Gaming with Jade Colored Glasses

F.3.A.R. Part 2

2012-01-15T17:39:00.000-08:00

Unfortunately, FEAR 3 doesn't really keep up the intensity that I described in my previous post. As the game goes on, it becomes apparent that FEAR 3 is nothing more than a hodgepodge of modern gaming and horror movie cliches.

F.3.A.R.

2012-01-07T19:26:00.000-08:00

Just started F.E.A.R. 3 (or F3AR in their marketing 1337 speak), and I must say, the campaign is INTENSE. And that is just the first mission.

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X-Men Destiny

2012-01-02T20:07:00.000-08:00

I'll get the oncoming flood of updates kicked off with X-Men Destiny while it is still fresh in my mind. X-Men Destiny is a brawler from Too Human developer Silicon Knights, which, after the infamous development cycle of Too Human, is probably only still in business because of federal funding from the Canadian government. Destiny shares some similarities with Too Human, but it isn't nearly as slow as Silicon' Knights earlier effort.

Blog Revival: Jade Harder

2011-12-20T11:17:00.000-08:00

What's up folks! It certainly has been a while since you have seen ANY activity here, I know. (I wonder if this will still get pulled to Facebook... we will see... ).

Well, I have that "itch" again, so you will yet again be subjected to video game related musings and reviews. 2011 was a GREAT year for gaming, and 2012 looks like it will be just as good, if not BETTER, so no better time than the present to revamp this hear jaded blog, don'tcha think? (Now with less GREEN!)

Coming up first will be Skyrim (of course) and Dead Space 2, so stay tuned!

Metal Gear Solid 4

2009-08-11T13:46:00.000-07:00

Metal Gear Solid 4is supposed to be one of the smokin guns of PS3 exclusives, in a time where almost zero games are (or remain) platform exclusive. So many games are cross-platform or "timed" exclusives (how I hate the corporate BS that goes on behind the scenes here) now that you aren't really missing out on a whole lot by only owning one console (and I'm talking either PS3 or 360 here, of course). Myself being a PS3 fan, though I own and like both consoles, I was really hoping to be like 'well, but we have THIS', referring to MGS4 of course. And, MGS4 did sell a whole hell of a lot of PS3's here and in Japan.

However, I think MGS4 is an embarrassment to games.
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Red Faction: Guerilla

2009-07-27T10:54:00.000-07:00

Yes, I know I have been slacking on this here collection of words. Work has been pretty damn busy recently as I help usher in a new batch of blue people, and well, I'm too lazy to actually update at home. But anyway, here's some thoughts on/review of Red Faction: Guerilla.

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Happy Video Games Day

2009-07-08T14:18:00.000-07:00

Apparently, July 8th is Video Games Day. Didn't know that did you? Neither did I. No idea how this was started, or who even started it, but that certainly won't keep me from celebrating...
Check it out here!

Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Survivor

2009-06-29T14:21:00.000-07:00

The latest entry in the Shin Megami Tensei series of RPGs has arrived, and it is in a nicely portable form for the DS. This is the third game in the SMT series that I have played, and from what I have seen so far, this game looks like it is going to be great.

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Hello there Cliché

2009-06-23T21:39:00.000-07:00

Just got to the Pirate Ship level in Tales of Vesperia. Nothing cliché about that at all....

Class of Heroes Early Impressions

2009-06-23T10:04:00.000-07:00

Class is in session at Particus Academy and I have created my party and have begun wandering around the first two dungeons in Class of Heroes. Here are some of my early impressions of the game as I take my first steps in this new dungeon crawling RPG from Atlus.

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Not so Hellish after all

2009-06-12T15:30:00.000-07:00

So, I finally beat Persona 3 Wednesday night (full review to come soon!). So, check one off the list.
So, last night I was ready for my next PS2 RPG romp, Ar Tonelico II. This game intrigued me when I first read about it on RPGGamer. It is a bit hard to explain the premise without having played it for myself yet, but it focuses a lot on character interaction, and the main character (you) getting to know your faerie/angel/songstress part members better by "diving" into their minds. Also, the battle system seems to involve you actively blocking during a "Defense" mode. So, I was intrigued, and wanted to try it out, even though I expected not to "stick it out" for the long haul like I did with Persona 3. I was quite unhappy with the next turn of events.

I put it in my PS3, and wait for the game's intro to start up and lead me through some gratuitous anime introduction with some quirky J-Pop playing over it (I've been spoiled by Tales of Vesperia and Persona 3, what can I say). But, as I busy myself with the laptop on... my lap, I notice the screen is still black. Odd. Maybe I wasn't paying attention and didn't start the game like I had thought. Restart, reload. Still nothing comes up except the "Playstation 2" splash screen. Take the game out. Some minor scratches, nothing big. Clean it anyway, try it again. Still nothing. Argh, wtf? Is the game just broken? Obviously it has been played before, so what is up. Did it suddenly go defective?

None of the above. After some searching on the interwebs, come to find out, Ar Tonelico II is incompatible with my 80gb PS3. Sigh. What the hell?
Apparently, since my 80gb model uses software emulation for PS2 games, not all games work. Earlier 60gb PS3 models used hardware emulation, so all PS2 games worked on them. But since Sony switched to software emulation, only like 80% actually works. So upset. The original Ar Tonelico works on the PS3, but not II. Ugg. I am sick of Sony's policies on backwards compatibility. At first the PS3 was, then it kind of was, and now the current models aren't at all. I understand that I do own a PS2 (it is currently residing up at Meghan's, serving as a DVD player :-p), and new ones are only $100 now, but all of Sony's SKU hopping is about the only thing I hate about the PS3. It annoyed me when the PS3 was first released, and how Sony kept introducing new models and discontinuing old ones. It is like if you were an early adopter, you get screwed in the long run for having an "inferior" model (smaller HD). And now, they drop BC. BC should be able to convenience. I love playing my games on the PS3. The bluetooth controllers, the slick interface, virtual memory cards, I love all of it. I want my PS2 games too!
I realize that was a bit of a rant, but yea, needless to say, I was a bit annoyed. So, back went Ar Tonelico II. I realize I can still play it, but this just kind of relieves some of the RPG backlog. Maybe I will try to snag the first game instead. For now I will just keep playing Tales of Vesperia, Class of Heroes, and maybe give DDS another shot.

Hell just got a little cooler.

Class of Heroes Incoming! I'm in RPG Hell

2009-06-10T16:30:00.001-07:00

So, if you have been a faithful follower of my blog... and I know there are literally like two of you (<3), you might know that I have been anticipating the release of Class of Heroes for a while now. Class of Heroes is the newest dungeon crawling RPG from Atlus, in the spirit of Etrian Odyssey and Wizardry.

I saw the game was sent from Gamefly today, so I have been buzzing all day about it. I read the review from RPGGamer, then reread the reviewer's blog about it, where he detailed his adventures as he went through the game. I am really excited for the class system in this game. There are 15 different classes in the game, and you can only have 6 party members at a time. But, at anytime you can have a character switch "majors", as they are called in this game, which lets them keep all of their stats, but halves their maximum HP. They also carry over spells and abilities previously learned, as long as the new class can use them. The possibilities for customization seem endless, and you could presumably have one character explore every class available. That is what these games are all about, the customization and exploration. They aren't meant to tell a grand tale of adventure... they leave that part up to you.

Also.. I'm in RPG hell right now. I am about to finally beat Persona 3, but still have to push through. I have Ar Tonelico II sitting in its Gamefly sleeve on my floor, patiently waiting for me to beat Persona 3 so I can play it. I also am currently playing through Tales of Vesperia, at about the 18 or so hour mark, if I remember correctly. So that's three RPGs I'm currently playing, with Class of Heroes on the way from Gamefly. It took me an entire year to beat P3, and I rarely finish even one RPG at a time. How am I going to juggle all of this? Yes, I know, the woes of existence. Did I also mention that I have Persona 4 purchased and still in its plastic wrap, waiting to be played? And that now that I have P3 (almost) beat, I want to go back and give SMT:Digital Devil Saga (which I bought waaaay back when it was first released) a more fair chance, now that I have been introduced to the Shin Megami Tensei world? So make that six RPGs in my life. Not counting I am currently playing DAoC. Delicious hell.

The Future of DAoC

2009-06-04T15:40:00.000-07:00

So, the Camelot team has announced their fix to DAoC's segmented population. Background info for those who aren't aware, DAoC currently has 3 clusters and 2 "other" server. Recently, people have flocked to the Devon cluster from the two other clusters, resulting in one mega cluster and two almost dead clusters. People have been clamoring for character transfers. Also, their "other" servers, one PvE only and one PvP only, barely have 100 players combined (and the PvP one usually doesn't break into the TEENS for population). So, obviously, the fragmented playerbase is a big problem. I love their fix (you prob need to read the above link to understand what the fix is...), and below is my post in the VN boards discussion

Bravo to Lori and the remaining DAoC team.

This is exactly what EA Mythic as a company failed to do with Warhammer. Warhammer catered to every single feedback point (whine) that the players from DAoC had, and they didn't make a game with their own vision. It was a watered down version of everything that made DAoC great, and it blew.
Here, Lori and Co. took a DAoC community issue and did something totally unexpected that will work out better for everyone in the long run, they didn't just do exactly as the players said they wanted (transfers to Devon). They took feedback and made a decision on their own, that they knew as developers would be the best for the game. This took balls. Lori and Co. should be running EA Mythic, they have the balls to do what is necessary, and not tiptoe around the whiny minority. Again, Bravo for these changes.

A few tidbits:
- The Gaheris/Mordred merge is very interesting to me, and I think in the end, with enough population mind you, this will be amazing. The Gaheris crowd will get a few more people to dance around the flowers with.... and the Molvik Open PvP could end up being bats--- insanity with enough 8 mans running around, which is exactly what Open PvP should be imo: balls out insanity and fun. It will be a nice distraction for people to hop and enjoy a break from normal RvR (and while they are waiting out realms timers...)

- I hope the realm timers are at the very least an hour. It will force people to think about what side they want to play for their next extended play session. No realm hopping garbage.

- Did I mention great job Lori and Co.?

That was my post. I also forgot to mention that I hope Origins doesn't get released, but methinks that it is coming, due to Lori's "stay tuned" comment. I would rather have this one server utopia that is coming, and not further segment the players, which will result in a faster collapse down the road, IMO. What any game in its later years needs is a very tight-knit community. If Origins is released, then said community will be split in two, and will constantly be at odds about the future direction of DAoC. With one server, the community will be unified (as unified as people in an MMO ever are...).

So, here's to hoping we don't get Origins after this.

Tomb Raider: Underworld Epilogue

2009-06-03T11:50:00.000-07:00

So, I tried to play more of Tomb Raider:Underworld last night. I began running around the next level, which was happily devoid of water. Then, the massive octopus creature made its return, smashing walls down around me. Oh hell yes, I thought, let's do this!

I was quickly disappointed. The cutscene ends with Lara pointing out this incredibly obvious spiked rock chandelier thing hanging from a chain right above the creature's head. The eight legged monstrosity then proceeds to FUCKING SIT THERE while you clumsily navigate your way around the top ledge of the chamber the thing is idly sitting in, waiting for you to crush his skull with the outrageously convenient spiked dangling thing. This is especially annoying when you just witnessed an awesome cutscene where it was demonstrated that A.) The octopus knows you are there, because you just had a stare down with it, B.) it can easily reach you, and C.) it could easily crush the life out of you on a whim, if it so desired. This menacing beast could have been an awesome boss fight, with you jumping around avoiding tentacles and possibly diving into the water (shudder) to shoot it with your harpoon. Nope, it will just sit there while you crush its head. Sigh. Needless to say, this game is already in the mail back to Gamefly.

I hate when games do this. This is exactly what i hated about Devil May Cry 4. You would watch a cutscene where the new Dante (whatever his name was) approaches a bunch of baddies, and you get pumped for a big fight. But the cutscene doesn't stop there... you then get to watch as he slaughters the group of enemies all badass-like. Then you come out of the cutscene and are allowed to solve some inane fucking puzzle. I don't want to be cock teased by my games... I want to actually PLAY them. These games could learn a lot from God of War, which started its series much later than either Tomb Raider and Devil May Cry. It gives you the cutscene of the big baddie approaching, shows you the obvious "way to kill it" (sometimes), but then the boss processes to try and kill you while you do the same. But the thing is it actually lets you rip the head off of the boss rather than just having you watch.

More manual head ripping in games please. Thanks. I now patiently await while Gamefly hopefully sends me Prototype on Monday. While waiting I will hopefully beat Persona 3 finally (86.5 hours and counting).

A whole bunch of crap and Children of Bodom in GH5

2009-06-01T11:31:00.000-07:00

The full list of bands that will be in Guitar Hero 5 has been released.

The list contains a whole lot of what we have come to expect from music games now. Crap. A whole lot of awful bands, mixed with a smattering of not awful bands, most of which we have seen before, like Iron Maiden and Megadeth. Children of Bodom is the only new band in GH that I am excited before. CoB was released as DLC for Rock Band 2, but RB blows, so I am counting Bodom as new since I haven't played them in GH yet. But, I most likely won't be getting this anyway. the guitar game genre has quickly been milked into the ground by both Activision and Harmonix, and the whole genre isn't exciting anymore. Hell, I haven't even gotten around to grabbing GH:Metallica yet since Meghan and I are just so bored with these games. We will just has to cherish the memories of GH1-3 until something new and fresh comes along.

Tomb Raider: Underworld

2009-06-01T10:49:00.000-07:00

Oh Tomb Raider, how long it has been. I haven't dove (/cringe... more later) into a TR game since TR3 on the PS1. I used to love the old Tomb Raider games and experiences. They were a perfect mix of puzzle solving/platforming and action. However, lately the Tomb Raider franchise has descended into irrelevancy, as attempts to "reinvent" itself have failed. So, how does the latest game in the series fare?

