Reset Games

Best of 2011 - Best Ending

Fri, 09 Mar 2012 19:55:30 -0500

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BEST MOMENT

THE END - BATMAN ARKHAM CITY

There are certain moments in our video game careers that remind us why we play. Areis’ fate in Final Fantasy 7. Finding out the truth about Darth Revan. Psycho Mantis reading our mind and our memory card. Every gamer has these moments they willl always remember, and 2011 wasn’t short on memorable scenes.

Virtually every set piece in Uncharted 3 was worthy of a nomination. Watching the physics of water sloshing around as Drake nearly drowned on a sinking ship was incredible; as was falling out of an airplane and barely pulling a parachute before crashing into the desert below. “The Moon” scene in Portal 2 was the absolute best way to end way to end Chell’s over-the-top adventure. Even Gears of War 3, through all the machismo and gore, managed to tug on a heart string halfway through the game.

We felt, however, that there was no bigger moment in all of 2012 than the universe-altering ending of Batman Arkham City. It’s hard to talk about the moment without unleashing a monster spoiler bomb, but if you finished Arkham City you know how big this moment was. The leadup, the twist, and the final scene blew us away in every sense of the phrase.

Rocksteady might as well have hit us in the face with a Freeze Blast. “Did that just happen!?,” we thought as the closing cinematic unfolded on our big screens. We don’t know if our jaw hit the floor first or our controller did. We could talk about the implications of this scene forever, but we’ll stop and say that if you haven’t completed Batman Arkham City, it should be on your to-play list.

RUNNER UP: THE MOON - PORTAL 2
RUNNER UP: SINKING SHIP - UNCHARTED 3
RUNNER UP: PLANE CRASH / DESERT SCENE - UNCHARTED 3

CHECK OUT THE BATMAN ARKHAM CITY REVIEW BY CHRIS CLOW:http://resetgames.com/site/reviews/item/250-review—-batman-arkham-city

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BEST MOMENT FROM A GAME YOU MIGHT NOT HAVE PLAYED - “CROSS MY HEART AND HOPE TO DIE” - DEAD SPACE 2

The blood spatter of recently mutilated civilians decorate the halls of the Sprawl space station. Necromorph body parts float in zero G after you’ve ripped them apart in brutal fashion. Dead Space 2 is a nightmare you don’t want to wake up from. Developer Visceral set a new standard for survival horror games in 2011, and the most disturbing scene had nothing to do with slain innocents or dismembered aliens coming after you.

“Cross my heart, and hope to die. Stick a needle in my eye,” was a pretty cryptic phrase we would say when we were young. Until Dead Space 2, we never thought we would actually have to carry out the deed. Towards the end of the game, our hero Issac Clarke finds an eye poking machine that was used on patients who had gone crazy before the Necromorph attack. In order to stop the alien invasion, the delusional Issac entered the contraption and literally stuck a needle in his eye to administer some medicine.

The best/worst part? We, the player, had to aim the needle slowly descending into Issac’s retina as he squirmed like a worm being hooked by a fishing line. We also had to keep the needle steady so we didn’t kill Issac by way of human pincushion. This horrifying mini-game left us wanting a hug and cold shower. Well played Visceral, well played.

CHECK OUT THE DEAD SPACE 2 REVIEW BY JANIO SUPPINI:http://resetgames.com/site/reviews/item/51-review-dead-space-2

Best of 2011 - Best Multiplayer

Fri, 09 Mar 2012 19:49:00 -0500

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BEST MULTIPLAYER

PORTAL 2

In a year dominated by big-budget first person shooters, one might think our favorite multiplayer game would come out of the online arena. Battlefield 3 blew us away with realistic destruction physics, incredible gunplay and vehicle mayhem. The revamped Gears of War multiplayer suite kept us hording out for months, gleefully eviscerating the Locust with friends.

As much fun as we had with the holiday shooters, we felt that Portal 2’s cooperative campaign was something special. Rarely do we get to play a game with as much charm and brilliance as Portal 2. Even better, we got to experience it with a buddy.

We laughed together when GlaDOs expressed her frustration that we were hugging instead of completing tests. We got frustrated with each other, deliberately dropping light bridges out from each others feet and chalking it up as an “accident”. The adventures of Peabody and Atlus will become the stuff of video game lore; a mode that we will be reminiscing about for years to come.

RUNNER UP: GEARS OF WAR 3
RUNNER UP: BATTLEFIELD 3

READ OUR PORTAL 2 REVIEW BY JANESSA OLSON HERE:http://resetgames.com/site/reviews/item/181-review—-portal-2

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BEST MULTIPLAYER FROM A GAME YOU MIGHT NOT HAVE PLAYED

RAYMAN ORIGINS

After platforming through the wacky levels of Rayman Origins, almost every Reset employee came away with the same thought. “Why aren’t more people playing this?” Rayman Origins is packed full of style, stellar platforming and, straight up fun for anyone who picks up a controller. The multiplayer makes the game exponentially better, so grab a friend, grab a sibling, heck even give your mom a controller. You would be hard pressed to find a four player drop-in multiplayer game as enjoyable and accessible as Rayman Origins.

Best of 2011 - Best Story

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 15:47:00 -0500

As the year draws to a close, we’ve decided to look back on the best video games of 2011. Every Reset Games employee has voted for their favorite games and through that process we’ve determined which games we thought were the best of the best.

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BEST STORY

UNCHARTED 3

As video games mature as an entertainment medium, the quality of storytelling seems to have gotten better and better. Portal 2 had us laughing at the expertly written banter between GLaDOS and Wheatley, while at the same time injecting a rich story about the origin of Aperture Science. The voice cast of Batman Arkham City was arguably the best ensemble ever seen in a video game, lending their talents to a solid narrative worthy of being one of the best Bat-stories ever told.

Even with the stiff competition, we felt that Uncharted 3: Drakes Deception’s story stood out above the rest. Sure, one could argue that the story of Among Thieves was a little too similar. Chasing Sir Frances Drake’s shadow across the globe eventually leading to a lost city again would have frustrated us, if not for the way developer Naughty Dog handled the character development of Drake and Sully.

After a healthy backstory detailing the fateful meeting of our favorite heroes, we realized how much Drake looks up to Sully, and how Sully will go to hell and back for Drake no matter what the odds. What’s brilliant is that we, the player, know that Sully might be getting too old for this kind of high-risk adventuring. There were times in the game where we didn’t want Sully to go with us because we didn’t want anything bad to happen to him. We questioned navigating Drake through another sticky situation after Chloe and Elena tried to break through and ask Drake if a dusty old treasure was worth risking not only his life, but Sully’s.

The Uncharted series is well known for over-the-top set pieces harmoniously paired with great dialog. The over-arching quest to find the Atlantis of the Sands was compelling and all, but nothing extraordinary. What blew us away was how the fourth wall was broken. We cared about these characters so much that we didn’t want to see harm come to them, let alone be responsible for controlling it. Naughty Dog pulled all the right emotional strings in Uncharted 3. We can’t wait to see if The Last of Us, or the eventual Uncharted 4 can generate the same response.

RUNNER UP: BATMAN ARKHAM CITY
RUNNER UP: PORTAL 2

Read our Uncharted 3 review by Brent Lindquist here: http://resetgames.com/site/reviews/item/272-review—-uncharted-3

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BEST STORY FROM A GAME YOU MIGHT NOT HAVE PLAYED

CATHERINE

Relationships, commitment, and infidelity aren’t your normal video game storylines, but Catherine dared to tackle these issues head on. You play a 30-something every-man named Vincent, who has a mediocre job and a girlfriend, named Katherine, who wants to take the next step in their relationship. This kind of commitment scares Vincent, and after a night of heavy drinking he wakes up to a new girl, Catherine.

This interesting turn of events leads Vincent to have terrible dreams directly pertaining to the events of the previous day. As Vincent hides his infidelity from both women, his dreams get weirder and balancing his love life gets increasingly more difficult. Throw in demonic undertones and an epidemic that is killing young men in their sleep, and you have one of the most unique narratives you’ll ever see on a console.

Read our Catherine review by John Snell here: http://resetgames.com/site/reviews/item/231-review—-catherine

Review - Skyrim

Mon, 02 Jan 2012 15:16:44 -0500

Ironically, your first experience in Skyrim will be controlled, on-rails, and wholly detached from the rest of the game. You’re lead from point to point with little input or choice, and it feels strikingly similar to most other modern titles. I like to think that this was developer Bethesda’s way of easing your transition from other games into an experience that I can only describe as overwhelmingly enticing. After the preliminary sequence, you’re set free, both literally and metaphorically.

A vast landscape opens up before you, with jagged peaks rising defiantly above mist-shrouded valleys. The glint of waterways and lakes shimmer in the distance, while brilliant clouds drift lazily through the sky. A gust of chilly wind runs down the mountain behind you, whipping up a mist of icy snow from the surrounding rocks. Your first steps feel momentous; the initial foray into an unknown world of seemingly limitless possibility.

This is Skyrim, where secrets lie deep in ancient dungeons and dragons haunt the skies. In the northernmost province of Tamriel, mistrust runs rampant after the assassination of their Nordic king and civil war erupts over ties to the Empire. As the last pieces of an ancient prophecy fall into place, Alduin, the ancient dragon god of destruction, begins to stir. It is into this tumultuous world which you are thrust, tasked with nothing less than saving humanity; you are Dovahkiin, last of the Dragonborn.

For now, however, saving the world can wait. After all, how can you be expected to concentrate on such a monumental task with all these lovely distractions? You’re a recently released man or woman (or anthropomorphic cat-creature or lizard for that matter) and the world is your oyster; its time to go exploring! Everything here is wonderfully crafted to be believable and interesting, and nothing is off-limits, from the lowest valley to the highest peak rising in the distance. Bethesda gives you an open invitation to dive into one of the most comprehensive, dynamic and enjoyable worlds ever created in a video game. It’s a forgivable, and entirely understandable, offense to completely ignore the main quest and simply wander the world.

It is impossible to bottle the delicious elixir of Skyrim into one review. The vast world and everything it contains is simply too massive and varied to distill into mere words. When first confronted with the prospect of reviewing Skyrim, I was ecstatic. However, once reality set in, I had to face the daunting prospect of actually conveying its contents in a meaningful way.

How could I inform the reader of every significant facet of a game that could very well take a player hundreds of hours to finish one play-through? I tossed around the idea of presenting a series of unique or hilarious encounters and experiences I had while playing through the game. However, this would force me to spoil some of the games most unique charms. I then thought about writing out a comically long list of the features contained within the game. A list which, even compacted into the most concise of words, would, out of necessity, span the entirety of this review.

I instead decided to simply narrate a day in the life of my character in Skyrim. While my first “complete” (as if that word could ever be truly ascribed to Skyrim) playthrough ended with a whopping 113 hours of gameplay, this particular day occurred roughly 30 hours into the game. Most titles are content when their entire campaign spans 30 hours, but I had only touched a tiny portion of Skyrim in that time.

While most role playing games have you select certain stat points and perks at the start of the game, Skyrim only asks one question; what do you look like? You’ll choose from one of the ten playable races, customize your appearance, and that’s it. By only requiring the player to choose their race and sex, we avoid one of the most common flaws of RPGs. Normally, you’re required to build a basic character without actually knowing what skills you will find most useful during the game. You’re locked into a character that may not even be a good fit for you or how you like to play.

Skyrim allows you to craft a character based on the actions you use the most. Rather than pre-selecting a character class with defined attributes, you’ll consciously and unconsciously sculpt a character over the course of the game based on how you play. My character is a morally questionable wood-elf with a taste for long-range archery and stealing anything not nailed down. You’re free to play however you like, and I chose to be a big jerk.

My day began in the town of Whiterun, where I had recently finished running wild with the fighting Guild know as the Companions. They had presented me with a hairy proposition that I needed time to mull over, so I departed from their company for the time being. Whiterun is situated on the edge of the vast plains of Skyrim, near the foot of the largest mountain in the world. Low, lodge-style thatch housing is the typical design, with a pleasant aqueduct cascading through the main square. Geographically and politically, Whiterun sits in the middle. You won’t feel overt tones of support for either side in the civil war, the Legion or the Stormcloaks, like you do in some of the other cities. Its one of 5 major cities in Skyrim, with a handful of smaller settlements scattered about as well. The sun was just beginning to rise and the town was empty except a few beggars and the night-watch guard.

As I wander through town, I overhear a guard fearfully commenting about a dragon sighting on a nearby peak. My map and quest log get automatically updated as soon as I hear the information and I’m free to check it out at my leisure or simply ignore it. You’ll pick up new locations and even quests just by listening to rumors or eavesdropping on conversations. Another guard comments on my weapon choice with a voice that sounds slightly European. The people of Skyrim can’t quite seem to decide on an accent. Sometimes they sound vaguely Scandinavian or Nordic, other times they sound like modern English, and sometimes they sound like Nords doing a poor Arnold Schwarzenegger impersonation. It’s something you’ll find off-putting at times and hilarious at others, and its one of those things that’s a shortcoming in a technical sense but kind of amiable in actuality.

Before I venture out into the world chasing dragons, I have a few things I need to take care of around town. I swing by the house I recently purchased to drop off some items I don’t want to sell but don’t want to lug around right now, taking up valuable carry weight. After ridding the town of a local problem, the Jarl anointed me as a Thane of Whiterun. In addition to giving me some pull with the local guards, it also gave me the option to purchase a house here in town. To sweeten the deal, they threw in Lydia, a Housecarl, to serve as my companion and bodyguard. Each of the major cities has a Jarl who governs the town and the surrounding area. Getting on their good side usually comes with some nice perks. Lydia greeted me as soon as I entered the front door, ready to assist me at a moments notice. Today, however, I’m rolling solo. I drop off the loot in my newly refurbished bedroom, bid my Housecarl adieu and head back outside.

Pulling up my quest menu, I scroll through all the quests I’ve discovered, looking for something interesting to do. Significant or intricate quest lines are separated under their own title from the more basic quest lines, which are grouped under the “Miscellaneous” quests. Just from exploring a small corner of the massive world map, I have generated an extensive list of quests that need doing. In fact, the thing I’ve found to be most difficult in Skyrim is getting my quest log down to a manageable size. Recalling the dragon sighting I overheard earlier, I locate it in the quests menu and make it active, bringing up a beacon on my map and heads-up display (HUD).

To ensure the destination was close enough to be reachable in a day, I brought up my world map. Now, this is no ordinary cloth map with clumsy drawings on it. This is a living relief map of the world, with every peak, valley and river accurately shown. The cloud cover is rendered in real time, meaning that if it’s cloudy in one part of the world, those clouds will be shown, as well as which way they are moving, on the map. Any location you’ve already discovered can be fast traveled to, but that takes most of the fun out of it. Already discovered locations will be shown in white and locations you’ve heard about but haven’t visited with be shown in black. You can even spot some of the larger undiscovered locations you haven’t heard of if you look hard enough. The dragon was last spotted on a peak to the west of me, and a small indicator on the map shows that it’s an active quest.

The people of Whiterun were now beginning to stir, moving about the town and working their merchandise stalls. I briefly entertained the idea of dropping by the local Inn for a drink and some work, but a past experience made me decide against it. A barroom fistfight with an overly confident bard turned sour when an errant haymaker accidently connected with a bystander of the fairer sex. The other onlookers, initially content to merely observe and shout encouragement, took offense to that, and the scene suddenly devolved an all out melee. Ironically, the guards coming to arrest me were the only thing that saved me from being cut down. I decided it was best to avoid the bars and stick with the task at hand today.

While there are plenty of things still for me to do in Whiterun, I have a taste for dragon fire and fresh mountain air. In addition to netting me some sweet loot, as a Dragonborn I have the ability to absorb the souls of Dragons. Dragon souls are required to unlock Shouts, which are powerful words in the Dragon language that are similar to spells. You will learn these shouts by discovering “word walls” or being instructed by certain people. Your shout is mapped to a dedicated button and can be used at will with a recharge period in between each shout. Be warned, however, that most folk don’t take too kindly to a Dragon shout to their face, or anywhere near them for that matter.

I head towards the main gate but, before I reach it, notice the local blacksmith outside working on her grindstone. Recalling that I had a weapon I would like to upgrade, I sidle up next to her and subtly tell her I want to rub my dagger on her grindstone. While that may sound dirty, it’s a legitimate request. Although my blacksmithing skill isn’t terribly well developed, I can still upgrade basic weapons to more refined, and damaging, versions. Upgrading or creating weapons and armor requires different ores and leather, depending on what you’re trying to make. You’ll need to have a higher blacksmith level than I had to upgrade superior or enchanted items. For now, I was content to upgrade my standard dagger to a sharper point and enchant it at an arcane enchanter later.

As you can see, even something as simple as leaving town has taken me through all sorts of diversions and distractions. Finally, however, I reach the exit to the town. Any time you enter or exit any indoor areas, be it a cave, a house or ruined outpost, as well as any of the 5 major cities, you’re taken to a loading screen. The load times can be significant for the larger areas, but installing the game to the hard drive will noticeably decrease them. On the loading screen, there will be some artifact or other interesting item that you can view in full 3D, zooming and rotating the item at will. You can also view any item in your inventory in a similar manner, and some items hold secret codes that you’ll need to discover in order to access certain areas. While this sounds interesting on paper, its application is unfortunately limited and basic, and I feel that there is some missed potential there. Regardless, it’s still a cool way to look at every intricate detail of your items.

Immediately after exiting Whiterun, I was beset upon by thugs with no warning, and my confusion did little to stop them from attacking. Neither did the Whiterun guards for that matter, who, after witnessing blades being drawn, simply ran away rather coming to my aid. Spineless cowards! Unfortunately, I had no time to direct my ire at the guards due to the fact that three thugs were directing their blades at my face. I’m a scrawny wood-elf thief; I’m not built for face-to-face confrontation. As a result, the fight went less than stellar for me a few times (prompting me to reload my latest saved file).

After finally disposing of them by running out of reach before shooting them full of arrows, I found a contract on one of their bodies, indicating that they had been hired by someone I had robbed a while back. My bad, I guess. I paid the worthless guards back by picking each of their pockets clean of gold and valuables. Like I said, I’m not built for face-to-face confrontations; I prefer a more indirect route.

With a roll of drums, I was notified that my pick-pocketing skill had increased, and as a result, my overall level had also increased. If you use a certain skill, it will rank up, which in turns contributes to your overall level. Each new level rewards you with a skill point, which may be used to unlock “perks” in any of the numerous skill categories. For example, the archery skill tree has perks that, among others, give you more damage with bows, the ability to zoom while aiming, or additional arrows from fallen foes. For this level, I chose to increase the probability to successfully steal stuff from people who are sleeping. Like I said, I’m kind of a jerk.

