Days of Horror

As the Halloween season, which it apparently is now, reaches the culmination point (Halloween) I have spent some time getting "into the spirit".

I recently picked up Dead Space, because what is the halloween season if not a time for games that can scare the crap out of you. It's difficult to classify the game in any one particular genre, but that doesn't make it any less fun. The game plays out from a third person over the shoulder perspective and has a lot of the survival horror elements, except for the fact that the amount of ammo you get (in medium mode) makes it feel a lot less like you need to be making accurate shots. I did play this in hard mode for a bit and it definitely feels more like a survival horror due to a reduced ammo supply, harder to kill monsters, and the addition of extra monsters to specific scenarios. Despite this ambiguity of the classification the game really is a lot of fun and the environmental elements are stunning. There hasn't been a game recently that has immersed me into the environment the way that Dead Space has. The length may deter people from paying the $60, and I can understand that point of view, but I recommend picking it up through rental or purchase. This game is definitely worth playing through at least once.

If you have been playing World of Warcraft, and since their subscription base has now reached 11 million it's pretty likely that you are, then you will have participated in the zombie invasion that let players infect other players and npcs with the zombie disease which turns the infected person in a zombie who then in turn spreads the disease. Despite a lot of backlash from some of the player base Blizzard has said that the event was a success and that we should expect to see more events to come as their expansion pack: Wrath of the Lich King gets closer and closer to the release date. If you missed out on the zombie invasion there is still the scourge invasion happening all over the digital world as well as a new boss in Karazhan.

If you happen to have a source game on the computer I want to let people know to try out a mod being distributed for free by steam. It's called Zombie Panic! and it is a fun game that captures the feel of the zombie horror movies, and will help gear up players for the Left 4 Dead release from Valve.

Possible new...maybe

So a lot has happened since I last posted. I have been entirely too busy with real life obligations to actually sit down and play some games to write about here. However I have been keeping my ear to the rumor/news mill, and I must say some of the things announced and quasi announced are fairly compelling.

The long awaited sequel to the Diablo franchise was announced a while back with Diablo 3. This is something the series fans have been clamoring about for quite some time. Of course they were, they wouldn't be fans if they didn't. The game takes place sometime after Diablo 2 ended with the worldstone having been destroyed, and I must say the game looks fantastic. Check out the blizzard website for more info (and there is a ton of it to go through).

Cryptic studios, original creators of the City of Heroes/Villains franchise, are developing a new super hero based MMO called Champions Online. This time around they say they have suped up (no pun intended) their combat speeds and changed the art direction they are going in. The game looks good, but only time will tell. They have a countdown going on their web page but I haven't been able to get any confirmed information on what it is for as of yet. Rumor has it that it is a countdown to the beta release.

Speaking of Betas, Wrath of the Lich King (WotLK) the next World of Warcraft installment has gone into beta and the NDA was lifted. There's a ton of officially released info on their website, and visiting any gaming website would be likely to yield some very interesting info about the changes being made.

This next bit of info is pretty sketchy as to whether it is true or not. According to portfolio.com and their Bioware/EA exec's quote Bioware is indeed developing a KOTOR universe based MMO. Now if this is true it will likely spell doom for Star Wars Galaxies (the previous lone Star Wars MMO project). Some of the die hards say they won't be leaving, and truthfully they likely won't. Doesn't matter much if you choose to leave or not if the servers get shut off on you. Really I was a SWG fan once upon a time, in the "golden age" as it was called, but SOE did a lot to destory the fun of the game that they have never been able to completely undo. Whenever two games come out based on the same IP they are always compared, but with a persistent game world, that relies on subscriptions to stay running, this likely means Death Knells for the game that comes out looking inferior.

Warhammer has some information released on it. They apparently took out a bunch of classes that weren't working due to time constraints (thanks EA), but reports from the beta show the game in a highly unfavorable light so I am not going to go into anymore detail other than to say they just started Beta session 3.

DC Online is another Superhero based IP but based on already established characters. Apparently it has been in development for a while and the footage they have released was mediocre at best.

