HoboGamer

Quick update

2010-02-08T14:17:00.002Z

The last few months have been pretty busy, between work, being messed around by my uni and writing I've completely lost track of the blog, I hope to change that slowly so here's a quick update.
After a bit of a break the CitizenGame squad are back, check out the latest episode of the podcast here and why not give my review of Bayonetta a read here.

I've had a few article ideas swirling around in my head for a while now and intend on getting them written soon, so check back regularly to see what madness I've been thinking about recently.

Citizen Game 2.0

2009-10-17T02:24:00.002+01:00

The guys over at Citizen Game have been working hard on the relaunch of the site, Danny has moved to London (mere minutes away from me), and we're all working on the site very regularly, these are exciting times. Keep your eyes on Citizen Game for the imminent launch.
See you soon Citizen!

inFAMOUS, what have you done to me?

2009-07-02T02:10:00.014+01:00

When I sat down a few weeks ago to plan which upcoming games I would be purchasing I decided that I really wanted to play both inFAMOUS and Prototype. Despite the similarities in genre and gameplay style each had a unique quirk that prevented me from disregarding it in favour of the other. The comic book art style and general superhero shtick of inFAMOUS appealed to the comic book fan in me, and the idea of a re-imagined Hulk: Ultimate Destruction with all the ‘next-gen’ trappings of a modern action game also piqued my interest.

Despite my intentions to buy and play both games I have only purchased and played inFAMOUS. Not because I don’t have the money or because I’m having trouble finding a copy, but because playing inFAMOUS has killed any desire I previously had to play Prototype, in fact I’ve gone from being extremely excited for Prototype to actively avoiding it.

This kind of emotion is unusual to me; it is a completely irrational response, an illogical dismissal of something despite having no contact or experience with it, it is the kind of characteristic pioneered and perfected by fanboys and I’d like to think that I’m not a crazed fanboy (does a fanboy know whether he or she is a fanboy?). I’ve been struggling to figure out what has caused this and after thinking long and hard I’ve come to a conclusion, fate, yes – fate!

My opinions of inFAMOUS are about as irrational as my opinions of Prototype, although I can recognise that the game has numerous flaws; the hawkeyed sharpshooting enemies, the repetitive mission types and numerous glitches to name a few, I have fallen completely and utterly in love with inFAMOUS. I’m infatuated the point that I’m am actively enjoying aspects of the game that I would cite as cliché and contrived if it were featured in any other game. Cole’s bald headed gruff voiced character design is extremely generic, but I’ll still argue he is much cooler than Alex Mercer despite feeling deep down that I wouldn’t be surprised if it turned out they were identical twins split at birth as part of a social experiment. Other than Cole’s ability to command electricity in various forms his only other skill is his familiarity with the city and his skills in ‘Urban exploration’. To me it’s a beautiful method of effortlessly moving from point to point with the finesse of a calm breeze, but to everyone else it’s that Parkour crap that everyone seems to be able to do ever since Altair showed up, jumped from a shack to a windowsill and then walked along a beam and into some hay. Sure, I know it’s Parkour but I’ll still maintain that the gameplay and feel of Cole’s particular brand of Parkour is much better than Altair’s or Alex’s, -- like I said, completely irrational.

It seems Sucker Punch has created a game that clicks with me on every level, every aspect of the game ranging from the comic book visuals to the electricity infused combat, the simple but cool characters to the typical and slightly predictable anime/comic book style storyline appeals to me. It appeals to me on a level that even lets me appreciate and enjoy the aspects of the game that are so clearly generic and uninspired. It’s almost as if Sucker Punch had a detailed psych profile of me and then created a game perfectly suited for me, a game that I was predetermine to love.

After playing inFAMOUS and looking at Prototype all I can see is a game that seems to have been rushed, an uninspired and poorly updated rehash of an old title, created with the kitchen sink approach to development and wrapped in bland, unremarkable and unappealing visuals, and I say all this having never played the game.

Yeah I know, I know what I am...

Resi 5 Review

2009-03-24T01:10:00.003Z

Phew, after powering through Resident Evil in 2 play sessions I've written up a review. Click here to read it.

Review: Flower

2009-02-18T22:56:00.015Z

Say what you will about the PSN service but when it comes to original online games there is no denying that its offerings represent some of the most engrossing titles that gaming has to offer. Since its launch it has become home to an assortment of unconventional but quirky titles such as PixelJunk Eden and Flow and has cultivated an environment where developers such as Q-Games and ThatGameCompany can realise their most ‘out their’ concepts and indulge their pretentious and esoteric artistic whims, in some cases, with the backing and encouragement of big name companies such as Sony.

Flower is the latest title from outside-the-box-gaming developers ‘ThatGameCompany’; it retains the same simple and approachable gameplay style previously featured in their first PSN contribution Flow. The player takes control of an ethereal breeze on a predestined mission of rejuvenation, following in the footsteps of Amaterasu of Okami fame and the Prince of Persia the resolute gust of air must soar through six gardens in an effort to reinvigorate them by carrying the petals of other flowers throughout the gardens and in passing injecting life back into the withering life-forms.

Although the objective and gameplay are very simple playing Flower initially can feel like a bit of a struggle, this is because the game is played using the Six-Axis motion control system, although it isn’t the most robust motion control system out there it is well suited to the game, once acclimated with the manoeuvring and acceleration based mechanics of movement controlling the stream of petals becomes second nature, you’ll soon find yourself flying through the gardens with ease.

Flowers greatest accomplishment is how well it sets the mood and atmosphere of each garden, the various facets of the game work symbiotically and meld together to create and maintain immersion, the painstakingly rendered grass and foliage is dripping with vivid colours, the lighting effects compliment the colourful art style by giving the environments the tranquil feel of an idyllic Eden and the music perfectly communicates and enhances the theme and mood of the gardens. Complimenting the music is a humble rhythm game element, each flower makes a sound and together they essentially act as a supplementary botanical orchestra contributing to the overall symphony.

Although it is possible to get a sense of how the game looks from screenshots, in order to truly experience the sense of euphoria the game creates you have to play it, especially since the screenshots aren’t indicative of all the different environments Flower has to offer.

Flower is a unique game, not only in terms of concept and gameplay but also because it is the kind of game where despite how many people write reviews or impressions on it you can never truly get a grasp of what it has to offer or the what the experience is like (way to invalidate everything said so far), it’s a game which everyone should play if only to form a personal opinion on it, in my case I can safely say that the three hours I spent playing Flower were three solid hours of breathtaking gaming.

Close your eyes, go to your happy place, imagine a soothing breeze, grass calmly swaying in the wind, air whistling as it passes through the thousands of delicate blades of grass – now open your eyes, and fly.

ResiRant Evil

2009-02-04T19:02:00.010Z

Resident Evil 4 was phenomenal; few games have an impact on the industry as profound as what was felt after RE4, its legacy can still be in games released today with the likes of Dead Space, Gears of War and even Metal Gear Solid clearly drawing inspiration from it. With such grandiose achievements and the uniformly positive critical response in mind it's pretty hard to temper expectations into something realistic and attainable, it would be unfair to expect Resident Evil 5 be as innovative as Resident Evil 4 but it isn’t unreasonable to expect the game to evolve. The demo for RE5 is now available on Live and PSN and for some it serves to further suggest the differences between RE4 and RE5 will be few, sure it's good to see the series taking a step in a different direction with the inclusion of online Co-op but other than that RE5 seems to be fundamentally the same, and honestly -- I'm not complaining.

Resident Evil 4 was born from desperation, with Resident Evil 1,2 and 3 Capcom had taken their particular brand of survival horror as far as it could go on the PlayStation and then even further with the various Gamecube remakes, everything from the tank like character controls, the awkward and unaccommodating camera positioning and the predictable enemy AI had been pushed to its usage limits, they created a new and innovative formula, established genre conventions and then bled them dry to the point that it could be argued that the development team had fallen into a one track mind in relation to game design, they seemed to have turned game design and development for Resident Evil into a standardized routine, this is supported by reports stating that the first Devil May Cry game, another Capcom title that bore unmistakable resemblance to the Resident Evil games and their various quirks , originally started life as Resident Evil 4, Capcom seemed to have backed themselves into a corner, their reliance on what had been established in previous titles in the series made them complacent and to be fair they had the right to be , the formula was more than satisfactory, it was successful enough to firmly position Capcom as the king of the survival horror genre in the eyes of many a game enthusiast, but when it came to Resident Evil 4 I think it was clear they needed something beyond the stagnant formula used in its predecessors, I'm sure that everyone will agree that what it became was nothing short of revolutionary.

This practice of incrementally updating titles for sequels is certainly not something new to the video game industry and I'm not suggesting that Capcom should be condemned for adopting the practice, I am merely drawing attention to the fact that this sort of exercise is something Capcom has used in the past and suggesting that while it is fair to expect new and innovative changes to each new installment in a Capcom series this isn't something that they have a history of doing, past practices suggest that innovations and evolutions such as those seen in Resident Evil 4 are pushed to their absolute limits in terms of usage before being scrapped, with Resident Evil 5 serving as only the second incarnation of the Resident Evil 4 formula the likelihood is that Resident Evil 6 will also stay close to the formula and conventions established in Resident Evil 4 and then recycled in Resident Evil 5.

The recent confusion as to whether Chris will have the ability to shoot while moving in RE 5 has caused some controversy, while some (including myself) are happy to play the game as it has always been, clunky shooting and all, and reason that the restrictive controls contribute to the feeling of pressure and are arguably an essential element to the Resident Evil formula others haven’t taken too kindly to the realisation that former S.T.A.R.S Special Agent and current Bio-terror Assessment Group Agent Chris Redfield doesn't seemed to be trained in the art of firing a weapon while in motion. If my Red Bull fueled, wildly outrageous speculations are used to judge when Resident Evil will makes the jump into the next set of 'series innovations' it may be that the Resident Evil protagonists won't fully overcome the aforementioned inadequacies until Resident Evil 7, only time will tell, but until then we can rest safe in the knowledge that the current formula is still one of the most thrilling and enjoyable experiences video gaming has to offer.

Return fire!

2009-01-18T21:25:00.007Z

OK, I admit it, I've been slacking recently, it's hard enough to get readers on a blogspot site and now my recent inactivity has condemned the blog to the darkest corner of this already overpopulated and grossly bloated blogosphere, the only way I can recover from this is to start hosting either shady software cracks with guides or you know, that stuff that 95% of web surfers actually use the internet for.............................................................. Desktop Tower Defense clones. Of course there is that other option; put some hard work in and actually post regularly again, yeah, I guess I'll do that - for the sake of integrity.

So let me provide a few reasons (read: excuses) for my recent absence, the biggest reason for my lack of posting is simply the fact that it was Christmas time and working in retail around this period is very demanding, over the past month or so I’ve had to do the most ridiculous work shifts and by the time I get home a small twitter update is about all I can squeeze out before just collapsing on my bed. Working in retail is hard around Christmas regardless of what you sell, mainly because the amount of people out shopping skyrockets and of course, 80% of those people are extremely inconsiderate and selfish troublemakers who think the world revolves around them, unfortunately for me I work in a store that sells games and consoles exclusively and it seems this year the most popular gifts are either games or consoles and peripherals, needless to say it was an exhausting few weeks.

As well as work I also had a coursework deadline to meet, this involved weeks of research followed by days of furious typing, the fact that my computer essentially had a heart attack and died the day before I started working on the coursework didn’t help much, since then I’ve been using a laptop that was kindly given to me by a family member, It’s a humble little machine that is capable of surfing the internet and running a word processor at the same time but anything more and it will buckle under the pressure.

However, now that the Christmas period is over my shifts have become far more reasonable, my coursework has been handed in and my monstrous gaming PC is nearing completion I have no excuses, so expect more from me over the coming weeks. I thought I’d ease into it by just doing a short personal update and just mentioning a few things relating to the recent happenings in the world of video gaming.

First up is UGO’s purchase of 1UP and closure of EGM, as a resident of merry old England I have to admit that my exposure to EGM has been extremely limited and confined to the last few years, as a child I read any and every gaming magazine there was, whether it was a new edition I purchased personally or an old issue that I either found in a friends house or at the library, but unfortunately I never actually got to hold a copy of EGM, it may have been possible to import the magazine but I’m sure that sort of thing was far beyond my capabilities as a child. So although I can appreciate that EGM was an institution in the world of gaming print magazines that appreciation isn’t derived from a long-standing relationship with the magazine it’s from the amazingly ridiculous things the magazine has been involved with over the years that have been catalogued on the internet, shenanigans such as the ‘Gouken’ April fools joke which has been cited as the reason the character ‘Gouki/Akuma’ was created for Street Fighter or their involvement in the creation of the Mortal Kombat character ‘ERMAC’, even though I haven’t read an EGM I can appreciate what it has done for the industry and am extremely saddened by its closure. The reasonably low level of personal damage inflicted by the closure of EGM was more than made up for by the detrimental changes made to the 1UP website. As well as offloading EGM a number of high profile 1UP staff member were also laid off, from long time senior staff members such as James Mielke and Shane Bettenhausen to fairly recent additions like Nick Suttner, Anthony and Phillip. I’m certainly going to miss the fascinating features and editiorials as well as the concise and amazingly well written reviews but what I’m going to miss the most is the podcasts. Over the past few years I’ve become quite fond of the 1UP podcasts, usually I would listen to at least one of the 1UP podcasts a day with the exception of Sunday so I guess you could say that the people and personalities featured on those podcasts are engrained into my everyday life, 1UP Yours helped me get through a number of tough revision and exam periods and helped ‘confirm’ my weekends, EGM Live was my little peek through the window into the world of Electronic Gaming Monthly and GFW Radio was my way of keeping up with PC gaming when I didn’t have the necessary equipment to play them myself, as well as expanding my horizons courtesy of evil genius Shawn Elliot and seasoned vet Jeff Greene. More recently Retronauts and 1UP FM made the long train journeys to and from work easier and getting up on Saturday mornings to watch the 1UP show with breakfast became somewhat of a ritual.

As someone who would like to work in the industry I always hoped to work with the guys at 1UP in some capacity, even if it was something small, they are some of the most talented and respected writers in the industry so like many other aspiring writers the ideal or ‘dream’ placement is at 1UP along side the likes of Shane, Nick, Anthony, Garnett and all the others, with that it mind it’s quite sad to see that I’ll never be able to achieve the dream. Lucky for me though those guys and girls are extremely resilient and almost instantly got back to work, they’ve filled the void left by all the collapsed 1UP podcasts with Rebel FM, Geekbox Radio and an eagerly anticipated new show from the ex-1UP Show lads now based at Talking Orange. You know what they say ‘with every door closed another is opened’.

Anyway, that’s enough rambling for today, until the next post why not hang out at CitizenGame, post some comments, enjoy the podcasts and jump onto the Left4Dead servers, you will be welcomed with open arms, unless you’re a zombie In which case you’ll almost certainly be shot to shit.

Review: Mirror's Edge

2008-11-27T11:49:00.003Z

It's been a little too quiet around here lately and I don't like that one bit, so here is a review for Mirror's Edge to break the deafening silence.

Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood Review

2008-10-14T21:21:00.004+01:00

Click here to read my review for the eagerly anticipated Sonic RPG developed by Bioware.

While you're there why not subscribe to the CitizenGame podcast it's a gaming podcast - with Irish hosts....nothing else like it.

Review: PixelJunk Eden

2008-09-16T17:17:00.003+01:00

When it comes to downloadable games the PixelJunk series is comprised of arguably the most unique and captivating titles on the market. The striking but cordial visuals are unassuming enough to entice the casual player into picking up the controller and the simple but addictive gameplay has the depth to keep both the casual and the hardcore gamer hooked.

Eden is the third game in the PixelJunk series and serves as the first foray in to platform games; however, this isn’t the run-of-the-mill platforming experience we’ve all become begrudgingly accustomed to. For better or for worse the classic genre has been injected with the unmistakable PixelJunk style along with a number of gameplay twists and what results is both a euphoric and frustrating gaming experience.

The game is comprised of 10 gardens that are accessed from within Eden which serves as the hub world. Players are given control of a creature called ‘Grimp’, a name attributed to it because of its ability to grip and jump. Grimp is also able to shoot out a line of silk which it can then use to swing from one part of the garden to another as well as to collect pollen.

Armed with these functions the player is tasked with transforming the serene but barren gardens into gardens thriving with plant-life. The ultimate goal of the game is to collect each of the 5 Spectra (a large flower like item) within the 10 gardens; these Spectra in turn develop the hub world into an idyllic Eden. In order to collect the Spectra that are hidden deeper within the garden the player must gather pollen from the floating pods which burst upon contact with the Grimp or its silk, once the pollen is gathered up using the silk it is drawn into nearby seeds which are fertilised and grow upon contact with the Grimp, the player must then traverse the newly developed terrain to access previously unreachable areas and collect the Spectra.

It is at this point when the first hurdle must be overcome – the controls. In order to jump the analogue stick is used to define a trajectory and then a double tap of the ‘X’ button will launch Grimp into a jump. Pressing ‘X’ once produces a line of silk which is used to swing in a small circle around the original launch point, the distance of the swing can be altered using the trigger buttons which reel Grimp in. While airborne holding the button down will send Grimp into a spin, this allows it to pass through plants the player wishes to bypass, which is useful since Grimp automatically sticks to surfaces it comes into contact with.

While the controls aren’t exactly unwieldy or unusable they do require some getting used to, especially since navigation requires precise and calculated jumps, which can easily go awry if you aren’t comfortable with the controls and are being set upon by one of the patrolling enemies aiming to impede your progression - falling to the bottom of the garden after fifteen minutes of climbing is devastating.

