Review - Guitar Hero Van Halen

A Guest Review by Tom McShane

• Game: Guitar Hero Van Halen
• Format: Xbox 360
• Console: PS2, PS3, Wii
• Developer: NeverSoft
• Publisher: Activision
• Genre: Music/Rhythm

If there’s one guitar solo in the history of all music (nay, all sound) that makes women moist and gives guys the nut-chills, it’s Van Halen’s ‘Eruption’, and before now the only coverage the spandex-clad, harmony-fuelled rock gods have had in the world of music video games has been a cover of ‘You Really Got Me’ in Guitar Hero II, and a blisteringly-difficult rendition of ‘Hot For Teacher’ in World Tour. So is the addition of a Van Halen iteration to the roster of band centric Guitar Hero titles enough to give you those Eruption-esque chills all over again?

The answer, sadly, is no. Unlike the Aerosmith and Metallica instalments, this is quite a lacklustre effort from the folks over at Neversoft. Picture the scene; Van Halen are in their prime, rocking it with some of their best known songs with flamboyant frontman David Lee Roth. They’re leaping around the stage looking like they’ve been poured into the skin-tight spandex and leather… wait. That’s right – Van Halen’s major, non-musical traits (their typically 80s outfits; their over-the-top stage presence; David Lee Roth’s flowing hair) are all but absent from this game. The band appear as they did on their 2009 tour – complete with a short-haired David Lee Roth, a rather aged Eddie Van Halen and lacking both original bassist Michael Anthony and any of the band’s signature stage presence.

There’s nothing particularly wrong with the core of the game, mind you. It’s still Guitar Hero, and the plethora of classic Van Halen songs (all from the arguably superior David Lee Roth-era) are fantastic fun. Pretty much every single song that made Van Halen who are they is in here – ‘Panama’, ‘Jump’, ‘Eruption’, ‘You Really Got Me’, ‘Running With The Devil’… the list goes on and on for 25 songs of rocky goodness. In fact, you could take the songlist from this game and easily package it as a ‘Best Of’ that fans (myself included) would lap up and hand over a tenner for. But there’s nothing new here that stops the game becoming anything more than a glorified expansion pack that rapes your wallet of £40, which also unfortunately seems to be the way the whole Guitar Hero franchise is going.

The game mechanics are exactly the same - in fact they might even be worse, seeing as Guitar Hero: Van Halen actually lacks the drop-in/drop-out play mode of Guitar Hero 5, despite the VH iteration being the newest game in the series. Everything looks the same (save for some gratuitous red, black and white Van Halen striping around the menus) and the on-stage models are much the same too – incredibly realistic looking, but when it comes to movements they’re stiff and lifeless. The animated band does move about a bit and pull off the odd stage antic (like the David Lee Roth spinning the mic stand) but it’s all very half-arsed. There’s just no Van Halen magic to it at all. Maybe I’m expecting too much for some 3D animated models to capture the same stage magic of the real-life Van Halen from way back in the 80s. Or maybe that’s the problem with the game and why the first statement sounds like I’m having to make excuses for a game that feels rushed and half-finished. I mean, what’s so ‘Van Halen’ about short, neat haircuts, a nice shirt and smart jeans, and a reserved, ‘in awe of a stadium audience’ stage presence and attitude.

David Lee Roth’s ability to hit those high notes is no surprise after you get one look of the spandex tightly hugging his crotch.

Yeah, ok, you can unlock stage models of the band from their spandex/ass-less chap era (late 70s/early 80s) but there’s two reasons why this is totally rubbish, the main reason being that it’s totally backwards. This classic 80s formation of Van Halen is that one that should be available from the very beginning; long hair and ridiculous skin tight, glittery costumes is the epitome of Van Halen and the glam rock era they championed. The rather polished, ‘we’ve grown up now’ look of the modern-day Van Halen is the costume and model set that should be unlockable – not the real Van Halen!

Which leads me into the second reason as to why the character sets are completely backwards – it means that for a large part of the game it just doesn’t feel like you’re playing as Van Halen. It feels like you’re just playing as some random collection of computer-generated rockstars performing away in the background on an extra-large Van Halen song pack on Guitar Hero: World Tour. And that’s all the game is really – an expansion pack. Hell, those lucky American folk got this for free if they bought Guitar Hero 5.

So if there’s a bottom line here it’s “don’t buy this game”. It’s such a shame as Van Halen are the perfect band for a game like Guitar Hero – catchy riffs, blistering solos (one thing to mention about the game is its racked up difficulty in comparison to a lot of older GH material) and screaming lead vocals. But it’s pulled off in such a way that will leave you feeling short changed. Maybe if some generous American fella is selling his free copy on eBay dirt cheap, or the market price responds to the abysmal press scores it’s been given (averaging less than 66% on GameRankings as well as a meagre 4.9/10 on IGN), then it’ll be worth it. Until then, it’s probably best to crank up that Van Halen record and air-guitar around your room like a buffoon. It’s cheaper and much more satisfying.


Discuss the article on the forum.

Continue reading Review - Guitar Hero Van Halen

Hardware - Turtle Beach X1 Headphones

A Guest Article by Funk
I've always played CoD4 and MW2 with headphones on as I think it's one of the best advantages you can have in the game. The downside is that although you can hear exactly where people are, you can't actually talk to people in games. It bothers me sometimes being in games where people are slagging me off because I'm winning and not be able to respond in some way. I've been on the lookout for a headset that had decent sound that matched my awesome Sennheisers and a mic built in that worked with the 360. Recently I got these Turtle Beach X1's.

Not being a sound engineer it's kinda hard to explain technically why they're good but they seem to have an advantage over my Sennheisers in that the sound is amplified and boosted in the right areas. There's a massive bass boost and a focus on the sound of footsteps, reloading and enemies using tech like predators etc. You can actually hear the briefcase opening!

The wires are a bit fiddly to start with because you have a usb cable to the console and an audio jack to your sound source and then another lead from the sound controller to the pad. This allows independent control of game volume in your ears and the mic volume of people in the lobby. You do get a slight humm through the phones when there's no game sound but this is because of the bass boost I think -and you never notice it during gameplay.

