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Review: Birds of Steel

By
Don Parsons
– April 9, 2012Posted in: PS3, Reviews, Xbox 360

Designing a flying game for consoles that pushes the genre forward is getting harder to do. On one hand, you have Ace Combat, which took the genre into an action packed, cinematic experience and Air Conflicts: Secret Wars  delivered a unique story set during World War II. Gaijin Entertainment moves the group into a more free and user-friendly area with custom missions, dynamic campaigns and the biggest selection of airplanes on consoles. This is the Gran Turismo/Forza Motorsports of aerial combat games.

The whole presentation of Birds of Steel far exceeds anything I imagined. The graphics (both for the airplanes and the environments) are some of the best I have seen when it comes to a game of this kind. Realistically modeled airplanes (and there are over 100, mind you) offer various specs, individual plane bios and even some limited-but-nifty customization options. Some planes have various skins, but any plane can be customized with various decals. Remember pictures showing those hot women spreads across the nose of airplanes? Yes, that is an option.

It’s hard to describe the feeling of flying over Hawaii in an F2A-3 fighter plane, patrolling the Pacific Ocean for Japanese planes. The water has a beautifully realistic aesthetic to it, and the way the sun peeks through the clouds is actually breathtaking. I lost count of how many times I zoned out in sheer awe at the beauty. Coupled with the sound of the engine whirring while I led my four-man crew across the ocean, I can’t think of another game in the genre that looks and sounds this good.

There are two types of earnings in Birds of Steel; one is XP which levels up your pilot and unlocks more planes. The other is currency which will allow you to purchase any unlocked airplane. The hangar is separated into countries and then split into trees to show the progression of planes you can get. It usually starts with a fighter on one side and a bomber on the other, branching down to progressively better planes. XP is earned in every mission, but money to purchase planes is only earned in a few different modes, mainly Dyanmic Campaigns and online play.

The Historical Campaigns don’t yield money, which is a shame because it’s a great mode to play through. Every mission is set up with real footage from World War II and a narrator preparing you with what had happened prior to whatever series of missions you are about to partake in. After the tutorial campaign, you have two selections to pick from; an American campaign and Japanese campaign. Whether you have the required plane unlocked or not, you can partake in every mission. The footage is great for history buffs and well presented, but not earning money made me not want to spend too much time in this mode in one sitting.

Dynamic Campaigns allow you to manipulate certain factors and fight through a series of user-selected missions, such as Air Patrol, Bomb Carrier or Head-to-Head Combat. With the variety of settings, and the ever-evolving war you are fighting, it makes for some interesting sittings. You can’t save a Dynamic Campaign, though, which is another small knock against the game.

If competitive flying is your thing, Birds of Steel delivers. Unlike some of the other flying games I have played and reviewed, there are people actually playing online and it’s not hard to get into a room. Hopping into a quick match is easy, but you can also browse available rooms (which shows the handling model used if you only play a certain way). Online modes are a great way to earn both XP and cash for planes.

There’s a few different physics models in the game, so no matter what your experience level with flying is, you can get into the action. Simplified physics give novice pilots that feeling of control, while realistic physics make flying drastically more difficult.

One of the minor problems I had was with bombing, and the bomb target indicator. I generally fly with the camera above-and-behind (Note: third-airplane instead of third-person just didn’t sound right..) the plane, and the color of the target recticle blended in too much with the environments. The light grey color was too hard to work with, even when changing camera views.

Birds of Steel accomplishes so much in one budget title ($40 USD is far too generous) that it’s hard not to recommend to even the most-casual fans of the genre. With more planes than most games combined and a surreal, authentic aesthetic, Birds of Steel soars above its competition and raises the bar for future air-combat games.

Note: This review is based on gameplay on the Playstation 3 console with material provided by the publisher. Birds of Steel is also available on the Xbox 360.

Pros:

  • Dynamic Campaigns keep things fresh
  • wonderfully-presented Historical Campaigns with real footage
  • more planes than you can shake a stick at
  • budget priced!

Cons:

  • bombing recticle hard to work with
  • no money earned in Historical Campaign
  • you can’t save in the middle of a Dynamic Campaign

Score: 4/5

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Review: Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City

By
Don Parsons
– April 5, 2012Posted in: PS3, Reviews, Xbox 360

Have you ever wondered what really happened back in Raccoon City during the initial outbreak of the T-Virus? Have you ever been curious how a more shooter-centric Resident Evil title would feel? Capcom delivers on both fronts with Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City, developed by Slant Six Games. This is not your typical Resident Evil title, but that was how Capcom wanted it: The developer’s goal was a “squad-based shooter set during the early Resident Evil games”.

Operation Raccoon City takes place during the timeframe of Resident Evils 2 & 3. You control a small group of mercenaries sent into Raccoon City by Umbrella Security Services (USS) to help clean up the evidence linking the disaster to Umbrella. Spanning seven missions, you’ll battle your share of zombies, soldiers, Lickers, Hunters and even a few Tyrants as you go about doing the bidding of the USS. You will also see some familiar faces from past Resident Evil games (I won’t spoil those if you don’t know).

Each character fits snugly into a generic class; Assault, Medic, Recon, Surveillance, Scientist and Demolition. I liked the characters’ designs, but their abilities (outside of the passive abilities) all seemed irrelevant during the campaign. Each character has two passive abilities and three active abilities, as well as a starting gun loadout. Experience earned in the game is per user, not character, so you can buy guns and abilities no matter what character you use and one gun purchase is all that is required to use it with everyone. While the abilities can be upgraded, weapons cannot which was a letdown to me.

During the campaign, only a few active abilities were of any use. You could tell they were designed for multiplayer, but even during the multiplayer I rarely used them. While a good idea, and I’m sure some people would argue their usage, I have more success without them. Still, The Medic’s “cure infection” is a winning ability, and Surveillance’s “items on radar” ability made getting collectables easier when trying to get an S rank on missions.

