Code Geas Episodes 24 and 25

I've been waiting all summer for these episodes and frankly it was worth the wait. The action started immediately and proceeded quickly. Events took place at a dizzying pace which perfectly matched the atmosphere of the show. Instead of feeling rushed the pace really sets the tone for the action and how desperate the characters are.

Rather than try to go through things as I happened, I'll just look at how they ended up. First and foremost, the biggest question is who fired that gunshot?! Both Suzaku and Lelouch were extremely angry. However, Lelouch already ordered Suzaku to live with the Geas, will this prevent him from shooting Lelouch and activating the sakuradite? Lelouch seems the least handy with a gun of the three, nor does it seem likely he would shoot his best friend even in such a situation. He probably does not have the accuracy to shoot the gun out of Suzaku's hand either. Karen on the other hand seems decent with guns and would have the accuracy to disarm Suzaku (or shoot Lelouch!) so my bet is on her.

Seems like Orange got some strange new powers, but CC is taking him to the bottom of the ocean...presumably to keep him out of Lelouch's hair. VV kidnapped Nunnaly, but she doesn't seem particularly evil, nor particularly good! We also have "chigusa" running around with knowledge of Lelouch's power and identity. Shirley and Cornelia (not sure what happened to her either!) also know of his identity. Things are falling apart quickly!

Anyway, I know I've been writing more about what happened and less about how good the episode was. Frankly, I think it was great. I can't wait until Season 2 starts up! I heard a rumor that it is going to be called "Suzaku of the Counter Attack".

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

If you haven't read the book, stop reading now - spoilers ahead!




I haven't had time to read this until now, but I finished it in a night! Pretty decent. The beginning was very exciting but the excitement slackened off slowly. The wedding bit and surrounding parts were slow...Grimauld place was slow...the long, long, long period of wandering around forests hiding was incredibly slow. The real problem here is that Harry Potter usually has a wide array of characters and subplots running simultaneously at Hogwarts. The much more limited cast of Harry, Ron and Hermione (and for a short bit, just Harry and Hermione) was very different than setting of the other books. Harry, Hermione and Ron had their usual minor fights, but without anything else to serve as a backdrop or distraction, it was pretty dull.

The ending was decent. I have to admit I feel a large part of Harry's development at the end was practically exactly the same as what happened in Tales of the Abyss, but I doubt the author knowingly ripped it off. It was still good however. Dumbledore's shift from the perfect idol to a fallible human was also quite interesting. It was somewhat undermined by the fact that everything ended up following his plan anyway.

Anyway, a good book. I still haven't thought everything through about it, but my general feeling is that it was very different from the other books, and much simpler due to the lack of subplots.

Prince of Persia: Rival Swords

So my friend got me interested in Tomb Raider Anniversary (mostly just to see how my computer would run it). After playing for an hour or so I was pretty frustrated with the controls especially in comparison to Prince of Persia on the xbox. So, I happened to see PoP: Rival Swords the other day and I picked it up to see how the Wii controls were.

I was honestly expecting them to be pretty bad but actually the controls are quite good, an improvement over the xbox version and definitely better than TRA. Despite the number of different actions available in PoP, all of them were easy to perform. The Prince's two handed fighting style was perfect with the wiimote controlling his right hand and the nunchuk controlling his left for attacking. The only problem I had was jumping and rolling; both are controlled with the same button. There were a number of places where I rolled off a platform instead of jumping or jumped in place instead of rolling away from an enemy.

The graphics and story are pretty much the same as the xbox version; nothing special but not bad either. The thing that always impressed me about this game was how it is so linear yet never seems so. You are constantly high above the streets manuevering from balcony to balcony. It seems there are many ways to go at the open intersections of streets yet you are always subtly guided down one by the positioning of the various poles and shutters you jump off of.

The one downside to this game is there is no replayability. Most games at least throw in an unlocked mode and some bonus activities once you finish the game. This had nothing at all; once you beat the game it is over. There are different difficulties but frankly the fighting is flat out easy and not a big part of the game anyway.

All in all I liked it but strictly fun for the great platforming. The fighting is easy; despite the large number of available moves there is no reason to use them. The storyline is good but does not carry the game. A nice throwback and improvement on an older style of gaming.