Not so well. Eidos continues to struggle to relive the series' glory days, and developer Crystal Dynamics doesn't seem to really know what made Tomb Raider so magical all those years ago.
On the surface, Tomb Raider is about exploration. The premise is that you are some rich, um.., tomb raider who goes off on various adventures searching for lost artifacts for whatever the current reason in, and usually ends up pissing off some ancient deity or bastard evil doers in the process. So, we have exploration, and we have combat. What really made Tomb Raider great back in the day was the pacing of the game. In the first game,while on your plundering excursion you would emerge or a cave or water passage or whathaveyou and some wolf or bear would be there, waiting to unceremoniously attack you. This is what I loved about the games. There was no warning or Resident Evil-esque cutscene or scare music. It wasn't like some switch was flipped to let you know that is was ok to panic now. Nope, one second you are trying to find your way through some cave network, the next you have a wolf chomping on your leg. The second game nailed the action/exploration balance. In TR2 you fought a lot more human enemies, and you had much more combat tools at your disposal. The game was great for getting your heart pumping with a fire fight with 5 bad guys or a high speed boat chase through Venice, and then letting you catch your breath afterward as you worked your way through the level.

However, from my couple hours with Underworld, it seems the action/exploration balance has be ousted for more full on exploration. It reminds me a lot of Prince of Persia and Assassin's Creed now. So much potential in the game engine, but wasted on boring, uninspired "puzzle" worlds.

The game starts as we'd expect, with Lara's mansion. But, just as you hit 'Start Game' you see Lara's mansion explode. I see what you are trying to do here Crystal Dynamics. Start the game off with a "bang". Try to get people excited they are Tomb Raider again. Ok, let's see what you got. You then lead Lara through her burning house, reacquainting yourself with the classic Tomb Raider controls, along with learning some new tricks. All of the typical actions seem to be here. We have the standards like run, jump, wall grab and shimmy. What I notice is that Lara's iconic hopping backstep is gone, in favor of a more typical slow backstep. Sad. This may have been tossed a long time ago, but since I haven't played TR since Tomb Raider: The Last Revelation demo on the Dreamcast, I'm going to say it is new. Lara definitely controls a lot smoother than in her older games. It is nice to see, but something inside of me still misses the old, clunky controls, much like many people still prefer the old school Resident Evil controls, as unintuitive as they were.
Anyway, Lara now also has a grappling hook to use. Originally I thought this was going to be simply for swinging, but in the first level she used to it hook onto the head of a snake statue and bring it crashing down onto a puzzle platform. Nice touch.

Ok, so I finish the flaming mansion introduction. I am ready for some classic Tomb Raider action. However, I am disappointed to learn the first level of the game is a MOTHERFUCKING UNDERWATER SWIMMING LEVEL. As you kidding me Crystal Dynamics? Someone needs to take a bat to the head of your game designer. Underwater swimming levels are always terrible and frustrating, but they are forgivable later in the game for a change of pace as long as they remain short. Not right off the bat before people have had a chance to settle in to the controls. Sigh, I almost want to quit even before I finish the level. It isn't even a linear level. You have the open space of ocean floor awaiting you, and you have to find these different caves that have the keys you need to open the door in this main temple. All underwater. Sigh. As to be expected, there are shark enemies, but there are only 2, and they don't put up any fight at all. You see them coming from a mile away and you simple lock on to them and shoot them with your harpoon. Underwater enemies are supposed to be a pain in the ass to kill, which adds to the frustration of the underwater level, but in a tolerable way. The frustrating thing here isn't the sharks after my flesh, but the fact that I can barely see in this underwater hell and I need to explore these hard to find caves. Sigh.

So I finally find the keys I need, and eventually I am led to a cave where I can actually get out of the water. Nice. Maybe I'll find some odd underwater creature waiting to chomp on me. Nope. Just your typical platforming BS before I get to the door of the next level. The only exciting thing in the entire level was coming around a bend in the water cave and seeing an octopus leg slide out of the opening in front of you. This actually got my heart racing for a bit, hoping for a fight, but I didn't see my tentacled friend again for the rest of the level. Disappointing. I'm assuming maybe I'll see it in the next level, but for now I'm left with a bitter taste in my mouth. Probably from the salt water. I almost sent the game back to Gamefly right then, but I decided I wanted to get a little more playtime with it, to see if maybe the combat can help save the experience. I will update when/if I play the next level, but for now it looks like Lara has fully gone the way of the hedgehog (Sonic the Hedgehog that is... who has fallen into similar irrelevancy).

Demon's Souls

2009-05-20T14:34:00.000-07:00

Amidst my actually busy/productive day I work, I found some really good news at Kotaku and wanted to share quickly.
Demon's Souls is coming to North America.

This is a game that has been talked about a lot by the import crowd over at Kotaku, and a lot of people have raved about its amazingness. So much so that it seems many people have taken to importing the Asian region version of the game, which includes an English language option. Hell, I even tried snooping around to see if I could find a copy, but that version has been hard to find for a while. Well, that won't be necessary anymore. North American PS3 owners will be able to walk/run/hop down to their local Gamestop this fall to grab this game.

So, why all the hype? Well, Demon's Souls, on paper, seems to be the action-RPG of everyone's dreams. The best way I can think of to describe it is the character customization and go-anywhere feel of Oblivion, mixed with the online-multiplayer (cooperative and PvP) aspects of Diablo, with the atmosphere of King's Field (i.e. medieval fantasy). (This game is, after all, the spiritual successor to King's Field). The atmosphere and the graphical style of the game have me the most excited. This game just looks dark and grim, and if they can pull off a mature story without it being too corny or bland, people could be playing this game for years to come.

So, needless to say, I am excited to see what this game brings to the table. If it is a polished/smooth experience, I'm on board. If it is as buggy/clunky as Oblivion, I think it will be a disaster when bugginess is combined with network lag. Reviews overseas have been great, but we'll see if the American version remains as polished.
I'm trying to remain cautious because games like this are usually a let down, or are just not engaging to me. I hope this game really delivers, as I have been waiting for a big PS3 exclusive game to really blow me away again ever since Heavenly Sword.

And now, moving pictures for your enjoyment:

Deadpoolicious

2009-05-20T09:09:00.000-07:00

Deadpool is making a return in Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2. I'm giddy. I still think I need to play the first game, especially since I'm currently catching up on 4 years of Marvel comics storylines, so I'm feeling Marvel-tastic right now.

Kotaku has posted an all Deadpool trailer for MUA2, and it is pretty delicious. It really looks like they have spent a lot of time making it so Deadpool can play like Deadpool instead of just another mindless beat 'em up character that most of the characters probably will be. Guess we will see in September...

Facebook fans can click here to see the video!

Are long games dead?

2009-05-19T15:30:00.000-07:00

Good read on the fate of long games over at Sexy Videogameland.

My thoughts:

I find it sad that I live in a world where the term "JRPG" is now a dirty word. I let out a slow sigh when reviewers use the fact that an RPG is "old school" as a knock against it. I think it is a trait to be praised nowadays when everything has to have fancy "next-gen" battle systems that are just a giant mess.

I think RPG companies (especially Squeenix...) need to get back to basics and strip out all the fancy graphics and cut scenes and just focus on making the gameplay solid again. Persona 3 didn't have fancy graphics or overly long/abundant cutscenes. Just solid gameplay that keeps me coming back for more (hour 82 and counting...). Then once they have relearned how to make a solid "game", then they can add all the bells and whistles back in slowly, without sacrificing the game.

Prince of Persia

2009-05-10T11:10:00.000-07:00

Prince of Persia is sort of a "re-imagining" of the series for modern consoles. As far as I know, it doesn't have any/much relation to last generation's series of games, but I never got around to playing those. This new game in the franchise doesn't give me any motivation to change that fact.

You star as an acrobatic dude with a claw, who is followed around by some girl with magic powers whose father has just released Ahriman (the god of darkness and bad stuff) from his eternal prison under a tree. While that seems like a basic overview of the story... that is the only story that is revealed in the first 2 hours or so of the game. Oh, there is some random flashback/dream thing. I don't even know why the acrobatic hero guy is helping the random girl. She isn't even good looking. It was like she fell on him, then magically he had some unbreakable bond compelling him to do her dirty work. She is trying to banish the god Ahriman back to his tree prison before he destroys the world. Her father released Ahriman, for whatever reason that has yet to be explained other than we wouldn't have a game to play without trying to save the world.

The world you are trying to save is also... empty. So far the only inhabitants in the world are you, the girl, her dad, and like 4 random goons you beat up. That is it. It is basically a giant empty playground for your acrobatics stunts. Does Ubisoft really think gamers are that slave-minded where they will just do anything to save the world even if it would only result in like 2 deaths? (the dad doesn't count, he released it ffs).

The gameplay is every coma-inducing adventure game cliche you can think of rolled into one package. We have jumping, double/long jumping, ledge hanging, vine grappling, wall running, pole swinging, pole sliding, wall sliding, roof running... you get the idea. And these things aren't even broken up by fighting. Fights are so far and few between they end up feeling like mini games. The focus of this game is obviously on the "acrobatic" adventure moves, which have already gotten tedious after 2 hours. I can't imagine I would be sane after finishing this game...

This is a shame because the fightsjavascript:void(0) are actually fun, and incredibly cinematic. This is what fights in these types of games should be like, acrobatic and fancy with lots of flair. You really have to see these fights in action to fully appreciate how good they look. And after searching around for a bit, I didn't really find any nice videos... so you'll just have to take my word for it.

Either way, fights are not the main focus of this game. The exploration is. So, either you like to explore a nice looking world just for the sake of exploration (and "saving" it), or you don't. If you do, this game is for you. But I found it incredibly boring. Maybe if there was more motivation to do anything, it would be a bit more compelling. As is, however, I just don't care, and definitely don't want to put up with annoying cliche adventure elements to get through it.

Guitar Hero: Smash Hits tracklist isn't.... horrible?

2009-05-08T10:11:00.000-07:00

Guitar Hero: Smash Hits is yet another game in the Guitar Hero franchise, full of songs you have already played. However, these songs are being re-released with full band support, updated song charts, and now all songs are master tracks (oh the good ole days of horrible cover songs from GH1...).

The tracklist isn't nearly as awful as I was expecting, but certainly not as good as I hoped. See the full tracklist here.
No "Six", no "Light That Blinds"... but definitely some decent songs on there I wouldn't mind playing again with updated song charts. But, with that said, I probably won't ever get around to buying it. GHIV definitely reached maximum milking overdrive, and I think most people who have been around since the first game are a bit tired of the series, especially now as it incorporates more "family friendly" songs. Yet another beloved game/movie/comic fucked over by the mainstream machine. Sad.

One other thing... why can't either Activision or Harmonix get away from boring crap like The Donnas - "Take It Off" and Pat Benatar - "Hit Me With Your Best Shot". Who the hell likes to play these songs? 40 year old moms who pick up the game once for a quick play to see what all the fuss is about? They are boring as hell, and to me they don;t add in anything to the experience besides annoyance that I am forced to play through them to advance. If those 3 or so songs were replaced by any other songs from GH1-3, this setlist would be so much better.

Persona 3 is awesome and you should play it

2009-05-05T13:02:00.001-07:00

So, in case I haven't mentioned before, Persona 3 is awesome. I will be writing a full review of it soon, once I finally finish the beast (I'm sitting at about hour 73 at the moment). I suggest you don't wait for me to finish it, just go out there and buy it right now, if you a fan of RPGs at all. Don't let the fact that is on the PS2 scare you... it is far better than any attempt at an RPG on a current gen console, I assure you.

Some other game ramblings:
I'm excited for Sacred 2's console release coming up in a week (May 12th). Not only does it include an in-game performance from Blind Guardian, but it is apparently a pretty damn good hack 'n slash as well (yes, that means it is "like Diablo"). I'm hoping to give it a whirl online with some friends, and also subjecting Meghan to it until she rolls her eyes at me when I ask her if she wants to play it :-p.

I am also equally excited about Class of Heroes, which is set to finally release in early June. It was delayed from an early April release, which made me sad, but hopefully this extra time just means it going to be perfect (I can only hope right?). Class of Heroes is a dungeon crawling RPG, much akin to Atlus' other recent RPG Etrian Odyssey (and yes, Wizardry). I thought Etrian Odyssey II was great, but it lacked a bit of depth in the class system (or maybe I just missed it?). Basically, there wasn't much to look forward to after most of the classes hit a certain level, and with no storyline, so things got boring. Class of Heroes looks like it is oging to have more depth, and will also remove the sometimes neat/sometimes annoying map making system from EO. I'm hoping to get a bit more mileage out of my PSP with this one :).

Gaming in the Month of April

2009-04-17T11:13:00.000-07:00

So yes, I know I have not made a meaningful update here in a while. Mostly it is because my gaming experiences for the past month or so have been mostly minor, not really necessitating their own update. But, the minor updates have been piling up, so I thought I'd pack them all into one, hopefully not entirely horrible to read, post.

