Read and post comments if you want to. I'm online most days so I should reply quickly.

"You know what they say about the leading man; he never dies!" - Balthier Final Fantasy XII

• 18Jul 08

  Multi-platforming and Square-Enix's Big Decision

  Being a long time fan of Square's Final Fantasy series I felt I should post my own feelings on the matter.

  Back in 2007 I bought a 60GB when I heard the newer 40GB were going to lose the backwards compatibility, originally I was going to buy one when the price had dropped but I couldn't lose the ability to play the original Final Fantasies haha (obviously). I was always going to buy a PS3 in the end as all my favourite videogame series' are on the PS; Final Fantasy, Kingdom Hearts, Metal Gear Solid, Devil May Cry, Dynasty Warriors (I didn't know they were going multi-platform at the time). Plus I liked the look of Uncharted, Heavenly Sword, Resistance, Warhawk and Motorstorm, and it turns out that I was right on all five counts (lucky me eh..?).

  Now on to the main topic of multi-platforming. Up until a few days ago two of my favourite franchises had turned multi-platform; Devil May Cry 4 is a fabulous game in my opinion, a brilliant fighting system, an engaging (albeit short) story and great characters, however, I felt the graphics on the PS3 version of the game could have been amped up quite a bit but I can understand Capcom's wish to give 360 and PS3 owners an equal gaming experience. As for Dynasty Warriors 6 I have three words: huge **** up, so I wasn't bothered about that either. Now for Final Fantasy: in my humble opinion I'm actually glad Square moved XIII to the 360, it will give them more business so that they can keep pumping out more outstanding games for me! MUHAHAHAHAHA! But seriously I have half a dozen friends that own 360s who have been dying to play a Final Fantasy so I'm happy for them too. The only outcome that would make me angry (and when I say angry I mean ****ing livid) is if the PS3 version is hindered in any way by it's 360 counterpart because Square have always been the best at getting the most out of a console and I want to see what the PS3 can REALLY do.

  On a side-note, if the PS3 version isn't up to standard, at least we have Versus eh?

  • Posted Jul 18, 2008 1:58 pm PT
  • Category: Opinion
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• 23Jun 08

  The Perfect Game

  The Perfect Game has finally arrived. Metal Gear Solid 4 does everything SO well on SO many levels that even the most loyal of the Xbox fanboys are admitting it's technical prowess.

  Let's start with the blatantly obvious. The graphics are absolutely ASTOUNDING. To give you an example of how real they look my mother came to visit me a week ago and wandered in on me playing Metal Gear (it was at a cutscene at the time) and she actually said "Are you just gonna sit there watching movies or give your Mum a hug?" She actually thought I was watching a DVD rather than playing a game! They are so crisp and clean, no jagged edges at all (well I haven't seen any). The only part of the graphics that distinguish Metal Gear from a movie is that there is no bodily hair (don't get any rude ideas...) like arm, leg and facial hair. That is understandable however as all the tiny details in the hairs would have to be individually animated and that uses memory that could be put to much better use.

  The music is not only as profound, as powerful and as, well... perfect as ever but there is the added twist of Snake's new iPod! It allows you to play music from the other games in the Metal Gear Saga but also the official Metal Gear Solid Podcasts. It also adds the extra element of collecting new tunes as you progress through the game. Not ONLY THAT (yes there is another element) but listening the iPod reduces Snake's stress levels which is useful when trying to reduce the amount of healing items used. The older songs certainly give out the feeling of nostalgia that the many flashbacks start.

  The gameplay is completely on par with everything else so far but I'm afraid to get into too much detail for fear of spoilers so I'll just mention the points that have had the biggest impact for me. The first is the introduction of the over-the-shoulder view for shooting. This makes machine-gun and pistol shooting much faster which is VERY useful as the possibility of being over-run by enemies is much higher than in previous installments. Next is the weapon customisation, the assault rifles and sub-machine guns can be customised with a variety of scopes, grenade launchers (and other attachments), rifle lights, grips and a laser sight. This really allows for a degree of personalisation for each person's style of gunplay. Lights can also be added to some pistols but the only REALLY useful pistols, the Mk2 and the Desert Eagle can't be customised.

  Finally I'm going to mention the characters. Probably the best part about the characters is that every single character that was still alive at the end of the previous installments returns in one way or another and the ones that had the misfortune of dying are mentioned or shown at least once. I won't say anymore for fear of spoilers.

  • Posted Jun 23, 2008 7:16 am PT
  • Category: Games
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• 25Apr 08

  The Air has Cleared

  All is now well in the land of Metal Gear, the beta has finally begun and it has proven so far to be an extremely enjoyable online experience the control system is flexible and user friendly (I am an MGS veteran though) and the graphics are second only to Uncharted so far, and even then that's a push.

  There is one... minor... problem though, the servers for Metal Gear Online seem to only be able to handle 3000-5000 people at the same time but I noticed on the 360 ( ) COD4 online could handle 16000-20000. You need to fix that before release Konami.

  One more thing, I need an easy way of getting headshots with the sub-machine guns I seem to be the only one that can't do it .

  • Posted Apr 25, 2008 11:59 am PT
  • Category: Opinion
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