Adventure

The onslaught of HD remakes continues.

Mike

Sony and a few others are moving at great pace to give their back catalogue a new coat of high definition paint and now it’s the turn of Team Ico’s masterpieces but do things really look good a second time around or are certain things lost in translation?

Ico

Released in 2002, Ico was the critically acclaimed debut which never really made the mark in terms of sales.  It had a re-release back in 2006 but, for those that missed out, this is another chance to pick up the atmospheric, short and sweet cult favourite.  Naturally, with an HD re-release you have to take certain things into account.  Having revisited the land of standard definition recently, I can safely say the guys at Bluepoint have done a real number on bringing the game into focus.  Textures are looking crisper whilst still looking like a game from an age gone by.

Gameplay remains the same, shock horror.  You escort a strange girl around a castle and are trying to escape after being placed there by men on horseback.  Animation hasn’t suffered in the jump to HD.  It all looks very lovely and refined.  Same can be said for how it sounds.  I forgot just how much of the game is played out in stark silence.  It makes the game feel so distinct and its easy to see why some saw this as a gaming watermark.

All the flair of an award-winning Czech cartoon from the 80s.

Shadow of the Colossus

Arguably the better received, Shadow also had a few technical drawbacks which really held the game back.  Personally, slowdown was never a real deal-breaker for me but, those with sand up their arse will be happy to note the game runs smoothly.  The impact of HD doesn’t really hit home in this one – it looked pretty good in 2006.  The game provides enough spectacle with its boss run gameplay and functional platforming.  One issue does remain, however.  The game’s camera does sometimes get completely out of hand and can sometimes be a real pain to negate.  There are options to tweak the camera speed but I’ve preferred just to lump it.

Replaying this reminds me of just how well-designed and different each colossi battle is.  Both games can be quite brief but neither feels underdone and its unlikely you’ll feel short changed by this package.  Both games feature a very deliberate, less-is-more design approach and both prosper for it.  For those curious to return to the Ico universe of those who missed these games first (or second) time around, it’s a really nicely packaged product.  If nothing else, this collection really wets the appetite for The Last Guardian which is currently being pegged back by delays.  Take your time, gentlemen.

Rating: 8 out of 10 stars 8/10

Action/Sandbox

A polished performer that makes umpteen things clean?

Colin

It seems that over the past decade the world of media has been more and more fascinated with the comic book genre. We have had our superhero movies and TV shows with powers but oddly not nearly enough videogames (or great ones for that matter). Perhaps due to the fact that the very essence of even the most “normal” video game character is extraordinary, every level you face the bizarre, the impossible and the just plain absurd, and that’s just from the latest CoD.

Don't bring a fork thing to a shotgun fight.

When a team does actually go out there to create an original power-based IP, I can’t really think of a better example than the first Infamous. Quick recap: bike messenger is hired to carry a package which explodes, killing many, ruining Empire City and giving him sweet electricity-based powers. Moral choices are made, heal people or drain the juice from them. Powers evolve and the city either respects or fears you. Final showdown with Kessler (the guy who caused all this) reveals that all the damage he caused was for the greater good, to prepare you for something even worse coming: The Beast.

The second game picks up shortly after the first, you tangle with The Beast and promptly get your ass handed to you (and rather conveniently he steals some of your powers you spent the whole first game building up! – grrrrrrr, lazy devs!) so you up-sticks and run to New Marais to find some new powers to prepare yourself for round two.

Some firey shit coming out of a bloke. Fuck, I don't know.

All in all the game is much the same as the first and you’ve got many different ways to play, the story is really good and essential for reclaiming and harnessing new powers. Meeting new people with powers, uncovering the secrets of New Marais and even the in-game news broadcasts (with real actors no less) reporting on The Beast’s path of destruction down the East coast of America all add to the enjoyable experience and will keep you playing to find out more. You can take some time to shoot down carrier pigeons for audio logs and extra back story – much more enjoyable than the dead drops of the first game and they do really well to enhance the story. The optional side missions will help you to reclaim territory in the city from the bad guys and more importantly unlock a few new passive abilities to boot, and the free running and climbing will help you find blast shards all over the city to boost your electrical capacity.

Matthew Secondary Review I was pretty disappointed with Infamous. It was on the verge of being great, but just didn’t feel quite there yet. Did developers Sucker Punch push it that bit further to fix the problems and irritations from the first game? For the most part, thankfully they have. One of the main complaints I had with the first game was the fact that all of Cole’s superpowers just felt like pistol, shotgun, rocket launcher etc. replacements. This time the electrical powers are shaken up a little more with the addition of ice and fire powers with each being dependant on what path you take throughout the game and who you side with. The new mobility powers such as the ice launch which causes a pillar of ice to grow out of the ground and catapult you in the air help break up the tedium of scaling buildings via the normal climbing method. Another plus is that you no longer have to go through the tedium of the sewer sections in order to return electricity to parts of the city to be rewarded with new powers, instead you are rewarded at the end of quest chains. The eagle-eyed enemies who can shoot you square in the face from the other side of the city are as annoying as ever and at times if feels that either they have too much health, or your powers do to little damage – probably a combination of both. The introduction of a third faction of foes later on in the game makes fighting more interesting when there’s basically three groups fighting each other, and even more so when one of those factions has super powers similar to your own. The new setting, characters, powers and soundtrack (despite the absensce of Amon Tobin) make for a worthy sequel, but one that doesn’t do enough to elevate it to the next level Secondary Score: 7/10

Powers now come in ice or fire flavours, depending on your choices in game and as such you can’t have both, however there are now different variations for the individual powers you had in the first game, take the basic zap electric blast, as you play through the story you unlock new variations to purchase with xp which range from a three-way bolt, a long range bolt, a slow firing magnum bolt or the rapid firing bolt. Most of the powers have different variations which really enhance the way you decide to dish out the damage and are very easily accessed with a very nifty and extremely useful in-game pop up menu. Although at least half of the basic powers (shock, rocket, blast, grenade) were in the first game, this tweak on the idea is an excellent addition and gives the illusion of much more powers than there actually are and the new super-ionic powers (usable once you collect special orbs dropped by random bad dudes) are excellent at turning the tide of battle and much more useful than the super-dooper power you acquired in the first game. The new melee ‘Amp’ weapon also allows you to kick things up a notch and make it more enjoyable to get up close and personal than before.

There’s also a new feature where you can create your own missions which seamlessly pop up in other’s games, it’s relatively easy to use but unless you have the creative spark you’re not going to really want to. From what I saw while playing I wasn’t really wowed by this User Generated Content  from the other users or even the levels the devs made themselves, it in no way detracts from the main game and it gives you more content once the game has been completed.

A few negatives come in the form of the audio, at times the levels seem as screwy as the Alien3: Special Edition DVD and at other times sound is oddly absent. When it works the music sets the tone beautifully but it’s a little ominous when you can’t really hear anything and there’s not much ambient street noise. The difficulty is as erratic as before, at times it’s easier to kill a 50 foot behemoth compared to when you try to stop a mugging and get bummed. Checkpoints are very liberally scattered around but one really has to question the logic of the difficulty, perhaps it’s to show the frailty for the character but once you learn not to run in guns blazing at all times you will stop from getting shot in the face. Enemies don’t quite seem as unique as in the first game, gone are the giant scrap behemoths and big ghostly looking guys and in come swamp monsters and ice dudes, the character design is very good but they just don’t stand out as much as before.

Infamous 2 is an excellent game that allowed me to once again dust off my PS3. Like most sequels, the changes aren’t earth shattering but frankly the whole experience was a joy from start to finish. Combat, story, progression, exploration, characters that you actually like and some choices that will make you think will keep you playing to see what’s around the next corner and much like the last game there’s a fantastic ending to it all. Even if a new game in the series stays true to the formula of Infamous like this has, it will still be one helluva ride.

Rating: 9 out of 10 stars 9/10

Fighting

Tournament Edition Pro Hi-Def Remix Turbo etc.

