Nights of Azure 2: Bride of the New Moon (PS4): Baby Steps Forward

I wanna say at some point in 2016, I saw a trailer for a game that was being produced by Gust. If you don't know who Gust is, that would me you probably don't play the Atelier franchise with almost the heroine like addiction that I seem to. While they are known for item creation RPGs, the trailer depicted a much more faster paced action game with hack n' slash combat, over the top super movies, and what seemed to be good soundtrack. Gust is a competent studio, so I gave this a purchase with little thought.

It was not a very good game.

So I didn't immediately rush to pick up the sequel when it came out, but during the summer months I had a relative dead spell where I didn't have any immediate new releases to get to, and I saw that gamestop of all places had it ridiculously marked down (not a good sign). But as poor as the previous was, I was able to see it through to the end, and felt with nothing else to do and only 20 to spend, why not give the sequel a try....

NIGHTS OF AZURE 2:
BRIDE OF THE NEW MOON(PS4)

Nights of Azure 2 picks up in the distant future from the previous iteration of the game. After the last battle with the Nightlord banished away eternal night, the world was not as saved as people hoped as during the night monsters called fiends surface and terrorize humans, leaving the sun as their only defense and forcing the world to never truly know restful sleep.

A holy order known as the Curia task of their best agents, a woman named Aluche, to take her friend and now-priestess Liliana to be a sacrifice to one called the Moon Queen and to become the fated Bride of Time. An upset and distraught Aluche proceeds with her mission to accompany Liliana where the ceremony is supposed to take place, but they carriage never makes it. They are attacked by fiends and in Aluche's efforts to protect her friend, she is slain in battle.

Sometime after, Aluche awakens to find herself under the care of a Curia researcher called Camilla Alucard (yeah, that's not fucking on the nose). Using sciences shunned by religious practices, Aluche now lives again as an artificial half demon with purple blood, like the last holy knight to fight the Nightlord. Leliana is missing and leads point to a nearby ruined city and with no other course of action, Aluche pursues to try to find and save her friend. 

Okay before I even get started with the actual review: Carmilla Alucard? Really? You named a fucking character Carmilla Alucard? Come the fuck on. I mean she's not a vampire so it's kind of misdirection I guess, but she does deal with blood transfusions for the half demon character. You could have named her Elvyria D. Edgelord and that would have been about as a subtle. Sheesh. 

So Nights of Azure 2 plays pretty similarly to the previous iteration of the game with some subtle differences, so while I never gave the first version of the game a proper review, there is going to be some significant carry over here so you could see this somewhat as a double review.

At its core, Nights of Azure 2 is a mission based hack and slash spectacle fighter with some RPG elements and splash of Pokemon monster collecting to go with it.  Functionally how it works is you start by accepting missions at your base of operations (the same hotel from the first game) and then go out into the surrounding map to try to complete your objective, be it slay a certain monster, number of them, find specific items, etc.

The rub is that even though Aluche's new half demon status grants her significantly more strength, it does require regular blood transfusion and digestion to maintain, essentially forcing her into a state of vampirism to stay alive. So when you leave the hotel, you only get a short amount of time to complete your goal. So with a clock constantly ticking, you have to quickly navigate the map as efficiently as possible, while simultaneously battling monsters to increase your experience and gain blood so you can level your character and thus allow you to fight for longer stretches. 

If the time expires during the mission, you only get the experience for the monsters that you defeated none of the rewards for completing the quest. This forces you to try it again the next time you go out, the problem is with each chapter you only have a limited number of nights to get your main story quests done, while side questing along the way. If you fail to get everything done by the time the moon goes dark, you get a game over.  I've heard people complain about the time mechanic in this one but honestly outside of the first chapter or 2, I never really felt pressured by it. I've completed story missions with plenty of moon phases to spare, and then ultimately those carry over. You could do more side questing later.

