Dec 19, 1:40 pm
There are few things I love more than pounding a mythical creature until its body turns to dust… Pounding a mythical creature until its body turns to dust and releases power orbs! For people who might not understand what I mean, power orbs feature in a lot of hack ‘n’ slash adventure games. You are often rewarded with them whenever you slay a foe. Sometimes these orbs fill up your health gauge, your combo gauge or your power gauge. But one thing is consistent - they’re always very satisfying to receive! I know it sounds a bit strange, but these orbs are something I look for whenever I’m thinking adding a new title to my gaming collection. If I spy an orb floating around in any in-game screenshot, it’s almost a guarentee I’ll buy it.
... So imagine my delight at Ninety Nine Nights on the Xbox 360. Here was a game that supplied me with a lot of wonderful power-giving orbs. Okay, so the frame rate can get a bit annoying. Too many monsters on screen makes it slow down so much it’ll make you scream like a little girl. But honestly - who really cares? Slashing your way through a whole bunch of monsters is so ultimately rewarding and satisfying that I could forgive many glitches. The baddies pump out orbs, as plentiful as blood, whizzing across the battle field and filling up your all-important orb gauge. It’s bliss I tells ya.
I know this game was not a favourite amongst 360 owners and was generally not revered as particularly brilliant. However, I feel it was somewhat of a lost opportunity. If you look at my Xbox Live profile (you have to register with xbox.com if you wanna see the goods!), you can clearly see that I do not have a single achievement for N3. People think this means I lost interest or didn’t really like it. But all it really means is that I gave it a good go and then ran out of free time. And now, with the holidays upon me and my 360 away at Microsoft’s hospital (having broken down last week), I can’t play it when I do have free time! It’s so frustrating. There is nothing I want to do more than sit back and thrash some goblins. This is not so I can complete it, or so I can get a higher gamer score. It’s simply because I can try and earn more orbs than anyone else in the world! ... Of course I can’t, but my brain is paying no attention to this logic.
Anyway, my point is that I really liked N3. I thought it was a fabulous little game with a lot to offer. It involved a lot of skill as the levels progressed and health was thin; it was visually stunning (with jaw dropping cut scenes), and it was really good fun to play. So if you haven’t given it a try, and you like games with orbs, see if you can pick one up from the second hand bin this Christmas.