It’s hard to describe the visual style of PixelJunk Eden without resorting to drawing from the lexicon of a stoned frat boy since it is arguably the best fit for the art style – but I’ll refrain.

The appeal of the visual style of Eden lies in the simplicity of the art; the gardens are comprised of psychedelic backgrounds complimented by plants and various pollen pods peppered around each of the gardens, in comparison to the hypnotic backgrounds these are usually simple solid colours but serve as a visually pleasing contrast to the insanity behind it. The delicate use of colour and the subtle changes in lighting make the gardens extremely atmospheric.

Gameplay and the visual style in PixelJunk Eden seem to have a symbiotic relationship, the persistently changing environment and swaying plant-life along with the music perfectly compliment the jumping and swinging mechanic and together manage to create a flow to the gameplay which you can easily lose yourself in, it’s an undeniably stunning game.

The biggest problem in PixelJunk Eden is a problem that stifles the experience to the point that it can become extremely frustrating playing the game; this problem is the time mechanic. While working through the garden there is a timer counting down, once the time runs out you are kicked out of the garden and back to Eden, although the time can be extended through collecting pickups this has a severe impact on the flow of the game since it shifts the focus from exploration and collecting Spectra to a frantic dash to find pickups and prevent expulsion from the garden, and usually ends in a misjudged jump followed by a long and painful fall to the bottom of the garden. The time mechanic breaks the sense of progression and forces the player to abandon any sort of flow or rhythm in order to backtrack.

As well as the time mechanic the progression through the gardens can become increasingly exasperating since the game will only allow the collection of 1 new Spectra at a time, after each new Spectra is collected the game kicks the player out and back to Eden thus forcing the player to constantly replay the same sections numerous times. Coupled with the time mechanic this can become infuriating to the point that some players may feel it just isn’t worth playing through the same areas again.

PixelJunk Eden is delightfully simple in both gameplay and aesthetics but despite the simplicity the visuals are vibrant and engaging and the gameplay is fluid and deep, it’s a unique botanical adventure that needs to be experienced first-hand in order to be appreciated. However it isn’t without flaws, artificially extending the game through forced repetition and time constraints that betray the very nature of the game results in an extremely trying and at times an uneven gameplay experience.

Destructoid Feature

2008-07-27T21:06:00.004+01:00

The fine folks at Destructoid.com have deemed my piece on E3 2008 worthy enough to be featured on their website...click here to take a look.

E3 - What has changed?

2008-07-17T23:13:00.002+01:00

For those attending E3 today marks the end of a week filled with announcements, press conferences and for many ambitious journalists - frantic live blogging. Those watching at home facilitated via the numerous live streams and gaming websites enjoy a luxury not available to journalists caught up in the weeklong news-storm and media-blitz; the time to absorb all the information, formulate their own opinions and then take to the internet and troll forums pledging their allegiance to a single company whilst attempting to quantify how much ‘win’ each press conference contained.

It’s been an interesting week despite the fact that E3 was largely uneventful with the exception of one bombshell dropped by Microsoft courtesy of Square-Enix president Yoichi Wada, like many UK based video game enthusiasts I’ve never had the pleasure of attending E3, neither as a fat guy collecting free schwag and adding to line congestion in the ‘glory days’ of E3 or as a journalist covering the E3 that some are now describing as a ‘shadow of its former self’, but I’ve always watched from the comfort of my home, so in my own way I’ve been there for all the important bits.

For someone watching a live stream of the event it’s near impossible to gauge excitement or to experience the general atmosphere around the convention hall but in the E3’s of yesteryear you could always rely on the Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft conferences to get the average gamers excited and work the fanboys up into a frenzy, but this year the big three conferences were a tamed affair, despite numerous high profile announcement and a number of great game demonstrations in comparison to the previous years they were pretty boring, but why?

It’s no secret that the video game industry is adversarial, whether the console manufacturers want it or not the fans will inevitably compare each console and claim their console of choice as the superior one. During the year the majority of these pissing contests we’ve lovingly coming to call ‘the console wars’ are confined to internet message boards but once a year it spills over into E3, whether people admit or not for some E3 serves as an opportunity to stock up on ammo as well as an opportunity for the big three to give the world a glimpse into the future of their console. This got me thinking, could the absence of the insanely dedicated fanboys and people using E3 as their own real life loot collecting playground be the reason that this E3 seemed lackluster?

We’ve come know E3 as the place where the proverbial ‘gaming bombshells’ are dropped and in past years E3 has lived up to its name, but since the exodus of the average Joe gamer its gone from the gaming event of the year to just another in a long line of gaming events, and it could be the loss of once reviled fanboys and loot gatherers that has caused this, in my opinion their presence served as a rationale for the big three to engage in their own little pissing contest by trying to one up each other through making the biggest announcements of the show which in turn generated buzz around the convention as well on the message boards, the winning company becomes the talk of the industry and the fanboys get their ammo – it was a win win situation.

Without them the big three have adapted their approach to aid the aims of the journalists who are being given more time with games and are therefore able to provide in-depth previews and impressions. While this is ultimately a huge benefit for consumers it shifts the approach away from attempting to surpass the competition in terms of announcements and moves it to announcements and further information being given on existing games and other services that are already in the general gaming consciousness, and we all know which one was more fun.

Even though many people are arguing the view that E3 is no longer necessary because the various gamers days and other events such as TGS and Comic-con have basically taken over the duties of E3 I still think the convention serves a purpose, but recently I’ve felt that there has been something missing – think of this as my attempt at figuring out what.

Review: Metal Gear Solid 4

2008-06-17T14:25:00.007+01:00

Metal Gear Solid 4 is the long awaited final instalment in Hideo Kojima’s seminal stealth action game and serves as the concluding chapter in the story of Solid Snake. MGS4 attempts to make sense of the complex and convoluted story by answering the numerous questions and providing a definitive conclusion to many issues that have until now been the subject of conjecture and speculation by series fans. Anyone familiar with the series can appreciate how lofty an ambition this is but by drawing on nearly every game in the series Kojima has managed to craft a story that provides closure and a satisfying conclusion to one of the greatest video game characters of all time, it may even bring tears to your eyes.
The story begins some years after the events of Metal Gear Solid 2, no longer the young and healthy soldier he once was Solid Snake is once again called into action and returns to the battlefield to finish the long running feud with his brother Liquid Snake and put a stop to his imminent insurrection, however along with the numerous enhanced soldiers, various disturbed bosses and the technologically hostile battle conditions Snake must also fight against his old age and deteriorating health in order to get the job done.
The most striking aspect of this game is the presentation, it’s evident that every facet of the game has had the utmost care and attention given to it, the visuals are a technical marvel with detailed and lush textures used to recreate environments such as the middle-east with astounding accuracy as well as producing highly detailed character and weapon models. The series is known for its high quality audio and MGS4 carries on the tradition with the return of long time score composer Harry Gregson-Williams and Metal Gear Acid composer Nobuko Toda. Another series staple is the top notch voice acting and for the most part the voice acting is superb, David Hayter once again provides the iconic voice for Old Snake and a number of other series favorites return to reprise their roles, while the majority of characters manage to pull of flawless performances there are some characters who sound a little awkward and forced, but this drop in quality is more than offset by the overall high quality in the voice acting. Working in unison these aspects combine to provide an authentic cinematic experience delivered through both the gameplay and the lengthy but awe-inspiring cut-scenes, since the cut-scenes are rendered using the in game engine Metal Gear Solid is the first example of a truly seamless transition between cut-scene and gameplay, it’ll take your breath away. The presentation also extends to storytelling and what results is the most sophisticated method of storytelling gaming has ever seen, it is something that just has to be experienced, there is no doubt that Metal Gear Solid 4 has fantastic visuals and great gameplay but what it will be remembered for is the storytelling.

The cut-scenes have long been the object of criticism in the Metal Gear Solid series with particular attention being given to their length, MGS4 doesn’t do anything to address these criticisms, while the inclusion of a pause function softens the blow somewhat it doesn’t mask the fact that the cut-scenes are just as long if not longer, the lengthy codec sequences have been removed but the cut-scenes have been extended to compensate for this, for some this will be a point of criticisms but for those looking for closure these cut-scenes provide answers to many of the series’ long standing questions, for those not looking for answers the high production values are likely to be engaging enough to keep you from hammering on the skip button. One of the most satisfying aspects of the cut-scenes is the small amount of interactivity within them, at various points during the cut-scenes players may be prompted to press L1 to look through Snake’s eyes or to press X to view flashbacks, while these sound insignificant they are integral to the story-telling and also contribute to the nostalgic theme of the game.

The gameplay in Metal Gear Solid 4 will feel familiar to anyone that has played the previous games, each iteration in the series has refined the gameplay (with the exception of the CQC controls in Snake Eater) and MGS4 has refined the gameplay to near perfection, the once cumbersome controls have been given an overhaul and now feel natural to the point that even the most complex maneuvers can be easily performed in the heat of battle. Taking a cue from the western approach to shooting controls the game features the Resident Evil 4/Gears of War over-the-shoulder view for aiming, along with the first-person viewpoint this provides a more satisfying and precise way to dispatch with enemies and is flexible enough to let you shoot yourself out of any situation, those choosing to run and gun their way through Metal Gear Solid 4 will find the controls to be more than accommodating. The sneaking has also been streamlined, actions such as pressing up against walls are now contextual button presses which means that the players fingers are free to do other tasks such as peeking out of corners and shooting, there has also been the addition of a stage of movement between standing and crawling, whereas in previous games pressing ‘X’ from a standing position would effectively take Snake into a crawl now Snake transitions into a crouched sneaking mode, this allows players to Sneak silently without enduring the mind numbingly slow pace of crawling. Snake is also equipped with a suite known as OctoCamo, this suite takes on the texture of any surface Snake presses up against, as well as being visually pleasing it eliminates the menu dependent camouflage system used in Snake Eater, by automatically changing camouflage and dispatching with the menu the player remains immersed in the game and sneaking is far more satisfying. In addition to the traditional sneaking and shooting gameplay there are also a number of unfamiliar gameplay types, while it is tempting to talk about them they may be considered a spoiler to many people, it’s safe to say that MGS4 doesn’t just stick to what it knows, it varies the gameplay and adds some new elements, the only problems is that they’re quite brief and since they occur just before the game goes into full on narrative mode you probably won’t get to spend as much time as you’d like with them.
Unlike the previous games where Snake was thrown head-first into the battlefield as a lone agent in a remote island, floating plant or military base, a large portion of this game is spent in expansive open environments in scenarios where rebels are engaging Private Military Corporations, this means that Snake can choose to befriend rebels and work alongside them, the interesting aspect of this is that as you assist the rebels your notoriety amongst them grows and you will become somewhat of a hero to them, this means that Snake can use the cover provided by the rebels to facilitate his sneaking. These large scale firefights are uncommon territory for the series but are done exceptionally well, the rebels exhibit comradery amongst each other and with you, PMC’s are constantly adapting their tactics to your movements and the firefights have an epic feel to them; bullets are whizzing around, vehicles are exploding and buildings in the distance are being toppled, it creates a very tense atmosphere.

Although the progression in the game boils down to ‘get from point A to point B’ and is ultimately linear there are a number of alternate routes and approaches that can be taken to reach the designated goal and the environments are open enough to facilitate exploration, the routes are suited to different playing styles, players can opt to blast their way through the middle, sneak their way through the battlefield by sticking to the outskirts, or get to higher ground for a mixed approach, exploration is rewarded through weapon and ammo pickups as well as the occasional special item such as costumes.

The Metal Gear Solid series has had some of the most creative boss battles in video game history and while the bosses in MGS4 aren’t on the same level as Psycho Mantis or The End they are still a cut above most boss battles. While some battles can boil down to finding the boss and then shooting it others require far more finesse with factors such as wind direction and footprints in play, other battles may require the player to utilize various items in order to figure out the trick behind beating a boss. The boss fights while enjoyable (and in some cases quite memorable) are a bit unnecessary; the bosses are all given different personalities and a tragic back story, these feel like an afterthought and ultimately take a backseat to the overarching Metal Gear storyline.
Another major addition to the game is the shop system, in the game the world has become one where weapons are ID-locked, anyone who isn’t registered to that weapon is unable to use it, after meeting a weapons launderer you are given the ability to utilize his services and have him unlock weapons for usage, in return any weapons already acquired by you that are collected on the battlefield are traded to him in exchange for points, these points can be used to buy additional weapons, ammo or used for unlocking. The shop is available to Snake at all points in the game via the start menu, this means that as long as you have points you can keep buying ammo and guns, while this seems to encourage people to blast their way through the game there are other factors at play. The war economy runs on a war price, prices of weapons and ammo change according to the prevalence of fighting and war at the time and the need for weaponry, this means that If you kill everyone and regularly create situations of conflict the war price will increase and as a result the prices of guns and ammo will increase.

Metal Gear Solid 4’s biggest achievement is in storytelling, Kojima has created an incredible story that manages to tie up all the loose ends and address all the unanswered questions (yes, even the arm) but it also serves as Kojima’s mouthpiece and this is the game only real flaw. It successfully provides closure on the series but does so at a cost, the balance of gameplay and storytelling takes a serious hit towards the second half of the game, in order to provide said closure Kojima uses the majority of the second-half of the game to tie up the loose ends; so players will find themselves mostly watching cut-scenes, and while there is a reasonable amount of gameplay it isn’t the type of gameplay that players have become accustomed to up until this point, it is restrictively linear gameplay focused entirely on narrative, to some this will be to the games detriment but to others this will be exactly what they play the Metal Gear Solid games for, these small bits of gameplay are synergy between gaming and storytelling at its best and are compelling and engaging enough to have you jump out of your seat and scream at the TV.Metal Gear Solid 4 is quite simply a masterpiece, both as a technical achievement and in terms of storytelling and narrative. The game continues the tradition of having one of the most intricate and complicated stories but the way it tells the story is truly amazing. Kojima manages to create a connection between the player and Snake in a way that will have you feeling the pain and desperation Snake feels during his journey, a journey that ends with one of the most memorable sequences in video gaming history, Metal Gear Solid 4 is an emotional experience unlike anything the video game world has seen before.

Bad times....

2008-05-11T16:02:00.000+01:00

A few months ago I bought a beautiful 40 inch Samsung HDTV, a TV so beautiful I wake up every morning with thoughts of fornicating with it in the hope that It would give birth to more beautiful little HDTVs, I haven't had the guts to follow through - that TV is way out of my league, i don't stand a chance.

The TV let itself go abit and has recently developed a hideous skin condition, 2 small black lines appeared on the screen, lucky for me I had warranty. The technician showed up earlier and took my baby away for some repairs, it has been away from me for 2 hours - bad things are happening........

Limited Edition Blog Post - Read it while you can it will be here forever.

2008-04-23T20:25:00.002+01:00

Being a transient insomniac does have its upsides; it gives me plenty of time to listen to the plethora of video gaming related podcasts available on the internet. Last night I decided to listen to the latest episode of CAGcast, the Cheap Ass Gamer podcast. In the podcast CheapyD and Wombat talked a little about Limited Editions of video games and it got me thinking.

It used to be that only a select few games would also have a limited edition, these, unlike their modern counter-parts were actually limited editions, there would be a relatively low amount of these games circulated and more often than not they’d be almost impossible to find after the day one release. In a stark contrast, these days almost every game that makes enough noise to attract even the smallest amount of attention is released with a not-so-limited “limited” edition, even the triple AAA titles follow along the same lines. The effect of this is that it takes away from the personal satisfaction gained from having a limited edition of a particular game and more importantly it makes you look like a complete idiot when you pull out Halo 3 LE to show off to friends or the internet at large, since everyone has it and it’s not particularly difficult to track one down it’s hardly noteworthy.

Looking through my stack of games I can only find 5 special editions; God of War 2, Shadow of The Colossus, Bioshock, Devil May Cry 4 and Resident Evil 4, most of these were purchased a little while after their initial release when the price had dropped, although I picked up Bioshock and DMC4 on day one this was mainly because the price difference between the standard and LE was insignificant, I just wasn’t interested in buying a limited edition of a game when nearly every other person on the planet had it, it makes me sound a bit pretentious and snobbish but if you think about it having so many that even months after the release of a game there’s a sizeable amount of them floating about defeats the purpose of having a limited edition. As I mentioned earlier most of the limited editions these days don’t have the “wow” factor they once had, and most people who buy these games either intend on keeping them for the memories (which will always be a little tarnished unless they bring it upon themselves to embark on a crusade to wipe out every other copy in an attempt to make their copy more valuable), or they get them to sell later, and considering the value is linked to the rarity of the item, they probably won’t get much for it.

The thing that makes limited editions impressive these days are the ridiculous prices, and it’s not usually the actual product that impresses, it’s normally the fact that you were dedicate enough (or stupid enough depending on how you see it) to pay the ridiculous price to get it, not everyone is that crazy, therefore you are one of few people insane enough to have the limited edition, props to you.

Even though I knew that companies put out Limited Editions because there are always people crazy enough to buy them even if they’re marginally different from the standard edition it still doesn’t explain why smaller companies with games that don’t exactly warrant a special edition do it, you can usually tell whether your product is going to sell well or not which logically should dictate whether or not to release a limited edition but that isn’t usually what happens, games that aren’t exactly poised for success still have limited editions. After thinking about it for a while I’ve come up with a theory, like all of my theories it’s farfetched and bordering on unbelievable, but that won’t stop me from talking about it.
It’s a well known fact that most retailers these days make their money from the used games market, whereas ordinarily a portion of the sales of new games revert back to the developers and publishers selling returned items as used game allows retailers to make money for themselves, this is one of the reasons that retailers aren’t too happy about the internet as a content delivery method.

