Motorized Offensive Battle Attack Tank

2008-11-25T09:47:00.000-08:00

With the price drop on the Xbox 360 many of my friends have picked them up. With that in mind three years has passed since its launch and many of great games have come and gone. With this seasons block busters emptying our wallets I thought writing a quick note about great games you can now pick up at very low prices.

BioShock - First person Shooter - $29.99 - Score 96
Great shooter with an enticing story and beautiful graphics. I really cannot say enough about this game, just get it and enjoy it.

The Orange Box - First Person Shooter - $19.99 - Score 96
Bang for buck you do not get much better then this. The second halflife and its first episode also includes team fortess 2 and the now epic Portal game. Not including multiplayer this is easily 20 hours of great gaming.

Dead Rising - Third Person Melee - $19.99 - Score 85
Have you ever watched a zombie movie that the survivors are stuck in a mall trying to live through the apocolypse? Well of course you have and this game encompass's the idea entirely. This was one of the reason I bought a 360 and it lived up to all my expectations. A must have for any 360 owner, will give plenty of hours in game play with multiple endings.

Crackdown - Third Person Shooter - $12.99 used - Score 83
Ever thought about being on the good side in grand theft auto? The lone police officer doing anything he to keep orgonized crime from controlling his city. Well her you go and a nice touch would be the human enhancements that allow you to jump over buildings and throw cars.

The Darkness - First Person Shooter - $17.99 used - Score 82
This shooter gives you mystical dark powers that help you fight for revenge. The game has a twisted story line that takes you to hell and back. Strangley many people who played it found a ton of enjoyment just poking out street lights, if you try the game you will understand.

Assasins Creed - Thrid Person Melee - $29.99 - Score 81
This company built a machine unlocking your DNA to reveal your ancestors memorys, alrighty then. But on better note this is a game for this who enjoy sneakign around and striking foes with out wanring and after disapaiting into the crowd. The enviroment is semi sand box with open citys, plenty of this to do from pick pocketing to removing and unjust leader.

Condemned: Criminal Origins - Mystery - $12.99 used - Score 81
Your a detective trying to catch a serial killer only to enravel a larger plot. If you want something to keep you on the edge of your seat and a prefrence to keep the lights on when you play this is the game for you. While the fighting is in first person I personally would not classify this as a shooter or a melee. Since the majority of what you do is analize crimes and clues to figure out whats going on.

Lego Starwars: Complete Saga - Platformer - $19.99 - Score 80
When you get to freely use the force and light sabers it can only be a good thing. Not to mention the violence is masked by simply having the legos break apart. Fun for all ages and appropriate to play in front of children.

Lost Planet - Third Person Shooter - $29.99 - Score 79
Mechs, Snow, and giant aliens three of my favorite things. A story worth following and plenty of action. If your into multiplayer there is much to be had with this one.

With that I will bring my list to a close, all of these games can be picked up very cheap used on ebay. But I included links if you prefer that new game smell.

2008-03-24T09:28:00.000-07:00

Games I have completed

Xbox 360:
Ace Combat 6
Armored Core 4
Army of Two
Assassins Creed
Battlefield: Bad Company
Battlefield 2: Modern Combat
Beautiful Katamari
Beowulf
Bioshock
Blacksite
Battlefield 2: Modern Combat
Blazing Angels
Brothers in Arms: Hells Highway
Bullet Witch
Cabela's African Safari
Cabela's Big Game Hunter
Cabela's Trophy Bucks
Call of Duty 2
Call of Duty 3
Call of Duty 4
Call of Jaurez
Cars
Cars: Mater-National
Civil War
Clive Barkers Jericho
Conan
Condemned: Criminal Origins
Condemned 2: Bloodshot
Conflict: Denied Ops
Crackdown
CSI-Hard Evidence
Darkness
Dark Sector
Dead Rising
Devil May Cry 4
Dirt
Earth Defense Force 2017
Enemy Territory: Quake Wars
Eragon
Fallout 3
Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer
Fracture
Front Lines: Fuels of War
Full Auto
Gears of War
Ghost Recon: Advanced War Fighter
Ghost Recon: Advanced War Fighter 2
Grand Theft Auto IV
Half Life 2
Half Life 2: Episode 1
Half Life 2: Episode 2
Halo 3
Hellboy: The Science of Evil
Hour of Victory
Iron Man
Jumper
Just Cause
Kameo: Elements of Power
Kane & Lynch: Dead Men
King Kong
Kung Fu Panda
Lego Indiana Jones
Lego Star Wars 2
Lego Star Wars Complete Saga
Lost Planet
Lost Via Domus
Marvel Ultimate Alliance
Mass Effect
Medal of Honor: Airborne
Nighty Nine Nights
Ninja Gaiden 2
Open Season
Overlord
Prey
Project Sylpheed
Quake 4
Rainbow Six Vegas
Rayman Raving Rabbits
Shrek the Third
Silent Hill Homecoming
Solider of Fortune: Payback
Sonic the Hedge Hog
Spiderman 3
Spiderman: Friend or Foe
Splinter Cell: Double Agent
Stranglehold
Superman Returns
Tales of Vesperia
Tenchu Z
The Club
The Force Unleashed
The Golden Compass
The Incredible Hulk
The Simpsons Game
Time Shift
TMNT
Tony Hawks American Wasteland
Too Human
Turning Point: Fall of Liberty
Turok
Viking
X-men 3

NES:
Bionic Commando
Contra (with code)
Crystalis
Final Fantasy
Maniac Mansion
Rescue Rangers
Starwars
Super Mario Bros.
Super Mario Bros. 2
Super Mario Bros. 3

SNES:
Super Mario World

Nintendo 64:
Mariokart 64
Starwars Episode 1: Racer
Turok
Zelda: Majoras Mask

Nintendo Game Cube:
Dance Dance Revolution: Mario Mix
Luigi's Mansion
Pokemon Collosium
PN.03
Resident Evil 4
Samurai Jack: Shadow of Aku
Soul Caliber
Tales of Symphoney
X-men: Next Dimension
Zelda: Wind Waker

Nintendo Wii:
Call of Duty 3
Excite Truck
Legend of Zelda: The Twilight Princess
Rampage: Total Destruction
Trauma Center: Second Opinion

GameBoy Advance:
Mario vs Donkey Kong
Metroid Zero Mission
Pokemon LeafGreen
Pokemon Sapphire
Super Mario Advanced
Super Mario Advanced 4
Tales of Phantasia
Zelda: Minish Cap

Nintendo DS:
Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrows
Mario and Luigi: Partners in time
Mario Kart DS
New * Super Mario Bros
Pokemon Pearl

Playstaion 2:
Evil Dead: A Fist Full of Boomstick
Evil Dead: Regeneration
Final Fantasy VII: Dirge of Cerberus
Futurama
God of War
Guitar Hero
Guitar Hero 2
Guitar Hero Encore: Rock the 80's
Gun Grave
Karaoke Revolution
Predator: Concrete Jungle
Psychonauts
Samurai Western
Teen Titans

Playstation Portable:
Burnout Legends
Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories
Lego Star wars 2: Original Trilogy
Loco Roco
Ratchet and Clank: Size Matters
Scarface: The world is not enough
Tales of Eternia
The God Father: Mob Wars
Valkyrie Profile Lenneth

Xbox:
Halo
Halo 2

Dreamcast:
Berserk

PC:
Aliens vs Predator
Aliens vs Predator 2
Area 51
Call of Duty
Call of Duty 2
Call of Juarez
Crimson Skies
Dues Ex
Duke Nukem
Doom
Doom 2
Doom 3
Farcry
Gun
Half Life
Half Life 2
Half Life 2: Episode 1
Half Life 2: Episode 2
Half Life Opposing Force
Land of the Dead
Medal of Honor
No One Lives Forever
Portal
Quake
Quake 2
Quake 4
Red Faction
Redneck Rampage
Return to Castle Wolfensiten
Serious Sam
Serious Sam: The second encounter
Starship Troopers
Star wars: Dark Forces
Star wars: Xwing
Star wars: Tie Fighter
Tron 2.0
The Punisher
Will Rock

Arcade:
Bionic Commando
Super Mario bros 3

2008-01-13T08:17:00.000-08:00

Overlord – Completed

It is hard for me to classify this game, I will go with “Third person RTS”. You start out in a third person view of your “overlord” and collect minions. The minions are at your will and command, they can be controlled manually by the right stick or sent off to attack using the right trigger. The minions you collect through out the game are of four different types: Brown (normal), Red (fire), Blue (water), and Green (Poison). Each ahs there own abilities including resistance to the elements there color reflects. Sadly all but blue will drown themselves if you take a wrong turn towards water and ton realize this. Early in the game the inform you that your minions will happily sacrifice themselves for you, but something tells me I should be able instruct them to not mass suicide into water.

A not so unique feature in this game is the ability to make moral choice. Now don’t get me wrong we will slaughter hordes of Halflings, Dwarfs, and unicorns. But you accidentally kill a single human peasant and suddenly you are corrupt! Not sure what the message they are attempting to convey is, but its clear anything but human should be slated for genocide.

While in the game a small portion is centered on recovering smelters that will allow you to make more powerful armor. Now to me this is a great idea to advance your abilities since up to this point all you got was more and more minions. After recovering the lesser of all smelters I went to make armor only to find out for it to be upgraded properly would require me to spend a few hours farming minions. This is a single player game that promotes farming, Blizzard send this people a cease and desist for there gold farming trainer!

Game to me was 6 out of 10. The game definitely had awkward ideas when it came to being programmed and the concepts of corruption. But graphics were not to shabby, yet story was fairly weak.

2008-01-05T08:08:00.000-08:00

Kameo – Completed

There was actually a learning curve when it came to this game. All of your actions are done with the shoulder buttons on the controller and to switch between elements were the normal buttons. I often found myself switching elements rather then executing an attack, it got annoying pretty quickly.

The game centers around a fairy type culture and the elemental creatures they control. When enabled you essentially turn into that elements creature and have full use of there power. As you go through the game you find exactly what you need to move on (imagine that). The kingdom you live in was invaded by a evil troll who killed your father and kidnapped your family. At this point it’s a basic plat former that takes you through stages in order to recover the elements and defeat the troll.

Game for me was 6 out of 10. It was fun and colorful, yet could be frustrating at time trying to figure out which element to use next and in what situations. That concept coupled with the odd controls did not leave me with the best impression.

2008-01-02T07:28:00.000-08:00

Assassins Creed – Completed

When first gazing upon the white clad individual slowly pushing himself through a crowd, then breaks into a sprint jumps through the air landing squarely on his targets chest ejecting a blade from his palm. Well let’s just say it made me giggle. Not to be a huge spoiler since this happens in the first 5 minutes, but this game does not take place in the dark ages. It takes place in a machine that essential unlocks your family history from your DNA. To me this is a great concept in which many games in the future could use. My thought is it takes away the realism, because you are playing someone who is essential playing a game. Also sets the basis for knowing you’re in an unrealistic environment. Let’s see a judge not laugh when some kid goes crazy and blames it on assassins creed, it would just be silly (not to mention don’t bring a knife to a gun fight har har har).

This game has some really great features which I hope to briefly touch on most of them. First off is the combat system, you have many options such as ranged throwing knives, stealth kills with palm blade, sword attacks that include counter attacks. One thing I would like to point out is combo attacks really suck. The system for them seems so flawed compared to the ease of use in the rest of the game. It occurred to me that perhaps the attacks might be more difficult since they are a killing blow. But honestly every other attack including single button pushes for stealth and ranged kills are also killing blows. The idea is that when your sword clanks another’s you press the attack button again. This initiates a killing blow to your opponent and is easy enough to do in practice, but very frustrating in a real fight.

Now if you get frustrated with games that wont let you jump on a dumpster because its “just to high” aka the programmer cant set environment limits creatively. This game will be a blessing and a curse. You can run up walls and if there is the slightest edge you will be able to hang on. You can and will climb builds to be able to see the span of the city. It’s almost like playing a sandbox super hero game, leaping from roof tops and such (can someone please make a Tick mod?!!?). But then you go on and play other games and there seems to be a 2x4 in your way which disables your ability to move forward. Makes you think back to the good ol days of being all terrain in AC.

Game was 8 out of 10 for me. Graphics are awesome, achievements are a challenge but not overly tedious (at least the ones I got). But the game is repetitive, only have a few different scenarios which to play out (pickpocket, eves drop, kill someone, save a citizen).

2007-12-23T21:58:00.000-08:00

Call of Duty 4 – Completed

How is it a World War II based FPS can storm the market with something new and unique? There answer is COD4, from what I can tell much of the population agrees. To a few this would be the new substitution for counter-strike. But one can only wait to see if it stands the test of time.

The game has normal terrorist plot with more immersion then you would generally expect. After the first level there is a cut scene that allows you to move your head around and nothing else, ending with your execution. At first this disturbed me a touch, yet when I realized this is how the game was making connect it made much more sense. You understand the capacity of evil the people you are hunting are capable of. After which you really tune into stopping them.

I have one major complaint about the controls and that is the run button. By pressing the left stick forward and down you would run. Sounds simple enough yet any slight deviation and it seemed to click off. In the hours I attempted to get through the training course in 20 seconds I found that not being able to control when and how I ran was my downfall. It was fairly frustrating, luckily it is not required use in the normal single player campaign.

The game is 9 out of 10. Honestly it was not really long, yet pretty enjoyable. Veteran difficulty seems nearly impossible and would definitely kill the majority of the enjoyment you would get from the game.

2007-12-18T23:47:00.000-08:00

Tony Hawks American Wasteland - Completed

Since THPS3 came out I have had a positive disposition towards skate boarding games. Personally I really do think I suck at the games, but after playing American wasteland I felt the training it gives you a better grasp on how to control your skater. This is in some essence a role playing game. Has a decent story line and even invokes small amounts of emotion. Pretty odd for a skating game don’t you think?

The levels are diverse and put together fairly well. I did find in that in classic mode some of the objectives were explain so vaguely that is seemed impossible to complete them. This was more common in the flip over object objectives. It shows the object and tells you the trick, yet seems that you need to be in the perfect spot in order to correctly execute the move and get credit for it. I was unable to completed classic mode 100% due to this issue. For sometime I did have troubles with the high score and combo portions of the game. I found if you switch to your feet and start flipping it adds to the multiplier and you can jump right back on to a rail and continue gaining points. At this point I was easily able to finish off all the scoring modes with little issue.

For me the game was 8 out of 10. I really did enjoy it, the story mode is not so rigorous to drive you off and the controls were mapped very well. After playing Tenchu it was great to have so many different environments to be involved in.

2007-12-12T20:20:00.000-08:00

Rayman Raving Rabbits - Completed

After playing this on the Wii I was pretty reluctant to try on the 360. The Wii control scheme was not very stable and I assumed that it was the programming not the input. But strangely enough on a regular controller the game is made unbelievable easier. No more concern about moving your left hand too late with the Wii mote, since you just use the left and right buttons on the 360 controller. Having the ability to make a steady rotation and throw the cow farther then I was ever able to on the Wii. Now don’t get me wrong this game is still kind of crap. A boat load of mini games and somewhat fun FPS sequences, yet still seems to be lacking content. There does not seem to be and pure party mode to allow you and four friends to wreck havoc when drunk. The single player includes one game that’s the same for all 15 level and you end up repeating the majority of the games with increased difficulty. Which bring me to the point of the door closing game, if I find the man responsible for that game so help me I shall slam a door in his face repeatedly!

For me the game was really 5 out of 10. Nothing new and improved about it, mini games from Mario party were more engaging. The only real fun part was shooting stuff with plungers, everything else seemed like work.

2007-12-11T19:36:00.000-08:00

Rainbow Six: Vegas – Completed

This was a pretty decent squad based shooter. There were points in which I wanted to throw something at the TV, yet it was much more playable the solider of fortune. The story is solid and the environments are wonderful, add in the balanced well done controls and it’s easy to understand the positive reviews on this game.

To me there is not a whole lot to say about it, if you have played Rainbow Six or Ghost recon in the past you already have a good idea of the game play. The biggest difference would be an update in graphics and AI. Both of those aspects hit home this latest installment. I do recommend giving it a try. Fair warning if you us the Camera to make your own character, mine came out bald! Anyone who knows me is well aware that is not the case!

Easy 8 out of 10, playable, looks good, solid plot. Does leave you hanging in the end and seems nearly impossible to get into a multiplayer game.

2007-12-07T23:32:00.000-08:00

Tenchu Z - Completed

Ben played this and seemed to enjoy it, when I ran out of other things to rent I thought I would give it a go. The premise is fairly simple, you’re a ninja and need to kill people or steal items. Think of a PSX version of assassin creed, which would be a fairly good interpretation of the game. Graphically the game is nothing stellar, and the environments at first are in-depth and intriguing. Then you realize that they reuse the same ones over and over, making the game extremely repetitive.

Not being much for sneaking games I assumed that I would lose interest quickly. Strangely enough I started to enjoy it more and more, not to the point where Ill go play Splinter cell or Metal gear. But for one of the first times in gaming I felt the basis for sneaking around was done very well. This could also have something to do with the environments allowing you to take many different approaches to each situation. If you die you know there is multitude of other possibilities to successfully navigate the level. The other dynamic of sneaking was how to kill. If someone spotted you the battle would ensue mimicking street fighter. But if you were able to sneak on them it would allow a single button kill.

For me the game was 6 out of 10. Though I did enjoy it, the biggest fault was the scoring system. In my opinion if I can make it in and out of the level with the single kill of my target and not alerting anyone. That should be a high level ninja ranking. But its not, you get so many points for kills and how you kill. Being extremely stealthy does not earn you points, but getting spotted detracts points. Not a balanced system in my eyes.

2007-12-03T21:26:00.000-08:00

Blazing Angels – Completed

This game was one of the first few I got for my 360. It suffers pretty seriously from a lack of direction. When on a mission you have only an incline as to what to do and hope the objective is clear. In one mission you need to destroy and airport, meanwhile your bombers are constantly crying for help. So you go and shoot down the planes chasing them only to fail the mission. When all along the only thing you needed to do was destroy the anti-air units on the ground. Also some of the mission require you to fly canyons or low and on a path, then they give you a time limit. This resulted in my plane being pasted many times into walls and the ground, it also almost resulted in a controller going through the TV.

Each mission preselects your plane and payload, this gives you little room to strategize. You do not have the option of missiles vs. bombs (getting the idea you should play ace combat 6 instead?) making some ground attack stages incredibly hard when a simple payload of bombs would allow you to do your job with little difficulty. The missiles are not homing (it is World War II) in essence they are pretty useless.

