I've linked to this before, but it bears repeating. And yes, they are playing the PS3 version, but I can't imagine the 360 version being any less fail. In fact, in purely technical terms, the PS3 version actually features more fail.
http://lparchive.org/LetsPlay/Sonic2006/
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Wednesday, February 4, 2009
Friday, January 30, 2009
Flashback
In the wake of a lack of updates and realizing that I wrote a review for Gears of War 2 and no other games, I decided that the rest of my collection needs some love. Welcome to some self-indulgent reviews of old 360 games.
The Japanese game market has this concept of budget games. They're games that are dirt cheap, but you should know that you get what you pay for. These games rarely make it to America because translation and localization kinda kill the whole "budget" aspect (though some have trickled into European markets). But occasionally we get one, specifically on the XBox 360. At ridiculously low prices is Earth Defense Force 2017. The predecessor to this game got a European release on the PS2 (I don't remember the title) and in some ways the 360 version is noticeably less complex.
The plot is simple. Sometime in the near future (guess what year "EDF 2017" takes place in!) aliens show up, although SETI gave us about 5 years forewarning. The government codenames the aliens as "Ravagers" and then tries to figure out whether or not they're hostile, though I would think judgement has already been passed if you call them Ravagers. And then the aliens drop every 1950's era invasion scenario on us. Giant ants, giant spiders, flying saucers, Godzilla, and giant robots that look life refugees from "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow." You've been given an assault rifle and a rocket launcher. Go fix this.
Each mission is pretty much identical in concept; there are aliens, kill them. You're given weapons with infinite ammo (or, more accurately, infinite reloads) and get dropped on large, sprawling maps where any and every manmade structure is destructable. Hypothetically, this is to both highlight the destructive power of the aliens and to make navigating cities easier. In practice, the players is often a greater threat to civilization than the aliens. But there is no score and no penalties for property destruction, and on the rare occasion that civilians pop up they have the magical ability to make bullets pass harmlessly through them. Your NPC teammates don't get the same invulnerability benefit and will routinely die at the hands of aliens and malicious players. Like I said, no penalties.
While every single mission consists of "exterminate the enemy," they at least try to create some variety. For example, defending a beach head from waves of robots, getting ambushed, and hunting for the giant ant queen underground. Or my personal favorite, shooting down flying saucers. But all of this is pseudo-variety. For all the nuances your mission briefing tries to instill in the mission, every mission is completed when you're alive and all the aliens are dead (teammate casualties optional). Not terribly tactical, but this is a game that gives you INFINITE FLAMETHROWER.
There is a massive armory of weapons in this game, but once again the variety is illusory. There is some variety in your weapons, off the top of my head I can think of 5 variations on the assault rifle alone. This sounds impressive, but it's rather sobering when you realize there's something like 200 assault rifles in the game, so the vast majority are simply improvements over earlier models. So that's 200 rifles, 5 variations. There are other weapons and their own variations as well; rocket launchers, missile launchers, grenade launchers, sniper rifles, shotguns, and hand grenades. And that doesn't count the specialty weapons that don't comfortably fall into a category, such as the laser rifle and sentry guns. But since every enemy in the game is killed by simply shooting it until it dies, you have access to nearly a thousand weapons and you will only ever be using 3.
Continuing with the faux variety are the vehicles. Nearly everyone who has played this agrees that the vehicles are useless. The air bike is too fast for it's own good and you're likely to crash into a building as you race past the spot you wanted to be. The helicopter has some of the clunkiest controls I've personally ever encountered, and the robot thing is too slow and stodgy that it's faster and more efficient to just go on foot. The tank is the only one that's even remotely useful, but even then your rocket launcher can do the same kind of damage and with greater mobility (and, depending on the rocket launcher, higher rates of fire).
