Nukezilla » Mark Steward

Nukezilla Review: Nomis: Legacy Islands (Xbox Indie Games)

Mark Steward — Mon, 30 Aug 2010 16:41:41 +0000

If there’s one thing I enjoy, it’s the opportunity to indulge in a little nostalgia. Luckily, Nomis: Legacy Islands brings fond memories to the forefront of my mind in two distinct ways. The mix of run ‘n’ gun and platforming mechanics prods at the portion of my brain that views the Amiga 500+ with rose-tinted spectacles. There’s a slightly off-kilter quality to the artwork that brings to mind the MTV cartoons of the mid 90′s. Throw in the option to upgrade your character’s abilities and play the game co-operatively and you have a decent picture of what Nomis: Legacy Islands is all about.

When I first started playing Nomis: Legacy Islands, I mistook it for an off-brand Mega Man and tackled it in a similar way. This approach became obviously unsuitable once the game had sat me down, looked me in the eye and carefully explained that ammunition was not going to be abundant. Instead, the game revolves around switching to a stealth mode, becoming invisible and rushing towards the enemies to deliver a quick and deadly melee attack. Projectile attacks are still possible but nowhere near as effective, only to be used when getting up close is difficult or impossible. Once the underlying systems became apparent, I started to really enjoy the frantic mix of platforming, negotiating the maze of ladders and desperately rushing towards the enemy before my stealth ability had to recharge.

The only real roadblock to enjoyment comes in the form of a series of frustrating, joyless boss battles. Melee combat is thrown to the wind and the battles revolve around shooting at weak points for, well, a bit of damage. Having a limited amount of ammo stops being a challenge and becomes an arbitrary limitation, not only did I have to avoid the bosses attacks but I also had to go through some tricky platforming to pick up extra bullets. For the first two boss battles, I ended up brute-forcing my way to success by simply shooting all my ammunition, dying and then respawning with full ammo. As long as I managed to dodge a couple of attacks, I had enough extra lives and by extension enough extra bullets to kill each boss. It isn’t a universal problem, I did eventually encounter a boss that I found much less frustrating to defeat but if I wasn’t trying to review the game I may have stopped at the second boss battle.

Though I got a few hours of fun platforming out of Nomis: Legacy Islands, I didn’t feel motivated to finish the game. It didn’t introduce any new mechanics or interesting twists along the way and eventually, the maze of ladders and platforms that makes up each level felt a bit repetitive. I’m not going to hold the developer’s feet to the fire for that minor transgression, it’s still a good looking and responsive platformer that I’d happily recommend to a friend. If you remember games like James Pond 2: Robocod or even older titles such as Jet Set Willy or Manic Miner with fondness, it’s definitely worth checking out.

Disclaimer: We received a free code to download the game from its developers Robot Foot Games.

GSC Gameworld Announce S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 Is In Development

Mark Steward — Sun, 15 Aug 2010 17:00:50 +0000

Though it was posted to the official GSC Gameworld website on Friday, the official announcement of a new S.T.A.L.K.E.R. game passed me by until this morning. Despite the first three games only being available on the PC, the next S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 is being developed with “multi-platform technology”. It might be heresy to say so but even as a devout PC disciple I’m glad that console gamers will finally get to experience S.T.A.L.K.E.R.‘s uniquely bleak and threatening environments. S.T.A.L.K.E.R. 2 is set for a 2012 release and I’m already looking forward to it. Read on for a little background on the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. franchise.

The S.T.A.L.K.E.R. games, Shadow Of Chernobyl, Clear Sky and Call Of Pripyat, take place in and around the Chernobyl exclusion zone, a radioactive wasteland left by the Chernobyl disaster. They’re set in an alternate history where mysterious phenomena began emanating from “The Zone” and several groups of “Stalkers” arrive on the scene. Stalkers are the brave, foolhardy or just plain greedy people that venture in to the exclusion zone to recover precious artifacts with incredible powers.

Mechanically speaking, the games are a combination of first-person shooter, open-world western RPG and survival horror. The exclusion zone is an incredibly hostile environment to be carefully explored with the threat of being killed by a rival Stalker or a mutated animal always present. I won’t spoil the games by describing every last detail, if you have the patience to cope with their steep difficulty curves then you should definitely check them out.

Via: Destructoid

S.T.A.L.K.E.R. Developer GSC Game World Closing its Doors

Nukezilla Review: Starcraft 2: Wings Of Liberty (Multiplayer) (PC)

Mark Steward — Thu, 12 Aug 2010 17:27:24 +0000

Click here to read Mark’s review of the single player campaign

The multiplayer experience offered by Starcraft 2 is underpinned at every stage by Battle.net 2.0. The system has two main functions: it is both a matchmaking tool and a social network that ties players together across all of Blizzard’s current franchises.

Upon first registering with Battle.net, the player creates a unique Starcraft 2 character. Only one character can be created per purchase of the game which has the immediate effect of ending the phenomenon of smurfing. For those unfamiliar with the term, it refers to experienced players creating new accounts to trick rookies in to playing against them.

The ranking and matchmaking side of the equation is a little more complicated. Ranked competition begins with a series of five placement matches, games against players of varying skill to assess the player’s abilities. The results determine the player’s league, from the lowly bronze to the silver, gold, platinum and diamond leagues. Each league comprises countless divisions, groups of 100 players ranked directly against each other. Rather than show the player’s overall standing, this system gives each player a less specific idea of their skill level. It’s a touch controversial, the more obsessive players want to know exactly how they compare to everyone else. Personally, I can live without knowing how many millions of players are better at the game than I am.

Battle.net 2.0 accomplishes the goals it has set for itself with ease and grace. I found myself pitted against some very evenly matched opponents, allowing me to gradually learn new strategies and improve my skills. Although one or two matches have been marred by lag, the vast majority have been completely lag free. If you want to play serious, evenly matched competitive games against strangers, Battle.net 2.0 will serve you well.

Custom games against friends are also possible, with optional AI enemies or allies, though it’s worth noting that they can’t be played against a friend in another region. Regions broadly correspond to continents so as a European, I won’t be able to play against friends in the USA. Though I appreciate the speedy performance of Battle.net, I find the region locking incredibly frustrating. Blizzard have made noises in the past about opening up non-ranked play across regions at some unspecified date but nothing has been confirmed. It’s an issue who’s importance will vary wildly across players. If you were only going to play against someone who lives down the street, ignore it. If you have a large group of foreign friends then it could be worth thinking about.

The matches themselves have been joyously frantic excercises in guess work, strategy and micromanagement. Sometimes the killing blow comes early in the game, an all or nothing frontal assault by basic units that overwhlems an unprepared enemy. Other matches can get to the point where each player is probing the others defenses, waiting for a moment of weakness and responding with a closely managed surgical strike.

I always feel as if I’m improving, developing more sophisticated strategies and recognising moments of genius displayed by my opponents. The knowledge that I’m not being matched against unassailable foes is incredibly reassuring. If I’m defeated, it isn’t a cause for rage or frustration. I just have to think about what they did and a counter strategy will present itself.

As far as the balance between the strengths of the Terran, Protoss and Zerg factions is concerned, everything seems fine. Perhaps high-level players will have figured out minor exploits but down in the gold league, I’m beating and being beaten by every race. It’s worth pointing out that the Terran faction available in multiplayer are quite different to the Terrans in the single player campaign. Several units including the Goliath, Vulture and Medic that many Starcraft veterans will remember have been removed. Blizzard claim that it’s a measure to even out the abilities of each faction but I’m a little more skeptical. Maybe it’s the conspiracy theorist in me but I suspect we’ll see many units re-introduced to the multiplayer once the two planned expansions to Starcraft 2 are released.

Blizzard have managed to create an environment that’s both fiercely competitive and strangely welcoming. Long before a player enters a ranked match they have the chance to play practice matches against other rookies or try out the game’s challenge mode to work on specific skill sets. Once they step on to the ranking ladder, they’ll get the chance to compete at their own level. My only concern is that the range of skill levels will stop expanding soon and eventually contract, leaving the same impenetrable community of obsessive players that plagues so many multiplayer games.

If you have the slightest interest in playing Starcraft 2 competitively, I would urge you to play through your placement matches and spend some time in ranked games. Battle.net 2.0 isn’t a perfect system, but it’s by far the most elegant I’ve experienced to date. As a result, Starcraft 2.0 is the first real-time strategy game I’ve played competitively and frankly, it’s become an addiction.

Disclaimer: This game was reviewed on a PC with a 2.5ghz dual-core processor, 2gb of RAM, 512mb Nvidia 8800GT graphics card and a 2MB internet connection.

Nukezilla Review: Starcraft 2: Wings Of Liberty (Single Player Campaign) (PC)

Mark Steward — Fri, 06 Aug 2010 16:01:29 +0000

Click here to read Mark’s review of the multiplayer

If there’s one thing that Blizzard could never be accused of it’s rushing out their games. In the 12 years since Starcraft was released, the real-time strategy genre has mutated in countless ways. Some developers went for a ‘macro’ approach and gave us hundreds, if not thousands of soldiers to command at a time. Others, most notably Relic, refined their games to the point where Dawn Of War 2 only allowed the player to control four units at a time.

