This is what a real sniper looks like, fuck you Call of Duty with your quick-scope/360 no-scope bullshit. Now, with that out of the way, onto the review.
Sniper Elite V2 is an apparent sequel and remake to the first, I never played the first myself. I originally got this for the PS3 but completed it on 360. I played through the entire game with a friend, this game is a fun game in co-op. However, if you want to be able to stealth through it, then single-player is the best way. Less chance of getting caught on your own.
The game is set in WW2, you play as- hmm, I don't even know... You play as some guy in WW2, equipped with a sniper. The guy you play as was incredibly bland and didn't even stand out in appearance, the story was also bland. Basically the game is fun, everything else is bland, but it has some really good gameplay and some great mechanics.
The graphics are ok in this game, I'd expect more considering it's quite recent. The hair looks terrible though, it looks plastic, like you're playing a video game of an Action Man doll that came to life! (I miss Action Man come to think of it.) The sound-work in this game is incredible, just the sound of the boots as you're sprinting is great. But it is pretty bland elsewhere, a short and not very engaging storyline. No characters to like and a boring playable character. It may be a sniper, war game, but it needed more in these elements to improve it.
One thing I did like, is how it actually forces you to use your sniper. That may sound weird given the name of the game, but hear me out; the pistol is incredibly difficult to kill enemies with unless your close, due to the huge reticle aim, the machine gun has next to no bullets and you never find much ammo, thus using your sniper! You do get a whole load of other gear to use too, you get trip mines, grenades and even a rock, which you can use to throw and distract enemies with.
Here's the best thing in the game though; X-ray kill-cam. These truly are a thing of beauty, there's nothing better than watching the camera follow your bullet and fly through an enemy soilder as it shows their skeleton and organs, as you see the bullet pierce them and destroy where ever you hit them from the inside. It's incredibly satisfying seeing the bullet shattered the skull or explode a lung, vulgur in text, but trust me on this. I don't feel there was enough X-ray kills. The bullet cams are good too, but compared to the X-ray bullet cams, they are boring. You have no silencer either, which makes the game much more difficult, but being able to mask the sound of your shot by nearby noises is a great feature. As well as the story the game has some other modes you can play in co-op, but they can get boring fast but they do add a little more.
The game as always came with some bugs and issues. Not being able to go prone despite nothing being in the way as a sniper shot at me was frustrating. While taking cover at a destroyed tank, the camera started to shake vigorously. Couldn't fit through a gap that was big enough to walk through, thanks to the incredible invisible walls. Would sink into the ground as you walked up structures and steps. You were forced to trigger the enemy spawns, meaning you would often have to put yourself out in the open to proceed, which often end up with needing to be revived. Speaking of the reviving, it was awful, a huge delay from trying to revive eachother resulted in having to hold the button to revive many times and that it would take you out of prone and force you to crouch, making you a much easier target to shoot.
This game is really fun with some great features. I'm not surprised a third was released and soon to be a fourth. I am surprised at its apparent Game of the Year release though, still not sure if it is a legit GotY. Too much blandness lowers this game's score, but I do look forward to the next releases.
7/10
Sunday, 24 July 2016
Tuesday, 5 July 2016
Assassin's Creed (Xbox 360)
Well, this is were it all began. Assassin's Creed, who'd have thought this would become a series that never stopped. It was also one of the first games that kick-started my wonderful Xbox 360 career. Let's eagle dive into this one ;)
The first in the everlasting series, released back in 2007. This game didn't really age well, but what do you expect, it is very old now. Set in the Third Crusade, in Jerusalem, we play as a disgraced assassin, Altair and also Desmond, in present day. Desmond, taken in by Abstergo to explore his ancestors memories, by entering the Animus. The Animus is a sort of bed, that delves into the minds of the subject and is capable of exploring the ancestors lives of the subject.
The game is fun, being able to climb practically every building in sight, no matter how tall. Free running over the rooftops, sword fighting, riding horses. It's all fun. Across the many AC games, this has my favourite combat. The counter move is the most useful asset, it comes in handy when you end up in a fight against thirty people. The introduction of the hidden blade started here, being able to walk up undetected and then take out your target in one quick attack can save you an intense battle.
The game started off much simpler than it's followers, find information on the target and then kill them. The problem was that the game was repetitive, doing the same kind of investigations, interrogating people, eavesdropping and pickpocketing and then reporting back before you started the assassination of your target. It started off great, it was different, it was new and exciting. It sadly deflated pretty quickly when you realised it was the same thing. Altair was dull and boring, I'm certain he wasn't capable of emotions. His outfit is one of my favourites throughout the series though. The other characters were boring too, I just didn't care about them and don't even get me started on Desmond!
I loved the game at the time, but we were miss-sold. We were expecting it to be set in the past, yes it was, but we were really in the present day, entering a sort of time machine back to the past. I remember thinking "what the fuck is this", when I was first placed in the modern era. It slowed the game down, being taken in and out of the Animus, although the modern story makes more sense the further it goes, but I can't help think that this game should've been strictly set in the past and got closer to the present each game.
The architecture was beautiful, the scenery, the landscapes, all great. Travelling to each city was a pain though, it was nice riding on a horse at first because it made it seem like you could travel a lot with the horse. You can't, you can only go to each city and when you're there, you have to be on foot. It was far too big as well, it took ages to get to each city and there was nothing to do in between. It also never made sense how you would alert guards just by running by or sprinting with the horse. It was so frustrating how often guards would engage in combat when you were just exploring the city.