Finally, I’m able to leave the confines of Whiterun and head out into the world proper. A haunting tune begins to play, providing an invigorating companion as I survey the expanse in front of me. The music in Skyrim is top-notch, providing refreshing background noise while you explore the world or adding punctuation to battles. Gazing out across snow-clad mountain tops below a brilliant night sky while Skyrim’s music plays is an unparalleled experience in video games. It just feels like an adventure.

However, it was still early morning in my day, and I had a dragon to slay. A horse-drawn carriage was parked outside the Whiterun stables, offering rides to any of the major locations, but I preferred going on foot for now. Choosing to forgo the main road, I cut across the field of a nearby farm, picked the farmers pocket, jumped into the river and emerged on the other side. I could make out my destination mountain top in the far-off distance, with tattered clouds hanging about its peak, and I set my sights towards its base.

Alas! My lofty ambitions were sidetracked by a pair of blue butterflies drifting across my field of view. I immediately gave chase, oblivious to any dangers of the surrounding landscape, desperate to pluck their delicate wings from their body. Before you recoil in disgust, understand that the flora and fauna of Skyrim can be mixed into various potions or consumed to replenish health or learn new alchemic properties. You may castigate my butterfly massacre now, but I’ll wager 100 gold septims that you’ll find yourself chasing butterflies, picking snowberries, or diving for salmon on more than one occasion yourself.

Much of your time will be spent with some odd insect or flower in your mouth. Like a child who never seems to learn his lesson, I eagerly stuffed any newly discovered plant or animal into my mouth, hoping to learn its unique characteristics in the most primitive way possible. I’m a hands-on kind of learner. With my taste for butterfly satiated for the time being, I turned my focus back towards my initial mountain-top goal.

A light rain began to fall, blanketing the landscape in a misty gray shroud. The rumble of distant thunder indicated that the light rain could soon become a heavy downpour. I noticed a ruined tower on my overhead compass somewhere to the southeast and, in line with my earlier lack of focus, began to head in that direction. The irresistible urge to discover new things is an itch that Skyrim is all too willing to scratch.

A pair of deer went bounding off to my right, scared away by my tromping through the underbrush. As I watched them make their way down the hillside, I simply couldn’t resist; PETA members should probably skip this next part. I pulled out my bow (fire enchanted to kill and cook the meat in one shot) and took aim. Leading the antlered buck and adjusting slightly for elevation drop, I let loose. The arrow went whistling by the deer and clattered harmlessly against the rocks. Drat! Quickly notching another arrow, I took aim a little more carefully, as the deer were quickly moving out of reach. With a solid thunk, my second shot struck home. The deer immediately tumbled to the ground and down a small ridge, carried forward by its weight. While I did feet a little bad, it was too magnificent a shot not to allow a small celebratory smile. I found the carcass, harvested some antlers and hide, retrieved my arrow and turned, once again, back to my original goal.

The tower that had diverted me initially was now in sight; a mass of rock and wood peaking through the mist of rain and wispy clouds, stark against the morning sky. From past experiences, I knew these places are usually filled with any number of unscrupulous characters, so I crouched into a sneak position as I drew closer. Pulling up my favorites menu, I select the Detect Life spell for my left hand and my recently upgraded dagger for my right.

Any combination of weapons or spells can be assigned to either hand. If you want to be a duel-wielding swordsman, go ahead and put a blade in each hand and hack away. If you’re more magically inclined, why not throw a fireball spell in one hand and a hefty axe in the other? Or if you’d rather forgo the barbaric touch of physical weapons altogether, put a spell in each hand and dual cast them for devastating combinations or increased power. You can also place any item or spell into your favorites menu, which allows you to quickly select it without navigating through the standard menus. I tend to stick with bows and daggers, as those two weapons have some pretty powerful sneak bonuses.

While combat initially feels a little rough and simplistic, as you unlock new perks for shields, armor and weapons it expands to be more engaging and interesting. However, it’s not an action game by any means and the combat will never feel all that deep no matter how many perks you unlock. The Elder Scrolls games have never been praised for the combat system and, while Skyrim adds some much needed nuances, it’s still a pretty primitive system. Pulling the left trigger, my Detect Life spell burst to life, pulsing magical energy from my upraised left fist.

Four glowing red energy signatures indicated that there were four enemies, most likely bandits, taking up residence in the ruined tower. A stone arch bridge was delicately spanning the raging river below, and I could make out another enemy on the walkway. Noticing one bandit lounging idly outside the tower doorway, I switched back to my bow, crept a little closer through the underbrush, and stuck an arrow straight through his side. With a grunt, he collapsed in a heap. A small eye-like indicator showed that my stealth kill had not been detected. Moving in closer, I again drew my dagger and entered the tower.

An Orc bandit was sitting at a table, singing a tune about some girl from long ago. I snuck up behind him, picked his pocket, and then brought my blade across his throat. I did the same to a guard patrolling the stairwell. However, this last kill had alerted the bandit outside on the walkway. Switching now to a shield in my left hand and a sturdier weapon in my right, I prepared for battle.

I watched in amusement as the bandit, instead of charging me, slipped and fell off the high walkway into the shallows of the river below. Uttering one muffled grunt at impact, his body crumpled with a splash and the current carried him away. I crossed the bridge and began to make my way up the mountainside. A few moments later, perched on a rocky outcropping, I looked down and saw his water-logged corpse cast upon a sandy beach at the foot of a waterfall. As morbid as it may sound, it was simply too amazing not to watch and reflect on; this was all happening independent of my actions and completely unplanned. It wasn’t a set-piece or quicktime event that caused or pulled my vision towards the scene, it was simply the living world around me.

As I continued to climb the mountainside, the rain began to turn to snow. The snow then began to turn into a blizzard. Soon, I could barely see 10 feet in front of me, but I blindly made my way ever upward. Finally, I broke through to the peak of the mountain and the clouds and snow gave way to a brilliant vista. Crystal snow blanketed the harsh mountain top, and the tattered remnants of the storm were blowing away to the east, leaving a clear view of the vast plains far below. The sun was beginning to fall from the sky, and brilliant oranges, reds and purples painted the clouds. I switched to a third-person view to get a more scenic look.

Like all recent Elder Scrolls games, Skyrim allows you to switch between a first and third-person perspective on the fly. In previous games, the third-person view left a lot to be desired, with awkward animations and environmental collisions tarnishing the immersion you would normally feel. It was mostly used as a vanity perspective to view how your character looked in their new armor. In Skyrim, however, both viewpoints have been overhauled to look fantastic. In first-person, visceral finishing moves have been added to give combat a more refined feel and casting or combining spells creates brilliant flashes of magical energy. The third-person view now looks much more natural, allowing you to use it to actually play in addition to admiring your character’s armor and weapons.

The scenery of Skyrim is nothing short of magnificent. Normally, I give a passing glance of appreciation to nice backdrops and move on with the game. With Skyrim, I literally stop playing and take a break to just look around. Nearly everywhere you go will display a panoramic vista of towering mountain peaks and misty valleys. Sure, the up close textures can sometimes leave something to be desired, but it’s easy to forgive when the massive landscapes look so stunning.

The roaring bellow of a Dragon shattered my peaceful musings. Quickly scanning the sky, I made out its huge frame circling overhead. It had already spotted me, and I quickly ran for cover. Before I made it to the refuge of an ancient stone house, I was bathed in a searing hot gush of dragon fire, igniting my clothes and tearing through my health.

Quickly consuming a few health potions and a resist fire potion, I drew an arrow and prepared for the Dragons next passing.

We battled. Arrows flew through the evening sky, flame bathed the mountain top and the shouts of Dragon and Dragonborn echoed down through the valleys. In the end, the Dragon came crashing to earth, leaving a scar across the ground as it fell from the sky. With a final roar, I made the killing blow. In a fiery blaze, the Dragon’s flesh was consumed and its soul flowed into mine, leaving only its monolithic skeleton as a reminder of our struggle.

I watched as twin moons rose above the horizon, crowned by a million stars. The northern lights began dancing through the sky, the purples and greens in stark contrast with the barren mountain. Far below to the east, the lights of a new city beckoned me back to civilization. To the west, the vast plains stretched out, dotted with waterways and rolling hills. To the north and south, the mountain range stretched out for what seemed like an eternity. “Where to now?”, I thought to myself. I turned and headed down the mountainside, eager and unsure about what lay ahead.

While I wanted to give the reader a sense of a typical day in Skyrim, that really is an effort in futility. Every player is going to have unique and crazy experiences that will be completely different than my own. Additionally, there are so many things I barely touched on that add charm, character and depth to the game. Just wandering off into the wilderness always turns up something interesting, and you can lose yourself for hours and hours with no specific goal in mind. There is a massive world with expansive dungeons, diverse landscapes, and creatures from the mundane to the fantastic.

To save you any heartache down the line, I want to temper any rampant expectations; if you didn’t enjoy Morrowind or Oblivion, you probably won’t like Skyrim either. It is an Elder Scrolls game through and through. However, advances in technology and design expertise have allowed Bethesda to bring their vision to life more than ever before. Fans and newcomers to the series will be blown away by both the sheer scope and the minute details of the game.

The rigidly controlled cinematic experience at the core of many games is at odds with the vast freedom granted to the player in Skyrim. Where other developers funnel you down corridors and through set pieces, firmly showing you the story and how much work they put into their game, Bethesda wants you to see everything. This is not the immediate sugar high of an on-rails rollercoaster, but the slow build of crafting something unique. Your character is the story, and the initial release from captivity and eventually saving the world are merely the bookends, not the narrative.

Despite having all of the qualifications of a “video game,” I still have trouble ascribing that label to Skyrim. It just feels like something more. It’s a fantasy world simulator, a look at what games might be in an alternate dimension, or some strange social experiment using gaming as a medium. Like life, Skyrim can at times feel tedious and repetitive but then, again like real life, there will be moments of brilliance where you can’t help but smile.

Skyrim is not perfect. There are bugs and glitches, NPC’s often react in ways no sane person should, combat is pretty basic and some things could have been done a little better. However, the sheer mass of what Skyrim contains crushes those concerns into oblivion. This is the most realistic, massive, and dense world I have ever seen in a video game.

Skyrim is the culmination of the unspoken promises that echoed through our heads when we first imagined interactive video games. While Skyrim is wholeheartedly a role-playing game at its core, only the most ardent anti-RPG players should think to pass it up. This is the game you should be playing over the coming holiday and into the days and months beyond. Immerse yourself it the world of Skyrim, revel in its glory and its oddities, and watch the skies traveler.

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Review by: Nathan Twining

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Review - Ico and Shadow of the Colossus Collection

Wed, 14 Dec 2011 19:09:05 -0500

“Video games can never be art.” This sentiment, expressed by renowned film critic Roger Ebert and shared by many others, ignited a firestorm of debate on the internet which has yet to be extinguished. Are games simply entertainment, meaningless little distractions from everyday life? Or do they have the potential to be transcendant experiences, like books or films? And what does the word “art” even mean at the end of the day, anyway? Though there is no consensus yet (and you certainly won’t find humble little ME attempting to tackle such weighty issues…well, at least not in in this particular review), two games constantly seem to find themselves at the center of the controversy: Ico and Shadow of the Colossus. Originally released for the Playstation 2 in 2001 and 2005, respectively, Ico and Shadow of the Colossus are actually difficult to discuss purely as games rather than in the wider context of artistic experiences at this point. But with their recent HD remastering for the Playstation 3, now is the perfect time to re-evaluate them. So do these games deserve their reputation, or has their hype been inflated to colossal proportions?

Though both titles share a unifying design aesthetic, their actual gameplay could not be more different. Ico is an extended escort mission through a labyrinthine castle as you guide your title character and a mysterious, ethereal girl to freedom. The game is primarily concerned with navigating your characters through clever puzzles, with some simple and sparse melee fights with creepy, if unmemorable, shadow creatures providing your only opponents aside from one climactic boss encounter at the finale. Shadow of the Colossus, however, sets your character Wander free in a sprawling world to search out and defeat sixteen unique “colossi.” Seeming intent to make up for the lack of boss battles in Ico, Shadow makes them the entire focus of the game, with each encounter playing out like a hybrid of puzzle-solving and combat which is difficult to describe for anyone who hasn’t played it for themselves.

Ico is the fledgling effort of the game designers, and it shows. The controls can be clunky and frustrating at times, the combat basic and repetitive, and the entire game is over and done with in what feels like the blink of an eye (unless you get stuck on a particularly tricky puzzle). The entire experience feels somewhat small and boxed in, notwithstanding the size of the castle environment, but it still gives a taste of what the creators are capable of. By contrast, everything about Shadow of the Colossus is open and massive, achieving a sense of scale rare in video games. Apart from the colossi themselves, the world they inhabit is huge, and traversing it to hunt down the towering creatures makes most other game fields (even the venerable Hyrule Field of the Zelda franchise) seem tiny by comparison. This does come with its own issues, however; Wander’s horse Agro can be frustrating to control, and will get stuck or tripped up on unseen obstacles far too frequently. The biggest enemy in Shadow of the Colossus, however, has to be the camera. Though you can move it with the right analog stick, it will constantly fight to return to its default position, which is usually designed to give the most visually impressive view of the world or the colossi rather than the most strategic view to the player. There were many, many deaths I could have avoided had the camera been more cooperative.

Despite how frustrating these gameplay issues in can be, it almost feels like nitpicking to even bring them up. There is a reason these two games have become the rallying points of the “games are art” camp: they achieve a sense of mystery, awe, isolation, and wonder that no other games have quite matched. Where other games often succumb to a temptation to over-explain their stories, these two place you in a world that works in strange and alien ways, give you only the barest plot setup necessary to put the gameplay in context, and leave all of the rest of the details to the players’ imagination. And that, even more than their gorgeous visuals and haunting scores, is probably the biggest secret to their staying power. You will find yourself thinking about the world of Ico and Shadow of the Colossus long after you’ve stopped playing them. And that in itself is a pretty powerful argument for their artistic status.

In the end, despite some flaws in their gameplay mechanics, Ico and Shadow of the Colossus provide experiences like no others in gaming. If you haven’t explored them before, now is the best time to do it. They’ve never looked better than with the HD graphics upgrades on the PS3 and, as an added bonus, the version of Ico included in the collection is the never-before-released in America “Game of the Year” edition from Europe, which includes some replay bonuses for those who want to explore the castle a second time. I highly recommend picking this collection up.

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Review by: John Snell

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Review - Halo Combat Evolved Anniversary

Thu, 08 Dec 2011 14:50:09 -0500

I used to have a friend named Bob who worked at a QFC when I lived in Seattle in the summer of 2001. Bob was a good guy. He hooked me up with chicken strips and jojos. He often had coupons I didn’t know existed that cut the cost of my groceries in half. He even jump-started my car when my girlfriend left the lights on, once. More importantly, though, Bob always had the inside knowledge on what was going on with the release of the Xbox. His uncle was part of the Microsoft team responsible for overlooking Bungie’s development of a title called “Halo: Combat Evolved.” He often used the word “bad-ass” when describing the upcoming game. “It is going to blow your mind, dude. Soooo bad-ass.” Little did Bob know, he was feeding me insider knowledge on what would come to be arguably the most influential first-person shooter of all time.

Halo: Combat Evolved took the world by storm November 15th, 2001 with the launch of the Xbox system and went on to sell over five million copies. Its brilliant combination of fast-paced action, unique storytelling elements, and revolutionary multi-player experience successfully brought the PC dominated world of first-person shooters to consoles worldwide. Halo: CE paved the way for a decade of would be followers, “Halo killers,” and sequels still to come.

With the recent movement of classic titles getting the high definition treatment and the pending release of Halo 4, it should come as no surprise that Microsoft’s 343 Industries would give Halo: CEa facelift for its 10-year anniversary. The result, simply titled Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary, does more than add a fresh coat of paint to the original. While the attention is welcome, 343’s love isn’t enough to cover up the obvious cracks in the original’s design.

A quick unboxing of Anniversary shows the amount of detail that went into breathing life back into the title. From its support of 3D, 1080p, and Kinect voice instructions, to the addition of Firefight and re-imagined versions of classic multi-player maps with Forge support, Anniversary is not just a high definition upgrade to the epic. 343 even went out of its way to include extra goodies for the dedicated masses. Master Chief Avatar armor (for both sexes) and an exclusive “Grunt Funeral” skull that causes grunts to explode like plasma grenades also accompany the upgrades as an added incentive to purchase the classic.

But what about the game itself? I will be the first to admit that I’ve been skeptical of playing through any of the HD remakes that have been released in the last year. Halo: CE was purposely selected to be my first, due to my previous experience with the franchise and borderline addiction to the first two installments. I am happy to say, after encountering the blue loading screen before the title menus from the original version, low-def and all, my skepticism faded. That nostalgic touch took me back, but it wasn’t until the angelic chorus of the intro credits pumped through my surround sound that nostalgia turned into excitement and the upgrades became immediately apparent.

Marty O’Donnell’s award winning soundtrack has been overhauled and it sounds brilliant. While the original was prized for its use of sound to drive the game in areas that could have been deemed redundant, the re-mastered strings, orchestral pounding of the drums, and atmospheric ambiance have not only recaptured the feeling of its predecessor, but managed to somehow feel new. This is the same soundtrack seasoned gamers have heard time and time again, but it feels remarkably fresh. 343 is so proud of the remastered version that they are re-releasing the soundtrack, complete with a remixed version, in digital and vinyl formats for the holiday season. It truly is that good.

As the majority of readers will have some, if not copious, amounts of experience playing the series, I will spare you all the details of going into the story. What you need to know is whether or not it is worth your time or money. I can resoundingly say, “Absolutely.” The minutiae that has gone into the gameplay upgrades is immediately apparent. UNSC uniforms no longer look stiff and lifeless. The blasts of fire throughout the Pillar of Autumn during the Covenant’s attack and scattered throughout the game are up to par with current Halo titles. Cortana’s once squarish hair now looks feminine and sexy. Comparatively, character models look great, but this is no Battlefield 3, or anything near it for that matter. Not that I expected them to completely overhaul the game, but there are particular moments where the facial modeling begins to show its age, reminding me that I was playing a decade old game, for better or for worse. The facial modeling is not the only area where the wrinkles are showing. The frame-rate stammering during sequences and clipping in walls have not improved in the transition. Worse, sound stutters are abound in the game which definitely pulled me out of the gaming experience and alerted me to the fact that I was also writing a review.