So here goes:

Tales of Vesperia update

Tales has been coming along quite well. The story has remained quite interesting, even verging on compelling and intelligent. There was one major plot point I had expected to go its usual cliched way, but it seems the characters in Vesperia are a but more intelligent than normal RPG fare.
The thing that has surprised me the most about Vesperia is its continuing evolution of the battle system. Most games like to dump every convoluted aspect of the battle system on you right at the start, and it is up to you to figure it out and gradually learn its ins and outs. Most of the time, this is ok since battle systems in most RPGs aren't all that complicated. However, it is usually a bad idea when they are either incredibly complicated or confusing (see: Inifinite Undiscovery). In Tales, the game gives you the basic system to start out with in order to sink your teeth into a sizable chunk. Once you are comfortable with the basic system, it gives you the "Overdrive" meter, which is comparable to a Limit Break in the later Final Fantasy games, but instead of pulling off a predetermined super move that you just sit back andv watch, Overdrive mode lets you pull off all of your normal combos, but now they are super-powered and much faster. If used wisely, they can really help you rip through a tough boss, especially when used multiple times in a fight.
Ok, so now you have Overdrive to use. Not really game changing, but you can unleash hell on your enemies every so often. So you continue on with the game, and then are met with the One Shot Kill moves. One Shot Kill moves become available once you have used enough Artes (special atttacks/spells) of the same type on an enemy. now your Artes are classified into three types, which you didn't know before, and you are trying to continually beat on tough enemies with same color/type of Arte in order to do a cool One Shot Kill.
So there's that. Then you are faced with Burst Artes. Then they add Limit Duo. You get the picture. The battle system keeps become more and more complex, but they way they space out each addition is perfectly executed. You start to feel comfortable with the battle system, maybe even bored, then they give you something else to consider. I know this is seen in a lot of games, but it is pulled off so well in Vesperia that it is really worth mentioning since it is pulled off so well, and usually RPGs aren't as good at executing this progression as action or platform games. Kudos to the Tales Team.

Final Fantasy VI

More RPG love! So, I never really played Final Fantasy VI. Blasphemy to some, I know. I have started it a couple of time before, as I own the Final Fantasy Anthology collection of V and VI for PSX. But other games always kept getting in the way, and PSX had so many good RPGs I was always busy with new games. But now, I have put FFVI on my PSP, and I have given it a true go.
Immediately I see why this is such a fan favorite. I love the characters so far. I love how Kefka, the main villian, is seen right from the start. None of this 'the true foe only reveals himself at the final hour' BS seen in some games. Kefka is there being evil (and really fucking goofy) right from minute one. I also really like the ability to pick different character paths as you go along. I love having multiple storylines to jump in and out of (oh how I miss you SaGa Frontier....). I really wish they would do this in more FF games. (There are rumors that FFXIII might do this, but I am doubtful...). At the start you have all of these characters from completely different backgrounds coming together, and it really works well here. Sometimes its corny, but that is really some of the charm. And also, it has the "built-in" class system as seen in FFIV, FFIX and FFXII, where the classes are there, but you can't change any of the character's classes. I love the class system in any form, and even though it isn't a true class system, I'll settle for the built-in. I might have to play FFV after this one in order to get a class fix. Anyway, I hope to continue to rectify this gaping hole in my gaming resume over the new few months.

The end of WoW

Yep, it has happened (again). I have canceled my WoW account. I am done (again). The game is just getting old. Not necessarily in an "aged" sort of way, but old in a repetitive sense. The last two expansions have been the same deal. Get to the new max level, grind instances, grind heroic versions of the same instances, grind rep with various factions, get into a raiding guild to start raiding, etc. It is a lot of grinding. Yes, I know that is a large part of MMOs, but adding new bosses and locations doesn't keep things fresh for me. I need some compelling part of the game, and PvP is just a mess now. Wintergrasp is a giant buggy clusterfuck at all times, and the Arena has always been built around having the "perfect" group. That and the fact that the Enhancement Shaman that I have loved through the best and worst of times is completely worthless in PvP, and barely relevant in PvE. I always feel like the retarded step child, and having to always be pumping DPS as hard as possible just to compete wears on a player. Death Knights are so stupid... I support adding new classes, but this is the wrong way to do it. Ugg. I'm done before I get too bitchy about DKs.
Anyway, WoW has gotten too boring for me, and this time I realy don't think I'm going back. Now that I raided again and saw what it was like in the "new" WoW, I;ve gotten my fix, and I'm going to move on.

Dark Age of Camelot
And by "move on" I mean go back to playing Dark Age of Camelot. Oh Cammy, how I love thee. I don't think i will ever get over DAoC. Everytime I go back it is just like yea, this feels right. The game mechanics just work so well for me. This was before WoW came along and mandated MMOs have to run as smooth as an adventure game. In DAoC, it feels like I'm an actual person running around a large world. Casters feel vulnerable. I know if that mob or player hits me, I need to do everything in my power to get away from it. None of this 'oh if the mob hits me its fine, my cast bar goes down'. No, if someone is stabbing you in the face, you can't very well cast a spell. Tanks have a lot of defense, but not a whole lot of offense. Melee combat can feel like a chess game at times. You are waiting for that block or parry to really put a hurting on the mob. I think they really nailed the combat machanics in this game, and while they probably don't agree with the first-person shooter/action game crowd, I think it is for the better.
Not much has changed since my last brief foray into DAoC. Now they have just made things easier for players. Gear isn't as hard to get, leveling is a breeze, and you get a lot more money now. RvR is still as fun, though we haven't gotten into it much yet, still leveling up now that we have actually figured out where we are going to play. nothing is more satisfying than rolling over a group of Hibs :).

So there you have it, that's what I have been up to this month. I know it has been boring around here, but I am going to try and post more in the coming months. I am going to try to block out a part of the day to devote to blogging, so stay tuned!

Dissidia: Final Fantasy

2009-04-03T10:38:00.000-07:00

Dissidia: Final Fantasy is an upcoming PSP fighting game, where you fight as various past FF characters again one another. A fighting game tie-in to a major game franchise isn't anything new to gaming (and Square also did it before on the PS1 with the somewhat decent Ergheiz), but damn, this looks like it could be EPIC.

Yea, it is just a trailer, but ME DO WANT. Pretty sure I won't touch anyone else other than Sephiroth for a long time... then Cecil probably. Coming this summer!

Max Payne 3

2009-03-23T11:23:00.001-07:00

Max Payne 3 was just announced, and it will be out by the end of this year.

Sweet mother of god, YES. I have been waiting for this forever. The first two Max Payne games were so good. The original Max Payne originated the whole "bullet-time" concept in gaming, which has been copied to death sense, and the addition of rag doll physics in MP2 kept me replaying sequences over and over again just to keep coming up with cooler ways to kill people. (No, videogames are NOT desensitizing our society.....).

I like the original Max Payne a bit better for the story and the grittier feel to it. Also, the gun sounds have much more OOMPH to them. (Play the second one right after the first and you will see what I'm saying... it actually makes a big difference in atmosphere for me). But, MP2 was great as well, not only for the aforementioned rag doll fun, but also the environments were a bit more varied. Either way, both games were a good time.

A year or two before Max Payne came out, I had dreamed of having an action game that was actually like an action movie, where you could actually dive around while shooting. Like diving over tables and counters while still putting a bullet between the eyes of the baddie. Max Payne mad all my dreams come true, and it is still my favorite action game of all time. Do want MP3.

I think a replay of both games is in order sometime soon....

Bioshock 2

2009-03-13T15:54:00.000-07:00

This just in:

You play as a Big Daddy.

In fact, you're the first of the lot, a so-called "renegade" Big Daddy who's on the hunt for a Little Sister of his own, according to a tipster who has the new Game Informer magazine in hand. You'll take out rival Daddies with your huge hand-drill and plasmid powers, claiming their wee sidekicks as your own. Similar to the first BioShock, you can choose to either harvest your Little Sister prize for ADAM or you can adopt her as your own.

....

....

OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG OMG

DO WANT NOW PLEASE

Source from Kotaku

Tales of Vesperia Early Impressions

2009-03-12T14:47:00.000-07:00

Finally Gamefly has decided to bestow upon me Tales of Vesperia. This has created for quite the Xbox 360 renaissance in my life. My sugar daddy Fat Jay bought me a year's worth of Xbox Live randomly (heart), so I play Halo 3 and Gears of War 2 with him and Jim during the first part of my west coast evening, the play Vesperia after they head to bed. Who would of thought I would be playing 360 again anytime soon.

Anyway, Tales of Vesperia is the latest in the long line of Tales game, starting with Tales of Phantasia originally on the SNES. The next game was Tales of Destiny on the PSX, and I briefly played this with Jim. The PSX Tales game allowed for 2 players to control a character during battles, so I hopped in randomly and played the battles during his play through. Mostly I remember delicious 2D chaos from Destiny 1 and 2. The only other game I've played in the Tales series was Tales of Symphonia on Gamecube. I picked it up used about a year and a half ago, since I was looking for an RPG at the time and I read it was the best yet of the Tales series. Mostly I enjoyed the characters and the fast-paced battle system, but the story was too bland to keep me interested past 10 hours or so. And apparently the same can be said for most of the Tales series. Great battle system, hilarious characters and dialogue (complete with lots of voice acting), but bland, cliche story and setting.

And it was this sameness that hit me like a truck in Vesperia. The world map looks exactly the same, the battles look the same, menus, etc. Hell, one character in your party even has the SAME EXACT face as the main character from tales of Symphonia. Sure anime faces aren't hugely varied, but I mean, come on. So, my first reaction was one of disappointment. I was hoping for something new and fresh, in look and feel at least, from last generation's RPG. But then I was thinking to myself, isn't this exactly the same thing that Final Fantasy does? I mean Final Fantasy 3-6 had the same looking over world, menus, character design, etc. Even the newer games continue to use some of the same elements, even if they are more varied. But, I usually don't fault the FF series for that because I am a fan and I am expecting those things. I am looking for that familiar comfort zone, along with the new characters and story. So, taking this perspective on tales, it has begun to grow on me.

Let's start with the best part. The graphics. This is by far the best use of gaming's often maligned 'cel-shading' techniques. This game looks gorgeous, and screenshots of cutscenes look extremely close to a still of an actual hand drawn animation. It is really a treat to just watch this game, especially since I'm a fan of anime. There are also actual anime cutscenes in the game, which mix hand drawn animation and 3D graphics. There really isn't that much a difference between the hand drawn characters and the in-game characters. Kudos to the artists and developers.

Not only do the characters look good, but they are actually interesting (and hilarious). Sure, their back stories may be cliche... you have the anti-hero main character, his faithful "dog" companion, the sheltered princess, and the plucky, sometimes angry other female. But, their interaction with each other, along with the great voice acting, is what really makes them special. You actually get the feeling that this is how an actual group of teenagers would interact with one another, as they are also joking and poking fun at one another. Too many RPGs forget the humor entirely, or fail miserably at it. Luckily, Vesperia gets it right, and you actually start to grow attached to the characters. Which is important when the overarching story is a bit dull. Admittedly, this one is presented much better than Symphonia's, and I have gotten into the story a little bit. Hopefully it picks up nicely and doesn't get dull in the middle.

Now on to the other main draw of the Tales series, the battle system. Again, you can see enemies on the field, and avoid/engage them to your heart's content. The battles are real-time, with no turns to be had. And they can be hectic with your 4 characters battling 5 or more enemies at once, all pulling off skills and combos with abandon. The battles are fast and fun, and you are constantly awarded with new "Artes", which seem to unlock randomly during battle. A fun battle system that actually makes you want to grind in an RPG is always a good thing. I do have one gripe with the system though. Now, I haven't played any of the Tales games between Symphonia (Legendia and Abyss), but the system seems to have taken a step back in the fluidity department. In Symphonia, the transition between attacking, blocking, and jumping was all fluid, if I recall correctly. I remember jumping around like a mad man, especially with flying enemies. Now, there is a noticeable delay between attacking and blocking. Once you finish your combo, you have to wait for the character to do this annoying sword flip over his shoulder animation to finish before you can block. But of course, enemies can attack you as soon as you are done hitting them, so it is annoying to attack then block, as was standard in Symphonia. Most of the time, I get hit back before I can block. So if I want to block an attack, I am best served by holding block until the enemy gets around to attacking me. Not too fun. So mostly I just attack everything in sight as fast as I can and just let the healing character stand in the back and heal me. it works fine, but it would be nice to actually block something between attacks every once in a while. Boss fights can be annoying because of this, since you need to block some attacks. not sure why this step back was taken.
Also, in order to jump, you first need to block, and then press up on the analog stick. Also, I think I have managed to jump forward once, because it is such a pain to get the right motion. I could have just been imagining jumping forward too, since I've never been able to replicate it. So, you can just jump straight up. Pretty useless in what is basically a free-motion fighting game. Combine this with the aforementioned headaches with blocking, and it pretty much takes jumping out of the game for me. Sad when it would be so nice to jump into the middle of a group of enemies and go to town. Again, this was possible in Symphonia, so not sure why they made it such a headache here.

Other points of note:
The cooking menu is confusing. Basically, you collect ingredients throughout your travels, and find recipes in order to make food for your party after battles, with various effects like restoring health or raising attack power for the next battle. . That is all well and good, but the menu you use to set up cooking is confusing as hell, and not explained at all. I think you can set a specific character to cook certain recipes, since you have the option of making 4 right after the battle. So, in theory you can assign a different person to each recipe, or have the same person make them all. This is important because using certain chars to make certain recipes unlocks new recipes. This would all be well and good, but sometimes random characters who I don't want making a certain recipe make it, even though I have another character seemingly assigned in the cooking menu. It isn't clear, and kind of frustrating. I want Yuri making Rice Balls, not Karol DAMMIT.

The minimap is pretty damn hard to see when on the world map. I wish RPG developers would remember some people in this world don't have 50-inch HD TVs. Infinite Undiscovery had the same issues, only much worse.

This game makes me lol consistently. Post battles exchanges are pretty damn funny, even after 100 times. We'll see how they hold up after I've played for 30 hours.

Aside from Artes, which are spells and melee combos, their are Skills in the game, which are mostly passive buffs. The Skills system is ripped directly from Final Fantasy IX and Final Fantasy Tactics Advance, where equipment has certain skills attached to it, and after a few battles, you learn the skill permanently and can then move on to a different piece of equipment with new skills. I don't mind the rip-off, since the system from FFIX is my favorite RPG skills system ever. Combine that with a weapon crafting system (again ripped from various other RPGs), and you have quite the enjoyable Skills system, even if we have seen it before.