Apart from a greatly modernised interface and a little more automation for certain unit behaviours, Starcraft 2: Wings Of Liberty ignores most of its genre’s mutations. At its core, this is a traditional RTS where bases are built, workers are dispatched and hordes of units are pumped out. The three playable races are back, though not all of them are playable during the Wings Of Liberty campaign. The humans, Terrans in Starcraft parlance, are the focus of the game as you re-start James Raynor’s rebellion against the hated empire of Arcturus Mengsk. Though much of the game involves Raynor’s insurgency against the ruling Terrang faction, there are plenty of opportunities to fight the insectoid hordes of the Zerg and the elite, high-tech forces of the Protoss.

In place of drastic changes to basic mechanics, Blizzard have focused on spicing up the context in which these mechanics are used. Timed events and unique enemies are regularly employed and I really felt that it helped each mission feel new and exciting. Starcraft 2‘s missions have a faster pace than the first game’s and kept me on my toes most of the time. The old RTS trope of throwing up a cutscene and depositing the player in a bog-standard match against the computer never reared its head. Blizzard have clearly thought about bringing new players into the experience and as such, the standard difficulty level won’t present much of a challenge to experienced RTS players. I checked out the ‘hard’ setting for the first few levels but found it a touch overwhelming as the complexity of missions steadily rose. That being said, I was trying to finish the game so that I could bring you my opinions on it. With a little more time and a little more practice, I’d probably have found the harder difficulty more rewarding.

Between battles, Blizzard have included a central hub where the player can research new technologies, hire mercenary teams to summon during battle, improve their existing units or just speak to various characters before choosing their next mission. There’s a clear link between choosing a mission, it’s subsequent rewards and spending those rewards to prepare for the following mission. Instead of branching, the campaign offers a number of potential missions at once, to complete in the order the player chooses. It all combined to give me a pleasing sense of agency over how my army developed and where it was deployed to without any risk of hobbling myself. There’s plenty of background humour included in this hub area, I recommend trying out the in-game arcade machine and listening to the jukebox. Apparently even in the distant future, rednecks will still want Neil Young to remember that a southern man don’t need him around.

The word that sprang to mind throughout so much of Starcraft 2: Wings Of Liberty’s campaign was “polish”, the only exception being the dialogue in many of the game’s cutscenes. The dialogue was so clunky and cliche’d that I lost interest in sitting through the games pre and post-mission videos. Blizzard got so much right in terms of building the world and plotting an epic story that the failure to give the characters anything interesting to say is incredibly jarring. The artless writing stands in stark contrast to the incredibly well-realised mechanics, structure and level design.

Like many fans, I was very disappointed by the news that each race’s campaign would be separated out across multiple releases. I questioned whether the Terran campaign alone would feel like a complete experience. My fears were dismissed by the end of the Wings Of Liberty campaign. The game evoked both a powerful sense of nostalgia and a desire to discover what Blizzard have added to the formula. I enjoyed each mission more than the last and found myself staying up late and waking up early to fight the next battle. With the addition of achievements and the inter-mission decisions, I might even go back to the campaign and see if that ‘hard’ difficulty is a little less frustrating now that I’ve mastered the basics. I really can’t say enough good things about Starcraft 2: Wings Of Liberty’s campaign, you owe it to yourself to play it.

Disclaimer: This game was reviewed on a PC with a 2.5ghz dual-core processor, 2gb of RAM and a 512mb 8800GT graphics card.

Haiku Impressions: Starcraft 2

Mark Steward — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 15:43:15 +0000

Zerg deep below me
The Protoss way above me
Glad to be back home

Nukezilla Review: Avatar Racedrome (Xbox Indie Games)

Mark Steward — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 08:00:20 +0000

As videogame titles go, Avatar Racedrome is one of the more self-explanatory. With their Xbox Live Avatar in the driving seat, the player can compete in a series of races against AI or human opponents. Competition can take place either on a split screen or against seven other opponents over Xbox Live. Although Avatar Racedrome has a less than realistic driving model, giving the handling a kart-racer feel, it foregoes the power-up combat that its genre stablemates often include. Races take place in the titular racedrome, a concrete race track surrounding by a huge stadium. The game features 16 tracks and the option to play either single races or multi-race championships.

Any evaluation of a racing game boils down to two factors: how the cars handle and the tracks available to race around. In both areas, Avatar Racedrome comes up short. I found the handling to have a slippy, disconnected feel as if the cars tyres weren’t in contact with the track. Cornering felt imprecise and I didn’t feel as if I could swing into a powerslide with any regularity. In general, I just didn’t enjoy driving Avatar Racedrome’s cars. The lack of any vehicular variety doesn’t help matters. The only options available to the player are the colour of their car and the flag printed on to it. As enjoyable as the occasional burst of patriotism can be, it’s not enough to compensate for the absence of meaningful choice.

Though 16 tracks is certainly a healthy level of variety, the tracks themselves lack inspiration. Each track is a plain, concrete path at the centre of the same stadium. Avatar Racedrome’s tracks are workmanlike at best and flat-out boring at their worst. The tracks lack character to the point where regardless of their layout, I felt as if I was navigating the same track during each race. I find it difficult to blame the designer, it can’t be easy trying to match the pace and style of big-budget racing games with the meagre resources of an XNA developer. Nevertheless, there’s very little fun to be had on Avatar Racedrome’s tracks.

This leads me to my ultimate criticism of Indie racing games such as Avatar Racedrome, they just can’t stack up to the competition. I’m not a rich man but between various rental services and trading in old games, I have access to plenty of racing games. My points of comparison for Avatar Racedrome include DiRT2, Mario Kart Wii, Forza Motorsport 3, Split/Second, Blur, Wipeout HD and Burnout Paradise. Why make such a seemingly self-evident point? Well, there are Indie Games out there, in contrast to Avatar Racedrome, that only bite off as much as they can chew. Shoot ‘em-ups, puzzle games and sidescrollers don’t need a vast development budget to be good, that isn’t the nature of the genre. When your points of comparison are Mega Man and Robotron, you don’t need to be bombarded with polygons and flashy effects to be impressed. Though there are numerous problems with what Avatar Racedrome is, the real problem is what it isn’t.

(What does this score mean?)

Disclaimer: Rendercode Games sent us a review copy of this game.

This Year’s Porn Convention Was The Best Yet

Mark Steward — Sun, 20 Jun 2010 22:30:54 +0000

E3 has long been my favourite porn convention. Others might cite the AVN awards as the primo space to meet and greet the hottest pornographic actresses. Sure it has the big names but in my opinion, the sneakily codenamed Electronic Entertainment Expo has the sexiest and classiest attendants. The only difference this year was the scope of pornography on offer. Thanks to the 24-hour rolling news coverage provided by so many blogs, I’ve been in an erotic nirvana for the past week.

Now I’ll get my criticisms out of the way right here, there’s still a bit too much talk about nerd shit like videogames or whatever. I get that this is the cover for the real purpose — gathering hundreds of scantily clad women in one place — but personally I think we could get away with being more overt. There’s no law against women showing off their cleavage and photographs of said cleavage being distributed online, so lets all just be a bit less coy. I’d also like the women in attendance to show slightly less conservative attitudes. Sure the outfits they wear are skimpy but as someone who takes a profound level of sexual gratification from humiliating and objectifying women, I’d like them to be skimpier. I’m willing to compromise as far as full frontal nudity is concerned but it’s 2010 for heaven’s sake, we can get away with a nipple or two.

Now that I’m done with the negatives, it’s time to offer some commendations. This year there were three sites that really stood out. Their efforts to mask their secret pornographic agenda were deeply impressive. Some went as far as conducting fake interviews with random Japanese people and dancing around to distract anyone who might be watching. Of course, you aren’t interesting in the techniques, you wanna see the results. Believe me, they’re pretty stunning.

First on the podium has to be CVG. 64 images of barely-clothed ladies is nothing to sneeze at. Though it may be something to expel another bodily fluid towards, ifyaknowwhatimean. There’s a strong focus on my specific fetishes; Japanese women and fake tits, which resonated with me on a very personal level. This is the kind of article that cuts through all the dorky bullshit to bring readers what they really want, shots of cleavage. And asses.

An extremely narrow second place goes to the Destructoid team. Though they certainly had the quantity, in my opinion CVG had the quality. Still, it’s a fantastic contribution and if I could award a hybrid gold/silver medal, I would. Their work really got my blood pumping, my pores sweating and my wrist jerking frantically. If CVG are the U2 of soft-porn, Destructoid are The Pixies. They might not get quite the same level of exposure but it’s raw, it’s real and it touched me in a very special place. I’m talking about my penis.

