Oh hey... been awhile. I haven't forgotten - just been busy, as usual. Rented a lot of games, none of them terribly fantastic but still worth killing time on (Space Marine, Rise of Nightmares, Crysis 2, and more...) My life has been consumed by Gears of War 3. Yes, it's that effin' good. I love me some Gears. I haven't even beaten the story yet, but I've been tearing my way through twats in versus, horde mode and beast mode. Glorious. I don't even have to write a review for this. Get it if you know what's good for you... so I can have more people to play 4-player co-op with.
In other news, I think my EA Skate career is dead. Uploading clips to EA Nation no longer works, and I have no other feasible means of recording, save for buying a capture card, which at this point, would be an absolute waste unless I wanted to start filming other games, which I really don't ever think of doing. I suppose I could record Gears of War 3, but .. ehh... I dunno if it'd be worth it to buy a capture device.
Friday, September 23, 2011
Monday, June 27, 2011
Don't Diss Duke
Hey there,
Been awhile - for the little few of you that actually read and/or care. I've had a lot to do lately, plus I've been sort of lazy, so I haven't really gotten around to actually writing anything. I just moved into my new apartment in the St. Louis area and started my new job. No more university homework, so I can just come home now and play games. Between the moving and off-hours, I've recently played 3 games that I think deserve talking about. I'll be honest and say that I rented all 3 of these. This one will be a three-part wall of text so brace yourself. I'll try to make it quick and concise.
Duke Nukem Forever
In case you haven't heard, Duke Nukem: Forever finally came out. No really, it did. It's been getting absolutely atrocious ratings, however, which I feel that are wholly undeserved. I don't consider myself an oldschool Duke fanboy, but some things need to be said here. I've seen ratings of 2/10, 1 out of 5 stars, 10 out of 100, etc etc, so on and so forth. You get it. People are reaming Duke with terrible scores. I think it's because of one major reason alone, coupled with a few other contributing factors. That reason, dames and dudes, is high expectations. Sure, it may seem normal to expect something that has been in development for over 12 years to be worth it's weight in shat-out golden bricks that line the fountain of youth, but lets be realistic here... You would only expect that if it was the exact same product being worked on from start to finish. Let's all understand this - Duke: Forever has had several story rewrites, several graphic engine overhauls, and has even been tossed to a different development team. They weren't working on the same monster for 12 years straight. By the time Gearbox got the rights to the King, the graphics were about 2008 quality, and most of the content was whatever they inherited. Gearbox didn't make the entire game - they simply finished it. There's no way anything could ever live up to that kind of expectation and deep-down, they knew it. And let's cool it on the graphics gripes - honestly, I think the game looks better than CoD: Black Ops (which reminds me of PS2 days), and I'm not one to even judge a game purely on its graphics anyway. So, yes, I played it. And I actually enjoyed it. Was it freaking amazing, capable of inducing gamer-gasms? No. Was it fun(ny)? Yes. I don't think it deserves all the heat it's taking. Seriously, a 2 out of 10 would mean that a game is utterly unplayable garbage that a 2 year old could code out in a week. I've played *WAY* worse games than Duke: Forever that had better ratings. I think the "professional" reviewers were just really butt-hurt that it didn't live up to their wildest dreams. Sure, there are some parts I can gripe about, such as the over-use of the mini-duke levels, but for the most part, the game mechanics worked, and it was fun to destroy alien scum in a purely blast-through-em mentality. I played Duke Nukem: Forever with a beer in hand, knowing full well that every bit of it wasn't about being taken seriously - it was about college toilet-humor and slapping wall-boobs, and more importantly, Duke himself. Don't drink the haterade til you've given it a go yourself, after having pulled the stick out of your arse. Worth playing? Yes, but maybe not buying. Give it a rent. I'll leave it at that.
