Surprise! - Game of the Year 2009

Uncharted 2? More like Uninspired 2.

Call of Duty? More like Modern Snore-fare.

Left 4 Dead 2? More like Expansion Pack Left 4 The Bargain Bin

Street Fighter 4? More like Arm Wrestling 8 Ex Plus ∑ Championship Ω Edition

Halo 3: ODST? More like Halo 3: ROYC (Rip Off Your Customers)

Demon's Souls? More like Shut-In's Utopia.

Killzone 2? More like Killzone 2 Little 2 Late.

No good sir, I'm talking about the best game released this year. Perhaps you've heard of it. No? You already saw it on the list of pretenders up there? Well then, I am here to remedy your ignorance.

Through my usual plucky internet channels, I was made aware of the fact that the demo for Hideki Kamiya's latest masterpiece, Bayonetta, was released.

Kamiya, you deranged genius, you.

If you really must boil Kamiya's brilliance down to something so simple as a genre description, Bayonetta is Kamiya's triumphant return to the 3rd person stylish action genre that he popularized when he and his team released Devil May Cry in 2001. In the demo, you can tell that Kamiya has clearly been taking notes from not only his own creations, but from the other challengers to the throne. Bayonetta controls like a dream; we finally have a game where the gameplay is as smooth as the protagonist herself (hawt). This game will blow your goddamned mind in ecstasy. Don't just take my word for it: Did I mention that Bayonetta was awarded a perfect score by Famitsu, putting it in good company with the likes of The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, Vagrant Story, Soul Calibur, and Metal Gear Solid 4?

Make sure you wear a bib and put up a tarp, because your eyeballs are going to explode. When your wife comes in the room and you tell her you need new eyes because you gazed upon 2009's forbidden masterpiece, remember your brief time with Bayonetta fondly. She'll be waiting for you once your name reaches the top of the eye donor list in 10 years. Or you should probably just skip the whole thing and tell your doctor that you want robot eyes, because only a machine's cold unfeeling logic could possibly process the exquisiteness that is Bayonetta without wanting to burst in ecstasy.






And yet, our lowly technology seems incapable of capturing the sheer majesty of this game. Forgive my trangression Bayonetta! I only wanted to spread your good news!

In conclusion:

East Vs. West and the Arbiter That Loved Them

So the ambitious journey to complete Final Fantasy XII begins.

With a few baby steps.

First impressions are that the game has not aged as well as I predicted it was going to. Even though FFXII was released a scant week or two before Gears of War, the artistry on display still held its own versus the technically impressive juggernaut. Now that we're firmly entrenched in the "HD Era" where even bite-sized arcade games are released in HD every week, it gets harder and harder to maintain a sense of perspective.

The quality of the voice acting also now strikes me as "competent" instead of the high bar I remember it setting. Perhaps it's too early to make that call (especially since Balthier has not yet made his appearance).

Hitoshi Sakimoto's music is still lovely though. While you can argue that it doesn't really fit what you expect from a main series entry, his work has defined Final Fantasy Tactics and anything relating to the land of Ivalice.

The establishing plot remains interesting however. The tiny Kingdom of Dalmasca is landlocked between two gigantic warring Empires. After getting overrun by the northern empire (wherein the heir to the throne is killed during the engagement), Dalmasca's king is forced to surrender. A pretty shocking betrayal follows where the high ranking Captain Basch assassinates the King of Dalmasca and the character you are controlling at the time (revealed to be Vaan's older brother with his dying breath). The marquis narrating the story so far (Cid, if I remember correctly) then reveals to us that the princess Ashe has committed suicide in her grief over the loss of her husband and country's independence.

Fast forward two years and we come to control the orphan Vaan. First User Interface irritation. You can't reverse the X-axis camera control. Arrrrrrrghghghghghgh. I used to be able to deal with controlling a "virtual camera" (where holding right swings the "camera" to the right so you see what is on your character's left and vice-versa). Having played so many third person shooters (like Resident Evil 4 and the Splinter Cell games, Gears of War, Metal Gear Solid 3 & 4, etc. etc. ETC. ETC.) makes this feel completely foreign to me. I remember this continuing to be a problem even during my first sojourn into this game.

Anyway, a bunch of non-interesting things happen where Vaan has to run errands for a shopkeeper that looks out for him. (Thankfully) as the story goes on, the irritating Vaan plays less and less of a role. This is probably an unpopular opinion, but Vaan doesn't strike me as being a likeable protagonist. I remember liking Tidus from FFX more (gasp!) It probably had to do with both you and Tidus being a stranger in a strange world and he acted as a decent enough cipher. How about a compromise: I don't think Vaan is nearly as interesting a protagonist as Zidane from FFIX. Both are meant to be sly thieves who are down on their luck and are trying to change their situation but Zidane was far more charming than this kid.

But I digress.

As for the game itself, well, only putting 30 minutes into this game hardly gets you to the "game" at all. I've succeeded in only watching the opening cinematic and narration and had to stop at the first real combat scenario. I am thinking about turning the battle speed up. It seems like there's too much of a lull in the action while I'm waiting for Vaan's action bar to fill up to do his next command. Standing around waiting for a bar to fill doesn't seem like that's how the developers intended the game to be played. When I get back to FFXII I will experiment with that setting.

Finally, any suggestions as to what I should title this blog "series"? I know that you can sort posts by tags, but I just want a title for consistency's sake.

Coming To Terms With Your Disappointing Son

Or at least, that's how I've described my impending playthrough of Final Fantasy XII. Final Fantasy XII had a lot going for it on the outset with me: Yasumi Matsuno was directing it (I was a huge fan of his work from Final Fantasy Tactics & Vagrant Story), the game looked gorgeous, it took place in Ivalice from Final Fantasy Tactics Advance (allegedly), was the next mainline entry in the Final Fantasy series, the characters all looked charming, the voice acting was extremely well done, etc.

The battle system sank the ship for me however.