The game for me is 5 out of 10, graphics are not bad, controls kind of suck, story is World War II so nothing new there, and the achievements are out of this world difficult to get. After a good 5 hours of game play I got a single achievement and was at least two hours away form a second one.

2007-12-02T21:25:00.000-08:00

Quake 4 – Completed

Now I have played through this once before on PC. Ben had it and I figured I could get some achievements from it. Low and behold this is probably the second FPS on 360 that I would recommend to anyone who asks. Its about eight to nine hours long, that seems to be double the normal for shooters on the 360, has a great story and helps you connect with the characters. There never seems to be a dull moment and of course the great quake weapon selection (BFG anyone).

Seeing as this game came out near the launch of the 360 you would not expect the graphically comparable to other games (but then you realize there’s crap like Kane and Lynch) but in my opinion it is. The human models in this game are second only to half life 2 in my eyes. The game also sports a simple and effective control system. Did I mention the lovely quake weapons?

The game is 9 out of 10 for me. It wasn’t over in 3 hours, has great controls, good graphics, and even though most of the achievements are multiplayer they few you can get make for some interesting game play.

2007-12-01T21:22:00.000-08:00

Time Shift – Completed

Mike T rented this before I got a chance and was generally disappointed. When I went to play it my expectations were not that high. With that mind set I think it allowed me to enjoy the game more. An FPS that gives you the ability to control time in small increments, such as rewinding time, pausing time, and slow motion. The time allotted is based on which one you use, for instance pausing time using more power then putting people into slow motion. Occasionally it will force on type on you for the detected environment. Other times it will allow you to use any at your will. When it does choose it’s usually for a good reason, an example would be getting hit by a sticky grenade. The suit automatically knows to reverse time and let you get out of the way. There are other times when being bombarded by missiles you have to control it manually to effectively dodge attacks. Using the manual control was less then ideal and I think they could have found a better way to do it.

The story is a little thin for my tastes, they give you little to grasp when it comes to the evil power you are fighting. Near the end you actually figure out why you are fighting and in my opinion would have been much more motivating had they told you in the beginning. But then again they may not have cut scenes that way and really a game is only as good as its cut scenes… isn’t it?

Now the absolute best thing about the game is pausing time and walking up to a bad guy. You can then take is weapon and restore time. He is completely dumb founded and starts to cower and of course to can proceed to shoot him or beat him to death. The bewilderment alone made me crack up every time.

Game for me was 6 out of 10. Really only few hours long and most of the achievements are multiplayer. When are developers going to realize that multiplayer achievements only for people to boost stats with there friends, because the majority of the time after a month no one is playing the game. Do they really think they have created the next counter strike?

2007-11-28T21:21:00.000-08:00

Ace Combat 6 – Completed

This is my second take on an ace combat game, the first being the PSP version. Luckily as with most 360 games the controls for this game are great and make it playable. Something I want to get out right now is after finishing this game I was really inclined to keep playing. Now there are some achievements to be had, but honestly the game is fun!

With a great assortment of planes and weapons you can earn it seems like limitless possibilities when going into an encounter. When I finally sat and watched the briefing instead of just trying to destroy everything, well I was much better equipped to handle the battles. The battles have a decent range of air and ground combat. Though at times ground combat can prove to be fairly tedious and the SAM missiles have a tendency to hit you even when you don’t think they are close enough.

Now there is some sort of a story associated with this, I changed a setting and the cut scenes only had subtitles and no voice. Not being able to hear them I would just skip over them. I came to the conclusion they had to do with a girl and some kids. They assist you in the last mission with vital information. Outside of that I can only comment on your wing mans whining through out the game. I really wanted him to STFU, its war deal with it.

Game was a solid 8 out of 10. Fun game play, good graphics, just enough different missions to keep you playing to the end.

2007-11-28T20:08:00.000-08:00

Kane & Lynch – Completed

There are two things I took away from this game, cussing is a corner stone and if you fail once try, try, try again. It seems the staple for the entire dialog is based on the F-word along with some other choice phrases. When it comes to the game play you will fail, often. When you fail the only thing you can do is hope for the best and keep tying, bet you can’t guess how annoying that got.

To top it off aim is annoyingly difficult until you get use to how it works and even then there are times you wonder how skilled the mercenary you are controlling is. At one instance you have to shot the window out of a moving vehicle. You have an MP5 and when you fire more then two bullets the gun raises. It occurs to me that any one with training would be able to maintain the level of control over there weapon for more then two shots. When it came to hitting a small moving object you get the pleasure of trying it many times.

Graphically the game to me almost looks like everything has a clear coat on it, gives it a nice shine. It seems to me that games over two years old were more capable of realism then this. I will admit the modeling and environments were well done and the environment reactions were actually pretty cool. Just had to shoot through the clear coat in order to get it!

The AI is pretty much useless, not to mention Lynch curses you any time you give him an order. The soldiers who fight with you will aim in a general direction and fire, but they lack any precision. Despite your teams lack of abilities the enemies have a pretty deadly aim. They included a small system to swap guns with your guys, since they never seem to run out of ammo like you it was great handing them all SAW’s and watching the hale of gun fire. This would not be a bad feature to see in other games.

Finally you are posed with a moral choice at the end of the game. Nothing to the caliber of BioShock where you hold a small child’s life in your hands. But if you so choose you can play and extra level against decent odds, that is if you were not already sick of the game and wanted to end it or move on and let your friends die. Nice thing about this choice is if you drop back to the save and choose the other path you are able to get the achievement.

Game was 5 out of 10. Guess its worth a rental if you don’t have much else to do, a good portion of the achievements are online, graphics kind of suck, and well the game play with hard aiming sucks.

2007-11-25T22:25:00.000-08:00

Cabela’s Big Game Hunter – Completed

Oh Alas a hunting game I will honestly recommend to anyone, achievement whores or not. If you like shooting shit this is a quick and fun game for it! Its straight forward, has objectives, wants you to win the game, you can spend 6 hours on it for achievements or bust through the entire thing in an hour and a half (At least if you played through it once and know where everything is). Its not nearly as in depth or dynamic as African Safari. Its fairly simple and required some skill to get through the game. It actually has BOSS battles that are tricky! So if you like hunting games I totally recommend it, African Safari will always be number one, but this is a good second place holder to keep you form playing Trophy Bucks or Alaskan Adventures.

For me game is 6 out of 10, its short but fun and I probably would not be playing it if I had something better to do.

2007-11-24T23:24:00.000-08:00

Solider of Fortune: Payback – Completed

The third installment of this FPS, both of its predecessors were very good games. Sad to say the same is not true for this rendition of it. The game graphically is very appealing and it functions fairly well. But sadly it does suffer some issues, first would be the game is short. If you tear through it might be 3 hours long. Secondly the AI is crazy in the game and has a tendency to spawn behind you in sections you have cleared previously. The boss battles seem to be unlike most FPS games. If your fighting a single man he should not be able to take ten 50 cal shots to his body and not perish. The one boss that was functional was in a helicopter that you had to shoot down. When fighting the final level most of the enemies have shot guns and are one shot one kill. If you do not conserve your grenades properly good luck finishing the level. The biggest glitch this game suffers is the check points that are not labeled correctly to tell you how to continue. I spent a good 30 mins online trying to find out how to blow up this concrete barrier because the game didn’t show the explosive position let alone tell me what the objective was. My only suggestion would be to tap B when facing the red check point circles. This was immensely frustrating.

Other then those things the game is fun to play. It was kind of like Conan with tearing of limbs of and the exploding heads. Your mainly fight terrorist organizations in the first few levels and finish off fighting some Germans… I think. The story is pretty thin, yet the commentary can be comical.

Gave is 6 out of 10, want decent graphics and normal shooter then it would be enjoyable. But I would add it to my list of “Play BioShock before this”.

2007-11-24T21:09:00.000-08:00

Conan – Completed

Blood, limb chopping, and boobies is this game in a nutshell. Yet we man hunt 2 gets banned for violence. One of the achievements for this game is to dismember 500 people. This includes head and limb chopping, and even cutting someone in half. In man hunt 2 it shows you strangling someone for a brief moment, but in Conan you tear apart 10 people in a row and save a damsel who’s barely wearing underwear and welcomes your rescue with a provocative comment such as “Crush me with your love”.

But all that is besides the point, the game is a linear hack and slash with a decent plot. Through the game you get runes which allow you to upgrade new moves and chop just a little stronger with your cleaver. First thing that came to my mind was a God of War clone and its not half bad. Graphics are a touch lack luster in comparison to some games, but you get distracted by the nudity enough to not notice.

The game does bring back some epic boss battles with a new feature that I absolutely love. If the boss has 7 phases, there is a check point between each one. If you die you drop back right where you started. None of this Zelda crappy of fighting for an hour to die and have to do it all again. It does make it easier, yet honestly if I beat that part give me the credit for it, makes me no less of a gamer.

For me I did enjoy the game, however I still qualify it 6 out of 10. Not really next gen and a little repetitive. Yet I have no regrets for playing it.

2007-11-23T21:08:00.000-08:00

Clive Barkers Jericho – Completed

I was actually pretty excited to play this game until the poor reviews started coming in. Then I took a step back and decided it might be best to wait and pick it up cheaper later. Ben lent me his extra 360 for the holiday weekend since mine is out for repair. While at his house I got a glimpse of the game along with assassin’s creed. Needless to say Jericho was not even comparable to the beautiful violent game which is assassin’s creed. But since there was nothing else to rent I figured $5 would be worth my time since it is a shooter and well the guy who does “Spikes” voice for cowboy bebop is the main character.

Now the story got me right off the bat, a team built and trained to fight the paranormal (Can you say Hellboy!). Each individual has there unique psychic ability’s much like you find in BioShock or the Darkness. While playing if you find your weapon is under powered or you need a new strategy you just swap to another character and give it another go. Rarely do I feel like I have options while playing through a game and don’t have to use just brute force and hope for the best.

There are a few instances where the UI will just run head first and die in a fight. If you think it through and have a little bit of tact you can utilize them to there full potential. For instance you walk down a long tunnel and at the end these minigun monsters come out of the wood work and destroy your team. But if you tell your team to hold up before the tunnel and run up solo to trigger the event and lead them back the run into a hail of gun fire. By the end of the game I begin to appreciate the squad elements of the game.

One final thing that Ben complained about and I almost have to give praise to, the button mashing sequences. In Jericho when you have to press X is shows on the left side of the screen in the middle and for B it would flash mirrored on the other side of the screen. This made the sequences much easier as you did not need to do as much label or color association as you do in other games. You can easily just judge from the position of the flashing button.

Your welcome to disagree with me, yet I feel this game is an 8 out of 10. Its not BioShock, but I would play it again before halo3 or the darkness.

2007-11-22T20:07:00.000-08:00

Cabela’s Trophy Bucks – Completed

After playing African safari I had fairly high hopes for all the other hunting games that would find there way to 360. Then Alaskan adventures doused my hopes and this game helped very little to change my mind. I am not going to go into a lot of detail because hunting games all have the same premise. Just how it is delivered, Alaskan adventures was confusing and got frustrating. Trophy bucks is very straight forward as to what you need to hunt. But lacks completely on letting you know how you should hunt. Case in point, there is a turkey shooting level. I was unable to get better then a bronze medal because the turkeys become like Sherman tanks once you fire a single shot. I literally had to run up and put the gun to the back of there head to kill them. Please anyone show me turkeys that can with stand a 12 gauge from 20 feet let alone 5.

Another issue I found was with the achievements, if you don’t do them right away there is absolutely no way to go back and work on hunts you failed. This is flawed in my opinion, if a person wants to practice or work on particular hunts they do not have the options.

The game is defiantly 4 out of 10. Some decent achievements that are not terribly hard to get. Expect some stress if you want to 1k it.

2007-11-18T21:05:00.000-08:00

Area 51 – Completed

Time to shoot some aliens and the added bonus, David Duchovny narrates the entire game! The plot is fairly simple, your going to Area 51 to contain an outbreak of some sorts. What ever had been released is turning normal humans into super solider zombies with bad aim and a blood lust.

At first it seems like a squad based shooter and you have little to no interaction with your team mates other then they randomly shoot enemies. Then of course the plot twist kills them all off, luckily its fast enough that you don’t develop an emotional attachment. As the game moves on your character gets infected and has essentially the ability to turn the mutant powers on and off. The mutant powers are fueled by killing, the more you kill the longer the meter stays full. This is a nice feature, yet I found I would barely use it other then to identify invisible enemies or to slow time down if there was an excess of enemies.

The weapons are nothing to get overly excited about. There is one rifle that has regenerating ammo (an energy weapon). When games have this it’s almost a sense of relief because you constantly don’t have to worry about ammo consumption because you always have a backup.

The game for me was 7 out of 10. Some portions felt a little glitchy, but the story was tolerable and the game play was decent.

2007-11-13T21:49:00.000-08:00

Starship Troopers – Completed

This is not really a new game, I just finally got around to getting it and playing it. Being a fan of the movie finding out there was a game really sparked my interest. The nature of the gaming being you get to annihilate numerous amounts of bugs. The game does seem to be true to the story of the movie, including propaganda that includes excerpts from the movie.

First thing I noticed was it ran fairly choppy, being as my machine can run HL2 smooth as slick this annoyed me. After setting all the graphics to low and getting through the first level the game leveled out and was much more playable. Strangely enough I found that it even looked better with the graphics turned down. Also the graphical settings did not affect the look and feel of fighting the bugs. That is if you don’t mind graphics slightly superior to Quake 3.

There is a great weapon selection, everything from a rifle that never runs out of ammo to a nuke launcher. Sadly the nuke launcher was not mobile or used more then once, something about carrying around a WMD gets me all giggly. Ammo is fairly abundant and due to the infinite supply to the base rifle I never felt John McLane’s two bullet frustration. On the final boss I was reduced to using the base rifle since all my rounds were expended getting to him. It was probably the one instance in the game where they did not supply you at all.

If you have an older PC and liked the movie, give the game a try. If you’re more cutting edge graphics then you won’t find it that enjoyable.

I give it 6 out of 10.

2007-11-08T20:47:00.000-08:00

Half life 2 Episode 2 – Completed

At first I did what I could to boycott this game, yet with my 360 out of commission I found I had little to do. Evidently the mass amounts of games and consoles I own could not feed my lust. I broke down and purchased orange box. The new episode was not mind blowing or revolutionary, it was just 4 hours of game play continuing on what we already know. This took them quite sometime to release. I contribute the expenditure of time to marketing and making money. They could lump in portal and TF2 to try and milk us for out money. Then they completely over price the episode, letting the players know they would just be completely stupid for buying any of the individual pieces to save money. Now with your purchase you get a cope of Half life 2 and Episode 1. You can gift these to people for them to play since you purchased them a long time ago and valve wants you to feel like your getting your moneys worth since your just buying two games you already bought. Mine went to a guy in our QA lab, he had never played Half life or Half life 2. Upon reception of the game I felt good about the excitement he felt. Though while waiting for episode 3 I am sure he will curse my name.

Portal – Completed

A new device that could change the face of gaming, yea right go look up “grappling hook” that piece of equipment worked much better when programmers allowed you to use it. Don’t get me wrong portal was cute and entertaining, I still crave cake after playing it. Yet it just seems like a gimmick, now had they let me play through Half life 2 with the device, I probably would have wet myself. But alas you get to listen to the computer which is really intent on ending your existence. The whole game became worth while as I loaded the portal song to my phone as a ring tone. Took me about two hours to beat the normal levels and an hour for the advanced ones.

I have said this before and I do not really enjoy repeating myself, but don’t buy this go buy BioShock. Seriously not worth the cash unless you have never played or do not own Half life 2. Also TF2 is just TF1 with new graphics, I don’t attract to shiny things like most I guess.

2007-10-29T21:35:00.000-07:00

Full Auto – Completed

Back in the day we use to play car wars the card game. Yes it was in fact a card game like poker and what not. One of the only resemblances of reality that came from my numerous outings with the youth group I was in. It consisted of cars with weapons attempting to blow up other cars with weapons. That is my definition of full auto and well you get to race as well. If you like the mixture of above then you might like the game. Right now I don’t think to highly of it due to the fact that there is so much more they could have done.

What would I have liked to see in the game (since I know your asking? First off track variety, I don’t just want to blow up the city, I was to blow up the desert and mountains and so on. What seems like the exact city every time over and over got quite annoying. The other thing is weapons come in sets, why cant I customize to have grenades on the back and a missile in the front. That leads me to my other point, the cars are primarily selected for you. This would be the first and probably last time I would agree with some other games that force you to buy a car and use it. Give it some of your personality and run with.

Finally the career mode is short, you can easily complete it in one evening. There are other modes to play, but after career mode I just did not feel the need to play anymore.

The game was 4 out of 10 for me. I have a copy if you want to borrow it for a few hundred achievement points.

2007-10-28T12:34:00.000-07:00

Superman Returns – Completed

If you’re a gamer like me and you think of Superman, your mind will drift back to the 90’s and memory off the complete disaster Superman 64 is. When this title came up I avoided it like the plague until finding it fairly cheap on eBay. Curious I went to meta critic and saw the score was not disastrously low. By no means game of the year but a few people said it was playable. With the idea that the game is sandbox and you’re able to fly around metropolis, well I opted to pay the $12 and see for myself.

There are plenty of bad reviews out there, this is not going to be one of them. I would prefer to only touch briefly on the bad and focus on the good.

Flying has to be one of the best aspects of the game. You start out slow and can press a button to fly faster, and at some point you break the sound barrier and a sonic boom is emitted. Now when traveling at super sonic speeds the controls are a little squirrely, in my opinion this is as it should be since your flying at 500 mph. At now time did I really feel out of control. The use of powers, cold breath, laser eyes, and blowing giant gusts of wind are easily used and fairly entertaining. The one thing I had hope for that was not included was X-ray vision. Thinking through what the developer would have needed to do in order to have the special vision I can understand why I was left out. Each of the three powers has two different modes, normal and burst. With burst it store up and release the power in a large blow. The concept is sound but I generally found its inaccuracy made it ineffective during the game.

Strangely enough the game has cut scenes that associate it with the movie. I will be honest and say I skipped over all the cut scenes and there never seemed to be anything in the game play that would tie it to the movie, I could be wrong yet I don’t feel the need to go and find out.

If you like sand box super hero games then give it a shot, the game is cheap and fun. I will forewarn you that it is very repetitive. The boss battles make it worth the play.

Give it 7 out of 10, love sandbox super hero games, achievements were challenging with out frustrating me.

