OVERVIEW: Mass Effect 2

It's been two years since Eden Prime, two years since the assault on the Citadel, two years since you where killed. Cerberus as bought you back from the dead to find out what is making human colonies vanish. Given a list of names to for you, as Commander Shepard, to recruit. You and your new found team must stop the Collectors and prepare for the coming war of the Reapers.

PICK AND CHOOSE

On the Xbox 360 version of the game, you can import your Shepard from the original Mass Effect and depending if you saved Ashley or Kaiden, you will know right away that the choices you made in the first game matters here. On the Playstation 3 version, it will start off like you never played the original Mass Effect, and how could you? Microsoft owns the publishing rights to Mass Effect so seeing the original coming to the PS3 is highly unlikely. After the intro, set two months after the first game, you get a chance to watch a comic book style recap of the first game. It's a clever way to bring Playstation 3 players up to speed if they never played the first one. Another thing about it is you can pick six choices players had to make in the first game. The downside about this is that the only way to get it is either buying The Cerberus Network or getting the game new. It's not that big of a deal, but seeing that Mass Effect 3 will, supposedly, tie up everything, it kind of sucks.

Six ways to play

After the comic recap, you go into the character creation screen. This is where you can either make a new Shepard or create your own; I created my own. You can choose from various aspects of your character. There are six classes in total, and all have their own unique gameplay. For my female Shepard I picked the solider class. The solider class allows Mass Effect to play out like a third person shooter. What makes solider class different from the rest is that it is the only class you can use an Assault Rifle and adrenaline. For my Shepard, I named her Emily based on Emily Haines of Metric. While I named my Shepard after her, it does not look like her; Short black hair, green eyes, and dark purple lipstick. I thought it was black, but towards the end I saw that it was purple.

MIDDLE OF THE ROAD

Once the game starts, you wake up and the lab you are in is under attack. Because I choose the solider class, the game plays like a third person shooter. Despite this, you can still command your party into doing things for you. One of the first person you meet during the attack is a man named Jacob. He's got biotic powers so you can use that to your advantage. This is a pretty neat way to show off what you are missing. I am planning to start again with a male Shepard and this time using Vanguard. The commands are easy to do; push a button, command your squad or pick something for you, and see the results. It may sounds strange to say, but I play the game like Dragon Age. I never used the quick select. I bring up the wheel, see my surroundings, and plan accordingly. It's more effective, than just simply pushing a button.

After you escape from the attack with Jacob and Miranda, you are met with the Illusive Man. The person that founded Cerberus. He tells you that colonies are going missing and it's up to you to find out who and why. This is one of the reasons why the recreated Shepard. The Illusive man gives you a dossier full of names and you go and try to recruit them. He also gives you a brand new ship that is modeled after the first Normandy.

Pause, look, dominate

Once you find out who, the Illusive Man tells Shepard that he must go through the Omega 4 Relay. The Omega 4 Relay is a lost Relay. Instead of shining blue, like the rest, it shines red. Anyone that has past  through it has never returned. It's best to have all your team and ship upgraded before passing through. Along the way, you can collect resources by scanning planets and doing random side quests. The most important side quests is the loyalty quests. After talking to your teammates, they will ask you to do something for them. If you do the loyalty missions, they will trust you and will have a good chance of surviving. I say good chance because I did Miranda's loyalty mission and she still ended up killed. She was the only member in my team to die.


EXPANDING OUR LITTLE TEAM


The cast of characters expands from the original Mass Effect. The locations you go expands also, and instead of having every building look identical, they all look different with different layouts. The planets are no longer identical. There are alot of planets to explore and to land. Sometimes you can find unique things that can only be found in the planet. This is also where the DLC comes in. If you have the PS3 version, there are 3 great DLC to do; Lair of the Shadow Broker, Kasumi: Stolen Memory, and Overlord. Shadow Broker is the best one and it answers what the Shadow Broker is.

Shooting

There is no two ways to play the game. You can be either paragon or a renegade. It's all up to you. The bad thing about this is that you pretty much know what will gain the most paragon or renegade points. If you choose a renegade option, you will have more renegade points given to you and a little bit of paragon. Same implies if you picked paragon. There are many hours to be had in Mass Effect 2. It will take a good while to do everything this game has to offer.


With Mass Effect 3 on its way, I can imagine that everyone that is getting the game is playing Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2, so they can see if all those choices they made are really worth it at the end. I have high hopes for Mass Effect 3. If Mass Effect 3 ends up being bad, at least we know that we got to excellent games to fall back on. 

Battlefield 3 Single Player Review

After I beat a game I reflect everything that I did on the game; Was it good? Was it bad? Was it worth remembering, and going back to? Unfortunately, Battlefield 3's answer is no. From a technical standpoint, it's great. The characters go past Uncanny Valley and into something more real. From a gameplay standpoint, it's greatly lacking.

GAMEPLAY

Battlefield 3 is the definition of mediocre. All the buttons you have used in past first person shooters can be used here. You aim and you shoot. Nothing changes. In the game you either follow someone, or there will be an indicator telling you where to go. There is no freedom in this game. If you stray to far you will die. It's either do this, or risk taking a bullet to the head. While the areas do feel big, where you will go is not. Because you are following something 90% at the time, you can't go out and explore different vantage points and ways to flank. The game lets you flank whenever it tells you to. The game will also tell you to do something that will guarantee an instant death.

Push To Win

The game does allow breaks between the shooting. In one mission you can drive a tank. The controls of the tank is like every other game out there; awkward. Because they tell you where to go and who to shoot, this section of the game is more boring than it should be. If the section was more exciting, I would not have mind the awkward controls. In another section, you are a co-pilot of a jet. While you don't get to fly the jet, it does leave with something exciting. You can shoot down other enemy jets. I was never a good flyer in games, so this was gladly welcome.

During all the shooting you will do, and you will do a lot of it, there are one too many quick time events. I'm not one to complain about quick time events. When done properly, it can be very exciting. Battlefield 3 is the exact opposite of that. When you get into a quick time event you and another enemy will start hand to hand combat. Instead of pushing a button to trigger the next move, you just push one button and lean back as you watch the scripted fight plays out. This game could have benefited from having a mini brawler game. Push X for punch, Push Circle for kick. Nothing fancy, just something better than this. It happens way to frequent for it to be surprising.