I hated the demo that came with Dragon Quest VIII. I sadly decided I was going to pass on it, until some blog posts convinced me to give it a shot, that it was different from the demo in a few key ways.

No it wasn't.

I played it for about 20 hours and shelved it after conferring with a friend of mine who said I wouldn't enjoy the rest of it. And there it has sat, for 2-3 years.

After talking with a couple other friends who spoke highly of it and see the game pop up on a few web sites as a BEST GAME EVER (shout out to Gamespite), I've decided to give the game another go, with a much more open mind this time. I know what I'm getting myself into, and hopefully I'll be able to get into the swing of things. I'm hoping to make this a log of sorts on my journey to complete this game, hopefully before the release of Final Fantasy XIII.

Let's see where it takes me.

GG RIAA

Well, I just received an e-mail from Youtube saying that my Brütal Legend video was blocked for copyright infringement due to content being owned by Viacom. Seeing as I'm pretty sure EA is still independent (massive, but independent) I can only guess that Viacom is protecting any of their music that appears in the game. So! Seeing as the music is a major MAJOR part of the Brütal Legend experience, I guess I'm done posting direct feed footage of the game. MAYBE I will post some footage of the RTS battles just so you all can see what that's about, but... I'm kinda sour on wasting my time encoding and uploading these videos just to be shit on by the RIAA and its members. GG RIAA, your draconian bullshit is why I pretty much don't buy music anymore.

Suffice to say though, Brütal Legend itself continues to hold up with interesting characters, humorous dialog and fantastic all-around presentation. This is a game where any (possibly perceived) shortcomings in gameplay are bolstered (possibly overshadowed) by the fantastic aesthetic presentation.

That's Brütal

Finally, one of my most awaited games of the year was released last week. I've gotten to the point of experience in this hobby that I'm starting to follow notable designers and software teams' work as opposed to being attracted to strictly brand loyalty (although that happens too I guess...)

But I digress. Double Fine Productions, headed by Tim Schafer, has released their latest game, Brütal Legend upon the world. One of the interesting things about Schafer is that ever since he left Lucasarts he has been dabbling in other game genres while still keeping his signature sense of humor and strong character-based plots. Psychonauts was a ridiculously funny platforming game and Brütal Legend is a... really ambitiously designed game. Thus far, Brütal Legend is no different. If there were two things that have surprised me about the game so far though, it's that 1) The sharp dialog seems to taper off after a couple hours (somewhat disappointing) but the visual humor keeps the overall comedic tone high and 2) it's a Real Time Strategy game. The latter point completely blindsided me until maybe a couple days before it was released. The demo gives no indication to this point (indeed, you'll see not even a couple hints of RTS game in the first couple videos I'm embedding below). Despite what(Tim Schafer says about the game not being an RTS, I'm more inclined to agree with Penny-Arcade.

It's not that I dislike RTS games, it's just that I find them really hard to play and there's a huge learning curve on them. While I'm dealing with my RTS shortcomings I will say that Brütal Legend's hilariously badass aesthetics make me want to continue learning to play the game and get better. For the record, I think Brütal Legend will probably join Warcraft III as the only RTS game that I actually enjoy, but time will tell.

Below, I've posted some direct feed HD videos of my concurrent Brütal Legend playthrough. I've put the subtitles on for a particular friend of mine. I also have a save game that's much farther along than this, but I'm posting this one to make the game look as badass as it deserves. Some game over screens will be preserved for hilarity's sake (like Jack Black's/Eddie Rigg's line of dialog before crashing into the sea on the upcoming 3rd video). Should I put video updates in new posts or should I append them to this current one? Let me know in the comments.

Introduction:



I get to play! (the demo material...):



Alright, now it's time to finish off the demo and show a snippet of the full game itself:

Damn You Nostalgia(?)

Talk about a product engineered to snipe your warm fuzzy memories with surgical precision.

The game I'm talking about happens to be DISSIDIA FINAL FANTASY (herein much more reasonably referred to as Dissidia). It's an ATM for Square-Enix shareholders that is directly linked to their rabid fanbase's wallet and comes in the guise of a video game. To continue the pessimistic line of thought, the game is a big What If scenario: The 10 main characters of the main Final Fantasy games square off against their respective main antagonists in a 1 on 1 fighting game. It looked and sounded like a petty cash-in when it was announced.

So why can't I stop playing it even in the wake of BIG releases this week in the form of Batman: Arkham Asylum and Metroid Prime Trilogy?

Well, the unexpected happened: the game has turned out to actually be very playable and really good.

1) Despite the fact that it is a fighting game, the designers did not forget that these characters earned their adoration in RPGs. The game mechanics lend themselves to typical RPG design concepts. There is stat building, upgrading equipment and customizing your character (with different abilities that they learn through leveling up).

2) Interesting fighting mechanics. The game appears to be like a 3D fighter. The are two meters that matter: your Bravery and your HP. HP is self-explanatory, you lose when you run out of it. You gain Bravery by using Brave attacks, but conversely you lose Bravery by being hit by them. On top of that, the more Bravery you have, the more damage your HP attack will do (i.e., if you have 2000 Bravery and your opponent has 1500 HP, your HP attack will kill them if it connects). Your Bravery "fuels" your HP attack, in essence. Once you connect with an HP attack however your Bravery drops to 0 and must be replenished.

3) Many, many additional game systems to supplement the main fighting. These include Summons, new equipment, accessories (which in turn have booster accessories that can enhance other accessories depending on a variety of scenarios), story mode to power up your character in a regular RPG fashion, A separate "Chocobo" meter, etc. etc. etc. You don't have to pay attention to all of these different game systems, but if you do your character will greatly benefit as opposed to had you not.

Upon announcement, I thought the game was going to be a cheap cash-in on nostalgia. In reality though, the massive amount of fan service actually enhances a really solid & playable game, in the same way that the Nintendo mythos enhances the basic gameplay of a Smash Brothers game. Bravo Square. I didn't think you had it in you anymore.