Third place goes to the avant-garde contribution of GamesRadar. Some of these pics are a bit wilder and a bit wackier than those provided by the competition. There’s some freaky costumes in there but I know that some of you guys are looking for just that type of content. I’ll hold my hands up, just for a moment though, and admit that this isn’t my sort of thing. Nevertheless, it’s groundbreaking, innovative stuff and I could certainly see them climb the podium at future expos. Speaking of climbing podiums, I like sex. With girls. Boobs.

Those are my top picks but this is Web 2.0 people, feel free to chime in with your personal faves. The world’s a great big melting pot and I’m open to any suggestions from my loyal audience. Is there anyone out there that you feel deserves a round of sticky, smelly applause? If there’s anyone you feel I missed, send me a link and after 10 minutes of quiet contemplation and the brief employment of a wetwipe, I’ll get back to you.

Image: Mediaspin

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E3 10: A Troll’s Eye View On The Microsoft Press Conference

Mark Steward — Tue, 15 Jun 2010 15:00:05 +0000

If there’s one thing I can’t stand, it’s measured and balanced commentary. In that spirit I thought I’d bring my own angry, spiteful, embittered opinions to bear on Microsoft’s yearly infomercial. I’ll be following up with an equally dispiriting burst of rage at Sony and Nintendo once their coked up drones have taken the stage and talked at us about their plans for world domination. For now, I’ll stick with Microsoft.

Microsoft’s press conference got off to a flying start as they announced the re-release of three of their greatest hits. Yes ladies and gentlemen, or just gentlemen if we’re being honest about Microsoft’s core demographic, the holy triumvirate of Fable, Gears and Halo will be assaulting audiences over the coming months. Finding out that Microsoft would be bringing me the same old shit with added tits and particle effects was a truly revelatory experience. Just to show that they didn’t forget about the huge wad of cash they stuffed down Kojima’s throat, they showed off a re-skinned version of Devil May Cry starring everyone’s least favourite Metal Gear Solid character. We can only hope they’ll bless us with a dating sim starring Otacon to make sure that the Metal Gear brand is as diluted as humanly possible.

Once the cursory glance at actual videogames was over, MS moved swiftly on to ramming their motion control add-on down our throats. Kinect will detect movement, voice commands and the sound of 10 million wal-mart customers saying, “hmmmm, kinda pricey, maybe we should just stick with the Wii”. Words like “nauseating” and “repugnant” swirled around my mind as a cavalcade of multi-ethnic douchebags frantically waved their arms in front of the audience. By far the most vomit inducing scene came during the Kinetanimals demonstration. I could live with watching a kid pet a virtual tiger. Watching her giggle as the virtual tiger pretended to lick her had me reaching for a bucket. That isn’t child-like joy you’re witnessing, that’s stage school and the unfulfilled dreams of her dangerously demanding parents. I’d feel sorry for her if I didn’t think she earned more money from that sickening display than I do from a year’s hard work.

Other delights included a dumbed down version of Forza 3 that, for the first time, allows players to simulate overtaking a family hatchback on a motorway in a Ferrari. Finally we can all know what it’s like to be an asshole executive. Sources have revealed to me that a coke-snorting minigame will be included free of charge. Harass your underpaid and uninterested secretary this fall, exclusively on Xbox 360.

Once the barrage of bouncing, grinning, pod people had come to an end MS brought out the big guns. For the first time they showed off a slightly revised version of their current console. It may have taken them close to five years but they’ve now reached feature parity with every other console and handheld of this generation by including wireless connectivity. Not wanting to rest on those laurels, they also revealed that they won’t be ripping off consumers by raising the price of their console. In emulation of the most successful console in gaming history, the Sega Saturn, they promised that it would be in stores by the end of the week.

Then, just to top everything off, they bribed the attendant games press with a free console live on air. They may not have an original idea to their name but God dammit, Microsoft have some balls. Never has the childish M$ nickname been so deserved. Watching the gaping idiots whoop and holler at the thought of free shit filled me with joy. Occasionally I wonder if I have all the necessary skills to be a professional games writer. Turns out a complete lack of any dignity or professional ethics will get you pretty far in this industry.

Image: Wikimedia

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Nukezilla Review: Blur (Xbox 360)

Mark Steward — Sat, 05 Jun 2010 08:51:11 +0000

Blur is a videogame collage, an original work pieced together from other racing games. It combines real cars, unrealistic handling, power-ups and tracks based on real-world locations. This unique combination is wrapped in a futurist aesthetic and a twin-track progression mechanic. As well as straightforward races, the game also features checkpoint and destruction events. The former requires the player to hit gates and speed boosts to finish a race within a time limit. The latter tasks the player with collecting power-ups to take out an endless pack of AI-controlled racers.Winning these events and meeting certain in-race requirements nets the player lights and fans. Lights advance the player through the games leagues and fans unlock new cars and car modifications.

On a race-by-race basis, I had a lot of fun with Blur. The handling model gives a great sense of barely controlling a powerful vehicle at high speeds and the power-up based combat gives the races a chaotic intensity. These qualities shine through in the online multiplayer component. Races of up to 20 players can turn into spectacular, high-speed bloodbaths as each player litters the track with mines and pillars of lightning or blasts their opponent with a guided explosive.

If Blur’s frantic races are it’s alluring perfume then the horrible, frustrating structure is it’s incurable halitosis. For me, it came close to ruining the single player experience. At first, I was fine with having to unlock new leagues and cars by performing well in the events. I wasn’t getting perfect results in each event but I still earned a decent amount of fans and lights. I felt as if I was genuinely improving my performance when I retried an even a couple of times, my lap times decreasing with each attempt. Eventually though, I hit a brick wall. Around 80% of my way through the single player campaign, I just couldn’t do well enough to unlock the last couple of leagues.

It wasn’t that the events themselves were too challenging, I was still placing in the top three on each race. It’s that the methods by which extra lights and fans are earned are so arcane and counter-intuitive that frustrated me. For example, each league is topped off by a one-on-0ne race against a special opponent. These races account for around 1/7th of the lights and fans available in each league. I couldn’t even attempt these races because of how frustratingly specific their entry requirements are. Some require you to perform a very specific action, only possible in particular circumstances, on multiple occasions. As enjoyable as the game’s mechanics are, I’m just not willing to grind my way through race after race to unlock these events. As a result, a sizeable chunk of the game is off limits to me.

This progression mechanic seeps in to the online component of the game. Although all the tracks are available, the cars and ability enhancing ‘mods’ have to be unlocked. Losing a race because you didn’t have access to your opponents car is just plain frustrating. It didn’t make me want to keep playing and unlocking new vehicles as the developer clearly intended. Instead it made me want to go and play a game that wasn’t so hell-bent on wasting my time.

In short, Blur is a game who’s structure casts a long shadow over its content. If you can dig through that structure, there’s a fantastic racing game waiting for you. A game that gripped me during its races and at some points threatened to unseat Wipeout HD as my arcade racer of choice. Blur is like a magnificent castle surrounded by a moat filled with toxic waste, sharks and sewage. I can’t deny the majesty of its architecture, I’m just not willing to swim through all that crap to get inside.

(What does this score mean?)

Haiku Impressions: Blur

Mark Steward — Sun, 30 May 2010 14:00:10 +0000

“Blur” the lines between
Wipeout HD and Forza
This game is damn hard

Nukezilla Review: Red Dead Redemption (Xbox 360)

Mark Steward — Sat, 29 May 2010 15:45:53 +0000

John Marston is a man with a dark past tasked with tying up the loose ends of his life as an outlaw. During his time in the fictional American state of New Austin he must take on a motley crew of old friends and new enemies if he wants to earn a future inside the law. These events occur during 1911, as the wild west recedes into history and modernity takes its place. In practical terms, this means taking on a series of missions from characters that range from noble ranchers and sheriffs to machiavellian officials and corrupt soldiers. Between these story-advancing missions, animals can be hunted, bandit hideouts can be raided and a host of other emergent scenarios plucked from the milieu of wild west fiction are played out.

There are two main activities that define Red Dead Redemption, gun slinging and horse-riding. Thankfully, these combat and traversal mechanics are well implemented and a lot of fun. I was mopping up side quests long after I’d finished the game, just to spend more time on horseback with a revolver in hand. Even the mundane activities of gathering plants and killing wild animals were entertaining as a way to extend my time with the game.

I only wish that I could pay the same compliments to Red Dead Redemption‘s story and themes. John Marston is apparently a man with a moral code, more Robin Hood than Clyde Barrow. Nevertheless he still winds up working alongside individuals who are so inhuman that I lost any sympathy for the man. Marston isn’t a character that straddles the line between black and white, he’s someone who ping-pongs wildly between extremes. Sure he’ll help a damsel in distress and show an anachronistic sympathy for Native Americans and women, but he’s also willing to work for rapists and murderers.

As well as telling the story of John Marston’s personal salvation, Red Dead Redemption depicts the ‘civilisation’ of the wild west. Once again, it handles a delicate theme in an inelegant way. The references to the novelty of automobiles, the imminent arrival of powered flight and the expansion of the railways started to grate. I don’t think it takes a PhD in North American history to realise the kind of technology and social norms that would be present in 1911. The writers seem to disagree with me on that point.