The plot was an interesting “behind the scenes”  look at the early Resident Evil games, so if you like the series’ canon, you shouldn’t be disappointed. On the opposite side of things, the campaign is rather short. Leaving the replayability argument alone for the time being, completing the game in five hours was rather disappointing in regards to the story. If you are into trophies, this is a positive thing as the trophies encourage multiple playthroughs. One side of me wanted to see more of what happened back in Raccoon City, but the other was ready to be finished with the campaign and not look back.

The whole campaign is drop-in co-op, so at any time you can invite a friend and if they leave, you just keep on playing by yourself. However, if you get disconnected and your game turns into an “offline” game, you can’t invite anyone in until the game is over. Your squad is a four-person team, so if someone bails in the middle of a mission, the AI will jump in and fill the role.

If someone dies, reviving them can be a tricky process. See, when upon death you drop your gun so that someone else can pick it up (I assume mostly to please at Versus crowd). Me and my wife played through the campaign and when either of us would die, it quickly became a cursing contest of me yelling to hurry and revive me and her yelling at me that she was trying (oh, and the game does not support split-screen; this was done on two PS3′s with two copies of the game), or vice-versa. The whole time, you are walking around in a circle trying to find the revive prompt. Instead, you keep picking up and swapping guns. While it should be said this was not always the case, it is very noticable when you are pinned down by snipers and trying to revive a teammate.

Playing solo, you are accompanied by three AI players. Anyone that remembers Resident Evil 5 (I know, I know, I swore not to compare this to a prior Resident Evil game, my apologies) surely remember the bad AI you were forced to play with in singleplayer. Take that, and multiply it by three. Sure, they help shoot enemies at times, but like most games with AI partners, when you actually want their help, they are standing off to the side not doing anything. Oh, and that First Aid Spray you need? Sorry, your partner got to it first. Unlike Resident Evil 5, you can’t manage their (small) inventory of items, either.

Before I jump into the fun part of Operation Raccoon City, let me say the enemies in the campaign are complete bullet sponges. You can unload a round of bullets from an assault rifle into an enemy and they just keep firing. Zombies are a little quicker to kill, thankfully, as they are what you will see the most of. Humans in the game take an obscene amount of firepower to kill, and even headshots don’t kill people in a realistic fashion.

Luckily, Operation Raccoon City features a well-designed cover mechanic. Walk up to a wall, box or any other obvious piece of cover and you snap to cover. It’s very easy to use, and works wonders for the style of shooter it tries to be.

Versus mode comes in a few different variants, all played in two teams of four. While that number seems small, you are also on the field with various zombie types, including some of the specialty B.O.W.’s (Lickers, Hunters, etc.). The maps are rather large, so if your sole goal is to find other players and run through the hordes of zombies, you won’t be given much fun in that regard. It was a lot of fun mowing down zombies, racking up kills and eventually finding my way to a person and killing them. Versus mode is geared towards a more tactical audience and I’ve come across some pretty tricky squads, but the majority of people playing (on PS3 at least) are going solo.

Survivors mode, my favorite, has your team pitted against the other team in what seems like a deathmatch. The more you die, though, the longer it takes to respawn. After so much time passes, a helicopter lands on on the map and you are then tasked with getting to it. The catch is, there are only four seats and if your math is as good as mine, eight people on the field fighting over four seats causes just a little chaos.

The other three modes, Team Deathmatch (just as it sounds only with zombies), Heroes (protect your Heroes and kill the opposing Heroes; when you die, you respawn as a regular soldier) and Biohazard (a G-Virus sample spawns and both teams fight to bring it back to their base), were all a lot of fun, but Survivors created the most dynamic outcomes and allowed people who weren’t so good at the killing part get a bonus for surviving.

It’s worth noting that (as I mentioned) I played through the entire campaign with my wife, someone who could not get into Resident Evil 5 with me and enjoys shooters but isn’t great at them. Operation Raccoon City was easy for her to jump into, and I was asked almost nightly if we were going to play. So the game can appeal to people unfamiliar with the series, or even the action-shooter genre. Above all, this is a multiplayer experience. We probably had more fun the second time through trying to get S+ ranks on all the missions. We were trying harder, skipping the story segments and generally rushing through while actually coordinating so we both got a high rank.

Contrary to what the negative press reaction might lead you to think, Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City delivered some good times. While I don’t feel it lived up to expectations, there is still some fun to be had. Outside of a few gripes, I really enjoyed my time with the game, and will continue playing multiplayer for the next few months. The camera, a large step forward in the series, is definitely something Resident Evil 6 needs to look at when designing the next real Resident Evil. All in all, people not looking to mingle and get their competitive game-on should steer clear. But if you are after some zombies to kill and have a buddy or two, Operation Raccoon City may just be up your alley.

Note: This review is based on gameplay on the Playstation 3 console purchased by the reviewer. The game is also available on the X360.

Pros:

  • Best camera in series so far
  • The canon is interesting for fans of the franchise
  • Surviors multiplayer mode madness!
  • Great cover system

Cons:

  • Revive mechanic is a pain to work with
  • Enemies take far too many bullets to kill
  • Terrible AI (both enemy and partner)

Score: 3/5

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Review: Tiger Woods PGA Tour 13

By
Don Parsons
– March 31, 2012Posted in: PS3, Reviews, Xbox 360

Note: This review is based on gameplay on the Playstation 3 console with material received by the publisher. The game is also available on the X360.

Golf games strike a certain chord with me. I’m not sure why but I don’t really question it. I’ve been playing Tiger Woods games for about ten years now. I don’t actually golf, nor have I even swung a golf club. But the Tiger Woods games have always made me feel like I could walk onto the green and make things happen. This year is no different, and lots of wonderful tweaks and additions make Tiger Woods PGA Tour 13 a considerable leap forward in the series.

