This is essentially the same game as Doom 3 except with the lights turned on and fewer monster closets. What both these games do well is provide tons of satisfying gun-play but with only the barest of story lines to keep you motivated to continue. I think the plot of this one was to find the big button that will win this war, but first find these three lesser (but still challenging) buttons. There is some variety in the form of a few turret and driving missions, but for the most part this is nine hours of pure arcade style run-and-gun action.
The original Duke Nukem 3D was perhaps the best of the first wave of FPS games. I also really liked Rise of the Triad and, of course, Doom but Duke was filled with tasteless humor, pop-culture references and a richly interactive world. For some reason Duke Nukem Forever has only a 53 Meta Critic rating and I can’t for the life of me see why. Sure its was released about 8 years too late and it doesn’t really bring anything new to the genre, but everything that was great about the original game is still here. I felt like there was just about the right amount of variety in game play and I especially liked the levels where I was shrunken to action-figure size and made to navigate through giant jars of mayo and mustard. I guess the only big difference here (outside of the expected technological improvements) is that they have brought the tastelessness more to the forefront of the design—the game opens with you standing in front of a urinal controlling a stream of pee. I’m glad this game finally was released and I hope that the franchise will live on, but, fellas, please just try to release next one sometime this decade so that the references are somewhat more timely.
File this one under the “What were we thinking back then?” column. In 1991, this was the bees knees in and around my campus apartment but it has since lost much of its luster. The titular track is a rap parody, I guess? Or ironic rap? In any event, it’s poorly executed and clumsy (perhaps on purpose) with forced lyrics. The song mocks closed-minded rednecks and such, but, in hindsight, I get the feeling that RevCo were the close-minded ones with their myopic view of Southerners. Musically, this stuff hasn’t aged well either. In ’91 it took a rack of hardware synths and sequencers to pull this off, but nowadays a teenager with Garage Band on his Mac can create more interesting songs. The two live tracks are a little less jarring and offer a nugget (a chocolate nugget?) of what it was that attracted me to this band twenty years ago.
This is the original 1965 record that inspired the Phantom Surfers to create their great slot car themed record. The Go Sound was conceived as a way to cash in on the early 60s popularity of slot car racing. Once you get past the ridiculous thematic hook, this is really just a great, classic surf and drag record by The Hondells. The best line is from “My Baby Dig Slot Car Racing” when they sing (without a hint of irony) about a girl with “a heavy hand on a rheostat.”
This is the game that forced me to update my video card last year. I remember playing the first Far Cry and thinking that that was about as close to reality as games could ever get. The sequel leaps and bounds ahead of the original in the looks department. Unfortunately, the game-play does not match the quality level of the visuals. Unlike the first game, Far Cry 2 is a mission-based open-world game alá Grand Theft Auto. Unlike GTA, the missions are all exactly the same: drive to an indicated point on the map; along the way shoot guys at various checkpoints (which you swear you killed last time you drove though there); find the target; kill the target while fending off waves of identical thugs; finally, drive to next mission spot on map and kill the same guards you killed on the way to the last mission… again and again. Far Cry 1 had open levels, but at least they proceeded in a linear fashion that drove a story along. This game has zero story and eventually I just wanted it to end so I could get my $4.99 worth of gaming in and then move on to something else.
I missed out on the original Tomb Raider game in the 90s. I think I downloaded the demo and thought, “This isn’t Doom, or even remotely Doom-like” and then proceeded to erase it from my 450mb hard drive. It wasn’t until I played the franchise reboot Tomb Raider: Legend that I understood what all the hoopla was about. I had to set aside my blood-lust and come to grips with the fact that the game is primarily about platforming and puzzle solving.
Underworld continues that gameplay tradition by pitting Lara Croft against various ancient death machines that all seem to run on elaborate systems of gears and pulleys. You can climb, wall jump, balance on columns, swing from ropes, drag towering structures with your bare hands and numerous other ridiculous actions. This type of reality defying acrobatics is exactly the sort of thing that ruins CGI driven movies but make video games so awesome. You really get to feel like you have superhuman skill even though all you are doing is sinking back in your desk chair, twitching your mouse every few seconds and occasionally hitting the pause button so you can sip your Diet Dr. Pepper.
This game is a couple of years old and I was still blown away by how great the graphics look. I’d say that the jungle settings here look even better than that graphics whore Far Cry 2 ever did. Even more impressive than the visuals is the symphonic score that features tons epic choral arrangements that make “O’ Fortuna” seem like a tin pan alley ukulele number.
The story picks up right where The Colour of Magic with our heroes tumbling off the edge of the world. Book two in the Discworld series is more of the same easy, light-hearted reading as book #1. I wouldn’t call it a “page turner,” but there’s enough imaginative characters and situations to keep it interesting.
I think this is pretty much the antithesis of the kind of music I like. I find Lou Reed (at least this solo stuff) mind-numbingly boring. I suppose he turns an interesting phrase lyrically, but, if that’s what your interested in, read a book or go to a poetry slam. Ah, the joys of having merged my CD collection with my wife’s.
Movie number four from the excellent Icons of Suspense Collection: Hammer Films DVD package. Despite having a killer with a blow torch in the opening scenes of the movie, this movie is not quite on par with the other Hammer noir films I have seen. That’s not to say I didn’t like it. By the third act, after a bit of squirmy mother/daughter love-triangulation, there is finally some real suspense. Also, as one might expect, there is a neat little twist at the end that I never would have guessed.
Pushing balls around has never been more fun! I have really enjoyed the last few Tomb Raider games like Tomb Raider: Legend and Anniversary. This game takes the standard puzzle solving elements of Tomb Raider—pushing blocks and balls on to pressure plates and the like—but, rather than platforming, puts the emphasis on shooting enemies. In fact, the combat is not dissimilar from Robotron 2084 or other, more recent, twin stick shooters. Run with one stick and aim and shoot with the other. The gun-play is never quite as frantic or enemy-rich as Robotron or Geometry Wars, but it can get pretty challenging at times. There are also time challenges and item bonuses to try to achieve once you’ve played through the game once. I like this top-down, isometric perspective (I would love to see a Nox sequel using a similar engine).
