Although it’s a massive 30-40 hour game, New Vegas is really just an stand-alone expansion pack to the wonderful Fallout 3. If there were graphical enhancements or gameplay tweaks, I didn’t notice them. But that’s okay. I liked the way Fallout 3 played and more of the same can’t hurt. This time around I was already well-aquainted with the mechanics so I was able to be more thorough in my exploration of the map. I managed to discover every area and, quite frankly, I’m a bit peeved that there wasn’t an acheivement for that.
The story has you waking up after having been buried and left for dead. The main goal is to find out about the man who shot you. This could be interesting, I suppose, but I was a bit ho-hum about the main plotline. That’s okay though. There are ton of little stories to be had all throughout the game world. Plus you get to run around in your boxer-briefs if you so choose.
I have had this game sitting on my video game to-do list for a long, long time. This is regarded as one of the best cRPG games ever. It is perhaps deserving of that praise simply for sheer imensity of its scale and attention to detail. Unfortunately, like other older RPGs, the game makes no concessions towards more casual players. There are a gazillion magic spells with which to become familiar. Gear and weapons are identified by numerical stats and dice roll probabilties rather than simply saying, “Powerful sword of lightning damage” or something. I must have looked up what THAC0 meant half a dozen times and I still don’t quite get it. At times the game is just plain unfair, like when you walk through an unmarked door only to die instantly from the attacks of magical creature on the other side. It’s like dying until you chance upon a strategy is part of the intended game mechanics. Like the first Baldur’s Gate I found myself having to cheat my way through 2 or 3 of the battles near the end of the game. I may have been able to win those fights (I doubt it), but after 40+ hours of hacking away at this game, I simply wanted it to be over.
During the majority of the first half of the game, when I wasn’t being killed every two minutes, it was really enjoyable and addicting. My OCD tendencies had plenty of ways to be satisfied by the many, many side quests and stories. Combat actually requires real tactical thinking (which is probably I was getting killed all the time), which is an element sadly missing from most modern RPGs and every Japanese console RPG since the dawn of time. I think it’s time for another game in this style but modernize it so you don’t need a degree in advanced nerditude just to understand the manual.
Having whet my appetite for adventure games on the excellent Sam and Max series, I thought it would be a good time to try some more modern PC adventure games. Scratches is an indie game that uses the tried and (not-so) true first-person point-and-click gameplay formula. Myst, Hell Cab, Dragon Lore… I have many fond memories… well, not really fond, but I do remember playing a lot of those types of games from back at the dawn of the CD-ROM era.
Now, I liked this game for reasons I will go into in a bit, but it did serve as a huge reminder as to what really sucked about first-person point-and-click games. First there are the dreaded “hunt the pixel” situations. Scratches isn’t that bad in this respect, but there were two or three times when a puzzle was unsolvable until I found the exact cursor position (see the image to the left – I’m supposed to be picking up that stone). Secondly, a lot of the time there is no indication that a graphical element is important. Rather than saying, “You are in a dark room full of junk, but there is a useful looking crowbar here,” you are supposed to click on every object in the pile of junk and just randomly figure out that you can only pick up the crowbar.
That said, I did like the game. Once the narrative kicks in the game gets very interesting (and believe me it takes a long time of aimless exploring before things start to happen). You slowly learn the dark history of the house via newspaper clippings, diaries and other found texts. And once you are fully versed in the lore, unexplained things start happening. I have never been this creeped out by a game (and I have even played House of the Dead 2), let alone being creeped out by what is, for all intents and purposes, a glorified slideshow. Nonetheless, thanks to an awesome, well-integrated soundtrack the game gets VERY creepy. It’s worth slogging through this one with a walkthrough by your side just to experience those intense moments of horror.
Having been burnt twice by buying the technically challenged Wii versions on Season 1 & 2, I decided to move from the den to the office and play season three on my PC. The visual difference is astounding. This game looks great both in terms of graphic quality and its cartoony art direction. This has been my favorite of the three seasons. In addition to usual humor and wacky characters, there seems to be much more focus on unifying all the episodes under a larger story arc. They’ve also mixed-up the gameplay a bit by giving Max a variety of psychic powers that add to your puzzle solving arsenal. That may have made the game a little easier, but I still felt satisfaction as I progressed through the game’s puzzles. Bring on season four!
This is the fourth Oddworld game. The first two were great 2-D puzzle platform games of which I was reminded of when I played the excellent Braid. In the X-Box era Oddworld moved into 3-D with Munch’s Oddysee. After having purchased all four games during a Steam sale, I immediately jumped in to Munch’s Oddysee. Oh my god. What a horrible game with horrible controls, animation, and everything. I gave up after about 4 hours of tedium. Fortunately, Stranger’s Wrath takes a completely different turn.
Stranger’s Wrath is a hybrid platformer/FPS game. Unlike its predecessor, this game actually manages to be controllable despite its limited console-inherited customization settings. The FPS parts of the game are nowhere near Half Life FPS game play standards, but they work well. The gimmick here is that you have a single weapon with a variety of ammo that does everything from tie up enemies to lure them into environmental hazards. I think the idea was that you would approach combat as though it were a puzzle with an ideal ammo solution. In reality, it doesn’t really work out like that. I just spent most of the time using the machine gun bees.