Overall I'm well happy with them, they've made me even more devastating and now I can verbally slap people who start talking crap at me during games. The X1's are reasonably priced and if you want to spend another 50 quid on top you can get the wireless X31's.

If you're serious about your FPS's and you want mic ability too. Get these - they're awesome.

Discuss this article on the forum.

Continue reading Hardware - Turtle Beach X1 Headphones

TGN Game of the Year 2009

It's 2010 so, naturally, we look back at the previous year in various different ways. The most popular form seems to be all over the TV in the form of list shows, but they're inexpensive to make and get good viewing figures (I think), so I'm going to conform to that because I'm pretty bored, and the Blog hasn't had a new article all year (hurr-durr). SO! I went into the GotY thread on TGN and tallied up the "votes" and came to a really unsurprising conclusion. I'm going to do it anyway. I'm bored.

Now, the nature of the thread means that this is all pretty sketchy, as Mr Party Hat couldn't select a single game, so he told everyone to list 5 and most did, though some only mentioned one, and one person put down 10. But it seems to work regardless of that (as per usual on TGN), certainly, my GotY hit the top spot. A bunch of games were only mentioned once, so I got rid of them for the countdown. I ended up with a Top 8. At least it's an even number…

8
Tales of Vesperia
2 votes

I haven't played this, yet, so I'll hand it over to quotes from the thread.

Master hunter:
"An example of how JRPG's should be done. Addictive story, likeable characters, awesome soundtrack, nice length, and I can't think of where they took a step wrong besides having unskippable cutscenes."

Falco:
"Truly awesome experience. The fighting just worked, there were some unreasonably tough sections but the majority was do-able with challenge. On the second play-through it made you feel like God.


…it was simply a joy to play, and a truly epic experience."

7

Ghostbusters: The Video Game

2 votes

I've waxed lyrical about this game on TGN, or at least if I haven't I bloody well should have done. No, I definitely think I have. You see, it's Ghostbusters and it's a video game, but it's a damn fine video-game. Prior to its eventual and troubled release there was a feeling in the air that it might be a bit rubbish, as with most licensed games, but it really isn't. The ghost trapping is spot-on and it's incredibly fun, too, and the cast is there in their entirety… almost. You've got all the Ghostbusters, Janine and even dickless himself, Walter Peck. Only Dana and Louis are missing, but that's not really a problem. It's not as funny as the movies and certainly not as quotable as the first, but it's got a lot of legs, as you'll find on your third or fourth play-through. It's also got a fairly well-done and enjoyable multiplayer, even if it's a little difficult to get into a game with a friend. Then there's the fan-service; it references the film almost non-stop throughout the game, whether it's a dancing toaster or the portrait of Vigo (who will admonish you should you approach him), to the brilliant boss-battle with the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man, and the back-story given to the Gray Lady, the very first spectre the 'Busters encounter. Fantastic.

6

Borderlands

2 votes

Mr Party Hat:
"There isn't much that can be said about Borderlands that hasn't already been shouted from the forum-tops by an adoring Internet. It has more satisfying gunplay than any FPS released all year, perfects WoW's loot fetishism in a way even other MMOs struggle to do and is set in a strikingly pretty world. Above all else though, and perhaps more than any other console game this year, it was created out of the developer's desire to do so, rather than financial necessity, and this comes through in every acid bleeding, blood splattered, shotgun wielding Badass Midget Psycho."

Enough said, I think.

5

Assassin's Creed 2

3 votes

Now, this only got two mentions in the thread, but I got it for Christmas and I'm adding a vote for me. I haven't even completed it yet, but I'm absolutely loving it.

Apocalypse Dude:
"A perfect example of how exactly to do a sequel. They took on board everything that was criticised from the first game and corrected it, improved everything that was already great, and then threw a heap of new stuff in on top. Utterly superb.


Also, best last boss ever."

I can't say anything at all about the last boss, but I've played enough to know just how good a game AC2 is. It takes a while to get into the game proper, but it's a testament to how good a game it is that it doesn't matter, as you'll still have a lot of fun. The parkour elements are just as fun as ever, and I found myself climbing the tallest buildings just for the sake of it. There's nothing like the immense sense of satisfaction to be garnered from pulling off a perfectly executed assassination without being seen and without your notoriety going up.

4

Street Fighter IV

3 votes

A game I've got and have played, but not a game I've played a lot or know much about. I do know it's got fantastic graphics, and what I did play was a lot of fun. Here's a couple of quotes:

Boss Man:
"Brings the classic characters and gameplay from what we loved from SFII. Got this game when it came out and I'm still playing it today."

Stifler:
"Surprised only Boss Man has mentioned it so far, given that it was officially declared as GOTY 2009 when we did the 2008 thread last year


Can't fault it, aside from the lack of an online spectators lobby...looking forward to Super SFIV fixing that though (and adding in Cody!...GOTY 2010 for sure!)"

3

Uncharted 2

3 votes

Mr Party Hat:
"So beautiful it makes me want to get my cock out, so I've got a third eye to watch it with."

I'd like to leave it at that, but I have to add more stuff in so the box-art doesn't get messed up with the next game.

Android18a:
"For me, this is unquestionably the Game Of The Year. Surpassing the original Uncharted in almost every aspect, Uncharted 2 is a blooming masterpiece from start to finish. Stunningly rendered locations, the best acting on a videogame to date, and a fantastic action-adventure romp.


Perhaps most impressive is the almost complete lack of filler. No endless repeating corridors, no copy-and-paste areas, and none of those endless waves of enemies from the original game. You're always moving forwards, and there's something round every corner. A fast moving river to cross, a collapsing bridge, being chased by a tank, scaling to the top of a ruined luxury hotel… every single minute is gold. With the possible exception of a slightly cheap final boss."

