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Multiplayer Game Reviews
September 5, 2010
It’s been a while since I’ve gotten off my editor’s throne and actually done a review. But it’s also been a while since I’ve found a game that I really felt I needed to make a personal commentary on. Our reviewers here do a great job with everything they do, but I’ve been feeling the itch to get back into writing myself. So, when I found myself playing through Mafia II the other day and commenting on various things to my roommate, I realized that if I was going to get back into writing myself I had to do it now. And there’s no better game out at the moment to have helped me with my creative urges than Mafia II.
Before I really get into things though, it needs to be said that this game is rated M for mature, and for good reason. Prolific violence, foul language, and nudity mean that this game is NOT for children. So please, be sensible, read the label, and don’t let your kids play games they shouldn’t be playing at a young age.
The game is set in 1940’s America, following the character Vito Scolleta (you), from his early days as a young boy in Italy, through his childhood life in America, up to his days as a soldier during World War II (where the cinematics end and the gameplay begins) and through his Mafioso days after he comes home.
Visually, the game is absolutely stunning. Sure, there are some that have been a tad better, but you’d be hard pressed to find any physical errors with the way the world looks. It captures a look and feel of the 40’s better than anything else I’ve seen from the time. The “Beaver Cleaver” suburbs, the downtown business districts, the dirty slums and even the heavily industrial dock section all received equal love and care to their visual appearance. And the characters themselves are magnificent. There are parts of the game that are gritty and dark, while others sparkle with a chrome-like sheen.
 Things can get pretty brutal in the industrial sector.
The gameplay is equally spectacular. The whole game is driven by a story that has various climaxes and down times, and works well to depict the underworld lifestyle of Vito and his mafioso friends. If you’re not putting the squeeze on someone for not paying their dues, you might be driving like a madman to evade police, boxing some fool who thinks he could take you, or lounging around the strip club and watching the story move seamlessly into the next chapter. The game also has it’s fair amount of open-endedness. You’re free to do as you please, the same as in most games like this. Your criminal activities might range from shaking down businesses for cash, stealing cars and sending them to the crusher for money, or running around trying to find the numerous collectable items (wanted posters and playboy bunny photos) hidden out in the world. Or, of course, any other creative ideas you might have for yourself.
 But sometimes you just need to make an example out of someone.
But no matter what you decide to do with your time, if you’re into a very solid story backed up by excellent gameplay and quality graphics (and are old enough to buy the game with it’s M rating), then you really can’t go wrong with Mafia II. So far, this game looks like it could be a very strong contender for the Game of the Year award I’ve been mulling over for the site.
Game: Mafia II | Developer: 2k Czech
April 11, 2010
Hot on the heels of Dr. Zed’s Zombie Island and Mad Roxxi’s Underdome Riot, Gearbox Software has released the third (and supposedly final) DLC for Borderlands – The Secret Armory of General Knoxx.
Right at the start, you’re thrown into a mess when you discover that a bounty has been placed on your heads by Atlas Corporation. A rather sizable one at that. Never one to sit back and take it, you and your companions take on a mission to strike back at Atlas. You’re aided in this quest by some new friends and some old ones as well, including Scooter who has setup shop nearby.
 Stepped Right into Trouble... Secret Armory introduces a few changes to the game. Foremost among these is the Level Cap which has been raised up to Level 61 (a subtle nod to Spinal Tap and their amps that go to 11). The first missions start out at level 50 and believe me when I say, you need to be at Level 50 to try it. My level 45 Soldier died repeatedly until I managed to play through the original game once more to raise some levels.
Also added is a plethora of new loot (including a new type of chest), incredibly powerful weapons, new missions (and side quests), and impressive enemies that keep you on your toes throughout the game.
Like Zombie Island, Secret Armory has only one Fast Travel location and it’s far more spread out than the island. Thankfully, there are three new vehicles to take advantage of the wide open space. One of these, the Lancer, seats four. Yes, Gearbox answered their fans and came up with a vehicle that everyone can rid in. It’s a blast.
 A New Ride Graphics and Sound have not changed since the original Borderlands with the exception of new dialogue for Scooter and a handful of new characters. As in previous installments, it’s great. The voice work is well done and adds a lot of humor and atmosphere.
For just ten bucks, The Secret Armory of General Knoxx is a sure bet. Pick up a copy and get blasting with your friends.
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Game: Borderlands : The Secret Armory of General Knoxx | Developer: Gearbox Software
March 24, 2010
If I had to describe this game in one word it would be: im-freakin-pressive. I can’t believe I’ve never heard of Trine before. This is the kind of indie game I thrive on. It’s a  real testament to the fact that you don’t have to be a big company to put out interesting, enthralling, entertaining games.