AoC came out, I had fun with it for a while. With out serious attention to some serious issues with the game I got tired of putting up with it and canceled my accounts. There are rumors that the game is in trouble, but those are unsubstantiated by the company (of course) so there's no point into going into details about it.

Well that's about all I have for now, I will attempt to keep adding more entries as I can fit them into my daily schedule.

Age of Conan comes to my PC

As the title states I have recently picked up a copy of Age of Conan (AoC) and installed it on the previously mentioned new rig that I put together. I decided with something as important as a semi-review for a new MMO I would divide it up into audio, visuals, game play, and my personal impressions of the game.

So, to kick things off I am going to start off with the audio that is present in this particular online world. When I first got the game, which I downloaded before my retail copy even got into my hands, I was unable to play it for a week. However, I was able to fire up the login screen and the first thing I noticed about the game was even the music for the login screen felt epic in its quality. Moving forward into the game I have to say that my love for the score of AoC only became more profound. The combat music really makes you feel like you are thrown into a visceral and unforgiving environment where danger is around every corner. The ambient sound is top notch providing the player with sounds of the wild like occasionally having random wild beasts belting out their various howls, snarls, growls, etc. The different background music definitely sets the mood for the zone you are in for instance when in the desert region of stygia you get what you would really imagine hearing if you went to a desert region in our world and listened to their cultural music, the same follows for the other zones like the highland like Cimmerian tribal region. Overall the sound is top notch and to me that is 50% of the battle to release a good game.

On to the visuals in the game. Now I want to add a disclaimer here, the visuals are obviously heavily dependent on the load that your computer is capable of handling, so the phrase "your miles may vary" is appropriate here. For me, on the new rig, the game looks amazing and I have the settings primarily maxed out. There are some big issues with the overall optimization of their engine and some technical issues with some of their settings in the game. For example when running the game turning off the shadow component yields about 20 fps which is insane. Shadows are taxing on the best of computers but to have a difference of about 20 fps (frames per second) is beyond anything I have ever seen to date, to the point that I don't know a lot of people that would sacrifice 20 fps for the slight visual bump. A lot of people are also saying that turning up some of the settings to a higher quality actually seems to improve performance instead of detracting from it, which makes no sense at all. Aside from the glaring technical issues the game truly shines as one of the best looking MMOs I have played to date. All I can say is you will see what I am talking about when you get into the first real group dungeon called The Sanctum of the Burning Souls. The scale of this place is jaw dropping and the atmosphere and detail are flawless. It is hands down the best looking dungeon design I have seen, and it's fairly early on in the game so you get that epic feel of the dungeons without having to raid at end game.

Game play, one of the most important areas of an MMO in my opinion. A game can look and sound great, but for me if the game play is horrible it's a deal breaker. Luckily at its core AoC has some phenomenal game play. There is no auto attack in this game and you have to attack your opponents in their weak spots using directional attacks and a "combo" system, which is basically special attacks using the directional combat system. The system is engaging and I have never found myself nodding off during combat like I did in the World of Warcraft. Truthfully in this game if you aren't paying attention you simply aren't going to win the fight period. The direction combat system primarily affects the melee classes and the ranger class, the casters play typically how you would imagine from other MMOs. I won't go into too much more about combat because there still has to be some wow factor when you first try out that game so I will leave it at that. There is PvP in the form of PvP servers, battle group type mini games, and eventually when the game matures more it will open up siege battles to the end gamers. Siege battles revolve around one of 9 player held keeps in the world of hyboria. The keeps are held by guilds and bestow special and very important buffs to anyone in the guild that controls the keep. Of course with all such valuable things other people will covet them and desire to take them from you. Herein lies the essence of what a siege battle is. One guild wants your keep, and has amassed their army to try and persuade you to die and hand it over. Of course due to imbalances in guild sizes, availability, etc... these fights could become very unfair. It is for that reason that Funcom implemented the mercenary system, which does exactly what you would imagine, both sides of the siege can send out a call to other players that are for hire to come help either storm or protect the keep and will pay them for their services.

