vix's GameSpot Friend's Reviews vix's GameSpot Friend's Reviews vix's GameSpot Friend's Reviews en-us Copyright (c)1995-2013 CBS Interactive. All rights reserved. http://www.gamespot.com 20 Sat, 18 May 2013 23:38:32 -0700 GameSpot vix's GameSpot Friend's Reviews http://img.gamespot.com/gamespot/shared/promos/misc/gs_logo.gif http://www.gamespot.com 135 40 Tue, 07 May 2013 15:08:22 -0700 WTA2k5 reviewed BioShock Infinite for the Xbox 360... http://www.gamespot.com/bioshock-infinite/user-reviews/811097/platform/xbox360/ ...and gave it a 8.5.

Who dares doesn't always win, apparently. BioShock Infinite is a game that far too often goes only halfway in realizing its many grand ambitions. It dares to speak on ever-relevant issues of racism, classism, and nationalism, but in an odd twist of irony, it marginalizes these plot elements that, in the real world, often lead to oppression and marginalization to instead focus on some good old-fashioned mind-bending speculative science fiction. It admirably deigns to not fall back on jarring cutscenes, but predicates most of its major mechanics on familiar shooting structures, leaving most of its truly affecting moments to be navigated through singular button-presses, that is, if you are given the opportunity to have any real input in these moments in the first place. It wants you to lose yourself in the visually engrossing but philosophically abhorrent world of Columbia, but many of the floating city's major players are paper-thin caricatures, and the game's wealth of audiologs feels cheaper and more overly-convenient than ever.

Still, it must be said that the fact that Infinite even partly accomplishes any of the tasks that it sets out for itself is hugely impressive. Considering many games have difficulties spicing up even the most rote shooting mechanics, unleash a deluge of cutscenes and quicktime events on players at every possible opportunity, and often struggle to not, themselves, be racist, BioShock Infinite stands out as an important step forward for big budget games that strive for serious artistry and drama. Irrational's latest isn't the gaming medium's magnum opus of cultural expression that one might expect given the game's self-serious artistic posturing, and huge critical acclaim, but it's still an utterly important release, and a damn good one too.

This is because there are plenty of things that Infinite gets totally right. The game's astounding audiovisual presentation is perhaps the foremost place to start. The game doesn't overtly flex any technical wizardry in the way an id or Crytek release might, but its sheer artistic splendor makes it one of the very best looking games of this console generation. At the root of this is no doubt the game's stellar environment, which ranks among the pantheon of gaming's greatest settings.

In the game's opening hour, players are slowly, calmly introduced to the seeming utopia of Columbia, an opulent, sun-drenched city above the clouds defined by exaggerated American expressions. Bright, idyllic gardens surround grand Palladian building; a peaceful stillness remains pervasive even through bustling storefronts and chatting citizens, only to occasionally be interrupted by enticing music selections (seriously, pay attention to this game's soundtrack), or - as players will encounter soon after arrival - a gleeful carnival complete with silly games and booming fireworks.

The game is wise to devote such a long period of time to simply navigating and luxuriating in its enticing environment, as Columbia is a true marvel that demonstrates the fact that Infinite's surely ungodly budget was put to good use - Irrational's hugely talented art team seems to have been truly unleashed. And though the game reserves for itself a few more simple moments of quietude, players will also soon discover their chief motivation for the rip-roaring action that consumes the vast majority of Infinite's running time.

Lead by the self-righteous and disturbed Father Comstock, most of Columbia's denizens have adopted a worldview that takes notions of American Exceptionalism to ridiculous but no less frightening extremes. Here, other religions have been extinguished in favor of a faith that idealizes America's founding fathers, as well as Comstock and his family, and all but the Anglo-Saxon adherents to this dogma are marginalized, reviled and exploited. This, as you might imagine, is causing some problems within the floating city, and tensions continually escalate from the moment you arrive.

But don't ready your spinning skyhook just yet, as there's quite a bit to dissect with this hefty plot setup. As mentioned before, Infinite has no qualms about diving headfirst into seemingly risky storytelling territory. But, much like the original BioShock's awkward and contradictory critique of Randian Objectivism, Infinite handles its set of sociopolitical critiques in a rather bumbling, heavy-handed, and ultimately ineffective way. For most of the game, these heavy themes of discrimination are mostly shock with little substance. Early on, for example, players will find themselves in the headquarters of The Fraternal Order of the Raven, an environment whose every last bit of iconography - including statues of John Wilkes Boothe, and enemies garbed in darkened Klu Klux Klan robes - spews bigoted filth. Troubling, to be sure, but this environment is never explored to a satisfactory degree in a narrative context. We are never told what drove the Order's members to this disgusting mindset, or what function it plays in Columbian society as a whole; instead we're instructed to simply tear through the environment, dismembering every racist we can find. Indeed, almost every one of the game's on-the-nose explorations of racism and jingoism seems to exist as more out of a desire to simply justify Infinite's absurd level of bombastic violence than a willingness to earnestly and cerebrally comment on these weighty issues.

It's a true shame, but again, the fact that the game is willing to go to these dark places in an upfront and confrontational manner when most games dodge around similar issues or make heavy use of metaphor and allegory in order to indirectly speak on them is commendable, even if it keeps Infinite's apparent daring from being something to truly celebrate.

But there is a second major component of Infinite's ideological critique, one that is much more subtly woven throughout the game, and one that ultimately cuts much deeper. Forgiveness and rebirth, in regards to its inherent inclusion in many major religions, is relentlessly examined and scrutinized over the course of the campaign in some truly unsettling ways. This side of the game's narrative might be so uncomfortable, in fact, as to offend adherents to the faiths that Infinite draws some heavily parallels to with its own disturbing belief system. The fact, however, that these themes aren't merely dabbled in, as are the game's superficial commentaries discrimination, but rather made absolutely integral to the core narrative and explored fully and fearlessly leads Infinite, in this instance, to fully live up to its grandiose goals. This is the moment where Infinite's narrative triumphs, and I can only hope that more games follow in its footsteps in bringing to light serious thematic content in a more direct manner, as can be seen so often in other media yet so rarely within video games.

Alright, here's where you can start revving up your skyhook. As he progresses through the carnival that greets him as he first steps foot in Columbia, Booker DeWitt, the game's playable and decidedly not-mute protagonist, begins to fully unravel the noxious worldview of Columbia's inhabitants. On his way towards a strange raffle that serves as the fair's main event, Comstock's voice booms over a loudspeaker, warning the citizens of Columbia about the arrival of the False Prophet, a man who has the letters "AD" burned into his right hand. Sure enough, our anti-hero holds his hand up to reveal that exact marking. And sure enough, during this eerie raffle event, the Columbians take notice of the mark, and Booker DeWitt swiftly digs a spinning hookblade into the skull of the first police officer that attempts to apprehend him.

With this, BioShock Infinite reveals its heavy emphasis on twitchy shooter gameplay and ridiculous amounts of gore. Engaging in the game's slick shooting mechanics feels no different than it might in the latest Call of Duty game; guns have a fantastic sense of weight to them and the responsiveness and ingenuity of the game's heads-up display ensures steady environmental awareness despite the over-the-top freneticism of many of the game's combat sequences. But where Infinite's combat truly shines is in its surprising mechanical density. Vigors that grant Booker special powers like the ability to shoot electricity from his fingertips or absorb bullets and toss them right back at foes serve as the first extra layering. For those familiar with the series, these powers might seem quite like the Plasmids introduced in the first BioShock, and though they do perform the same function, they're implemented in a far more balanced way in Infinite than they are in its predecessors; they're powerful and readily available but must be dealt out conservatively, as the mana pool they run on is rather restrictive.

But as gleefully destructive as they can be, Vigors are decidedly uninteresting in the face of Infinite's more inspired new mechanics. Booker's ability to latch onto the aerial Skylines running throughout Columbia is perhaps the most mind-blowing gameplay feature of them all. Though the mechanic seemed rather unbelievable during its first E3 showing a couple years ago, it speaks to the ingenuity of the game's level design that fluidly navigating Skylines that weave throughout many of the game's rather conspicuous battle arenas while taking shots at enemies, a potentially disorienting feat, becomes effortless after only a few encounters. The verticality and freedom of movement this system grants the game is awe-inspiring, and almost attaches a sense of childlike wonder to the act of mass-murdering racists.

For the first few hours of gameplay, these are the mechanics that Booker is limited to. It's during this time that he seeks to accomplish a seemingly simple direction mandated by a mysterious client: "Give us the girl, and wipe away the debt." Though this phrase ends up holding more significance than an uninitiated player could possibly know, it nonetheless serves as the impetus for finding Elizabeth, a young woman whose power to tear holes in the space-time continuum has, perhaps expectedly, lead her to be sequestered on the looming, Statue of Liberty-esque research facility, Monument Island.

So, as one might expect, this ability of hers adds more than a few layers of complexity to what might've otherwise been a rather straightforward plot. As the extent of her powers is gradually revealed, a suitably mind-bending narrative begins to form that comments, among other things, on the frail nature of identity and the profound ways in which a single choice can influence personhood, for better or worse. Though the introduction of converging space-time might seem to risk devolving the story into an Inception-esque exercise in overly complex authorial self-indulgence, BioShock Infinite uses this storytelling conceit to build a truly tragedian narrative.

But Elizabeth isn't merely a means for crafting a brain-melting metaphysical storyline. Nor is Booker DeWitt a stupefied on-looker who hails from the same lineage of horribly flat shooter protagonists as Gordon Freeman, or Corvo Attano. They are both memorable characters whose defined personalities infuse the plot's affecting tragedy with a true sense of humanity. Elizabeth, on one hand, starts out as a surprisingly cultured and self-aware inversion of the classic damsel-in-distress trope, and her evolution over the course of the game's ten- to twelve-hour campaign is astonishingly well-paced and believable. Her exaggerated features and expressive animations that pay homage to the distinctive style Grim Natwick invented for Disney solidify her as one of the most memorable and empathetic characters in gaming. DeWitt, by contrast, is predominately a closed-book, limiting himself to practical, yet charismatic antics strongly reminiscent of classic swashbucklers like Han Solo until his dark past is fully revealed during the final act. When that happens, he extends far beyond his narrative role as a foil to Elizabeth, and the resulting revelations cut to the bone. Major compliments are due to Troy Baker and Courtnee Draper, who faultlessly brings this odd couple to life even through all the mind-blowing turns the story takes.

The duo also serve as a great team during Infinite's huge combat sequences. Though Booker, as mentioned before, is in charge of most of the direct combat, Elizabeth is a key ingredient in what makes the game's massive shootouts so dazzling. Most significantly, she uses her ability to alter time and space to bring objects into the battlefields that didn't previously exist. Asking for a wall of cover to hide behind when a dozen enemies are facing you down, or perhaps a Skyhook that lets you access a sniper perch adds an exciting tactical dynamism to combat that feels especially important considering the sheer number of foes the game throws at you. Since you can only select one object to tear in at a time, more heated battles require a constant mindfulness and economization of Elizabeth's power that is as exhilaratingly strategic as the best of tactical shooters.

A smaller, but no less genius touch is the fact that Elizabeth tosses you mana and ammo when it feels clutch. Even when it becomes obvious that she's scripted to do so whenever your resources are running low, the notion that an AI is looking out for you is relentlessly fulfilling, especially in a game that constructs a scenario that might've so easily fallen into the dreaded escort-mission trap. Indeed, going back to other first-person shooters has become tough, as Elizabeth is not just a delightful companion in a narrative sense, but she's also integral to the satisfaction of Infinite's moment-to-moment combat proceedings.

Each of the augments to the core shooting experience are satisfying in their own right, but once they all start working in tandem, Infinite's combat scenarios reach the upper-echelon of FPS sublimation. Not since Half-Life 2 has a shooter married pulse-pounding twitch thrills to a deeply strategic core so seamlessly, and while leaving so much room for experimentation. The gritty sound design that punctuates the action is equally superb; a combination of abrasive string stabs, impactful weapon sound effects and some truly horrifying enemy damage reactions unfailingly sell you on the weighty ferocity of the mayhem you cause.

All this, of course, sounds amazing, and on some level it truly is. But consider this: for all its fast-paced entertainment, Infinite's combat never fully works. In a mechanical sense, it's pretty much as polished as can be, but the game's massive amount of carnage doesn't quite work within the context of the story. In fact, story and gameplay don't feel merged at all. While there's a fair amount of narrative justification for the heavy degree of violence, the fact that shooting people and ripping their heads of with a spinning hook is pretty much Booker's only way of interacting with the world undercuts much of the arresting emotionality of Infinite's narrative.

Highlighting this problem is the fact that many of the game's most powerful moments either preclude player input, or limit interactivity to the push of a single button. Elizabeth's ability to tear holes in the space-time continuum, for example, may have been the basis for some ingenious puzzle solving and narrative interaction, but players are instead left to simply push a button to demand entry into a new reality where they can proceed to shoot more people in the face. Again, this feels like BioShock Infinite going only halfway in bringing its many fantastic ideas to life; some truly inventive mechanical structures may have been borne out of the game's central narrative conceits, but Irrational has disappointingly opted to instead rely on more comfortable and pre-established action gameplay.

This disconnect is furthered by the game's odd focus on scavenging between each firefight. While the opportunity to really dig into and appreciate each environment, as well as get a break from the nearly nonstop action is welcome, the context of the narrative doesn't really support these detours either. Booker's mission is given an impactful sense of urgency, so the fact that the game encourages you to stop down for long stretches of time to eat random food items littered about and try to uncover Columbia's many secrets is rather off-putting. Early on, for instance, Elizabeth finds herself in immediate danger. An objective indicator flashes on-screen telling you to go rescue her, yet you find yourself surrounded by lootable objects designated by a pulsating golden glow. Of all the moments to try and fish pieces of cake out of a trashcan, this may be the least opportune, but Infinite's structure, which evidently values narrative over gameplay in terms of pacing and logic, continues to tempt you astray regardless. This might all seem a bit nitpicky, but considering the fact that Infinite is so intent on being treated as a significant work of art, these small annoyances can't be ignored, as they gradually undermine the meaning the game tries so hard to construct for itself.

BioShock Infinite is a game worth any mature player's while, but it has come at an unfortunate time. Within the past year alone, the industry has been treated to games like Spec Ops: The Line, The Walking Dead, and Hotline Miami, just a few titles that are capable of eloquently and expertly exploring dark themes while being cognizant of their respective mechanics' impact on the narratives they try to weave, making a game like Infinite - one that never fully accounts for the ways in which its gameplay influences the meaning and effectiveness of its story - seem a bit clumsy by comparison. David Jaffe, the brilliant designer behind games like God of War and Twisted Metal once deemed the relationship between gameplay and narrative as being like the combination of "chocolate and tunafish." I would argue that this claim isn't necessarily true, and games like Spec Ops are perfect demonstrations as to why that is. In the case of Infinite, however, Jaffe's argument has a haunting validity. But take heart, the chocolate that is BioShock Infinite's gameplay and the tunafish that is its story are pretty much premium grade when enjoyed separately. Just accept the fact that the combination is going to taste a little odd and find something to savor within it.

Get the full article at GameSpot

"WTA2k5 reviewed BioShock Infinite for the Xbox 360..." was posted by WTA2k5 on Tue, 07 May 2013 15:08:22 -0700
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/bioshock-infinite/user-reviews/811097/platform/xbox360/ Tue, 07 May 2013 13:42:46 -0700 WTA2k5 reviewed BioShock Infinite for the PlayStation 3... http://www.gamespot.com/bioshock-infinite/user-reviews/811095/platform/ps3/ ...and gave it a 8.5.

Who dares doesn't always win, apparently. BioShock Infinite is a game that far too often goes only halfway in realizing its many grand ambitions. It dares to speak on ever-relevant issues of racism, classism, and nationalism, but in an odd twist of irony, it marginalizes these plot elements that, in the real world, often lead to oppression and marginalization to instead focus on some good old-fashioned mind-bending speculative science fiction. It admirably deigns to not fall back on jarring cutscenes, but predicates most of its major mechanics on familiar shooting structures, leaving most of its truly affecting moments to be navigated through singular button-presses, that is, if you are given the opportunity to have any real input in these moments in the first place. It wants you to lose yourself in the visually engrossing but philosophically abhorrent world of Columbia, but many of the floating city's major players are paper-thin caricatures, and the game's wealth of audiologs feels cheaper and more overly-convenient than ever.

Still, it must be said that the fact that Infinite even partly accomplishes any of the tasks that it sets out for itself is hugely impressive. Considering have huge difficulties spicing up even the most rote shooting mechanics, unleash a deluge of cutscenes and quicktime events on players at every possible opportunity, and often struggle to not, themselves, be racist, BioShock Infinite stands out as an important step forward for big budget games that strive for serious artistry and drama. Irrational's latest isn't the gaming medium's magnum opus of cultural expression that one might expect given the game's self-serious artistic posturing, and huge critical acclaim, but it's still an utterly important release, and a damn good one too.

This is because there are plenty of things that Infinite gets totally right. The game's astounding audiovisual presentation is perhaps the foremost place to start. The game doesn't overtly flex any technical wizardry in the way an id or Crytek release might, but its sheer artistic splendor makes it one of the very best looking games of this console generation. At the root of this is no doubt the game's stellar environment, which ranks among the pantheon of gaming's greatest settings.

In the game's opening hour, players are slowly, calmly introduced to the seeming utopia of Columbia, an opulent, sun-drenched city above the clouds defined by exaggerated American expressions. Bright, idyllic gardens surround grand Palladian building; a peaceful stillness remains pervasive even through bustling storefronts and chatting citizens, only to occasionally be interrupted by enticing music selections (seriously, pay attention to this game's soundtrack), or - as players will encounter soon after arrival - a gleeful carnival complete with silly games and booming fireworks.

The game is wise to devote such a long period of time to simply navigating and luxuriating in its enticing environment, as Columbia is a true marvel that demonstrates the fact that Infinite's surely ungodly budget was put to good use - Irrational's hugely talented art team seems to have been truly unleashed. And though the game reserves for itself a few more simple moments of quietude, players will also soon discover their chief motivation for the rip-roaring action that consumes the vast majority of Infinite's running time.

Lead by the self-righteous and disturbed Father Comstock, most of Columbia's denizens have adopted a worldview that takes notions of American Exceptionalism to ridiculous but no less frightening extremes. Here, other religions have been extinguished in favor of a faith that idealizes America's founding fathers, as well as Comstock and his family, and all but the Anglo-Saxon adherents to this dogma are marginalized, reviled and exploited. This, as you might imagine, is causing some problems within the floating city, and tensions continually escalate from the moment you arrive.

But don't ready your spinning skyhook just yet, as there's quite a bit to dissect with this hefty plot setup. As mentioned before, Infinite has no qualms about diving headfirst into seemingly risky storytelling territory. But, much like the original BioShock's awkward and contradictory critique of Randian Objectivism, Infinite handles its set of sociopolitical critiques in a rather bumbling, heavy-handed, and ultimately ineffective way. For most of the game, these heavy themes of discrimination are mostly shock with little substance. Early on, for example, players will find themselves in the headquarters of The Fraternal Order of the Raven, an environment whose every last bit of iconography - including statues of John Wilkes Boothe, and enemies garbed in darkened Klu Klux Klan robes - spews bigoted filth. Troubling, to be sure, but this environment is never explored to a satisfactory degree in a narrative context. We are never told what drove the Order's members to this disgusting mindset, or what function it plays in Columbian society as a whole; instead we're instructed to simply tear through the environment, dismembering every racist we can find. Indeed, almost every one of the game's on-the-nose explorations of racism and jingoism seems to exist as more out of a desire to simply justify Infinite's absurd level of bombastic violence than a willingness to earnestly and cerebrally comment on these weighty issues.

It's a true shame, but again, the fact that the game is willing to go to these dark places in an upfront and confrontational manner when most games dodge around similar issues or make heavy use of metaphor and allegory in order to indirectly speak on them is commendable, even if it keeps Infinite's apparent daring from being something to truly celebrate.