GRAPHICS

The Graphics in this game is insane. The attention to detail should not be ignored. From the faces, water, fire, and environment, all looks amazing. Once I found out Glenn Morshower was in the game, I noticed his character talked the same why he does. It's very startling and awesome. The guns feel real and they each has a unique look to them. However, if you played past military themed games before, you will already know which one is your favorite.

Can you see them?

The lighting is just as detailed. When light is facing you, it does as it does in real life. Gets annoying and blinds your vision. While having flashlights on you make sense, not so much with lasers. The lasers gets right in front of your eye. No matter where the enemy is point and where they are at, it's always following you. This section of the game was stupid and I was shaking my head in disgust.

The audio is also another thing worth noting. The voice acting does a good job on showing some emotion, it's not the best we've ever heard, but it works. The explosions, the firing of the weapons, the yelling for orders. Everything is in top form. I was afraid that my headphones was going to blow out. While the sound of the weapons is amazing, it still sounds like a pea shooter. When firing a gun, I expect it to make loud cracking sounds. While it does sound weak, the guns is powerful. It takes a couple of good shots to take someone down. 

DIFFICULTY 

At least it looks good

Make no mistake, this game is surprisingly difficult. I'm not used to Battlefield games, but the ones that I have played was just a difficult. While I can see someone blowing past this with ease, with cheap deaths in the short amount of time I had the game I reluctantly switch the difficulty. I manage to beat the first few missions on normal and that took a good 40 minutes. On easy, it took no less than 20. Easy is too easy. Normal is too hard. If I had the game longer, I would have beaten the game on normal, but I was in a timetable. This is where the game separates itself from other military themed games. You are a badass in the game because the game didn't make you one. The game can be beaten in 6 hours. It's not that long of a game, but because the way the game is, it feels like it's long just to be long by giving out cheap deaths when ever you mess up. Whether by your moves, or where you went.

STORY

This is wasted potential. You play as a marine named Blackburn. He is sent in of questions of treason. The entire game feels one massive flashback into how you got the way you are. This would have been interesting, but they started to add more characters for you to play as and the story is not in order. I love nonlinear storytelling. I blame Quentin Tarantino for this, but at least his storytelling is focused. Here, it's all over the place. Nothing really make sense. All it is, is an excuse to throw many missions under one game. They tried to be shocking the way Call Of Duty is, but where Call Of Duty succeeds, Battlefield 3 fails. There is one mission where you are a french solider and you start killing cops towards the end of the mission. It's all pointless. Then you see a character get executed. Again, pointless. This is all this story is, pointless. This story would have been better if it was told in a linear line. Not all games need to be nonlinear.

OVERALL

Battlefield 3 takes everything you like about Uncharted, Rainbow Six, and Call Of Duty and makes it as dull as possible. The team at DICE knows the Frostbite 2 engine and knows it well. What they don't know, or at least forgot to, is to make an exciting game. In that stupid war against Battlefield and Call Of Duty, there is no winner. At least Call of Duty, despite it's tired formula, is an exciting game.

Endings: Metal Gear Solid 4

"Dissolve"

This is what Director Hideo Kojima had in mind when making Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns Of The Patriots. Dissolve was chosen because it's Solid Snake's finale mission and it was to be the end of The Patriots. Another theme within the game is Redemption. Almost every character in the game has a moment of Redemption. One of the characters that did not have a redemptive scene was Vamp. I don't think he was ever meant to be redeemed. Another theme that the game has is sacrifice. The ending of Metal Gear Solid 4 is a perfect way to end the series, but it's also kind of a paradox.


PUT ASIDE THE GUN AND LIVE

"I finally understand the meaning behind your words"

It's no secret that the final cut scene of Metal Gear Solid 4 is long. It almost pushes the hour mark by the time the credits begin to roll. After a few cut scenes, where it finishes out the character's own story ark, it cuts to Solid Snake in a graveyard. This is the same graveyard Big Boss was in at the end of Snake Eater. Snake just sits there holding a gun. He thinks of all that he has done to save the lives of many; and he is ready to do it again. Only this time, the way to do it is to kill himself. He puts the barrel to his mouth, un cocks the gun, and then the camera pulls out over to some trees near by. A gunshot is heard as birds flies away. Like Snake Eater, where I always almost cry at the end of that game, I flinch at the sound of the gunshot. This was to be Snake's last moments and we are with him to the very end. After a brief credit roll, a new cut scene begins.


Snake is on his hand and knees. Sweating profusely and the gun empty. He breaths heavily as he hears a voice. It was telling him that it was good that he didn't kill himself. Snake looks and then there he is, Big Boss. They both stare at each other not knowing what the other will do. Big Boss moves closer raising his Patriot Gun, Snake is quickly reloading his. Big Boss aims his gun and then drops it. Confused, Snake watches as the weapon falls and without warning Big Boss comes in a perform some CQC. It doesn't last long and it ends with Big Boss holding his surviving clone. Big Boss offers peace and he begins to explain everything the Metal Gear Solid series has stood for and what has happened.


IT ALL STARTED WITH HIM


Big Boss begins to do a lot of info dump. I don't really like info dump that much, because it feels lazy, but Metal Gear Solid 4 has deserved this. There was a lot of information that the initial story couldn't do. It begins with how Big Boss is still alive. If Big Boss was in his fifties when they created his clones in the 70s, then that means that Big Boss is around 80 years old. It also shows further understanding of Ocelot's goal from Metal Gear Solid and Metal Gear Solid 2. If you played Metal Gear Solid 3, there is a good chance to know that Ocelot's mother is The Boss. He sacrificed himself, just like she did during The Cold War.

The ruler all.

This is also the moment when we found out who Created The Patriots. It was Zero. Zero was Big Boss's commander during Snake Eater. Zero used the funds of the Philosopher's Legacy to help create the Patriots. Other founders include; Signit, Eva, Para-medic, Big Boss, and Ocelot. Big Boss and Zero was best friends, but a falling out left them separated. They both had different interpretation of The Boss's will. Zero wanted in inside world, a world that comes together as one, but as Zero got older, he became more paranoid. So, to it protect the will he created AIs. Four AIs named after the three Presidents on the Mount Rushmore and another AI named John Doe. Then one day the AIs became self aware and deviated from Zero's and The Boss Will and crated it's own will. One that keeps the AI becoming stronger and more controlled of the world. No one saw this coming. Not even Zero himself. It took a good while, but The Patriots found a way to keep its new found power growing; The War Economy.