Danny

So, another year has rolled around since Street Fighter IV and not only do I feel really old for typing out that sentence but Capcom have released a budget priced ‘Game of the Year’ style re-release in Super Street Fighter IV. If you are of the more of our cynical readership you are probably thinking two things. Firstly, isn’t this just a cheap cash in like back in the good old 16-bit days? Secondly, isn’t picking Danny to review this a bit redundant? I mean he loves fighting games, so he’s going to be pleased no matter what. Well allow me to respond first by saying that’s harsh! Admittedly I do love a fighting game and while it’s true that Super Street Fighter IV is essentially just building on the previous title, Capcom have expanded this game in a way that the fans of the first game all would of wanted, even if there are some slight niggles.

Bruce Lee vs Kylie Minogue. It's a dream come true.

In fact let’s go though some of those niggles and get them out of the way now. First of all -  what the hell Capcom? The special ‘bonus’ for owning Street Fighter IV is lame. Two extra colours for my fighters that make them look like they are ‘inked’ or ‘sketched’ which is all very nice but a bit of a lame bonus and what happened to the Gallery?  Or the Time Attack and Survival modes? I enjoyed those modes and it must of taken you more effort to take them out than to put them in, surely?

Survival and Time Attack I can kind of understand, being that I might be the only guy who enjoys that kind of thing, but taking of the Gallery is a really stupid idea in anyone’s book. Then there are some (and please correct me if I am wrong on this!) unintentional untranslated voiceovers for some of the characters’ ultra moves while they are in English dub mode (Makoto’s first Ultra springs to mind!) which really stand out, only the ‘Shotos’ are allowed to randomly yell stuff in Japanese in the English dub!

Trial mode presents its own problems too but is mainly there to teach players combos by giving them a list of buttons to press. Unfortunately, it does all of this without proper context of when to press them and where on the screen the player needs to be.  Also it doesn’t explain how to perform some of the more complex techniques like charging or attacking while in the middle of an attack for example. So unless you are already a Street Fighter veteran of some kind, you are probably going to have to run to the internet to look up videos on how to beat these, which is unacceptable.

In Soviet Russia game plays you!

Hell, say what you like about the Virtua Fighter and Tekken games but at least their equivalent of the combo practice mode has the option of allowing the game to show you how it’s done. Capcom could have made the game even more accessible to beginners with proper tuition (like with the videos for SSF2T on the Capcom Classics Collection vol. 2) but they chose the lazy route which is a shame since there are achievements and trophies for beating every character’s trials which might annoy some people (hnnnnnghhh! – Ed).

Like I said these are minor niggles (well apart from the Trial mode one, as it seems I have dedicated two entire paragraphs to it!) and, these aside, this is a fantastic game. Capcom made sure to add a lot of fan service to the game but not in the lame ‘well here are some pictures we drew’ kind of way. Capcom decided that the best way to win over the hearts and minds of people who brought the first SFIV would be to add in some old favourites from past Street Fighter games, as well as a few new faces, bringing the new character count up to ten and the total roaster up to thirty five. We have Dudley, Ibuki and Makoto from the Street Fighter 3 series, Guy, Cody and Adon from Street Fighter Alpha series and Dee-Jay and T-Hawk from Super Street Fighter 2. All of which are lovingly rendered and really capture the spirit of their old 2D counterparts.

Capcom have not just been slapping in new  characters though. They have also been making improvements to  the old guard as well. Every character now has a choice of two ‘Ultra’ moves which the player must pick from at the start of a fight. Each of the old characters have also been brushed with a fine tooth comb of gameplay balancing as well. Let’s just say that a certain one-eyed Mauy Thai practitioner has been weakened some what so he’s not so abusable but still remains a strong fighter in the hands of a skilled player. It’s not just the really strong characters either. I noticed many of the characters have had changes made to them like Fei Long no longer has his invincibility frame during his ‘chicken wing’ move, so it can’t be used as a wake up move any more for example.

Some tweaks are for the better and some for the worse, but it brings the crappy fighters and God-like fighters just that bit closer together and every character now has new movies during Arcade mode which are about as bad as they where before but they do continue their various stories on from the events of Street Fighter IV.

By far one of the most important improvements that SSFIV brandishes is that it has a much more robust online suite now. Eight player lobbies are in and so are team battles and the free DLC Tournament mode once Capcom get their arses in gear and make it available on XBL and PSN. The netcode has been streamlined and plays remarkably well even with six other people watching you fight. There is also a fantastic replay mode which allows you to host and view other peoples replays of previous matches. This can be a useful tool to learning a new character as well as entertaining to watch if you the kind of person that watches people play in matches over YouTube.

Grizzly Secondary Review Street Fighter 4 was a bit good. A mix of classic gaming action with some of the best graphics to grace the current consoles and one of the most balanced fighting games to boot. A question that is on a lot of peoples mind is this. Should this have been a standalone release? Why not DLC? In the end I think that Capcom have added enough to warrant a full retail release, affording the game with added visual flair, ten new characters and an overhaul to its online component. Very few beat em ups employ such a large cast of fighters which are balanced as well as fun to learn and the new blood in the form of Juri and Hakan make very welcome additions to the roster, boasting both interesting and accessible vessels to uninitiated players. Super Street Fighter 4 is truly a game for party players and the new lobby system compliments this fact brilliantly, making it easy to get friends together for a tournament in which everyone can watch a game being played, meaning you don’t have to go to rigmarole of explaining an epic match after it happened. All in all Capcom have pulled this out of the bag, sprinkled it with gold and with a dash of raging fan service and have created a fighting experience which just about achieves perfection. Here’s to Super Street Fighter 4 Championship Edition. Secondary Score: 10/10

The presentation in SSFIV is fantastic. Capcom have done a really good job with the new soundtracks (yes there are two in this game!) and arenas which capture exactly what the Street Fighter series is about. On a technical level the game has received some slight polish from what I can tell from the PS3 version as it no longer suffers from what horrible lack of anti-aliasing which the previous game had problems with. The new stages themselves are really colourful, vibrant and full of motion. Seriously I don’t think these backgrounds could have been done in a 2D game without it costing an absolute fortune because there are so many people, animals and objects moving around and interacting with each other, it’s just fantastic (the rhino level is the best I’ve seen in a SF game – Ed).

The animation of the fighters is as smooth as ever and the new characters do not look out of place at all. I think it’s definitely safe to say that Capcom have nailed the whole asthetics thing and the best thing is that the game moves and acts just like a proper 2D fighting game while keeping some of the benefits of a 3D engine like multiple dynamic camera angles during Ultra moves for example.

Super Street Fighter IV is a fantastic game at this budget price even if you already own the previous game. It would have been perfection in my eyes if wasn’t for the aforementioned niggles but I still had (and still having) so much fun while playing Super Street Fighter IV online with friends and offline.  This is probably the best Street Fighter game for anyone who is new to the series to jump into, yet it’s also fantastic for longterm fans of the series as well as being a must-have for all fighting game fans in general.

Rating: 9 out of 10 stars 9/10

Sandbox

There were rumours of anti-Castro pigeons.

Danny

I liked Just Cause.  Okay, so it had a problem with pacing and the missions got really boring after a while – they where all the same after all – but as sandbox games go it was not bad, quite fun some might say.  I can’t believe Just Cause 2 is from the same development team. While the landscape has been switched to a more varied Asian setting everything else seems to have gone backwards in terms of game design.  In other words this game is not as good as the original.

Blowing shit up like this should never feel like a chore.

Now if you are about to send me some hateful comment on this review or an angry e-mail (I wouldn’t worry too much.  We’ll track them by IP address and have them ‘disappeared’ a bit like Shannon but without the comedy pay-off – Ed), I tried okay!? I really did try to like this game. In a video gaming industry which at the moment seems only to be dealing with absolutes, Just Cause 2 is firmly in the ‘open-ended sandbox’ camp which is a refreshing change from other newer titles being released around the same time, bucking a gaming trend so to speak. But the problem is for a decent sandbox game to work it needs substance which is what this game sorely lacks.