2

Batman: Arkham Asylum

6 votes

Ah, finally, a game I can talk about. Arkham Asylum is pretty much as perfect as a game can get. It's challenging without being unfair, the story is entertaining and thrilling without going over the top or being too convoluted, the graphics are superb and there are close to no glitches whatsoever. It makes you feel like Batman; you spend most of the game using your grappling hook to get into vantage spots to take out the enemy in the most impressive or efficient way. It's a joy to finally play a game and know that whenever you get hurt, it's pretty much your own fault completely. It must be possible to go through the whole game even on the hardest difficulty and not get hurt at all. That's one of the beautiful things about Arkham Asylum, it never gets frustrating and stays at the right side of challenging throughout. Whenever Batman gets hurt, it's because you've fucked up. You never feel like you've been harshly done by, and whilst there might be times when you'll get a bit angry, it'll only be anger directed toward yourself, never to the game. You might say something like "how the hell was I supposed to know that was going to happen", but deep down, you'll know you did something wrong and could easily have stopped it from happening were you looking in the right direction or what have you.

Every part of this game and every part of Arkham Asylum has been paid so much attention to, it's surprising when you realise that it was made by a little known developer from London whose only previous game was Urban Chaos: Riot Response on the PS2. No, I've never heard of it, either. I can't wait to see what Rocksteady are up to nex– oh, wait Arkham Asylum 2! Sweet.

Number 1

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2

7 votes

Predictable? Yes, but as you can see from the votes, it only just won. Undeserved? Definitely not. While the single-player story might be a bit of a mess, it's not so much about the story but rather the situations the game puts you in. In a recent interview with Gametrailers.com, some of Infinity Ward's lead designers talked about the process of the story's development, and said that they had an idea of a bunch of different set-pieces, then crafted the story around that. You can see that quite clearly, as set-pieces such as invading the Gulag, scaling a glacier and the infamous 'No Russian' level are talked about far more than the actual story. Even with all that said, the single-player campaign is, for most people, only about 10% of the actual game. It's the multi-player that makes up the reason this game is so lauded. It's predecessor, Call of Duty 4, was so good it dominated Xbox Live play-time over the likes of Halo 3 and Gears of War, but Modern Warfare 2 makes CoD4 obsolete in every way shape or form.

At first, even to CoD4 veterans, the sheer amount of new perks, killstreak rewards, deathstreak perks, weapons, weapon add-ons, equipment, challenges, callsigns and game modes can be overwhelming. Once I first started playing the multi-player, I didn't know where to start, and found myself just staring at the screen with my mouth agape. After a few games, though, I was squeaking down my microphone at my friends with sheer delight as I tried out the new care-packages and called in a Precision Airstrike. The amount of times in CoD4 where I've lamented a perfectly placed airstrike missing every opponent because of the random angle the airstrike came in at. Now you have full control over where it strikes and where it comes from. But this isn't even the best killstreak reward; the AC-130 might not be the most effective form of air-support, but it sure is fun and the Chopper Gunner is just ruthless, with a cannon that unloads molten death onto anyone you care to aim at. Then you've got the Nuke. The End Game in its purest form. Incredibly satisfying to use, especially when you're on the losing team. It sounds a little unfair, but, believe me, if you can get a 25 killstreak, you deserve to win the game. I haven't even mentioned Spec-Ops yet, and I can't bothered to, either.

So, there we have it. 2009's best games as (kind of) decided by the gloriously proportioned members of TGN. 2010 will probably be better…

Discuss this article on the forum.

Continue reading TGN Game of the Year 2009

Review - Assassin's Creed II

• Game: Assassin's Creed 2
• Format: Xbox 360
• Other Formats: PC, PS3
• Developer: Ubisoft Montreal
  
• Publisher: Ubisoft
  
• Genre: Third Person Adventure

The first Assassin's Creed was a game with great potential - the Prince of Persia-style free running allowed you to climb any building then leap into a conveniently placed haystack at the bottom. Then there was the crowd-based stealth system that when used properly could let you walk right up to your target, stab him, and walk away before the guards even noticed he was dead. All this was tied up with a plot that could best be described as "The Da Vinci Code if Dan Brown wasn't a talentless hack" and the truly revolutionary concept of using a historical setting that was neither World War II nor ancient Rome.

Note the lack of Nazi gladiators.

Despite this potential, there were a number of major flaws that prevented it from being a truly great game. But now two years on, the sequel is here and provides one of the best examples in years of how to address the flaws of a game and bring the concept forwards.

The story kicks off right where the first game ended. Desmond is rescued from Abstergo by the modern Assassins and put into an upgraded version of the Animus. Once there he begins to relive the life of his ancestor Ezio Auditore da Firenze, a 15th century Italian nobleman who, much like Altaïr, is also a behooded Batman wannabe fighting to stop the Knights Templar from stealing the powers of Space Jesus. It makes sense in context. This change of character brings with it a new setting in the form of five cities in Renaissance Italy.

The dialogue è ormai casualmente switch between English e Italiano. Accendere i sottotitoli. Requiescat in pace.

The most obvious flaw in the original game was the dull mission structure, with constantly repeated missions involving such thrilling jobs as pickpocketing or sitting on a bench. The sequel does its best to address this problem, with much more variety in the missions and more cinematic set-pieces. There are also a number of underground tombs that allow you to make the most of Ezio's parkour skills. Having said all this, there are still too many "very slowly walk after this guy" missions (i.e. more than zero).

And the improvements extend further than the mission structure, to the point where it is hard to think of a single criticism of the first game that hasn't been addressed to some extent. Lack of reward for finding things? Collection increases the value of your villa and hence your income, plus there are proper unlockables for finding enough hidden feathers. Instant death water? You can now not only swim, but make sneaky takedowns from the water's edge. Not enough answers regarding the metaplot? Two sidequests give plenty of information about both the Assassins and Templars, and the ending is essentially a chain of massive revelations.

Non-instakill water. Really useful when you're in Venice.

There are still a few problems though. Having to keep returning to the villa to pick up money is a pain, especially as it involves a loading screen and usually a fairly long walk. In addition, despite improvements the combat still pales in comparison to something like Batman: Arkham Asylum. There are a number of new moves, but the all-powerful counter attack is still enough to defeat just about any enemy. This combined with enemies that politely attack one at a time means that battles often degenerate into holding the block button and waiting for an opportunity to counter.

All in all, this is the game we should have got two years ago, and means the series now actually deserves the level of success it has received. There are a few things left to be ironed out, but if the inevitable Assassin's Creed III has the same dedication to addressing its failings then it could be a true classic.