SEND ZERO BACK TO NOTHING


Now that the Patriots are no more, thanks to Sunny and the FOXALIVE program, the world has gone back to zero. In Big Boss's Redemption, he kills his old friend and mentor, Zero. Earlier in the game, Snake is implanted with a new version of FOXDIE, and it was designed to kill the original members. Then Big Boss falls. Ready to die, he asks Snake to take him to The Boss's grave. Big Boss then explains that the new FOXDIE is uprooting the old version. The old FOXDIE was mutating, and if it was not for the new version of FOXDIE, the old FOXDIE would have caused a epidemic.


To me, this is where the Paradox begins. Snake goes through a lot of crap to stop Liquid Ocelot, even still. He does all the stuff he was willing to do all along and he never got his sacrifice. If Snake killed himself to make sure that he didn't become a walking virus that can kill everybody, that would have been his ultimate sacrifice. He may not redeemed himself, because he doesn't have a reason too, but at least he can be like his brothers. Sacrificing himself for the greater good. Liquid and Solidus wanted the same thing, to end the Patriots rule. They both sacrificed themselves to make it happen. Even Ocelot sacrificed himself to see it happen. 


IN MEMORY OF A PATRIOT, WHO SAVED THE WORLD

Only one scene comes close. Can you guess?

In Big Boss's final effort of life, he understood what The Boss stood for, and he does one of the greatest scenes ever in gaming. He toughs out the pain, he gets his feet together, he slowly raises his hand, then he salutes his mentor. It's a phenomenal scene from the series, and one of my favorite moments in gaming.


Big Boss shows his respect for Snake for the first time, and as Big Boss raises his hand to shake, he falls. This is the final minutes of Big Boss, and he talks about how Zero, himself, Liquid, and Solidus was not so different. They wanted to change the world for the better. Big Boss then tells Snake that he's unique in ways that he wish he was. Big Boss asks Snake to leave war and live on. He can finally be free.


"Dissolve"


Snake picks up the cigar and places it on Big Boss's lips and he gives one final puff. 


"This is good, isn't it"




No matter how it ended, it's still a fantastic ending to a series that changed gaming. While this isn't the end of Metal Gear, it is the end of Solid Snake. And what an amazing end it is.

Easter Eggs and Unlockables.

Remember playing an old game and then you see something that didn't have anything to do with the game? Remember that rush you felt when you found something, and telling your friends the next day? Those days are now gone. With the Internet you can find out about an Easter Egg before you even get the game. While some games still keep that tradition, it's no longer a mystery if you will find them or not. If there is a game that as an Easter Egg then there is a very good chance that the Easter Eggs are found within a week.

KEEP PLAYING

This was for both Single and Multiplayer

One of the things that is greatly missed in this generation of games is unlockables. Few games have this feature in their games. It's always fun to see that when beating a game there is a reason to go back to. It helps that if the game is amazing, and you were going to play it again anyway, the unlockables would have given you extra reasons. Unlockables can range from; Videos, Art, and gameplay tweaks. One of the best games of this generation, at least to me, is the first two Uncharted games. One of the reasons is because the amount of tweaks the game gives you. You would need to get them by either money or treasures. It all depends which game you play. Uncharted 3 is missing this feature. They do have unlockables, but you can only unlock them by playing the game, but it's only videos. With the rise of DLC, Unlockables are becoming a thing of the past. I want to unlock them, not buy them.

NO ONE NEEDS TO PROTECT IT

Another awesome thing games have is Easter Eggs. Easter Eggs are hidden surprises that rewards players by going that extra time into looking around the environment. On of the biggest surprises in 2009 was X-Men Origins: Wolverine Uncaged Edition. Not only was it one of the very few good movie/game tie end. That in itself is a bit of a paradox seeing that the movie was terrible, but the game was great. I really didn't know much about the game one of the reasons I wanted to play it was because of the M rating. This is a very shallow reason to play a game, and I don't recommend anyone doing it. The other reason was because it's Wolverine. We finally get to see the grim reality with those blades he has. 

Hope he doesn't forget to push the button

It didn't have a lot of Easter Eggs, but the one that I didn't know made me geek out. It happens early in the game where you are outside. I found this door and broke it to get past it. Then there it was The Hatch from Lost. I love Lost. It is one of my most favorite TV shows of all time, so seeing that made me geek out into excitement. Then the light came on and an achievement was unlocked called "Found." The coolest thing about this is that they didn't put it there no reason. Two of the actors in the film was in the series. Other Lost game related Easter Eggs include; Just Cause 2, Modern Warfare 3, Half Life 2: Episode 2, World At War, and World of Warcraft. Another of my favorite shows of all time is Breaking Bad and RAGE had a Easter Egg that relates to the series.

DOES HE KNOW THE PASSWORD

Halo has a ton of Easter Eggs that relates to the fans of the game. One of the best ones is from Halo 3. In the game you will come across a couple of soldiers talking about passwords. Depending on the difficulty, you will hear members of Rooster Teeth. The creators of Red Vs Blue. Even in the last Halo game they've added a really cool Easter Egg where they thanked the community for being fans of the games. It's a shame that so few games has Easter Eggs now. It gives you a reason to go back and play a game and look at the nooks and crannies the game has. 

A COLLECT CODEC CALL

Stating the obvious since 1987

Sometimes, Easter Eggs are triggered by doing something in the game. Metal Gear Solid has a whole plethora of Easter Eggs ready to be unlocked. In Metal Gear Solid 4, there is this one where after you die, you can call up Rose and she will tell you about a nightmare she had where Snake was killed. She even goes into detail of how you died. It's a nice twist and puts the whole thing into a weird, if non canon, look over the whole series. In Metal Gear Solid 3, if you saved at a certain point, when you come back you can play this short game where you are a vampire hunter. The small mini game was fun and wished there was a game like that. Another Easter Egg is the Metal Gear Solid series has is hidden codec calls. It's all staggering that Kojima has put this much effort on something most will probably never listen. Even Super Mario Brothers Brawl used Codec Calls for Snake.