The Career mode starts you off as an amateur and lets you pick between a few tournaments to enter. This was my favorite portion of the game, as I watched my likeness rise in fame. The “Create A Golfer” seemed a little lacking in options, however, the character models look beautiful. There were many times I just put the controller down while at the tee and watched the wind rustle my clothes while birds chirped in the background.

I would have liked more hair options during character creation, but the other facial properties are widely customizable. As you progress through your career and complete various sponsor challenges, you’ll unlock more clothes to outfit yourself. I will say, that green jacket is awfully snazzy after winning the Masters tournament.

New to PGA Tour 13 are pins. These boost various stats, or give you more XP/coins/status points. You start with a few, which can spoil you greatly in the beginning, and getting more requires you to spend in-game currency (coins). Each pin only has so many uses, but can be refilled and “leveled up” by obtaining a duplicate pin, which grants a greater bonus. The catch is that you can only pick up to three pins to bring onto the course with you. While it seems like a rather small addition, it is very helpful at the start of your golfing career.

One of the more interesting ways to use your hard-earned coins is to purchase a round of golf on the DLC courses. Each course has a “Course Mastery”, a list of objectives to accomplish as you play through the course (ie. 50 Career Birdies). If you completely master one of the DLC courses, you earn the right to play it anytime you want. This neat little feature needs to continue (and make its way into other games), and gives you a reason to spend some coins on a few rounds at TPC San Antonio.

The actual swing-mechanics in the game have been overhauled this year, too. Focusing on your tempo, you take the left stick back then forward — a common gesture in the series — in a rythmic fashion. The dynamics of this change with your timing, so you can manipulate your distance by swinging faster to drive the ball a little further. This new system, coupled with the Swing Meter (the visual representation of your swing power), give a more realistic approach to the genre and allow a more authentic representation to the sport.

Golf fanatics get a treat as they can play through “Tiger’s Legacy”, a point-by-point retelling of Tiger Woods’ golf career. You start as “Toddler Tiger”, with a short story about the era you are about to play. It’s an amusing way to bring a real story into the franchise, and a welcome addition to the features PGA Tour 13 brings to the table.

The online receives an overhaul and is taking steps into a more social experience with Country Clubs. You can create a club, or join a club, but can only be a part of one club at a time. The idea is genuine, and presents itself well. You (and your club mates) earn status points as you play the game, which contribute to your country club. So you are always contributing to your club’s rank. If your club happens to have quite a few members, you can even participate in club tournaments, or you can pair up with a club mate and challenge another club. It’s a well-conceived feature that develops the online play into more of a community atmosphere.

Move controls return to the game, and while I enjoyed driving the ball with it, putting was a catastrophe. I’ve played putt-putt. I’m actually pretty decent at it. So I figured putting would have been similar. But I felt it was very inconsistent and failed to add any sort of value to the experience (outside of frustrating). I am willing to admit this could have been me and my Move arrangement, which works well for most Move-enabled titles.

At times, when putting, I could slowly tap the ball and it would chip the ball over the hole. Other times it would do the complete opposite and tap the ball two feet. Driving the ball on the fairway, on the other hand, was a treat. After a few bad swings to get a feel for things, you get the point very quickly.

The enhancements to this years Tiger Woods game offer a fresh experience and continue to build onto the franchise. Instead of updating the graphics, and adding one or two new changes, PGA Tour 13 updates nearly every aspect of the game: overhauled online community, the ability to get DLC courses without actually paying for them, in-game currency with items to buy, and more. The only disappointing part about Tiger Woods PGA Tour 13 was putting with the Move. And that doesn’t even apply to everyone.

Pros:

  • New community feature, Country Clubs
  • You can earn the ability to play on DLC courses without buying them
  • Layers of difficulty for everyone (new people can use the Caddie to help direct their shots)

Cons:

  • Putting with the Move feels inconsistent

Score: 4/5

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PS3: Shoot Many Robots

By
Khristopher Reardon
– March 30, 2012Posted in: PS3, Reviews, Xbox 360

Shoot Many Robots is my favorite painful pleasure this year and will probably be the reason I destroy both my monitor and controller sometime in the near future. This game is both completely wonderful and utterly frustrating in the same breath, but it’s nothing that video gaming’s ‘old guard’ hasn’t seen before.

Developer Demiurge wants to take you on a plunge into a dystopian future where robots have run amok, causing a robot apocalypse or ‘robotcalypse.’ You take on the role of P. Walter Tugnut, a beer swilling, nut tugging son of a gun with a penchant for robo-pistol whippery as you go out to, well, Shoot Many Robots.

This game feels a lot like old school side scrolling shooters Metal Slug, Contra, and even Ghosts n Goblins, but it also adds in the ability to fully customize your character with custom load outs like a lot of the more modern shooter genre games. You also level up your character which adds to the damage you do and your overall health.

The coolest thing about Shoot Many Robots is that it’s an online 4-player co-operative game, allowing you to throw three of your beer swilling compatriots into the trailer to take on the robot infested terrain together.

My advice is to get some friends in on the mix, because when I used the matchmaking feature I didn’t have much luck finding partners to blaze down the dusty trails with.

Shoot Many Robots is pretty basic; is it moving? Shoot it! Do you think it will move? You should probably shoot it! Sounds simple enough but make no mistake, this game is a steep climb.

This game starts out pretty easy but the difficulty shoots up significantly as you progress. I’ve got a character that’s level 42, quickly ascending to the 50 cap and though I’ve finished the game on normal, on hard I’m quickly grinding to a halt, I don’t even want to think about what this game will be like on insane. Shoot Many Robots was obviously made to accomodate people playing co-op to clear out hordes in later levels, but if you want to play this one solo you’re going to find the need to grind through old levels in order to be able to get the gear and experience you need to move on.