Score:
8/10

Discuss this article on the forum.

Continue reading Review - Assassin's Creed II

How to Not Completely Fail… at Hexic

A Guest Article by Funk

OK, I don’t purport to be a Hexic master myself but I know there are a few people out there who don’t know where to start and might appreciate some pointers on how to get going. Hexic can seem more complicated than it actually is at first and if you’re having trouble making your first black pearl or even your first starflower, maybe my ‘common sense’ guide to maximising your potential might be able to help. I wanted to just write some basic tips that I know would have helped me when I started playing.

Contents:
My Philosophies
Strategy
Techniques

Funk’s Basic Philosophies
The following musings are I believe major factors in eventually becoming a master at Hexic. I am following these myself and my own skills have progressed. I look at a Hexic board completely differently now to when I started playing and although I do still make mistakes I am making consistently higher scores all the time.

1. Hexic is not a game you can play quickly. You must have patience, so take your time and consider every single move you make, like you would in Chess. Also, it can take hours to build a big score so don’t make rash moves. Take regular breaks if necessary. You can even quit the game and come back to it without losing your progress, take advantage of this feature as I find coming back with a fresh perspective can help you out in the long run.

2. While learning about Hexic keep it simple. Your first goal should simply be to know how to move pieces around in order to make a single starflower. So forget about high scores and black pearls for a while, just practice. Once you are adept at making one star you can move on to making and manoeuvring multiple stars. Then as your skills improve your goal will change again from making starflowers to producing black pearls. Then you can make some really big scores and win the game by making a black pearl cluster.

3. Never make a move unless it’s part of a planned sequence and you know or are at least 80% sure of what will happen next. Play the game in your head first. There is nothing worse than thinking you have your next star or pearl made and then when you make the ‘killer’ move in a sequence something completely unexpected happens and you’re back to square one. Avoid this catastrophe by planning carefully because being back at square one can often be more detrimental than you may think. Making a big mistake can knock your confidence. If that happens step back for a while.

4. Grasshopper say “Don’t try to run before you can walk. Patience and planning is the only way.”

Strategy
Some basic strategies
Always try to create your first stars in the centre or upper middle area of the board. This is a good springboard and makes it easier to keep control of the board and only destroy the clusters that you want to destroy. Obviously this will not always be possible - sometimes you will be forced to make moves lower down if only to change the layout of the board if you run out of good moves.

Try to avoid making moves and destroying clusters in the lower area of the board as this will have a knock-on effect at the top. More random pieces will fall and you might build up long strings of worthless combos that don’t do your score-making potential any good whatsoever. In the early levels, avoid chaining large useless combos by only destroying clusters at the upper area of the board.

Your best chance of making a really high score is by having a large number of starflowers on the board before you reach the level 4 - 5 mark. From there onwards it becomes more difficult to make starflowers and consequently black pearls are harder too. This is because there are more colours on the board (meaning less pieces of any one colour) and also more bombs to contend with. Once you start seeing pink and dark green pieces on the board, things begin to get tricky so if you only have a few starflowers (3, 4 or 5) on the board at that point, it’s going to be very hard work to build up enough more to make a decent score.

Don’t waste time when you see a bomb. A bomb at the wrong time can ruin everything. Focus entirely on getting rid of it. In the early levels you get nine moves to get rid of a bomb so you have slightly more freedom to move your pieces around whilst still maintaining control of the board. Later in the game it becomes more difficult to remove bombs in six moves or less so at times you have to sacrifice some of your hard work. Never think you can get rid of the bomb later, or ‘after I’ve done this first’ unless you have planned the moves carefully and are at least 80% sure where every piece will land. I say 80% because there will always be new pieces dropping down from the top that you can’t see yet.

Never mix special coloured star pieces with bombs. Removing all of one colour can ruin the whole layout of the board and set you back many moves. Only if you have already lost control of the board should you bother doing this, otherwise you risk dropping perfectly placed starflowers or pearls out of play and to the bottom of the board.

When you have a few starflowers reasonably spaced around the board, use them wisely to reposition more pieces and make more starflowers. Don’t rush to create a black pearl, wait until you have at least 10 to 16 starflowers on the board before you use up 6 to make a pearl, that way you can continue manoeuvring the other pieces around easily to continue making even more starflowers.

Wherever possible, make a new starflower around another starflower. The existing starflower will only drop down a little way while a new starflower will drop in from the top of the board. This is one of the easier ways of making starflowers because when you have two or three in close proximity you can use them like ‘cogs’ turning each one to exchange the coloured pieces from one ‘cog’ to the next.

Keeping between 10 and 18 starflowers on the board is the way to go. If you get to 18, try and make a pearl. The remaining 12 plus the pearl are more than enough to arrange pieces to create more.

Techniques
Basic starflower
Look at the board and try to locate three pieces of one colour together in a kind of U shape. There will always be one somewhere and if you’re lucky it’ll be in the middle or upper middle of the board. This is the ideal place to get a starflower because you have half of it made for you. Look around that area and see where the colours you need are and think about how you can go about moving them into position. Often there will be a piece that you need nearby but you’ll have no means to move it. Sometimes you have to destroy other clusters above the piece you need to bring down other pieces you haven’t seen yet. The important thing is not to rush into making a move without purpose. You can and will get those pieces you need.

Moving 1 starflower using another
When you have two starflowers together this is great. It is very easy to move them both to anywhere else on the board, just be careful that the path you take doesn’t destroy useful clusters or start chains of unwanted combos. You can use two starflowers together to go and collect a coloured piece from one side of the board and easily take it to another position where it can be used on another cog.
Choose which starflower is to become the centre of the cog, turn it until the one branching off is facing the direction you want to go in. Then simply highlight the branching one which now becomes the centre of the cog and turn again repeating the process until you get where you want to go. This is how to travel across the board. You can also do this with three and more starflowers but this requires more moves and takes longer to set up. I’ll add a picture for three or more starflowers next time I get into that spot.

Place starflowers equidistantly apart using the above method but so that they interconnect with either one or two pieces. This is your best tool in the game. It’s easily the best way to churn out loads more starflowers. Think of the starflowers like interlinking cogs, and by turning the linked cogs clockwise and anti-clockwise you can move a piece from one cog to the next.