My personal opinion of the game is that, for me at least, it has replaced WoW as my current MMO. It's not that WoW is a worse game, but AoC offers me something new from the tired repetition that I got from wow after 4 years. The game in it's current incarnation has some big bugs that still need to be ironed out, but with any MMO that is starting off it's always been the same story even WoW. For a launch Funcom did a very good job, one of the best MMO launches to date. Also the speed at which Funcom is attacking and fixing their problems is something that I find unusually fast and I am pleasantly surprised. I will post up some screen shots when I get some I think are worthy of a captive audience.

The MMO future

So I got the new rig up and running and it is a beast. I haven't bench marked it yet mainly because there are so many gaming delights to be had that I just refuse to take time to do it. I will get to that later, but I wanted to take an entry to cover some of the things going down in the MMO space.

Age of Conan is set to come out in 8 days and has, like every other promising MMO, been hailed as the WoW killer. Now I am not a fan boy for WoW, but nothing will kill this behemoth...it's quite literally an unstopable force at this point. That isn't to say that there can't be competitors against it, and Conan is looking to put up a decent fight. If you pre-order the game you get to start the game 3 days early which for many people is something they are clamoring for. So if you are really looking forward to the game I suggest you get a head start by pre-ordering (you also get the usual fare of in-game items).

Star Wars Galaxies, hailed as one of the most promising MMO's to flop is about to get the latest upgrade sometime soon, and what would a star wars game be without the battle of Hoth. The info is here if you are interested. I actually used to like and play this game, but being burnt so many times by bugs and having to deal with outdated server software I gave up on the game entirely.

World of Warcraft developers, blizzard announced some info about Wrath of the Lich King. Actually that's an understatement because if you are looking forward to the expansion it's the equivalent to the atom bomb of information. The article is here if you are interested. The changes are shaping up to be something truly unique particularly the "epic" class the Death Knight.

In other gaming news, I previously wrote an article about Savage 2 and as it turns out Steam has decided to feature the game on their website as a digital download and has a reduced price tag to boot. Like I said the game is innovative from a game play stand point but for the price and lack of US players it fell short of my expectations. Having Steam feature it might just be what the game needed to stay relevant.

New Gaming Rig...

Ok so I took the plunge and spent quite a bit on getting the parts to my new gaming PC ordered, it's a good thing I just got my tax refund back I can tell you that. The parts finally arrived and I put the thing together with the assistance of a buddy of mine. Go to fire the thing up and as it turns out the motherboard is DoA. So yesterday I had to RMA (get a manufacturer to replace it) so once again I have to wait for them to process the request and send me a new one. I guess it is worth the wait as this will be a beast.

-EVGA 790i ultra sli mobo
-EVGA 8800gts graphics card
-Intel Core 2 Duo Wolfdale 3.0 ghz processor
-4 x GSKILL DDR3 1GB sticks

So hopefully with that rig I will be able to get more of a PC perspective on the newer games coming out. Also if you are a vendor of anything to do with gaming (ie: PC hardware, Consoles, or the games themselves) and you would like to help an aspiring technology reviewer be able to review some of your products it would be deeply appreciated.

I will let you all know how the rig runs once it's up and running with some benchmarking.

Ikariam

So as a fellow gamer I know we all love free games, provided they are fun of course. Well I have come across a free browser game called Ikariam.

The game plays out as a civilization builder where you populate a town on an island. You work you way up by gathering wood and one other resource that the island provides. Eventually you get the opportunity to start a colony on an island of your choice. Take care when choosing, because the primary reason for your decision is which alternate resource do you want. The decision is important since you wont be making another colony for some time.

Another great idea is to build up a city army for defense and upgrade your wall to keep the rabble from trying to take over. Over all the game is great and definitely worth trying if have 5 minutes of down time. It takes a while to build/upgrade things later so you can set it t build and log off (ie: the perfect game for work).

