The Hitman games have always been a curious beast. They’ve always given the impression of having some freedom yet in the past there’s been time limits for hits and in the end it’s seemed that only one way is really the best way. This was what I got from the first two games, I always like their ideas but the execution and lack of leniency leaved a lot to be desired. Blood Money is the only game I’ve played after the first two demos and I have to say it’s improved so much. (more…)
Archive for the ‘Reviews’ Category
Hitman: Blood Money
Wednesday, November 8th, 2006The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
Wednesday, November 8th, 2006What can you say about a game like Oblivion? That’s a question I have for myself when writing this review. I’m not really much of the RPG player type and as some might know I prefer the action variety if I do play them. Oblivion is one of those action RPGs. It’s also a rather ambitious game too. There is an absolute tonne of quests to do. (more…)
[Review] Rockstar Table Tennis
Monday, August 14th, 2006Grand Theft Paddle. This was a name that absolutely no one came up with when Rockstar shocked the world by not announcing another headline grabbing game. While the tabloids won’t be stirred by the game, maybe the gaming public might well take notice of this one. This isn’t the game I pictured myself playing when it was announced. In fact even when the low price was announced I didn’t see myself getting it. However, my good friends Paula and Steve bought it me for my birthday so I got a chance to get my hands on it.
The Xbox 360 Hour Tour in Leeds
Monday, November 21st, 2005OK so I’ll spare you the log of my week for another entry. This is solely reserved for my impressions of the Xbox 360, which happens to be launched soon in the US and on December 2nd over here.
So what was the 360 Hour Tour? Well it was the usual demo pods with the HD TVs positioned around a small room with a screen with PR info being displayed at the back. In the centre of the room were four groups of four sofas placed in a square around HD TVs with a wired pad and game to play on. There was a DJ who looked really cool dude at the back, who was pumping out banging tracks! Which was banging man, those Microsoft boys know how to throw a party. Everyone was given a wristband and given an hour to walk around the room and play.
So what did I think then? Well the console looks as good or bad (depending on taste, I quite like it) as it does in the pictures. It seemed to be the size I was expecting it to be. The controller was pretty fantastic really, it felt good in the hand and the new smaller, lighter size was a joy to hold. The new shoulder buttons may take time to get used to, but it’s pretty much the same as the S controller.
Here are the games I played on, some I ignored because I didn’t like the look of them (cough EA, cough)
Project Gotham Racing 3: Well I have to say it was the favourite of mine. The cars handled well and it seemed to be tweaked to be slightly lighter. I was disappointed with some of the graphics on the 90% build that was on show. The jaggies looked worse, but that seemed more like an up-scaled picture like you get on an LCD monitor. To me this fueled the rumour that it wasn’t running at 720p resolution that Microsoft promised all games would run on. I’m sure they’ll fix it, or it may have been the TV. Some of the buildings looked more PGR2 than next gen. Again, having looked at Edge this issue just as I got in this evening, it seems to have improved. OK it’s not much of a leap over PGR2, but then it’s still a lot of fun. I’m also sure that it will be the same amount of fun over Live that PGR2 is.
Condemned: Criminal Origins – An impressive looking game, it was a slow starter on the tutorial, showing off the detective scanning and such. I got up to the part where you got a gun, with the enemies run about in the shadows avoiding you. This could well cause some scare factors for some. It seems like you might have a game of hide ‘n’ seek on your hands! It looked nice and all, however I’d like more natural skin tones rather than the “Doom 3 plasticine effect” that was present. Overall could be a good game, but not one I could play while under a time limit and standing up in a noisy room.
Kameo: Not a game I got to play much on, so I feel like it’s unfair to comment too much. It seemed a competent platformer, however I was left on a ball rolling bit after picking up the demo from someone else. Not knowing how to launch myself up the ramp properly didn’t help, so I left it at that.
Perfect Dark Zero: Not as bad as some might say it is. It felt very much like a spruced up Perfect Dark though. The cover move was good, but needed a strafe action, all I could do was aim and not move along the wall. Maybe it’s in there somewhere, but I couldn’t find it. I didn’t try the roll move much, but it didn’t seem as bad as I thought it would be. The rest is pretty solid but not too special, with a typical protection mission and a boss battle to deal with.
Gun: Blurgh! It’ll no doubt be a shit PS2/Xbox game too. Not worth the £45 they’ll be asking for it. Not even worth £30 if you ask me!
Need for Speed Most Wanted: Typical Need for Speed with the loose handling. The cars seem to have inertia compared to the last games, but it’s still no improvement.
Call Of Duty 2: It’s Call of Duty again. My PC runs it at that res and looks just as good. Which is either a compliment or not that impressive depending on how you see it. Not worth the money they’ll be asking for it.