The gear is an awesome addition to this kind of game, it allows you to really tune your character to your preference. You can go in with all guns blazing or you can take a more defensive tact; this allows players to vary their team setup for the different situations they’ll encounter.

The grinding aspect of the game isn’t too bad though. Considering the source material for this kind of game, spending a few extra playthroughs on a couple of older levels isn’t quite as bad as being sent back to the start to play everything all over again. Grinding can also yield unlocks for new weapons and more ‘nuts’ (the game’s currency) to spend on new equipment.

Speaking of nuts, as you play the game you’ll find a meter in the top of the screen which fills as you kill enemies. It peaks at 5x and acts as a multiplier for the nuts you’ll pick up of of defeated enemies. In order to keep the meter from depleting and knocking you back down to lower multipliers, you have to continuously defeat enemies. This acts as incentive to keep moving forward and to take chances against more difficult enemies.

There’s a good amount of enemy variety. You’ll mostly see these tiny robots with chainsaw on their backs throughout the game, these generally come in large groups and attack you Zerg style. They’re easy to deal with one on one but they can easily swarm you as you progress, often pouring out of every opening in the scenery like a clown pulling handkerchiefs from its sleeve.

This can be grating at times, as the game simply wants to overwhelm you. Often time I found myself bouncing above scores of enemies shooting down. This can be quite frustrating, especially if you spend four minutes in a level jumping around like an idiot only to die. When the enemies become that thick you either outmaneuver them or you go back to earlier stages in a hope to grind to a level up or get newer more powerful gear. This really cuts into the flow of the game, but for an old school side scrolling shooter like this it’s nothing new. I’d just grab a water, come back and keep playing.

Other enemies will become more tricky and diabolical as you move through the game, requiring you to knock back their bullets with your melee attack or shoot their missiles out of the sky before they home in on you and obliterate your health bar. It can become downright enraging as you get to a point in the level where you’re fending off several shooting robots while swarms of chainsaw wielding bots carpet the ground beneath you, forcing you to constantly jump and shoot or use an ability for crowd control.

There are two special abilities that allow you to crowd control these zerging bots if you aren’t hitting them with your gun. You can equip a slide maneuver which allows you to damage and knock down foes who you collide with, or you can equip a slam which acts much like the ground pound in Mario games. Both are fairly effective but risky a lot of the time, and either really aren’t dedicated to your character as you have to equip items which allow you to use them.

One of my favorite parts of the game is the rocking guitar in the background that plays during your rampage. It goes from a somewhat light solo during the lighter battles to really heavy when you are in the thick of battle. It’s like whoever has the guitar suddenly gets a pang of inspiration whenever he sees blood drenched robots pouring in from every corner of the screen and it really suits the tone of this game well.

This game is pretty funny. The entire game is a riff on the idea of the robotcalypse idea. The in game text is drenched in humorous one liners including false statistics like boosts to patriotism for every flag bearing weapon you can buy. There are also references to the nuts sacks you collect and even the less-than-subtle toilet flush when you exit your inventory will draw a chuckle every so often. The gear will allow you to dress P. Walter Tugnut in any crazy way you want, you can make him a ballerina in a tutu and fairy wings or you can just have the “Fruit Fucker” of Penny Arcade fame make sweet love to his balding head as you play. You’ll also get ridiculous items, like a cat carrier that shoots giant bombs, or a baby carrier which gives you, well, “plus one babies.”

It even fits the slightly cel-shaded look of the game which was an excellent choice for this downloadable title.

This game delivers a lot of content for its price tag. It asks 10 bucks for a game that I think has delivered a lot more than most downloadable titles I’ve seen recently at a higher price of admission. Even if you go in on nostalgia for those older games alone, there’s not much to regret taking the plunge on this game.

Note: The Playstation Network version of this game was played for review. Shoot Many Robots is also available on the Xbox Live Marketplace on Xbox 360

Pros

  • The price of admission isn’t too steep
  • A huge array of items to customize your character with
  • Online four player co-op

Cons

  • Can be very frustrating when the game decides to suddenly turn up the difficulty
  • Grinding becomes boring and monotonous
  • Calling beers ‘juice’ in the PS3 version. C’mon!!!

4/5

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Review: Armored Core V

By
Don Parsons
– March 25, 2012Posted in: PS3, Reviews, Xbox 360


Welcome, Mercenary. You will pilot and outfit your very own Amored Core (referred to as an AC); a large mechanized fighting vehicle. You will be sent on various missions varying in difficulty. Diligent soldiers will be paid well, so the more you work the more money you have to upgrade your AC. Now go find some like-minded soldiers, join a team and good luck.

You can play Armored Core V by yourself, but you can tell that developer From Software had team work and social interaction in mind when they made their latest entry in the Armored Core series. You start by entering your pilot data and going through a brief tutorial so you can grasp the controls. Then, before getting into heavy combat, you finalize the process by either forming your own team or joining one. After this short bit of an introduction comes the overwelming part, menus.

Armored Core V’s menu system serves its purpose. You have a map tab to start missions, a tab for the workshop to customize your mech, and a team tab to see team happenings. It feels a little clunky and I feel they could have been much more streamlined so that you aren’t switching tabs on a constant basis (and going to the wrong one). That said, it does work.

Customizing your AC probably consumed 1/3 of my playtime. This is probably the most overwhelming part about the game, especially to newcomers who aren’t familiar with the series. There are SO many options (over 500 to be exact) that your first hour with the game will probably be spent just sorting through them. Do you want a lightweight AC with rapid fire weapons? You can do it. Are you thinking about a mech with tank-treads instead of legs? You can do it. How about a reverse-jointed juggernaut with shoulder missiles, a battle rifle in one hand, and a standard rifle in the other? Yeah, that was mine.