There's a good alert system that lets you know when you're being watched, when you're detected and when you're safe or hidden. You can also blend in with scholars and using them as a moving hiding spot to sneak through guarded areas. Another cool thing is the Eagle vision, it highlights guards in red and the assassination target gold. There's also the eagle dive, where you jump off a building and safely land in a hay barrel, it's cool but very unlikely you'd survive. We don't play games for them to be life-like do we?
I never expected this game to get as many sequels/spin offs and even a movie after this game, despite how much I liked it. I'm glad they changed the character and setting and it's always something to look forward to where it'll be set next. For the first time, we're getting a break from the annual release since the first game, although the movie is out this year...
7.5/10
The first in the everlasting series, released back in 2007. This game didn't really age well, but what do you expect, it is very old now. Set in the Third Crusade, in Jerusalem, we play as a disgraced assassin, Altair and also Desmond, in present day. Desmond, taken in by Abstergo to explore his ancestors memories, by entering the Animus. The Animus is a sort of bed, that delves into the minds of the subject and is capable of exploring the ancestors lives of the subject.
The game is fun, being able to climb practically every building in sight, no matter how tall. Free running over the rooftops, sword fighting, riding horses. It's all fun. Across the many AC games, this has my favourite combat. The counter move is the most useful asset, it comes in handy when you end up in a fight against thirty people. The introduction of the hidden blade started here, being able to walk up undetected and then take out your target in one quick attack can save you an intense battle.
The game started off much simpler than it's followers, find information on the target and then kill them. The problem was that the game was repetitive, doing the same kind of investigations, interrogating people, eavesdropping and pickpocketing and then reporting back before you started the assassination of your target. It started off great, it was different, it was new and exciting. It sadly deflated pretty quickly when you realised it was the same thing. Altair was dull and boring, I'm certain he wasn't capable of emotions. His outfit is one of my favourites throughout the series though. The other characters were boring too, I just didn't care about them and don't even get me started on Desmond!
I loved the game at the time, but we were miss-sold. We were expecting it to be set in the past, yes it was, but we were really in the present day, entering a sort of time machine back to the past. I remember thinking "what the fuck is this", when I was first placed in the modern era. It slowed the game down, being taken in and out of the Animus, although the modern story makes more sense the further it goes, but I can't help think that this game should've been strictly set in the past and got closer to the present each game.
The architecture was beautiful, the scenery, the landscapes, all great. Travelling to each city was a pain though, it was nice riding on a horse at first because it made it seem like you could travel a lot with the horse. You can't, you can only go to each city and when you're there, you have to be on foot. It was far too big as well, it took ages to get to each city and there was nothing to do in between. It also never made sense how you would alert guards just by running by or sprinting with the horse. It was so frustrating how often guards would engage in combat when you were just exploring the city.
There's a good alert system that lets you know when you're being watched, when you're detected and when you're safe or hidden. You can also blend in with scholars and using them as a moving hiding spot to sneak through guarded areas. Another cool thing is the Eagle vision, it highlights guards in red and the assassination target gold. There's also the eagle dive, where you jump off a building and safely land in a hay barrel, it's cool but very unlikely you'd survive. We don't play games for them to be life-like do we?
I never expected this game to get as many sequels/spin offs and even a movie after this game, despite how much I liked it. I'm glad they changed the character and setting and it's always something to look forward to where it'll be set next. For the first time, we're getting a break from the annual release since the first game, although the movie is out this year...
7.5/10
Thursday, 30 June 2016
Mars: War Logs (Xbox 360)
Welcome, to planet Mars! The sandy, dry wasteland, home to many inhabitants. The first game to the recently released, Technomancer. The battle for water, between Abundance and Aurora, two major factions, leads to where we start the adventure, a POW camp.
You play as Roy Temperance, a POW who hatches a plan to escape. Specialised in combat, stealth and technomancy, a sort of magic, the ability to craft weapons and better outfits for defence to help you through some tough combat. The game is small, but it has a fair amount of content including side missions, crafting and upgrading.
The areas you traverse tend to be quite small, but during the story and side missions, there's a lot of back and forth so it turns out to be a bit of a plus side. Only main parts of the map require a loading screen, as oppose to every door you enter. The loading times are also very quick. You also get a companion in almost the whole game, you can choose to go alone in parts, but they're a nice way to distract enemies when you have a bunch to fight at once. There are vendors to trade with and there's plenty of crafting, you can create components that will help you create ammo or better gear. I enjoyed the combat, I thought it was done well and the evade is your best friend, especially on the higher difficulties. I think the best thing in the game is the extreme difficultly, it's the 4th tier difficultly and it definitely is a challenge, there were times I thought I'd never get through it. However, when you know about the crafting and selling well enough, you could just manage your gear well and buy a tonne of ammo and health to aid you more easily.
As much as I liked this game, it had lots of problems. Like I said earlier, there's lots of back and forth, ninety percent of the game is just fighting. The voice acting is one of the worst, I don't think any voice in the game was a professional actor and the beginning of the game, there's some sort of monologue by a guy named 'Fatso', who is without a doubt the worst voice actor ever, play the beginning and you'll see! The graphics are also very poor, there's no detail in anything and just because it's a desert planet, it's not an excuse. Only detail seemed to go into the main character. The character you play as isn't even likeable either, he's not hateable though, he's just boring and forgettable. You could get other companions in the game but they came far too late, the guy you're stuck with for the majority of the game is by far the worst also, he's weak and does practically no damage to enemies. The story seemed like it was gonna be great, but things happened too quickly and it just deflated and left me disappointed.