Let me know what you guys think, I believe you will be impressed.

Savage 2 Revealed...

So having spent some time with the demo of the game, which I felt was enough time to give this game a fair shake I have composed this little review of the game.

Obviously since the game is a little older now the graphics are a little dated compared to some of the newer games on the market, but having grown up in the Mario bros. era anything better is beautiful to me. From the limited time I had, getting into a local server was much harder than I had originally thought. It seems like there not as many people playing in the US as there are in say the UK. This lead to the actual full servers that I played on to be more sluggish than usual and did detract from the experience. The actual game play was interesting with the fusion of the RTS elements from the Commander and the FPS of the soldier view it was nothing short of an interesting experience to be sure.

The classes in the game were fun to play, interesting in their own way, and lead to some interesting little skirmishes in the midst of the big battle. Mid way throughout the game there were some demon classes unlocked by gathering souls and those were definitely the embodiment of destruction as they cleared armies of guys in their wake.

Overall I would say the game is definitely fun to play, but if you are big into the latest graphics you could do much better for the $29.99 price tag that comes with it. I would recommend people head to their website here and download the free demo which turns out to be about 5 hours of play time (meaning only when you are in a game) so you don't have to worry about wasting time in the lobbies.

My obligatory number score for this one is a 8/10 for their unique fusion of two pretty straight forward genres.

Savage 2 Introduction

So I came across this game while skulking around the Internet and the concept of it intrigued me. This RTS/FPS hybrid could, if done right, be something truly amazing. While this game is not new it is to me and I am sure to many readers as well so I think I am going to download the trial version and give the game a shot.

Here's an overview of the game...

Set in a fantasy setting the game centers around combat between two races: Man and Beast. Now this is not to say there are little wolves running around. No, these beasts mean business. They have shape shifters, shamans and so much more. I refuse to go into detail on the story because it is actually really good and my synopsis of it will not do it justice. So for those of you interested in it go here and enjoy a well written tale that sets up the game perfectly.

Now each side has a commander that plays the game like an RTS via a star/warcraft-esce interface. From the screens I have seen there is the typical building of the base and researching aspects of the typical RTS games. However unlike those games the commander does not have direct control over the units. These units are actually other players playing out from a First Person Shooter perspective or FPS. The commander can set way points and targets for his/her units and give buffs to the units or debuff the enemies. The object is to destroy the enemies base as a standard RTS objective.

I will provide more as I give the trial a shot.

R6V2 update...

It appears that Ubi soft has done something to remedy their network issues with their latest rendition of the Vegas title. They seem to have performed some update to their databases (woo no download required) and fixed the issue of people dropping and failing to join games. The trade off is that people are reporting more lag than usual but nothing game breaking for most. I personally think it's a fair trade and a step in the right direction.

Wii!

Ok so I got a Wii finally and loaded up Super Smash Bros. Brawl. The game itself is the same as all the other iterations of the series, but like trend has shown adds a lot of stuff that makes it a more than worth while purchase. Like a ton of new characters ranging from Solid Snake to Sonic.

One of the most important additions to this game is the use of online playability. The game allows you to match make with others or join games with your friends. These are the modes that were to be expected. One of the unforeseen modes called "spectator" mode allows the player to watch a game and bet coins on the outcome of the match. Now this may not sound like much but it can be quite entertaining to watch four iconic characters beat the ever-loving crap out of each other and have a stake in the outcome. By all means the online gaming experience that Nintendo has brought is not the utopia I would like it to be. There is no voice chat feature which can definitely detract from the experience, as well as you can't invite friends to your games...you just have to start one and hope they notice and join.

Over all even though it is more of the same but better my obligatory number score is a 9/10. Go out and pick the game up if you want to smash digital faces and enjoy yourself for hours on end.