The part that can consume you is the volume of choices you have. There are three weapon types and, while you have a variety of weapons (each doing their own damage type), the options you have for body parts is staggering. It gets difficult in later stages to clear the missions with a “generic” AC, which is what I did. Most body parts (head, body and arms) have choices between the three types, so you can mix things up to cover weaknesses in other areas, or just be strong against one type of damage.

If you decide to play the game “lone wolf”-style, that’s fine. But having friends makes everything better, right? In Armored Core V’s case, it does. I did not get much play time with the competitive modes, but you can duel another player or compete in a free-for-all type match. I spent a few nights looking for an open game, and no one was playing (on PS3, mind you). That’s not to say people are not playing the game on other platforms, though I can’t verify that.

Before starting a mission (Story or “order” mission), you can squad up with a friend or several people depending on the mission. You can also tackle those more-difficult missions with strangers, aka mercenaries. If you want to help someone else out, you can sit in a lobby as a registered mercenary and wait until you are hand-picked for a mission. Unlike the competitive side of things, plenty of people were available to pick from and everytime I registered as a mercenary, I was picked within 30 seconds.

Another interesting multiplayer component is Conquest. Not to be confused with the popular Battlefield mode, in Armored Core V you fight for territory. My experience with this was depressing, but that’s not to say it isn’t a compelling mode. My team simply never gained any territory and every battle I entered with them to gain some was a failure. In short, you go into battle and have a certain amount of time to destroy your objective.

I had a problem with losing my player data. I received the game the Thursday before release, put a lot of time into it and when I went to play online for the first time, my data couldn’t be found on the server. I’m almost positive this was a one-time instance that no one else will have happen to them, but it was infuriating having to start over when I had already completed nearly 30 order missions.

Armored Core V’s fast-paced action and multiplayer foundation create a great package for fans of the series. While it’s advertised as a more “tactical” approach to the series, I simply found it to be a fun shooter where you needed to hide behind buildings on occasion. If this is your first Armored Core game, be careful not to get buried in the sea of options.

Note: This game was reviewed on the Playstation 3 platform with material received from Namco. It is also available on the X360 platform.

Pros:

  • lots of action
  • the co-op offers team-play through both side missions and story missions, so you can always have a wingman
  • customizing your AC to fit your play style

Cons:

  • can be too much for beginners
  • no one was playing competitive modes
  • customizing your AC is very overwhelming

Score: 3/5

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Review: Warp

By
Kyle Baron
– March 25, 2012Posted in: PS3, Reviews, Xbox 360

Gore, cursing, and torture are juxtaposed by an adorable and sympathetic character

I’ve never felt so helpless and uncomfortable after hitting the start button in a puzzle-action game that I thought would bank on the cutesy wiles of its alien protagonist.

Seconds after I hit the button to start the game, I was given the first person perspective of an alien who barely survived a crash on earth. Scientists approach me hesitantly, with groans of pain gurgling forth as my eyes struggle to stay open. I pass out shortly afterwards, with intermittent spots of awareness as I’m wheeled into a science facility. I’m operated and experimented on, with pained groans croaking over top the sounds of the intrigued scientists and their scalpels.

When you escape from another humiliating experiment shortly afterward, the satisfaction of regaining your powers and teleporting into the soon-to-explode body of your first scientist couldn’t be more satisfying.

Warp, the first game from Canadian developer Trapdoor, sets the premise for the game’s puzzles and combat with moments like those mentioned above.

While trapped in the large underwater science facility, your goal of escape has you working together with a fellow alien captor against an unnamed and malicious military commander intent on killing you with security bots, guards, and a few other surprises.

The puzzles, whether environmental or combat related, quickly ramp up in difficulty

All of the above mentioned hazards, which quickly increase in variety and presence, kill you in one hit, so being a fast learner comes in handy. The game also gives you many instances where killing your assailants and former surgeons is entirely optional, allowing you to sneak past them entirely.

Unfortunately, the large amount of deaths that happen in Warp from carelessness or the innocent learning process of figuring out the mechanics lead to a lot of loading screens. These loading screens, which took about five to eight seconds each on the Playstation 3 version of the game, become incredibly annoying. This is a huge shame, as the checkpointing system in Warp is executed so intelligently, with each respawn area placed just before and after the increasingly difficult puzzles and combat scenarios.

Rather than wordlessly tacking on new enemies and obstacles, Warp keeps things logical; security camera footage of your exploits, along with intercom conversations and cutscenes, show the humans in the facility trying to research new technology to adapt to your increasing array of abilities. It’s all well done, with gruesome footage of your kills and some humorous, curse-filled chatter between the employees in the facility juxtaposing with your cute alien avatar and his mostly-innocent quest of self defense.

Your abilities, also gained through some intelligent narrative moments and often at the expense of less fortunate experimental subjects, help you smartly adapt to your increasingly well equipped foes. Your basic and firstly given ability to teleport short distances is complemented with abilities like the phantom, which lets you use a specter of yourself to distract enemies and trick them into shooting each other or exposing their weak-points.

Unfortunately, the controls lack the precision to keep up with the often-unforgiving puzzles and combat/stealh scenarios, which leads to deaths (and loading screens) that feel undeserved and unnecessary. The directional pad and thumbstick are both used for movement, but the eight way direction on the pad is completely imprecise and the thumbstick doesn’t allow you to react quite as quickly as you’d like to.

Those control issues, compounded by rare stutters in frame rate and consistently lengthy load times, mar what is otherwise an overall worthwhile package. Several challenge rooms are included that give you an easy way to practice your abilities to perfection, and the rewards are kept meaningful as they help you upgrade your powers. I won’t spoil the ending, but the emotional impact and satisfying conclusion make all of those awful death-load-screens seem like less of a fault.

Note: The Playstation 3 version of Warp, available on the Playstation Network, was played for review. The game is also available on PC and on the Xbox Live Marketplace.