Easter Eggs and Unlockables are some of gamings greatest treats. They can make you play a game to find them, or keep you playing to make the game you want it to be. It can make a difficult part much more fun, or make the game better than ever before. I'm sure there are games out there that has Easter Eggs, but it comes to the point where you don't know which one does or which one does not.

PSVita and Uncharted: Golden Abyss First Impressions

The PSVita has released and I got to spend a little time with it.

The PSvita is the next generation of Sony's Handheld market. Meant to be better than the PSP, Sony is hoping to have a bigger success than their past PSP systems. What I noticed was the analog sticks; It felt like I was using a brand new Dual Shock Controller. If you ever played with a new Playstation controller, then you know what this would feel like. I got to play the painfully short Uncharted: Golden Abyss Demo. The game looks fantastic. It feels like an Uncharted game. You can move Drake the way you would in the Playstation 3 games. For some reason the sound wasn't working, but I think that has something to do with the store. The touch screen stuff is pretty nifty; if you chose to use it. Unlike the Nintendo handhelds where you need your stylus, you don't need one on the PSVita. Your fingertips are fine enough. 

I only used the touch screen as an option just to see how it works. If Drake needs to climb somewhere you can just swipe your finger across the yellow ledges and he will follow. This makes the game play for itself; and I would never use it because of that. Part of the fun of Uncharted is going to one section to another without knowing if Drake will fall or not. I would tell you about the shooting, but the demo ends before you can do the rest of the Uncharted stuff. I doesn't even tell you when the demo ends, it just start over.

The screen itself is amazing. If they can make a handheld Uncharted look this good, there is no telling what it will look like when the system is figured out. There are a few other demos; ModNation Racers and Gravity Shift, but haven't got to them yet. As sleek as it is, it's hard to know if it's worth the $250 price tag. The only game that seems to take advantage of the technology is Uncharted: Golden Abyss. If I got to play more of Uncharted, and it showed off more of what the system can do, I would have much more to say. Unfortunately, the demo they had set up hasn't convince me to want to get one.

Punk O Matic.

There's this old Flash Game called Punk O Matic where you can make your own song out of riffs and beats. This one took about two hours. It was originaily made in 2007

Song 1
2---6-3---4-6-6-1---1---1---2---2---2 ---6-6-6-5-5-5-1---6-6-6-6-9---------
-----------6-1---1---3-bbbb4---4---7-
7-0---1---1---3-3-3-6-6-9---9---2---7 -7-7-c----------------9-2-0---3-4-8-6 -6-1---6-7-1---0---a---6-5-5-5-9-5-5-
6-3-5-5-5-4-4-4-a---6-6-7-8-5-a--


Song 2
------------------6-6-6-2---2---2---2---77222---4-45-1---1--1111---3---78999999999-------0-------2---2---3-3-2---a---a-----2---6-1----1------------4-------a-a-a---3-5-c--0-------1-----3-3-3---2-3-2-----0---0-----4-5------a----------------------6-6-7-4-a--


Song 3
----------------88880---0---0---4-4-4-5---------2---2---2---2---3---2--1---1---1---9-a---a---5-5-7-7-7-7-2---2---2---4---4---4---6-bbbbbb6-6-4---4-7-4---3-b1---1---1---c---------------------------9-3-3-4-4-4-2-2-2-a---------9-3-3-3-3-3-3-a----------------



http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/147276

HOOKS: Why We Play

I'm not going to say that anybody can come out with a First Person shooter so easily. There are too many complex factors that I don't understand. While each game plays the same, what makes them want us to play them? Could it be the settings? Could it be the developer behind the game? There are a ton of reasons to want to play a game. The big question is, why do we continue to play the game afterward? 

I DON'T RELY ON LUCK

A Complex Race.

In preparation of Mass Effect 3 I bought Mass Effect 2. What keeps the games unique is the hook that they have that makes it great. That hook is the world that Bioware has created. Whole galaxies of history, races, places, and technology. Have you ever heard some of the codecs from the game? Each race has their own biology, psychology, religion, politics, history, everything a race needs to keep them unique. The games are fantastic. It's learning more about the galaxy out there that makes me play it again. You will never know if you will learn something new about the game.

Hooks can be a powerful thing, but they don't only apply to big games like Mass Effect. Sometimes it can be the characters themselves. Nathan Drake is one of the greatest new character to hit video games in a good while. A wise cracking, always lucky, treasure hunter make the Uncharted games funny and fresh. Even though he's no super solider, he takes more beatings than any other character in gaming. From a train crash to a plane crash, Drake always finds a way to survive. Seeing how Nathan Drake escapes danger time and time again is one of the hooks of the games. The brilliant thing about the games is that it's got several hooks. One hook that the games have is the other characters. Elena Fisher, Victor Sullivan, Chloe Frazer, and others are great around Drake. The story is the another hook the game has. All the games has a great story that makes you come back time and time again.

HIP THREE MINUTE DITTIES 

There was a time where this was Fresh

Call Of Duty has a phenomenal hook. The single player is short and not really worth it half the time. What it does have that fans continue to go back to is its Multiplayer. That need to upgrade and get better weapons. While I do believe that Call Of Duty has run its course, there is no denying that Multiplayer is the reason why people buy the game and not for the Single Player. Before mulitplayer became big, the hook for Call Of Duty 4 was that it was finally leaving World War 2 and going for a more modern setting.

What makes them hooks in the first place? Hooks is something that grabs you. Hooks also implies to music. No matter the song or genre, there is something that just grabs you and you will remember it at the end, and that end will make you go back. The same goes for games. If it doesn't have that hook there would be no reason to spend up to 100 hours on a game. If there is no hook than that game has failed. Would you really want to spend a few hours a day on something that is boring. Take Guitar Hero. The first time I played the game I was terrible at it. It took a couple of tries to get it, but once I did I could hardly stop. I would go to the nearest Best Buy just to play it. People would come and watch me play. I was never good enough to play it on expert, but I was pretty good with Normal. I used to be really good at Jordan by Buckethead. Every once in a while someone would get the game, just because they saw me play it. Those music games had a very clear and amazing hook. 

ONLY THEN SHALL I ABIDE

Don't let her fool you. It's a hard game. But a great one

Sometimes when you play a game you don't know what the hook is til you play it yourself. Bayonetta's hook, or at least it was trying to be, was its sex appeal. While I didn't care about the sex appeal, I did play the game and had a lot of fun with it. To me the biggest hook that game has is its total fucking insanity. The game play and the insanity was worth the price.