But there is a second major component of Infinite's ideological critique, one that is much more subtly woven throughout the game, and one that ultimately cuts much deeper. Forgiveness and rebirth, in regards to its inherent inclusion in many major religions, is relentlessly examined and scrutinized over the course of the campaign in some truly unsettling ways. This side of the game's narrative might be so uncomfortable, in fact, as to offend adherents to the faiths that Infinite draws some heavily parallels to with its own disturbing belief system. The fact, however, that these themes aren't merely dabbled in, as are the game's superficial commentaries discrimination, but rather made absolutely integral to the core narrative and explored fully and fearlessly leads Infinite, in this instance, to fully live up to its grandiose goals. This is the moment where Infinite's narrative triumphs, and I can only hope that more games follow in its footsteps in bringing to light serious thematic content in a more direct manner, as can be seen so often in other media yet so rarely within video games.

Alright, here's where you can start revving up your skyhook. As he progresses through the carnival that greets him as he first steps foot in Columbia, Booker DeWitt, the game's playable and decidedly not-mute protagonist, begins to fully unravel the noxious worldview of Columbia's inhabitants. On his way towards a strange raffle that serves as the fair's main event, Comstock's voice booms over a loudspeaker, warning the citizens of Columbia about the arrival of the False Prophet, a man who has the letters "AD" burned into his right hand. Sure enough, our anti-hero holds his hand up to reveal that exact marking. And sure enough, during this eerie raffle event, the Columbians take notice of the mark, and Booker DeWitt swiftly digs a spinning hookblade into the skull of the first police officer that attempts to apprehend him.

With this, BioShock Infinite reveals its heavy emphasis on twitchy shooter gameplay and ridiculous amounts of gore. Engaging in the game's slick shooting mechanics feels no different than it might in the latest Call of Duty game; guns have a fantastic sense of weight to them and the responsiveness and ingenuity of the game's heads-up display ensures steady environmental awareness despite the over-the-top freneticism of many of the game's combat sequences. But where Infinite's combat truly shines is in its surprising mechanical density. Vigors that grant Booker special powers like the ability to shoot electricity from his fingertips or absorb bullets and toss them right back at foes serve as the first extra layering. For those familiar with the series, these powers might seem quite like the Plasmids introduced in the first BioShock, and though they do perform the same function, they're implemented in a far more balanced way in Infinite than they are in its predecessors; they're powerful and readily available but must be dealt out conservatively, as the mana pool they run on is rather restrictive.

But as gleefully destructive as they can be, Vigors are decidedly uninteresting in the face of Infinite's more inspired new mechanics. Booker's ability to latch onto the aerial Skylines running throughout Columbia is perhaps the most mind-blowing gameplay feature of them all. Though the mechanic seemed rather unbelievable during its first E3 showing a couple years ago, it speaks to the ingenuity of the game's level design that fluidly navigating Skylines that weave throughout many of the game's rather conspicuous battle arenas while taking shots at enemies, a potentially disorienting feat, becomes effortless after only a few encounters. The verticality and freedom of movement this system grants the game is awe-inspiring, and almost attaches a sense of childlike wonder to the act of mass-murdering racists.

For the first few hours of gameplay, these are the mechanics that Booker is limited to. It's during this time that he seeks to accomplish a seemingly simple direction mandated by a mysterious client: "Give us the girl, and wipe away the debt." Though this phrase ends up holding more significance than an uninitiated player could possibly know, it nonetheless serves as the impetus for finding Elizabeth, a young woman whose power to tear holes in the space-time continuum has, perhaps expectedly, lead her to be sequestered on the looming, Statue of Liberty-esque research facility, Monument Island.

So, as one might expect, this ability of hers adds more than a few layers of complexity to what might've otherwise been a rather straightforward plot. As the extent of her powers is gradually revealed, a suitably mind-bending narrative begins to form that comments, among other things, on the frail nature of identity and the profound ways in which a single choice can influence personhood, for better or worse. Though the introduction of converging space-time might seem to risk devolving the story into an Inception-esque exercise in overly complex authorial self-indulgence, BioShock Infinite uses this storytelling conceit to build a truly tragedian narrative.

But Elizabeth isn't merely a means for crafting a brain-melting metaphysical storyline. Nor is Booker DeWitt a stupefied on-looker who hails from the same lineage of horribly flat shooter protagonists as Gordon Freeman, or Corvo Attano. They are both memorable characters whose defined personalities infuse the plot's affecting tragedy with a true sense of humanity. Elizabeth, on one hand, starts out as a surprisingly cultured and self-aware inversion of the classic damsel-in-distress trope, and her evolution over the course of the game's ten- to twelve-hour campaign is astonishingly well-paced and believable. Her exaggerated features and expressive animations that pay homage to the distinctive style Grim Natwick invented for Disney solidify her as one of the most memorable and empathetic characters in gaming. DeWitt, by contrast, is predominately a closed-book, limiting himself to practical, yet charismatic antics strongly reminiscent of classic swashbucklers like Han Solo until his dark past is fully revealed during the final act. When that happens, he extends far beyond his narrative role as a foil to Elizabeth, and the resulting revelations cut to the bone. Major compliments are due to Troy Baker and Courtnee Draper, who faultlessly brings this odd couple to life even through all the mind-blowing turns the story takes.

The duo also serve as a great team during Infinite's huge combat sequences. Though Booker, as mentioned before, is in charge of most of the direct combat, Elizabeth is a key ingredient in what makes the game's massive shootouts so dazzling. Most significantly, she uses her ability to alter time and space to bring objects into the battlefields that didn't previously exist. Asking for a wall of cover to hide behind when a dozen enemies are facing you down, or perhaps a Skyhook that lets you access a sniper perch adds an exciting tactical dynamism to combat that feels especially important considering the sheer number of foes the game throws at you. Since you can only select one object to tear in at a time, more heated battles require a constant mindfulness and economization of Elizabeth's power that is as exhilaratingly strategic as the best of tactical shooters.

A smaller, but no less genius touch is the fact that Elizabeth tosses you mana and ammo when it feels clutch. Even when it becomes obvious that she's scripted to do so whenever your resources are running low, the notion that an AI is looking out for you is relentlessly fulfilling, especially in a game that constructs a scenario that might've so easily fallen into the dreaded escort-mission trap. Indeed, going back to other first-person shooters has become tough, as Elizabeth is not just a delightful companion in a narrative sense, but she's also integral to the satisfaction of Infinite's moment-to-moment combat proceedings.

Each of the augments to the core shooting experience are satisfying in their own right, but once they all start working in tandem, Infinite's combat scenarios reach the upper-echelon of FPS sublimation. Not since Half-Life 2 has a shooter married pulse-pounding twitch thrills to a deeply strategic core so seamlessly, and while leaving so much room for experimentation. The gritty sound design that punctuates the action is equally superb; a combination of abrasive string stabs, impactful weapon sound effects and some truly horrifying enemy damage reactions unfailingly sell you on the weighty ferocity of the mayhem you cause.

All this, of course, sounds amazing, and on some level it truly is. But consider this: for all its fast-paced entertainment, Infinite's combat never fully works. In a mechanical sense, it's pretty much as polished as can be, but the game's massive amount of carnage doesn't quite work within the context of the story. In fact, story and gameplay don't feel merged at all. While there's a fair amount of narrative justification for the heavy degree of violence, the fact that shooting people and ripping their heads of with a spinning hook is pretty much Booker's only way of interacting with the world undercuts much of the arresting emotionality of Infinite's narrative.

Highlighting this problem is the fact that many of the game's most powerful moments either preclude player input, or limit interactivity to the push of a single button. Elizabeth's ability to tear holes in the space-time continuum, for example, may have been the basis for some ingenious puzzle solving and narrative interaction, but players are instead left to simply push a button to demand entry into a new reality where they can proceed to shoot more people in the face. Again, this feels like BioShock Infinite going only halfway in bringing its many fantastic ideas to life; some truly inventive mechanical structures may have been borne out of the game's central narrative conceits, but Irrational has disappointingly opted to instead rely on more comfortable and pre-established action gameplay.

This disconnect is furthered by the game's odd focus on scavenging between each firefight. While the opportunity to really dig into and appreciate each environment, as well as get a break from the nearly nonstop action is welcome, the context of the narrative doesn't really support these detours either. Booker's mission is given an impactful sense of urgency, so the fact that the game encourages you to stop down for long stretches of time to eat random food items littered about and try to uncover Columbia's many secrets is rather off-putting. Early on, for instance, Elizabeth finds herself in immediate danger. An objective indicator flashes on-screen telling you to go rescue her, yet you find yourself surrounded by lootable objects designated by a pulsating golden glow. Of all the moments to try and fish pieces of cake out of a trashcan, this may be the least opportune, but Infinite's structure, which evidently values narrative over gameplay in terms of pacing and logic, continues to tempt you astray regardless. This might all seem a bit nitpicky, but considering the fact that Infinite is so intent on being treated as a significant work of art, these small annoyances can't be ignored, as they gradually undermine the meaning the game tries so hard to construct for itself.

BioShock Infinite is a game worth any mature player's while, but it has come at an unfortunate time. Within the past year alone, the industry has been treated to games like Spec Ops: The Line, The Walking Dead, and Hotline Miami, just a few titles that are capable of eloquently and expertly exploring dark themes while being cognizant of their respective mechanics' impact on the narratives they try to weave, making a game like Infinite - one that never fully accounts for the ways in which its gameplay influences the meaning and effectiveness of its story - seem a bit clumsy by comparison. David Jaffe, the brilliant designer behind games like God of War and Twisted Metal once deemed the relationship between gameplay and narrative as being like the combination of "chocolate and tunafish." I would argue that this claim isn't necessarily true, and games like Spec Ops are perfect demonstrations as to why that is. In the case of Infinite, however, Jaffe's argument has a haunting validity. But take heart, the chocolate that is BioShock Infinite's gameplay and the tunafish that is its story are pretty much premium grade when enjoyed separately. Just accept the fact that the combination is to taste a little odd and find something to savor within it.

Get the full article at GameSpot

"WTA2k5 reviewed BioShock Infinite for the PlayStation 3..." was posted by WTA2k5 on Tue, 07 May 2013 13:42:46 -0700
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/bioshock-infinite/user-reviews/811095/platform/ps3/ Sat, 19 Jan 2013 10:58:13 -0800 dragonps reviewed Anarchy Reigns for the Xbox 360... http://www.gamespot.com/anarchy-reigns/user-reviews/806458/platform/xbox360/ ...and gave it a 8.0.

Sometimes very rarely, a videogame will come along which will be missed by the unaware consumer and finds itself pushed to the back of the gaming shelf. Games like Anarchy Reigns or Max Anarchy in Japan where the price is right (17 pounds in the UK for the limited edition) the gameplay is smooth and rewarding and the characters are anything but generic.

Anarchy Reigns plays something like Saints Row 2 meets Streets of Rage with a hint of Virtua Fighter and a pinch of Dynasty Warriors. The game has you running round a free roaming area defeating hordes of enemies using simple combos that become deeper if you delve. Some would scoff at the repetitive nature of pressing X,X,X,X to defeat these hordes but then there are lots of combos available not to mention barrels, tires, and vehicles to smash or throw at your foes. And that's before you hijack a super futuristic chopper and use it to fire missiles before smashing it into the ground.

This helps to alleviate that repetitive nature that some would tar the game with, so knowing this lets get into what the game offers.


Campaign:

Essentially the games story mode where you choose a side (black or white) and enter one of several free roaming areas defeating foes and finding secrets. What's interesting is that you see the story from both sides, this adds an extra "one more go" feel to the game as you want to know just how things pan out if roles were reversed.

There are two types of missions available, free and main.

Free missions don't advance the story and you don't have to complete them hence their name, main missions however will advance the story. The missions themselves are devilishly fun having you defeating as many enemies as possible to riding a huge beast destroying everything in your path. There's even a racing mission where the rules of racing are thrown out the window and killing bad guys is part of the fun.

Once you complete one side you will automatically start the other side, there's even a secret Red side to unlock later on.


Characterization:

Sometimes very rarely, a videogame will come along which will be missed by the unaware consumer and finds itself pushed to the back of the gaming shelf. Games like Anarchy Reigns or Max Anarchy in Japan where the price is right (17 pounds in the UK for the limited edition) the gameplay is smooth and rewarding and the characters are anything but generic.

Anarchy Reigns plays something like Saints Row 2 meets Streets of Rage with a hint of Virtua Fighter and a pinch of Dynasty Warriors. The game has you running round a free roaming area defeating hordes of enemies using simple combos that become deeper if you delve. Some would scoff at the repetitive nature of pressing X,X,X,X to defeat these hordes but then there are lots of combos available not to mention barrels, tires, and vehicles to smash or throw at your foes. And that's before you hijack a super futuristic chopper and use it to fire missiles before smashing it into the ground.

This helps to alleviate that repetitive nature that some would tar the game with, so knowing this lets get into what the game offers.


Campaign:

Essentially the games story mode where you choose a side (black or white) and enter one of several free roaming areas defeating foes and finding secrets. What's interesting is that you see the story from both sides, this adds an extra "one more go" feel to the game as you want to know just how things pan out if roles were reversed.

There are two types of missions available, free and main.

Free missions don't advance the story and you don't have to complete them hence their name, main missions however will advance the story. The missions themselves are devilishly fun having you defeating as many enemies as possible to riding a huge beast destroying everything in your path. There's even a racing mission where the rules of racing are thrown out the window and killing bad guys is part of the fun.

Once you complete one side you will automatically start the other side, there's even a secret Red side to unlock later on.


Characterization:

This game features of the most bizarre and strange takes on generic characters available including:

A guy with a chainsaw in his arm

A psychotic female fighter with nunchaku

A disturbed man with a cybernetic leg that fires missiles

Ok yeah you get the idea and the great part is you get to play as these characters on levels you have completed when you unlock them.


Combat:

Many games like this one fail in this department due to over simplicity or because they are hyper technical. Thankfully Anarchy Reigns is neither and offers simple and stylish combat along with decent training and tutorial modes. Each character has their own "killer weapon" that deals a hell of a lot more damage than your regular fists and feet. These weapons range from chainsaws and nunchakus to missile laden cybernetic legs and flaming Chinese fans. However my one complaint surrounding the combat is the guard/roll system. If done correctly you can avoid enemy attacks and counter them, however the input is rather fiddly at times and can throw you off.

It is however a minor complaint and not a deal breaker.


Multiplayer:

Characters you unlock can be used in the games multiplayer mode you can also unlock the characters here by going up in rank. The mode consists of your typical battles such as Team, Tag, and all out battle Royale.

They are oodles of fun and even if you lose you still rank up.


Extras:

Oh yes the game features a tonne of extra content from concept art to character models and even a color customize of sorts. Its a very rare site to see a bargain priced game offer so much content for so little.


Conclusion:

Platinum Games have created a rather fun game that brings back memories of the 80's/90's era of gaming when men were men, women were well women and the script was right out of an action movie. A great budget game with enough to keep you going for a long time and the limited edition features extra multiplayer modes plus Bayonetta as a playable character. There are a few misgivings such as the roll move and the music is not as drum and bass as you might expect.

However the content on offer and the small price tag will ease any qualms you may have about purchasing.

Get the full article at GameSpot

"dragonps reviewed Anarchy Reigns for the Xbox 360..." was posted by dragonps on Sat, 19 Jan 2013 10:58:13 -0800
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/anarchy-reigns/user-reviews/806458/platform/xbox360/ Wed, 26 Dec 2012 13:56:14 -0800 WTA2k5 reviewed Halo 4 for the Xbox 360... http://www.gamespot.com/halo-4/user-reviews/805201/platform/xbox360/ ...and gave it a 7.5.

Halo 4 begins with a gorgeous CG cutscene that presents many of the series' key battles in a slick montage - the fall of Reach, the invasion of New Mombasa, you name it, it's probably there. Amidst all the jaw-dropping action and visual splendor, a comparatively low-key scene plays out: Dr. Halsey - the creator of the Spartan program, and thus the Master Chief, as well as his AI sidekick Cortana - sits in a shadowy room as an interrogator looms over her. This enigmatic figure half-heartedly accuses her of war crimes before revealing what he's really after -  the keys to the Master Chief's success as an unstoppable killing machine. He explains that Spartans tend to exhibit sociopathy (though Noble team might have a thing or two to say about that), then asks a particularly juicy question: 

"Do you think Master Chief succeeded because he is, at his core, broken?"

For a series that seemed to possess a steadfast determination to never address its numerous narrative criticisms, this single question presents a surprising moment of self-awareness. The Master Chief is indeed broken, not just in terms of personality, but in his general quality as a protagonist. It might always be a blast to take control of the series' signature 7-foot, impossibly strong android, but watching his story actually play out has long been an immense bore. Within this one small moment, newcomer developer 343 Industries sets a strong expectation - namely that, in the middle of the high-concept sci-fi grandiosity that fuels the franchise's muddled mythos, they won't forget to lose sight of the humanity that should be at the center of every great epic. This ambition is certainly striking, but 343's initial cognizance of the series' problems soon fades away, and the proceedings more or less revert to Halo as we know it. And while that may bode poorly for Halo 4's campaign and narrative, the franchise's mechanical perfection, along with immense production values and a great set of multiplayer options, allows the new team of creatives to get by with the series' exalted legacy very much intact. 

Still, it's very hard not to feel let down by the campaign that follows such a clever opening cutscene. Perhaps the most disappointing part is that, for its first few levels, Halo 4 successfully leads you to believe that it's bolder and wiser than any of its predecessors, as the game's first act sees the Master Chief and Cortana surrounded with enticing and menacing unknowns. After being rudely stirred from a four-year cryosleep, the Chief soon finds himself contending with a whole host of obstacles, including a fleet of rogue Covenant and the planet Requiem, a mysterious and truly alien environment the likes of which the series hasn't crafted since the original Halo. The conflict that takes center stage, however, is the onset of Cortana's rampancy - the height of an AI's aging process, and the time at which their systems begin to fail. With Cortana's "death" seemingly imminent, the long-understated relationship between the series' famed duo finally takes center-stage as the Master Chief finds himself struggling to balance saving his partner and confronting a newfound menace.

This all adds up to clearly indicate that 343 knows what needs to be done in order to not only put their stamp on the Halo series, but to make it better than ever. Unfortunately, it seems they lack the daring needed to execute on these concepts in a truly compelling way. The driving plot involving a new alien threat falls into the typical Halo series pitfall of becoming overblown and convoluted pretty much the very second additional plot elements come into play. Ancient evils, secret weapons, evolution and genetic modification, Halos, Forerunners, Prometheans, and a whole host of other topics work their way into Halo 4's narrative, but none of them come together to form an engaging, or even coherent plot. The more personal subplot centered on Cortana and the Chief's relationship should've fared better, but the repetitiveness of its key moments, along with a climactic sequence that falls completely flat, make it lose every bit of its potential poignancy.

The action that surrounds these story beats is entertaining insofar as any Halo game is, but there are clear signs that the usual campaign formula desperately needs to be reexamined. To start with the good - or rather, utterly fantastic - the mechanics are still as perfect as ever. Every gun has a weighty feel entirely of its own, and punchy sound effects do a lot to sell you on their raw power. Movement and aiming is slick and precise, and 343 does well to maintain series signatures like a subtle but finely tuned bit of aim assist, and the Master Chief's superhuman leap.

Beyond these core elements, moment-to-moment gameplay is most reminiscent of Halo: Reach, as dual-wielding remain out of the picture and Armor Abilities factor rather heavily into firefights. Unlike its predecessor, however, every one of Halo 4's batch of Armor Abilities is a hit. Abilities like Armor Lock that didn't quite work are gone, while old favorites like jetpacks and holograms return, and new additions like the Autosentry, a hovering robot companion who aids you in gunning down your foes, and the Hardlight (read: riot) shield further change the dynamic for the better.