Now I know what you might be thinking “but Danny this game looks fun and I just want to mess around should I buy it?” well the simple answer is no. In this day and age just having a fun sandbox to play around in will not cut it. Besides there are much more entertaining sandbox games out there which are not only cheaper but come with online co-op play which I think you will agree screwing around with friends is a lot more fun than being by your lonesome. Anyway the games in question is Saints Row 2 and Crackdown. I feel that (and this is pure speculation!) SquareEnix pushed this game out the door in a hurry because the end of the financial year was approaching and they knew this game was not going to sell well in the new financial year with games like Crackdown 2 on the horizon.

Get over here!

The game is a simple sandbox affair. You are send in to destabilise the country by any means necessary which normally means either blowing up stuff or collecting things, or blowing up stuff and collecting things at the same time. (sometimes they spice things up by telling you to do something different but that’s rare!) A big problem with this game is the lack of mission variety and the sheer mass of things the game wants you to collect or specific government buildings that they want you to destroy.

Simply put Just Cause 2 has the Nintendo 64 platformer mentality about it which is bad for a game of this size, I’d say that the world is five times bigger than your average sandbox game easily. There are over 1000 weapon, vehicle and armour upgrade collectables and also thousands of sabotage targets (government buildings that are not radar trackable).  So yeah I feel that all this busy work gets really old really fast.  Forty or more hours just doing the same old boring shit and yes I am aware most sandbox games have collectables but those run in to the hundreds but this game has them in thousands, does that sound like fun to you?

When the game is not making you collect everything under the sun or escorting some of the most brain dead A.I. I have witnessed in some time though a gauntlet of RPG troops, mounted gunners and snipers the game is really fun, especially with it’s trademark grappling hook which is not as good as Bionic Commando‘s but hey at least you can “double hook” people in Just Cause 2. Double hooking allows the player to attach both sides of the elastic rope on to objects, people and vehicles with interesting results. The most popular one is attaching an unsuspecting passer-by or enemy troop to a Boeing 747 and smirk to yourself as it takes off dragging the poor sap you have hooked on to it with it.

This is my point, when the game allows me to do my own thing and not worry about stuff to much, everything is fine. You know when I complained about all that collecting earlier on? Well that’s the best bit of the game! Yeah I know that’s messed up right? The missions are bland and very cookie cutter. This is also compounded by the fact that the whole factions idea is wasted here. In the first Just Cause when you did jobs for factions you not only earned new hideouts to save your game and get more ammo but they would also upgrade the vehicles the hideouts had as well as weapons. Each faction also had their own specialities.

In Just Cause 2 working for a faction does nothing other than advancing the plot. There is no warfare between the factions (which would help create more chaos in the country, no?) and the voice acting and dialogue for these leaders is some of the worst I have witnessed. Literally no time went in to making the mission briefings or cutscenes and they did not bother fleshing these characters out, it’s all very barebones. I feel there is a lot of wasted opportunity here. The there is the weapon buying. Running out of ammo is a big problem in this game and luckily you can air drop supplies in during a firefight (something you could not do in the original) but you can’t simply buy ammo you have to spend like $20K to $50K on a single gun with full ammo which is highly annoying and I preferred the first game’s method of handling the weapon upgrades and ammo supplies.

Rich Secondary Review ‘But PEOWW, what do you mean? This game is getting great reviews!’ Yep, Just Cause 2 provides so much shock and awe that everyone seems to have forgotten what gameplay actually is. I’ll say it right now for the record, Just Cause 2 is achingly beautiful. Everything looks stunning and has a draw distance that makes you suspect that Avalanche Studios have secretly replaced your console with a super computer from the future. Also, the grappling hook is a joy to use in both combat and exploration. The sheer larks that are provided by simply hooking a car to a helicopter and then using it as bespoke wrecking ball are almost worth the price of admission alone. However, everything else in the game is half-assed at best. The list of crimes is nearly endless but here’s a checklist for you in case you missed them in the demo. Awful vehicle handling (made worse by the stupid number of races that this game throws at you), rubbish gunplay (you can’t buy ammo you so need to rebuy guns you already have THAT COST AS MUCH AS A FUCKING PLANE and that don’t auto-switch when you run out of ammo, are inaccurate as fuck close up), absurdly repetitive missions, bugs (falling through the floor really isn’t on), thousands of fucking collectibles, another giant area to play in that mostly has thousands of square miles of FUCK ALL in it, the shittest story since whatever Jim Carey was last in, AI that would get laughed at by a Commodore Vic 20, voice acting that wouldn’t be out of place in an episode of Doctor Who and a choice of difficulty settings which is fucking ludicrous in this type of game especially as the difficulty adapts as you progress. Once you get shitty story campaign out of the way, simply bounding about the place destroying things and collecting upgrades can be actually kind of enjoyable – addictive even – but it’s a short-lived feeling and you’ll be looking to capitalise on the game’s trade-in value. Saints Row 2, Crackdown and Saboteur all did this kind of thing a lot more convincingly whereas Just Cause 2 clearly needed another six months. Secondary Score: 5/10

Then there is the vehicle handling. Depending on what you are driving this varies from awesome to whack but mostly whack. I found myself travelling via chopper for most of the game because it has chainguns mounted on it and was a dream to fly but also because the GPS waypoint system while a land based vehicle in this game is like being directed around town by a senile pensioner, there is no two ways about it. I was constantly missing turns with it because it’s not clear enough and does not indicate within reasonable human reaction time when to make a turn, it’s rubbish.

One of the games biggest saving graces is the island that the game takes place in. It’s fantastic looking and a real beauty to behold. It’s detailed and full of life and it much, much more varied than the original game. The graphics are gorgeous and you can tell this is where most of the development time and money went. Everything from how the water reacts everything around it with the sun shining off it. Flying over the mountains in a chopper is also another highlight, one which I spent a lot of time revisiting thanks to the fact that I decided to do a lot of the Reapers’ missions which where all situated there. My only wish was that the developers thought a little more about the mission structure of the game because all this collecting stuff really takes away from the tremendous feat they accomplished when creating this great sandbox of an island for the player to screw around in.

From the cackhanded way they progress the story with unvaried missions to the clumsy upgrade system, the developers obviously bit off more than what they could chew. Simply being an average sandbox game isn’t enough in a world filled with great ones especially when most of your main competition have online play and are much cheaper to buy these days. Just Cause 2 is a very rough game and lacks the polish to match the beautiful graphics this game churns out which is a shame because I really like the original and I had high hopes for this game.

Rating: 5 out of 10 stars 5/10

Kart Racer

Shenmue fans get psyched.  In a bad way.

Grizzly

‘Oh for fuck’s sake!  Not another one.’  This is the thought that generally goes through the mind of any gamer when they see a tarnished gaming celebrity go through the rigmarole of yet another kart racer which tries and topple that fat bastard Mario at his own game.

Well here we go again,kids.  Welcome to Sega All-Stars Racing, also known as Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing or, if you own an Xbox 360, you may prefer to call it Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing With Banjo-Kazooie. Seriously the game sounds like a fucking shampoo, “now with added irrelevance.”

You won't find any sailors there...

As a few of you Peoww forumites know, I am shooting for a complete collection of Sonic the Hedgehog games. That means everything he is a part of whether it be a cameo, full priced release or the many collections bearing his 16-bit guise. I’m doing this because Sonic to me is the very epitomy of nostalgia and without the blue hedgehog in my life I may very well have done something far more productive like paying attention in school or being less overweight. For this I thank Sega, the company that could do no wrong in my developing years.

Now what you may be thinking would be something along the lines of  FAN-BOY! or something to that effect, you may also be correct. I am however not naive enough to state that Sonic has been doing just peachy recently. It seems that Sonic Team are doing whatever they can dig the critter a grave lined with unsold copies of  Sonic Unleashed and Sonic and the Black Knight.

Sega have promised change though, we have seen some hope with what is to be Sonic 4 (previously known as Project Needlemouse) a game which will hopefully remind us why we loved holding down a direction and tapping the jump button once in a while. Although when games like Sonic & Sega Allstars Racing with Pantene Pro-v get released us gamers start to roll our eyes and curse Sega for fucking about with our fond memories.