There were plenty of bugs and issues too. The amount of times I got killed by getting hit through cover and walls was atrocious. Sometimes my weapons would disappear and I would be swinging air but it still did damage, poor lip syncing, slow textures, lots of clipping when there was nothing there. After ending combat you would have to wait for your character to put their weapon away before you could search bodies or open doors and it just took far too long. I found the technomancy powers pointless because they took so long to initiate and when I was low on health, I would spam the health injection and still get killed because the health didn't work and I hadn't realised, this happened far too often.
I did enjoy the game for what it was, one of the biggest challenges I've had in gaming (and I finished it for your information, which I'm proud of!) but, it just fell short. It was a great idea and with more work could be something great. I'm looking forward to The Technomancer and seeing as it's a full release, I'm expecting it to be good!
6.6/10
You play as Roy Temperance, a POW who hatches a plan to escape. Specialised in combat, stealth and technomancy, a sort of magic, the ability to craft weapons and better outfits for defence to help you through some tough combat. The game is small, but it has a fair amount of content including side missions, crafting and upgrading.
The areas you traverse tend to be quite small, but during the story and side missions, there's a lot of back and forth so it turns out to be a bit of a plus side. Only main parts of the map require a loading screen, as oppose to every door you enter. The loading times are also very quick. You also get a companion in almost the whole game, you can choose to go alone in parts, but they're a nice way to distract enemies when you have a bunch to fight at once. There are vendors to trade with and there's plenty of crafting, you can create components that will help you create ammo or better gear. I enjoyed the combat, I thought it was done well and the evade is your best friend, especially on the higher difficulties. I think the best thing in the game is the extreme difficultly, it's the 4th tier difficultly and it definitely is a challenge, there were times I thought I'd never get through it. However, when you know about the crafting and selling well enough, you could just manage your gear well and buy a tonne of ammo and health to aid you more easily.
As much as I liked this game, it had lots of problems. Like I said earlier, there's lots of back and forth, ninety percent of the game is just fighting. The voice acting is one of the worst, I don't think any voice in the game was a professional actor and the beginning of the game, there's some sort of monologue by a guy named 'Fatso', who is without a doubt the worst voice actor ever, play the beginning and you'll see! The graphics are also very poor, there's no detail in anything and just because it's a desert planet, it's not an excuse. Only detail seemed to go into the main character. The character you play as isn't even likeable either, he's not hateable though, he's just boring and forgettable. You could get other companions in the game but they came far too late, the guy you're stuck with for the majority of the game is by far the worst also, he's weak and does practically no damage to enemies. The story seemed like it was gonna be great, but things happened too quickly and it just deflated and left me disappointed.
There were plenty of bugs and issues too. The amount of times I got killed by getting hit through cover and walls was atrocious. Sometimes my weapons would disappear and I would be swinging air but it still did damage, poor lip syncing, slow textures, lots of clipping when there was nothing there. After ending combat you would have to wait for your character to put their weapon away before you could search bodies or open doors and it just took far too long. I found the technomancy powers pointless because they took so long to initiate and when I was low on health, I would spam the health injection and still get killed because the health didn't work and I hadn't realised, this happened far too often.
I did enjoy the game for what it was, one of the biggest challenges I've had in gaming (and I finished it for your information, which I'm proud of!) but, it just fell short. It was a great idea and with more work could be something great. I'm looking forward to The Technomancer and seeing as it's a full release, I'm expecting it to be good!
6.6/10
Monday, 20 June 2016
Fallout 4 (Xbox One)
Put on your blue jumpsuit and step out of your vault, Fallout is back. It's still unreal that this game has actually came out. I was in disbelief when it was announced and now it's been out for so long! If you haven't played Fallout 3 or Fallout New Vegas, then stop reading immediately and play them! But come back and read the rest please.
Plenty to talk about with all the new features and this is a big-ass game. Bethesda know how to make good games and that's why they're my favourite developer. The fifth major installment including New Vegas. An open world game set in a post-apocalyptic future, what doesn't sound great there? Despite the city of Boston being in ruins, there's plenty to explore and many buildings to enter, this is a change from Fallout 3 as you can tell what the place looked like prior to the nuclear war. F3 was a lot more of an empty wasteland compared to 4.
Unlike the other games in the series, this game starts before the bombs fell. Happy families living their daily lives, something we never saw before. Unfortunately it doesn't last long and soon after continues after the bombs. It would've been nice to get to spend time in the pre-apocalyptic world and explore at little at least, seeing as it had never been done. Despite being set in the future, the year 2287 to be exact, it has a 1950s style to the game, giving it an old style-future.
Without spoiling too much, the story is quite similar to F3 in that instead of looking for your father, you are now trying to locate your missing son. The game starts off straight into the customization of your character. The graphics have improved so much, they're not amazing, but they are fantastic compared to the old Fallouts. Your character now speaks, which I love, I hate games that have Silent protagonists. The performance is great but because there is now an actor, the dialogue is a lot more limited than it was, it's a huge loss as the dialogue was stellar in the older games, but we at least get a talking character. Now new factions roam the wasteland, mainly the infamous 'Institute', that has everyone running scared. They are said to kidnap people and create synths, human like robots that don't even know they aren't human. The story is a pretty good one, albeit quite short, but as usual has multiple endings, so you get to choose who you want to side with. This gives the game replayability, so many choices, so many playthroughs.