Child of Eden
Short and sweet. That's Child of Eden for you in 3 words. This is a game that, whether you play it with a controller or with the 360's Kinect (my chosen method), sucks you in visually and musically. Overall it was a very enjoyable experience, and I felt more connected to a game while playing it than I had in quite a long time. Maybe it's the fact that while I was playing it, I didn't have a controller in my hand... or it could have been that while in the beautiful digital levels, there's barely a noticeable HUD to distract you. Musically and visually, this game couldn't have done better. It's a shame that its just so damn short. You can beat it easily in a day, but there's a ton of replay value to be had. The achievements and collectibles in Child of Eden are extremely challenging to obtain and, if you're into whoring yourself out for achievements, you'll have plenty of fun. Because I only rented it, I didn't get to do much whoring, myself. Worth a buy (which I plan on doing after a few paychecks settle in maybe), especially if you own a Kinect. Fun to play, easy to approach, but difficult to master.
F.3.A.R (aka FEAR 3)
This one is fresh in my mind, so I figured I'd review it. I've had a love-hate relationship with the FEAR series. Each game was very enjoyable, but always had one or two things that it could have done to make it better. The story arc among all 3 games has gotten progressively more complex and confusing. The first game focused more on being scary than the following 2 sequels, but the latter added more solid game play in a nicely wrapped package. F3AR, I'll say, wasn't nearly as scary. It had its moments of tension, but they were always kind of a letdown. I wouldn't even bother to call it anything close to a survival-horror shooter anymore. It was more of a thriller than horror. The game starts off rather quickly, assuming you totally understand the previous 2 games and hoping that you ignore some of the plot-holes it leaves. You play as one of 2 brothers, either Point Man, from the original FEAR, or Paxton Fettel, who you shot in the head at the end of said first game. Does it bother to explain how a psychic-him is still floating around? No. Does it bother to explain why the main character (Point Man from the first game) was captured and imprisoned? No. There's a pregnant ghost-girl mother who's having FEAR2's Daddy's baby. If you've ever played any of the FEAR games, you'll know what I mean. They assume you come into this knowing you're getting into some paranormal stuff they don't have to explain. It just has one gear, and that's *GO*. So other than those gripes, how was it? Pretty good actually. I'm considering buying it soon when I can, so I can replay it as the other brother and get into the completely reworked multiplayer. For this review, I just played through the single-play instead of the 2-brother-co-op, which the game was quite obviously designed for. I owe it more time, but I liked it. They improved on some let-downs from FEAR2, and actually brought in characters we care about again. The gameplay was really solid. I can't really complain about the shooting bits, because there's really nothing wrong there. I just wish it were scary again... that's part of what sold me on the original. F3AR constantly takes you out of the game by throwing tons of stuff on your HUD reminding you that you're playing a video game and that you're not actually in some horrific setting. Take me back to the creepy bits please - I actually like games that make me hesitant to go into the next room. I felt like I blazed through this without much worry at all. I digress...
If you like shooters, put down your Halo and your CoD and give this iteration of FEAR a whirl. It's a welcome change of pace from the typical crap that the FPS market is churning out, and is definitely worth playing through if you've had any experience with this game's predecessors.
Been awhile - for the little few of you that actually read and/or care. I've had a lot to do lately, plus I've been sort of lazy, so I haven't really gotten around to actually writing anything. I just moved into my new apartment in the St. Louis area and started my new job. No more university homework, so I can just come home now and play games. Between the moving and off-hours, I've recently played 3 games that I think deserve talking about. I'll be honest and say that I rented all 3 of these. This one will be a three-part wall of text so brace yourself. I'll try to make it quick and concise.