Eventually, I started to erect a mental barrier between the story being told and the open world I was exploring. I found the brief glimpses of grisly, frontier experiences afforded by the standalone missions on behalf of mysterious strangers much more interesting than the over-arching narrative. Despite my lack of interest in its story, I was still utterly compelled to play through the game’s campaign and spend hours on its side quests.

My time with Red Dead Redemption‘s multiplayer has been a mixed bag of fantastic co-operative experiences and lacklustre competition. Roaming the game’s world, hunting animals and taking on hideouts filled with bandits was a lot of fun with a posse of friends. Playing the standard team-deathmatch and objective based competitive modes wasn’t as enjoyable. It’s certainly a competent third-person shooter in this regard, but there isn’t anything new or interesting enough for me to spend a lot of time competing against other players.

I’ve had a fantastic time with Red Dead Redemption and I’d wholeheartedly recommend that others play it. I only wish that the story and themes were handled in a more subtle, nuanced fashion. Luckily, the shootouts and gorgeous environments were enough to keep me engaged. I may not care about New Austin’s inhabitants but that didn’t stop me from traversing its valleys, plains and canyons for many hours.

(What does this score mean?)

Tropico 3: Absolute Power Prematurely Released On Steam

Mark Steward — Tue, 25 May 2010 21:16:14 +0000

Clarification: After checking with some American colleagues, I felt I should clarify that Tropico 3: Absolute Power is prematurely available to British Steam users. The game has separate release dates in the US and UK. The game should not have been made available until 28/05/2010 in the UK. It was released on 17/05/2010 in the US.

I was a big fan of Tropico 3 upon its release last year and when I heard that there was an expansion pack on the way, I was more than happy to pre-order it through Steam. Today, for no particular reason, I attempted to install Tropico 3: Absolute Power. To my surprise, I was successful and have been playing around with the first mission for the past half an hour or so, despite it not being released until Friday.

For those not familiar with the original game, Tropico 3 sits in the city building genre alongside games such as Sim City or The Settlers. The player takes the role of a dictator and must fulfil specific conditions in order to win each campaign mission. The first mission of the expansion pack involves maintaining the happiness level of an island filled with hippies. After a quick look at the new buildings available, I was particularly interested in the ability to start my own nuclear weapons program. In mechanical terms, it provides a way to prevent foreign invasions of the island without having to worry about diplomacy.

I’ve encountered a few technical issues so far when attempting to continue a game that I’ve already started. When I hopped back into a campaign mission after exiting the game to email the devs, the menus ceased to function and I couldn’t build any structures. On a second attempt, all the functionality appeared to be there but the game crashed after a minute or so.

These issues are probably a symptom of the game’s premature release over Steam. It’s entirely possible that some kind of patch will be released on Friday, when the game is supposed to be available. I’ve contacted the publishers, Calypso, and I’ll be sure to update this post with their response. I would also like to make it absolutely clear that no nefarious trickery was employed to play this game. I simply installed the game through Steam in exactly the same way that I would install any other game.

Here we can see the new monuments available in Tropico 3: Absolute Power.

Here are the victory conditions for the very first mission of the game

Nukezilla Review: Pew Pew Pod (Xbox Live Indie Games)

Mark Steward — Mon, 24 May 2010 17:00:59 +0000

Every twin-stick shooter needs a twist to set itself apart from the competition. In Pew Pew Pod’s case the twist is that the player can switch between four different weapons on the fly. The four weapons broadly equate to a machine gun, a rocket launcher, a shotgun and a laser that bounces off the side of the arena. As an aid to memory, each weapon is colour-coded and corresponds to a button on the Xbox 360 controller. Much like Geometry Wars 2, Pew Pew Pod is divided up in to several different rulesets. As well as a standard “arcade” mode, where players kill waves of enemies within a time limit, there are modes of play with more specific objectives. Each of these modes accommodates up to four players.

Pew Pod does a decent job of mixing up the twin-stick shooter formula. Although some of the alternate game types feel like revisions of those found in other twin-stick shooters, one mode in particular caught my attention. Titled “Think Fast”, this particular mode introduces constantly shifting rules that must be obeyed in order to score points. It gives a sense of urgency to the action that I really appreciated. It also exposes the one main weakness of Pew Pew Pod‘s colour-coded weapons.

By tying each weapon to a face button, it makes the controls much easier to memorise. However, having to take my thumb from the right analogue stick to switch weapons means spending a brief but dangerous amount of time not shooting. Thankfully, the bumpers and triggers substitute for the trigger buttons but this negates the usefulness of colour-coding the weapons. After a while I adapted to the trigger/bumper controls and ignored the face buttons, but it added an unexpected learning curve to the experience.

My other main source of irritation during games of Pew Pew Pod was the lack of any screen-clearing weapon. It’s the one bog-standard feature of twin-stick shooters that’s been omitted from Pew Pew Pod‘s vocabulary. I found it frustrating when hordes of enemies were flocking towards me and the last ditch strategy that’s been drilled in to my head by Pew Pew Pod‘s genre peers wasn’t available. Even once I’d come to accept that I didn’t have that kind of option, I still felt a grim sense of inevitability as the crowds of enemies floated towards me.

Taken on its own merits, Pew Pew Pod is fun little twin-stick shooter with some interesting game types. As well as the aforementioned “Think Fast” mode, I enjoyed the “Waypoint” game type. In this mode, the player has to hit specific waypoints on the screen in order to progress. It’s certainly a pleasure to see an indie developer do something different with this particular genre. Unfortunately, the thing that holds this game back is its status as an indie game.

Personally, I need more than just the basic mechanics to play any shooter for an extended period of time. Achievements and a friends list full of competitors add that structure and sense of progression, something that Pew Pew Pod lacks. If you have 80 Microsoft points to spare, I’d certainly recommend that you play Pew Pew Pod. Just don’t expect to spend a long time with it

(What does this score mean?)

Disclaimer: Bad Egg Studios provided a free code to download this game.

Nukezilla Review: Section 8 (PS3)

Mark Steward — Tue, 04 May 2010 08:00:12 +0000

Section 8, originally released at retail last year for the Xbox 360 and PC, has now arrived on the Playstation Network. In most respects, it’s a traditional first person shooter with brief campaign mode and competitive multiplayer. Section 8′s central concept is that each player is blasted from space on to the battlefield. Equipped with a jetpack and a variety of different weapons, they must fight for control of various points on each multiplayer map.

A class system is present with players choosing from a number of pre-set archetypes (sniper, assault etc.) or customising their own loadout. As well as choosing different weapons and gadgets, the player can assign points to different aspects of their character. One player might create a glass cannon, armed with a rocket launcher and machine gun with all their points geared towards boosting damage. Another might create a tougher soldier with additional armour and a repair tool to heal themselves and others on their team.

I generally gravitate towards team deathmatch when I pick up a multiplayer shooter. On rare occasions I’ll play around with more focused, objective based modes but most of the time, I just want to hop in and kill other people. Section 8 doesn’t offer that opportunity and is entirely based around capturing and holding points on the map. I’ll admit here that I found this disappointing. Unless I’ve got a team of people that I know and trust, I don’t want to rely on complete strangers to co-ordinate and strategise. For me, this need for co-operation is where Section 8‘s reach exceeds its grasp.

Part of the problem is the ease of constructing highly effective defences. Performing various actions during combat rewards the player with in-game currency. This currency can be used to call down turrets and vehicles to aid in attacking and defending the objectives. The end result is that a co-ordinated team can pepper an objective with sensors, machine guns, rocket launchers and anti-aircraft turrets. Not only can they stop the attackers from dropping near to an objective, they can put up a very effective defence against anyone approaching on foot. Attacking vehicles, namely a tank and a mech suit, can be purchased to counter these defenses. However, the extra cost and unwieldy controls seemed to repel most players.

My lack of satisfaction with the over-arching structure of the matches contrasted with my enjoyment of the moment-to-moment combat experience. When I encountered an opponent out in the open, without any turrets to spoil the fun, the ensuing duels were very enjoyable. Zipping over a play with my jetpack and unleashing a mortar strike on them from above was very entertaining. The option to modify your abilities adds an additional layer of depth without being unbalanced by having to go through any kind of unlock system. At its base level, Section 8 is a fun shooter.

Ironically, I took more enjoyment from Section 8‘s brief campaign than I did from its multiplayer. Divorced of the need to work with other players, I could enjoy the combat by itself. Unfortunately, everything surrounding the combat wasn’t particularly impressive. The game has a bland, lifeless presentation with dull, barren environments. The missions teach the mechanics of multiplayer fairly well but the end result is that most campaign objectives consist of running up to an object and hitting X.

Most of my complaints with the multiplayer mode could be made irrelevant by a determined community of players. I can imagine dedicated teams spending hours honing their skills with the result being a tense, dynamic battlefield. Unfortunately, those dedicated individuals probably aren’t playing Section 8 and if we’re being honest, neither are you. In a saturated market, merely having potential and some solid mechanics isn’t enough. Taken on its own merits and experienced in a vacuum, Section 8 would be an easy recommendation at its budget price of £19.99. In the hyper-competitive FPS genre, it just doesn’t do enough to justify moving away from countless other games.