The environments throughout the Anniversary universe sparkle and shine like they’ve been hit with Mr. Clean. I often found myself stopping just to take a look around at the vast improvements. 343 was kind enough to include the ability to turn off the enhanced graphics and play through the game in “Classic” mode, as it originally appeared, and this provides an excellent opportunity to see quickly how much work went into updating each level. Blades of grass move in the wind, waterfalls pour with life-like movement in the distance, and sunlight glimmers off of the new details in the water providing gorgeous additions to the beach levels. Fire fights in areas such as these will make you forget that you are playing a HD remake. The team did an amazing job at giving a shock to the utterly lifeless surroundings of the original when viewed in comparison.

Unfortunately, the polishing of each level doesn’t make up for the inadequacies in some of them. Levels such as “The Silent Cartographer” and “Assault on the Control Room” are no longer awe inspiring so much as glaringly redundant. I quickly reverted to the 19 year-old impatient version of myself, ready to smash something if I had to walk through another version of the same hallway backwards again. Alas, by the time I reached that level of irritation, the problem was over, and I had reminded myself of the limitations Bungie was originally working with in their chosen platform for the release. Though these levels proved as frustrating in moments as they did in the past, others like “The Maw” and “Keyes” manage to retain their controller gripping intensity, providing some of the best edge-of-your-seat battle moments in the history of action gaming. Additionally, 343 has hidden terminals in each level with cut scenes revealing elements to the backstory, often told from the perspective of the 343 Guilty Spark and other key characters. The careful use of certain pronouns and repetitive codes in these sequences may be pointing to plot lines in Halo 4, which is even more reason for Halo lovers to give Anniversary a playthrough.

Master Chief still seems to glide effortlessly through the levels like a phantom and jumps awkwardly for a cybernetically enhanced super soldier, but overall, the controls still hold up. There were times when I wished for an overhaul of the scheme to make use of the 360 controller’s user-friendly button placement (thank god there are no awkwardly placed black and white buttons), i.e. left trigger for iron sights, not grenades, and so on, but the Halo format hasn’t changed too drastically over the years, so it didn’t bother me too often. I still found myself clicking the right thumbstick in and zooming unintentionally, and I am still terrible at driving the Warthog, but these have always been problems for me. Chalk it up to user error. 343’s decision to include Kinect voice recognition controls for some of the game’s more used functions is utterly useless. In the time that it takes to utter “grenade” three or four times before Kinect finally recognizes it, you can exhaust your grenade supply by pulling the trigger. It was a noble idea, but they could have diverted their resources elsewhere instead of giving me the frustration of yelling “flashlight!” at my TV for a minute before it actually turns the flashlight on (which, in and of itself, is nearly useless, too). It also makes me skeptical of future titles incorporating this function, such as Mass Effect 3.

Where would a Halo review be without addressing multiplayer? The original Halo: CE revolutionized the multi-player experience in a console gaming era that was focused on the single-player. Halo: CE proved that console gamers will unite in masses and battle until the early morn. As Halo: CEwas birthed before the dawn of Xbox Live, system-linking was simply the way it had to be done. The most exciting element of opening the Anniversary package was discovering they had re-imagined and retooled some of the classic maps from Halo: CE and Halo 2, like Battle Creek, Timberland, and Hang ‘Em High. Each of the re-imagined six multiplayer maps (Battle Canyon, Break Neck, High Noon, Ridgeline, Penance, and Solitary) comes complete with a re-tooledAnniversary edition of the same level that stays true to the original. Standing atop the stone archway in the Battle Creek canyon, rocket launcher in hand, I began to recall the glory days of coming home to my roommates demanding, “Joel. Battle Creek. Rockets. Now.” The re-imaginings are beautiful, and often give the classically smaller maps a little more breathing room. Large maps like Ridgeline will become instant classics for snipers and run-and-gunners alike, but having the ability to be locked in the deadly confinements of their original iterations is a welcome gesture from 343. Anyone who recalls the never-ending battle for the overshield and rocket launcher in Battle Creek should rejoice at the ability to relive those days, as I do. Fans who decide not to make the purchase of Anniversary can also find these maps available for download for use in Halo: Reach.

Halo: Combat Evolved has certainly not been forgotten in the decade since its release, but 343’s dedication to the title in Anniversary is certainly noticeable. Whether Anniversary is a labor of love, commercial exploit, or tie-in to Halo 4, isn’t important. While the sands of time have revealed weaknesses in the once perfect title, the amount of detail that went into prepping Anniversary’srelease is apparent from the get-go. Long-time fans, like my old friend Bob, and newcomers alike will surely enjoy revisiting the title. Had 343 Industries only chosen to dress up the campaign and include the retooled multi-player maps, I would have recommended picking it up, but the inclusion of the expanded plot terminals, re-imagined multi-player content, and other aforementioned bonuses make Halo: Combat Evolved Anniversary more than worth its $39 price-tag.

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Review by: Joel Ward-Sanders

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Review - Super Mario 3D Land

Wed, 07 Dec 2011 23:45:02 -0500

Nintendo has always dominated the handheld gaming market. The potent combination of accessibility, software, and innovation has kept Nintendo devices light years ahead of the competition, ultimately dooming other handhelds to obscurity. It wasn’t until this generation that Nintendo’s throne was legitimately challenged; the rise of mobile and tablet gaming has threatened to best them at their own game. Luckily for the Big N they have a plumber up their sleeve; a knight in blue overalls who has renewed my faith in the 3DS and will show consumers that they should not ignore the system this holiday season.

Super Mario 3D Land is the reason I purchased my 3DS, I just didn’t know it until now. The 3D feature of every game before Mario was more of a novelty than a gameplay addition. After 30 minutes of 3D, I would turn down my slider for the remainder of my playtime because, frankly, I didn’t need it. Seven months later we finally have a game that shows the general public how the 3DS offers a unique gameplay experience that you can’t find on other mobile gaming devices. Nintendo has created a game where playing in 3D makes the software significantly better, especially when the z-axis is required to navigate some of the terrain.

The first definitive 3DS game couldn’t have come at a better time or with a bigger franchise. Super Mario 3D Land is an incredible game, spanning eight worlds each with expertly designed levels that continue to surprise throughout. Not once during my romp across the Mushroom Kingdom did I feel like a level repeated itself. The worlds remained fresh and, more importantly, ridiculously fun. Fan favorite Mario stages are ever present in Mario 3D; from desert levels, Boo houses, and water worlds, to flying Bowser ships and castles, everything has been included.

Mario 3D’s biggest success is the perfect implementation of retro Mario mechanics and modern 3D controls. Flagpoles mark the end of each level and award 1UP mushrooms to those who can reach the top of the pole. Bowser spits fireballs at you while you attempt to maneuver around him and drop a bridge out from underneath his feet. Mario even shrinks after being hit, signifying that you can only be hit one more time before you lose a life. Every little touch is wonderfully polished so anyone who has ever played a Mario game can jump in and feel nostalgic while veterans will feel right at home with backflips, butt stomps, and super jumps.

Of course, this wouldn’t be a Mario review without analyzing his signature powerups! Your standard mushrooms and fire flowers are present as always and are accompanied by some new and returning items from previous Mario games. The propeller box (from New Super Mario Bros Wii) sits on top of Mario’s head allowing him to skyrocket into the air and float back down. This is especially helpful when reaching hidden areas or slowly navigating a treacherous free fall to the flagpole. The lone new item, the boomerang suit, lets Mario toss out a boomerang to take out an enemy or retrieve an item off in the distance. The offensive ability of the boomerang isn’t as effective as a good old fashioned fireball, but being able to retrieve items that required the boomerang suit was definitely helpful.

The best feature of Super Mario 3D Land is the return of the Tanooki suit from Super Mario Bros 3. Maybe it’s because the suit is great for any situation, or it could be because Mario looks awesome dressed as a fuzzy raccoon, but I want a Tanooki suit in every future Mario game. The ability to flutter (similar to Yoshi) makes navigating the terrain a breeze, providing some breathing room when committing to a big jump. The spin attack is equally as useful, allowing Mario to defeat Goombas with ease and be able to hit the frequently grounded question mark blocks.

There are two variants of the Tanooki suit that show up in special situations. During the main game, a glowing Tanooki powerup appears after the player has died multiple times in a row. It’s up to the player whether or not to take this powerup, as it makes Mario completely invincible, taking away any challenge the level might have had. In the meta game, which is unlocked after clearing the first eight worlds, the silver Tanooki suit can be acquired allowing Mario to turn into an impenetrable stone statue, as well as having the normal flutter and spin attack.

The main campaign took me 5 hours to complete and, in all honesty, it was fairly easy when compared to the Mario Galaxy games. Mario enthusiasts will find the real challenge in the meta game where the levels are difficult remixes of the main game. There is no golden Tanooki suit to hold your hand, extra lives and coins become risky ventures, and an overwhelming amount of special coins have to be unlocked to progress deeper.

There are three special coins in each level, each requiring some digging and outside-the-box platforming. You might not feel compelled to go after these elusive coins at first, but later levels require a certain amount of these coins to unlock the stage, even in the main game. Luckily, acquiring special coins amounted to some of the best, and most challenging moments in Super Mario 3D Land.

Clearing a bonus room also gives you much needed special coins and makes the area available to other 3DS owners via the Street Pass function. Fellow plumbers can also pass along powerups which were helpful towards the end of the game. I would have liked to see a more creative way to use Street Passing but, in hindsight, this is a fairly practical way to use the feature for a platformer like Mario.

From Mario’s signature voice to 1UP chimes, every soundbite in Mario 3D hits the perfect note. The remastered retro soundtrack invokes a familiar happy feeling as you stomp Koopalings and jump into warp pipes. Every moment of Mario 3D is refreshingly fun and is a sure bet to be a staple title for Nintendo’s latest handheld. You just don’t get gameplay like this on the iOS or Android marketplaces.

As the handheld gaming market moves into the future, we can only speculate which device will come to own the biggest share of consumer dollars. Nintendo has some major hurdles to overcome if they wish to stay on top with the 3DS, especially given the low prices and casual appeal of mobile and tablet games. The success of Super Mario 3D Land indicates that Nintendo still has the magic to create a one-of-a-kind experience on their handheld, but is one stellar first party game enough to hold of their competitors? I believe Nintendo has to release the floodgates in 2012, delivering quality titles that are on par with Mario 3D at a faster rate. Nintendo faithful will always clamor for Marioand Zelda, but the casual handheld market will start to look elsewhere. In generations previous, Nintendo handhelds were a sure bet. If the Big N doesn’t put up a fight in 2012, it shouldn’t come as a surprise when mobile and tablet gaming eventually come out on top.

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Review by: Janio Suppini

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Review - Modern Warfare 3

Tue, 06 Dec 2011 19:37:22 -0500

Ah warfare, for as horrible as the reality of the concept may be it provides millions with entertainment, joy and rage everyday through such mediums as Xbox Live, the Playstation Network, and the wild world of the inter-web. And what better way to celebrate the ever climbing digital body count, than with Activision’s biggest release of 2011: Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3. With an incredibly strong advertising and marketing campaign, a rock solid foundation of being a leader in multiplayer mayhem, and a top notch production company behind the helm, we as the consumer would expect Modern Warfare 3 to be a shining star in the combat simulation sky. However I feel that is not what we received with the release of Modern Warfare 3, what I consider to be Activision’s newest and most disappointing promise to the masses yet. So now let’s take a look at what I see as being one of the most damaged title franchises in the gaming industry, and why Modern Warfare 3 will fill your heart with High School Prom-like dreams, goals and aspirations, and promptly leave you sitting on your front porch till dawn.

For as foreboding as my introduction was, I was not entirely appalled by the campaign. The plot, though typically over the top and unrealistic, told a somewhat interesting story; one that took you to a few unexpected places, and allowed for some satisfying moments. The campaign, graphically, is very well polished and by far superior in graphic appearance to it’s predecessors. Shadows are deeper, lights are brighter, and textures are better rendered. And, as you may expect, the cinematics and cutscenes are over the top and utilize unrealistic computer technology. However cheesy, these simulations do effectively relate the story in a manner that television has popularized on such shows as CSI and other crime dramas: excessively powerful computers and somehow an unlimited capacity to “enhance” images.

Modern Warfare 3 picks up almost immediately after Modern Warfare 2, where World War 3 has broken out and is now underway in Manhattan. You follow a group of soldiers through the conflict in an over-the-top, perfectly orchestrated, mission to take back the city. Meanwhile the primary protagonist from the previous title “Soap”, has been injured and is being treated for his injuries. This period of respite for Soap, however, does not last long and your character—Yuri—is thrown into combat immediately and the non-stop action begins; which goes to show that “relentlessness” is the name of the game in MW3.

Like most Call of Duty titles, the AI enemies are constantly engaging and they appear to have no limit to their numbers. Furthermore the AI’s collective intelligence rests somewhere between that of your average house cat and that of your run-of-the-mill brick. In one of the final missions I dispatched almost every enemy in the level with my knife alone; they simply couldn’t catch on. Personally I like to see my AI have more human qualities, such as the desire to live.

In the throes of combat you are shot at from every conceivable direction, and there are so many explosions that you often become disoriented. And you will, of course, be hit—but fear not, you can safely take a half dozen or so shots before you die. In spite of this, miraculously, the story drives on, and you are thrown along the story arch as an actor to a script—because after all: the show must go on.

It is just such combat-driven story that is the main fuel for my complaints in Modern Warfare 3. Throughout the game you are put into obscene scenarios that require you to go, guns ablaze, into such chaotic and absurd environments that you often lose sight of what you are doing there in the first place. Granted the overall story arch remains intact: you are a soldier, you must kill many people in order to end WW3. Personally I enjoy a slower paced combat experience, environments that don’t constantly force you into corners where your only solution is to empty your clip. To me games such as MW3 are the product of poor execution: the story was actually quite decent, the way it was told was not.

Certainly the largest issue I have with the campaign is the amount of shock factor that CoDcontinually tries to incorporate into their stories. It isn’t enough that a city is beset by an invading force and you and your team are needling your way through the carnage; Activision insists on showing you every bloody detail. Though it does give you the option at the beginning of the campaign to opt out of the “objectionable” material, I sincerely doubt that many people do so. That being said MW3 took home the gold for bad taste with its gratuitous depiction of terrorism and the medium in which they chose to reveal it. For spoiler purposes I won’t share further. Despite the graphic content, MW3 does give you some truly visceral moments such as well placed knifes to the throat and opportunities for bullet time head shots.

From a mechanics perspective it appears that MW3 plays exactly like its predecessors. There is an old adage that you “go with what you know”, and for the most part that is a good for standard operations. However I will argue that when you are designing one of the most successful games ever made, that you simply have to venture out into the unknown. I thoroughly believe that Activision and MW3’s associated creators should have done something more innovative with the game mechanics. Progress is about pushing limits, and when you are responsible for one of the best selling game franchises in the world, I believe that you should strive to change things for the better! But alas in MW3 we see the same blur when being shot, the same blood spattered vision when injured and—unsurprisingly—the same ragged breathing and sporadic heart beats when on the brink of death. There were several moments in game where the sound effects were nearly identical to Call of Duty Modern Warfare! Which begs the question; with a budget as large as Activision has to offer to the series, why recycle sound bites and some visual effects?

Furthermore, for me it simply does not make sense that you can barge into a room full of enemies, get shot no less than seventy times, yet remain fully functional and in control of your faculties. Mechanically I would love to see some hinderance in my aiming ability, my walking ability and so forth. Without these elements MW3 plays much more like a rail shooter or a side scroller than a proper first person shooter. In short: I was disappointed with the lack of improvements throughout the campaign.

Now onto the Multiplayer. I cannot accurately recall how many hours I spent playing Modern Warfare, or Modern Warfare 2, against other people. I can, however, imagine that the number of hours spent was exceedingly high due to a couple factors; there was always something new to explore, the maps were cleverly designed and I could effectively enrage other players.

Upon engaging in Multiplayer in MW3 I found that the spark was gone. Yes the game looks marginally more polished, however the gameplay is rudimentary at best with nearly identical play and function as MW2 or Black Ops. A couple “improvements” have been made. Killstreaks are no longer the only way to unlock powerful artillery as they have been replaced by Pointstreaks. Pointstreaks allow you to unlock your typical lineup, along with some additional items, without having to engage in all out combat, such as earning points for assists and other “team oriented” actions. Personally I think this is a smart move on the part of the creators as there are people, such as myself, that like to engage in alternate activities during a session. It appears that MW3 is attempting to do what other FPS titles, such as Battlefield, have done very successfully: specialization.

Unfortunately, despite Activisions efforts to draw me in with pointstreaks, an immense amount of unlocks, and perks; I still cannot be swayed. For me the lack of ingenuity and foresight to pose something truly innovative against MW3’s competition is a major turn off. Despite amping up the graphics—marginally—MW3 looks, feels and plays almost exactly like Black Ops while abandoning all forms of dignity. For me the maps are cramped, exploits are abound, and multiplayer matches are based on luck and smack-talk, rather than skill, patience and strategy.

To be honest I took home MW3 with high hopes, as a first-person shooter enthusiast I remember the glory of Modern Warfare, and the triumphant release of Modern Warfare 2. Those two titles were hallmark moments in my gaming career as they combined the excitement of a well orchestrated release, with that of a compelling and well made game. Despite the wonderfully developed playability of those titles, they did something even more important: made improvements upon their old work. With MW3 I feel that I’ve been cheated; left short handed with a game that promised a revolution and merely gave us a protest.

Ultimately I believe there is something to be said for the gaming industry: it is either very good at keeping promises, or it is very bad. Activision, as of now, happens to be the group taking the cake in the very bad category.

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Review by: Matt Thogerson

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Review - Uncharted 3

Fri, 02 Dec 2011 18:44:38 -0500

Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception is the best movie I’ve played all year.

That might sound a little strange, but bear with me for a minute.

It’s no secret in either the gaming world or in Hollywood that films based on video games tend to be pure crap. Ask any gamer to choose a quality theatrical release that got its start as a video game, and he or she will more than likely be hard-pressed to name any serious contenders.

Titles like Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception prove, however, that this question is becoming more and more irrelevant as the gaming industry progresses. Hollywood will always try to cash in on the financial success of video games, but mark my words, Tinseltown will never, ever release a game-based movie that’s as fun to watch as Drake’s Deception is to play.