To begin with, Trine has a soothing kind of fairytale telling feel to it. The art is brilliant but stand still, as if you’re looking down at a printed book. The story that is weaved before you sucks you in, and before you realize it you’re staring at a character, waiting for more to happen, and suddenly realizing it’s your turn to play. It doesn’t drag on but you can easily become engrossed in the plotline of the tale.
In Train you play as one of three characters. No, let me clarify. You play as all three characters, one at a time. You toggle base d on your needs and are expected to know which character you need for the particular obstacle in your way. For the most part this is obvious. If you’re being attacked by a band of sword carrying skeletal monsters you’re pretty much guaranteed to whip out your brute (and I mean that in  every sense of the word) strength warrior and get to the hacking and slashing.
The music in Trine is relaxing, which is odd because the game itself is anything but. I know all you experienced players out there are fully capable of using the W, A, S, D method for gaming but for us slow people the switch in gears can be darn frustrating. I can’t tell you how long I had to take in order to figure out how to jump properly and even so it was still a toss up on whether I would actually make it to my goal or not.
Still, with that little minor complaint I would largely recommend Trine to players of all different types and genre preference. It mixes action with puzzle, adds a little humor, and steals my breath away with stunning visuals and care. You can really tell that these people loved this game while they were putting it together and how could we, as players, do anything other than that?
Game: Trine – http://trine-thegame.com/site/ | Developer: Frozenbyte — http://frozenbyte.com/
February 21, 2010
Our Hero … Hiro
The story is as old as time – an Evil Warlord has arisen and is transforming the forest creatures into evil minions. You play Hiro, a young Ninja tasked with saving the world and rescuing your Ninja companions who have gone before you. Along the way, you’ll be aided in your quest by helpful animals and make use of a wide variety of special Ninja powers.
Coming from IO Interactive, Mini Ninjas is a sharp departure from the more realistic and gritty games the company has made in the past (i.e. Hitman series) but it’s fun and enjoyable. It does a wonderful job of bringing the world of Japan to life for an audience that is both young and old.
The graphics and art style in Mini Ninjas are excellent. In many places, it’s downright cute. Even when kicking their butts, I enjoyed how the enemy samurai bounced around while letting out high pitch chirps and squeals. On occasion though, the camera will suddenly rotate and leave you feeling disoriented. This didn’t happen too often, but when it did it was disconcerting. The designers also did a great job in capturing the feel of Japan with the audio and music.
Controls in Mini Ninjas are simple and come down to button-mashing. You can put together some combos and use Power Moves to vanquish your enemies. Speaking of vanquishing, the violence is completely cartoon and family friendly. Defeating your opponents reverts them back into the cute and fluffy wildlife creatures you’ve come to save.
 Defeat Your Foes and Release the Forest Creatures
Hiro has a multitude of special powers. These include Spirit Form which allows you to take possession of nearby animals. Possessing some animals such as Boars or Bears give you different modes of attack. Additional powers come in the form of being able to throw Fireballs or Lighting bolts at your enemy.
Along the way, you’ll find flowers and mushrooms that can be collected. These can be turned into potions or other special items by purchasing recipes. Crack open jugs and other containers in a Zelda-like fashion to find items such as coins, Smoke Bombs, and Healing Potions. Magical Shrines, hidden throughout the world, give you additional powers. Need extra health? Find an apple or cherry tree and shake it until the fruit falls down for you to eat.
As stated earlier – freeing the other captured Ninjas allows you to play them. One of these is Futo, Hiro’s best friend who carries an enormous hammer and the strength to wield it. Can’t open a gate? Try swapping to this brute and knocking down those doors. Other rescued characters have their own powers and special moves.
 Take advantage of Futo's strength for the big guys. Certain areas will have hints available that you can easily access with the press of a Key. If you’re feeling lost at any time, simply press E to mediate for guidance. The method feels a lot smoother and more in-game than pulling up a world map. Besides – guidance only tells you the direction, not quite how to get there.
There’s even a few mini-games including the ever popular Fishing. This is done while sitting in your boat (which just so happens to be a large hat that you can paddle about) and using simple mouse controls. Each time you catch a fish, it’s instantly transformed into Sushi.
 Even a Ninja Needs a Break Mini Ninjas is charming, fun, and family friendly. There’s no co-op play (which would knock this game out of the park) but that doesn’t take away from how much fun it is. For it’s 8-10 hour length, the game is a bit pricey at thirty bucks, but if you’re looking for some wholesome entertainment, I’d say pick it up.