Duke Nukem Forever
In case you haven't heard, Duke Nukem: Forever finally came out. No really, it did. It's been getting absolutely atrocious ratings, however, which I feel that are wholly undeserved. I don't consider myself an oldschool Duke fanboy, but some things need to be said here. I've seen ratings of 2/10, 1 out of 5 stars, 10 out of 100, etc etc, so on and so forth. You get it. People are reaming Duke with terrible scores. I think it's because of one major reason alone, coupled with a few other contributing factors. That reason, dames and dudes, is high expectations. Sure, it may seem normal to expect something that has been in development for over 12 years to be worth it's weight in shat-out golden bricks that line the fountain of youth, but lets be realistic here... You would only expect that if it was the exact same product being worked on from start to finish. Let's all understand this - Duke: Forever has had several story rewrites, several graphic engine overhauls, and has even been tossed to a different development team. They weren't working on the same monster for 12 years straight. By the time Gearbox got the rights to the King, the graphics were about 2008 quality, and most of the content was whatever they inherited. Gearbox didn't make the entire game - they simply finished it. There's no way anything could ever live up to that kind of expectation and deep-down, they knew it. And let's cool it on the graphics gripes - honestly, I think the game looks better than CoD: Black Ops (which reminds me of PS2 days), and I'm not one to even judge a game purely on its graphics anyway. So, yes, I played it. And I actually enjoyed it. Was it freaking amazing, capable of inducing gamer-gasms? No. Was it fun(ny)? Yes. I don't think it deserves all the heat it's taking. Seriously, a 2 out of 10 would mean that a game is utterly unplayable garbage that a 2 year old could code out in a week. I've played *WAY* worse games than Duke: Forever that had better ratings. I think the "professional" reviewers were just really butt-hurt that it didn't live up to their wildest dreams. Sure, there are some parts I can gripe about, such as the over-use of the mini-duke levels, but for the most part, the game mechanics worked, and it was fun to destroy alien scum in a purely blast-through-em mentality. I played Duke Nukem: Forever with a beer in hand, knowing full well that every bit of it wasn't about being taken seriously - it was about college toilet-humor and slapping wall-boobs, and more importantly, Duke himself. Don't drink the haterade til you've given it a go yourself, after having pulled the stick out of your arse. Worth playing? Yes, but maybe not buying. Give it a rent. I'll leave it at that.
Child of Eden
Short and sweet. That's Child of Eden for you in 3 words. This is a game that, whether you play it with a controller or with the 360's Kinect (my chosen method), sucks you in visually and musically. Overall it was a very enjoyable experience, and I felt more connected to a game while playing it than I had in quite a long time. Maybe it's the fact that while I was playing it, I didn't have a controller in my hand... or it could have been that while in the beautiful digital levels, there's barely a noticeable HUD to distract you. Musically and visually, this game couldn't have done better. It's a shame that its just so damn short. You can beat it easily in a day, but there's a ton of replay value to be had. The achievements and collectibles in Child of Eden are extremely challenging to obtain and, if you're into whoring yourself out for achievements, you'll have plenty of fun. Because I only rented it, I didn't get to do much whoring, myself. Worth a buy (which I plan on doing after a few paychecks settle in maybe), especially if you own a Kinect. Fun to play, easy to approach, but difficult to master.
F.3.A.R (aka FEAR 3)
This one is fresh in my mind, so I figured I'd review it. I've had a love-hate relationship with the FEAR series. Each game was very enjoyable, but always had one or two things that it could have done to make it better. The story arc among all 3 games has gotten progressively more complex and confusing. The first game focused more on being scary than the following 2 sequels, but the latter added more solid game play in a nicely wrapped package. F3AR, I'll say, wasn't nearly as scary. It had its moments of tension, but they were always kind of a letdown. I wouldn't even bother to call it anything close to a survival-horror shooter anymore. It was more of a thriller than horror. The game starts off rather quickly, assuming you totally understand the previous 2 games and hoping that you ignore some of the plot-holes it leaves. You play as one of 2 brothers, either Point Man, from the original FEAR, or Paxton Fettel, who you shot in the head at the end of said first game. Does it bother to explain how a psychic-him is still floating around? No. Does it bother to explain why the main character (Point Man from the first game) was captured and imprisoned? No. There's a pregnant ghost-girl mother who's having FEAR2's Daddy's baby. If you've ever played any of the FEAR games, you'll know what I mean. They assume you come into this knowing you're getting into some paranormal stuff they don't have to explain. It just has one gear, and that's *GO*. So other than those gripes, how was it? Pretty good actually. I'm considering buying it soon when I can, so I can replay it as the other brother and get into the completely reworked multiplayer. For this review, I just played through the single-play instead of the 2-brother-co-op, which the game was quite obviously designed for. I owe it more time, but I liked it. They improved on some let-downs from FEAR2, and actually brought in characters we care about again. The gameplay was really solid. I can't really complain about the shooting bits, because there's really nothing wrong there. I just wish it were scary again... that's part of what sold me on the original. F3AR constantly takes you out of the game by throwing tons of stuff on your HUD reminding you that you're playing a video game and that you're not actually in some horrific setting. Take me back to the creepy bits please - I actually like games that make me hesitant to go into the next room. I felt like I blazed through this without much worry at all. I digress...