The new breed of foe you'll face in the form of the Prometheans also help to keep things feeling relatively fresh. While the smaller enemies mostly behave like reskinned versions of older baddies, the daunting Promethean Knights offer an invigorating challenge. Decked out with a long-ranged weapon, shields, crushing melee, and the ability to teleport out of harm's way, these aliens are some of the toughest foes in series history, and facing them down is always a riot thanks to their unpredictability. The bright, bold colors and sleek chrome look that defines these new enemies, though very clearly influenced by Metroid Prime's iconic space pirates, still provide a wondrous departure from the typical Halo aesthetic.

Unfortunately, the dynamism seen in this singular enemy type is nowhere to be found when examining the campaign as a whole. Though its reluctance to adhere to current development trends during this setpiece-heavy era of singleplayer gaming is commendable, the standard proceedings simply get boring after a while. As fun as the new weapons and enemies are, standard gameplay structures simply can't sustain an eight hour campaign, and repetitive objectives only exacerbate the feeling of sameness that sets in after the first couple of hours.

The game does subvert repetitiveness to some degree here and there. In Halo 4's most inspired bid at shaking things up, Requiem's bold, angular visual design is occasionally made a factor in gameplay. An early sequence, for example, sees players teleporting to different platforms in the middle of a vast, hollow globe of alien machinery is enthralling in its visual design to the point where the more immediate action almost becomes secondary. Beyond moments like this, the game also seems to acknowledge its relative lack of variety by including a number of vehicle setpieces in its last few missions. Aside from a gleeful rampage through a space station in the new Mantis mech, however, these moments are mostly retreads of old setpieces.

Though sandwiched between Halo 2 and ODST's more experimental campaigns, Halo 3 and Reach locked into similarly comfortable grooves with their singleplayer components. Halo 4 sticks mostly to their formula, offering a campaign built around the series' core gameplay and the long-running, immensely confusing narrative with a few decent setpieces and half-hearted appeals to emotion thrown in for good measure. The problem is that this setup works no better in this title than it has in the past, and while powering through the game's eight levels can be fun simply thanks to a set of thoroughly satisfying core mechanics, it's quite clear that a significant change must be made in order to craft a compelling experience once more. Halo 4's setting is the clearest indication of this notion; the metallic opulence of Requiem is pure, old-school sci-fi splendor that serves as a refreshing change of pace from the militarized planets seen in previous titles. In fact, this awe-inspiring new backdrop is realized so meticulously that it even serves to alter gameplay from time to time. Unfortunately, Requiem isn't a reflection of the rest of the campaign's ingenuity so much as a standout exception to its lack thereof.

It's rather odd that 343, despite showing a painfully apparent reluctance to break new ground with the Halo franchise's aging campaign formula, is willing to overhaul the series' exalted adversarial multiplayer offering in major ways. Taking cues from pretty much every major online shooter from the past couple years, Halo 4's suite of multiplayer options (dubbed Infinity) is exceedingly fast paced, and brimming with unlockable rewards. Though many fans have been skeptical, modern tweaks like killcams, split-second respawns, killstreaks, and a lengthy sprint ability fit quite naturally into the preexisting Halo dynamic. In fact, the healthy dose of twitchy freneticism they provide gives multiplayer matches a consistent energy and intensity, the likes of which wasn't necessarily accomplished in previous games' more emergent design.

Furthering this more structured approach is a swath of unlockables. Partaking in the matchmaking madness earns you new ranks, as well as Spartan Points, which then lead to the acquisition of a whole host of rewards. Some of them, such as new pieces of armor, are simply smoke and mirrors that seem to exist just to keep you hooked. Other unlocks, however, can be quite substantive. Perhaps the biggest revelation comes with the addition of loadouts. By allowing players to select their own starting weaponry, the usual lull that occurs as a game begins is entirely avoided. Having to dive into a match's first few firefights without any idea of what to expect from your opponents is immensely exciting, and helps rounds feel fresh and dynamic from the very second they start.

This chaotic and utterly exceptional combination of Halo multiplayer mainstays and post-Modern Warfare features is further amplified by Halo 4's ten incredible maps. At first glance, it might be hard to pick out one or two real hits out of the bunch, but it soon become apparent that each arena is a masterstroke of design. With varied visuals, perfect weapon and vehicle placement, and meticulously crafted chokepoints, Halo 4 features the best map lineup in the entire series. With any luck, this slew of fantastic arenas will cause the Halo community's usual tendency to favor one or two maps over all others to become a thing of the past.

Secondary modes like Theater and Forge, an accessible map pseudo-editor, make a return and provide pretty much exactly what fans would expect. Both features are as fleshed out and easy to use as they've always been, and sharing your works is quicker than ever. The Forge toolset has also seen a good bit of expansion, with three (rather than just one) base template to work with. At this point, it's likely that most players have made up their minds as to how much time they're willing to spend delving into these extras; some are devoted to building architectural wonders and Forge, some have turned the Theater mode into a sort of art form, while others ignore these features entirely. Players new to these features owe it to themselves to give them a shot, however, since the toolsets offered are among the best console gamers can get their hands on.

Perhaps the most radical upending of Halo tradition is the removal of the Firefight wave-defense mode in favor of a new beast: Spartan Ops. This new cooperative mode's main conceit is that it takes on an episodic format. A new episode is delivered each week, bringing with it five brief stages that can be cleared with up to four players. More surprisingly, however is that these pieces of content also provide gorgeous CG cutscenes that reveal new pieces of an overarching narrative. While these marvelous cinemas succeed in drawing you into Crimson Squad's perilous exploits, the ensuing gameplay doesn't do its part to support Spartan Ops' ambitions.

This is because, for the most part, stages are rather bland and unexciting. Players are usually tasked with shooting through a bunch of foes, accomplish a menial objective or two, then hold off as they wait for extraction. Though this might change down the line, Spartan Ops' first few episodes have clung to this ill-advised formula rather tenaciously, resulting in an experience that quickly runs out of steam. Compounding this issue is the fact that only the single most recent episode supports matchmaking. Thus, if you want to catch up on the story or play through more than just five fleeting scenarios, you'll be out of luck unless you can gather some friends together to power through the content you actually want to experience. This baffling choice to eschew easy connectivity for past episodes comes as a huge detriment to Spartan Ops, as it fails to incentivize experiencing the piecemeal narrative upon which the mode is predicated. Though 343 deserves some credit for trying to subvert the archaic blueprint laid out by Gears of War 2 a few years ago, the solution they've devised in Spartan Ops never quite comes together, and is ultimately less entertaining than a standard Horde-mode knockoff might've been.

Taking an all-encompassing look at 343's attempts to put their stamp on Halo's three main pillars of play - those being campaign, coop, and adversarial multiplayer - yields an amusing result. The campaign formula, which is in desperate need for a change, ultimately receives the least improvement, even if a story expressly built to tug on your heartstrings might attempt to convince you otherwise; the action is still plodding (save for a few setpieces), and the narrative is still insufferably focused on needlessly fleshing out a mythos that has already way overextended any immediate narrative's ability to implement its innumerable and absurdly complex plot elements in an interesting way. The cooperative component does well to move onto a fresh format that has nothing to do with waves or hordes, but 343's innovation only goes halfway; Spartan Ops suffers a number of problems that keep it from being the phenomenon it has the capacity to become, the most notable of which being its exceedingly shoddy matchmaking functionality.

Where the new developers see the most success, however, is in their revamping of player-versus-player combat. Though this side of the Halo franchise has always been addicting enough to reduce a quietly humming, freshly powered Xbox to a loud, clunking jet engine, numerous smart design tweaks have been made to bring the action to even greater heights. Why it is that a mode that would've still impressed if left alone receives the most attention is beyond me, but that doesn't keep the proceedings from possessing an undeniable fun factor.

Halo 4 is, essentially, the old "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" rule gone horribly wrong. The facets of the series that have been, to a certain extent, broken for years (a few of which get pointed out by 343 themselves) are left in their faulty state. Meanwhile, the Halo franchise's more time-tested strengths receive major overhauls. Fortunately, this perfect storm of confusion as to how to iterate on a strong IP never leads Halo 4 to fully underwhelm. The presentation, complete with a wonderful score by Neil Davidge and the best visuals you'll find on the Xbox 360, is thoroughly fantastic, the multiplayer is endlessly entertaining, and despite their being rough around the edges, there's still quite a bit of fun to be found within the campaign and Spartan Ops.

Ultimately, however, Halo 4's perpetuation of the series' masterful set of core mechanics allow it to remain a damn good game. In this way, Bungie has equipped their best-known franchise with a comforting anchor; no matter what direction any new creatives try to drive their sci-fi opus, the moment-to-moment gameplay will never fail to entertain. 343 Industries may use this fact as a crutch too often, but it nevertheless acts as a potent assurance that this is a series that will always be worth players' while.

+Excellent core mechanics
+Superb and robust adversarial multiplayer
+Stunning production values
+Forge and Theater are as compelling as ever

-Repetitive campaign
-Poorly executed narrative
-Spartan Ops never quite lives up to its promise

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"WTA2k5 reviewed Halo 4 for the Xbox 360..." was posted by WTA2k5 on Wed, 26 Dec 2012 13:56:14 -0800
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/halo-4/user-reviews/805201/platform/xbox360/ Sun, 16 Dec 2012 11:58:25 -0800 dragonps reviewed Dead or Alive 5 for the Xbox 360... http://www.gamespot.com/dead-or-alive-5/user-reviews/804788/platform/xbox360/ ...and gave it a 7.0.

7 years is a long time to wait, games change genre's change people change. Gaming tends to evolve within that period, so when a game returns after so many years of absence your hoping it will do what everyone else does....but better.

Sadly this is not the case with DOA5, from the moment you start up the game a huge underwhelming feeling passes over you. A very bland title screen greets you with no opening move and some rather generic music in the background. Getting to the main menu screen and things don't get much better but then these are trivial things.

Something very different that Team Ninja have done is do away with the individual arcade endings and in their place is a rather comprehensive story mode. However arcade mode returns but no end boss of character ending awaits you.



STORY MODE:

A mode that comprises most (not all) characters stories into several segments that eventually join up together. Something interesting is that the game eases you in by giving you challenges that if you complete (and win the match) unlock a title. These can be used to customize your fight card and are very similar to Street Fighter 4's titles.

However there is a very frustrating thing about this Story Mode title collection

In order to obtain the title you need to both meet the requirement and win the match. This is easy for titles like "hit opponent X amount of times" however titles such as "counter opponent X amount of times" can be increasingly frustrating. More often than not you will meet the requirement with only a small amount of life remaining but then lose the fight AND the title and have to do it again.

Eventually you may end up forgetting about the titles anyway due to the somewhat confusing storyline, fighting games have never really had great stories so It's not something to complain about. Although you may find yourself skipping the story scenes (try not to though as there is an achievement for watching them all) and getting right back into the action.



SURVIVAL MODE:

Some fans may be disappointed with this mode as it loses the item collection of previous games and is now solely a "fight till you drop" experience.

None of the other modes have changed at all and you still get to unlock costumes after completing most modes. Although you may find that the costumes you unlock in game are rather unsatisfactory compared to the ones that are available as DLC.

This is one of the huge let downs of the game classic costumes are gone and replaced by color swaps and some very undesirables. No DOA2 Jann Lee C3 or Zack shadow man outfit, and on top of this no customization (though holding different buttons changes some costumes/hairstyles)

After waiting seven years one would think Team Ninja would go all out with their fighter and show the competition that Dead Or Alive is back and means business. Instead after completing story mode you may find yourself bored with things to do although the gameplay makes up for a lot of that boredom.

Yes that great system from previous games returns with enough tweaks to make it even better, tag mode is still oodles of fun with a friend and remains so satisfying you can taste it.

So overall a good fighting game but lack of content and modes AND the fact you have to pay for classic costumes makes DOA's return somewhat underwhelming.

Get the full article at GameSpot

"dragonps reviewed Dead or Alive 5 for the Xbox 360..." was posted by dragonps on Sun, 16 Dec 2012 11:58:25 -0800
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/dead-or-alive-5/user-reviews/804788/platform/xbox360/ Fri, 14 Dec 2012 11:25:07 -0800 WTA2k5 reviewed Assassin's Creed III: Liberation for the PlayStation Vita... http://www.gamespot.com/assassins-creed-iii-liberation/user-reviews/804694/platform/vita/ ...and gave it a 6.0.

After completing a playthrough of Assassin's Creed III: Liberation that I knew to be somewhere in the realm of 12 hours or so, I went to check my exact play-time in the game's stats screen. According to this submenu, my week's worth of multi-hour play sessions had, in truth, only lasted 42 minutes. As bizarre as this error was, I didn't think much of it as I had already encountered dozens of similar flaws by the time I had completed the campaign; in a game as sloppy as Liberation, the flaws are so manifold that it's hard to take particular note of any one of them by the time all's said and done. Whether its a chugging frame rate, an incoherent narrative, clunky combat, or serious glitches, there are more than a few punches to roll with while playing Liberation. Still, it's quite hard to call it a bad game, and this is simply because it manages to mimic the series' acclaimed ethos, even if it never fully captures it. The hugely inconsistent experience that results is generally a mess, but the mere fact that it achieves even the slightest success in upholding the franchise's stellar ideas and mechanics allows it to, intermittently, be quite brilliant.

One of the game's occasional bursts of cleverness comes in the establishment of its unique framing device. Instead of following the core console series' formula in which a modern-day protagonist straps into the Animus and lives out their ancestors' memories, Liberation's historical narrative is presented as a propaganda-laden consumer product released by the franchise's chief antagonists, the nefarious Abstergo corporation. If the game had executed on this concept with any grace, the adventures of 18th-century New Orleanian Assassin Aveline de Grandpre would have had an enticing air of deceit about them. Unfortunately, whoever's coming up with the slanderous propaganda over at Abstergo exercises surprising restraint, leading Liberation's narrative tone lacking in any sort of clarity; it's rarely apparent which sections are doctored memories and which are the real deal. What follows is a continuously off-putting plot that's wholly unreliable simply by accident and lack of foresight on the part of its writers.

The historical plot, even when distilled from its ill-conceived framing device, doesn't fare much better. The game's focus on the dichotomy between New Orleans' upper-class merchants and the suffering slaves that fuel their wealth seems like a promising setup. Similarly, the fact that Aveline is of mixed heritage, with one parent on either side of this class and racial divide, makes her a fitting anchor for this seemingly fearless tale. The fact that these themes are presented, however, doesn't mean that they're explored all that thoroughly. In fact, the plot largely glosses over its weighty subject matter in favor of a more straightforward whodunit mystery, thus completely squandering its impactful potential. Mostly good voice acting and memorable character designs keep story sequences from being a complete bore, but it's still unfortunate that the game doesn't capitalize on its fascinating foundations.

It's odd, but no less impressive that the best realization of Liberation's thematic ambitions is achieved within a small gameplay subsystem. During the first half of the game, Aveline is often required to change into one of three different outfits: the Slave, the Lady, and, of course, the Assassin. Each Persona, as they are called, affects both Aveline's moveset and the way the world responds to her. The Lady costume's restrictive corset, for example, prevents Aveline from stashing very many weapons or from engaging in the series' signature free-running mechanic. To make up for this seeming disadvantage, the citizens of New Orleans are much less suspicious of her, and some particularly chivalrous gentleman can help her blend into crowds or assist her in dealing with muggers. The Slave costume has its own set of perks and pitfalls, and the Persona system as a whole provides a refreshing twist on the usual Assassin's Creed formula.

Perhaps the best part of this system, however, is in how efficiently it characterizes Aveline. Though the game's lackluster cutscenes fail to give her many defining traits, this system eloquently shows her resourcefulness and knack for assuming the various societal roles that comprise the world around her. The Personas thus video game storytelling at its most ideal, as gameplay actively enforces the narrative shown through more traditional means (never mind how poor that plot is in the first place).

As fun as it is to experiment with the Slave and Lady costumes, the latter half of the game has you donning the Assassin's garb most frequently. It's here that Liberation returns to playing like Assassin's Creed as players know it, complete with death-defying platforming and swift, brutal combat. But while the series proper has perfected its core gameplay to the point of mechanical sublimation, a myriad of issues keep Liberation from attaining that same level of quality.

Though the excellent ambient sound design and lush art direction that bring New Orleans and the surrounding bayou to life create a wondrous sense of place, the immersion is all but broken once things pick up speed. As powerful as the Vita is, it's still unable to handle quick movement through such a large and detailed environment while maintaing a steady frame rate. Thus, the sense of speed and effortlessness that gives Assassin's Creed's parkour its thrilling edge is more or less nonexistent once the game begins to frequently dip into lows of 15-20 FPS. Still, the series' free-running system have always succeeded in inducing a sort of trance-like state thanks to its combination of stunning environments and detailed animations, and this effect is nevertheless achieved despite Liberation's relative sluggishness.

Combat, similarly, can yield some satisfaction despite never quite feeling right. Fights control much in the same way they do in Assassin's Creed III proper; the old block-counter routine of games past have been removed in favor of an Arkham City-esque control scheme centered around aggressive attacks and rhythmic parries. While this might sound perfectly entertaining, the game is oddly inconsistent in registering your counter-attacks, and you'll often find enemies proceeding to successfully wounding you despite your best efforts to get the upper hand. The same goes for stealthy kills; the game fails to recognize up-close assassinations rather often, leaving you to fumble around for another way to quickly dispose of your foe before getting caught up in an all-out brawl.

Luckily, Liberation almost seems to acknowledge its problems, and quickly introduces you to a vast array of instant-kill maneuvers to ease the pain that accompanies its poorly made combat structures. A pistol, multiple poison darts, liberally dispersed muskets, and a mark-and-execute system lifted straight from Splinter Cell: Conviction provide Aveline with plenty of ways to end violent encounters quickly and decisively. It goes without saying that none of these elements bode particularly well for the game's core fighting system, but they serve as apt crutches for its shortcomings.

Liberation further suffers from the same sort of arbitrary integration of the Vita's many control options as Uncharted: Golden Abyss did earlier this year. Swiping the screen to paddle a canoe or open a letter, using the gyroscope to solve a digital version of a magnetic handheld maze (don't even ask), and pointing the camera at light sources to illuminate invisible ink are about yield no enjoyment, and are readily visible as the needless stopgaps they are between the moments of more meaningful action.

The game also features a peculiar asynchronous, strategic multiplayer mode that plays out like an extension of the Brotherhood meta-game found in later console entries. You and your opponent vie for control of various cities across the world and achieve dominance by going on missions, and, of course, killing each other. All of this action takes place on a world map and within submenus with no real-time gameplay to be found. Though it's certainly atypical, this multiplayer mode simply isn't compelling enough to deserve much of your attention, and its social game trappings that limit the number of actions you can perform in one sitting lessens its appeal even more.

Though it's technically a spin-off of Connor Kenway's bloody campaign in Assassin's Creed III proper, Liberation is most reminiscent of the series' first entry. Altair's first outing is much like Aveline's in the degree to which it is defined by unrealized potential. Conceptually, everything is in place for one hell of a game. From a memorable protagonist and an immersive setting to a cool frame narrative and tried-and-true gameplay concepts imbued with a few innovative twists, Liberation has it all - on paper anyway. The slew of technical problems and ludonarrative inconsistencies that plague every facet of the game keep it from ever living up to its grand ambitions, and rather unfortunately renders the original Assassin's Creed its most fitting analog. All we can do is hope for a sequel that we might just as easily compare to Assassin's Creed II.


+Persona system is a great bit of ludic characterization
+Strong audio
+Great concepts...

-...that largely suffer from poor execution
-Data-corrupting bugs
-Arbitrary, uninteresting use of the Vita's many control options
-Poor frame rate

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]]> http://www.gamespot.com/assassins-creed-iii-liberation/user-reviews/804694/platform/vita/ Sun, 21 Oct 2012 16:53:06 -0700 WTA2k5 reviewed Dishonored for the Xbox 360... http://www.gamespot.com/dishonored/user-reviews/801782/platform/xbox360/ ...and gave it a 8.5.

