For many years we skateboard loving gamers amused ourselves with the great-yet-arcadey antics in the Tony Hawks Pro Skater series. Sure they were fun, really fun, but the skateboarding itself and the physics just felt...wrong. There was definitely something missing from the experience that annoyed me, it probably affected me worse than most non-skateboarding gamers because of the amount of time I used to pour into the sport. Then the Tony Hawks games took a turn for the worse and transformed into the hideous beasts of Tony Hawks Underground 1, 2 and Tony Hawks American Wasteland. These games offended me so much that I didnt even bother to buy them. Sure they sold well but that was due to the fact that no other half decent skateboarding games around at that time. Neversoft seemed to realise their vile mistakes and aborted the American Wasteland series in favour of the back-to-basics Project 8. I picked this one up and liked it quite a bit, it wasnt as good as the original games but it was definitely a step in the right direction. Then one warm day in spring I saw a post on the internet about EAs new skateboarding game...
I was intrigued it has to be said, Im not the biggest EA fan out there but their subsidiaries tend to put out interesting new IPs from time to time, so I thought I would read a bit more about it. I had just finished Project 8 so I thought this could tide me over till the next TH game. It seemed like a solid concept, an open world to skate about in and more realistic physics looked to be a great combination for a great realistic skateboarding game. The one thing that worried me actually was the new control scheme, they pegged it as revolutionary but I had serious doubts about it. When I read about it, it seemed nothing short of awkward and clunky compared to the precision of the THPS scheme. Then the game came out and I bought it, I fell in love. It was the closest that a game has ever came to re-creating the realism of skateboarding. The physics were incredible; the tricks were realistic but most importantly of all the control scheme I had worried about so much was simply amazing.
However this months Monthly Musings theme isnt Talk about how your favourite game is amazing it is If you love it, change it, so I will now point out the flaws that this most brilliant of games unfortunately has. First of all the game was extremely buggy, to the point of annoyance. I think this flaw existed because skate was the first game by EA Black Box on the next-gen consoles. They did a great job with the mechanics, design and art but ultimately it has been the only game to ever freeze my PS3. One of my friends had the 360 version and it froze his console too, so I think it was bugs in the engine and not specific to the difficult coding environment of the PS3. It wasnt just the game freezing, sometimes the textures themselves would pop up and the cars would sometimes appear out of nowhere. There were times were I got stuck in walls as well which really annoyed me.
The game is technically a sandbox game and has inherited the flaws of the genre, most prevalent of all the jumps in the difficulty curve that happens due to not having a linear path for the missions. Some of the missions would be ridicolously easy and at the same point in time you could have a stupidly hard mission to do. In fact there is still 1 or 2 of the video missions I havent completed because I got so frustrated at their difficulty and/or my incompetence. There were times where the instructions themselves were unclear and it was a case of trial and error to find out exactly what parameters needed to be met before you could complete the task. There was one particular mission where you had to nollie 360 flip over a stair set but it was worded so badly it took me 5 tries before i figured out what to aim for and suffice to say that was not my idea of fun.
Although a minor gripe, I felt that the games storyline itself was a bit on the short side. It could be run through in about 6-8 hours. Generally in sandbox games the storyline is at least 15 hours long and opens up the world as you complete various missions but skate had the entire city of San Vanelona open from the very beginning which took away the sense of linearity that sandbox games have and in some ways the feeling of accomplishment that accompanies this progression. The game could have used some more interesting challenges to buff up the story line, although this would probably end up with either a lot of repetitive challenges (see pro skate missions) or the horrible route of Jackass-esque challenges that the Tony Hawks games took.
The traffic was apparently super dangerous in this game as if you even brushed a car you would bail (fall over) and the car would be unscathed. I wouldnt have been annoyed by this if it only happened when you hit the cars at speed but it happened each and every time, mostly in the middle of a very high scoring combo. The cars also had no damage which would have been a nice touch to add to the realism of the world, but then again not every racing game has damage (see Gran Turismo and Mario Kart). Somehow hitting a car at speed on your board and leaving a person sized dent in the bumper would have made this game so much more satisfying but that is probably the sadistic murder-training game player in me getting out.
The final flaw I found with this game is the skate.reel function that the game used. EA made a huge deal of this pre- and post-launch but I could never seem to get it to work. The idea behind it was do an amazing trick in game, edit the replay, upload it to the skate.reel servers and view it online at any point in time. However in practise I have not once got this to work, I can upload it fine but as soon as I go to look for the video on their website it goes through the same three pages, asks me to register or login then back to the original page and it annoys me because I uploaded some impressive and just plain cool tricks. If the service had been a bit simpler then I would have enjoyed using it but it got me so frustrated that I just gave up on it.