This used games market is something that developers and publishers are also aware of, which is why I think they’re all too willing to release limited edition versions of games. I think that these limited editions are used as a form of guaranteed revenue, since most people who intend on buying a limited edition wouldn’t settle for a used limited edition it’s pretty rare to find limited editions in the used section or the bargain bin, for developers and publishers it’s ideal, keeping the limited editions around the same price as the standard edition is usually a compelling enough reason to pick it up, if these limited editions do sell it pretty much guarantees the money from it will come back to them, and also limits the money retailers earn from selling games used.

At this point I only buy the limited edition versions of games to support the developers, provided that they’re at a reasonable price that is. It’s too late to pick up the GTA IV Limited Edition but maybe I’ll get the Metal Gear Solid 4 version – let Kojima know that if he told me to jump off a building, by god I’ll do it, and do it well.

Twitter

2008-04-23T01:56:00.002+01:00

I not an arrogant person, you will rarely find me playing the 'I am awesome song' but that last post featuring various remixes using the BONK! and BUMP! sound clips from the TF2 Scout was mind blowing. However it wasn't enough to put out the burning fire of guilt scorching my insides (see below for relevance), I'm still unable to put out full length posts, however, I have been recommended Twitter, head over to the Twitter website to find out more about it, but for now all you need to know is I'll be using it to send regular updates - the burning...the flames are being quelled.

Guilt post

2008-04-20T14:57:00.003+01:00

I'm currently being overwhelmed by exam revision and dissertations, but my guilt for not posting anything to my blog is too much to bear, so here's something with minimal effort but maximum satisfaction.
This is the kind of thing the internetz was made for, Mario songs and Team Fortress 2....ENJOY!

Mortal Bonkat.....

Soulja Bonk - this song is utter crap and I pray everyday that I have the opportunity to meet Soulja Boy so that I may slap him in the face, give him a wedgie and send him home to read some books and do some homework, however, this remix..........epic

God of War: Chains of Olympus Review

2008-03-31T00:23:00.002+01:00

“Ten years, Athena! I have faithfully served the gods for ten years! When will you relieve me of these nightmares?”

This futile plea screamed by Kratos at the beginning of the first God of War is the foundation that Chains of Olympus is built on. God of War: Chains of Olympus is the second PSP game from Ready At Dawn, the developer responsible for the resounding success that was Daxter.
The game takes place before the events of the first God of War and follows Kratos through a small portion of his ten years in servitude to the Gods of Olympus.
Although the previous God of War games have placed a heavy focus on the narrative and overall story, in comparison Chains of Olympus is not as epic of a tale - however, the tale that it does tell is just as engaging and entertaining as in the previous two games and the welcome return of T.C Carson as Kratos and Linda Hunt as Gaia give the game that authentic God of War experience.
The game opens with Kratos being sent to the city of Attica to fend of a Persian invasion and kill a Basilisk unleashed on the city by the invaders, after dealing with the invasion Kratos witnesses something that forces him to embark on a journey through Hades and beyond., Kratos must once again face an evil threatening to destroy Olympus and the world with hopes that at the end the Gods of Olympus would live up to their word and free him of his torment.

While playing the game it can be easy to forget that this is in fact a portable title developed on a system that is relatively underpowered in comparison to the PS2, the game is a testament to the amazing care and effort put into development by Ready At Dawn, their familiarity with the platform and attention to detail has produced a game that looks and plays better than many console games.
You only have to glance at a screenshot to see that Chains of Olympus is pushing the PSP beyond what was thought possible, the game runs on an enhanced version of the Ready At Dawn proprietary engine used in Daxter and as a result graphically it is exceptional and unmatched by any other PSP game. The environments are detailed, the lighting is beautifully done and character models are rendered with painstaking detail, along with the magnificent sense of scale these visual touches successfully evoke the eye-catching aesthetic that God of War has become known for, and best of all – it all runs without so much as a single hiccup.The stability of the game is in large part due to the fact that the game is pushing the PSP’s processor to the limit by allowing it to run at 333MHz.

One thing that I found particularly impressive is the animation of Kratos, as well as his remarkably realistic facial animations Kratos now moves with a realistic fluidity, instead of launching into a run the animations show progression and momentum, his roll and jump animations all look much less rigid and awkward which makes Kratos much better to look at as well as control.

Chains of Olympus, like its predecessors is strictly a linear affair where the player is essentially asked to get from A to B while fending of demonic enemies and solving the occasional puzzle. In its simplest form Chains of Olympus is an arena based brawler, Kratos will enter a room filled with enemies and the exits will be blocked by a demonic barrier until the enemies are defeated, once defeated the player will be allowed to progress through a small platforming section usually involving the same lever pulling, statue dragging, or wall climbing that the previous games featured, you would think this process would become repetitive but through mixing up the environments and placing more of a focus on the combat as opposed to the platforming the game is perfectly paced and never becomes monotonous or a chore.

The deep combat the series has become known for also remains fully intact. Whereas in the previous games Kratos would build up an arsenal of weaponry in Chains of Olympus there are only two weapons, his trademark Blades of Chaos and the Gauntlet of Zeus, a huge metal boxing glove like weapon that allows players to get up close and personal with their enemies. As well as weapons Kratos also has a number of magical abilities at his disposal, although the abilities are just rehashes of those featured in God of War 1 and 2 they are still great to use and more importantly are effective in combat.

The most surprising aspect of the combat is the controls, although the PSP lacks the second analogue nub this is compensated for by utilising the shoulder buttons in evasion, whereas on the Dual Shock 2 the right analogue stick would control the evasive manoeuvres on the PSP pressing both the shoulder buttons and then moving the nub in the desired direction will make Kratos leap to safety in that direction, initially this seems cumbersome but in actual fact it is a surprisingly intuitive alternative which makes movements far more precise. This control scheme also allows for a more seamless transition from offence to defence.

There is no doubt that God of War Chains of Olympus is a remarkable game and a technological feat but it does have a few small problems.
The biggest problem is that the game does absolutely nothing new, if anything it actually cuts out some key improvements on the original God of War. Whereas God of War 2 introduced a number of new gameplay mechanics such as the grappling mechanic, the flying and the crazy Incredible Hulk jumping through environments, Chains of Olympus actually takes all of these out, although this doesn’t really impact that game significantly the experience is a little less exciting since it’s all familiar territory.

As well as this Chains of Olympus is quite a short game, most players will get through it in around 6 hours which is a little disappointing, however the game is full of bonus content including a God mode as well as a number of challenges which in turn unlock alternative costumes for use in the main game, so there is a lot of replay value in the game.

When all is said and done God of War: Chains of Olympus is an extraordinary technical achievement and an amazing game that is worthy of the God of War name, even when compared to its console counter-parts the game holds up remarkably well. The impressive visuals, familiar but excellent gameplay and thrilling story all work in unison to provide an experience unmatched by any other PSP game, it’s simple - if you own a PSP you need to play this game.

Points and their relevance!

2008-03-27T23:59:00.002Z

Allow me to paint a picture, Microsoft has had incredible success with their first home console and is in the process of creating the next iteration of the Xbox, along with a new console they have visions of a unified online platform featuring online gaming, voice and video chat, arcade games and an integrated marketplace where users can purchase downloadable content including games, pictures, music and even feature length movies. Buried amongst these grand plans is the proposal for a simple concept revolving around awarding players points for completing tasks within games, these points would then be manifested in the form of a Gamerscore, a simple numerical total of all the achievement points the player has acquired represented by nothing more than a digit that can now be found on a players gamercard prefixed by a perfunctorily created symbol.
On paper, although novel, the concept doesn’t seem like anything gamers would latch onto, in its simplest form it’s just a number given to the player for completing the task. Upon unlocking my first achievement I was extremely excited at the prospect of accumulating a ridiculous number of gamerpoints but this was largely due to my mistaken belief that the points could be utilised in purchasing items from the marketplace, after realising that I was wrong and in fact the gamerpoints had no relevance or application outside of being a number underneath my gamertag I lost interest in the whole idea of gamerpoints.
It makes you wonder how vested in the concept of gamerpoints Microsoft really were, did they have the foresight to predict that gamers would attach a deeper meaning to the Gamerscore and so included it as a key feature of the Xbox 360, or was it something that they flippantly included believing its only merit to be one of novelty.

To this day I cannot understand why people spend so much time unlocking achievements with the goal of increasing their Gamerscore, I can understand approaching achievements as an additional challenge, for example I know of a number of people who spent hours attempting to complete the Mile High Club achievement on Call of Duty 4 but this was because of the challenge involved, I myself spent more time than I should have unlocking the various skull achievements on Halo 3, but my motivation was acquiring the Hayabusa armour as opposed to adding to my gamerscore and inflating my ego. The fact of the matter is that in reality most people don’t do it for the challenge or the added replay value, they spend copious amounts of time and effort playing games that don’t deserve to be played for the sake of acquiring these points. The question is – Why?
Regardless of how you feel about points and scores its hard to deny the satisfaction received from unlocking an achievement and this is something that Microsoft and the Xbox team should receive credit for, the satisfaction in unlocking an achievement is in my opinion derived in large part from the on screen popup notifying you that you’ve unlocked an achievement, the audio and visual cues are what put the smile on a gamers face, imagine if the notification of the achievement was just some unanimated text appearing on screen saying you’ve unlocked an achievement, in comparison how satisfied would you be, I’m betting not a lot.
You only have to look as far as the PS3 to see how true this is, if you’ve ever unlocked an achievement on a PS3 game you know that the notification is just a line of text which appears momentarily, the satisfaction gained from this is incomparable to the animated notification along with the now iconic sound accompanying it. After a while you can become addicted to the momentary satisfaction that you get from hearing the sound and watching the animation, maybe that’s what drives some of these fixated points gatherers.
I believe the success of the gamerscore / gamerpoints / achievement concept is largely due to the deeper meaning that gamers have attached to the points.
Gaming is competitive by nature, there’s always someone claiming to be the best at a game, in the old days the only way to settle such a dispute would be to sit down and have it out (virtually of course), however in the newer generation of internet gaming settling such arguments takes far less effort, in this sense gamerscore can function as proof of stature as a gamer, many gamers use gamerscore to gauge the ability of another gamer, the higher the score the more accomplished and formidable the player, in a way It serves as a way for gamers to judge ‘a book by its cover’, a simple glance at a players score lets you know what you’re up against, this compels people to rack up gamerpoints in an attempt to assert themselves in the upper echelon of gamers. Although in practice this makes no sense since usually the points aren’t awarded based on gaming ability it is reinforced through the relevance given to gamerscore in social integration on Xbox live. Although Xbox Live is an open network available to everyone in some situations social position and stature is judged by gamerscore, it isn’t widespread but that doesn’t mean it isn’t there. I’ll provide some anecdotal evidence, I wasn’t an early adopter of the Xbox 360 so when I picked one up and jumped into a game of Gears of War online I had very little gamerpoints, the result was that it turned into a juvenile game of ‘harass the dude with 20 gamerpoints’, the players had used my gamerscore to decide I would be the one in the game to get harassed (unfortunately for them I’m quite apt with the shotgun and proceeded to blow chunks out of everyone), if this was a isolated case I wouldn’t bring it up but I was recently in a game of Halo 3 with someone who had a very low score and lets just say he wasn’t exactly welcomed into the online environment, as well as this I know of a number of people who have had similar experiences. Maybe the reason people spend so much time collecting points is to ensure social integration, as well as stature as a gamer, it would explain why sites such as 360voice.com are so popular.
Points serve as a persistent meta-game that can be played as apart of every other game available for the system and some points hounds would claim to be obsessing over points because they find enjoyment in devoting time to collecting the points but the social impact that points have online is also undeniable

Well, Play.com Live sucked!!

2008-03-17T15:55:00.002Z

Upon hearing about Play.Com Live the gamer and budding video game journalist inside me worked itself up into crazed frenzy, after all, an open to the public event featuring playable versions of upcoming unreleased video games is something that every European gamer yearns for every time E3, TGS, Leipzig or any other acronymically named video gaming event kicks off.
Play.com Live was ‘An Entertainment Extravaganza For The Whole Family!’ featuring high profile video games such as Lego Indiana Jones, Star Wars: Force Unleashed, Resident Evil 5, Rockband, Ninja Gaiden 2, Bourne Conspiracy, GhostBusters, Prototype and many more. I travelled down to the newly rebuilt Wembley Arena with hopes of checking out some upcoming games, possibly getting some hands on time with a few triple A titles and writing about them for you, the dedicated readers.
Disappointingly the event turned out to be a gathering of trailers and gameplay footage all of which are readily accessible on the all-powerful internet.
While the aforementioned list of games is impressive the playable titles at the event were largely comprised of games that have been available for purchase for a while now, games such as Unreal 3, Gears of War, Guitar Hero 3, Halo 3 and Call of Duty 4 were featured prominently at the event, they’re all great games but at this point - not exactly worthy of coverage.
There were a few exceptions though; I did get some hands on time with Rock Band, The Bourne Conspiracy and Soul Calibur IV.Although Rock Band has been out for a while now the game still hasn’t been given an official release date for Europe, I can’t figure out why it’s taking so long but If I had to hazard a guess I’d say either downloadable content issues or retail distribution procedures are holding it back.
When the original Guitar Hero game came out I was new to the rhythm game genre, I didn’t play Guitar Freaks, Amplitude or Frequency despite being recommended them by a number of friends, what can I say – my tastes were restrictively simple back then.
So when Guitar Hero came out the appeal of being able to play a Guitar without actually learning to play hooked me in and I made the leap into rhythmic waters. I loved Guitar Hero, it defeated my pessimism and did exactly what it claimed to do, made me feel like a rock star in the comfort of my own living room, but when Guitar Hero 2 came out I decided to give it a miss, the main change to the game was a new song list and since I wasn’t particularly enamored with the set-list It just didn’t appeal to me, the same goes for every other marginally different Guitar Hero release since the first one.
When Harmonix revealed that their latest rhythm game would let players play drums my ears perked up and I started to pay more attention, the most appealing aspects of Rock Band are the drums and the delivery method of songs. The gameplay of Guitar Hero is great but the novelty of guitar playing element wore of pretty quickly for me, but applying the gameplay style to the drums is something I’m definitely interested in.
I got the chance to play the drums at the event and it is pure unadulterated fun, it is extremely hard however, playing on medium right off the bat it not something I’d recommend. From what I’ve seen so far the content delivery method that has been implemented in the US release is also something to look forwards to, It’s good to see that Harmonix is taking the consumer friendly approach by treating Rock Band as a platform which they can update through downloadable content instead of the money hungry Guitar Hero approach.

I’m a big fan of the fighting game genre and have been disappointed by the consistent decline in fighting games over the last few years. Thankfully 2008 looks to be a good year for the genre, titles such as Street Fighter IV, Blaze Blue, King of Fighters XII and Soul Calibur VI are leading the charge in the fighting game renaissance. Everyone has ‘a game’, a fighting game which they claim to be a master of, mine happen to be Street Fighter and to some extent Soul Calibur, while I probably won’t be much competition in a professional capacity I can still hold my own in both of these games, so when I got the chance to play Soul Calibur IV I was more than excited – I was ecstatic.
Although the demo was clearly an early build it was still developed enough to be evident of how the final product will turn out.
The Soul Calibur games are known for being on the upper tier in terms of visuals and this game is no different, the character models are extremely detailed and features such as clothing and hair all animate realistically, a disturbing amount of attention has also been paid to the animation of what can only be described as the encumbering aspects of the female anatomy, seriously it’s a bit redundant at this point.
The gameplay of Soul Calibur is completely intact but it felt a little slower than the previous games, the movements felt sluggish which meant that battles didn’t flow as well as they did in the previous games and it was difficult to get combos going, this was also in large part due to the significant lag between the game and the Xbox 360 controller, the response times between a button press and the character execution were far too long, this is something which I have no doubt will be addressed before the release. The demo was restricted to Taki, Sophitia and Mitsurugi, although I don’t have much experience with Taki she did feel a bit overpowered, but again this is probably something they’ll fix during the balancing portion of the development. I’m still just as excited to play Soul Calibur 4 but it’s a shame they still haven’t fixed the series’ biggest flaw – there’s still no way to counter ringouts.

Lastly is The Bourne Conspiracy, I didn’t get the chance to play this for too long but the little I did play was pretty decent, I’m a little reluctant to give any sort of definitive opinion because this is a book/movie based game and we all know how those turn out (yes I know Riddick was awesome). The combat although not very deep was oddly satisfying; the little ‘Bourne’ moments appear in the form of God of War style quick time events and pack the same punch, watching Bourne beat someone over the head with a fire extinguisher in the game was just as entertaining as watching him lay the smackdown with a phone book in the movie.

Anyway, overall the event was a giant disappointment and I feel like a complete chump for buying VIP tickets, honestly, the only thing I got was the option to get in a different line.

How hard would it have been to get demos for Smash Bros, Little Big Planet or Metal Gear, they’ve all been playable at various events throughout last year so it’s just a matter of getting permission to use them. I guess the show just isn’t important enough – why does the industry hate us so....

PC Gaming = Still Alive!

2008-03-13T16:19:00.003Z

Over the past few months some wildly outrageous and somewhat unsubstantiated claims have been thrown about – a pimple faced kid on the train told me Spider-Man sucked, my brother bragged he could beat me at Third Strike, and my ‘friend’ told me to pass on Wii Fit because I was too heavy for the balance board, from my response to the Wii Fit comment it wouldn’t be a far stretch to assume that I was deeply hurt, but in actual fact it didn’t have much of an effect on me, firstly because IT IS NOT TRUE...ANY OF IT, and secondly because I was too busy nursing a pre-existing emotional wound I sustained from reading a number of disturbing articles featuring various industry figures RSVPing for a funeral – apparently, PC gaming is dead.

