What a rollercoaster of a year! It all started slowly, with a trickle of titles, which continued on to the drout of summer. But with the cold months came steller title after steller title. I’ve narrowed it down to a top 5 Read the rest of this entry »
At this years VGA (Video Game Awards) Batman Arkham Asylum 2 was teased/confirmed with a video, currently exclusive on game trailers.com
What we can tell so far from the video, is that Arkham seem’s to have moved (backed up by arkhamhasmoved.com). It looks like Gothem city has fallen into chaos, and potentially, gothem it’self has been quaranteened and desginated as the Aslyum itself. In the video and website you can also see lots of ‘Uncle Sam’ style we need you posters, but these look a little differernt. The face is always obscured, half the suit/hat seems damaged and darker, which can only point towards Two Face being in the sequal. Also expect to see Killer Croc, Bane, Scarecrow, and of course The Joker, who features prominently at the end of the teaser video. Even though the effects of the Venom toxin seemed to have taken their toll on him, he’s still as menacing and twisted as ever.
No release date or any other information is confirmed, but i would be surprised to see this available in 2010. A late Q4 launch could be a possibility, or Q1 2011.
Following my impressions post, i played for quite a few more hours and finished the game. My thoughts haven’t changed much since then, so I still believe it to be one of the year’s better games, but I don’t think it’s a game for everyone…
There’s definitely a lot to like about this game, but there’s also a lot to put people off. It’s very much so a game for people who love the experience/leveling of an RPG, and the run and gun game-play of first person shooters. Everything pretty much stays the same in-terms of gameplay so, if you’re not keen on those things, this definitely isn’t for you. However, if you do, then read on for the full review…
Read the rest of this entry »
This is going to be a quick review, as you’ve no doubt already read multiple gushing reviews of Batman Arkham Aslyum, months ago. But until i finish Borderlands, i wanted to test out the new review summary format.
Surprisingly, this game has become one of my all time favorites. Surprising because it’s reborn batman in a brilliant way which combines the over-the-top stories and characters of the comics, with the dark and gritty reality of the 2 recent films. It’s setting, environment, visual style and story created an engrossing game, which is just as good as the master piece Bioshock. The gameplay is balanced between close hand-to-hand combat, detective like scenarios using various gadgets, exploring areas for secrets and stealth sections (which actually work). I thought the length for the game was good, but it definitely wasn’t a big game. The only downside? That i have to wait a few years for a possible sequel…
I decided to get Borderlands when i traded in the uber disappointment that was Brutal Legend. Not sure what to expect i entered the world of Pandora with an open mind. The only expectations i had, were that it would be an open world, FPS with RPG elements. After only a few hours of play i was pleasantly surprised.
Firstly, it feels a lot like an MMO in the way you progress and play the game. You collect quests from bounty boards and characters, which simply list the quests in a menu, most being explained in text. It’s this sort of loose story telling which makes everything you do less about a desire to see what happens, and more about gaining XP. Thankfully, it’s all pretty fun. You travel to an target area on foot or in a buggy, find/kill A, and take it back to B, killing C, D, E ,F etc in between. It’s pretty mindless fun which doesn’t take much to get used to or become efficient at.
The presentation of Borderlands is top notch. They changed the visual style towards the end of the development cycle, from realistic to a cartoony, painted style, which works brilliantly with the humour of the game. The sounds do get a bit repetitive, with the vehicle sound being particularly awful, which just sounds like a landmower.
My main criticism after nearly 20 hours of play, is that there isn’t enough variation. Mainly in the enemy types. There are 5 main type of enemies in the game, with each having a handful of varitions. This just isn’t enough for a game of this size. And secondly the missions tend to send you to the same areas over and over, which does get a bit tiresome towards the last few missions of an area.
Overall though, it’s a surprisingly good game which is great to play through with friends. Expect a full review soon.
Ok Digital distribution – will we really see the end of the digital disk any time soon?
For me the answer is a massive no. I’m not rejecting the idea that digital downloads will never become a big factor in game distribution, but the physical medium is not going to go away.