Like the last game, on top of using a combat system with light, heavy, and special attacks to combo and chain, you can still summon demons that you collect called Servan to fight alongside you. Some of these can be used for support and some of them have attack properties. But a handful of them also have some situational map purposes such as burning down an impeded path or using one's flight to jump to a higher level and open a new route. So while it is good get some some strong one's leveled up, you will need to occasionally rotate some out from mission to mission.

How it differs from the first Nights of Azure game is now this time you have a number of support characters who can fight with you as well. It wouldn't be a Gust game if it literally wasn't barfing cute anime girls at you with every given opportunity but it did add an interesting new ripple to the game. If you are going to give me all these characters, at least they are letting me get some use out of them.

Because of the breadth of characters to choose from, the game now also features an affinity mechanic that plays a factor on character specific side quests, cut scenes, and possible ending outcomes. So if you want to unlock more of the content, you are going to want to jump around from character to character. To its credit, some of them have some pretty unique moves that make them all pretty interest to use. But as it is with games like this, you will find one or two characters you will want to stick with be it for their moves or story.

Once you are back at your hotel base, you can speak to your supporting party members to finish up any specific side quests you did for them to watch new interaction scenes with them, and then head to the lab to level up. In the lab you basically have two forms of experience. Your regular XP you use to level up your skill tree for stats, weapon abilities, and other passives. You also have a blood XP that is used to level up your Servans. Once they level up to a point your "evolve" them which basically makes a stronger version of the one before, and sends it back to one.

Now before I get into the complaints with the game, I would like to stress that I do generally enjoy games that Gust puts out  (most of them are Atelier, but shut up). So the real crux of the review is did they learn from their mistakes from the previous title to make Nights of Azure 2 a better than the first one? Nights of Azure was functional and did had some bits that I liked, but there was a lot of room for improvement.

Well, there are some story bits that are still pretty cringe worthy. First of all leveling your character. Much like the last Nights of Azure,  Azure 2 had to contrive a reason for when you are leveling your character, the process requires Aluche to be clad in a scantily white set of bridal lingerie. They did this in the first Azure as well. Whenever she successfully raises a leave she has this pleasured moan animation that she does to complete it. It's super awkward.

There are some useful skills on each tree, but stick to one weapon or the game becomes a grind.

Then you have a number of "pool" scenes. Since they highlight that this hotel has a pool, they basically have a significant number of character interactions take place at the pool to justify the characters getting into swimwear. And holy crap, if the level up bridal lingerie was racy, then the swimsuits are a step over that. I don't think even girls with perfect bodies would have the courage to wear some of the suits the characters in this wear. I love me some fan service as much as the next guy does, but these are so over the top it borders on comical.

They do this, I feel, to really hammer the point that Aluche is gay. The first Azure game also had gay protagonists. That's fine, I get that it's a consistent theme since the first game and as I played through I started to piece together that the affections between the main characters were clearly more than friendship. But at least to that sense, it felt more natural as the story progressed on. Azure 2 would have been about as subtle if they just said: "Aluche got a massive girl boner because Carmilla wore her bathing suit". It feels like it had to be crammed in because the last story did.

Speaking of cramming things in, this game expects you to do an awful lot with very little time. I did a fairly significant number of side quests and used a decent amount of my allotted time to explore the maps to try to find better paths or where certain monsters or treasures were. And when I would get back to the base, I would be awarded with affinity from the character I used. Each character has about 6 hearts to fill, but after playing through the entire story, I don't know if it's even possible to to max out every character's possible affinity rank. I feel you must be able to to get the good ending, but I don't see how.

This is something I bring up a lot of games of this nature, but the combat still kind of has that weightless floaty feeling the first one did. It is better this time around but the recoil from enemies taking damage still jerky and unnatural, and it ruins the entire feel of the combat. It also really doesn't motivate me to learn how to properly combo since stun locking enemies into the longest slew of attacks I can muster basically traps them into place. It also negatively impacted my Servan usage since I basically didn't need them. I would wait for my special counter to finish and then mow groups down with it. It just didn't have that visceral recoil that I get when I play Bayonetta.