2007-10-15T20:37:00.000-07:00

Bullet Witch – Completed

Originally I only gave this game about five minutes of my time (got it from gamefly) and it seemed completely off kilter for a 360 game. At that point I put it back into the sleeve and sent it on its way. Then I realized there were a few achievements to be had and only six levels of game play, Sara was kind enough to loan it to me for two nights and that seemed to be all I needed to finish the game.

To be 100% honest the game is not horrible, just don’t play it after BioShock or even Halo 3 for that matter. Graphically it’s not overly appealing and definitely looks like last generation graphics. Play ability is fine and it has some originality with spell casting. There are two aspects which appealed to me, first the constant firing of weapons against a fair amount of enemies, second the spell casting. Spell casting is a bit weak when it comes to different spell options you have, some are just for extra damage using little mana (not sure if that’s how it is referred to in the game but who cares) and others that do massive damage to a large area and use all your mana. The appeal comes from casting out a tornado into a large group of enemies or summoning meteorites to pummel the ground. It definitely gives the player a sense of power.

In between levels you have a chance to spend skill points collected during the previous levels. They are over priced for the benefit and if playing on normal you will only received maybe three upgrade the entire game, so long as you pick ones worth your while. This annoyed me to no end as it seemed I had little control or understanding of how to get skill points, granted I never put any real effort into figuring it out.

Finally the final boss battle was fun but frustrating, and not because it was hard. Simply because you never knew if you were dealing damage to the correct area of the boss, you receive subtle hints from what ever entity is communicating with you through the game. But even with the hints it never appears you are doing something correct until you have poured 1000’s of rounds into a certain area of the boss.

The game for me was 5 out of 10. Better then gun grave yet just as short. My suggestion would be to avoid spending any money on this game.

2007-10-14T21:25:00.000-07:00

Ratchet and Clank: Size Matters – Completed

This is the first Ratchet and Clank game that I have played, even though I have one for the PS2 I have yet to pop it in and try it. Now it is far and few between that I find a PSP game I would actually tell my friends to play. This would be one of those games.

R&C is a mascot plat former for the play station brand. Think of a Mario game with guns and a giant wrench. The premise of the story is Ratchet is taking a well deserved vacation when a child who wishes to see him in action gets kid napped. He of course being a hero goes into the depths of space in order to save her and of course things are never as they seems. The story is a touch thin but has a sense of humor with out being childish. I really did not care what would happen next, but I was not annoyed either.

The majority of play is spent jumping and shooting like a normal plat former. Though there are occasions where you can race, fight through space as giant clank, mini games that resemble robot wars, and a few other mini games one of which is a lemmings clone. What seemed to give me the most enjoyment was the weapon selection. There have been many of commercials for these games where a few guys are in there front yard playing with one of these weapons, the outcome is pretty entertaining most of the time. The game has over 10 weapons/gadgets to choose from and use. Most of the weapons upgrade through use as well as purchases. The variety ranges from a regular blaster to little robots that fire lasers and missiles. Ammo is plentiful and bolts which is the source of money seem to be fairly accessible.

One of the let downs in this game was the armor. The first set I completed through regular game play and the effects were great, as you walk you leave burn marks and when hitting enemies with your wrench it sets them a flame. This was short lived when I upgraded my armor for protection but was unable to easily complete any of the other sets. In a programmers mind I could see how this would create reply for the game and it almost did for me. But seeing how the armor had to be acquired (via walk through) appeared to be more work then fun.

The last point I want to make is lately in most games there has been a serious lack of boss battles from yesteryear. All the boss battles in R&C:SM are not epic, but take some work and strategy, not just balls to the wall firing for 30 seconds (looking at you halo 3).

The game is a solid 8 out of 10 for me. It’s not to short with decent graphics and really just down to the nit and grit the game is fun to play.

2007-10-10T21:53:00.000-07:00

Stranglehold – Completed

John Woo is making a video game? Well that’s just a fantastic idea and after playing the demo I fought back not buying it on opening day. That turned out to be a pretty good decision on my part. Mike T rented and beat the game quickly enough to give me a shot at it.

The game like a John Woo movie centers around Chow Yung Fat’s character affectionately named “Tequila”. A cop bent on stopping a mob war at any cost, I will even call him a super cop. With a few plot twists and some Russian the story plays out as you would expect from an action movie. Not particularly moving by any means, but has its share of gun battles and explosions.

It’s a third person shooter with destructible environments, a decent range of weapons, and Tequila bombs! No I do not mean drinks, but Tequilas special ability’s, heal him self, aimed shot, barrage attack, and the spin attack. Each one unique and powerful in its own right and giving you options when you approach different situations. It cracked me up every time I did a spin attack, doves fly as a slow motion sequence ensues and you kill every enemy in site. Perhaps the doves were a ploy to distract the ESRB!

Now the crappy part, the game is short and I mean like Halo 3 short. For the sake of achievements I beat the game twice in the day I had it. It probably would take anyone four hours maximum to finish the game.

On that note the game is 6 out of 10 for me. It is fun, but short and there is nothing overly unique about the game play.

2007-10-08T00:08:00.000-07:00

Dirt - Completed

First off, please take a moment to remember Colin McRae a great racer who tragically lost his life in a helicopter accident September 17th 2007. His name appeared on many of games including Dirt (in Europe). Though I am not sure of his contribution to the games with his name, I would like to think his contribution was what made them enjoyable.

Rally racing is not very big in the US, but my father is a junkie so I have spent many afternoons watching or listening to rally races. To race I am sure it can be exhilarating, but the games lacked longevity and drive. The premise of rally racing is not a bunch of cars on a track, but a single car on a course racing the clock. This lacks a certain amount of excitement that say F1 would have with passing and crashes. Being as all your trying to do is go as fast a possible with out flying off the track can get quite boring over time.

Dirt changes all that, with a great mixture of different types of racing. You get to run events with everything from semi truck hill climbs to dune buggies. This gave me the drive to keep playing and see what was next. In the beginning you run shorter tracks with single racers per event. Since it is only certain sectors on bigger tracks each time you raced for the first 50 times the tracks seemed new. Towards the end when racing tracks like the full 12 miles of Pikes Peak hill climb you have raced there enough that you know the track, but it’s not quite repetitive.

The game is beautiful graphically and like most 360 games, the controls are spot on. If you’re a racing fan I really think this is a must have for 360 owners. I finished it in 7 hours and 44 minutes, some of that time was spent practicing tracks and was not all pure racing. There are 46 cars to buy and race, but unlike other racing games they come fully prepped for racing. You do not have to spend two hours trying to pimp a Honda civic to be competitive. Finally the achievements like BioShock are littered through the game and can be easily obtained with just playing.

I easily give this 9 out of 10, as I said before a must have for 360 racing fans.

2007-10-04T09:34:00.000-07:00

Burnout Legends -Complete

My faithful PSP made a return as the foremost game system while in Cancun. Andrew brought a laptop with all his games so I was not limited to the ones I pre-loaded. Daniel was playing this and told me it was a lot of fun so I went for it.

Low and behold a racer I enjoyed, the burnout series has been around for a while. Yet the first few attempts at the game left me wanting something more fulfilling. Since in Mexico and lacking my 360 I gave it a much more solid look and found enjoyment in it.

This seems to be one of the few PSP games where the controls (of course not the nub) seem to work very well. The D-PAD was very smooth and functional a nice change of pace for the normally plagued controls in PSP games. Since the racer is basic it only used a few buttons, however they were also done correctly with there layout adding to the ease in playing.

The game play consists of two modes, racing and crashing. I did not discover the crash mode until I had finished all the career racing modes and honestly I am really happy it played out that way. There are 100 different crash runs and after the first 5 it is extremely repetitive and not that enjoyable, my only drive was to finish the game. The racing has a few different styles that kept the game interesting. The first that comes to mind and the worst in my opinion was burning laps. While I gained gold medals easily in all other facets this one seemed to be the most difficult. All you have to do is make a lap in a certain time, which at certain points seemed nearly impossible. I would really recommend avoid these if possible, it drags the game. The other modes are normal races, crashing cars, and being a cop crashing a car. They were all fun and rarely caused frustration.

The game was 6 out of 10, but definitely fun for a PSP game.

2007-09-27T21:28:00.000-07:00

Gungrave – Completed

Taking a quick break from my 360 and whore what Halo 3 achievements I can. I went to a friend’s house to sit in her living room in case her son woke up. It was only an hour and a half so she could play softball so I grabbed a few PS2 games and headed over.

This was a bargain bin game I picked up since I enjoyed the anime. I assumed that it would resemble “Gungrave Overdose” which I never beat but enjoyed playing. This assumption was completely wrong. The game is short, and were not talking short like a bungie game, I mean it only took me 1 hour and 11 minutes to beat.

The game play is strictly run and gun, there are a few dodging movements, however there is no mechanism for blocking (like in over dose). The graphics will not very detailed seem very lax compared to a wide range of PS2 games, there was also a slight hint of cell shading. The cut scenes were almost a saving grace as they were very well done.

I give it 3 out of 10, ask me if you want to borrow it. Not even worth renting.

2007-09-26T21:49:00.000-07:00

Halo 3 – Completed

If your reading this your either my friend or value my opinion on video games. So what I will tell you right now, is that unless you want to play online you need to put Halo 3 down and buy Bio Shock.

What I expected from the hype and advertising of Halo3, an epic battle to save all life in the universe. What did I get? I got the exact same game play as Halo 1 and 2 with some new weapons and vehicles. Oh and that master chief is still apparently the most bad ass human to show is face on the earth, that is of course because this is earth is in a alternate dimension where Gordon Freeman does not exist!!!

There really is not much to say, looks a little shinier, plays pretty much the same, and its pretty neat in the first cut scene how master chief looks retarded after he lands on earth. Seriously don’t waste your time, play the master piece which is Bio Shock or wait a few weeks and pick up Half life 2 episode 2. It’s a much better expenditure of your money.

2007-09-23T14:46:00.000-07:00

Halo 2 - Completed

If you took the time to read my previous post you will see why I am playing Halo 2. The graphical difference between the first halo and the second halo almost looks like a generation gap. Now both games are decent looking but Halo 2 set a new standard. I can only assume Halo 3 will push the limits and give us something pretty to stare at for hours on end.

There are some new elements that I can really appreciate. Duel wielding and a melee weapon were nice additions. This seems to allow you to input some strategy into how you assault and what weapons you take. Though I was sorely disappointed that the stock rifle from Halo did not make it into the 2^nd, it was definitely me weapon of choice. The new energy sword proved to be a great weapon that provided some entertainment.

The story in the second game is much more involved and gives you a greater sense of danger. It’s also funny to watch the people blindly worship a object that was created to wipe out all life in the universe. Now the game looks great, plays well, and really is a enjoyable experience I would recommend to anyone with a 360. Because if you cant play Halo 3 after the Halo 2 ending, you will be one angry cookie. It was not to upsetting to me, as I can play Halo 3 today if I choose. But after years of waiting for Halo 2 to get that ended, had I been an avid fan I would have wanted to kill someone.

2007-09-22T17:34:00.000-07:00

Halo - Completed

Once upon a time long before the Xbox Moose showed me a trailer of one of the first online multiplayer games to have vehicles, I was in shock in awe. Then the day came when I found out this game would only be on the Xbox. I was upset but went on playing half-life as I did back then. This was also the time of my life where I was boycotting Microsoft and to this day have not owned an Xbox (but gladly take one if anyone is giving them out). The game was then ported to PC and I gave it a shot only to find one of the worst console to PC ports I have ever seen. No matter the caliber of my machine it never seemed to run correctly. So countless years later, a few red vs blue episodes and purchasing a Xbox 360. I allowed my self to be pulled into the hype of Halo 3 and there ad campaign.

Not ever finishing halo made me think that I might be at some disadvantage and so I asked Draccuu if I would borrow his copy. He gladly let me and in two days I had powered through Halo. Is it a good game? Yes I think it is a good game. Is it a great game? Sorry Morgan Freeman puts master chief to shame. Which brings me to my next point, what is with all the master chief fanboys? Were they not graced with an opportunity to play half life? Was this the first FPS worth playing on a console that didn’t include james bond? Was halo the first inception into multiplayer gaming for a lot of young men who never had the PC’s to play quality FPS’s? What ever it may be, I suggest to all of you who hold this game so high to play some half life.

There is not much to be said about the game that you have not already heard before. I think it would be smart to play through it if you plan on playing Halo 2 or 3. Things will just make more sense.

2007-09-21T21:20:00.000-07:00

G.R.A.W. - Completed

My pops bought this for on my birthday and after falling asleep during the tutorial I waited a long time before giving it a second look. The original ghost recon was a great game that was involved with many of LAN parties, my assumption was this one would meet my expectations. The flaw in my logic is that game is a few years old and my expectations have grown, games from yesteryear no longer are capable of the fulfillment they once provided.

The game is not horrible by any means, the graphics are well done and I will give them kudos for a decent story. But two major things affected how much I enjoyed the game. The first would be the HUD. This is a 3^rd person shooter and unlike a FPS where your focus is on the center of the screen, you have to user the area in which the player is not sitting to take in your environment. With the hub covering ¼ of the outer edge of the screen and your persona on the screen taking up the center portion, it makes it difficult to turn and track enemies. The second issue is the control scheme, constantly jumping on the ground on accident with a subtle click of the left analog. Attempting to zoom in with a scope with out moving your sites proved difficult. I think they could have found a much better scheme for the default controls.

The game is 6 out of 10, take into account I played 0 multiplayer games.

2007-09-12T23:39:00.000-07:00

Condemned: Criminal Origins – Completed

This game on Meta critic was rated fairly well and was pretty cheap on eBay. My assumption is the game has been out for a while and the price did not reflect the quality of the game. So I snatched it up and gave it a go. This game has gratuitous violence and its fair share of gore and situations that would give some adults nightmares. I strongly recommend heeding the M rating when considering it as a purchase.

The idea is you are a FBI agent/detective, your character goes to crime scenes of serial killers and goes through the scene collecting evidence to try and catch the killer. My assumption was each level would essentially be a case you had to solve and I was far from being right. There is a plot that flows through the entire game linking all the events together. One thing you should know is that you never get closure to the story line, the end only makes you assume what is going on and never clearly tells the player. Though I did find it intriguing enough that I wanted to play through the entire game.

When it comes to levels and game play it is extremely linear. There is no real variation in game play and it holds your hand to each goal. One level is a library where you have to find certain things through out, yet all the shelves are blocks in order to create the look of a maze yet it is just a straight path. In my general opinion this could have been more dynamic and given the player an opportunity to prove his worth and find there own way. The combat in the game has two variations melee weapons and guns. I was slightly annoyed to find out your only able to carry one weapon at a time as well as only being able to use the bullets that are in the gun when picked up, there is no extra ammo. The element of realism is understandable, yet I still think it should allow you to carry one extra clip of some sort as the character does have pockets. They do give you a tazer that temporarily stuns enemies and can incapacitate weaker foes with one or two hits, this allowed you some strategy while fighting.

All in all the game for me was 7 out of 10. Nothing to out of the ordinary and very linear, controls are solid, achievements not overly difficult, and graphics were on par.

2007-09-03T20:30:00.000-07:00

Earth Defense Force 2017 - Completed

Sometimes you want to just shoot stuff. This game lets you shoot hordes of enemies relentlessly with well over 75 variations of weapons. The sad part is you only get to shoot the same monsters over and over. When purchasing the game I was under the assumption that you would play as one of those futile little guys who shoots a bb gun at Godzilla. The idea intrigued me and my imagination went bounds thinking of all the great monsters I will have to best with practically my bare hands. The first level started out very promising, there are giant ants attacking Tokyo, we must save the city and destroy the menace. But when I got to the 50^th level where I was fighting ants, spiders, and a few scat giant robots which all represent the same faction it started to feel quite repetitive. The terrain would slightly change and occasionally you would fight in the mountains. But there is not real strategy involved with the process of killing. You run backwards and fire away till you die or they do.

Now they did include the use of vehicles, four different types. You can run a motorcycle, mech, tank, and helicopter depending on which is included on your current level. The motorcycle is fast but lacks greatly in damage. The mech takes quite literally 5 minutes to turn around, how does anyone think this is plausible? You give them mech jump jets so it can fly but the blasted thing cannot turn around, this made no sense to me. The tank has a single fire mode and did well against a single target, yet it was hard to drive and maneuver. Finally the helicopter, I crashed more times then I was capable of killing the enemy. If your going to include vehicles in a game make sure there useable. This seemed to me as the biggest programming flaws in the game. Which leads me to another silly aspect of the game, one of the unlocked weapons is a turret gun. Stands alone and tracks enemies with cameras while firing away. Now your little fellow with not so much as a back pack has unlimited ammo. Yet the turret guns run out of ammo and disappear after a few hundred shots. Its not as if you can sit back and let them fire on forever to beat a level, the tracking systems require the enemy to be very close in order to be fired upon. Yet they choose to give this stand alone gun with an ammo canister larger then my characters torso 200 shots or so, seems a little silly to me.

When I was tired of the monotony I scoured all the weapons and found a missile launch with 30 some on missiles that homed in. I found that if I backed off a ways and fire the homing missiles would fly completely across the level to the nearest target and destroy it. For about the last 5 levels I would be reading or what not and just pushing the button to fire as it auto reloaded. Not sure if this be considered a flaw, but if I choose to get anymore achievements from the game you can be sure this is how it will be done.

The game was 5 out of 10. Playability was sub par, graphics where nothing special, story was stale, and the monotony was killer.

2007-08-26T23:57:00.000-07:00

BioShock – Completed

A new game to redefine the genre of first person shooters, that’s the impression I got from the hype of this game. Does it accomplish that feat? Not by my standards it does not, Half life and Half life 2 defined what first person shooters of today are. Before I go any farther I want to make something very clear, buy this game, play it and love it as I did.

To me there is nothing really over the top new in this game and honestly if there was and you were a FPS fanatic would you even want to play it? The game does take many unique ideas that have been used before and combine them into one hell of a game. The game employees what can barely be described as a duel weapon system. You have traditional guns as well as your genetically enhanced hand. Your hand can switch between six different actions you set for different purposes. Anything from burning away ice to removing debris with telekinesis, the methods and system of powers reminds me of “The Darkness” and how those powers are required to move through the game. It is unique but in my opinion not ground breaking.

The story is almost something new, you could just chalk it up as another shooter fighting mutants. Unlike other mutant fighting extravaganzas the story fuels this game. It kept me intrigued enough to want to know what would happen next and got semi excited when large portions of the story were reviled. At least it was not Nazi’s or aliens right?

