RandomNPC – Video Game RPG Reviews, Editorials, and Features

Just a couple quick ones for y’all, some Blood of Bahamut screens and a few snippets of Tales media. Apparently they’re making an anime out of Abyss, and there’s some other Tales Supergroup game in the works. Oh, and a shot of a character from the upcoming Tales of Graces. What I’m trying to say is they’re still not making my dream game where it’s just a cast of reasonably charming characters going on wacky adventures without some overarching plot involving racism.

And all of the female characters are voiced by Jennifer Hale. Let me have my dreams! (more…)

Y’know what the hardest thing about getting back into Oblivion is? Other than downloading more in mods than the size of the actual game, or getting the stupid things to work right? Planning your character, man. You gotta throw out everything you know about conventional RPG grinding to max out your stats in Oblivion. It’s dumb and wrong and yet when you figure it out it feels so… well, okay, actually it still feels dumb and wrong, but it’s all worth it to crush some poor schmuck’s weapon arm in one go, take the weapon he was using, and use it to dismember him. But I digress.

In today’s media update: Crimson Gem Saga, Dragon Quest IX, Dragon Quest Wars, Kingdom Hearts 358/2 Days, Persona PSP, Phantom Brave Wii, and Super Robot Wars NEO. (more…)

On my last evening at E3, the gang and I got our hands on League of Legends: Clash of Fates, Riot Games’ upcoming online SRPG. Whatever else can be said about the good folks behind this game, they are nothing if not gracious hosts. The game demo was a private party at a nearby bar, with food and drinks on the house. As for the game itself, it’s based on Defense of the Ancients, a popular mod for Warcraft III where players select hero units and square off amidst a larger ongoing battle. We were set up in a LAN group of about ten people, and once we all chose our heroes we were divided into two teams and dropped into the beta map.

If you cannot reach the victory when to playing League of Legends, you can visit boostingboss.com they have pro players that will help your desired rank in a day or two.

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Riot Games has just announced two new additions to League of Legends: Clash of Fates, its session-based multiplayer strategy RPG, bringing the total number of known characters up to 21. One is an undead creature called Sion, a melee combatant who focuses on life-stealing and damage reduction abilities. The other, Evelynn, is a stealthy assassin who gains attack bonuses from the deaths of enemy champions, regardless of whether she is the killer. Screenshots and detailed profiles are available on the game’s website, along with a new gameplay trailer showing three of the other champions in action.

This update brought to you in part by boat waiting times and death by lamiaea. Lamias? Whatever the plural term is for angry vaguely-female snake things. I ramble. In this update: Final Fantasy XIII, Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a Darklord, Ys Online: Call of Solum, Mega Man Star Force 3, and Lunar: Harmony of the Silver Star. (more…)

By now, anybody who cares has seen the trailers for Bioware’s upcoming fantasy RPG Dragon Age: Origins. We laughed, we cried, we wondered how in the world they thought adding Marilyn Manson to scenes of mass violence and armored dudes sneering at each other would help it sell. At E3, the gang and I got a closer look at the actual game, and while there was little to sway people one way or another, I did get the impression that there is cause for hope yet. Allow me to elaborate. (more…)

When you’re assembling your MMO gear, you just gotta ask yourself one question: is it glowy and spiky enough? Is it glowy and spiky enough?! I didn’t think so! In a related story, we have imagery from Ijji’s upcoming MMORPG Soul of the Ultimate Nation. Take a look why don’tcha! (more…)

While poking around Konami and hoping the psych profile thing for the Silent Hill remake isn’t as gimmicky as it sounds, I got a quick taste of Vandal Hearts: Flames of Judgment for the 360, a prequel to the original for the PlayStation. It’s been a while since I got a taste of a good, turn-based strategy RPG, such that I probably would’ve gotten creamed by the giant enemy worm if it hadn’t been half dead when I started playing. (more…)

Hey, everything else hooks up to that accursed site, so why not?

Hiya folks! Gathered here is roughly fifty-seven minutes of our E3 Away Team knocking heads over corporate theater and glitchy alphas of unreleased games. Alethea fangirls over Mass Effect 2, J calls out Project Natal, Roku does his postapocalyptic janitor thing, and I wish I’d brought more microphones. You’ll laugh, you’ll cry, you’ll wonder what it takes to get better acoustics. The answer to that is “More than you’d think.” Anyway, give a listen, won’t you? (more…)

While putzing around on the show floor, Alethea, Roku, and I got our mitts on a playable demo of Point Lookout, the next DLC release scheduled for Fallout 3. While Alethea was busy getting her sea legs, and Roku contented himself with playing the post-apocalyptic janitor, I took my work seriously and was prepared to thoroughly dissect this latest riveting plunge into the human psyche. Or just shoot mans with a gun. Yeah, mostly that. (more…)

Namco Bandai and tri-Crescendo’s Fragile: Farewell Ruins of the Moon is getting a US release courtesy of publisher XSEED. Set in a ruined world without light, Fragile incorporates the Wiimote for use as both a flashlight and a metal detector.