The developer diary has become an increasingly common pre-release marketing strategy amongst AAA game studios. Though they are, in essence, glorified advertisements, they represent something rather grandiose and self-important in that they show potential customers the meticulous inner-workings of a project that might not ultimately be all that special. Dishonored is a AAA game, and it did indeed benefit from a long string of developer diaries leading up to its release, but Arkane Studios' behind-the-scenes videos are quite unlike most; instead of inundating viewers with quick-edits of flashy gameplay clips and pithy talking-heads, their developer diaries are content to be unabashedly unhip. Instead of spoiling the story, tossing out overblown superlatives, and showing off cool kills like most others do, a lot of Arkane's diaries spend their running time talking about things like whales, rat plagues, and what goes into designing dystopian metropolises.

Oddly enough, these videos probably do the best job of capturing how Dishonored feels to play; just as they are bizarrely off the mark despite feeling more honest and true to the game's ethos than most other dev diaries, the game itself adamantly - and sometimes sloppily - circumvents most staples of modern gaming in order to bring back the dynamism of the non-linear FPS classics of yore. The resulting experience is an engrossing love-letter to games like Deus Ex, and Thief, and though the game's execution doesn't always live up to its many ambitions, the degree of freedom it grants players is simply awe-inspiring.

The game doesn't start out by letting you loose, however; its decidedly dull opening moments are largely spent setting the stage for the cliched drama of betrayal and revenge. As Corvo Attano, bodyguard to the empress, you quickly find yourself framed for the monarch's murder at the hands of a shadowy band of assassins. Her assassination is, of course, done in the name of placing the egotistical, tyrannical second-in-command in charge until her daughter comes of age. This, in turn, leads Corvo to team up with a group of loyalists to the royal family, and hunt down all those behind the conspiracy. Unfortunately, the ensuing narrative is just as bland as its setup; there's not one interesting character or plot point in the entire game, and twists can be seen from miles away.

Luckily, this mostly becomes a non-issue as the game hands the reins over to you, letting you explore the twisted city of Dunwall to your heart's content. The city itself, with its many narratives both explicit and implied, is far more engrossing than the game's shoddy traditional storytelling. A rat plague sweeps the city, leaving its citizens dead, dying, or even zombified. A devastating flood leaves a good portion of Dunwall in ruins. Propaganda booms over loud-speakers and corrupt aristocrats surround themselves with armies of guardsmen while commoners die in filth. Learning about Dunwall's fascinating and horrifying issues is spellbinding, and will likely send you scouring the corners of its semi-open-world levels in search of more bits of lore, whether they come in the form of side quests, books, or audio recordings.

Furthering the macabre appeal of Dunwall is its masterful visual design, which comes from the mind of Viktor Antonov, the man who devised Half-Life 2's iconic style. Much like the imposing, police-state of City 17, Dunwall's looming, angular architecture is strikingly creepy, and contrasts nicely with the cartoony character models. The city's Victorian-meets-steampunk designs are a joy to behold and explore, and each new environment brings its own unique wonders. The tech that backs this all up isn't always up to the job - there are a number of pop-in issues, blurry textures, and poor graphical effects - but these issues are far outweighed by the bold splendor of the artistry.

Of course, your primary means of exploring, and even shaping the city of Dunwall is through the game's litany of entertaining sandbox mechanics. Corvo, already possessed of superhuman agility and quite good with a knife, quickly becomes acquainted with a mysterious being who grants him magical powers and a genius quartermaster who supplies him with the latest in steampunk murder instruments. The result is an absolute glut of gadgets and abilities to toy around with that also impressively subverts feeling overwhelming. Taking the time to experiment with your massive arsenal can yield some shockingly brutal outcomes. Tricks like stopping time while you're surrounded, plopping a grenade amidst your frozen pursuers, then running to a safe distance and watching the ensuing bloodbath are vastly entertaining, and feel especially rewarding because the game gives you so few indications of how powers and gadgets can be used in tandem. You are given complete free rein over the use of your many powers and the game is balanced enough to make any play style viable, so whether you wish to take a completely non-lethal route through the game's 12 hour campaign, shoot everyone you see in the face, or simply mess around with your myriad of powers to your heart's content, Dishonored's exceedingly smart level design will ensure you can succeed.

On my first playthrough, I favored abilities like Slow Time and Blink that would allow me to traverse the environment fast, kill my targets even faster, and get out of Dodge before anyone caught on to me. Thus far, this play style has been the most satisfying; Dishonored features the best first-person platforming this side of Mirror's Edge, and once you get the hang of its movement mechanics, gracefully hopping and teleporting around the roofs of Dunwall is absolutely joyous. Taking both the non-lethal, or the head-on approach can be equally thrilling, but require an adept knowledge of the game's levels and mechanics; though these options aren't as accessible, they're ultimately just as fine-tuned as any more balanced play style, and the fact that Dishonored can support the myriad of potential approaches is immensely impressive.

Unfortunately, Dishonored's ill-conceived narrative rears its ugly head within the realm of gameplay thanks to the addition of a confounding morality system. Based on the number of people you kill, levels will be slightly (or in the case of the final level, significantly) altered to reflect the degree of unrest you've caused in Dunwall; shed too much blood and you'll be faced with more security, zombies and vicious, flesh-eating plague rats than those who prefer a more peaceful approach. While the idea of handling choice and consequence through the direct actions of players rather than gameplay-halting dialog trees is certainly a good one, it simply doesn't fit the game's essence; the bag of tricks Dishonored hands you actively encourages experimenting with different gameplay styles, so the decision to incorporate a restrictive morality calculus is truly baffling.

This system proves to be equally flawed from a narrative standpoint. Emily, the daughter of the decreased empress, looks up to Corvo, and her dialogue and behavior is thus influenced by his actions. While this is also a novel concept, it simply doesn't work within the greater context of the narrative for many reasons. For one, Emily's responses to Corvo's level of brutality are comically overblown; though her reactive dialogue is meant to instill in you a sense of pride or guilt, they'll probably end up causing you to chuckle more than anything else. Secondly, players are never given a reason to care too much about Emily. In fact, aside from the game's final sequence, there is only one other time at which the player is required to interact with her; I, for one, felt no inclination to check up on her between missions, so her heavy involvement in the endgame sequences never meant much. While this may sound somewhat inconsequential, it's highly indicative of just how poorly planned Dishonored's morality system is in the first place; not only is it contrary to its design philosophies, it also comes to the detriment of the game's already poor narrative. Why, then, it is in place, is a true mystery. Ever since BioWare pioneered binary good/evil decision-making, similar systems have been arbitrarily tacked on to far too many games, and Dishonored is an unfortunately perfect example of why such gameplay conceits should be used far more sparingly than they actually are.

About a third of the way through the game, after collecting most of my primary abilities and gadgets, I forced myself to stop caring about my moral standing; such delightfully violent powers were too good to not toy with. It was soon after that I came across the Golden Cat, a brothel which my two assassination targets were patronizing, and more importantly, the game's most open-ended environment. It was in this moment - what would turn out to be the first of many - I found myself stuck, not because of the game's difficulty, but rather due to the overwhelming vastness of options that lay before me: I could have easily gone on a rampage, killing anyone who stands between me and my marks, or I could perhaps have slinked through a few open windows, silently dispatching my specified targets and escaping without anyone knowing the difference. What's more, I could've done a separate favor for the local crime boss in exchange for the abduction of the corrupt conspirators. Considering these options isn't arresting simply because they are so manifold, but also because I know they'll all be gleefully entertaining. Not many games can support your every whim, and even fewer can ensure that your choices can yield fun and entertaining results, but such is the beauty of Dishonored. At a time when the design behind most action games sacrifices too much player input to mimic the straightforward thrills of a Hollywood blockbuster, it's nice to play a game that is willing to sacrifice flashiness for emergent gameplay and dynamic, player-authored fun. Games like Dishonored have been done before, and have been done better, but rarely in recent years have they been executed so effectively.

+Amazingly free-form gameplay
+Dunwall is a joy to behold and explore
+Great first-person platforming

-Uninteresting story; mostly bland characters
-Confounding morality system

Get the full article at GameSpot

"WTA2k5 reviewed Dishonored for the Xbox 360..." was posted by WTA2k5 on Sun, 21 Oct 2012 16:53:06 -0700
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/dishonored/user-reviews/801782/platform/xbox360/ Tue, 16 Oct 2012 15:14:20 -0700 dunnuck reviewed Resident Evil 6 for the Xbox 360... http://www.gamespot.com/resident-evil-6/user-reviews/801566/platform/xbox360/ ...and gave it a 6.0.

Graphics aren't the only elements in a video game and this installment in the Resident Evil franchise shows clearly that glossy, detailed visuals alone don't make a for a satisfying experience. There are so many things that have gone wrong with this most recent attempt at grandeur that it's hard to see a future for the franchise. As a longtime fan of the series, it honestly hurts to say. Nonetheless, it is the truth.

Resident Evil 6 features three separate campaigns, four if you include the campaign of the series' obscure female spy, Ada Wong. While the idea of multiple campaigns following multiple characters can be attractive and add a very positive and complex narrative, Resident Evil 6 is a prime example of how not to do such a narrative. Trying to apply to both classic RE fans and new RE fans, Capcom attempted to give each campaign it's own flavor. Adding a plethora of new characters didn't help matters any by trying to force feed characterization far too soon and far too quick. The overall result is a diluted experience overstuffed with mediocre elements.

The plot, well...let's be honest, Resident Evil hasn't had the most coherent plot and it's mostly been a nonsensical line of logic. This reaches a new, all-time high within Resident Evil 6, the multiple plot turns and plot devices so laughably bad that it leaves fans thinking "Are you serious? Now we have the T, G, and C Virus? What's next? The B virus?" And unfortunately, if there already isn't a B virus I'm forgetting about, it maybe next in Resident Evil's line of diseases.

Lets move onto the campaigns of the game. While I have yet to play Ada Wong's, the other's have been mostly lackluster. Jake and Sherry's Campaign has the best plot but the gameplay is hitched upon quicktime event after quicktime event and is littered with forced development for the the newbie in the series as well as overall bad, typical cool-guy dialogue. It seems like someone on the development team has been watching a slew of mediocre action movies between the 70s and 90s.

Chris' campaign is difficult to complete. It's by far the worst in the game, and that's saying something with a game that has received such a low score. The campaign is the "part" of the game that Resident Evil fans want to forget about and veto from the series. It is all action, no substance.

Leon ad Helena's campaign is the best in the game, and if Resident Evil 6 was focused on them and had no other campaigns in it. then everyone's outlook on the series' future would be quite different. It partially delivers on what fans used to expect from the Resident Evil franchise.

Three things in the game that's present in all campaigns are the following: Characters saying and doing incredibly idiotic things, obnoxiously persistent bosses, and an amount of convenience that doesn't ask you to suspend disbelief, but to completely omit it from your brain.

Get the full article at GameSpot

"dunnuck reviewed Resident Evil 6 for the Xbox 360..." was posted by dunnuck on Tue, 16 Oct 2012 15:14:20 -0700
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/resident-evil-6/user-reviews/801566/platform/xbox360/ Sun, 07 Oct 2012 06:49:18 -0700 Minishdriveby reviewed Kid Icarus: Uprising for the 3DS... http://www.gamespot.com/kid-icarus-uprising/user-reviews/801054/platform/3ds/ ...and gave it a 6.5.

Kid Icarus: Uprising is a mixed bag. The controls are fairly bad, and although they become manageable in time, I never was able to master them during my 8 hour playthrough. I'm talking specifically about the ground missions when I say they were bad. The on-rail flight sections were truly a joy, but the ground system and some of the vehicles you can hop into, the bike specifically, are horrid. The camera is moved around by flicking the stylus across the bottom screen, not moving the stylus toward the side, but flicking the stylus. With a little bit of trouble you get use to this system; however, Pit also has a problem with moving. There's a dash/run system that speeds Pit up quite a bit, and this is done by flicking the control nub in the direction you want pit to dash. The only problem is sometimes you'll go to just walk and you'll end up dashing off a ledge. This is what caused the majority of deaths in my game. It wasn't enemy difficulty that caused deaths; it was the clunky platforming if you can even call it platforming (Pit can't jump), really it was just falling off platforms that were floating above bottomless pits.

Because I tallied up quite a bit of deaths due to this horrible control method, I realized another system that is rather odd in Kid Icarus, the difficulty system. You can change the difficulty in Kid Icarus at the start of every level. All you need is the games currency to bet that you can finish the level. You bet more and more hearts as you increase the difficulty level scale which has absurdly minute increments (Really what's the difference between a difficulty level of 3.0 and 3.1?!). If you don't have enough hearts, in game currency, you cannot raise the difficulty. Then if you die in the level, say do to falling off platforms to many times which will likely happen, the difficulty will be lowered by a whole point and a half in some cases. I didn't enjoy this system because enemies are fairly easy to beat and the boss at the end of every level only takes 2 minutes to beat. I started countless boss battles that were finished in under a minute which is a shame because the boss designs were pretty cool.

Another complaint is that the checkpoints are not save points in the levels. You have to play the whole level to save.

So those were the major faults I had with the game. What were the positives?

Well the game had an awesome musical score. It really was a cool playing through the on-rail flying sections and listening to this game with headphones on. Even the ground segments had good music. The voice acting is non-stop and although you may miss a couple quips here and there do to focusing on the screen and not listening, there are some good one liners, 4th wall breaks, and references in the game to make a couple mental laughs happen. I found it really funny when Pit came across a boss and had a littleRocky Horror Picture show moment.

The atmosphere and level design/diversity were also awesome. There are 25 chapters and each one is unique and is a joy to look at. Once again the most credit has to be given to the flying sections as they are more controlled and give you a bunch of cool cinematics and awesome background and foreground scenes as you swoop and dodge enemies and environmental objects. Ground levels still look nice, but they are a little more generic. Each levels plays as a mini-chapter, and once finished you return to the main menu, which is reminiscent of Super Smash Bros Brawl main menu, to buy/sell weapons, combine weapons, and select the next level to play. The story has quite a bit of twists and turns to enjoy as well, so you'll always be seeing something new.

There is also a cool weapon system where you can synthesis weapons and redeem hearts to buy more weapons. To be honest I didn't dig too deep into this system, but I did find it to be a nice feature that added more depth to the game.

Kid Icarus could have been a great revival of a character. It has all the right pieces to make an amazing game, but the controls become the biggest factor in causing the game to slip from the pedestal. If you can find it on sale, I'd say get it, but I cannot recommend this game at full price.

+ Amazing Music/non-stop voice acting
+ Varied Atmosphere
+ Weapon Customization
- Fairly Bad Controls that cause most of the deaths in the game
- Weird difficulty system that will lower difficulty if you die
- Checkpoints are not Savepoints

Total time: 8 hours
Price: $15
Score: 6.5

*Note: I don't play video games online, so I cannot comment on the online portion of the game.

Get the full article at GameSpot

"Minishdriveby reviewed Kid Icarus: Uprising for the 3DS..." was posted by Minishdriveby on Sun, 07 Oct 2012 06:49:18 -0700
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/kid-icarus-uprising/user-reviews/801054/platform/3ds/ Tue, 11 Sep 2012 21:33:30 -0700 WTA2k5 reviewed Spec Ops: The Line for the Xbox 360... http://www.gamespot.com/spec-ops-the-line/user-reviews/799898/platform/xbox360/ ...and gave it a 8.5.

A few weeks ago, Richard Pearsey, Narrative Designer at Yager Development wrote an interesting blog which ultimately and unfortunately way undersold the brilliance of Spec Ops: The Line. In his concluding paragraph, he states that "In the end, The Line is not about ethics and morality in war or war games," and then proceeds to explain that the game is more built around triggering emotional reactions in its players. Though it does seem unavoidable that any player would have a strong response to a playthrough of Spec Ops' campaign, the game's blistering narrative power comes from it being a stark and self-aware contrast to the clunky, behemoth franchises that typify the modern shooter genre. Despite the fact that Call of Duty 4 still seems genuine in depicting the horrors of modern weaponry, almost every big war shooter that's followed in its footsteps has awkwardly fumbled in continuing its trendsetting vision; Battlefield 3's campaign presented one laughable cliche after another with a straight face, Modern Warfare 2 & 3 featured tasteless and exploitative scenes of atrocities, like "No Russian," simply to brew up controversy, and the upcoming Medal of Honor: Warfighter has one of the most manipulative and irresponsible marketing campaigns games have ever seen. Despite the fact that it's been less than 5 years since Call of Duty 4, the subgenre it popularized has already gone awry in innumerable ways, with most of its flagship successors reducing themselves to uncomfortably mindless experiences. Spec Ops: The Line stands apart from its infantile yet self-serious brethren simply because it's reactionary; Yager had the good sense to step away from the games of its peers and cast a critical eye on them, shaping Spec Ops to be their opposite.

It's important to note that Spec Ops: The Line's antithetical nature isn't just skin deep because it doesn't try to merely be the anti-war counterpart to EA and Activision's war-glorifying franchises; the game isn't anti-war, it's anti-wargame. Despite the fact that Spec Ops' budget seems quite limited compared to other war shooters, it fires on all cylinders, going above and beyond expectations in almost every way in order to deliver a hard-hitting message about the nature of action games. I'll give you what I feel is a perfect example of the genius that fuels this game's forward-thinking narrative:

The game at first seems to perpetuate one of my biggest gaming pet-peeves by featuring asinine loading screen messages that do nothing but insultingly point out the obvious ("Press X to reload," etc.). When I first played through the game and knew little about it, I merely took this as a sign that the game was willing to adhere to certain trends, no matter how stupid they are. To me, something as simple as a quick message during a load-screen can be surprisingly indicative of the design philosophy that governs a game's development, and Spec Ops: The Line's initial batch of load-screen "hints" seemed to say it didn't aim for much despite its potentially tacked-on connection to Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness.

Imagine my feeling, then, of dying partway through the game and getting hit with this loading message: "Cognitive dissonance is a feeling caused by holding two conflicting beliefs simultaneously." I won't divulge what narrative significance this line holds, but suffice it to say, it caused my jaw to drop much in the way an explosive setpiece would.

By the point in the campaign at which I read this, the game had already escalated beyond the mindless shooter fare it slyly pretends to be at the start into something truly remarkable, but this message sealed the deal. Neither the game's basis in Conrad's 1899 classic, and moreso in Francis Ford Coppola's Apocalypse Now, nor its intent to defy its peers is used as a mere gimmick or means of attracting an audience looking for a highbrow shooter; Spec Ops: The Line is a genuine, deftly-conceived exploration of the dark parts of the soul, and every facet of the experience is imbued with its core theme. But while its film and literary counterparts are grounded in exploring the dark and surreal within the harsh realities of war and colonialism, respectively, Spec Ops focuses purely on the fantastical. More specifically, it critiques the power fantasy associated with modern shooters. While playing the action game du jour, we like to envision ourselves as heroes ridding the world of enemies through all sorts of drastic means, free of any semblance consequence. Spec Ops: The Line flips that sense of empowerment on its head; the further you go, the farther you stray from both heroism and the illusion of it.

Spec Ops casts you as Captain Walker, the leader of a Delta Force squad sent into a sandstorm-ravaged Dubai to uncover the truth about the disappearance of his former commanding officer, the not-so-subtly named Colonel Konrad, and the battalion he commands. The game's narrative is centered around a hellish downward spiral - the organized, routine mission that Walker and his squad sets out for at the game's outset soon turns toward complete and utter chaos. The game's constantly escalating narrative tells you to work through more than a few harrowing scenarios, and frequently shows you the consequences of the relentless force and power of your actions. The real kicker is that it then asks you if it was all really worth it; by the time all's said and done, you'll have treaded innumerable moral grey areas and committed one atrocity after another in the name of the "mission." After the credits roll, most games would give you a "congratulations" and 100 Achievement Points, but Spec Ops forces you to solemnly look upon the terrible things you've wrought.