The game is full of choice and like the others, it let's you choose how you want to play. Third person or first person, I usually play first myself. You can also drift away from the main storyline, you can go off and adventure or go do side missions. The game has no restrictions. There's plenty of new features, you can now have individual pieces of amour to protect yourself, each individual piece has different affects too. Lots of crafting that lets you make all kinds, such as weapon attachments, armour, drugs and more. Power armour is a lot different too, it's so powerful and requires fusion cores to power it, so you can't use it forever. The game took a Minecraft approach in that you can build settlements. I think this is a great feature being able to create your own buildings and such. It's easy when you get used to it, but can be overwhelming at first. I'm not very good at it, I think it's difficult to make things look like a real structure, seeing as my walls are usually floating above the ground, but I'm not entirely sure how to fix it.
There are plenty of improvements in this game and the graphics are definitely one of them. A lot of people aren't that impressed with them, but if you look at the old Fallouts then you'll clearly see. Also Dogmeat looks like a real dog, he looks beautifully real. The game now has weather, it can rain and even have radiation storms. The lip syncing is really well done and actually looks like the people are speaking. There's also dialogue scenes, they're kinda like an interactive cutscene and I think they look better than just staring at the person you're talking to while the background is just frozen. The excellent music is back and fits beautifully in the game, there's quite a few new things to talk about too.
One of the new features is that you can command your companions to go somewhere and pick up items or even search areas for you. There's no level cap so you can go way beyond with your level and the new leveling up page is a thing of beauty. Each perk is accompanied by a relevant picture of Vault Boy and just generally looks more interactive and better fitted. You can romance with your companions now and they're also given an interesting back story that you have to earn the right to listen to. As well, companions have their own skills and you can get them to hack terminals or pick locks if they have the skill, saves you doing it eh. You can also carry on playing after the main story, thank you Bethesda.
Of course, the game has its faults I'm devastated to say. F4 now only let's you have one companion and that's including when you have Dogmeat by your side too. I don't think there is enough missions in the game, the story is short and there aren't a huge amount of side missions. I did everything in this game, to this day I'm certain I never did everything in both Fallout 3 and New Vegas. There's the missions that go on forever but they're boring and if that's all you've got left to do in the game, then it just isn't worth playing anymore. This is a Bethesda game and with that comes bugs, we all know that. But, as it's Bethesda we always forgive them. This is something we have to stop, bugs shouldn't be present in any game and no matter how good these games are, we can't just keep forgiving and forgetting and get what we paid for. NO BUGS! This game is great, fantastic even, but it has to be said, with how good Fallout 3 was back in 2008, I think we all expected a lot more. Maybe our expectations were ridiculously high, but that's the standard Bethesda set. Overall it's a disappointment but it's still amazing and I guess I just expected too much.
Fallout 4 is really here and all the great things are back, the excellent Pip Boy used to manage your equipment and hold your mission info, the V.A.T.S targeting system that slows down time and let's you attack individual body parts and of course, all your old friends, feral ghouls, super mutants and the terrifying deathclaws. There's still DLC to come, so let's hope they keep the game alive and most importantly, fun. Let's go Dogmeat, it's good to be back.
8.9/10
Plenty to talk about with all the new features and this is a big-ass game. Bethesda know how to make good games and that's why they're my favourite developer. The fifth major installment including New Vegas. An open world game set in a post-apocalyptic future, what doesn't sound great there? Despite the city of Boston being in ruins, there's plenty to explore and many buildings to enter, this is a change from Fallout 3 as you can tell what the place looked like prior to the nuclear war. F3 was a lot more of an empty wasteland compared to 4.
Unlike the other games in the series, this game starts before the bombs fell. Happy families living their daily lives, something we never saw before. Unfortunately it doesn't last long and soon after continues after the bombs. It would've been nice to get to spend time in the pre-apocalyptic world and explore at little at least, seeing as it had never been done. Despite being set in the future, the year 2287 to be exact, it has a 1950s style to the game, giving it an old style-future.
Without spoiling too much, the story is quite similar to F3 in that instead of looking for your father, you are now trying to locate your missing son. The game starts off straight into the customization of your character. The graphics have improved so much, they're not amazing, but they are fantastic compared to the old Fallouts. Your character now speaks, which I love, I hate games that have Silent protagonists. The performance is great but because there is now an actor, the dialogue is a lot more limited than it was, it's a huge loss as the dialogue was stellar in the older games, but we at least get a talking character. Now new factions roam the wasteland, mainly the infamous 'Institute', that has everyone running scared. They are said to kidnap people and create synths, human like robots that don't even know they aren't human. The story is a pretty good one, albeit quite short, but as usual has multiple endings, so you get to choose who you want to side with. This gives the game replayability, so many choices, so many playthroughs.
The game is full of choice and like the others, it let's you choose how you want to play. Third person or first person, I usually play first myself. You can also drift away from the main storyline, you can go off and adventure or go do side missions. The game has no restrictions. There's plenty of new features, you can now have individual pieces of amour to protect yourself, each individual piece has different affects too. Lots of crafting that lets you make all kinds, such as weapon attachments, armour, drugs and more. Power armour is a lot different too, it's so powerful and requires fusion cores to power it, so you can't use it forever. The game took a Minecraft approach in that you can build settlements. I think this is a great feature being able to create your own buildings and such. It's easy when you get used to it, but can be overwhelming at first. I'm not very good at it, I think it's difficult to make things look like a real structure, seeing as my walls are usually floating above the ground, but I'm not entirely sure how to fix it.