Continue reading How to Not Completely Fail… at Hexic

Review - Beneath the Ashes (Tomb Raider: Underworld DLC)

• Game: Tomb Raider: Underworld – Beneath the Ashes (DLC)
• Format: Xbox 360
• Other Formats: None
• Developer: Crystal Dynamics
• Genre: 3^rd Person Adventure

Not content with letting sleeping Tomb Raiders lie, we – the rabid excuse for a public – are once again force-fed another nauseating chapter from the life of the world’s most questionable archaeologist as she bends over in front of cameras in new and exciting locales. We are “treated” to an extension of Tomb Raider: Underwear in the form of downloadable content, as Lara ventures beneath Croft Manor for some reason or another that I shouldn’t give two green pasty shits about.

Quite why Crystal Dynamics decided to create extra content in the form of DLC that you actually have to pay money for – based on one of the most uninspiring chapters of the base game - is beyond me. Send Lara back to Thailand, or perhaps follow the details of her holiday in Tahiti as she plays Gears of War 2 with her rich friends for Christ’s sake. God forbid that we should have anything more visually stunning and appealing to look at than an upturned grey flagstone. Something that did raise a smile however, was how the much touted six extra costumes, created exclusively for this DLC, are simply a couple existing costumes with a palette change and four colours of bikini – made presumably on a budget, as there is a distinct lack of material covering Lara’s huge… personality. What kind of people do Crystal Dynamics take us male gamers for? I chose the blue bikini.

Both the main gameplay influences in action

Starting off the content in her father’s old secret study, Lara finds something that describes another thing that she wants for reasons that she doesn’t say, before jumping down a hole that I swear wasn’t there before in the main game. Sorry about those spoilers – I just couldn’t help myself. Eventually you will come across the ‘proper’ parts of Tomb Raider, and by ‘proper’; I mean the climby bits as no-one plays the series for its “in-depth combat system”. The good news is that these sections play very much like the main game and even come close to besting it in some respects, as the climbing is still enjoyable, albeit still clunky and forced in some places. You see, usually in a game like this, you get the feel for the character and their physical limits by now, but I’m still not entirely sure how far or high Lara can actually jump. Sometimes while grabbing wood (-en) beams, Ms Croft will flip towards her intended ledge with all the finesse of a Russian Women’s Shot-putter and end up 10 meters short with a face full of ground. Other times, under exactly the same conditions, she’ll have an epiphany and magnetically become dragged towards the target like a Ben and Jerry's van to a Weight Watchers meeting. Which outcome actually materialises when you play the game is left entirely down to Lara’s mood and whether she’s feeling pretty today, or something equally out of your control and fucking frustrating.

My initial concerns when I heard about this DLC was whether the catacombs of Croft Manor (of which, I’m still not entirely sure why they are there) would just be a depressing grey-fest or a slightly-not-as-bad-but-still-depressing-grey-fest. Thankfully - I think - it is the latter and I can think of at least one point where the game can actually be called ‘pretty’, as you ascend a giant waterwheel (again placed there for reasons unbeknown to me) and shafts of sunlight pierce through a fissure in the ceiling and light up the aqueous cavern below. Why then, would the developers insist on the rest of the level being a complete grey eyesore, rubbing your optic nerve with a metaphorical scabby flannel?

If there is so much natural light in these catacombs, why hasn't anyone noticed their existence before?

As a cop-out answer, I could say that Beneath the Ashes is ‘one for the fans’; something that you should get if you’re hankering for some action that’s more of the same. Instead I’ll just leave you with the thought of having to pay money to wade through gorilla faeces in order to obtain a rather nice cupcake. Sure the cupcake might be above average in texture and taste - and you can spend hours explaining that to yourself as you pace up and down the library in your smoking jacket – but it doesn’t change the fact that it’s probably not worth the entry fee.

Oh, and another thing! I think it’s absolutely wonderful when character dialogue kicks-in, just as an enemy is scripted to appear. I absolutely adore how I can’t hear what is being said over the sound of my shotgun. And I think it’s positively brilliant how I’m missing out on probably an important piece of key information in an otherwise incoherent mess of a story.

Single Player Score – 5
Multiplayer Score – N/A

Discuss this article on the forum.

Continue reading Review - Beneath the Ashes (Tomb Raider: Underworld DLC)

Review - Burnout Paradise: Ultimate Box

• Game: Burnout Paradise - Ultimate Box
• Format: Xbox 360
• Other Formats: PS3, PC
• Developer: Criterion Games
• Publisher: Electronic Arts
• Genre: Racing, Sandbox

Early 2008 saw the arrival of Criterion’s Burnout Paradise – a balls-to-the-wall, adrenaline-fuelled arcade racer that scrapped the menus for a free-roaming city with which to confound and annoy you. Upon lending yourself to the city for a few hours however, you soon found that navigating the twisty-turny streets like a twisty-turny thing became second nature, so fans of the game should feel right at home with the expansions as they are set once again in this ‘paradise’.

Wayne has already covered the core game and it’s assets in his review way back when, so I won’t go treading on his street-racing tippy toes… too much. The Ultimate Box contains the main Burnout Paradise game, with the inclusion of all the current updates and the free Burnout Bikes, in conjunction with the Party Pack – a pay-for add-on for offline multiplayer. From the offset you can see the transformation in the front-end menus as you are given the option to select ‘Burnout Bikes’ and the old favourite ‘Robotically-Controlled Driverless Cars’. As well as this, EA have jumped in with their big ‘online stick of internetz’ and offered the gift of a bulletin board detailing updates to the Burnout community and a nice little calendar detailing events to look out for – all while Paradise City loads.

Naturally, ever being the social stud that I am, I delved into the single-player Burnout Bikes as my first port of call, choosing the needlessly busty female rider in a fetching pink suit to tear some asphalt. What you notice from the word ‘go’ is the intense speed that is available to you from the off. The bikes pack a punch and it certainly gets the adrenaline flowing. It’s been a while Burnout, I’ve missed you like a fat kid misses cake. The good news is that the bikes handle very differently to their four-wheeled counterparts and it definitely feels fresh, even if you do miss boosting. You see, apparently the bikes go fast enough as it is, so there is no need for them to ever boost, making the ‘A’ button redundant in this mode. While perhaps leveling the playing field from wavy mounds to a smooth camber for those new to the genre, it does however render the tricks and stunts rather pointless as they only endanger your race rather than giving any sort of reward.