Minor Technical Difficulties

Just when I'm getting ready to edit some footage to post for Trials HD (which I will be speaking more of soon), I find out I'm running out of hard drive space. Lousy iPhoto albums.

And hey! Looks like Persona 3 will be getting a re-release/upgrade to my current RPG platform of choice, the PSP! This will be the third copy of the game I own, even though I haven't put more than 10 hours into Persona 3: FES. :(

To my credit, this port looks like it will have another necessary upgrade that I was having a hard time dealing with in Persona 3: the ability to directly control all characters in your party, like in Persona 4. AI directed characters in Persona 4 were actually pretty smart, but the AI seemed downright lousy to me in P3, especially when directly comparing the two games.

LOLZ. The Irony Is Not Lost On Me

but apparently it is lost on Microsoft. I'm putting together a new PC (so I can get some silky FPS in Left 4 Dead and finally be able to play Dawn of War 2) and my new mouse came in the mail today. The first thing I noticed?

The silhouette of Master Chief, the star of the ridiculously popular Halo games on Xbox, is highlighted front and center of the packaging:




The amusing irony pointing, of course, to the existence of an argument wherein people debate (that's putting it nicely) whether Mouse control in first person shooter games are better than Gamepad control and vice-versa. This argument came to its current state of idiocy with the release of, you guessed it, Halo on Microsoft's first Xbox.

Even though I'm aware of the Halo 1 & 2 PC ports, I still think this is pretty damn amusing to see anyway.

(Oh, and as far as this blog is concerned? Mouse input is the superior and preferable input device for FPS games, but FPS games on consoles are still very enjoyable and playable with a gamepad. I don't understand these people that can't adapt to a new control scheme and enjoy themselves.)

Wii Sport Resort

is probably a better name for a product than Wii Sports 2, though it doesn't have the same brand recognition that a sequel's typical name does. Make no mistake, this game is the sequel to Wii Sports through and through. I'll detail all the different modes in the following blog post, (along with one hour of footage!) but for now, enjoy some direct feed footage of the extremely responsive and downright fun swordfighting that can be had in this game.

The Secret of Monkey Island is...

now available once again for your PC and/or Xbox 360. :D

I played the demo on 360 this afternoon, but it just felt... wrong. Not trying to PC Snob it up in here, but I enjoyed the game (almost 20 years ago!) back when they called them "Point and Click Adventures". I think the player interface is a pretty essential part of my nostalgia. It was my first graphic adventure game and really unlike anything I had ever played at that point. The... smoothness... of the remade animation is a little off-putting, but it's worth it to hear Dominic Armato as the voice of Guybrush Threepwood again.

From what I can tell though, if you've never given the game a shot, you really can't go wrong with either version. The fact that you can flip between the classic version and the remake at the touch of a button along with being a legitimate classic game offered at a 10 dollar price-point makes this a tough one to pass up.

Red Faction Redux

Ok, it looks like I've got this embedded video figured out (at least to the point of not looking like a complete amateur). So, Red Faction. In the following videos you may only see snippets of the interesting rebellion dynamic I mentioned in my blog post. But what you WILL see is a whole lot of buildings and stuff breaking apart, falling down, exploding, flying in different directions, etc. Make sure to stay tuned for the end of each video? I thought they were funny ways to finish each segment. :)

This one depicts a side mission you can take. I just recently came upon the bright idea of loading my vehicles with remote charges. Now I just have to learn the appropriate time to dive out of my suicide bomb. :O



There's really not a whole lot more to say about this video other than... Jesus I'm glad I don't work security on Mars with all of these psychos running around.



Don't worry, embedded videos don't mean the end of my observational posts, I'm just trying out some new stuff and getting comfortable with the video process before striking a balance of content.

Video Test #2

Testing other hosting solutions and how the videos work in the blog. Have another BlazBlue match!

A Little Experiment

So, on a complete spur of the moment, I decided to do some research on video capturing equipment and software. I came away with a solution I'm pretty happy with. A good friend of mine also hosts a file sharing site so I will be uploading my captured footage to his site and embedding them in my blog posts here. I hope that capturing footage of games I'm playing as I play them will make perusing my blog a little more interesting and stimulating. Leave a comment if you have any suggestions or like this new addition to my blog!

First up, some footage of the new crazy Japanese fighting game I mentioned in my last blog post. You can see the second match I played on Xbox Live below:



Fun Stuff!

UPDATE: I'm aware of the embedded window cutting off some of the video feed. I'll bring it up with my friend and see how I can take care of it. In the mean time, here's a direct link to the video as well.

Heaven or Hell? REBEL 1 LET'S ROCK DISTORTION FINISH

Jesus, I think I suffered from mental paralysis yesterday on account of the sensory overload that is BLAZBLUE: CALAMITY TRIGGER. It's a good thing my friend was playing versus with me so he could have engaged in CPR if necessary.

On the brighter side of life it's definitely a new fighting game from the creators of Guilty Gear; Meaning once your feeble non-Asian brain is able to process what's happening on your screen there should be a fun and versatile fighting game system to dissect and learn. I'm looking forward to dropping some time into this game. Maybe I should play a couple online matches since now is the time that people are more likely to be terrible at it than a couple months down the road.

Public Service Announcement: You Need To Play Red Faction: Guerilla

I've always been dubious of Red Faction series. The original Red Faction was released on the PC back in 2001. I remember trying the demo and coming away thinking that the Geo-Mod terrain destruction/deformation was a tech demo and nothing more. It seemed like a great idea whose time had not come yet, certainly not in that game anyway. I promptly forgot about it despite the fact that a sequel followed one or two years later. Checking on Mobygames, I guess the PC version didn't have multiplayer support at all? Very stupid.

Let's let bygones be bygones however! Red Faction: Guerilla is a great game that could fly under the radar if more people don't check it out. This particular Red Faction game has been expanded into an open world game, akin to a Grand Theft Auto type of game. The main focus in Guerilla is not destructible terrain, but destructble structures within that terrain: radio towers, office buildings, barracks, security checkpoints, shipping crates, vehicles, chemical tanks, bridges, etc. etc. etc. If it was created by man, you can destroy it... by man.