(What does this score mean?)

Images: Giant Bomb

Crytek CEO Says Demos Are Too Expensive to be Free

Mark Steward — Sat, 17 Apr 2010 13:45:05 +0000

In a recent interview with Develop, Crytek CEO Cevat Yerli has voiced concerns about the cost of developing demos. Yerli stated:

“A free demo is a luxury we have in the game industry that we don’t have in other industries such as film.”

Although not explicitly stated, I have to assume that Yerli is referring to the ‘vertical slice’ often released as a playable demo. For those unfamiliar with the term, it refers to a purpose-built demo level rather than a section of the full game.

Despite being developed using in-game assets, these vertical slices are developed outside of the main game and require their own manpower. Obviously this additional manpower costs money and doesn’t directly create any revenue. According to Develop, Yerli also put his support behind EA’s plans to sell demos for 10 or 15 dollars.

There are two important arguments that Yerli isn’t acknowledging in this statement. Firstly, a demo is a promotional tool to create interest in a game. It isn’t supposed to be a gift, it’s part of the game’s marketing cycle. If a demo isn’t a reliable way to generate sales then that’s fair enough but it certainly isn’t a “luxury”.

Secondly, whilst I’m sure a vertical slice demo is expensive to produce, it isn’t the only option. I have to assume that a section of standard gameplay could be made available at a lower cost. Personally, I’d prefer a realistic sample of actual gameplay to a demo that only shows the game’s best aspects. Frankly, if a vertical slice can’t persuade enough people to purchase a game and recoup the cost of its development then I have to wonder about the full game’s quality.

Paying for a demo is exactly the kind of ridiculous idea that only members of the game industry would float. The only real way to counteract such a strategy would be to simply not buy the demos that are eventually put on sale. Sadly, the demented fanboys that surround every major game release would probably fork out for this nonsense.

Via: Joystiq

Things We Hate About Gaming: Multiplayer Unlocks

Mark Steward — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 08:00:06 +0000

Back in late 2007 when Call Of Duty 4: Modern Warfare was released, I was introduced to the concept of unlockable abilities in a competitive multiplayer game. I’m well aware that CoD4 wasn’t the first game to employ these mechanics, it just happened to be the first one that I played. At the time it was almost intoxicating; I would arrive home from work and pour hours into CoD4‘s multiplayer modes. I inhaled experience points and exhaled guns, perks and attachments. Something about that mechanic tapped into a primitive, reptilian part of my brain and massaged it expertly. The illusion of progress was mesmerising and it held my gaze for months.

At some point, I don’t quite remember when, the illusion was broken. I’m no longer willing to tolerate the chastity belt locked firmly onto almost every modern multiplayer game. I feel like a dog being taught to beg for its food. More accurately, I feel like a sucker for buying games with half their multiplayer content locked until I reach an arbitrary playtime.

For me, the psychological effects of these multiplayer unlocks are far worse than their material effects. In the heat of the moment, when I’m killed by xxxganjasnipaxxx, I’m racked with self-doubt. Am I just plain bad at the game? Would a better player with a similar loadout have succeeded where I failed? Or was I doomed from the second he set the sights of his leveled up sniper rifle on me?

When the playing field is level, I can take real satisfaction in my successes. Even in defeat, the “clever girl…” moment where I realise my opponent has bested me with some innovative strategy can be satisfying if the contest was even. I fondly recall several evenings playing Left 4 Dead where only the quickest and most co-operative team would come out on top. I could learn from both my failures and their successes. On an uneven playing ground, even my victories are rendered meaningless. At best they might result in the shallow thrill of a freshly unlocked weapon or item.

Even a Bad Company 2 match, whose basic mechanics are a pleasure in themselves, can feel hollow when the realisation dawns that my only mistake was not to play more. Entering into a sniper duel and re-enacting Enemy At The Gates can be thrilling as my opponent and I bob and weave behind cover, daring each other to take the first shot. That thrill is soon crushed when I realise that although I struck first, I lacked the unlockable ammunition necessary to win.

The inclusion of an unlock system in Bioshock 2 put me off the multiplayer mode entirely. The thought of exhaustively grinding through the levels to reach parity with my opponents simply didn’t appeal to me. I’m willing to commit to a lot of things. My political beliefs, my friends, my family and my job are all things I’m willing to lay down time and effort in the name of. I’m not willing to embark on the long, slow march to the level cap just to indulge a developer or publisher’s fear of the pre-owned games market.

To me, the inclusion of these leveling up mechanics just smacks of a lack of confidence in any given game. I spent months playing Left 4 Dead with two maps and a measly handful of weapons, because it held up as a fun game by its own merits. If DICE had ripped the enter unlock system out of Bad Company 2, I’d still enjoy the scope of its battlefields and the interplay of the classes. Taking the model and applying it to any other field of human competition exposes how ridiculous it is. Would football be better if the players only got access to boots after 20 games? Would chess be more fascinating if one player started with extra pawns? Or how about Olympic swimmers removing a layer of clothing after every successive victory, only stripping down to a swimsuit after they’d hit the max level?

R.U.S.E. Beta Impressions

Mark Steward — Mon, 05 Apr 2010 19:00:22 +0000

Now that the beta is reaching its end, I thought it was about time I offered my opinions on R.U.S.E. Ubisoft’s real-time strategy promises, as its title hints, to integrate deception and fraud into the traditional RTS template. In terms of its broad structure, this is a conventional RTS. Bases are built, units are produced and victory is achieved through the destruction of the enemy. Overlaid on this template are the titular ruses, special abilities employed during a battle. Some might boost your units movement speed or make enemy units more likely to retreat. Mixed in with these more direct enhancements are the deceptive ruses. In the eyes of your enemy, buildings can disappear and light infantry can become a column of tanks.

Outside of the myriad of special abilities, R.U.S.E. is a solid if unremarkable strategy game. Although set in the second world war, R.U.S.E. doesn’t differentiate the allied and axis powers. R.U.S.E achieves balance by making each side’s abilities identical rather than giving them contrasting strengths and weaknesses. There’s nothing wrong with this approach to a game’s mechanics, after all it works in Chess. However, it does makes me worry about how the lack of variety will affect the games longevity.

I couldn’t shake the feeling throughout my time with R.U.S.E. that by not playing it with friends, I wasn’t getting the best out of it. This came down to a lack of feedback as to how effective the deceptive ruses are. I found myself wondering if I was misdirecting the enemy or just wasting an opportunity to use a simpler ability with a more obvious effect. For example, one ruse directs a large group of fake units to an area of the map. Due to the way R.U.S.E. deals with fog of war, the enemy can’t easily tell if your units are really there. It was hard to tell if my opponent had fallen for my tricks or not.

After a while, I just stopped using the deceptive ruses and I noticed that my opponents weren’t using them either. We would both fall back to using straightforward buffs that made our units faster or fearless. I still enjoyed myself but the one central mechanic that sets R.U.S.E. apart wasn’t being exploited. R.U.S.E. became, in the space of a mere beta test, a bog-standard RTS.

Stripped of its distinguishing features I found R.U.S.E. had a number of other flaws. Matches seemed to resolve themselves in the first five minutes based on a combination of luck and memorisation of build orders. Either I pumped out the right handful of units and secured all the maps resources or my opponent did. I didn’t feel like there was any real back-and-forth to the game.

There’s also a lot of downtime during a given game of R.U.S.E. The movement speeds for all land-based units are incredibly slow and resources take a long time to build up. It’s an obvious ploy to encourage players to think before committing their forces. It makes sense in the context of the game as it is intended to be played. When the game devolves into a standard strategy game it just makes everything feel unnecessarily slow and awkward.

As you may have guessed, I wasn’t terribly impressed by R.U.S.E. during my time in the beta. It has the feeling of a fascinating idea let down by the introduction of actual human beings. Its most interesting and innovative features were subsumed by a competitive community that just wanted to win. In truth I was probably ‘playing it the wrong way’. Unfortunately, that was the only way to win.

Command & Conquer 4 Beta Impressions

Mark Steward — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 09:30:28 +0000

A few weeks ago I joined the Command & Conquer 4 beta with an eye to writing up some impressions. When I started playing, I encountered a version of C&C that’s profoundly different from any game in the franchise. In place of the traditional base-building, an entirely new, decentralised system has been created. Players begin with a single command unit capable of constructing any and all units available to the player. The command unit is mobile, capable of planting itself in the ground to send out an army. Aside from the in-game mechanics, other changes have been made to the game’s multiplayer mode. After every match, experience is earned which eventually unlocks different units in the matches. The character-building of MMO’s and online shooters has been mixed into the RTS genre.