As always on the 360 the graphics are done very well and the controllers were easy to se and very fluid. I must tip my hat to 360 developers for taking away the pains I felt on the PS2 and Wii with what felt like lack luster controlling.

The game is 10 out of 10 for me. My only qualm is it could have been longer. I really enjoyed the frequent achievements of 5 to 10 points giving you some sense of accomplishment. Again go now and buy the game and love it. FYI the PC version evidently does have some bugs if your considering it over the 360 version.

2007-08-17T07:23:00.000-07:00

The Darkness – Completed

One day Moose and I went to his house for lunch so he could let the dogs out and I could check out his PS3. He was raving about this game and wanted me to play the demo. After about 10 mins I had fallen in love with the concept. You are the evilness plaguing the world, you are the beast tearing the hearts from his victims.

The story centers on a mobster on his 21st birthday. He basically dies that day and the darkness brings him back to life (think ghost rider the movie). The city that could almost be considered a mini-sandbox is your playground to find your foes and enact vengeance on them. The story in itself has some depth to it and plays out well with everything going on.

The game is a FPS, with a twist that seems to be more common in games these days. You have a darkness that you can use alternatively to regular guns. Through the game you develop different types of the darkness in which you can unleash. Each situation you find yourself in can be approached with different styles, sometimes brute force works and other times its better to use a stealth tactic.

The game for me was 9 out of 10. With the controls seemingly perfect and the game play looking smooth and well done, I can’t not recommend this to any who has a 360 and enjoys a shooter. It could have been just a few hours long and made the game perfect.

2007-07-24T23:23:00.000-07:00

Guitar Hero: Rock the 80's – Completed

Now I only finished the game on easy, in all honesty I think after playing the first two guitar heroes easy gives you a good idea of the game as a whole. The problem with this version is I lived through the 80’s and my father being a music lover exposed me to a lot of what was popular at the time. After playing the first 20 songs not many stuck out in my head as songs I liked from that time. Nicole who is an avid fan of 80’s music was also disappointed in the selection. This is probably an instance of “what could have been” rather then something I would recommend to my friends. One neat little change is all the characters from GH 1 are in the game but with different clothing, helping them fit the genre.

If you’re a guitar hero fan and have grown leery of the songs in I and II, then pick up this version and jam away. You should easily enjoy yourself. I honestly don’t feel right giving this game a score is it is only held back by music selection. If you were waiting for something to push you over the edge into buying GH go get GH I or II. Only pick this up once you have over played the rest.

2007-07-23T23:55:00.000-07:00

Pokemon Pearl – Completed

After beating the three GBA versions of Pokemon the next installment really seemed no different. If you’re a fan of course you’re going to love it and play it. If you’re new the genre well I would say give it a go, the mechanics and play of the game has been going strong for years for a reason.

The new interface using the DS is fairly nice and allowed me to battle just using the touch screen. The buttons are made large enough for my fingers to easily access the option I want. Also included for the DS version is your poke watch thing. I really don’t remember the name and I am kind of proud of that. But this watch rests on your button screen and has multiple applications that you collect while playing the game. Some of these are very used full, while others I never even figured out what they did. The concept is sound and gives the trainers that much more to play with.

After beating the elite four and the champion I was compelled to continue playing the game. In order to get the national pokedex you have to see ever create available in this region. This may seem like a tedious task as it turns out it was pretty easy. The programmed it so if you fight every trainer available you will view all of the pokemon in the game. Myself powering through the game missed many of those trainers and had to retrace my steps in order to finish off my pokedex. I would suggest taking your time and beating what ever trainers you find, in the long run the XP is really good for your primary pokemon.

I give this installment of pokemon 9 out of 10. An easy 30 hours of game play that is enjoyable and rarely frustrates.

2007-07-13T19:45:00.000-07:00

Land of the Dead: Road to Fiddlers Green – Completed

There tends to not be many FPS’s for the zombie genre, this could be because most people might find the sluggish nature of zombies mundane. This game however nailed making the zombies a threat. When sitting in a farm house feeling safe and sound, then suddenly the door cracks in half and five zombies are chomping at the bit its compelling. The zombies come at you focused, steady, and in numbers. The threat feels real and the fact that a single .22 to the head barely slows them down make it that much more intense.

Sadly what you have just read is probably the only great part of the game. On occasion I will run across a FPS that makes me sick, as in motion sickness. I have come to the conclusion that the one in fifty games that does this to me is due to poor use of the graphics engine. Nothing in particular stands out about the graphics that made me ill, but the entire six hours it took me to play it I would barely last half an hour. This was after much tweaking of the graphics only to find settings that affected me to a lesser extent. The sound was equally as daunting, the music alone was enough to give you a headache. I don’t think any gamer wants to plan on taking two Motrin just to play a game that really is not that great to begin with. Finally the controls and guns were not too bad, I did think that most of the weapons felt under powered against our rotted enemies. Also the fact that shooting a zombie with a shotgun in the legs did more damage then a direct shot to the face, someone should really explain the mechanics of this to me.

The game for me was 4 out of 10, this includes my love for the zombie genre so you can only assume how bad it was to play. Six hours would be too little for most FPS’s, but for this it was just too much.

2007-07-11T07:41:00.000-07:00

Call of Juarez – Completed

I got this game on a whim because I saw it was coming out for the 360 (which sparked my interest), yet I was already released for the PC. There has not been a good western FPS in a very long time, thinking back Lucas Arts outlaw was the last great western I remember (I don’t count gun, not FPS).

The story centers on the events following the death of a teenage boy’s mother and step father. The boys step father has a brother who happens to be the town preacher attempting to atone for his sins. In light of his brothers death he swears vengeance on the boy blaming him for the murders. The story as it unfolds was actually quite entertaining and lead things along to where you wanted to know what would happen next. The key to the game is that both the boy and the preacher are played. Once completing a level with the boy you switch to the preacher and chase the boy through the level. This may seem a little repetitive, however both characters play completely different. While playing the boy its very MGSish, sneaking around and hiding in shadows. But the preacher is balls to the wall action, with his armor plate chest piece and duals revolvers he becomes a force to be reckoned with. He also has the ability to focus when shooting, slowing the fight down as your cross hairs slowly pass across the screen allowing you to tag multiple enemies. The concept is not much different then adrenaline in Cabalas African Safari.

The game did only take me around 8 hours to beat and felt a little short. Yet I hope that anyone who ever decides to make an Indian Jones game plays this and programs the whip and guns in the same fashion, because that would be one hell of a game.

I give them game 8 out of 10, the graphics were good but sluggish if set to high and I think my machine should be adequate. It could have been a touch longer, otherwise the game was on par for story, game play, controls, and keeping me entertained.

2007-06-10T19:16:00.000-07:00

Shrek the Third – Completed

This game severed a single purpose. To allow me to finally catch up to Mile T in gamer score (it officially brought me to 10k). This also should my 360 exclusivity kick and allow me to play some of the 30 ps2 games I have yet to touch.

Being as I really enjoy Shrek movies playing the game sounded like it could be enjoyable. It is a basic plat former that you lets you play multiple characters from the story and follow a plot that loosely fits into the movie. It does not follow so closely that you know what will happen on every turn, but it does follow it enough for you not to say everything is completely wrong.

The controls like most 360 games are very well done and easy to learn and use. Graphically it is on par with the movie with some subtle adjustments that should be expected in a video game. I really don’t have much to say about this other then it was fun, I did enjoy replaying some of the levels for achievements and I think anyone who enjoys the movies would like the game. Who wouldn’t want to do flying kicks with sleeping beauty!

Game is 8 out of 10, good graphics, fun game playing, defiantly something the younger crowd would enjoy. My only qualm with the game is not being able to skip all of the cut scenes, when replying levels it got to be annoying.

2007-06-09T22:45:00.000-07:00

Prey – Completed

Ever wonder what would happen if Turok and Quake had conceived a child? Well the answer is here and it is called Prey. You’re an American Indian (Cherokee to be exact) trying to pull yourself away from the reservation but the woman you love believes in the tribe and all there followings, so she wont leave. That’s right about where the majority of the unique plot ends (if you call it unique) and the story spirals into aliens have come to harvest us for food (Killer Klowns anyone?). Now that I have spoiled the entire plot for you we can talk about game play.

Once abducted you start to find some miscellaneous alien weapons, but always have your trusty wrench (I wanted my crowbar dammit). The nice thing about these weapons is they never require reloading. If you have ammo you can fire continuously until it runs out. You have your basic machine gun, rocket launcher, alien grenades, and then you find a special gun. Its not all that powerful to change the game balance, yet the concept is really fun. It fires like a shotgun liquid acid, and burns the victim like a DOT. The acid is bright green and leaves a distinct mark on your enemy, this gun is very useful for tagging something in the dark (almost piantballish). All the weapons seem to have there advantages and work really well in the correct conditions. To me the weaponry was well planned and developed.

The game introduces something I have not seen before which they call spirit mode. This allows you to leave your body and move to certain areas of the game which you cannot reach on this plane of existence. While in spirit mode you have your Cherokee bow that can kill living things and is fueled by there souls. If your mortal body dies in the game you are transferred to the spirit world and if you fight off the evil spirits long enough you can be transferred back to the living. Essential I was not able to find a way to die in the game, even jumping off cliff sent you to the spirit world. You can only assume this made the game pretty easy, but when you are resurrected you do not have any extra ammo. It may come to the point if your really bad at the game you will have to fight some fairly large monsters with your wrench.

The environments in the game cannot go unnoticed. The giant doors and monster holes gained most of the attention from the outside world, this was due to the visual aspects. Some of the doors are round and look like a rectum, which I have affectionately named sphincdoors (get it ha-ha) and then some of the monster doors look like the female reproductive organ. At first you giggle and it throw you a little bit, by the end of the game you wonder what kind of perverted developers work there.

The game is 8 out of 10. This is probably the smoothest normally controlled FPS I have played on a console. Though it took around 6 hours to beat, that seems pretty short.

2007-06-08T11:06:00.000-07:00

X-men 3 – Completed

I tend to be fairly critical of super hero games when they are plat formers. It seems to take away the true capabilities of the hero. But in this version of X-men I was amazed to see how well it was done.

There are three characters played through the game: wolverine, Iceman, and Night crawler. Unlike sonic you have to play all the characters in order to continue through the game. This kept the game from feeling repetitive while not spreading the story to thin. Also when completing levels you get mutant genes that upgrade your characters powers in five or so categories. These upgrades made the levels easier when playing in the harder modes.

Wolverine’s levels are pretty normal hack and slashing, though I found out quickly that I was putting my upgrades in the wrong areas. This made some of the levels seems fairly impossible and when I start to upgrade the correct areas the game flattened out and became playable. Until that point it did become slightly frustrating.

Iceman’s levels were fun because the game play was almost that of a shooter. Your constantly sliding on a ice wave firing off hail and ice beams. Some levels have you racing through tunnels and brings back fond memories of Luke on a speeder bike racing around trees with lasers flying about. In general Iceman was fun to play the only difficulty was trying to find the side items in each level, since his levels were fairly large or ran through at high speeds it was difficult to spot things.

Night crawler was by far the most enjoyable portion of the game. Teleporting from here to there and when it comes to fighting you got to use a single button to teleport behind your enemy and punch them repeatedly. Imagine the first scene from X-men 2 where he is jumping through the white house, and that is exactly how the game play feels. The control of teleport along with the ease of use was done so well I was quite amazed. My hopes are for a sandbox X-men game with him as a playable character!

The game was 7 out of 10, good graphics and controls. But it was very short taking less then a day for me to beat and get all of the achievements.

2007-06-07T11:05:00.000-07:00

Cabela's African Safari - Completed

Few years back when I only played FPS on PC and ignored all other gaming venues, I found a hunting game that sounded like fun. That game was Carnivores. It was a dinosaur hunting game that made me enjoy stalking around and firing a single bullet to eliminate my prey. When Mike T suggested that I check this game out not only for the achievements but because it was genuinely fun, I thought I would give it a go.

Let me tell you this game is enjoyable, stress free, frustration free, and well you get to shoot stuff with large guns that actually exist. The game consists of four basic types of hunts, Bird shooting, Heard hunting, Tracking, and just walk out and shoot the animal. The bird hunting would be what you expect from a 3d version of duck hunt, other then your dog is not laughing when you miss the bird. Heard hunting was shooting fish in a barrel, some forty odd animals run by and you have to pick the biggest ones off while in a moving jeep or just shoot randomly into them until you get your quota. Tracking was the only portion that could be frustrating as you have to look for these certain spots that have tracks on them. My first tracking mission took me three tries to figure out that I had to follow there bread crumb trail before my objective would even appear. Once I understood the process these hunts were not as bad.

The last hunting type where you go out and shoot them was by far the most fun. Stalking your prey avoiding predators and waiting to make that perfect shot, and when you hear the crack of your rifle and see that with a single bullet you bagged a rhino, well it was rewarding. Now I am not a real life hunter nor could I ever be the concept of hunting living things for sport almost sickens me. But when it’s virtual and nothing that breathes is harmed in the process I am all for it. Now while doing these hunts you’re not allowed to shoot anything but your intended target. So when that cheetah comes running after you what can you possibly do? Your adrenalin kicks in and you whip your pistol out and try to take it down. Since this cannot always be avoided the game does not penalize you for it. Plus it gives you a nice little rush when you see an elephant thundering towards you and fall before your feet.

Now the one thing I found that I was surprised to appreciate as much as I did was the sound. The sound was very realistic when walking on the ground and even in the water. The faint rustling when walking through bushes gave the game some realism. When game gives you some idea that your actually there in the area depicted someone somewhere was really doing there job.

The game for me as far as hunting games go was 9 out of 10. The controls work, the graphics are good and the game is over all just fun.

2007-06-04T08:09:00.000-07:00

Sonic the Hedge Hog - Completed

Again with me and my silly achievements, which by the way this games was no easy to give up. Jenna was kind enough to loan me this game and for warned me that it was hard and frustrating. Armed with this idea I went ahead and loaded the game up and had at it.

First and foremost issue with this game is controlling sonic. The jumping and running is easy enough, but when moving very fast it’s like a drag car on skis and does not appear to have any really stability. This forces you to run into walls and bonk sonic on the head. If this were not bad enough half of the game while playing sonic is jumping puzzles (read my Futurama review to understand how I loathe jumping puzzles) and the other half of the game is homing attacks. This gives the game an extremely repetitive feel.

After pushing myself to beat the game with sonic I moved on to silver and shadow. To be honest both of these characters were quite fun to play, if they had not been I would not have walked away with what little achievements I did. If you are a huge sonic fan then I suggest playing sonic to the second level where you fight and beat silver. Once unlocked start his game and play through and the experience could actually bring you some pleasure. While playing silver you can unlock shadow and play him through also.

To complete the entire game you will need to finish sonic along with the two others. This unlocks the fourth story mode that has you play each of the characters (including side characters tales, knuckles, etc). The levels are frustrating and the final boss is fairly easy, but it has to be done if you want to “Officially” beat the game (plus its some extra achievement points).

The game for me is 4 out of 10. For the most part the story, controls, and graphics are sub par. The game honestly is not worth the achievements I got from it.

2007-05-15T08:28:00.000-07:00

Spiderman 3 - Completed

The first next generation Spiderman game is well more of the same. I thought Spiderman 2 was ground breaking, being as it was a sandbox superhero game. In my mind that is the only real way to do a super hero game (unless of course your hero has to walk every where). If you enjoyed 2 then 3 really is just more of the same even graphically.

The controls have been fine tuned and are very fluid. Though I still wonder how a common thug can take a full punch from Spiderman and still be standing. Anyone who can clue me into why this is would be much appreciated. The only seemingly new concept built into the game is the fact that you get to push buttons, just like in God of War. This concept has caused minor grumbling in the gamer community. The patterns are not overly hard but do require precise timing. Now what this means to me is you are playing someone who is super human in the capacity much further then us normal humans can control. These sections allow us to perform such super human feats with out frustration and add to the immersion of the game. If you beat Spiderman 2 and went through the end battle of trying to crawl to each power cord and yank it out, you know how frustrating it is to do something that Spiderman himself would have no problem doing. I myself welcome the change and look forward to other games involving this flow in there games.

To finish the storyline in the game took around 11 hours, which was a good 20 hours short of Spiderman 2. Perhaps developers have listened to gamers and are developing a fun experience that does not require a full work week to get a sense of accomplishment. I am really on the fence with this because I like a lot of game for my money, but I also appreciate it when I finish a game.

The game to me was 7 out of 10. For 360 the graphics could have been enhanced and even with the few changes there could have been more to it. The controls and flow of the game were spot on and made it an enjoyable experience.

2007-05-03T10:03:00.000-07:00

Ninety-Nine Nights – Completed

My pops wanted to buy me a game for my B-day, this has been the trend for a few years now as he knows how much I enjoy them. The game was only $30 so he bought it and GRAW too (costing what a normal game would be). Now to me there was not a whole lot of interest in the game being as the only advertisement I saw was a floor mat in GameStop. But I figure as a gift it might be fun and only had 9 achievement points it would be worth a go (I have become quite the achievement whore).

To start off the game does look good and plays well. That is if all you want to do is kill mindless hordes of enemies over and over again. This really appeals to me at this point in my life, mundane mindless button mashing with a goal of an extra 1000 achievement points. You start out with the first character and work your way through the battles to finish and unlock five other characters. Each character having its own abilities and play style give some variety to the game.

Now the story and how the characters are involved is quite complex. The base line is an army is fighting off goblins because the goblin king wants to gain immortality by joining two mystic objects. Through each battle the boss’s are other characters you get to play. This may seem repetitive as the battlefields are the same, but in the end the objectives and fighting style differ so much that it does feel like a new level. In the end you get to see ever aspect of the story, from a goblin, a knight, a mercenary, and a simple minded troll.

For $30 I don’t think you can go wrong.

The game gets 8 out of 10, it was a little short even though I am still replying it.

2007-04-16T07:07:00.000-07:00

King Kong – Completed

Now let me tell you I only played this game for the achievements. That is the only reason anyone should disgrace themselves with playing this debauchery. While I didn’t care for the movie and in general movie games don’t live up to and standard my expectations of the game were low.

The game has two different play modes as you go through the story, a FPS as the lead actor in the film and as Kong. Now the FPS aspect of this game was really tough to play. Most people who know me realize I have been playing FPS’s for over 15 years. When I got about an hour into this game I started to feel my stomach swirl. I was actually getting motion sickness from playing the game. The game literally made me physically ill and I could only play in hour spurts. The controls were not horrible and the concept that if you run out of ammo there are spears around for you to throw was a nice additive.

