Battlefield 3

My mind has been officially scattered all over the wall. I just watched the Battlefield 3 Caspian Border Multiplayer trailer and holy crap is it amazing. It once again proves how much of an edge EA and DICE has over Activision and Infinity Ward and their Call of Duty series.

If I were them, I'd start toning down the hype on MW3 cause there is no way they can match this. I might even have to rebuild my entire computer just to play BF3. Something I will do gladly.

Seriously, I nearly had a spaz attack when I watched this.

(on a side note, you shouldn't watch if you have epilepsy or are allergic to awesomesauce)

and Lolz @ 1:34. Watch and you'll see what I mean.

Homefront

The year is 2027. The US has been devestated by a tactical EMP and then a millitary invasion by the United Korea which controls the Eastern US up to the Mississippi river, which has been contaminated. New Orleans is a dead zone and the Korean People's Army rules with brutal force. The US Millitary is fractured and in chaos. In the East, members of resistance cells fight back against their oppressors. With hit and run tactics, they seek to end the oppression.

Homefront is the latest from Kaos studios and published by THQ.  It's an FPS set in heartland America after the millitary invasion of the United States by The United Korea. On the surface, it seems like almost a garden variety shooter. Run and gun, shoot em up kind of thing. But below that, Kaos has created something quite interesting.

Thanks to the help of the writer for both Red Dawn and Apocalypse Now, Homefront paints a bleak picture of a future America that is ravaged and eve the most basic of needs is scarce and the enemy controls every facet of life. One thing that really sets the game apart is the locations and battlefields. Where most shooters will be set in a massive battlefield, or a burned out city. Homefront takes place, for the most part, in backyards and cul-de-sacs. In neighborhoods that are not easily recognizable and familier, yet unknown. You'll fight KPA soliders though playgrounds and streets, fighting to regain your homeland. And beyond that you'll find yourself up against American Survivalists. The story is amazing. The locations of exquisit. The downside is that the story is quite short, only 7 missions. But they are long missions, for sure. Still, I finished it while I did feel sated, I felt myself yearning for more. I certainly hope Kaos builds on it and develops a sequel.

You take control of a former USMC pilot by the name of Robert Jacobs. And that is all that is told about the character. You never see your face. You never hear your voice. But you, as the player, will feel connected to the character quite quickly. You are teamed with three other characters, Conner Morgan, Rianna and Hopper.

Kaos does many things right with this game. Chief among them, is the AI. They are ruthless and well coordinated for the most part. But they do switch it up and become annoyingly redundant at other times (especially after you've been killed 20 times trying to get through the same 5 minutes). The switch up in tactics has the effect of keeping you on your toes through the game.


Overall, Kaos does an amazing job of making something truly spectacular. It may not be groundbreaking, but the story makes up for any lack of real originality in gameplay.

9 out of 10. Amazing, but lacking in story length.


Home. Home is where the war is.

Ubisoft

I love how Ubisoft tries to justify their use of over the top DRM (Digital Rights Management) software. They say that it "protects their product from pirates". They say other things too, but it all goes back to that.

Amazing how simple a lie, eh?

Ubisoft has come under much fire from gamers and the gaming community for it's paranoid and OCD use of DRM software. Quite a few of their games are so controlled that the gamer must maintain a constant internet connection in order to be allowed to play the game, so that Ubisoft servers can validate the software that it is authentic and legally purchased.

it is a load of bull crap.

Aside from a few mentions, most of the people I know pirate Ubisoft games for this reason. The company then goes out and says that "It's their fault! Look they pirated it and we have to protect our money, I mean games" When they don't understand that by putting in such DRM software and making it so much of a headfuck to actually play the game, that they drive people away from wanting the games themselves and that people will gladly pirate a copy to avoid having to jump through the 353 or so hoops just to be able to play their legally purchased copy. Frankly, I do not blame them.

Now, on the one hand, I'm not really supportive of piracy. I believe that if a developer takes the time to make a great game, that they should not have to stand their product being stolen and used with no reward for such a good title.

On the other hand, I support piracy, especially with Ubisoft games, because if a company is going to go OUT OF THEIR WAY to make it hard for and basically say "fuck you" to it's loyal customers, just so they hope to discourage a few piraters and make a few extra bucks, then I say, Pirate away, maties.

As I've said time and time again, the best way to combat piracy is to lower the prices on the games and not make it so that the gamer has to jump through endlessly frustrating hoops to enjoy a game. By the time they get to the game, it's not fun from all the frustration.

STEAM does DRM very well. They don't fuck people over and they respect their customers. Ubisoft does not. I say boycott them. Maybe when none of their games sell, they will finally learn.