The story doesn’t really take shape until the last third of the game. Up until then, much of it seems like a series of samey quests. However, I did like the way the game’s main plot twist played out in that last third so stick with it if you can. If Oddworld Inhabitants ever decides to continue this series, they’d better hire some more voice talent. Having every creature in the game voiced by one dude is just lame.
Zeno Clash brings brawling and melee combat to the FPS genre and makes it work. Whenever a game has attempted this in the past it has always been kludgey. Mirror Edge is the only game I can think of that came close (that, and maybe the boot from Duke Nukem 3-D). The fights in Zeno Clash work because the action is a little bit slower, more focused and the dodge and block mechanics require timing and skill missing in your typical button masher.
On top of this is a wildly inventive art direction in which your tribal hero meets humanoid bird creatures, giant moles, a squirrel bomber and a number of other truly imaginative enemies. The environments are a bit sparse and the creature animation can be wonky, but these technical shortcomings don’t distract much from the game play or the interesting, flashback-heavy story line.
This is a sequel I have been meaning to play through for a few years now. The original Deus Ex was very well executed, although I would be hesitant to heap as much praise on it as seems to receive these days. Its big hook was the open game play it offered: sneak, negotiate or kill… it was up to you. Invisible War has some of those choices, but it is dumbed down to the point where you might as well just kill everybody you meet because there is no advantage (or fun) to choosing a different path.
The game also lacks the precise allocation of RPG stat points that you got in Deus Ex. Instead, you get to fill a few slots with “biomods.” These are essentially generic power-ups. I never felt like I was creating a unique character. By the end of the game I found myself just ignoring any new biomod canisters I came across because they didn’t really do that much.
What Invisible War does do right is maintain the feeling that every object in the world can be manipulated. I loved just randomly throwing chairs at bystanders and watching the rag doll physics work. The graphics are also much improved and hold up quite well. The story is just as convoluted as the original, but, for what its worth, we do get to see some of the main characters reprise their roles (sans the amateurish IT department voice acting).
Painkiller is a first generation FPS that’s about a dozen years too late. Unlike most modern shooters, your goal is singular: shoot everything. Story, characters, game play variety and puzzle-solving are all out the window. That said, I think there still is a place for games like this, but I found Painkiller lacking in a couple ways.
First, although the game has a sort of achievement system for getting power-ups, completing the level tasks just wasn’t fun. Who wants to search around a poorly designed game map looking for barrels. Rather than rewarding meaningless exploration or OCD item hunting, there needed to be a system that rewards risky game play (big points for melee attacks) or high skill shooting (headshots). The core of the game is shooting, don’t make us obsess over things that have nothing to do with our modus operandi. Secondly, if you aren’t going to give as a story, at least crank up the comedy (Serious Sam) or horror (Doom 3) that would motivate us to progress through the game just to hear that next witty jibe. The Black Edition includes the expansion Battle Out of Hell which I found to be slightly more challenging and well thought out that the original.
Mass Effect had a really interesting storyline and I was pretty excited to delve further into the universe of Shepard and his tight-clothed comrades. The game starts off with an exciting cinematic which fulfilled goal number one of any RPG sequel: strip the player of all their powers and loot so they can start from square one again. Well, all was not completely lost. I imported my character from the first game so it remembered a few of the major decisions I had made which, for all the hype, seemed to have very little significant bearing on most of Mass Effect 2.
Game play remains mostly the same. Things seem to be a bit easier this time around and the hideous inventory system has been ditched altogether and replaced with… nothing. So, inventory management is gone and now you can just blindly click through and upgrade everything without having to put any thought into your decisions. Okay, fine. I’ve said I’m a lazy gamer in the past, but this seems to defeat the role playing aspect of the experience. The new-found focus seems to make this more of a twitch-free shooter with only hints of role playing in the mix.
The majority of the game’s decisions are made in your dialogue choices. Choosing wisely gains you the benefit of avoiding conflict later on, and can help shape the loyalty of your crew. This time around I was more careful to build relationships with my crew which help me care about them more during the character killing climax of the game. I also spent more time mining resources for upgrade. This was the thoroughly boring process of mousing over the surfaces of dozens of planets and waiting for beeps to get faster. Couldn’t they have made a mini-game out of the process? Even a tertris clone would have improved this.
Fortunately, the story keeps things interesting and makes much of the grinding worthwhile. Each character is given some back story and you actually care about them all. The main plot is rather simple and lacks the grand mystery of the first game but there are plenty of side quests and lots of character development to make it seem deeper than it really was. In the end I like Mass Effect 2 and ME3 may actually be a day of release purchase for me!
Portal 2 is incredible. You’ll find plenty of gushing reviews just about everywhere else on the ‘net so I will keep this short. The game combines a wickedly funny narrative with innovative and engaging game play mechanics. Portal 2 isn’t terribly difficult (it’s much easier than Portal), but there’s still nothing more satisfying than completing a particularly rube-goldberg-esque puzzle. Also, multiplayer co-op adds a whole new level of complication to the puzzling. Hopefully Valve will keep releasing new maps for the co-op game in the near-future. This is one of those games with a fairly universal appeal which you try to get your non-gamer friends to play just so they can get hooked on gaming (and heroin).