King Kong: Not that impressed with what I played. The FPS bits are OK and can be pretty clever in execution at times, but the Kong bits were a bit average. Now I realise that you’ll all be saying that its a Michel Ancel game and that makes it brilliant etc. Well that doesn’t wash with me. Beyond Good & Evil is good but I feel overrated, and it doesn’t automatically make it a great game. I’ll stand by my comments for the other versions of the game too by the way.
Dead or Alive 4: Didn’t seem much different from other Dead or Alive games. Then again the demo wouldn’t allow for a CPU battle, and no one would play against me 
Tiger Woods: It’s Tiger Woods, with prettier graphics. Oh you want more? Well erm… his trousers looked good.
Overall, I would say lay off the 360 until next year. There were perhaps two or three games I would get the system with, but then I wouldn’t be too sure on the long term appeal of anything other than PGR3. We shall see what the developers truly have to make of the machine next year. Hopefully it will be the bigger leap we were expecting. MS should have held off the launch until the time when developers could get to grips with the machine and show off it’s power properly.
Project Gotham Racing 2
Wednesday, April 7th, 2004 |
There were a few introductions that I had thought of doing for this review. Nigel Mansell was one person I was going to make a very lame joke about. Then there was something along the lines of style, which was too obvious. In fact I was going to give up completely until this dawned on me.
The Unrelated Intro…Supermarkets and Trolleys. Most people just push the thing around with two hands firmly gripped on the handle. I however feel the need to show off. I pull with just the one hand, I glide between mums and toddlers, I even take tight corners around the aisles. Maybe I’ve not quite grown up yet, except of course I don’t push and put my feet on the bar between the wheels and let the momentum take me to undiscovered sections – usually the women’s makeup section. Well you can’t anymore, they ‘wisely’ removed that feature on new trolleys. Anyway, there are those who show off, and those who don’t. PGR2 is for show-offs. *What do you mean I wasted time and space with trolleys? |
Holy HistoryRight those at the back, time for a lesson for those who don’t know their gaming history. PGR2 was developed by Bizarre Creations and Bizarre Creations were also responsible for one of my favourite racing games ever. Metropolis Street Racer on the Dreamcast (R.I.P) was a dream come true after after a trend for serious race simulators that cropped up when Gran Turismo arrived. MSR introduced the Kudos system, and driving around the streets of London, San Francisco and Tokyo with style. The Kudos system gave you points for driving like this (usually skidding a lot around corners, overtaking cars well, finishing with good times). It added a kind of ’score attack’ system to a racing game, when every other game concentrated on times. It also added challenges and gambling elements to keep you on your toes, like choosing how many cars you overtake, then having to do it or lose kudos points. It was a really fun arcade style racing game, and I loved it. (Had I mentioned that earlier?) Anyway, since Sega dropped the DC and seemingly any plans for MSR2 (if they existed), Bizarre took their game engine with all it’s Kudos and accurately mapped cities and went elsewhere. Microsoft at the time wanted a nice console for themselves, and needed a top class racing game to go with it. The rest is history and PGR was born. I caught you with my laughing box of tricks (Yes I know)I’ll admit I’m a latecomer to the XBOX fold. Most of the games passed me by as my PS2, Gamecube, and PC took the gaming crown for me. However, the power of Bizarre’s creation drew me, I wanted to play PGR and PGR2. I started seriously wanting it until one deal too far, and I bought the XBOX with PGR2 bundled for free along with Panzer Dragoon Orta for cheap. So yes it wasn’t Halo or Halo 2 that brought me to the XBOX, it was PGR2. Chances are though I’ll get them anyway, but that and the whole XBOX Live thing really hooked me in. Chapter 1PGR2 has a few changes to the MSR format. The Kudos points system remains, except now it’s been tweaked and updgraded. They’ve now added new ways of getting points, like keeping to the racing line at optimum speed, or drafting behind an opponent (taking the draft of air from your opponents car and using it to gain an extra boost of speed). This is all fine and well of course. It gets better when they add a combo system. If you perform a move within two seconds of the last one, it opens up a combo bonus. Thus you can accumulate vast amounts of Kudos points through chaining these combos together. However, make a mistake like hitting the side of the road and the Kudos bonus is lost, just leaving you with the small Kudos amounts from your moves, or none at all if you only made one move. Complete the challenges set and you keep the Kudos and it adds to your total which can be used to unlock cars. What are these challenges? In the Kudos World Series you compete in Car Classes, and within each class are challenges. Hot Lap challenges give you a lap time as a target. Timed Runs are extended Hot Laps over two or more laps, just beat the set time limit. Street Races are explanatory, just finish in the position required. Speed Cameras require you reach a target speed when you cross the camera line. Cone Challenges are a pain in the lower areas. You have to drive between cone gates and rack up huge combos of Kudos points and beat the target within the time limit. A pure test of driving skill and manoeuvrability if ever there was one. Each challenge has a medal you can acquire from the very easy Metal, to the insanely difficult Platinum. Of course