Lost Planet play progress update

So it's been a few days since my initial impressions of Capcom's Lost Planet. I still haven't tried multiplayer, I finally finished the third level (without beating the worm), and died on the fourth. Overall, I still like the game, although it is definitely getting harder. Here are some more observations, both good and bad.

Lost Planet seems to follow the tradition set by many of Namco's XBLA games - it just doesn't remember where your save is located, even though the only place mine could be is on the hard drive. Yet I have to select it each and every time I load the game! What gives, Capcom (and Namco, and some others)? Is this some sort of API issue (where there is no auto-default-to-the-only-available-location option), or developer laziness, or something else? Seriously, this needs to go away right now! It just really takes away from the overall experience.

I still feel like I am moving around way too slowly, although I did learn that you can perform a dodge by essentially crouching (by pushing the left stick) and using the A button.

The enemy AI is not stellar, with not much teamwork happening, and yet they seem to fight really dirty, with almost every bunch having some guy somewhere high up lobbing rockets at you. On one hand, the rockets - and their smoke contrails - look and sound stunning as they go whooshing by (in my case impacting into me). It's just a very neat effect. On the other, once hit, the again gorgeous smoke and fire graphics totally obscure all of your vision, take away quite a lot of health/energy, and it takes you a while to get back up and recover, all while being vulnerable.

The great graphics also make things tricky whenever you are getting attacked by something massive (very often) and when riding the snowmobile VS (at which point all you see is the snow you kick up) - in both cases making it sort of difficult to see where you are going and what's going on. I'm not sure if I'm actually complaining about excessive realism here.

It's also interesting how Capcom made a lot of achievements optional, but available for perfectionists. For example, you can find and shoot sets of "targets" that spell out a word in at least some levels. You can also either fight or avoid certain enemies like the worm in the third mission and the moth in the fourth. If only I had known that before dying repeatedly and in vain. Oh well, that's what, ahem, "guides" are for.

However, so far I am not sure who wants my character more: Luka or that evil so far unknown chick that almost killed me at the end of mission three in her vastly more maneuverable VS. I'm betting on Luka, fingers crossed.