Shin Akai Katana Confirmed for North America

[burgerkingdiamond]

I stumbled upon this review

http://www.thisisxbox.com/360/akai-katana-review/

it's not horrible. The guy gives it an 8 and has a lot of good things to say. But he still doesn't really get it.

"Visually, the game is more on par with most Arcade games than other retail titles; which brings the question as to why Akai Katana was not ported for the Xbox LIVE Arcade instead? It’s an Arcade quality game which isn’t over lengthy and can be completed within the hour depending on how you play and difficulty settings."

Maybe some people would rather have it for LIVE. But I sure as hell wouldn't There is something to be said for actually owning what you buy. And to say it can be completed in an hour is asinine. This game has infinitely more replay value than 90% of games on the market now.

(I know I'm preaching to the choir though).

[StarCreator]

I -still- think Cave should go back to making credits an unlockable, to stave off this mentality. They started doing it with their newer iOS ports at least...

[MR_Soren]

it's not horrible. The guy gives it an 8 and has a lot of good things to say. But he still doesn't really get it.

Yeah, I read that earlier today. Poor writing, and the author clearly doesn't get it, but at least it was positive. I wanted to post a comment on the review, but I decided to not bother this time. I post too many negative comments on too many game reviews, and those authors are all still getting paid for their writing and still can't be bothered to learn about what they are reviewing.




StarCreator - I totally agree. Slow credit unlocking might force people to play a game enough to understand it before they claim to have cleared it.

[TrevHead (TVR)]

I like both climax mode for its more indepth use of options / bullets and slash mode for its use of katanas. Original in 4:3 just feels weird after playing 16:9 climax mode

Hell I even like the suicide bullets, a much better game than Deathsmiles imo.

Does that jump in rank for no missing stage 1-2 apply to all 3 modes?

[dunpeal2064]

Credit unlocking is the only reason I ended up playing shmups seriously. Shiki II on the ps2, which still felt difficult with 9 credits unlocked ( )

Once I hit unlimited, I would delete my data and start over. I had no idea there was such a community at the time, and I probably would have never played them seriously if there was just infinite credits from the start.

[TrevHead (TVR)]

It does confuse me as to why CAVE still use unlimited credits, (ild rather see easy-7, medium-5, hard-3 credits, plus options for 1 credit and unlimited) maybe they don't want to piss of creditfeeders who are used to it in their games

[dunpeal2064]

It does confuse me as to why CAVE still use unlimited credits, (ild rather see easy-7, medium-5, hard-3 credits, plus and option for 1 credit and unlimited) maybe they don't want to piss of creditfeeders who are used to it in their games

Pssh, they need to piss off those credit feeders, they are the ones giving their games bad reviews.

[Op Intensify]

Credit unlocking is the only reason I ended up playing shmups seriously. Shiki II on the ps2, which still felt difficult with 9 credits unlocked ( )

It wasn't enough for me. I used to abuse free play in Ikaruga after I unlocked it. I needed to read about how these games are really meant to be played.

[Special World]

Mars Matrix is undoubtedly the best game to coax players into scoring.

The shop was essential to my understanding the fun of scoring.

[burgerkingdiamond]

I stopped by GameStop today and paid in full for my copy.

Needless to say the clerk was taken aback that I wasn't there to pre-order the new Black Ops game or some bullshit.

[BPzeBanshee]

Nice to see Australian retail stores ignored it again.

So jealous right now. Everything work as expected I presume?

[Illyrian]

I stumbled upon this review

http://www.thisisxbox.com/360/akai-katana-review/

it's not horrible. The guy gives it an 8 and has a lot of good things to say. But he still doesn't really get it.

"Visually, the game is more on par with most Arcade games than other retail titles; which brings the question as to why Akai Katana was not ported for the Xbox LIVE Arcade instead? It’s an Arcade quality game which isn’t over lengthy and can be completed within the hour depending on how you play and difficulty settings."

Maybe some people would rather have it for LIVE. But I sure as hell wouldn't There is something to be said for actually owning what you buy. And to say it can be completed in an hour is asinine. This game has infinitely more replay value than 90% of games on the market now.

(I know I'm preaching to the choir though).

All that matters here is that he gives it a good score and bigs it up.

Not everyone is going to get the arcade mentality of 1cc'ing, or fully understand why it's nice to have CAVE games on disc. I really hope there will be more reviews like this, and there's probably a possibility of Spadgy doing some mainstream media reviews of it over here in the UK, as he did with DDP: Rez. That will hopefully get the ball rolling.

[AntiFritz]

Nice to see Australian retail stores ignored it again.

So jealous right now. Everything work as expected I presume?

If anything jbhifi or gametraders will get it 3 weeks late. Same thing happened ages ago with blazblue ct.

[BulletMagnet]

I stopped by GameStop today and paid in full for my copy.