That's really the focus of the game. It's not going to be the first videogame to make you cry (there's still the countdown to tears, after all) but it may just change the way you think about certain games.

This is a game that now gives you an extra way to interact with your character's world. Granted, it stills centers around the absolute destruction of an object as your primary means of interactivity, but it's nice that we're advancing the depth of that concept. The game forces you to think about the weapons you use in two applications now: efficiency of killing soldiers versus efficiency of destroying buildings. You now can cleverly use your environment besides just taking advantage of the new well-executed cover system. Take out the structural supports on a bridge and watch the army convoy get buried by your maelstrom of wreckage. Need to take out a satellite dish on top of a (seemingly) well guarded military installation? Find the biggest truck you can and drive through the support beams, taking out the dish objective along with a whole mess of troops in the upper floors. Need to lose an army pursuit force? Use a rocket to destroy the bridge the military was about to follow you over.

Another notable design decision that I like is that Red Faction: Guerilla is the first open world game I've played where I actually care about keeping the NPC civilians alive, not just during an escort mission of some kind. It actually makes me feel like I'm part of a rebel uprising. People go from being super pissed at you jacking their vehicles to gladly jumping out and letting you take it for the cause. Then they'll pick up rifles and other weapons and keep the military distracted while you set up elaborate traps of destruction with your explosive devices. I'm really impressed by the fact that their survival not only explicitly rewards me (with more salvage/money and new missions to undertake) but implicitly as well (they go from not wanting to get involved to laying down suppressing fire with their machine guns or grabbing a turret on your truck as you move out). It gets me as a player vested into their cause.

Check Red Faction: Guerilla out. It may just surprise you in its flexibility and interesting aesthetic. I also hear the multiplayer modes are a lot of fun, which I fully intend to check out as some point as well.

Maybe it's because I don't know a goddamned thing about golf

but I think I just got completely fucking robbed in Tiger Woods 10 for Wii. I was playing a game with my friend, and I had a BEAUTIFUL shot on a Par 3. Then a heartbeat sound started playing, and my ball landed on the green and started sloooooooooowly rolling towards the hole.

!

.... O. M. F. G.

Hole In One!

Fuck yeah! First hole in one ever, virtually or otherwise!

The game's response?

OUT OF BOUNDS


WTF?!?

Maybe one of you golfers out there can help me out, but when the HELL is a Hole In One out of bounds?!?!?!?

FWIW, we were playing Skins? Maybe that was it. Golf is hard.

Directed Fun Versus Meta-fun

I had an idle thought while playing Prototype yesterday. A lot of reviews out there are complaining about how bland the world is and how your character has a variety of attacks and powers but no challenges that make you fully utilize the options that are available to you.

I wonder if I'm just finding fun in different places than a lot of reviewers out there, or if I'm just far more easily amused (could very well be the latter point!). One of my favorite things to do in Prototype thus far is to harass random pedestrians. If you slowly walk in Prototype, your character gives anyone near him a little push (a bit like Assassin's Creed, but more of a forceful push). Most of the pedestrians admonish you or flip you off while military-types will shove you back or start verbally berating you.

Which makes it all the more satisfying to grab them by the throat and have your way with them. >:)

Depending on how I feel, I may a) just absorb the overly confident pedestrian in a maelstrom of bone and blood, b) throw them at a car, often bouncing them off hoods and into other vehicles, or c) run away with them to consume them out of sight, like a predator which has just caught its prey.

This particular meta-game that I play is probably where I feel the most like a HUGE JERK in Prototype. If I'm just destroying the military or rival mutants during regular missions, I feel more like my character is a force of nature that harbors no particular malice towards NY citizens even if they (almost always) get swept up as collateral damage.

In this way, I feel like Prototype is not entirely unlike Assassin's Creed, where you have to make your own fun to really get the most out of the game. It's just that this game has the tools to make your metagaming interesting, unlike Assassin's Creed.

Hah, Called It

in my last blog post. Nate Fox, the Game Director of inFamous gives a shout-out to the Spider-man 2 game as being influential while they designed the game. Glad to see my observations were not just ramblings. :)

Good interview on Joystiq, give it a read.

I might be playing a superhero in inFAMOUS...

but the "evil" poster some guy painted of me was too awesome. So I decided to let the artist plaster copies of it all over Empire City. Thus my moral standing took a dip because of negative propaganda that I put my seal of approval on. :(

This post isn't a review of any kind, it basically is just giving me an excuse to talk about inFamous (spelling the game's title canonically is already getting tiresome).

It all began with Spider-man 2. Technology had progressed to the point that someone FINALLY got the bright idea of "Hey. These Grand Theft Auto games are pretty popular. Should we make Spider-man screw hookers and then drop them off skyscrapers? WAITAMINUTE what if we took the other fun part of GTA games and apply the open world "sandbox" philosophy to Spider-man instead?" The result is the template that (any notable) Spider-man game has followed ever since. While they have seen various levels of success quality-wise, what it did do was inspire other companies with dreams of "Superhero" games to apply the sandbox design to their characters.

Then Crackdown came along. Crackdown stands out in my mind because it was a successful fusion of the Superhero's Sandbox and the Thug's Sandbox. In Crackdown, you can hijack cars, pick up all manner of conventional weaponry (handguns, machineguns, rocket launchers, grenades, etc.) and go on huge rampages commonly seen in GTA games. At the same time, Crackdown puts you in the shoes of a genetically modified supercop. Your cop can develop superpowers that are most manifest in the ability to leap incredibly high (jumping from building to building, and scaling up ledges are commonplace in Crackdown) which you can eventually develop into the ability to LEAP OVER certain buildings. Combine this with the fact that you can improve your character's strength, and soon you are kicking cars at gang members or lifting semi-trucks, jumping onto a roof, and taking out an entire gang at once by throwing the truck at them. The vertical nature of the game combined with the varied toolset of your abilities plus the many weapons at your disposal gives Crackdown an incredibly versatile sandbox for you to enjoy.