The skill tree branches on a few different paths, and it's mainly to beef up the various weapon types as you play through the game, but honestly I just stuck to the route of the base sword and it really didn't seem to affect my experience in any tangible way. The first Azure title was not very difficult to get through, and this one really isn't either. So long as you occasionally remember to spend your points at base, you should pretty easily clear the game.

It's visual design is.... fine. I guess. It's an anime game so I don't know how much I can say about it. It's pretty consistent with the games they tend to put out, but it looks like it would be just as at home on the PS3 than a PS4. But I have to figure if they aren't going full bore on the details of the characters or environments (which admittedly can feel samey), you would figure to get a must smoother and consistent frame rate.  Perhaps I am remembering wrong but Azure 1 had a pretty solid 60fps all game. I don't think Azure 2 is that smooth at any point.

I generally like the soundtrack in Gust games, and Azure 2 is no exception. Much like the boss battles of the Atelier series, this series is known for blending synthesized fantasy classical blended with contemporary rock and metal. For lack of a better expression, it very much is "video game music" but it's not bad. It didn't shake me like Persona, Doom, or Undertale did, but it's definitely a credit to the games favor. And for certain story moments, you might recognize updated arrangements from the previous Azure title, and I appreciate consistency like that.

But the sound design overall in this one is not great. There are inconsistencies throughout the game. There will be points where the voices will just cut out during scene (Japanese language). During combat voice lines will sometimes surge up and sound effects of attacks will mute during special moves. Some song volume levels are much higher than others. It's strange and feels very unpolished, which honestly wouldn't surprise me with how fast this company pumps games out.

It's story is still somewhat nonsensical. They do not have a lot of build up to who exactly the final boss can be. I think in both games they make an early appearance and then never again until the actual last boss battle. It makes it a little hard to get motivated when I don't really know what it is I am fighting. I actually finished the first game not realizing that was the final boss. It adds characters and gives you new locations, and it does constantly warn you of the impending doom, but yet as I play it it never feels like the stakes are getting raised. The tension level remains consistent from the first to last stage.

But Gust does do some story things right. They are very consistent in their lore. In Atelier games, in sequels major characters in one title will be minor characters in another, showing a change in the timeline and growth. Azure 2 does this as well as one familiar support character references and tells of the events of the previous game, which culminates with a major character returning to join the party. I won't lie, despite my lukewarm feelings to the first one I got happy to see them again, and was even more happy when I got to use them too. So the story must have done enough to leave some kind of lasting impression.

I find myself somewhat mixed on Nights of Azure 2. I affectionately refer to it as "anime trash" because that is absolutely what it is. But for a game that I didn't think was that good to get a sequel, and for that sequel to be good enough to see the story through does say something. I definitely can say that they did make improvements so it certainly is a better game. But at the same time it just so decidedly average.

Azure 2 is an ultimately unoffensive title. It pushes no boundaries and doesn't really shake up any established game mechanics. It's visual design is pretty anime and it has a relatively decent soundtrack. It's not a horrible game, but depending on what it is you are looking for you can find so many better options in that same vein. It's vanilla ice cream. It's perfectly fine as it is but it feels like it's begging for so much more. Tighter story, more weight to the combat, better implementation of its mechanics, better sound design.

I want to say that I paid close to 20 or 30 bucks for this game. That's probably a fair price because despite showing improvement, there is still quite a bit wrong with this game. That said, the ARE showing signs of improving, so I am not totally ready to write this one off. I wouldn't tell anyone to take a chance on this one, and it is a game that can be very easily forgotten after you've played it. Roll the dice on it if something about it speaks to you, but otherwise I wouldn't give a recommendation.

Carmilla Alucard.
I'm still mad about that.

Catherine (XB360): Its like an aneurysm, One and done.