There are a ton of games out there that has a hook or two that will keep you coming back. Either the story or stealth in Metal Gear Solid. The brutal difficulty of Ninja Gaiden. Or something as simple as puzzles in a new way. Each successful game has a hook that developers and publishers take advantage of. If a game doesn't have a good enough hook, or no hook at all that game is going to fail.

Mass Effect 3 PS3 Demo Impressions

Mass Effect 3 isn't coming out for another month, but that did not stop Bioware and EA to release a demo for the Xbox 360, PS3, and PC. The third game of a planned trilogy hopes to bring the conclusion of Commander  Shepard and his crew at Normandy. It's not know how long its been since the last game, but we do know that  Shepard had to pay a price for what he had done. Before you even start you are given three choices. Action, Role Playing, or Story. Each has their own way the game is played. Believe me when I say that playing all three will take a while, but it will be all worth it.

BUST YOUR KNEE CAPS

There was a choice where you can play this Shepard 

Action mode makes Mass Effect 3 play like a typical third person action game. You don't get to decide what to say or what your character will be like. Once you start this mode, it goes straight to the gameplay. The graphics are amazing, but it's not in a solid 30 Frames Per Second. Seeing that this is probably an old build, I'm willing to forgive them for now. Other than that, it looks great. The Mass Effect engine continues to impress. This was the first mode I played with and I waited til it was time to pick what I wanted to say, but it never came. The dialogue is chosen for you and the conversations will play out like cut scenes.

Once the action does start I am reminded how great the action is in this series. You pick what ammo types you can use, and you can use to control your other companions on what they can use. This is all standard for Mass Effect and it's still a lot of fun to play around with. The game in Action Mode is not very difficult, but I did die a couple of times. Another standard about Mass Effect is that if you don't mind your surroundings, you will die as you try to get to new cover. The same is implied here. Through two different scenarios, the gameplay is still just as amazing.


CONSEQUENCES

The Final Stand

Role Playing Mode makes Mass Effect 3 play like the past games. This time you can pick your dialogue and what your person will look like. The character creator is still the same as in the past games. Nothing is really changed, but why should it be? If you played the past Mass Effect games, your character from that save will import to Mass Effect 3. The gameplay is just as the same as before. Except it's a little bit more hard. Like Action, it's not all that difficult, but it is harder than Action. The enemies are faster and they have better armor. This is what the past games have played like before. The sound is amazing and the voice acting is top notch. In this mode I played a Female and Jennifer Hale did a pretty good job. Keith David as Anderson is in this demo also and, once again, David is amazing. You will meet different characters from the past games, and the voice actors are back in there respective roles.

THE LAST PAGE

The version I'm getting

Story Mode makes Mass Effect 3 painfully easy. This feels like a mix between Action mode and Role Playing Mode. You get everything you need from Role playing, and get all the difficulty of Action. The only difference is that the difficulty of this mode is non existent. You can kill a group of enemies without even knowing. This is a great way to only focus on the story, but I can't see myself playing this mode except getting trophies that I can't get in the other modes. The way the demo is split up they wisely skipped any big story spoilers to save for the full game. That is not to say there are not any spoilers at all. You play out the first 20 minutes of the game, and then about 20 minutes of something that will happen later on. The weapons in Mass Effect 3 are pretty amazing so far. There is this one weapon they give you that is quite powerful no matter what mode you played. It acts like an assault rifle, but it's single shot only. That might not sound great, but the weapon itself packs quite a punch. Especially if you have the incendiary ammo on.


This looks to be one of the best games of the year. With three different modes to play there is more freedom than ever before. One of the best things about the series seems to take place here. The choices you made in the first two games has an impact or another in this finale chapter of Mass Effect. Are we going to see more Mass Effect coming? Absolutely. Is this the finale game we see of Shepard? I don't know. What I do know is that the game is going to end in a grand bang, and I can't wait to play it.

The Blending Of Years

LATE 80S EARLY 90

Darkwing Duck is awesome, always.

I'm going to warn you that my years are all messed up. Don't ask me the year because I forgot. Don't ask me the age because I forgot. What you can ask me is the game. That is what I remembered. My gaming timeline is more confusing than the timeline of LOST. Each time I remember when I played a game I tend to forget what year it was. It dosesn't help that moving around was the norm. Despite this, I'll try my best. I remember being slightly disappointed because I thought I beat the game, when in fact there are other worlds to go to. This game I'm talking about is Super Mario Brothers 3. At that time the game had been fairly new and it something I constantly played. Along other games I played was Super Mario Brothers and Duck Hunt. What little I do remember I was getting into The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, I even had that for the NES. If that helped, I would not know. I had major surgery and when I came to, I found that I had a NES. Some of the games I remember enjoying and playing nonstop was Darkwing Duck and Duck Tales.


MAYBE AROUND 1994 - 1996

I think I was around 9 when this came out

But what games do I do remember. I remember quite a bit actually. I remember hating Ecco The Dolphin for the Sega Genesis, I remember playing the hell out of Bartman meets Radioactive Man (which is something I don't recommend). There's also Jurassic Park for the Nintendo, Super Nintendo, and Genesis. Yeah, I had three versions of Jurassic Park game on three different systems. Why? Because I, even to this day, love Jurassic Park. I knew someone that had a bunch of NES games and I played a lot of them. Again, not remembering what I played. Then around 1994 I got a Super Nintendo. We didn't have a lot of games, but the games we did get was a lot of fun. We rented more than we bought. Some of the games we rented was Alien 3, Judge Dredd, and I borrowed Star Fox, which I didn't get to play a lot of. We had a SNES for awhile. One of the game games we did have, and played a lot of was Mortal Kombat and Mortal Kombat II. Mortal Kombat was one of the first games I've ever beaten and it was awesome. I didn't know there was a difference between the SNES version and the Genesis version, but I didn't care. All I cared about was playing a game and having fun with it. Mortal Kombat II was something my  family played a lot of. My mom, my dad, and my three sisters all played the game. I would win because of the amount I played of the game.