Naughty Dog has a masterpiece on its hands here, and despite a few very minor flaws, Uncharted 3takes its place as the best Playstation 3 game released to date, and one of the best games released on any platform this year.

Drake’s Deception begins as protagonist Nathan Drake and his treasure hunting partner, Victor “Sully” Sullivan work out a deal with the game’s primary villain, Katherine Marlowe. I won’t spoil any more than that, but suffice to say that this is the franchise’s best story yet. Despite being an elderly woman, Marlowe is easily the most convincing villain the series has seen. Her sinister subtlety is far more effective than the menace displayed by past antagonists like Roman, Navarro, Lazarevic or Flynn. Marlowe’s right-hand man, Talbot, is also a wonderfully convincing enemy to face.

Naughty Dog delves into the backstory of Nate and Sully, and inject that story with a surprising amount of depth. The simple fact that some of Uncharted 3’s most memorable moments don’t always come in the form of action set-pieces isn’t a knock against the game, it’s high praise. The game’s action is hard to top, but a few of the quieter sequences are just as powerful. Just wait for Nate’s sit-down with Marlowe or his stint in the desert.

Purely as a gaming experience, Uncharted 3 shines. At its core, this game feels quite similar toAmong Thieves. Drake still shoots, takes cover and does a whole lot of climbing. Much of it feels far more refined this time around, though. Specifically, hand-to-hand combat has been revamped, and though it’s not always the way to go in a fight, the brawling system feels exceptionally satisfying, especially after battling and beating a heavily armored enemy.

Shooting has also changed quite a bit since Drake’s last time out, though it might take some getting used to. Naughty Dog community manager Arne Meyer put it best when he addressed some fan complaints following the game’s release:

“In Uncharted 2 the bullets would leave the barrel at a pre-set deviation when you were aimed in,” Meyer said. “What this means is that the bullets would not fire straight out of the barrel all the time - they could come out at an angle. Therefore, you could have a target clearly in the reticule and still miss it by a wide margin. This was frustrating, because it was difficult to tell why you were missing a target.”

“As a result, we wanted to be sure you had a better grasp of whether you were hitting or missing a target. In Uncharted 3 the bullets now fire straight out of the barrel 100 per cent of the time. However, we have recoil - where the reticule moves/bounces as you fire. Therefore, it is easier to tell if you are missing or hitting a target. Now it is much more obvious when you are hitting or missing based on the reticule itself.”

The sensitivity is also much higher, making the proceedings a little more precise. Enemies are faster this time, and the popular AK-47 no longer has the range it once did.

What this all adds up to is this: Uncharted 3 isn’t worse than the previous installment in the shooting department, it’s just different. I’m partway through my second playthrough now, and I honestly prefer this game’s gunplay. The sensitivity is especially difficult to adjust to, but it’s all worth it in the end.

So, hand-to-hand combat and gunplay are better, and the climbing and exploring mechanics are as good as ever. It must be said, however, that the true greatness in Drake’s Deception’s gameplay lies in the intangibles.

It’s difficult to describe just what makes navigating a burning chateau or escaping from a crashing plane just so cool, but these sequences and so many more are some of the most memorable ever put into a game. I haven’t spoken about the cinematography in too many games before this, simply because games aren’t cinema. Uncharted 3 manages to skirt the line between movie and game, and it does so with undeniable grace.

Therein lies my biggest problem with the game, which isn’t really a big problem to begin with. I often didn’t feel as though I was in control of the action. One of my favorite scenes in the game is a prime example. The crashing airplane has been showcased in a number of trailers, and it certainly lived up to my expectations. The problem is, much of this sequence is heavily scripted. Sure, the player mashes buttons and toggles them when prompted, but many scenes like this felt more likeHeavy Rain-style interactions than actual gameplay sequences.

That said, a lesser game would’ve relegated stuff like this to a viewable cinematic. Naughty Dog lets us play it, and although I’d like a bit more control over the action, especially as Drake falls from the sky, I’ll admit it: as an Uncharted fan, I’ve been a bit spoiled over the past few years.

My other minor quibble lies in the game’s tendency to be a trial-and-error affair. All too often I found myself dying and reloading over and over again. The difficulty spikes here are often jarring, and one wrong move can sometimes lead to a reloaded save. A stealth section of the game’s ship graveyard scenario was particularly irritating.

Again, I must stress that all this is minor compared to the game as a whole. This might be the best-looking game I’ve ever played; sand has never been so pretty to stare at. The character models are about as perfect as they could possibly be, and we can thank the game’s approach to production for that.

Drake, Sully, Elena Fisher, Chloe Frazier and other characters in the game were fully motion-captured by the actors who voiced them, and the voiceovers were recorded as they moved. This enhances the filmic quality of the proceedings to a ridiculous degree. If you took away all the details in Drake or Elena’s character models and just showed them moving as stick figures, I could probably tell you which character was being portrayed. Just like in real life, everyone moves and walks differently.

Once the single-player has been played and played again, there’s still a multiplayer component to look forward to. Much of this will be familiar to Uncharted veterans, but Naughty Dog introduces Boosters and Kickbacks this time around. Think of these like Call of Duty’s Perks. They allow players to customize the experience to their playing style, and are surprisingly balanced considering the option count.

The gametypes here are pretty standard, but I think that’s the point. I doubt this multiplayer will ever be as popular as that of Call of Duty or Battlefield, but hopefully players give this a second look. It’s too bad the PSN isn’t as robust as Xbox Live, because a better framework would definitely support Uncharted 3. There are so many character customization options and unlockables in this game’s multiplayer that it’s tough to not get addicted to the mode.

There’s also a cooperative mode, which can be played in both offline and online setups. As someone who doesn’t utilize the PSN much due to Internet limitations, the ability to play co-op locally is much appreciated. I also noticed that Uncharted 3 allows competitive split-screen play using two PSN profiles on the same television. This isn’t offered in many games on the PS3, and I can’t stress enough how much I appreciate this addition. I don’t want to see split-screen gaming go the way of the dodo, but a variety of recent titles have seen this mode inching closer to that fate. It’s good to see such a high-profile title supporting the option.

Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception is absolutely a must-play. I haven’t heard the term “system-seller” in quite a while, but this game defines it. There hasn’t been a better time to pick up a Playstation 3, especially considering all the other highly rated titles that have dropped this year. Drake’s Deception stands above all of them.

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Review by: Brent Lindquist

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Review - Goldeneye 007 Reloaded

Thu, 01 Dec 2011 15:31:08 -0500

Chances are, if you ever owned a Nintendo 64, you played GoldenEye 007. It was the second-highest selling title on that long-lived and legendary console, and was so influential on the burgeoning first person shooter format that it has deserved legendary status in all of FPS gaming. As a movie tie-in, it was an absolute triumph. Even though it came out two years after theGoldenEye feature film, it defined the late nineties gaming realm. Fast forward to the year 2010, and developer Eurocom decided to pay tribute to that original game by building a new experience in the spirit of the film.

The 2010 game had several differences from the original game. The first, most obvious difference is that it featured the likeness and voice talent of current Bond star, Daniel Craig instead of originalGoldenEye Bond star Pierce Brosnan. Because of that, the single player story mode is not a straight adaptation of the original film. It’s updated for modern times, separating itself from the era of the Soviet Union and uses the action sensibilities of Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace as opposed to the Bond films of the Brosnan era.

While the 2010 game was well received, as a Wii exclusive, it seemed to fall short of many FPS-lovers’ radars, as the Wii doesn’t have the audience or reputation of the Xbox 360 or PS3 for shooters. Word came early this year, though, that the 2010 Wii exclusive was going to be remastered with a new engine and an HD graphical upgrade to be re-presented as Goldeneye 007: Reloaded. Because the Wii’s mechanics are pretty different from the other two consoles, an engine overhaul was required to both allow for smooth controls as well as to increase the graphical output of the game.

The presentation here is definitely an upgrade from the Wii version. While the Wii does a good job with its renderings, it is not a high definition console. In the first version of the game in the nightclub level, it seemed that much of the crowd was rendered with two-dimensional sprites as opposed to non-player models and created barriers blocking you from parts of the map. Part of the upgrade sees that remastered level receiving full NPC models. They still act as barriers to parts of the map, but are now fully realized which is definitely a positive for this version.

Although all of the graphics are now in high definition and are a definite improvement over the Wii version of the game, you get the impression early on that Reloaded isn’t fully taking advantage of the full capabilities of the power that the 360 and PS3 have. The graphics are very smooth, but lack detail in some cases, and even in cinematics the game maintains an apparent approximate framerate of 60 per second. Most games like this with a lot of graphical power tend to drop to about 30fps during cinematic sequences, but this game doesn’t skip a beat in that regard. This is a positive and a negative, as the game moves along, but lacks the graphical power you might hope it has.

The single player story itself is, I think, a wonderful update of the story originally conceived in the 1990’s. Craig brings Dame Judi Dench with him, and the renowned actress reprises her role as M, a role she first played in the GoldenEye film. Unlike the original video game and film, the whole story takes place after the Cold War, replacing the early bad guys from the USSR with the Russian Federation. As you might remember from the film, the story accounted for the governmental change by jumping nine years into the future early on. In this game, the story does not jump nine years ahead after the opening sequence and continues at a normal pace. Craig and Dench’s voice work is great, and really make the game feel like a genuine Bond experience from the outset. The other cast members that populate the other characters are largely forgettable, except for Elliot Cowan, the new Alec Trevelyan (aka Agent 006) who turns in a great performance.

The gameplay itself, even though being built from a different engine, feels very similar to the 2010 game. This is a good thing. The mechanics were pretty sound in the first game and for the most part are what you’d expect from an FPS. Every once in a while, there are doors you have to open by hand with simultaneous tapping of both triggers on the controller. Other than that, the controls are pretty straightforward. The single player gameplay itself is linear and straightforward, but depending on the difficulty you play it on there are other supplementary objectives you have to complete that don’t necessarily come easy. In order to complete all of the objectives, it involves some serious exploration of the game map in order to find everything and get that sweet “Mission Complete” banner at the end. The AI in the single player on higher difficulties can seem stupid at times, because even when you think you have all your bases covered, the AI will send an enemy into the line of fire with no apparent feel of self-preservation.

I think the true mileage for this game will come from the multiplayer. Given the history of this title as a huge multiplayer machine, it wouldn’t surprise me if a lot of people would pop this into their console just for some straight split-screen action. That’s where this game really shines, is in the competition between friends sitting across from you. It’s enthralling, engaging, and just plain fun to roam around the maps looking for the kill that makes your buddy scream in rage as the blood streaks down his part of the screen. It does a good job of evoking the classic game in that regard, as the social experience of the multiplayer really does feel largely unbroken from the game that came out for the N64. That, to me, is pretty astonishing.

Oftentimes, the multiplayer feels like parts of it are taken from Call of Duty: it features online play for up to 16 players across 14 multiplayer maps, and there are nine different game modes for online multiplayer. Online multiplayer can be used over Xbox Live and the PlayStation Network, but even though up to 16 players can connect to a game remotely, only one local player (from your specific console) is allowed at a time. Multiplayer includes characters from the single player campaign, such as James Bond and Alec Trevelyan, as well as classic Bond-series characters including Jaws, Oddjob, and Julius No, all using their original likenesses. Evoking Call of Duty, online multiplayer offers XP progression, multipliers, and unlockables.

There is also a new single player mode, called “MI6 Ops Missions.” These are special single player outings with specific goals, such as defending a computer console downloading information (while waves of enemies come at you to try and destroy the console), surviving endless onslaughts and reaching your checkpoint without dying, eliminating all enemies in a map before time runs out, and stealthily dispatching enemies without being seen. These feel like challenge maps and while they don’t add a whole lot to the gameplay, depending on the difficulty these can be welcome additions for refining your skills and definitely add to the game’s replayability.

GoldenEye 007: Reloaded is a welcome addition to the 360 and PS3 for Bond fans and FPS-lovers alike. While it’s not the most advanced game present on the new consoles, it comes packed with a lot of fun and relatively minimal frustration. For Bond fans interested in the tweaking of the mainGoldenEye story, it’s sheer delight seeing this story play out in a new way with the current Bond sensibilities, and the multiplayer is good old fashioned fun with friends. This is definitely a fun outing and although pretty simple, it feels like a genuine Bond experience and a simple and fun FPS. Doesn’t sound like a bad distraction to me.

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Review by: Chris Clow

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Review - Battlefield 3

Tue, 22 Nov 2011 15:17:28 -0500

I grew up on first person shooters. From the first day I grasped the NES Zapper and started blasting ducks out of serene blue sky of Duck Hunt, I was hooked. Now I’m not a particularly violent person yet somehow my digital bloodlust has always seemed to be due for a filling. Seeking a better FPS experience is what drove me to titles such as Goldeneye, Battlefield 1942, the Halotrilogy, and finally into the Modern Warfare franchise. That, however, all changed with my purchase of Battlefield Bad Company 2.

In March of 2010 EA put together a phenomenal platform for their upcoming Battlefield titles with the creation of BC2 — a game that held such scope and vision, that it was practically a new genre in itself. Not surprisingly, with the release of Battlefield 3 we have seen the revolution of this “new genre”, and yet another excellent triumph for the Battlefield franchise.

Since dropping on October 25th, Battlefield 3 has become my go-to game for the first person experience. Boasting incredibly detailed graphics, realistic in-game dialogue, and the versatility one would hope to experience from “real life” combat, Battlefield 3 has replaced all other war simulations in my library. However, BF3 is not all rainbows and gumdrops; like any large launch, the game has it’s pitfalls. In this review I will give you an in depth look at why you need to own this game, a few things what will both challenge you and drive you insane, and ultimately – why BF3 is a perfect addition to your game library.

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The Campaign

The campaign, apart from the multiplayer, is phenomenally gorgeous; an experience that is nearly frustrating in it’s impeccable detail. Characters are fully conceptualized people, with their own personalities and traits. The story is complicated and yet extremely engaging, forcing the player into a moral dilemma that I believe hasn’t been incorporated into many FPS’s. The story takes you to places that I haven’t experienced in previous First Person Shooters, which—let’s face it—are usually based around petty revenge, or your run of the mill “black operations” teams.

In BF3 your primary character is Sergeant Blackburn, a U.S. Special Forces officer who leads a small team on a mission to find chemical weapons. Needless to say the proverbial crap hits the fan and you are left separated from your group, losing them one by one, and entrenched in a plot that threatens nuclear war between the global superpowers. Though the story arch may seem fairly rudimentary, the non-linear story telling is by far the best presentation of a FPS plot I’ve ever seen. We observe our protagonist after most of the events of the story have happened being interrogated by CIA. This allows for an intriguing narrative/cutscene to play out prior to most missions in the game. I found this process of story telling to be really quite entertaining and furthermore: the voice acting is actually quite good! It is far too rare to find games with decent performance and it appears that EA sought out some genuine talent to push the story forward. Many will liken this story format to that of the campaign of Black Ops, and in many ways it is an homage to that style of story telling; only better.

The detail and graphic quality of the Campaign is superb. Large, dynamic levels and intelligent AI immediately sets BF3 apart from its competitors. Smoke, fire, and weapons are beautifully rendered, allowing for a completely immersive gameplay experience. Enemies on the horizon blend seamlessly with environmental elements which—even on normal—can make target acquisition extremely difficult. I realized after dying several dozen times, that BF3 was not at fault; it was how I was playing the game that was leading me to fail.

Other FPS games have taught me that barging into an environment, and overpowering the AI wish sheer ferocity, is the most effective method for getting through a campaign storyline. In most FPS games I’ve found that a well placed grenade, a knife, and lots of jumping – could get you a good 75% of the way through the level. BF3, however, has made me appreciate the intricacies of stealth, patience, and the reservation of ammunition. The “run and gun” methodology that I utilized through all the Modern Warfare titles was not effective against the AI’s well placed shots and use of environmental leveraging.

Overall the Battlefield 3 campaign is a massive success.

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Multiplayer

Now onto the meat and potatoes of all First Person Shooter’s: the multiplayer. EA has worked extensively on creating a multiplayer experience that is both visceral, destructible and beautiful. Almost all of the maps are massive, covering everything from large sections of city blocks, mountain sides, meadows and subway tunnels. On this landscape in such multiplayer modes as Rush and Conquest, you the player have access to helicopters, tanks, jets, Humvees and ATV’s—and trust me, you’ll need them.

For as beautiful as the levels are, they are also the fuel for one of the main complaints I hear from non-Battlefield connoisseurs: “the maps are too big” or “it’s so boring”. While having ample grounds to play in is fun, it can be quite frustrating when you have to walk for a good minute or two to get to the combat zone, only to be sniped from a crackshot sniper before you can contribute.

In addition to the gorgeous scenery and the scale of the levels, the Multiplayer is very well thought out from a game mechanics perspective. The four available classes Assault, Support, Recon and Engineer are designed to serve specific functions in your immediate squad and for the whole team; all the while allowing for an incredible amount of customizability. From your camouflage pattern, to the attachments on your primary weapon, EA has allowed a wide array of setting yourself apart from the crowd; without having to paint your assault rifle bright pink.

The roles and functions that you play as your favored class can vary greatly. The Support class can be primarily used to supply your squad with ammunition, or to lay down heavy suppressive fire—which in BF3 has been built into the game mechanics. As an Engineer you can focus on repairs and laying traps, or offensive actions against tanks and aircraft. As an Assault soldier your role of healing and reviving is extremely valuable for your squad, as is your impressive arsenal of assault rifles and grenade launchers. Finally with Recon your role is to strike from a distance, or give your team a tactical advantage by placing spawn points or painting targets. Ultimately how you play your class will vary from person to person, regardless of how you play—however—you will be thoroughly pleased as all classes allow applying devastating damage to the opposing team and the environment.

Aside from all the praise I’ve been giving this game, there are certainly some things that myself—and many others—would rather do without. First and foremost are the network issues. With almost every game that EA has released that involves online play, they have had server issues e.g. crashes, lag, and non-functionality for several days after launch. This has left many players rueing the day they were born when they return home from their midnight launch and can’t connect to a game. As frustrating as it can be I must commend EA on their response times with this launch. A large majority of the connection errors and server issues are rectified within a couple hours, and most of the initial kinks were solved within the first seven days.