Of course, I haven't even described what the game is in its most basic essence: a cover-based third-person shooter. And whereas most recent games of that ilk have augmented their core gameplay with setpieces, vehicles, or platforming sequences, Spec Ops sticks to its formula relentlessly; aside from a couple on-rails sequences, pretty much all you'll do in this game is get into cover and pop out every once in a while to shoot people. The shooting mechanics aren't even that remarkable either. Aside from a gruesome execution system that furthers the game's focus on moral grays, every aspect of the gameplay is rather cut-and-dry. The game's absence of variety and general lack of polish in terms of mechanics make it feel archaic, and furthering this feeling is the game's use of laughably old-school shooter conventions like bright red exploding barrels and mounted turrets that trigger massive enemy spawns. It'd be tempting to say the game uses its story as a crutch, but upon reflection, the unimpressive gameplay that serves as the venomous narrative's backbone seems apt; after all, Spec Ops sets out to critique shooters, so it's rather fitting that it almost feels as if the game's singleminded and mind-numbing mechanics were built to purposefully exaggerate and stereotype the gameplay found in war games of past and present.

The sand-buried Dubai that the Delta operators find themselves in serves as a fitting and beautiful thematic backdrop for the campaign's action. Environments shift from grimy ruins, to lush opulence, and places in-between all at the drop of a hat. As the game progresses, the imagery becomes even more twisted; character models change to reflect their injuries, color-palettes become more defined and striking, certain ruins take on an almost fantastical vibe, and no matter where they may find themselves in the city, Walker and his men have seem to always be on the descent.

Beyond providing chest-high cover to duck behind, Spec Ops' environments do occasionally have a direct influence on gameplay. The most prominent example is the option to occasionally bury an ill-positioned enemy in sand by shooting out a vent or window. This isn't a terribly exciting feature, but it's still a nice permutation of the exploding barrels concept; the effect is ultimately the same, but it's integration is a lot less conspicuous. Far more entertaining, and far more underutilized, are the game's sandstorm sequences, which have you making a mad dash towards safety while contending with your remaining foes and poor visibility. As far as the action goes, these are the game's most intense and inspired moments, making the fact that there are only three or four of them throughout the eight-hour campaign rather disappointing.

Much like the visuals, there is an extreme attention to detail in the game's sound department. Most importantly, the voice-acting is phenomenal. Though it's become rather exhausting to hear Nolan North provide the voice for about half gaming's protagonists, he, and every other actor that lends their talents does a great job. The dynamic writing that fuels the script furthers the power of its dialogue; Spec Ops might be the first game I've ever played to feature ambient dialogue that changes based on the characters' state of mind. Initially, for example, characters will indicate that combat sections have ended by giving a simple "All clear." Conversely, later sections of the game will see the characters communicating the same ideas in much more blunt, brutal ways. This might seem like a small aspect of the game's presentation, and it admittedly is, but this sort of emergent and dynamic dialogue has never been done before, and once again, this minimal detail is just one more pillar that supports this game's grand themes.

Aside from your two squadmates, your most prominent companion in Spec Ops the Radioman. Having set up speakers all over Dubai, he provides a running commentary that's equal parts funny, intriguing, and disturbing. However, he also subjects you to his musical taste, which largely includes popular classic rock tracks from the 1960s and 70s. These are clearly implemented as a means of recalling Apocalypse Now's juxtaposition of cheery, sometimes angsty radio tunes with all sorts of bleak scenarios, but just doesn't work here simply due to the fact that Spec Ops doesn't actually take place in the 60s or 70s; death metal and hip-hop might not have the same sort of cinematic appeal, but they'd certainly be more fitting. Thankfully, in another film-inspired move (this time lifted from the works of Michael Mann), the game gets its act together towards the end switches its soundtrack over to some moody post-rock tunes.

Having gone over basically everything else, I've inevitably arrived at having to talk about Spec Ops: The Line's critical flaw. Whereas its campaign sets out to display and critique the machismo-driven, single-mindedness and manipulation that underlies a number of modern action titles, Spec Ops' multiplayer wholeheartedly embraces the development philosophies its other (and better) half demonizes The litany of unlocks and character customization options are uninteresting and the game modes are all similarly bland - not that it matters since everyone just plays team deathmatch anyway. It all feel like what a less daring developer would see as requisite - a series of boxes that needs to be checked in order to have their game achieve success in today's military shooter market. The problem is that Yager have proven themselves to be quite daring, and considering the singleplayer portion of their game is highly confrontational toward its peers, the inclusion of this sort of multiplayer is extremely problematic. All might've been forgiving if the game's mechanics were as slick, fun and satisfying as, say, Gears of War, but they aren't. Looking at Spec Ops purely as a shooter, with it's immense narrative and superb presentation torn away from it, the experience is rather substandard. The audacious craftsmanship that allowed its singleplayer campaign to be intense and memorable despite not being traditionally fun simply isn't present in the game's multiplayer component.

I've heard some critics say it's unfair to have the game's multiplayer weigh down its significance and meaning as an overall package, but as much as I'd like to focus purely on Spec Ops' singleplayer portion, its overly-traditional and thoroughly unimpressive multiplayer experience provides quite a conundrum. In any other game, this exact online component could be written off as forgettable or tacked-on, but its inclusion in Spec Ops is so contradictory that it comes as a notable detriment to its developer's vision. Long story short, when a developer refers to their own multiplayer mode as a "cancerous growth," you know it's not worth playing.

Whether or not a video game needs to be fun to be great is a topic that been long debated. It's easy to be inclined to lean towards the side of letting games remain the only purely fun popular entertainment medium, since no doubt most of the images that pop into people's minds when they think of their favorites are some immensely entertaining games. But as incredible as titles like Ocarina of Time, Half-Life, or San Andreas (or what have you) are, they don't provide much diversity in terms of core concepts and design. Though each game features wildly different aesthetics and narrative, they, and most classic games, are built around exploration, triumphing over obstacles, and providing players with a sense of empowerment and accomplishment. Distilling these games down to this formula certainly doesn't capture their quality, but it easily demonstrates how few alternative ideas and designs the gaming industry has tapped into.

Spec Ops: The Line is one of a select group of successful attempts to break free from the mold, and it does so namely by flipping the aforementioned formula on its head; the game features little-to-no exploration, overcoming the game's twisted challenges will make you feel terrible rather than rewarded, and it actively disempowers you in ways that would be to spoilerific to delve into. Add to that a set of core mechanics that aren't all that engaging, and Spec Ops is a thoroughly unfun game. But that doesn't stop it from being one of the most striking, riveting and memorable singleplayer gaming experiences out there. This is simply because every facet of the game (save its disappointing multiplayer) is built with the express purpose of crafting an excellent narrative, and even though traditional fun is sacrificed in the name of driving home its central themes, the message that Spec Ops ultimately delivers hits hard. I, for one, will likely never look at a shooter in the same way again, and that's as good an indication as there could possibly be of Spec Ops' success.

Get the full article at GameSpot

"WTA2k5 reviewed Spec Ops: The Line for the Xbox 360..." was posted by WTA2k5 on Tue, 11 Sep 2012 21:33:30 -0700
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/spec-ops-the-line/user-reviews/799898/platform/xbox360/ Wed, 25 Jul 2012 20:16:57 -0700 WTA2k5 reviewed Diablo III for the PC... http://www.gamespot.com/diablo-iii/user-reviews/797804/platform/pc/ ...and gave it a 3.5.

The left mouse button has long been relegated to performing PC gaming's most important actions. It pulls the trigger of a gun in shooters, selects your armies in strategy games, and inspects your environment in adventure games. For whatever reason, players and developers alike have fostered a deep connection to this click-centric control style for decades now. And in no series of games is the left mouse button more paramount than in Diablo. It (with the help of right-clicks and some numbered hotkeys) is the center of the universe when you dive into a Diablo play session; it kills your foes, grabs your loot, and moves your character. With Diablo III, Blizzard proves yet again how the simplest of control schemes and premises (the rather brutish cycle of killing monsters and upgrading gear) can reach deep into the reward centers of our brains to provide endless hours of entertainment. But, like a reality TV show or a phoned-in summer blockbuster, this kind of fun lacks any kind of heart and soul. The atmosphere, the tension and the thrills of its predecessors have been stripped away in favor of focusing the experience solely on the popular interpretation of its ethos: spamming the aforementioned few buttons and picking up loot. The game does house a story and some interesting visuals, but they are flimsy beams supporting one sole mechanic - looting enemies. Ultimately, Diablo III represents a wild misinterpretation of what makes video games such a superb medium; a single mechanic does not make for an engrossing experience, no matter how exalted the series' loot-grind has become. A truly great game is one that combines compelling design, aesthetics and narrative to create a rewarding experience - one that captivates you with its world and atmosphere, that makes you think and empowers you, forces you to change your perceptions and gives you something you can take away from it. Diablo III tosses all this away in favor of its randomized loot bonanza as if to say all the aforementioned elements are flimsy pretexts that disguise the true purpose of a gaming experience. Bad move. The false assumption that addictive mechanics are the true meat of a game is what positively ruins this game.

Describing Diablo III's superficial entertainment value is a tricky endeavor; the basis for the entire game is killing monsters to upgrade your character's gear and abilities. Of course, once you upgrade your gear and abilities, you'll no doubt want to kill more monsters to see the satisfying payoff for all your grinding. Yet, as soon as you start killing more monsters, more and better gear drops for you to outfit your character with. And thus, the cycle continues. As you may have noticed, the game is entirely illogical in its most basic essence. It's a digital Ouroboros. Yet despite how fallacious this game's premise is, it's utterly addicting. There is something endlessly entertaining about becoming stronger and stronger and being able to best tougher and tougher combat encounters. The problem, however, is that if one were to think for just a minute about whether this experience is entertaining or enriching in any substantive way, Diablo III's paper-thin, lazy fun-factor all but disappears.

Even if improving your character to face tougher enemies provides a depthless sort of entertainment, it doesn't really build up to much of anything. The crux of Diablo III's replayability is running through the game again with more challenging opposition (and, of course, better loot). Though the game's harder difficulty settings provide a steep challenge, the fact that frustrating instant-kills are implemented to artificially boost difficulty does little to provide either a sense of empowerment or dread. What's more, the game ships with nothing in the way of PvP, and there's no way to show off your character to the Battle.net masses as there was in Diablo II. Further bogging down the fun of Diablo III's character advancement is the new Auction House. Though an integrated method of selling items is a neat idea, it makes finding an exceptional piece of loot rather unimpressive; if you're particularly proud of a certain piece of armor, chances are you could go on the Auction House and find that exact item, if not a better one, for sale. While working through tough combat scenarios to acquire loot can provide some mindless fun, actually getting your hands on good gear is surprisingly devoid of any sort of gratification, especially once you approach the endgame and realize just how little there is to show for all your hard work.

While Diablo III mostly rests on the laurels of its tried-and-true gameplay formula and largely fails to revolutionize the genre in any meaningful way, I must yield that it does feature some interesting new ideas. The biggest change from its predecessors is the way in which the game handles leveling up and picking new abilities and specializations. Gone are the days of freeform character customization; stats are leveled up automatically and by the time you reach level 60 you'll have acquired all available abilities and modifiers. Though old-school purists may cry foul, this less stringent system ultimately allows for deeper customization. The biggest advantage is that it encourages players to experiment. Instead of running to the forums to check out the recommended specialization for your class, you can simply pick and choose different combinations of abilities to see for yourself what set of moves best suits your play style. By simplifying the game's behind-the-scenes stats and damage calculus, as well as giving the players the ability to change specializations on the fly, Blizzard has expertly crafted an immediately accessible, yet deceptively deep approach to character-building.

There are also several smaller tweaks the bolster the game's overall playability. Pesky Scrolls of Identification, Scrolls of Town Portal and Horadric Cubes have all been replaced by basic abilities that don't require inventory space or excessive fiddling. For the newcomer to the series, these changes will likely mean nothing, but veterans will find these improvements very welcome.

Blizzard applies a lot off MMO sensibility to Diablo III, but unfortunately, it doesn't work all that well. I've already mentioned the inherent problems of the game's Auction House, but there are many more beyond that; always-on DRM has lead to flooded servers (which in turn can cause lag and server crashes), player accounts (including mine) have been hacked into already, and there's no PvP to be found. These problems will likely be addressed down the road, and Diablo III might be all the better for it, but it's undeniably frustrating that issues like this exist within a 1-4 player game. Though Blizzard's goal of building a better, more connected community is admirable, Diablo III's online gameplay is only marginally more accessible due to its online connectivity, and that does little to justify all the heavy detriments of Battle.net's thorough integration. Between its manipulative gameplay and intrusive online components, this is an anti-consumer game through and through.

In the world of gaming criticism, the words "addicting" and "immersive" both imply the same result: the loss of hours upon hours at the hands of a game. However, the experience of spending that time is entirely different based on which word is used. A game that's immersive pulls you in with its clever design, gameplay, story and audiovisual wonders; in short, it provides an experience you can truly luxuriate in and inhabit. A game that's addicting merely does whatever's necessary to keep you hooked. Whether its through experience points, loot, devotion to your guild/clan, or tempting microtransactions, these games know how to pull players in, even agains their best interests. At best, a game that's addicting can also be immersive and wondrous despite its cheap tricks. At worst, an addictive game is downright nefarious in the way it demands tons of time and effort from the audience and gives nothing back in return. Diablo III is one such game, and is thus one of the lowliest kinds there is.

+Mindless, time-wasting fun (if you're into mindlessly wasting your time)
+A few interesting twists on standard genre conventions

-Entirely devoid of any compelling feature beyond its randomized loot system
-Online integration is intrusive and comes to the detriment of an already flimsy experience
-Auction house and lack of an endgame give players little payoff for all their time and effort
-Once you realize the fallacious nature of its gameplay, playing like nothing more than a chore

Get the full article at GameSpot

"WTA2k5 reviewed Diablo III for the PC..." was posted by WTA2k5 on Wed, 25 Jul 2012 20:16:57 -0700
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/diablo-iii/user-reviews/797804/platform/pc/ Thu, 12 Jul 2012 20:34:15 -0700 WTA2k5 reviewed Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes for the GameCube... http://www.gamespot.com/metal-gear-solid-the-twin-snakes/user-reviews/797258/platform/gamecube/ ...and gave it a 8.5.

"There are six members of FOXHOUND involved in this terrorist activity. Psycho Mantis, with his powerful psychic abilities. Sniper Wolf, the beautiful and deadly sharpshooter. Decoy Octopus, master of disguise. Vulcan Raven, giant and shaman. And Revolver Ocelot, specialist in interrogation and a formidable gun fighter. And finally, in charge of them  FOXHOUND's squad leader  Liquid Snake."

Back when I first played the original Metal Gear Solid right before the release of its sequel, the introduction of Solid Snake's upcoming nemeses felt menacing. Seldom few games build up to momentous conflicts well enough that they're willing to give players a foreboding preview of their imminent challenges straightaway. In 2012, however, Colonel Campbell's rundown of the FOXHOUND freakshow sounds downright goofy. Between their ridiculous names and the too-serious descriptions of their equally absurd powers, a moment that once felt so compelling and cinematic now feels almost laughable. This small snippet of dialog is a surprising indicator of how the experience of revisiting Metal Gear Solid (in the form of the GameCube remake, The Twin Snakes) feels as a whole. Upon revisiting any of the original game's successors, that feeling of poor aging isn't at all prevalent. That's a huge testament to how remarkably forward-thinking and uncompromising Kojima's masterpiece series became, even between the first and second titles. There's still plenty of strange stuff to see as the series moves forward, but all the whacky villains and cheesy lines grow to be executed with a sense of self-assuredness that simply isn't present in its beginnings. Despite its improvements over the original version, Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes is still representative of a mythos in its infancy; certain narrative tropes later games in the series pull off so wonderfully never quite feel right (as mentioned before, for example, the handling of the incredible rogue's gallery) and the gameplay experience as a whole is slightly clumsy. Ultimately, revisiting this game reveals enough oddities to forgo the conclusion that it's the title the Metal Gear Solid series will be remembered for, but it's still a striking experience in many ways and one that must be experienced by any serious gamer.

The Twin Snakes' chief objective is to marry the look and mechanics of Metal Gear Solid 2 to the story and layout of the original classic, and for the most part that goal is met rather successfully. While it doesn't look nearly as good as Sons of Liberty or Snake Eater, the graphical overhaul is definitely welcome and it's also great to see a few reappearances of the many visual intricacies Kojima pioneered with the second Metal Gear Solid. Several elements of the sound design have also changed with the most noticeable difference being the redone voice-over work. Several bits of dialog have been changed and certain characters are voiced by new actors; the biggest change is the fact that Mei Ling and Naomi Hunter both drop their original accents and are voiced by two of the usual stable of US dub actors whose performances would later be canonized by their inclusion in Metal Gear Solid 4. The original Metal Gear Solid was noted for its excellent audio presentation, and it's even better here. All the changes brought by The Twin Snakes, from the fun, overblown voice-acting, to the great music and stellar sound effects all add up to make one of the best sounding games the GameCube has to offer.

Easily the biggest change, however, is the addition of the first-person mode introduced in Metal Gear Solid 2. Holding the top bumper will snap away from the games usual isometric perspective and allow you to see through Snake's eyes. However, in keeping with the game's non-traditional control scheme, you can't move around in this mode, so it's likely you'll only ever use it for observation or to fine-tune your aiming. While it might not sound like much, it changes the game drastically; it gives new depth to the standard sneaking gameplay, reveals fun new goodies within the game's environment, and most importantly, makes the game's stupendous boss encounters feel fresh again. Unfortunately, with this new power comes an increased challenge as guards are now able to spot you from much further away than they used to. This is a true shame since The Twin Snakes' environments are often too large to allow for complete situational awareness, even with the new perspective. For all but the most experienced Metal Gear Solid fans, a feeling of cheapness will likely be pervasive from beginning to end, but the experience as a whole is still so engrossing that it isn't enough to lessen the game's overall entertainment value.

Delving into the story of The Twin Snakes is rather difficult. The brief overview is that Solid Snake must breach into a weapons manufacturing facility in Alaska, absurdly named Shadow Moses, to eliminate the aforementioned group of terrorists that have taken the place over (though 14 years after the fact, it's not much of a spoiler to say it involves a Metal Gear). Going into too much more detail, however, would run the risk of revealing one of the game's many plot twists or fun narrative quirks. Truth be told, The Twin Snakes features a rather poor storyline, but the way it's told is just so peculiar that it may very well resonate with you whether you want it to or not. The game tries to touch on a few complex subjects pertaining to nature-versus-nurture and technology's place in warfare but it doesn't quite have the grace that its sequels do, and the resulting cutscenes and Codec chats are truly bizarre; characters have a tendency to spout inane dialog, the rather frequent dips into melodrama are exceedingly awkward and long-winded bouts of exposition are fairly frequent. Taking this even further are remade versions of the original Metal Gear Solid's cutscenes, courtesy of Silicon Knights and director Ryuhei Kitamura. The new cinemas revel in bullet-time death ballets and sudden, over-exagerrated movements; Gray Fox's gruesome introduction is even more of a gory spectacle than it originally was, and Snake pulls off an average of 1.5 impossibly agile stunts per cutscene. All these elements add up to create something of a train wreck. Luckily, like a movie that's so bad it's good, The Twin Snakes is an endearing disaster that's easy remember fondly despite your better judgment.

The way The Twin Snakes audaciously starts you off alone in an environment filled to the brim with enemies with only a few pieces of equipment reveals the game's focus on non-lethal stealth rather quickly. This game absolutely cannot be approached in the way most action-adventure games can, but the resulting experience is uniquely satisfying. At the crux of The Twin Snakes' minute-to-minute gameplay is sneaking past enemy guards while keeping a low profile. While this may not sound terribly exciting on paper, the way it plays out is immensely entertaining. Being that your enemies are almost always on patrol, there's a cyclicality to their movements that you have to recognize in order to sneak by undetected. Beyond the game's opening stages, enemy movements can become exceedingly difficult to navigate through, but sliding through a small crack in their defenses is always rewarding.