However.

When I started playing Allstars Racing I found that I was enjoying myself far too much. Should this  be possible? My expectations were so low for this product that I went in thinking I was going to be playing a cheap cash in. Instead I found myself grinning from ear to ear as I passed my opponents, performed perfect drifts around hairpin turns and fought for first place.

One fucking blue shell... I dare you, Sega.

Sumo have managed to capture the look of the games that the tracks take inspiration from. Affording fans of Sonic, Billy Hatcher and Jet Set Radio with the joy of a HD update to some of their favourite locales. My particular favourite scene for the game are the Samba De Amigo tracks, these are filled with the very same mardi gras quirkyness that made the original game so great, they also happen to be trippy as fuck, the first track featuring a swirling vortex which warps you to another part of the track with a giant Amigo grinning insanely at you. The cast are characteristically well represented.  They look and feel exactly as they should with only a few minor exceptions, such as some of the facial expressions and mid-race taunts.

The problem with this admittedly excellent cast though is the fact that a lot of the racers are under-represented in the form of playable tracks, additions like Ryo Hazuki and Opa Opa are merely cosmetic and do little to get the taste buds going for a dive back into the retro. This is a shame as each of these characters come from great sega licenses and their worlds would have been a great playground for the racing shenanigans. Also with the xbox 360 we are inexplicably treated to play as Banjo-Kazooie who to be honest feel so out of place in the game you start to wonder what the fuck are they doing there in the first place.

Danny PS3 Review It’s seems like Sega can’t market games for toffee these days. First of all they release Yakuza 3 (arguably one of the best games they have released in years!) on the PS3 on the same week as Final Fantasy XIII but secondly it seems that Sega feel that they just need to slap Sonic’s name on anything they are selling at the moment otherwise it won’t get shelf space. It wasn’t always like this though, Sega used to make awesome games back in the day and I am not just talking about their Sonic output. Games like Streets of Rage, Golden Axe, Fantasy Zone, the Phantasy Star games all the way up to games like Shenmue and Crazy Taxi on the Dreamcast. It seems Sega wish to remind us about the good old times with a decent if slightly generic entry to the ‘karting’ genre. While the game is a by the numbers karting affair. The courses are what make this game really and in this game they are very vibrant, colourful and very well made and full of unique touches in terms of course design and nostalgic Sega flair. I would dare say that they are perhaps even better than the offerings of the most recent Mario Kart. Makes a change from camo green and muddy browns that’s for sure. The courses will get you so far,  and there is a ton of stuff to do in single player, but the online is a little ropey (i.e. laggy and full of disconnects).  But the game is a fun game to play with friends and is very well made for the most part. I did not have any frame rate issues with the PS3 version to report but some of the online trophies are glitched. Overall I recommend this game to anyone who does not own a Wii but would like some Mario Kart-style shenanigans in their life! Secondary Score: 7/10

The game handles very nicely with responsive controls and there are no game breaking problems to speak of making this one of the better Kart racers. I actually enjoy the drifting which is vital to your success in the game, it handles a lot like the recent Outrun games which is to be expected as Sumo is behind the wheel. My major gripe with the game is that the weapons feel completely uninspired feeling more like ticks on the checklist of a kart racers status quo.

You have the green boxing glove for a straight up projectile attack a red rocket for a homing attack, Sonic’s shoes for a speed boost yadda yadda. Its all so needlessly generic when the Sega back catalogue is filled with so many games that could have been plundered of items and power ups. How great would have been to have columns raining from the sky? Or how about the teleport monitor from sonic 2‘s multiplayer mode? Sumo plundered the depths of nostalgia with some of the unlockables so there is no reason to be so half arsed in this respect. The all-star attacks (which are unique to each character) looked game-breaking at first but I can thankfully say that they do not overpower the one using it, instead it just gives those lagging behind a chance to get further up the field.

Content-wise the game has a lot going on. As you play through the game whether it be multi-player or single you can rack up currency in the form of Sega Miles. This can be used to purchase unlockable extras such as characters, music for the stages and stages for online play. This is a great way to add longevity to a game and I applaud Sumo for taking this route as you can unlock Sega Miles by playing in almost any mode depending on your mood. Meaning that if you choose you can play the game entirely in multi-player against friends but still retain the fruits of your labour by getting all of the extras without having to faff about in single-player. The unlockables are actually fairly decent as well, the music tracks range from old favourites like Palmtree Panic (Sonic CD) to remixed/original tunes based on the race tracks themselves. The Cast is a good range as well, I was surprised to see the bonanza brothers and Opa Opa from Fantasy Zone in the mix, this just shows that Sumo have taken into account us older cynical gamers as well as the young ones when making the game,

I think its fair to say that Sega may have dodged a bullet with this one, much kudos to sumo for pulling this brilliant time waster out of the hat despite the shortcomings of its concept. The game is great fun, its not original but it does not need to be as it serves its purpose. A genuinely good party game for the family and a great kart racer for those who can’t stand that Italian plumber’s smug grin.

Rating: 8 out of 10 stars 8/10

Interactive Drama, apparently

Press X, triangle, X to read the rest of this review.

Lurk

Heavy Rain is a spiritual sequel to David Cage’s previous game Fahrenheit. That original game was fun, but eventually went downhill during the final act of the story where they tried to cram too much in and ultimately it made little to no sense. Which was a shame since it was a highly plot-driven game, veering awfuly close to an ‘interactive film’ territory.

The story for this game follows four people who are all linked by their search to find out who the identity of the mysterious Origami Killer. Someone who kidnaps children and then drowns them in rain water, leaving a small origami animal and a white orchid on their bodies. The gameplay is seen through the eyes of four different people whose plots intertwine along the way.

Club Tech-Noir moment.

Ethan Mars is the main protagonist of this game.  After his eldest son dies in a car accident which puts him into a coma, he spirals into depression. When his other son is kidnapped by the killer, he is sent on a series of missions very reminiscent of the Saw series of films. Norman Jayden is the FBI investigator sent try an capture the Origami Killer. He is an officer who is struggling with his addiction to the fictional (but awesome sounding – Ed) drug Triptocaine.

Scott Shelby is an ex-cop who is also now a Private Investigator, searching for clues about the killer apparently being paid by parents of the killer’s victims. The final playable character is Madison Paige a photographer who gets involved with Ethan when they meet at the same motel they are staying at.

I'm leaving you. I need to go back to Roseanne Barr.

With the stage set for the players, you take control of them individually, where your actions steer the direction in which the story goes. The game isn’t very free flowing and it does have a tendency to rail road you along to where you need to be for the next set piece to come up. Though if a character dies within the game then they will not show up again. So it is in your best interests to  get all of your characters to the end of the game, especially if you want to see the good ending.

When you are playing as Jayden you find clues to the identity of the killer using a pair of augmented reality glasses. You tap R1 and your view turns blue showing up clues in either green or orange. These glasses are hooked up to a network so you find out what they are immediately helping you find anything or anywhere of importance.

Heavy Rain shares a lot in common with Fahrenheit, since the majority of the action sequences are driven by various QTEs. Instead of the ‘Simon Says’ style dual sticks approach they are all done with the buttons or the right analogue stick. The way these are displayed makes it much easier to follow what’s going on in the game, though sometimes they can be slightly confusing as to what action needs to be taken. Especially at times when you need to repeatedly tap the same button.

These sections also make use of the Sixaxis motion controls, these work with varying degrees of competency. Single motions like sharply pulling the controller down, up, left, or right seems to work fine. Yet when you have to shake the controller it sometimes glitches out even though you are doing the correct actions.

As well as the QTE events, there are times where all you are doing is walking around and doing certain actions to progress the game. It can be a little difficult to figure out what it is you are doing during these moments since a prompt will come up to do something and you find its nothing more than leaning against a wall or sitting in a chair when what you are trying to do is open drawer or pick up an object for example.