There are plenty of improvements in this game and the graphics are definitely one of them. A lot of people aren't that impressed with them, but if you look at the old Fallouts then you'll clearly see. Also Dogmeat looks like a real dog, he looks beautifully real. The game now has weather, it can rain and even have radiation storms. The lip syncing is really well done and actually looks like the people are speaking. There's also dialogue scenes, they're kinda like an interactive cutscene and I think they look better than just staring at the person you're talking to while the background is just frozen. The excellent music is back and fits beautifully in the game, there's quite a few new things to talk about too.
One of the new features is that you can command your companions to go somewhere and pick up items or even search areas for you. There's no level cap so you can go way beyond with your level and the new leveling up page is a thing of beauty. Each perk is accompanied by a relevant picture of Vault Boy and just generally looks more interactive and better fitted. You can romance with your companions now and they're also given an interesting back story that you have to earn the right to listen to. As well, companions have their own skills and you can get them to hack terminals or pick locks if they have the skill, saves you doing it eh. You can also carry on playing after the main story, thank you Bethesda.
Of course, the game has its faults I'm devastated to say. F4 now only let's you have one companion and that's including when you have Dogmeat by your side too. I don't think there is enough missions in the game, the story is short and there aren't a huge amount of side missions. I did everything in this game, to this day I'm certain I never did everything in both Fallout 3 and New Vegas. There's the missions that go on forever but they're boring and if that's all you've got left to do in the game, then it just isn't worth playing anymore. This is a Bethesda game and with that comes bugs, we all know that. But, as it's Bethesda we always forgive them. This is something we have to stop, bugs shouldn't be present in any game and no matter how good these games are, we can't just keep forgiving and forgetting and get what we paid for. NO BUGS! This game is great, fantastic even, but it has to be said, with how good Fallout 3 was back in 2008, I think we all expected a lot more. Maybe our expectations were ridiculously high, but that's the standard Bethesda set. Overall it's a disappointment but it's still amazing and I guess I just expected too much.
Fallout 4 is really here and all the great things are back, the excellent Pip Boy used to manage your equipment and hold your mission info, the V.A.T.S targeting system that slows down time and let's you attack individual body parts and of course, all your old friends, feral ghouls, super mutants and the terrifying deathclaws. There's still DLC to come, so let's hope they keep the game alive and most importantly, fun. Let's go Dogmeat, it's good to be back.
8.9/10
Sunday, 12 June 2016
Resident Evil 5 (Xbox 360)
Resident. Evil. 5. Review. You know, like when you start the game and the guy says the name of the Res game you're playing? No? Whatever, idec anymore. Anyway, Resident Evil 5 came out back in 2009 and continues the everlasting Resident Evil series as I believe it's the 14th released game, there's so many I'm not one hundred percent certain.
Before I delve into this review, I have to say that this is one of the few games I never get bored of. Don't get me wrong, it's not 10/10 (SPOILER ALERT), but it's just so much fun. It's even more fun in co-op and for the love of God, play this in co-op or face the wrath of one of the worst AI partners you could ask for. To be frank, or Chris should I say? ;) I've never really played the game on my own, except when I first got it and I never have since. I've mostly played as Sheva, mainly so I never have to see how bad her AI is again, she's also one the most poorly voiced characters I've played as.
It's a survival horror game, but honestly, it doesn't feel like one. The game isn't scary at all, although the chainsaw manjini's are terrifying when they're after you. Plus there's lots of ammo and so much weaponry, my definition may be a bit different to yours, but for a good survival horror for me, would be a lack of ammo and strong enemies that cause you to have to run away. But the sensitivity is very slow and you can only shoot standing still, so you've always got to be alert there.
The graphics aren't that great, but they're ok, the enemies look really evil, but the monster type bosses look ridiculous. They're just squid-like creatures with orange balls on. Sounds stupid right? The melee is awful, it's so slow and with you standing still they have to be right next to you. The enemies melee attack is so much faster, being able to melee is the most pointless feature I've seen in a game, they should have removed it. The laser sight is your only way to aim, it's pretty awkward but you'll get used to it, I'd much have preferred a reticle though.
You can trade with you partner, things like herbs and ammo, if you're playing on your own, then you can dump most of it on Sheva. There's a great point system giving you final ranks on missions, that make you want to get an S rank on all the levels to unlock some cool extras. Upgrading and purchasing weapons is addicting, with so much to get, it certainly makes you play the game a lot to get the sufficient amount of money.
I wasn't that engaged in the story, but that's mainly because I didn't know what was happening, as this was my first Res game. The game is full of terrible dialogue and really average voice acting. The game was released in 2009 but still followed 'old style gaming', every time you interacted with a locked door, it would stop the game to tell you it was locked rather than an animation of you trying to open the door, or a chest would open up on its own instead of your character doing it. Doors close after you open them, so if you're not with your partner, you'd have to open the door again and it would be an animation of you going through the door, instead of letting you walk through yourself. Maybe old school Res fans would like that, but not me, if I wanted to play old-style games, I'd play the first Res. There were constant short cutscenes every time you did anything, you'd walk an inch and then there'd be a cutscene showing the enemies entering the area, this happened with almost every group of enemies. It was a constant stop and start and really slowed the game down. You'd have to wait for your partner to open a heavy door or get in a lift, rather than the next section trigger when just one of you gets there, even if you're playing on your own you still have to wait for the dumb AI to catch up.
The game is nothing special, but it's so much fun and I never get bored of it, if I rated based on how fun it is, it'd be a ten! But I judge it as a game and have my own criteria to judge, suffice to say this game is rated lower than what I even expected. But I highly recommend everyone to play this game if they have a buddy. Despite not playing many older Res games, I hope the next one feels more like a survival horror. Suck on that, Wesker.
