ICO, Prince of Persia, BG&E...

[Stingray]

I'd say hands down that my favorite three games I've played on my PS2 in the past year are (in no particular order) ICO, Prince of Persia: Sands of Time, and Beyond Good and Evil. They're all very much of the same stripe, a lot of puzzle solving and a bit of fighting thrown in for good measure. Are there any other games of this type and of this high quality out there for PS2? If so please enlighten me.

 

-S

[Dones]

Hmm... Have you tried Rygar? Good adventure game. It's just like you said, not to heavy on puzzles with some fighting in between.

 

If you are a fan of horror games you might want to give "Clock Tower 3" a chance. It's a short game and it has some frustrating bits, but the quality of the cutscenes is excellent. These alone motivate you to keep playing. The game can be finished in about 6-8 hrs on your first sit.

[Stingray]

Just read a few reviews of Rygar. Sounds like one that's worth checking out. Thanks.

 

-S

[PaulEMoz]

Sphinx and the Cursed Mummy is pretty decent, and can be found pretty cheaply these days.

[figgler]

I say pass on Rygar. I hated it. So poorly translated and everything about it was incredibly counter intuitive. You'll be saying "WTF? Where am I supposed to go? WTF just happened?" Like constantly. As far as the universe goes, gamers are better off with Rygar for the NES

 

Mark of Kri is pretty good, not exactly in the same genre as the others you mentioned, but worth the budget price it goes for these days. The style is unmatched and it has heavy stealth mixed with crazy fighting and puzzling. Good stuff.

[mechanized]

Actually, Rygar has a few flaws.

 

While the look of the game, the combat mechanics, level design, et cetera, are all quite good, the plot is completely stupid (Note to Prospective Writers: Don't take historical people and characters and try to work their names into your piss poor plot.) and there just aren't enough enemies. And I don't just mean not enough enemy models and such, I mean quantity. You'll spend a lot more time bashing down pillars, torches, and other rocky things to max out your weapons in the first third of the game than you'll spend on all the enemies of the game. Then, finding stones to put into the discarmors is ridiculous; without a FAQ handy, don't expect to find many, and even then, don't expect to find them all. Finally, at least of what comes immediately to mind, when you do come across a hard fight, it's usually because of some weird special mechanic involved with the boss fight, like one boss cycles through discarmor immunities (if he has a red aura, then the Hades discarmor will be ineffective) while Also being rather unfairly difficult to close in on and attack, and occasionally just hard to keep him in view.

 

That said, I do have *high* hopes for the next Rygar, if they make one. They've got a good grasp on how the game should handle, now all they really need is someone else to write the plot up, dump some more enemies into the mix, have less breaking things for points to upgrade discarmors. They do all that, I'll keep my mouth shut if a slightly cheap boss fight comes along, especially if they add a minor equipment system (what can I say, I like to play Barbie with my video game characters, outfit them and all that).

 

ICO, though, is an awesome, awesome game. I'd say rent it, though, because being that it's a puzzle game, you won't get much replay out of it until a year later when you've forgotten most of the puzzles.

 

Prince of Persia was a great, great time. I just wish he had a slightly more involved move set. Can flip over your enemies and hack into their backs only so many times before it gets reeeaaally old. Remember, though, it's a great, great game. Some great level design, he's one acrobatic bastard, and it has a fun ending.

 

 

 

Some other great titles I've spent some time with...

PS2

Castlevania: Lament of Innocence (it's quite a fun game with great scoring; basically, ignore much of what other reviewers have said about it, they were more hung up on it being a Castlevania and having too many preconceived notions on how "Castlevania" 'should' be)

Ratchet & Clank games (especially with the direction that Jak games have taken after a phenomenal Jak & Daxter - pass those up and get Ratchet & Clank with the money instead)

TimeSplitters2 is one of the best console FPS games, ever, as far as I'm concerned.

Armored Core series if you like piloting giant robots and mixing up their parts.

Summoner and Summoner 2 are some damned fine RPGs.

Wild Arms 3 was a long, good RPG with a fun, Western-themed cast of characters, all without that Grits and Chewing Tobacco vibe.

R-Type Final ate up a lot of my time, it was a great end to a long line of 3rd person space shooter games. Could have used a few more stages, sure, but it's at a good price.

 

GameCube

Animal Crossing ... the novelty will wear off, but until it does, it's going to be a whole lot of fun, there'll be a whole lot to do, and a whole lot of furniture and things to collect, not to mention something close to 20 NES games.

Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker ... the cell shading actually did the trick, it's a fun time with lively characters, great dungeons, and an interesting plot. Sure, there's a lot of sailing involved, but it was actually a brilliant way to deal with the GameCube disc's lower data capacity - the sailing makes the world seem a lot bigger, a lot more flooded, et cetera. If only they'd added fishing....

Pikmin ... pretty affordable now, the only fault I'd say the game has is that it's sort of Timed. They learned their lesson for the sequel, though.

Mario Kart: Double Dash ... good fun!

Mario Golf: Toadstool Tour ... I'm not typically fond of sports games, but sometimes a Golf title catches me, and this is one of them. (As was Hot Shots Golf Fore!, actually... I should add that to the PS2 list...)

 

 

And additionally, there are a few game compilations for various systems that are worthwhile, like the Mega Man Anniversary collections, Sonic collections, Midway Arcade Treasures 1, Namco Museum on the GameCube, Activision Classics, et cetera.

[Dones]

Wow some posts were pretty passionate against Rygar. Talk about knitpicking a game to death! In my opinion Rygar is a good game with great graphics, sound and interesting gameplay. A well made jump from the 2D classic NES game. @Stingray: Don't let those influence you and make your own opinion.

[Stingray]

Dones, I'll probably pick up Rygar, but I may rent it forst to see what I think about it.

 

However, I saw a huge number of commercials for the new Prince of Persia game over the long weekend. I didn't even know that was coming! I think I'll just hold off on buying a new game until PoP: Warrior Within is released later this week. From what I could see on the ads it looks like he has more moves in this game, which (like mechanized) was about the only thing I ffound wrong with The Sands of Time

 

-S

[mechanized]

Yeah, I'd say hold out for PoP:WW if it comes between that and Rygar. PoP:WW is pretty close to being a sure thing, if they can keep up the gameplay (plus new moves!) and level design in the first one. I think they've proven they can manage an appropriate plot, so I'm not too worried there.

[wapchimp]

ico is a great game I picked it up for £5