Also the walking mechanic is rather awkward, you choose where you want to go with the left stick and hold down R2 to walk. This means its easier to stop dead then turn your head to choose the direction you want to go in. Rather than being to be move in a natural way, though the game does have a sort of aid to this. Say you are walking down a flight of stairs and there is a bend to go onto the second flight, then the character’s head will turn and you can just hold down R2 making them walk automatically.

Gareth Secondary Review I really liked Fahrenheit. Sure, the story went a bit tits up towards the end but the first scene is one of my favourites in video game history. So with the promise of improving on everything that was wrong with it, does Heavy Rain deliver a stronger experience? Well, not really. Don’t get me wrong, I really enjoyed Heavy Rain. They’ve fixed the way the QTEs are displayed on screen so you can actually watch what is going on now rather than just focusing on what you have to press and…well that’s it really. The graphics have obviously been taken up a notch but things like facial expressions can still look a bit off and some of the animations as you walk around can be stiff and awkward. The controls for walking take a lot of getting used to and sometimes during the QTEs it can be hard to tell whether you’re supposed to continuously tap a button or hold it down when you’re under pressure (though it’s very rarely fatal). The story doesn’t totally descend into madness this time around though and despite some rather large plot holes and a weak twist I enjoyed the ride. It’s a tough one to judge as there isn’t a lot of gameplay here. You walk to something, move the analogue stick and something will happen, then you might talk to someone or have a chase/fight scene. All of this is done by just pressing whatever button is indicated on screen. If you come into Heavy Rain expecting it to test your skills as a gamer you’ll be disappointed, but if you want something a little different then you might just enjoy yourself. Secondary Score: 7/10

As you can imagine a game like this has a lot of voice actors and whilst the main 4 characters are very competently voiced the same can not be said for some of the supporting cast.  For a game set in New York hearing strange accents from some who seemingly isn’t a native English speaker seems to draw you out of the story on times. This leads to slight mispronunciations of words and suspect acting.

Graphically the game looks very good, with many of the character models being highly detailed. Though it can some minor slow down at time as well as some strange model clipping. Because of this at one point during the game I was being attacked by the invisible man with a floating gun on the screen being my only clue as to what was going on.

This game isn’t particularly long maybe 8-12 hours in total, but the fact there are many different endings for what actions you take during the game mean it is definitely worth going through the game for more than one play through. The story is also very compelling, meaning I spent long chunks of doing nothing but play the game. The twist at the end of the game as to the identity of the killer came as a shock. Though it is not necessarily the most logical conclusion, it still made more sense as an overall story compared to Fahrenheit, dispatching with the supernatural elements of that game is an improvement.

If you are looking for a game with a strong story with an interesting plot full of twists and then is for you. It is not a mindless game, you really need to think about your actions. Though the implementation of the game mechanic isn’t always that great it is still very interesting.

Rating: 8 out of 10 stars 8/10

Review – Uncharted 2: Among Thieves

Platforming, 3rd Person Action

Any excuse to use a picture of Claudia Black.

Mark

It’s all to easy today to compare games with movies now with the two media forms becoming more and more like each other. Games are evolving and finding better ways to show exposition as cut scenes and movies seemingly dumbing down to become a non-stop orgy of explosions and smarmy one liners thanks to hacks like Michael Bay. So when people say games like Tomb Raider and Uncharted are just “ripping off” the Indiana Jones films it pisses me off, why? Well the Indy films are just “ripping off” the Republic serials from the 40s and 50s who in turn where taking their queues from radio shows like The Shadow and pulp comics like Doc Savage who stole from the books of H. Rider Haggard, so on and so on.

The best train level since GoldenEye.

So yes you’ll feel a sense of déjà vu playing Among Thieves with the Turkish chapters having a real Topkapi feel with later levels in Borneo and Nepal both evoking cinematic moments from movies gone by and maybe even the odd videogame moment or two: A Hind-D…?  Anyway that’s enough with all the reference bollocks let’s get on with telling you why Among Thieves is going to win every Playstation 3 game of the year award going.

After a quick in medias res opening set aboard a wrecked train (see the video below) and some flashbacks the story begins with Drake teaming up with a pair of fellow treasure hunters (read: thieves) Flynn and Chloe to acquire a lamp from a Turkish museum at the behest of Flynn’s mysterious employer. Flynn’s your stereotypical English rogue and Chloe a feisty Australian voiced by Farscape babe Claudia Black and both help out in their own ways with Flynn being just as adept as Drake at scaling walls and leaping from rooftops with Chloe providing the darkness needed to sneak past the many security guards between Drake and the museum tower.

This opening section acts as a tutorial for new players and a good refresher for veterans returning that’ll soon have you hanging from pipes, hunting for alarm switches and shooting security guards with a tranquilliser pistol. The action is seen from an over the shoulder 3rd person view with you able to move Drake around with all the jumping, rolling, ledge grabbing and shooting you’d expect with the controls feeling slightly tighter than before which helps cut down on stealth mission failures and unexpected plummets off small ledges when the Dualshock 3 analogue sticks won’t take the hint. Other small improvements include a few new jumping animations that sell the whole ‘oh ssshhhiiitt’ felling you’ll get when making a life or death jump from one exploding building to another or when fleeing a gang of armed thugs armed with laser sights that track your every move forcing you to dodge and weave around the scenery to avoid a bad case of lead poisoning.

Headshot in... 3... 2...

The theft of the lamp leads to Drake’s betrayal by Flynn and Drake ending up spending a few months in Turkish prison before being sprung by long time ally Victor ‘Sully’ Sullivan from Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune. With revenge in his heart he’s free to pursue Flynn who’s now on the trail of Marco Polo’s treasure fleet with the clues gotten from the lamp. Clues that lead to the fleet’s location that disappeared after finding the mythical city of Shambhala or as you might know it Shangri-La. Before long Drakes in the jungles of Borneo where the treasure fleet ran aground raiding Flynn’s digging sites with Sully providing backup firepower and Chloe leaving explosive charges while she keeps tabs on Flynn.

The Borneo sections are where the game really hits its stride with the platforming sections being interspersed with hectic firefights where you take on groups of well armed and trained mercenaries. You’ll fight them off with a simple semi-auto pistol to start with but soon over a dozen types of firearms are available such as assault rifles, shotguns and grenades are all added into the mix with each handling differently be it how much damage it delivers, the effective range or even the amount of recoil it has. You can run and gun without accurate aiming but you’ll soon learn that using cover and taking a well placed headshot with a simple pistol is preferable to firing hundreds of rounds of machine-gun fire against the well armoured foes who’re prevalent in the game. Sure it can be frustrating to empty a clip into a guy without little effect but as with most games it comes down to this… Headshot: those that can do those that can’t bitch.

Later levels mix things up a little with some areas being combat or platforming heavy but if you’re fleeing down an alleyway shooting at a runaway truck in a war torn city or climbing up a snowy cliff face on the other side of the world you can be assured everything looks and sounds amazing. Drake’s Fortune wasn’t a slouch in the presentation stakes and Among Thieves surpasses it to such a degree that if you said it was the best looking console game out today I wouldn’t argue with you. Every chapter is rendered in painstaking detail with lush tropical jungles, eastern temples filed with gold leaf statutes lit by flickering candlelight or icy caverns that felt so cold I was shivering in a room that had a TV, PS3 and laptop all running in.