The other beauty of The Twin Snakes' core gameplay is how open it is to experimentation. The arsenal players receive in a more typical action game usually serves to give them a fairly straightforward and self-explanatory solution to the challenges that lie before them (usually involving murdering everyone in sight) - such is not the case here. Between Solid Snake's vast moveset and a dizzying number of guns, gadgets and explosives, there are seemingly innumerable options at your disposal. While the game certainly allows you to fall into a sneaking pattern that's as predictable as the rounds the patrolmen make, it would be a shame to go through the whole game without playing around with its many tools and mechanics. Why simply run past a group of guards when you might knock one out, plant a C4 by his body, grab the attention of another nearby soldier, detonate the bomb as he goes to wake up his buddy and then sneak out during the ensuing panic? The possibilities are grim and glorious.

Despite its depth, The Twin Snakes' core gameplay isn't actually a big part of the experience. Though I haven't clocked it myself, it's very possible that you spend the majority of your time outside the games cutscenes engaged in one of its many superb boss battles. Between frantic fistfights and slow-burn sniper battles, the game's boss fights pack a ton of gameplay variety and whiteknuckled intensity. The fact that there are at least ten of these excellent encounters with the game's 6-8 hour running time makes it that much better. About midway through your adventure, the game's core mechanics almost drop out of the picture entirely in favor of snappily driving you from one boss fight to the next. In an age where the boss is an increasingly tired and poorly-handled gaming trope, it's refreshing to revisit a game that makes these moments feel like real highlights rather than adjunct and archaic additions.

Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes is one of those rare gaming experiences that qualifies as an absolute must-play despite the fact that it's not a truly exceptional title. Certain parts of the game haven't aged well (the whacky story chief among them) and others, like the game's often frustrating environmental design, never quite worked right in the first place. Even to this day, however, the game feels totally unique and fresh, and it's concepts are so grand that it's hard not to admire, or even be awed by them. Some games can stand the test of time, and in some respects, The Twin Snakes is not that kind of game; there are more than a few punches to roll with in order to bring yourself to appreciate the experience. But ultimately, the game remains a resounding success in the ways that matter most, and it's thrilling gameplay, ambitious story and intense boss battles will likely never fail to entertain.

+The game's many oddities are inexplicably endearing
+Satisfying and surprisingly open-ended gameplay
+Superb audio presentation
+Boss battles are a riot

-Limiting camera and increased challenge don't mix well
-Overblown cutscenes

Get the full article at GameSpot

"WTA2k5 reviewed Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes for the GameCube..." was posted by WTA2k5 on Thu, 12 Jul 2012 20:34:15 -0700
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/metal-gear-solid-the-twin-snakes/user-reviews/797258/platform/gamecube/ Fri, 25 May 2012 17:04:45 -0700 WTA2k5 reviewed Max Payne 3 for the Xbox 360... http://www.gamespot.com/max-payne-3/user-reviews/794712/platform/xbox360/ ...and gave it a 9.5!

Though video games as a medium seem to grow exponentially in terms of artistic and narrative complexity from year to year, one simple facet of interactive storytelling still hasn't been entirely figured out: the role of the player character. While a lot of novels and films seem to live and die by their protagonists, video game heroes are usually afterthoughts, and sometimes even wholly unsympathetic and unavoidably contradictory (the Uncharted series' happy-go-lucky Nathan Drake who can flirt with a love interest one second and then proceed to murder two dozen people the next is a shining example). Allowing players to interact with an environment and giving them a set of tasks tailor-made to provide a sense of mechanical fun and fulfillment is almost never conducive to creating a memorable, three-dimensional character. Yet, one only needs to leave it to Rockstar to figure out how to capture the best of both worlds. Max Payne 3 confronts the issue of inconsistent characterization for the sake of gameplay head-on, and is tremendously successful in overcoming the problem. The game's world-weary titular protagonist is well aware of the inner demons and cycle of violence that he (and by extension, the player) perpetuates. He guns down hordes of nameless foes, and pops painkiller after painkiller everywhere he goes, but he owns up to his violent nature. Ultimately, the fact that Max is always aware of what he's doing (though not always of why he's doing it) makes him a much more sympathetic and human character than the vast majority of protagonists to be found in video gaming. And that is the game's single greatest achievement. Of course the action is glorious, the multiplayer is robust, and the production values are nearly flawless - that's to be expected of any Rockstar game that comes out nowadays; but it's the unflinching and hard-hitting struggle against all odds experienced by both Payne and the player along the course of its stupendous campaign that makes Max Payne 3 a striking, masterful game.

The game begins with Max peering down at the gritty streets of Sao Paulo from the balcony of a glitzy hotel, quickly capturing one of the narrative's essential themes: the disparity between the rich and poor. The conflicts here aren't started by some rogue badass with a cause, they're the result of a deep-seated animosity between Sao Paolo's wealthy, who get to party it up on rooftops, and the poor, who have to slum it out in the favelas. Max Payne is hired onto the security detail for the Branco family, one of Brazil's richest and most powerful, who very quickly find themselves a gang target. From there, it's up to Max to navigate through all the grisly conflicts between rich and poor, law and criminal that define Rockstar's vision of Sao Paulo. The end result is a winding, brutal, and unforgettable story that packs a real punch. Certain scenes cut to the bone, and Max Payne is forced to grow as a character to survive when things start slipping out of his control.

As mentioned earlier, Max Payne guns down dozens of enemies in each level, and though that fact could easily be justified as a way of crafting fun firefights for players to blast their way through (which it is), Max is quite self-aware. Not in the sense that the game breaks the fourth wall, or ever confronts the player directly, but merely that the protagonist knows that killing massive numbers of people and getting in way over his head seems to be his lot in life. This one simple plot detail helps elevate the character and overall story experience even further. Every bit of Payne's characterization feels believable despite the fact that a man who can dive around in slow-motion and pop pills in the middle of a gunfight should, by all logic, be entirely unbelievable. Fans of the original games need not worry, writer (and Rockstar co-owner) Dan Houser's vision of the character and his universe is even more memorable than Remedy's.

While the story is a triumph in and of itself, it's the way in which it's integrated into singleplayer gameplay that is most striking. The game moves from cut-scene to gameplay seamlessly, without a trace of loading times to be found - you may even be caught off guard by some of the places in which the game chooses hand the reins back over to you. The result is a breakneck sense of pace, the likes of which has only been achieved in a few other games, and once Max Payne 3 grabs your attention, you might find it exceedingly difficult to put the controller back down.

This cinematic presentation is greatly augmented by the game's production values. Though Rockstar's Rage engine is starting to show its age in some respects, the game's graphics are mostly great. The game has a superb art style that manages to believably capture everything from a muddy, decrepit boat graveyard to snowed-out Hoboken back alleys, and character designs are equally inspired. The game's blurry faux-lens technique (ripped straight from Tony Scott's film "Man on Fire") is also an integral part of its visual design. Audio-wise the game retains its consistent quality. Rockstar has always had some of the best soundtracks in the business, and Max Payne 3 is no different. There's a few of brooding, orchestral compositions, a lot haunting noise rock courtesy of the band Health, and some selections of Brazilian music in select sequences. The impactful battle sound effects and impeccable voice work seal the deal. While Max Payne 3 does struggle with some of its engine's limitations, the overall presentation is still almost flawless.

Of course, none of that narrative and cinematic goodness would be worthwhile if the gameplay driving it wasn't fun. Luckily, Max Payne 3's slick shooting mechanics, and deft mix of tactical and run-and-gun action makes it one of the best third-person shooters on the market. For the uninitiated, Max Payne's signature move is the Shoot Dodge, an impressive, Jon Woo-esque maneuver that allows Max to dive through the air and wreak glorious havoc in slow-motion until he hits the ground. This maneuver has always been the series' show-stopping mechanic, and even though plenty of games have lifted the idea since, it's still as entertaining as ever. Dipping into slow-motion Bullet Time without performing the Shoot Dodge even more crucial; Max moves slightly faster than his foes when time slows down, so the tables can be turned on seemingly impossible firefights rather quickly.

Max Payne 3 also introduces the franchise to a cover system much like any other that has dominated third-person shooters for the past several years now. The catch here is that the use of cover isn't as heavily emphasized as it is in most games. Hunkering down to pull off a few quick kills or pop some painkillers (there's still no regenerating health) before reentering the fray is about all you'll use it for throughout most of the game. However, as the difficulty ramps up about two-thirds of the way through the campaign, players are forced to use cover much more often. Though this is sometimes due to frustrating and artificial spikes in difficulty (which pretty much make up the only issue I can find with this game), it's largely a nice change of pace; actively figuring out when to take a slower approach, and when to charge into battle with reckless abandon is intense, and, when you make the right choice, immensely rewarding.

Even when separated from all its flourishes, the game's core shooting mechanics are slick and satisfying. On a presentational level, the firefights are often just as superb and cinematic as the cutscenes that precede them; environments get torn to shreds, enemies move intelligently and react realistically to their injuries, a number of interesting set-pieces change things up a bit, and brutal, slow-motion kill cams punctuate each battle. Furthermore, the animations are uncompromisingly real despite the fact that the action is way over-the-top. If you've ever wondered how, exactly, two guns are reloaded when dual-wielded, or how someone can carry a two handed weapon without a shoulder-strap while clutching a pistol in the other hand, Max Payne 3 has all the answers.

Max Payne 3's gameplay is an incredible mix of new and old-school sensibilities. The steady integration of narrative and gameplay in its singleplayer campaign creates a great sense of pace, and the gunplay balances run-and-gun arcade gameplay with tactical stop-and-pop in a way that's never been seen before. It's been a long time since Rockstar has made a flagship game that's this focused. The game is no sprawling epic, but the concentration of resources is made abundantly clear; Max Payne 3 upgrades the series' rock-solid foundation in innumerable ways, and the result is one of the most singular shooters on the market.

There's also a robust multiplayer mode to dive into, and it's easily Rockstar's best online offering to date. The game features all the customizable loadouts, challenges, and leveling up that most players have no doubt grown accustom to over the last few years. The game really starts to deviate from the norm with its unique spin on the now-standard killstreak system. You can only have one killstreak (dubbed Burst) per loadout, so as you rack up adrenaline (from dodging gunfire, getting kills, and looting corpses), you have to choose to either cash in on your Burst immediately, or wait to accumulate more adrenaline, resulting in more powerful effects. Knowing when to dispense your Burst immediately, and when to go for the glory and try to save it up is a fun challenge in and of itself; a minimum-adrenaline Burst may help you take down an enemy player or two, but if you choose to wait, a fully-charged Burst can absolutely devastate the other team.

The game modes feature a few different spins on standard Deathmatch and Team Deathmatch game types, but the real stars of the show are Gang Wars and Payne Killer. The latter is a mode that sees two players taking control of either Max Payne, or his partner-in-crime, Raul Passos while six other players try to kill them. If you kill Payne or Passos, you become them, and thus acquire a number of overpowered abilities that even the odds. But, the standard grunts can still overwhelm you, and so the cycle continues.

Gang Wars is an awesome mode that features a dynamic list of objectives that cycles regularly. Each match consists of five rounds with unique objectives, and rounds cycle every four or five minutes. Each new objective you encounter is directly affected by the outcome of the preceding round. The constant variety Gang Wars provides it impressive in its own right, and the sense of dynamic progression that influences it all adds some serious replayability.

Not only is Max Payne 3's multiplayer suite easily the best that Rockstar has ever put together, it also fits in perfectly with the themes that drive it singleplayer campaign. Gang Wars and Payne Killer are especially fitting summations of the cyclical, inevitable violence that the singleplayer game portrays. By providing small bits of narrative context and putting you in the shoes of a common thug, Gang Wars matches further flesh out the hellish, futile power struggle that takes place endlessly in Rockstar's Sao Paolo from a new perspective. After completing the game's singleplayer campaign, the narrative that backs up some matches can be especially impactful; by getting to see what the city was like before and after Max arrived, you get an even better sense of the effects his actions in the campaign had. Payne Killer achieves a similar goal; not only do you face the seemingly impossible challenge of trying to take down Payne and Passos from the eyes of a nameless gunman, but you'll quickly start taking more risks in hopes of replacing them. These thematic tie-ins may not dominate your thoughts as you play each match, but they're ultimately hugely successful in hitting home the brutal conflicts that take place within the game's gritty environments.

"The way I see it, there's two types of people: those who spend their lives trying to build a future, and those who spend their lives trying to rebuild the past," Payne astutely observes partway through the campaign before describing himself as being "stuck in between." A pretty fitting description of Max Payne 3 as a whole, I'd say. On one hand, Rockstar sticks to what made the first Max Payne games so tremendous; the slow-mo gunplay, heavy story, and brooding atmosphere that defined the first two titles are still a huge part of Max Payne 3. On the other, Rockstar updates the series in great ways; the storytelling is snappier and more powerful, modern shooting mechanics underscore the game's old-school action, and a AAA multiplayer experience will keep you hooked. Even more significant than its combination of new and old-school trappings is Max Payne 3's strong authorial voice. Though definitive characterization usually conflicts with gameplay in most other titles, Max Payne 3 successfully subverts this problem, and the resulting narrative is utterly captivating.

Though it comes from a studio known for making massive interactive worlds, Max Payne 3's relative lack of scope shouldn't be construed as laziness. The game instead has an unshakeable focus on delivering white-knuckled action and an affecting story that defines its singleplayer campaign and multiplayer matches alike. Backed up by awesome production values, mechanics and high replayability, Max Payne 3 is yet another modern classic courtesy of Rockstar Games.


+Incredible campaign perfectly fuses cinematic flair and brutal action
+Top-notch writing, characterization and storytelling
+Robust multiplayer
+Slick shooting mechanics
+Impeccable sound design and visual presentation

-A few frustratingly difficult fights can halt the breakneck pace

Get the full article at GameSpot

"WTA2k5 reviewed Max Payne 3 for the Xbox 360..." was posted by WTA2k5 on Fri, 25 May 2012 17:04:45 -0700
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/max-payne-3/user-reviews/794712/platform/xbox360/ Mon, 16 Apr 2012 15:35:14 -0700 WTA2k5 reviewed Mass Effect 3 for the Xbox 360... http://www.gamespot.com/mass-effect-3/user-reviews/792100/platform/xbox360/ ...and gave it a 8.5.

Taking a moment to look at the new memorial wall on the Normandy is just as quiet and solemn a moment as it is exciting and gratifying. On one hand, it will force you to remember the great characters that you lost, and make you think of how they may have impacted the final stretch of your journey. On the other hand, it shows you that the game remembers; a choice that I made five years ago that resulted in the series' first major character death still echoes well into the third game. Mass Effect 3 is absolutely filled to the brim with moments like these, and whether they're equally reflective or exponentially bigger and badder, they end up creating an unforgettable testament to the world you've shaped, and the character you've built in Commander Shepard.

It's precisely this heavily branching mythos that makes it nearly impossible to provide any kind of plot summary. The absolute most basic overview I can provide is that Shepard will find him or herself on Earth at the outset of the game. The long-awaited Reaper invasion arrives swiftly, and Shepard must soon venture out into the greater galaxy to raise support for the war effort to stop the synthetic menace and reclaim Earth. Ultimately, however, each player's Commander Shepard will be unlike the next, and the plot will end up varying in ways both large and small. Here the genius of Mass Effect 3, and the series as a whole comes into full view. There's an intricate web of choice and consequence on display that's dictated not just by major the Paragon/Renegade choices of past and present; new bits of narrative are revealed based on the interactions you've had with major characters, the order in which you complete missions, who you take with you on said missions, your thoroughness in completing quests, and the outcome of Mass Effect 2's brilliant suicide mission. The number of elements the game keeps track of and factors into the story is simply awe-inspiring.

Though Mass Effect 3 has been heavily marketed as easy to get into even without having had played through the previous two games, it's not recommended. As the last game in a trilogy, much of the experience thrives on dealing with the long-lasting effects of all the decisions you've made thus far, and BioWare does an excellent job of showing you what all your decisions have lead up to. If you choose to make a new Shepard rather than import a character from Mass Effect 2, you'll encounter some extra exposition to get you up to speed, but the experience will no doubt lose a lot of its impact. If you haven't played the first two and have a sudden interest with the arrival of Mass Effect 3, I strongly recommend you play through them first. The original is a little hard to play at this point, but its storytelling is still top-notch (no to mention it's short), and Mass Effect 2 is just as ambitious and spectacular as it ever was.

The game's main campaign is comprised of what are by far the most well-constructed and memorable levels the series has yet seen. The action in these missions is relentless, and the environments you'll tear through are usually filled with visual wonders. Most importantly however, most all story missions are opened and book-ended with impactful moments of dialogue and choice that both play up the connections you've fostered to the series' large cast of characters while also leaving you huge decisions that go above and beyond any choices the previous Mass Effect games have offered.

There are also numerous side quests to hunt down. Some are so phenomenal that most players will no doubt see them as inseparable from the main campaign while others are a little humbler in terms of presentation. N7 missions introduce you to the game's multiplayer maps and give narrative reasons for why they should be constantly defended in the game's wave defense mode, dialogue-driven quests on the Citadel usually reunite you with old friends and offer great insight into some of the war effort's smaller concerns, and scanning missions make a return in a much quicker, more accessible form. While not all of these quests reach the pinnacle of presentation and design that the most significant ones do, the rewards they offer in terms of story and experience points make them worth checking out.

Mass Effect 3's final level is made apparent after only a few hours. Much like its predecessor, Mass Effect 3 uses the foreboding presence of its finale as a means to incentivize seeking out side-missions to increase your preparedness. Readiness is tracked in two ways: gathering War Assets by completing singleplayer quests increases Effective Military Strength, and Galactic Readiness is boosted by playing multiplayer matches. However, unlike the previous title's brilliantly divergent coda, Mass Effect 3's last mission will play out in pretty much the same way regardless of the two ratings. At no point are you shown how each of your War Assets helped you in the end, or how playing those multiplayer matches helped against the Reaper threat. Luckily, much this content is rewarding enough to warrant experiencing for its own sake, but it's a true shame that BioWare failed to follow up on Mass Effect 2's ingenious suicide mission, especially since increasing these ratings is made out to be of the utmost importance.

Though its predecessor made great strides towards delivering a combat system on par with AAA cover-based action titles, Mass Effect 3 easily takes a spot in the pantheon of third-person shooters - a rare accomplishment amongst story-heavy games. Beyond taking cover and issuing simple squad commands, the crux of the game's combat is its six distinct classes. Though there are certain shared abilities, each class has two or three exclusive special powers that drastically change your approach to the game's intense combat. The Vanguard, for example, thrives on close-quarters combat thanks to a forceful charge move that will simultaneously give you a shield boost and knock your foes back a few yards. Meanwhile, the Engineer plays a more defensive role, using stun powers and a deployable drone to fend off enemies. Most importantly, however, you'll never feel as if you've chosen the wrong class; despite variances in tactics, each class is capable of dishing out plenty of damage.

While the expertly-crafted classes are at the center of Mass Effect 3's action, the combat is plenty thrilling in its own right. BioWare claimed that combat would be decidedly faster and more challenging, and that appears to be absolutely true. Even on normal settings, many firefights are downright difficult, but feelings of frustration will likely never set in - mastering the positioning and tactics required to best the game's most challenging encounters is always a joy. Additionally, the game's faster pace, cinematic melee attacks, weighty gun sound effects (courtesy of DICE), and vast enemy variety all add up to make it one of the best third-person shooters on the market.