Game: Mini Ninjas | Developer: IO Interactive
February 1, 2010
The hugely popular Borderlands game continues its assault on the first-player shooting world by introducing us to the first DLC for the game – The Zombie Island of Dr. Ned. The story line follows a disturbance at Jakob’s Cove and a search for answers from Dr. Ned (who is most definitely not Dr. Zed from the main game).
Upon installing Zombie Island, you’ll find that you can instantly fast travel to Jakob’s Cove. Once there, there is no fast travel (except back to the main game areas) or vehicles, but maps are small enough that you can easily complete a mission in a far flung area and return before the enemy re-spawns. Depending on your preferences, this might be seen as a bonus or annoyance. Somewhat irksome was that no matter where you ended your gaming session, you always restarted back in Jakob’s Cove.
 You Always Come Home Again The enemies are slight rehashes of those found in the main game with your standard Zombies (Bandits), Maniacs, Midgets, and Wereskags. New foes include huge Tankesnteins and Suicide Zombies who carry explosive barrels to chuck your way. Shooting the barrel has the result you’d expect. Headshots reward you with Zombie Brains that can be used for a side quest. Limbs can be blasted off as well, leading to a few surprises. After a one vicious fight, I found myself being spewed upon by an enemy I couldn’t see. It was then that I discovered that if you blow off a zombie’s legs, their insatiable appetite keeps them crawling. I kept a better eye out for torsos after that.
Along with the main story line, side quests are provided by the familiar Bounty Board and ECHO missions. No new skills are added in Zombie Island, just about forty or so new missions. Players are given the opportunity, after completing a specific quest, to purchase firearms from a special Jakob’s vending machine. Sadly, the machine in my game stopped working after I quit for the evening and I couldn’t buy from it again.
 Beeeer...er, Braaaains Because the game is based on your story progress and not your level, some might find it too easy. I didn’t pick up Zombie Island until after I’d finished the main quest. This resulted in fun, but not terribly challenging game play. Four player co-op with some friends at a lower level provided more of a challenge with the added bonus of pulverizing the undead with friends.
From the sarcasm-laced introduction provided by Marcus and a sweet little girl to the Jakob’s public service announcements (“We’d like to remind survivors that we are not a taxi service…”), Zombie Island shows off the same quirky humor seen throughout Borderlands. The graphics are well done with the spooky swamp atmosphere achieved by modifying the Day/Night cycle so that it never gets very bright.
The Zombie Island of Dr. Ned is a great addition to Borderlands and for just $10, quite a bargain. Grab some friends, pick up a copy, and spend the weekend sending the undead packing.
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Game: Zombie Island of Dr. Ned | Developer: Gearbox Software
October 9, 2009
Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising
Does anybody remember the older Ghost Recon games? They were a pc series of first person shooters that did military style campaigns with a significant degree of realism. They were always fun, they were always challenging, and they were always fulfilling. I haven’t played any of the previous Operation Flashpoint games, but I was a fan of Ghost Recon, and I’ve been aching for something along that style of play to pop up sometime soon. Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising, brings the nostalgia back with an excellent formula for both single and multiplayer gaming goodness.
Multiplayer
The multiplayer offers cooperative play against the computer, or competitive play against other players, either online or via a LAN. Games were very easy to find, there were plenty of servers running and players were eager to start games. I played through several maps of both the cooperative and competitive styles and had a blast, regardless of the style of map, but there was something nagging at me the whole while that I couldn’t quite put my finger on. Then one of my teammates suddenly started speaking, and I realized exactly what it was. PS3, unlike the Xbox360, doesn’t just out and hand you a headset along with your first controller, and that lack of communication in a game like Operation Flashpoint could get you killed very quickly. The squad leader has a list of options and commands he can issue to try to guide the team in the correct direction, but unless everybody on the team has purchased a microphone to use on the PS3, sometimes you lose track of your squadmates, or aren’t quite sure what they’re doing. I’m not faulting the game for this at all, I’m faulting Sony, but because of the obvious effect it has on the game it needed to be mentioned. So whether you’re trouncing the computer or trying to outmaneuver a real squad of opposing players, keep your squadmates in sight, or you might find yourself out in the open and drawing way more fire than you can handle. Overall though, the multiplayer aspect is both challenging, rewarding, and well paced. You never feel like you’re sitting there waiting for something to happen. On the contrary, more often than not you’re on the edge of your seat as bullets slam into the ground beside you and you pray that none of them actually hit their mark. The game’s damage system is very realistic, and it only takes a shot or so to the torso to kill you. So keep your head down, stay in cover, and make your own shots count.