One of my earliest and least enjoyable experiences in the beta was of a particular scenario. I would send out a huge force with an equally sized build queue, this force would capture as many points as possible until eventually I encountered the enemy and slugged it out. As they moved their force on to one of my points, I would move mine on to one of theirs. Several matches devolved into a merry-go-round of units shuffling from one control point to another. It didn’t feel particularly satisfying and resulted in such narrow victories that they felt more like a product of good luck than strategic thinking.

Later on, I started playing a few larger matches with four or five players on each side. These matches encountered their own problems. The population cap that controls how many units are available is split between each player. This forces a profound level of co-operation on the teams if they want to win matches. In practice there wasn’t much communication going on and a lot of players just quit as soon as the match went the other team’s way. As an individual player, I felt neutered with no ability to strike out on my own.

The over-arching experience system wasn’t something I wanted or needed to be added to the franchise. I understand the logic behind it – if it worked for Call Of Duty and Battlefield then why can’t it work for Command & Conquer? The problem is that locking away a particular gun is wholly different to locking away a specific unit. A good FPS player can get plenty of kills with the starting weapon in any shooter. Regardless of skill, an RTS game requires the player to make full use of every soldier and vehicle at their disposal. I found that I experienced a great deal of self-doubt when playing C&C4. I would ask myself if I just lost a match because I wasn’t the best player or because I didn’t have the right units. Seeing an enemy crush my forces with a unit that I didn’t even realise existed was very demoralising.

C&C4 isn’t a complete shift into the ‘real-time tactics’ subgenre popularised by games such as Ground Control and World In Conflict. Instead, it’s an attempt to integrate some of those more action orientated mechanics with traditional RTS gameplay. I’m not convinced that they’ve taken the best elements of both genres. The choice of three different classes and experience based unlocks retain all the needless complexity of older strategy games. Without the base-building and economic aspects of older RTS titles, that complexity doesn’t seem to translate into depth. As far as modern RTS games are concerned, I’m more interested in the extreme fringes being explored by Relic and The Creative Assembly with their Dawn Of War and Total War franchises. C&C4, at least in terms of its multiplayer component, occupies a middle ground that I don’t find particularly interesting.

Haiku Review: S.T.A.L.K.E.R: Call Of Pripyat

Mark Steward — Sun, 14 Feb 2010 20:48:15 +0000

Ukraine is quite brown
Radiation sickness sucks
I hate mutant dogs

Negative Gamer Review: Mass Effect 2 (PC)

Mark Steward — Wed, 10 Feb 2010 17:41:29 +0000

Mass Effect 2 continues the story of series protagonist Commander Shepard in what has to be the most direct way possible. Where the original gave the player a sense of consequence through the immediate effects of their choices, Mass Effect 2 takes a more long term approach. As well as the direct consequences of your next action, Mass Effect 2 regularly reminds the player of how influential their actions in the first game were. The ability to import a character from the original game only serves to emphasise how Mass Effect 2 revels in its own backstory.

Although the sci-fi setting and story remain intact, the core mechanics have been drastically altered. Mass Effect 2 retains the character building RPG mechanics of the original but makes significant changes to the combat. Encounters take the form of leading a three-man squad through cover-based gunfights. You can still employ special attacks and the different classes have significantly different abilities but the combat has more in common with Gears Of War than Baldur’s Gate. Both entries in the franchise sit firmly in the action-RPG genre but Mass Effect 2 swings pretty far into the action side of things.

Stop, pop and roll

Mass Effect 2 can be boiled down to two courses of action; talking or shooting. The dialogue system from Mass Effect remains the same, conversations can be steered down a number of different paths depending on the player’s choices. I found the conversations almost universally satisfying to progress through. Although I didn’t find the shooting to be particularly bad in any specific way, it didn’t feel quite as refined as the dialogue.

Divorced from the detailed and subtle interactions with other characters, the shooting in Mass Effect 2 wasn’t entirely to my taste. The basics are fine, weapons provide a decent amount of feedback and some of the special abilities can be very effective and a lot of fun to use. The problems arise in the subtleties of how your characters gets in and out of cover. I found the cover system occasionally frustrating and sometimes I just couldn’t seem to snap in and out of cover as quickly as I needed to. The best cover systems give the player a sense that they can effortlessly shift between taking cover and moving freely. Mass Effect 2 just doesn’t capture that feeling.

Now everyone hold your buddy’s hand and don’t retreat until teacher tells you to

Whilst the imperfections in the general shooting mechanics were small enough that I didn’t feel handicapped by them, the imperfections in squad management were more noticeable. Each mission involves bringing two non-playable characters along for the ride and by the end of the game, I felt like more of a babysitter than a leader of men (or women, or whatever the hell you call an Asari). They’ll shoot at enemies and make use of their special abilities but that’s about all they can do. Any time there was a long and winding path between two encounters my companions seemed incapable of keeping up with me. They also didn’t seem to prioritise enemies particularly well, sometimes they failed to kill the enemies that had flanked us and focused on the ones in the distance.

The AI controlled squad members of Mass Effect 2 aren’t awful, too much effort was put in to the production values of this game for that to be true. They’re just disappointing in most situations outside of a slim corridor with the enemies at a distance.

New from EA: Mass Effect Party!

As I played through Mass Effect 2, I quickly tired of the three different minigames that it throws up periodically. Each one accompanies a specific action and correspond to mining, hacking and lockpicking. Lockpicking and hacking are both simple matching games and mining involves dragging a cursor across a planet’s surface until a meter spikes and launching a probe to extract certain minerals. The mining clearly serves a purpose and allows patient players to break the game’s internal economy if they want to. It’s the same central philosophy as optional grinding in a conventional RPG.

The hacking and lockpicking minigames are much more frequent and often feel unnecessary. I found these minigames so easy that they just became arbitrary barriers between me and some extra cash. Occasionally they would pop up as I moved through a mission, barring me from entrance to the next part of the level. I really can’t stress enough how dull and pointless these minigames are, I sincerely hope they don’t make an appearance in Mass Effect 3.

A generic wooden crate by any other name…

Maybe I didn’t go on enough side quests into the far flung reaches of the galaxy but some of the environments in Mass Effect 2 felt bland and repetitive. The game’s second act is based around establishing a loyal team by helping them deal with one of the larger skeletons in their various closets. Unfortunately this often means revisiting areas from earlier in the game and moving through the same environments.

The separate locations do feel different in a way that the first game’s identikit structures didn’t. However they still don’t escape the cover-based shooter’s inherent problem of needing environments to be filled with low walls and boxes. In mechanical terms, these elements of the environment make perfect sense. They give the player a constant rule-set and clearly differentiate what is and isn’t a piece of cover. The problem is they make some environments feel samey and extremely linear.

A few other things worth mentioning:

This game was reviewed on a PC with a 2.5ghz dual-core processor, 8800GT graphics card and 2gb of RAM. I encountered some very occasional framerate issues but no real technical problems.
I played through as the ‘Vanguard’ class.
Mass Effect 2 has most of the positive qualities of a top-flight third-person shooter. Unfortunately it also has the requisite disappointing final boss fight.
I didn’t feel a great sense of closure after finishing the game, mainly due to the heavy emphasis on story continuity and in-game reminders of the inevitability of Mass Effect 3.

My complaints with Mass Effect 2 stem from a handful of very minor issues that I encountered throughout the game. Even if it was just a third-person shooter, Mass Effect 2 would still be a competent example of the genre. Add the profound sense of consequence to all of the player’s decisions and the brilliantly realised characters and Mass Effect 2 becomes much greater than the sum of its parts. It’s a testament to the game’s quality that as soon as I finished, I wanted to start a brand new character and play through again.

You should buy this game if…

…you want a third-person shooter with a story that matters and all the best qualities of an RPG.

Final Score

An almost seamless integration of third-person shooter mechanics with a top-notch story and wholly believable characters.

(What does this score mean?)

Negative Gamer Review: Platypus (Xbox Indie Games)

Mark Steward — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 18:27:06 +0000

Thanks to their gift of a download code, the time has come for me to review Escapist Games’ sidescrolling shmup Platypus. It was previously released on the PSP and is now available as an Xbox Live Indie Game. As shooters go, it’s very traditional with none of the bells and whistles of more modern entries in the genre.

It feels more like a lost entry in the pantheon of 16-bit shooters than a modern title. Where modern shooters have introduced unique scoring mechanics, Platypus simply scrolls from left to right throwing enemies at the player until an inevitable boss encounter.

Back To The Front!

Platypus‘ art direction helps to distinguish it from other shooters. The Pixar-meets-claymation style is charming and makes the settings and enemies feel unique. Unfortunately, problems arise in distinguishing between whether objects and enemies are in the background or foreground. It seems like an almost inevitable result of the ’2.5d’ design philosophy. For example, in the background of one level a volcano erupts and spits out boulders that rain down over the screen. I found it difficult to tell which of these falling, smouldering boulders were just scenery and which were something to be avoided.

Platypus also has a habit of showing enemies in the distant background as well as the foreground. Some of these enemies come in identical shapes but different sizes and I would occasionally be surprised by an enemy that collided with my ship when I thought it was merely a part of the background. It wasn’t a persistent problem and on repeated playthroughs I soon learned to tell the difference. Nevertheless, it still felt unfair on my first few attempts at a level.