We left the SNES behind and got a Sega Genesis. Like the SNES we didn't have a lot of games and the games we did have was a lot of fun. There was this short period where the family would play darts and who ever wins gets to have anything they wanted. While I didn't win, one of my sister's did. What she picked was something that all 4 of us had to enjoy, but it would be hers. She picked Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3. To say that I played the hell out of that would be an understatement. I didn't have a lot of games, but with that game I didn't need to. UMK3 was all I need. One of the cool things about it is if you beat the tournament mode, you get to choose a prize. When I found the Supreme Demonstration logo it suddenly became an event where all my sisters and I would gather around the TV and watch all the fatalities, babalities, friendships and animalities there are. I would not any other logo. Just that one.

1997

The Roller Coasters was fun into itself

When we moved it was lost during the moving process. Which was something of a sad tradition. If we actually stayed in one place instead of constantly moving, I'm sure that my room would be felled with old game system and games. Not James Rolfe big, but a decent collection of games I would be proud of. Then there was a small period where I didn't have a gaming system. I was young and still had a bunch of toys that I enjoyed. Jurassic Park: The Lost World was coming out and I got some cool toys from that. I was around 11 at the time. 1997 would become my favorite year ever. That year got a Playstation. Resident Evil had just came out and I watched my dad play it. I tried playing it myself, but would always get killed. There was Reloaded, Twisted Metal, Twisted Metal 2, Resident Evil 2, and a few others. I even played a game that was had something to do with Monty Python. I would have to say my time with the Playstation 1 had my clearest memories of gaming. Tomb Raider was something everyone played, my Dad mostly played Myst. My mom played Tomb Raider, my sisters play some of Resident Evil. I just played anything I got my hands on. I even played Final Fantasy VII when that came out, and no I didn't like it. When Resident Evil 2 came out we made an event out of it and we would watch my dad play that. I tried to play that too, but I got killed a lot.


1998 -1999

Don't like sports, but liked this.

We moved. It wasn't all bad this time. When we moved my grandparents had a Super Nintendo. This is where I played a lot of Tetris Attack. Tetris Attack was like an addiction to me. It was so good. Then we moved, again. Seeing that it wasn't my system we had to leave it behind. This time in, what I believe is 1999, for Christmas, I got a Sega Saturn and one of the games they had in box was Tomb Raider. That version was OK,  but if you didn't beat a level in under an hour, the loading screen would freeze. It was very strange. This was also the time where I played Virtua Fighter and NBA Jam for the first time. I would spend all night playing NBA Jam and it was awesome. It was a pretty good system, if it wasn't for the PS1 I could see the Sega Saturn being bigger. This was also the first time where I got to play a little bit of the Nintendo 64. The one game I played a lot of was GoldenEye and Perfect Zero. Then again, we moved. It was almost a year before we got another Playstation 1. It was around 1999 and the Dreamcast was coming out. The two big games I played was Silent Hill and Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver. We didn't have a lot of games, again, but it didn't matter to me. What we had was enough. I watched my dad play Pitfall 3D, unbeknownst to me at the time that the main Character was voiced by Bruce Campbell.




1999 - 2000

Don't EVER play this. EVER

Then, maybe, around 2000 I got another Sega Genesis. The games I played this time was Mortal Kombat 3, Vectorman, and Zero Tolerance. Columns was another game I played a lot of. I didn't have the Genesis for long because we moved. It was around this time where Blockbuster was allowing people to rent systems and we rented one for a while. I played Resident Evil 3, Ready 2 Rumble boxing, NFL Blitz, and Star Wars Episode 1. It was around this time where I tried to get into PC gaming. Sadly, the only game that can be played was Carnivores, a hunting game where you hunt dinosaurs. I also had a Gameboy in two separate occasions. In one time I played Pokemon: Blue and the other Resident Evil: Gaiden. I'll let you pick which one I had the best time more. This was also around the time where I spent my biggest gap of not playing video games. Thankfully, this is where the years becomes clearer than ever. It was sort of a reset for me.


2002 - NOW

In 2002 I got a Super Nintendo again with Mortal Kombat II, Link To The Past, Donkey Kong Country, and Super Metroid. I played a lot of Link To The Past, but never finished it, the same goes for Donkey Kong Country. I didn't play Super Metroid because I didn't want to delete the saves the game had. I sold the Super Nintendo shortly after, yes you can facepalm here, but not long after I got a Nintendo 64. I played a lot of Mario Tennis, Quake 64, and Turok 64. Then I got another Playstation. This is where I finally got to play Metal Gear Solid. I played a lot of Playstation games at that time, I couldn't tell you if it was good or not though. Maybe a few months after getting a Playstation I finally got a Playstation 2. I had that for a long time playing all the great games like Ratchet and Clank, Psychonauts, Metal Gear Solid 2, MGS 3, Resident Evil 4, and so much more. There's a reason why it's considered one of the greatest Consoles of all time. Unlike the past, where I rarely got a game. I got few every few months, sometimes weeks. I had that until I got a Xbox 360. I played pretty much all the big games from that and now I have a PS3, which I am enjoying. My gaming history is confusing...

DLC, yep another one.

I was a fool to think that DLC would be a great thing. When the new generation of consoles was coming out, game developers was going to do this thing called 'Downloadable Content.' I remember saying that DLC is a great way to expand a game and we don't have to see sequels all that much anymore. It would lead the way to new IPs. Jump forward now and DLC is worse than I feared. While not all DLC is bad, there is a growing epidemic going on. Pre-Order DLCs, Already on Disk DLC, and over price DLCs.

I WOULD MAKE A GANDALF QUOTE, BUT IT WOULD BE TOO EASY

It's not even worth it most of the time

I'm not going to stand here, or sit here as the case maybe, and say that DLC should just leave forever. No, when DLC does right, it shows what DLC can do. Games like Fallout, Oblivion, and Alan Wake (yes i'm talking about alan wake again) all showed that you can have great DLC that shows what I originally thought DLC was going to do. Then there are terrible DLCs. Five bucks for something that is already on the disk, Capcom I'm looking at you. Then there is this thing that is even worse than DLC. Something that will prove worthless in the long run, Online Passes. Online passes are the evil that companies can do. I buy games used and new. I should not be punished for not thinking that 70 bucks is worth a game that could be terrible. I would rather wait a year for that used price drop so I can play it. The worst that could happen is that I lose 15 bucks. The best thing that could happen is I buy the sequel new when it comes out. This is what I did with Uncharted. I bought the first one used for about 15 or 17 bucks. I greatly enjoyed the game and I ended up buying Among Thieves and Drake's Deception new. I can get why they do this so they can "combat" the used game sales, but those used game sales does more good than they know. If stores like Gamestop gave a percentage to the companies from people buying used, these online passes would not exists. In fact, in my personal opinion, I think that companies would take more risks and create new IPs if they get a piece of the Used market. It would be a win-win for everyone. It sort of sounds like I'm contradicting myself, but it should not be the costumers fault on the business practices of Gamestop. Online passes SHOULD NOT have an expiration date, EA.