When playing as Kong the controls were completely off. When you press a button or try to move him it was like driving a car with no power steering, yet the wheel only goes so far. This made the experience fairly miserable for a twitch gamer, if you like chrome hounds you might enjoy this portion of Kong.

This game is 3 out of 10. Don’t get it unless you want achievements and recognize it will be a miserable experience.

2007-03-30T09:25:00.000-07:00

Marvel: Ultimate Alliance - Completed

Another one of those games that my past influences me to play. Being as I still have around 200 comic books sitting in my garage (mostly marvel) how could this game not have appeal. The game is a 3^rd person hack in slash, in the same style as X-men Legends. The characters include marvel legends such as: FF, Avengers, Spiderman, and a few X-men. The characters that proved to be my favorites would be Iron man and Captain American. The game has a unlock system that seems to be based on the amount of kills you get with each character. For instance with Iron man I was able to unlock his classic armor as well as his Man o War armor. These tidbits did wonders for the nostalgia of the game.

Now something to take into account is I played this game first on the PSP and then on the PC and hated it. The pc controls are completely unreasonable. You have to click the mouse to move the character and click the same button to attack. It was quite the debacle and really kept the game from being enjoyable. The day after I bought my 360 I went to Brian’s house and since I only had table tennis he let me borrow M:UA. On the 360 (with no clicking and a GOOD analog stick) the controls are smooth and work as one would expect. This changed my entire view of the game and I actually started to enjoy it.

The story is quite typical, the masters of evil are trying to destroy the universe as we know it. Only the collective of super hero’s can band together in order to stop the tyranny at hand. The CGI cut scenes are amazing, if we could only get an ultimate avengers movie done in this style I would pay $9 to see it. Then when it transitions to the game screens it looks well done as long as there are no close ups. Then things get a little blocky and N64ish.

For the most part you just hack… slash… rinse… repeat to get through the game. The boss battles are a little less difficult then you might expect. Perhaps this was because I was being a slacker and played the game on easy. When you encounter the bosses it seems half of them use the “Press this button” syndrome. This seems to lack the epic feeling that you should get while fighting Galactus. Honestly its mother fucking going to devour your world Galactus. Yet all I have to do is throw two switches and let the silver surfer fly around his head like a bug. This is no way to combat one of the most powerful beings in the universe.

The game is fun for the comic book wanna be hero’s like myself. But I would call it 7 out of 10. Content, graphics, controls are all good. But lacks being epic to give the game a final polish and could have been 10 if they would have let me tear it up with the punisher.

2007-03-30T08:55:00.000-07:00

TMNT - Completed

My generation caused the turtle crazy when I was about 12. I have seen all the live action movies and the majority of the cartoons. Deep down inside there’s a little turtle fandom. When the preview for the new movie popped up I was ecstatic, almost as if I were 12 again and thought to my self “I wonder how good the game is going to be” as I played TMNT2 on my play choice. In all honesty I was not let down and did not regret purchasing the game.

The game is a plat former that almost seems based off god of war. The camera is fixed and adjusts itself automatically to the angle which is need for the section you are in. Unlike other fixed camera games I rarely felt that it would not allow me to see what I needed to. In god of war every level appeared to have a point I would die due to lack of visibility. Then there is the control scheme, two buttons for attacks, a jump button, and a turtle switching button. There is some stuff to do with the triggers, but the entire layout is simple and easy to use. Even when it came to combo turtle attacks it was a single button push. The quality of the camera and easy of controls made the game pretty much stress free.

The game is based off the TMNT movie and the graphics seem on par with it. All of the cut scenes are direct excerpts from the movie in its CGI goodness. Being as I went and saw the movie halfway through the game it was nice to see that the game did not give away the entire plot. But it did fill in some gaps and allow you to understand some of the subtle things in the movie. It was also nice to see a turtle game that was not overly focused on dialogue (cowabunga) or pizza.

There are essentially three parts to the game: Roof Jumping, Fighting enemies in confined space, fighting the Boss. The roof jumping reminds me of crackdown only on a vary liner path. On occasion you have to call on another turtle to swing you that little extra. Fighting enemies was enjoyable and almost like a mini game. Pick which turtle you want and fight away, do a combo hear and there pretty much just senseless fighting with no blood. The boss battles were a nice refresher to what a boss battle should be like. There was none of this “hit x now, alright hit y now”. The boss attacks you and you fight with as much tact as possibly.

The game is fun and the easiest 1000 achievement points to hit the 360.

For me a TMNT lover and the fact I enjoy a simple plat former now and again this game was 8 out of 10.

If you want a real gaming experience then this would not recommend it.

2007-03-05T08:20:00.000-08:00

Lost Planet – Completed

The story this game is based around is defiantly something that has crossed my mind in the past. Humanity ruined the earth and we have to find a new home. Well they found one but sadly it is infested with giant insect like aliens, oh and there is snow. The idea is the planet needs to be terra formed, yet the bugs keep killing everyone. Compelling isn’t it?

The big drive on this game is the ability to use mechs or as the call them VS’s. The come with an assortment of weapons that can for the most part be interchanged to your liking. Some can hover, some have drills, and others can turn into snow mobiles. This adds to the game play and actually gives you a sense of power when using it. One of the best parts about the game is you don’t always have to have a VS to get through the game. One of what I thought was the hardest bosses I finished off with a rocket launch on foot, yet in a VS it is difficult to kill soldiers on foot. This was a great balance between the two fighting situations in the game.

This is one of the best games I have played since TLP for boss fights. The boss fights switched between fighting other VS’s to the bugs. While the VS battles were pretty straight forward and pure combat, the bug battles we stages and well thought out. The sequences to defeat the bugs came fairly quickly and were not incredible hard. This gives the player a sense of accomplishment with out much frustration.

The game to me was 8 out of 10. Great graphics, solid game play, compelling story and easy to control. Also according to Ben the multiplayer is incredible. Only playing a few online games myself, my own preference would be to play 2142 online rather then this.

2007-03-05T07:07:00.000-08:00

Crackdown - Completed

There seems to be a growing trend in my Xbox 360 games. Primarily they are all shooters, and Crackdown is just another addition. The initial concept of the game got me very excited. Instead of being a criminal or fending off an alien race, you get to be a super cop. Actually trying to do well by the people.

The story while not overly compelling gives you a sense of good and evil. When given your first mission do not expect to be a Batman type hero, this is much more like the Punisher. It all boils down to the fact that you kill a bunch of mobsters. Each mission has a dossier on the mobster in which you need to kill. Unlike other sandbox games this is the only mission type. The game became very repetitive due to this.

As far as controls going the game like every 360 game thus far were very well done. The camera could have used some work, but that has been a programming nightmare for years and I no longer expect it to be perfected.

The highlights of this game was kicking cars, jumping from rooftop to rooftop, and taking on 50 enemies and being victorious. This kept me entertained through the majority of the game.

As a side bonus I got the Halo 3 beta with the game.

The game is 6 out of 10 for me. While I did enjoy it, the game play was repetitive and the game play has very little lasting value.

2007-02-26T18:02:00.000-08:00

Dead Rising – Completed

Before knowledge of Hell boy for 360, this game was the most compelling reason for me to get the new Xbox. Zombies in a mall with a plethora weapons at hand seems like a complete formula for success to me. A concept many lovers of the zombie genre have contemplated since the original Dawn of the Dead.

At this point the majority of 360 games I have played had great controls and were easy to learn and use. Dead rising as followed suit very well. In the game you control quite a few objects and vehicles. It seems that each process was thought out and designed specifically for the situation. When racking up my 53,594 kills for the mega buster I spent a lot of time in vehicles. The vehicles are a very small portion of the game and you can almost complete the game with out using them. Yet when driving through leisure park trees were easy to avoid with faster responsive controls. You can tell the time was put in to make sure everything worked well. The only thing I found frustrating was sniping. It seems that when you’re zoomed in and move the reticule, it is moved a set distance. This keeps you from being very accurate in aiming while completely zoomed in. To compensate for this it seems if a zombie is any where near the center of your site the bullet will still magically hit it. This isn’t posed to be a realistic shooter and this is what I would consider a small feature to compensate for minute portion of the game.

The mall itself was fairly well designed, yet I wonder if when they got to the north plaza they got lazy. The majority of this area is under construction. It does add a certain ambiance that differs from the rest of the mall, however I think it could have easily been filled with a wide range of stores. When was the last time you were in a mall and it was being renovated?

Sound bits are a tad over done for me. I kept hearing this clicking in the background wondering if something strange was following me only to realize that it was my sword. Sitting in the security office waiting for the next case to begin the TV had to be muted. These ungrateful whiners whom I had already saved from impending doom insist on crying once brought to safety. In my second run through the game I almost contemplated not saving them for my own peace of mind.

The game has seven different endings, two of which I have had the pleasure of seeing. The thing that got me was having to know what exactly you must do to get the true ending. With no guidance through the last day I sat waiting for my helicopter. Isabella sat in her brother’s hide out and gave me little to no response from 6 am until 8 am as I waited for her to come with me. Only to find out that I had to speak with her after 10 am. Games built that require guidance or sheer luck annoys me.

I give it 9 out of 10

2007-02-26T07:59:00.000-08:00

Gears of War – Completed

My first 360 game completed!

Number one selling game for Christmas, the amount of hype for this game was just amazing. Then upon its release it seemed to live up to its name. One of the reasons I purchased a 360 was this game. People seemed to think it was worthy to be the game of the year and to me it had to prove itself.

A future war and you are an imprisoned solider with a past. You have to fight the alien horde to save the planet. Seems fairly familiar when it comes to shooter games yet amazingly enough the story gets you involved. Something I didn’t really care for but kept me intrigued was the amount of information that is missing. Maybe I didn’t watch all the cut scenes or wasn’t paying attention, but it seemed like there were holes in the story they just never chose to fill. I don’t expect final fantasy like character development, but at least tell me why I am in the slammer. In the end I was content with the shallowness of the story as it did not really affect the game.

When I started out I didn’t read all the text and missed that I could have done a tutorial. Training would have made the first hour of the game much more enjoyable. I would suggest to new players at your first fork in the road go right and get the training. Once you have a handle on the controls the game runs well and is easy to maneuver. What makes the controls unique is the one button to do it all. When you want to duck behind cover, run crouched, or tactfully move through a house you only need to press “A”. Making what would be very difficult maneuvering for a novice player so simplistic gave this game allot of appeal. For season veterans such as my self the single control limited my abilities that I have spent over a decade honing. In years of counter strike / quake / battlefield you get a sense of movement and adopt it to your playing style. The game does not allow you to use this experience and requires the cookie cutter fashion in which it was programmed. What does this mean for the players? It makes everyone equal and bound to the same exact scheme of movement and control. This could be why the game is doing so well, it is a level playing field.

The graphics and sounds have a great effect in immersing you into the environment. The graphics are some of the best to date that I have seen in gaming. The lighting and ambiance of it all give you the tingle you haven’t felt since resident evil.

I will give it 8 of 10. Game didn’t not feel as short as I expected it to be and the controls once learned are stable and well done. If you own a 360 and like shooters this is a must have.

2007-02-07T08:49:00.000-08:00

Futurama – Completed

This game has been sitting on the shelf for probably two years. This is mostly because I got half way through it and was frustrated and quit. In a push to finish games I started but never completed this was on of the first few titles that came to mind.

The game is a plat former that centers on a typical Futurama plot. Through out the game you play as four characters Fry, Bender, Leela, and very briefly Zoidberg. Each character sports here own type of moves and give a real sense to who they are in the show. The voice acting was great and I would not be surprised if the voices were done by the original people in the show. During load times they splash up advertisements from past episodes, which I found to be a nice addition to the feel of the game. Characters were cell shaded and the environments looked straight out of the Futurama world. I could probably go on and on about how I liked the look and feel of this game, being such a Futurama fan but I will spare you.

The game play was a little tough through the first half of the game and then I got to Leela. All of her attacks are melee based with out a targeting option. This made combat difficult and awkward. Fry had a guy that let you auto target and Benders moves allowed him to attack enemies some distance away. After passing the first few levels with Leela it came to light that there was some half baked idiot they let program a few sequences. These sequences require you jump from pillar to pillar and in some cases you are not even able to see where to jump thanks to the some what shoddy camera. Of course if you fall of its into lava which instantly kills you. At some point I slammed my PS2 controller into the coffee table and quit playing. I would much rather take on 1000 enemies then have to jump from tiny ledge to tiny ledge, it is not they way to increase the difficulty of the game and I wish some of these programmers would figure that out. After a good nights rest I tried again and was able to pass the lava pit and move on. At this point I felt as though recommending the game to anyone would only do them harm.

The game itself had some rather crappy features. The camera could actually get stuck behind a wall and not allow you to see where you were going. Often the camera would not give you the angle needed in order to progress. This was another source of my frustration with the game. Also the save system and lives was terrible. You can only save in between levels, and have extra lives if you die. If you run out of lives you are returned to the title screen and have to reload your save. They didn’t even make a short cut to allow you to continue from the starting point, and with PS2 load times the could take up to three minutes to reload your game. The game just has small little quarks that make the game overly difficult and frustrating.

I give this game 6 out of 10. If you’re a fan of the show then I would suggest getting it and pushing through the crappy game play and save system. Being immersed into this world was great fun and made me laugh. If you’re looking for a plat former game then stay away, it’s not worth your time.

2007-02-06T08:04:00.000-08:00

Trauma Center: Second Opinion - Completed

This is my second bout with this game as I originally had it for the DS. The revamp of the game changes the controls for the Wii and also has difficulty levels. Most people who attempted the DS version walked away quite frustrated with sore hands. Second opinion scales the difficulty and makes for quite the game.

The game itself is surgery, something that many people can rarely witness. It gives you the opportunity in a virtual environment to know and do things that surgeons do, at least to a certain extent. In the end it is still a game.

The controls are easy and if the very idea of a surgery game intrigues you. Then you should really consider giving the game a go.

There are a few bad features anyone should consider before playing. Two major things stand out in my mind. One being the music in this game is terrible and turning it off could make for a more pleasurable experience. The second issue being the games story and all of the dialogue it requires you to read to understand the story. Luckily one of the developers must have recognized this flaw and put in the option to skip all of the talking. This is done in a very half assed manor, when you select skip it speeds up the text and makes it clearly unreadable but still has to go through each sentence of text. Although at first for me it proved to be a good time to use the restroom and get food, over time it was annoying.

Give it a 7 out of 10, took around 6 hours to beat with out the extra seven surgery’s which I have not done. The idea of the game is extraordinary and I would love to see more titles with out side the box thinking. The dialog got annoying and some of the levels caused immense frustration. But over all a good experience.

2007-01-31T08:32:00.000-08:00

Call of Duty 3 (Completed) vs. Red Steel

Now that I have completed Call of Duty 3 and worked my way through the first two hours of Red Steel, I felt I would review them against each other.

Both games of course are first person shooters and on the Wii. Both were released at the launch of the Wii. In most aspects the games are alike, even though it may not seem that way. Linear paths for forward progression with objectives and goals that need to be accomplished.

Features:
Red steels most anticipated attribute is sword fighting. With the controls you dodge and parry the slash at your opponents, it is fairly interactive and a neat feature. COD melee portion is less often and subtle. Through out the game there are small things you must do with the wii motes in order to create an action, such as rowing a boat, planting c4, and wrestling with the enemy. In Red steel this interaction felt like a mini game, where as COD gave you immersion into the game. COD also had a few missions where you controlled vehicles, this was a great break from the normal FPS frolicking.

Controls:
The difference in controls for the games was flat out astounding. Red Steel seemed to be very buggy. At times my cursor would be in the middle of my screen and jump a few inches in any given direction. This made precision shooting problematic. During the sessions of play I often felt motion sickness. In my opinion this is attributed to the flow of the controls and how they are correlated on the screen. Also when zooming it required you to push the wiimote forward, this was not only uncomfortable but it was hard to aim and sustain the zoomed position. The sword fighting while fun felt off. The sword position would mimic the position of your hand while holding still, but took a decent swing of the wiimote to get the sword to swing. COD however was smooth and extremely precise. With the single shot rifles I could clear a line of enemies one shot one kill with very little problem. When zooming it appear that the ratio between movement of the wii mote and movement on the screen changed. A motion form the wiimote that would normally spin your screen around only moved the cross has a smidgen. This made aiming with a sniper rifle easy and precise, yet realistic in its own manor.

Graphics:
COD was all that I expected, great character models and environments. The smoke grenades when let loose gave a fairly realistic sensation as the filled a room. Red steel on the other hand really felt like an updated version of golden eye. The majority of 3D models in the game seemed simple and colored strangely with out realism in mind.

Story:
COD while only trying to recreate history was a little scattered. The different factions of allies you play from mission to mission gave an over all picture. But it didn’t give you the chance to bond with the character you were playing. Red Steel appeared to be a standard yakuza story, but I found it entertaining. If the plot had not been in Red steel I am not sure it would have made a real difference.

In the end my over all feeling would be COD any day of the week over red steel. COD is a solid FPS that is easy to control and fun to play.

Call of duty took me right around 12 hours and I would consider playing it again.

2007-01-24T08:29:00.000-08:00

Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess – Completed

The latest installment of the truly loved genre of RPG games from Nintendo. I am a Zelda fan, sadly this will be only one of three Zelda games I have completed. The others being Majora’s Mask and Wind Waker. Though playing this game on the Wii proved to be an unparalleled experience. Even though I power housed the game and was able to beat it in just over a week (logging 37 hours), it never grew tiring. Few points of frustration which I will get into later.

The basis of the story is an evil menace has unleashed its power on the land of Hyrule. Forcing it into the twilight where humans are transformed into spirits and only have fear of the dark beasts around them. As Link you have been choose to save the world and you can entire the twilight. But when you enter the twilight you are transformed into a wolf. In the form of the blue eyed wolf you do not have access to your gadgets, rather you have your own special abilities. This made for a good change of pace with in the story of the game. Once you had thwarted that portion of the twilight Link would return to human form. There is also the introduction of a new character named Medina. She is from the twilight and assisting you only as a means to gain the power she wants. She acts as the voice of help when Link is lost on his quest and looking for the path in which to continue.

The basic controls involved directing link with the nun chuck’s analog stick, slashing by making movements with the wiimote, aiming your bow by pointing the wii mote at the screen and pressing the B button to fire. Over all I found it simple to adopt after the first few hours. When I first played the game it only lasted maybe two hours. My wrist started to ache and the game was shelved for a few weeks. After some good ol ribbing from a friend of mine I gave it another shot. The second time around everything felt comfortable and easy. Oddly enough not being restricted to hold my hands together like with a classic controller elevated the majority of hand pain in long gaming sessions. Another bonus for being able to play on the wii.