7.4/10
Before I delve into this review, I have to say that this is one of the few games I never get bored of. Don't get me wrong, it's not 10/10 (SPOILER ALERT), but it's just so much fun. It's even more fun in co-op and for the love of God, play this in co-op or face the wrath of one of the worst AI partners you could ask for. To be frank, or Chris should I say? ;) I've never really played the game on my own, except when I first got it and I never have since. I've mostly played as Sheva, mainly so I never have to see how bad her AI is again, she's also one the most poorly voiced characters I've played as.
It's a survival horror game, but honestly, it doesn't feel like one. The game isn't scary at all, although the chainsaw manjini's are terrifying when they're after you. Plus there's lots of ammo and so much weaponry, my definition may be a bit different to yours, but for a good survival horror for me, would be a lack of ammo and strong enemies that cause you to have to run away. But the sensitivity is very slow and you can only shoot standing still, so you've always got to be alert there.
The graphics aren't that great, but they're ok, the enemies look really evil, but the monster type bosses look ridiculous. They're just squid-like creatures with orange balls on. Sounds stupid right? The melee is awful, it's so slow and with you standing still they have to be right next to you. The enemies melee attack is so much faster, being able to melee is the most pointless feature I've seen in a game, they should have removed it. The laser sight is your only way to aim, it's pretty awkward but you'll get used to it, I'd much have preferred a reticle though.
You can trade with you partner, things like herbs and ammo, if you're playing on your own, then you can dump most of it on Sheva. There's a great point system giving you final ranks on missions, that make you want to get an S rank on all the levels to unlock some cool extras. Upgrading and purchasing weapons is addicting, with so much to get, it certainly makes you play the game a lot to get the sufficient amount of money.
I wasn't that engaged in the story, but that's mainly because I didn't know what was happening, as this was my first Res game. The game is full of terrible dialogue and really average voice acting. The game was released in 2009 but still followed 'old style gaming', every time you interacted with a locked door, it would stop the game to tell you it was locked rather than an animation of you trying to open the door, or a chest would open up on its own instead of your character doing it. Doors close after you open them, so if you're not with your partner, you'd have to open the door again and it would be an animation of you going through the door, instead of letting you walk through yourself. Maybe old school Res fans would like that, but not me, if I wanted to play old-style games, I'd play the first Res. There were constant short cutscenes every time you did anything, you'd walk an inch and then there'd be a cutscene showing the enemies entering the area, this happened with almost every group of enemies. It was a constant stop and start and really slowed the game down. You'd have to wait for your partner to open a heavy door or get in a lift, rather than the next section trigger when just one of you gets there, even if you're playing on your own you still have to wait for the dumb AI to catch up.
The game is nothing special, but it's so much fun and I never get bored of it, if I rated based on how fun it is, it'd be a ten! But I judge it as a game and have my own criteria to judge, suffice to say this game is rated lower than what I even expected. But I highly recommend everyone to play this game if they have a buddy. Despite not playing many older Res games, I hope the next one feels more like a survival horror. Suck on that, Wesker.
7.4/10
Monday, 30 May 2016
Wolfenstein The New Order (Xbox One)
"The Nazi's rule the world now". Wolfenstein TNO is a first person shooter game set in an alternative history, in which the Nazi's won the war and had advanced technologies, which lead to them ruling the world. You return as B.J Blazkowicz, who starred in the previous games and helps the resistance against the Nazi's. TNO is the seventh Wolfenstein game and it also spawned a spin off game soon after, entitled The Old Blood. I've only played two all the way through (including this one), but I really enjoyed Wolfenstein (2009) and thought this one looked great. So let's enter General Deathshead's compound.
The game looks amazing and the in game cinematics are seen through B.J's eyes, so you feel like you're really watching the game through his perspective. At times in this game there are incredibly tense moments that make you worry if something's about to happen or not. It's like they were taken from a Tarantino movie, they're so well done. The scenes and interactions are the best parts of the game I'd say. In the first mission there is a choice for you to make, with both leading to alternative storylines, this gives the game some replayability which is always a good thing.
The game has a good selection of weapons and even has dual-weilding. Despite being a first person action game, you can also choose a stealth approach often in the game. Being equipped with throwing knives, putting a silencer on a pistol and being able to do takedowns on enemies are good ways to avoid an unnecessary battle. The game also has a perk system, where if you do the requirements you unlock an upgrade and the next objective to try and unlock more perks. This was a fun addition as I enjoyed trying to unlock all the perks and it made me try different things with what you were asked to do to unlock another perk, so I'd end up using different tactics and weapons I wouldn't usually use.
The game has health and armour and what's good is when you lose health, it regenerates but stops at a certain number depending on how much you lose. It starts at 100 and if you pick up more heath packs it becomes overcharged, but drops down until it hits 100 again. The story is a great 'what if' and interesting enough to keep you engaged, there's a rescue mission, a prison break and even a mission to the moon for all those aspiring astronauts. There's even a torture scene for the sicko's, it caters everyone's needs! The characters feel real and are well voice acted, they look great too. But the villians are by far the most memorable. General Deathshead is psychotic and Engel is terrifying (you'll find out why). There's also some unique sections involving driving and swimming so you're not always running and gunning, there's also boss battles that fit well and aren't too over the top. It's also good that the weapons have attachments like silencers and grenade launchers to give you more ways to play.