HAIL TO THE KI- QUEEN, BABY

You ain't leading but two things.

What does online passes have to do with DLC. I'm not really sure, I just wanted to throw that in there. So, back to DLC. Some DLC can help sell a game. I knew what Chainsaw Lollipop was, but I really didn't care for it. That was until last week when they released the pre-order DLC for the game. I'm a fan of Evil Dead so seeing that Juliet can be dressed as Ash from the series, I sort of got excited. I watched videos from the game and after seeing some of it, I want to play it now. I hope it's this year's Bayonetta. While it's kind of silly to look at a game after some DLC is announced, it does show that sometimes the DLC is more interesting than the game itself. I haven't played it, but I've heard that Grand Theft Auto: The Ballad of Gay Tony is much more fun than the actual game itself. While GTAIV took itself too seriously, Gay Tony goes the exact opposite. If I knew that Fallout 3 would end the way it did and it would not take you back to the world, there would be a good chance that I would at least rented it. Seeing that I got it new, and the collector's edition no less, I had to deal with the fact that I could not go back. I traded it in about a couple of months after I had it. I did not want to see a message over my head to do something the entire time I do other quests and explore. About a few months or so Broken Steel came out. It would show a new ending and you can continue on your exploration of a bombed out Washington DC while giving you more stuff to do and see. That is one DLC should have have been in the game in the first place.

REALLY, AGAIN

I really liked the DLC for Alan Wake. They had two The Signal and The Writer. They both could have been in the game, but I felt that it needed to be its separate thing. It does continue the story of Alan Wake, but I don't think its that much of a requirement in the game. In the Signal Alan is trapped in the lake and he tries to find himself. In The Writer he is stuck in his own mind trying to save himself. They only give hints of what is to come if Alan Wake 2 is a reality. If you got the game new you get The Signal for free. It was not on the disk and you had to wait a good while for it to come out. The Writer, the better DLC, came out a while after that as well. With any luck, if Alan Wake 2 does come out it will show a 'Previously On Alan Wake' like the games "Episodes" do. Both DLC was not in the Disk and you really had to wait for the content to come out. They both was worth it at the end and it was only game I bought DLC for.

JILL IS NOT THE MASTER OF UNLOCKING AFTER ALL

My Dream Team

DLC does have it's dark side also. While games like Grand Theft Auto IV and Mortal Kombat you had to wait so the developers can make the DLC, there is a few out there that will just make you pay for something that is in the disk anyway. Marvel Vs Capcom is infamous for this. I played a little bit of the game and had a good time with it. So why didn't I get it? Because I don't want to pay 5 bucks for Jill Valentine when she is already in the disk. She has her own code if you got the collectors edition. Speaking of Jill Valentine, Capcom actually had the audacity to make you pay for Online gameplay for Resident Evil 5. Back then it's a joke. It was something that no one saw coming. Now, we have Online Passes. There are two kinds of Online  passes, one for online gameplay that you have to play online. The other, which is becoming new, an online pass that will unlock single player content. Mass Effect 2 did this with the Cerberus Network, and Kingdoms of Amalur does this also with side quests that is shut off. This is unacceptable.

FEAR AND LOATHING IN MAP PACKS

Another thing that is annoying is when pubilshers released overprice DLC. It should not cost $15 bucks for a couple of maps. The highest it should be is $10 and even still that is too high. You can say that there is a ratio between play time and price, but all of that is thrown out the window when the next Call of Duty is coming out the following year anyway. It's not like you can use those maps you paid for in the new one. The worst part of it all is that it's mostly Flashback map packs. Maps you loved in the past game would have to be bought so you can play them again in the newest installment. It really pisses me off a bit when I see that a new 3 level map pack is one of the highest brought item in either 360 or PS3 stores.

IF ALL WE WANT TO DO IS WIN, WHY ARE WE LOSING?

If you want DLC to succeed lower the price on new games. We should not pay $70-$100 for a game, 150 sometimes for collector's editions. And expect us pay almost $5-$15 whenever a new DLC has come out. And for the love of god, don't make Game Of The Year or Complete Edition a year after the game is released. That is only a slap in the face to people that bought the game new when it came out and all of the DLC that has been released. People are willing to wait a year for a game at a lower price with all of its DLC.  DLC can be a powerful thing. It will make you interested in a game you didn't care for at first. It can make you care about a game more than you ever did. It adds extra time of that game you love and it won't grow stale long after it's released. There is rays of hope when it comes to DLC, but as of now as publishers are abusing it. DLC should not be overpriced, should not be on disk, and it's got to have a legitimately good reasons to get it.

If you got it day 1 with all DLC when
it came out it would have cost you 120.
40 bucks more than the CE. 

If you waited this was 30 bucks
when it came out

Rage Review Rewrite

RAGE review by G1 Stealthmaster86


It's been years since the Godfather of the First Person Shooter genre created a new game. Can this new IP from the creators of DOOM and Quake show what made them legendary in the first place or do they need to pass the torch? This was played on the PS3.


Developer: ID Software
Publisher: Bethesda Softworks
System: Playstation 3, Xbox 360, PC, Mac
ESRB rating: M
Release Date: October 4, 2011




STORY


I love stories in games. I hate to be so blunt, but I would take anything that is given to me and I would be intrigued by it. I'm probably the only one that greatly enjoyed the Story in Gears of War. I only wanted to play Modern Warfare 3 just to see if they finish up what they started in Modern Warfare 2. Story is one of the reasons why I love the Uncharted games so much. Having said all of that there is nothing worth liking here. I know they want to make the world come alive with its characters and setting. I know they want to have this mythology that can be used later on. I get all that, what I don't get is how half-assed everything is. Just when the story starts to pick up into something much more interesting, it ends. There is no reason to do the things you do. You go around this small world and do tasks for random folk. From saving a town to go through a gauntlet. The worst part about it is that once the story does pick up, it's the same fare as with most RPGs. This Authority, that is the name of the main villain, not even joking, needs to be stop so we need you do to do all these tasks. The task them selves sets itself up thinking that something grand is going to happen. By the end of the game as I watch the credits rolled I think of it was all worth it. You don't even see your guy leave the area he is in. The game can be completed in a good 10 to 15 hours depending if you do the side quests or not. Seeing how that the story really doesn't go anywhere till the last 2 to 3 hours there is no point into anything.