The first console I owned was a SEGA Mega Drive II (Genesis in the US) and since then my gaming has been almost exclusively on consoles but the PC still has a special place in my heart, it introduced me to first-person shooters and eye-strain through Quake and eventually led me to what would become one of my favourite games of all time - Counter-Strike, so forgive me if I’m reluctant to call time on the PC gaming industry.
The console gaming environment would not be what it is today without both the direct and indirect influence of the PC gaming industry, even the most rampant console purist would have a hard time arguing against this. Everything from genre influences to major developments in the way we play games (evident through the console internet gaming revolution) got their start on the PC, and if that’s not convincing enough...without PC gaming there would be no Xbox Live – come on, you know that hurts.
That’s not to say that PC gaming isn’t suffering, clearly it is and it all boils down to one thing - approachability.
If you’ve had any experience with PC games you’ll know that despite all the mind-blowing evolutions in technology getting a game to work on a PC is even more difficult than it would have been ten years ago.
The reason console gaming has become so popular is because of the simplicity involved, when you want to play a game you just purchase for the appropriate platform, put the game in the drive and watch it go, whereas attempting to do the same for the PC involves a whole lot more, take me for example, I love Counter-Strike but haven’t played it in over a year because I can’t get the damn thing to run on my pc. Despite upgrading my PC numerous times the game still runs like slideshow. At this point a consumer is usually faced with two options; spend a ridiculous amount of money buying a powerful new graphics card, realise that your existing components aren’t compatible with it and then sell some treasured possessions to pay for upgrades to the rest of the thing only to have it all become impotent a mere three or four months later.
The second option is to buy a home console where the only supplementary spending will be on the games, the hardware will remain largely unchanged for at least 4 years, 10 if you believe Sony.
As much as I want to play Crysis given the amount of money I would have to spend in order to experience the game the way it should be is just not an option, I’d gladly support the PC if I knew that I could play the game I purchase, but that just isn’t the case.
It is for this reason that smaller flash based video games have become so popular, even though I have Half-Life 2, Counter-Strike: Source and a bunch of other games installed on my computer Desktop Tower Defence got the most PC playtime in 2007.
This is where Steam comes in; I’m really excited to see what smaller games come out of the platform, so far Audiosurf has got me back to gaming on my PC and it’s the type of game that isn’t typically associated with PC gaming.This is where I think the future of the PC gaming is, sure there will always be the dedicated group of gamers willing to keep up with the constantly changing hardware in order to play the triple A title but gaming as an industry will develop through the little quirky games created by a small group of passionate developers thinking outside of the box and offering experiences that large developers wouldn’t think of or couldn’t get the green light for. Playing games like Audiosurf, Desktop Tower Defence and Fez, games that don’t require divine gaming rigs to play makes me hopeful for the future of PC games, PC gaming isn’t dead – it’s evolving.

Review: Army Of Two

2008-03-10T01:27:00.003Z

Originally scheduled for release last year Army of Two is an intense third-person shooter developed and published by EA. In a surprising move EA opted to delay Army of Two for three months in order to allow their Montreal studios to add a final coat of polish to the game, although they missed out on the lucrative Christmas period the extra development time has clearly done the game good.
Army of Two departs from the usual third-person action shooter formula by placing a heavier focus on the co-op aspect of the game as opposed to the single player campaign. Everything from the gameplay to the story has been built from the ground up around the idea that the player would take control of one part of a two man team.
Although the obligatory single player campaign makes an appearance the game is clearly designed to be played co-operatively, the AI does a good enough job of executing the commands issued but the overall experience is drastically improved when playing with a real person.
When first unveiled Army of Two was pitched as a cooperative game featuring an unprecedented level of artificial intelligence, the AI would be integrated seamlessly into the gameplay to the point that it would be difficult to distinguish between playing with a human teammate and a computer controlled teammate, the AI would react differently according to the way it was treated by the player, adapt to the constantly changing situation and the condition of its teammate, and interact with the player in a lifelike believable way.
Unfortunately, with the exceptions of a few quirky character interaction animations the AI falls short and as a result what’s left is a derivative third-person shooter.The story in Army of Two is heavily influenced by current events, the underpinning political and moral issues relate to the role of Private Military Companies and of course, big bad terrorists – it’s all too reminiscent of Blackwater.
The player takes control of either Elliot Salem or Tyson Rios, the predictable mercenary types given an aesthetic edge by sporting masks and armour that look like they were designed by the members of Slipknot.
Tyson and Elliot are recruited from the military to work for a PMC and are sent to various conflict zones to recover information, disarm weapons or rescue captured operatives, and more often than not kill a diabolical middle-eastern terrorist.
Throughout the game the battle scenarios change in relation to the political climate in the game, this is an interesting dynamic that has the opportunity to create a compelling narrative, but, disappointingly the game fails to capitalise and ultimately the story becomes a predictable afterthought. With narrative out the window the story is utilised as a method of setting up the various battle scenarios which all boil down to ‘this guy is doing bad things in this country, go and take care of it’, nevertheless the comedic interactions between Tyson and Elliot keep it entertaining enough to warrant sitting through the short cut-scenes.

The gameplay in Army of Two is nothing new; if you’ve played any recent third-person shooter you’ll feel right at home with this game. The combat is very much in the same vein as Gears of War, the player is expected to use cover and the over-the-shoulder precise aim to clear the various areas of hostiles.
The crux of the gameplay is the Aggro element, attacking the enemy causes a build up of Aggro, this is represented by a red aura around the character model, the Aggro attracts the attention of the enemy which leaves your partner free to cause some backstage mischief. The Aggro mechanic adds depth to the otherwise unremarkable combat; it provides the opportunity take a more tactical approach instead of the usual guns blazing modus operandi, most of the fun is had when one player attracts the attention of the enemies while the other heads behind enemy lines and takes them out.

At various points in the game the combat will launch into a back-to-back sequence where the two characters form an impenetrable wall and take down the enemies while covering each other, this is the most enjoyable portion of the co-op gameplay, but since the sequences are scripted they only occur a few times.
The combat has a number of shortcomings, the most prevalent of which are the long range combat in which it becomes difficult to hit the target and the close quarters combat where if an enemy gets to close it can become difficult to aim at them, the alternative to shooting is the melee attack but in a face to face confrontation the enemy usually gets the upper hand, this is probably to encourage the tactical use of Aggro.

The level design in Army of Two is uninspired, the environments although graphically stellar are often extremely bland and the progression is linear with some occasional branching paths thrown in.
The flaws in the level design usually results in running around aimlessly in a attempt to figure out where the next objective is, this is remedied by the inclusion of a GPS system that basically tells the player where to go; at any point in the game a quick press of the button reveals luminescent arrows that can be followed to the next objective, you’ll find yourself leaning on this very regularly since many objectives require you to scale a wall that you’d previously dismissed as an unimportant background feature, or interact with switches or buttons that aren’t visible to the naked eye.
The high points in this game are usually the scripted events such as the two man parachute sequences where one player guides the parachute and the other attempts to shoot eagle-eyed enemies on ground level, or the aforementioned back-to-back sequences.

Overall Army of Two fails to meet expectations; however it is a competent cooperative third-person shooter. Although the combat is ordinary it is nevertheless enjoyable and playing through the game with a friend makes the experience far more enjoyable.
The heavy focus on the cooperative gameplay pays off in the end but doesn’t deliver anything that you couldn’t get from the like of Halo 3 or Gears of War.

An uninspired ramble

2008-03-08T13:42:00.003Z

After coming to terms with the fact that my PC could no longer serve me in a functional capacity without a reformat I overcame my inhibitions and formatted my poor excuse for a personal computer – unfortunately for me my inhibitions returned seeking unholy vengeance and I spent an entire day trying to get my wireless internet connection back up.
After much hair pulling and regular fits of anger in which I swore to throw the ‘fudging’ (you know what I mean) thing out the window and immediately purchase a Mac I got it up.
During these fits of blinding rage I played some games to calm myself and ensure I don’t make good on those anger induced threats, since I’ve spent the last few days reading a large law book which I have a sneaky suspicion was written to encourage law students to commit suicide I thought I’d ease back into blogging by talking about some of the games I’ve been playing over the past few days, so here goes.

Since buying my Wii I’ve made a measly two purchases from the virtual console, the first was Ocarina of Time and I am more than satisfied with it – it’s Ocarina of Time for god’s sake, who wouldn’t be satisfied.
My second purchase was yesterday, while lazily browsing through the list of virtual console games I happened upon Gunstar Heroes (apparently I missed the release), after freaking out for a few minutes I put the game on download and watched the progress in eager anticipation.
A short play session later I found myself scratching my head and working myself up into a frenzy trying to figure out why I loved this game so much as a child, this was not the game I remembered it to be. I played this game through a number of times on my Mega Drive and enjoyed it more every time, but during my recent play session with it I was more than bored, I was frustrated and annoyed.
Back when I first played the game I was obsessed with the co-op, to the point that I ended up forcing everyone from my sister to my dad to play through the game with me, but I couldn’t even play through the first level this time -- mainly due to the annoying controls and gameplay mechanics , the most frustrating of which I found to be the throw mechanic, if you get too close to the second player while shooting it results in your character grabbing his teammate and throwing him across the screen which more often than not kills them but at the very least lands them in the middle of an enemy picnic. After beating the first boss I decided that my memories of playing the game as a child were too important to destroy so I ended the torture and gave up.
I’ll go back and play it again later, I owe the game that much but I guess I’ve learned my lesson -- I’ll think twice next time before playing a beloved childhood treasure.

As well as Gunstar Heroes I've been clocking up some serious hours on the Halo 3 multiplayer, nothing too exciting but it is surprising to me (and a number of people on my friends list judging by the messages I received) mainly because I’m not a big fan of the Halo despite buying all three games (don’t call me a conformist).
I forced myself to play through all three single player campaigns mainly to do justice to the thirty or so pounds I spent, but I only remember enjoying the first Halo campaign on co-op. Since then I haven’t taken much notice of the games, I understand why people like it but it just didn’t click with me. Halo fans and Xbox owners in general will preach that the multiplayer is the greatest thing since Quake but even after many wasted hours on the Halo 2 multiplayer I couldn’t see what the fuss was about.
It didn’t help that the yardstick I was measuring it against was Counter-Strike on PC, and let’s face it – there aren’t many multiplayer first-person shooter games that can stand side to side with Counter-Strike without soiling itself.
I felt that the Halo multiplayer lacked the finesse and refinement of Counter-Strike, when playing Counter-Strike there is a clear distinction between experienced and new players, if you had spent time playing the game, practicing and familiarizing yourself with the game mechanics luck would play a lesser role in the flow of the match, you could make it through multiple rounds without dying by simply relying on skills gained through experience. On the other hand after a few games the gameplay of Halo became perfunctory, I was simply running at people with the trigger held down and using the melee attack once I was within range, with the occasional grenade thrown in of course, I wasn’t having fun.
In case you hadn’t noticed I have been referring to my experience with Halo in the past tense, why you ask, well – er, H-H-Hi, my name is Tamz..a-a-and-and I’m a Halo addict.
After being totally engrossed in the Call of Duty 4 multiplayer I decided to give Halo 3 another shot and to my surprise I found myself having fun and remaining fully engaged throughout the lengthy play sessions. The simplicity I once felt hindered the experience was now drawing me in, sure it still doesn’t have the depth of Counter-Strike but I enjoy not having to be as precise and calculated, I can run in with my pants around my ankles and just shoot anything that moves, if I tried that in CS there would immediately be a bullet lodged in my head.
Needless to say I’m having a lot of fun and will definitely be playing more of the game.

I’ve also been playing a few arcade titles including Geometry Wars, Undertow and Puzzle Quest.
Again I’m a bit late to the Puzzle Quest party but you know what they say-- better late than never.
After spending a whole day trying to find the game on the PSP I decided to just buy the 360 version, although it’s the better version I would have preferred to have it on the go. It’s a great variation on the Bejeweled formula, the injection of RPG conventions gives the classic gameplay formula a new layer of depth which I am loving.

Other than that I’ve ordered a copy of Persona 3, I had the chance to play the game for a while when it first came out on a friends US console but since I have a PAL console couldn’t carry on, now that it has been released in the UK I’m looking forward to devoting my spare time to it.

Anyway I think that’s enough rambling for now, I promise my next entry will be something mildly interesting as opposed to this mindless dribble.

Thoughts collected!

Internet Gaming Michief!

2008-03-03T00:08:00.001Z

Newsflash! Online gaming is no longer confined to the PC, if you own an Xbox 360, Playstation 3 or Wii there’s a high probability that you are or have in the past played over either Live, PSN or the Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection for those dedicated enough to endure the ridiculous friend code system, although they all essentially take place in the same domain the experiences on each service is undoubtedly different. When I say experience I don’t mean the experience we have in terms of the performance of the services, or the usability, what I’m referring to is the social interaction that players have with each other, the experience of playing with complete strangers from around the world over the service. I have a number of friends with Xbox 360’s but the majority of them turn down my invitations to play over Live in favor of the PC or PS3 – why? No, it’s not because I like to break into verses of ‘I know a song that’ll get on your nerves, get on your nerves, get on your nerves’ while talking to them in private chat, it’s the experience they’ve had in the past with the Live service.

In addition to being the online gamers service of choice Xbox Live is also the most hostile and unfriendly social gaming environments in the history of online gaming, it’s pretty obvious that in any situation where a person interacts with others with complete anonymity there will be an abundance of… ‘douchebags’, for lack of a better term, but Live seems to have become the epicenter of internet douchbaggery, which got me thinking about PSN -- although there’s no comparison in the hours of time I’ve racked up in PSN to Xbox Live the experience I’ve had has been drastically different, my play sessions on PSN have been quite pleasant in comparison, the lack of profanity, name calling and general unpleasant behavior has made for a good change of pace. But why is it that the usual breed of internet hoodlums don’t seem to be as regular of a feature in Warhawk, Burnout or Resistance, the fanboy will say “coz PS3 is lame tbh, nobody plays the games and noone has headsets”, but being the drugged up optimist that I am I prefer to think of it as a reflection of the type of people playing on the PS3, that’s not to say that everyone playing on Xbox Live is a douchebag, saying that would be a false generalization and would amount to effectively painting a large target in permanent ink on my forehead but from my experiences with both the services I’ve found the random gamers I encounter on PSN seem less inclined to tell me I suck then spend the time to accurately position their crotches over my lifeless head and sit on it over and over again.

The fact that online games aren’t as widely played over PSN is a contributory factor which cannot be denied, which is why I am looking forward to seeing what happens when we finally get Playstation Home, the service encourages meeting up and interacting with other players and facilitates the social interaction through allowing users to communicate via the virtual on screen keyboard, Bluetooth or USB keyboards, e-motes and the good old headset -- the possibilities for mischief are endless. Home will be where the PSN users reveal their true colors and the Playstation Network solidifies its position as either yet another unfriendly network filled with wayward gamers or something a little more family friendly.

Tigger Uppercut!

2008-03-01T00:56:00.003Z

In case you hadn't noticed - I! LOVE! STREET FIGHTER!
Although i usually play with Ken I have been seen enjoying some hot Sagat action in the past, he has the most ridiculous uppercut in the game, it probably does the same amount of damage as a shoryuken but connecting with a full on tiger uppercut just feels so much more brutal. Until now Sagat has not been announced for Street Fighter 4, but earlier today some footage (shot on a mobile phone by the looks of it) showing off Muay Tai master Sagat made its way to youtube.
Capcom later confirmed on the Capcom Blog that Sagat and Balrog (M.Bison in Japan) will be in the final game, the characters are currently only available in select arcades around Japan but cannot be selected via the character select screen, they show up as opponents under certain conditions.
As well as the two new/old characters Capcom Blog also confirmed that three new locations have been added to the game; North America: Drive-In at Night, South Asia: Beautiful Bay and South America: Inland Jungle.

Play.com Live saves thousands of UK based nerds from wedgies

2008-02-27T20:18:00.003Z

Video games conventions are great, you get to play hotly anticipated games, watch your favorite video game developers and publishers talk about future products and unleash your inner video game nerd without having your underpants pulled up over your head.

Unfortunately for enthusiasts living in the UK all we can do is enviously watch coverage courtesy of our gaming website of choice and moan about how the UK never has any good conventions. Sure we had ECTS and Playstation Experience for a few years but let’s face it, they could never hold a candle to E3, TGS, GDC, Leipzig, Penny Arcade Expo…oh god why doesn’t the UK have any good conventions…

It seems online retailer Play.com has heard our cries of despair and come to our aid with Play.Com Live - a two day event taking place on the 15^th and 16^th of March 2008 at Wembley Stadium. Gian Luzio, head of games at Play.com has recently confirmed to ‘TotalVideoGames’ that publishers attending include Ubisoft, THQ, Apple, Sierra Entertainment, SEGA, Capcom, Konami, Codemasters, Warner Bros, Microsoft, Activision, Oxygen Interactive, EA, Square-Enix, Midway, the Blu-ray Committee, Sony and Dare to be Digital.
Attendees can look forward to playing titles such as Lego: Batman, Rockband, Ghostbusters, Bourne Conspiracy, Condemned 2, Iron Man and Ninja Gaiden 2 at the event.

As well as the plethora of games on show at the event there will also be a number of other events to look forward to, Warner will be showing off The Dark Knight (the latest Batman Movie), Sony will be unveiling upcoming Blu-Ray titles and there will also be a chance to win £50,000. Stars in attendance include former Hollyoaks actress Gemma Atkinson and well known radio presenter Ian Lee who will be hosting the event.