Something that was very annoying was having to pick up everything like ammo and collectables. You're always gonna want ammo if you can carry it, so why can't you just run over the ammo and collect it? It's a pain having to keep stopping to pick it up. There's a few times in the game were you have to run and jump to or off something, this should not be in the game because I died missing the jump more than being killed by Nazi's! You can lean around cover which can be useful, but in the tutorial section you have to lean under the door to shoot someone, I never used this again after that so it felt pointless being able to do it. You could also carry every possible weapon at once, including the dual wielding weapons, provided they could all be picked up in the level. This made you overpowered being able to carry so much and switch to any weapon available in the game. There's also a bunch of pointless side tasks in between missions, one for example is that you need to get a power tool, you go to the power tool box and find a note that says someone took it, you go to the person who supposedly has it and it turns out they dropped it miles away, you then go to find it and once you have it, go do the original task. A lot of effort don't you think? These should have been able to be skipped or something because they were unnecessary long.
Wolfenstein looks great and has a very unique and interesting story. It has replayability, with two alternate storylines but that's more or less all it has. Just a story, but a strong one. It's also a very short one too if you know where to go and such. The characters are the stand out feature here. I'm looking forward to playing the stand alone game, The Old Blood. I certainly wouldn't be surprised if more Wolfenstein games are announced and I'll play it for sure! See you at Castle Wolfenstein.
7.4/10
The game looks amazing and the in game cinematics are seen through B.J's eyes, so you feel like you're really watching the game through his perspective. At times in this game there are incredibly tense moments that make you worry if something's about to happen or not. It's like they were taken from a Tarantino movie, they're so well done. The scenes and interactions are the best parts of the game I'd say. In the first mission there is a choice for you to make, with both leading to alternative storylines, this gives the game some replayability which is always a good thing.
The game has a good selection of weapons and even has dual-weilding. Despite being a first person action game, you can also choose a stealth approach often in the game. Being equipped with throwing knives, putting a silencer on a pistol and being able to do takedowns on enemies are good ways to avoid an unnecessary battle. The game also has a perk system, where if you do the requirements you unlock an upgrade and the next objective to try and unlock more perks. This was a fun addition as I enjoyed trying to unlock all the perks and it made me try different things with what you were asked to do to unlock another perk, so I'd end up using different tactics and weapons I wouldn't usually use.
The game has health and armour and what's good is when you lose health, it regenerates but stops at a certain number depending on how much you lose. It starts at 100 and if you pick up more heath packs it becomes overcharged, but drops down until it hits 100 again. The story is a great 'what if' and interesting enough to keep you engaged, there's a rescue mission, a prison break and even a mission to the moon for all those aspiring astronauts. There's even a torture scene for the sicko's, it caters everyone's needs! The characters feel real and are well voice acted, they look great too. But the villians are by far the most memorable. General Deathshead is psychotic and Engel is terrifying (you'll find out why). There's also some unique sections involving driving and swimming so you're not always running and gunning, there's also boss battles that fit well and aren't too over the top. It's also good that the weapons have attachments like silencers and grenade launchers to give you more ways to play.
Something that was very annoying was having to pick up everything like ammo and collectables. You're always gonna want ammo if you can carry it, so why can't you just run over the ammo and collect it? It's a pain having to keep stopping to pick it up. There's a few times in the game were you have to run and jump to or off something, this should not be in the game because I died missing the jump more than being killed by Nazi's! You can lean around cover which can be useful, but in the tutorial section you have to lean under the door to shoot someone, I never used this again after that so it felt pointless being able to do it. You could also carry every possible weapon at once, including the dual wielding weapons, provided they could all be picked up in the level. This made you overpowered being able to carry so much and switch to any weapon available in the game. There's also a bunch of pointless side tasks in between missions, one for example is that you need to get a power tool, you go to the power tool box and find a note that says someone took it, you go to the person who supposedly has it and it turns out they dropped it miles away, you then go to find it and once you have it, go do the original task. A lot of effort don't you think? These should have been able to be skipped or something because they were unnecessary long.
Wolfenstein looks great and has a very unique and interesting story. It has replayability, with two alternate storylines but that's more or less all it has. Just a story, but a strong one. It's also a very short one too if you know where to go and such. The characters are the stand out feature here. I'm looking forward to playing the stand alone game, The Old Blood. I certainly wouldn't be surprised if more Wolfenstein games are announced and I'll play it for sure! See you at Castle Wolfenstein.
7.4/10
Friday, 27 May 2016
Crackdown (Xbox 360)
Let's get crackin'! Crackdown was released way back in 2007 and even came with a Halo 3 beta code, old right? It was one of the first dozen games I played on the 360 (also the game I was playing when I first witnessed the red ring of death! D:) and also the one of the first open world games I played on 360 too.
Crackdown is about an agency trying to bring down the crime in the city. You are an agent who becomes faster and stronger the more you build up your skills. There are three major gangs and each has seven targets for you to wipe out. Some are really difficult and a pain to get to so you want to play careful sometimes.
This game is so fun. Jumping around on rooftops and climbing buildings, blowing shit up, it's awesome. Leveling up your abilities is addicting and watching your scrawny agent change over time in to a huge beefcake makes you feel tough and it's easy on the eyes! Beating the crap out of enemies and throwing things like boxes and cars (if you're strong enough) is way more fun than shooting them.
The games story is pretty non-existent, you get the objective of 'cleaning up the city' and more or less get on with it. The only story related type of cutscenes are the updates about the boss you've discovered, when you've killed a boss and when you've wiped out a gang. They're also pretty boring so you'll most likely skip them. You have a handler in the form of a voice over, the voice is cool but when he chimes in all the time moaning at you to do stuff, I'd often greet him with a "STFU". What's really good about this game, is that you pick which boss to go after if you've discovered their location, the game isn't linear and let's you go where you choose.