So, Tales of Vesperia is growing on me. I'm not very far in yet, but I can see this being good. As long as the story keeps me mildly entertained, the battles and characters can fill in the rest. I'd like to actually finish an RPG once in a while...

Drugs Are Bad

2009-03-09T10:11:00.000-07:00

In case you didn't know, drugs are bad. Specifically, weed is bad. If you don't believe me, you might want to check out how weed can affect your gaming....

Drunk Japanese man Explains Mario in English

2009-03-02T13:38:00.001-08:00

Kotaku found this hilarious video of a Japanese man playing a GameBoy version of Super Mario Bros., while drunk and explaining what he is doing in English. Well, the suspect he is drunk anyway. He could also just be very Japanese. They do crazy things.

WEAPON! WEAPON! WAAAOOOOOOOOOOO

Slumdog Millionaire

2009-03-01T21:53:00.000-08:00

Overrated.

/Discuss

League of Legends

2009-02-26T10:16:00.000-08:00

So, this one is for Jim.

The creators/developers of DotA are making their own full-fledged game.

......

Are your pants back on Jim? Ok good.

So, the game is called League of Legends (wonderfully abbreviated by LoL... best part of the game imo) and is basically its own standalone DotA game. The developers said they wanted to make their own game so they did not have to be constrained by the Warcraft III framework, which at its core is still an RTS game. I suspect that this will either be every DotA fanboy's dream come true, or seen as a horrible travesty. My guess is there will be a split camp of people who switch to LoL and snobs who want to stay DotA purists.

I am pretty excited about this actually. I never played DotA, mostly because of my dislike for Warcraft 3 (and my want for a social life...), but I can see this game being a good entry point for people who avoided DotA for fear of being massively confused and then raped in their first bunch of games. We will see when it is released how it is received by DotA vets and new players.

Anyway, here is the incredibly lengthy Kotaku report, and the gameplay video is below.

Fiddlesticks ftw.

Guiness Book of World Records: Clueless Edition

2009-02-26T09:40:00.000-08:00

So, the Guinness Book of World Records has a so-called Gamer's Edition. And while you might expect it contain various amusing and actually interesting records like "Most Hours Spent Playing World of Warcraft without Getting Up" or "Most Versus Games in a Row Won in Street Fighter II", it doesn't actually have anything to do with people at all. It is just boring stuff like "Best Selling PS2 Game" or "Longest Running Franchise". Really? You could just look this stuff up easily on the net... why would you buy a book about if it, if it doesn't even contain anything interesting?

Anyway, they have also put out a list for the top 50 Most Influential Video Games of All Time. First of all, the Guinness book is based upon actual, measurable records. How can you measure something as subjective as influence?

So right off the bat, you know it is going to be bullshit. And it is.

#1 is Super Mario Kart. No, not Bros., Kart. Huh? Really? I mean Mario Kart is a great game and all, but the Most Influential game EVER? Um, no. You couldn't even go with the obvious easy choice of Super Mario Bros.? Super Mario Bros. defined an entire generation of gaming, and is responsible for one of, if not the, most recognizable icons in videogames. Mario Kart is a spin off franchise, and while great, hasn't even had an ounce of impact that the original game did. The "kart racing" genre never was anything but Mario Kart and a few knock offs.

Frustrating.

Other notable points of retardation:
-Final Fantasy XII ranked #8, Final Fantasy VII ranked #20. You have got to be kidding me. FFVII made next-gen RPGs what they are today. Big budgets, rendered CG cutscenes, convoluted plotlines. While not the most perfect FF RPG released, it is definitely the most influential towards modern gaming. FFXII... why? In my opinion, XII had very little actual impact. People either liked or dismissed the new battle system, and that was the only point of anything interesting about the game. It hasn't influenced anything after it, so far. FF X was much more influential for the PS2 era RPG, and it isn't even on the list.

-Lego Star Wars #23, above Resident Evil, Chrono Trigger, Guitar Hero. LOL. What have the Lego games influenced besides more Lego games?

-GTA being on there 3 times. Do we need separate entries for GTA, San Andreas, and Vice City? How were the second 2 influential at all? They were just more of the same from GTA3. And another issue is that it is listed as GTA, and not GTA3. I know they mean GTA3, and not GTA1, but why pretend that the first 2 games in the GTA series didn't exist, especially from a book/institution that's supposed to be "official"?

The list does have the majority of the games that would be on an actual gamer's list. It would be better if they didn't actually rank them, because it shows just how stupid and clueless they really are.

It just goes to show that, even though games have now gone "mainstream", the media and population at large still have no clue what the hell they are talking about. Just leave the games to the gamers people, and stop with these stupid lists.

Gemcraft

2009-02-24T14:26:00.000-08:00

Gemcraft is another addicting/amusing flash game I discovered today. It basically blends tower defense with a simple RPG system of upgrading your character. During tower defense, you power your tower (ha.. ha..) with gems of various power and abilities, which you can create and combine together for maximum destruction.

As with any flash game, it is fun, simple, and addictive. Have at it!

Gemcraft

Warning: I am not responsible for your addiction. You have been warned.

World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich king

2009-02-23T09:57:00.000-08:00

Yes, I went there.

So, Meghan and I grabbed the new WoW expansion sometime during the Christmas break. Mostly, we weren't happy playing Warhammer, and just wanted that lovin' feelin' back in our lives. I wanted to have fun playing my character again, and I wanted to do 5 mans. I love doing 5 man dungeons in WoW, and it is something I missed in Warhammer. I was not a big fan of the public quest/raid dungeons in Warhammer.

So, first impression of the expansion zones was basically /meh. In The Burning Crusade, I was blown away when I first stepped through the Dark Portal. It really felt like you stepped into a war zone, and you were now in the shit. In WotLK, you take a zep/boat from the main city, and are unceremoniously dropped into a new quest hub. Not quite the start I was expecting, coming from BC.

Anyway, we started into the old questing routine on our Horde Shaman/Mage combo. Mostly things were the same, but now it seems Blizzard has finished its process of quest polishing it got mostly right in TBC. What I mean is, gone are the annoying quests from classic WoW. No grinding the same mobs over and over for one quest item drop. No stupid, pointless fetch quests that just waste time. the vast majority of quests are worth your time, and offer a painless experience. They have also thrown in questing with vehicles, which could be anything from siege engines to being held in the hand of a giant while you the player control the giant instead of your actual character. The vehicle concept/interface can be slightly buggy at times, but it was nothing that got in the way of completing the quests. Usually, the vehicle quests were a nice, fun diversion from the typical quest grind.

The zones themselves, aside from the first blah impression, are pretty big, and diverse. The Borean Tundra, our first zone, feels like 6 different zones in one, as there are many different areas with their own theme. This is a nice change of pace from Hellfire Peninsula, the first zone in BC, which is a large zone of bland. Also, this zone has a total of 4 flight paths in it, which makes getting around a breeze, and this is certainly a welcome change of philosophy from the 1 flight path per zone idea in classic. The next zone we entered, Dragonblight, is another HUGE zone, and its mostly snowy, but breaks up the whiteness with the various dragonshrines throughout the zone, which are all pretty cool.

Dragonblight also introduces one of the coolest new features in WotLK, which is instancing within a non-instanced zone. (Maybe a good name would be "micro-instancing" ?). I'll give an example to explain. One area in Dragonblight is a gate that at first appears to be loaded with elite mobs. Then, as you go through a quest line, you actually get this awesome in game cut scene of the Horde and Alliance storming the gate, to kill off the Lich king's minions. but then the Lich King himself shows up, and the shit hits the fan. After the cutscene, the area around the gate is in ruins, things are on fire, and it is just generally messed up. Now, there are two instances of this area. One pre-cut scene, and one post-cut scene. Which one you enter depends on if you have gone through the quest line and saw the cut scene or not. And these instances are not just held for your character alone. Other players who have gone through the cutscenes with you will be able to see and interact with you like normal. But, you will not be able to see or interact with other players who have not yet gone through the quests, even though they are in the same area on the map. In order to see these other players, you need to exit the instance area. This is all done without load times or anything. It is not like entering a dungeon. it is all done seemless. It is a really cool feature. This eventually hist center stage in the Icecrown zone, where you basically have to unlock the entire zone in order to use it. You need to go through various quest lines to unlock towns and flight paths. And here, the progression takes various stages, not just 2 like in the Dragonblight event.

Instances in Wotlk are generally much easier than we have seen in the past. BC dropped us into Hellfire Ramparts to start, which has multiple 5 and 6 mob pulls throughout the instance, requiring a lot of CC and general mob management. In WotLK, however, CC is basically thrown out the window. Pretty much every pull now is an aoe pull, with the tank taking all 3-4 mobs at once, and everyone just killing the mobs aoe style. No CC or careful consideration required. This certainly makes things easier, and cuts down on group wipes in instances. Also, most instances now require around 45 minutes to complete. We don't see endless amounts of trash mobs like in classic and even BC instances. Bosses come almost in rapid succession in some instances, like Azjol Nerub, which can be cleared in about 30 minutes. So, basically 5 mans are a very casual friendly environment now, which end quickly and require little strategy. Heroic dungeons take the same form as the did in BC, with all dungeons being ramped up to lvl 80, and having a couple more surprises. Though again these are much easier than in BC. In BC, you really had to be on your game for heroics it seemed, and have some decent gear in-order to complete them. Now, heroics are basically just the next step once you hit 80. Even if you are undergeared for a heroic, if there are a couple geared people, they can basically pull the scrubs through until the end. So again, a much more casual approach to gameplay in WotLK.

Now we arrive at endgame. You hit 80, have some heroics under your belt, and now want to jump into doing raids. Again, this is much more casual friendly than in BC. Naxx is pugged all the time now. I could never imagine a pug doing MC in classic. I don't have much BC raid experience, but I couldn't imagine even then pugging Kara. Naxx is pretty easy, and again pretty much all trash pulls are aoe. Once you figure out the boss tricks, 2 out of 4 wings are basically trivial. Two of the wings are a bit tougher, and a coordinated guild is nice to have, but not required if people know the fights.
So, the basic consensus from the WoW community, especially hardcore raiders, is the WotLK is very easy. I mean, back in the day, if you were in a raiding guild, you were basically an elite on the server. Now, I see unguilded people running around in 25 man gear all the time. They just jump in pugs and do their thing. I personally went from fresh 80 to having almost all the gear I could want for my char in just 4 weeks of raiding. Granted, I jumped into a really good situation with a good guild, but others are doing it too. It doesn't take too much time or effort to get the phat lootz. Blizzard's philosophy seems like it is going like this now: don't exclude everyone but the most hardcore from seeing content. They want the majority of of players to be able to see the things they are developing. I mean, how many people have cleared the Black Temple? Not the majority of players, I can assure you. The new Tier 8 dungeon, Ulduar, seems like it is going to keep with this philosophy be having a "hard mode" for most bosses. This means to me that the content with be easy enough to get through for most people. Then, the elitists can do "hard mode" for bragging rights and a bit of extra loot. This is fine with me. I don't care about accomplishing every single thing in the game, as long as I can SEE the new things. I like having the experience of it all, I personally don't need to have completed it all 100%. As long as I have BEEN there, I'm happy as could be. Hopefully this will be possible as WotLK, and WoW itself, moves forward.

I can't comment too much on PvP, as I haven't done much endgame yet, but I'll make a few points. The new battleground, Strand of the Ancients, is fun as all hell. It is basically a mile gate/keep siege affair seen in DAoC/Warhammer, only sped up. Strand is really fun, and while not perfect, I can't knock it for what it is. Mythic wants to be the RvR king, with its keep warfare, but it forgot to add in the fun. Blizzard is all about the fun factor, and at the end of the day, that is what keeps me coming back. Wintergrasp is basically one big keep siege, and while it has a lot of technical issues, it again is fun. Attaching it to the Vault raid instance is also a good idea, and Vault offers another quick and easy way to get raid and pvp gear. If only my class/spec wasn't worthless for arena. But, Enhance Shaman have alsways been the bastard children of WoW, so I am used to it.

So, I am really happy with WotLK. I really have nothing to complain about. Blizzard has really listened to feedback, and has also thought ahead for itself, and the result is a great game experience. Mythic and Warhammer is missing the parts about thinking ahead, and thinking for itself, but of course Blizzard has always been known to release great products. It is hard to compete with that level of polish in a game. I am currently taking a break from playing so much WoW, but it is not a break of dislike, just a realization that I need some separation time before I got too sucked in. But, is it just too good, and I know I'll keep coming back after these breaks.

WoW remains king of MMOs, for better or worse.

Guitar Hero: World Tour

2009-02-03T10:50:00.000-08:00

So I finally got Guitar Hero: World Tour (thanks for taking 25 bucks off, Target). And it is everything you would expect from the Guitar Hero universe. Fun to play, ridiculous characters and venues, great solos, and some songs that will leave you wondering wtf just hit you in the face.

Meghan and I did our usual guitar trade off during the tour mode, and quickly remembered why GH is so much better than RB. The songs are just fun to play in GH, where in RB they are just boring. Even the annoying songs from RB that are also in GH (why the FUCK does Bon Jovi need to be in both games? sigh) are actually enjoyable to play in GH. Even if the song itself is annoying, playing the guitar is just a blast. Also, the tour/career mode doesn't force you to play the same songs over and over again. Thank christ. Was this too much to ask in RB? No. Makes the tour mode so much less of a chore. We were unlocking new venues left and right, and often the new venues we unlocked were 2 or 3 ahead of the current one we were on. So nice. The venues also retain the same GH sense of humor, like the ferris wheel at the state fair breaking off it hinges and rolling through the fair, cutting a swath of mayhem. Cliche, but appreciated nonetheless.

