I Don't Belong in Skyrim

Hey, it's Reuben again, and I think I can safely say I just had literally the most frustrating experience with a video game in my entire life...

...and I've played Simpson's Skateboarding, Glover for Playstation 1, and Kane and Lynch, you know.

I've even played as Frank West until I couldn't handle it anymore, but never before have I been so quickly turned off and frustrated and anxious by a game so quickly. It was nice when it was nice, but then it wasn't. I think it irritated me so much that I have some stress related acne on my chin I didn't have two hours ago.

Saying this will be as unpopular as when I say how awful of a movie I thought Avatar was, an opinion which I still maintain. But settle in, because here it comes - I actually hate Skyrim so far. I think it's been terrible. It is so unconscionably frustrating I don't know how I can go on. Here is why.

As well, using Matt Muzzy rules, anything that might be construed as a spoiler will be in red. Here goes...


I'll first say that this game by no means, in theory, is a bad game. However, completely ruining all redeeming factors it may have to me is a sloppy and wet smorgasbord of technical shortcomings related to the progression and mechanics that all just smack of mistakes amateurish to even a Playstation 1 game and the part where I ALWAYS DIE. They are so prevalent that I simply cannot believe it has received so many accolades and high marks. I was so dumbfounded by this that I actually had to pause and think, genuinely, "is this the greatest prank ever? Is this game really actually so horrible that people pretend to love it so others will fall into the same trap? Is this the "The Room" of video-games?" Of course, it is not, and it would seem people honestly love this game as much as they say they do. I am not one of them. In fact, the only reason I am writing this is for a distraction so I don't go to bed livid. To conclude this intro paragraph, what the actual Hell?

I initially let this one slide under my radar because I thought it didn't look like my style. It seemed boring, tedious, nerdy and forgettable. I didn't even give it the time of day. It was so forgettable that I don't even remember the moment I decided to not give it any credence. Then it came out, and people were so excited I feel like many of THEM came, all over twitter and the rest of the Internet. Unreasonably inappropriate play on words aside, people went bonkers. I couldn't escape it. It seemed EVERYBODY owned and loved this game. Not just loved; more than a few people said it was the best game ever made. There is no way.

So I thought I should maybe give it a second look. Maybe I'd prejudged too soon. I've never been one to give fantasy much of a shot, but I thought this might be the game.

I got the game as my big Christmas present, and I finally played it. Yeah, my initial prediction was much closer to base than I thought.

I'll admit, I clocked in several hours because I have no friends or a girlfriend or many current hobbies or activities of significance, and I'll admit, for most of those hours I genuinely was kind of enjoying it. I started off rough, though. First, I spent like a half hour designing my character (a dark elf that looks like Abe Lincoln) and when I thought I pressed enter, the game scrapped it and started over for some reason. I had to do it again.

And soon after, this led way to the biggest, terminal, game-killing cancerous cyst on the side of Skyrim - relentless attackings from the game's other characters. Not just even characters! Pivotal characters! Ones you need! You slip up once and they will have it in for you. They will kill you. You can't avoid it. You can't run, and if you saved within the time the character consciously made the decision to kill you, you've made your bed. It's over. I had to RESTART a game because I accidentally struck the first actual character, Hadvar, that I met, and he needed to kill me. Then, when he'd succeed, I would spawn back where I began - right before him killing me. I couldn't not get killed either, because he was too strong and I couldn't escape and I couldn't even kill him! I was trapped. I had to actually RESTART. I chose to go with Ralof this time around, and I decided to watch my step and not strike him with a sword. But come on, it's a video game: there's no way I'm the only person who struggles with self-restraint with video-games. Every good person does, and game companies are suppose to recognize this and accommodate and be forgiving. Skyrim doesn't. Instead, they give me a huge middle-finger in the form of a not-even-very-impressively-designed Nord. The whole game doesn't even look that nice. It plays like, once again, a Playstation 1 game if you ask me...or a PS2 if I'm being generous.

In fact, as I was playing initially and having a moderately enjoyable time, I couldn't help but draw the parallels regardless Skyrim seems to have with the Uncharted series, Bioshock and Red Dead Redemption. I thought, "If all these games collided at high speeds into Assassin's Creed's boring ass and a Big Daddy pissed on the carnage, you'd have Skyrim."

Think about it. Draw the similarities. Bioshock's first person, hands projected and shooting our flames dynamic, Red Dead's necessity to round up useless items everywhere you go, Uncharted's underground ruins and catacomb types things, and like every single game that has ever had a catacomb, horrible zombies that are nearly impossible to kill. And mostly, Assassin's Creed's tedious repetitiveness and boring time period. It's pretty indisputable, but sadly the aspects that it seems to borrow from other games aren't even the best parts of those games. I think the Uncharted series is leaps and bounds better than this, Bioshock is my favorite game ever, and Red Dead was at least playable and had a fantastic storyline that made me want to play it. Even Assassin's Creed was better, and I couldn't even finish that.

I don't even want to play Skyrim anymore. I don't like it. I don't like the animations, the perpetually pissed off and ravenous characters, the story is boring, the environment is sparse and cold...I don't even know what I DO like about it. Every time I found something I liked, I would literally just get killed. Every. Single Time. For example, a fox is my favorite animal. I found on in a valley and I decided to run around with it. I wasn't going to kill it or anything - I wouldn't even dream of doing that even in a video game - and it was really nice and relaxing. There was glorious fantasy music and the cute little fox was panting, and it was harmless and pleasurable...and then some goddamn wolves killed the shit out of me. Just like that. I couldn't even chase a fox without pissing off some wolves for no reason. Then the fox was gone. FFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUU

But I just think the worst part is how definite it is. You accidentally kill a guy or make him angry, and it's irreversible. "Fuck you," says Skyrim. "Deal with it you asshole." I've figured out why every single person in Riverwood is trying to kill me too. I killed a single chicken I shouldn't have. That's it. Before an elf, Faendor, was trying to kill me because I was simply on his property. No, I actually just walked past it. I can't talk to him now to finish a mission because I pissed him off. That part of the storyline is wrecked irreversibly. Now the next person I'm supposed to talk to, Ralof's sister Gerdur, for the progression of the game is trying to brutally destroy me...and she's also unkillable (at least to my knowledge). I can't leave the town fast enough because they will chase me, I can't fast travel, and I can't find refuge in a building because they spawn inside of every one I go into. I find myself trapped again...because I killed a chicken. I killed a chicken and ruined the entire game. Is that how this whole stupid thing is? Moments earlier I walked into a pub, and I kid you not, I kneeled down - that is ALL I DID - and the barkeep started to attack me with a huge massive battle-ax with his wife. They killed me several times. Oh my god. Now I can't go back into the pub without them trying to kill me, because I committed the sin of kneeling near a cheese on a table. Of course, I can't even BE IN Riverwood because EVERYBODY IS TRYING TO KILL ME AT ALL TIMES. I completed a Dragon's Claw mission, which took like three hours, and when I went to return it I found I hadn't actually completed it. I needed to go back and kill one zombie I had neglected to kill because I didn't walk near enough to a wall that would trigger the spawning of the zombie. So, I went BACK again, then I went to Riverwood to complete the stupid mission finally. I went to Lucan Valerious's shop and before I handed him the Dragon's Claw I went upstairs. I saw a bottle of wine on the table. There wasn't anybody up there, right? No, I was all alone. I decided to take the bottle of wine...and FROM DOWNSTAIRS, Lucian Valerian screams "you shouldn't have done that!" and runs up and kills me with his sister. This sister, if I can remind you, whose boyfriend tried to kill me because I walked past his house. Is this because I am a Dark Elf? Are they racist to Dark Elves in Skyrim? What is it?!

I'm only going to finish playing this thing (if I even physically CAN and if Riverwood will let me if I can run FAST ENOUGH to Whiterun because I DON'T EVEN HAVE A HORSE) because it was a very nice gift and I own it and there's no way I could sell it and get that money back. But I really don't want to. I like games with men in suits and hats and relatively modern politics. I am still so excited about Bioshock Infinite and Grand Theft Auto V, and if any of those come out while I'm playing Skyrim, I'm going to drop this shit like a hot potato. Hopefully I'll be able to kill a chicken in Bioshock Infinite without a whole city trying to massacre me forever and ever after.

I give Skyrim so far a D-

Batman: Arkham City

I played through Batman Arkham City a few weeks ago. I got it the day and came out and was so freaking excited since I absolutely loved the original Arkham Asylum. I was not disappointed. Well… maybe a little bit. But not really. SPOILERS will be in RED.