Something very bad happened to me in the midst of the game. After finding the sky cannon I save my game and walked away for a few hours. When I came back I noticed something odd was going on. The game would not let me move forward, transform or warp out. Apparently when you find the cannon an event starts. If the game is paused during that event the characters that need to be there to let you move on are gone. Yet they will keep link from leaving the small room to try again. There is no fix for this and Nintendo is aware. Lucky for me an Admin on the Nintendo forums sent me a save file that puts me right in line where I was with the story, making it so I could finish the game. When this happened the game really was tainted for me. This left a bad taste in my mouth that there was two minutes in the game if you saved all was lost. But it is software and they can only test so much.

Out side of my unpleasant experience the game was amazing.

For me it was 9.5 out of 10. While many could argue that it should be a 10 my personal experience and opinion is my own. This score is not based on the glitch but rather the fact that what I found difficult in the game not the fights. It was trying to decipher how to beat a boss or where to go next. This is extremely frustrating for me and can almost turn me off certain games completely.

2007-01-07T12:49:00.000-08:00

Rampage: Total Destruction - Completed

First off this game was not just completed by me. Athena and I were able to play through the campaign mode together cooperatively. At least it is supposed to be cooperative, Athena definitely nailed my monster a few times while flailing about.

Rampage is a game of destruction, you punch and kick your way through cities. Meanwhile police and armies try and thwart your destruction by attacking you in droves. The game takes you through major cities such as New York, Hong Kong, London and so on. Through out the levels there are challenges that can be achieved to unlock special powers for your monster. At the end of each city is a boss of some kind and they were definitely challenging.

One really great feature is being able to find new monsters. There appear to be quite a few hidden in buildings just waiting for you to unleash them. The monsters do not seem to be much different other then appearance, however a walkthrough I read suggested that some hit harder while others have more hit points. After unlocking the turtle I doubt any other monster short of Godzilla would impress me, but finding them is fun none the less.

This is the second WII game to be completed in my home and its hard for me to express my appreciation for the system. I am impressed to say the least. The controller scheme does use the WII motion sensing. But game play does not depend on it. Your punching and jumping are controlled by the A/B buttons and movement with the analog stick. This allows you to play as if on a normal console. Motion sensing is used to snatch people up from the ground by making a right left motion the with controller and to perform a ground pound you make an up down motion. This adds to the game and the motions you are making really give a good feel to what happens on the screen. The mixture of controls is very fun and easy to pick up.

This game gets 8 out of 10. There could have been a lot more put into it. But it was only $20, and I would recommend it to any of my friends that have WII’s and girlfriends who like to destroy things. The story is also kind of neat and quirky, which I didn’t really touch on because it didn’t affect the game.

2006-12-27T07:05:00.000-08:00

Guitar Hero II - Completed (Easy)

While only beating this game on easy, I feel it gave me a very in depth look at the game play. Also it should be known that even though I have finished on Easy I am still playing the game often (only three songs from beating medium).

The game is relatively simple, hold a fret down and strum the guitar as the notes flow down the screen. There are 5 frets of which only three are used in easy. This makes switching between them simple depending on the speed of the song and placement of the notes. There are longer notes that require you to hold down the fret for the duration of the note, though if you release early you are not penalized for missing the note. When doing single notes you can hold down lower frets as it is possible with a real guitar. For example the lowest note is green, followed by red then yellow. If there is a single yellow note you can hold down both the green and red buttons and still attain the correct sound. This is not the case when you have to press two notes at the same time, which you can only hold down the ones you need. Since the control was specifically built for the game, it works exactly how you would expect it to with reliability and very little learning curve.

The game won me over with three songs:

Reverend Horton Heat - Psycho Billy Freak out

Primus - John the Fisherman

Butt hole Surfers - Who Was in My Room Last Night

There is at least 37 other songs you can play and unlock, not including all the made for Guitar hero songs you can buy in the store. Money is earned when playing at medium the setting. Each venue pays you cash to buy people, songs, guitars, etc.

I could really go one about this game, my only concern is that even in easy mode the game would be difficult for a non gamer to enjoy. Something I think all reviews need to consider with the inception of the WII.

The game reels in 9.5 out of 10.

2006-12-26T19:30:00.000-08:00

Metal Gear Solid: Portable Ops - Impression

I am not a metal gear fan. I played twin snakes once and the old NES version. But sneaking around was never my thing. Probably why I never completed hit man or rainbow six. Metal gear from what I can tell is based off the idea of sneaking around and espionage and it really kept me from playing them.

This game for the PSP has shed new light on the series for me. Strangely enough I actually found the story compelling and the characters intriguing. However the games follow each other in a series and much of the story is based off a previous game from what I can tell. So I was a bit lost when it came to what exactly was happening. For the MG fan base I could only see this game as being a blessing.

The controls seem fairly solid, though I did have trouble getting the function down to lean against a wall and peak around a corner. But shooting and basic movement was easy to learn and use. No idea if this is the same scheme as the previous games, but it does work pretty well.

Graphically it is appealing, even the cut scenes with there strange style of art looked very well done. The sound was also done very well, they seemed to spend the amount of time on the game that it needed.

Having only played the game for a hour I don't want to rate it. But I can tell you that I seriously consider putting more time into it.

2006-12-12T08:06:00.000-08:00

Excite Truck - Completed

Hands down one of the best racing games I have had the pleasure of playing.

The game is on the wii and uses the controller to turn left and right and pitch up and down. The buttons on the wiimote control gas/brake/turbo. While relatively simple the controllers bring a huge dynamic to the game. If you can land a super jump on, all four wheels you get a boost. Traversing trees with slight left right moments will give you tree runs to the highest degree.

What could possibly make a racing game fun for me that didn’t include Mario? A racing game the measures your progress by something other then getting first place. You can excel in the game and unlock features while getting last place. The point system like many of Nintendo games is based on stars. Stars are obtained by doing performing different feats through out the track. Make a nice small jump get one star for catching air, make a HUGE jump using a turbo boost and stay in the air for a few seconds will get you five star super air. This also goes for drifting, crashing other trucks, crashing your truck, running past trees and so fourth. You do get a healthy amount of starts for winning, which is nice. But as I said you can generally gain all the stars you need on the track tromping around.

After completing the game in normal mode it unlocks the super excite. It does generally require you to get in first to gain enough stars to pass to the next track. But at this point you should know short cuts and game play well enough to continue on.

This game is 10 for 10, easily. I didn’t care for the music, but evidently putting MP3’s on your memory card will allow you to drive to your own sound track.

2006-11-16T08:05:00.000-08:00

Less then 30 minutes per game!

Currently though different sources I have found myself with an over abundance of games to try out. When these games are less then stellar I pack them away and don’t give them a second thought. However it might be good to give a brief explanation of why I felt the way I did.

Ridge Racer: Thumbs Down
First in our line up is a game that seems completely based of drifting your car to get nitro to go faster. Though I admit it takes a few minutes to get the corners down correctly, the game seem to simplistic to have any longevity. My preferences rarely fall on a racing game, and this one is coveted by many. For me it was just was not worth the time.

Lumines 2: Thumbs Down
If you wanted an update to Lumines one with some new songs and some videos in the background, well here it is. The first lumines didn’t do much for me, the second seem to be a remake with updated music.

Ever Extended Extra: Thumbs Down
For some reason when I saw this game was available I jumped at it. Not sure what the allure was but it got a hold of me and I wanted to play it. Once in and ready I selected the equivalent of a quick game option. Started playing and attempted to figure out what the point of the game is. Once I had five minutes later I thought to myself, that’s it? That was it, make little explosions to create chain reactions of other explosions. Cute and entertaining, but there are better free web games in my opinion.

Snoopy vs. the Red Baron: Thumbs Up
Doesn’t this sound fun? My favorite flight sim (not space sim) of all time would have to be crimson skies. Just looking at the cover made me hope that there would be a resemblance in game play. The controls are solid, yet playing on the PSP rather then a joystick felt odd. Not necessarily bad, just not what I expected. The game is cute and fun and I got thoroughly whipped in the quick play mode. It’s a game I would like to revisit when I have played through better titles and have the time to learn the dynamics of the game.

Pacman World Rally: Thumbs Down
It always amuses me when’s someone tries to take a successful game formula from Nintendo and make it there own. This game is the red headed step child of Mario kart. The karts didn’t move very smoothly the items just didn’t seem to have the right dynamics. Over all it was as I expected, a fairly poor gaming experience.

Ace Combat: Thumbs Up
This game is fun, repetitive yet fun. You fly and shoot down countless air craft with bullets and missiles. The only jet fighter game I can remember having fun with. But after playing for 20 mins it was the same thing over and over which isn’t something I really want to spend my time on.

Sponge Bob Square pants "The Yellow Avenger": Thumbs Down
I have watched a few episodes and enjoyed the child humor of it all. Didn’t really care for the controls scheme of the game, and the lack of directions. After about five minutes I just put it down and figured it was made for smarter people then me. Perhaps I was just having a bad night.

The Power Stone Collection: Thumbs Up
A close friend of mine holds this game in very high regards. Since I never had a chance to play its original debut I was always curious what he found so enjoyable about it. It’s a fighting game with allot of interaction from the environment. After about 15 minutes of play the allure had worn off. The game is fun and unique, but nothing solid enough for me to warrant continued play.

2006-11-16T07:51:00.000-08:00

Family Guy - Not Completed

This was a title that I had really been looking forward to. Since the TV show is a hit in my mind the game could only build off that and be a wonderful interactive world.

The game is a plat former that changes main characters after a set of levels. You play as Stewy, Brian, and Peter. Each character has its own story line which inevitably weaves itself into the paths of the other characters, think Pulp fiction. When it comes to plot I really don’t see this game lacking for people in its current fan base.

The first level grants you control of stewy, packing a weapon of some magnitude. At first aiming seems awkward, but very quickly the game informs you have the targeting mechanism that will lock on an enemy as you fire away. This made the first few levels fairly easy to pass through and let you bask in the humor which is family guy. Once you are so far in there is a puzzle element to the game, shoot a mirror and try to ricochet off it to blow up this or that and bring down the laser field. The precision aiming required is not something I think the PSP is capable of. This took a few try and a lucky random shot would do its thing and bring down the laser field. This wasn’t very frustrating since it went by quickly, but I could see with out getting that lucky shot I may have just put the PSP down and walked away.

We move on to Brian, whose power evidently is crouching down. With his ultimate power of being able to crouch the next few levels consist of hiding behind desks and in the shadows with out being seen. Now I am not a fan of metal gear solid games, for me it was more fun to shoot everything that moves with stewy then sneak around like you have to do with Brian. The only saving grace of this portion of the game for me was the humor, it had me laughing till my tummy hurt.

After doing my best to avoid cops and same sex oriented felons, I got to play Peter. This sadly was turned out to be the demise of the game for me rather then its salvation. With Peter your primary attacks are melee based, kicks and punches depending on the enemy. These attacks required you to be facing the correct direction which seemed difficult in a side scrolling plat former. Failing many times to accurately trounce my foes another problem came into light. The saving is only done ever so often and fairly far between instances of enemies. This required me to spend more time then I ever should have had to, fighting the same enemies. When my attempts failed the PSP was turned off set down.

To be honest the game is only flawed by the mechanics of it. The voices are spot on, the cell shaded graphics were as expected bring the cartoon to life quite well. But with out being playable the game couldn’t hold my attention long enough to get all the humor that I had hoped for.

The game for me was a 6 out of 10. I love the idea of it all and wish I was skilled enough to play it.

2006-11-01T08:34:00.000-08:00

What has happened to my blog...

In the past ten years of my life I have encountered massive multiplayer online games. Starting with LORD (get a point if you know what this is an acronym for) and continuing all the way up to WoW. These games are a time sink and a total waste of time. But really what video game is not a waste of time?

After buying my home I realized that my video game funding was drastically reduced. So I downloaded and started playing WoW again. Nice little human paladin on a PvP server (Never done PvP before this). With allot of help from Moose, Brandon, Katharine, Daniel, and Josh I am already level 38 and well equipped. However as I said this is a time sink, I spend my week nights in wow and my weekends with Athena. Eliminating the majority of my time for other consoles (until my wii comes). This has given me nothing to blog about.

Since I know I have at least four faithful readers (Moose, John, Brian, and Mike), I am hoping to try and up the amount of blogs I do. Take a single night during the week and spend an hour on each game I haven’t look at and see if I can surmise them. If I find a great game there is a chance I will play completely through it. Then give a complete review, but otherwise I am sure it will mostly be complaining about how psp controls suck.

I do appreciate you reading and hope to give you something more to read in the future.

2006-10-17T07:38:00.000-07:00

Gun Showdown - Not Completed

The PC edition of this game did not impress me. But I did take the time to complete it, this version is a different story. This review will mostly be an addition to my pc review since the content is 90% the same. Gun Review

There was allot of news about this not being a direct port. The game had new missions and kind of a make over. This is true and in most cases it did not feel like many improvements were made. Ill start with the positive, the camera angle was reminiscent of Resident Evil 4. Over the shoulder with a cross hair. This is something I really like in third person shooters, give the game a great feel the standard over the head look. The aiming was controlled by the four buttons on the right side of the PSP. This control scheme was something I tried with Metroid Prime Hunter with very little success. However for gun the control was much smoother and reliable. There appears to be a form of grid snapping. When you move the cross hair it would go a set increment. This is only noticeable when trying to move the cross hair a very short distance and made it difficult to hit enemies at a distance.

Now something I literally hate about this version of the game, the horse. Instead of being able to grab a horse out of a field or on the street, the decided to give you one. This means there’s only one horse you can ride and he will come when you whistle for him. Stuck out in the middle of a field with nothing around, then just whistle so you don’t have to walk. This is a great idea and if they would have left it like this, then all would be fine and dandy. But no they had to make it so when the horse takes damage it will buck you off disappear and regenerate health. This seemed to tweak the horse so that it would take a ton of damage in circumstances that are not very dire. The middle of a mission that requires you to run to a certain place in a certain amount of time and suddenly you get bucked of and are left to walk. In the pc version I don’t think I ever had a horse die, to me this just seems ridiculous.

On the subject of horses the new version does not seem to think you should be able to control the horse. When going into a sprint the horse does not respond very well to turning left or right. This ultimately made me stop playing, trying to run across town and spending to much time peeling myself off a wall I just ran full bore into.

The game is 5 of 10, not to much to add to the version if you have previously played it. The game mechanics and controls are lacking. But the storyline and voice acting is awesome.

2006-10-13T12:29:00.000-07:00

Nintendo Wii Pre-Order: Completed

With much hazing of the GameStop employees I had counted on visiting this morning in hopes a pre-order might be unveiled. Luckily there was no questioning the event when I received an email confirming that the orders would start today.

My good friend Brian "Moose" Montoya has done this a few times before and suggested we arrive at 7 am. With his previous experience I did not question his assessment of the situation. With very little vigor I slumped out of my bed this morning with one thought "am I crazy for doing this?” Packing warm clothes and two portable gaming machines at ready for a three hour haul that lay ahead. Upon arriving a certain satisfaction came over me, there were already people there. We were not going to sit like idiots for three hours in front of a darkened store, these methods to gain material bliss were justified.

After a few games of Mario kart with the posse of DS packing nintendites the manager arrived. Informed us that he would do his best to open a touch early so we wouldn’t have to wait as long. There were maybe ten people in line at this time and all were excited. The manager returned to let us know he had a mere 24 units to disperse amongst us. This was great to hear and made me almost 40% sure I would get a Wii on launch. The other manager arrived a few minutes later and said nothing. Back to the waiting game and to pass the time I was playing the perfect little gem "Bust a Move". Nearing nine a.m. we started standing and preparing, he said he could open early and that could mean anything between 9 to 9:30. Minutes later the second manager came out with cards and announced they had 20 units to pre-order... wait only twenty? Where had the other four vanished off too. Well we can only assume bad retail business’s not forcing there employees to forego the process us mere mortals must endure.

Finally the doors open and wield my business card stating that I am #4. We have been explained the options that are available to us, consisting of controllers, memory cards, games and what not. My decisions had been made quite some time ago but I need to do something last minute or I wouldn’t be me. So I decide along with my ever so coveted excite series which I can race with my dad I opt for a $30 game "Rampage Total Destruction". I was a fan at a younger age of this game since it represented the closest thing to Godzilla I could find. I reach the counter and speak out what I am there for and pay on my credit card mind you because I don’t really have the money a total of $358. Two games and my Wii, now looking back and happy with all my actions I must wait for November 19th and hope that I actually receive my console.

2006-10-11T08:38:00.000-07:00

Star Fox Command - Completed by John Blanco

A pee break can do a lot to change a man's life. Let me explain.

My wife and I were at Best Buy, browsing the Nintendo section, when she had to take a pee break. She's pregnant, so it happens a lot. I hung around looking at games, but there was nothing I wanted to get – and that's when I decided to play with the GameCube demosystem.

Well, in case you haven't noticed, the GameCube is all but dead. So, the demo disc they had was several years old. And what demo did it have on? Star Fox Assault.

10 seconds later, I was addicted.

So in the next few days, I bought every Star Fox game in the series, including the newest one, Star Fox Command! Star Fox Command is a choose-your-own-adventure style strategy/tactics game which includes certain parts of the classic Star Fox battle and introduces some new stuff as well.

The game is divided into missions. At the beginning of each mission is some storyline. The storyline changes depending on what "path" you take. It's just like a choose-your-own-adventure book from years ago. After the chatter, you are taken to a strategic mission screen where you see your team and you need to draw paths to determine who you attack. At first it seems weird, but then you realize you have a turn-based war sim on your hands alongside classic Star Fox combat.

And what about that Star Fox combat? Well, it's pretty standard. It will remind you a lot of Star Fox 64. The enemies look like Zaxxon graphics. Very weird, nothing realistic, but it's still fun. The big thing that is missing is your co-pilots. You are on your own. But rest assured, you still get commentary from them while you fight.

The game took a while to grow on me. The touch screen took some getting used to at first, but after a while it feels so natural you don't even pay attention to it anymore.

The enemies are pretty easy, though you'll run into some toughies from time to time until you really start to understand the capabilities of each ship. The biggest obstacle you'll face in your first few hours will be the missles. They can be a real trick. Just learn which ships are best equipped to take them down, some of the ships are terrible at it (Falco) while some are excellent (Panther!). Later in the game, all the ships will be quite good and capable of taking them down, thanks to multi-lock. (Multi-lock is yourfriend!)