What Crackdown opened my eyes to is that I have the most fun in the Superhero Sandboxes though. Spider-man 2 couldn't nail down that preference for me because outside of the incredibly fun webswinging, the depth of gameplay wasn't there. I could start to see my preference start to develop in Crackdown and I'm happy to say that my preference for superhero sandbox games (hereafter known as Open World Fuck Shit UP games) has come to fruition with inFamous.

I'll say upfront that I don't think inFamous quite has Crackdown's versatility. You can't do crazy barrel rolls and flips in cars because you can't drive vehicles in the game. This game seems to focus exclusively on the Superhero sandbox versus the Thug sandbox. But oh how inFamous revels in its Superhero trappings...

Like any great character driven action-adventure game, there's a tried-and-true experience point based character progression system that allows you to unlock new skills or upgrade old ones as you play the game more. Your powers range from a simple lightning bolt (which you can use infinitely) to lightning grenades, shockwaves to push foes away from you or juggle them, concentrated electrical bursts that explode on impact and more. While there are many enjoyable way to murder evildoers (or civilians...) the game also has some great travel powers that make traversing the city a pleasure. Your character Cole can scale virtually any building as long as there's a handhold somewhere (much like in Assassin's Creed) and will learn to grind off of power lines and train tracks (which will allow him to leech electricity to fuel his powers after an upgrade, natch). A typical encounter in inFamous for me (as of yesterday) has me grinding a power line, using precision to counter-snipe headshot an enemy which will chain lightning to his buddies, jumping off the powerline and coming down in a huge thunderstomp to clear the ground foes from around me, chucking a few grenades at the stragglers or throwing some orb bursts into the air and painting the targets with my primary bolt. Get a quick recharge to my batteries from a telephone booth and then I climb an apartment building and find a new powerline to grind.

Some people have complained that Cole's superpowers mimic conventional weaponry too much to be truly interesting (there are electrical equivalents to grenades, sniper rifles, and rocket launchers) But the fact that you have access to all of these powers and can combine them with each other seamlessly goes a long way toward selling the concept of "superhero" versus "thug" to me. Even better, the powers can for complementary effects as well as being modified by your moral alignment. A basic example is that my Good Shockwave slowly starts to make anyone hit by it float away helplessly, whereas my Evil Shockwave will actually electrocute foes unfortunate to be in the eye of the shockwave.

Long story short: I wish I could be at home playing this RIGHT NOW.

Bionic Commando - Not Enough Swing In Your Thing There Soldier

Perhaps the headline comes off more harsh than I intended. Let me get this out of the way now: Bionic Commando (the newly released current generation version) is a really fun game. The swinging method of traveling is just as invigorating and fun as I was hoping it would be. It's a relatively short game, broken (loading...) up by (loading...) many (loading...) load (loading…) ing times (loading…).

I've seen it mentioned in many reviews that Bionic Commando is actually, to tweak a well known phrase, too small for its britches. I could guess at their meaning, but having finished my first playthrough on Friday (yes I intend to play it again!) I see exactly what they're talking about. The new Bionic Commando game has a lot going for it: a rarely seen travel mechanic in the bionic arm swing, character upgrades, in-game miniature challenges tied to Xbox 360 achievements, beautiful graphics, a Hollywood summer blockbuster orchestrated score, semi-unimaginitive weapons that nevertheless complement the bionic arm actions well.

I think this game's biggest problem is that it shows you this wonderfully realized disaster area that's just begging to be explored and have epic conflicts in... and then the gameplay fails to take advantage of that. First is the fact that you're boxed in from exploring too much by radioactive fallout from the recently dropped bomb that ruins Ascension City. One notable instance of this missed potential is the lead-up to your first boss-fight. Spencer is tasked with getting to a skyscraper in the middle of the city in order to transmit valuable data from an elevated position. There are very entertaining points of conflict on the street leading up to the skyscraper: fodder soldiers, a couple snipers, biomechs, street lamps, rocket launchers, debris to throw at them, all the good ingredients for great gameplay in this particular game. After dispatching this horde you reach the skyscraper (loading…)

Spencer starts transmitting the data at the top of the skyscraper and is assaulted by a attack helicopter

Wait… HUH?

So let me get this straight... In a game that's all about swinging from point A to point B, you ask me to climb a skyscraper... and then you completely disregard a potentially interesting and challenging setpiece without even a cutscene to show our hero climbing the building. Your commanding officer Super Joe EVEN SAYS "We didn't give you that arm to scratch your ass with" right as Spencer reaches the entrance of the building.

On the slightly brighter side of life, at least the boss fight against the attack helicopter is a very fun cat & mouse arena battle where you can swing from various girders while trying to attain a lock-on for your rocket launcher to bring the chopper down.

The other notable instance that comes to mind is the boss fight against Groeder. This was a very fun boss fight in the remake of the first Bionic Commando game because Groeder can do everything that you can do with his own bionic arm. So it was an interesting fight between two mechanical Tarzans with high-tech weaponry. In this game you wait for him to rush you… then you kick him in the back. Not quite the payoff in gameplay you would hope for after seeing Groeder's return from the remake. What I don't understand is that the game should be capable of another climatic showdown between Spencer and Groeder due to the fact that there is a multiplayer mode in this game. So there is a frame of reference for fighting other bioncally enhanced warriors that makes this boss fight even more pathetic. At least the cutscene afterwards is a hilarious nod to Hitler's gruesome death in the first game.

Granted, there ARE instances where the scale of level and enemy encounters really do come together to create the experience you're expecting. One early example is the area where (if I remember correctly) you first obtain the shotgun. There is a building in the center with flagpoles that let you climb up, enemies on the perimeter, and ruined highways all around you; a bionic's playground. I think the game fires on all cylinders of its (current) potential in the oil refinery->journey to the oil rig set of levels. You have all your bionic upgrades at that point, lots of pipelines to swing from, biomechs patrolling, snipers on lookout, floating mines to swing from over deadly radioactive clouds, etc.