No release date has been announced.

Source: Kotaku

The path to recovery begins with the simplest but hardest action a person can take: admitting they’ve done something wrong. So some applause is in order for Bethesda, who finally saw fit to take another crack at Fallout 3‘s ending after the near unanimous criticism it earned. The ending was one of the few truly uncontested blights on an otherwise excellent long-awaited sequel, and that Broken Steel addresses this weakness goes without saying; the game is unquestionably better for it. Whether Broken Steel hits the right notes on its own, however, is another matter. (more…)

Propaganda Games, in conjunction with Disney, have just announced an upcoming action RPG based on Pirates of the Caribbean. Few details have been released, save that the game is a prequel to the movies and will not focus on any of the events featured in them.

Pirates of the Caribbean: Armada of the Damned is slated for launch on 360, PS3, and the PC. No release date has been announced.

Source: Kotaku

To hear the Warhammer universe tell it, the far future is bleak and brutal. Across the galaxy, humanity lives in constant fear of assault by impossibly huge numbers of aliens. Be they the brutish Orks, the conniving Eldar, or the ravenous Tyranid, there are countless creatures that see humanity as food, pawns, or just someone else to fight. And so humans genuflect to their God-Emperor and the Space Marines, a legion of genetically enhanced super-soldiers who literally exist just for the purpose of fighting. Thus is the setting of Dawn of War II, and throughout its bleak atmosphere it manages to deliver a compelling, if repetitive, twist on the usual real-time strategy formula. (more…)

Y’know, I love Fallout 3 and all, and Broken Steel finally retcons the stupid ending, but I get the feeling it’s not going to add what I really want: getting to wear Col. Autumn’s sweet coat, and more President Eden. Ah well. At least mods can fix one of those. Anyway, on to the media: Lunar: Harmony of the Silver Star, Demon’s Souls, Final Fantasy Legend II DS, and Blazing Souls Accelerate. Check ’em out: (more…)

Y’know, Jackie Chan can star in the worst movie imaginable, but it would still be worth it for the blooper reel and at least one of the fight scenes. Who Am I? is just epic. But, I ramble. Today we’ve got some A Witch’s Tale, Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a Darklord, Lunar: Harmony of the Silver Star, Ragnarok Online DS, and Resonance of Fate. Get ’em hot, get ’em here: (more…)

Hey everybody! No fancy stuff today, too busy running fetch quests for XP with catgirls to comment about awesome things like STALKER Complete 2009. But, I digress. In today’s update: Arc Rise Fantasia, Class of Heroes, Final Fantasy Legend II DS, Infinite Space, Mario and Luigi RPG 3, and A Witch’s Tale. Check it out! (more…)

Hybrid-genre games have always been something of an experiment, even as they have grown more common throughout the industry. Going back as far as the Doom era, namely with a little-known title called Strife (which was built on the Doom engine) hybrids don’t often truly appeal to fans of one genre or the other. Too much a shooter, RPG fans get turned off; too much an RPG, shooter fans won’t like it. This is a gross oversimplification, but there is truth to the notion that a hybrid game can’t lean too heavily on any single aspect. (more…)

Man, I don’t know if I want to live in a world where Duke Nukem Forever is truly no more. It was like Schödinger’s Cat in game form, only we now know for certain that there never was a cat in the first place, and they were just showing us pictures of other cats. Of course we kinda knew all along that something was up but were going with it anyway because it made for good joke fodder, and who knows? Maybe there really was a cat in there the whole time and it’d be a really awesome cat. A cat with attitude and strippers. Oh well. Another hallmark of our pasttime gone by the wayside.

Anyway, here’s some completely unrelated media for you: Knights in the Nightmare, Blood of Bahamut, Ys Seven, Inazuma Eleven 2, and Trinity Universe. (more…)

Hiya, folks! If you didn’t get enough Final Fantasy XIII from J_Sensei’s preview yesterday, we’ve got a whole heap of screenshots for you. Along for the ride are more shots of Harvest Moon: Makiba no Omise and Dungeons and Dam. Got a minute? Give a click or two or twenty: (more…)