People have always said to me: "CannonMan, I've always wondered what it would be like to be as pissed off as you are all the time. What does that feel like and how do I do it?"(Shut up, they do.) Well, now I can proudly announce to them that its a very simple process. Just play Catherine for about 3 to 5 hours and you will develop such a hair trigger for blood boiling murderous rage, that it would make a Tourettes syndrome support conference seem like the most zen center in the universe.

CATHERINE: (XB360/PS3)

Our story starts off with a bizarre introduction from a lady with red afro by the name of Midnight Venus, introducing the premise of the game as if you were watching some late night television show then starts the story with our protagonist, Vincent, dazing out at a coffee house with a woman named Katherine. We learn he is in a relationship with Katherine, who is a bit of a controlling but stable woman who tries to have "the talk" with him about showing more commitment to their relationship and taking it to the next level. This is something Vincent is not wild about.

See Ladies? We can use our cellphones when were bored of you too.

He makes his way home and after a brief credit sequence he goes to sleep and we enter the first stage of the game. Before going into the actual game play lets keep on the story a bit. Vincent has a nightmare where he is forced to climb a tower that is falling apart at the base, being guided by what appear to be sheep telling him if he falls he is going to die. Our protagonist narrowly escapes falling to his doom, and learns from one of the sheep that he, like the rest of them have been cursed and cursed by someone they know, and all they can do is to keep climbing to save themselves. He awakes to a wet bed and rushes out the door to get to work. He meets up with his friends at his hangout. They discuss Vincents situation and retort that all of them seem to have their own issues with relationships and about a curse that seems to be affecting the men in their area, but eventually leave Vincent to his own devices. As he's drifting off in thought about his future, he is joined by a blond, flirty vixen who goes by the name of Catherine. They seem to click about not wanting to get hitched and have a good night of drinking and ends with her forcing herself onto him.

Angsty doofus's like this tool don't get girls like her. Trust me, I'm an expert on the  topic.

As Vincent fades into the next night, he awakes to find himself in that same nightmare: Wearing his boxers and trying to climb a tower of blocks as they fall apart below him, racing up to the top before the other sheep that climb do. Waking up next to the new girl from last night, he now realizes that he is botching this situation and begins leading a double life while trying to figure out how to fix things.


Now then, Lets look at a simple definition Shall we?

fun /fən/
Noun: Enjoyment, amusement, or lighthearted pleasure: "anyone who turns up can join in the fun".
Adjective: Amusing, entertaining, or enjoyable: "it was a fun evening"

Apparently, this term seemed to be missing on the list of things that were supposed to go into the game when development started on this project, because there certainly was a severe lack of it. The game is friggen frustrating. I will say that straight off. If you have the tendency to throw controllers, set up some blankets and pillows on the floor. If you have the tendency to scream and cuss, close your door. You will be doing a lot of both, trust me. The concept of the the game is fairly simple: A story driven puzzle platformer with some horror elements. The objective is to climb to the top as fast as you can. There are not a lot of complex controls to use aside from the directional pad or one button to use items you find as you climb or one to pull and push blocks. You can pull a block off the edge, or push a block or blocks to move a row. The tricky thing to learn about the game is the physic dynamics. So long as the edges of the block are touching, the block will remain hovering. Some blocks are harder to move than others, some you cant at all, some slide the whole length of a row. There are some that fall apart and some that are traps. Each stage has a new theme and will throw a new curve ball at you, forcing you to adjust your strategy on how to proceed.

As your proceed through each stage you will reach checkpoints, where you can talk to the other cursed to learn a little more about them and more importantly learn new techniques and tricks to assist you in climbing to the top. There are also a series of conversations you have with other characters and at a confessional about your own opinions of relationships that will determine the outcome of the game for you.

After every few stages, you reach a "Boss Stage" where some incarnation of Vincent's fears or trepidations will manifest themselves and chase you up the level. Increasing the challenge. Here is my problem with that, this game isn't exactly easy for the first time play. The controls are kind of awkward to learn and its hard enough to just keep pace with the stage so it doesn't fall below you. Throwing in a boss that chases you and leaves you with that much less time is just going to result in constant deaths.