Arkham City is a game that I would put on my list the top 10 games ever made (that I’ve played). Althogh, since it’s a super hero game, it doesn’t have a lot of competition in that genre since all super hero games genuinely suck. But this game. By god! It’s almost a masterpiece! (still talking about Asylum). The sequel, Arkham City, took all of what made Asylum good and built on it. It kept in the combat (which is amazing) and improved on it further! Now you can take down 3 enemies at once as well as other new special ability additions.

The combat in Batman is superb. I can’t stress that enough. In a lot of games, I tend to dread fighting. Sometimes I’ll even go out of my way to sneak around enemies so I won’t have to fight them. Games put in experience point systems to try and coax you into fighting people, which Batman does as well. However, another way to coax players in to fighting is to make the combat so much fun to play! In this game, I will willingly fling myself into an enormous group of enemies and salivate as I beat the living shit out of all of them with the fluidity of a dancing flame! You don’t even have to be skilled! You can take it slow and careful in an attempt to time your strikes just right in order to build up combos for greater attacks OR you can just mash the shit out of the buttons and pummel everyone in sight! It’s really the perfect system.

Playing as different characters is fun. I remember hearing someone say before this games’ release that Catwoman felt the same as Batman in combat situations, so I wasn’t expecting much, but whoever said that was obviously an idiot. Yeah, she has the same controls, but she has unique moves, quicker actions, and a unique set of weapons. Outside of combat, she is pretty much like Spiderman the way she climbs up the sides of buildings and uses her whip to swing around rooftops. If you download the Catwoman pack before playing the game, it includes all of her story chapters into the game, giving you a break from the Batman story line. After the game is completed, you can free roam around the city and switch between the 2 characters at will.

Robin is only available in the challenge maps, which is a shame. He actually fights very well and has a sweat staff that he uses to smack people around. He even does a sort of spin kick thing ala Neo from Matrix Reloaded. He’s slower than Catwoman, but quicker than Batman. A nice medium. Hopefully we will get to play more as him in the next game (assuming there is a next game)

Arkham City had a set of comic books that prelude it. They kind of worked to connect the end of the last game with the beginning of this new one and I definitely recommend them if you haven’t yet started this game. They don’t reveal anything pivotal, but they do set the scene nicely so you have some idea of what you are getting into. I thought of it as a pretty cool idea.

This paragraph is kind of spoilery? Maybe? But it only spoils the opening scene, which I don’t think is much of a spoiler, but it’s important. The opening scene is one the best scenes in the game. It is VERY reminiscent of the opening scene to Half Life 2 where you are shoved through a containment camp and you are pretty much helpless but to obey the orders of your captors. This time however, you are Bruce Wayne being locked into Arkham City. What makes this good is the whole idea of “interactive cut scenes”. Most of the time, cutscenes take the control away from the player as a movie plays. Half Life 2 doesn’t have cut scenes like that. All of the action happens in front of you as you are still in control of your character. If someone is speaking to you, you can either stand and watch them, or you can wonder around the room while you listen. The game still gets its cutscene information in, but the player always stays “in the game”. This first scene of Batman is exactly that, and that is why it’s amazing. The only problem is, it’s the only scene like it in the whole game. LOL!

The graphics may not be up to par with games like MF3 and there may not be destructible environments like in BF3, but this game is gorgeous. It was kind of weird when they would have some cut scenes pre rendered and some rendered in game, but it wasn’t jarring or anything. The prerendered character models were amazing! Especially Batman’s mouth when he talked. Great work. Some character models were visibly less detailed than others. This is made even more apparent in the games Model Viewer Mode where you can actually unlock the character models and zoom into their little details (just like in Arkham Asylum). Lesser villains had models that weren’t as well done as main villains like the Joker for example. But they all looked pretty damn good.

The last game left me wanting more. And this game gave me more! More villains! I love Batman villains. The Batman universe has the best set of villains out of any other (with Spiderman coming in second my opinion of course) I pretty much got to see all of my favorites. The only problem however is that so many villains were squeezed in that a couple felt very rushed. I wish they could take the time to flesh out all of the villains equally, but I mean, there’s only so much you can do for one game. They actually squeezed in so many villains that I’m not sure if there is anyone left to do another sequel. They are either going to have to bring back quite a few or dig out some really obscure names for a third title.

The gadgets this time are cool. There are not a whole lot of new editions (and you start the game with MANY of the gadgets you ended with in the last game, which was very cool) but the new ones were definitely pivotal to certain puzzles and they integrated them well into the gameplay.

Boss fights are nice! Every one is different and not just rehashes of the same maneuvers over and over again. In the last game you pretty much just did the same thing over and over with boss fights, but in this one, you actually have to find patterns and figure out how to beat the guys. (I even had to look online at one point because I had no clue how to beat one guy LOL)

The free roaming aspect is done pretty well. Flying around is fun. I felt there were a LOT of enemies strewn about though after a while. I’m all for groups of thugs to beat up, but they put a LOT of armed guys on rooftops around the middle of the game. I don’t like guns a lot because it forces you to be stealthy and that takes a while (for my at least). I started to fear rooftop jumping because there would be gunners around every corner. Kind of irritating, but whatever.

The actual story portion of the game runs about 50% of the completion. THAT was a little irritating. Here I think I have a whole second half of the game to go only to find that about 50% is f’n challenge maps. I for one am not really into the whole “challenge maps” thing, so I pretty much only bought half a game… So yeah, it’s a little disappointing. BUT, I still have Riddler missions to complete I guess. There are side missions as well (I think about 9 or so) Those are kind of fun and are good to break up the main storyline a bit. Certain villains are exclusive to these side missions, and you don’t really have to even do them if you don’t want, but you’re missing out. You can always beat them after the game though of course, but I found it’s best to do them before the end.

Adding to the disappointing aspect and idea of rushed villains: fucking Dr. Hugo Strange. This whole time, Hugo was booked as the MAJOR VILLAIN. He was the mastermind behind this whole operation. HELL! It even came to be that he master mind the entire LAST game as well! It turns out he was Warden’s Sharpe’s psychiatrist and Hugo kind of controlled Sharpe in a way, leading him to create Arkham City and leading him to trap Batman inside of it. This guy is a genious! He can’t be beaten! He’s all powerful! Wrong. It comes time to find Hugo and you climb to the top of this giant puzzle tower, which I guess is daunting, but after playing through Infamous with an even larger tower, it wasn’t that epic. Hugo is at the top, locked in a room with armed guards. I take out the guards using stealth and walking through vents like normal, and then that’s it. I get to Hugo and it turns out he’s not really the main villain and he was doing all of this to try and take over as the leader of the League of Shadows, blah blah blah. So Ra’s sl Ghul kills him and then DIES AS WELL! WHAT THE FUCKING FUCK!? After all of that, building up to the smartest fucking villain ever, and he dies in 2 seconds (during a cut scene no less) and the REAL mastermind behind everything dies as well!?? IN THE SAME CUT SCENE!?!?!?!? WHAT!?!?

If you can’t tell, I was pretty pissed at this. Then Joker comes out and fumbles his way into the main villain roll (of course) yadda yadda yadda. Jeez Louise. What a letdown.

Basically, this game starts perfectly paced and AMAZING, starts to speed up, becomes rushed, and then ends abruptly. The ending is decent, but like… it just didn’t build up properly to the conclusion in my point of view.

Pretty much, when it’s all said and done, Batman: Arkham City is still an amazing game. It’s just as awesome as the first game if not better. But it is a little disappointing in the fact that it started so strong only to get more and more rushed as time went on. Still a great experience overall though. And if you are a fan of Batman, this thing is a MUST OWN.

Pros:

One of the greatest and most fun combat systems

One of the greatest casts of villains ever

Starts off amazingly and really hooks you

Improved boss confrontations

Looks great

Cons:

Doesn't continue using HL2 cutscenes like it does in the opening

Begins to feel rushed towards the end

iOS App Hedgehog Adventure is Too Cute for its Challenge

Update (02/10/11): Much to my chagrin, it seems that after this review was posted, an update for this app was released just a few days before (literally, like 09/29 was when the update was available). This update has greatly improved the app's performance on my device, but what I failed to see was that it also has a glitch that disables the first level to be actually completed. I have been notified by several people of this, late, late last night, and all I can say for any unfortunate buyers is that you'll just have to wait for another update. I'm looking into contacting the publisher today to notify them of the bug. Regardless, I did finally beat the game, and I can assure any concerned buyers that it's definitely a really fun and challenging game. It's the only app I've downloaded that has given me a significant, fair challenge and it was fun until the end. I'm disappointed it's over, but it has a really cool (and super easy) final level, followed by a short level that's more of just a high score attack. All in all, if I had purchased it, I would have been satisfied, but I only say this because I like the retro challenging feel to the game, and I had a lot of fun with it!