One complaint that I have against BF3 is the utilization of lighting, and the drastic effect it has on gameplay: more often than not I found it difficult to even ascertain where the enemy was shooting from. The lighting effects are so vivid, and so very well utilized that simply turning a corner from a dark room into daylight, can leave you hapless for several seconds. However I think that credit has to be given to the designers, who spent so much time and effort, mastering the effect. Where lighting is not properly used is in the multiplayer, where the opposing teams tactical lights are practically compact versions of the Sun that follow them around. Happen to come face to face with an enemy within twenty feet or so, even in broad daylight, and you’ll likely be sent to your grave wishing that you had sunglasses and cursing at your television.

As with most first person shooters there will be times where you turn a corner and your enemy will still manage to hit you. It appears to me that Battlefield 3 is still dealing with some issues concerning trailing hitboxes which, those of us that played Counterstrike know, can be the death of a good game and the birth of an anger problem. Granted, the trailing boxes could also be merely a symptom of chronic lag, in which that returns us to the network issues.

Despite these minor issues I believe that Battlefield 3 is the best combat game choice for 2011 offering a completely immersive, gorgeous, gameplay experience that will leave you yearning for more; and with ten times as many unlocks in Multiplayer mode then Battlefield Bad Company 2, you’ll have plenty of reasons to keep playing!

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Review by: Matt Thogerson

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Review - Batman Arkham City

Mon, 21 Nov 2011 18:20:28 -0500

When it comes to the wide pantheon of comic book superheroes, I don’t think there is anyone more compelling, complex, or awesome than the nocturnal guardian of Gotham City. The young man who saw his parents taken from him in a hailstorm of pearls and blood decided, through his trauma, that he would use his vast wealth and resources to travel the world and gain the skills necessary to hone his body and mind to the peak of human perfection. Learning that criminals are a superstitious and cowardly lot, he knew that in addition to all of his skill, fear would be his best weapon against the bold criminals that dare do wrong in his domain. He promised that what happened to him would never happen to anyone else ever again. It’s these unique and defining character traits that give us the immortal and unforgettable Dark Knight: Batman.

Batman may be the most popular superhero with his name on some of the most unforgettable television series, feature films, comic books, and radio shows. For some reason, though, like most superheroes, the definitive video game based on the character was always an elusive goal, that was never quite reached. That all changed at the end of summer 2009 when Rocksteady Studios developed, hands down, the best Batman gaming experience ever in Batman: Arkham Asylum. The success of that game immediately brought up speculation about a sequel, hopes that were confirmed in December of 2009 with an ominous teaser trailer featuring a sick and decrepit Joker laughing maniacally at chaos running rampant through the streets of Gotham. Whatever this sequel was going to be, it definitely moved away from the confines of Arkham Island and at least into a portion of Batman’s home, Gotham City.

But now, all the curiosity and speculation can be put to rest as this past October 18th, Batman: Arkham City finally saw release to a gaming community clamoring for a new bat-adventure. To say that this game is ambitious is an understatement. The criticisms of Arkham Asylum were mostly limited to aesthetic aspects, such as the lip-synching and some minor clipping issues. There wasn’t a whole lot to fix per se, so if you manage to pick up the controller completely unaware of the massive hype machine preceding the game’s release, you might ask: what’s left to explore? Well, the answer is apparently a lot. While Arkham City doesn’t really fix anything from the first game, it does is expand on virtually every aspect of gameplay that was present in the first outing, and maintains the relatively simple control scheme that made the first game so fun. It also does what every good sequel should do, and allows you to, quite simply, do a whole lot more with the Dark Knight’s ability to thrash either an unsuspecting purse snatcher, or a Venom-doped supervillain.

One of the most defining and unforgettable aspects of the first game is the actual story. As with the first game, the story was written by renowned Batman writer Paul Dini, who wrote some of the best episodes of Batman: The Animated Series as well as a very memorable run on DC’s Detective Comics. With him, Dini brings back two very notable Animated Series alumni in Kevin Conroy as the definitive voice of Batman as well as Mark Hamill’s final hurrah as one of the most unforgettable iterations of Batman’s arch nemesis, the Joker. The story of Arkham City picks up approximately one year after the events on Arkham Island in the first game, and deals with the construction of a new facility within the borders of Gotham City cordoned off from the remainder of the beleaguered metropolis. This is brought about by the mind of the villainous Professor Hugo Strange, whose greatest weapon in his ongoing plot is the knowledge that Bruce Wayne is Batman.

In Arkham Asylum, you had to travel around Arkham Island into different sections of the map, where in Arkham City you can travel with relative ease into every situation and area that you need to, all while still managing to increase the overall size of the gameplay area. Transit in-game is one of the most efficient and innovative changes made since Arkham Asylum. Instead of the minimal gliding time present in the first game, Arkham City allows for longer periods of gliding, while also invoking Batman’s famous grapple gun in enhancing the range of the grapple in attaching to structures around Arkham City. An upgrade you receive by completing one of the training mode side missions also allows you to implement the grapple during gliding, so that at a certain point, you don’t even need to touch the ground during your entire travel time.

Most of the gadgets present on Batman’s utility belt in the first game make their return here. From the definitive and ever-reliable Batarang, to the Explosive Gel, down to the Cryptographic Sequencer and the Line Launcher, much of what you’ve come to expect from the first game makes its return. There are a few notable additions to Batman’s arsenal this time though, and if you’re as big of a Batman fan as I am, then you should be happy to find that the singular Smoke Pellet is finally available allowing you to make quick, mysterious escapes in addition to confusing the hell out of your enemies. A broadcast disruptor is also a new addition, and with the proper upgrade you can remotely jam up to 2 enemies’ firearms so that they become far less of a threat. The new Remote Electrical Charge (REC) allows you to either temporarily shock enemies or open devices which would normally be closed off to you. Mr. Freeze also makes his presence known on your utility belt, as you can make use of his freezing technology at a certain point in the campaign to immobilize and devastate scores of enemies who then become helpless to your onslaught.

One of the most distinctive and defining parts of the last game was the fact that it forced you to tactically think as the Dark Knight might in certain situations. Unlike many other superhero games, both this game and its predecessor simply don’t throw wave upon wave of enemy at you, forcing you to simply button mash your way to the end of a level. Instead, the Arkham games make you approach every enemy type differently. For example, in this game, you cannot fight a Titan-powered henchman and Solomon Grundy the same way. You have to adapt your tactics to the enemy in front of you and look around the environment or your target to locate weaknesses that may give you the advantage you’re looking for.

This is a slight spoiler alert, but in order to demonstrate my point, take the battle against Mr. Freeze. While he wears his suit, his strength is enhanced tenfold, and it also protects him from most basic melee attacks. The advantage that you have is in Batman’s extensive capabilities as a stealth combatant. Freeze uses thermal imaging to track your footsteps, and there are portions of the environment that are dangerous to him. What does this mean for your battle against him? Simple: you can lead him into traps. Send him toward a power coupling, and when he pauses there, fire your Remote Electrical Charge at the coupling and temporarily disable him, allowing you to beat on him for a few seconds and work down his health before his suit cycles back up forcing you to hide. It’s the thinking involved in boss battles like this that automatically separate Arkhamfrom most other superhero games around.

The singular Freeflow combat system also makes it’s triumphant return in Arkham City, largely unaltered, but definitely enhanced. In addition to the devastating attacks granted by receiving a combo flow of 8x or more, now you can implement more of Batman’s gadgets in combat flows like the famous sonar Bat-summoner in addition to an attack that allows you to destroy an enemy’s firearms, stun guns, or riot shields. The combat system, definitely one of the most celebrated parts of the original game, remains one of the most innovative and well-rounded combat systems in any action-adventure game.

One very notable addition to this game is the ability to play through parts of the campaign as an entirely new character. That character should be no stranger to most people as one of the definitive and interesting members of both Batman’s rogues gallery and allies, that of the Feline Fatale herself, Catwoman. Over the course of the campaign, there are four separate episodes that you can play as Catwoman that dovetail through the main story’s narrative, and as is appropriate, Catwoman’s gameplay mechanics are decidedly different from that of the Dark Knight’s. For instance, Catwoman is noticeably faster on her feet, but lacks the capabilty that Batman’s brute strength provides. Catwoman has different abilities and gadgets as well, and while not nearly as extensive as that of the Batman’s, she uses her famous whip, disorienting caltrops, and disabling bolas to take out a myriad of enemies. When using the Freeflow system with Catwoman, her mechanics are basically the same as Batman, although you have to focus a little bit more with her on each enemy than you do with Batman.

The challenge maps make their return with this game, and allow you to hone your abilities with the Freeflow combat system and with your stealth capabilities. As with the last game, there are two basic types of maps to the challenge modes: combat maps, giving you four rounds of enemies to defeat with the Freeflow system and awarding medals based on your score, and Invisible Predator maps, making you rely on taking out your enemies from the shadows and warding medals based on your use of the environment and your gadgets. The challenge mode also adds a new component, that of “campaigns.” These are a series of both types of map while implementing specific modifiers to the requirements of each map. Winning combat medals allows you to contribute to your overall game completion percentage, and have to be something you play in if you’d like to try and reach full game completion and get the trophy or achievement for it. When you end up finishing the game’s main story, you may be surprised to see that your overall completion of the game will hover around the 30% mark. If anything, this shows the obvious replay value present if you want to mine this extensive game for everything that it’s worth.

The story brings about 12 unique side missions that can be accomplished at specific thresholds reached within the main story. One of them involves a mysterious figure watching you from the shadows as you beat down thugs, and speaking to him may give you clues to where the story goes beyond the confines of this game. Another involves a strange hallucination brought about by the mind control of Jervis Tetch, aka the Mad Hatter. You’ll also find yourself racing around the city answering random payphones in order to try and stop the insane murderer Victor Zsasz from his near-religious devotion to the “steel of his blade meeting warm flesh.” Several other side missions treat you to unexpected cameos from across the world of Batman in some very interesting situations.

One aspect that will keep Arkham City’s community alive for the foreseeable future is that some interesting downloadable content is promised in the coming months. The Catwoman pack comes with any new purchase of the game, and a pack allowing you to play challenge maps as Batman’s original protégé Nightwing, adds more achievements and a very cool combat dynamic to the challenge mode. Nightwing’s use of escrima sticks and new gadgets such as wrist darts allow for some fun new exploitations and very acrobatic components to dishing out punishment for enemies. Robin’s DLC pack is also a sight to behold, with the use of the Boy Wonder’s bo staff making the deposition of enemies brutal and dynamic. You can also use new skins for the Dark Knight himself, with a large skin pack hitting the marketplaces featuring costumes form across Batman’s history, including ones from the classic Frank Miller Year One and Dark Knight Returns stories, as well as an Animated Series skin. Others include skins featuring Batman in a Green Lanterninspired Sinestro Corps uniform, and Batman’s awesome design from the upcoming Earth Onegraphic novel.

Batman Arkham City is a massive achievement not only for superhero video games, but in showing other game developers that sticking to what people love about the first game is largely a winning formula, as long as you add to it. There’s an incredible story to be told, and this game definitely does what the first game did, but better: it makes you actually feel like Batman. For someone who’s admired the character for as long as he can remember, Arkham City is just what a fan like me needs. Do yourself a favor and pick up the best game that I personally have played all year. Batman: Arkham City is the new “best superhero game ever made,” and it’s entirely deserving of the torrent of accolades it’s sure to receive. Take the plunge and become the invisible predator. I’m sure that you not only won’t regret it, but that you’ll become involved in one of the most compelling Batman stories told in recent memory. We now have our Dark Knight of video games. Don’t miss it.

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Review by: Chris Clow

Want to leave a comment on this article? Visit the official Reset page here: http://resetgames.com/site/reviews/item/250-review—-batman-arkham-city

Review - Spiderman Edge Of Time

Tue, 15 Nov 2011 19:14:48 -0500

Beenox, the creators of last year’s critically acclaimed game Spider-Man: Shattered Dimensions, retain the keys to the webslinger for this year’s sequel, Edge of Time. Where the distinctive part ofShattered Dimensions was the ability to play as four different Spider-Men from across the vastness of time, space, and universes, Edge of Time partially continues that trend with a narrative that moves between the “Amazing” Spider-Man (the one we all know and love) and Spider-Man 2099. One of the trade-offs of only having two characters is that unfortunately the game feels slower and less unique than its predecessor.

The story in this game is a very clever science fiction piece written partially be renowned comic book writer Peter David. David’s no stranger to Spidey, having written him regularly several times over the course of his long career in the field. The game begins with a cool interactive credits sequence where you, as Spider-Man 2099, are shadowing the main villain Walker Sloan. One of the defining tenets of the 2099 universe is a corporation called Alchemex ruling over much of the future world with a crushing monopoly over several businesses. Sloan, one of the company’s top players, has devised a way to go back in time and start up the company generations before it’s supposed to be created, therefore assuring that the company’s monopolies take hold years before they’re supposed to and dominate every facet of life by the year 2099.

The time that Sloan travels back to is that of Peter Parker, the original Amazing Spider-Man. Because both Spideys have a stake in Sloan’s scheme, they try and reverse his plan in order to return both of their times to normal. This sets up a really interesting narrative device through the game that shows Amazing Spidey and Spidey 2099 constantly communicating with each other, and affecting each timeline by their individual actions. Sometimes the story is difficult to follow though, because of its reliance on pretty abstract principles of fringe science and the flow of time. It clears up a few weird liberties it takes with time travel, but the story is pretty strange and fuzzy when compared to the straightforward, focused story crafted by Amazing Spider-Man monthly writer Dan Slott in last year’s game.

As far as actual gameplay goes, Edge of Time is not quite as sharp or as memorable as Shattered Dimensions. While a lot of the individual traits of the Amazing and 2099 Spider-Men remain from the last game, a lot of the original moves that set them apart are absent this time around. Instead of very different combat styles, 2099 and Amazing both have very similar modes of operation in the way that they dispense enemies. 2099 in last year’s game was all about the unmatched acrobatics he had in addition to his suit’s advanced technology. While the suit does have the technology, it seems dialed down compared to Dimensions and his combat is very similar to that of his counterpart’s.

The most direct comparison to make here is to last year’s Shattered Dimensions, for which in my review I noted that Spidey felt a little less mobile than he probably should in places due to control hypersensitivity. Unfortunately, this problem has returned pretty blatantly in Edge of Time. One of the main issues with control of the Webslinger is in the free fall portions. Several times through the game, you have to jump down chasms that are really, really, really long, and mobility plays a rather large role in the ability to pass these levels successfully. Unfortunately, speed does as well, and the combination of both make this portion of the game especially difficult when you need to navigate through a tight spot.

One of the more general problems that immediately comes to mind when comparing Edge of Timeto Dimensions is summed up in one word: repetition. Because Shattered Dimensions contained four main characters with distinctive objectives, gameplay styles, and graphics, repetition wasn’t ever really a problem. Here, the protagonists are cut in half, and the gameplay options are seemingly cut with them. More uniformity in the renderings also make this experience feel flat. InShattered Dimensions, you had a popping, four-color style to the Amazing Spider-Man levels, a cel-shaded animation fest in Ultimate Spider-Man, grim and gritty darkness for Spider-Man Noir, and vibrant realism and fantastic environments surrounding Spider-Man 2099.

The variety and vibrancy of those distinct flavors is gone, because the two Spider-Men that you play as in this game appear sometimes in the same world. I understand you can’t very well have a realistic character render paired with a cel-shaded figure; those types of polar graphical opposites would definitely stick out like a sore thumb. The end result, though, feels much less distinctive on the aesthetic side. That’s not to say that the game doesn’t look good. It does. It just lacks some of the color and definition of Dimensions, which I sorely miss.

As far as the gameplay is concerned, the entire campaign is basically a series of quests that call for you to find something, encounter a bunch of very difficult and annoying enemies, and destroy as many of them as possible before encountering a boss. Every once in a while they’ll throw in a free fall mission to mix things up a little bit, but that’s basically the outline of the gameplay experience of Edge of Time. When compared to the mode of operation in Dimensions, which had you saving hostages one minute, followed by reassembling a device in another, then jumping to another world where you have to take thugs down silently without being detected, Edge of Time feels boring because of a lack of gameplay diversity.

With that variety gone, and replaced with pretty rigid uniformity across both your playable characters, it’s hard not to make a comparison to Shattered Dimensions in the negative. From a character and story perspective, though, the game does manage to get things pretty right. Spider-Man sounds as he should, and his 2099 counterpart is appropriately annoyed by his sarcasm and wit. Two voice actors from Shattered Dimensions and Spidey animation alumni return to the vocal chords of Peter Parker (or Miguel O’Hara): Josh Keaton (from the animated series The Spectacular Spider-Man) and Christopher Daniel Barnes (From the 1990’s Spider-Man Animated Series) provide the voices for Amazing Spidey and 2099 Spidey, respectively.

They even managed to get other people involved in comic book productions of the past to voice characters. Laura Vandervoort, who most genre fans will remember as Clark Kent’s Kryptonian cousin Kara Zor-El form the later seasons of the Smallville TV series, voices Mary-Jane Watson. And a former Batman, Val Kilmer (Batman Forever, Tombstone), provides the voice for the games villain Walker Sloan. I couldn’t really complain about the voice acting with much accuracy because it was all rather enjoyable. Kilmer in particular sounds oddly and appropriately detached as Sloan, and that seemed to fight his character very well.

The fact of the matter, though, is that in a video game, gameplay must come first. I will not make a bold statement and call Edge of Time a bad game, because I don’t think it is. I really do think, though, that it would be much easier to praise this game if we weren’t spoiled by last year’s very solid outing in Shattered Dimensions. Lesser mobility, less diverse gameplay, an admittedly less focused story relying on pretty abstract fringe-science, and an all-around duller experience make this kind of a lesson about what not to do in superhero game sequels.

In game sequels, people can and should expect everything that they loved about the first outing amped up and expanded upon in ways we thought not imaginable. In that regard, Edge of Timecan’t help but feel like a step backward. Then again, a year between releases really doesn’t seem like a whole lot of time to assemble a truly great gaming experience. Beenox was just announced to be creating the movie tie-in game for next year’s Amazing Spider-Man film. I think that they have a pretty solid template from where to craft a good Spider-Man game, and they proved they could do it with their first entry out the gate. While Edge of Time is kind of a hiccup, I really hope that’s all it is because there’s still a lot of potential with this developer handling this character.

In the end, Edge of Time isn’t the best Spider-Man game and feels like a demotion of sorts fromShattered Dimensions. It’s worth checking out if you’re a Spidey fan, but if you’re looking for a game that expands on what made last year’s outing great, Edge of Time just doesn’t quite deliver.

