Author: Steve Haske

Pon, pon, pata pon. Pon, pon, pata pon. Pon, pon, pata pon. Sound familiar? If you’re a fan of Patapon, Sony’s quirky, rhythm-cum-real-time, strategy-action game, this beat will certain call up some memories.

The concept of clichés in JRPGs is far from new, and the amount of criticism leveled at it is insurmountably high. Rightly so—if there’s one genre that suffers the most from stale, overwrought plots, character dynamics and stereotypes, this is it. This goes for the subsets of RPGs, whether tactical, strategic, simulation-style or whatever.

Over the years I’ve played a lot of games in a lot of different genres, but the graphic-adventure, or “interactive novel” is one I rarely come across. Although the popularity of these kinds of games is pretty high in Japan, the genre is hard to get into here in the states.

Remember Wanted? That movie that came out last year starring Angelina Jolie as a completely badass assassin? Well, here’s the sequel. Yes, yes, I know it’s a year late. Don’t ask me what possessed Warner Bros. Games to release this now, rather than last year.

Point-and-click adventures may just be the best genre ever. In what other kinds of games can you go around collecting a seemingly random assortment of crap and show it to strangers?

These days, you can’t throw a nickel in a Gamestop without hitting some kind of open-world organized crime game, and EA’s first Godfather game did little to differentiate itself from the endless waves of GTA clones.

In an interview before the release of 50 Cent: Blood on the Sand, two of Fiddy’s boys, G-Unit rappers Lloyd Banks and Tony Yayo, revealed they were more than just rap stars lending their voices to the multi-platinum rapper’s new game.

Like other Crystal Chronicles games, the story here is more of a means to an end, but that’s OK. Do we really need an epic storyline about a semi-randomized hero and some crystals? Not particularly. So, true to the spin-off’s format, the draw is how you go about traversing the game’s many dungeons.

Prinny is as unexpected a game as you’re likely to find, and not just on the PSP. It’s the ultimate Disgaea fan service: a tough, ridiculous game (and 2-D, to boot) starring the exploding penguins (or whatever the hell they are) from Nippon Ichi’s quirky strategy RPG series.

The PSP is a system that often seems to get the shaft, especially in comparison to its dual-screened competition. Recently, Sony even admitted to making mistakes with their portable hardware, saying the shipping schedule for quality games has been poor thus far.

At the beginning of Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars, Huang Lee, the spoiled brat son of the leader of Liberty City’s triad gang, is mugged, beaten up and left for dead. Given this is GTA we’re talking about here, the territory isn’t entirely unfamiliar.