I'm extremely surprised by this review. Here's why; this app was free when I came across it, and upon booting it up, I figured it would be deleted shortly. I only ever feel compelled to write a review if I find the game worth the money at which it is priced, or if I feel it is severely under appreciated. This game fills both categories, if you're like me; you like a challenging, clever, and polished platformer. If you dislike one of these things, don't get this app. If you're uncertain, there's a free version, titled "Hedgehog Adventure - experiments". I don't know why it is called that, but it seems like the 'lite' version after a quick once-over.

Let me explain; "Hedgehog Adventure" has you play as a little hedgehog who curls up into a ball and you have to control him through 40 different levels, collecting all the pieces of fruit before finding the exit. I first scoffed when I saw that number -- "40 levels? That's child's play!" I exclaimed. I wanted to write this review after I beat the game, but so far, after about 2 weeks, I am on level 33.

Now, that sounds like a lot more time than I actually played this game. Regardless, I am completely shocked at how challenging this game is. However, it's not the frustrating "I can't do this because the game is poorly designed!" Rather, it's the "I know I can do this if I jump here/push this block here/etc." All the puzzles, for all their challenges, can be completed. It's the challenge of figuring out what blocks to use, where to go in what order, and several other factors that make it exciting. Not to mention the introduction of new level gimmicks continues up to the point I'm at; a level I played was mostly barren, until I took a leap of faith and found an invisible platform that appeared when I stepped on it! I know that could be annoying, but for this one level (I haven't seen it since), it was a blast.

Another positive point is none of the levels have ever felt too long. They are all within the scope of completion and are honestly well designed for a platformer/physics puzzle game. Seriously, this is some of the best level design I've ever seen in an app for my iPod.

I think it's worth mentioning the game's art direction as well. To be blunt, this is meant to look like a child's game. It's entirely cutesy -- the fruit bobs up and down, waiting for you to grab it, the platforms are candy cane striped, and when you 'die', your hedgehog just turns into a ghost. I implore older gamers to try and look past this style, however, it hasn't bothered me. It may be that it's because those are the types of games I play (I love the Sonic series for its style) but I can understand how real macho men might have problems playing this game.

Two things I'm not really sold on are the music and the controls. The music seems to be limited to two tracks, and although they are just fine for the purpose they serve...two tracks get tired after two hours spent on this game. Before you freak out because I was talking about stellar platforming before and now I just bashed the game's controls, let me tell you that my iPod is on its way to the great Silicon Valley in the sky. It tends to be unresponsive unless I touch the area near the home button to 'activate' the rest of it. So, the controls sometimes didn't seem responsive or always accurate. While the jump button can be held down to repeat jump, sometimes the direction buttons stopped working. I mention this whole situation because some of the game's reviews mentioned odd controls. So, while they've never really ruined the game for me, they have made me have to restart once in a while.

The last thing that is worth noting is the game's performance. After passing level 10, I ceased having problems, but level 3 and level 10 caused my iPod to crash and I lost my progress in the levels previous. This can be frustrating, sure, but nothing that seriously made me want to rage quit. Just restart the app or your device, or try a different approach to the level are the best solutions I have. I'm also playing on a 2nd Generation device, so that may also be the cause of my problems. Hopefully a stability update will be released in the future.

All in all, this is the classic platforming app that I've been waiting for. It's not exactly a Mario or Sonic, but it feels like how platforming should be in an iOS app. A platformer with great puzzles and some spot on physics, coupled with a cute hedgehog and an environment so cutesy, you'll want to puke.

Pros
Fun platforming
Fair challenges
Really phenomenal level design

Cons
Controls may be wonky (I don't know for sure)
Challenges this tough may be a turn off
Problems with crashing
The puke-worthy cutesy starts with a cheezy "Hello!" when you start the game!

Infamous

Everything about Infamous says it should be a corny, repetitive, and glitchy experience plagued with all of the problems of modern sandbox games. And while it is all of those things, it is an awesome game and deserves all the good praise it gets.

Infamous is about Cole Evans who awakes at the start of the game in the middle of a large crater where a super explosive had just gone off, wiping out a large chunk of the city. The effects of the bomb have spread throughout the rest of the city and now it is quarantined, letting no one in and no one out. To make matters worse, the city is overrun by different gang factions, all of which have gained kinds of super powers from (I’m assuming) the explosion. Cole has powers as well, and can manipulate electricity! However, news gets around that Cole was the carrier for this explosive that threw the city into turmoil (although he remembers none of this) and so the city is very on edge towards him. Cole must now decided whether to try and better his public image by doing good, or take control of the city by any ruthless means necessary; all while trying to unravel the puzzle that is his existence.

The first thing you notice is Cole’s voice, which is really deep and somewhat cheesy. It’s almost Metal Gear Solid-esque. I thought this was going to irritate me for the entire game, but the voice actually grew on me quite fast. It is a super hero game after all, so the voice eventually fits his character.

The second thing I noticed was the actual graphics of this game. The shadows (at least on my consol) were very pixilated. As the game progressed, I noticed many of the electrical effects were the same. Now, I’m using an HDMI cable to hook my PS3 up to a 1080p LED TV, so I don’t think it’s my system. I’m just not sure why some of the graphics would be so splotchy. It could also be the sheer amount of “stuff” that’s crammed into this game, feeding the need to downgrade things like shadow quality.

Don’t get me wrong, the game looks very nice. I was just expecting more from a Playstation 3 title (especially after playing Uncharted) But when you have a very large sandbox environment, that’s to be expected. One thing what I would really LOVE to point out is “bugs”. When you get to the part of the game where you play at night, you can actually see small swarms of bugs gathering around lights. I thought this was a very cool touch added by the developers.

Speaking of the environment, the city itself (Empire City) is sprawling and vast. The game encompasses 3 islands of cityscape. It’s impressive to see how much city there is (especially when you eventually climb to the highest point and can look down on all of it) but if you try to memorize the cities, you’re in for a challenge. This is because there is a large amount of reused areas. It took me a while to figure it out, but after passing the same gas station 4 times, I realized: there is 4 of the same gas station. (there may be more, I didn’t care to go around and count them all. The same goes for boat houses, warehouses, little cemeteries. They all look exactly the same, and so it’s hard to judge exactly where you are without consulting your map. I understand that this is necessary for making a very large city in a sandbox game, but when you think of games like Grand Theft Auto that pulled off a massive city that you could learn and traverse without using a map, you start to want more out of your games. GTA really raised that bar in this genre (which it also created). I’m not saying that the reused areas are bad, I’m just saying that it can become disorienting if you aren’t using your map.

Along with the repetitive environment, there is also repetitive gameplay. Usually when I hear that a game is repetitive, I shy away from it. But Infamous proves that it can still be fun. The game has different missions throughout the city, I want to say there are about 5 or 6 different mission types that you just play over and over in different sections of the city. But even though the mission types are the same, they get more challenging as the game goes on. There are then of course the story missions which are all basically different, but they get more challenging as time goes on. There are also sewer missions which have you go underground to activate large power circuits that turn electricity on for blacked out parts of the city. These missions are fun because with each one you gain a new ability, and the sewer then acts as a tutorial on how to use it before it unleashes you on the city above. So although missions are all basically the same, you get to play then with increasing difficulty and new abilities which give you new ways to complete the tasks.

Part of the games difficulty stems from its enemy types. This game has a LOT of different enemy types. I was impressed. Uncharted had like….2. This game has near 20! More and more enemies are introduced as you progress and each new enemy is increasingly difficult to defeat. It ranges from basic gang member with a gun to flying, grenade launching machines that turn invisible (which are very irritating). The enemies were something I thought the game did a great job with. Even after you beat what you think is a boss, they just throw into the city one day when you are running around! It was also nice to see that the boss battles used attacks and animations that were specific to them and are not seen outside of that fight. So you have to learn the attacks at that moment and know how to move (where as other games just have bosses that are bigger versions of enemies you’ve fought 100 times before)

The checkpoint system (for when you die) is pretty good. It has its faults though. Many times I would die and it would respawn me with a couple less enemies or in the case of chase scenes, would put me a bit further along than I was, kind of adapting to my abilities (or lack there of) which I thought was kind of nice. Some people may find irritating. But there are other times when it’s the complete opposite and spawns you right in the middle of a roof top surrounded by enemies that all immediately fire upon you (I find THAT irritating) But all in all, it felt pretty good.

Controls are pretty good. You can jump and dodge and attack and all that stuff. You hold a shoulder button to go into an over the shoulder, 3rd person shooter, style camera and can fire on enemies with electric energy bolts. The more powers you unlock, the more buttons there are to press. Eventually you have the entire controller filled with attacks that you can use. You can also upgrade all of these attacks by gaining experience points for things like defeating enemies and completing missions. The attacks also use your electric energy which you can recharge by sucking energy from electronics like cars and street lamps and whatnot. Collecting “blast-shards” around the city will increase the amount of energy you can hold at one time.