If you like shooters, put down your Halo and your CoD and give this iteration of FEAR a whirl. It's a welcome change of pace from the typical crap that the FPS market is churning out, and is definitely worth playing through if you've had any experience with this game's predecessors.
Tuesday, February 8, 2011
Two Worlds 2
A long jump forward, a few steps back...
The original Two Worlds was an RPG that actually had a decent amount of hype, but fell short on pretty much all of it. Yet I still played the ever-living hell out of it. Given all of its shortcomings, bugs, terrible voice acting, low framerate and overall clunky and mostly broken system, I loved playing it. It had a certain charm to it, and I really, REALLY like 3rd person, open-world RPGs. I think I'm one of the few people in the world that legitimately liked it.
Now take the original game, with all its failures, and improve almost damn near everything... almost. That's Two Worlds 2. Its name is a bit silly, but my, how it has grown. They learned their lesson and actually made the sequel into something really worth playing, if you like RPGs, that is. Do not make the mistake of calling yourself an RPG fan and then compare it to Elder Scrolls... it doesn't work like that. I hate that criticism, "oh it's no Oblivion, so therefore it sucks". They're on completely different ends of the RPG spectrum, with the only thing linking them is that they are fantasy games.
With that out of the way...
In Two Worlds 2, you are once again the main character from the original game, except the story or the landmarks in the original didn't matter. Your sister and you (the nameless hero) are imprisoned by the evil emperor Gandohar (funny names in this game). Apparently you've been in prison for somewhere around 5 years, so there's enough excuse to make you have to relearn all your combat skills over again. You get busted out by some friendly orcs and get sent on your epic quest to learn Gandohar's weaknesses and free your sister. It doesn't sound as epic to start off, but later in the game, things build up to where there's more than just the rescue of your sister at play.
Almost everything about it is better than the previous iteration. They actually throw in an existing story, hired some decent voice actors, and made things interesting. There's a decent tutorial right from the get-go this time around. The character models are kind of iffy-looking but the environments look absolutely awesome. A lot of the original game got a major overhaul as far as functionality and customization goes. You can still stack "cards" to increase your magic power, but it's even more customizable. Almost everything can be broken down into raw materials to upgrade weapons or armor with. That's one thing I loved about the original Two Worlds, that I'm glad they kept around... the sheer amount of customization and upgrades. This version of the game is much deeper - there's a lot more to do - it definitely feels like the kind of game you'll spend a ton of time on. There's even a good bit of humor in the game, often making pop-culture references or poking fun at how campy the original game was (see videos embedded at the end of this post).
As for your combat, you can deal in magic, melee or archery. I recommend choosing 2 of the 3 for at least a small portion of the game, so you can adequately defend yourself as a mage in close-quarters, for example, by also having some melee until you've improved your spellcasting. You'll want to choose what you focus in wisely for awhile until you start earning extra skill points as you level up. But beware... one thing that I found strange was that not all the skills you can master are actually useful. For example, I might have used alchemy once, but never found a reason to use it again. And I had no real reason to allocate precious points into stealth or armor-crafting. Just go with what works for you and don't venture too far from your set skills.
There's also a multiplayer, which I've honestly spent a decent amount of time on, where you can play a few matches against other players, build a village, or do a secondary campaign with friends. I like this option because instead of importing your solo character, you create a new online character that you can choose more focused and specialized stats in. It's fun to mess around with the different builds you can use and it's actually a good tool in learning what you might want to use in single-player as well. Village mode is like RPG meets RTS meets crack. I check on my village daily and make sure that I build a new building or save the villagers from spiders when needed.
