Please just listen to the first few seconds.

OK for all of you guys who will go tl;dr (to long didn't read), The short score of this game is HOLY FUCKING HELL IN A BASKET AWESOME.

For those of you still reading Ill continue with my initial impressions of the game.
In case you don't know Far Cry 2 has billed itself a a more realistic gritty Far Cry, no trigens or genetic experiments here. As far as I have seen in the game this is very true. You are most certainly NOT a super solider. The game treats you like a very hard to kill mercenary but one who will die if shot enough. Unlike some soldiers I can think of *cough* master chief , any one from COD4 and Crysis *cough*


I'm looking at YOU Crysis

The game controls very well on the PC and if you happen to have a bitching fast one like me it preformes beautifully. I haven't experienced ANY lag not even a slow down. I have been in fights with multiple people cars, animals and explosions with all the graphic settings on very high and I have had NO problems. Color me very impressed. The game looks amazing with colors liberally splashed from vista to vista with a palpable change in lighting and dynamic moving from jungle to open safari. Speaking of looks by far the most amazing thing about the games looks and world is the weather. They were NOT lying when they said it would mimic the real world realistically. This is one of the only times I have ever been blown away with something that in most games is passive. The weather plays a large role in game play, if its a misty night you might want to be more sneaky, a blazing sunny day might call for a more Rambo style approach. Far Cry 2 also made me do something I never do and that is pay attention to the game world as more than a backdrop. I find myself thinking about the wind direction and speed because it affects my fire setting stratgey. The game immerses you like nothing else has done in recent memory. Far Cry 2 Gets the game world RIGHT end of story.

Pictured NOT Far Cry 2, But pretty damn close.


But lets talk about the mechanics of game play. Not only does the game LOOK amazing but it also handles with almost no hitches. All the guns with the exception of the RPG feel real and heavy. The bullets pack a solid punch and the satisfaction from taking down an enemy is amazing.

Not that the game isn't with out its flaws. From the get go the game hardly explains WHY I am doing anything characters I have just met are willing to risk their lives for me for seemingly no reason. The AI needs work. They can be pretty stupid and down right retarded standing in front of grenades and refusing to get out of the way of my speeding truck. All of these down sides can be ignored however in light of the addicting game play and visceral response you get from each kill. In short Far Cry 2 deliver big time. I would at this point whole heatedly recommend the game. It has some minor glitches in terms of hit detection and animal AI but these are quickly forgiven. Once you play the game and get the feeling for it it becomes one of the most addictive games you will play this year.


This shit is awesome play it

Hey guess what today is is NotAZombie's Birthday. He made it a full year with out dying which is cool because as we all know he is NOT already dead. Figured I'd give him a lame birthday shout out. Hes my friend IRL so Ill prolly be over to his house later to beat him up. He did all those castle crasher updates so we wouldn't have to click on a website that isnt Dtoid to find out what was going on. Saved me almost like 3 minutes of effort.


Pictured: The results of being the only one at a party who is Not A Zombie

Anyway figured I'd Let you guys know sense he never says anything. You guys should be as annoying as possible to him he'd love that.


Happy Birthday NotAZombie we all know you wont be eating our brains anytime soon and we thank you for that.


Pictured: Not-NotAZombie

I bet you guys hear all the time in fact I KNOW we hear all the time about the evils of gamestop and their ilk. How we should never shop there and should in fact be burning them to the ground.



Take that establishment now can I reserve mirrors edge please?


But how often do we really look else where for our gaming needs? I am here today to show one prime example of a local game store which I frequent and if you live in the Columbus Ohio area you should too. Today I went to a place called Video Game Music Exchange which has two stores here in Ohio.


I went there today to change a preorder from fallout 3 to Gears of War 2. I went in expecting excellent service because that's what I have always gotten. This was one of the most painless experiences of shopping I have ever gone through. I walked in gave them my name and preorder info and wham done. Not only that but the guy who works there remembers me as the guy who bought a psp and asked me how it was doing. Small stores like this take care of their customers, they need to to stay in business and it shows. When I walk in I am greeted causally not with some corporate standard greeting.




The guy who owns it offers to call if he gets games in, or even go out of his way to get a weird game for me and call me when he has it. He values my patronage and actually cares about his customers. In fact I traded in a bunch of DS games and got about twice as much as I would have at gameshit. Because I bought so much in my psp trade in deal he gave me some 5 dollar off coupons that I can use on pretty much anything. That brings me to another reason local game stores rule. They don't have corporate rules to fallow if they want to offer me 10% off they can. If they want to give me some flyers to pass out I will because I WANT them to succeed in buisness because its beneficial to me for them to. I care about how they do because they care about how I do this is how business is supposed to work and VGMX gets it right. So if your in the Columbus area hit them up you wont be disappointed.

Heres a link to some coupons if you need extra prodding but seriously check the place out.

http://www.vgmx.com/coupons.htm

My monthly musing is less of being afraid of one specific game or moment but rather a situation I often found my self in in games gone by.


Mario 64, Doom 3, Halo 1, Morrowind, Megaman 2 you wouldn't think these games had much in common but you my friend are mistaken each of these games has a feature we seldom see in games now a days. I am speaking of course of the health bar or health meter call it what you will, that thing used to and still does scare the shit out of me.



In times past a gamer had two things to watch while playing a game the screen and the health meter. I remember playing Doom 3 which is a pretty scary game on its own but it takes on a whole new dimension when you have 20hp and the next hit could kill you and death awaits around the next corner. There is nothing more pulse pounding then feverishly looking for a health pack while dispatching enemy after enemy hoping against hope to make it just a bit further. Now a days we no longer have to fear the health bar with games like Gears of War and Halo 3 giving us recharging health and games like Bioshock which have no real penalty for death and while having a health bar, med kits abound so much that its not really an issue.


You'd be happy if you could adsorb 50 trillion bullets and have a 5 second recovery time


Now I understand that health packs aren't the most realistic thing ever but come on Gears of war Isn't exactly the more realistic game I've ever played. Not to say these games are bad but nothing makes me sweat more than a blinking health bar and room full of baddies. The frantic search for life when almost certain death awaits you is what made games like Half-Life 2 and Doom 3, in my opinion so good, the fast paced need to get from room to room with as much health as possible. They made you think while playing if you got hurt you had to push on in search of health not just rest back for a second and become an unstoppable death machine again. Instead of thinking "oh well I died Ill try again in my next respawn" you were thinking "OH SHIT OH SHIT I NEED A MED KIT NOW! OH FUCK! OH FUCK! WHATS AROUND THE NEXT CORNER?!?"


Imagine staring down this fucker with 10 health, yeah.


My final musing on Health bars is that it changes the way you save your game. In a game with recharging health you don't really have to worry about when you save but you bet your ass in a game with Health bars you wont be saving very often with 10 HP between you and oblivion. Nothing sends the fear into my heart more than pulse pounding feverish low HP game play.

I am sorry D-toid, Its been a long time I have been doing school and such and haven't posted a blog buuuuuuut I like this website a lot so I am going to try and be more active. So consider this a re-intro post I deleted some of my more gay blogs and I plan on having some new ones up when all these new games hit. Untill then will you take me back D-toid? I love you and I am beary sorry for being gone.