Pros:

  • Intelligently designed puzzles and enemies.
  • Interesting powers that match up with the increasing difficulty nicely
  • Overall change in variety of powers and obstacles works into the narrative
  • Sympathetic main character that’s developed without any real dialogue

Cons

  • Imprecise controls
  • Load screens between deaths are far too long
  • Rare stutters in frame rate

4/5

1

Review: SSX

By
Chris Scott
– March 21, 2012Posted in: PS3, Reviews, Xbox 360

Note: This review was done using the Xbox 360 version of the game. It is also available on Playstation 3.

A decade ago, extreme sports ruled the console gaming space. There were skateboarding games, BMX games, surfing games and of course snowboarding games. Out of all the snowboarding games that were released, none was as popular as SSX. However, all dynasties come to an end and the era of extreme sports quickly faded away, leaving only memories of snowboarding runs filled with high speeds and insane tricks. Aside from one mostly ignored title on the Nintendo WII, SSX has been a dormant franchise this generation.

Although there is no indication that the extreme sports bubble is inflating again, after all Tony Hawk games have been in the tank for years, Electronic Arts has deemed the series worthy of a revival and SSX has returned. Thankfully ditching the original concept of SSX becoming a weird hybrid of military action and snowboarding, SSX is mostly the game diehard fans of the series have been waiting years for. Mostly.

The foundation of SSX is built on a symbiotic relationship between speed and tricks. The more tricks you do, the faster you go. The faster you go, the more insane tricks you can perform.  This new SSX nails that relationship and with the new analog stick trick system, it has never been easier to do cool things right out of the gate. Doing cool tricks will grant players boost and stringing together combinations of tricks will render players Tricky, allowing them unlimited boost and even higher scores. Going Tricky early and sustaining it as long as possible are the keys to finishing at the top of the charts in races and trick events.

While races and trick events are the core of the game, SSX did not shed all the ideas that stemmed from the original hybrid design. What remains from the paramilitary snowboarding adventure snafu are the all new survival events, which play completely counter to the rest of the game. Survival events toss out high scores and fast times, requiring players to do only one thing, survive.

Survival can be as simple as taking one’s time going down the drop, avoiding trees and rocks, to utilizing specialized equipment like headlamps and oxygen tanks. While it is a unique curveball to the tried and true formula, survival drops tend to be frustrating instead of fun. Unfortunately, the single player World Tour mode is focused firmly on them as every level in World Tour mode is culminated with a survival run called a Deadly Descent.

While the World Tour’s focus on survival runs is disheartening, it fortunately is not the main draw of SSX. No, that honor belongs to the game’s multiplayer modes. Featuring asynchronous multiplayer, instead of direct head to head play, SSX’s Explore and Global Event modes allow for players to race against friends and strangers every time they attempt a drop. To be honest I was quite apprehensive about the multiplayer actually working, after all not actually being able to play friends head to head leaves a giant hole. However, ghost times and the inclusion of the Need For Speed Autolog inspired Ridernet give the game a more competitive draw than many actual head to head games and it can all be done on one’s own time.

Further accentuating that competitive aspect of the game is the in-game economy and character leveling system. Drawing some inspiration from Call of Duty, characters in SSX have load outs that can boost attributes. Using currency earned from drops, players can purchase better boards, suits, equipment and even one-time use mods, all of which can improve player attributes in speed, boost, tricks or up their survival chances. Because these upgrades are tiered based on level there is always a push to get better equipment so as to remain competitive with friends on Ridernet.

As much as some players may want to be competitive, their skills may just not cut it against the best of their friends (like mine). Thankfully, SSX has ways for those players to remain interactive with their friends while still rewarding them with currency to be used to purchase better equipment, which in turn might help make them more competitive. While racing, tricking and surviving are the key focuses, exploration is also rewarded. Geotags, as the game calls them are virtual icons that can be dropped in the world and left for friends, and strangers to search for. These tags earn experience for being placed and found, as well as for the length of time they are left unfound.

Considering the origins this particular game came from, SSX does not really have the right to be as good as it is. The game manages to reinvigorate the dormant series, making snowboarding fun and exciting once again. Aside from the mostly ill-advised survival drops, it stays true to its roots, all the while redefining what multiplayer can be.  SSX is a rare game that should not be missed by anyone, let alone fans of extreme sports that should already be playing it.

Pros

  • Simple yet fun control scheme
  • Multiplayer is innovative and fun
  • The leveling system and a strong competitive draw keep the game interesting

Cons

  • Survival drops are more frustrating than fun

5 / 5

0

PS3 Review: MLB 12: The Show

By
Tony Odett
– March 21, 2012Posted in: PS3, Reviews

That pitcher? He’s a major leaguer for sure. 3 solid pitches and 95 mph heat. Me? I’m just a pretender. I’ve got a lot of potential, but I’m just 18. There’s a lot to learn before I am where he is. But now, we face each other.  I dig in, sitting on what I hope is a fastball. First one is always a fastball, right? In comes the pitch, way outside, and I relax.  It swings back, just over the outside corner. Strike one.

An off-speed pitch for an 0-1 count always throws me off-balance. I like to think that if strike one is a fastball, at least I can expect the pitcher to change speeds on the next pitch. But now, I have no idea. I’m off balance. Guessing fastball, I quick stride at the pitch. My knees buckle at the curveball, my arms locked into position. I can do little else but stare helplessly. Strike two.

There is little room for debate here. This at-bat is a foregone conclusion.  I’m so out of sorts at this point that I won’t be able to hit anything squarely, and the pitcher has me so befuddled, he could throw practically anything. I shorten up my swing, determined to do anything but strike out. My big worry is that lower outside corner. The slider, the curve, the changeup: any of these three could be big trouble. I look there, for something offspeed. And when the fastball comes up and in, I never had a chance. Strike three.

