The PS2 Lives!
Postpone the decorative-coffin-pillow shopping and drop out of your creative-epitaph writing classes; the old PS2 ain't dead. Despite the prognoses of many well-meaning analysts, the little console that helped you ring in the new millennium seven years ago may just make it through 2008. The sharp increase in both gas prices and the speed at which our female pop superstars age may tell us that we're living in a far different world than the year 2000, but one fact remains: Like all good things worth bingeing on, the PS2 is cheap and plentiful.
While the PS2 does lack the "oomph" of the new generation of consoles, when looking at the system's future release list, there's something to be said about the active life of seniors. The groundbreaking, blockbuster games of tomorrow, with their accompanying Internet arguments already going strong, obviously won't grace the meager PS2. However, the past few months have seen a few modestly awesome titles hit the little black box, and the next couple of months will see a few more. So don't go overboard and carve your old PS2 into a crudely fashioned Wii stand or take it out to the shooting range to see what its insides look like; the old boy could make it to next Christmas.
Before this celebration of life gets too out of hand, remember one thing: While you and your PS2 may be having a good ol' time today, it still stinks of death. And with that smell comes the various buzzards that symbolize the end of any console: crappy, crappy games. The quirky and insanely Japanese title that wouldn't have seen the light of day at any other time in the PS2's life may be accompanied by something right out of the abyss of The Disney Channel. But have no fear -- our guide to the final days of the PlayStation 2 will show you how to make the most of the time you have left with your soon-to-be-departed friend.
The Recent
While the rest of the world was searching feverishly for Wiis and sending their Xbox 360s back to Microsoft for revival, quite a few amazing PlayStation 2 games slipped out to store shelves, going nearly unnoticed. Here's a sample of what you may have missed.
Persona 3
Persona 3's status as a niche game on a dying system is probably the only thing that saved it from media scandal and lengthy Senate hearings. The reason? Persona 3 is sort of like Final Fantasy, except that in order to summon monsters, your characters must first shoot themselves in the head. Sadly, in the Final Fantasy universe, where many characters need to be shot in the head, self-inflicted gunshot wounds are in poor taste. But in the occult-happy world of Persona 3, it's all in good fun. This unique little game mixes elements of RPGs, dating sims, and Satan, all in a package your parents wouldn't approve of.
Be Grateful: Since RPGs take an inordinate amount of time to produce, Persona 3 has the distinction of being one of the last, best RPGs on the PS2. Fans of the original PlayStation will remember the similar deathbed release of Arc the Lad Collection, which contained so many games that the packaging was nearly a cube.
Fire Pro Wrestling Returns
Fire Pro Wrestling Returns? Doesn't something have to exist before it can return? If you were paying attention during the first year of the Game Boy Advance, you would have known that the long-running Japanese wrestling franchise entered American waters back in 2001 with a bit of a belly flop on Nintendo's portable system. Of course, we didn't know any better. How were we supposed to realize that the Fire Pro Wrestling series is one of the finest videogame takes on the "sport" when it was hidden away in some other country for so long? Now that it's back in America, ignorance is no excuse. And with Returns, the series' most popular feature, wrestler creation, hits its peak; you'll never guess how many different ways guys in colored underpants can hit each other. (Hint: Over 1,000).
Be Grateful: Since the robust Dual Shock controller can really take a beating, the best in wrestling games no longer needs to evoke images of broken Nintendo 64 controllers.
MLB Power Pros
Like Fire Pro Wrestling, MLB Power Pros is yet another long-running Japanese sports game; but unlike the former, MLB Power Pros didn't step foot outside of its home country until this year. Looking at the graphics, it doesn't take much deductive power to figure out why the very Japanese baseball series Jikkyo Powerful Pro Yakyu made its American debut in 2007: Those freaky baseball players and their massive, featureless heads-it takes time for a country to welcome such nightmarish proportions. But give them a little time and they grow on you, as will the deceptively complex gameplay wrapped up in a cute little superdeformed package. And if you squint hard enough, it kind of looks like a South Park-licensed baseball game. Add your own swears when needed.
Be Grateful: That the MLB Power Pro league doesn't have its own Mitchell report. It's not clear what's making those players' heads so big, but it can't be from the planet Earth.
Tomb Raider: Anniversary
As gamers, we've been trained to not be interested in a Tomb Raider game since around 1999, when the series was creatively bankrupt and supported only by Angelina Jolie's floatation devices. So it's more than a little off-putting when news breaks that not one but two good Tomb Raider games have come within the past two years. The latest, Tomb Raider: Anniversary, is actually good enough to make you forget that Tomb Raider used to be an annual affair meant only to ruin Christmas. Anniversary takes the structure of the original Tomb Raider, arguably the best game in the series, pretties it up a bit, and most importantly, makes Lara control less like a walking math problem. With all this and extra content, you don't even have to worry about locking your bedroom door before playing Tomb Raider again.
Be Grateful: With a much more fair checkpoint and health system in place, Tomb Raider is no longer an OCD experience of hoarding health packs and repeating the same jumps over and over and over again. Feel free to still count the ceiling tiles, though.
