Games of the week for 05/10/09: Ray Peacock edition

10:00 PM on 05.10.2009   |   Jim Sterling

32 comments

I am very late to the game, but I recently discovered the Ray Peacock Podcast thanks to community member Half Left. It kept me entertained on a boring flight to LA and I have to say that it's the funniest bloody thing I've heard in a long time. The show is basically Ray Peacock and Ed Gamble, a pair of comedians, bullying and mocking ex-Eastenders star Raji James with a complete lack of compassion. It is brilliant.

I recommend you check it out here. Also, hit the jump for a video of the show in action. Speaking of hitting the jump, you can also view our games of the week. Do let us know what you have been playing as well, because we are proper interested, thanks!

Topher: Siren: Blood Curse is a pathetic excuse for a horror game, and serves only to uphold the archaic idea that a shit camera and janky controls equals "scary." On the rare occasions when my character isn't stading directly in the way of what I'm trying to look at, the screen is otherwise obscured by either a block of obnoxious white text telling me exactly what to do in order to solve the game's puzzles, or some class of prompt to shake the fucking controller when a button press would do just fine.

It also isn't very conducive to "survival horror" when I have no desire to see any of the playable characters survive. They're douchenozzles. I wouldn't actually mind if they were torn to ribbons by zombies. If you can't get through a bamboo fence when you've got a sledgehammer in your hands, why should I help you? You deserve to get your face eaten, and I'll just escort the adorable cursed Japanese girl to the next town without you. Douche. The game's not scary, it's just irritating. Is it so much to ask that a horror game be scary instead of just broken?

I have also been playing Ape Quest for PSP, which is absolutely delightful and completely makes up for the other crappy thing I just talked about.

Bennett: I hate Siren too, Topher. Anyway, this week for me has been mostly Plants vs. Zombies -- I'm still completely addicted a full week after finishing the game and my review. Got a little bit of Resident Evil 5 in too -- we're almost finished!

Chester: My 360 shit the bed earlier this week while I was trying my hardest to play Mass Effect. So I have not -- as many people would expect -- been playing Rock Band 2 all week. But here's what I did play: Guitar Hero Smash Hits; Lumines on both the PSP and PSN; the inFamous demo that I liked way more than the early press demos; Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars; and Plants vs. Zombies.

I also started to play Beyond Good & Evil, a game I've played the first 15% of twice... but never made it any further. I forgot how amazing that first 15% was, and intend on seeing it to the end this time. And yes, this has everything to do with that supposedly leaked Beyond Good & Evil 2 footage. God damn that looks hot.

Razak: 15 percent! For shame! It's especially upsetting because at 16 percent is the part that gets you so hooked that you can't stop playing. You were only one percent away!

I've been tearing through Wolverine for most of the weekend. It's a blast, though slightly repetitive so far. I'm hoping for a few more interesting large monsters to battle, but we'll see. The lunge attack is made of epic win though, despite it sometimes making the game a bit to easy. I'm not sure there is much that is more fun then lunging at a guy, plunging my claws into him, standing up and jumping to the other side of the level to kill another guy. Brilliant.

Also still playing Bond on DS. You know what, Wolverine isn't repetitive at all. I'm pretty sure Bond is going to be the same thing for the next however many levels it is. I must trudge on though.

Aziz: So how does Wolverine get killed in the game?

Razak: Well I believe the logic is, and I think it works like this in the ocmics too. If he gets torn up enough, there isn't anything to regenerate. So you've got your outer layer which is like yoru shield and once that is ogne your internal organs start getting deadified. Once those are gone, your dead, but everything regenerates eventually, which is pretty fucking cool to watch.

Sarkar: Well, that was a clusterfuck of typos.

Grim: Finally beat Plants vs. Zombies, and now I'm trying to win the last few mini-games while harvesting my zen garden for mad diamond loot. As for Silent Hill: Homecoming, I'm starting to like it less and less the more I play for some reason, but I am not one to give up on a game easily. Finally there's Patapon 2, which was an absolute blast until I got the the boss with a hammer that can kill half of my army in one hit. Utter bullshit, I'd say. Looks like I have a few more hours of grinding ahead of me. Hooray.

