Forever love

After years of gaming (my PS2 was bought in year 2002, PSP 2004 and DS 2007), I definitely have my own "forever love". I am going to just focus on PSP and DS because they are relatively new. There ain't many games that I have my forever love in. Basically it means I would replay it even though I have finished the game. I guess, it has a lot of personal, aka non-objective opinion in it but who cares. The list is in the order of release time:

Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops is a stealth game directed by Masahiro Yamamoto, with series creator Hideo Kojima acting as a producer. I myself is not very good in stealth game (basically I am a clumsy person). However, out of my surprise, this game has the RPG depth in it. The missions are short or nicely tuned to fit in the PSP. More importantly you could capture and recruit soldiers to build your own army. You could deploy your arm to spy on the enemy, to medic team, or even could put them in the frontline to stealth for you (of course with your control). Due to this depth, I have spent roughly 20 hours in this game, and I like to revisit all the missions. It has won its beautiful 87 average score from all games reviews.

Final Fantasy Tactics: The War of the Lions is a tactical role-playing game produced by Takamasa Shiba and the characters are designed by Akihiko Yoshida. I always love tactical games, especially those produced by Square-Enix. Considering I have spent 50+ hours in this game, it shows how much love I have in this game. There are tons of customizable job classes, beautiful cell-shaded cutscenes, not to mention attractive game play experience. It just has so much in it than any other games that I have played before. I certainly hope it will have a sequel (not the DS version that I will talk about later) on PSP! This game has won 88 average score of the reviews. Don't forget it is actually an enhanced port from Playstation One.

The World Ends with You is a action role playing game developed by the Kingdom Hearts team led by Tatsuya Kando (game director), Tomohiro Hasegawa (co-director), and Takeshi Arakawa (planning director). And, it wouldn't be complete not to mention the famous Tetsuya Nomura and Gen Kobayashi who design the characters. I think I have already mentioned about this game more than 4 times now. Thus, it goes without saying that I really love this game - colourful presentation, wonderful music and beautiful gameplay system. I am now already 6 hours into the game, but I guess I can go further to 15 hours without any problem. This game has also won 87 average score.

God of War: Chains of Olympus is a hack and slash, action-adventure game developed by Ready At Dawn founded by Didier Malenfant, Andrea Pessino and Ru Weerasuriya. The game series is actually started by David Jeffe for Playstation 2, but Ready At Dawn certainly has done a lot to squeeze this game without really shrinking its epic style on the PSP. In other words, the small size does not constrain the epical adventure at all. It runs perfectly smooth on the PSP, with flawless presentation. The gameplay itself certainly feel the same as with the PS2 version. Even the total time required to finish the game is short (roughly 6 hours), but since it has so much worth to revisit, it could lasts actually as long as you want. Not surprisingly, this game has won 92 average score!

Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII is an action role-playing game developed and published by Square Enix including Yoshinori Kitase, Shinji Hashimoto, Hajime Tabata, Hideki Imaizumi, Takeharu Ishimoto, Tetsuya Nomura and Kazushige Nojima. This game definitely has attracted a great deal of attention because of Final Fantasy VII (for Playstation One). As a prequel, this game is about Zack Fair, a close friend of Cloud Strife. Square-Enix certainly has spent a lot of effort in developing this game. It has push the limit of PSP to another level. The presentation is so beautiful that some even though this game is a PS2 game. The gameplay is interesting and novel in a way it is action, but also a time-based RPG. The combination of both is seamless. Story is thrilling for those hard-core fans, but also touching for those who know nothing about Final Fantasy VII. The game is no doubt won 85 average score.

Patapon is a genre-straddling video game combining gameplay features of music and rhythm games, real-time tactics and God games. The game was developed by Pyramid and produced by Japan Studios, the same studio that developed and produced Loco Roco (the men behind Loco Roco are Tsutomu Kouno and Keigo Tsuchiya). The main reason I choose Patapon over the more-well-known Loco Roco is due to its strategic RPG features. The cartoon-ish-big-eye-ball characters are lovable and customizable, i.e., you could "produce" different types of these to fight for you. The fighting itself is literally musical because you need to beat your drums rhythmically to command your army. This game can surely attract casual and hardcore gamers. I myself even though after 10 hours of gameplay still enjoy it whenever I feel like a music. Patapon has 86 average score.

Ninja Gaiden: Dragon Sword is an action adventure role-playing game produced by Tecmo, led by Tomonobu Itagaki. I have played this game for about 3 hours (and the total time to finish the game is roughly 6 hours). The gameplay experience using the DS stylus is certainly a fresh experience. Sometimes I hope I didn't use too much force to scratch the surface. Since the gameplay is so interesting, I really love this game. I don't care much about the story cause I think the story itself is not that interesting. I will replay this game whenever I am really stressed at work. A good way to really release any grief. It has won an average 84 score.

Final Fantasy XII: Revenant Wings is a real-time strategy RPG developed by Square Enix and Think & Feel Inc. The men behind this game include Yasuhito Watanabe,
Motomu Toriyama, Toshitaka Matsuda, Hitoshi Sakimoto, Kenichiro Fukui and Ryoma Itō. This would be the first real-time strategic game for Final Fantasy franchise. By using the stylus function of DS, this game certainly live up to the name of Square-Enix. The gameplay is certainly refreshing. OK, the graphics probably are not as nice as Final Fantasy XII for PS2. But, I think it is the game play and (perhaps) the story that count. I mean DS is a small device, which will never beat console PS2. I have spent about 20 hours (finishing all those side quests) to finish the game. From time to time I am also replaying this game. It has averagely 81 score from the game reviews.

Final Fantasy Tactics A2: Grimoire of the Rift is a strategy roleplaying game from Square Enix developed by Akitoshi Kawazu, Yuichi Murasawa and Ryoma Itō. This is the sequel of Final Fantasy Tactics Advance for Gameboy Advance. Unfortunately I am currently playing the Japanese version. The English version won't be so soon. However, the game play experience is still wonderful. I can't wait for the English version.