Sorcery Saga: Curse of the Great Curry God – A Mysterious and Fragrant Dungeon

Japan’s most commonly seen take on the popular roguelike RPG subgenre — typically referred to as “Mystery Dungeon” games after the Chunsoft series that cemented the formula — is a little different from how we tackle our dungeon-delving here in the West.

Mystery Dungeon-style games have been developed by a wide variety of companies over the years, and the formula is straightforward and versatile enough that it’s been applied to all manner of franchises ranging from Pokemon to Etrian Odyssey as well as a number of original creations.

Sorcery Saga: Curse of the Great Curry God from Compile Heart and Idea Factory takes Compile’s venerable Madou Monogatari series — that which ultimately begat the much more well known Puyo Puyo puzzle empire — and reimagines it for the Mystery Dungeon age. The result is an accessible and enjoyable game that is a great introduction to this style of RPG.

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Hyrule Warriors: Leading the Charge

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The Warriors series as a whole has experimented with a few twists on its basic mechanics over the years, and Hyrule Warriors most certainly provides one of the most accessible, immediate takes there is.

This is at least partly down to the influence of Koei Tecmo’s division Team Ninja, who played a role in the game’s development alongside longstanding series producers Omega Force. The result is a speedy, fluid Warriors game that is easy to get into but challenging to master in its entirety.

Today we’re going to take a look at the various components that make Hyrule Warriors’ gameplay tick, and see how they come together to create such an enjoyable experience.

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Delving into Musou: Dynasty Warriors 2

With it being a month of Hyrule Warriors here on MoeGamer, and with me recording a bunch of footage for upcoming video versions of articles, I thought it would be a good time to start another ongoing series poking at the Warriors/Musou series.

It’s a long-running series with over 50 separate releases at the time of writing, and while I’m not sure I’ll get the time to explore all of them in detail, it’s a franchise I’ve always been rather fond of since the PS2 days, and thus one I’m more than happy to casually devote a bit of time to.

For existing Musou fans, I hope you enjoy. For those new to the Musou series, here’s pretty much where it all began.

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Waifu Wednesday: Midna

One cannot, in good conscience, discuss the appealing female characters in the Zelda series without bringing up Midna at some point.

Confined to a distinctly non-human imp-like form for the majority of 2006’s Twilight Princess, Midna takes on the role of the “companion” character in this particular installment, offering Link help and advice on his adventure… only this time around with a fair amount of sass and a considerable amount of mystery surrounding her.

And she’s playable in Hyrule Warriors, in both her imp and humanoid Twili forms. Which is nice!

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Delving Into Dragon Quest: Chapters of the Chosen – #2

Dragon Quest is a great example of what I like to think of as a “comfy game”. That is, the kind of game you can pick up and play, and immediately feel like you’re welcome in its world.

There are certain series that do this very well. Gust’s Atelier games — particularly from the PS3 era onwards — are especially well-known for it, and my journey through Chapters of the Chosen on Nintendo DS is making me feel like Dragon Quest as a whole is very likely to be the same way.

As controversial as it might be to say these days, I feel a big part of the pleasant atmosphere the later English versions succeed in creating is down to the efforts of the localisation team and how they made some significant changes to how the original scripts were presented. So let’s take a look at that aspect today.

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Wii Essentials: Eledees

Despite selling extremely well, Nintendo’s Wii — or, more accurately, its software library — is not something that gets talked about a whole bunch these days.

This is largely down to the fact that its motion and pointer controls were seen by many as “gimmicky” despite how accessible they made gaming to people who had historically never picked up a controller. But, as anyone who has taken the time to get to know the Wii and its substantial library of games will know, games where you point a remote at the screen aren’t automatically “bad”… or even “casual”.

Sometimes they’re really good. Like Eledees by Konami, also known as Elebits outside of PAL regions. But I’m from a PAL region, so it’s called Eledees so far as we’re concerned!

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Hyrule Warriors: Fun with Timelines

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The Zelda series timeline is… complicated. Whether or not it was originally intended to be that way is a matter of opinion, but the fact remains: Zelda is complicated.

Hyrule Warriors is regarded as a non-canonical installment in the series as a whole. But to be honest, with the way it’s set up, it actually slots quite nicely into the convoluted timeline, albeit mostly unfolding in its own separate little corner, largely (but not completely) divorced from the main paths down which the series’ narratives progress.

Let’s take a look at how Hyrule Warriors fits in with Zelda lore as a whole… as well as how the series got to the state it’s in today.

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Delving Into Dragon Quest: Chapters of the Chosen

Welcome to the first installment of what will hopefully become a regular (though not necessarily scheduled) feature here on MoeGamer: Delving Into…

The aim of this column is to give me the opportunity to catch up on and write about games and series which perhaps aren’t entirely practical to fit in to the monthly Cover Game format — usually due to them being much too long or consisting of too many individual titles to squeeze into a single month… or, most likely, a combination of both.

I have a number of different series that fit into this category, including Dragon Quest, Yakuza, Trails in the Sky and Trails of Cold Steel, so as time goes on, I’ll be exploring each of these gradually — and offering some immediate, ongoing, personal thoughts about my experiences as I proceed through them rather than a single, “final thoughts” article. We begin today with the Nintendo DS version of Dragon Quest IV, aka Chapters of the Chosen.

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Waifu Wednesday: Zelda

Zelda is an interesting entry in Nintendo’s substantial portfolio of beloved characters… because she isn’t just one character.

While some may debate whether or not the convoluted, multi-universe, split-timeline narrative of the Legend of Zelda series as a whole was intentional from the start, it’s certainly true that both series protagonist Link and the titular princess have undergone numerous revisions over the years. And, in the latter case, she’s become some of Nintendo’s most memorable characters. Plural.

Let’s take a look at some of my favourite takes on Zelda — and if your picks differ from mine, feel free to share ’em in the comments.

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Wii Essentials: Beat the Beat – Rhythm Paradise

With how well-received 2009’s DS title Rhythm Paradise was, it was only a matter of time before the series made the jump to home consoles — and the Wii was, of course, the perfect fit.

Since Nintendo’s unconventional but immensely popular console catered to a broad demographic almost identical to that of the DS, it made perfect sense to bring the series to players’ televisions. So that’s exactly what happened in 2011 in Japan, followed by a Western release in early 2012.

Like its predecessor, Beat the Beat: Rhythm Paradise (Rhythm Heaven Fever in North America) combines extremely simple, accessible mechanics with a gentle but firm difficulty curve — and the result is a highly enjoyable game that pretty much anyone can enjoy, regardless of their gaming experience.

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