Which I guess leads me to another point: This game is also very much like a summer blockbuster in that there are no surprises (other than a very strange and semi-compelling plot twist near the end of the game). If you've seen any release trailers of the game, you've seen everything that the game is going to show you. The fun and heart of the game lies in the execution of the mechanics.

I think Capcom & GRIN did a really great job of updating the Bionic Commando formula from a 1988 NES sidescrolling platform game to this 3D Action Adventure game. They've built a really solid base to build off of, now they just need to take it further. I would like to see a more open world that rewards players for exploring off the beaten path, more interesting setpieces and bosses that are consistent with the design philosophy of the game and work off of Spencer's abilities, a more finely tuned approach to how weapons should work in tandem with the game's flow, and challenge levels akin to the exercises in GRIN's Bionic Commando: Rearmed. Those improvements should turn this game/franchise from a notable summer blockbuster into a AAA game worthy of all the accolades of other legendary game franchises.

I'm not going to humor this post with a crack about Bethesda's buggy release history and how "X" Never Changes

Anyway. Bethesda released their final (announced) DLC pack for Fallout 3 yesterday, Broken Steel. This is the pack that I was the most excited about, because it adds some expanded gameplay upgrades to Fallout 3, as well as another new area to quest in, etc. What was particularly enticing to me was the fact that the game now does not end after you finish the main questline and the level cap has been bumped up to level 30 (from 20). It was great to take my first character out of retirement and tour the Capital Wasteland again and actually be rewarded with Experience points. I'm somewhat disappointed with the descriptions of some of the new perks that I read. As opposed to being fun, interesting character tweaks that you can't get anywhere else, the new perks are somewhat uninspiring. Examples include: three seperate perks to set your karma to best possible/neutral/worst possible, one perk to automatically know how to create every custom weapon in the game, one perk to convert Nuka-Cola into Nuka-Cola Quantum, one of the two final perks at level 30 increases all of your characters stats to 9 (out of 10), etc. It seems like almost all of these are "grind-reducing perks" which misses the point of what was so fun about character perks in my opinion. Mysterious Stranger, Hired Assassin/Lawbringer perks... stuff like that is more what I had in mind. Thinking off the top of my head, I guess a lot of perks in Fallout 3 were grind-reducers, but they were cleverly described in context which led to your character feeling more S.P.E.C.I.A.L. (sorry).

However, the other final level perk (while not feasible in gameplay) sounds far more amusing: when your health drops below 20 HP, you spontaneously combust into a nuclear explosion that (I assume) kills everything around you.

Again, in the little bit I played, it was fun to be exploring the Capital Wasteland with my main Fallout 3 character again. Even yesterday, I still found new locations in the game that I had never seen before (including a computer that had a "beta" text-based adventure game on it, hahaha). There's still even new quest content and items that I have to explore on top of all the additions to the main game! I will definitely have to set some time aside for my re-entry into Post Apocolyptia.

Killzone 2, more like BORE-ZONE... I got nuthin'

I finished the single player campaign of Killzone 2 on default difficulty this past weekend. It was... serviceable. On the one hand, I feel like the game probably shines on a higher difficulty level. On the other hand, I detest how "muddy" the look sensitivity feels and the button configuration. I kept thinking to myself over-and-over that if this game's controls felt as sensitive and right as Call of Duty 4's that I probably would enjoy the game much more than I ended up doing.

The standout positive things that I enjoyed about the game were:

1. Amazing graphics. I remembered being wowed by the initial E3 trailer (that was later admitted to be pre-rendered). The final game actually comes very close to that level of graphical fidelity.
2. Great ragdoll physics after killing an enemy soldier. The Helghast soldiers drop like they have actual weight to their bodies and armor. This makes the game feel more convincing and immersive.
3. Uh, the graphics are great?
4. There were some really great set-pieces midway through the game till the end. There was a great end of level sequence in the game where you are attacked by Helghast inside of a shantytown; very fun playset. The abandoned mining/refinery village was fantastic; with a engaging sniper showdown. An assault on top of a speeding train was another highlight. The final push into Col. Radic's stronghold also had a great flow of action with semi-linearity and seemed appropriately apocalyptic. Basically anything that wasn't "War-torn City" was visually appealing and memorable.
5. Piloting an Exo-Skeleton Warbot near the endgame was a fun surprise, especially after the game had avoided vehicular combat up until this point.
   
6. The final showdown was tense and and suitably epic, even though it overstayed its welcome.
7. Multiplayer seems like it could be a lot of fun. Plus botmatch! I always appreciate that in first person shooters. Must be my fondness for Reaper Bots.
   
8. The graphics were really great.

Things that I didn't like:

1. Back to the game's controls, but it bears repeating: This game simply doesn't feel responsive enough, even after messing with sensitivity settings. Combine that with many of the buttons you need to hold down simultaneously to get into cover and then aim through your reticle... it's overly complicated. My mind kept wandering back to Call of Duty 4 and Rainbow Six Vegas and thinking: if these games figured out how to have fluid controls with similar game design two years ago, how did Killzone 2 miss the memo?
2. The basic gameplay simply isn't very fun. There is a very generic feel to the skirmishes you will have in this game. The shooting mechanics are unsurprising; you've used these guns in countless other First Person Shooters before. Couple this with the irritating restriction of being able to swap your primary weapon only. Granted, I like the back-up magnum your player character is equipped with, but it really stifles the variety of your encounters when your tactical load-out choices are Assault Rifle A + Magnum, Assault Rifle B + Magnum, Machine Gun + Magnum, Generic FPS Staple Weapon + Magnum etc. At least there's offhand grenades (thank you Halo). Even the enemy types hearken back to the complaint of generic enemy design. You've got your regular foot soldiers, big guys, a couple flying drones. Sometimes those foot soldiers will try to kill you with a knife! A couple tanks too I guess? Killzone doesn't even have as many enemy types as BioShock, never mind the fact that it simply doesn't hold a candle to BioShock's aesthetic design and atmosphere.
3. Bros of War - Man, this is so irritating in this game. Gears of War is pretty notorious for this overly-macho frat boys-getting-new-toys-and-killing-durty-foreigners/aliens/whatever, but for some reason Killzone 2's take on this aesthetic irritates me even more. The members of your Alpha Squad overly irritating macho assholes who aren't any tougher than your average grunt but spout off like they are the omnipresent force of victory on the battlefield. Fuck you, annoying loudmouth stereotype guy, I'm the only fucking reason this invasion is going to be a success. When you can sympathize with your enemies (who are Space Nazis) more than your own squad/military, you've missed the boat when it comes to drawing players into your world.
4. About half or a little more than half of the level design is lackluster. When your enemy skirmishes are generic and uninspiring to begin with, it falls to the level design to have interesting places to fight in. Thankfully the latter half of the game picks this up, but you'll have to stick with the game for a while until it does.