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Review by: Chris Clow

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Review - Dark Souls

Wed, 26 Oct 2011 17:24:09 -0400

It is a bleak and dreary sight that I am presented with; standing alone on a narrow cliff ledge, an armor-clad warrior slowly advances. My health is dangerously low; one wrong move and I plummet to my death, one misjudged swing and I will be run through. Off in the distance, I can see the hazy outline of a massive castle standing like a silent guardian, instilling both a desire to reach its heights but also a sense of ominous foreboding. For while it certainly holds riches and rewards, it most certainly contains creatures even more dire and deadly. But for now, my attention must be focused on the challenge in front of me. Readying my shield, I desperately hope that this time, I will survive and press forward.

By now, I’m sure the vast majority of what you’ve read about Dark Souls is that it puts a great deal of emphasis on the difficulty and steep learning curve. Behind that tough reputation is a game that, while extremely difficult, has an undeniable beauty that drives the player to continue fighting, even in the bleakest of circumstances. The difficulty is delicately offset by the distinct sense of personal improvement and advancement, and it’s one of the most addicting single-players games I’ve played in recent memory.

For those of us old enough to recall a time in gaming where difficulty was not seen as an insurmountable barrier to entry, Dark Souls is a welcome respite from an industry that has become obsessed with accessibility and ease of use. You’re thrown into Dark Souls with little fanfare or introduction, with no direction other than to advance in whatever manner you can. If you go in expecting the same spoon-fed experience we’ve become accustomed to in gaming, you’re in for a shock. Whether or not it’s a pleasant shock depends on how well you deal with adversity.

If there was one thing I want you to take away from this review, it’s to not let the clamor about difficulty scare you away. Sure, this game can be punishing at times, but it very rarely feels unfairly so. Through concentration, skill, and preparation, every challenge can be overcome. It would be a shame to miss out on such a unique and addicting game just because the difficulty is oversold.

The game opens with your character locked in the Undead Asylum, in the cursed realm of the Undead. The embers of the world’s creation are fading, leaving only darkness and despair. Like the rest of humanity, you are undead, Hollowed by an affliction known only as the Darksign. Unlike the rest of the Hollowed, you still retain some knowledge of your past Humanity and desperately seek to return to the world of the living. An unknown character drops a dead body into your cell with the key to your freedom in tow. The camera zooms in, and you begin your playtime.

You’ll be lost at first, struggling with the controls and conventions of the world. Luckily, there are helpful tips written on the floor in fiery red lettering that slowly introduce you to the basic controls. There are the standard 3rd person action-RPG elements like player stats, weapon combinations, and spells, but other than that, your understanding will come from exploration. Your first clue as to direction, in terms of what the heck you’re doing, comes from a dying Knight in the Undead Asylum who hints at a bell that an undead hero must ring.

While this tidbit gives you some direction, I wouldn’t say there’s a story here, in the traditional sense. However, there most certainly is a world with history and character. You’ll get bits and pieces of it from talking to the NPC’s as well as from item descriptions. The introductory cutscene provides some historical background for the creation of the world, but other than that you’re on your own.

Progression in Dark Souls is based around a traditional RPG leveling system and the bonfires. Bonfires are the focal points from which you venture forth and retreat to for save haven. Every time you die, you will start from the bonfire you last visited. You can rest at bonfires to replenish health, refill special items and remove poisons and toxins. Estus Flasks, the potions that replenish some of your health, and your magical spells are automatically refilled when you rest at a bonfire. You can also level up your character, change your equipped spells, and repair or upgrade weapons and armor.

If you’ve been paying attention, you should know by now that nothing comes free in Dark Souls; resting at bonfires will respawn every creature in the world, aside from bosses and other major demons. That Drake standing in your way who just took all of your health and Estus flasks to defeat? Yeah, retreating to a bonfire to rest will also bring him right back, ready to block your path once more. You must decide whether to brave the unknown on low health and supplies, or replenish them at the expense of fighting through the same creatures all over again.

If you have Humanity, you are given the option to reverse your hollowing and then kindle whichever bonfire you are currently resting at, both of which deplete one Humanity sprite from your inventory. When you reverse you hollowing, certain characters will treat you differently and you will do more damage to enemies. However, if you die, you are hollowed once more until you recover you dead body. Kindling a bonfire means that every time you rest at that bonfire, you are given 10 Estus Flasks as opposed to the normal 5. You’ll want to Kindle the bonfires you think are the ones you’ll use the most. Eventually, you’ll be able to Kindle bonfires multiple times, increasing the Estus refill count to 15 and 20.

You’ll be rewarded with precious Humanity Sprites either from discovering them in the world or defeating greater demons. While Humanity Sprites are rare and usually more difficult to obtain, Souls are the primary unit of value in Dark Souls. Increasing a character stat, purchasing an item, repairing times, and upgrading weapons and armor all cost you Souls. You can obtain Souls by killing enemies or finding Soul items that award you with Souls when used.

Keep in mind that you can only use souls while resting at bonfires or when talking to certain NPCs. Any time you die you leave behind a glowing green soul at the spot of your demise, along with all the Souls or Humanity you were carrying. If you can recover your soul on the next life, you get back any Souls and Humanity you had when you died. However, if you die again without recovering your previous life, all those Souls and Humanity are gone forever.

To survive and thrive in Dark Souls, you need to explore the world and its creatures. There are powerful hidden items for the observant player to find. Additionally, it may not be obvious how to defeat some of the more powerful enemies in the game on your first few encounters with them. You’ll need to be observant and explore the arenas and how the enemies attack to beat them.

The reward for succeeding isn’t some unlockable gimmick or item that is handed to you with little effort. No, in Dark Souls the reward is an intangible sense of accomplishment and improvement that is so painfully lacking from most other titles. As you advance, you are repeatedly met with failure and heart-pounding success. Progress can often come slowly, but it will come, and if you stick with it, you’ll find a thoroughly gratifying experience.

There is a massive, interconnected world here for you to explore. You’ll tiptoe along airy heights and delve deep into lava encrusted caverns and poison filled swamps. As you push further and further into each area, you’ll discover shortcuts to earlier areas and safe bonfires that will have you sighing with relief. It’s a lonely, dangerous world out there, and finding a bonfire after a particularly difficult stretch is a thoroughly cheering sight..

The feeling of loneliness and solitude permeates every facet of the world, from the ominous landscapes to the dreary weight that seems to hang thick in the air. That isn’t to say that you’re alone, as there are a few curious inhabitants you’ll meet along the way. With every conversation, you get the distinct feeling that everyone here is quite mad, in an Alice in Wonderland kind of way.

If you’re connected online, you’ll see the ghostly shadows of other players flitting about the world in addition to the traditional NPCs. Dark Souls takes a very interesting approach to online play. You’re given the option to place a summon sign on the ground, which allows other players to summon you to their world and help them defeat bosses. However, you cannot converse with each other or interact in any other way; you are just another ghostly apparition, briefly summoned. You can also choose to invade other player’s worlds and attack them, netting you additional items and souls.

Online interactions are most commonly found in the glowing red messages littering the landscape. Players can place these brief messages for other players to see, warning them or alerting them to whatever is ahead. However, not all players have your best interest at heart, as these messages can sometimes be painfully misleading.

You can enact your revenge, punish wrongdoers, or join other players online by swearing allegiance to different covenants found throughout the world. To join a covenant, you must first find and then swear an oath to a certain NPC. Each covenant has different objectives that alter the way you interact with other players. One covenant will have you invading the world of players who have killed another player. Another will have you defending players from invaders. You may also join a covenant that will summon you whenever a player enters their domain, to protect the covenant. These interactions add a new layer of interaction, seamlessly blending the single player and multiplayer portions of the game.

There are some issues that players may find disconcerting aside from the difficulty. The control scheme is a little odd, especially for the setup of the Xbox 360 triggers, and it will take some getting used to before you feel fully comfortable with it. The lack of customizable controls is disappointing, as I found myself dying a few times simply due to how unintuitive the scheme is. Sure, like the majority of my deaths, it was the result of user error, but it’s frustrating to die from something as basic as wonky controls. You’ll eventually get comfortable enough that the controls are no longer killing you, but I never felt the control scheme was as good as it should be. I’d assume this issue is a little less problematic on the PS3, as the controls were most likely designed around the Dualshock.

One other issue that I ran into was the targeting system. Often, you’ll lock onto the wrong enemy and switching between targeted enemies sometimes doesn’t respond as you intend. It becomes especially problematic when the enemies are different distances away. If you accidentally lock onto the enemy furthest away, you’ll frantically try to switch targets or remove the targeting lock while awkwardly avoiding the immediate threat. It doesn’t always work out.

The frame rate takes a serious hit in some environments. It can get annoyingly slow in areas with large bodies of water and it will sometimes stutter ever in basic environments. The graphics aren’t extraordinary by any means, but they are serviceable with the occasional impressive vista here and there. There are a few frustrating instances of environment clipping, where a boss or other creature can literally kill you through the walls. That can get really annoying really fast, but it’s not a major issue for the most part.

My playtime with Dark Souls could best be described as “probing.” Not in the extraterrestrial body-snatching sense, but like delicate tendrils snaking out into a dangerous world. The bonfire was my heart, my refuge, my rock. I would cast out from them, testing for a weakness, a soft spot in the world, for which I could fight past. With each foray I would press a little deeper, a little further afield, before being violently forced to retract my fragile avatar. Sometimes the results would be inspiring, as I reached previously unattainable heights, other times it would be a brutal reminder that anything but preparation and caution will lead to a quick death.

With each step you take away from the safety of the bonfire, you feel more and more exposed. The thrill of advancement is delicately balanced against the fear of retracing your steps should you die. Although you can recover lost souls and humanity when you die, provided you reach your corpse before dying again, even the most basic enemies can overwhelm a careless player.

I recall one instance where I had 6 humanity sprites (a noteworthy amount) and thousands of souls built up from defeating a demon and a slew of other creatures. Rather than using the rare humanity sprites to kindle a bonfire or leveling up with my souls, ensuring their utility, I chose to venture forth, foolishly thinking that I would be able to recover them should I perish. And perish I did.

Eagerly charging forth after respawning at my last bonfire, I thought it to be a relatively simple task to return to my corpse and regain my humanity and souls. But alas, a routine battle along a cliff-side ledge quickly turned sour, and I watch helplessly as my knight plummeted into the depths. And they were gone; all the humanity and souls I had built up vanished forever. I was devastated, but, in a testament to Dark Souls, I still hungrily pressed on.

That’s the true beauty of Dark Souls; despite the difficulty and repeated deaths, you’ll want to jump right back in and have another go. Were there times where I was frustrated, feeling more apt to toss my controller across the room than watch another “You Died” pop up on my screen? Of course, but I was invariably drawn back in, knowing that if I learned from my mistakes I would eventually triumph, raising my controller in victory rather than to heave it through a wall.

Dark Souls is not for everyone. It unabashedly presents players with challenges that require concentration, dexterity, and planning. There is a massive amount of content here, with a huge interconnected world, tons of different weapons and upgrades, and just discovering how everything works. If you fail, and you will, there are no hints to guide you and no handouts to help you; you must simply learn from your mistakes and improve. The world of Dark Souls remains indifferent to your plight.

Dark Souls has some incredibly odd conventions and requires a lot of exploration just to gain a working grasp of how things operate. It’s cryptic, difficult and often repetitive. However, there is an undeniable draw that compels me to continue playing and to continue exploring. With every failure there is a splash of disappointment followed by an irresistible wave of determination, compelling me onward. I could write pages more attempting to describe the little intricacies and quirks of the world or why it’s so engaging, but it’s just something you need to play for yourself. Dark Souls one of the most interesting and absorbing games I’ve played in recent years and would recommend it to anyone interested in a truly unique and rewarding experience.

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Review by: Nathan Twining

Want to leave a comment on this article? Visit the official Reset page here: http://resetgames.com/site/reviews/item/246-review—-dark-souls

Review - RAGE

Tue, 25 Oct 2011 17:43:11 -0400

To anyone remotely familiar with the history of first-person shooter games, the name “id Software” should ring a bell.

The company did, after all, basically invent the genre. Though id first made a name for itself with the wonderful Commander Keen series of platformers, the developer is better known for shooter series like Wolfenstein, Doom and Quake.

It should come as no surprise then, that the release of the company’s newest monosyllabic game,Rage, was met with some decidedly high expectations. Rage is id’s first major release since 2004’s Doom 3, and talk of its open-world setting and flat-out gorgeous visuals had gamers foaming at the mouth to consume the new title.

In the end, however, Rage proves that while these expectations may help sell games, they must be managed properly in order to prevent disappointment. Rage succeeds in its most basic elements, but fails to deliver on a number of very crucial fronts.

Rage begins much like Fallout 3 does, with the player emerging from a wasteland vault (“Ark”) following an apocalyptic meteor strike. Weaponless and lost, the confused wastelander is quickly attacked but subsequently rescued by the John Goodman-voiced Dan Hagar, who drives the player to his settlement.

So begins a game packed full of post-apocalyptic gangs, ramshackle settlements, rebels and a fascist government bent on controlling the wasteland. Most of the story elements in Rage have been done to death in the past, and that’s just the outset of the game’s biggest problem. More on that in a bit.

What Rage does not have a problem with, on the other hand, is the technical side of the coin. Aside from some muddy textures here and there, Rage is one of the prettiest games ever released on a console. The textures are the way they are because the game itself is so massive. On the Xbox 360, Rage spans three discs; on the Playstation 3, it’s a required eight-gigabyte install. I never noticed any framerate hiccups during my initial playthrough, and the landscapes themselves, especially in the bright and sunny first act of the story, are flat-out breathtaking.

The voice acting is mostly strong with some questionable writing choices peppered throughout, but it gets the job done. Goodman’s presence is much appreciated, even if we don’t see much of Dan Hagar after the game’s first couple of hours. The music is also well done, if not particularly memorable.

Rage can be broken down into two basic gameplay elements: shooting and driving. It’s in these elementary pursuits that the game hits its stride. The simple act of pulling the trigger is wicked fun. Rage offers the player a limited number of weapons, many of which can be upgraded and augmented with special ammunition. Switching between weapons and ammo is as straightforward as the press of a shoulder button and the flick of an analog stick. Each weapon has a distinct feel and power to it, and each is satisfying in its own way.

Some of my favorites include the mind-control bolts for the crossbow, which allow the player limited control over a target after shooting it (this includes the ability to detonate the bolt, destroying anyone vulnerable within range), and the wingstick, a sharp, tri-bladed boomerang-like secondary weapon that lets players decapitate and impale to their hearts’ content.

Even on the Normal difficulty, enemies are appropriately responsive to player actions, and that includes dialogue. Each faction, from the Ghosts, Jackals, Gearheads and more, move and react differently to the player’s assaults. This provides a varied experience each time the player enters a faction’s hideout.

In addition to shooting, the player will spend a lot of time driving in Rage. The developers have crafted a driving system that, while not exactly simulation-realistic, is extremely fun to mess around with. There are a number of Authority drones peppered throughout the landscape, indicating stunt jumps that the player can complete for a bonus. Aside from the ATV, which is available right away, all the game’s cars are fully upgradeable, utilizing a system that’s both addictive and fun.

Car parts can only be purchased with racing certificates, which can either be obtained by winning races or destroying enemy vehicles in the wasteland and receiving a bonus from an NPC. This encourages the player to compete in time trials, simple races, weapon-based races and rallies. I found the time trials and races to be a lot of fun, while I would’ve rather skipped the rallies. Racing to see who can collect the most rally points just isn’t as fun or satisfying as a standard race. Aside from that, it’s really astounding to see what a shooter-oriented developer like id pulled off withRage’s driving system.

In the opening hours of Rage, I was absolutely hooked. The shooting was satisfying, the driving was surprisingly fun and the missions seemed to get better and better. My first trip through the Dead City was a particular standout, with atmospheric terrain, creepy moments and an ominous, giant mutant snooping around in the background.

However, as the game goes on, its cracks begin to show in some very prominent ways. For me, it all started when I was sent back into the Dead City on a quest, only this time, the mission tasked me with backtracking through the landscape I had already traversed just a few missions before. Remember “Two Betrayals,” the Halo: Combat Evolved mission that brought the Master Chief back through the landscape from “Assault on the Control Room?” Many players criticized Bungie for featuring a simple re-tread of a previous mission. I’ll say this: At least “Two Betrayals” swapped nighttime for daytime and featured some amazing set pieces. Rage’s re-tread just felt lazy by comparison.

Even worse than the backtracking present in some of the missions is the quest design. Coming fresh off of playing Deus Ex: Human Revolution, with its dynamic and varied objectives, playing through Rage’s tired fetch quests was annoying at first and downright jarring later on. It’s almost like id didn’t know how to justify Rage’s trips through the wasteland’s many gang hideouts. Sorry id, but battling through a den full of angry gang members only to find a broken feltrite coupler is not very satisfying.

That served to highlight some of the much more troubling problems present in the Rage campaign.

First of all, the game is short. At less than 15 hours, give or take, Rage’s length doesn’t come close to matching up with its open-world premise. Games like this demand some meat behind their campaigns, and such a short trip through the wasteland felt cheap and disappointing. I understand that not all games can be as lengthy as an Elder Scrolls or Fallout title, but less than 15 hours in an expansive environment like this is simply too short.

Finally, the game’s most glaring problem is its story. I don’t know if the writing simply took a backseat to the game’s technical prowess, but I wouldn’t be surprised if that was the case given id’s focus in the past. It’s a forgivable problem at the beginning, as the awe of the game’s world displaces the story’s weakness, but by the end of the game it’s a glaring issue that shouldn’t exist in a game like this. Despite its looting, questing and item creation elements, Rage isn’t an RPG; it’s a shooter at heart. Id obviously intended to create a world on par with those of RPGs likeFallout and the Elder Scrolls titles, whose developer, Bethesda Softworks, actually published Rage.

Fallout and the Elder Scrolls both have something that Rage doesn’t: the advantage of a back catalog. Those series are set in worlds that already exist, with mythologies that were established years ago. Rage is a new franchise, and this was id’s chance to lay out an interesting premise for this and future games. The developer failed miserably, presenting not a single interesting or memorable character across an entire wasteland.

These shortcomings only highlight the aforementioned problems in the quest design. Not only are the game’s pursuits dull, there’s no sense of urgency either. I didn’t care if any of these characters died. At one point, while playing Fallout 3, I reloaded an early save to see the effects of taking a different route. Instead of saving Megaton (the main hub town) from nuclear destruction, I destroyed it. As a result, I wanted to reload my real save immediately, just to make sure Megaton’s denizens were alive and not irradiated. Rage brings about no sense of emotional connection to anything in its narrative.