Head over to Play.com to buy your tickets, or simply click this magical word (abra-cagamersconvention-dabra) and the power of the internet will take you there. This is an opportunity to show that the UK is just as relevant to gaming as Germany, Japan and America, if the event is a big enough success, maybe the powers that be will take notice and move E3 to London…ok I know that’s not going to happen but that won’t stop me from wishing.

MGS4 Release date confirmed!

2008-02-26T22:51:00.004Z

2007 was a big year for gaming, there were so many games that every time a title originally scheduled for 2007 slipped into 2008 gamers around the world breathed a suppressed sigh of relief, with so many games to play and so little time games like Metal Gear Solid 4, Burnout Paradise and Devil May Cry 4 would have certainly cleaned out bank accounts, and probably have caused a number of other games to be relegated into the ‘play later’ pile.
While a number of ‘triple A’ titles from 2007 have been released the details on when Metal Gear Solid will finally be unleashed have remained hidden in a bullet riddled barrel, until now.
According to information released at the ‘Playstation Destination’ conference (a conference for retailers focused specifically on Playstation products) Metal Gear Solid 4 will hit retail shelves on June 12th.The Kojima Productions teams have made it clear through announcements, trailers and their podcasts that MGS4 would receive a simultaneous worldwide release so it’s safe to assume that American and European gamers will be able to get their hands on the game on the 12th.
Many Playstation 2 owners have not as of yet made the leap into the next generation, those not persuaded into investing in Sony’s monstrous third generation Playstation by games like Resistance, Heavenly Sword and Warhawk are probably stubbornly sitting on the fence in anticipation for Metal Gear Solid 4, Sony have welcomed those patient few with open arms and announced that a MGS4 PS3 bundle comprised of an 80GB Playstation 3, a copy of MGS4 and a Dual Shock 3 will be available all for a meager $499, the only remaining question is…is it backwards compatible?
As of yet Sony hasn’t stated whether Europe would be blessed with this package, but it would make sense for the package to show up in Europe, then again, the logical step isn’t common territory in the video games world.
Expectations are high for MGS4 and from what we’ve seen so far it is shaping up to be a great game, unlike the main game which has had extensive coverage (too much in my opinion) the online component of the game has had very little, which makes the announcement of Metal Gear Online beta all the more sweeter, SCEA revealed today that those who pre-order the game will be treated to a beta in April.
Kojima Productions have taken some positive steps forward to make the game the best that it can be, much of the changes can be traced back to the influence of Ryan Payton (host of the Ryan’s Report podcast).
As an avid video game enthusiast who has to pay upwards of £30 for each of my games I’m not too keen on the Idea of paying an additional sum of money for the supplementary online component, especially when it’s Metal Gear, not because I don’t like Metal Gear - on the contrary, it’s my favorite video game series…of all time, but if the online aspects of MGS3 and Portable Ops are any indication of how MGO will turn out I’d rather spend my money on a new Xbox Live subscription. So when MGO was announced as a separate product I was actually quite excited, since it was being sold separately maybe it would be given the appropriate attention in development, instead of being developed as an afterthought all things point to it being developed as a fully fleshed out multiplayer experience, if this turns out to be true, I will gladly pay for it.
One of the biggest barriers that new MGS players have had to overcome is the controls, the muddled and overcomplicated controls reflected the somewhat archaic and uncompromising nature of Japanese development, but when hands-on reports from TGS cited newer streamlined controls as the most impressive part of the demo this indicated a change in the way Konami have been developing the game. During the Demo run-through by Kojima he showed off the first-person combat and it looked much more refined than the previous games, while the previous titles featured a first person perspective it was the weak link in the game, sure it got the job done but it just wasn’t developed enough to depend on in combat, a point made most clear by the online components of Snake Eater and Portable Ops, the cumbersome controls (along with the camera) would often make killing the enemy a far more arduous task than it should have been, needless to say it sucked the fun right out of the online component.

The gameplay and overall enjoyment of MGO hinges on how well the controls are implemented, but from what gaming journalists have said so far Konami have taken the right steps to ensure that the controls won’t have a negative impact on the game anymore.
Halo 3 and Call of Duty 4 are the most successful online consoles games and other than their genre the games have one important thing in common, they both had a beta for their multiplayer component, purchasers of Crackdown were able to play the Halo 3 beta before the games launch and Infinity Ward released a beta for Call of Duty 4 for download over Xbox Live. Both Bungie and Infinity Ward used the data gained from the beta and opinions and suggestions from various forums to refine and fine tune the multiplayer and it clearly has paid off, the beta will provide Kojima Productions with the same opportunity to gauge how well the MGO final product will be received and ascertain what they can do to ensure it is the best multiplayer experience it can be. The beta gives credence to the idea that Kojima Productions is taking the multiplayer seriously, which just means that more people will be willing to buy it come release time.
The shift in Japanese game development can be seen most through the inclusion of a multiplayer beta in the development cycle, traditionally Japanese developers have kept their games locked away until the release with only the development team and higher-ups able to provide input on the title, so the plan to have a beta for MGO is a step in the right direction for Kojima Production.
Clearly Ryan’s western influence has had a positive effect on MGS4 and MGO, hopefully other Japanese developers will take notice and let their audience have more of an input on their games, once they start caring about online multiplayer that is.

Update: The PS3 in the MGS4 package will be backwards compatible.

GDC Picks

2008-02-26T17:22:00.002Z

Despite the fact that GDC is a conference for ‘game developers’ to discuss the ins and outs of development yet again the games taken over causing havoc like a drunk uncle in a china store. As well as the numerous talks and panels GDC was also the stage for a number of announcements and an opportunity for developers to show off their latest projects. ~~To ease my boredom~~ For your entertainment I have compiled my picks of the show;

Puzzle Quest: Galactrix

Puzzle quest was easily the most addictive game of 2007; it combined the simple gameplay of bejeweled with all the character development systems of an RPG. Infinite Interactive announced that they were working on a new Puzzle Quest title. Instead of simply releasing an incremental update and then watching the money roll in Infinite Interactive has taken the ‘cousin’ to the original game in a new direction, they’ve ditched the medieval theme in favor of a sci-fi décor. The most exciting part of Galactrix is the way in which it is trying to differentiate itself from Bejeweled and the original Puzzle Quest. Instead of the played out square board Galaxtrix features a hex board where matches are no longer limited to two axis, the player can now match tiles on six axis. To compliment this the gems now fall from the direction that the match has occurred in, by no longer forcing gems to fall from the top of the board it provides an opportunity for a far more tactical game. Puzzle Quest Galactrix adds depth to the gameplay by placing heavy focus on ships; the player can acquire a variety of ships each with their own classes, abilities and attributes, these ships can then be used in a battles to suit the players own style. It’s good to see Infinite Interactive taking the game in a new direction, and I can’t wait to play it.

APB:

APB came out as the most talked about game of GDC, developed by Realtime Worlds (the team that gave us Crackdown) on the surface it looks just like a run of the mill MMORPG but it has the potential to be so much more, David Jones from Realtime Worlds shows the mission statement driving the game through his reference to the game as a ‘Multiplayer Online Game’ as opposed to a MMORPG. From what they’ve shown it’s a refinement of the genre, by taking all that makes MMORPG’s fun to play and weeding out all the level grinding and unfulfilling quests APB is shaping up to be an online RPG that you can have fun in without devoting every waking moment to.
At the event Realtime Worlds showed off the most detailed character editor I’ve ever seen in a game, unlike the usual restriction that character creation mechanics have APB allows the player to tweak every aspect of the character to the point that they can create characters modeled after real people, sure other games have claimed to be able to do this but APB is probably the first game to be able to pull it off properly. David Jones showed of detailed and accurate character models based on well known developers Richard Garriot, Warren Specter, Peter Molyneux and Shigeru Miyamoto.

The gameplay of APB is very much influenced by Crackdown, except without the superhuman abilities, the players take the role of either cops or robbers and can roam the city freely until they commit a crime, when they commit the crime an APB is issued to all local officers, the APB is delivered through a dynamic match making system, when a crime is committed the APB is issued to enforces that are of equal skill level, or a few experienced players against a large group of new players, the dynamic matchmaking always ensures that the matchups are equal. Although I’m not a big fan on the MMO genre (mainly because I don’t want to become addicted, I’ve seen what WoW can do to people) this is a game that I’ll definitely be keeping an eye on.

Prototype:

Hulk: Ultimate Destruction was a great open-world game but unfortunately it was underappreciated, lucky for us Radical Entertainment hasn’t let that stop them, their next project takes the same gameplay improves on it in ‘Prototype’. The game features the same high jumping, building destroying, car throwing mechanics from Ultimate Destruction but adds some new gameplay elements into the mix. As a ‘prototype’ you are able to absorb people and assume their forms as well as gain their abilities.
After throwing a few cars around and shooting up some military property the player can find an every-day Joe Shmo, absorb him, shape shift into him and then walk away right under the enemies nose. Much like Ultimate Destruction the main aim of the game is to break into military strongholds and ‘liberate’ information about your situation, and pick up some upgrades along the way. Although there hasn’t been much revealed on the story of the game, other than ‘you’re an escaped government experiment that’s lost his memory but can kick some serious ass’, the story is intriguing, firstly through the actual plot and secondly through the way that it can progress in a non linear fashion, the game has a number of key people or points that need to be reached but it is up to the player in which order they approach them. There hasn’t been a lot of information given on the game but that doesn’t stop me from getting excited if only for the chance to play what is Hulk: Ultimate Destruction 2.

And then there's Gears of War 2, since the only thing they showed was Marcus having a chainsaw battle with a Locust there isn't much to say on the game other than, yeah, Gears Of War 2...we all knew it was going to happen.

Alone In The Dark Preview

2008-02-21T20:42:00.012Z

If you haven’t played any of the previous Alone in the Dark games chances are that your only exposure to the series has been the god awful Uwe Boll movie of the same name.
Alone in the Dark was originally released for PC in 1992 and is widely considered as the original survival horror game, it paved the way for games such as Resident Evil and Silent Hill.
Atari are now attempting to resurrect the classic with a next-generation title currently scheduled for a May release on the Xbox 360 and PC with a PS2, PS3 and Wii version showing up some time after.

"Since the beginning we anticipated it would be the higher tier of the next gen games so we’ve built the engine to handle the highest quality of rendering and physics"

Alone in the Dark will see players taking the role of Edward Carnby, fans of the series will recognise him as the protagonist of the previous games, while the previous installment were set in the 1920’s this game will bring Edward to modern day New York, specifically Central Park and for some reason, he hasn’t aged a bit.
The game starts off with Edward awaking in a room with two armed strangers, he has no memory of how he got there or who he is, the two men proceed to insult him for a while and then lead him to the roof to meet his maker but things become a little supernatural when something begins destroying the building, it is from this point that the player is taken on a roller coaster ride filled with self-discovery, the supernatural and a chilling conspiracies.
As Edward Carnby the player is tasked with figuring out who he is and why he is in the modern day, as well as this Edward must discover the secrets of Central Park.
The game takes place over the course of a single night, however the structure of the game is modeled on a TV show, the chapters are split up into episodes which are in turn broken down into checkpoints, each section was written to reflect conventions of a traditional TV Show and will usually end on a twist or a major event. Casual players can opt to play a single episode and then continue the game at their own pace, the danger in this approach would be forgetting what has been done and what hasn’t but this has also been also been addressed through an introductory sequence at the beginning of each play session, the game remembers what the player does and saves the data to the hard drive, when the save data is loaded up it shows a ‘previously on Alone in the Dark’ segment which shows the player what he or she did during the last play session.
In order to make the game an enjoyable experience Alone in the Dark will also contain a skip feature; should a player come to a point where, for some reason, they would rather not play the area they can opt to skip to the next checkpoint, when I asked producer Nora Paloni why they decided to put this feature in she said;

"We want to avoid situations where the player feels frustrated; Alone in the Dark is an experience and we want the player to enjoy the experience as much as possible so this allows the player to pass over anything that is causing frustration"

There are however penalties for skipping this, as well as losing out on some gamer points and important plot points there will also be an effect on how the ending plays out.

"Half-Life 2 was the first time we could really interact with the environment but there was still a barrier because of the gravity gun, we wanted the player to feel as though he or she is controlling and interacting with the environment, we’re pushing interaction in games further"

I was shown a number of different areas that will be featured in the final game these included; the sewers underneath New York, a museum reception hall area and a car park.
The game is very reminiscent of Resident Evil 4, this is mainly due to the over the shoulder camera view the game uses, although it is a third person game Atari have said that it is fully playable through the first person perspective and although the controls do require some fine tuning the first person perspective at this point doesn't seem out of place or gimmicky.
All the levels I was shown held up very well, graphically the game is very impressive, it is built using Atari’s Twilight Engine which is an improved version of the engine used in Test Drive Unlimited. Although it would be easy to talk at length about the textures the real star of the show is the lighting, Alone in the Dark is an extremely atmospheric game, in large part to the lighting effects the game has, in one single area there can be a number of different light sources all which cast shadows that accurately move in relation to the source.
One of the most impressive aspects of the game is the behaviour of fire, Atari have clearly taken the time to painstakingly render the fire, it looks amazing and behaves just like fire should. In the demo I grabbed hold of a chair and exposed it to an open flame, the fire eventually spread onto the chair which I then used as a torch, after a while the wood was reduced to ember and then eventually ash, in the final game if the burning item is held for too long the fire will burn Edwards hand, and since all the injuries Edward receives are realistically rendered onto his body you will have to get out the old first aid spray and take care of it.If Edward takes too much damage his performance will become significantly affected, he moves slower, his reaction times are cut and his vision becomes blurred, this is where the blink mechanic comes into play, yes you heard correctly – blink mechanic. To restore Edwards vision the player must press the right bumper button to make him close his eyes for a second or two, this clears up Edwards vision and lets you carry on unhindered, the more damage you have taken the more times you are required to blink, while it sounds a little strange it has a profound effect on the gameplay. In order to immerse the player into the game it never steps out of real time events, this means that while you have your eyes closed an enemy could creep up and have his way with you, this adds an immense amount of dramatic effect and will probably have players jumping from their seats.
Atari have given the game what they call ‘Real World Rules’, in the context of the game this means that everything in the world behaves just like it should, the subtle physics certainly help this goal.

"We didn’t want to be primarily one game, not just a driving or shooting game, we wanted the player to assume they could do everything a normal person in that situation could, there’s a lot of variety in the gameplay"

Instead of pitting the player against hordes of the undead the game adopts more of a situational approach, this means that while there are a number of gruesome monsters to go up against, more often than not you will find yourself trying to figure out how you can use the environment to help you proceed.
The items that Edward picks up in the game are all controlled using the right analogue stick, the movements of the analogue stick are accurately reciprocated by Edward in his movement of the item he is holding, it is therefore possible to subtly manipulate the environment using this control scheme. In the demo I found myself faced with a large pool of water which had been electrified thanks to a hanging cable, instead of doing the obvious and turning off the power you can grab hold of a large broom and use it to gently lift the exposed wire out of the water and hook it onto some nearby pipes.
As well as the puzzle solving applications, the analogue stick movements can also be used in combat, a quick movement of the analogue stick will result in an attack based motion, so a quick movement from left to right will make Edward swing his axe, chair or any other item from left to right.
In addition to all the potential weapons available in the environment Edward is also equipped with a standard pistol, from what I’ve seen this is as far as Edwards choice of firearms goes, the player is expected to create makeshift weapons using the items available in the environment which is appropriate since the enemies in the game require more than a bullet to kill, while a simple headshot would usually render a zombie useless in any other survival horror game in this game they will eventually recover and come after you, this means that supplementary actions must be taken to insure the dead stay that way, after killing some enemies the play you can douse them in a flammable substance, create a trail, and set them alight from a safe distance.
Careful attention has been paid to the enemy AI in the game, these monsters are far more formidable than you would expect since they can do almost everything Edward can, they are able to destroy wooden doors, break through windows and even smell you, if Edward is hurt he will bleed, the enemies can then smell the blood and will track you down using the scent.

Alone in the Dark has also given the ‘inventory screen’ a much needed facelift, in the interest of immersion the inventory is integrated into the gameplay, when you need something from the inventory Edward simply looks on the inside of his jacket, the camera transitions into a top down view of the inside of the jacket and you are free to select an items for both hands. In other survival horror games like Resident Evil the inventory screen can give you a short moment to catch your breath, if things are becoming a little overwhelming just bring up the inventory and take a breather; however in this game the inventory is accessed in real time, this means that Edward is vulnerable while he is admiring his impressive loot organizational skills. Edward is just a man and as such can only carry a certain amount of items; large and heavy items cannot be stored on the inside of his jacket so they cannot be carried about.This constant real-time aspect of the game even extends into the puzzle areas, the action will not pause while you attempt a puzzle, if the enemies in the area have not been taken care of before you initiate a puzzle they will attack you if they come across you.

The final part of the demo that I was shown took place in a crumbling new York, it felt a lot like the latest stuntman game, you have to navigate New York while it is being absolutely decimated by something, although it was entirely scripted it was still a spectacle, cars were frantically trying to escape, people were mindlessly (and somewhat futilely) running for cover, towering skyscrapers were crumbling, it was impressive. The aim of the area is to navigate the terrain as fast as possible and escape from the area before the ground crumbles beneath you, spend to long marveling at the scenery and you’ll plunge into the abyss.