As you can see although I love this game there are many things about it which I would have wanted changed before it was released. Hopefully EA Black Box has seen the problems that people had with this game and fix it before the inevitable annual update. If they do fix the problems then I think they will have created the best skateboarding game ever which will then cause a rip in the space time continuum as a game will have to actually get 11/10 and reviewers will be sucked off into the black abyss.
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Hot off the press this week was the news of a film adaption of the highly acclaimed Bioshock. This game was very well received by both critics and players the world over, and was lauded for its superb narrative and the way it was revealed to the player. It was set in the underwater utopia of Rapture, set up by the illustrious Andrew Ryan. The player enters the game after a plane crash in the middle of the ocean to find Rapture decimated and is left to fend for himself and find out what exactly happened to the place. The film is being handled by the Pirates of the Caribbean director Gore Verbinski and is being aided by the games creator, Ken Levine.
Now I havent personally played Bioshock, partly because the atmosphere of the game world freaked me the hell out, but I can tell from a mile away that this film is going to fail hard. I dont mean that it will be a bad film; I mean it will fail at being a good game film. To adapt a game of this calibre and style to celluloid will take massive compromises and obviously the removal of interactivity, arguably what makes a game a game. Generally when adaptations of other sources are done the film makers add something to the medium, i.e. books have visuals added to them and sound, radio has visuals etc. When film makers adapt games they take away the interactivity and are often left with a mediocre story thats only purpose is to push the player into new tasks. Bioshock from what I have heard has a pretty good story (eh give me moral choices and doesnt afraid of anything), but still compromises will have to be made for the mainstream audience to swallow before they put down cash to see what will probably be a big budget film.
Film makers have the choice of one of three routes (or four if you count Uwe Bolls film making as a route) when adapting a game to the big screen. The first of these routes is the literal translation of the games story; this can give the film a very real sense of being the game as it clings as close as is possible to the games world. It can however cause major headaches as the core audience of these films have already played the game and know what to expect as the story progresses. This can sometimes work for other mediums (such as the Lord of the Rings trilogy) but I think that is only because of the strength of their narratives and the lack of tangible visual information. If a literal adaptation is created then the broader appeal of the work is often diluted because they dont know what Bioshock is, or even worse they may be turned off by the fact that it is based on a game.
The second route is the oft-used we have the rights to the IP and we will do whatever the hell we want to do with it (see the Resident Evil films). They often bare only a passing resemblance to the original titles and have been severely re-written into something non-canon so that the dreaded mainstream audience will want to see it. These films tend to come out as action films although Silent Hill was borderline horror. These films can often turn off the core audience of the games because they bastardise the original story and place characters in unfamiliar territory which they know shouldnt be happening which makes the whole film hard to swallow. Amazingly these types of adaptations generally gross well in the box office and so spur production companies to create more mindless drivel to shovel to the masses.
The third and final route is something that I personally would like to see happen a lot more. This route I feel is the best compromise between games and films, one that works for both parties. An adaptation of a game IP that is handled in tandem with the film makers and the game makers but one that is totally separate from the actual storyline. This kind of adaption can have the trademark writing of the games creators in a whole new storyline that can appeal to both the core and mainstream audience with help from the film makers to point out what could be changed and what is feasible with current technology. A game-to-film of this kind would work well in a franchise that has a well established and well rounded universe of many threads. The best game I can think of to suit this brief has to be the Metal Gear Solid series. The game has so much back-story left untouched, scenarios that are awesome but never explored in any of the games, or better yet a new tale based in the same universe. Imagine how amazing a Metal Gear Solid film would be that is set in Outer Heaven. Unfortunately these kinds of films have yet to truly happen even though they could achieve such critical acclaim given the right team behind it.
Until such a time as a successful game-to-film adaptation happens I really will not have any solid faith in game films, the last once I watched was Doom and that really put me off the whole experience. Hopefully movie executives will see the light one day and realise that gamers dont want mindless crap but something more meaty, more meaningful than Resident Evil 23: Zombies Gone Wild Party Edition. We can but dream.
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Many gamers bring forth arguments about sequels; how they are a bad idea, how they are a good idea and how idiots go and buy the same game time and time again, yet they themselves go and buy the latest game in their favourite blockbuster franchise. What exactly is it that grates with the hardcore about the repetitive nature of sequels? Is there something written down in the holy gaming handbook about not being able to re-use ideas or have continuity of design in the games? I want to take a look at questions like these and examine the nature of sequel game design.