the aim of the game is to get Platinums on every challenge and unlock the beast that is the TVR Cerbera Speed 12! Now this system is all well and good, and indeed does work. Yet MSR’s, which introduced a gambling element to the game, was in my opinion, better. It saved at the start of every race, which meant if you quit the race, then you would forfeit points with a penalty. If your car hit anything it would add penalty points. PGR2 is quite lenient on you folks, as you aren’t given any penalty points. You only lose Kudos stash based on the move you were doing, and any lovely combos too. I tell you, you lot have it easy nowadays! Or do you? Let’s take a spanner to ‘imNow none of the cars have tuning options. A bad thing you say, seeing as tuning adds depth? Well not in this case. Sure the huge depth of the multitude of tuning options isn’t present, but that’s not a bad thing. PGR2 concentrates on the skill of driving and just getting down to driving. Really I don’t see the problem of not having tuning options. Why can’t we just have a game where you go straight in, choose a car and race? PGR2 isn’t a simulation in that sense and as such cannot be compared to Gran Turismo. It’s a straight in, get going arcade style racer and it’s just fun OK? So we’ve established that PGR2 isn’t a simulation. Which of course is reflected in the handling of the cars. They have to take some liberties to allow for the nature of the game. You need to be able to slide easily and manoeuvre quickly. Thing is you never feel out of control of the car. It does feel right, when you steer the cars and take them round the corners. It’s not overdone in any way and is perfect for the game. Dizzy, My Head is Spinning…Well everything feels perfect until you race against the computer on the harder difficulties. They cheat, plain and simple. The computer car knows of a ’sweet spot’ on the corners of the tail end of the car. The computer car then barges into the sweet spot using the Drafting technique and you find yourself spinning away, while the computer cars speed off and you lose any chance of gaining 1st or 2nd place. Now I tried a simulation of this with a two player game, and I tried it many times. In all cases both cars span off in separate directions and needed to recover. There are other problems with AI being a bit stupid and not considering it’s own safety. Now I’d accept this completely if the computer actually was bound by the same physics as I am. Yet it’s recovery is excellent, and it seems to be never affected by any rules I am. I may of course be making excuses, would I ever do that? (What do you mean yes?) Still though it’s not that bad. You learn to find ways to avoid such attempts of cheating, and it only really affects you when you are on the final bend of a five lap race, and the computer barges you, meaning that much needed second place is lost for your Gold medal. I suppose though you (I) should have taken every corner that little bit better shouldn’t you (I)? I suppose really though it’s a sign that this game isn’t a simulation, and that anything goes in the end. Living it upYou may well complain at the computer driver, but there is one breed that is far worse… The Human Opponent. Unpredictable, Unforgiving, Unwashed (joking)… This is the draw of PGR2, the Multiplayer mode. Not just System Link or Split Screen either, it’s the XBOX Live mode that impresses. Now I’ve played online games, yet mostly it’s been on FPS games, maybe the odd game of Rise of Nations though. Now they’ve always been smooth affairs with broadband, yet for a racer I’ve been told that it can be laggy. Not with PGR2, it feels smooth to play and the occasional lag isn’t much bother. It’s a wonderful system that adds many more hours to you play, as you also gain Kudos points and tokens online, so even if you don’t complete the Single Player game, you could still unlock all those cars, except the bonus ones. Which is good for me, incase you couldn’t tell. One point to note is that there are a few ‘custom’ games about on the online circuit. Two of which I have played are ‘Cat & Mouse’ where there are up to four teams of two. One player is a Mini (the mouse) the other is a powerful car (the cat). The aim being that the team with the first mouse to finish wins. The cats get to help there mouse by pushing it (thus boosting speed) or knocking the other mice of track that are ahead of you. Usually the mouse you should take out is in first place, yet some break the rule. (Not me you understand You also get a Live scoreboard system where your best Kudos scores and times are posted against other XBox Live players on PGR2. They even included weekly and monthly online challenges for you to pit yourself against others at. Pretty much a standard should be a standard for online games now this scoreboard stuff. Some games have it, others don’t. Remember what I told you old chum.So should you buy PGR2? Well if you like arcade style racing where the replay factor is more about gaining points then building cars, more about fun than sticking to the laws of physics, then yes PGR2 is great fun. If you have XBOX Live then it’s one of the best experiences there is. I don’t think I’ll convince the die hard GT fan though, lack of tuning options may well keep them away if they are that way inclined. There aren’t as many cars either, but frankly I could live without a 1975 Nissan Sunny. PGR2 is in my opinion, the best racing game available for any console. It has replay factor with the Kudos points, ever trying to beat your best. It has the challenge, and a bloody hard one at it, which should keep you going for a fair while too. Plus, the online mode is fantastic fun. Thoroughly recommended stuff for the racing fan in all of us. Dalv’s Verdict: 5 Moons on Sticks |
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