Atari have decided to restrict the Xbox 360 ability to play music over the game, since the game is dependent on atmosphere allowing players to play their own music would somewhat compromise the experience of the game. The music in the game is extremely dynamic, it changes and adapts depending on the environment and the actions of the player, it was portrayed to us as an orchestra watching the events and playing their instruments to suit the mood, and actions of the game, the music changes when Edward picks up a weapon and then subtly changes again when he swings it, I asked Nora Paloni about the music and she had this to say;

"We don’t want the music in the game to just be in the background, we want it to play a larger part, we never want the player to leave a room and come back into that room with the same music playing"

Alone in the Dark is currently scheduled for a May release on Xbox 360 and PC, with a PS3, PS2 and Wii version also in the works. It is shaping up to be a great game and I can’t wait to get my grubby hands on the full game.

Gears of War 2

2008-02-20T21:59:00.005Z

Back in 2006 when Gears of War came out I was completely and utterly blown away, It was everything a stereotypical man could want in a game; blood, guts, aliens, guns, chainsawing aliens rendering them a fountain of blood and guts, and of course the large steroid dependent space marines.
Gears was extremely gritty, it conveyed the 'shit hit the fan' atmosphere amazingly through the use of excessive amounts of blood, extremely detailed textures and the trademark roadie run.
While the game was an undeniable success it did have its fair share of problems, the most apparent of which were the bad team-mate AI in the single player, texture popping, and underdeveloped online multiplayer.
The multiplayer was my biggest disappointment in Gears, while people will proclaim the multiplayer as the greatest thing since Counter-Strike I just couldn't overcome the issues it had.
I found the weapons to be extremely unbalanced, the shotgun was usually the weapons of choice for everyone since it was so ridiculously powerful, but then you had to take into account the somewhat random hit detection.
The maps were buggy and it just completely sucked the fun out of the game when people figured out how to jump out of the map and take out people from a distance.
The other main problem with the game was the storyline, or lack thereof, although Gears had a great premise it didn't actually develop on it, in the end it basically boiled down to 'armed marines go get bomb, put in hole, kill big monster', pretty disappointing since they hired a professional writer for the game.
So Gears 2 has finally been announced, we all knew it was going to happen but the question on every gamers mind was, when?
Microsoft revealed at GDC that emergence day is currently scheduled for some time in November of this year.
While I'm looking forward to the game I do have some requests;

1. Place more of a focus on the story telling in Gears 2, sure its a testosterone fueled shooter and we love it for that, but we loved the first one for that, Gears 2 needs to actually deliver in terms of story.

2. Take some time to iron out the kinks, that means the buggy maps, the texture popping, and suicidal artificial intelligence (give Dom some common sense).

3. Develop the multiplayer, the groundwork has been laid out, refine the gameplay so that luck becomes less of a factor and skill is what sets a player apart, let us play with more than 8 people in one match and get rid of that god awful host advantage.

Obviously the game needs to evolve but i really hope that they also address the problems that plagued the first game, come on Cliffy...don't let us down.

Arrow point down is still alive

2008-02-19T11:43:00.003Z

If you've glanced at a video game website in the past few months you'll have probably heard about the G-man, no not that freaky bureaucrat from Half-Life, I'm talking about Jeff Gerstmann, or Gert-s-mn depending on what podcasts you listen to, Ryan Davis and Alex Navarro's departure from gamespot.com. I hate to say it but those guys made the Hotspot podcast worth listening to and their departure has left a gaping hole in the show........and many people's hearts. Well now your prayers have been answered, Ryan and Jeff have got together (probably under the influence of Alcohol) and recorded a new podcast, head over to Ryan's blog, Arrow pointing down and give it a download.

Devil May Cry 4 Review

2008-02-14T22:44:00.003Z

Originally developed as Resident Evil 4, Devil May Cry exploded onto the scene in 2001 brandishing a giant flash filled syringe which it proceeded to jam into the unsuspecting action game genre. Devil May Cry was a hack and slash game overflowing with style and substance; it was a game with so much impact that it resulted in countless pretenders springing up in an attempt to emulate what it had achieved, while some gained just as much notoriety the majority found their way the local video game bargain in no time.

Capcom continued the series by taking ‘style’ too literally in the underwhelming Devil May Cry 2 and followed this up with the stellar but infuriatingly difficult Devil May Cry 3.

Devil May Cry 4 is the first in the series to appear on the current generation of consoles but does it make the leap into the next-generation guns-a-blazing or does it trip on its leather coattails and fall flat on its face?

There has clearly been an effort to make the story interesting in Devil May Cry 4 and it pays off despite the fact that it ultimately takes a back seat to the gameplay. While the story isn’t pushing narrative in games forward it does remain interesting enough to keep your thumb from hammering the skip button every time a cut-scene starts, but then again that may be down to the breathtaking choreography and the occasional appearance of a sexually charged femme fatal.

Devil May Cry 4 takes a risk from the outset by benching the series’ charismatic demon slayer Dante in favor of Nero, now while this may seem like a bad idea it doesn’t have much of an impact on the game since you are given control of Dante for a number of missions towards the end of the game, that and the fact that they are essentially the same person both in terms of their looks and their personality. Nero is blessed with the smart mouth and corny one-liners that Dante incessantly puts to use in the series.

The story is simple; Nero is part of the Order of the Sword, a religious group who worship Sparda, the demonic father of Dante. Halfway through a heartfelt religious sermon Dante crashes through the ceiling and impales ‘his holiness’ on the sharp end of his blade. Nero is sent off to bring down Dante but things start getting complicated when Nero’s girlfriend is kidnapped for the Orders nefarious purposes.

Although DMC4 is far more serious in tone than its predecessors it retains the crazy sense of humor found in all of the previous games. DMC4 is over-flowing with personality, this is usually felt through the eccentric supporting characters, be it the incredibly risqué Gloria and her open policy on clothing, the mad scientist Agnus and his cinderblock of a chin or the lesbian fairies (seriously, you can’t make this stuff up), needless to say that there is never a dull moment.

Devil May Cry 4 is developed by Capcom so it won’t come as a surprise to hear that it’s one of the prettiest next-generation titles on the market. Throughout the course of the game you’ll trek through a variety of different environments ranging from rustic cathedrals and sinister metallic underground labs to beautifully lush forests. The great textures and beautiful lighting help create environments bursting with life and personality. Unfortunately the visuals are let down by the horrible shadows, many of the environments contain moving light sources such as flickering candles or swaying chandeliers, this means that the shadows cast are usually in motion which transforms them into jagged eyesores which are impossible to escape, indoor environments are filled with tables, chairs, lamps and an array of other furnishings, outdoor environments have dynamic architecture and an abundance of trees and other foliage, all of which cast these hideous shadows.

The character models on the other hand bear no such faults, every character and enemy is extremely detailed, some disturbingly so. It’s a joy to see the gothic aesthetic of Devil May Cry in gloriously high-resolution.

Along with the detailed models the bosses in DMC4 are given a huge sense of scale, Nero and Dante are often pit against foes that make them look like very tiny fish in a barrel. The grandeur of these minions of hell is sullied by the repeat performances they are forced to endure, you’ll fight most of the bosses at least twice, they just aren’t as breathtaking after you’ve already handed their asses to them multiple times.

One of the lesser talked about features of the Devil May Cry series is the great sound, sound effects aside the series has some strangely atmospheric music, the gothic rock soundtrack from DMC3 returns alongside some welcome remixes of tracks featured in DMC1. By and large the music is great to listen to, with the exception of the track that plays during Nero’s battles, after a certain point the vocals become mind numbingly annoying so it’s a welcome change when Dante’s DMC1 remixes kick in.

The previous Devil May Cry games suffered from a severe case of ‘more of the same’ and DMC4 is no different, if you’ve ever played any of the previous games you’ll feel right at home, unfortunately even the linearity rears its ugly head once again.

There are two major changes to the gameplay both of which are courtesy of Nero’s Devil arm, this demonic arm has the ability to reach out and grab enemies from afar which provides a simple and approachable way to link combo’s, with a few well timed presses of a button even casual players will be able to chain combo’s together like a pro.

The second gameplay change is Nero’s ability to rev his sword like a motorcycle, while not as significant as the Devil arm it does provide the opportunity for dedicated players to take combat deeper, rev your sword at just the right time and you could change a run-of-the-mill sword swipe in to a devastating fuel-injected slash. Other than this the immensely deep combat gameplay remains fully intact.

About half-way through the game you are given control of Dante, series vets will feel right at home with him, even more so since his different styles are mapped to the D-pad allowing you to switch between them on the fly, although it is possible to pull of crazy combo’s using his various styles it isn’t nearly as easy as with Nero, this is probably something the hardcore DMC players will invest some time in.

Dante packs some serious power, so much so that playing through the same areas and bosses is a breeze, it’s unfortunate that he’s buried so deep in the game, it does however give the game replayability.

Dante has one of the greatest weapons in video game history, a briefcase called ‘Pandora’, this briefcase has the ability to change into a variety of totally over the top weapons, with a few inputs it can be transformed from a mini-gun to a rocket launcher and if you stick with it, eventually an insane flying rocket ship…thing, it has to be seen to be appreciated.

The combat areas are separated by some platforming and the occasional puzzle, the puzzle elements and platforming usually take advantage of Nero’s arm, the grab ability is used to swing from point to point, while this might stir some feelings of Capcom nostalgia it isn’t nearly as fun as it sounds, Nero doesn’t actually swing from one point to another, it’s more a guided leap from point A to point B.

The biggest problem this game faces is the same problem that every other game in the series has faced; the stubborn camera angles.

Capcom seems to be a fan of the fixed camera and while it does create some dramatic angles it usually ends up making platforming frustrating and combat unnecessarily difficult.

Don’t be surprised if you find yourself battling enemies behind some protruding architecture with the camera making no effort to give you a better view.

The camera also sucks what little fun the platforming has left in it right out, during Nero’s swinging areas the camera has trouble keeping up with the movement of the character, this means that you can’t target the next grappling point and instead Nero will end up latching back onto a previous grappling point and throwing you right to the bottom again. While the archaic camera does detract from the overall experience it isn’t to a large degree.

Overall Devil May Cry’s transition to the newer generation of console is an undeniable success. The most surprising aspect of Devil May Cry 4 is the fact that Nero is just as much fun to play as Dante, ditching the star of the show in favor of a new character usually goes wrong but In this case Capcom have pulled it off. The high production values, great storyline and an array of eccentric characters make for the best action game experience yet.
While it does have some minor flaws these are more than made up for by the stylish and extremely deep combat.

Grading System = 9.5 (EXCELLENT)

2008-02-09T22:25:00.000Z

2007 was undoubtedly one of the greatest years in video gaming history, in the eyes of many a game enthusiast it even surpasses 1998, the year that gave us Metal Gear Solid, Half-Life, Starcraft and The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of time, games which have and will continue to be held up as the ‘greatest game of all time’. Gamers were blessed with titles that not only provided endless hours of entertainment but served a greater purpose, these games pushed the boundaries of what made a high-quality game and many of them were instrumental in taking video games as an industry and a form of entertainment a step further. Bioshock and Portal instigated an evolution in story-telling, Assassin’s Creed closed the gap on realism by means of the frighteningly life like movements of Altair and Halo 3 showed that a first-person shooter can be so much more than a mindless shooter.

It’s obvious that 2007 won’t be forgotten anytime soon and its effects will be felt for years to come, but the biggest change to the industry didn’t stem from games, but from the Journalistic aspect of the industry. One particular event has taken the fundamentals of video game journalism and thrown it into a blender, only time will tell if what comes out is a deliciously nutritious smoothie or a disgusting carrot based vegetable shake that we’ll be told is good for us but tastes like a rancid treat.
The first widespread industry changing effects of Gerstmann-gate are being felt courtesy of Ziff Davis Media, no I’m not talking about James Mielke’s bump up to Editor in Chief, I’m talking about the welcome change to how games are rated. In a recent press Ziff Davis Media said;

‘1UP Network is making changes with its game scoring system on 1UP.com, in EGM and in GFW. Games will be graded on a letter scale, A+ to F, rather than a numerical scale. All previously scored games on 1UP.com will also be converted to the new letter scale. Look out for these changes in March on 1UP.com, in the April issue of EGM and in the April/May issue of GFW."

Up until now the majority of websites and magazines have utilised a numerical rating system often with increments of .5, this has resulted in the emergence of a review bashing culture and fanboy campaigns to smear the good name of a writer simply doing his or her job. Gamers have proven themselves as the most temperamental, demanding and picky group of enthusiasts, we make the rabid anime fans look humble and accommodating. You only have to look as far as the forum posts found on the Gamespot boards after Jeff Gerstmann’s review of Twilight Princess to understand what the existing form of scoring has done to us, gamers have become blinded by the glistening 9.0’s and 9.5’s and reject anything below this as an insult, we’ve lost sight of the bigger picture and focus all of our attention on the numbers, not what they represent, if any of the uncompromising Zelda fanatics took the time out to truly think about what an 8.8 represents they would have arrived at the same conclusion that Jeff Gerstmann and many other rational fans did, an 8.8 is a great score.
The broad number based scoring system leaves too much open for debate, while in actuality there isn’t world of a difference between an 8.0 and an 8.5 in this day and age a potential buyer is more likely to buy the game that is rated an 8.5 even though both would be categorized as ‘great’ or ‘excellent’. The aforementioned grade based system being implemented by Ziff is a positive step forward, it places less focus on the specific nature of review scores which fans have become so anal about and instead aims to project the opinions of the reviewer, the system can be universally understood and doesn’t require any additional explanation or tacked on words like ‘gggrrreat’ or ‘AWESOME!’, everyone knows what a grade B encompasses.
In an ideal world other popular websites and magazines would follow suite, there needs to be less of a spotlight placed on the actual number a game is assigned and more on how the content of the game comes across, solving this problem opens doors to fixing a number of other problems the games industry is currently facing, advertiser pressure could finally be a thing of the past…again.

The King of Guitar Hero Kong

2008-02-06T21:46:00.000Z

I don't watch a lot of films these days, the last film that I subjected myself to was Spider-man 3, it was an unimpressive movie that made my inner Peter Parker cry, Spider-man 3 along with a number of other films that have been relegated to a cobweb filled corner of my mind contributed to killing my faith in movies, but once in a while I will be enticed into watching something, my latest leap of faith has led me to 'The King of Kong', an extremely entertaining documentary about Steve Wiebe's quest to beat the highest recorded score in King Kong, set by Billy Mitchell at an amazing 957,300 the score has never been beaten despite numerous attempts by other full-time retro-gamers. Although the film is a documentary the personalities of Steve Wiebe and Billy Mitchell fit neatly into the typical film character archetypes, Billy's arrogant self-serving nature places him firmly in the 'bad-guy' character slot. Steve Wiebe is shown as someone with limitless potential hindered by a string of bad luck, after about fifteen minutes you'll find yourself rooting for the guy. The film is very entertaining, even if you don't like video games, the most intriguing aspect of the movie is the whole culture of professional (if you can call it that) retro-gaming, the different allegiances and deceptive nature of a number of the characters creates great tension between the characters, its great to watch.
After watching the movie I headed off to an event being held in Zaavi (formerly Virgin Megastores) by Guiness Book of World Records, the main events of the day were a Guitar
Hero relay marathon, the event involved 50 pairs playing one song each in a co-op mode on a variety of different difficulty levels, a world record attempt at the highest score set by 6 people on one guitar, each person would be assigned one button with one player strumming, and lastly Luke Albiges would attempt to beat his own record (in case you're wondering, he failed).
The event was attended by a number of well known people in both the gaming and music world including the 'Fragdolls UK', the cast of 'We will rock you' and rock band 'Towers of London'.
The excellent turnout begs the question of why there isn't a more professional competitive gaming league in the UK.

The King of Kong showed how a small time record tracking company 'Twin Galaxies' went from a couple of guys tracking scores on a website to an institution that is seen as the premier competitive gaming source. Maybe Xbox live should take leader boards more seriously, here are some pictures for your enjoyment and you can head over to the HoboGamer youtube space to check out videos from the event. Kitt and Jam of Fragdolls UK fame rock out on some Guitar Hero 2.

The cast of 'We will rock you' and 'Towers of London' pose for pictures.

Imran, London's very own Guitar Hero does what he does best, plays Guitar Hero, Imran later went on to set a record as one part of the 6-man team, he strummed till his fingers bled leading the makeshift team to victory.

The joys of February

2008-02-06T00:07:00.000Z

So far February has been a pretty good to gamers, sure January gave us Burnout and we love it for that but February is shaping up to be a great month, now by this point you're probably saying "what the hell is this fool talking about?", well along with the European release of Devil May Cry 4 on the 8th, Capcom have announced that they will be unveiling another character for Street Fighter 4, so far Ryu and Ken have been strutting their stuff (mainly crotch stuffing skills and the 'O' face) and a Famitsu scan showed off Japanese high-school slasher movie reject Crimson Viper. In interviews with 1up Yoshinori Ono alluded to Dhalsim and Chun-li.
If it was up to me, I would go with Skullomania, purely for comedic value.

Update: Korean website 'Ruliweb' has leaked images originally intended for the Friday issue of Famitsu, the inky new screens show off a number of returning Street Fighter staples in the flashy Japanese art brush style. Guile, Blanka, Zangief, Dhalsim, E. Honda and Chun-Li will join Ken and Ryu in the latest iteration of the legendary fighting series. Click the link and check out the images.