And you are going to die in this game. A lot. To infuriating levels. If its pushing things in the wrong order and leaving yourself trapped, taking too long to think of what to move, not noticing a trap somewhere, or just the boss spam killing you, you are going to hear the violin game over screen many, many times. But if that wasn't frustrating enough, they give you a limited number of lives to do it with! By the first boss stage I was cussing at my screen and had to turn the game off. It was fucking infuriating.

What makes the game so frustrating is that the controls are very awkward in and of themselves. As I said its really just a matter of using the D-pad but the problem is sometimes when you climb down, you accidentally climb behind the level. The camera can only spin about 45 degrees either way, so if you are well behind a stack and you moved a block, you get to eat shit. Even better is when you are on the other side, they inverse the controls, so its very easy to get yourself stuck in a position where you cant get back before the bottom drops out. I would say at least 60% of the deaths I had in this game came form me not using the right control when I wanted.

I think what really got under my skin the most is that watching the cutscenes just made me as angry as the levels did. Through the entire play through during every single cutscene I'm thinking. "Jeez, Vincent is an asshole" or "God what a bitch!". Through most of the game I am getting increasingly angry at what a unlikeable set of douche bags this cast of characters is. But to make matters worse, I start comparing things that are happening to the game to my personal life and getting even more angry and depressed. I am getting mad at a FICTIONAL CHARACTER, for him having two other FICTIONAL CHARACTERS hanging all over him or wanting to be with him despite him being a complete prick in both situations. I'm getting jealous over people who don't exist! Good lord its my high school anime disillusions all over again.  Maybe if I didn't play video games I wouldn't have this fucking issue, (you know, in addition to good looks, charm, a notable presence, confidence, or a generally likable personality. But that's another post for another blog entirely.) And while the story starts off as something most people can relate to and follow along with, to quote Yahtzee: "The story goes 8 ways bananas by the end". There is a massive jump from reality to fiction (more so than what you are already accepting in the premise) that it so jarring it almost put me off from finishing the game.

The Last thing I want to bang on about is this character here: Erica Anderson.

Looks can be deceiving. 

In between stages you visit Vincent's bar "The Stray sheep" with his friends. The Waitress there is Erica, she is also a friend of the group of main characters. She is cute, flirtatious, and charming. In between cutscenes you can roam around the bar and talk to her to learn more about the curse. The exact quote I told my sister was "Both of these Catherine's piss me off. I wish the game had more to do about Erica, she is the hotness." Well, without spoiling too much the best good ending you can get unveils a little secret about Erica that makes me want to retract that statement or confuses me for having it. I can hear my sister laughing at me already.

Here's the thing though.. Through all the cussing and screaming and bitching I've done about this game, it was never so frustrating that I would put it down for long. I had to beat the next stage. I shot a video of me playing one of the later stages and no joke it ran for 45 minutes and I couldn't do it, I couldn't post it because the quality sucks and you cant really see the screen. I was mad, but would never quit. But then in the last few stages.. something happened.. Something about how I was playing clicked, and I realized essentially if you focus on just the LEFT and RIGHT keys and really nothing else, the game feels a lot let complex. Suddenly I found myself starting to really fly up the stages, and then learning a few of the snake tactics, there were very few levels that would slow me down. Going back to the earlier stages I found myself rocketing up the towers like a gunshot, suddenly I was trying for gold ranks and not just beating the level, I was having more fun with the game. I was trying to race through the stages to see what happened next. I guess the point I am begrudgingly getting to is that the game actually is pretty fun once you get the knack of it. The game also has something along the lines of eight different endings so it does have some replay value although after one or two times I was totally over it. There are also time trial modes and multiplayer as well.

So I suppose I would say Catherine is worth a try, but you would be well within your rights to smash the disc with a hammer for the amount of cheap deaths it gives you, or trade the game after you've got your fill.

Oh yeah, and Toby is the worst...