The only real variety is in the aliens, as every type of enemy offers a unique challenge, and they will often mix and match the aliens you face just to make things hectic. There are the black ants that spray acid, the red ants who have ridiculous amounts of hit points and will simply bum rush you by the thousands, the spiders who have a ranged attack and can jump long distances. And the flying saucers (complete with overtly hidden weakpoint) which deliver your enemies to the battlefield, and the giant robots that can come with a myriad of weapons including scatter guns and plasma artillery. And fire breathing dinosaurs. And cyborg fire breathing dinosaurs. This is the only variety in the game, but it's a damn good variety. And it's a good thing too, because enemy AI is lacking. Most enemy strategies consists of rushing towards you as fast as they can (which isn't very fast in some cases) and firing constantly if they have ranged weapons. The designers seemed to take this into account, some people enjoy this kind of no-thinking twitchy gameplay, and if you stuck with it for 50 levels then one of the last levels is simply a massive blitz against you by damn near everything in the game's beastiary. And with the variety of enemies it really doesn't get boring.
Bottom line, it's a fun game that's more dependent on how you play than how the game is designed. If you're a weird little mutant like me you can sit down with this for hours with the goal of completing it and have a ball. Others could see it as a kind of stress relief; sit down, blast alien bugs for a level or two, move on to other things. It's not a deep game in the slightest, it's just monsters, guns, and property destruction. If you really need depth in a game, a game like this can still be fun in 15 minute intervals when you just feel like blowing shit up. Or maybe you're like me, a person who will compensate for a lack of depth in a game by filling it in themselves, and as a result I've got a novel worth of story for this game squirreled away in my head. It's mindless fun, with an emphasis on the mindless.
The Japanese game market has this concept of budget games. They're games that are dirt cheap, but you should know that you get what you pay for. These games rarely make it to America because translation and localization kinda kill the whole "budget" aspect (though some have trickled into European markets). But occasionally we get one, specifically on the XBox 360. At ridiculously low prices is Earth Defense Force 2017. The predecessor to this game got a European release on the PS2 (I don't remember the title) and in some ways the 360 version is noticeably less complex.
The plot is simple. Sometime in the near future (guess what year "EDF 2017" takes place in!) aliens show up, although SETI gave us about 5 years forewarning. The government codenames the aliens as "Ravagers" and then tries to figure out whether or not they're hostile, though I would think judgement has already been passed if you call them Ravagers. And then the aliens drop every 1950's era invasion scenario on us. Giant ants, giant spiders, flying saucers, Godzilla, and giant robots that look life refugees from "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow." You've been given an assault rifle and a rocket launcher. Go fix this.
Each mission is pretty much identical in concept; there are aliens, kill them. You're given weapons with infinite ammo (or, more accurately, infinite reloads) and get dropped on large, sprawling maps where any and every manmade structure is destructable. Hypothetically, this is to both highlight the destructive power of the aliens and to make navigating cities easier. In practice, the players is often a greater threat to civilization than the aliens. But there is no score and no penalties for property destruction, and on the rare occasion that civilians pop up they have the magical ability to make bullets pass harmlessly through them. Your NPC teammates don't get the same invulnerability benefit and will routinely die at the hands of aliens and malicious players. Like I said, no penalties.
While every single mission consists of "exterminate the enemy," they at least try to create some variety. For example, defending a beach head from waves of robots, getting ambushed, and hunting for the giant ant queen underground. Or my personal favorite, shooting down flying saucers. But all of this is pseudo-variety. For all the nuances your mission briefing tries to instill in the mission, every mission is completed when you're alive and all the aliens are dead (teammate casualties optional). Not terribly tactical, but this is a game that gives you INFINITE FLAMETHROWER.
There is a massive armory of weapons in this game, but once again the variety is illusory. There is some variety in your weapons, off the top of my head I can think of 5 variations on the assault rifle alone. This sounds impressive, but it's rather sobering when you realize there's something like 200 assault rifles in the game, so the vast majority are simply improvements over earlier models. So that's 200 rifles, 5 variations. There are other weapons and their own variations as well; rocket launchers, missile launchers, grenade launchers, sniper rifles, shotguns, and hand grenades. And that doesn't count the specialty weapons that don't comfortably fall into a category, such as the laser rifle and sentry guns. But since every enemy in the game is killed by simply shooting it until it dies, you have access to nearly a thousand weapons and you will only ever be using 3.
Continuing with the faux variety are the vehicles. Nearly everyone who has played this agrees that the vehicles are useless. The air bike is too fast for it's own good and you're likely to crash into a building as you race past the spot you wanted to be. The helicopter has some of the clunkiest controls I've personally ever encountered, and the robot thing is too slow and stodgy that it's faster and more efficient to just go on foot. The tank is the only one that's even remotely useful, but even then your rocket launcher can do the same kind of damage and with greater mobility (and, depending on the rocket launcher, higher rates of fire).