GAMEPLAY


Well if the story sucked, what about Gameplay? Thankfully, the gameplay is worth it. It's got all the standard flare that ID is known for. It's got great weapons, even if they are in the generic side. You got your AK, shotgun, and the revolver. What it lacks in weapon type it makes up for it for ammo. There are a few ammo types for pretty much every gun. There are armor piercing rounds and one that will make the guy you killed blow up in a chunky bloody mass. It's all very satisfying. In a time where pretty much every game has the iron sights, which I have no problem with, it's refreshing to see what FPS games was like before it. You can go iron sights, but it's much more fun not to. Don't worry about missing, where the aiming reticle is pointed at, that is where the bullets will go. There is this one weapon, the wingstick, is fantastic. It's a blast to use both a gun and the wingstick. It's possible to get it back after its used, as long as it's not broken. Unlike the past games it's not all shooting all the time. ID decided that car combat was the way to go in a Mad Max like world. Once you drive around it becomes apparent that this is Twisted Metal: ID Edition. Playing the car combat minigames and driving around the boxed canyon made me want to play the new Twisted Metal. It's an awesome sight to see the finale car explodes in slow motion as you drive past it. It made me feel like I am an action hero badass. In the midst of all this there is a light, and when I mean light, I REALLY mean light RPG element into the game. It's not like most RPGs where you use a certain weapon and the weapon gets more powerful. No, you buy your upgrades to your car, armor, and weapons. Even still, the armor and the weapons is not worth the price. When it comes to upgrades, the only thing that will be worth while will be your car upgrades. It makes driving easier and less likely to be killed. The only thing you should be focusing on is ammo. All your money will go to your ammo, and even still you won't be out of money to buy things. There is an online mode, but I really didn't bother with it. It might seem that I wasn't the only one.


GRAPHICS


This is what ID does wonders. Yes, it's a boxed canyon in the middle of nowhere. I think this is why it's so small, it is to get as much detail as possible. Rockstar did it in Grand Theft Auto IV. But, unlike Rage, Grand Theft Auto IV is bigger. The black magic doesn't come in until you realize that there are rarely any frame rate drops. The game runs at a 60 frames per second and it never really stalls. There are some screen tearing, but it's only noticeable if you look for them.  The particle effects, the smoke, the fire all has this comic book feeling from them. It gives it a nice visual look. The animation is the true star of the show. Each person is animated in a way that gives them weight and personality. While, at a distance, the game looks great, but if you get closer you see the glaring flaw within the game. It sort of feels like you are going through a time machine at times. Far away you see what gaming has becoming, A big beautiful world. Up close, Textures that reminded me of the PSONE days. It gets distracting. 


SOUND


Sound is a hit or miss. While the sound of the guns feel powerful and the voice acting is pretty good, John Goodman is tragically underused, still the sound is really nothing to talk about all that much. Each character does have something to say. You can talk to someone and they will tell you a little bit about themselves. It would be interesting, if it wasn't the same as with every RPG. The world around you has a sound coming from somewhere and it never really shuts off the sound. There is a glitch of some kind that when driving around the sound of your chaingun does not register and you are left with nothing. It happens more times than it should. Everything about the sound feels like there should be more to go with it. The sound of the guns are almost varied to a degree. It can't escape the generic sound those guns make. There are three types of sounds a gun can make. Soft toy sounding guns, a medium generic sound, and a powerful pop of each round fired. This, sadly, falls in the toy category. It has this weird mixture where the guns feel fine and the sound of it isn't.



DIFFICULTY 


The Difficulty is kind of a joke. As long as you have the cash, it's almost impossible to run out of ammo. You can get your AK to the max and still have enough for the shotgun. The better the ammo the higher the price, but I felt that the standard AK did the trick on most everyone. The enemies are a lot faster than they look. They will use their surroundings to there advantage, set traps, and ambush you when you think they are safe. They know what weapons you are using and shout them out to warn the others. Some will flee and some will yell for help. It keeps the dynamic of the gun fight fresh. When I was done with the game, I checked out Nightmare difficulty to see the diffrence between the two. It felt that there was no difference. You can die quicker in Nightmare, but everything else is set. All you would need to do is to kill everyone quickly before they see you. The ammo is in a fixed price. If you played this on normal the price will be the same on nightmare. There is this new mechanic they did add that if you are fallen you can enter this mode where you are using a defibrillator to yourself, kind of like the movie Crank. Do the minigame correct and everyone around you dies. I think this is where the difficulty kicks in because of it's recharge time. Fallen before the recharge time and you die. If you wanted to you can just set tight and wait the defibrillator to recharge before completing the quest.



REPLAYABILITY


After you beat the game there is no reason to go back at all. The story is non exsistent, the world itself is small, there is not much to do when you are all done. The worst of it all is that after you finish the last mission you cannot go back and complete the side quests you might have missed. Which is a shame because despite a few glaring flaws there is a world that has potential. I hope that ID would take what they have learned and make it bigger and better than before. As of right now, there is not much to go back to.


CONCLUSION 


ID Software has made an interesting game. It's a game full of promises. And while those promises are not really there it does offer a ray of hope that in the next game it will be fully realized and we can explore the world more and the mythology they have created. If there is one thing to take that ID needs to fix, its the story. Don't just end it when it is starting to get good. Keep going, or at least have a much better ending. The world is there, they just need to make it better next time. It's not a bad game. It's well made to an extent and it's refreshing to see a new IP from ID software. Not the greatest thing ever, but not horrible.




6/10 RENT IT


PROS
* Gameplay
* Variety
* Graphics at a distance


CONS
* Sound
* Story
* Graphics up close
* John Goodman is wasted