RB6V2...

which apparently is now the acronym for the latest installment from this branch of the Tom Clancy tree. I picked the game up, and have to say I like it more than the first Vegas, but the game has...once again...network issues galore. I played some online co-op terrorist hunt with a couple of buddies of mine and kept having issues of people dropping or failing to join games we knew were up and running. To be fair I followed their "what ports need to be open guide" and it only really helped when I hosted a game, but should the user really be responsible for getting the game to work online. At which point did it no longer become the developers burden to release a solid gaming experience. Granted I would not have given them too much flak for this failing...if it was the first time this happened, but this is the same thing that happened to Vegas 1. In typical Ubisoft fashion they have said they are planning to patch the problem out "soon", but once again this is the same song and dance we saw for the first Vegas, and that patch never came.

The game itself isn't bad at all. In fact it's extremely enjoyable unfortunately it is counter balanced by how frustrating trying to play online can be. My obligatory numerical score is a 7/10 until they patch their network issues.

Lots to do...

Recently it has been harder than usual to be able to port here and get things updated, but at least the reason is that there are just too many games to play and too little time.

As some of you may remember my last endeavor into the MMO world was the ever popular World of Warcraft. I have recently made the conversion to LOTRO or Lord of the Rings Online for those of you unaware of the acronym. The game is quite honestly amazing and has inspired me to start a blog for the game alone. If you were ever a fan of the Books, which let's face it you should be, you will absolutely love the game. Turbine, while not unknown in the MMO world IE: Asheron's Call, have had some serious problems developing any real solid titles and I am happy to say that they hit the nail on the head with this title. Having pulled a PC game of the year award for 07 I would say that the official critic community would agree. The landscape is amazing the difficulty is everything you could want out of a challenge while still being accessible to the newer crowds. If you have any interest in knowing more about the game my blog for it is at http://beyondbagend.blogspot.com/ and is just a begging there so don't judge it just yet.

Rainbow Six Vegas 2 comes out today and I can't say that I don't want this title because really I do, but I don't know if I am hungry enough for it that I am going to pick it up today or this week for that matter. I am going to treat this as I will get it when I get it type of a deal. I will only purchase for the PS3 and I still haven't forgiven Ubisoft for not releasing the patch they promised for the first installment in this series.

I got my girlfriend hooked on Pixeljunk Monsters, more specifically the co-op mode, and it has been quite a lot of fun completing most levels with a rainbow (or perfect clear as they call it in normal tower games). I still recommend getting this as I think it is one of the best mini games out there you can purchase.

I finally had a chance to play Harmonix's Rock Band for the first time the other day. I loved it, but (and it's a big but) I will not buy this game for three reasons. First, The price is $157.00 dollars on sale at target right now. This would not be so bad except for the following two reasons. Second reason, I will not play this game by myself because the multi player is, as the saying goes, where it's at. I don't want to throw down that kind of money on a game that I will not play but maybe once in a blue moon. Third reason, there is a certain line you cross (into nerdome perhaps) when you have an entire band worth of plastic instruments lying around your living room. This is a line that I am without a doubt unwilling to cross at this point in time. I have however heard that they are selling the instruments by themselves at which point you can play but the game at a reduced price to play online when you can get people to do so. If this option becomes worthwhile I may be making the purchase, but until then I will not swear fealty or my musical genius to any band yet.

Oh Noes ze pixels zhey hurt my retinas...

Despite that odd title I am writing this in all seriousness. I still maintain that "PixelJunk Monsters" is an awesome game. There is even more strategy to each level that I would not have expected, to the point of almost madness. I just wanted to throw out the warning that extended playtime with this game in one sitting will indeed cause your eyes to bleed, probably from the mind rape you brain is undergoing trying to figure out the best strategy to beat different waves on monster attacks. No joke, at one point it appeared as if I was crying because my eyes burned so bad.

I make no apologies to my eyes however because we both know it was worth it. That is all.

Life's little fine points

One thing that I find great about artistic mediums, such as video games, is that quite often you find something amazing that you didn't really expect to find. One such example of this is a new game released to the PSN (PlayStation Network) online store called "Pixeljunk Monster". Underneath this crisp cartoon style facade beats the heart of a surprisingly fun game. Playing on the "Tower Defence" genre this game was an almost immediate smash hit in my journal of PS3 gaming.