There are as many arguments about sequels as there are games, the arguments are usually based on the games themselves as opposed to a wholesale rule-set. It may be a defence mechanism against being a hypocrite or it may be just plain good sense to see that every game is different and that generalisations are not a good idea. Whatever the reasoning is, it is clear that there is strong resistance against games that are, at first glance, the same game with a different title. I can understand this view point because in this generation of games we routinely place down 50 or $60 for a new title and if we pay such a significant amount we expect it to blow our mind or at the very least try to. In this light it is easy to see one side of the argument, but the other side is well known too. This side belongs to the publishers and developers who need profits to keep going, they know that Super Awesome Vampire Pirates 4 made them a good solid profit on the last consoles so the first thing they do is start to make Super Awesome Vampire Pirates 5 for the new consoles. It just plain good business sense, if you have a large and willing audience that likes a certain game then a sequel will generally be more successful than an unknown title full of strange ideas.
This business strategy is widely adopted by the gaming industry as can be evidenced by the mind boggling amount of sequels, franchises and, to an extent, spin-offs that exist in the marketplace today. The business of sequels is so well documented that games are being designed from the ground up to be parts of trilogies or to have multiple sequels, for a modern example have a look at Assassins Creed which has been designed to be the first in a trilogy of games. Square Enix have become masters at this business and successively bleed each one of their masterpieces dry so that they can swim in pools full of Yen notes, or possibly create new games with increasingly large budgets.
The type of sequel that gets the most abuse at the hands of gamers is the yearly update of a sport game. This I can understand to a point because at face value it is the same game with a new roster and the current year beside its title. EA are notorious at this practise, to get the sales of the rabid football fans they release their Madden games each year with the current roster of players and what appears to be little else. In truth these near-identical games are created because lets face it, what else can you do in a football game apart from play football? Sure you can have different tournaments, leagues, playoffs, Super bowls etc but you are still essentially playing football. The developers wouldnt dare screw about with the actual football itself for fear of losing the fan base (although they do try it with their XTREME labels, released in most cases to critical and commercial failure). The developers are stuck between a rock and a hard place, or rather the publishers thirst for money and the fans thirst for up-to-date rosters in sports games.
The Halo franchise is a good solid trilogy (at the time of writing anyway) of games, the original was lauded as being one of the first truly great made-for-console FPSs and as an excellent game in its own right. It went on to spawn two sequels which continue the story of the last Spartan super soldier Master Chief. Now I like games that continue on their story, as that is the very reason I play games. I play not for challenging puzzles, not to train my brain, not to play only online (although I have played online heavily since days of Counterstrike 1.6) but to see a story, that I have personally unravelled, develop in front of my eyes. From an excellent base Bungie made what appeared to be the same game but with more story, however if you look closely you will see many improvements and tweaks (let us not forget the online multiplayer) that make it Halo 2. I see no problem in these kinds of game that tell a continuous story, if there are problems I like them to be sorted in the sequels but if the game has the same mechanics as the game before rarely do I complain. I understand that people dont like this kind of thing but really what do you want? A story arc that in the middle chapter sees Master Chief playing mini-games on a sunny beach with the Arbiter? If there is continuity of story and themes then I would like to play sequels that bare more than a passing resemblance to each other, and if the developers tweak their formula to perfection then who am I to complain?
JRPG series also take a heavy hit from people crying out that its just last game but with a different story or I hated this battle system in the last 5 games, and I still hate it now.
This affects me too as I love the Persona games but 3 and 4 are VERY similar and appear from the early screenshots of P4 to share many common features and assets. People however do complain about the fact that Final Fantasy games for the most part are the same game but with different art styles, stories and characters (although some remain staples of the series such as Biggs, Wedge and Cid). I find this argument, while valid, to be somewhat thin on the ground because each game is set in its on bespoke universe with its own lore, myth and art direction. The people over at Square Enix make each title as a separate game and it really shows. If they recycle a battle system because it works well then all the better because it can make a great game amazing.
Mario games such as Super Mario Bros have always baffled me. Not because I am so ridiculously stupid that I cant beat the game, but because they are all very similar yet sell through the roof. This has been brought up time and again but why is it that Mario sells, and has always sold, really well when we are basically replaying the same game each time but paying more for the privilege with each successive generation of hardware? The games may have different stories but these are never continuous and are general isolated from other games. The NES and SNES Mario games all had similar looks (I am talking about the main series games and not the spin offs) and similar goals to achieve, but no one ever complained about this series being overly-familiar. Nowadays the home console Mario games are becoming more inventive and different but the portable ones never seem to change. Mario kart and Super Smash Bros seem to have the same problem, since their inception very little has changed apart from the switch to 3D for Mario Kart 64 and online for both of the titles latest incarnations. At times they are hard to tell apart from an infrequent players perspective and even reviewers are noting this in their reviews, especially Mario Kart Wii. Is it possible the real reason we dont complain about the similarity of the Mario, and come to think of it most Nintendo titles are because we loved the original adventures of a (possibly latent homosexual) plumber? Does that little guy hold enough gravitas for us to blindly and unerringly hand over cash for his latest title? What separates the mind numbing same-ness of Nintendos titles to that of any over developer?