Though Mass Effect 3 is just as unconcerned with variety as its predecessor was, the expert ebb-and-flow pacing keeps the proceedings fresh and engaging throughout. When you aren't mowing down hordes of baddies, you'll be wandering around either the Citadel or the once-again refurbished Normandy to chat with companions or take on some simpler, quieter quests. Thanks to great writing, delivery, and hopefully the player's connection to the Mass Effect mythos, these scenes always resonate. With the stakes higher than ever, BioWare's usual M.O. of punctuating stretches of extreme action and harrowing decision-making with moments of reflective quietude works better here than it ever has, and you'll quickly forget that there really isn't much to do in the game besides walking, talking, choosing, and killing.

Luckily, traditional role-playing elements are a bit more prevalent than they were in Mass Effect 2, and their presence adds a bit of depth to the game's rather straight-forward proceedings. Weapons can now be slotted with upgrades, armor is much more customizable and focused on stats, and branching skill trees offer fun ways to tailor your class more to your liking. It's also great to see just how well these added RPG flourishes are balanced with the game's skill-over-stats combat; your equipment and specializations definitely have tangible effects on the game's battles, but enemy encounters don't lose any of their twitch-based ferocity in the process.

This mix of weighty combat and light role-playing also serves as the backbone for the game's surprisingly strong multiplayer mode. Though many originally scoffed at the idea of Mass Effect's own four-player spin on multiplayer gaming's latest craze, the Horde-esque wave defense mode, any amount of hands-on time with Mass Effect 3's slick shooting mechanics will show just how well-suited it is to an action-centric game type. The premise here is simple: players must work together survive ten increasingly difficult waves of enemies, scrambling from their defensive positions every few rounds to complete a simple objective. Though there is only one mode of play, and this formula is never changed, it's endlessly entertaining not only because it's a pure distillation of the game's incredible combat, but also because of its challenge and addictive rewards system. On the game's Bronze (low) difficulty, matches feel like simple run-and-gun affairs, but should you go up to Silver or Gold you'll find that excellent teamwork and communication are all but required.

The multiplayer also has its own unique spin on online gaming's now-standard means of artificially boosting replayability. Experience points are used to upgrade skills much in the same way they are in the game's singleplayer component, complete with branching skill trees that lead to further specialization. The credits you earn, meanwhile, unlock equipment packages that can contain anything from spare ammo reserves and medi-gel to new characters and weapons. The contents of the packages are determined mostly by chance, and it's this element of randomization that can end up being the multiplayer's biggest frustration as often as it can be its biggest draw. There's a certain MMO sensibility to it as striking gold with a lucky pack feels immensely rewarding, while receiving nothing of interest for all your hard work is a huge disappointment. Still, the multiplayer is superbly crafted, and is an absolute blast even if you don't always get the loot you want.

Mass Effect 3 is not the most technically stunning game on the market. Not by a long shot. The game is running on an engine that's at least five or six years old at this point, and small graphical glitches aren't uncommon. Luckily the game's art direction is more cohesive and inventive than ever before. The game expertly mixes the ultra-clean old-school space opera aesthetic of the original with the dystopian grit and grime of Mass Effect 2. The game also doesn't shy away from ambitious set-pieces. Within the first few levels alone you'll encounter Reapers as tall as skyscrapers and get a front-row seat to a smoldering planet while fighting on its neighboring moon. The engine is old and imperfect to be sure, but BioWare pushes it to its limits to fantastic results. Though I've already mentioned many of the game's strengths in terms of audio, intuitive overall sound design, and newcomer composer Clint Mansell's fittingly bleak soundtrack bolster the presentation even further.

One of Mass Effect 3's most awe-inspiring qualities is its exceptional pacing. Somehow the game manages to give you the sense that it's sprinting head-on into its inevitable conclusion, all the while giving you a mature, restrained view of the impact you've had on its universe. And though it's undeniably frustrating that the endgame doesn't take your authorship into account, BioWare nevertheless accomplishes their goal for the Mass Effect series with the utmost success. You'll step away from Mass Effect 3 with a clear sense of how the ideals you've instilled in your Commander Shepard have spun a wildly branching narrative yarn into a singular, unforgettable story. Just as soon as I finished my first playthrough I went back to the original and started another, pondering the innumerable ways in which it could all be different.

+Top-notch story and characters
+Plenty of haunting decisions
+Old choices come full-circle
+Great presentation
+Superb multiplayer that packs some surprising staying power
+Combat is challenging and frenetic
+RPG elements have been expanded upon

-Final mission fails to live up to the promise of the Galactic Readiness and Effective Military Strength mechanics
-Randomized loot in multiplayer is frustrating
-Minor graphical problems

Get the full article at GameSpot

"WTA2k5 reviewed Mass Effect 3 for the Xbox 360..." was posted by WTA2k5 on Mon, 16 Apr 2012 15:35:14 -0700
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/mass-effect-3/user-reviews/792100/platform/xbox360/ Tue, 10 Apr 2012 15:08:51 -0700 WTA2k5 reviewed Alan Wake's American Nightmare for the Xbox 360... http://www.gamespot.com/alan-wakes-american-nightmare/user-reviews/791750/platform/xbox360/ ...and gave it a 5.5.

In today's video game industry, the idea of a "sleeper hit" is almost laughable. Most quality under-the-radar games get their just due, whether it's through extensive games media coverage, ports and HD rereleases, or the increasing accessibility of indie and underexposed games brought by digital downloads. As such, the original Alan Wake stands as a not-so-secret gem in the Xbox 360 library. Though it might not be remembered for its gameplay, its quirky vibe that merged pulp mystery and horror-humor was utterly captivating. Despite some doubts that Remedy's latest IP would ever see another release, the now-franchise returns with Alan Wake's American Nightmare. Unfortunately, the game has made no great strides in the gameplay department, and to make matters worse, the game's story falls totally flat. Lacking playability and the soul that made its predecessor such a special title, American Nightmare is an uninspired game that isn't worth the time or money despite its $15 price tag.

The setting of Alan Wake's new reality-blurring adventure is the television show Night Springs, a program Wake used to write for but now finds himself trapped inside (or so I assume). Toward the end of the original game, the titular writer learned of the emergence of an evil doppelg nger known as Mr. Scratch, and in American Nightmare he hunts down his homicidal impostor before any harm can come to his loved ones. Taking him down won't be so simple, however, as Wake soon finds himself trapped in a time loop that forces him to repeat the same night over and over again.

It's this demented Groundhog's Day that ultimately proves to be American Nightmare's biggest problem. You'll be forced to relive the same night three times throughout your five hour adventure, completing the same steps over and over as you inch towards facing off with Mr. Scratch. The lack of objective variety alone makes this scenario rather mind-numbing, and the fact that the characters and plot are all bland and uninteresting (especially compared to the original) makes the journey that much worse. The nail in the coffin is the game's thoroughly unsatisfying endgame, which is far too abrupt to justify the repetitive campaign that precedes it.

The fact that the game lacks the charm that made its predecessor's narrative so engrossing is also hugely disappointing. The original Alan Wake used its convoluted plot to great affect, using its labyrinthine plot to introduce players to many great characters and set up numerous fun scenarios. American Nightmare does none of this; its new characters are all uninteresting, secondary sources of narrative such as radio broadcasts and television shows offer little meaning, and the game never explores its hero's psyche as much as it should. Alan Wake has always found himself caught between realities, and the original title did an excellent job of keeping you guessing as to whether or not he would find his way back to reality or sink deeper into the dark realm he found himself in. American Nightmare, on the other hand, asks you to take everything at face value, never once giving you any hints as to what's really going on with its protagonist's fractured existence along its main story track.

Luckily, manuscript pages make a return, and these collectibles hold the only interesting narrative you'll get in the entire game. These pages serve a few purposes from foreshadowing future events to recapping the original game, and most importantly, offering the smallest bit of insight as to what American Nightmare's plot is really about under the surface. There are an absolute ton of these pages scattered throughout the game's three environments, so those who are into hunting down hidden collectibles will surely get a kick out of tracking down all 53 of the hidden goodies. Manuscript pages also unlock weapons crates that further flesh out Wake's newly-expanded arsenal. No longer is he limited to the normal pistol, rifle and shotgun fare - nailguns, SMGs and even crossbows make Alan more dangerous than ever.

Though its rarely challenging (mostly thanks to the overabundance of guns and ammo), combat in American Nightmare is solid, and occasionally thrilling. Almost all of game's enemies are enshrouded in a darkness the makes them immune to firepower, so you'll have to pierce through their shadowy veil with a high-powered flashlight before delivering the killing blow with your weapon of choice. Its a simple formula, but it works well in building tension as enemies can close in on you quite quickly before you're even able to harm them. Though decent enemy variety and the occasional huge battle will keep you on your toes, the aforementioned lack of intensity really drags down American Nightmare's combat sequences. Most of the time you'll be facing off against only four or five enemies, and considering how powerful the new arsenal is, taking down your enemies will feel like a chore more than a white-knuckled struggle to survive.

American Nightmare features a whole secondary mode based around the game's combat mechanics, and though it avoids the campaign's pitfalls by cutting back on your armaments, it has its own fair share of issues. Fight Till Dawn is a spin on the wave defense mode that has been dominating multiplayer gaming for the past few years now. You'll be tasked with surviving for ten minutes, combating wave after wave of possessed foes in hopes of racking up a high score before dawn. The quintessential problem with this setup is that its three ways of dictating your performance in a round (the timer, the wave number, and the score) never come together to form a cohesive objective - if anything they all conflict with one another. Often I found myself wanting to face off with a more challenging wave of enemies, only to be inhibited by the game's ten-minute countdown. Though it does support a basic leader board, the disappointing lack of multiplayer makes the Fight Till Dawn mode feel like a real missed opportunity.

On a presentational level, American Nightmare is something of a mixed bag. The game's visuals are a bit underwhelming thanks to some jolting animations, supremely cheesy live-action cutscenes, and the overall lack of detail on offer due to the unrelentingly dark art direction. Still, there's rarely anything outright bad, and certain lighting effects are done quite nicely. The game's sound department, on the other hand, is of a consistently high quality. Creepy ambient sound effects, stylish narration, and licensed music are all used to great effect, and though there are a few poor performances, the voice acting is mostly spot-on. Though the graphics aren't all that impressive, its great audio design keeps the presentation from falling into the realm of mediocrity that the rest of the game does.

Though it's great to see a game like Alan Wake get a second chance, American Nightmare not only fails to expand on what made the original so great, but doesn't stand up as a quality title in its own right. The game's repetitive, time-loop premise is its most glaring flaw, but the throwaway story, sloppy visuals and lack of fun enemy encounters bog the experience down even further. The game's Fight Till Dawn mode does serve to alleviate some of the campaign's frustrations, but is riddled with problems of its own, namely the lack of focus and intensity that makes other survival modes so thrilling. Though there are a few things that American Nightmare does right, the bad far outweighs the good. The writer has entered a dark place indeed.


+Good audio presentation
+Solid combat mechanics
+Collectible pages offer some nice insights

-Awful story
-Repetitive objectives
-Combat scenarios are mostly dull
-Fight Till Dawn feels like a missed opportunity

Get the full article at GameSpot

"WTA2k5 reviewed Alan Wake's American Nightmare for the Xbox 360..." was posted by WTA2k5 on Tue, 10 Apr 2012 15:08:51 -0700
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/alan-wakes-american-nightmare/user-reviews/791750/platform/xbox360/ Mon, 19 Mar 2012 12:16:46 -0700 WTA2k5 reviewed Uncharted: Golden Abyss for the PlayStation Vita... http://www.gamespot.com/uncharted-golden-abyss/user-reviews/790235/platform/vita/ ...and gave it a 8.0.

It doesn't take long for Uncharted: Golden Abyss to show off the Playstation Vita's rather stunning graphical and control capabilities. Within the game's first fifteen minutes you'll be maneuvering through a beautifully crafted environment, shooting enemies with dual-analog stick controls, and utilizing some of the Vita's many additional control options. The game's first few minutes are a true marvel, as they deliver a gaming experience that's completely unprecedented for a handheld, and the truth is, despite a few nagging issues, that sense of wonder never really lets up.

Golden Abyss is set before any of the other games, though it has no real connection to its predecessors, and Nathan Drake is no less capable than he's always been. As usual, Drake and a few buddies have to go after some long-lost treasure and avoid the clutches of a maniacal warlord in the process. But also as per usual, the game features plenty of amusing dialogue and great delivery in order to keep the plot engaging. It's best to describe the latest adventure as fun but forgettable; it's unfortunate that it doesn't reach the apex of characterization that Uncharted 2 did, but it wisely avoids the laughable attempts at self-seriousness that dragged its immediate predecessor down so much.

While Golden Abyss also keeps the Uncharted series' now-standard gameplay formula - a combination of climbing, shooting, and puzzle-solving - the usual fare is made all the more impressive simply through the fact that you get to play it all in the palm of your hand. The game's platforming elements continue to entertain despite their relative linearity. Sequences in which you climb up huge set-pieces, take daring leaps of faith, or high-tail it to avoid a heavily armed group of enemies always prove to be thrilling, and the incredible sense of urgency these sequences provide further their success.

Where the game really steps out of its pre-established comfort zone is in its spectacular combat. On the surface, the game plays out much like most modern third-person shooters - the use of cover is heavily emphasized, and if you do find yourself outside of a safe spot, it should only be to run to another one or engage in some quick melee combat. However, Golden Abyss sets its gunfights apart from the competition through great use of the Vita's control options. Melee attacks and weapons swaps can be done on the Vita's touch screen (as well as through traditional button-presses, for purists), and arcing the trajectory of grenades tosses is handled entirely with the Vita's touch controls. The real revelation, however, is the game's use of the accelerometer. While aiming handles just fine with the right analog stick, you can make subtle adjustments with the device's SIXAXIS controls. While this may seem like a relatively small addition, it ends up giving Golden Abyss by far the slickest and most engaging combat the Uncharted series has yet seen.

Unfortunately, the game's puzzle fall short of the precedent set by its entertaining platforming and combat. For the most part, its because of needless gimmicks built solely to capitalize on the Vita's touch controls. You'll be stopped fairly often in order to do mundane tasks such as making charcoal rubbings (done simply by swiping your finger across the touchscreen), or cleaning dirt off of an artifact (done by swiping back touchpad). Not only are these small interruptions devoid of fun in their own right, but they can be detrimental to the snappy pacing the game shoots for. One segment early in the game breaks up well-crafted cutscene no less than three times for these throwaway uses of the Vita's tech. The game's major puzzles are certainly better, but they still aren't all that great, and often feel like just as intrusive a stop as the aforementioned touch screen gimmicks. On the whole, these segments feel so archaic and unrewarding that it's hard to wonder why they're there in the first place.

Continuing the game's detrimental use of touch controls are the few dragged-out quicktime events that show up towards the end of the game. These moments are essentially fill-ins for boss encounters, but are handled extremely poorly due to their unnecessary length and difficulty. They probably would've been more fun to watch as cut-scenes than play as exercises in frustration.

Setpiece moments are practically the lifeblood of the Uncharted series, and even though technological limitations keep the game from showing off huge moments like a cargo plane wreck or a collapsing building, Golden Abyss still features plenty of great moments that spice things up. There are a few adrenaline-pumping chase sequences, an on-rails shooting sequence, and some pretty massive environments to behold. Nothing comes close to being as breathtaking as the console entries' most impressive segments, but there's some surprising moments to be found nonetheless.

Though Uncharted games have always featured a bunch of collectibles hidden throughout their respective environments, the staggering number of hidden goodies in Golden Abyss is almost intimidating. There are well over 100 secret artifacts, gemstones, bounties, and photo opportunities in the game, and while most people may not feel the need to track down all of them, they can certainly pad the 12 hour playtime significantly.

On a presentational level, Golden Abyss is pretty much unparalleled on portable systems. It features great animations, an incredible amount of detail on character models, plenty of expansive and varied environments, and some well done lighting effects. There are few graphical shortcomings to be found; the game uses lame 2D backdrops in place of sprawling vistas when you get to a spot with a nice view, and the particle effects are straight out of 1999. Despite those minor problems, however, Golden Abyss is easily the best looking handheld game on the market, and is more or less on par with early Playstation 3 titles.

The same goes for the game's audio. Whereas the console Uncharted titles benefited from having huge set pieces with which to show off their sound design wizardry, Golden Abyss keeps things relatively basic. Still, the voice-acting is just as great as it always is, and the music is similarly inspired.

Uncharted: Golden Abyss is something of a reluctant killer-app for the Playstation Vita. On one hand, the game looks and sounds incredible, delivers plenty of thrilling moments, and features some great uses of the Vita's many control options. However, there are many more instances of the portable's touch controls being used as throwaway gimmicks that serve to break up the game's pacing and add some unneeded frustration. The game goes to great lengths to get players to realize the Vita's capabilities with widely varying success. Though it is a shame that Sony Bend couldn't exercise a little more restraint in its uses of the Vita's tech, Uncharted: Golden Abyss is still a perfectly worthwhile game that shows off the massive potential behind Sony's latest portable.

PROS:
+Unparalleled portable presentation
+Great combat that features superb use of the accelerometer
+Fun platforming
+By far the lengthiest Uncharted game

CONS:
-Bad puzzles
-Minor graphical flaws
-Gimmicky, adverse use of touch controls

Get the full article at GameSpot

"WTA2k5 reviewed Uncharted: Golden Abyss for the PlayStation Vita..." was posted by WTA2k5 on Mon, 19 Mar 2012 12:16:46 -0700
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/uncharted-golden-abyss/user-reviews/790235/platform/vita/ Mon, 12 Mar 2012 19:24:00 -0700 WTA2k5 reviewed Mass Effect Infiltrator for the iPhone/iPod... http://www.gamespot.com/mass-effect-infiltrator/user-reviews/789721/platform/iphone/ ...and gave it a 5.5.

The Mass Effect series has grown to become one of this generations most ambitious and unforgettable new IPs. And of course, every behemoth franchise needs a few spinoffs. Mass Effect has tried branching out into iOS territory before, but it'd be safe to assume that most everyone who played the horrendous Mass Effect Galaxies has erased it from their memory. While Mass Effect Infiltrator stands head and shoulders above its mobile predecessor, it's still far from being a great experience.

The top-notch storytelling, fleshed out characters and great world-building the Mass Effect series is known for is completely absent here. The game puts you in the shoes of Cerberus agent Randall Ezno, who very quickly turns rogue and rampages through a Cerberus base after the shady organization kidnaps his friend. While this might seem a decent premise, there are never any meaningful story moments, and the awful voice-acting effectively does away with any weight the sparse narrative may have carried.

To make matters worse in the story department, tacked on Paragon/Renegade choices pop up from time to time throughout the campaign. The decisions you're presented with not only consist of just one basic scenario (killing or sparing a target you get the drop on), but lack any kind of context or consequence. In the series proper, it's worth seeing multiple playthroughs to the end just to see the effects different decisions you make have on the mythos you know and the characters you love, but Infiltrator captures none of that same magic.

Luckily, the moment to moment gameplay in Infiltrator is pretty solid. While the game is a stop-and-pop cover-shooter that utilizes the dual-invisible-analog stick controls that iOS gamers have grown to expect from most shooters on the platform, it wisely eschews a full suite of controls in favor of a more simplistic approach to aiming and shooting that better suits the iPhone's limitations. Once you snap into cover, you simply have to tap on an enemy and your character will pop out and start firing. From there you can do some fine aiming to hit your target's weak point, or tap on the screen once more to duck back down. If there are multiple targets close by, you can chain your attacks for bonus points. There are also a number of biotic and tech powers, as well as melee moves that serve as effective methods of spicing up combat.

There are a few nagging issues with the combat system. Despite the fact that the controls are a lot easier to manage than they are in most iOS shooters, the UI can still get cluttered, and if you're playing on the iPhone's small screen, maneuvering around in more chaotic situations can get a bit too overwhelming. For the most part, however, combat is done quite well, and is certainly a step up from all the iOS games that try too hard to mimic their console brethren.