Gaming Review
Operation Flashpoint has a playstyle that almost feels more like a real life simulation than a video game. It trades the glitz and the non-stop action for the realism of intense, spur of the moment adrenaline rushes and the dramatic, nerve-wracking periods of silence in between. Visually, it’s still a pretty attractive game. The graphics aren’t cutting edge, but for a game of Operation Flashpoint’s massive scale (you have an entire island to traverse), it keeps everything well in a realistic perspective. If they’d gone overboard on the graphics, I don’t honestly think they could have fit the entire game on one cd. Sound quality is crisp, clear, realistic, and at times uncomfortably quiet. When you can’t hear anything but your own breathing, then all of a sudden someone in your squad spots the enemy and bullets start whizzing by, your own squad’s rifles are cracking away, and the groan of trucks or whopping of a helicopter adds to the tension, you really get immersed in the experience. At any given moment you’re sneaking quietly through the trees, then the next your fighting for your life as bark splinters off the tree you’re hiding behind and dirt flies up into your eyes, obscuring your view (yes, it really does this). Operation Flashpoint definitely went for a combat simulation style with the game, making as much of the game mechanics as they could as realistic as possible without going overboard on the graphics and turning it into an unnecessary gore-fest. Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising brings out the fun in it’s team play, high stakes gameplay and the simple fulfillment of surviving a firefight when you’re outnumbered on a regular basis and just one bullet in the wrong place can bring you down. I recommend picking the game up without a second thought.
Media
Check out Operation Flashpoint’s website for some really well done videos on the game.
Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising Vids
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Demon’s Souls, also for the PS3, will get a review sometime within the next couple days.
September 27, 2009
Wet – Get Ready for some Monkey Business.
Every game has to start with an idea, but it’s rare to find a game that feels like it truly started with a vision. This one most certainly does. It captures the gritty, raw feeling of emerging action cinema and combines it with the modern stylization of slow motion combat and environmental manipulation. It’s fast paced, action-packed, challenging, full of interesting options and has an artistic charm all its own. Ah, and you can’t forget the creepy cymbal smashing monkeys you can collect! In short, Wet is what you’d get if you gave Quentin Tarantino the reins behind a video game development studio. It’s fun packed in a never-say-die main character, rolled in blood, guts, and explosions, and kicked in the face for good measure. Here’s the breakdown.
Technical Quality
The game had a vision of style that it carries out flawlessly. The graphics are excellently crafted for its design, fit the motif at every turn and purposely gritty, which adds greatly to the experience. For those looking for a smoother feel though, the film-tear is optional, and can be turned off very easily from the options menu. The sound runs in the old school action movie clique and the music creates an energized atmosphere that will rock your socks. Controls are easy to learn and work well with the environment, giving you as many opportunities as possible to use the environment to your advantage and create a genuine movie-style play on the action. On top of this all, the interface is as simple as it gets, and it works out perfectly for the game. You’ve got a health bar, an indicator of which gun you currently have equipped and it’s ammo count. Everything else is all about the visual action. Wet gets a high five in the tech department, courtesy of its own merits.
Gameplay
The gameplay for Wet is fun, visceral, and rewarding, while at the same time being unforgiving in the vein of any true hardcore action flick. At certain stages of the game you’ll find yourself completely surrounded by continually spawning hordes of baddies, all bent on beating (or shooting) the hell out of you until you break the entrance controls to their spawn point. At other points it plays almost like a throwback to the old Dragon’s Lair game, or more familiarly, Indigo Prophecy, where on screen cues prompt you to press certain buttons in order to survive the challenge. It also mixes up the level designs, going from close quarters hack-and slash stages to balcony jumping shootouts, car chases and even more interesting and original stages I’d rather not ruin for you. The game certainly gets you engaged. You’ll quickly find yourself empathizing with the main character’s begrudgingly frustrated attitude towards her antagonists, and occasionally even her reluctant allies. No matter what way you look at it, Wet is downright fun, and it doesn’t punish you for losing the occasional firefight. Returning you to the nearest checkpoint if you die, which is always reasonably close by, it never seems like a chore to try again. Instead, it feels like a motivating “I’m gonna get that son of a *$&@^!” challenge. It’s a rare game that can make you feel happy to be running back for more after you just got whomped, but Wet does just that. And it’s all the more rewarding when you beat it the next time around.
Any way you look at it, Wet is a hardcore work of video gaming art.
The next review is still pending, I’m working on getting a way to post screenshots of console games without having to deal with the copyright nonsense from other review sites. Did find an interesting game on steam last week though that I wanted to review immediately following its release, but some things came up, so maybe I can get it some late exposure here sometime this week.
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