The graphics are beautiful, they're in the form of cell shaded (the first game I'd even seen in this type, yes, a game of many firsts it turns out). I loved taking out the gang bosses, it felt so good to rid the city of one less boss. They were pretty difficult at times and you know you were making progress when you took one out. One cool feature was being able to target different limbs so you could disarm people or make them fall over. There's also a pretty good selection of weapons and a huge variety of cars to drive. The sound of the guns and the explosions was music to my ears. There were also a bunch of different agents for you to play as and you could also customise them but it was pretty limited. This is a great game to play in co-op and it's much more fun, so grab a buddy or make a friend if need be.
Some of the controls took some getting used to X to switch weapons and LB to reload were off putting. Your agent doesn't talk and there were no feelings I felt towards them and whenever you died you could just respawn, it just made you feel like you were expendable. Even though the limb targeting was a good idea, it was very frustrating at how easy it was to accidentally aim at their arms over their torso. It was also annoying how quick you could be overwhelmed by a few enemies, dying so fast even if you were a highly skilled agent. Also being able to aim at dead bodies was a pain, especially if you were in a big gun battle trying to kill the living rather than continuing to shoot the recently deceased. I found grenade throwing poor too as it seemed to hardly go anywhere and always seemed to damage me no matter where I stood. The driving handling was quite difficult but I preferred to run and jump around instead, it was so much better.
The game had a bunch of side stuff too like road races and rooftop racing to help your stats grow. There wasn't much else that added to the game that felt worth doing. The game was quite buggy too which I noticed more recently than back in the day. Some bosses just didn't seem to spawn, so I'd have to go to a completely different part of the map and then go back and hope they'd show. Some enemies would just flash and dissappear and would show up again when you had your back to them and were vulnerable. It made the game seem cheap. Not grabbing ledges despite facing them and losing progress of climbing a ridiculously tall building never made sense either.
Crackdown is soon to be a trilogy and I'm glad it's a game that's been a success and spawned more games. I'm surprised by how happy I was when the third game was announced at E3, I guess I liked it more than I thought. I for one am really looking forward to what CD3 will bring and will certainly plan to write a few words on it. Until then Crackdown.
7.1/10
Crackdown is about an agency trying to bring down the crime in the city. You are an agent who becomes faster and stronger the more you build up your skills. There are three major gangs and each has seven targets for you to wipe out. Some are really difficult and a pain to get to so you want to play careful sometimes.
This game is so fun. Jumping around on rooftops and climbing buildings, blowing shit up, it's awesome. Leveling up your abilities is addicting and watching your scrawny agent change over time in to a huge beefcake makes you feel tough and it's easy on the eyes! Beating the crap out of enemies and throwing things like boxes and cars (if you're strong enough) is way more fun than shooting them.
The games story is pretty non-existent, you get the objective of 'cleaning up the city' and more or less get on with it. The only story related type of cutscenes are the updates about the boss you've discovered, when you've killed a boss and when you've wiped out a gang. They're also pretty boring so you'll most likely skip them. You have a handler in the form of a voice over, the voice is cool but when he chimes in all the time moaning at you to do stuff, I'd often greet him with a "STFU". What's really good about this game, is that you pick which boss to go after if you've discovered their location, the game isn't linear and let's you go where you choose.
The graphics are beautiful, they're in the form of cell shaded (the first game I'd even seen in this type, yes, a game of many firsts it turns out). I loved taking out the gang bosses, it felt so good to rid the city of one less boss. They were pretty difficult at times and you know you were making progress when you took one out. One cool feature was being able to target different limbs so you could disarm people or make them fall over. There's also a pretty good selection of weapons and a huge variety of cars to drive. The sound of the guns and the explosions was music to my ears. There were also a bunch of different agents for you to play as and you could also customise them but it was pretty limited. This is a great game to play in co-op and it's much more fun, so grab a buddy or make a friend if need be.
Some of the controls took some getting used to X to switch weapons and LB to reload were off putting. Your agent doesn't talk and there were no feelings I felt towards them and whenever you died you could just respawn, it just made you feel like you were expendable. Even though the limb targeting was a good idea, it was very frustrating at how easy it was to accidentally aim at their arms over their torso. It was also annoying how quick you could be overwhelmed by a few enemies, dying so fast even if you were a highly skilled agent. Also being able to aim at dead bodies was a pain, especially if you were in a big gun battle trying to kill the living rather than continuing to shoot the recently deceased. I found grenade throwing poor too as it seemed to hardly go anywhere and always seemed to damage me no matter where I stood. The driving handling was quite difficult but I preferred to run and jump around instead, it was so much better.
The game had a bunch of side stuff too like road races and rooftop racing to help your stats grow. There wasn't much else that added to the game that felt worth doing. The game was quite buggy too which I noticed more recently than back in the day. Some bosses just didn't seem to spawn, so I'd have to go to a completely different part of the map and then go back and hope they'd show. Some enemies would just flash and dissappear and would show up again when you had your back to them and were vulnerable. It made the game seem cheap. Not grabbing ledges despite facing them and losing progress of climbing a ridiculously tall building never made sense either.
Crackdown is soon to be a trilogy and I'm glad it's a game that's been a success and spawned more games. I'm surprised by how happy I was when the third game was announced at E3, I guess I liked it more than I thought. I for one am really looking forward to what CD3 will bring and will certainly plan to write a few words on it. Until then Crackdown.
7.1/10
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