Even though it's wayyyyy better than the original, and more than I could have hoped for, there's still some issues I have with it. For one, and this was something the original was criticized for as well... the horse-riding still sucks. Ok, well they improved on it, but it's still just useless. You're better off walking. The inventory is still clunky and the interface is see-through, so depending on where you are or what's in the background while you're browsing your latest loot, it can be kind of annoying. One thing I liked about the original that is pretty much non-existent in the 2nd game is dragons. NO DRAGONS?! WAAAAAAT?! I loved going dragon killing in Two Worlds and they took it out.
So that about sums it up... I might add to this already-too-long post if I think of anything extra to love on or bitch about. Overall, I love the hell out of Two Worlds 2 and I'm glad TopWare & Reality Pump have my money for it. Well worth it if you like RPGs. And now, for some humor...
(Making fun of the voice acting & general abuse of language in the original Two Worlds)
(A tribute to Monty Python...)
The original Two Worlds was an RPG that actually had a decent amount of hype, but fell short on pretty much all of it. Yet I still played the ever-living hell out of it. Given all of its shortcomings, bugs, terrible voice acting, low framerate and overall clunky and mostly broken system, I loved playing it. It had a certain charm to it, and I really, REALLY like 3rd person, open-world RPGs. I think I'm one of the few people in the world that legitimately liked it.
Now take the original game, with all its failures, and improve almost damn near everything... almost. That's Two Worlds 2. Its name is a bit silly, but my, how it has grown. They learned their lesson and actually made the sequel into something really worth playing, if you like RPGs, that is. Do not make the mistake of calling yourself an RPG fan and then compare it to Elder Scrolls... it doesn't work like that. I hate that criticism, "oh it's no Oblivion, so therefore it sucks". They're on completely different ends of the RPG spectrum, with the only thing linking them is that they are fantasy games.
With that out of the way...
In Two Worlds 2, you are once again the main character from the original game, except the story or the landmarks in the original didn't matter. Your sister and you (the nameless hero) are imprisoned by the evil emperor Gandohar (funny names in this game). Apparently you've been in prison for somewhere around 5 years, so there's enough excuse to make you have to relearn all your combat skills over again. You get busted out by some friendly orcs and get sent on your epic quest to learn Gandohar's weaknesses and free your sister. It doesn't sound as epic to start off, but later in the game, things build up to where there's more than just the rescue of your sister at play.
Almost everything about it is better than the previous iteration. They actually throw in an existing story, hired some decent voice actors, and made things interesting. There's a decent tutorial right from the get-go this time around. The character models are kind of iffy-looking but the environments look absolutely awesome. A lot of the original game got a major overhaul as far as functionality and customization goes. You can still stack "cards" to increase your magic power, but it's even more customizable. Almost everything can be broken down into raw materials to upgrade weapons or armor with. That's one thing I loved about the original Two Worlds, that I'm glad they kept around... the sheer amount of customization and upgrades. This version of the game is much deeper - there's a lot more to do - it definitely feels like the kind of game you'll spend a ton of time on. There's even a good bit of humor in the game, often making pop-culture references or poking fun at how campy the original game was (see videos embedded at the end of this post).
As for your combat, you can deal in magic, melee or archery. I recommend choosing 2 of the 3 for at least a small portion of the game, so you can adequately defend yourself as a mage in close-quarters, for example, by also having some melee until you've improved your spellcasting. You'll want to choose what you focus in wisely for awhile until you start earning extra skill points as you level up. But beware... one thing that I found strange was that not all the skills you can master are actually useful. For example, I might have used alchemy once, but never found a reason to use it again. And I had no real reason to allocate precious points into stealth or armor-crafting. Just go with what works for you and don't venture too far from your set skills.
There's also a multiplayer, which I've honestly spent a decent amount of time on, where you can play a few matches against other players, build a village, or do a secondary campaign with friends. I like this option because instead of importing your solo character, you create a new online character that you can choose more focused and specialized stats in. It's fun to mess around with the different builds you can use and it's actually a good tool in learning what you might want to use in single-player as well. Village mode is like RPG meets RTS meets crack. I check on my village daily and make sure that I build a new building or save the villagers from spiders when needed.