An irritating part of the controls is climbing. You can climb ANYTHING in the city and go pretty much anywhere you want. You just need to jump at something and Cole will grab on. But this can get glitchy; which is expected in this kind of game. Sometimes he won’t grab something unless you jump at it just right, or sometimes something will be just out of reach and you have to find an alternate route, but later found out you could just get a running start and make it up. Climbing down is an even bigger pain. If you hit the drop button, Cole just drops down to the next ledge no matter what. So you either have to jump completely off the building and land who-knows-where, or sit there and hit the drop button some 50 times to make it all the way to the bottom. (I think they fixed this though for Infamous 2 by including a button that you have to hold in order to hold on to a ledge (ala Shadow of the Colossus)) This can be especially irritating in high pressure situations like chases or when you are running for cover.

Speaking of which, there is a cover system! But I barely ever used it. I’m usually the kind of guy that uses cover all the time. In Uncharted I was behind cover about 98% of the time. In Infamous, it was just easier to fly over someone’s head and fill their face with bolts of lightning quick enough to kill them dead before they killed you. Cover also becomes obsolete when you have enemies that do nothing but shoot missiles or grenades at you. It was a nice touch, but something that could be greatly improved.

One of the biggest features of the game is its moral dilemmas. You can either be good or bad basically. Cole can either help all of the people in Empire City and reach Hero status, or he can kill and steal from people and become Infamous. Even though the game’s title is Infamous, I decided to go the hero route. In a game full of villains and gang members, the people NEED a hero! Both paths give you slightly different moves which you can look at in your pause menu. I really didn’t see a whole lot of difference in them except when you are going bad, your electricity becomes red instead of blue. When you are good and complete good missions, the citizens of the city stop to take photos of you, come to you for help, and even help you fend off enemies by throwing rocks and stuff. When you are bad, people throw the rocks at you, and also run up and push you and stuff like that. I’m assuming since the city is full of people, going the “bad” route would make the game a little more difficult because practically everyone would be an enemy; but I look forward to playing through again, being evil this time.

The NPCs in this game are hit and miss. To me, all of Cole’s friends and family were really irritating. Not sure why he hung out with them. There are a couple others though that were decent, but all in all, I think Cole would be better off running alone. The story itself is pretty decent actually. It’s not super corny, even though it is a little. It’s got some pretty good twists and turns that left me feeling pretty good ( can’t wait to get to 2!)

The cutsenes are all animated comic book style. This may throw some people off (threw me off at first) but they actually aren’t that bad. They add some style to the game and make it different. The art is also very well done in these, and even though they are stills, there are slight animations that make them come alive.

All in all, Infamous is a fun adventure. I really enjoyed the freedom you had and always looked forward to new missions. This is why I’m so anxious to play the second game now! I’m hoping that in Infamous 2 you get to keep all of his powers from the end of 1. I know one thing they improved in 2 is walking on water. I know from the demo in 2 you can run on water for a limited time before falling in, whereas in 1 you just splash around and slowly die unless you can jump out in time.


Pros
Fun gameplay
Many different enemy types
Many different powers
Decently good story
Repetitive done well

Cons
Repetitive nonetheless
Can be kind of corny at times
Reused areas in city makes it hard to know your way around
Glitchy climbing and cover system

Sonic Colors Has a Short Reach for the Stars

I held off on Sonic Colors for almost a year because I hate my Wii. I resent its place in the market, as well as my home. However, I should have tried this little gem sooner!

Sonic Colors is the newest entry in the "not sucky" Sonic game series. I've been day-one-purchasing all the newest titles because I love the series, but I can fully recognize their swift decline. Just ask fellow writer Matt Muzzy about the experience I put him through with Sonic '06! I was pleasantly delighted in playing this game, as my biggest complaint (of very few) is the brief nature of this game. I purchased it and beat it in less than 12 hours from the time of purchase. Total playtime was probably about 3 hours.

Of course, there's still 100%ing to be done, with a just reward at the end (seriously, it's exciting), but I have gone through all the levels and bosses and have even completed 50% of the "extra" in such a short time. I will admit that those three hours were almost straight, pure fun.

To begin, I suppose I should point to the co-op levels. Though there are only 21 basic and short co-op "remakes" of the various Sonic 1 zones, they were a blast to play through with a friend of mine. It was very much like playing through New Super Mario Bros. Wii but actually having a good time with it. The levels were challenging and fun, and the mechanics require teamwork. However, it's kind of frustrating that your Sonic wants to constantly homing-attack the other Sonic. In this case, the simple remedy would have been to map the homing attack button to another button, rather than share it with the double jump button. It was a frustration, though, that made me laugh, not eternally hate the other person (a la NSMBW).

I actually played through the story mode after playing through a third of the co-op levels. I was pleasantly surprised with a majority of it -- the levels were rather well designed, the camera was well-improved, and the locales were inspiring and really pretty. On that note, the graphics here are top notch; every world is populated so well and has a lot going on in it. There are some ugly pieces, but they are just pieces to a grander scheme. I want to make note that the levels, in comparison to Super Mario Galaxy, are much more impressive. Though perhaps not as refined, they are much more interesting because they offer a "fullness" to them -- something that a game set strictly in space loses.

All in all, right now is a good time to get Sonic Colors. I don't think $50 was a fair price point, but the game is really fun and if you are a completionist, it has great replay value. It's also the first game in a long while that offers a just reward for completing everything. It's a great game for a rainy day and it's definitely one of the Wii's few greatest games (IMO).

Pros:

Charming and fun

Beautiful locations

Good Replay Value

Cons:

Way too short!

Story is...terrible

Rough, goofy dialogue

Wishing I hadn't discovered [Uncharted] Drake's Fortune

This game may be the worst downward spiral I’ve ever played. Spoilers will be in RED.

Uncharted has garnered quite a bit of attention since its release. People praise it for its amazing graphics and cinematic style of gameplay. It is said to look like a movie at times, which is true. I was interested in it since 2007 but only recently was able to pick it up when I bought a PS3 for the first time. I thought I might as well by Uncharted as my first PS3 game since it is seen as one of the Playstation’s crown jewels.
It is a 3rd person shooter, action adventure title with many plat forming elements. The game begins and is pretty breathtaking. You begin to get to know the characters and everything starts to unfold. It has a very Indiana Jones feel to it, and I love that. You adventure through the jungle and some ruins and you climb rocks and trees and stuff. The climbing reminds me a lot of Shadow of the Colossus (which is my favorite game of all time) so it was easy for me to get hooked.
Then the gun fights began. I knew it was inevitable so I held my breath and ran into battle. The controls were nice enough and I got through. The only problem is the gun fights never stopped. Fire fights soon rook precedence over the actual “adventuring” portion of the game. As the game progressed, instead of having climbing and puzzle solving challenges with some gun fights in between, it became more and more of a fire fight where you have to turn a knob every once in a while. And don’t get me started on fucking jet skis!! UHG!!
There are also many parts where you are climbing and jumping around environments and (unless you know exactly where to go) you have to guess and check. This usually ends with you falling to your death. But instead of you spawning anywhere near where you had died, you have to start the whole thing all over again. That’s not to say the check point system in the game isn’t good, because it is. The moment you get somewhere its saves (I even had the game freeze a particularly crucial moment and it actually saved exactly where I was when I turned it back on) but it’s when you are doing climbing puzzles that I wish it would actually save where you are in the room and not just making you start the whole freaking thing over again.
Not to mention this one time there was a gap I had to jump. I tried jumping it 10 times and feel and died each time. I kept trying though because it was the only place I could see to go. I finally broke down and went to Gamefaqs and low and behold I WAS DOING THE RIGHT THING!! I went back and tried 5 more times and I made it across. It’s the multiple moments like that that make this game frustrating.
What was the most frustrating? When the fucking monsters came out. No, I mean literally. Monsters come out. Yeah! It was at that point the whole game was ruined for me. I actually didn’t even finish the game. After my 13th attempt to run through a corridor of giant clawed zombie monsters that kill you with one slash, I put the game away (it’s a good thing I bought it used or else I’d feel bad). When I started this game, I was looking forward to a realistic adventure. Not a goddamn Guillermo Del Toro movie. It figures that this game would be looked at so highly by the “gaming” community. I should have known fucking zombies would come out.
Uncharted started off amazingly and turned into a nightmare. And no, I still haven’t beaten it to the end because I was so frustrated. I may go back and finish it since I do want to know what happens in the story, and I kind of wanted to play Among Thieves and the new one that’s coming out soon, but now I don’t even know anymore. I’ll probably just go out and get Infamous and start playing that franchise. Thankfully the HD ICO and Shadow bundle is set to release in a month or two.