The biggest treat of the game is the multiple storylines. Depending on which path you take, different stories unfold, with most of them integrating in with others. The neat part is that certain paths will result in power-ups for your ship, making previous missions easier the next time through.

With multiple storylines come multiple endings, too. You'll have fun finding them all, and unlocking all the missions and all the characters. After you finish about 3/4's of them, you might start getting frustrated as you've mastered the game but are spending a lot of time looking for new paths. I gave up at around this point -- it just wasn't worth the effort to get every last one anymore.

Some of us don't have Mobat's time after all. ;-)

Overall, I give this game an 8 out of 10. The stylus controls are fun to experience, the multiple storylines give you a reason to play over and over again long after you've solved the game (ala NSMB). The graphics won't overwhelm you, nor will the sound, but the gameplay is a treat.

And Krystal is hoooooooooooooot...sh-wing!

John BlancoJava Game Development
zablanc@yahoo.com
Blog'ed @ http://zablanc.blogspot.com/

2006-10-06T09:09:00.000-07:00

Scarface - Completed

This movie is along the same lines as the Godfather. To me it’s nothing big, just another flick I have no real desire to see. The game seemed to follow the same lines, under 6 hours of game play and way to many cut scenes that don’t benefit the game. It’s strange that when I played cars I kept in mind it was a movie game trying to follow the plot of the movie and what not. When the movie is over twenty years old I just don’t get the same feeling. In my opinion they should be pushing the idea of the movie not just the plot.

Now this game is essential a combination of risk and drug wars. You have two different types of crew, pushers to sell your drugs and thugs which do the fighting. You can only have 10 thugs per territory which gives the battles balance for the most part. Pushers play a small but important role. You can have all the drugs in the world and it does you no good unless someone sells them. One pusher can sell so many units of drugs and you can have as many pushers as you want, which makes it just a matter of money to hire them. Ever round you push drugs for certain prices in different territories and that is how you make your money.

Money comes pretty quickly, however the buying system in place makes money management quite important. When you buy a thug the first one is a certain amount, the second one is double that amount and so fourth. At the beginning of each round this is reset, but it keeps you from completely overloading your territory and gives the game a strategic aspect. Like where to place thugs and if more pushers help etc.

Also there is a feature which can be compared mostly to card type games. The cards give you abilities to influence combat, drugs, and the law. Once per turn you can choose to attack an enemies territory. When this attack takes place you can choose from the cards to start off with and watch the battle ensue. The player has no control of the battle outside the card system. Through out the battle it will pause and allow you to play a card. The cards can be something as simple as a grenade to a coked up thug on a rampage. This is honestly the only part of the game I found interesting.

There are ten scenarios in the movie mode of the game. All of them start with a cut scene from the movie and have a vague connection between what your doing on the battle field and what happens in the movie.

This game honestly is 4 out of 10 for me. The graphics of the actual game play suck, I think they try and pull your attention away from this with all the cut scenes. But its a PSP it plays movies why should I be impressed with this. The game is also very short and not the interesting. When you finally beat it guess what the game tells you "If you want to continue your adventure look for Scarface on PS2". Thanks game developer as if I hadn’t just bought this game to play the adventure.

I think most players will be disappointed that they don’t get to shoot a bunch of people with Tony Montana.

2006-10-06T09:04:00.000-07:00

Final Fantasy IV - Completed By John Blanco

My first official guest review!!!!

I was a latecomer to the Final Fantasy series. It started when I played Final Fantasy I in early 2006. I never was much into RPG's as a kid, but have grown to love them as a quasi-adult.

After playing Final Fantasy I + II (Dawn if Souls), I had some questions about what the big hubaloo was about. Final Fantasy IV Advance, however, showed me.

FF IV Advance is my favorite FF adventure to date. It's the first title that really integrated a cohesive storyline alongside the usual great turn-based game action.

The game's lead hero is Cecil, a man of mysterious origin who is ousted from Baron's Red Wing army when their missions become a bit too tyrannical for his tastes. His questioning of the King leads to his ouster, and upon finding out who is behind the change in strategy, decides to overthrow Golbez, his sworn enemy.

The game ran me about 25 hours. As opposed to the "on your own" game play of the first title in the series, this game featured a lot of in-game cut scenes. The story flowed nicely, with characters mixing in and out of the party -- characters that would really grow on you.

The redone graphics for the GBA version are clean and the sound and music are much improved over the early GBA titles. Anything is better, anyway, compared to the repetitive music of the first two games.

Along with improvements in aesthetics, the game was far more difficult. I found myself going to the walkthrough more frequently, about 5 times total. Sometimes, I was a putz, but other times it was very difficult to determine what to do next -- no hints, just explore.

Exploration is a sort of double-edged sword with the FF series. The random battles make the mere act of walking around frustrating if you're not in any mood to fight. Additionally, after the fight ends, you are oftentimes puzzled as to what direction you had just come from. It's this hesitation to spend hours exploring a small area, because of the attacks, which led me to the walkthrough to save some time.

The other side of the argument is that the exploration SHOULD lead to more battles as this allows you to be leveling up. I believe this caused my stonewalling later when I couldn't advance because my weak party.

Later in the game, when you advance to the Moon, the enemy difficulty ratchets up severely. I spent hours leveling up, but despite the improvements the battles were still very difficult all the way through the rest of the game. Be prepared with lots of power up items, and make sure you are leveled up quite a bit before tackling the Moon.

The final dungeon was the most difficult of all because of the length and ferocity of the enemies. The Behemoths and Wicked Masks were such a tough hill to climb. There was no easy way to fight them, and they were a drain on health and especially magic. I spent most of my hours in this final push sweating bullets, hoping I could find a save point where I could stop and sleep in my cottage. :-)

Not to give away the ending, but you'll find yourself shitting a brick when you barely make it to the final boss, only to realize you didn't get that save point you'd hoped for!!

Overall, I give this game 8.5/10. The game was great, but sometimes leaves you a bit lost as to what to do next. I believe my problem is that the previous games could be finished in 20 hours and were pretty straightforward. I think it's time to start treating these games like 40-50 hour adventures where your approach is more like an online RPG -- seeking out quests in non-linear fashion and enjoying your opportunities to level up.

I can't wait for FF III for DS! I'm now prepared!

2006-10-03T15:55:00.000-07:00

Less then 30 minutes per game!

Alright so this past weekend I was completely unable to find a PSP game I wanted to play. These are the four games that were played and well I just didn’t care for.

Pocket Racers:

It’s a racing game, the tracks are composed of environments you would expect hot wheels to travel through. Messy bedrooms with all kinds of junk in your way and so fourth. The first few tracks were fun, how ever it became fairly dependent on the weapons to get ahead and stay ahead. I wouldn’t recommend picking it up.

Mercury Meltdown:

This looked like a fairly neat little puzzler. But as with most of the puzzle games I have seen lately, it does not give you time or solid control to complete the levels. I could see how this would be fun for the smart bomb crowd but not for me.

Rengoku II:

This is a third person adventure type game. You go from room to room killing enemies, the repetitiveness of the game in the first five minutes turned me off. If you like hack and slash I think you might enjoy this, there might be more to the game I just missed.

Spectral Souls:

Seems like a final fantasy tactics knock off to me. It’s been a while since I played a turned based RPG and I guess I don’t really care for them. Nothing really stands about this game. If you’re looking for an RPG I suggest Tales of Eternia, I think Legend of Hero’s is suppose to be pretty good also.

2006-09-29T08:52:00.000-07:00

Gitaroo Man Lives - Not Completed

This game sounded like a bundle of fun. In fact when I saw it was released in English I was actually got excited and instantly found means to acquire the game. When I got it in my hot little hands and started it I was instantly amazed. The graphical quality was amazing and the use of bright colors had me in awe.

So I load up the first level, which of course is training and prepare for the onslaught of gitaroo action. The game is a pattern game, where you press certain buttons in order as they appear on the screen. My trusty dog decided he is going to school me in the ways of gitaroo. The first segment of any altercation requires the charge mode, you point the analog stick in the direction of this blue line and press anyone of the four buttons when a cord needs to be played. This was pretty sweet but my timing is a little off so I miss a few cords. The second segment is battle, this is where you are attacked. A cross appears on your screen and symbols matching your buttons come from the direction of the button lay out. This is a little hard to explain but a good example is the "X" button. One the PSP the "X" button is on the bottom so when its symbol comes it fly’s up from the bottom. The "O" symbol is on the right, so its fly’s in from the right side. Not that confusing on the screen yet difficult to explain. Now while you are blocking these attacks you intermittently have to play guitar cords to attack. With no real pause in-between attacking and defending I usually ended up missing the first cord. On to the final part of the battle, which is where you opponent is on the run and you attack mercilessly to drain there power and win. Sounds like fun don’t it?

I am suddenly thrust into my first battle and the flurry of bright colors and sound I am pretty enthusiastic. I start my battle and notice the level in which things are happening seem to be much faster then the training. I am able to defeat this little devil girl on my first attempt with quite a bit of power left. The second attacker I was not so lucky with. Everything seemed fine and dandy during the charge phase and then came the battle. While attacking did not seem to be to difficult the defense was completely unreasonable. The buttons were flying in at a in which only soulless Japanese children could maintain. I thought to myself this is only the second level, what do they really expect from my fat American fingers (Imagine Stadlbauer playing this!). I fail miserable and it was only from my defense. I didn’t even get to the final segment of the battle. Not to be discouraged by this game I have looked so forward to I gave it another go. When the battle phase came I reverted to my mortal komabt days and mashed this living shit out of the buttons. In the end I walked away with barely any power left and was able to defeat my foe. Not this was the second level. At this point I am fed up because game play sucks, it is to hard and call me what you want. But what kind of idiot developer makes a game that is near impossible for a hardcore gamer. Even Athena was looking forward to this game and I don’t even want to put her through the experience.

Give it 3 out of 10, the game seriously pisses me off.

2006-09-28T08:29:00.000-07:00

La Manquina de Bailar - Completed

Last night I sat down at my computer and watched this movie. Roughly translated means "The Dance Machine", the movie was done in Spain and was completely in Spanish. After watching countless kung fu movies and the three weeks I spent in France it no longer bothers me to watch movies I cannot understand.

The plot or near as I can tell is the classic story of someone needing money for something. The cast consists of your classic characters:

Young man who is repressed, Best friend of young man who isn’t repressed, Old guy who had something tragic happen to him and can teach him the way, Girl who’s bubbly and the Object of main characters affection, other guy who likes DDR and is the token gay fellow, The teenage boy who looks up to the main character, Mobster who’s a dick and has way to much money, DDR champion of Japan and his two monks

Something kind of funny I think they actually call them shaolin monks, which last time I checked we only in china and the DDR champ is from the land of the rising sun.

Here is a quick break down of the plot. Old guy needs money, man character and friends decide to enter a Konami DDR tournament to win him the money, Old guy sends them to dance school to hone skills, Best friend turns on main character, teenage boy fills best friends spot on team, the totally school the other dance teams, mobster pays of judges to force the main character against Japanese guy and as not to ruin the movie for Blanco because I know he is going to watch it, I will say no more.

As cheese as the movie can be it is still better then any Uwe Boll movie. In fact I was more interested watching this movie completely in Spanish with no nudity, then house of the dead.

Should you watch this movie? If you want to and speak Spanish then go for it. Maybe the DVD will have English subtitles.

2006-09-28T07:58:00.000-07:00

Puyo Pop Fever - Not Completed

Tetris stormed the world at one time and I am not sure the Japanese were thrilled this game didn’t come from them. So they made Puyo Pop Fever, the game essential is a Tetris clone with game play changes. The blobs you are given can come in sets of two, three, and four. One of the largest differences is that you’re matching colors and not trying to just get a line across. This makes for interesting game play and allows you to create chains. Four of this color is removed and the blobs drop and make another four to create a chain. Which I found to be challenging and entertaining.

The single player mode is always against a computer opponent. When you clear so many blobs it drops them on your opponents stack as white blobs. These blobs are removed when a set of four is cleared above or around them. The end of the game is when your blobs get so congested they reach the top of the screen.

This game is colorful and has solid game play. For an on the go puzzler I think I enjoyed this more then lumines. The music selection lacks a little bit and I did not explore all of the available play modes, so it did seem to lack a bit of content. They extra play modes might add ten times the entertainment value.

Game is definitely 7 out of 10. Good game and solid game play, however it just didn’t hold my attention and have me coming back for more.

2006-09-27T19:13:00.000-07:00

Smart Bomb - Not Completed

There are few things in games that absolutely drive me insane. One of them is puzzle games that rely on timers to gauge the difficulty of the game. Another little attribute games have I don’t care for is having a high difficulty and no save points forcing you to redo certain areas you have already completed over and over again.

With hat said this game is based on both of these features per say. The bombs have multiple switches that you have to solve in order to switch it off. After completing five out of six sequences you’re suddenly stumped on the last sequence and run out of time. Boom you’re done and well you get to start over again. Now you can start out with any part of the bomb, and work on that multiple times until you get it. But after every failure you get the luxury of watching yourself be blow to pieces. Now don’t forget this is all happening as you hear siren type sounds as your count down timer clicks away.

This game for me was not enjoyable at all. I have enjoyed puzzle games in the past. But this one was just a total let down.

Give it 4 out of 10. The game looks nice and is a great concept for a puzzle game. But the playability is so low it’s not even worth renting.

2006-09-25T15:38:00.000-07:00

Nintendo McDonalds toys - Completed

McDonalds for the past few weeks had Nintendo toys and I couldn’t resist trying to catch them all! Many thanks to Mike T for letting me know this was happening.

Now I was able to get the entire collection, this required me to eat way too many happy meals. To be honest I am not sure I would have even got half of them if Athena hadn’t helped me out. She’s endured happy after happy meal just for me. I have some extras, doubt I will do much with them, but having them satisfied the little collector inside me.

While the Mario ball is certainly the coolest of them all followed closely by the inflatable hammer, I must give major props to the Donkey Kong helicopter thing. You can fire those blades across the entire room with little effort. I think I could actually hurt someone with this thing, perhaps I will take one to work!

2006-09-25T14:21:00.000-07:00

Bounty Hounds - Not Completed

WARNING: This game was played less then two hours. My comments are all based off of these two hours and should only be taken with that in mind.

Here we go on another magic journey to the land of hack and slash games. The game play is solely based on waves of enemies spawning from thin air and attacking you. Your camera angle is 3rd person, but it is not set. You have to constantly click the left shoulder button in order to reset the camera to its default position behind your character. This got annoying very fast with enemies pouring from all sides.

The tutorial was brief and not very helpful. I stood over a few corpses that contained items just wondering how to pick them up until I had pressed every button. Once I received the phat loots it appeared I could not use them. Why I don’t know that’s just how the game plays.

On a positive note the game looks really good. The weapons have some great affects when used and it looked stellar. The sound quality was regular and nothing to impressive.

One annoy thing about the game were the cut scenes. Which were very well drawn in a comic style single panel delivery. However all the text was in bubbles. This is the PSP why cant you have voice over’s? I know translations can be expensive, but I am way lazy and don’t think I should have to read my way through a game. If that is what I wanted I would have bought a book!!!

This game will not receiving a rating since it did not feel I got a full perspective of what it has to offer.

2006-09-25T13:46:00.000-07:00

Bust a Move Deluxe - Not Completed

Once upon a time I was reading Little gamers and they referenced a game called "Bust a Move". Now I was a die hard N64 fan which saw very little on play station. My only real exposure with was from hanging at Matt and Joel’s place. So I missed out on allot and it appears that this game was one of those gems you regret missing out on.

The game is simple, match three or more colors together and they disappear. The stages become more complex and have different specialty bubbles that react different ways when they are used. Being as I played a game similar once upon a time on a my Linux machine it was easy to pick up and play.

For a puzzler I don’t think you can get much better (perhaps Tetris) then this game. The two hours after loading the game into my PSP just flew by. The next day continuing where I had left off I put another two hours into the game. At sometimes I will admit I was frustrated, but it passed very quickly.

This game will probably be that one game I keep around to play in air ports or on car rides. Since the time constraints are very minimal and the fun value is very high.

If you have a PSP and enjoyed any of the previous bust a moves or frozen bubbles, then this is a must.
I give the game 9 out of 10. In the genre of puzzle games, I think this blows Lumines and Loco Roco out of the water.

2006-09-25T12:40:00.000-07:00

Racing Genre: It sucks

Here is my conversation with video game aficionado John Blanco:

Blanco: there is no game genre I hate more than car racing games
Blanco: There are so many series...they all look UBER sexy
Blanco: And they all play like shit :-)
Blanco: I'm glad Nintendo has none...I'd take Mario Kart anytime
Blanco: And that's my rant.
Mobat555: I concur, Grand Turismo is fun for 30 minutes, and Mario kart is fun for weeks
Mobat555: in normal racers you hit a wall and bounce
Mobat555: Mario kart you hit a wall and expect to bounce.
Mobat555: if it’s going to be beautiful and realistic then why don’t they take damage?
Blanco: EXACTLY!
Mobat555: it’s like playing god mode in a FPS, you still have to make all the complicated jumps, but not worry about dieing
Blanco: it's a bull genre
Mobat555: I concur

Are we the only ones who feel this way? Honestly what do these games give us other then going fast in a car we could never own? Is it a refresher from killing aliens, Nazi’s, etc? Mario Kart gives us a video game environment, a place you expect un-realistic things to happen, like in most Nintendo games. The leaders in racing games focus on realism of graphics and handling rather then how realistic the game play is. Would people play these games if there card exploded after nailing the wall once?

One of the best driving games that I have ever played was “Driver”. If your car got destroyed you were done and it forced you to focus on driving well rather then just fast. If there were more games like this then I might be able to call myself a fan.

2006-09-25T10:38:00.000-07:00

Wipe Out Pure - Not Completed

After a quick discussion with Zablanc, I have come to the conclusion that the racing genre is flawed. Perhaps I can convince him to do a post on why we feel this way. So from now on please take this into account when you see me give less then stellar reviews to any game other then Mario Kart.

Wipe out to me is F-Zero on the psp. The other racers seem unreasonably fast and can always catch you. Falling behind is not something you see them do, but of course you as the player are very capable of getting lapped. The steering requires a combination of the directional pad and the shoulder buttons which are the equivalent of an emergency brake. This makes maneuvering at high speeds through the courses a huge task. The boosts and weapons while adding to an aspect to the racer did not seem to help me that much.

The graphics are good and I was impressed knowing this was a launch game. In fact this is the game I saw on Moose's PSP when he got it that set the seed in my mind that I wanted one.