This is the opposite of what I did

As much as I’d like to catalogue the features in MLB® 12: The Show is the latest in Sony’s line of baseball simulations, doing so would be a disservice to the experience. The level of immersion in The Show is stupendous, putting you out on the mound or in the batter’s box in a way that sports games seem to have forgotten to try. Baseball is the ultimate in showdown sports games. When it’s your turn, you step in against Marino Rivera, or groove a fastball for Albert Pujols. Those moments, when a pitcher and batter face each other down, are one of immense tension, which Sony’s San Diego studio has harnessed. Instead of loosely observing sports, I’m an active participant. I stare out at the mound, trying to figure out what is coming next, and what my best approach will be. If I can get into the head of the opposing pitcher, I can hit the ball hard. With the wrong approach, however, I can look very foolish.

I’m not a hard core baseball fan, and you don’t have to be one to love The Show. The confrontation between hitter and pitcher is the centerpiece of the game, and learning the strategy involved is an immensely satisfying experience. The frustration of failure and the thrill of victory are magnified by a realistic results system, based on timing, ball location and swing location. As I began my career in the excellent Road to the Show mode, starting my major league career as a no-name second baseman toiling away in AA, I hit very poorly. I couldn’t square up balls or swing on time, and when I did, I always seemed to hit them right at defenders. As I became more experience, and mastered the pitch guessing system, I hit much more successfully. The more I hit, the better I became. It was an essential experience, and one that felt right in every way.

The shades are only for style points.

I could go into greater detail about the improved upgrade system, the cross-Vita compatibility, and the awesome season mode which allows you to have your results surrounded by the real world results of the actual 2012 season. MLB® 12: The Show is the complete package, a game with tons of features and exciting, engrossing gameplay. But more than anything, this is a sports game you truly experience, lacking the “gaminess” of other titles on the market. The baseball of MLB® 12: The Show is authentic, from the batting cages and warm up pitches to the home trot and post at-bat analysis. This is baseball, the way it was meant to be enjoyed, now here for everyone.

Pros:

  • Pitcher vs Batter feels better than ever
  • Cross vita capabilities
  • Season , Road to the Show modes all best in class

Cons

  • Base running still a little fickle in Road to the Show
  • There aren’t enough hours in the day to play

5 / 5

An Oriole making a play. Clearly fiction.

1

Review: Naruto Shippuden: Ultimate Ninja Storm Generations

By
Don Parsons
– March 19, 2012Posted in: PS3, Reviews, Xbox 360

Note: This review was written based on Playstation 3 gameplay with material provided by Namco Bandai. The game is also available on the XBOX 360.

Naruto is one of those iconic anime shows that even people who don’t like anime know about. The video games were sure-to-follow, and they did in the mid-2000′s. The Ninja Storm series has evolved from a 3D fighting game with exploration elements to a story-driven game with more characters and a unique online fighting system.

In the beginning the combat was overwhelming, though not because of the complex battle system. In fact, it was quite the opposite. You only have one main attack button (Circle on the PS3), which is off-putting if you are used to having half a dozen different buttons corresponding to different things. Let me assure you, there are other buttons and the combat system is much deeper than a “one-button” game, but this simplistic method allows the game to be accessible to people outside of the fighting-genre crowd and Naruto fans. Once this small hurdle is overcome, learning the rest of the combat mechanics falls right into place. It becomes a timing battle of hitting L2 to “ninja vanish” and reappear behind your opponent. A bar limits how frequently you can do this, so strategy becomes based around timing this maneuver.

A chakra meter also enhances attacks and allows you to do various Jutsu moves. Each character has an “Ultimate Jutsu Combo” as well and the simple manner of pulling these devastating (and often-times match-saving) moves off is a satisfying experience. A cool aspect, and even more so a match-saver at times, is the inclusion of Awakening mode. When you drop below 50% health and fill your chakra meter, you can transform into an impressive alternative form which only lasts a limited amount of time.

This cast is comprised of the same actors from the past two games, so you will see plenty of faces (72 to be exact, though some of them are clones of each other with subtle differences), and they span the whole series so you will get to see the various characters at different ages. All of the characters have different tactics to master, but none seemed to be overpowered.

While in Story mode, you will progress through stories catering to an individual and it will be from their perspective. The developers CyberConnect2 opted to remove the exploration elements from the previous game to make a much more streamlined experience. The opening to each story will inevitably lead you to a battle, which is then followed with another narrated cut-scene. Rinse and repeat, and you have the story formula.

The scenes that set each battle into place are not fully-animated, but they are authentically voiced by the original cast. After you complete a story you are treated to a beautiful animated sequence putting the whole story into perspective and wrapping it up. Only a small handful of characters get their own story, but completionists will unlock more stories as they proceed.

In addition to story mode, there are bracket tournaments, quick matches and a survival mode. The tournaments feature themes and victory will unlock more challenging ones. A tournament named “Hidden Leaf” will have relevant characters from Hidden Leaf village. When you win you are awarded Ryo (the in-game currency), and any possible number of prizes. This goes for any mode, including online modes and the Story mode. You can unlock a variety of customization items for your Player Card and the higher the difficulty the better the prizes.

Dude.. no means no..

Survival mode is battling a succession of opponents with one health bar. The twist in Naruto is that you regain some health based on your performance. So ending a match quick and in-style will benefit you more than just spamming the same combo.

The online mode centers around your player card. Throughout your fighting career (online and offline) you will unlock card images and titles. Titles are just for looks but images figure into one of the battle modes online. Custom battles offer you the ability to customize both the fight and utilize these card effects, which can give you a boost in battle. The unique part about this feature is that you can buy Naruto cards and input a number in the top right corner, unlocking that card in the game.

While the premise is amusing, I had more problems with online battling than what it was worth. Over half of the matches had a bad connection. Finding a lobby was easy and there were plenty of people playing, but I experienced too much lag. Quitting laggy matches without powered down was impossible.The matches that were lag-free, though, ran smooth. And you can trade player cards after a match.