Grappling with mechanics

2008-02-03T19:24:00.000Z

Video games are a media format limited only by the imagination; the creative possibilities are endless, new and exciting gameplay mechanics are always being developed within each genre to keep it fresh. Be it the power meter in sports games, the parry in fighting games or the timeless genre transcending headshot, games are always reinventing the ‘mechanical wheel’ to provide a fresh new angle on a dated gameplay element. One of the most famous game mechanics is undergoing somewhat of a renaissance, the much loved ‘grappling hook’ mechanic is making a comeback, in large-part thanks to the revival of a Capcom classic. To ease my boredom and for nostalgia’s sake I have compiled the five most prominent users of the grappling hook mechanic, although they use it in a variety of forms each retain the same underlying mechanics, so here they are in no particular order.

The grappling hook mechanic was originally made most famous by Rad Spencer in Capcom’s timeless classic, Bionic Commando. Equipped with a bionic arm and awesome red hair Rad Spencer is sent to rescue a man named ‘Super Joe’, with only his arm Rad took on futuristic Nazi’s who had resurrected Adolf Hitler (or Master-D in the American release), using their evil-genius scientists. The mechanic involved Rad using his extendable arm to latch onto various surfaces, the grappling arm could then be extended fourty-five degrees to allow Rad to leap from platform to platform as well as pull himself up to the area his arm is latched onto. In addition to the arm’s navigational perks it could also be used to reel in distant items and on some occasions unwary enemy Nazi soldiers. The mechanic added a new twist to the platforming genre; the game replaced jumping with the swinging mechanic which could also be applied to combat, although the idea of replacing a jump with a swing sounds awkward the mechanic allowed for fluid and swift platforming which provided endless fun. Capcom has recently announced a new Bionic Commando game, developed for the Playstation 3 and the Xbox 360 the game and takes place after the NES game, the player will take control of ‘Nathan Spencer’ and will traverse Ascension city using the iconic Bionic Arm. As well as the sequel Capcom have also announced a remake of the NES Bionic Commando, entitled ‘Bionic Commando: Rearmed’, the game will be released on Xbox Live Arcade, Playstation Network and on the PC.

Arguably the most famous user of the grappling hook in video games is Link, protagonist of Nintendo’s flagship game ‘The Legend of Zelda’. The games usually see Link tasked with rescuing Princess Zelda, the princess come damsel in distress of Hyrule, typically from Gannon, an evil tyrant intent on enslaving Hyrule. Although Link’s main tools in his quests are generally his trusty sword and shield, he is regularly required to use his ‘hookshot’. The games place heavy focus on exploration; the various Zelda titles are by and large comprised of a number of dungeons to explore, at the end of which the player is rewarded with a new tool to aid them in the remaining dungeons. The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time was released in 1998 and served as one of the earliest uses of the grappling hook mechanic in a 3D adventure game; the hookshot is given to Link by the Ghost of Dampe after beating him in a race. In a similar fashion to Bionic Commando, although primarily used to negotiate large gaps, the hookshot can also be used to ‘drag distant items towards you, or you can use it to pull yourself towards something’. While the hookshot has appeared in previous Zelda games they have done so on a 2D plain, the grappling hook mechanic in the subsequent 3D Zelda games have typically been extremely limited in terms of movement, nevertheless they have become synonymous with the Zelda games and its green tunic wearing hero.

Another of Nintendo’s iconic characters also has a grappling hook in her arsenal of weaponry. Samus Aran was first introduced to gamers in the 1986 classic, Metroid. Samus is a galactic bounty hunter equipped with a power suit; the power suit provides Samus with a plethora of weapons and other tools to support her in her hunt for the Space Pirates and parasitic Metroid. Created by Gunpei Yokoi Metroid is another trademark Nintendo exploration game, however whereas the early Zelda games used an overhead view the Metroid games were side-scrolling action exploration games. The Metroid games have come to be known for all having the same structure, the games usually start with Samus exploring a small planet or space station which proceeds to blow up, narrowly escaping the explosion Samus crash lands on an uncharted planet, coincidently Samus’ suit malfunctions which leads to her abilities being restricted. The player then takes control of the legendary bounty hunter and proceeds to explore the planet while restoring function to her suit and collecting upgrades. The grappling hook in the Metroid games were used almost exclusively on getting Samus through hostile terrain and to unreachable areas, the grapple hook remained purely for navigational purposes up until Metroid Prime 3: Corruption. Corruption was the first iteration of Nintendo’s long running franchise to appear on the Wii console, the consoles motion sensitive controls and the interactivity between Samus and the player allowed Retro studios to utilise the grappling hook in ways the series hadn’t before. In addition to helping Samus reach energy tanks unreachable by the usual abnormally high jumps the grapple beam could now be used to rip amour away from well insulated opponents, easily the best fit for the grappling hook mechanic the Wii’s motion sensitive controls has given a welcomed new twist on the mechanic, Samus has never been so deadly.

The grappling hook mechanic is almost always seen in adventure or exploration games, which makes sense since it’s clearly most-suited for these purposes, however, it has been used in a fighting games (with good effect), the character using this technique is one of the most deadly fighters in any video game, no I’m not talking about D.Dark from Street Fighter EX, I’m talking about Scorpion from Mortal Kombat. Former member of the Shirai Ryu ninja clan Scorpion is resurrected and seeks vengeance on those who brutally slaughtered his clan. Scorpions trademark move is the ability to throw out a roped-spear into his opponents, he follows this up by dragging them over to him then opening a can of hellish whoop-ass on them. While it is not strictly a grappling hook it does have almost all of the same characteristics, Scorpion just decides not to use it to climb mountains, instead he likes to throw it at people and decimate their internal organs. Scorpion is without a doubt the most prominent fighter to use the grappling hook mechanic.

Spider-man, I don’t think there’s a need to say anymore…but I’m going to, while Spider-man’s grappling hook mechanic is not powered by a mechanical arm, gun or cybernetic suit it is probably the most useful and deadly. After being bitten by a radioactive spider Peter Parker is transformed into Spider-man, a man with spider powers including the ability to produce extremely strong strings of web which he then uses to swing from building to building, tie up misbehaving perps and generally harass the cast of regularly appearing foes. Spider-man has appeared in a number of videogames including three movie based tie-ins, a number of Marvel fighting games and dungeon crawlers and a comic adaptation.

The last user of this timeless mechanic is video games’ greatest anti-hero, Kratos. Kratos was a brutal and fearless Spartan warrior, after years of relentless conquering, Kratos finally met his match against the Barbarian army, in a last desperate attempt to crush his enemy he offers his life in servitude to Ares, the God of War, Ares accepts his offer and binds the blades of chaos to his arms, these blades serves as grappling hooks throughout Kratos’ journey to bring down Ares (oh yes, there is a lot of betrayal). Kratos uses this mechanic in both combat and exploration. The mechanic is used in combat primarily to chain attack combinations, after launching an enemy in to the air he can then use the blades to wrench them back down and continue to rip through the poor sucker. The navigational applications of the blades are fairly limited, at designated points in the game Kratos is able to latch onto certain points and swing from one area to another, this is given some depth through the inclusion of momentum, building up momentum lets Kratos travel further, while this is fun the most satisfying use of the mechanic is in the combat.

Honorable Mentions:

Wayne Holden - Lost Planet

Nero – Devil May Cry 4

Lara Croft - Tomb Raider

Rikimaru/ Ayame : Tenchu

K-Project is a go!

2008-01-30T20:07:00.001Z

Rez HD has finally been released on Xbox Live Marketplace and is available for download priced at a meager 800 points.
Rez was originally released for the Dreamcast in Japan back in 2001 and then later released on the Playstation 2 and Dreamcast in Europe, created by Tetsuya Mizuguchi (who went on to create modern rhythm game classic Lumines) the game is an on-rails rhythm action shooter.

Back when it was released my gaming tastes were quite simple, fighting games, role-playing games and traditional action games, so an artistic on-rails rhythm shooter didn't even show up on my radar, I was too busy trying to chain shoryukens.
From what I heard though the game didn't do to well, mainly because it was so far ahead of its time that it just didn't click with people, sure it has a cult following and is one of the most loved games in video game history but it wasn't a mainstream success (maybe that's where some of the appeal is).

Over 5 years later, lucky for me and probably a considerable amount of other gamers Mizuguchi and Q Entertainment have put out a gloriously high definition remake of Rez, and it, is, fantastic.
The premise is taken straight from the 80's to suite its general aesthetic, more on that later. The player takes control of a hacker who is traveling through a computer network in an effort to locate and restore a crippled artificial intelligence known as Eden, it seems an information overload has caused it to question its own existence and shut down.

The gameplay is extremely simple and on its own very shallow, you simply hold down a button and then move the cursor onto any on screen enemies, this locks onto the target and then a simple button release shoots a laser and destroys the approaching computer nasty. The pulsating avatar is able to simultaneously lock onto a total of 8 targets so the trick is to hold the lock on button then use your cursor to mark your targets, let go and then watch as they turn to dust.

The visual style of Rez enhances the colorful 80's techno-hacker theme that is prevalent throughout. It's a very Tron esque wire frame world filled with a variety of enemies comprised of evil geometrical shapes. Although they are initially overwhelming you slowly start to realise that the visuals are like nothing that any game, or movie for that matter, uses today, while it was common place back in the 80's where everyone thought the future would involve rainbow colored wired architecture it isn't as cool in the modern day, however Rez takes this old-school visual style and delivers it in beautiful high definition, and it works.

The third and final piece of the Rez puzzle is the audio, like Mizuguchi's current works music is an integral part of the experience, the retro trip-hop soundtrack just adds the final touch of crazy to this game, every action in the game adds a little beat to the overarching soundtrack, everything from a button press to a laser shot or explosion has an effect on the background audio.

" Gameplay is the heart of every game, if the gameplay isn't particularly interesting or fun the game isn't fun, so what makes this game so good?"

Thats what I kept asking myself during my short breaks from the game (after about half an hour of continuous gameplay I found myself feeling a bit dizzy).
Around two hours into playing the game it hit me, Rez isn't a game in the traditional sense, it's an experience, the eye-catching visual design, retro trip-hop soundtrack and simple but intriguing gameplay all work in unison to make an interactive experience that is unmatched by any modern-day game.

Persona 3! Buy it or I'll send Ninja-Pirates after you

2008-01-29T19:04:00.000Z

Although there was a myriad of unforgettable games in 2007 one of my favorites became a casualty of the next-generation transition, you would think that with the outlandish install base the Playstation 2 has (and continues to expand on) that console owners would seize the opportunity to play a good RPG but alas Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3 has enjoyed limited success courtesy of devoted fans of the series and a select few that have heeded the favorable words of their enthusiast information outlet of choice.

I guess it would be unrealistic to expect new casual gamers who are being drawn in by the affordable price of the console to pick up such an intimidating title and I mean title in every sense of the word, let’s face it ‘Shin Megami Tensei: Persona 3’ isn’t exactly appealing to a new gamer.

Then again there’s still a sizeable amount of gamers who are still on the fence on what ‘next-gen’ console to buy, I really should stop using the phrase ‘next-gen’ to refer to the current generation of consoles, the word is a bit redundant, we all know they are the next generation but I guess it won’t die out until the previous generation of consoles are no longer viable, lucky for the phrase the PS2 is clinging on for dear life, you would expect that the majority of these fence dwellers would buy the game, after all, there isn’t much else coming out on the PS2, but it looks like that hasn’t been the case.

Over a year after the Japanese release and around five months after the U.S release European gamers are finally being given the chance to experience one of the best role-playing games of 2007, or 2006 depending on where you live, until now we’ve had to sit in the corner and sulk about the need for simultaneous worldwide release dates and why European gamers get treated so bad, in the paraphrased words of one John Dorian, “Why do they hate us when we show them nothing but love?”, finally we can show our support for the game, but how well will the game do?

A lot of the devoted fans are probably internet savvy enough to have already got their hands on the game, even if some of them utilised less than legal means, tut tut. All that remains are the devotees who have been patiently waiting in foetal position since 2006, the true to their word pirates who “only downloaded it because they couldn’t wait and will buy the game when it comes out to support it”, and maybe some new PS2 adopters looking to broaden their horizons.

The Playstation 3 hasn’t got a lot of games; while the library is expanding with excellent games like Uncharted and Ratchet and Clank leading the charge this 'growing phase' leaves the perfect opportunity to check out any PS2 games that have been foolishly missed, so there’s a lot of potential gamers who could end up picking up a somewhat niche title, then again if you’ve got a 40GB model you’re in trouble.

I’m looking forward to seeing how Europe receives Persona 3, needless to say that I wholeheartedly recommend this game, if you consider yourself a fan of the RPG genre and you don’t pick up this game you are doing yourself an injustice, Persona 3 will be in stores on February 29^th, come on…give it a chance, otherwise I'll start rambling about 'Yakuza' and 'God Hand'...don't make me do that...

Welcome to Paradise City

2008-01-27T17:13:00.000Z

The first triple A title of 2008 has finally been released, Burnout Paradise is out and it is an amazing game, open world, amazing crashes, what more could a man want from his game.
Slice!Gaming has my full review on the game, just click here.

A Tale of Souls and Swords, Eternally Retold

2008-01-26T01:20:00.001Z

Namco Bandai recently announced the return of three Soul Calibur veteran fighters, the nun-chuka user and part-time Elvis impersonator Maxi, ranged staff user Seong-Mina and Yun-Seong (also known as "Isn't that just Hworang from Tekken with a blade?").
Obviously not as exciting as their earlier announcement about Darth Vader and Yoda but still noteworthy. I can't say that I've played with Seong-Mina long enough to form an opinion, but Yun-Seong and Maxi are two characters that I have spent copious amounts of time mastering. Maxi is one of the most frustrating and psychologically devastating characters to square up against, his attacks are very quick and his movements are extremely hard to read, especially when you're under pressure, skilled players can string together crushing combos that will leave any unprepared player babbling like a confused baby.
Yun-Seong is a very fun character to play, he has alot of fakes and is able to string together juggling combos.
As you can tell I am dying to play Soul Calibur 4, so much so in fact that I'm going to pay Soul Calibur 2 now.

Slice Gaming

2008-01-24T18:12:00.000Z

Good news everyone! (It is really hard to do a Farnsworth impression in text format), I have been lucky enough to be involved with the launch of a new UK based gaming website, although the site is still getting on its feet I have confidence in what it will become.
So if I'm not posting regularly it might be because I'm working on the site, either that or I'm dead, in which case someone please notify my family.
Obviously this site is the greatest site on the internet and every second you spend away is a waste of your lifetime, this statement is bias free and 100% factual.
Head over to www.slicegaming.com

Street Fighter IV playable sooner than you think...

2008-01-24T13:30:00.000Z

Capcom has confirmed that Street Fighter 4 will be playable at the AOU Amusement Expo 2008, this yearly expo is centered around arcade games and will be the host for a playable build of Capcom's hotly anticipated Street Fighter 4.
As well as Street Fighter Capcom will also have fate/unlimited codes and Sengoku BASARA X at the expo but lets face it, Street Fighter is where the lines will form.
Thanks to Kotaku and Famitsu for the heads up on this one.

www.kotaku.com
www.famitsu.com

Devil May Cry 4

2008-01-24T13:04:00.000Z

2008 is set to be a great year, there are a number of very tasty upcoming games, Burnout Paradise, Metal Gear Solid 4, Mario Kart and Smash Bros. to name a few.
One of my most anticipated games is Devil May Cry 4, the one time PS3 exclusive is merely days away from its multi-platform release but like the spoiled gamer brat that I am I want it now, lucky for me Capcom heard my cries for a demo despite the fact that I had a pillow smothering my whimpers of desire, the demo has been released on PSN and Live in Japan and the States but as of yet only on Live in Europe, I'm optimistic that the demo should be out on the European PSN later today since the 360 controller isn't exactly built for use with this type of game.

Zack and Wiki impressions

2008-01-20T18:25:00.000Z

Although the Nintendo Wii is an undeniable success most hardcore gamers feel like Nintendo has turned it's back on them, other than Nintendo's first party titles the Wii game catalog consists mainly of party games, disturbing fish petting simulator and PS2 ports with tacked on motion controls, so its nice to see third party publishers working on something different for the Wii, something that even the hardcore market could enjoy.
One of the most promising third party titles is Zack and Wiki, a adventure puzzle game from Capcom. I got my hands on this game yesterday and although I've only played it for around two hours I am impressed and to a large extent, relieved.
As I said I haven't played the game for too long, and much of this playtime was getting acquainted with the game mechanics, how the game utilizes the Wii controls and getting stuck on one of the puzzles.
The premise is simple and from the short section that I played the story takes a back seat to the gameplay. You take control of Zack and to some extent Wiki, the newest addition to 'The Sea Rabbits', a lovable group of pirates. After being attacked by the Rose Rock pirates you crash land on an Island where, after a short introductory puzzle, you find the trapped remains of Barbaros, a legendary pirate.
Barbaros explains that his remains have been scattered and offers his mythical ship in exchange for Zack's help in putting him back together.
The game puts the Zack into a level and then leaves the player to utilize the contents of the level to solve the puzzles and get the treasure, this is where Wiki comes into use, although the game does have enemies they are mainly used to solve the puzzles, Wiki is able to change into a bell and turn enemies into tools which Zack can use, for example, shaking the Wiki bell while near a frog turns the frog into a frog bomb, using the bell on a centipede transforms the angry bug into a centisaw which can then be used to cut down trees.
Zack and Wiki is one of the few games that uses the Wii remote creatively and accurately, at various points in the game the player is required to use the motion controls to complete the tasks, the game asks the player to think of the Wii remote as a physical representation of the item Zack is interacting with on the screen and handle it as they would in real life, the on screen assistant pops up regularly to show the player what to do, for example when using a crank the Wii remote should be held horizontally with both hands, then, the player should move the controller in a circular motion just like a real crank, when inserting a key into a lock the controller represents the key and is to be rotated as a key would be, much of the motion controls have appeared in other Wii games such as Metroid, Wii play and Wii Sports but the fact that the controls are built into a fully fleshed out game as opposed to a mini-game collection makes it far more satisfying. Although the controls are fun to use there are some aspects that take a little getting used to, the game uses a point click interface to move Zack, clicking on any accessible area of land will make Zack move there but I found myself simply holding the A button then moving the Wiimote to guide Zack, similar to the way Link is controlled in The Phantom Hourglass, in this case the Wiimote acts as the stylus, I won't lie though, at times I found myself wishing I could just plug in the nunchuk and move him around with the analogue stick.
As well as the intuitive and creative controls the games visuals are very pleasing to the eyes, it is done in a very anime style which is appropriate since many of the characters seem as if they are taken straight from an anime , this is especially true of Wiki, the solid colors create a very vibrant world that is a joy look at.
Zack and Wiki are great characters but they I don't expect them to gain the popularity of other duos such as Rachet and Clank or Jak and Daxter, nevertheless they are extremely entertaining to watch, even though they do the same little poses and the animations are repeated they are still fun to watch, much like Link in Zelda.
Although they are great characters Wiki can become extremely annoying after a while especially when you are stuck on a puzzle, the characters don't actually speak instead they make noises to represent speech and convey emotions similar to another great Capcom game, Okami. Wiki seems to have been voiced by a Japanese girl, the flying monkey regularly bursts into squealing fits, for the most part this is cute and endearing but when the same high pitched noises are strung together in succession it can become a bit annoying.
This game has let me breath a sigh of relief, for a while there I was starting to resign myself to the fact that the only good games for the Wii would be the established Nintendo games and a few rehashed third party games in between but this game has given me hope in third party development for the Wii, all it takes is some care, consideration and creativity, the three C's for the Wii.
So far I am having a blast with the game, the puzzles are starting to become more difficult but I'm looking forward to delving in deeper into this quirky and creative game, thank you Capcom.