Video Game studies

There seems to be a fairly obvious pattern when it comes to video game studies and how they effect people, mainly kids and teens. It seems to me that a new one will come out every month or two and will be basically the opposite of the last one. One comes out that says something to the extent of "Oh, video games don't have many downside effects to them at all. Our study proved that" and then the next one will come out saying "Video games have serious health effects and children should be banned from using them or they will become braindead morons and fail at life completely" and then after that another one will be released saying "Well, despite some minor effects like insomia and mild headaches, there are very few issues to be had with playing video games and none of them are of real consequence"


Okay, first, seriously? I mean, it's like there is a organization of people who do all these studies and rebrand them every month or so. It's sending mixed messages and it's going to leave people with more questions then answers and really won't get to the issue. Then again, if you ask me, the issue itself is a media manipulation to control people more. It's sad and not giving truth to anyone. What kicks it is that the people who are the focuses of the studies are at both ends of the extremes. Either exteremely addicted gamers who spend every waking second playing or casual gamers who rarely play, but are playing more just for the sake of the "studies"

This needs to stop.

Mafia 2 demo

I just finished playing the Mafia 2 demo. It was basically what I had expected, Set in 1950s USA, the game featured one mission that showed off most of the key parts of the game - driving, shooting and most of the mechanics.

You start off playing Vito, an Italian immigrant trying grab a slice of the cake that is the "American dream". The mission that you are given is basically a hit mission and it shows off several of the game systems. You get to use a small variety of weapons, and I have a feeling that the small variety isn't going to change. Over the course of the demo, you use a wall-mounted machine gun and then you have your fists as well as a 9mm pistol, shotgun and the infamous gangster "Tommy Gun" Thompson Submachine gun. As well as you have to drive through bits of the city. Now, the driving bit is where I noticed the hardest part of the game. And while I won't say too much, I will say that it does need some tweaking, but I think by now 2K Czech is well beyond that. Either that, or the cars really do handle like 1950's Chevy autos.

I'm not sure which I would prefer....

All in all, the game is amazingly well done, so far anyway.

Also, I got enough into it that I had to bribe a cop. I didn't see that coming.

The demo is now available on Playstation Network, Xbox Live Marketplace and Steam. I highly recommend downloading it.

The real downside is that you only get 10 minutes ingame play, which is just enough time to finish the mission or play around. Your choice.

Game Review - Beat Hazard (2010)

I just found this game and decided to play a few rounds.


Holy crap. It was the most trippy thing I have ever played. It goes through your music files and you can select tracks to play too. It's like Rock Band or Guitar Hero or even DJ Hero, but you know, ACTUALLY GOOD, which was suprising, and not unpleasant.

the gameplay is fairly simple, it plays like Asteroids and those kind of "top down" shooter games, but adds in the whole music element which adds in a whole new element of awesome.

It looks simple. and it is. W A S D and a mouse is all that is needed (well, music tracks too, I suppose). And the filesize is small, but amazingly impressive. The game comes with several tracks built in, but you can also mess around and do really crazy stuff like this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vIbNBkRx8gg

OH THE HUMANITY.

Go out and get this game. Now. If you don't, you are the most lame person on the planet.
http://rs758tl4.rapidshare.com/files/388649550/2623707/Beat_WarezFreaks.Org.rar
^if you are too cheap to buy it.

Just Cause 2

minor spoilers ahead.

Before I begin, let me start by saying that YES, I know this has been out for awhile. I've been too busy playing it too actually review it, so here goes.

JC2 is one of those games that you might look at and not think much of from the cover, but it is amazing. A cross between Grand Theft Auto, Mercenaries and Spider-Man. That sounds cool, and it is. It's very much like GTA and Mercenaries in that you play as a character running around in an open world doing whatever the hell you want (unlike in Mercs, you don't get penalized for killing civvies). You play as Rico Rodreguiez, an agent for the creativly named US organization called "The Agency" (my hunch is C.I.A., but there is no hints to that). The game takes place on the fictional South East Asian island nation of Panau. A place where, despite the tropical local, the climate is wide and varied, from a large desert to the South-West to the snow capped mountains and the tropical savanna in most of the map.

The map itself is huge. Massive even. about 5-6 times as large as GTA: San Andreas + Mercenaries 2 maps. With 369 villiages, millitary bases/airports/communication outposts/ports and a few smaller cities beside the main capital city which, in itself, is massive. (I'm about about 71% and I've been playing for about 76 hours. Yes, that large.) Vehicles of all types are readily available for use. From motorbikes and small, 3-wheeled taxis, to sedans, sports cars, hummvees, tanks, helicopters, planes (both millitary and civillian), as well as both millitary and civillian boats. Really, the only type of vehicle that the game should've had added was submarines. But oh well, maybe in JC3.