Another nice touch in GH is the appearance of real musicians throughout the game. GH3 saw a little bit of this (Slash and Tom Morello), but WT takes it to a new level. We first saw it with Billy Corgan on a Smashing Pumpkins song early along in the tour mode. Then it seemed like every venue had a special guest. We saw Zakk Wylde, Travis Barker (who I don't think was modeled with the burns...), Ozzy, and others. The best was when Ted Nugent rode out onstage on the back of a buffalo... amazing. Another amusing one was when this female came jumping onto the stage in a white t-shirt with the typical punk anarchy symbol on it. I'm like... who the hell is this? Then we see the name and it is the lead singer of Paramore. Meghan is furious at this point since it is her turn and she HATES Paramore. I laugh at her. Then, she passes me the guitar at the end of the song, and we see the next song is "Hotel California", which is one of her favorite songs. I laugh at her some more and then quickly pass back the guitar before being pummeled.

Also, the new GH:WT guitar is incredibly nice. The classic GH fret buttons, along with a nice solid design make for a nice (fake) guitar. The slide bar is also really fun to use, when you actually get the time to in a song. It is a nice addition, and it actually adds something to the game, while offering a different take on RB's "soloing frets" which are only used for random, inane mashing during certain sections.

So, Guitar Hero reigns supreme in the land of plastic toy instruments because it remembers it is a GAME, and not an outlet for musical expression. Oh wait, it has the song creator in it. Guess it wins on that front too, and I've heard some good things about the song creator.

The Wonders of Mainstream News

2009-02-03T10:44:00.000-08:00

Thought I needed to share this one with everyone. This is a wonderful news story about the "secret society" of WoW players. Full story here.

Lmao. I love it when mainstream media tries to be relevant with the kiddies.

Anyway.... /4 DPS LFG 10m OS/10m VoA/H CoS. Enh 3.4K AP ....ftw

Rock Band v. Guitar Hero

2009-01-26T13:57:00.000-08:00

Yes, yes, this is an actual game update. Expect more soon since work has slowed for a bit.

First, some impressions of Rock Band 2.
So, over the break, by a fluke of the Gamefly queue, I received Rock Band 2, which was way down on my list, kind of just there as a reminder that once I got Guitar Hero World Tour (which still hasn't happened), I would pick up RB2 just to see how it was. So, I went out and got a used RB1 guitar for 15 bucks so we could play it.

The first thing I noticed was that I hated the molasses-feeling strum bar. The RB strum bar doesn't "click" the GH one. So, the act of strumming is much more of a press than a strum/flick. OK, so what does that mean exactly? Well, since RB's philosophy is cords over single notes, you get a lot of long rhythm sections (i.e. boring repetition). This made my entire right forearm ache terribly, since the strum bar is so damn hard to keep pressing over and over. And, I go to the gym 3 or 4 days a week, so its not like I have no forearm muscle. It doesn't help the fact that the songs with the long rhythm were usually the ones that were unbearably awful, but I'll get to the song selection in a bit.

The fret buttons are ok, but I have a couple of gripes for them as well. The little brail dots on the buttons do not serve as a good position marker at all. Why did you have to go away from the middle ridge on the yellow button that you created for GH1 & 2 Harmonix. Just to be different I guess. Different is worse. I found I had the toughest time finding the yellow button, since it had no marker that actually worked. Also, since the fret buttons take up the whole width of the neck, I found myself inadvertently pressing buttons by gripping the neck. The GH guitar allows you to actually hold the neck with your left hand and press the buttons. For RB, you cant do that as much. I guess this is more along the lines of an actual guitar, when you don't want your palm hitting strings on the neck, but I found it slightly annoying.

Now on to the the awful tour mode and song selection. So, the tour mode (or whatever its called) started out innocently enough. You get one city and one venue to play at first. The city has 2 or 3 songs to play, along with a "Mystery Set List" and something like a "Choose 2 Set List". Ok, not sure what the set lists do right now, so you play through the three songs. You get rated at the end of the song (1-5 stars, though if you actually complete the song you are guaranteed 3 it seems). You quickly realize that you need the stars to unlock new venues/cities. I hate hate HATE hate HATE HATE this convention in games. I despise having to go back through a level again and again to try and get a higher rating to actually advance. If I get through, let me go on to the next. I'll try to get a higher score later if the level/song actually warrants another play through. To make matters worse, the "new" set lists in each city actually just recycle the same songs over and over again. At first they give you songs you haven't played yet, but as you unlock more, you get the same ones over and over. And you have to play the set lists in order to get enough stars in a city to advance. We didn't finish the tour, and probably played some songs 7 or 8 songs. Of course, these were the most annoy, awful songs in the game. Thanks Rock Band for making this such an excruciating process. Appreciate it, assholes.

Did I mention the songs were bad? RB2 boasts like 80 something songs, and I would say about 5 we unlocked (we didn't unlock them all) we actually enjoyable to play. Even playing Metallica's Battery felt lifeless. The song charting just makes the game boring. Some parts are challenging, to be certain, but the challenge in RB comes from chord switching, and not playing single notes (like during solos). They put a lot of time and effort into the cord transitions, and barely any for solos. Solos get their own little "part" in the song, where the background of the notes goes blue, and you can see how good you did on the solo at the end. The problem is, the solos are actually the easiest part in some songs, and none of them were very challenging. The solo needs to make me sweat and think "omg it's coming". But it doesn't and solos are just bleh in this game. Instead, you get to play the same chords over and over. How exciting...

So what have we learned so far? I'm not too much of a fan of the RB1 guitar (even though I'd use it if I had to) and I pretty much hated the tour mode, song selection, and the song charts. The biggest issue I take with Harmonix and its followers is that it boasts that RB is more like "playing a real guitar" than GH is. If you don't know, Harmonix created GH1 & 2, then went off to start Rock Band, while Neversoft (the developers behind the Tony Hawk games) took over the GH franchise, starting with 3. The RB fanboys also like to hang this over the heads of GH fans, like some badge of honor (kind of like Mac users (i.e. hipster jackasses)). Here's a newsflash for all of you: it is a fucking videogame. Your dreams of being a rockstar are over. You are now a games developer, so why don't you make games that are fun to play, rather then trying to cater to all the new "casual games" tards out there who want the game to be easy as possible and want to sing songs like Blondie's "One Way or Another" over and over again (kill me now). Harmonix, get over your huge ego. You aren't making games for musicians. You are making a videogame.

The ease of Rock Band (and likely GH: World Tour, though I haven't played it yet) is believed to be attributed to the response from GH3, which was difficult in a 'hopes and dreams crushing' way. Personally in GH3, there are some songs which I really liked to listen to, but Medium was too easy, and I failed out in Hard right at the beginning ("Take This Life", I'm looking at you). I didn't necessarily want the game to be easier, but just wanted the gap between Medium and Hard to be a bit narrower. Meghan, on the other hand, loved GH3 because of the challenge, and I think I would have liked it more if I was better at it (i.e. had her long pianist fingers...).

I just found the GH philosophy to be much more compelling. Challenging songs, intimidating solos, and the realization that you are playing a GAME and not trying to be in a real band. I want to have fun, not learn scales. I also want to have songs that are fun to play, and actually rock hard, not ones that are made for your mom to sing, like "Livin' on a Prayer" in RB2 (how I hate you Bon Jovi). Essentially, I want metal, and not stupid radio pop. Harmonix got this right with songs like "Six" and "The Light That Blinds" in GH2, but now they are catering to the iTunes crowd.

One last topic here: downloadable content. RB, admittedly, boasts a bigger collection of downloadable songs. They even had DLC for Children of Bodom. So they win as far as the songs themselves go, but when said songs are rooted in the philosophy mentioned above, I could give shit. I don't really ever see myself downloading songs to play that much, unless they are incredibly awesome, so this whole area doesn't matter much to me. However, I get pissed at the RB fanboys when they gloat about their DLC, and then accuse GH and Activision of milking the GH franchise with GH: Metallica. They say they should just release it as DLC and not a whole new game. Let's do the math here assholes. A single DLC song costs you 2 bucks. GH: Metallica has 49 songs, and is selling for 60 bucks. It would be 98 bucks worth of DLC. Hell, it would be even more than 60 bucks for the Metallica songs alone. Now they counter with, 'oh, but you can pick and choose your DLC'. Right, but if you are a fan who likes metal/hard rock, you will prob want a lot of these songs. I think you are the tards getting milked here.

So, maybe Guitar Hero: World Tour sucks, since it is obviously trying to cut into the Rock Band market of a full band game. Who knows, I just know that RB2 definitely sucked, and that as long as the basic philosophy of GH remains mostly intact, it will be a much more compelling experience. Just writing this post has made me itch to play GH again haha. If only it wasn't so expensive to buy these damn games...

And this just in. Guitar Hero:World Tour outsells Rock Band 2 to 1. Guess there are more people with sense out there after all.

A Life Changing Experience

2009-01-26T12:56:00.000-08:00

This is C Diddy owning your face. Go watch Air Guitar Nation right now.

Change?

2009-01-21T13:09:00.000-08:00

I didn't spontaneously explode into hundreds of butterflies this morning.
I guess everything is mostly the same after all....

Geekgasm

2009-01-16T12:08:00.000-08:00

Ok, I know I promised lots of updates. But, work has turned out to be crazy these past couple weeks, so I haven't had the chance (or the will at home) to update. Here is a quick one though that I wanted to throw out there quick.

If you have always wanted a real life replica of your WoW character custom-made... well, now you can. FigurePrints.com is a site that creates custom figures of your WoW character, complete with all the gear you currently have on, in any pose you want. You just have to give them your character name/server, and they do it for you (no account info is exchanged as far as I know).

I found this particularly interesting because they use a rapid-prototyping process to create the characters. This is a process used by the manufacturing industry to create to-scale mockups, well, rapidly, using plastics and other materials. Seems like industry has answered the prayers of manchildren everywhere. They are a bit pricey at $130, so pretty much only the most self-absorbed WoW player with nothing better to spend his (or her?) money on will pay for this, but I still thought it was pretty neat.

Check out the site for more details.

Puzzle Quest DS

2009-01-06T10:02:00.001-08:00

The first game that I played over the break I want to talk about is Puzzle Quest for the DS. This is a random game I got for Meghan because I had heard it was really good, even though I didn't know much about it. Since I got her super addicted to Nintendogs for her birthday, I decided I had to try and live up to that with another addictive DS game.

Puzzle Quest is basically a mixture between a simple RPG you might find on a cell phone nowadays and a really addictive flash game. More specifically, this is an RPG where you fight battles by playing a Bejeweled-esque game against an opponent. Matching like-colored orbs gains you Mana of that color, which you then use for your spells, which have various effects including directly doing damage to your opponent, or blowing up certain parts of the board. The game board also includes tiles containing gold, extra experience, and skulls. The matching skulls does damage to your opponent. The strategy in these fights comes from knowing the moves your opponents can do (trying to mana screw them), matching more than 3 like pieces to create chain combos, and not setting up your opponent for moves that will kill you. The battles are quite fun, and definitely addictive. The same simple, addictive quality of the flash games remains true here, and it makes the game quite compelling.

The RPG elements are rather simple. The overworld and story reminds me of something like Final Fantasy Tactics Advance and other strategy RPGs. The story and writing are passable, and you have a generic world map where you make your way to different landmarks to fight a battle. The leveling up is simple. You can put points into each of your mana types, and also increase your Battle, Cunning, and Morale skills, which have various passive bonuses, like increasing health and amount of damage done from skulls. Also, there are 4 different class types in the game, each with their own set of spells, so it makes for a slight variation on the battles if you decide to play through again. There are also other things to do in the world, such as create weapons from runes found in the world (guarded by hard to kill Runekeepers, obviously), capture enemies to learn new spells, and siege cities. Even the capturing and spell research has you playing a variation on the Bejeweled mini-game in order to be successful.

Overall, this is a really good game, and I recommend it to anyone with a DS (if you can find it). It is a great combination of traditional RPG elements and simple, fun browser gaming. While it is not the most deep game, it is certainly one of the best games when you are on the go.

Happy New Year!

2009-01-05T11:00:00.000-08:00

Hey everyone! I am finally back at work from a very relaxing vacation. Meghan and I basically just lounged around for two weeks, mostly playing WoW, Rock Band 2 and Puzzle Quest DS, with breaks in between to drink (a lot). So, expect to see some updates soon with impressions of the games above, and a Rock Band vs. Guitar Hero comparison.

In the meantime, what games did everyone else play over the holidays?

Infinite Undiscovery

2008-12-15T10:59:00.000-08:00

God, this game is awful. Don't buy it or play it, ever.

Now that that's out of the way, some comments.

This game really looked promising. It was being developed by tri-Ace, who also created the Star Ocean series and Radiata Stories (awesome game). The graphics looked amazing in previews, and it looked like tri-Ace was going to step into the big leagues of RPG development.

Wrong.

All of the focus was, apparently, on the graphics, and they completely forgot to make a good game. Right from the get go, you are thrust into fighting without any indication of why or how to do anything. Supposedly you look EXACTLY like some knight guy. And you don't even know who YOU are. And the dialogue/voice acting is LAME. Really Lame. Then, the game DUMPS tutorial screen upon tutorial screen on you. There is no gentle easing into the gameplay mechanics, like most well designed would do. You get 5 screens of text, and then they say, ok, go do it. This might beOK if the test weren't IMPOSSIBLE to read. They forget people still have normal, 27-inch, tube TVs. The text was beyond blurry, and even walking right up the the TV, I could not make out what buttons I had to press when they were talking about the L and R triggers. Luckily, the face buttons on the Xbox controller are colored, so at least I can see that. Bad engineering on that part.