There are many kinds of sequels and many different viewpoints, no one will ever agree on all things. The best I can do is give you my take on these things. I feel that sports games (because everyone wants to play as their favourite teams current star player) and titles in a series of games that tell a continuous story should be allowed to have repetitive design (so there is continuity between the games). All other games should at the very least try to innovate and avoid repeating themselves as much as possible because otherwise to me, it becomes difficult to tell the titles apart. I realise this article will probably anger more people than it pleases, but these are just my opinions. They may be right or wrong in your opinion but that is something which you are entitled to as well. If I have, however, made arguments without logic then feel free to tell me, constructive criticism is always welcome.
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To many seasoned pros of gaming and its culture the jerk-wad gamer is a common and inescapable foe, one which makes every level headed and rational gamer quiver with fear. We often get lumped together in one big sweaty pile with every other gamer/stereotype by the media these days and these kinds of gamers give us a proverbial black eye from their irrational behaviour. You know the kind I am talking about the annoying people on Xbox Live that say nothing but racist slurs, the hyper active 12 year olds (you must note that only 12 year olds and proper adults play online) that force you to mute them before they make your ears bleed and last but not least, the ranting angry gamer.
Of all these stereotypes and generalisations (both terms I hate but they are necessary evils in this world) the angry gamer causes me more chagrin than any other. This particular type of gamer, although prolific before the internet forums and/or message boards, is more prevalent in the web 2.0 world than ever before. Having more of a say should really be a positive thing but as we all know it can severely backfire into our collective faces. There will be one gamer saying things like “ARRGHHH EVLENTY!!!111 Jack Thompson is wrong and I’m going to cut his balls off then eat them with soup OM NOM NOM NOM!!!1113453”on any given message board, or at least something to this effect. Now I’m not saying that I expect perfection from the gaming community, far from it, but some people could do well to find some tact before they next log on to their computer.
In recent years the gaming culture has been under fire from many different lawyers, so-called experts and what can only be described as crazy people (or a mix of several in some cases) about the increased violence and inclusion of adult themes in a still fledgling entertainment sector. One thing you must remember is that the previous generation still think of videogames as Nintendo and Mario, bright happy colours and child friendly images. Parents look to the media for advice, albeit a flawed way of parenting it still has its advantages, and see “Super violent game with sex in it goes on sale soon” and get horrified by the thought of their little Jack soliciting sex from a bunch of pixels, then killing the pixels afterword’s to get his money back (Jack was ever so prudent). I am not saying they are right I am trying to say that some parents lack the interest or education to actually find out for themselves that games have matured since the day-glo days of the mid-eighties.
This is the point that the angry gamer stereotype comes into play, for he is the bearer of all things true and pure, except that stash of porn he likes to call Betty, riding his high horse and dousing the uncouth peasants with hot frothy knowledge juice. Except they don’t, what they do is just start shouting at people illogically and, in the majority of cases incoherently, much like a frustrated local would do to try and get a foreigner to understand how much of a douche the local actually was. The one thing that this ‘type of gamer acheieves is cementing the tarnished view of gamers as raging sociopaths with little to no interpersonal skills and a penchant for that 12 year old girl next door(who he suspects played against him on Xbox Live the other day).
If you are going to try and combat the mainstream ignorance of any kind of speciality then please do it in a calm, cool and logical way. Never fly off the handle at people because they haven’t grown up on the same games that you have, don’t claim they have relations with your dog because they can’t see at first why games and movies are seen as completely different beasts and in the public eye can share no commonalities of themes. Think things through before you commit them to the annals of internet archives, if they even sound remotely irrational re-word it so it is not so offensive or condescending. If we all try to do this from time to time, maybe one day our image will improve.
This brings me to my final point in this already-too-long cblog: the upcoming episode of Podcastle. If you do listen to this amazing Destructoid podcast you will have heard last week’s episode and suffice to say it was pretty damn amazing, hard to top in fact. To top the last feat of podcasting they have managed to get Jack Thompson (of legendary game violence hating fame) to semi-agree to come on the show. Now I not for one second think he will turn up, and if he does he will basically ignore anything the crew say. This fills me with more dread than anything else as we all know how angry Jim can get. We all take it in good jest because we know he is kidding about but to outsiders this would be less apparent and the last thing we need is Jack Thompson running around brandishing clinching proof that we gamers are not fit to play games because the crew couldn’t control themselves. Please for the future of all gamers, do try and be considerate and as inoffensive as is possible.