This game will not receive a rating, the time spent playing does not qualify for a proper evaluation. It did not hole my interest for more then an hour.

2006-09-21T10:07:00.000-07:00

The Godfather - Completed

To start off I am not exactly a fan of the god father series. The movie wasn’t bad and I enjoyed watching it, but doubt I will ever find the need to see it again. From what I recall of the movie the storyline inter mingles well with the movie. I cannot say for sure if the character you play is in the movie or not. Either way you know the story line is good since it is based off the movie and the cut scenes/missions coincide really well from what I see.

The game play consists of two different paths. The first is story mode which follows the movie and has missions. The missions are essential scenes from the movie where you play and assist the main characters. Then there is the "Mob Wars" mode. Breaking down New York to look like you are playing risk. With in the sections you will find people to extort and business to take over. When you are ready to move onto other territories you select who you want to attack and it brings up a mission. Unlike risk where your armies battle it out via a dice roll, in mob wars you get to do your own fighting. There is also a card element to mob wars. Cards that help you with your heat level (cops), to entice truces, and even directly steal money from the other families. You must destroy the other 3 family’s compounds in order to take over all of New York. The bottom line of the game is to be the Don of New York. In order to do this you have to complete story mode and mob wars. Which took me around six hours, with at least an hour of the re-playing levels because I couldn’t find the best method to pass a certain point and would die.

I was impressed by the fighting in the game, the down and dirty punch them in the gut. The options you have to beat people allowed for some creativity. Sadly the second mission you receive a gun and rarely revert back to your fists. When it comes to the gun play I was a little let down. You press a shoulder button to auto lock on an enemy and fire away. This is all good and dandy if you can see the enemy. There is an option to put your self flush against the wall and peek around corners and shoot. But this doesn’t help when you are going down stairs or the wall layout does not allow you to see anything. In these instances you would walk blindly into a room while you’re being shot at. Press the auto lock mode and because you cannot see the enemy it won’t lock on and if you fire your gun, it shoots straight down. Who in hell thought it would be a good idea for you to shoot straight down with a Thompson machine gun? If anything have him shoot from the hip randomly into the walls and give the chance to hit an enemy.

The missions all consist of the same thing, run down the street, go into a building, either kill everyone or extort the shop owner, and well sometimes you plant a bomb. They only thing that saves you from the repetitive nature of the game is being in the movie sequences. Helping Michael protect his father in the hospital and so on gave the game some spark and pushed me to keep playing. I did not touch mob wars until I had finished with story mode and this made mob wars a breeze. With upgraded weapons and skills I destroyed the other families in less then an hour.

When leveling through the game you are given skill points. These are used to upgrade your abilities (fighting, shooting, health, etc). In the end I had upgraded nearly all my skills to the max and strangely enough after raising a skill it was hard to recognize its affect. Health increase and how much you can carry were easy to spot. But the weapon increases and accuracy were not that apparent.

The graphics of this game are great, better in my opinion then GTA:LCS. The cut scenes are very well animated and higher end for what I have seen on the PSP.
I give the game 7 out of 10. If it had a little more content and some better shooting mechanisms they game would have been much better.

2006-09-20T14:07:00.000-07:00

Loco Roco - Completed

What I think was one of the most hyped up games of this year. Which seems to be some what of a flop in Japan despite the inventive game play and its off the wall artistic style.

The game play is quite different from most games I have played. In fact I cannot really propose a game that resembles this one.

The game play is quite easy the majority of the time. Essential there are three types of input, tilt left, tilt right, and jump. Completely regulated by the shoulder buttons on the PSP. Sounds a bit odd does it not? Once in the game it makes perfect sense. You are a little blob, the rolls right or left and collect what looks like orange roses in order to get more blobs. These blobs can join together to make a larger blob. At times through out the levels you need to separate into little blobs to move forward. Which instills some tactics into the game.

Levels in the game are unique and very colorful. Tilting the world left and right hoping too and fro attempting to eat bugs and find all the orange roses. Each level felt different as I passed through them, even the smallest change made enough of a difference to keep the game from being repetitive.

One major complaint I have see is the music and honestly I cannot oppose these accusations. The music is something from a children’s special in the middle of the day. It does fit the format of the game, but in some respects I think classical music or even techno would have given the game a better sound element. After the first level I muted my PSP to save myself. The music has no significant value in the game. So I would suggest loading up some of your own tunes to have in the background while you play.

I happily give them game 8 out of 10. Short yet solid game play with plenty of content. Though the music left something to be desired it is better then nothing.

2006-09-20T10:05:00.000-07:00

Exit - Not Completed

This is strange little game where all you really try and do is exit. This game gained my attention for maybe an hour. I enjoyed the cell shad-ish type graphics that would be the only real positive point about the game. The controls feel like you are steering a large truck and don’t seem all the responsive. When the jumps have to be precisely timed and climbing down objects has to be fairly accurate so you don’t fall ten feet to your death, you would anticipate precision input.

This game really in a way seems like a rip off of lemmings. Granted there are drastic differences in game play and look and feel. But the game qualifies for that type of puzzler, where as you use specific objects to get past obstacles and with out proper planning you fail. This does not hold much appeal for me.

I give this game 4 out of 10. No real depth to hold your attention, some nice looking graphics and controls that are not all the controllable.

2006-09-18T10:31:00.000-07:00

DDR night round III

The most gracious hosts John and Michele Blanco invited me and a guest to there home for there infamous DDR nights. This one was not done in a tournament style and was more free play. With out the structure of the tournament some people felt obligated to play less then others. Which is ok, I fully understand that dancing and bronco games are not activates for pregnant women to attend.

It was a great time and of course being the nerds we are, we all came equipped with our Nintendo DS's. This made for some wild Mario kart fun. Hopefully the next activity night will include some Tetris also.

Thanks for the great evening and the fresh cookies. Was great to talk shop with Sean again, and total props to Kelly for being the newbie and sticking with it.

Blankmans blog of the party:
http://zablanc.blogspot.com/2006/09/ddr-night-iii.html

2006-09-17T06:37:00.000-07:00

Bionic Commando Arcade - Completed

Forgive the not so flattering picture of me. It was after a long night of DDR and Mario Kart at the Blanco’s. Today I picked up my cocktail version of Bionic Commando. This is what I plan to use as my kitchen table in the future. The machine works quite well, yet I would like to get the joysticks out and clean them. There not always registering the movement when going left. The game itself is fun, I was a little disappointed that it was not the original NES game. The game has more SNES type graphics and five or 6 levels of game play. I wasn’t exactly counting as I was trying to beat the game. It turned out to be quite easy to beat, but yet still enjoyable. Be sure to give it a try the next time you come to my place. Hopefully by then I will have it wired so an external button supply credits to the player.

2006-09-17T06:18:00.000-07:00

Lego Starwars 2: Original Trilogy - Completed

At first you think star wars and legos, could there be a game that is more nostalgic and fun? Yes there could be a great deal of games that are more fun. When a person spends more then five minutes in an area that should take them less then thirty seconds to complete, something is wrong. There were at least four instances through out all three parts of the game that I got stuck. When I say stuck this means I could not even find a walkthrough to get me past this point and I am ready to chuck my PSP. The frustration I felt was intense enough to give me a head ache and ask for help from a friend. While my friend (Mike T) said he would look into it, I gave the game another go and found the simplistic yet obscure way to continue past the instance of my frustration. My feelings for this game were greatly dampened by this type of level design.

Playing through the three movies took me around six hours. Now here is a perk about the game. After completing all three episodes your only 35% complete with the game. It appears there is that much content in this game, though I will not continue with it for the sake of my sanity.

Some of the really great things about this game are the controls and the graphics. This game is very clean visually, giving life to movies which I have seen so many times Legos were a welcome and refreshing change. The animation while being simple still gave the characters depth. Showing emotions with smirks or frantic gestures. It at times was very amusing. The control of the game involved a party of characters the majority of the time. Allowing for some puzzle type scenarios, keeping the game from being a hack and slash. Using the force was fun but lacked a real ability to manipulate your environment. Everything was very linier when it came to using the force. I was disappointed with the fact I could almost blow anything up with a blaster, yes I can’t pick up and drop a flower pot with the force to break it. Alas this is not Jedi academy, it is Lego star wars and I guess my expectations my have been too high.

The game gets 7 out of 10. Looks great plays well, just call me if you get stuck on a level and I may be able to save you some frustration.

2006-09-13T09:34:00.000-07:00

Fired Up - Not Completed

Remember the old days of Carmagheddon and Interstate 76? I sure do and love the concept of cars with guns shooting other cars with guns. While allot of this love can be attributed to see road warrior at a very young age, the games still had influence on me.

This is a pure combat game with menial mission to transport things here and there and item collecting. Starting off with the combat, I found it quite enjoyable. The weapons on the vehicle are very easy to use. You have your primary cannon which has some assisted targeting, this eliminates allot of the frustration I normally endure in car combat. A good example is side missions in Mario kart, you have turtle shells and need to hit the goomba and have to be directed just right in order to hit it which sucks. The secondary weapons consist of things like missiles, grenades, energy weapons, etc. Homing missiles have a little ridicule that appears on the target and locks on and will seek the target to a point. If you’re facing the wrong way it won’t go blue turtle shell for you so it takes some skill. The challenge while fighting mostly stems from being faced the correct direction and the amount of enemy’s attacking. You are fully capable of out running enemies and hiding your vehicle. Being able to get out of a situation takes away the stress of the fire fights and who wants to be stressed while relaxing with a game. Another aspect of combat is the man able turrets through out the city. You can exit your car into the turret and fire limitless grenades into the enemy’s. This was used in a mission, but can also be occupied for good clean destruction.

The graphics are not ground breaking by any means, but there good and clean. The city’s you trudge through are well planned and designed giving the user a sandbox type feel. Through out the rubble of roads and buildings you will find strategically placed ramps and jumps. They are constantly used through out missions.

The story for this type of game can be fairly shallow and yet rewarding. I was actually impressed by the basis of the story and why the player is doing missions giving the player a feel for the post-apocalyptic destruction that has occurred.
This game gets 8 out of 10, there is just not enough to keep me playing (epically with Lego star wars loaded). It has a lot of the essentials for a fun game and I may complete it in the future

2006-09-12T11:50:00.000-07:00

WTF Video Story Contest - Not won

Today is with out a doubt not my day. This is the second contest I entered and lost.

Here is the story that won:
http://kotaku.com/gaming/wtf/wtf-video-story-winner-200142.php

2006-09-12T09:14:00.000-07:00

Most Impressive Gaming Rig Contest - Not won

Joystiq asked in a post last week for pictures of how you have all your systems set up and connected to your TV. I sent in the same picture as I did for the Ultimate Ghosts and Goblins contest. Admittedly the picture was not the best representation of my gaming collection and setup and I did not have high hopes of winning.

However they announced the winner today. Sure he got happy with labels and this must have been what the editors wanted. But it appears that they did not pick this picture based on how it was connected to the TV. In fact in the picture I do not see any representation of all the systems connected to the TV. This disappointed me, not so much that I did not win. But that Joystiq selected one that does not appear to fit the criteria of the contest.

This is the post of the winner:
http://www.joystiq.com/2006/09/11/joyswag-most-impressive-console-setup/

This is the post for the contest:
http://www.joystiq.com/2006/09/04/gamer-culture-can-i-get-an-adaptor-please/

Any thoughts or am I just being a whiner?

2006-09-11T11:07:00.000-07:00

Crazy 360 Video Impromptu Contest

Kotaku posted this crazy Xbox 360 video that seems to be an audition for the banned train station commercial from the UK. Brian Cercente is running an impromptu contest for a copy of Loco Roco and a Loco Roco Kitchen timer. The contest is to submit a short funny story explaining the commercial. Below was my entry. Wish me luck on winning!

Here is the post:
http://kotaku.com/gaming/clips/wtf-crazy-360-video-199750.php

Here is the video:
WATCH THE VIDEO HERE BEFORE YOU READ ON

"This is the Microsoft effort to assist in the medical treatment of people who suffer from Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome. The woman you see in the video is former KGB agent Ula Yokhfov who suffered through many horrific endeavors during the Russian Afghan war. The video game system can help re-create some of the most traumatic events that Ula had witnessed. Once recreated and Ula has been exposed to the traumatizing events, the emotion will fester into her mind and cause an episode.

What is witnessed in the video is the break through in Ula's treatment. The initial shock of the treatment may in fact contribute to the healing process and provide a way of achieving mastery over the event. For most people, these symptoms usually become less severe and gradually disappear over time. For others, the symptoms persist and become chronic which is why this treatment is getting so much appraise. This could lead doctors down a new path for those who suffer PTSS that were deemed to be untreatable. Ula's son Vladimir assisted in the process buy acting out as one of Ula's fellow agents adding familiarity to the situation and giving a loving presence of her son to help deal with her trauma.

This effort was made possible by Microsoft helping to further technology and how it can assist in the medical field, also thanks to the Lucile Packard Children's Hospital and there work exploring Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome and possible solutions."

2006-09-10T23:31:00.000-07:00

Cars - Not Completed

This is a cute little game with what I consider very good graphics. The game play is decent as a racer but does not seem to have a good balance. When I first loaded the game my assumption was that it was going to be a game geared for kids and would be a breeze for me. I have beaten the last three Mario karts and have done fairly decent with most racing games. But this one well stumped me. Its fairly hard and seems to lack the controls needed for a good racer. In most racing games you feel some sense of control when using a hand brake. With this game it really felt hit or miss and was not consistent at all.

After figuring out I wasn’t to hot at turning, I did realize that I could spin the other cars with ease and pull ahead. One of the tracks seemed to belong to a certain character, I spun said character out and looked at my map only to realize the game re-spawned this car directly behind me. Forcing me to lose the great lead I had in the race. I know this is an animated car racing game but why take away little advantage I was able to get?

The entire experience of the game was played in story mode. Story mode to me would be telling a story. Not just starting a different track with a header like "Farmer blah blah doesn’t like people in his field" and some where on the track the farmer pops out. There was a complete lack of plot and very little cut scenes. What cut scenes there were did no coincide with the game play. I have not seen the movie and I think it would be the only way to understand if there is even a story that is being followed in the game.

This game gets 5 out of 10. Graphics are great and the sound quality is decent. When it comes to game play the game is to hard and could prove frustrating for kids or people who are not proficient at racing games other then Mario kart. No story to be found in the game and the un-lockables just didn’t seem worth while.

2006-09-10T23:29:00.000-07:00

On most days beating Super Mario Bros. just isn’t a big deal. We have all done it at least once or twice in our life. Some can do it level 1-1 straight through to the end in under 10 minutes. But for me I always feel giddy inside when I see that I have saved the princess and she is actually in that castle. Tonight I beat SMB for the very first time on my Nintendo Play choice arcade machine. The controllers are in likeness to the NES advantage yet still awkward having to stand the entire time. But great fun none the less and small milestone in my gaming life.

Also something must have shifted during the move, or perhaps the planets are just aligned correctly… But Excite Bike started to work on my play choice. I was quite excited since it was one of the main games I wanted, yet when I got the PCB it didn’t work and I hadn’t seen one on eBay after that for quite some time.

2006-09-07T23:28:00.000-07:00

Untold Legends: Brotherhood of the Blade - Not Completed

This to me is a decent title for the PSP. Essential a Diablo style RPG that you hack and slash your weigh through numerous dungeons. Though sometimes it felt off when trying to position your character to fight, doing a series of swings the wrong way.

One of the great aspects of this game is modifying weapons and adding effects. Back in my EQ days getting a weapon with any effect would make me giggle all happy like. Rich gave Drakonion a screaming mace or something the first day I logged in and it was the coolest. So this feature made me very happy.

Class selection was not something I played with too much. Picked a berserker to play and stuck with it. This may be an added point to the game that I am over looking that you might want to keep in mind.

This game scored 8 out of 10, pretty basic story with very repetitive game play. Allowing you to port back to the city and sell then return to the point you ported from was a really good feature and the graphics looked very well done to me.

This game was not completed because I formatted my memory stick while um ya know trying to brick my psp.

2006-09-07T16:58:00.000-07:00

People really don't need to fight over controllers at my house...

Unpacking everything I decided to lay it all out on the table pretty much everything console hardware related that I could. This in my opinion will be one of the most complete pictures of my systems I will ever have.

Over 400 games
32 consoles (including portable devices)
62 controllers

I need to have a garage sale or something.

A fun fact for you, the NES with the fox sticker on it, is the one I original bought when I was 12. Thanks Toth for hanging on to it for me.

2006-09-06T09:19:00.000-07:00

Karaoke Revolution - Unlocked all venues

This game is a kick in the pants. All it requires is for you to make the correct tone at a certain point in a song. If you sing the words it helps allot but it’s not required. Its DDR for your mouth (doesn’t that sound bad ha-ha). The selection of music was a good mixture of classic hits and newer top 100 songs. Since I am not very good at holding a tune the only songs I was decent at were the ones I already knew the words too.

This is a great party game that’s easily learned and played. For the record Brian flat out spanked me at this game. Not sure thats a good thing for him.

Give it 8 out of 10, I wish it had more songs.

2006-09-03T22:05:00.000-07:00

Sifting through blogs on Friday I found a link to IGN where Mike Bozon was raffling off extra copies of “Ultimate Ghosts and Goblins” for the PSP. Basically you send in pictures of you with Ghosts and Goblins stuff and or your classic gaming collection. Since I just got done moving in and was prepping my living room to be flooded by games I thought I would have a little fun. That’s over 200 games and 12 consoles. One power glove a Mario striker’s jersey and Nintendo baseball cap, and yes I am sitting on a power pad! Hope you all like it.

Heres a link to the giveaway: http://blogs.ign.com/Bozon-IGN/2006/08/31/29656/p2

2006-08-31T11:18:00.000-07:00

Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex for PSP - NOT Completed Sorry for the week hiatus, between moving into my house and the trip to Maryland I didn’t have allot of time to blog.

On that note I want to start of and say I did not give this game a very good chance. After playing maybe an hour of the game it found its way back into the case and has not left it since. GITS is one of my favorite anime movies. I enjoyed the PS1 version of the game and the PS2 version. But this game just did not feel very well put together. The graphics are very low grade and I personally think easily comparable to a PS1 launch title. It is an FPS which does not seem to be a genre that is doing well on the PSP. It appears no one can get the formula right to make an FPS easily playable with the nub control scheme.

All in all I give it 4 out of 10. Good cut scenes and seemed to have a storyline that follows the series. However very poor graphics content and game play made this game a dust collector.