UPDATE: I beat the game. Ya. The explanation for the zombies kind of made the idea better. Even Indiana Jones has strange and paranormal stuff like that in the movies, so I guess I can live with it. I was reading a little about Uncharted 2 to make sure there were no zombies in it. Turns out there are Sasquatches LOL!! It just figures. I will never look at this series the same way.

The last fight pissed me off because it played out just like that time I mentioned before where I was jumping that gap and couldn't make it, only this time it was a fight. I thought I knew what to do and I tried it over and over and just couldn't get it to work. So, usually when one thing doesn't work, you try another. I tried to do this fight scene about 13 times and nothing I did could keep Nathan from getting killed so I went online again, and low and behold, the answer was what I was doing from the beginning. I tried it a couple more times and it worked... uhg. It really makes a "dramatic ending" lose all of its drama when you have to replay the scene over and over 20 times. Maybe I just suck at games. Maybe this game sucks. Who am I to judge? I only have a bachelors degree in Game Design LOL

But seriously, the game really isn't that terrible I suppose. But it still doesn't live up to the hype the gaming community created for it. Uncharted 2 is suppose to be better though, which I hope is true.

Pros:

Pretty good visuals

Fun dialog and characters

Did actually feel like a movie sometimes

Fun environmental puzzle solving

Cons:

What was mentioned in the spoilers...

Too much gun fighting and not enough adventure

Some spots are difficult for stupid reasons

Hard to find things may be too hard to find at times

Check Points vary in convenience

In Defense Of: Dark Void

I can understand some of the scores this game received when it was first released. I'll say it right off the bat: the controls can be crazy-wonky at times, the story is a bit loopy, some levels are too small while others are too big, and overall it has an aire of disappointment. For a lot of people, they were disappointed with the game as a whole for being so questionable. For me, I was disappointed it never fully reached what it seemed it was supposed to be.

I'll begin by saying this is the only Capcom game that I've owned for a long period of time and have played through twice. I think a majority of what they produce is ultimately exciting, innovative, and really interesting...but upon trying it out, it always just kind of falls short. Dead Rising and Marvel vs. Capcom 3 is my modern case in point. However, Dark Void presents something that I just can't explain.

Dark Void started as a game Capcom hired a western game studio (Airtight Games with employees who were involved with Crimson Skies) to produce, in hopes of beginning a new IP and attracting western audiences. Unfortunately, it failed. It had a great number of elements to it, looking back; a score done by Bear McCreary (Battlestar Galactica), a relatively unused gimmick (jetpack), and such an interesting story. Not to mention, it was made in an effort to make new IPs during the times of Mirror's Edge, which I feel very strongly about. What ultimately resulted in its failure was the lackluster reviews it received, the fact that it was new and not a "tried and true" IP, and that it was significantly flawed.

The story follows Pilot Will Grey and his awesome jacket, attempting to save his female interest, Ava, while also reluctantly fighting back an alien race from taking over the Earth. While it's standard Sci-Fi fare, it's told in such a way that reminds me of the mystery of older generations of games -- when there wasn't a Google to search the reasoning behind something or a better explanation of what's going on. I mean, hell, I spent a good hour to two hours attempting to find even a shred of "underground" info on this game's development.

The reason it deserves consumers' time stems from the fact that it just feels ambitious. Playing through it, you realize the confusing elements stem from a lack of time or budget in production and it makes me want to know what the original intent was behind so much of the game. It's support for games like this that will help the games industry move forward, producing new and original content alongside current, established IPs. Unfortunately, the market in just about every industry sucks, and Dark Void was a risk that unfortunately failed to pay off.

And what makes it even more disappointing is it sets up for a sequel that would have been set during WWII. All these confusing elements lead to something that is never going to happen. My only hope is that Brad Pitt's movie company (Plan B) goes through with the production of the movie. Even without the game ties, the story is still such an interesting Sci-Fi.

All I can really say is that if you like third-person cover-based shooters or titles that are mysterious cult hits, then Dark Void is worth the small admission price.

Pros:

Mysterious Sci-Fi story

Fun jetpack mechanic

Phenomenal soundtrack

Cons:

Controls can be irritating

Level design is often lacking

So much left unexplained!

Vanquish

I picked up Sega’s Vanquish a little while back for 19.99. I had my eye on it since I first heard about it. The games director is Shinji Mikami who also directed Resident Evil 4, and it’s for this reason that I was looking to purchase this game new (also because it came with a cool collectors figurine!) Regardless, I ended up choosing NOT to purchase Vanquish at launch and instead waited for the price to drop… which didn’t take long. But I’m glad I did! Not that this game is “bad” per se, but I would be a little upset if I paid 60 buckaroonies on it.

Spoilers will be in RED

Let’s start off a run down of what the game is. Vanquish is a 3rd person shooter that takes place in the (near?) future. The USA has built an enormous space colony thing in order to harbor excess sunlight to use as energy for the people back on Earth. Honestly, most of the story went over my head and I either wasn’t paying attention or they did a bad job of explaining it. But when I do know is that the Russians took over the space station and used its energy as a weapon by destroying San Francisco. The president (who looks very similar to Hillary Clinton) sends a retired and very grumpy Lieutenant Colonel Burns up to the station to take out the evil Russian group that is led by a creepy, flamboyant bald guy. Oh, and Sam’s there too. That who YOU play as!
Sam is from DARPA which is a science and research organization. He’s got a badass suit that not only looks cool, but gives him some sweet abilities. Burns doesn’t like Sam very much because… well, idk. Sam’s mission is actually different from Burns and his men. A scientist from DARPA has also been kidnapped and is on the space colony for some reason, so Sam is sent up there to not only assist in killin’ Russians, but also finding and returning this scientist guy.
Anyway, Sam’s suit is badass, aside from the fact that it has a visor of the mouth and not the eyes. Basically all of the art in this game is nice. It’s probably the games most redeeming quality. Everything fits together well and looks great! (except for Burns’ beard… that thing’s a little iffy) The military forces are easily distinguishable from the enemies, which is always nice. The levels also feel very large even though you are pretty much always confined. It’s really well done.
The enemies are all robots. This is cool because it gives you the ability to use weapons like EMP grenades that makes them all spaz out and leaves them open for attack. Robots are also cool because you can end up fighting some really ridiculous shit. And this game has a variety of crazy shit. It goes from giant mechs with drill arms that can burrow underground and pop up underneath you, to giant piles of scrap metal that flows around like Morpha from Ocarina of Time. You have to dodge its lasers and cut it down to size before attacking its red eyeball. I was very pleased with the diversity of enemies in this game, but the only downside was that they were reused a lot. Every mini boss you would end up fighting at least twice, and later on you’ll have to take on 2 or more of the same thing. And bosses were pretty much the same machine over and over which is the giant spider from the demo that turns into a walking mech. I believe you fight that thing 3 or 4 times...
Speaking of variety, there is a good variety of weapons as well. But while I admire the creators making some crazy weapon ideas, I pretty much just stayed with the same 3: assault rifle, heavy machine gun, and sniper rifle. Since you can upgrade weapons, I didn’t really feel like dropping the weapons I had for new ones when I worked to upgrade the ones I had. I wasn’t punished for this though, I was just left feeling like I could have done more. Anyway, some of the crazier weapons are a disc shooter and a gun that fires a slow moving pulse of energy that will push back anything in its path (as long as it’s not too far away). So there’s some cool stuff. The animations for changing weapons is also cool. Instead of the typical “reach behind your back and pull out a new weapon”, In Vanquish, your gun “transforms” into whatever you select. It’s pretty sweet. Something annoying is how whenever I picked up a weapon, regardless of what it was, San would utter “not what I was looking for, but it’ll do.” I still haven’t found the exact weapon he was looking for. WHY CAN’T I PLEASE YOU, SAM!?!
Most of the dialog in this game was pretty corny. I’m not sure if that’s what they went for (kind of like how Metal Gear Solid’s corniness has become a staple for that series) but I just found it to be a little off putting. And the morals they tried to work in were very repetitive and forced. Numerous times in the game, Lt. Burns would leave his men behind to die either to save his own ass or because “they knew what they were signing up for.” Sam would then yell at him for being so inconsiderate. Basically this same scene happened over and over game for the duration of the game. And speaking of men dying, no matter how many times Burns left his men behind to die, dwindling the numbers of their platoon, their numbers would always somehow increase for the next mission, which was convenient, but kind of missing the point of its own logic.
The meat of this game is its fast paced action. It’s what sets it apart from other games of its genre. You can shoot, but you can also use your suits powers to zip around in a rocketed knee slide, slow down time in a sort of “bullet mode” and punch the living fuck out of shit. The only bad thing is, your powers are limited. You can pretty much knee slide for however long you want, but if you have to take a break every few seconds or the suit will overheat. The same with bullet time and with melee attacks as well. You can get about 1 hit in and the game will drag it out into a combo and your suit will go down. It sucks because when it overheats, you can’t do shit. You can shoot and that’s all. When I played, my suit overheated a lot so I was basically a sitting duck (but I tend to play more of a laid back, cover based game anyway, so it wasn’t such a problem) But if you are going into this game hoping to just go hog wild and wreck some shop, think again. I can understand putting a cap on the suits abilities, but this game just seemed very restrictive. What makes it even worse is, THIS NEVER CHANGES! SPOILER ALERT: it is only in the very last fight that your suit gets upgraded to give you unlimited power, but the level is so densely packed with walls and pillars, you can’t really maneuver around to your full potential. And then when the fight is over, the games over, so it doesn’t even matter anymore anyway. If you pace your movements, you can probably avoid overheating, but a lot of the time it’s unavoidable.
Also, many of the “over the top” action sequences were designated to cut scenes or quick time events, which made me feel gypped. You spend the whole game confined to the few moves you can do, and all of a sudden the game takes over and pulls off all of these ridiculous stunts. Whack.
The end of the game is also somewhat of a gyp. I’m not sure if there are multiple ending or not (I don’t believe there are) but the whole thing was just very anticlimactic. Possible SPOILERS: Nothing really every comes of anything. There are some double crosses (fucking Burns even does a triple cross or some shit! That guy was a nut) The final boss isn’t even the main Russian bald guy! You fight him once in the middle of the game and he gets away. The final boss fight is basically 2 of him but they turn out to be remote controlled. You never even get to fight him! He’s still out there!! WTF!!?!
Vanquish is a cool game, I will admit. It was fun and gets pretty challenging (frustrating especially during the last few acts). I couldn’t even beat the whole game on Normal (Casual automatic is so much easier! :D) And at the end I unlocked God Hard! So like… if you love horribly difficult and frustrating games, this is probably something you want to pick up. It’s definitely a game for fans of shooters, that’s for sure. If you want it just for the fighting and powers, think again.