Ultimately, this game validates my Gamefly subscription. It was fun at its best, but quite irritating at its worst. I would consider playing the game on a higher difficulty to see how tactical the gameplay could be if it wasn't so uninspiring the first time around and the controls were tighter. If the multiplayer side of the game is as fun as it seems (and the internet is to be believed), then Killzone 2 is probably worth picking up on the cheap ($25 or less IMO). If you have no interest in multiplayer, this game has rental written all over it.

This is how we do math... IN THE STREETS

Take this:


Plus this:


and you get THIS:




Ahhhhhh. :) That was a fun Sunday afternoon project. There's a few things I would have done differently, but not much. For a first time mod I'm pretty damn happy with the way it turned out honestly. The fact that I didn't short out the circuit board and catch my hair on fire was a victory in and of itself. I also installed an octagonal restrictor gate on the joystick (to make it feel more like an American-style joystick). It was weird going back to it... I wonder if I've used a square gate for so long that I'm better with them now? It doesn't matter too much because it was the cheapest part of the lot. The new buttons I installed are AWESOME though. They're super sensitive and I'm already noticing some combos are flowing easier because of it. Swapping the gumball for the bat-top on the joystick was a good move too... it feels much more "substantial" in my left hand now. That's staying for sure. As for the art, well I really liked it when I saw it linked in a couple of forum posts, so I just sort of cobbled together some templates that I liked (definitely wanted to keep the Street Fighter 4 "splatter" motif) plus that particular image and worked them together. I think it worked out pretty well. :)

In more Street Fighter news, they released the FREE "Power Pack" update. This adds an online tournament mode. While there are still no online lobbies (a grave oversight in my opinion), the new championship mode really takes care of some big problems I had with the online mode. Mainly, the fact that there's a double blind select now (so you're more likely to see people playing other characters instead of trying to counter your pick) and a disconnect % (so you can see if they're a sore losing wanker who disconnects before they get a loss on their record). Other than that, Championship works very much like regular matchmaking: you can play Arcade mode while you wait for your match in the brackets. The cool thing is that if you win the virtual tournament, you're allowed to save your replay for studying later. Finding replays is not an intuitive process at all but once you know how it's simple to find them. It's really interesting to watch top players' tactics, as you would imagine. Capcom is making a huge push to make Street Fighter 4 as significant as the impact that Street Fighter II had. While I think that's an unattainable goal, they're doing a great job reaching for it. Now put a player match lobby system in there and you'll have crafted the finest fighting game this generation Capcom!

It was like Daydreaming in Freshman Study Hall... BROUGHT TO LIFE

A couple of things about Star Wars: The Force Unleashed. One, it makes a great first impression. The first level sees you touch down on the Wookie's home planet as none other than Darth Vader. One of the things that I enjoyed about this level was that contrary to using his character skin in Jedi Outcast, Vader has a purposeful stride that he maintains through the whole level. He never breaks into a run, which differentiates Vader into "Stoic Badass Evil Sith Lord" from the original Star Wars trilogy versus "Crazy Flailing Ninja Jedi" that have become the popular depiction from the new Trilogy. Of course level 2 places you in the shoes of a new school Jedi immediately after the great prologue. Hmm.

While the game still makes concessions to the more tangible game-iness of showing Force "waves" when Vader uses Force Push (for example) I was still overwhelmed by a feeling of "Classic Star Wars" in this prologue. Even when you fight the Jedi ninja at the end of the level, Vader still uses his economy of motion to put him down.

As for the rest of the game and Vader's Apprentice, well... it's actually better than I thought it was going to be. It still seems to suffer from average problems of games in this genre (mainly, camera control and keeping the enemies you want to attack on the screen), loose, floaty jumping, and frivolous combos that are never more useful than your bread and butter combos. I'm not sure how I feel about levelling up (as opposed to the genre heavies' method of purchasing new combos through currency earned by defeating enemies) but it seems pretty good and doesn't altogether limit the all-too-important feeling of progression. The combat has a nice solid feel to it, but the aerial combat feels slightly lacking, like it's not as well integrated into the general game flow. I may have to unlock more aerial combos and perhaps my opinion will change. I do like that the (seemingly mandatory in games these days) quicktime events flow presentationally, even if you fail. As opposed to being hit by a "Game Over" screen or a hard cut back to pre-quicktime battle, it flows/animates pretty naturally back to the beginning of the event. Hopefully that small but intelligent design decision is repeated throughout the game.

Oh yeah, one thing that bothers me is that man, game artists/modellers/texture artists/whoever CANNOT get human faces right. They end up looking all doughy and weirdly doll-like. At least the lip synching animation is done well, when the Xbox 360 can actually be bothered to synchronize the sound and the animation. Will have to install to the hard drive and see if it makes any difference...

Definitely more fun than I thought it would be. It's worth putting some more time into.

War... War Never Changes

But apparently we'll finally get to see how Las Vegas has changed in the Fallout universe. Other encouraging news is that it is being developed by Obsidian Entertainment, who employ many of the original developers from the first 2 Fallout games. I'm interested to see how Obsidian veterans will handle returning to a franchise that they made so special, and also how New Vegas compares to the New Reno that they established in Fallout 2.