Shoot By Numbers

I can’t emphasise enough how traditional Platypus is in both its structure and mechanics. The difficulty curve, powerups and pace are straight out of any mid-90′s scrolling shooter. After some research, I found that there was supposed to be a heavy emphasis on co-operative play. However, during my time playing it by myself I honestly didn’t see any enemies or obstacles that required teamwork to overcome. Some of the bosses did take a fair amount of time to defeat, implying that with a second player they would have been defeated more easily. Other than making it easier to kill enemies that could withstand multiple shots, I can’t see co-op adding much to the experience.

Personally, I’m not much of a shmup historian. I like the genre but I tend to respond to more modern games with distinctive mechanics beyond just shooting enemies. The rhythm game elements of Everyday Shooter, polarity switching of Ikaruga and Triggerheart Exelica‘s grappling hook spring to mind as examples of the genre moving beyond a basic template. As such, I felt little motivation to play Platypus through to its conclusion. Even the powerups weren’t particularly distinctive and include a spread shot, rapid fire and missile launcher – nothing I hadn’t seen before.

A few other things worth mentioning…

At 400 MS points, Platypus sits at the top end of indie game pricing on Xbox Live. That being said its still cheaper than the original PSP version of the game.
Despite its generic feel, there’s nothing particularly wrong with the game. It’s competent rather than excellent.
I found the difficulty curve to be a bit steep. By the middle of the second zone, the screen started to fill with projectiles. I soon found myself knocking it down to ‘easy’ and had a much better time with the game.

There’s nothing bad or frustrating about Platypus. Every game reviewing cliche’ could be used to dance around its lack of originality. Words like ‘solid’, ‘tight’, ‘slick’ and ‘classic’ spring to mind. The problem is that there are better games out there that whilst not quite as cheap, are still easily affordable. Once you get past the charm of its presentation there isn’t enough depth to make the game truly captivating.

You should buy this game if…

…you find the modern bullet-hell shooter intimidating and want a simpler and more old-fashioned type of shmup.

Final Score

An entirely competent shooter with excellent visuals that don’t quite make up for its lack of any distinctive mechanics.

(What does this score mean?)

Early Impressions of Star Trek Online

Mark Steward — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 18:30:04 +0000

I went into the beta of Cryptic’s new MMORPG with high hopes. I’ve been interested in the genre for a while but I’m not much of a fan of the high fantasy settings that so many of these games go for. I’ve no objection to grinding my way through hundreds of faceless enemies, I’d just prefer they were aliens rather than orcs. With access to the Star Trek Online open beta, I created an attractive female avatar named Jenna Jameson and put her in command of the U.S.S. Neckbeard.

In terms of its interface, STO was instantly familiar to me. The genre seems to have reached the same point that console based first person shooters reached after the release of Halo. Sure there are a few unique features here and there but they’re about as significant as moving the ‘reload’ button from X to B on a console controller.

The on-foot sections of STO were as familiar as the interface. I found myself moving to waypoints, clicking on enemies and selecting attacks from a hotbar until their hitpoints dropped to zero. I will credit STO with some refinements that became apparent to me. I didn’t seem to spend a lot of time backtracking to quest givers and instead moved from one objective to another in succession. The fiction helps in this regard, the presence of communicators and transporters in the Star Trek universe allows instant movement and updates to quests. Despite these admirable attempts to streamline the on-foot sections of STO, I still found the quests as repetitive as those from any other MMORPG.

Where STO really distinguishes itself, at least from my perspective, is in the space based combat introduced at the end of the tutorial. Survival requires that the player keep their strongest shields facing the enemy through direct control of their vessel. It gave me a sense of having to pay close attention to the battles. Once I got past the tutorial section I actually got into situations where I would succeed in battle through careful ship management rather than grinding until I had reached the requisite strength.

MMORPGs have an inherent problem in terms of how they deal with player death. The more forgiving they are, the less thought has to be put in to how much risk the player should take. Conversely, the more punishing MMORPGs risk alienating the player and discourage exploration by forcing the player to gamble hours of progress on an unknown reward. STO definitely tends towards the more forgiving philosophy.

The first time the U.S.S. Neckbeard was destroyed in battle I wondered what was going to happen. As it turns out, after a few seconds I immediately respawned earlier in the encounter. I won’t swear by it but as far as I could tell, nothing had been lost and any enemies I’d killed before dying hadn’t respawned.

This experience definitely put a damper on my more positive impressions of space combat. There’s something about seeing my spaceship explode and almost instantly respawn that hurt my suspension of disbelief. STO sacrifices the emotional peak of succeeding against all odds to rid players of the despair that would result from having to rebuild after permanent losses. In the final equation, I prefer this approach but it definitely robs the experience of a true sense of accomplishment.

As well as assigning skills to your own character, three bridge officers accompany the player on away missions and provide special abilities to your ship. I can’t say I found them to be particularly remarkable. Essentially they just represent three additional and quite simple skill trees to be managed by the player. They felt like walking lumps of hitpoints and didn’t seem to have any real character. They felt more like pets than companions which is something of a misuse of what could potentially be interesting party members.

At some point during the development of STO Cryptic had some clear choices to make as to where it would sit in the Star Trek contuinuity. In the end they chose to set the game decades after the events established in the TV shows and films. For practical reasons this was probably the lesser of the many evils on offer. By setting it beyond the events of the TV series they have a greater creative license in terms of how they depict Star Trek. The trade-off is that there isn’t much fanservice on offer. In my time with the game I encountered a few familiar surnames, in particular a member of the Sulu family. At times it felt like a Star Trek skin wrapped around a standard MMORPG template.

The best compliment I can give to STO would be that I’m tempted to buy the full game once it’s released. I’ve been looking for a sci-fi MMORPG that isn’t as threatening as EVE Online for a while now. However, for me that’s all STO seems to be – a streamlined MMORPG in the Star Trek universe. The space combat was a pleasant surprise, although battles could get drawn out and a little repetitive. The on-foot questing is adequate, doing everything you’d expect it to do but not much more. There’s nothing here that leaps out at me as a mechanic that will set the world on fire.

Of course, these are just the impressions of someone with limited experience of the genre. For a more in-depth analysis of the game, no doubt filled with incomprehensible jargon, check back here when the beta is over for Wex‘s thoughts.

DJ Hero Sequel On The Way

Mark Steward — Sat, 16 Jan 2010 15:30:23 +0000

All signs point towards Activision continuing to support the DJ Hero franchise. Although critically acclaimed at the point of its release, DJ Hero didn’t sell as well as its guitar-based ancestors. Nevertheless, an announcement on the MIDEM (MarchÃ© International du Disque et de l’Edition Musicale, the worlds largest music conference and trade fair) website has revealed that a sequel is in the works.

The MIDEM conference brings members of the music industry together and has previously hosted “listening sessions” that resulted in Attack Attack appearing in Guitar Hero 5. This year, the conference is asking for submissions to the listening sessions where a panel of judges will choose their favourite. The winner is set to be included and mashed up with another song in the next DJ Hero title.

I didn’t get a chance to play DJ Hero, it proved too pricey for my wallet to handle. However, I’ve heard nothing but good things about the game and a part of me wants to suspend my cynicism and applaud Activision for sticking with the franchise. That being said, it’s yet another sign of the publisher’s refusal to follow the Rock Band model of releasing huge amounts of downloadable content. Given Activision’s past treatment of the Hero franchise, DJ Hero looks set to become another annualised franchise with limited DLC support.

Via: CVG

Dead Rising Sequel Set in SoCal, has Themes of Illegal Immigration

Negative Gamer Review: Bayonetta (Xbox 360)

Mark Steward — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 13:50:04 +0000

Taking place in a reality in which heaven battles hell and witches trade vinyl records of angelic hymns with blaxploitation bartenders, Bayonetta is as distinctly Japanese as any game I’ve played in years. The plot, as far as I could discern, charts the titular protagonist’s attempts to recover her memories and prevent the reunification of three separate planes of existence. Mechanically, Bayonetta sits comfortably inside the “character action” genre based around third person melee combat and some occasional platforming spiced up with a few minigames and vehicle sections.

As far as a unique selling point is concerned, Bayonetta rewards the last second dodging of attacks by switching into ‘witch time’. You may already have guessed that ‘witch’ could be substituted with ‘bullet’ and this mechanic would remain the same. Time is slowed down for the player, allowing them to freely inflict damage on enemies without any risk or complete specific platforming sequences that are impossible otherwise. Carrying on the tradition of other games in the genre, there’s a certain degree of character customisation and item management. Between levels or at designated points in each stage, the player can trade in the halos they’ve received after killing enemies for various items or weapons.

You’ve been a bad boy, haven’t you?