As mentioned before, your performance in combat is graded, and you're rewarded with a certain amount of credits depending on how well you fought. These credits can then be used to buy and upgrade weapons, armor, abilities and biotic powers. Unfortunately, unless you're a real pro, it takes a while to get a good amount of cash, and it's likely you'll only own about half the game's abilities and upgrades by the time you reach the end of your first playthrough. You can also collect pieces of intel scattered throughout the game's levels that can serve one of two purposes. Either you can use them to raise your Galactic Readiness rating in Mass Effect 3 (which will net you a better ending in that game), or you can trade them in for some more cash, which seems like a nice touch for those who might view Infiltrator as more of a standalone experience rather than a tie-in.

While Infiltrator's initial screenshots looked extremely impressive, the end product doesn't quite match up to those first glimpses. Certain character models and environments look very really good, but for the most part you'll be seeing the bland corridors of the Cerberus facility, and the similarly bland armor of its guards. While the game does look pretty decent, you won't ever forget its an iOS title.

Mass Effect Infiltrator is hard to recommend to anyone but the most devoted Mass Effect fans. Anyone who's played the console titles will surely get a kick out of Infiltrator's slick take on the series' combat mechanics, and the game's tie-ins to Mass Effect 3 are neat, but the lack of a compelling narrative and decisions, as well as the uneven production values make this feel like a game that's only given half of its effort. The reason why the numbered entries in the Mass Effect series resonate so much with gamers is because there are no compromises, and Infiltrator simply fails to capture the magic that comes from a consistent, top-notch quality.

PROS:
+Fun combat
+Interesting tie-in functionality
+Plenty of items and upgrades

CONS:
-Terrible story and voice-over work
-Tacked on moral decisions
-Mostly bland visuals
-UI occasionally becomes cluttered

Get the full article at GameSpot

"WTA2k5 reviewed Mass Effect Infiltrator for the iPhone/iPod..." was posted by WTA2k5 on Mon, 12 Mar 2012 19:24:00 -0700
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/mass-effect-infiltrator/user-reviews/789721/platform/iphone/ Sun, 19 Feb 2012 19:54:54 -0800 WTA2k5 reviewed Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning for the Xbox 360... http://www.gamespot.com/kingdoms-of-amalur-reckoning/user-reviews/788163/platform/xbox360/ ...and gave it a 7.0.

The first thing I noticed about the front cover on my copy of Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning wasn't the decked out warrior wielding both a sword and a warhammer, but rather its bold pronouncement that it comes "From the minds of R.A. Salvatore, Todd McFarlane, and Ken Rolston." Yet, for all the namedropping that's been going on surrounding the game's release, Reckoning does little to prove these creatives deserving of their visionary status. That's not to belittle the exceptional work that they've all made in the past, but rather a way of pointing out the fact that Kingdoms of Amalur ultimately plays it too safe to show off the kind of ingenuity one might expect from this game-development supergroup. But while its adherence to role-playing traditions may cause it to lose the kind of shock-and-awe provided by recent groundbreaking RPGs like Skyrim or The Witcher 2, Reckoning falls into a comfort zone that any RPG fan can enjoy.

"Fate" is the most important key-word when it comes to describing Reckoning's story and overall design philosophy. To start with its narrative implications, the idea of predestination comes up often in the game's core narrative, as well as many of the major sidequests. The denizens of Amalur all have a fatalistic worldview, and subscribe to the notion that their path through life has been totally pre-determined. Yet the player character seems to be an exception, as he or she is brought back to life after being killed in battle to discover that they are fate-less. It's an interesting take on the usual "chosen one" trope that's been repeated so many times throughout RPGs, but the rest of the game's narrative simply doesn't back it up.

When it comes to any new role-playing IP, one of the first things many players scrutinize is the lore and world-building on display. While Big Huge Games certainly seems to have an astounding amount of lore (it's been said that they wrote about 10,000 years of history for Amalur), the level of quality in terms of its presentation doesn't nearly match the quantity. The game doesn't introduce players to its world in an accessible way, and unless you decide to dig through numerous extra dialog options or peer through texts lying around, it's hard to piece together a detailed understanding of exactly what this newfound fantasy realm is all about. The game's use of confusing, borderline-incoherent pieces of recorded dialog (dubbed Lorestones) in order to flesh out the game's millennia-spanning narrative doesn't help much either.

The minute-to-minute plot is a little more successful, though it still has its faults. The game tasks you with finding out your place in the world, all the while fighting off the deranged villain, Gadflow, and his army of equally deranged immortal beings. The main plot is pretty good since it makes more of an effort to bring the game's themes of predetermination and changing the fate of the world to the fore. The game's sidequests vary in terms of providing interesting narrative. At best, these side stories feel as worthwhile as the main plot; at worst they are merely throwaway context for a simple fetch mission.

As mentioned before, the idea of playing a character with no set path translates to gameplay as well. Reckoning allows for an unprecedented amount of openness when it comes to building your character. While you can train in the kinds of abilities and talents that will send you down the more traditional paths of the warrior, thief, or mage, you can easily hybridize any of these general classes, or even make a jack of all trades. What's more, the game rarely puts equipment restrictions on you, and you can cheaply and easily reallocate your talent points whenever you may feel a change of heart. No RPGs have succeeded as well as Reckoning when it comes to circumventing restrictive character-building, and the level of freedom the game provides in terms of customization is one of its most shining qualities.

Another of Reckoning's greatest strengths is its visceral combat. The game takes more queues from hack-and-slash action games than traditional RPGs. As such, the controls are satisfying and responsive, and there's no shortage of moves, spells, counters, combos, and quick-time executions. Of course, your damage output and defenses are supplemented by behind-the-scenes stats and dice-rolls, making character progression feel even more meaningful. While even the simplest of combat encounters are a blast, great boss battles, and the occasional opportunity to pick off some enemies with stealth executions help shake things up a bit.

Reckoning also features the now-requisite dialog wheel, but conversing with the world's NPCs isn't nearly as engaging as it could have been. The writing and voice acting are perfectly good, but stiff character animations, terrible lip-synching, and the fact that half the screen is inexplicably blacked out all work towards making dialog something of a chore. The dialog options for the player character don't help either; your character isn't voiced, and rarely do you get to say anything that can shake up a conversation beyond a quick response from an NPC. Luckily, a few instances of meaningful decision making do pop up from time to time, and most choices result in tangible consequences.

The land of Amalur itself is something of an oddity as far as open world RPGs are concerned. Honestly, it's hard to compare the environment to any other game. While Reckoning certainly doesn't feature the sprawling vistas or the "go anywhere you can see" philosophy of games like Skyrim, it features a scope that more linear role-playing experiences like the Fable series simply don't offer. There are about two dozen different zones total, and unless you enter a major city or cross to a new continent, they are all seamlessly interconnected. While there are never any breathtaking expanses, there's plenty of room for exploration in each of these zones, and the locales never feel especially restrictive.

Reckoning's production values aren't very impressive, but they mostly get the job done. While conversations suffer from the aforementioned presentation problems, combat and cutscenes are animated very well (no doubt thanks to Todd McFarlane). The game's stylized art direction takes is undeniably inspired by the exaggerated visuals of games like Fable and World of Wacraft, but the world still feels relatively unique, and the art hides the fact that the graphics aren't all that impressive on a technical level. My one major gripe with the game's visuals is the camera, which focuses so much on the action taking place on the ground that you rarely get a sense of the game's often impressive scope and verticality. The game's sound department is similarly passable; the game's voice work and sound effects are good, but the music is uninspired and bland.
Reckoning delivers a lot of value for your dollar. Even if the story might not always keep you coming back, the prospect of leveling up and getting your hands on some new loot certainly will. If you set off to complete every side quest you come across, your play time could stretch well over the 60 hour mark. However, it's worth noting that the game's abundance of side quests are often quite bland and repetitive. Thusly, if you simply stick to the main storyline as well as the game's more inspired faction quest lines, you'll avoid the feeling that your playthrough is more a chore than anything else (not to mention that the game's running time will still be about 30-40 hours).

In recent years, big-budget RPGs have been pushing the genre to its very limits, offering grand worlds, game-changing decisions, and unique gameplay experiences. Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning is ultimately too derivative and too safe to reach the lofty heights of many of its peers, but the game does have its own small triumphs. The game's character progression is unprecedented in its openness, and allows for a truly freeing gameplay experience. Combat is also a blast thanks to the game's responsive controls and vast number of weapons, spells and special moves. Beyond these great mechanics, almost everything else in Reckoning, from the more minor facets of its gameplay to its presentation, are simply passable. Though the game is only notable in a few areas, there are also very few missteps (aside from the occasionally convoluted lore). Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning does absolutely nothing to shake up the role-playing genre, but a die-hard RPG fan will surely find it enjoyable.

PROS:
+Great combat
+Excellent character progression
+Interesting environment
+The game's many stories are can be engaging...

CONS:
- But can also be bland
-Poor presentation during conversations
-Extremely derivative

Get the full article at GameSpot

"WTA2k5 reviewed Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning for the Xbox 360..." was posted by WTA2k5 on Sun, 19 Feb 2012 19:54:54 -0800
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/kingdoms-of-amalur-reckoning/user-reviews/788163/platform/xbox360/ Sun, 05 Feb 2012 13:54:10 -0800 WTA2k5 reviewed The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword for the Wii... http://www.gamespot.com/the-legend-of-zelda-skyward-sword/user-reviews/787127/platform/wii/ ...and gave it a 8.0.

The Legend of Zelda series is one of gaming's greatest mainstays, and aside from a couple infamous Philips CD-i titles, has been a remarkable series in terms of consistent quality. For the most part, this may be due to the series' fairly strict adherence to a set formula. Each Zelda game shares a core narrative and general gameplay design, and while these basic ideas are expanded upon and explored differently with each ensuing title, Nintendo has essentially been following the "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" rule for the past quarter-century. Before its release, Skyward Sword had been touted as a completely new direction for the series.

There is some truth to that claim, as Skyward Sword's overall structure and heavy reliance on motion controls give it a decidedly different feel from its predecessors, but the game still carries on plenty of past traditions. The end result of these simulatenous moves toward change and preservation of past mechanics and tropes is somewhat mixed. In my mind Skyward Sword stands with the likes of Bully and the first Assassin's Creed as a truly flawed masterpiece. The game has some pretty fundamental narrative and design flaws, but the overall experience is compelling enough that it remains a blast despite its missteps.

The first of these major flaws lies within Skyward Sword's narrative. While its story gets off on the right foot thanks to some great characterization (particularly in Zelda's case), the game comes close to dropping its driving plot all together throughout the game's middle stretch. The proceedings do pick up once again in the game's final hours, but it's a shame that the interesting world-building done in the game's opening moments is barely touched on again for so long. Even though the game starts with a lot of promise, the action is scarcely elevated from the usual Triforce-hunting, evil-vanquishing adventures we're all used to.

Luckily, while the main plot lacks interesting characters and events, side missions and some of the world's more minor denizens are very charming. Skyward Sword is the first Zelda game with proper side quests beyond mini-games and scattered collectibles, and these small diversions add a lot of life to the game's small collection of environments. Moments like an encounter with a sociable, but misunderstood demon, and deciding what to do with a classmate's letter add some memorable moments to the game's mostly sparse narrative.

In terms of basic gameplay, Skyward Sword sticks closely to the blueprint layed out by past Zelda titles. The player is almost constantly faced with a gauntlet of enemies, environmental puzzles, boss fights and platforming sections that have to be navigated through using the proper move or tool (which is usually an item from Link's ever-expanding collection of gadgets).
The most commonly used item is undoubtedly Link's sword. Thanks to tricky enemies and responsive, nearly 1:1 motion controls courtesy of the WiiMotion Plus attachment, swordplay is a blast in Skyward Sword. Enemies will be a lot smarter about defending themselves than they've been in the past, so the key to most combat encounters is catching an enemy off-guard and moving in for the kill. Occassionally, battles against stronger enemies will require such a constant barrage of attacks that you'll have to resort to mindlessly waving the Wiimote, and sometimes you'll need to recalibrate your controller if you exaggerate your motions too much, but on the whole, the basic combat is superb.

Aside from your sword, nearly every item in Link's arsenal benefits from compelling motion control. The newest item, a flying mechanical beetle controll entirely with the Wii remote, is one of the most useful, fun to use item in the game. The almost-too-accurate bow and arrow, as well as the awesome grappling hook are other highlights. It's a shame that a game that so effortlessly integrates items that show off the Wii's accuracy in motion controls came so late in its life-cycle.

In terms of its overall design, Skyward Sword is indeed quite different from past Zelda games. The areas you're dropped into are fairly open-ended, but there isn't much to do in them besides collect hidden treasures or materials for crafting, and none of the game's four main zones connect seamlessly. For the most part, your journey is as straightforward as it gets, and you constantly know where to go next.

Luckily, the openness and wonder of past Zelda titles isn't sacrificed for nothing. The game boasts the most consistent and prevalent set of challenges this series has yet seen. Puzzle-solving, and major enemy encounters are no longer strictly limited to dungeons, as the outdoor environments leading up to them are just as well-designed. In one particularly brilliant instance, you'll have to navigate your way around a ruin, solving some pretty devious puzzles and navigating your way through quicksand in order to even unearth the next temple.

At first this pacing is blissful. It plays like a pure distillation of the Zelda series' finest mechanics and does well to get rid of any filler. However, around the twenty hour mark, the game seems to try as hard as it can to stretch out its running time far longer than it should. Soon you'll be backtracking through zones you've previously visited with sloppily designed objectives. I consider some of these moments to be the most egregious examples of padding and backtracking I've ever encountered in a game. In the game's absolute worst moment, you're forced to leave the zone you're in while in the midst of solving a puzzle in order to get an item which will allow you to proceed (which is, of course, in an entirely different area). Then, once you retrieve the item, you must, for no apparent reason, make your way back to the spot you need to get to on foot (even though you would normally be able to fast-travel there), completeing a ridiculously unnecessary escort mission along the way. Now, this is the worst instance in the entire game, but there are plenty of scenarios that are similarly forced. As a 25 hour game, Skyward Sword is superb, but once you add in the 10-15 hours of hugely unnecessary backtracking, the game is considerably less impressive.

Fortunately, the game's dungeons are pretty great overall. Aside from one overly-simple dungeon later in the game, the dungeons have great layouts, fun boss battles and a smooth difficulty curve. The game's desert dungeons which revolve around manipulating time altering artifacts are downright genius, and the game's Sandship level ranks as one of the most mind-bending and unique dungeons in the series' history.

In terms of production values, Skyward Sword is excellent. The graphics are absolutely incredible, and well surpass the Wii's limited graphical capabilities by focusing on gorgeous art. It easily ranks among the likes of Super Mario Galaxy as one of the Wii's best-looking titles.

The sound department is also great. Sound design is great thanks to great effects, and the series' trademark jingles that are no doubt burned into the reward center of any Zelda fan's brain. The score is awesome as well. Nintendo seems to have stuck to the more quirky, avant-garde music displayed in Super Mario Galaxy 2 rather than the usual Zelda orchestration, but the result is equally as effective as it was in the plumbers last intergalactic adventure. Another one of the series' returning quirks is the lack of voice-acting. At this point, you've either accepted it, or dislike it, but it's simply a fact of life as far as the Zelda series is concerned. While I personally have no problem with it, I did notice that Link had a ton of implied dialog, which leaves me to wonder why he's still a mute.

The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword is, in many ways, a brilliant game. The excellent pacing displayed through the games first two-thirds or so is a welcome change from the series usual formula, and slick motion controls really do their part to elevate the basic gameplay. What's more, the game has excellent production values, and features some worthwhile side content. However, the game has two fairly major flaws. The first is that the story never takes off in the way it should until the game's final few minutes, and the game generally lacks the epic feel and importance that it strives for. Secondly, the game features an unbearable amount of backtracking once you start approaching the endgame content, and this padding serves to damage the experience greatly. However, Skyward Sword's strengths shine brightly through all its unnecessary clutter, and is ultimately another great entry in the flagship series, and is without a doubt one of the Wii's few recent must-play titles.

PROS:
+Excellent motion controls
+Great graphics and sound
+Compelling side content
+Great dungeons
+The game's new overall design is great at first...

CONS:
-...But eventually leads to forced, unrewarding back-tracking
-The narrative never reaches the heights it wants to
-There are few minor control issues
-Some people still may find the lack of voice acting off-putting

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"WTA2k5 reviewed The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword for the Wii..." was posted by WTA2k5 on Sun, 05 Feb 2012 13:54:10 -0800
]]> http://www.gamespot.com/the-legend-of-zelda-skyward-sword/user-reviews/787127/platform/wii/ Mon, 30 Jan 2012 19:18:37 -0800 GAMECAMILLER reviewed Half-Minute Hero for the PSP... http://www.gamespot.com/half-minute-hero/user-reviews/786739/platform/psp/ ...and gave it a 8.0.

Half-Minute Hero is a game that's built around completing a task 30 seconds. Whether that be defeating a boss via a RPG, shooting your way to find a flower, or preventing you Sage from being attacked, Half-Minute Hero is what it is, trying to be a "hero" in 30 seconds of less.

(Note this review does give away what modes are unlocked after the third mode is completed. Other then that, nothing else is revealed/spoiled about the game's story."

The game itself is broken up into 5 modes. The first being Hero 30, which are 30 levels of mini RPGness. The game includes everything you would see in a RPG: towns, items to buys, leveling up, grinding, money earning, and of course Boss fights. The object is to defeat the Boss of each level in 30 seconds or less. Sometimes you need more time then 30 seconds; You can turn back time by7 praying to the statue goddess... which really means paying money, that doubles each time you sue it in a level. Overall, I really liked the game play of those levels, and everything seemed to work out very smoothly.

The second is Evil Lord 30, which is a Real Time Strategy game (in 30 seconds) across 30 levels. i didn't like this mode so much as the others. You have access to three monsters; Brutes which are great against speed type enemies, Nimbles, which are great against shooting enemies, and Shooters, which can take down brute types. Your aura around you dictates how strong your summons are, and how many you can summon at a time. If you are hit, you summon level takes a hit, making it harder to complete a stage. Luckily you can, like in Hero mode, for a price, use the golden barrels that house the goddess to not only turn back time, but return your summon stats to maximum. Sometimes the levels get a bit too intense to summon and this mode, out of all 5, seemed to be a hassle at times. Luckily ti doesn't last as long as Hero 30

Third, is Princess 30, which is a 30 second shooter. I liked this mainly for the change of pace in the game at this point, albeit it was a bit too easy for me. You as a Princess progress across 30 levels with your knights trying to complete quests, all while getting back before 30 seconds are up. The red carpets across the level allow you to turn back time, for some coins.

Fourth, is the Knight 30 mode, which is an action game that you try to keep the Sage safe for 30 seconds while it charges it's spell to end the level and send the monsters packing. This has 30 levels as well. It was a nice change on the 30 second concept since the sage has to go untouched for 30 seconds nonstop. You can guide the Sage around the level to protect it, set traps, use weapons (that break very easily) or try to use your own body to protect the sage. You'll die a lot, but luckily the game doesn't end as if you guide your spirit back tot he sage, you can live to protect the sage again. So in other words, whatever it takes in this mode, PROTECT THE SAGE!

Finally. the story ends with a 5th mode, which is 1 level that ties all the previous mode's stories together in an RPG in 3 minutes.

There's also a bonus mode which is a single level you try to beat in 3 seconds. Yes, THREE SECONDS. Thank god it's not part of the main game. It's insane.

The graphics for the game are pixeled backgrounds and characters to give the game a fitting 8-bit retro look, while the cut scenes (or cut scene screenshots) are detail artwork images.

As for the music and sound, the game sounds fantastic with fitting RPG tunes. It brings out the nostalgia of the old games it's inspired by.

Overall, I liked the game's neat concepts, though Hero 30 is the best out of them all. I give this an 8.0 out of ten. Solid game, very neat concepts, worth checking out.

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"GAMECAMILLER reviewed Half-Minute Hero for the PSP..." was posted by GAMECAMILLER on Mon, 30 Jan 2012 19:18:37 -0800
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