Needless to say the clerk was taken aback that I wasn't there to pre-order the new Black Ops game or some bullshit.

Heh, the folks at my local GS know me well by now...when I popped in and said I needed a pre-order, the first thing they said was "That katana thing, right?"

[xbl0x180]

I stopped by GameStop today and paid in full for my copy.

Needless to say the clerk was taken aback that I wasn't there to pre-order the new Black Ops game or some bullshit.

Heh, the folks at my local GS know me well by now...when I popped in and said I needed a pre-order, the first thing they said was "That katana thing, right?"

Those GS dweebs are taken aback by pretty much anything that isn't some FPS crap. They were surprised to get an order for Beautiful Katamari from me

[BulletMagnet]

Those GS dweebs are taken aback by pretty much anything that isn't some FPS crap.

Nah, not all of 'em are like that: there aren't any shmuppers in my branch, but they play a decent variety of stuff and can hold a good conversation about games they're familiar with. The store in the next town over used to have a staff like that too, though now it's new people I don't know very well (still seem friendly though). Guess I've just lucked out in avoiding the Highly Unmotivated Teenager stereotype, heh.

[Deca]

The guys at mine aren't so bad. They don't know dick about stgs but they aren't cawadoody maintreamers. They were excited about Xenoblade and I remember one of them being interested in Solatorobo when I placed my order for that.

They've told me "If there's some weird game that noone knows anything about we know that you do," which was nice for my ego They never give me shit about my purchases, they usually end up asking me about the games.

[DragonInstall]

Will the pal / us version get the first print dlc voice pack? There should be extra dialogue during mid boss and during the boss fights. From the youtube videos, I think it's omitted, but can't tell since they're talking over the audio.

Also they should be saying something every time you switch.

Heres an example for those that have the game. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WCxYihEHEGo

Seems weird to omit it.

[AntiFritz]

I doubt it, deathsmiles didn't have it after all.

[BPzeBanshee]

I'm still waiting to hear about that 'bringing over all the DLCs' business is about.

Frankly I couldn't care less about voices though considering I'm a OMG evil gaijin who can't understand spoken or written Japanese so long as the port actually works as intended which it does (or so I'm told). I can understand those who are educated in the language feeling weird without said voiceovers though - playing the Japanese version of Progear and then the US version left me with a similar feeling.

[StarCreator]

I heard you guys like reviews, so here's EGM's review.

Still waiting for confirmation of the game's region locking status.

[Skykid]

I heard you guys like reviews, so here's EGM's review.

Could have been a lot worse, but you have to love it when EGM's reviewers (and editors evidently) can't even spell properly:

"They went from the for-everyone fair of the arcade titles I listed above"

Dearie me.

[dan76]

Still waiting for confirmation of the game's region locking status.

It doesn't work on a Japanese xbox if that's what you mean - posted that a while ago.

[foxyg]

I just went to gamestop, it appears each gamestop only received 1 copy and they all opened it and put ugly price sticker on it already. Guess I am ordering on amazon now.

[Deca]

As hideously written as that EGM review may be I found myself somewhat shocked at the overall quality. The reviewer actually has some understanding of what he's reviewing. The first comment then promptly made me want to hang myself.

[StarCreator]

Still waiting for confirmation of the game's region locking status.

It doesn't work on a Japanese xbox if that's what you mean - posted that a while ago.

I assume this is the European version you've tested? Looking for confirmation for the NA version, but that doesn't sound good either =/ Thanks!

[Chacranajxy]

As hideously written as that EGM review may be I found myself somewhat shocked at the overall quality. The reviewer actually has some understanding of what he's reviewing. The first comment then promptly made me want to hang myself.

You wanted to hang yourself because someone was going to wait for the price to drop?

[Deca]

Its already budget priced and the guy is basically complaining that it isn't an xbla release. Just a frustrating reflection of how people see the games.

[TrevHead (TVR)]

Its already budget priced and the guy is basically complaining that it isn't an xbla release. Just a frustrating reflection of how people see the games.

I agree, while waiting for a game to drop lower is a smart thing to do especially in today economy ,but how much profit are the publishers not to mention the devs getting from £15 - $20? So many boxed games quickly crash to that level.

That said my main beef is with gamers and ppl in general who don't understand the difference beween getting a quality product at a cheap price and buying cheap tat.

[BulletMagnet]

I just went to gamestop, it appears each gamestop only received 1 copy and they all opened it and put ugly price sticker on it already.

Maybe it's because I pre-ordered, but my store got 3 copies and kept all of them sealed (didn't even put a sticker on the one they set aside for me).

I assume this is the European version you've tested? Looking for confirmation for the NA version, but that doesn't sound good either =/

I can (re?)confirm this: tried the US release in my J360 and it did not work.

Someone else will have to test out the 4/3 screen thing though, as I don't have any CRTs near my US 360.