The game’s multiplayer does try to remedy these problems. The Wasteland Legend mode, which allows cooperative play through single levels at a time, is a lot of fun. The ability to play through these stages while simultaneously helping and competing with a partner is something more and more developers are including in their games lately, and that’s because it works so well.

Very strangely, id didn’t include a deathmatch multiplayer mode in Rage. Many fans consider that a staple of the developer’s shooters, and I find it a bit strange that with its wonderful shooting mechanics Rage lacks a mode allowing players to fight their friends. I doubt it would usurp the Call of Duty, Battlefield or Halo throne if they did, but a Rage deathmatch mode would’ve been served well by the game’s best element: the gunplay.

The developer goes a long way toward making up for the lack of a deathmatch mode with Rage’smultiplayer car combat. It offers a number of unlockables and a frantic pace, in keeping with the wonderful driving portions of the campaign. It’s not a mode that will keep me coming back day after day, but it’s a fun time-waster, to be sure.

Rage is a technically gorgeous game that falls short in a number of key areas. Its overworld is breathtaking, even if it’s much smaller than the hubs present in recent adventure games. This wasteland is polished almost to perfection, providing one of the prettiest experiences available on a console. Throw in a hearty mix of pitch-perfect gunplay, satisfyingly responsive enemies and some very fun driving elements, and you have the makings of a great game.

Sadly, Rage falls short in the substance category. Nothing here feels purposeful or meaningful, and this makes the beautiful wasteland feel like a perfectly painted version of the fake western town fromBlazing Saddles. The story is weak and forgettable, the game is unforgivably short, and the ending feels about as anticlimactic as possible. A far worse offense than that, however, is the increasing prevalence of unimaginative quests as the game goes on. Rage’s gunplay deserves better questing to push the game along, and it sadly doesn’t get it.

While id certainly leaves room for a sequel, I’m just not quite sure I care enough to see what happens to our nameless protagonist and the world around him. Rage is a fun game that wears thin as the player gets deeper into its paper-thin storyline. I’d probably recommend the game if 2011 were a weaker year for video games, but with games like Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception,Batman: Arkham City, The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword and The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim on the horizon, Rage just doesn’t earn that recommendation.

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Review By: Brent Lindquist

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Review - NBA 2K12

Wed, 19 Oct 2011 16:37:13 -0400

Over the past two weeks I’ve learned more about the game of basketball than I have growing up watching hoops. NBA 2K12 has coached me through the core fundamentals of the sport, while simultaneously teaching me about the rich history of the league and its players. Never before has a sports game held me captive like 2K12 has; I can’t see myself putting it down in the foreseeable future. It’s a near-perfect basketball sim and is, without a doubt, the best sports game I’ve ever played.

My love for this game is due, in large part, to the stellar presentation in every corner of 2K12. Point guards glance up at the clock waiting to set up the last shot of the quarter. Mascots perform Michael Jackson dance moves when the arena blasts a soundbite from Thriller. 2K Sports leaves no detail unpolished giving players the complete NBA experience. 2K12 even recognizes when a game is played on a holiday with specific graphics on the digital scoreboard and the broadcast team saying phrases like “Here to serve you up an extra helping of NBA goodness” on Thanksgiving.

The commentators flow so well that not only does it seem like a live broadcast, it’s arguably better. The quality of the dialog makes the Madden script seem like it was written by John Madden himself. The commentators never miss a beat, carrying on actual conversations about the players, teams and cities that are always entertaining to listen to. It impressively took the broadcast team five games playing with the same team for them to repeat a line of dialog.

My main complaint about 2K11 is the cheap AI defense that brought down the level of realism with all too frequently intercepted passes. In 2K12, most of my picks were directly attributed to making a poor decision when forcing the ball through traffic. One of 2K12’s greatest achievements is how it captures the flow of an actual NBA match. Kobe is a ball hog, Jason Kidd shouldn’t be ignored behind the arc, and CP3 is so quick that I have a hard time keeping glued to him. There are no hiccups like dropped passes in Madden being “hot potatoed” by multiple defenders. 2K12 is simply better than that.

NBA’s Greatest is the signature game mode of 2K12. Here you can play through 15 scenarios featuring some of the most important players in NBA history. Everyone from Jordan’s Bulls to Jerry West’s Lakers are chronicled here with their fully realized supporting cast. The best part about NBA’s Greatest is they play out like you’re watching an NBA classic reel with retrospective commentary and period specific visuals. The Bill Russell match is presented in grainy black and white and players have to accommodate for the lack of a 3PT line.

I ended up learning a ton of history playing through NBA’s Greatest. It felt like I was interacting with a documentary not only about the featured “Great” and his supporting cast, but also about they team they played against. I had the pleasure of going up against the 95’-96’ Seattle Sonics during the Scottie Pippen level and I learned a wealth of new information about a team that I adored as a kid. I had no idea that Oklahoma City wanted to retire Gary Payton’s jersey but he politely refused and wants to wait until Seattle has a team again. How awesome is that? Even better, once I cleared the Scottie Pippen level I unlocked the entire 95’-96’ Supersonics! It feels so good to play The Glove, Rain Man, Detlef, and the rest of the crew against some of the current NBA squads.

As awesome as the NBA’s Greatest mode is, “My Player” is easily my favorite mode on the disk. I started My Player by creating myself as an NBA rookie. After playing in the rookie showcase and talking to some NBA general managers about their interest in me in the upcoming draft, Janio “Smooth” Suppini was drafted 16th overall to the Philadelphia 76ers. The whole process was nerve racking, I really wanted to go one draft pick higher so I could play in Madison Square Garden for the Knicks, but alas, not every rookie gets drafted to an ideal situation.

It was in My Player that I learned the in’s and out’s of the point guard position. After every game I play with Smooth I’m analyzed with a “Teammate Grade” that rates me on every aspect of my game. Here I learned how to assess the opposing defense, dish an effective pass, how to play proper defense, and where my high percentage shots were, all on the fly with actual game experience and not a tutorial. There are numerous drills and practice options available, but there’s nothing like getting benched for a stupid turnover, or having the crowd go nuts when you convert on a fastbreak opportunity.

The better I play, the more skill points I get to level every aspect of Smooth’s game, including specialty shots like my fadeaway or my dribble step. With all these upgradable stats I can see myself playing Smooth’s entire career in My Player mode. It is ridiculously engaging. I even talk about Smooth outside of 2K12 as if he were a real player, pouring over the last game’s stats to my friends who, for the time being, don’t seem tired of me gushing every day.

To get the most out of My Player mode, I suggest that you switch the quarter length from the default 5:00 minutes to the regulation 12:00 minutes. This way you can post realistic NBA stats and scores, while getting your player more skill points. The only gripe I have with My Player mode is during the post game press conferences, some of the available response options ended up being completely opposite of what I was hoping to say. This became a small problem because Smooth’s teammate chemistry, local fan support and league-wide popularity ride on these confusing choices.

NBA 2K12 lets you take your game online in a variety of ways. The normal “Play Online” option is available for a quick exhibition against a random player, but for the more dedicated ballers there’s an online “Association” mode. Here, you can start a league with existing teams or use a fantasy draft to create your dream team by yourself or with friends online. With these four main gameplay options, gamers have an absurd amount of replay value.

The only major letdown of NBA 2K12 is a complete lack of rookies from this year’s NBA draft class. I don’t know if there was a player licensing issue because of the real life lockout, but it’s a shame that 2K didn’t (or couldn’t) include the likes of Kyrie Irving and Jimmer Fredette.

If it weren’t for the absence of the 2011 rookie class, NBA 2K12 would have been the perfect substitute for the potential NBA lockout. Being the best sports game on the market will have to do for now. NBA 2K12 is a love letter to the game of basketball and a must play for any hoops fan that owns a video game console.

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Review by: Janio Suppini

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Review - Gears of War 3

Tue, 18 Oct 2011 15:06:53 -0400

Blood erupts from the freshly eviscerated carcass of my former enemy. With a guttural scream, I ran the Locust beast through with my chainsaw-tipped weapon and now the two halves of its body drop to the ground at either side. The brutal manner in which I dispatched my enemy, and the gore that comes with it, is neither celebrated nor glorified; it’s merely a part of life in Gears of War 3. It is a violent, desperate world and there are no peaceful ways to die here.

Gears of War made a splash in the industry with its fantastic graphics, visceral combat, and rock-solid mechanics. The original Gears game ushered in a new wave of third-person, cover based shooters, and it has always maintained a distinct prestige over its competitors. It has become one of the iconic franchises, not only for the Xbox brand, but for modern gaming. While it certainly has its shortcomings, Gears of War makes up for them with an uncompromising commitment to uncomplicated gameplay and over-the-top gore. Rather than make drastic changes to the formula,Gears of War 3 perfects what made the series such a big hit in the first place.

The Gears of War cast showing their diverse body types; “large” and “female”

Gears of War is the 80’s action movie of gaming; brutal, up-close fighting, ridiculous dudes of questionable proportions, bromance, sweaty grunts and cheesy one-liners. The times when Gears of War 3 embraces this are when the game is at its best. When it tries to be something its not, in most cases a touching story with meaningful discourse, Gears 3 is more likely to induce cringing than a connection.

I just got done literally chain-sawing a lumpy brute in half and now I’m supposed to care about Marcus Fenix’s emotional loss over a character we’ve never seen before? Sorry Epic, I’ve heard Marcus speak two words over multiple games now, “grunt” and some variation of a 4-letter word; I’m not exactly in-tune with his poignant character development.

Deep emotional ties are best displayed with gunfire.

Thankfully, aside from a few instances, the story doesn’t try to be overly emotional and is merely a method to advance you from one area to the next. In case you’re unfamiliar with the plot so far, the planet Sera, home to humanity, has been overtaken by subterranean monstrosities known only as the Locust. After Emergence Day, when the Locusts first appeared, the Humans have been fighting a losing battle. The Coalition of Ordered Governments, aka the “COG,” is in disarray, with no leadership or direction. There are still remnants of humanity, known as the Stranded, scattered across the landscape, desperately trying to survive.

Quickly losing ground and safe havens, the humans make a bold move to map and destroy the underground home of the locust. Marcus Fenix, along with fellow COG members Dom, Cole Train and Baird, venture into Sera’s depths to detonate the light-mass bomb. While this endeavor proves successful, it ultimately proves to be futile. With the Locusts still voraciously fighting, Marcus and Company are again sent into the cavernous home of the Locusts, this time to flood the entire system with Emulsion, the subterranean fuel that has been powering all of Sera for decades.

Unfortunately, the flooding merely forced the Locusts to emerge from the depths of Sera in full force. Additionally, it was discovered that the Emulsion was corrupting the Locust creatures, turning them into extremely volatile beasts, even more dangerous than before. With humanity grasping at straws, Marcus learns that the father he previously thought was dead is in fact alive and may hold the key to their survival. After the flooding of Jacinto, the COG scattered, and Gears of War 3begins with Marcus and the rest of his allies afloat on a large ship, desperately trying to stay alive and find a way to stop the Locust and the new Lambent threat once and for all.

As for the gameplay style, I’ll try to distill it down to a few simple sentences. First off, it’s a third-person shooter with a heavy emphasis on cover. The “A” button is the universal “do-something” button, allowing you to duck and run (“roadie run”), dive and roll, and hide behind the various objects littering the landscapes. You can carry 4 different weapons; one pistol, one grenade type and any combination of two of the rifles, shotguns, snipers or explosive weaponry. Each weapon features an “Active Reload,” where correctly timing a moving meter will get you a faster reload and additional damage. However, if you incorrectly time the reload, your weapon temporarily jams and slows you down.

You’re usually accompanied by anywhere from 3 to 5 of your fellow “Gears;” members of the COG. They’ll revive you when you bleed-out, cover your flanks and call out enemies. Like all AI partners, a big headache usually accompanies their less-than-ideal intelligence, but for the most part they’re welcome companions. The mid-combat banter is hit or miss, at once realistic and fluid and the next moment forced and contrived.

Marcus, seen here compensating for his pathetically small frame and biceps.

The gameplay is a clever combination of methodic advancement, strategic movement and all out firepower. You’ll duck and roll between cover, popping out to lay down fire on advancing enemies before charging through a hail of bullets to impale some poor beast on your chainsaw-tipped Lancer. Blood will fly, both from you and your enemies. It’s like everything on the planet Sera is doing personal recreations of the Army of Darkness pit scene, with a fountain of blood violently expunging itself after every blow. Heads don’t roll in Gears of War, they explode.

If you don’t disintegrate an enemy with an explosion, headshot or shotgun blast, they’ll sometimes fall to their knees into a bleed-out mode. During this mode, the downed character (an enemy, a teammate or your own character) has a limited time for an ally to revive them before they bleed out and die. When you run up to a downed enemy, you can attack them normally and end their life, or you have the opportunity to perform one of 24 unique executions. The type of execution you perform depends on what weapon you have and what button you press. Think of these as the “fatalities” of the Gears universe; they’re animated takedowns that usually end up with your enemy in several bloody pieces.

The pacing in the Gears of War series has always been stop-and-go, with moments of calm dispersed between frantic battles and set pieces. I find that I really appreciate the quiet moments, as it allows me time to admire what truly are incredible backdrops and environments. Destroyed beauty is a recurring theme in Gears of War, and Epic does a great job of maintaining that theme while still showcasing varied and breathtaking areas to play in.

While the environments themselves are quite noteworthy, it’s difficult, if not impossible, to wow any seasoned Gears vet at this point. We’ve come face to face with Berserkers, had a Brumak rodeo, entered the depths of a crumbling planet and survived being eaten by a worm so large it can consume entire cities. So it’s with an understanding tone when I say that the epic moments inGears of War 3 don’t quite pack the same punch we’ve become accustomed to. The majority of the campaign is a familiar retread of moments we’ve seen before, albeit with a shiny coat of polish.

After the debacle of Gears 2’s multiplayer, which was plagued with connection, balance and programming issues, Epic Games has learned from their mistakes and put some serious work into it this time around. Taking cues from their PC roots, Epic is providing dedicated servers rather than the peer-to-peer hosting system so commonly found on consoles. For those unfamiliar with this style of hosting, it essentially removes the notorious “host advantage,” instead providing a neutral server that all players must connect to. While it doesn’t actually remove latency from the system, it does do a better job of minimizing it and spreading it more equally among players.

Perhaps even more importantly, there was a public Beta for Gears of War 3, which gave players a chance to put the multiplayer through its paces prior to release. Based on feedback from the Beta, Epic made some pretty significant changes to weapon balance, glitches, and even the layout of some multiplayer levels. While I can’t promise there won’t be any problems in the weeks and months after release, the Beta certainly minimizes the chance of any game breaking issues materializing. This is without a doubt the most complete and refined multiplayer yet for the series.

Gears has traditionally featured a round-based multiplayer where each player is given one life per round. However, Gears of War 3 adds in a new Team Deathmatch mode where all players share from a common pool of 20 lives, allowing multiple respawns per round. This is fast-paced deathmatch with a Gears of War flair, and it’s probably my favorite gametype to play. Other modes include the traditional one-life-per-round deathmatch (called Warzone), another deathmatch mode where you can only kill enemies with executions (Execution), a mode where you must execute only the opposing teams leader, called Assassination, and a king of the hill style mode called Annex.

In addition to the competitive multiplayer, Gears of War 3 brings back the stellar Horde mode with some significant new additions. It’s still a wave-based survival mode where the enemies get increasingly more powerful and deadly with each round, but there’s now an economy system as well. As you kill enemies or assist teammates, you’re rewarded with different amounts of cash. With this money, you can buy ammo and weapons or use it to build, repair or upgrade barriers and turrets. There are command posts at various locations around each level which you can also purchase, opening up new areas to build turrets or barriers.

A completely new mode for Gears of War 3, Beast Mode, turns the tables by putting you in control of the various Locust creatures. As you progress through 12 rounds, you attempt to push through the defenses of a human outpost and kill everyone in the compound. You earn money which allows you to purchase different Locust creatures with which to wreak havoc.

In addition to all the various gameplay options, Epic has thrown in a leveling system and a ton of unlocks. After every game you play, be it multiplayer, horde, beast mode or even campaign, you’ll earn experience points based on how you performed. These points add up to increase your level, displayed next to your name in multiplayer, and unlock weapon skins, awards and different character models. There’s a bunch of content aside from the actual game here for fans to delve into, and it’s a nice bonus for those who are going to be spending a lot of time with the game.

Gears of War 3 is a must buy for anyone who enjoys third-person shooters and should definitely warrant a look from shooter fans in general. It’s gorgeous, bloody, a little bit melodramatic and silly, but most importantly, it’s a lot of fun. The environments are stunning and detailed and the gameplay is solid, addictive, and uncomplicated. Add in a large amount of multiplayer and cooperative content, and it’s hard not to find something that will take up a lot of your time in the coming months.

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Review by: Nathan Twining

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Review - X-Men Destiny

Thu, 13 Oct 2011 18:44:44 -0400

One of the most well known comic book properties on the planet is the mutant team of the X-Men. Famously protecting humanity in a world that hates and fears them, the X-Men have managed to strike a chord with many people across the world as an allegorical tool for racism, xenophobia, and inequality. Because of their status as one of the most popular and enduring characters both in comics and now in cinema, the X-Men have been adapted into video games several times over the entire generation of home consoles.

The latest console game dealing with the team is X-Men: Destiny, a choice-oriented action RPG giving players a new character in a threatening world and making them choose between the two primary factions in the mutant corner of the Marvel Universe. These factions of course being the X-Men, defenders of peace between humanity and homo-superior, and Magneto’s Brotherhood of Mutants, the self-interested mutant protectionist faction only interested with forwarding the causes of themselves, preferring humanity’s extinction. The most distinctive conceptual thing about this game is the fact that you don’t play as any of the well-known X-Men or Brotherhood members. Instead, the game gives you a choice between three new, unique characters with defined backstories and different stakes in the ongoing conflict between mutants and humans.

The characters themselves are surprisingly interesting, and create a starting point for where your personal choices in the game are made. One character is the son of a martyred member of the Purifiers, a gang of human supremacists that you face early on in the game. When he begins to develop mutant powers (if you choose him, that is) he begins to question everything he knows about a race he was raised to hate.