Ninja Destiny

2008-01-18T02:01:00.000Z

I enjoy Naruto, it's a great anime, well, the Japanese version is anyway (Insert arrogant otaku scoff here) but one thing that has been unimpressive so far is the excessive amounts of bad Naruto games, apart from Rise of Ninja for the 360 and the first two Narutimette Hero games the rest of them have all been below average, so you can't blame me for feeling a little sick every time a new Naruto game is announced, the next game in the series is Naruto: Ninja Destiny for the unstoppable Nintendo DS, the game is a 3D fighter, yes you heard me correctly 3D, so far it isn't looking to good, lets hope the gameplay can pull it back
Heres a gameplay video brought to you by the fine folks at www.gametrailers.com, one vaguely exciting aspect is the connection icon at the bottom right of the screen, online play anyone?

I love podcasts

2008-01-16T19:43:00.000Z

I love podcasts, especially gaming podcasts, theres nothing like sitting down and listening to your favorite video game journalists talk about news, what they have been playing, or sex on a couch with the PS3 running in the background (thank you CheapyD), so here I present for you, my favorite podcasts in no particular order;

1. The Hotspot: GameSpot's weekly show, tune in for a recap of the latest happenings in the video game industry, oh and they also take your phone calls and e-mails.
http://uk.gamespot.com/hotspot

2. GSUK: Fortnightly podcast from the Gamespot UK team, pretty much the same deal as the Hotspot but focusing on the UK.
' Welcome to the GameSpot UK Podcast, our regular audio show in which we recap the biggest news and trends in the gaming industry over the past couple of weeks and talk to people in the industry about what’s happening in their world.'
http://uk.gamespot.com/pages/features/ukpodcast/index.php

3. Kojima Pro Podcast: The Kojima Productions podcast hosted by Ryan Payton is a must listen for any Metal Gear fan, with interviews, regular guest presenters and if your lucky some exclusive news about MGS.
http://mp.i-revo.jp/user.php/kp-ryan/

4. Cheap Ass Gamer: Tune in to hear the opinions of a large white guy in Japan and a professional game blogger. CheapyD and Wombat keep me entertained on a weekly basis and they can keep you entertained too simply by clicking http://www.cheapassgamer.com/

5. Major Nelson: Xbox lives Larry Hryb a.k.a Major Nelson and E spend an hour or so of their precious time to keep us updated on all things Xbox.
http://www.majornelson.com/

6. 1up yours: 'the premier videogames podcast where hosts Garnett Lee, Shane Bettenhausen and John Davison report on the videogame industry and the community that surrounds it', or thats what they say, I agree.
http://www.1up.com/do/feature?cId=3149993

7.EGM Live: The companion to Electronic Gaming Monthly magazine, featuring an assortment of 1up Ziff Davis favorites.
http://www.1up.com/do/feature?cId=3149975

Assassins Creed

2008-01-15T20:46:00.000Z

Opinion has been divided about Assassins Creed, you could say it's the Marmite of video games, you either love it or you hate it. Although I've always had my opinions on the game I decided to keep them to myself until I completed the game, this was mainly because I heard from a number of places that you have to take the complete package into account before formulating an opinion on it, the ending has a substantial impact on the game 'apparently', I say apparently because I haven't actually completed the game yet, and I can't see myself doing it in the immediate future.
Like many other people I was incredibly excited for Assassins Creed, I'll admit it I was a complete sucker for it, the parkour, the amazing visual design and art style, hell, even the futuristic aspect that permeated the trailers intrigued me to no end, so when the game was finally released I forked over my hard earned money, rushed home and gave it to my PS3 to devour. The first hour and a half of the game was video gaming bliss, it was a beautiful game, the visual style had me tingling even though it was being done an injustice by being played on a widescreen CRT with distorted colour thanks to a family member walking by it with a magnet.
After spending over half an hour diving from rooftop to rooftop effortlessly, and realistically moving among the inhabitants of the city and scaling the detailed and historically accurate architecture of the city i decided to actually get on with the game, after the introductory fall of Altair i was let loose into the city to gather information and assassinate my first target, climbing the different viewpoints i stopped to marvel at the draw distance and amazing structure of the city, then launched myself into a graceful fall animation.
From there it just got better and better, my next task was to pickpocket some information, it was simple, press L1 to lock on, tail him and then press circle when i was close enough to yank the information from the unwitting chump, the animations of Altair, the target and all the citizens made the simplicity of the gameplay far more enjoyable.
Next up was the interrogation, again, very simple, lock on, tail him and then beat the information out of him. The actual assassination was amazing, I scaled the rooftops to the target, mingled in with the crowd and then took him out like a real assassin would, it was very satisfying, Ubisoft nailed making the player feel like a badass ninja assassin.
From there it was a downhill experience, after the initial high wore of I began to notice things I wished I didn't, most noticeably the mission structures were all the same, there was absolutely no variety, you were forced to the same tasks over and over and over again.
Then the inhabitants started to feel artificial, all the beggars kept repeating the same dialog in the same annoying overly aggressive voice, they were remarkably loud and lively for beggars, while the mentally challenged citizens added character to the city they started to hinder the gameplay, it was impossible to walk passed them without attracting the attention of all the nearby guards, while this didn't mean much in a large portion of the game early on, in the latter areas where you are constantly being watched these troubled citizens would often cause me to fail my mission, many of the inhabitants would react the same way with the same dialog, while it might be unreasonable to expect Ubisoft to record hundreds of different lines of dialog for each citizen a little bit of variety would have been nice, it just seemed out of place, a last-gen limitation in a next-gen game.
As the game went on I found myself caring less and less about Altair, this was in contrast to Desmond who I never really cared about from the start, I couldn't understand why i didn't care about this amazingly rendered badass character, he was an assassin who used parkour and had all the qualities of your cool anti-hero, he should be right up there with Snake, Samus, Ken and all my other favorite gaming characters but i just didn't care, then I realised what it was, his voice, Altair's voice acting was very unimpressive, he said the words but he was emotionless, there was no anger, no sadness, nothing, no life, just a bland neutral tone throughout the game, he was a lifeless character in a city bursting with character and life, this made it almost impossible to connect with Altair.
The story-line in the game was very uninspired, which is one of the most disappointing aspects of the game, the premise is very intriguing, the location is unique and with the futuristic aspect included the possibilities were endless, but what it turned out to be was a run of the mill predictable story, I had barely done my second assassination when I had already figured out that Al-Mualim was going to end up on the sharp end of my blade, this meant that after a certain point I was playing the game only to complete it and feel like i had got something for my money, I was simply going through the game just to see the ending and get closure, it could be argued that my lack of patience contributed to my enjoyment of the game, or lack thereof but I am a patient person, especially when it comes to games, I've played through all the Splinter Cell games, the Metal Gear Solid games, and a number of other games which require patience before the payoff, but this I couldn't take, I just wanted to complete it so I could see the ending, as a result the different features of the game started to become obstacles which I just couldn't enjoy, the already weak combat gameplay became even more annoying due to the fact that the guards were extra vigilant and the placement of the sentries rendered the rooftop huts useless for escaping the guards, the only option the game gave was to fight, the fighting boiled down to 2 buttons, hold R1 to block and then press square as the enemy began their attack animation, the simplicity sucked all the gratification out of the impressive attack animations and brutal kills, the parkour aspects of the game are just as simple, all you are required to do is press hold R1 to run then press X to jump, the depth and fun is in guiding Altair, jumping in the right directions then moving him to the scalable areas of the buildings, in comparison the combat had no other layers and therefore no depth at all, the combat has been described as a very simple rhythm game game, attack then follow up the attack when the sword makes contact with the enemy but this could have been implemented in a much better and deliberate way.
The AI of the enemies is extremely poor, especially when every other aspect of the game is so realistic, the enemies simply wait their turn and it can be up to 10 seconds before one decides to attack.
The game became a struggle and I found myself becoming frustrated and annoyed as I continued to play, the last few assassinations consisted of informant missions, fellow Assassins wanting Altair to dispatch with some pursuers, these missions were extremely frustrating thanks to the abundance of suspicious guards standing between you and your target, the mentally challenged citizens and the guards remarkable ability to move just like Altair around the city (these parkour trained guards made Altair feel very ordinary).
Eventually I gave up, and every time I go back to complete the game I find myself going through the same emotions and just turning the game off before i loose my cool, my PS3 doesn't deserve to be punished for something it hasn't done.
So how do I feel about Assassins Creed, one of the biggest games of 2007, after writing at length about why I found myself frustrated at the game you'd think I would be preaching my dislike for the game like a disciple of Salahuddeen making his opinions about the Templars known, but I think this game gets a number of things right and would go so far as to say it is a game that has helped the games industry take a step forward, it has raised the bar for games in a number of fields, graphically it is one of the most impressive games not only of 2007 but it surpasses many of the games scheduled for a 2008 release, the detailed textures both on the character models and the cities as well as the amazing draw distance make this game very aesthetically pleasing.
The animations are breathtaking, along with the extremely detailed character models they breathe life into the game, each character is given substance and a physical influence on the world around them, Altair and the citizens all react realistically to each other and external stimuli, the attention to detail is astounding.
While the storyline is predictable, it takes place in a unique setting, a welcome change from a war torn Earth invaded by aliens.
If I had to sum up Assassins Creed in a few words, I think I go with, 'Assassins Creed is a great interactive tech-demo showcasing the power of next generation gaming', it makes me excited for the future of video gaming and who knows maybe I'll complete it one day.

Delays, delays, delays...

2008-01-15T13:56:00.000Z

I love my wii, it's small, pretty and has Mario but it would seem my Wii doesn't love me back, so far i have only played Mario, Zelda and Metroid on it, there are no other good games for the system, sure there is the tidal wave of casual game and movie adaptations but lets face it, they suck lemons.
For me and many other 'hardcore' games enthusiasts Smash Bros Brawl is the light at the end of the old people and alpha mum filled tunnel but it seems Nintendo is not done with telling us it doesn't care about what we want, Smash Bros will be delayed until January 31st for Japan and March 9th for North America, expect the European version a little bit after that.
What the hell am i supposed to do with the thing now...

Resistance 2

2008-01-14T21:56:00.000Z

The PS3 is being constantly criticised for its lack of games, but what it lacks in quantity it makes up for in quality, Resistance Fall of Man is one of the best rated Playstation 3 exclusive games, it boasts impressive high definition graphics, fun first-person shooter gameplay and a story and character you actually care about.
Fans of Resistance will be happy to hear that the Insomniac team are now working on Resistance: Fall of Man 2 (do these people ever sleep?), the game will have a single player campaign as well as a separate co-op campaign, 60 player online play and number of character classes, colour me excited.

Soul Calibur + Star Wars = AWESOME!

2008-01-10T13:33:00.000Z

I'm going to keep it short and sweet, Soul Calibur 4, Darth Vader, Yoda, video, gamevideos.com

A tale of swords and souls.....................and the force?

2008-01-09T23:34:00.000Z

Soul Calibur has established itself as one of the best fighters on any console, over the years since the mind blowing Dreamcast version of Soul Calibur the games have just been getting better and better (with the exception of the abomination that is Soul Calibur: Legends), so my question to you is, how do you make a perfect game better?

The answer it would seem, is to throw it into a blender with Star Wars and create a Soul Calibur Star Wars milkshake....

Follow the link to the 1up exclusive story for more information.
http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3165334

Metal Gear Solid 4 on the XBOX 360?

2008-01-08T19:53:00.000Z

If you have been keeping an eye on any gaming forums or blogs you will have noticed that once again the immortal MGS4 on the 360 rumor returned like a born again messiah, despite being confirmed as a fake almost instantly by Konami the rumor lives on, if you need proof of its exclusivity, Sony had it at CES.
It clearly says 'Exclusive for the Playstation 3 supporting the new Dual Shock 3 controller'.
I give it a month before the rumor re-surfaces, i hope it comes with one of those funny fanboy insult pictures this time though...

Late to the party.!

2008-01-05T02:10:00.000Z

2007 is now in the past and we have all moved swiftly onto 2008, and in the spirit of the new year i think i should do the obligatory 'Game of the year' post, so, here it goes.

Nominees:

1. Super Mario Galaxy: This game was a breath of fresh air and a return to form for everyones favorite podgy plumber. The game was cleverly split up into bite-size planets, each with its own theme, essentially each little planet formed a mini-game which meant you could collect one or two stars and go, or play all day and collect every single shiny star and get a special treat at the end.

2. The Orange Box: This package packs a punch (say that 20 times really fast, go on..), comprised of 5 games including the much loved Half-Life 2 and its two follow up chapters (Episode 1 and 2), the mind-bending Portal and the aesthetically pleasing and dangerously addictive Team Fortress 2, as well as being pure value for money Portal and Team Fortress 2 alone could stand as Game of the Year candidates, with deep, addictive and thoroughly entertaining gameplay the Orange Box will be remembered for years to come, and not just for its horrible box art.

3. God of War 2: This game is pure, visceral, testosterone fueled chaos, picking up where God Of War left of Kratos, the newly crowned God of War must defend himself against Zeus, with an amazing story, tried and true gameplay and the most intense interactive cut-scenes this side of Heavenly Sword God Of War 2 is easily one of the best PS2 games made.

Third Strike

2008-01-04T23:30:00.000Z

The Street Fighter posts just keep coming, those fine folks at Ziff Davis have yet ANOTHER part to their in depth interview with Yoshinori Ono, in this third video the team discuss what platforms Street Fighter 4 is likely to appear on, customisation and online play......did he say DS?

Tap forward to parry?

2008-01-03T21:31:00.000Z

Street Fighter 3 stands as one of the most technical fighting games ever created, with devastating combos and a simple but hard to master parrying system it's technicality and deep fighting system has earned it a permanent staple of fighting game tournaments, so what does Street Fighter 4 have to offer in terms of technicality, will the new revenge system preserve the rewarding, balanced gameplay of Street Fighter 3 or will it opt to go the way of the Guilty Gear?
Find out in the next part of GameVideos, 1up, EGM interview, enjoy!

Street Fighter IV

2008-01-03T13:18:00.000Z

Unless you are blind, deaf and have no internet access (...In which case how did you get here and what do you want...) you've probably heard the recent announcement about Capcom's much loved Street Fighter series, Street Fighter IV (thats 4 for all of you that don't know your roman numerals) is currently in development for at the very least arcades, although a console release has not yet been announced an XBOX 360 and PS3 release is very likely. In this generation of high definition gaming its hard to imagine a 2D fighting game gaining popularity, even if it is Street Fighter. With games like Virtua Fighter, Tekken and Soul Calibur pushing the 3D fighting genre to amazing heights what place does a 2D fighting game have within this dying genre of games, well, lucky for you GameVideos (www.gamevideos.com) has been fortunate enough to interview veteran Capcom developer Yoshinori Ono and get the answers to some very important questions important questions.

XBOX Live has a Christmas fever

2007-12-31T02:35:00.000Z

My plans to have a solid hour of Call of Duty were thrown out the window thanks to the as of now, unstable xbox live service, I have had numerous problems including, not being able to sign into live, signing in but not having any of the blades load, and lastly a broken matchmaking service, in COD4 the matchmaking is unable to fill the player slots needed or balance the teams, instead it repeatedly drops players and then replaces them in an endless loop of doom.

Xbox lives Major Nelson a.k.a Larry Hyrb has come forward and said;

'You may have noticed that the LIVE service has been having a few issues over the past few days. This includes things like signing in, matchmaking and account recovery. Not everyone has had problems, but I know some of you have and I wanted to give you and update. While the service was never completely offline, problems like this are not acceptable. The entire LIVE team has been working day and night to ensure that you can have a great LIVE experience. While we’re not done yet, I wanted to let you know that things are getting better each hour and that no one on the team is going anywhere until the job is done. Thanks for your patience.'

Good to see they're working on it.