A major recent console launch has highlighted this fact. The PSP Go looked all set to fly off shelves and into people pockets. It is in many respects the iPod of the handheld gaming market. However, the iPod’s success cannot be said to be soley due to the digital distribution of music. Its success was in taking a persons physical CD collection and fitting it all into a device that fits in the palm of your hand. In this respect the PSP Go completely fails. There is no way to get digital copies of the games you may already own onto the device. Sony’s own plans to do this have failed miserably and consumers aren’t ready to put their faith in a device that only supports digital downloads. The fact that the PSP go has already had a price cut by £50 at many retailers highlights this. Read the rest of this entry »
Don’t let the name fool you, this isn’t the first Alien Versus Predator game to exist. In-fact it’s number 3, but the licensing people seem to have decided to do the same thing films are doing recently, and totally ignore number naming conventions. But i digress.
There’s some new alien game-play footage for the fore-mentioned game available to view on Gametrailers and it’s awesome-tastic. For those of you who didn’t play AVP2 (yes, because the new one is 3), it was a brilliant FPS on the PC with 3 great single-player campaigns allowing you to play as the Aliens, Predator or Colonial Marines. Each was fantastic for it’s own reasons. As the marines it was an almost horror experience, with the motion sensor of your gun sending you spinning every time you heard a ‘blip’. Where as for the Aliens and Predator it was an almost stealthy experience, of biding your time and then pouncing when the time was right, whether with a wealth of gadgets, or pure brutal strength and viciousness. This latest videos shows some great game-play from the Alien campaign, including the infamous Alien ‘little mouth head chop’. By the looks of this latest video, the developers Rebelion have the visuals and feel nailed, so I’m well and truly excited for this game, and so should you.
It’s due out late February 2010 on PS3 + Xbox 360
I guess I was right in some respects. These are the first screens of Epic Mickey, and it’s somewhat more colourful than i had expected… The concept art and front-cover of game informer looked really dark and twisted, gearing me up for a Disney themed adventure game with Dead Space-like warped enemies, and dark Warhammer 40K environments. What i see here is compromise and Disney’s brand image division at work. It just looks like a PS2 era adventure game crossed with WOW to me, with nothing appealing about it. I love the new retro look of Mickey though. Lets just hope the game-play mechanics aren’t so old-skool…
I’ll leave my final judgment until I’ve played the game, as it could still be a fun, if not different game. Who knows it might even be one of those fabled ‘good game, for the Wii’ titles.
What do you think? Leave any thoughts in the comments!
As gamers we are as guilty as the rest of the world for over indulging in electricity fueled entertainment. We shouldn’t feel guilty about gaming in-general, just more conscious about what we’re contributing to, and what we can do to minimize our carbon footprint. Its easy to say it doesn’t matter, or that if you weren’t gaming you would be doing something else which uses electricity, and it’s probably true. But there are things we can do to make our gaming habits more power efficient, which intern helps reduce carbon emissions. Unfortunately, like a lot of environmental options, they are more expensive than the norm, but since when has the cheapest option in life been the best? Check out the tips after the break: Read the rest of this entry »
I generally see Disney games as nothing more than cheap lazy efforts to make mounds of cash. That’s not to say though that there haven’t been good Disney games, as House of illusion remains one of my favourite child-hood games, right up there with sonic. But Epic Mickey looks to have the potential to go further and create a truly exciting and original game. What intrigues me is the concept art which was released a little while ago, showing a somewhat dark and twisted side of Disney. The environments and characters look like a cross between something from Dead Space, Bioshock, Warhammer 40K and steam punk imagery in general. Overall, something very un-cudly and un-Disney. Check out more here + here.
The story sounds pretty dark too, with the game’s antagonist being the first character Walt Disney created (Oswald the rabbit) who seeks to blot the world of Disney with black ink. The protagonist will be Mickey mouse, sporting a new retro look apparently. Read more about the story from eurogamer.
I see one potential problem though, and it’s partially why I’ve held off finishing this post…