Mafro Secondary Review One of the main problems with the first Uncharted game – and the one that irritated me the most – was the bullet-sponge enemies soaking up entire clips before dropping. So what do they do in this sequel? Dress them in full body armour, thus making things even more annoying. The combat is competent, but given the high quality of the rest of the game, it’s just not quite as good as it should be. Thankfully, the platforming is as good as ever. While not as tight as the Prince of Persia Trilogy, for example, traversing the environments is certainly among the game’s many high points. Despite the rather linear nature, the levels are much more expansive and detailed than before. It is rather selective when it comes to which pieces of scenery you can and can’t interact with, but this results in casually guiding you along the correct path. The whole “summer blockbuster” feel of the story and presentation is one of the best things about Uncharted 2. Nathan Drake & co. are as charming as ever, and the dialogue between them is as witty as ever. For the most part, it’s perfectly paced and some of the set-pieces are truly outstanding. The diverse locations, Nepal in particular, outdo it’s predecessor. Drake’s Fortune was undoubtedly one of the best looking games around, but Among Thieves surpasses it. A special mention must go to the multiplayer. It may have seemed an odd inclusion when it was first announced, but it is surprisingly fun. It almost plays like a faster-paced Gears of War, but without the cumbersome movement. Much like the step-up in quality from Gears 1 to Gears 2, Among Thieves improves on its predecessor in almost every department and is among the best games the PS3 has to offer. Secondary Score: 8/10

The sound is just as impressive with none of the sound effects or foley sounding stock or fake and the orchestral themes being as anthemic and catchy as anything by John Williams or Jerry Goldsmith. The main theme in particular is so rousing that hopefully in years to come it’ll become as synonyms with Nathan Drake as the Raiders March is for Dr. Henry Jones Jr. and the aural treats don’t there as the voice work is also first rate with the aforementioned Claudia Black elevating the part of Chloe Fraser from mere love interest come sidekick to a living character who’s fate you actually care about rather than only being the chick you have to drag around and save when things start to go wrong. Nolan North once again excels as Drake although having played this, Shadow Complex and Freedom Fighters in less than a month have left me a little worried about his range of accents with each game having identical vocals.

The only bad bits that you’ll find will be the occasional scripted event where either dumb luck or repeated replays are required for you progressing hazards like past collapsing floors or oblique boss fights where you can’t attack the boss before the game says you can. Thankfully such moments are few and far between with most of the game being clear about your objective without signposting clues too much or offering hints before you’re ready to concede and hit up game FAQs.

To be honest I’m starting to quibble now as every part of this game is pure class, even the multiplayer mode is well implemented and balanced compared to many games today that seemingly tack on co-op play and basic (read: shit) deathmatch modes to appease whiney bitches who can’t appreciate how hard it is to craft a satisfying single player experience that’ll keep you gripped from start to finish. The maps and game modes offer a range of play rarely outside of multiplayer only fare or games that try to fabricate a satisfying single player experience but have obviously shot their wad on the multiplayer aspect of the game. Yes Killzone 2 I’m looking at you, you dull brown/grey borefest.

Like I said PS3 game of the year without a doubt. Sure overhyped borefests like Killzone 2 or inFamous can try to lay claim to the title but when you’ve got a game as strong as this without having to carp on about its exclusivity or gameplay features only possible with Blu-Ray/Cell processor/Sixaxis (delete as applicable) you know you it’s not just a great PS3 game but a great game in anybody book, format be damned. Personally I can’t wait for the next inevitable instalment in the series as Naughty Dog have shown before with Jak and Daxter they know how to improve a franchise not just for its own sake but to make better games that will stand the test of time just like I know Uncharted 2: Among Thieves will.

Rating: 9 out of 10 stars

9/10

]]> http://www.peoww.co.uk/uncharted-2-among-thieves-ps3/feed/ 0 http://www.peoww.co.uk/the-king-of-fighters-xii-ps3/ http://www.peoww.co.uk/the-king-of-fighters-xii-ps3/#comments Sun, 27 Sep 2009 15:15:19 +0000 Mark http://www.peoww.co.uk/?p=4031

Review: The King of Fighters XII

Tournament Fighter

Ready… SHITE!

Danny

You know they say that 2009 is the year of the beat-em-up, well the year of the beat-em-up AND Modern Warfare 2 but that’s not the point. The point is that there has been a marked resurgence in the fighting game genre thanks to the popularity of two great fighting games, Street Fighter IV and Blazblue. SNK Playmore hope to cash in on this by releasing King of the Fighters XII which according to the Japanese developer is the re-birth of the series so will this brand now instalment of SNK’s most popular franchise put them back on the map or will it be just be another ‘also ran’?

If you can think of any funny captions...

Well first impressions while playing King of the Fighters XII are very good for the most part. The characters are well animated and are bright and colourful. The gameplay has kept SNK’s traditional three vs. three team battle system it was known and loved for and the gameplay is solid but after a while something starts to sink in, the dreaded realisation that King of the Fighters suffers from a serious aliment that effects a lot of old gaming series that have been brought to the current generation of consoles. King of the Fighters XII has PESlitis!

What is PESlitis? You may be wondering. Well PESlitis is a serious condition were a developer of a long standing video game series decides they want to release a new version of a game on the current generation of consoles and does everything in its power to tart up a game’s presentation. This is all well and good until you realise that the developer in question had to cut out content that was in previous games because of time constraints and thus what you get is a prettier looking but less filling gaming meal. The aliment in question was discovered by a Professor R. Harkness who named the condition after a famous football game franchise as it was a prime example of everything mentioned above. Of course the series would in time regain all of its old features but crafty developers will tout these as new selling points, cheeky gits!

Please send them to...

Before I really get in to the negative stuff, yes the fighting in this game is excellent. SNKp have done a great job of adding some new ideas and credit must be given to them for at least trying to mix things up. There is a new counter system which when your character’s counter bar fills you can perform a powerful counter attack which stuns the opponent for the brief period. It’s also easy to set up combos and the moves are not too difficult to do unless you are trying to use the crap Xbox 360 d-pad of course. The fighting in general feels very satisfying and feels like every blow has a lot of weight behind it which is something SNK have always been good it.

But that’s not enough though is it? I mean don’t get me wrong I was asked to write this review because I am the biggest fan of fighting games on this site (especially the 2D ones!) but this is not the late 90′s SNKp. You can’t just have a solid but bare bones fighting game package anymore especially when Street Fighters IV and Blazblue have not only brought the genre back from the brink but they are both crammed with extra features and content and both have large (for a non-fps) online communities.

While I am not going to dock points for KOFXII’s character roster size (after all Blazblue only has 12) but many fans felt that too many characters have been cut but personally I think the roster is acceptable. KOFXII’s roster contains twenty characters plus an extra two characters that were added to the console port. What I will dock points for is SNKp’s overall laziness, they have left out many things that most fighting game fans like in their games and thus I can’t shake the feeling that perhaps this game was rushed, literally pushed out the door to capitalise on the whole resurgence of fighting games that’s currently happening.

idontcare@peoww.co.uk

If KOFXII is supposed to be the grand “re-birth” of the series so why is there literally nothing explaining who these characters are? Please allow me to explain… Unlike in most modern fighting games there are no storylines, no win quotes, no special match entrances (were characters would do something interesting before a fight begins), one victory taunt for every character, the list could go on and newcomers will have no idea who these people are. This is a shame because SNK were renowned for having really good character development in their fighting games and I would like to remind readers that again Street Fighter IV and Blazblue did not skimp on this kind of stuff and it did not compromise the games graphics, gameplay or content in any way.

Another thing that pales in comparison compared KOFXII’s rivals is its gameplay modes. Arcade mode now plays like a time attack mode and gets fairly boring after a while, even if you are like me and you like to try and get high scores on games. This is not helped by the fact that the game has no final boss and the achievements are boring. OK in the King of the Fighters games you are allowed to pick three fighters at a time but most of the achievements make you pick three fighters but only use one throughout the entire game, aren’t these achievements against the who team battle thing. There’s also a vs. mode but no challenge or survival modes which were present in last years game’s.

Mark Secondary Review Unlike our man Danny I’ve never been a big fan of the tournament fighter and I’m sad to say KOFXII hasn’t done anything to convince me otherwise. When I did the CP for King of Fighter: Orochi Saga I loved the games lack of pretension with every one being a fun and easy to play button basher that you didn’t need to spend months learning button combos or some sort of specialist arcade stick to pull of half the moves. KOFXII seams to have forgotten all this and would rather complicate things with a second-hand counter system and a severely reduced character roster that while slightly better than the original arcade game is missing loads of my old favourites. The lack of content (or should that be ‘effort’?) also extends into other areas with only five areas to fight in and only a few play modes to test your skills. Oh yeah and less said about the load times and slideshow online play the better just save your shekels for the inevitable KOFXIII. Secondary Score: 6/10

Then we have the online mode, which is pretty much unplayable be because massive input lag which makes doing combo’s and such almost impossible to do. Even when Street Fighter IV and Blazblue got laggy the games were never totally unplayable and yes even when I am playing Americans on Blazeblue and SFIV the game rarely lags while KOFXII the lag is horrible in most of the matches I played which is a shame because if the online was good this game may have something to recommend it for.