One of the biggest letdowns with the bikes mode that became immediately apparent is the lack of any sort of ‘oomf’ to the crashes. Instead of hurtling your twin-airbag parading avatar several miles into a particularly painfully placed lamp-post as your bike crumples to the size and texture of an Oxo Cube, you are left staring at an invincible vehicle sliding carelessly along the floor with your magical rider having teleported off-screen out of harm’s way. For a series that parades itself on sweet-ass crash physics, this came somewhat as a shock when all I wanted to see was some humorous ragdolls thrown into traffic when I ballsed up for the umpteenth time.

Overall, Burnout Bikes is exactly what Criterion says it is – an add-on. There are nice little touches - such as half the events on the map being available at night and the other half being available during the day – but the mode as a whole is weaker as a stand-alone game when compared to the majesty of Burnout Cars; especially when you can drive the Delorean (for a small fee of Microsoft Points). Each event seems more like a lonely time trial rather than a ‘race’ and you’ll find yourself coming back to the screeching tires of the four-wheeled exemplars soon enough.

Here we see 'Jez' driving up the brown slope

A quick flex of my thumb and forefinger to twist the volume up on my speakers instantaneously created a crowd of friends to huddle into my room – and so we come to the Burnout Party Pack. A mode for up to eight players sees you and your acquaintances passing the controller around and taking it in turns to beat each other’s score. For some reason the menu aesthetics have been completely revamped for this addition and the game suddenly looks even more colourful than before, resembling a scene from Willy Wonka’s Chocolate Factory, and very aptly setting a ‘party’ atmosphere without killing-off small children in every scene. From the player-naming menu thingy, you are given the option of how many rounds you and your chums would like to compete in, from one to eight in three categories. ‘Speed’, being the obvious from a racing game; ‘Stunt’, having you rather unimaginatively clamouring through the air over an object; and ‘Skill’ seeing you showboating in any way possible to garner enough points to rub in the unsuspecting face of your compadres like the streaker at a sleepover.

Out of these modes, ‘Stunt’ is probably the weakest, as it just requires either a pass or fail attempt and, unlike the other two modes, completely trashing the expected score will get you no further than just getting by with the requirements. A problem that I find with the party pack is not so much a qualm with the formula, but that fact that I cannot choose a specific event to replay at my whim. A particular favourite of mine involved power-sliding round a monument for as long as possible, but as far as I can tell, this will only come up randomly out of the ‘Skill’ category for a round. While not a structural weakness in the building that is Party Pack, it would be nice to have a supporting beam or two in the form of extra options. As expansions go though, the Party Pack delivers a wealth of content that’s more perfect for playing with friends than naked Twister.

Overall, the Ultimate Box is exactly what it says on the tin. You take an updated version of an already great game, add in a couple expansions as well as a great little party mode, stick them into a bowl, and mix the funk out of them. What do you have? An updated version of Burnout Paradise with a couple of expansions and a great little party mode… in a bowl.

Single Player Score – 9
Multiplayer Score - 9

Discuss this article on the forum.

Continue reading Review - Burnout Paradise: Ultimate Box

Review - Street Fighter IV

Co-written with Boss Man

• Game: Street Fighter IV
  
• Format: PS3
• Other Formats: Xbox 360, Arcade
• Developer: Dimps/Capcom
• Publisher: Capcom
• Genre: 2.5D Fighting

Street Fighter II defined a genre and created an impression still felt today, a game known for great characters and great gameplay. After years of re-releasing it with new additions, Capcom released Street Fighter III - a great game in its own right, introducing the series to a parry system and an array of new characters. Many of said new characters had an almost cloned move-set of those from the previous game. As good as it was, it failed to draw as big a fan -base as its predecessor. Many games have even tried to imitate the series: King of Fighters and Dark Stalkers spring to mind, but none so universally accepted as Street Fighter. Nine years since the last game, Capcom have finally created a new addition to the already bloated series. So after countless pretenders, will this new installment prove itself to be worthy of its title, or will it be another impersonator and eventually be forgotten?

Street Fighter IV is purely a fighting game. If you’re hoping for mini-games, customisation of characters or anything other than a toe to toe brawl, then this isn’t the game for you. The fighting game staple that is Arcade mode is included - this is simply you going one on one against a number of computer controlled opponents until you eventually reach the final boss. On completing the mode you get the second anime bookend to your character's story. The more appealing mode is Versus, where you can play local, or online battles against real opponents. New to Street Fighter is Challenge mode, where you can find multiple tasks, like Time Attack (you are given a time limit to defeat a number of opponents), Survival (you have one life bar through a few fights) and Trial, which is very much like training mode but introduces players to moves and combos with increasing difficulty.

Kameh-hameh… wait a minute…

As for the game's graphics, it looks nothing less than gorgeous. Cel-shaded style not too unlike Prince of Persia's is used to stunning effect. For fans of the previous games it may take a while to get used to Ryu and Ken’s added bulkiness, other than that slight qualm the graphics are fantastic and even better in motion. Street Fighter IV keeps the gameplay strictly 2D, but allows the characters and levels to stray into the third dimension, in a similar way to Super Smash Bros.

Street Fighter IV returns to its roots, with the original twelve characters from Street Fighter II. As well as the returning 12 there are four completely new characters, all with their own fighting style, moves and inputs. These four new characters are welcome additions and fit the bill perfectly. There are also three playable boss characters you can unlock. Included with the console versions of the game, you also have six extra characters from updated versions or spin-offs from the original series. In total there are 25 characters in the home versions of the game. There’s plenty of variety so there should be at last one character that takes your fancy.

"And what do they call you? Wheels?"

Now for the online, the options here are simple; Player Match or Ranked Match. Player Matches allow you to invite a friend for some matches with the online system. Lobbies here are limited to two people so unlike a local multiplayer match you can‘t have a group of friends taking turns. Ranked Match is you versus an opponent of equal or higher skill, fighting to be the victor. As you win a ranked match you gain points depending on how strong your opponent is and these points are deducted accordingly if you lose. Through these online battles you can unlock titles and an avatar for your online moniker, these give your Street Fighter alter-ego a personal touch.