Back to the bad design, this game is an action RPG. Actually, it is mostly a hack'n'slash. No turned based battles or even going to a different screen to fight. All the fighting is done right there on the game field. At first, it kind of reminded me of Zelda... only in no way was it good. it is an action-RPG that feels way to clunky. It was hard to maneuver may character effectively, and I also had to just rely on hacking everything in sight and hoping my party member healed me. Oh right, we have someone tagging along. At certain parts of the game, it forces you to control you other party member. This is an incredibly frustrating experience, since the tutorials do a horrible job of explaining how to control them. So you are left guessing, and usually end up dead. Again, terrible design.

Then, before you can even being to get your bearings with the combat system, you are put into a chase segment, where you have to run from a big fat monster thing. However, on the way, you have to kill people in your way. So, backing up a second, you press R2 to draw and sheath your sword. You can't loot treasure while your sword is out, nor can you inspect things or open doors. Frustrating. Also, you run faster while you have your sword sheathed. So, take it out to fight, put it away to run. So you run up to enemies to kill them, then you start running away from the fat guy. Oh right, I need to put away my sword to run faster. Your character has to FUCKING STOP and do this slow animation of him putting away his sword, and the while the monster thing is beating on you with his belly or large club. Frustrating. Oh there are more enemies and barricades I have to fight through. Start the whole annoying process over again.

Me and Meghan stopped playing after an hour. It was just too bad to warrant any more time wasted. Terrible game all around. It is a shame too, it would have been nice to see some of those awesome graphics. Guess they will be left.... undiscovered. (I'm sorry.. I just had to).

Video Game Awards

2008-12-15T10:18:00.000-08:00

Last night was Spike's Video Game Awards. I was pretty excited to see what they did with it. I know that any kind of award show relating to video games is going to piss me off, but I was at least excited to see people talk about games.

This thing was a horrible mockery. Not only was it terribly managed by Spike (there were so many stupid mistakes....), but it was terribly managed AND utterly out of touch with anything related to video games. There was an endless parade of completely UNNECESSARY celebrity morons including LL Cool J, Mike Tyson, various UFC fighters, and some fucking horrible band filled with half-starved retarded children that I don't even want to know the name of. I mean, I could deal with the mistakes and the laid back approach as long as they kept it simple and kept it about the games. But the games were just an afterthought to the award show. Which means it was just a giant medium to sell advertising and for Spike to plug its other shows (nudge nudge UFC nudge nudge). I mean, I know games have been going towards the abyss of mainstream crapdom for a while, but it was just hard to watch what it has become. I should have expected it but, it was just sad.

Speaking of the games itself, all of the nominees were the equivalent of phoning it in. Not one intelligent thought or surprise pick was there. All we had were the blockbusters, the sequels, and the well-established series sludge. I'll admit that a lot of these were good games, but at least at the Oscars we see some actual artistic films filled with actual acting nominated, not just the blockbusters. Nope, we just get the Gears of Wars, the Grand Theft Autos, and the Rock Bands. No surprises. Hell, none of the games even nominated for Best RPG were actual RPGs. Come on, why not at least give a nod to games like Persona 4? Oh right, its just a mega-game from a major studio. Sorry I mentioned anything. Even Tales of Vesperia would be a nice nomination. Nope.

Uggggg. I hate to be one of those people but games were certainly of better quality when they weren't "mainstream". Games certainly have benefited in a way that they are no longer seen as some horrible thing only weird geeky people do. Nope, we are no longer lumped in with LARPers, and games like World of Warcraft and Guitar Hero (and the damn Wii) have certainly helped in that regard. But now, people only care about the blockbusters and the money making franchises. Smaller game studios keep getting eaten up, and the games industry is pretty much like the music industry now (but not quite as bad yet). You have those few giant corporations, and some smaller developers trying desperately to stay afloat.

And Jake Black wasn't even a host. More like a sideshow attraction.

Complete List of Nominees

List of Winners

/jaded

Games + Metal = Love

2008-12-11T21:36:00.001-08:00

Guiter Hero: Metallica info. Fuck Yeah.

Mirror's Edge: The Review

2008-12-08T15:07:00.000-08:00

So I just beat the full version of Mirror's Edge. The full game was everything the demo promised it would be, and (a little bit) more. The games contains great looking cityscapes, fun and fluid first-person "runner" gameplay, and a bit of combat/shooter segments. It was quite the enjoyable game experience, if not as absolutely amazing as I first thought (read: it was still really, really good).

So, the back story is that you are a "Runner", the last bastion of hope in a society where the government has completely taken over and censored society as a whole (hello, cliche). They say it is your job to run messages to and from members of the resistance, because phone lines and internet are no longer safe. However, you will never actually do this. The shit hits the fan right in the first level, and you are basically out to uncover a nefarious plot set in motion by "the man". It was a fairly decent plot line; just the right amount of fluff to keep things moving along, but not take anything away from the gameplay.

And this game is ABOUT the gameplay. It ends up rotating between sections of puzzling solving (how do I get over there?) and combat (who put these guys with guns here?). It works well and the system is mostly transparent until you near the end of the game, when you kind of realize they are just following a cycle. But, this doesn't mean it gets tired or old. The puzzle solving aspects remind me a lot of Portal... minus the... portals. In essence, you are simply trying to get from point A to point B, with the only obstacles being the environment. You have to be pretty clever to get through some of the areas, and you will end up using all of Faith's wide array of acrobatic moves, so your gaming skills will be tested as well. And you will die. A lot. But I never really felt like the game was too hard or being cheap. I always knew that I could get past an area with a bit of persistance. the checkpoint system is nice too, with only a few areas that made you get through an area you already passed through in order to get to the place you died (read: fell tragically to your death). I found these bits of the game to be incredibly rewording. It was a nice feeling when I figured out a particularly tricky area. Take THAT shady industrial areas I have no business in being in...

Now come the combat sections. Once the puzzling solving is done, you are usually placed in a situation where you have no choice but to get through a group of armed a-holes trying to kill you (you aren't exactly sure why either...). Your instincts tell you ok, this is first person, I snagged a gun from that guy I just killed (more like kicked once in the head.. now he's "dead")... so it must be a shooter, right? Wrong. You are going to die in the combat sections. A lot. It can be frustrating at times, but I felt it was in the same spirit as the puzzling solving elements: I just needed to find the "trick". When you don't have a gun, you can run right up to an enemy and disarm them as they try to beat you with their gun. (Why they don't just keep shooting is beyond me, but oh well). If you fail twice in catching their gun at the right moment, you are dead. Start again from the beginning of the section. So, you can see how it would be frustrating to run at an enemy shooting you in the face, only to then be killed when his pistol whips you. However, I still found these sections rewordingly challenging. It felt good to get through these parts, and have my adrenaline come down a couple notches for the next puzzling-solving part. Win.

So, I greatly enjoyed my time in Mirror's Edge. It was not as completely mind blowing as the demo was the first time I played it through, but it was certainly a great experience. I appreciate the new ideas and the innovative take on what essentially boils down to a First-Person Platformer. That description doesn't do it justice though. You really need to see the landscapes for yourself and get the feeling of momentum as you throw your character off of a building. I suggest a rental first. If you want toplay through it again multiple times (which I would definitely like to do) and do the online time trials, then I would say it is definitely worth the purchase.

Happy Leaping.

Coming Soon: Mirror's Edge: The Rant

Ok, just ONE more flash game...

2008-12-08T11:39:00.000-08:00

So, the Mirror's Edge flash game might have been kind of lame...

But, THIS one is awesome. Kind of like Mirror's Edge only much better and more intuitive. And snappy insults from an evil overlord/machine that is trying to kill you. Nice.

Oh, and it is called Hunted Forever. I promise this is the last flash game post....

Mirror's Edge: The Flash Game

2008-12-04T15:47:00.000-08:00

Wow, so I never expected to be writing/commenting about web games on this blog...
Anyway, so there's an official Mirror's Edge flash game being developed, and you can play the Beta for it now. Takes a little bit of getting used to, but it seems really polished for being a Flash game AND for it only being a beta release.

Check it out!

Auditorium

2008-12-03T10:52:00.000-08:00

You have to give it to indie web-based game developers. They really do have some incredibly innovated (and FUN) ideas for games. Makes me wish THESE people were developing next-gen console games, and not the people who like to recycle the same BS ideas over and over again.

I'm not going to explain what to do in Auditorium, you'll figure it out. Just go play it.

Kind of reminds me of this....

Bodom, meet Rock Band

2008-11-29T12:48:00.000-08:00

In honor of Children of Bodom being added to Rock Band as a downloadable track, here's some more games + metal = love.

Sacred 2: Blind Guardian

2008-11-28T12:55:00.000-08:00

HELL YES

Sacred 2 is a recently released Action-RPG a la Diablo. And its made by a German developer. And Blind Guardian is IN the game. Yes please.

Left4Dead

2008-11-28T12:21:00.000-08:00

Two words: HOLY SHIT. This game is intense. If you already know about the game itself, its great, go play it now. If you don't know what it is yet, here ya go!

Left4Dead is a first-person shooter from Valve, the creators of Half-Life and its various iterations. More specifically, it is a zombie FPS. This game was modeled to be Dawn of the Dead in game form, not another Resident Evil. These zombies aren't content to slowly plod after you, they run full out at you, and they come in droves. Fortunately, you don't have to go at it alone. You have 3 other teammates with you, who are either controlled by other people online, or by the computer. You would be cut down in seconds without the extra support. The team aspect makes the game even more scary, because the game is not-so-subtly telling you that if it catches you alone, it'll rip you to shreds. You need to stick with your teammates. You aren't some super soldier out to take on the world. You are just some person who gets caught in the middle of a zombie movie.

The game has 4 campaigns, which are basically different "movie" backdrops. Your goal is to survive through each section in the movie in order to be rescued at the end. You aren't here to cure the world, or even save it. Your only focus is to survive. I really love the focus of the game. It couldn't have nailed the zombie movie aspect more completely.

For each movie campaign, you can choose one of the 4 players. I chose the beefed-up Pancho. Once loaded up, you can pick which gun you want from a table in front of you. I chose the Shotgun (of course!). The other options are double pistols, an Assault Rifle, or a Sub-Machine Gun. As you progress later in the campaign, you can also pick up better weapons, including a faster, more powerful Shotgun and a Sniper Rifle. There are also the standard medpacs, pain killers, and various explosives.

So, the gameplay itself isn't anything super special. The whole point of the game is the atmosphere, and the situation you have been put in. Valve really nailed it here, and I can see this game being fun for a long time, especially online with a bunch of friends and added downloadable content. They have already planned on adding an exact replica of the Dawn of the Dead mall sometime in the future.... awesome.

2008-11-25T16:50:00.000-08:00

You are pure evil, and hate personified. You don't care anything about your fellow man, and are guided only by your desire to rule over your inferiors, i.e. everybody but you. 'Mercy,' you ask, prior to grinding an enemy beneath your mighty heel, 'What is mercy?'

Take the quiz!

Twilight

2008-11-25T09:53:00.000-08:00

In case you hadn't heard, there is a new adolescent book to movie hysteria that has recently been unleashed, and that is the Twilight Saga. The books, in a nutshell, are about a 16 year old girl who falls in love with a Vampire, who has been 17 since the early 1900s. So basically, it is a love story for the super-hero generation. When Meghan first read these (four) books, I was a bit skeptical at first. The vampires sounded really hokey and it mostly just seemed geared towards high school freshman girls, and in reality, it is. But, since the movie was coming out, I decided I would read the first book before, and not pull a Harry Potter where I haven't read the books at all.

The book pleasantly surprised me. Stephanie Meyer, the author, draws you into this universe and makes it completely believable. I love the witty sarcastic humor that she adds to the main character, Bella, and it sometimes feels as though you are sharing your own private joke with her. Also, the vampire love story isn't laid on too thick for my early 20s male self, and there was really only one part of the book where I felt.... well, awkward. But mostly, I just wanted to see what happened next, even though the book is mostly about emotions rather than action up until the later parts of it.

So, I can get through this book easily, but I can't force myself to sit down and read a whole Harry Potter, or even The Lord of the Rings. And, for those of you who don't know me personally, I love to read. I am a big fan of the Forgotten Realms/Dragonlance series of books, and I always have a current book that I am reading. But, I can't get through The Lord of the Rings, which is the basis for any fantasy universe ever created. The way Tolkien writes just.... annoys me. It is like reading the internal ramblings of a scatter-brained old lady. Also, I can't get through Harry Potter either. J.K. Rowling doesn't annoy me as much as Tolkien does, but I can't shake the feeling that she is just trying too hard to be Roald Dahl, and not quite reaching it for me. I like Roald Dahl (or I did when I was a kid anyway), but I can't get into Rowling or Tolkien. Maybe I just don't get British people..... that could be it.

Anyway, I liked Twilight. Book or not, when the movie was announced, I told Meghan I was going to bring her. She adamantly refused, because she knew the movie would never be as good as the books, just like Harry Potter, even though, she admits, the Harry potters movies are good movies. I assumed that since Twilight was also being made by Warner Bros., it would at least be an enjoyable movie.

God was I wrong. This movie is HORRIBLE. The best way I can describe it is it's like watching the atrocious meadow/fireplace scenes from Attack of the Clones, for two hours. It is THAT bad. First, the actors are terrible. Every single actor acts as if they have this giant stick up their ass, just like in the new Star Wars movies. The terrible acting is slightly more forgivable in a movie that takes place in space and has lots of action and lightsaber dueling, but this movie is ABOUT emotion. The acting should not just be a side dish. I thought that Robert Pattison would actually be a good choice for the role of Edward, the leading vampire man-meat, due to his role in Harry Potter. But, he comes off like Anakin. "Gee, I know I have some emotion and acting talent in here somewhere, but I just can't find it".