Pros:

Looks great

Runs great

Awesome enemies

Cool weapons

A level of difficulty comfortable for everyone

Cons:

Story is iffy

Anticlimactic

Suit overheats too fast

Intense action controlled by cutscenes

LaserCat Shoots His Way Into My Heart

I may occasionally search the XBLA Indie Game section for an interesting game, but I've only made two purchases to date. Mainly this is a result of the terrible XBL interface at which you purchase points to purchase games -- I don't want to spend five dollars to buy a game that is technically only one dollar. If it (and many more things) were set up like Apple's iTunes store, then I'd probably spend a bit more.

Regardless, LaserCat was brought to my attention this week and after downloading the trial version, I was completely enamored by it. Here is a simple little game that tries hard and really has a simplistic Metroid-Vania feel to it. Sure, there may not be any power-ups, and it's really nothing more than a puzzle-platformer, but it's charm greatly exceeds its simplistic nature.

You play as LaserCat, who is trying to save OwlFriend from the great evil Wizzord's castle. There are 30 keys to find, spread across some-255 rooms, all containing some individual challenge, from lava to falling to moving enemies. As such, each room has a name and these names give each room a little more depth, which managed to kind of hook me. Many of them contain references to mainstream game series such as Banjo-Kazooie, Mario, and even Sonic, while also referencing other indie-esque games like Braid.

Note, however, these are references, not satires -- the relationship only goes so far.

The music, oddly enough, is all royalty free music from Kevin Macleod. Because of this, I recognized a lot of the music pieces right off the bat and was, incidentally, even a little more charmed as a result of their use. The music makes it feel like an indie game, even though they are edited really well to blend together.

There's not a whole lot to say for this game. For a dollar (albeit a difficult dollar), it's worth it if you're a fan of classic platforming. It may only last about one to two hours if you intend to complete everything, but there is some fun to be found. It turned out to be one of those games that I just want to show to all my friends, which is what I intend to do.

Pros:

Charming indie platformer

Only one dollar

Cute characters and good humor

Really tight controls

Cons:

Way too short!

In Defense Of: Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts

I have always been fond of the Banjo-Kazooie series. I've been playing since the first one on the Nintendo 64 and I was certainly more excited for Banjo-Tooie than I was of any other game on that platform (yes, that includes Majora's Mask and Pokémon Stadium 2). I read every single theory on Stop 'N' Swop I could find on the internet, and I made my brother input the sandcastle floor codes on his file because I was so scared of losing my game data. When I heard that they were being ported to the XBLA, I gobbled them up there as well, itching to obtain all the achievements as fast as possible to show my love of the series. However, before they were re-released, another sequel in the series was released; Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts and Bolts (hereby known as N+B).

Now, I realize that it was a rather large departure from the series norm -- run here, collect here, beat up here. With N+B, they were adding a vehicle building engine and everything became vehicle-based. Upon the game's reveal, a large majority of series fans were rather disappointed. I will admit I was a bit disappointed; what would then happen to the days of simple collecting and learning moves? Regardless, I pre-ordered that shit as fast as I pre-order the next Sonic game.

I will admit I was disappointed by the beginning of the game. Though the story intro is rather amusing, it basically attempts to explain where the bear and bird have been for almost a decade: eating a lot of food and doing a whole lot of nothing. As such, they are overweight and have forgotten all their moves. Add in L.O.G. and his desire to return BK to their former glory and there's your story. It's very light, very basic, and all the mystery the series had behind its characters is kinda lost. Regardless, the dialogue is much more entertaining this time around and there are some new characters. But then the vehicle building begins.

At first, you are given a small amount of parts to build basic crafts, as well as some starter pre-built vehicles and their blueprints. It feels all kind of narrow and simplistic. That is, until you're let free to run around Showdown Town, the game's hub world. You begin to discover Mumbo crates that offer more parts and they are strewn about the town -- all 57 of them need collected and brought back to Mumbo's motors! This one aspect was extremely exciting for me, as each box contained a mystery (that usually paid off). Once you get so many parts, it becomes the open-ended racing game of the year.

I will admit that the game "worlds", while bigger, don't actually feel bigger. They are HUGE on foot, but the vehicle aspect puts them on a much smaller scale. What is ultimately disappointing is the lack of depth these levels lack. There just aren't a lot of secret areas and most of them just feel cluttered. Not to say that they aren't fun! Each level holds its own quirk that makes it feel different than the others and the style is just simply beautiful.

I also have to say that the way things are set up is a bit boring. You enter different Acts of one game world that have a certain amount of Jiggies to win and Jinjos to find. After a while, even though the game's challenges are decently varied, races become tedious and other tasks become a matter of just upgrading previous saved blueprints with new parts you've obtained.

No, I suppose the real fun of the game, the one thing that will desire you finish and get as many Jiggies as possible are the vehicle parts. The game's engine allows for so many possibilities and it's fun to just sit and make vehicles that serve no purpose whatsoever. I spent a large amount of time building things like space shuttles and commercial jets and rocket biplanes that could carry large parts of the scenery. The real fun is found outside of the game's challenges, and its real depth shines here.

I would strongly recommend that if you were a fan of the series before, you should give this game a try. Though it may not feel like Banjo-Tooie's proper sequel, the characters and humor are still there. Deep down it's trying to feel like a Banjo-Kazooie game with vehicles, which is everything Rare said it was.

Pros:

Deep, complex building system

Collecting still exists!

Great characters and entertaining sense of humor

Cons:

Feels a bit demanding/repetitive

Things sometimes feel cluttered and frustrating

Not recommended if you don't like vehicle-based games

"30 Minutes or Less" makes it just in time

This movie was pretty good. It was short, but said what it needed to say and didn't run on (which is good!) It was funny and enjoyable. Aziz didn't even annoy me at all! The story was good and filled with funny banter between the characters. Everything was perfectly set up and executed with style. Action scenes were shot very well and it grabbed my attention from the first few minutes. 30 Minutes or Less is just a fun adventure and a good time.

The only other thing I can think to say is the fact that I think this movie was based on a real life event, which really isn't funny at all considering a man actually blew up. I'm not sure if this movie actually WAS based on that account or not, but if it was, I'd say it's kind of in bad taste to make a "comedy" out of it. Regardless, standing strictly from a comedy movie point of view, it was a good movie. Not the greatest movie of the year or anything, but just.... good. LOL

If you are looking for something to do, this movie is a great way to kill an hour and a half.