Being a 2D fighter, it can easily be looked down upon for being shallow, but as fans know, Street Fighter can be exceedingly deep in the right hands. Unlike many fighting games, Street Fighter's simple controls give ease of access to newcomers, allowing them to play the game and have a good time in the process. Veterans of the series will not be alienated either, controls have been left untouched, even though some systems have changed. An example would be the exclusion of the parry system found in Street Fighter III, something called the 'focus system' has took it’s place and has proven to be quite a good inclusion. A focus attack when charged is unblockable, and when used properly they can lead into devastating combos. Street Fighter IV is almost perfectly balanced. If you lose, you know it’s because the other guy played better then you, but if you win, you know you deserved to win.

So does Street Fighter IV live up to it’s predecessor? Of course it does. With awesome characters, great gameplay and fantastic balance, this is easily one off the best fighting games ever, if not the best. Like Street Fighter II before it, Street Fighter IV doesn’t just impress, it pushes the fighting genre forward in one redefining leap.

Score:
10/10

Discuss this article on the forum.

Continue reading Review - Street Fighter IV

Review - Tom Clancy's EndWar

• Game: Tom Clancy's EndWar
• Format: Xbox 360
• Other Formats: PS3, PC
• Developer: Ubisoft Shanghai
• Publisher: Ubisoft
• Genre: Real-time Strategy

Another month and another Tom Clancy game appears galloping towards us from the dusty horizon with more American gusto and patriotism than a bald eagle donning aviators, loosely based around another book that he didn’t actually write. With all of the pessimistic post apocalyptic games currently out - detailing how our current lives are all useless as we’re all going to die anyway – it is refreshing to finally be given the chance to actually aid in the events leading to Judgment Day, instead of scrounging for pressure cookers and bottle caps to throw at irradiated zombies.

As the name (vaguely) suggests, Tom Clancy's EndWar throws you knee-deep into the conflict of the third World War, taking you for a ride on the RTS wagon. From the word ‘go’ I was bombarded with several industrial tankers worth of information and as a result of my obviously inferior brain I took in absolutely none of it. Regardless of my complete lack of understanding, I managed to win my first mission apparently entirely by accident and as to this moment I still don’t know what my objective was or how I achieved it. After blundering through the first few introductory missions however, you soon get the hang of how the game wants to be played. For instance, my initial thoughts of the camera – perhaps jaded by the generous top-down views from many other RTSs – was that it resembled a horny dog tethered to a leash at Crufts, and no matter how hard you fought, it would still be hauled back in to who was holding it. After a while of play however, I found that the style of locking the libidinous hound of a camera to the selected unit’s perspective forces the player to utilise certain squads as scouts and even garner the high ground purely for the advantage of sight – something that adds a small amount more to the ‘realism’ tally against methods such as ‘Fog of War’ utilised on older style RTS games for the same purpose.

The main premise of the game is to rather predictably ‘win the war’ by siding with a superpower – America, Europe or Russia – and seizing control of the capitols in each of the three territories. Naturally, I chose to root for the home team and selected Europe in the hope to realise my childhood dream of annihilating America at the hands of Britain. Granted, at the time I envisioned doing so with ninjas riding dinosaurs. After a few plays through with the blue army though (apparently we’re blue), it came to my attention that there is a distinct lack of Britain being involved in WWIII. Now don’t get me wrong, I understand that France is a big mover and shaker in Europe, but playing as the cheese-eating surrender monkeys for pretty much every mission is a bit of a letdown. You would have thought that Britain as one of the world’s leading powers today would at least get a passing mention in the next world conflict. Even the Aussies don’t get a look-in, and according to Halo they’re more abundant than Americans in the future.

The big draw of the game that I have purposely not touched upon until this point is the headset support, where a player is able to issue orders like a walkie-talkie throughout the battle. For the most part, this method of commanding works remarkably better than I had anticipated – picking up a great range of regional dialects – but predictably there are mishaps where squads don’t understand the soothing sultry tones of my voice. The key to victory is securing uplinks dotted about the maps, and when the game mistakes the words, “Unit 2, Secure, Alpha”, for ”Unit 9, Eat, Nuclear Waste”, I take that as a personal insult - implying something in the area of my vocal chords being no better than that of an electrified, epileptic strobe victim. With this attack on my ‘mouth noises’ (and my apparent tendency of taking things a little too personally), I find it much more effective and indeed faster to issue certain orders via the controller.

What you can't see in this image is Unit 9 eating nuclear waste

As the loading screens of Call of Duty 2 once told me, ‘there are no winners in war’, and this becomes increasingly apparent as the campaign progresses, with regions trading hands like the village bicycle and no progress in one area without losing another on the opposite side of the globe. When you think you just might capture Washington you have to run back to defend Paris before they start bleaching their flags. And while the unpredictability of it all might be realistic in some respects, after a while I can’t help but think it is a method of artificially extending the game’s lifespan as I fight the same battle again for seemingly the tenth time. But if a commander is not savvy enough during battle, they can find the tides turning far too quickly. Taking the Napoleonic approach with my French troops against the Ruskies, one battle saw me ploughing through their first wave of units in a heartbeat – taking my mighty fist of a battalion from point to point and securing them like the bitch that they are. Just when that little voice at the back of my head patted me on the shoulder, congratulating me on my sure victory, a giant turd of a Russian WMD annihilates my entire army, save for a single unit of cannon fodder who were running late to the party because Jenkins had a poorly tummy. Retaliating with an orbital laser of my own, I felt sure that victory was rightly grasped after that little blunder – but alas, a lone unit of Dmitri’s tanks had survived – presumably also due to poor punctuality. Taking immediate action, I sent my lads packing with their tails between their legs straight back to control point Alpha to do some emergency renovations to mission supports – all the while with hot doom fired over their heads from a distance. In the nick of time, my boys manage deliver a swift EMP to disable the enemy shields and dive into the nearest building to contemplate life and death. I quickly send in the NPC supports and take out the Boris while he’s weak to scrape a victory like plaque from the jaws of defeat.