Overall while I am delighted that SNKp are taking the time revitalise the KOF franchise I wish they spent a little more time doing so before pushing this game out of the door. While the graphics and animation look lush and fighting mechanics are as fun and solid as ever the lack of content and the poor online component will ensure that most players will not be playing this game for very long, even the most dedicated SNK fans. You can buy Garou: Mark of the Wolves or a really good version of King of the Fighters ’98 on Xbox Live Arcade for 800 Microsoft points so I would suggest buying those instead.

While KOFXII is not an inherently bad game (even though it’s been reported that the game bombed in the arcades) I just hope that SNKp will put back all the stuff that’s missing from KOFXII and that KOFXIII will be the real “re-birth” of the series that the fans have been waiting for.

Rating: 6 out of 10 stars

6/10

]]> http://www.peoww.co.uk/the-king-of-fighters-xii-ps3/feed/ 0 http://www.peoww.co.uk/batman-arkham-asylum-ps3/ http://www.peoww.co.uk/batman-arkham-asylum-ps3/#comments Sun, 06 Sep 2009 10:47:04 +0000 Mark http://www.peoww.co.uk/?p=3343

Review – Batman: Arkham Asylum

Metroidvania/3rd Person Action

A good Batman game? Sounds like insanity.

Mark

It’s hard to find a good Batman videogame, so hard in fact that if you were inclined to play one you’d have to go all the way back to the late 80′s to find a really good one, probably by Ocean or maybe Sunsoft if you’re in Americaland. Well that’s not the case anymore because after more than two decades of poor Batman games like Batman: Dark Tomorrow or Batman: Vengeance we’ve finally got a game staring the dark knight fit for the modern age and before you wonder, no we weren’t given anything by Eidos for this review.

Bale's at it again.

The game begins with all the brooding darkness you’d expect not to mention a great bombastic score that takes it’s queues from both the classic 1989 Danny Elfman Batman soundtrack and the modern Zimmer/Newton Howard Batman Begins and Dark Knight. Bats has re-captured his arch nemesis The Joker once again and had dragged him back to Gotham City’s newly rebuilt Arkham Asylum on its own self contained island in the Gotham Bay until he inevitably escapes again to go on another rampage. However it quickly becomes clear that the Joker has decided to break this ongoing cycle and has deliberately allowed his capture to actually trap Batman in the asylum’s grounds as part of his grand scheme that you’ll discover as you play through the game.

The gameplay is best described as being a 3rd person Metroidvania game but with the emphasis on hand to hand combat rather than shooting. At the start of the game you’ll have access to a few iconic gadgets such as batarngs to stun enemies, grapple gun for scaling ledges and high roof tops and Batman’s detective vision to scan the area for forensic clues as well as highlighting useful information such as proximity to enemy goons and points of interest such as access points to the ventilation system or handy gargoyles that you can perch on.

New from the Waynetech 'Peeping Tom' range.

As the game progresses you’ll gain access to new gadgets and upgrades to existing gadgets that’ll let you throw more and new types of batarangs, packs of explosive gel for blasting through weak walls to access new areas (along with stunning any goons caught in the blast), new combat moves and extra armour to increase the amount of damage you can take.

With the asylums security systems almost exclusively under the Jokers control and every area of the island patrolled by gangs of his goons you’ll have to tread carefully as it only takes a few bursts from a goon’s gun to kill bats or something as simple as a bodged takedown to alert the whole gang who’ll soon come gunning for you. Rockstedy have described it as “predator” gameplay were you hunt the goons to isolate the strong and intimidate the weak and I’d have to agree as I found it extremely satisfying to perch on a gargoyle and slowly pick off the goons one by one using silent takedowns and even stringing them up to lure other goons into an ambush.

Would.

When stealth fails and you’re forced to fight but unlike something like Tenchu or Thief you don’t feel at a disadvantage because once used to the game’s combat system you’ll be taking on dozens of goons without hesitating. You have three basic moves: attack, stun and counter with more advanced moves becoming available with upgrades or if your situation makes them viable. The early fights with just a few easy goons soon give way to huge gangs armed with clubs and knives who’ll easily overbear you if you give them the chance but with a little practice you’ll be throwing batarangs at the first wave of goons then tumbling over the next goon to throw then before countering the club goon behind you then stunting the knife goon then finishing of the last goon before tripping the first goon who was getting back up… From time to time the combat won’t flow if say you get stuck in a corner or if the camera decides to be an arse but compared to what passes for beat ‘em up action these days it’s a simple to learn but hard to master mechanic that’s just a part of the whole package that’s full of class.

That’s not to say you’ll just be fighting non-descript goons as what Batman story wouldn’t be good without a memorable villains and Arkham Asylum has tons of them. There’s the obvious fan favourites like Joker, Poison Ivy and Scarecrow (who I won’t talk about because his appearances are often subtle and unexpected) but even lesser know but great adversaries like ZsasZ, Bane and my personal favourite Harley Quinn. They might not get as much screen time as Joker and his goons but they all make a great impression thanks to some great script writing by Paul Dini who was the driving creative force behind the 90′s animated adventures of Batman and the original voice cast who all reprise their roles with the exception of Commissioner Gordon who’s voice casting to a little too gruff not sage enough.

Lurk Secondary Review I have to admit I’m a big fan of the goddamn Batman and I was really looking forward to this game for a long time. Then the demo was released a few weeks back and really made me want this game. I did have some reservations thinking that it was just going to end up alternating between fighting and sneaking, with very little in-between. Thankfully the game isn’t quite as linear as it seemed from the demo. For a start there are many times you have to figure out the way to get to the next area. Whilst it is always a linear path, but if you are going to find all of the Riddlers puzzles and trophies, then there’s a ton of exploration. One thing I did find was that you end up spending most of your time with the detective vision on, so you do miss out on some of the great graphics on display. The meat of the game consists of either fighting, which whilst very simplistic is extremely slick. Once you get the hang of it you can rack up some really big combos, once you get the combo up you can pull off more powerful moves. The stealth sections of the game are also very well done. As the game progresses you get more tools to use and these change how you complete them, so they never really get stale. One other thing that is really good are the sections that involve the Scarecrow. These are 2.5D platforming sections, which were something I wasn’t really expecting. Add to all of this the great atmosphere this game has and you have a very enjoyable game. The main faults are the short play time of the game and the combat can be frustrating on times, because it can be difficult to see what’s going on. Secondary Score: 8/10

The entire setting of Arkham Asylum is steeped in the Batman mythology not just the recent film and carton versions but also the original comics with every character in the story be it hero or villain having a full and detailed biography and even the odd extra audio clip to listen to with interrogations with Killer Croc or psychoanalysis with the Riddler to be found.

As PEOWW’s resident DC Comics nerd I’m happy to report everything is as it should be, right down to appearances of 3rd stringers like Scarface and relatively new characters like Hush or Great White Shark. Other background info can be found in the hundreds of Riddler challenges found across the island from statues hidden in obscure vents and on high ledges to objects and items that need scanning like a pair of Catwoman’s IR goggles or Bane’s childhood toy! These challenges while granting extra experience points to upgrade Batman’s arsenal also encourage exploration across the distinctly different areas of the island all of which are handled by the games graphics engine.

Like many games today Arkham Asylum uses 3rd party software tools (over half a dozen!) to create it’s environments. The main one being the almost industry standard Unreal Engine 3 which is thankfully free of the usual complaints of texture pop in but still has my usual gripe of everything looking a bit too shiny, rendering all of the admittedly highly detailed character models like giant  action figures rather than living, breathing people. Any other problems I have with the game all relate to the game’s longevity and lack of replayability. Sure the game is longer that you might expect, clocking in at roughly twenty hours but all the Riddler challenges and metroidvania backtracking can’t hide the fact that once played through more than once there’s not going to be anything new to see. Maybe I’m being too hard on it but playing it the week after I’ve reviewed Shadow Complex makes the longevity problems even more obvious to me.