But, I feel like this movie suffers from the same problem that the new Star Wars movies did, where the fault doesn't (totally) lie with the actors, but in the terrible writing and directing. First of all, they didn't actually make a movie based on the book, they basically just made a narration. You can get away with some of this dialogue in the book, since there is so much character development, you know why they are saying the things they do and acting the way they act. But, when you cut out all the character development, and then pull out random lines from the book for the characters to say, you are left wondering what the hell is wrong with these people. It feels like you are watching a movie about a high school for the mentally disabled, where every student also happens to be socially awkward. They needed to write a movie, not a book, cut out some of the stupid scenes, and focus on having less scenes with more character development. The whole thing just feels rushed. It seems like Warner Bros. didn't have faith that this movie would do anything. The movie is two hours flat, which is a telltale sign that the duration was a mandate from above, then the horrible low-budget writer they chose tried everything she could to fit the book into 2 hours. Wrong. The screenplay writer, Melissa Rosenburg, needs to stick to writing TV shows.

This brings me to the next huge mistake of this movie, the directing. This movie looks like it is shot from some n00b straight out of film school who just wants to throw in as many stupid, awkward, F-ING RETARDED camera shots as humanly possible. It is like she just discovered this new plaything called a camera and decided to just go crazy. Weeeeee. Do us all a favor and stop directing anything. The director, Catherine Hardwicke, also directed the movie Thirteen, which is about a (you guessed it) 13 year old girl who is discovering all the wonders of teenage life, including drinking, drug use, and sex. Here, Hardwicke's camera n00bness works because the movie has an indie-movie feel and is also very depressing, so the random hand held camera bits and shots that have the colors washed out feel more natural. This doesn't work in Twilight. You can't direct the same movie about teenage drug use when exploring a more lighthearted story of a girl and her vampire lover. Sorry, but it doesn't work that way. Also, your shots were so damn awkward that it made the actors feel awkward, which in turn makes your audience feel awkward. And for the love of god, BACK AWAY from the actors a little bit. The close of the the mom is probably the most frightening thing in this movie. Back up, make a real movie. Ugggg.

Also, another indicator that the producers didn't have any faith in this movie on its own, is the inclusion of popular music throughout the movie. The end credits roll with Linkin Park. Really? Did ANYONE take this movie seriously during filming/post-production? What a joke.

So anyway, if you were thinking of checking this movie out, don't. It's terrible. It reminded me a lot of the worst movie ever made, Pathfinder. I turned that movie off after 30 minutes due to the horrible directing and acting. Twilight doesn't hold a candle to the Harry Potter movies, not even close. Those movies are well constructed, directed, and acted. Twilight is none of those, and everyone should stay away from it, and read the books instead. You can read them in a single day if you wanted to and it would be much better spent than going to see this crap.

One other note about this movie. This movie is part of the reason we aren't talking about the new Harry Potter movie right now. HP and the Half-Blood Prince was originally going to be released around this time, but it was pushed back until next July to make room for Twilight. Another justification is that Warner Bros made such a giant, Titanic-sized load of money from The Dark Knight, they moved Harry Potter to next year to pad its fiscal pockets for '09, and placed Twilight in its stead.

Don't pay 10 dollars, or any amount of money for that matter, to see this movie. The End.

No More Metal in Guitar Hero/Rock Band?

2008-11-24T21:17:00.000-08:00

So today I was litening to some Lamb of God, and I got to thinking to myself, have we seen the last of any really good metal songs in Guitar Hero and Rock Band?

I was thinking, now that we have singing in both games (a feature I could easily do without... but I realize it kind of adds to the whole "band" thing), will we ever have any more true metal songs like Six, My Curse, Take This Life, and The Light That Blinds? I mean, it will probably be fairly hard to pull off metal/growling vocals in these games well enough to not be lame. Even these songs are fairly tame as far as lyrical stylings. You may point out that they are making a Guitar Hero devoted entirely to Metallica, but they are much more of a "singing" band, and the vocals aren't hard to pull off. In GH:World Tour and Rock Band 2, we are seeing very little metal songs, aside from Metallica. I wonder why exactly this is, but I have a suspicion the vocals are a pretty decent-sized factor.

Also, the drum parts would probably also be especially hard. You have some pretty heavy double bass in a lot of modern meal songs, and only one pedal to work with. The beat would probably throw you off, since there would be no real way to match it perfectly.

Then, I remembered that Korn's "Freak on a Leash" is in Guitar Hero World Tour. If you don't know, this song has this one part that's like growling scat vocals. I was like hmmmm, I wonder how they pulled this off. Well, the results can be seen below, at around 2:55:

Hmmm. Not sure how I feel about that. The video quality is terrible, but it seems like he is hitting the "notes" for the most part. I wonder if its the same for a female trying to do this, without the deep tone. Meghan will have to try :) .

Anyway, this isn't quite the same as a true metal song/vocals. And the intrument parts are not hard at all for the song. Hopefully, we'll see some downloadable content for these games with some actual metal in them.

What it Takes to Be a Pro Gamer

2008-11-24T20:39:00.000-08:00

Interesting read about a Pro Gamer. This guy was interviewed by ESPN the Magazine, which is pretty cool to have pro gaming in a major sports magazine.

Check it out.

If I played any game as much as this I would be so damn sick of it.

Mini Impressions!

2008-11-20T14:43:00.000-08:00

So, I haven't updated for a bit, mostly due to the lack of new gaming going on in my life until the last few days. I just got Madden 09 and Call of Duty:World at War from Gamefly.

We'll start with Madden. It seems like EA takes the main criticism of its flagship franchise to heart way too much. That criticism being that they are never innovating Madden, they are just basically charging full price for a roster update every year. This may be true, but I think that sometimes its fiddling with the game engine makes things worse. The character animations, especially after plays, look terrible. You would think this would be a huge area for polish for them, since the source material for these animations NEVER CHANGES. You don't have to put in new, lackluster animations in every other year in order to keep things fresh. Just continue to polish the ones you have, the game would be so much better.
Also, Pass Defense is horrendously hard to do manually, since the ball flies so lightning fast that the mechanical actions you have to take to switch to the nearest defender, run to the receiver, and block the pass will never be fast enough to get in the way of the pass. Madden now likes to rub it in even more at the end of the game by telling you your "Madden Skill" in Pass Defense has gone down. Thanks John.
Also, the ball looks huge in a player's hands, Quarterbacks don't look natural at all throwing the ball, Punt Block is the best way to return a punt, and you can't set the Sim Quarter Length, like you can in the 2K sports games. This means while you are playing a 4 min quarter, the CPU sims the computer controlled teams at 15 min quarters, making you seem like a slacker in the Season stats.
Here's an idea EA. Just polish your existing game. People will buy it no matter what, and you'll end up having a better game for it. Don't listen to the stupid reviewers.

Call of Duty:World at War is another Call of Duty game. Which means it is a great game, but nothing has changed since the last go around. Except the Japanese are more crafty at hiding in bushes and ambushing you than Germans are apparently. I haven't played a lot through the main campaign yet, but we'll see how it stacks up to CoD2 and 4.

So I got a wonderful little email today from Mythic saying my Warhammer account is canceled because the credit card was rejected. Oh right, I had to cancel that credit card. Thanks for making canceling my account easy for me Mythic! I was thinking about doing that for a week or so now, but this makes my decision for me hah. Warhammer just didn't get it right. It may eventually get there, as long as Mythic makes the base gameplay smooth and fun. It is just not fun to play right now.

WAR has actually made me want to play WoW again. I know, I know. Say what you will, but the base gameplay for WoW is just great. The game runs so smooth and it just feels right. WAR feels too forced. It is like here's something like WoW, but we don't have the will or resources to make it just right. I know WoW will be the same stupid questing/rep grinding/raiding at end game, but I'm looking forward to getting back on my Shaman, doing some 5-man instances, and pvping. My Shaman in WoW is an absolute blast to play. I can wade into a group and face stomp someone, and also actually feel like my heals make a difference. My Disciple in WAR just seems useless all over. My DPS never seems to matter, and my heals never seem to matter.
WoW got it right, and WAR might get it OK in the future. For now, I'll see what's up in the new expansion in WoW and have some fun on the perfect class for me, while I wait for the DAoC Origins server to get in some real RvR.

Meghan and I played Guitar Hero 2 last night. Goddamn I can't wait to play the new one. I miss me some GH action!

WAR - Some thoughts

2008-11-09T23:04:00.001-08:00

I've been wanting to post some thoughts about WAR here for a bit, but wasn't sure how to approach it. Then I found a thread on VN that started with a simple question of someone asking how it compared to DAoC. The thread was filled with a lot of thoughtful comments on where WAR has failed. I was surprised since thoughtful posts are quite rare on VN. I think it was really showing how much hope people had for this game, and how good they want it so badly to be.

But for a lot of people it seems, WAR is not there yet. We want it to be good so badly, but it isn't. I was going to make a short post in this thread, but it turned intoa full fledged blog on my thoughts of how WAR has went. Here is my post:

For a long time Mythic and Mark said, they don't want to BEAT WoW
I took this as "We want to do our own thing, and carve our own niche in the MMO market"

What this really meant was "If you can't beat em, join em"
Mythic made WoW 0.8, and just threw in more WoWish-PvP elements

People say that if they made DAoC2, they wouldn't have the subscriber numbers they have now. I don't agree at all. The MMO player base is much, much bigger now than when DAoC was in its prime. You had many people clamoring for the next big thing, and they wanted to get AWAY from WoW, not go play a misguided attempt to make another WoW. So DAoC fans, plus people who wanted out of WoW (a LOT of people) would make for a very big subscriber base.

If Mythic HAD done its own thing, carved its own niche and created a game for themselves, and not to pander to what they THINK people want, they would have a much more successful MMO, experience-wise. This game does not have the soul to hold the long term, dedicated fan base. There is nothing in WAR to be dedicated to, or be devoted to. It is either going to have a big fan base or crumble into the dust, very very quickly.

Mythic missed their big chance to grab a big audience from WoW. Now, WotLK will be out on Thursday, and people who have tried WAR hoping to find the next big thing will leave and go back to WoW, after they have seen there is nothing to see here. Now, we'll have people leave for WotLK.

AND, even though many people are CLAMORING for Origins on these boards, I think it would be a terrible decision on Mythic's part, for the long term success of WAR. Then you will have DAoC fans leaving to play Origins. And then you are left with the people still hoping WAR will be great. I think eventually those people will realize there is nothing magical about WAR. It has no soul.

WoW has really ruined MMOs for good. It has too many developers seeing $$green$$ and not enough following their own minds for making a good dame.

The game that will "beat" WoW will be absolutely nothing like WoW. Why Mythic didn't see this is beyond me. They made exactly what they said they were NOT doing from the start. They made another WoW, and its not even close to being as good as even WoW.

That's the post. I know this may make some people feel like I don't like WAR at all. That isn't true. I've had a lot of fun pvping with my guild. Having a full guild group working together is a lot of fun in this game. That is what these games should be about, having fun with your friends.
I have been trying to get all of my friends to play this game (dammit JIM). I have really enjoyed playing with my friends that are in there now (especially Meghan!). However, there needs to be something holding the experience together. I can play with my friends in any game. Right now, the game just seems a bit confused. It comes off as not really being sure of what it is. It tries to do so many things at once, and it sounds great on paper that you can DO so many things, but it just ends up not getting any of them fully right.

I have a lot of hope for this game. I think they have a lot of work ahead of them to make it a quality game, but I think it is in there somewhere. I think Mythic just needs to create the game they want to create, and not create a game they think fans want. Fans don't even know what they want, and they will never be happy no matter what. Hopefully WAR will get on track soon, and the people will have something other to play than WoW.

The Woes of Death, Take 2

2008-11-06T21:01:00.000-08:00

So I died again in Persona. Not to the same hard enemy (I beat that one this time around), and I didn't lose like 2 and a half hours again, since i was saving diligently. It was probably about a half hour of an XP grinding session, which was going well. Then some mobs ganged up on the main character and killed him. Damn shadow things. That's my one gripe in this game; if the main character dies, it's game over. And there are some abilities that have a chance to instantly kill you. So, a mob could cast an instant kill spell on you, and its game over. No way to stop it. Lame.

Oh well, I'll have to tackle it again soon, I'm being super motivated to beat it!

Mega Man 9 Demo

2008-11-05T21:30:00.000-08:00

Is HARD AS BALLS.

That is all.

The Woes of Death

2008-11-05T20:22:00.001-08:00

I just died playing Persona 3 after about 2 and a half hours of gametime. Uggggg. This game isn't conducive to saving, since you don't happen upon save points like in any other game. There's a save point in the house you live in, but since it isn't like a new save point where you are compelled to save, I usually don't. Of course I know I should especially when entering a new level of the dungeon with newer, more powerful enemies....

I have been neglecting Persona 3 for a while. I started it during early summer, like May/June. Lately I haven't been playing it, since I was out of it for a bit while moving to California from new York. I wanted to try getting back into it tonight during my break from WAR. And this is what I get hah. I was debating whether or not just to stop playing altogether, in preparation for Persona 4. But, 3 is such a damn good game that I didn't want it to go unfinished. Maybe I'll start it up again tomorrow, but right now I'm discouraged. Back to Stranglehold I guess....

Stranglehold

2008-11-05T10:27:00.000-08:00

So, the other game I have out from Gamefly right now is Stranglehold. I have been wanting to play this game for a while, and had it about midway down on my GameQ. I was hoping to nab Madden 09 or Too Human the most, but my next game fell all the way down to like 12th on my list. So I was a little disappointed. I guess that's my one major gripe with Gamefly, is that it is hard to get new games you want unless you time your returns with a game's initial release, which is what I did with Fallout 3 and The Force Unleashed.