Holmes: Recently, Wolverine got all his flesh melted off in a fire. Only his metal skeleton remained. From there, he went to the afterlife and talked with sexy chicks, while his brain and major organs slowly regenerated from scratch. With in a day or so, he completely regrew himself.

It was all kinds of ridiculous.

As for videogames, played through the Klonoa remake for review. I'd never played a Klonoa game before, but now I want to play them all. The series definitely has something special going for it, despite looking fairly generic from afar. I'm also playing the Donkey Kong Jungle Beat remake for review. The game has a ton of new stuff, including Donkey Kong Country-style rocket barrels, new enemies, new obstacles, a whole new life meter system,  a new crest earning system, and the occasional smattering of new graphics.

If the main thing you liked about the original was the bongo-gameplay, then you probably wont be a fan of this game, as it's sole reason for existence is to give you the chance to play the game with less motion controls (the first for a Wii port). Everyone else who likes 2D platformers should buy it post-haste. I liked the original a lot, but I think this remake is just a hair more enjoyable.

Crap, I just sort of reviewed the game right there, didn't I? Ah well, expect a longer, more unnecessarily wordy review in a few days.

Sterling: Haha Tron, that's why I won't get into comic books. They jumped the shark long ago. So many retcons and so much bullshit. This is the price you pay in any long-running serial. I wish American TV shows would realize this is why British sitcoms only last a few short seasons.

As far as gaming, it's been more Velvet Assassin, which is still fucking horrendous, although it's gotten a little less horrendous after the third chapter. I've also been playing the usual rounds of Killzone 2, although matches lately have been really laggy. While on a trip to LA I had tried to get back into Dragon Quest IV, as I'm only at the second chapter and had no clue where to go. Apparently I still have no clue where to go because I spent ages running around doing nothing. Anybody know what to do where you're at the bit with the tower with the locked door, and the guy who won't let you go to Endor through the portal because the stupid pussy King said you couldn't go there?

Also, UFC 2009 Ultimate for preview. I'm embargoed until tomorrow so I can't really talk about that, but I did get to see some dude called Rampage from the UFC and he came into the room to play a bit of the game and say sexist things. Fun times!

Concelmo: I played through Killzone 2 and ... meh. Not to shrug it off that easily (I mean no disrespect, Sony), but something about the game felt so generic to me. Sure, it was beautiful to look at (ZOMG REFINERY LEVEL!), but everything about the game screamed "cookie cutter." I didn't even get to fight a gigantic, super unrealistic boss like in Resistence 2!

After that, I dived into Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon for the Nintendo DS as all was better in the world. I have said it before and I will say it again: the Fire Emblem series is one of the greatest videogame series EVER!

Sterling: Chad, try the multiplayer on KZ2, that's where it really shines.

Razak: So the trick is to type so poorly there is no possibly way Samit could correct it all. This I can do.

Samit corrects my entire clusterfuck of typos in 3...2...

Sarkar: Now that I have a semi-competent gaming laptop (i.e., one that doesn't shrivel up at the mere mention of a Flash game), I spent some time this past week with demos downloaded from Steam. The Braid demo was fantastic, as was the World of Goo demo; I'll probably buy both games as soon as I get my next paycheck. Demos that I've downloaded but haven't yet tried include Psychonauts, The Maw, and Plants vs. Zombies.

I also played a few PSN demos. X-Men Origins: Wolverine was brainless fun; I can see why Jim liked it so much. Who knows -- maybe I'll pick it up if I see it in a bargain bin somewhere down the line. The Marvel Vs. Capcom 2 demo is stupid because it only allows you to play local multiplayer; my brother's not home from college yet, so sending Hadoukens at a stationary second player got old really quickly. Even so, I doubt I'll be buying the full game for $15 -- I'm holding out for an "HD Remix" version.

Finally, I got a code for the inFamous demo, which I enjoyed so much that I played through it twice -- in a row. It's much better than the pre-alpha build I played during New York Comic Con; Sucker Punch absolutely nailed the free running/climbing aspects of the game, and the combat is intuitive but challenging enough to keep you on your toes, always thinking about how to best take down your enemy. I'm really looking forward to the game's May 26th release now.