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Best of the Rest: Thomas' picks of 2014
ATTENTION: The year 2014 has concluded its temporal self-destruct sequence. If you are among the escapees, please join us in salvaging and preserving the best games from the irradiated chrono-debris. Disney Fantasia: Music Evolved I love listening to music alone. When no one's looking, I'm free to tap out drum beats, put on emotional lip-synchs and flail in synch with a song's swelling heights. Playing Disney Fantasia: Music Evolved is a lot like those solo jam sessions in the way it grants a free pass to completely lose myself in a song's components. Sure, I look ridiculous, but I have to! Matching notes with halfhearted swipes and restrained punches just leads to broken combos, as if the Kinect is the all-knowing gaze of an instructor ready to belittle a cold, tired performance. Substituting instruments and creating remixes adds a welcome element of experimentation to Fantasia, but it's the core focus of moving with music that brings me back each week. It's increasingly difficult to ignore life's noise while playing a game as I grow older, but Fantasia's peak moments tune out every distraction, leaving me with an uninhibited excuse to enjoy twisted, endearing remixes of songs that I love.
Sakaguchi's Terra Battle lands on iOS, Android this week
Terra Battle, a fast-paced, grid-based action RPG from Final Fantasy creator Hironobu Sakaguchi's Mistwalker studio, will start filling experience bars on October 9. The adventure begins as a free download on iOS and Android, with players leading a party to the center of the world to learn about a being called The Maker. Naturally, hordes of monsters stand ahead of your destination, inviting your group into bouts where intelligent positioning doles out extra servings of damage. While players can purchase Energy to restore stamina, avoid defeat in battle or unlock rare characters, Terra Battle's Download Starter will add content based on the game's accumulative download count rather than how much players spend. New music, characters, game modes and a console version can all be earned if 2 million adventurers brave Terra Battle's journey for knowledge. Contributing Editor Mike Suszek got a closer look at Terra Battle at PAX Prime, noting that at first, its hectic pace didn't make "a lick of sense, yet the slide-and-move-on action was innate and enjoyable enough to encourage continued play." [Image: Mistwalker]
Final Fantasy creator sees mobile success in download numbers
Hironobu Sakaguchi's name is credited with leading and assisting in the creation of many games over the years, from Final Fantasy to The Last Story, Chrono Trigger to Parasite Eve. The veteran designer announced his latest project in July, an action-RPG-puzzle game for iOS and Android called Terra Battle, before showing it off at PAX Prime earlier this month in Seattle. At its heart, Terra Battle is more RPG than puzzler, but it looked like a card game-style sidequest from a Final Fantasy entry more than anything else. In it, players slide card-like icons that represent their team of fighters to a battle grid, each with a mess of unique skills and abilities. One turn consisted of selecting a teammate, then gliding it on the grid, pushing teammates around before settling in a spot within four seconds. Depending on the enemies it was adjacent to and the fellow fighters it lined up with, it initiated individual and team attacks and spells. Within seconds, damage numbers, detailed character designs and ability names flashed on the screen in quick succession. The data stream was immediately overwhelming, then it evaporated from the screen. None of it made a lick of sense, yet the slide-and-move-on action was innate and enjoyable enough to encourage continued play.