Anyway, I got Stranglehold. This game is actually meant to be a story sequel to the movie Hard Boiled, which is directed by John Woo and stars Chow Yun-Fat. I downloaded this movie, but never got the subtitles working correctly so I didn't get to watch it. Anyway, there's some plot or something, but it probably just gets in the way of Chow Yun-Fat kicking major ass. Much like elements of this game... but I'll get to that.

So, the basic gameplay of Stranglehold is ripped straight out of Max Payne. Third-person action game with lots of guns, and you can can slow down time to slaughter people more effectively. Diving to the side will automatically slow down time, allowing you to mow down enemies in mid air, creating a very cinematic (and satisfying) effect. I loved Max Payne. It is my favorite action game of all time. It was everything I wanted in a game at the time of release (and still is really). The gameplay and atmosphere especially were wonderful. A bit B-movie, but I loved every minute of it.
Stranglehold tries to do the same thing, but misses the mark a bit. First, you face waves upon waves of enemies. I realize China has people to spare, but they will be taking a population hit here with the amount of people you kill. It is pretty fun to slaughter enemies 20 at a time, but eventually it ends up feeling like each enemy isn't some new obstacle to get around, like it felt for me in Max Payne. Don't get me wrong though, it is still a blast. Also, the game feels a bit more loose than Max Payne does. The controls aren't as tight, and it is more difficult to hit multiple enemies while diving, since you don't get as much air time. Also, you automatically slide over low platforms when you get near them. Things like table and counters. Sounds like a cool concept, but when you are in an area with a lot of these things around, like a bar, you end up sliding this way and that when you don't want to, and it's hard to aim when you are sliding at an odd angle away from an enemy. A bit frustrating, but those few times when you slide nicely across a bar, time slows down and you line up a few headshots in a row are very satisfying.

The environments are also highly destructible. Wood splinters, tiles shatter, and things explode around you in the middle of an intense fight. It creates quite a nice experience with things blowing up and shattering around you. One bar fight takes place around some tiled pillars. Think The Matrix lobby scene, which I'm sure was what they were thinking of. It was fun.

Another cool aspect is the "Sniper" ability. You don't get an actual sniper rifle, it's not this game's style, but rather you can activate an ability with any gun that slows down time and zooms in your aim. When you shoot, the camera follows the bullet (again, a la Max Payne) towards your target. You then get a nice bit where blood splatters over your enemy and you watch him writhe in agony for a few seconds before snapping back to your character. Nice.

Anyway, in the midst of all this fun in killing people and blowing things up, a snake rears its ugly head.... Gaming Conventions. I get to the second level, after the first is a straight up run to the end fight in the middle of a street/marketplace. Now I also have to destroy 10 drug tables along the way. I rolled my eyes when I first saw this. Stupid "do that, this many times" objectives. Ok, we will see how this goes. They were relatively easy to find, but I did spend some time at the end trying to find the very last one. Its frustrating to get to a point in the level that you can't get though because you haven't found everything. These lapses in action are usually expected in a game, but since the action is so heavy throughout the other parts, these portions are all the more glaring. Kind of takes you out of the intense battles. I wish they would just get rid of these altogether. In the next level, I got to the end and realized I couldn't actually finish the level, because the bomb I need to plant was back in an area that was now blocked off. Frustrating.

Another gaming convention gripe: only carrying two weapons. You start out with pistols, then eventually find the standard Rifle, Shotgun, Machine Gun, etc. But you can only carry two at a time. Why, because Halo said so? This is so stupid. I am taking 15 bullets to the face every minute and shrugging it off, but god forbid I carry more than two weapons. Come on people, Halo is not God's gift to gaming. Wake up. Halo says "Thou shalt not carry more than two weapons. Two weapons is the max, and the number of the maximum weapons to be carried is two." Stop with these stupid restrictions.

Anyway, Stranglehold is really fun to play, even if it is hampered by unnecessary game conventions. If these elements were removed completely from the game, I think the overall experience would benefit greatly. Just full on action and killing. It is good fun until World at War and Mirror's Edge next week. Funny this has taken the time completely away from Fallout.

Anyway... where the hell is Max Payne 3? Now please!

Mirror's Edge Demo

2008-11-03T21:55:00.000-08:00

Two Words: HOLY S@#T! This game is going to be awesome. I had an absolute BLAST playing this. I was going to wait until tomorrow at work to write about this, but I don;t think it can wait. I just got done playing through the demo level of it, and it is amazing.

For the uninformed, Mirror's Edge is a game based on FreeRunning.This concept was played with in Assassin's Creed, but here the entire game is based around it. Whoever thought up this idea must have seemed crazy to those around him, but by god is it fun. You spend your time running around rooftops, vaulting fences, wall running, sliding under obstacles, and yes, running/fighting enemies. The enemy fighting though seems like it will be more disarming them, then running. It is not a game based around killing your opposition, just finding creative ways to avoid them.

The level only had a small bit of people trying to stop you though, most of it is based around the environment obstacles, and how you navigate them. There are a variety of ways to apporach each obstacle, and this game had me going back for more as soon as I finished the demo. I wanted to play again to see how much smoother I could do the level. I wanted to perfect my run.

The imagery in the game is breathtaking. You are on top of buildings in the middle of the city, and it seems to stretch on all around you. The art style really stands out too. The environments are mostly white, with colors used to guide you through the levels, and give you hints on where to go next. This is implemented really well, and it reduces the confusion on where you should go next (this still occurs, but not in a frustrating way). If you fail and/or fall of a roof, you continue right where you left off, no harm done. Good move on that part.

This demo was a lot of fun, and gave a nice slice of what the whole game could be. I for one am excited as hell for this game to come out. If i time my Gamefly returns right, I should be sitting pretty playing this and Call of Duty: World at War next week.

Til then.... I'll be running around on rooftops!

/notsojaded

Fallout 3 (aka Elder Scrolls: Fallout)

2008-11-03T11:14:00.000-08:00

So Fallout 3 has arrived from Gamefly. It was on the top of my list of the flood of games being released this season, so I was excited. I was hoping for Bioshock with more RPG elements. What I got was Elder Scrolls: Fallout.

Let me start by saying I briefly played Fallout 1 and 2, a while ago. Actually, it was a random purchase, because I had heard about the games in passing, and about how good they were, then I randomly found then a some website for a $10 package deal. So I purchased and played for a bit. What I remember the most was killing/being killed by rats in a cave, then the desert, then townspeople being angry at me for no good reason. I do remember the atmosphere, and the dark humor. So, like I said, I had hoped this would give me the atmosphere and feeling of Bioshock and the original Fallouts, coupled with the gameplay of Bioshock meets a lighter Elder Scrolls.

On to the impressions of the game. I loaded it up, and it starts out with your birth, then random bits of your life as you grow up in "Vault 101". This is basically the point (much like in Elder Scrolls) where you are choosing your beginning traits/stats, and also going through a bit of a shooting tutorial (a very, very basic tutorial). It is kind of going slow, but that's ok. The game atmosphere gives off a bit of a Half-Life vibe at this point. I just can't help but feel like I'm gonna need to whack some uglies with a crowbar soon. As it turns out, I end up whacking people with a baseball bat once the shit hits the fan, so its not too far off. The game tries to have you create ties to a childhood "friend" at the start, so you feel bad when you kill her father, the Overseer. And by kill, I mean you have a choice as to how you are going to get through the secret passage. And it is not a A or B choice like in you are deciding to kill/save a Sister in Bioshock. The game lets you figure out the course of action, and eventually you realize that in order to get through the secret passage out of the Vault, you need info from the Overseer. Or you could just take his passcode/card/whatever from his cold dead corpse. This was not really a choice for me however, because once I had weapons, I was bashing everyone in sight, in slow motion awesomeness thanks to the VATS system, or whatever they are calling it. The system is essentially the quasi-turned based system seen in BioWare's products (Baldur's Gate and KoTOR) where you can queue up actions.
Anyway, I kill this girl's father, and she runs in and just keeps syaing over and over "OMG you killed my father. Don't talk to me". So much for any kind of ties or development. the girl wants you to leave her alone. So you follow the tunnel out into the actual game. Here's where the Elder Scrolls hits. The travel by locations system is the same. The wait/rest/sleep system system is the same. The walking around feels the same. I don't know if the early Elder Scrolls game were the same as Fallout 1 and 2, but man, all of the systems were ripped from Elder Scrolls. I realize its the same developer, but I was hoping for a bit of a different experience.
Ok, on to the first town. Its the same, nameless existence you have in Elder Scrolls. Talk to townspeople, get random stupid side quests that send you around the area, doing tasks, killing people in their homes, etc. There's also the main quest storyline, where you are tyring to find your father, who escaped the Vault just before you did, which causd this whole fiasco in the first place. Why do I need to find my Dad? Why did he leave? Why do I care? Some story build up in the beginning would have been nice. But no, you are given no reason for your Dad's departure, and are thrust out into the world. This may seem like motivation, but there is no personal connection. I don't give a crap about my father (besides the fact that he is voiced by Liam Neeson... awesome). Give me some real motivation.

Thus, we come to my problem with Fallout, and the Elder Scrolls game in general. I am one of those people where the games are just too broad. I don't like doing random side fetch quests. I want some motivation. Even the main quest, I feel so disconnected from it. There's story, but not the type of story seen in traditional RPGs. There's no emotion or connection. Just a grind. I can grind in MMOs. I don't want to grind and do random side quests in a single player game. I try really, really hard to like and get into Elder Scrolls games, but I just can't. there's nothing keeping me playing. There is no carrot. Well, at least no visable one. So, there's no story motivation, nor is there even character development motivation. Sure, I know if I go out adventuring, I'll eventually level my character, but the levels are so few and far between, I just don't care. The pace of the game is slow slow slow. I mean, can't Bethesda make a game like this where everything isn't so damn slow? Talking, walking, everything. You still walk around like you have a giant stick up the rear (try switching to third person, it is awful to watch...). Can't we have a smooth walking character to control, that can run and jump like any other third person action/adventure game? I think a Fable-ish style engine would do wonders for the Elder Scrolls series.

Anyway, I was hoping Fallout was going to be a different experience. But to me, it just feels like Elder Scrolls with a different coat of paint. I guess I'll just go back and play Bioshock again and pretend. And truth be told, I find going back to play Bioshock again would be much more enjoyable than playing ANY of the upcoming releases. /jaded

So, why the weird name?

2008-11-03T09:58:00.001-08:00

Gaming with Jade Colored Glasses is kind of a weird, maybe even dumb, name for a blog about gaming. Makes me seem kind of cynical doesn't it? I was trying to think of something profound, like Dubious Quality, but I know that I usually fail at being profound, or even remotely thought provoking, as much as I really would like to be.

So, the name would refer to my current attitude towards gaming: jaded. I have been playing games heavily since I was about 10. I played before that, but I really didn't know what I was doing. All I knew then was that every Ninja Turtles game on NES was god's personal gift to me. I will probably get into my history of gaming later, but before I go off track here, I'll continue. The PS1 was my first real start of "casual hardcore" gaming, and I loved it. I subscribed to about 5 different gaming magazines, I played consoles games like crazy, and was probably getting a new game about every week (thanks Dad!).

But now, in general I feel a big /meh towards games. Don't get me wrong, I still love gaming, and that is about all I do when I go home at night (pesky job...). But, it is hard to excite me anymore about games. Sure, I just reached level 40 in Warhammer Online after about 6 weeks of playing, so one might think I am fully addicted to the game, but really, it was merely to keep up with people in my guild, and just the general need to reach the highest level in something. There certainly isn't the level of sheer awe I felt when I first saw Dark Age of Camelot or first viewed a character flying into Ironforge on the back of a gryphon in WoW.
And right now, we are in the midst of one of the biggest season in gaming history. Just look at a release schedule right now, it is nuts. I'm sure many people feel EXACTLY like this. But me, I'm just mildly stimulated by the games. The one I wanted to try the most was Fallout 3, which I nabbed from Gamefly, and was left a bit disappointed (impressions coming soon!). The others, Gears of War 2, Resistance 2, Little Big Planet, Fable 2, Red Alert 3, Mirror's Edge, etc etc etc, I'm not excited about at all. Sure, I'd like to give some of them a try, but I am just not giddy about all the games coming out.

Ok, before I go too long with this, I think you get the basic idea. I LOVE games, and I want to get excited about them, I just don't. Is it because I am growing up? I hope not... Sometimes I think it may be due to the lack of new ideas in games, but really, there are some games out there mixing it up, and even when I try them, I come away feeling nothing about them. So, feel free to injecct your gaming love and enthusiam into this space, since most of my commentary may come off a bit.... jaded.
So, I hope to post some good commentary on games and the industry in general, along with some others things that I am interested in (heavy metal anyone?). I want to keep people interested and reading, so I will try to update as much as possible. I think I have been doing good with my 1up blog, so I'm hopeful for this blog. Hope you enjoy your stay!

The Start of Gaming with Jade Colored Glasses

2008-11-03T09:45:00.000-08:00

Hello everyone.

I have determined today would be the start of my *new* gaming blog. My old one can be found here . I stopped that blog after boredom and not keeping up with it. Recently, I have switched to blogging on the 1up.com gaming community. I have been enjoying this because it lets me blog in a pre-established community, and I can use one account/identity to also post my thoughts in the gaming clubs that go on there.
However, recently I have been thinking that I want to get my name out there a bit more and have my blog have its own nice url. I want to develop game blogging as my main hobby, when gaming doesn't get in the way of course. Gaming is the main hobby I guess, while blogging will sort of be my "outside of work interest". Is this making any sense at all?

So, I think that I will mirror posts on both blogs. I want to be seen by the 1up community, as well as the wider outside world. Maybe I will link to this blog from 1up. I want people to comment and discuss things, but usually it doesn't happen. We'll see what happens I guess. For now, you can head over to my 1up page. I will be posting some impressions on Fallout 3 soon.

Enjoy! Please comment to my stuff, it makes me feel warm and giddy inside.