Odin Sphere
Vanillaware's decade-in-the-making RPG may symbolize 2D's death rattle, but when this sacrifice is made to create what amounts to a living, breathing storybook world, you'll agree that 2D really took one for the team. The painstakingly intricate art of Odin Sphere becomes all the more interesting when you realize that you've been given the chance to control it. To match the ambitious graphics, the game features a complex, interwoven storyline with multiple characters ripped from the headlines of Norse mythology. All of this comes at the cost of sprite-based slowdown and slightly shallow game play, but Odin Sphere is worth playing just for the experience. You'll wonder how your PS2 was ever capable of Odin Sphere's magic -- and then shame it for holding out on you for so long.
Be Grateful: When you put it in perspective, 11 years isn't really that much time. Get used to thinking this way, because you won't see another Vanillaware game like this until 2018.
The Future
Who needs five-year development cycles, multicell processors, and multimillion-dollar budgets when the average PS2 game now takes only a few weeks and an average of $13.76 to complete? That may be a rough exaggeration, but it's true. The PS2 is still very fertile ground when it comes to game development, and even when PS2 game development grinds to a standstill, you'll still be able to play ports of all the newest PSP games! Until then, the following titles provide a bright future for the PS2.
Baroque
At this point, Atlus has been so successful at releasing niche Japanese titles that they could spend the next 10 years mining for unreleased PS2 gems and delivering them to our unworthy hands. But since their business plan isn't hatched from a fever dream, Baroque might just be one of the last RPGs of note for the PS2. While the game is developed by Sting, those gadfly RPG developers who recently brought us Riviera: The Promised Land and Yggdra Union, Baroque sticks to the standard and rather old-school realm of dungeon hackery. But on a system overloaded with RPGs full of embarrassing philosophizing, high-concept failures, and daddy issues, a straightforward romp through the catacombs is welcome, if not necessary.
Be Excited: Given the low print runs of Atlus RPGs, when you buy Baroque, you'll not only be getting a good game -- you'll also be making a sound investment in the college education of your future children should you decide to later sell it on eBay.
Lego Batman: The Video Game
While developer Traveller's Tales doesn't exactly have a shining track record, they were able to combine two types of nostalgia successfully with the Lego Star Wars series. Just in time for this summer's The Dark Knight, Lego Batman will essentially be just like Lego Star Wars, except with significantly more batmen. Expect the same small-scale spoofy humor and brick-building as seen in previous Lego games, but don't expect to see a flashback of Ma and Pa Lego Wayne getting rubbed out by adorable, yellow-hook-handed criminals. And since it's now clear that adults are playing these Lego games, you no longer need to pretend that you're buying them for an imaginary child. That GameStop clerk didn't believe you, anyway.
Be Excited: With the release of Lego Batman, we are one step closer to all forms of entertainment having an alternative Lego version.
Kiki Kai World
The Pocky and Rocky series, a crash course in Japanese mythology for ignorant American children of the 1990s, redefined the overhead shooter on the SNES with a cute-yet-frantic take on games like Commando. Kiki Kai World is a "spiritual sequel" to Pocky and Rocky-spiritual sequel in this case meaning "inspired by copyright and business conflicts." Still, Kiki Kai World isn't the GoBots to Pocky and Rocky's Transformers. Despite the change in name and appearance, it's still made by the same team, and that should matter to all 13 of you who played the originals.
Be Excited: Any entrance into Japanese mythology is always accompanied by a sudden loss of innocence upon seeing their culture's take on the tanuki and its magical body parts.
Yakuza 2
The original Yakuza shot for the sun and came up a little short. While it certainly was Sega's most admirable game in quite some time, the mix of Grand Theft Auto mechanics with J-RPG leanings made the whole production feel just a little awkward. Still, the Yakuza games are what the Shenmue series should have been from the beginning; in Yakuza 2, you run around an open-ended Japanese city during the 1980s. But instead of bumping into children who want to wrestle, you break countless pool cues over people's faces. Hopefully, Sega will show a disturbing display of competence by polishing some of the more tarnished parts of the original game with this sequel. But even if it carries the flaws of the previous game, Yakuza 2 might just be the last game this ambitious to appear on the PS2.
Be Excited: Fans of the franchise will be happy to know that buying Yakuza 2 will give Sega the vote of confidence they need to bring Yakuza 3 to America in the not-too-distant future. The third sequel takes place in early 17th century Japan, proving that the PlayStation 3 may function as some sort of makeshift time machine.
Persona 4
File this one under "What the heck?" Some of the aforementioned future PS2 releases are currently going through quite a long gestation period in Japan. Persona 4, however, isn't coming stateside after being available for 18 months in another country; in fact, it's so new that some would say it's not even finished yet -- and they'd be right. Recent RPG news rumblings have revealed that Atlus isn't making the jump to the next generation with their upcoming entry in the Persona series. Persona 4 will find its home on the PS2, catering to the millions and millions out there who have yet to find a new Japanese RPG-nesting ground with the PS3, Wii, or Xbox 360. Fans of the series and RPGs in general should be grateful that Persona 4's price of entry will be significantly less than hundreds of dollars.
Be Excited: It's a new RPG being developed for the PS2. Do you really need us to give you a reason to be excited?
More pics for each game can be seen at the link at the top!