The only real variety is in the aliens, as every type of enemy offers a unique challenge, and they will often mix and match the aliens you face just to make things hectic. There are the black ants that spray acid, the red ants who have ridiculous amounts of hit points and will simply bum rush you by the thousands, the spiders who have a ranged attack and can jump long distances. And the flying saucers (complete with overtly hidden weakpoint) which deliver your enemies to the battlefield, and the giant robots that can come with a myriad of weapons including scatter guns and plasma artillery. And fire breathing dinosaurs. And cyborg fire breathing dinosaurs. This is the only variety in the game, but it's a damn good variety. And it's a good thing too, because enemy AI is lacking. Most enemy strategies consists of rushing towards you as fast as they can (which isn't very fast in some cases) and firing constantly if they have ranged weapons. The designers seemed to take this into account, some people enjoy this kind of no-thinking twitchy gameplay, and if you stuck with it for 50 levels then one of the last levels is simply a massive blitz against you by damn near everything in the game's beastiary. And with the variety of enemies it really doesn't get boring.
Bottom line, it's a fun game that's more dependent on how you play than how the game is designed. If you're a weird little mutant like me you can sit down with this for hours with the goal of completing it and have a ball. Others could see it as a kind of stress relief; sit down, blast alien bugs for a level or two, move on to other things. It's not a deep game in the slightest, it's just monsters, guns, and property destruction. If you really need depth in a game, a game like this can still be fun in 15 minute intervals when you just feel like blowing shit up. Or maybe you're like me, a person who will compensate for a lack of depth in a game by filling it in themselves, and as a result I've got a novel worth of story for this game squirreled away in my head. It's mindless fun, with an emphasis on the mindless.
Monday, January 5, 2009
Right5Life
Hahaha... I'm so witty.
My 360 is working, and I have the following suggestions for those who want to play Left4Dead on any platform.
1. Quick Match for Versus mode is a Bad Idea (TM) as is looking for a game in progress. The primary reasons for someone leaving a game in progress are cheating, losing, and nerdrage. You will never be filling in for a brilliant player on a team of intellectual peers. You will always be stuck with the morons who haven't figured out that zombies and humans are not friends. Do yourself a favor and always look for game lobbies.
2. The same is not necessarily true of Campaign. Plus even if you do get put on a team of morons it doesn't hurt to have the ego boost of knowing you're the sole reason any of these idiots is going to survive past the first zombie.
3. Killing zombies is fun.
My 360 is working, and I have the following suggestions for those who want to play Left4Dead on any platform.
1. Quick Match for Versus mode is a Bad Idea (TM) as is looking for a game in progress. The primary reasons for someone leaving a game in progress are cheating, losing, and nerdrage. You will never be filling in for a brilliant player on a team of intellectual peers. You will always be stuck with the morons who haven't figured out that zombies and humans are not friends. Do yourself a favor and always look for game lobbies.
2. The same is not necessarily true of Campaign. Plus even if you do get put on a team of morons it doesn't hurt to have the ego boost of knowing you're the sole reason any of these idiots is going to survive past the first zombie.
3. Killing zombies is fun.
Saturday, December 27, 2008
Gears of Woar 2
In all that I do I like to think I follow only one command: serve the Queen. So while the Lambent storm the Nexus and groundwalkers infiltrate our cities I follow orders and lead my troop off to guard an evacuation route in the middle of nowhere. I follow my orders, I don't have to like them. The humans have a saying, "Ignorance is bliss." I think that may be true. I understand the reasons for our variations; we all have a purpose, and we all know our purpose as it was the purpose we were born to. From the day I was spawned I have been a Theron Guard of the Queen. The drones fight and die, the generals command and plan, the wretches get distracted by shiny objects. The Theron Guards lead by example. My skill is the sword of the Queen, my strength is Her shield, and as the avatar of Her will I inspire the drones to victory. I often think the drones have it easier. They get to voice doubts about the orders they are given, since at the end of the day the responsibility to compel them to battle falls on the Theron. But if a Theron voices doubts about his orders, then General Skorge will reduce your head to a thin paste and wear your fangs as hair ornaments.