When you browse over a shelf stocked with the latest fighting games, don’t overlook that one based on a popular anime franchise just because you are not a franchise fan. It offers fast-paced combat, beautiful and colorful visuals, and a story mode that comes second only to the last Mortal Kombat.

Pros:

  • Easy yet deep combat system
  • A strong story mode, which is rare in fighting games
  • Diverse roster of characters
  • A must-have for Naruto fans

Cons:

  • Online had some lag issues
  • No “quit match” while playing online
  • Hard (but not impossible) to sell to a non-Naruto fan

Score: 3/5

1

PS3 Review: Journey

By
Royel Edwards
– March 18, 2012Posted in: PS3, Reviews

My relationship with Thatgamecompany, developer of Journey, is quite healthy. Their games have a way of making me see things in ways I can only imagine. I’ll be honest, visuals are important to me in a video game. They often expresses simplicity, something that doesn’t complicate anything, but tells me enough information that I can figure out what my goal is, and that the objective is clear.

I first played Journey for a few minutes when I went to the Toronto Playstation Event and I admit that when I picked up the controller all I did was move the camera as the landscape looked breathtakingly amazing, especially since it wasn’t the final build. Not only that, but I had no idea what I was supposed to do. Yes, I moved around with my little scarf blowing in the wind behind me, but I just couldn’t grasp what was going on.

The first thing Journey introduces the player to is the beauty of the desert setting. You’re surrounded by shimmering golden sand as far as the eye can see, with a mountain in the far distance displaying a brilliant light gleaming from its peak that pierces the sky. The easiest part of the game is looking at it. It’s beauty calling out to you to ‘come here.’ Getting there, however, is a whole new chapter in exploration. I moved the left thumbstick up to start walking and my Journey began.

At first glace Journey seems like it would be a short walk through the park. An adventure that would be of relative ease, but it’s not – far from it. The game begins with your character. You. Encircled by relics and sandy hills waiting to be climbed. Your scarf blows in the wind for every step you take, following you to your goal. For most places on your journey the mountain stares at you. Really getting into the game I asked myself if getting there was worth the adventure, but I pressed on, I had to find out what was up there no matter what.

Journey is a short game. After an hour and a half, I was done, but I was satisfied. You may come across short games have many unanswered questions that leave you clueless and bored. Journey doesn’t take a piece of that cake. Upon completion of the game I thought to myself that a straightforward “wow” was not good enough to explain how fulfilled I felt.

There are parts where you explore destroyed ruins that are lifeless and empty, but as you progress through you see the beauty of everything you come across in a deep artistic approach. I’ve heard people argue that ThatGameCompany’s games are more than games – that they’re showing what games could and should be when you bring an artistic approach to the table. Journey definitely appeals to the eyes, but there’s a line where you play a game because it looks nice and playing a game that makes you think and reflect on real life decisions and actions like a painting in a museum.

Once you begin, there’s no turning back. Without words the game tells you that goals don’t follow you. You have to follow them to see it for yourself, to experience something you want no matter the sacrifices you make. You don’t know what awaits you, but you know you have to get there no matter what challenges you have to face.

The few controls for the game really help set the mood as well. A simple push of the circle button and your character emits a small halo-shaped shout in the form of an echo that’s used to communicate and interact with things around you. You can jump, but there’s a small catch. If you want to get up to that high ledge you’re going to have to scour the corners of the desert looking for a hidden ball of light that when absorbed, you gain fabric fragments that lengthens your scarf allowing you to double jump or more.

Journey features something very interesting for a game of it’s kind: multiplayer. This version of multiplayer is very minimal. There is no lobby of any sort, no voice-chat, no special menus or anything of the sort. If you’re connected to PSN while playing, you can run into another player and you continue your journey – together. I thought the stripped down multiplayer approach was impressive. It gave me the vibe that would relate to people in the real world. You have a goal and you’re working to reach it. You can run into someone who you don’t know who has the same goal, so why not work together to reach it?

I wouldn’t complain about the lack of puzzles either. Astonishment was the victor as I made my way through the game. Pulling me in more and more making me feel like I was there myself. In terms of difficulty, there’s nothing too hard or too easy.

Every time you triumph through a section of the desert, you’re rewarded with something that I personally call story time. You take a seat on the sandy floor and a quick glimpse is shown of what’s to come. At first you may not understand what it means, but when you see it, you’ll know what to do and maybe even what you shouldn’t do.

You’re not alone on your way to wherever you’re going during your play through the game. You have both allies and enemies. Your allies appear to be playful creatures that want to help you reach your goal. Your enemies, however, want to tear you apart. They don’t think you can complete what you set out to accomplish so they search for you, trying to break your spirit any way they can.

The list for what I didn’t like about this game is small. There was a few times where I was asking myself where the hell I was going. I even almost ended up going in a complete circle twice without even realizing it. I found it to be great fun. It wouldn’t be much of an adventure if you didn’t come across a few hiccups.

My main argument for the game is it’s price. At $14.99, it is a bit expensive especially for a short game regardless of how pretty it looks. Personally, if the game were priced at $9.99 I would have thought it was absolutely perfect. You can tell the team worked extremely hard to bring this game and everything in it to life from the soothing appeal of surfing down large sand hills, to the evening sunset beaming over vacant ruins.

Journey is a stunning game that tries to tie in players with the game itself telling players through story a rigorous escapade to reflect on their own lives in the making. It tells you of all the things you’ve dealt with, all the friends that may come and go you still have to push onward until the very end. If there’s something you need to get to, go for it. The only thing stopping you is you.

 

Pros:

  • Amazing environments and visuals
  • Simplistic controls
  • Interesting use of online play

Cons:

  • A little bit expensive
  • Too short

Score: 5/5

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