to heal up - the battles usually result in a swift game over. My favourite situation was in a fight against the 'Floating Coins' enemy. They have an attack that can hit all members of the party; but it only does 1 damage per person, often not doing damage at all. I initially laughed these off, until the game made me fight FIFTEEN of these at once. All of them using that attack, and coincidentally not failing to damage so much anymore...

Difficult battles you can eventually take in your stride, but what really bugged me about this game were the very complicated and obscure menu screens. The game will very happily give you starting items and equipment, but not tell you that it's not already equipped. You can't see the effectiveness of new items until you've bought them - and no, just because it's more expensive doesn't make it better. The most irritating thing of all is that one of the buttons will delete an item from your inventory with no insurance message - and by that same vein, will let you use an item on any character without any failsafes. This will lead to incredibly fustrating situations where you'll accidentally (and irreversibly) throw away that expensive mace you've just bought, or use your last antidote on a member that's not poisoned.

The game has a professional finish, but it belies extremely outdated gameplay. It's nice to be able to visit (or re-visit) a time where RPGs were presented in the rawest essence imaginable - and there's a rediculous amount of party customisation to be had with a brain-bendingly interwined experience/skill/magic/job system; but it always feels more than a little unfair - the game is very rarely on your side, and the effort you put into what you achieve is only passingly rewarded.

If you thought RPGs today are too easy, then by all means dig into this demon of a game. You're a stronger man than I. Pikachu and friends feel oh-so comforting.

[Cshad]

The review is very well written :o, really makes me want to see just how difficult the game is. Good job~

[GrooveMan.exe]

The game is significantly easier if you take things VERY slowly, by saving often, and grinding on the ground floor until your team is abusively powerful; then rinse & repeat for all other floors - but that's not particularly fun.

Then again, being jumped by bandits and dying as you try to run isn't much fun either...

[Dark Ultima]

I've got Wizardry GOLD. It seems alot like Might & Magic (I happen to have Might & Magic: World of XEEN as well). Never tried playing it, got sucked in by Ultima Underworld, Wasteland, Bard's Tale and Might & Magic. (I bought a collection of oldschool RPGs. Seriously awesome stuff)

I should install it under DosBox and give it a whirl.

[Vipershark]

It sounds like Nethack. Meaning I won't play it.
I can't get past the 2nd floor on Nethack. :p