P.S: In before the flames. Before anyone one says “your preaching to the choir” think about how many members of the Destructoid community can be classed as Angry Gamers.
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In this blog I want to explore the importance of single and multiplayer in both modern and retro games. There is a strong dichotomy between the experiences of single and multiplayer parts of any game once which seems at first glance to be heavily unbalanced, to take an extreme example Unreal Tournament has at best a mediocre single player experience but this happens because the developers spent the majority of its gestation period working on the amazing multiplayer.
Throughout the years of gaming I have experienced there have been many times when my friends have came over to my house and we went in search of good multiplayer games. These games tended to either have non-existent or hollow single player experiences, at least that is what we thought. Many people resorted to playing single player games using the hot swapping technique of playing for ten minutes or so then passing on the controller to the next person. This was enjoyable but at the same time it lacked the fun that proper multi-player experiences had in heaps.
This leads me to the question are single and multiplayer experiences mutually exclusive or are they dichotomous? Can great single player games still have great multi-player components or are we always going to have games such as Bioshock for great single player fun and Counter Strike for our multiplayer jollies? Lets have a look at the games that have great examples of both kinds of gaming experiences.
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare PC, PS3, 360 and DS
Ok maybe a slightly controversial title to start this off with but bear with me. For those that have endeavoured to drag themselves from the extremely well rounded multiplayer component of this game of the year title will no doubt have found their way to the great campaign. Normally FPS games have their campaigns added on almost as an afterthought but Infinity Ward seem to have nailed the intensity of modern warfare and it moves along at a blistering pace. From war torn Middle Eastern countries to...war torn eastern European countries the single player experience is never boring or repetitive. Even if you never touch the online modes or the split screen you will still feel satisfied by your purchase because of an excellent single player experience (with arguably the best ending of any FPS of last year). It does have some minor flaws such as its as short as a very short thing but it has replay value in spades.
Starcraft - PC
This game is pretty well known in pro-gaming circles as a well balanced, excellent multiplayer RTS and is the national sport of Korea*. Many people would be happy to while away their days planning epic zergling rushes against people from across the globe, but beyond this lays another face of the Starcraft package. The single player campaign. The campaign has a very interesting and almost deep storyline full of twists and turns which makes full use of all three races. I wont spoil the story for those who havent played it but it is safe to say it has one of the best storylines of any RTS ever made, with the exception of the warhammer ones (but they cheat due to the back stories were made years before the games were).
Super Mario Bros. - NES
There is not much I can say about this title that has not been said before. It is one of Shigeru Miyamotos first masterpieces and the birth in earnest of the 2D smooth side scrolling platform era. If you havent played this game then you probably have been living under a rock that is in the middle of Galactic space. Everyone knows the story by now unless you are the previously mentioned intergalactic hermit, Princess Peach gets kidnapped by Bowser, King of the Koopas and you have to go save the cock-teasing bitch from said Freddy Mercury-esque monster (see leather arm bands). The game itself is a master class in 2D platforming and is hugely enjoyable but if your friends come over and want to kick back, drink some brewskis and play some games you can bring in Marios ever present brother (wa)Luigi and save* the princess together. As the multiplayer is the same game as the single player you may bring issue with this particular title but I feel its inclusion is fair because there can be multiple players in the game and still be as great as it is on your own
Marathon Mac OS, Apple Pippin and PC
This game was one of Bungies earlier projects (yes they existed before the Halo trilogy, or Oni but we dont like to mention that game to many people as it has been proven to strike them down with mediocre fever) and stands as a testament to the quality of gaming that can be had on Apples nicely designed hardware and software. If you havent had a chance to play this wonderful game because you didnt have access to a Mac back in 94 then I suggest you go download the freeware versions of all three games right freaking now. This game had an epic and grandiose sci-fi story about a human ship that was converted from Demios, one of Mars two moons that is being attacked by aliens. It pits you as a superhuman cyborg and most of the story is revealed through crew logs accessed at the computer terminals. These terminals also give the player mission information from the ships main AI Leela and the two lesser AIs Durandal and Tycho (the relationship between the two adds another dimension to the story and rings a bell when you think of Cortana from the Halo games). This game had superb single player story mode which instead of having you run to the exit as quick as possible actually had you complete objectives (much like their Halo games, is anyone else beginning to see a pattern here). Apart from the great single player the multiplayer was amazing as well with a well balanced death match mode which could hold up to 8 people at a time. This was later modded to have co-operative play by the massive audience that it garnered on the Mac.