"Captain America" montages his way into history

This movie was a little weird. Um, yeah idk. It wasn't a "bad" movie really, but there were a lot of things I didn't like. First off, Cap is a really goody goody, which I suppose is how Cap is suppose to be since he embodies the "righteousness" of America and blah blah blah. But I just really hate when characters are super "just", ya know? There's no substance. Not to mention there was little to no character development in this movie besides the fact that he went from scrawny to Buff Bagwell.

His costume was awesome, except for the mask, which is probably the most important part of a costume in my opinion. The head piece just looked goofy as all hell to me. I think they really dropped the ball with that. Everything else was sweet. They should have just had him fight with no mask and he would have looked BA.

Women. Jeez louise! I understand that having a love interest is a good plot point to have in a movie, but it doesn't have to be the ONLY plot point when it comes to super hero movies. The sexual tension in this movie fills up a good portion while also not developing very much anything at all. It's all pretty dull.

Then there's the action. My god. I was hoping to see a whole movie with kick ass fight scenes, but what I got was an hour leading up to something that could be action and then a second hour of action bits sprinkled throughout more.... idk, whatever it was. The trailer makes it look like an action thrill ride, but it is most certainly not. Many of the clips from the trailer are actually edited into a FUCKING ACTION MONTAGE. Yes. A fucking montage. This is was pissed me off the most I think. Why would you fill up a majority of a super hero movie with passionless potential love scenes and then edit all of the decent looking action scenes into a 2 minute montage!?!?

Regardless, there are SOME action scenes that made it out of the montage. There's some flying ship parts and some human exploding laser guns. When we DID get to see Cap fight, he fucking DESTROYED people! He literally swatted people multiple feet away from him with one hit. This was pretty cool, although there wasn't any real deep fight choreography to come of any of it....

The guy who played Mr Smith in the Matrix movies did a great job as Red Skull, although the makeup for his character could have been more.... idk, grotesque? He looked kind of cartoony (even though one woman in-front of me in the theater actually cringed and turned away as he pulled off his human mask) I guess after seeing what Christopher Nolan did with Two Face in Dark Knight, my expectations are really high for that kind of thing.

Literally the best part of the movie in my opinion is the last few minutes where it sets up for the Avengers movie. Which saddens me.

All in all, like I said before, this movie really isn't "bad" (even though I mostly said negative things about it). I think I just had higher expectations for it. The trailer makes it out to look a lot more action packed than it is. It's just kind of so so. I think I liked Thor better, even though even that wasn't "superb" or anything. Hopefully the new Spiderman reboot and pick things back up again for Marvel. Or else I'll have to just wait until the next Batman is released, which I KNOW will be fucking amazing!!

Pros:

What action there is is pretty good

Lasers that disintegrate people

Builds up to what could be a cool movie in The Avengers

Cons:

Not as much action as the trailer implied

No real character development (unless I slept through it)

Failed romance

Bland characters

Doesn't meet expectations

"Octodad" gets stuck on you

Octodad is an indi title that was released for download at Octodadgame.com. I honestly am not sure if the group that made it has a name, because I didn't dig that far, but let it be known that everyone reading this should head over to Octodadgame.com and download this free game! It is fun, goofy, and at times: kinda difficult.

Basically, you play as an octopus that is posing as a father, except in doing so, he actually "is" a father. He loves his family so much and they love him and because of this, I don't really see why there needs to be a "suspicion meter" that goes up whenever you do something a "dad" wouldn't do in real life. Granted it's funny and granted I'm probably delving too deep into something that really doesn't need to be delved into, but I digress.

This game isn't the greatest thing in the world, but it sure has charm. This game made me laugh on a number of different levels, and although it is short, people can find themselves playing it over and over just to see how far they can push the limits and what whacky stuff they can pull off.

The biggest selling factor for this game is its control scheme. It's difficult, but purposefully so (i hope) You have 2 buttons that control the cameras rotation around you, and then you control Octodad entirely with your mouse. The space bar or middle click buttons switch from arm mode to feet mode. When in feet mode, the right click controls the right foot and the left click controls the left. In arm mode, you take control of the right arm only, the right click them controls the height in which you have the tentacle, and the left click controls grabbing onto objects (gee I hope I didn't get any of that mixed up) Regardless! The best part is the Octodad's animations as you fumble around a room. His body parts can get all mixed up as things start sticking to you. I laughed my ass off when I tried to wade through all of the junk in a closet. Just seeing a large octopus throwing boxes and toys around a small, dark room is hilarious!

Once again, this game is fun and funny. It's not a super polished, AAA title, but it doesn't have to be. Indipendent games is "where it's at" right now and this game is just another example. It's definitely worth playing, and the group that made it also has a kickstarter account on their site for those who would like to donate a little cash their way. I'd suggest it so that we can see more of Octodad in the future.

Pros

• hilarious
• charming
• something new
• FREE

Cons

• short
• controls may be frustrating to some

Tiny Tower Delivers Huge Fun

Because I am moderately poor, I consider myself a connoisseur of free apps for my iPod. No, this does not include the cheap knock-offs of popular apps (“Slightly-miffed Fowl”), but rather apps suggested by the likes of FAAP and BargainBin, both of which are great free apps to download (gateway apps, metaphorically speaking). Recently, FAAP had Tiny Tower up for free download and seeing the retro game art style, I was instantly interested. Little did I know that it would soon be my new addiction.

Tiny Tower comes from NimbleBit, who make a lot of free apps that are worth checking out. Regardless, Tiny Tower has you managing an ever-growing tower in a “god game” type of way. You start with two floors; one Residential and one Food. The goal is to move in more residents (called bitizens) into the residential apartments so that you can place each one of them into one of the many potential jobs available from 5 different categories: Food, Service, Recreation, Retail, and Creative. Every new floor you build can be designated to one of these categories, but what actual jobs or apartments you get are randomized. Each bitizen has specific, random stats in each of the categories (from 0 to 9) and one dream job. Each apartment complex can hold 5 different bitizens while each job floor can hire 3 different bitizens. Each job can stock 3 different products, as long as you have 3 different workers working at that store. To build more floors and stock more products, a specific amount of real time must pass. The ultimate goal here is to make money to build more floors and bring in more residents. At the time of this writing, I have 27 floors, and rising. The top player has 369 different floors -- the game is completely endless.

As confusing as it sounds, through an incredibly straightforward tutorial, the player will quickly learn the ropes and it becomes a really fun pick-up-and-play game. The most entertaining thing I’ve found is moving in residents to grant their wishes and place them in their dream jobs. It’s the perfect “anytime game” – I’m able to accomplish something during my play time, even if I’m just waiting for stock to come. Every few seconds, a bitizen will appear at the bottom floor and will ask to be moved to a specific floor. Upon doing so, you will receive a stipend or possibly a TowerBuck, which is this game’s currency you can buy with real money. If you’re lucky, a VIP member will appear instead, offering a specified bonus to whichever floor you decide to take them to.

Now, I know what you’re thinking – “This is Farmville in tower form!” As much as I hate to admit, I will agree. The timed elements are there and it’s ultimately just a grind game with no ultimate goal. To my surprise, however, is that given enough time, there’s no need to really purchase TowerBux ever, unless you’re looking to speed up a process. On top of that, there’s no punishment for not returning in time to restock a store. It has the casual feel of Farmville with a rather surprising level of depth.

The game can tend to get very confusing with its bitizens – more often than not I found myself writing down names and locations to rearrange people in their workplaces. On top of that, it can be frustrating to be banking on a specific job on your new floor to give to specific bitizens, only to get a totally unexpected job. Also, building a new residential floor almost always feels wasteful, and the more floors you have, the harder it is to actually move someone into that floor.

Regardless of a few things in question, this game really shouldn’t be free. It’s literally a steal because it is free, and if you, dear reader, haven’t downloaded this app or at least look into it, I cannot recommend it more. Now if you'll excuse me, I have a wedding chapel to stock.

If you want to add me, please GameCenter me at bradeustathios@yahoo.com.

Pros:
- Simple, casual game with a surprising amount of depth
- A good game to play when you have 1 minute or 1 hour
- Really satisfying to line up dream jobs or build new floors
- A pretty interesting art style (a newer style for the company)
- I have yet to see a repeat in floor style/job
- It’s free and there’s no reason to not give it a try

Cons:
- May feel like an unbearable grindfest for some people
- Random elements keep excitement, but are sometimes frustrating
- Residential floors become chore-like
- Necessary organization from time to time

A Review Of LA Noire

Hello hello! You are moments away from reading a guest post about a game very dear and close to my heart. Or, is it necessarily a guest post? Perhaps it isn't. But, it IS my first post, and you can take that to the bank. The following picture is me.