What do you get when someone plays Ryu like Sagat?

You get this Street Fighter 4 International Exhibition video. In all seriousness, this is probably one of the best match videos of any fighting game I've ever seen. The players are two of Japan's best players, the Dhalsim player being the one who most recently won their national tournament and the Ryu player being one of Japan's best ever Street Fighter players. The play-by-play commentator is Capcom's Seth Killian who by his own right is an incredible player as well. Even if you're only slightly familiar with the game, you should be able to detect the incredible skill on display.

Stuff like this makes you get psyched up and want to practice. Only to have your execution skills fail you during yet another scrubby Ken match. :(

What the... Where's my grappling hook?

I found a deal on Tenchu: Shadow Assassins for the Wii ($25 shipped), a game that seems to already have fallen under the radar after its release on February 3rd. Usually this is a bad sign.

Tenchu, for me, is an underdog series of games I always find myself rooting for. I can't help it. I've certainly had my ups and downs with new entries in the series over the years, but I find myself always checking out the latest release, if not purchasing it outright.

Tenchu, as a general rule, seems to have problems evolving its game design past what was established in 1998 by the original Tenchu: Stealth Assassins. The basic tenets of the game was to set your ninja character in a wide open map with a particular target to assassinate (usually). There are various guards/rival ninjas patrolling, civilians loitering, and animals sleeping in between you & your target. Your goal is to complete your objective without being seen (no surprise there). Tenchu adheres to the Thief series approach to combat: You can engage in open combat when you're seen, but your character is not very good at it. The best method to disposing enemies is the series' trademark stealth kills. The marriage of stealth kills plus the level design is what made Tenchu appealing to me. Stalking some poor sod walking along a dimly lit Japanese alley while watching from the rooftops to jumping down and slitting his throat seconds later... There really weren't too many gaming experiences like that at the time.

So the fact that this latest entry felt so different was simultaneously refreshing and alienating. On the one hand, seeing Rikimaru effortlessly dispatch a sleepy guard of questionable intellect felt as good as it ever did. On the other hand, the pace of the game feels much slower than previous entries in the series. It's much more methodical than the action-oriented feel the series started to take with Tenchu 3 onwards. With the original developers back on board, the game's controls are now like the original game instead of Tenchu 3's vastly superior implementation. I found it odd that aesthetically, the game seems to embrace the "mystical" nature of fictional ninjas more. Whereas before your ninja would be standing in a dark area, now when he finds a dark corner to hide in he is covered in a shroud of shadows, with streamers and a black mist hovering about him. It's an odd jump.

These things altogether are not inherently worse than the old games, just different. If there is one thing that I can point to that leaves a bad taste in my mouth, it's the fact that the levels are more stiflingly designed so far. That trademark Tenchu open level design seems to have been traded in for a more directed linear experience. For those familiar with the genre, it's like going from playing a level from Thief: The Dark Project to playing a level in Splinter Cell. I just feel that this style of level design directly hampers the Tenchu experience.

Also, no grappling hook -> rooftop stalking. what.

RESIDENT EVIL... FIIIIIIIIIIIIIIVE or: How I Learned To Stop Worrying and Love Achieving High Scores

I've spent a good deal of time on playing Resident Evil 5. While I don't think it outclasses its predecessor, I also feel that the game is still executed incredibly well; it's hard to make lightning strike twice, much less five times, right?

I was interested to come upon the realization, however, that I may almost be having more fun in Resident Evil 5 now that I've seen all that it has to offer. I feel like a lot of the fun in the game comes from the execution (quite literally in some cases) of the game's mechanics, moreso than whatever hackneyed story scenario the game throws you into next. This is best established in Resident Evil 5's sub-game, The Mercenaries.

I know The Mercenaries is not new to the Resident Evil series, having been added to the series in RE3. I'm more familiar with it in terms of Resident Evil 4 onwards. It's funny to think that I never really had a taste for this bonus game in RE4, but somehow it has turned into an addictive little arcade-type title in RE5 that I keep coming back to. I think part of what I had to do is overcome my RE4/RE5 playstyle, which is to handicap enemies and use the ultra stylish melee maneuvers to find them off. Since Mercenaries limits you to a strict time allotment, this narrow focus tends to limit the high scores you can achieve. This in turn limits you from unlocking new levels/arenas to play in and new characters to use in these arenas. A loosening of my typical brute force strategy was required.

This leads to a new kind of frantic pacing in the game. I found it interesting that RE5's admittedly obvious detour from survival horror to nonstop action has probably benefited this side game more than the actual campaign. Many of RE5's "arenas" are reproduced in Mercenaries, often to greater effect than in their respective scenario in the storyline. Having 8 different selectable characters also gives a replayable edge to the mode, as the weapon loadout and inherent damage ratings between the different characters benefit different playstyles.

On top of all that, this mode can be played with a second player, online or locally on your Xbox 360/PS3. I highly recommend you try it; you might be surprised about how addictive trying to achieve a high score in a Resident Evil game is!

Hello My Friends!

So, I believe an introduction is in order. This is my little spot on the internet. The focus of my blog is to record my thoughts and observations mainly related to my favorite pastime - gaming, particularly the television kind. Here you'll find my thoughts & impressions of games that I'm currently playing, nostalgia flavored reminiscence of videogames past, and idle musings on industry trends. I mainly am publishing this blog as place for my friends to keep appraised of these thoughts, but if you find yourself coming here from elsewhere on the Web, welcome and I hope you'll find something enjoyable from my ramblings. Future blog entries include something I've wanted to do for a long time, which is to record a formalized list of my favorite 50 games. Please leave a comment on the blog. Intelligent comments and discussion are always welcome!

As for the blog title/URL, anyone in the know should be able to mentally hear this quote in their heads. If you don't know what it's quoting, you'll know soon enough. :)