I’ll admit that I went into Bayonetta feeling more than a little anxious about its difficulty level. I enjoy a good hack ‘n’ slash from time to time but I’ve always felt intimidated by the arbitrary challenge offered by games such as Devil May Cry and Ninja Gaiden. My first few hours with Bayonetta turned out to be a pleasant surprise, the game was undoubtedly challenging but didn’t seem as punitive as other entries in the genre. During those early chapters I started to become comfortable with the dodging mechanic and thoroughly enjoyed the combat.

Unfortunately, as the game progresses the difficulty curve reaches some truly ridiculous peaks. Around four fifths of the way through the game it simply ceased to be an enjoyable experience. A combination of curiousity and frustration caused me to knock the difficulty level down to “Easy (Automatic)” and I plowed through the remaining levels. This was the point where I realised something quite profound about Bayonetta: this game hates me.

The punitive difficulty level of later levels was just the first hint of the contempt with which Bayonetta treats its players. As if to rub salt in the wound, the only alternative to the standard difficulty level is a mode in which combat is almost completely automated. I didn’t want to sit back and just mash buttons, I just didn’t want to die after one or two mis-timed dodges. There may well be some people who enjoy throwing themselves at frustrating sections of gameplay but I’m not one of them. Maybe that disqualifies me from the hardcore gamer pissing contest but if that means more time to play games that I actually enjoy then so be it.

Who’s she and why is she killing that baby faced angel thing?

I don’t normally like to criticise the stories told in videogames. Most of the time when I pick up a game, I do so because I want to experience the mechanics more than anything else. In Bayonetta’s case I’m willing to make an exception because it seems to be quite proud of its plot and characters. Everything about the lavish and sometimes lengthy cutscenes screams “hey, check out this awesome story we wrote!”.

Unfortunately, the attempt to draw attention to its plot falls flat on its face because there really isn’t much of a plot there. During the period where I could bear to watch the cutscenes, I never developed any attachment to Bayonetta’s cast or any real understanding of what was going on. This is Japanese videogame storytelling at its most ponderous and incomprehensible. Eventually I just gave up and ceased to care about the context in which anything was happening.

Hey dude, check this out, this chick is like totally hot and she’s got guns on her shoes yo

When I first started playing Bayonetta I was willing to go along with the over-the-top presentation. The crotch and ass shots coupled with the general idea that Bayonetta is some kind of action heroine/stripper/dominatrix hybrid elicited a couple of smiles. Unfortunately the game’s sophomoric sense of humour starts to grate pretty quickly. I soon became bored with the one-note humour and attempts at titillation.

Bayonetta feels like a character designed by committee to appeal to a specific demographic of horny, adolescent men. Whilst that could be said of many videogame protagonists, the ceaseless sexual references make it particularly apparent in this case. I ended up feeling that Bayonetta was more condescending than sexist, expecting the player to laugh and cheer along with this lifeless, shallow character.

A few other things worth mentioning….

The game punishes you for using healing items by lowering your score. It also punishes you for dying by lowering your score. Either way, I ended up with some damn low scores on certain levels.
Some people will enjoy improving their scores on repeated playthroughs. For me, the last quarter of the game was such a broadly negative experience that I was put off from repeating it.
Whilst perfectly functional most of the time, there are definitely points in the game where the limitations of the camera weren’t understood by the level designers.
I felt the need to be excessively cautious due to the extremely powerful attacks of some enemies. This led to me taking a standoff approach and using guns rather than going into melee combat. I found this disappointing, as if the game was holding me back from its most interesting qualities.
Later on in the game, Bayonetta’s version of escort missions are introduced. I hate escort missions.

For all my complaints about the tone and difficulty of Bayonetta, I still managed to wring quite a few hours of fun from it. Initially the spectacular visuals and challenging but fair combat really impressed me. It’s a shame that Bayonetta ended up disappointing me as it luxuriated in its juvenile use of sexuality and its punitive late game difficulty.

You should buy this game if…

…you find difficult games rewarding and get off on polygonal t ‘n’ a.

Final Score

What starts out as a fun, fanciful romp develops a belligerent attitude towards the player and ultimately outstays its welcome.

(What does this score mean?)

Images: Giantbomb

Negative Gamer Review: Pixeljunk Shooter (PSN)

Mark Steward — Fri, 01 Jan 2010 16:45:45 +0000

The latest Pixeljunk title from developer Q Games, Pixeljunk Shooter, centres around mixing a twin-stick shooter with elements of puzzle and collect-em-up games. Pixeljunk Shooter tasks the player with rescuing trapped miners and scientists in a network of underground caverns by manipulating the elementally themed environments. By combining various opposing substances, such as lava and ice or water and oil, the caverns can be re-shaped to allow safe passage.

Although it employs a wholly original style, Pixeljunk Shooter shares the same broad aesthetic of bright colours and crisp silhouettes of previous Pixeljunk titles. Everything is presented in an invitingly cheerful and cartoonish manner. Progression through the relatively short campaign is dictated by both the successful rescue of trapped miners and the collection of gems scattered around each level.

Gotta grab ‘em all

When I first offered to review Pixeljunk Shooter, one of my fellow writers who had already played the game questioned what I could possibly criticise. Initially I felt skeptical, the knee-jerk contrarian in me immediately thought “well, no game is perfect”. As I started to play, that skepticism faded and I began to thoroughly enjoy the process of understanding how each element of the game’s environments could be combined and manipulated.

That enjoyment was suddenly stunted when I reached the final stage of the first of the game’s three zones and was told that I had not collected enough gems to proceed to the first boss battle. I grudgingly returned to the earlier stages and dug out as many gems as were required, thinking that I’d learned my lesson. I fought the first boss, a satisfying encounter with a giant enemy crab, and moved on to the next stage.

As I progressed through the second zone, I made sure to collect any gems that I came across. I was sure that it was my own fault that I’d had to backtrack through the first section of the game. However I still found that an initial run through each level wasn’t enough. Even with my eyes peeled I had failed yet again to collect enough gems and the backtracking began again.

At this point it became obvious that in order to collect enough gems to reach the final boss, I needed to excavate as much of each level as I could. I found myself digging through endless piles of rock and ice, freezing every pool of lava and trying to evaporate or drain every puddle of oil. Mining ceased to be a theme and became an objective in itself. The game lost a great deal of its lustre as I felt obliged to clear out as much of each level as possible to get as many gems as I could.

For me, much of the considerable amount of enjoyment I took from Pixeljunk Shooter came from solving its simple, intuitive environmental puzzles. Once I had completed a level, that pleasure just wasn’t there any more and I deeply resented having to backtrack to collect meaningless trinkets. It feels like a mechanic that shouldn’t ever have been tied so closely to progression.

I’m fine with collectibles and unlocks in general, as long as they’re included for the benefit of completist or obsessive fans. Fallout 3 had its bobblehead dolls and InFamous had its ‘dead drops’ to keep the achievement and trophy whores satisfied. I just can’t abide tying these collectibles to core elements of the gameplay and using them to seal off entire sections of the game.

Me love you short time

The length of a game is too often discussed in terms of value for money. I would never complain about Pixeljunk Shooter’s amount of content simply in terms of how much the game costs. However I did find that the short length of the game had some mild but noticeable effects on the game’s pacing. The game is divided into three distinct sections, each focusing on specific elements, this led to a small inconsistency in terms of the introduction of new substances to interact with and the overall difficulty level of the game as they are introduced.

The difficult curve is entirely traditional and completely linear. Each successive level is more challenging, requiring faster reflexes and more sophisticated problem solving skills. I could see this becoming problematic for some players as new elements are introduced in a more difficult and dangerous environment. You’ll get to learn about how ice, lava and earth behave in an environment with less dangerous enemies then in a new environment you learn how oil and electricity behave.

I also felt as if I didn’t get quite enough time to experiment with the different elements. Perhaps it’s for the best, the game never gives you enough time to get bored with a particular environment. I just couldn’t shake the feeling that the game was over too quickly and had not explored enough of its admittedly fantastic ideas.

A few other points worth mentioning…

The process of digging out gems can be a bit boring. Melting ice can take a while and when it turns out there was no gem to be found, it can be particularly annoying.
Taking hits or being too close to dangerous substances causes your ship to overheat rather than lose health. Sometimes you can guide your crashing, overheated ship into water to cool it down but most of the time you just have to sit there and watch it slowly crash. It’s kinda frustrating to sit through.
There’s a secondary guided missile weapon that I found to be pretty redundant. It causes the ship to overheat pretty quickly and I tended to feel that it was more trouble than it was worth.

Pixeljunk Shooter’s problems stem entirely from the misjudged inclusion of a pointless collection mechanic. What would have been an almost perfect linear experience is marred by forcing the player to go through some dull exploration. My frustration at having these levels locked away should be taken as a compliment towards the levels themselves and how much fun I had when I actually played through them.

You should buy this game if…

…you’re looking for a more thoughtful twist on the twin-stick shooter that expertly mixes elements of puzzle and action games.

Final Score
An all too brief but consistently enjoyable combination of shooter and puzzle mechanics. Other than some irritating backtracking, there’s very little to fault about this unique blend of genres.

(What does this score mean?)