Well, being the impatient guy that I am, I picked up a copy of Advance Guardian Heroes today, It's day of release. Although I've never played the saturn version, I'd heard nothing but good things about it. So I figured rather than plo down $60+ for that on ebay, I'd try this, the Sequel.

well, I picked it up (along with Gradius V), and fired it up. I decided to try tutorial mode first. The first thing I notice is the horrendous translation. It's not so bad that you can't understand what's happening, but It's just annoying and very sloppy on Ubi Soft's part (they published and translated it).

I finished training mode, and decided it was time to move on to the actual game. I chose my character, the blue guy (his name escapes me at the moment) and started up. After struggling to comprehend the engrish storyline, the game began. Now the controls are great; plenty of attacks and magic attacks, and they're all executed perfectly. Now everything seemed good. Until one problem. One huge glaring problem.


Slowdown.

Not minor, occaisional slowdown, but nearly constant slowdown. There are no problems when there's 2-3 enemies on screen, but the problem is that there's almost always more than that. There were times that a had to mash buttons franticly, just rying to kill some guys and attempt to get the game running at a decent speed again. The worst part is that somewhere, under that glaring technical problem, is a great game.

So anyone who was planning to buy this: I implore you, wait until a price drop. Buy Astro Boy: omega factor instead. That's easily one of the greatest games I've played in a long time. In the meantime, I'll be playing Gradius V( which just oozes greatness).

If anything, this proves that no company is perfect. Oh and does anyone find it odd that treasure's first ever sequel didn't turn out so good? I guess that's a sign that treasure should continue to only make original games. That's just my 2 cents.

- Crush "I can't beleive I actually typed all that" Crawfish[/b]