Another character is a young woman sent to the United States by her mutant parents, alone, for a better life. Her powers begin to manifest right as the game begins. The last character is a football jock that feels absolutely no stake in the human/mutant conflict, who is forced to figure out what he thinks when he becomes a mutant himself.

Right up front, the story is one of the most interesting parts of the game. While it’s a little unfortunate you can’t get behind the optic beams of Cyclops or the claws of Wolverine, there is a lot of interesting interactions you can have with many of the mutants that fans know and love. From the teleporting Nightcrawler to the slimy Toad, all the way to the card-dealing Gambit and the villainous Magneto. Mike Carey, writer of the X-Men: Legacy ongoing comic book series, helped craft the storyline of the game and manages to load it with a lot of intrigue and mystery that befits some of the best X-Men stories.

Unfortunately, this is where my first critique comes into play. While I was aware that the game’s story would be one of the major focuses of the experience, in many cases I found the story to be a little too intrusive to the gameplay experience. You can’t begin a mission without engaging into a rather long exchange with another mutant or a mid-game cutscene that takes an unusually long time. Some might say that this is a staple of the action RPG genre, but other action RPG’s I’ve played don’t seem to have quite the length in establishing cutscenes.

The first section of the game sees you combating members of the Purifiers gang on the streets of San Francisco. I was hoping that after this first section the mode of operation of X-Men Destiny would change somewhat, but unfortunately the focus on missions remains largely unbroken from “Defeat (X Amount of) Enemies.”

The different missions that you choose to undertake help align you and give you favor with either the X-Men or the Brotherhood, except in cases where you need to free a certain amount of people from a cage, or going after an informant or delivery boy, the game seems solely interested with the amount of enemies you can defeat in a given situation. The only times that this is spiced up at all is when the plaster a time limit on the amount of enemies you need to defeat, but even then the time limit potentially only serves to increase a player’s frustration.

Boss battles in the game are pretty uninteresting and uninspired, and don’t really have a lot of inherent difficulty. The first major boss is a Purifier in a large mechanical suit with a regenerating shield. Other than attacking and dodging larger attacks, the only difficulty lays in the inexplicable and consistent regeneration of the shield that you must wear down three or four times before you can defeat him. You also have to engage in battle with a couple of well-known mutants, most notably Gambit and Wolverine. Unfortunately, this is largely the same story as the AI for all the enemy characters seems to be pretty basic, like the game’s entire method of play.

The choice element doesn’t quite play as large as you might think, either. While the three distinct characters are nice and provide some slight dialogue changes from one character to the next, the actual gameplay is not very different depending on the characters or powers that you choose. By the time you get to the game’s final choice, the previous choices that you’ve made don’t really seem to matter too much as this is the defining choice of the game and changes the game’s ending depending on your choice of faction. This was disappointing to me, because the most interesting part of the game when advertised seemed to be the promise that your choices affect all aspects of the gameplay experience.

Now, that’s not to say that an attempt wasn’t made to make choice one of the primary gameplay elements defining your experience. There is. My issue is more with how the game was advertised, which purported that choice seeps into practically every facet of the experience. This is not the way that the game is structured. I don’t particularly blame the game’s developers for this as much as Activision’s PR department. The best way to describe the way that choice factors into X-Men Destiny is that this is a largely linear experience with predetermined story beats that has a couple of choices peppered in to spice up the narrative in a few choice spots.

One of the well-constructed components of the game is the upgradeable power system. In the opening minutes of the game, you are given a choice between three beginning powers. While the result, offense, is the result of all of them, the game does a good job of giving appropriately devastating progression to each of the available power sets. As you move through the game, you’re also able to pick up some of the powers from well-known mutants in the pantheon of X-Men, such as Quicksilver’s speed, Wolverine’s berserker rage, or even a portion of Cyclops’ optic blasts. These are given in the form of “X-Genes,” and allow access to other powers in the game.

There are three different types of abilities that X-Genes unlock in the game: offensive, defensive, and utility. This is probably where the greatest portion of the game’s purported choice is present, because the ways you decide to mix and match your abilities can be unique to every player. The caveat with that, though, is that there’s really only one major thrust of using these abilities and that’s to contribute to the game’s singular type of gameplay.

All in all, while the game isn’t terrible, that’s hardly a justification that you want to hear for a video game let alone one based on a property adored by millions of fans. The development team, Silicon Knights, used to be able to do a lot of great work when they had the keys to the Metal Gear Solid franchise, but they’re probably best known for their GameCube outing Eternal Darkness. That game’s cult classic status made Silicon Knights a highly revered development house when that game dropped back in 2002. Unfortunately, the house hit kind of a rough spot back in 2008 with their Xbox 360 game Too Human, a commercial and critical disappointment. X-Men: Destiny will be a lot of fun for people that like button mashers with interesting stories. The story told here may have been better served in the pages of Mike Carey’s X-Men: Legacy title though, because while Destiny can prove an interesting diversion for a while, it’s not exactly the most memorable X-Men gaming experience that fans have been hoping for.

Destiny is an interesting game that tries to do interesting things, but doesn’t really give fans much of a reason to care about these new characters and instead had me counting down the seconds until Wolverine or Magneto showed up. We’ll see if Marvel can license out the property to a developer that can craft a truly great X-Men gaming experience, but for right now, Destiny will just serve as a hold-over until the next X-game comes along.

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Review by: Chris Clow

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Review - Captain America Super Soldier

Wed, 12 Oct 2011 19:27:10 -0400

The final comic book movie-to-game adaptation of 2011 has hit game stores everywhere in Captain America: Super Soldier. I’m holding a particular standard with this game maybe more than the others, because Steve Rogers happens to be my favorite character in the entire stable of Marvel Comics. Because of this, I think Cap deserves a great gaming experience (whether it’s tied to a film or not), and that his potential for a game is very high. Super human strength and agility, an unbreakable shield that can be thrown as an awesome offensive weapon, along with one of the most evil villains in comics as your arch nemesis? How can you mess this up?

The Marvel games have a lot to answer for as well, after spitting the travesty that was Thor: God of Thunder into stores in May. While both Thor and Cap are published by Sega, both games have two different development teams and should be distinctly different from each other. I was biting my nails as I placed this game disc into my console, and my experience was about to begin…

…until I noticed something just on the disc art. Now, tell me if I’m crazy about noticing this. The disc, obviously, is circular. The most definitive object associated with Captain America is his shield, also a circular object. What do you think would make the most sense about an image to place as the disc art? The shield, right? Well, count this as the first point docked, because instead of doing this, they just recycle the same image as the cover art onto the disc, onto the instruction booklet, and on practically every piece of publicity tied to this game. You’d think that placing the shield there would be both cool and creative, but instead, they use an image that’s generic and overused in the campaign to sell the game. It’s a nitpick to be sure, but it seemed so…obvious.

Now, onto the game itself: when it comes to besting the other two major comic film-to-games, the competition isn’t very heavy. The aforementioned Thor game, as I said in my review here, was very, very bad. In hindsight, I think my rating on that game was too generous. The second of the season, Green Lantern: Rise of the Manhunters, was a fun and respectable entry if not a little repetitive. So how does Cap rank? In a nutshell, second. While leaps and bounds better than Thor, the game doesn’t manage to be as fun or as visually striking as Green Lantern, and is downright frustrating in multiple places. It seems as if it’s partially confused about what it wants to be: is it a platformer, or is it a fighting game? It does one better than the other, but it doesn’t do either format enough justice to have a definitive place among the two.

The obvious inferior of the two is the platforming. This is an interesting addition to the game, and an admittedly inspired way to try and show off the superhuman balance and agility of Captain America. It seems straight forward: walk onto the starting position, and tap the jump button to initiate an ascent or descent to a location. The problems, unfortunately, begin almost immediately. The jumping itself is unresponsive. The game rewards you for getting “perfect timing” on executing a jump or a swing, but unless you’re tapping the jump button repeatedly as you get to the next part, you won’t see that reward. But, even if you are tapping repeatedly, you’ll probably only get the perfect timing bonus two or three out of five times. This makes the whole system rather annoying, and that annoyance would probably not be there if there was either a) a more responsive jump or b) no reward system for “perfect timing.”

Some of the platform obstacles are also downright frustrating. When scaling a pipe for instance, normally when damaging hot steam comes out of the part you’re trying to move across, there’s a discernible pattern so that you can make your way safely across. Not so with this game, as when you think you’ve got a pattern figured out some other steam hole presents itself as soon as you try and move past the first one. This makes for a frustrating and dumbfounding experience as soon as you try anything like this, in addition to making Cap seem stupid and weak for being so easily killed by steam. Come on, guys.

The camera angle for the platforming is also problematic. The perspective starts off well enough, but if Cap has to be at the high end of a building and jump through rafters or onto a ledge, the lack of sufficient light in front of you makes it difficult to see. Sometimes, when going across the aforementioned pipe, the camera doesn’t even allow you to see the steam ahead of you. It’s almost as if they want you to screw up in some places, and a more refined camera would’ve fixed that.

The combat system, while the better component of the game, still has its problems. The most obvious and unique part of Captain America’s fighting style is the use of his vibranium shield as both an indestructible defense and a devastating offense. Throwing the shield in this game generally works pretty well. The combat upgrade system allows you to periodically increase the amount of targets the shield can bounce off of, and at its max can be pretty devastating when dealing with the regular HYDRA foot soldiers.

The actual hand-to-hand combat system is almost awesome, but difficulty in controlling Cap here takes it down quite a few notches. The system here is a pretty obvious attempt at recreating the award-winning and pretty innovative free-flow combat system of Batman: Arkham Asylum, but falls short of that very high standard because of the difficulty in directing Cap between targets. Where in Arkham it was relatively easy to direct which targets Batman would trade off from, with Cap it’s kind of a crap shoot. There were a few scenarios when I wanted him to move from one target to another directly behind me, but the system seems to just favor whichever target is closest to you, which may not always be the correct course of action.

Cap is also very, very prone to taking damage through this game. Even the shield, while great when initiated correctly, cannot fully save you from a more powerful enemy. One hit from an enemy literally knocked off 25% of Cap’s health, and I think it’s frankly stupid that his health doesn’t even slowly regenerate over time. With the super-soldier serum pumping through his veins, it would make sense that the game would acknowledge Cap’s regenerative capabilities by having regenerative health. Nope. Instead, if you want to regen any health, you’ll have to fill up a critical strike bar (right above the health on your HUD) and use one of them to partially return some of your hit points. While the critical strikes are pretty cool slow-motion scenes to watch, it’s frustrating to have to rely on them to replenish a weakened health bar.

The system for blocking is helpful, but the execution is confusing. Because throwing the shield is initiated by the right trigger, you’d think the natural follow-up to block would be the left trigger. Instead, on the Xbox 360 the block button is the left bumper. The left trigger initiates Cap’s targeted throwing stance. Now, if any part of this game should’ve copied Arkham Asylum, it was this. If you remember back to that game, the left trigger was crouch and the right trigger controlled your batarang. If you held the right trigger, then you’d move to a targeted stance. If you just tapped the right trigger, then you threw a batarang “from the hip.” A system akin to this for using the shield would’ve made things flow much easier.

Cap is also kind of difficult to just move. For a super-soldier with strength and reflexes beyond that of a regular soldier, he sure can’t run very fast. When you jump or try to evade, it looks cool, but the animations are so static that you can’t control where he might end up if you need to. It’s also way too difficult to simply turn a corner, because the character’s turning radius is awful. If you try and turn a direct corner, chances are you’ll walk right into a wall.

The diversity of enemies is limited as well. You will encounter maybe four or five different enemy types before taking bosses into account, and the game gives you all of them pretty fast. This can make for a pretty repetitive combat experience, because each one only has a single tactic you can use to defeat them. While the regular combat is pretty fun, by the time I got to a bigger enemy type I found myself groaning. The boss fights are generally just longer versions of bigger enemy fights, which makes them boring. All in all, the regular combat you find yourself in through most of the game will be fun to play, but everything surrounding that can tend to be kind of a drag.

It also seems like you have to pillage nearly everything you see in order to gain any of the games unlockables. Each object you pick up, ranging from dossier files (why would you leave a dossier file on a ledge outside your train station?) to ceramic eggs, gives between 10-50 “intelligence points.” Since I’m a classic Cap fan, I’d like to unlock the original costume. How many intel points do I need to do this? 25,000.

Wow.

After going through the game once, I’m just over halfway there. That’s insane, and takes a lot of the fun out of it.

As far as the story of the game is concerned, I applaud the effort to try and make the game weave into the timeline of the film that just came out, but really, the end result is kind of a mess. There’s only a few places in the film that this game could have taken place in, and it seems like the order of tying into the film is a little too tall for this game. I’m also annoyed that one of the greatest highlights from both the film and the comics, the Red Skull, is little more than a glorified cameo in this game. The voice acting also tends to drag quite a bit, except for the performance of Chris Evans, reprising his role from the film as Captain America himself. The rest of the voice work is unremarkable and pretty generic.

In the end, Captain America: Super Soldier is a hell of a lot better than Thor: God of Thunder, but lacks the fun that defined Green Lantern: Rise of the Manhunters. So, it’s a pretty unremarkable movie tie-in that could’ve been a much better experience had simple common sense been implemented in a few places. I think that Captain America as a character deserves better, but when I see what else we’ve gotten this year, I also realize that things could’ve been much worse. That’s hardly an excuse or justification for mediocrity though, and I hope that future Marvel games look to a higher standard than one just motivated by cash-grabbing.

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Review by: Chris Clow

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Review - Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time 3D

Wed, 12 Oct 2011 16:18:50 -0400

It is December 24th, 1998, and my teenage self is restless; more restless than I’ve ever been on any previous Christmas Eve. I knew that when I woke up, after all the hype and anticipation, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time would finally be mine. The proceeding weeks provided some of the most memorable and influential moments of my gaming history. Ocarina changed everything.

After playing this masterpiece I realized the potential video games had as an entertainment medium. If it wasn’t forOcarina, I probably wouldn’t be working where I am today nor have the love for my favorite pastime that I do now. I’m sure that every hardcore gamer had this epiphany, and mine was adventuring through a 3D Hyrule. For an entire decade following I didn’t play a game that was better.

It is now 2011, the 25th anniversary of the Legend of Zelda franchise and the perfect time to re-release one of gaming’s greatest treasures. Does Ocarina hold up 13 years later? Should a new generation of gamers who never experienced OoT see what all the hype is about? The answer to these questions are both an emphatic “Yes!”

For those who never played Ocarina, or those looking for a refresher, OoT was the fifth major entry in the Legend of Zelda series and the first done in three dimensions. The game follows our favorite Kokori hero Link as he adventures from dungeon to dungeon in order to save the captured Princess Zelda from the evil Gannondorf. As with every Zelda title, each dungeon is a near-perfect balance of action and puzzle with a new weapon waiting to be found and used on the more advanced puzzles and bosses. The titular item, the Ocarina of Time, can be used to for a number of things like summoning your trusty steed Epona, warping you to different locations around Hyrule and transporting you back and forth in time.

What made Ocarina so iconic was the potent combination of adventure, charm, and music. I still laughed at King Zora awkwardly squeaking across his throne, I couldn’t stop smiling when crossing Hyrule field for the first time, and the great faeries still creep me out. A gambit of emotions ran through me the whole way through; everything accented by one of the best soundtracks ever created for a video game. From the simple item shop music to the incredible Guerdo Valley theme, the music in Ocarina is nothing short of magical.

Nintendo and developer Grezzo have kept the core game in tact, changing only the features that were necessary for the 3DS hardware. Gone are the polygon models of the N64; this remastered version is as beautiful as we imaginedOcarina to be when we were younger. Inventory and action buttons have been altered to fit the cramped 3DS layout. Grezzo takes away a quick inventory slot normally mapped to the C-buttons on a N64 controller, but adds two touch screen inventory spaces to make up for it. Even the Iron boots can be mapped to one of these touch screen inventory spaces, making the dreaded Water temple much more manageable.

With the bottom screen displaying Link’s health, quick inventory and menus, the top screen is left completely uncluttered allowing for a gorgeous widescreen view of Hyrule. The only displays on the top screen are a mini map and the ever important A button, telling you what you can push, pull or attack.

At the time, Z-Targeting was a revolutionary new mechanic for 3rd person gaming. The enemy lock-on feature still works great today, and is arguably better than some action titles on the current generation of consoles. Aiming down your projectile weapons has been given gyroscope enhancements that work well as long as you don’t have the 3D on to give you a headache. I still opted for using the analog stick to aim, but gyroscope aiming moves much faster and is just as effective.

The overall 3D effect is arguably the best seen on the system yet. With the slider on full blast the environments are deep and the framerate seemingly keeps the same speed as with the 3D turned down. I found myself however, like every 3DS game I play, eventually turning down the 3D a couple hours into the game, specifically when I was in Jabbu Jabbu’s belly. Every breath the giant fish took messed with my eyes to the point where I only turned the 3D back on during important scenes.

New additions to the game are few and far between, but mostly serve the game well. Sheikah Stones are Ocarina’shint system, lighting the way for the new generation of gamers. When you complete the game it unlocks the Master Quest mode - the more difficult / mirrored version of Ocarina. It would have been nice to have Master Quest unlocked from the beginning since a lot of gamers will be revisiting OoT, but either way it’s nice to have it on the cartridge. Navi has a few new lines to annoy you with, insisting that you take a break from the 3D every so often. If Navi were a little more descriptive with her hints, maybe she wouldn’t be the thorn in Link’s side that she is. A boss gauntlet mode is the last new feature, and can be accessed from Link’s tree house in Kokori Village.

The only major issue I wish Grezzo would have changed is the spawn system. If I were to save and quit in Hyrule Castle, I would respawn across the world in Kokori Forest when I returned to my save file. Back in 1998 we weren’t spoiled enough to care about a reliable spawn system, but for 2011 this might wear down a younger gamers attention span. A quick save option would have easily remedied this situation. I understand the desire to leave a masterpiece as unaltered as possible, but I think this is a small enough issue to tackle.

Minor gripes aside, Ocarina of Time is still a wonderful game. It was light years ahead of it’s time, and because of that it holds up enough to remain enjoyable throughout. I feel hesitant when revisiting something so prominent from my childhood for fear of it not being the same as I remembered. For better or worse, Ocarina is exactly the same game that I put on a pedestal so long ago. Whether you are coming back to Hyrule after a long trip away, or riding Epona around on your first adventure, The Legend of Zelda Ocarina of Time 3D deserves to be in your 3DS library. Now if you’ll excuse me, I have some fishing in Lake Hylia to do.

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Review by: Janio Suppini

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