From these examples we can deduce that as time has went on the truly great single and multiplayer games are becoming somewhat of a rare beast but that is because budgets keep getting bigger and bigger and plunging money into a campaign for an primarily online game just doesnt make sense anymore. This begs the question; does this fledgling industry stifle creativity solely on the basis of profits? Many games that are seen as innovative rarely enjoy financial success these days; take Okami for example it's developer had to close down because it failed to light up registers around the globe. The visionaries of this industry will continue to follow their dreams I feel but will they feel the ever-present breath on the back of their necks from the corporations hungry for profit? Another interesting question this raises is what makes the smash hit innovative games perform well at retail? Is it all down to hype? Marketing? Word of mouth? Sometimes I wonder if companies decide how well a game is going to do when it is still in development and sink in the amount of marketing dollars they think will be appropriate then, instead of throwing money into a worthless project?
There have been many great games with both stellar single and multiplayer experiences. However not all games have this, some games are just not suited to multiplayer/single player experiences and they rightfully remain isolated from other players and/or deep campaigns but the ones that try and up hold this dichotomy are truly great and show us that games can excel in both arenas.
* may be innaccurate
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For the uninitiated I started this blog some months ago about the games that I have been playing recently on my shiny PS3. I wrote about 6 of these blogs and then purchased a 360. Since I split my gaming time between the two, and frankly no one read my blog before I thought I would re-invent it as Confessions Of A PS3 And 360 Owner! Here is the first edition!
This week I have mostly been plotting the slow and tortuous death of all at Konami for the evil, vile monster of a mess they have made with the Konami IDs and the MGO beta. I awoke on Thursday morning turned on my PS3 and saw that the MGO beta was up for download on the newly-sexed-up PSN store. So like a good little MGS fan I downloaded it as fast as I could and then installed it. At this point I went and done some work for the horror that is university then came back to it about 2 hours later. I then went to run it and it tells me I need to update it, fair enough I thought it will need some tweaks before it goes live
and select the recommend option (Peer 2 Peer torrent style). I then realise what a nightmare this was becoming as it failed to start and told me to restart, first day server load I said to myself and restarted the game but after 10 attempts I give up and left it.
I went back to it the next day and eventually after trying several more times to get the download to work actually download the update although as my internet hates torrents takes an excruciating 4 hours to complete. It then happily informs me I have to get a Komani ID which rings a dull warning bell in my head as I remember reading on Destructoid about problems with it. Surely enough this disaster unfolds before my eyes and as of writing this blog still havent managed to obtain one of these elusive creatures.
Apart from slowly torturing myself with that endeavour I have been putting some serious hours into the lovely Gran Turismo 5 Prolouge on my PS3. I have written a review of this a few weeks back so I will sum up my impressions of it briefly. The online racing I really like, it has been nothing but a pleasant experience with little to no lag and friendly racers. The main game itself is as solid as ever and the only major problem I have with it is the lack of damage but at this point damage would be non-canon almost and would kind of wreck my experience of it (no pun intended, IRC has put me off them for life ).
As well as that I stupidly bought myself Call of Duty 4 for the 360, now if youve ever read the previous incarnation of this blog before then you will know pretty much everyone featured CoD4 at some point. I am up to the second last mission on the 360 now, and although I finished it on the PS3 beforehand its still enjoyable especially the sniping mission. Ive actually managed to level up more than I have on the PS3 version (just about to hit lvl31) and I find that the online is very similar to the PS3 version except with possibly more annoying idiots that sing into the headset. Thank god for the mute button! There is no perceivable difference between the two versions just like Infinity Ward said and I applaud them for this feat! I purchased the Variety Map Pack and found it to be very enjoyable for all the maps expect Creek which, far from being redundant and unplayable, just lacks the tightness that most of the other maps have. The map pack is a great addition to the main game and well worth the 800 points.
I have started and have managed to get to level two on Ikaruga but I have yet to get past it as it seems to like to force me into submission. It is an incredible game with very tight controls, personally I love it. The intensity of the levels and the strategy that the polarity switching mechanic brings to the game really set it apart from run of the mill shmups. If you have completed this game you truly are a better person than I. I would readily recommend this title to all who enjoy shooters and/or masochism, well worth those 800 measly points
Finally I have started the very wonderful game that is Lost Odyssey, developed partly by the lovely folks over at Mistwalker. Some of you may know that this is headed by ex-Final Fantasy producer Hironobu Sakaguchi and as such feels like a half brother to the oft-great series. If you have played Final Fantasy X you will be right at home although the battle system is quite different and the interface reminds me of Final Fantasy VIII. So far in my 4ish hours with the game I really have enjoyed my time with it and really like the characters. I dont particularly like the Picture In Picture effect they have used heavily in the cutscenes but that is just a personal thing. This grievance is more than made up by the wonderful Thousand Years of Dreams feature as each story is heartbreakingly tragic and supremely well written. This game is a must buy for any RPG fan that has a 360, truly this is its first great JRPG. (PROTIP: if you hate grinding stay the hell away from this game!)