All in all it’s good, not just good for a licensed game within a franchise that hasn’t exactly been treated well over the years (Gotham City Racer anyone?) but good for a new game that you’d expect to slap forty quid down to play. It looks good, sounds good and plays good but don’t expect to have the same pleasure replaying it over again as by its very nature the first play through with its rich exploration gameplay will soon have you hankering for something new that the game can’t deliver.

Rating: 8 out of 10 stars 8/10

]]> http://www.peoww.co.uk/batman-arkham-asylum-ps3/feed/ 0 http://www.peoww.co.uk/ghostbusters-the-videogame-ps3/ http://www.peoww.co.uk/ghostbusters-the-videogame-ps3/#comments Sun, 28 Jun 2009 13:15:37 +0000 Mark http://www.peoww.co.uk/?p=2956 Review – Ghostbusters: The Videogame

Action/3rd Person Shooter

A game event of biblical proportions?

Mark

Everyone remembers their first time. For me it was at a now demolished Cannon cinema on Station road circa 1984. It was here that I was introduced to the Ghostbusters a team of smart-ass paranormal investigators and eliminators who save New York from troublesome ghosts and later the world as we know it from a Sumerian god in the guise of a 300 foot marshmallow man. Many things have happened since then including the odd film sequel, spin-off cartoon TV series and even some videogames but nothing has come close to capturing the original excitement of listening to the Ray Parker Jr. theme tune and wanting to strap on a proton pack for real. Until now…

A unique fixer-upper opportunity.

After years of false starts, delays and publisher woes we finally have a proper Ghostbusters videogame that not only has all the spooks, spectres and phantoms you could want but also many of the original cast members returning to voice their characters and even a storyline by the movie’s creators based own their own unfilmed “Ghostbusters III: Hellbent” film script.

The single player career mode has you playing ‘the rookie’ a new and unnamed recruit to the Ghostbusters team who’s been hired to help out with the day to day jobs and test new experimental Ghostbusting technology. Picking up in 1991 a few years after Ghostbusters II the plot starts with the team’s unofficial mascot Silmer the ghost escaping from his containment cell and returning to it’s original haunting place in the Sedgwick Hotel. It’s here you’ll learn the fundamental skills needed to be a Ghostbuster from tracking, uncovering and scanning ghosts to catching them with the proton pack and ghost trap.

It's dead out there.

To find ghosts you’ll need to use the PKE meter which will change the normal 3rd person view to a 1st person view complete with a display showing strength and direction of psychokinetic energies along with the type of energy it is be it a hiding ghost, paranormal artifact or other manifestations like black slime. When you find a ghost and get close enough to it you scan it for Tobin’s Spirit Guide that’s viewable from the pause menu. This can tell you the ghost’s history, type and weaknesses against certain weapons which is very useful for later bosses that’ll easily beat you down if you don’t come prepared.

When the time for research has passed you’ll be called upon to fight a trap a ghost and I’m happy to say it’s just like you’d expect. You blast the ghost with a positron stream from your proton pack until you wear down it’s strength enough to lasso it with a containment stream. After that it’s just a case of laying a trap down and forcing the ghost in with the containment stream or slam dunking the bugger in if you’ve got the skills. Sounds easy no? Well the positron stream is highly destructive and will rapidly reduce most environments to rubble and crossing streams with a fellow buster can be potentially fatal so care is needed to avoid a total protonic reversal.

Can you smell burning?

As the game progresses and the story starts to take you to new locations and plot twists you’ll also get to play with new equipment that expands your arsenal and gives you new fire modes and not only deal with ghosts but also hazardous environments. The first upgrade lets you fire single but highly powerful boson darts from your standard proton pack rather than always having to use the weaker but longer lasting proton stream, well until your pack overheats forcing you to vent that is but despite sounding complex functions just like you would reload a gun in any other action game. Soon the stasis stream with it’s secondary shotgun style fire mode becomes available with the slime thrower MK2 and rapid-fire meson collider appearing later on each with its own primary and secondary fire modes and each effecting ghosts differently be they possessors that jump inside innocent civilians or golem creatures that animate nearby objects to become junk built behemoths.

Gameplay aside the first thing you’ll notice is just how Ghostbustery (new adjective alert) everything is. From the sound of the proton packs charging up to little touches like the grumpy Vigo of Carpathia painting in the Ghostbuster’s HQ or even the Employee of the Month board covered with pictures of Venkmen. It looks and feels just like the films right down to the fire poles and containment grid in the basement. Many of the locations are taken from film like the Sedgwick Hotel or Natural History Museum and look and feel like near prefect recreations. What’s not prefect is some other aspects of the presentation which need to mentioned along with a few other miscellaneous niggles.

Lurk Secondary Review Ghostbusters is a very polished game when it comes to the presentation. It has the full original voice cast, minus Rock Moranis thankfully. A story written by Harold Ramis and Dan Ackroyd. The graphics are very good, especially the faces of the main characters. Unfortunately everything isn’t quite so slick. The combat whilst generally fine just ends up being a bit confusing. You find yourself getting hit from behind with no warning a lot or you end up spending a lot of time running around  reviving your fallen comrades. Whilst its realistic that you don’t tumble and flip like a gymnast the dodge doesn’t work all that well either. You either don’t move sideways enough or you end up bumping into scenery. Luckily when the combat works, like during some of the very good set pieces it works very well. Using the proton pack to trap weaken and trap ghosts, works very well and is great fun. It’s just the general combat with the ghosts that just need to hit enough times before they evaporate. They are either too weak, so they only take a hit or 2 and they’re down, or take far too many hits to kill. To sum up, the game is generally fun, especially the atmosphere and plot with excellent voice acting. Unfortunately the majority of the action gets repetitive, but the game is short, so it never really grates too much. I’d say this game is definitely worth a rental. Secondary Score: 7/10

With the single player mode having such a dense plot it’s necessary to have lots of cut scenes (Not Hideo Kojima scale cut scenes ‘though, thank fuck) to move the story along and cover all the exposition. Some are pre-rendered and look great with the character modes representing like their counterparts and moving and speaking as they would if it was live action footage. For other plot moments that aren’t as important the in game engine is used and compared to the pre-rendered stuff looks like shit. Open and close lip synching, brittle character movement and even dare I say bored sounding line reading (Yes Alyssa I’m talking about you) will have you wishing they’d spent a little more time on presentation before rushing it for release.

But you know what when you have Spengler saying lines like “The PKE readings are off the charts! … Guess I’m going to have to redraw my chart.” or Venkmen quipping “He’s a New York bellboy just tip him and he’ll go away.” you won’t care about stuff like dodgy cut scenes or even the sometimes frustrating team-mate AI you’ll be too busy having fun. Yes fun that strange indefinable quantity which has been missing from so many games lately. Sure something like Gears of War 2 could be comparable in terms of gameplay mechanics but I’ve had tons more fun busting ghosts than I did putting a chainsaw to the locus hordes.

The multiplayer component is just as much fun with you and three other players playing different game types from simple timed busting missions to survival, siege and a mini campaign mode with you earning money to increase your Ghostbuster rank. The match making is a little temperamental with the game refusing to join open lobbies but persevere and you’ll find a game soon enough.

While the presentation is a little rough around the edges the amount of fun you’ll have more than outweighs these petty concerns. Ghostbusters a game almost unique in an age of quickly made soulless cash in movie videogames that exist only to make money from ignorant punters going with a name they know than risk buying something new. Full of humour, action and nostalgic love for a franchise that more than deserves to come back from the dead. Even after twenty five years bustin’ still makes me feel good.

Rating: 8 out of 10 stars

8/10

]]> http://www.peoww.co.uk/ghostbusters-the-videogame-ps3/feed/ 5