As we marched to wherever the generals seem to think is important we hear the constant commands of the Queen. We continuously hear Her promises that we shall seize the surface and destroy the Lambent, both at the same time. Personally, I thought a two-front war was a bad idea, but as stated I couldn't really say anything without being processed into snacks for the Boomers and Grinders. Then another voice cut in over the loudspeaker. A human voice came on and promised to whup all our asses as well as the ass of our Queen. This colorful rhetoric continued for about a minute before the loudspeakers were all shut down. At first I was annoyed that our defenses had allowed the groundwalkers into the palace grounds, but then I was relieved that I didn't have to listen to Her Majesty's constant prattle about our inevitable victory.
I turned to see if the troops were having the same thoughts on this as I was and, I swear by the Great Worm this is true, one of the drones was crying. I looked past him and saw that nearly the whole team was somewhat teary eyed, even that old grenadier who had served under me in no less than two campaigns. I knew drones weren't the sharpest bolt in the quiver, but I didn't expect them to really be that affected by some human's over emotional banter. The sobbing drone looked up at me with pitiful eyes and hiccupped "Are they really going to hurt the Queen?" As I looked into those sad, pathetic eyes I asked myself how the late, great RAAM would have handled a situation like this. With my left hand I patted the drone on the shoulder, and with my right hand jammed a torque bow arrow into his temple. I don't know enough about anatomy to know if a sharp object at that depth and at that location would cause immediate death, but I like to think that he lived long enough to contemplate his treason. From the look in his eyes I believe his last thoughts were of repentence before the warhead in the arrow removed the offending extremity from his body and liberated him from the need (and means) to contemplate such things.
I looked over his corpse and at the other drones under my command before barking "Who doubts the Queen?!" With that, they stifled their last sniffles and snapped to attention. I hissed "March!" and we continued. We marched off the defend some cave somewhere from humans or lambents or maybe magical rainbow colored kryll. It didn't really matter, I only had the one duty. Serve the Queen.
As we marched to wherever the generals seem to think is important we hear the constant commands of the Queen. We continuously hear Her promises that we shall seize the surface and destroy the Lambent, both at the same time. Personally, I thought a two-front war was a bad idea, but as stated I couldn't really say anything without being processed into snacks for the Boomers and Grinders. Then another voice cut in over the loudspeaker. A human voice came on and promised to whup all our asses as well as the ass of our Queen. This colorful rhetoric continued for about a minute before the loudspeakers were all shut down. At first I was annoyed that our defenses had allowed the groundwalkers into the palace grounds, but then I was relieved that I didn't have to listen to Her Majesty's constant prattle about our inevitable victory.
I turned to see if the troops were having the same thoughts on this as I was and, I swear by the Great Worm this is true, one of the drones was crying. I looked past him and saw that nearly the whole team was somewhat teary eyed, even that old grenadier who had served under me in no less than two campaigns. I knew drones weren't the sharpest bolt in the quiver, but I didn't expect them to really be that affected by some human's over emotional banter. The sobbing drone looked up at me with pitiful eyes and hiccupped "Are they really going to hurt the Queen?" As I looked into those sad, pathetic eyes I asked myself how the late, great RAAM would have handled a situation like this. With my left hand I patted the drone on the shoulder, and with my right hand jammed a torque bow arrow into his temple. I don't know enough about anatomy to know if a sharp object at that depth and at that location would cause immediate death, but I like to think that he lived long enough to contemplate his treason. From the look in his eyes I believe his last thoughts were of repentence before the warhead in the arrow removed the offending extremity from his body and liberated him from the need (and means) to contemplate such things.
I looked over his corpse and at the other drones under my command before barking "Who doubts the Queen?!" With that, they stifled their last sniffles and snapped to attention. I hissed "March!" and we continued. We marched off the defend some cave somewhere from humans or lambents or maybe magical rainbow colored kryll. It didn't really matter, I only had the one duty. Serve the Queen.