I've lost track of when I was invited initially to contribute to this blog in the first place, but it sure wasn't recently. It was by my old pal Matt Muzzy, whom I go way back with, to the golden age of YouTube when "Reubnick" was all that was on my mind, and "MattandCory" his, respectfully. Obviously, we've moved on a long way since then, and we have both branched in unique directions, trying very different new things. For example, this review blog. It's a world of different. And the reason for my delay is because I've been working on my first movie, and I've been quite distracted. Either way, however, I wasn't about to snub this blog. I've been busy, but this thing has been on my mind. The following picture is me with Matt Muzzy.


But, I'm sure nobody is interested in any of the dry, old-man-on-the-porch reminiscing I just subjected you to, however, and that's okay. You just have to learn that to deal with Reuben Glaser is to deal with long-winded tangents of no value or interest. But now, let's get to the real reason you are reading this: for the title. The title which happens to be "A Review Of LA Noire."

To put the following in perspective, I have a real weakness for all things old-timey. There is no era of more interest to me than 1910-1940, specifically the 20's and the 40's. As a matter of fact, I have the treasury of F. Scott Fitgerald's short stories at my bedside right now, and I'm enjoying every minute of it. I mean, sure, the 30's are okay, but that's all just too dusty and yellowed for my tastes. Plus, some neat things happened in 1900-1910, but Teddy Roosevelt was a massive neck-bulging, toothy, frothy prick, and I don't really like to talk or hear about that guy. As you can see, I like to sort of, at least as a reference, look at things in terms of presidents, though. The 20's were marked by the drunken caddishness and closet-sexcapades of our sleaziest president ever, Warren Harding. He was a well-dressed, sharp jawed man with his sleeves rolled up, and he was also a man who played cards with a bunch of scuzzy criminals, drank alcohol at all times, and probably started to cry and have a melt-down every time he actually had to do real work, having sex with a secretary under his desk as his only coping mechanism. His wife also probably murdered him. I'll leave it up to you to google that, though. I think there's a book about it or something. But anyway, he seemed to define a very specific demographic of people alive at that time. The partiers, the flappers, the chauvinists, the type that would have been at one of Jay Gatsby's blowouts. As did Calvin Coolidge, that decade's other president, although it was a very different type of person. He was a stern, citrus-lipped, tiny little republican weirdo with a horribly obnoxious voice. He didn't speak, play games, and he referred to every single meal of the day as "supper" for some reason. He was the law, the keeper of the rules, and he starkly contrasted the Warren Hardings. And, that was the 20's. Two archetypes, and some of the most interesting America has ever had.

Likewise, 20 years later, we wound up with Harry Truman (my favorite president), who was a fiery little, fast-talking 4-eyes, but still one of the most badass Americans to ever live. He's one of my favorites, and I inaccurately picture every single person to have a "press" hat and smoke a cigar in the 40's to look and act like him. That's why the 40's are so glamorized to me. Lucky, lucky I am that LA Noire takes place DURING his presidency. You even hear him on the radio. Plus, I figured this out AFTER I got the game! I was immensely excited for it long before that!


In fact, I don't think I'd ever been this excited for a game. I privately went a little crazy for Ghostbusters, Uncharted 2, Red Dead Redemption and Bioshock 2, but I think LA Noire trumped them. The thing with me is that just about nobody can tell I actually am a gamer, because I very rarely speak of it. I just always though interjecting conversation about video-games was annoying ever since people thought they needed to share every single way they killed Niko Bellic without there being any way to witness what they describe. But, the fact of the matter us that I do love video games, quite a bit. Due to money constants, though, I try to only really buy 1-2 a year and just absolutely immerse myself in it repeatedly. That's why I choose games to practically count down the days until their release. I bought both Red Dead Redemption, Grand Theft Auto (I believe) and LA Noire on the first day, and that's a pattern I intend to continue. Notice those are all Rockstar games? I did. That's because I personally think Rockstar has gone on to prove they consistently release the best standard of games, at least in my opinion. They have never disappointed me, all the way back to Bully. I just expect to love every game they release, and I hope to never be proven wrong. LA Noire did not disappoint more than just a tiny bit, but that's probably just because I was SO excited for it. I still firmly believe it is a nearly flawless game...I just really, really loved GTA IV, and that's a hard act to follow.

Let me first get out any complaints. What I minded most about LA Noire is the extreme linearity. I know this reflects negatively on me, but I truly miss being able to mow people down all over the streets, shoot strangers in the head, or hit them with a car off a cliff. Try as hard as I did, I only managed to plow ONE man off of a freeway, and after he fell 45 feet, he instantly got up and walked away. Come on, man. I also dislike having such fragile vehicles. If you hit three poles, the trunk and car-hood fly off and you start on fire...but only on fire. The cars don't asplode. That is a real buzzkill. Then Rusty Galloway's Ed-Schultz-lookin'-ass will just yell at you and you go and take another car.

Another complaint about the linearity is that much into the game, during the Roy Earle days, you get a sense that the game has Assassin's Creed Syndrome. I will go out on a limb and say I thought that was a very, very bad game. I never finished it. It bore to hell out of me. I just couldn't take it anymore, I had to put it down, which is a shame, because that thing sure wasn't cheap. LA Noire never, ever gets to that point, but you get a little tired of driving to a place, hearing those stupid chime noises a trillion times, Phelps claiming "I'm stumped," and that asshole guy with the camera being so rude to you. Actually, that doesn't bother me. But you should know the guy if you play the game. At the crime scenes, he's the fellow with the giant camera. Press the square around him. If you are like me, you will wish you could both plow people down, AND contaminate the crime scenes.


However, that's all the complaints I have, other than how Phelps looks like a pretentious little sissy when he runs down the stairs. I've got nothing else I didn't like. I actually could say I loved everything else. This is a genuinely excellent game, and you need to go into it for the story. That's what I did. That's the kind of game I like. It's been said before, but it's almost as much movie as it is game. It's considerably more hands-off than most, and you have to do a lot of watching and thinking and assuming. For as linear as it is, if you screw up one thing, you might have blown the whole case. The outcome might be completely different, and that really pretty lady named Candy might get shot or something. I personally am awful at telling when somebody is lying or not, and I'm sure that my poor decisions in the game have led to literal deaths by torture of innocent people with families. That's life, I guess. But I do think the interrogations are the best part of this whole thing. The shootouts are really fun, but too easy and too fast, and there aren't even bullet wounds like the ones in Red Dead, and as soon as you clip everybody off, it goes straight to the cinematic of the John Malkovich looking guy stuffing them in the coroners van. But if nothing else, the interrogations should keep you going. For every tedious "follow that truck but don't get caught" mission Rockstar doesn't seem to understand nobody likes, there is a great interrogation that looks beautiful and shows you a whole new interesting character. I love characters above all in video games, and so far (I haven't finished it yet), LA Noire, in it's hunt for realism, seems to lack any real dynamic characters to remember. Rusty Galloway is a start, but he's kind of annoying, and then suddenly after a creepy mission where you as the player begin to feel a real bond and reliance and kinship and understanding of him just because he's with you, he doesn't really have your back, and in an awfully anticlimactic way, you stop seeing him. In my favorite games, three fictional characters have stuck out. Augustus Sinclair in Bioshock 2, is one of the best, least static, most interesting I've seen. There's a character in the book I wrote that I based off of him, that's how much of an impact he had. Then there is Victor Sullivan from the Uncharted series. I love that guy so much, probably just because playing those games is as accurate of a simulation as there will ever be as to how it would be to fight mercenaries with my dad. I am beyond excited that Uncharted 3 is going to have a lot of him in it. Then, mostly, Fluorian Kravich (Bernie Crane) from GTA IV is literally the funniest character I have ever seen in any medium, TV or movies or books or music or video games. He is just the most hilarious. I spend hours and hours on those missions in the game just so I can see and hear every possible out come and hear every single recording that Timothy J. Alex made that was put in the game. I don't think LA Noire has one of those yet, and I'm hoping I'm wrong.

I guess it almost sounds like I'm knocking the game, but I'm not. In a sea of perfection with Richard Nixon banners and Benny Goodman tracks on the radio (he is one of my favorites) and other great driving tracks, those are merely the only things that stick out. It is beyond fun, and I will be depressed when I beat it. I do absolutely recommend it to anybody. It just simply isn't Rockstar's best, though. I can't speak from experience if it is one of Team Bondi's best, but I will say that it's one of the best video games in general, but not Rockstar's best. They have raised the bar so high, I think that just speaks for itself.

Hey! I'll see you all next time, I hope!

-Reuben