Having been an avid player of the tower defense player made custom maps from Warcraft 3 I knew this game was perfect for me as I no longer have WC3 installed on my system anymore and despite the constant urges to load it up just for Tower maps I just haven't had the time. In short this game gets a 9 in my obligatory number score book, but the plain and simple fact is this game is pure fun.

Mass Effect, Initial Reactions

As it is likely you have already heard quite a bit about this game if you are any kind of gamer, you likely already know the basics of what the game is. Developed by Bioware, the same company that brought the Knights of the Old Republic games and Jade Empire to us, Mass Effect has a similar feel to it but has a level of polish the other games did not.

Similar to the the previous RPG games this is a Role Playing Game at heart. The twist to this is that it plays like a FPS when the combat begins which gives the game a new depth to the action that it's predecessors lacked. Putting it as simply as I can the combat is just pure fun, plain and simple. Like all games however where there's good there's always something bad.

Mass Effect, as you will no doubt find out within 5 minutes of loading the game, has a lot going on with it. The problem here is that a lot of the controls are not intuitive and the game gives you little to no explanation on how to do some fairly critical things. My suggestion is that when you get a chance read the game manual. This one step will act as your only tutorial through out the process of playing this game. Even once you read this manual the inventory system can still seem unwieldy and will often give you a headache when you can't seem to do what you want with it.

Aside from these two things the game is marvelous at first glance. The conversations you have with people are actually interesting and can make putting skill points into charm or intimidation actually worthwhile. I will have more as I progress through the game and will be updating with a new post in about a day maybe two. Happy Hunting.

New Games, New Year

It took me a while longer to get to posting here than I would have liked, but I take comfort in the fact that the reason it took so long was that I had/have many games to play as I enter the New Year. As any gamer knows there can be no better reason to be late with something.

I will not be giving my opinion on all the games I have been playing right away but I will break them up into separate posts for better flow.

Let's start with a game (if this word can encompass all that this truly is) that is known as the Orange Box. This game is digital gold for your money there is no game that can rival the value of this disc. The game comes with Half Life 2, Half life two episodes 1 and 2, Portal, and Team Fortress 2.

Half Life 2 was one of the most innovative video games of it's time. This game is a titan among it's peers and still stands as a beacon of what a good shooter can and should be. With the clever use of physics and various other detail oriented effects the game has many nuances that make the game even more impressive. Whether its being able to use the gravity gun to pick up a giant circular saw blade and hurl it at a horde of incoming zombies (not in the traditional sense of the word zombies) or a magnifying glass that allows you to look through it at a particular section of a map the game is oozing with sexiness. The two expansions episode 1 and 2 follow suit.

Ah Portal, I love this mini game and I am not lying to you that I would spend almost the full $59.99 on this mini game alone...almost all only because the game is fairly short. This game is one of the best mini games I have played to date. The premise is you are in a testing facility for a new weapon which allows the user to create portals that bend the laws of space and allow for some inventive uses of the physics engine. The game will surprise many with the twist in the game and that is all I will say for fear of spoilers ruining it for you.

Now we come to the obligatory multi player that all games seem to have now a days. Fortunately instead of cooking up some half baked game the people at valve have given the player a stand mp game as a "substitute". TF2 as this game is referred to is highly entertaining and easy to learn. The original TF is almost single handedly responsible for popularizing the class system used in many multi player shooters on the market today. I am happy to say that it's successor continues the tradition with style. The only problem with this portion of the title is the lack of maps leading to repetitive game play in terms of location. Other than that minor fault TF2 is everything that fans could have hoped for. And as for the map situation as stated here under the maps section valve has plans to release more maps in early 2008.

With that said my tentative obligatory numerical score is a 9.5 on the standard 10pt scale. If valve follows through on the more maps...thus making TF2 even better I will be changing my score up accordingly. Have a great new year and stay "tuned".