Graphically the game leaves much to be desired, as I assume the general thinking from Ubisoft was that you’d be so far away from the action that you wouldn’t notice that the infantry look like little plastic toy soldiers, in both detail and animation. I found myself thinking that they should have their trousers round their ankles purely to complete the effect. I probably shouldn’t look further into those thoughts and neither should you. Aside from this though, the game runs very smoothly and can handle a great deal going on at once, so I can’t complain too much.

Signing into the ‘Theatre of War’ mode will hurl you into the ranked multiplayer of EndWar, and upon doing so for the very first time I was greeted with a right royal slagging-off from my commanding officer as he spouted insults about my absence from the multiplayer campaign and even accused me of desertion from my duties. If that wasn’t welcoming enough, he then proceeded to convey how disastrous the last week was for Europe. Now armed with morale-boosting thoughts, I selected a battle to fight that pointed out to me how matchmaking rivals Gears of War 2 for mind-numbing, soul-crushing lack of speed in finding opponents; unless that is, you pick a battle where your side has a distinct and unavoidable disadvantage, and suddenly finding someone to play against is almost instant. My point here is that people are bastards. I hate people.

Overall, Tom Clancy’s EndWar is actually a competent RTS and fills a nice little niche in the home console market. It’s not perfect, but it does the job – much like a gummy hooker. There, I managed to bring this review back down to my usual standard and all is well again in the world.

Single Player Score – 8

Multiplayer Score - 7

Discuss this review on the forum.

Continue reading Review - Tom Clancy's EndWar

A Look at the NXE

A couple of weeks ago, Microsoft announced that they were going to let a lucky few users try-out the Xbox 360's brand new revamped dashboard dubbed the New Xbox Experience (or just the NXE). To get the chance to wrap their deformed gaming thumbs around this 'preview', all they had to do was sign-up to Microsoft's 'Connect' service website … thing, fill out a quick form and they were entered into a selection process. I was one of the few who were chosen to download and preview the NXE weeks before its official release and so I thought I'd be kind enough to meld my thoughts and 'experience' so far into this concise but hopefully descriptive bit of readery for your eyes.

So what is the point in this 'Preview Program', I hear you ask? Well, it's basically a beta trial, where users can test out the new dashboard on their very own consoles at home and contact Microsoft to moan about all the bugs, so Microsoft can repair said bugs before it's officially released upon the public, like some kind of sexy-looking and rather functional pack of baying hounds. In other words, Microsoft gets a bunch of people to do their work for them and then have the gall to call them 'lucky'. You won't see anyone who got picked complaining, though, as the NXE genuinely is a lovely bit of user interface.

The loveliness of it all rears its beautiful head almost immediately as, you'll be glad to know, downloading and installing it is literally as easy as pressing one button twice. Whether it'll be as quick and painless on the 19th of November (when the WHOLE WORLD downloads it) is yet to be seen. It might be a little slower on the actual day, but at least it'll be painless, unless you sit on a pin or something. When you're all ready to go and when your 360 has restarted itself and after the rather spiffing intro video thing, your first interactive port of call in this 'experience' is to create your Avatar. You can either pick a placeholder for now and move on to the dashboard proper, or you could spend a while customising your Avatar, changing things such as hair and the other obvious bits I can't be bothered to mention. At the moment, though, it seems that Avatars are rather arbitrary and purely there for aesthetics. They don't do much except stand there waving at you and looking pretty. Come the 19th, however, I can pop my 360 on and have a look-see at the smiley new faces on my spanking new friends list. It's for this reason, and the fact that there are a lot more options available to you, that it's already tons better than Nintendo's simple-looking but faff-laden Miis.

Once you've saved your Avatar, you're finally taken to the dashboard. Without getting too in-depth, it's all set-out rather well; push up or down on the control stick and you're taken to the different sections of the dashboard, such as the Marketplace or your friends list, left and right taking you to the different options each section gives you, e.g. allowing you to play whatever game is in your tray. Your friends list is now no longer confined to the guide blade and has its very own full-screen section. Your friends all appear as their Avatars (the box of the game they're playing next to them) standing in front of certain background articles depending on the theme you've got, such as a big Xbox 360 or a police car or something. These backgrounds don't really have a purpose, but it's much more pleasing to the eye than a boring list or some kind of weird 'parade'.

One of the best new things about the NXE is the new guide button menu, which is a basic version of the old dashboard, but the speed at which it pops up and travels through its different options is rather refreshing. The old guide menu was a little clunky and a little ugly, especially when compared to the new one. It seems like the old guide has been retired to make way for its slicker, quicker and more intelligent younger sibling. You'll begin to feel pangs of regret every time you press that button (pangs that are quickly dispersed, mind you) as that old blade was like a friend. The kind of friend that is mostly reliable, but boring and slow. It did what it was asked to do without much fuss, and it might have broken down every now and then, but you always went back to it, mainly because you had to and had no other friends. I feel I've rinsed all I can from that particular analogy.

There are myriad features and options that the NXE gives you and I could go through them all, but by the time I'd have gotten around to writing them down it'll be next Thursday and everybody will already have it. I could go on to say that the new party system seems like an awesome idea, but seeing as nobody on my friends list (so nobody I actually want to talk to for longer than a minute) has the NXE, I'm not really able to test it out. But I'm not going to say that. I'm also not going to say that, at first, the NXE seems nothing more than a completely aesthetic make-over, but if you spend some time with it (and you will) you'll soon find that its newly found functionality and swiftness means that it's so much more than mere eye-candy. I could also say that perhaps I'm over-hyping it too much. Perhaps my love for all things Xbox 360 has clouded my judgement, and that if the NXE was merely a badly-compressed picture of Bill Gates sitting on a throne of money with a speech-bubble saying "buy more games you fucking loser" whilst giving me the finger I'd probably still love it. But, again, I'm running out of time here so I'm not going to say that either.

Just don't expect to play many games on the 19th, as you'll be too busy playing around with the front-end menu of a machine that was built primarily to play games on. Madness!

Discuss this article on the forum.

Continue reading A Look at the NXE