Anyways folks its late over here in the land of fry ups and heart disease (Scotland) and I will bid you all adieu. Thanks for reading or commenting TL;DR it is much appreciated and hope you enjoyed this re-tooled format! Godspeed!
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Well today my monthly issue of OPM UK came through the letterbox, less than five minutes ago in fact. This month it was a bit late and now I know why, it has the first PS3 review of GTAIV as far as I'm aware. It's not the first review of the game that honour goes to OXM (I think the US verison).
For OPM it's a fairly long main review about 9 pages that is excellently written as per usual. It goes in depth into the integration of the phone into the game, the new shooting mechanics and even the mulitplayer. The review showers the new game with praise and even says "It's the best GTA game ever, for my money". As you could have guessed by now it got a 10/10.
It isn't all praise, once again the camera can be a bit dodgy and the helicopters are a pain to fly as always but it seems to have not affected their view of the game much as the positives outweigh these tiny faults. Damn I can't wait for my special edition to come through the letterbox on the 29th :)!
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Now lets get one thing out the way before I start this review. I am both a racing game addict and a huge Gran Turismo fan. Evidence to this effect can be found in my trusty dual shock 2 which has both broken X , Square and analogue sticks which randomly stop responding now and again. This obviously will add some bias to this review but I will try to get over that. Hopefully. Possibly. DAMMIT IM ONLY HUMAN!!
This game is not Gran Turismo 5 but as the close minded people would say its only an extended demo. In many ways this is true, however in others it is not. It does feature the Eiger Nordwand track from the GTHD Concept demo. The main difference that instead of only about 10 cars this has in excess of 60 dream cars (why the Citroen C3 would be a dream car is beyond me). It also deviates from GTHD in that it has actual racing in it instead of time trials and drifting competitions. A welcome change I hear the racing game nerds say. It does however retain the leader boards but only for your online races. Yes, online racing in Gran Turismo. You heard right. Oh dear lord its sweet. Any way enough about that and on to the review for real.
I rarely get this excited for games that I actually set my alarm on my holidays no less at 9am (the shops in Edinburgh dont open till 10am, they are so inconsiderate). I went to bed extra early on Thursday night...well Friday morning, 2am. I woke up in an excited but tired mood to realise it was 12pm. Dammit. I decided what they hey and went on to my laptop.
Then I got up and went downstairs to stick on the heating and water (as it was freezing in my house) then back upstairs to my laptop and surfed Destructoid for a bit whilst my bath was running. Once all that was over with I headed up to Edinburgh. I got to the bus stop to find a bus had just left Dont worry about I said to myself the buses are every 5 mins. So I didnt worry about it and continued to listen to some Chiodos (first album naturally) and the bus did turn up. I got into Edinburgh some 20 minutes later and wandered over to the nearest centre of evil (short hand for Game the UKs equivalent of GameStop). Picked up one of the many, many display copies and went to stand in the cue. I got to the register where the sales assistant asked me if I wanted to purchase a controller with the game because it was half price if I did I already have 4. Then he tried to sell me a steering wheel I dont have room/that much money. Then he resorted to the age old pre-order angle Want to reserve GTA4? I already have a pre-order (somewhere in the region of a year old on Amazon) Is it with GAME? No Pity you could have got free stuff here he says under his breath. Well I could but what are the chances of me getting it on launch day if I preorder now? Well you probably wouldnt Exactly, now can I pay for this copy of GT5: Prologue?
Long story short, I get home and opened it up. I stop for a moment and smell the sweet smell of victory that the Americans wont have this for another 2 weeks. Its a strong smell. I turn on my PS3 only to realise I still hadnt downloaded the new firmware update. This takes up about 15 mins then I turn on GT5:P. It tells me I need to install the games data to continue. Fair enough if it helps load times. That takes another 10 or 15 mins and then tells me to restart the game. O...K. So I boot it up and then it tells me I need to download an update (this is getting annoying). So I download that only to get an error message 10 minutes later telling me Oh sorry the download didnt work whoops! Now I was angry. I restart the game to get it to download and it eventually does, I assume this is down to server load being the first day. Then the download installs with a handy caution All prize credits will be transferred over but there is a possibility that Save Data and Replays will be lost. Oh fun! So that installs and I FINALLY restart the game to be greeted by the intro movie. Oh dear lord its sweet. Better than ANY GT intro I have ever witnessed.