I Couldn't Be Bothered On Launch Day
Never let it be said that I don't like innovation. If it were not for innovation we'd still be living in caves and killing each other over the few available women. But in gaming, there is a bad habit of confusing innovation with quality. I can say with a completely straight face that Daikatana was a very innovative game for its time. Unfortunately, most of the development of that game was spent playing Quake while the designers pondered why the game hadn't magically created itself yet. Another very innovative game was Jurassic Park: Trespasser, a game so innovative it actually inspired alot of what we saw in Half-Life 1 and 2. Unfortunately they were trying so hard to be innovative that they didn't try to make the game good in any way, thus bringing us graphics so cruel to processors that a decade later the graphics are only a marginal improvement over Quake and still it manages to suffer slowdown on modern machines, and the physics engine hilariously lacked friction.
And all of that to say that I played Gears of War 2. I mentioned all of that because Gears of War is the antithesis of innovation. You play as a big tough manly man who wields the largest guns a human could realistically carry and battle subterranean mutants and there's lots of blood. There's a good amount of backstory, but that's all squirreled away in supplemental booklets that have been hidden on the dark side of the moon. In short, it's every shooter you've ever played. I would argue that they did a fine job of it. Okay, so nothing is new or groundbreaking, but at least I had fun making heads explode.
I was worried during some of the pre-release stuff. Mobile cover? More vehicles? While we're at it, let's just call it Halo. But everything seemed to work out for the better. The shields you can pick up only work with pistols, so your trading security for firepower. The heavy weapons have enough limitations that they don't turn into game breaking monsters. And I once compared Gears of War to a rail shooter and the vehicle sections stick to that tradition. Of course, some things have changed. The Unreal engine has been streamlined so textures don't spontaneously appear, instead they fade in creating the illusion that the camera is simply focussing. Also, the first Gears of War was about a single team on a single mission and the battlefield felt rather lonely. This time around it actually feels like you're part of a major campaign and you're not fighting alone out there. And then there are the difficulty levels. The original Gears of War had Casual, Hardcore, and Insane difficulties that were supposed to correspond with Easy, Normal, and Hard. Instead they corresponded with Normal, Hard, and Fuck You. Gears 2 adds the unimaginatively named Normal difficulty, with Casual being demoted to Easy. Between the two the enemies are just as smart and durable on Normal as on Casual, but with Casual the player has enough hit points to catch a nuclear warhead between his teeth and only be slightly singed.
To sum up, if you liked the original Gears of War then you'll like Gears of War 2 since they made everything better. If you didn't like Gears of War then nothing in Gears of War 2 is going to change your mind. And if you haven't played the original Gears of War then what are you using your XBox 360 for?
And all of that to say that I played Gears of War 2. I mentioned all of that because Gears of War is the antithesis of innovation. You play as a big tough manly man who wields the largest guns a human could realistically carry and battle subterranean mutants and there's lots of blood. There's a good amount of backstory, but that's all squirreled away in supplemental booklets that have been hidden on the dark side of the moon. In short, it's every shooter you've ever played. I would argue that they did a fine job of it. Okay, so nothing is new or groundbreaking, but at least I had fun making heads explode.
I was worried during some of the pre-release stuff. Mobile cover? More vehicles? While we're at it, let's just call it Halo. But everything seemed to work out for the better. The shields you can pick up only work with pistols, so your trading security for firepower. The heavy weapons have enough limitations that they don't turn into game breaking monsters. And I once compared Gears of War to a rail shooter and the vehicle sections stick to that tradition. Of course, some things have changed. The Unreal engine has been streamlined so textures don't spontaneously appear, instead they fade in creating the illusion that the camera is simply focussing. Also, the first Gears of War was about a single team on a single mission and the battlefield felt rather lonely. This time around it actually feels like you're part of a major campaign and you're not fighting alone out there. And then there are the difficulty levels. The original Gears of War had Casual, Hardcore, and Insane difficulties that were supposed to correspond with Easy, Normal, and Hard. Instead they corresponded with Normal, Hard, and Fuck You. Gears 2 adds the unimaginatively named Normal difficulty, with Casual being demoted to Easy. Between the two the enemies are just as smart and durable on Normal as on Casual, but with Casual the player has enough hit points to catch a nuclear warhead between his teeth and only be slightly singed.
To sum up, if you liked the original Gears of War then you'll like Gears of War 2 since they made everything better. If you didn't like Gears of War then nothing in Gears of War 2 is going to change your mind. And if you haven't played the original Gears of War then what are you using your XBox 360 for?
Tuesday, December 16, 2008
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