The wrist mounted grapple and redeployable stunt parachute are the real gems of this game, they make it amazingly unique. The grapple can be used for simple tasks, like pulling Rico towards vehicles or complicated tasks like wiring two vehicles together. Either way, it makes the game amazingly fun. The parachute allows Rico to base jump from very high up and land safely no matter what.

When Edios Interactive, Square Enix and Avalanche Studios made this game they took the physics book and tossed it out the window. Rico can pull stunts that would kill a real human (or even some game characters), but isn't affected much at all. For example, you can fall hundreds of meters to the ground, pull your parachute at about 5 meters and be perfectly fine, just stumble a bit. It makes for some reallllllllly fun game play.

The enemy AI is fairly interesting, they aren't too stupid, but tend to favour running and gunning with overwhelming firepower to tactics. The downside is that it actually works. They call in Helicopters outfitted with miniguns and rocket launchers when needed to deliver a powerful punch and handheld weapons are also fairly powerful, the Machine Gun being one of the more powerful ones.

Speaking of weapons, the game features quite a few different ones, or so it seems, they quickly seem to be a bit repetitive, but seem is the operative word thar. However, they could've put in a bit more variety of guns, but the ones they did are fairly good. Scattered around the map are weapon and vehicle upgrade crates, which can be used to, what else, upgrade weapons and vehicles that you can buy from the black market contact. Each weapon has 6 levels up upgrade. One it starts with and 5 more to upgrade with. The other side of the upgrade system is that the enemies ALSO get the upgraded weapons, so it makes it a bit harder.

The real area where the game flounders is in the characters voice acting. Just so bad, and not one of those so-bad-it's-actually-funny things, it's more like so-bad-it-makes-you-cringe. The accents are off key and just terrible.

Final thoughts.

Excellent game. Well put together and thought out. An excellent job in most areas. A few that could use improvements (aiming and voice acting). 9.6/10

On a side note, this game is best played with rock music in the background, like AC/DC or something. makes it that much more fun.

Iron Man 2

quick warning: spoilers included.

Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark/Iron Man
Don Cheadle as Lt. Colonel James "Rhode" Rhodes/War Machine
Mickey Rourke as Ivan Vanko/Whiplash
Scarlett Johansson as Natalie Rushman/Natasha Romanoff/Black Widow
Gwyneth Paltrow as Pepper Potts
Sam Rockwell as Justin Hammer
Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury











I'll admit it, I'm a sucker for movies like this. I love everything about them and IM2 is no exception. This movie had me from the start. As it started, I knew I was going to love it. That said, I do have some points to make.

Now, in more detail.

I did love almost everything about this movie. It was well written and had a lot of good moments. The characters, despite there being a lot of them and all intertwined, all fit together very well. The movie also wraps together several other characters and continues to take strides towards "The Avengers" movie bringing in characters like Black Widow as well as other classic Iron Man characters like War Machine, which makes a dramatic entrance

Badass.

The scene on the Monaco track with Stark driving the F1 and facing off against Whiplash was really well done. Slicing several cars in half with the whips was pretty awesome, but a bit overdone. One or two would've had a really good effect, but 4 was a bit much.

The movie is based around 4 things, Tony Stark's being poisoned, Justin Hammer of Hammer Industries being Tony Stark's business competitor and rival and Ivan Vanko's desire to get revenge on Tony stark for what his father, Howard Stark, did to Vanko's father. Suprisingly neither Natasha Romanoff, nor Ivan Vanko are referred to by their alias names of Black Widow and Whiplash, respectivly.

As the movie goes on and Tony really starts to believe that he is dying, he starts to get a bit wilder and uncontrollable. Turning Stark Industries over to Pepper Potts and making her CEO and some drunken antics during his birthday party, which saw him dancing around drunkenly in the Iron Man suit and Rhode having to suit up in the Mark 2 armor to try and bring Tony under control. A fight ensues between Starks and Rhode that ends with Rhode flying off in the Mark 2 armor and a good part of Stark's home being heavily damaged.

After the millitary (and by extension, Justin Hammer) get ahold of the armor, they soup it up and add it crap loads of weapons, leading to the birth of the War Machine. The majority of the movie is just building up to the final fight between Iron Man + War Machine versus a crapload of drones.

Something like this.

After that fight finishes, a newly armored Whiplash enters the arena and continues the fight. Which has the usual result. Afterwards Rhode mentions that he is going to "hang on" to the War Machine armor.

All in all, a fairly awesome movie. A lot of tidbits towards other marvel characters and movies.

In review 4.5/5. A couple bits could've been changed a bit, but otherwise awesome. Go see it. And watch for the small scene AFTER the credits.