Then I get to the main screen My Page as the manual calls it, which is nicely laid out if a little cluttered. At the top of the page there is a label with Gran Turismo 5: Prologue Spec II which indicates this is version 2.0 of the software (I hear that the Japanese original is constantly updated with new features). Below that is a map of the world with red dots which I can only assume means players or lots of players as they are generally focused on Europe and Japan. Beside that a clock with the time and then a weather report for all the various tracks. Below that there is a calendar and below that is a line of symbols that correspond to the various actions that can be taken.
I get a warning telling me I have no car and should head to the dealership symbol to purchase one, which I do. I get a Ford Focus ST in black. Then I head to events and try out the game. It has definitely been refined even from the GTHD demo. The physics are completely different much more stiff and the cars feel different to drive. Once again I turn off all the driving aids because Im hardcore and go to race some races. Two things become immediately apparent: no damage but that is to be expected from the game now and the cars still follow a predetermined path. However they do try to pass each other which I think is brand new but I may be wrong there.
After that I tried my hand at online mode which is as it says online racing. I am actually quite surprised at how smooth it can run, dont get me wrong if you have a bad connection in your race you will be able to tell, but when it is good it is excellent. My hat goes off to Yamauchi for waiting so long to perfect it. The only problem is the lack of voice chat, the online mode in its current state does not support it but I suppose it stops the douche bags coming out with stupid insults when they lose. The drivers I encountered were a mixed bunch, some were good, some went out of their way to cause havoc on the field. This is just something that you will never get away from in online matches I suppose. It took very little time to get into a race online, far less than any other racing game, or any online enabled game for that matter than I have encountered. I did run into server maintenance error once but it may again be due to first day load.
The thing that annoyed me the most however was the lack of tuning. I was actually shocked that there is no way to upgrade your car. Sure you can play about with gear ratios and tires but you cant buy new power trains or such which considering how engrained it is in the Gran Turismo experience I really cant understand how this was overlooked and deemed not important for the release of this Prologue. Another thing I have noticed is some minor slow down from time to time in races which although not immediately apparent does grate after a while of noticing it.
Overall I think this is a solid purchase for the price, 25 in the UK, but it does come with some caveats. It is not Gran Turismo 5 toned down or without the full roster of cars. It is nerfed in many ways (most prominently the tuning) but it is still highly enjoyable nonetheless. Im not going to attach a number to this review to make you all feel better or even a buy/rent/leave scale; Im just going to say its up to you if you want this game. If you are a GT fan then it will probably already be a must buy but if you like racing games in general it is a good purchase. It will keep you occupied till GT5 appears sometime next year.
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This is something very obviously not game related but it is hugely important to the Destructoid community. This community has so much talent it literally needs some form of talent liposuction just to stay alive at times. There are many forms of which this takes and I want to take a look into them all individually. Originally I planned to start this off on a totally different subject but a recent post made me change my mind. So here is part one of The Destructoid Community Creators
In this edition of this cblog I will be taking a look at the hot of the press release I KILL PXLS Press Start. This masterpiece of electro/dance was crafted by none other than our awesome sauce creative mind GuitarAtomik. Many of you may pass on this because it might not be your style of music but I assure you it is well worth a listen. Obviously being one of our fellow robots it is game-related as every song is named after a game or a feature of a game: My Final Fantasy, Continue? and Destructiods theme Its Time For Destructoid. I downloaded this today and listened to it several times, it really is that good.
I like all sorts of music, currently my taste resides in the heavier aisles of the music supermarket; hardcore, metalcore, thrash and mathcore to name a few, yet this album still appeals to me. The whole thing is based on a solid and interesting rhythm section with amazing beats and bass notes. Then on top of that is a veritable orgasm of synths, samples and melodies. The icing on this musical cake has to be the vocals, now Im not entirely sure but I think they are GuitarAtomiks but however sings has got a great voice for this music. These songs are great for both dancing to and kicking back relaxing to.
My favourite track has to be My Final Fantasy which is filled with awesome singing, great beats and amazing chord progressions. I suggest you go download this album from his website here and give it a shot, you wont regret it. If you do I will come round and smash your brain out with a slice of lemon, wrapped round a large gold brick!
This album is but a drop in the ocean of what GuitarAtomik creative mind has unleashed upon this community. He is also a creator of many awesomely cool t-shirts of his band and various designs. Apart from that he contributes some great shops to the communities various projects (most recently the Destructoid comic ). This guy is seriously talent and I think we should show our appreciation for his work just a little more often, or better yet make a donation to his bands website to encourage him to put out more awesome songs!
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