Even though it's wayyyyy better than the original, and more than I could have hoped for, there's still some issues I have with it. For one, and this was something the original was criticized for as well... the horse-riding still sucks. Ok, well they improved on it, but it's still just useless. You're better off walking. The inventory is still clunky and the interface is see-through, so depending on where you are or what's in the background while you're browsing your latest loot, it can be kind of annoying. One thing I liked about the original that is pretty much non-existent in the 2nd game is dragons. NO DRAGONS?! WAAAAAAT?! I loved going dragon killing in Two Worlds and they took it out.
So that about sums it up... I might add to this already-too-long post if I think of anything extra to love on or bitch about. Overall, I love the hell out of Two Worlds 2 and I'm glad TopWare & Reality Pump have my money for it. Well worth it if you like RPGs. And now, for some humor...
(Making fun of the voice acting & general abuse of language in the original Two Worlds)
(A tribute to Monty Python...)
Tuesday, December 28, 2010
Fallout: New Vegas - Dead Money Review
The first DLC for Fallout New Vegas, Dead Money, is out now for Xbox 360 (and I assume it will be out on PC and PS3 eventually), costing you 800ms points and for once, more than just a quick sit-down to go through and complete it. In Dead Money, you are lured by a radio signal and captured, forced into cooperating with 3 other individuals to pull off a heist at the Sierra Madre casino. Sounds easy enough, but the only problem is, there's an explosive collar around your neck ready to pop your head into bloody bits if you so much as think about disobeying your given heist plans. Sounds fun, eh? Like most of the DLC from Fallout 3, this one has its pros and cons, but it was honestly a lot better than I thought it would be this time around. And hey, it actually wasn't buggy either. Breakdown time!
The Awesomesauce:
This one's a game-changer, so to speak. You have to conduct yourself in this DLC differently than you would in the Mohave desert, because you go in stripped of your weapons, food, stimpacks, the works. This provides challenge. I appreciated that Dead Money wasn't just a walk-in-the-park add-on that most could easily breeze through in a single sitting. I no longer felt invincible, storming through the area with my high-powered weapons and armor - I was weak again - and that was a good thing. The new environment added an element of creepiness, and you actually had to pay more attention to what you're doing. There's traps everywhere, and you need to scavenge what you can to stay alive. There's a few new weapons and equips you can find and keep after you've completed the content, adding a little variety. You get your choice (well, it's not a choice, really, since you're forced to work with them or your head will explode) of 3 new companions to help you break into the Sierra Madre casino, and each of your newfound "friends" are pretty damned interesting. Should you think about running away, you die. If your companion dies, you die - you're all linked by your explosive collars to keep you in check for the story... and it's awesome. When you're finally in the casino, you can gamble and get some chips to help you buy much-needed supplies as well. The environment is cruel, and it feels that way when playing Dead Money. Overall, it was just a lot of fun - more fun than I expected to get out of the first batch of downloadable content for New Vegas.
The Buzzkills:
If Dead Money gets anything wrong, it's in the way the environment and enemies grow stale over time. You spend a lot of time in the Villa area before actually getting into the Sierra Madre casino for the rest of the DLC, and the layout is somewhat like a very same-looking maze. I usually like to explore new areas, but when it all started to look the same, I got kind of worried. I found myself taking wrong turns or going to places I shouldn't be yet just because of the way it was laid out. I had a sigh of relief when I finally got into the casino and the layout changed for the better. As also mentioned, the enemies grow old too. Aside from the occasional hologram that you just avoid (kind of like a walking security camera), all you really fight throughout the entirety of the content are these "Ghost" villagers. There are a few minor variations between them, such as one attacks you unarmed while another throws spears at you, but for the most part, they don't change and it feels like they're just there to have something to fight. I would've liked to kill more than one enemy. Finally, the only thing I can think of that actually bothered me beyond the 2 points previously mentioned was the lack of music. There was none. This is just a personal preference, however, since I prefer the music to whatever ambient noises are in the background.
 |
| You'll see lots of these guys... because they're pretty much all you fight |
PS. Try to find all the little clues hinting at another upcoming DLC
/* Save often on this one, or you'll regret having to retrace your steps a lot */
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