GameHater

Boom Blox, Army of Two, and Bully.

2008-05-29T15:01:00.001-07:00

Been playing a few different games over the past couple weeks. First is Boom Blox. This is the one I’ve probably had the most fun with. The idea behind this game is to interface with stacked Jenga style blocks in different ways. Only two of which really matter. You got the Jenga pulling mechanic where you pull out as many pieces as possible without making the stack fall. Then there’s the throw-various-types-of-balls-at-the-stack style of gameplay. Basically the game just presents you various configurations of stacked blocks and you throw the ball at it in an attempt to knock down the most blocks possible. There’s also a shooting range thingy which feels a little like holodeck phaser training, but it’s pretty much a throwaway mode.

The reason Boom Blox is fun is because of how it feels to interact with the gameplay system. Pulling pieces feels precise and realistic, which cannot be said about the actual Jenga game. There’s not much explanation needed for why chucking balls at stacks of blocks is fun. Knocking stacks of shit down is fun, obviously. The amount of inertia you exact onto the wiimote’s magical inertia detecting thingy actually matters. Strapping up is absolutely mandatory. Throw in a fleshed out co-op and competitive mode and Boom Blox equals an 8½ in my book. There are downsides, such as a lack of easily doable puzzles. The difficulty quickly ramps up to an intimidating level once you graduate to expert mode.

Also rented Army of Two since I had someone to play it with over the weekend. That didn’t go so well. The game is essentially Gears of War minus the slick graphics and gameplay. The cover system consists simply of ducking with the R3 button, or you can hit Y and slide into cover but that mostly results in leaping over the object you’re trying to take cover behind. There’s no lock-on targeting so every battle boils down to spraying bullets in the general direction of the enemies until you’ve built up enough agro for your teammate to get in behind them. The game is seething with bro love, mock guitar playing, Iraqi suicide bombers, and inappropriate fist bumping. The A button actually activates a slap-on-the-butt style props system wherein you can walk up to your partner while he’s firing at the bad guys, push A, then watch as he stops shooting, slowly turns around and rambles off something like “ladies lift your shirts!” or “props all around”. Somehow I managed to beat the game, probably because I’m a sucker for earning cash and buying shit. The fact that it’s about 4 hours long helped, too. 6/10.

The other game I’ve been playing, and thoroughly enjoying, is Bully for the 360. I missed it the first time around on the PS2 and always regretted not playing it. Turns out the game is really, really good. I’m still playing through it so I won’t give my full opinion on it yet but I will say the combat system is about 4 times better than GTAIV.

Bumbaclot!

2008-05-18T16:53:00.000-07:00

Now that I’ve developed a spasmic kink in my neck due to the 45 hours spent playing GTA IV, my opinions on the game have ... evolved. No longer do I think the aiming mechanics are archaic/second-rate. As far as targeting specific body parts it seems pretty much on equal footing with Crackdown. Just a more rubberbanded aiming style, compared to Crackdown’s snap-on targeting. I do prefer the Crackdown interface, however. Improvements to the combat system go beyond requisite iteration, in my opinion.

I still think hand-to-hand combat sucks. Other than an unreliable block and counter system virtually nothing has changed since GTA III. CQC still bristles with offending levels of pointlessness. Outside of obtaining the “Finish Him” achievement, brawling is of no need, use, or consequence. It’s just not fun to fight. It's not like it can't be done. Consider this list of GTA clones, all of which offer better combat than GTA IV: True Crime, Spider-Man 2-3, The Incredible Hulk: Ultimate Destruction, The Getaway. Fighting should be fun by now.

In other news, I’m currently playing Boom Blox. I’ve only played it briefly but the tactile sensation tucked away into its gameplay has me intrigued. Combined with the sort of tech demo-ey explosion/gravity/inertia style physics on display… I can already tell I’m going to be sinking a lot of time into it.

Looking forward to MGS4, June 12th – at which time I plan on feasting on the game velociraptor style.

10 THINGS I HATE ABOUT GTAIV

2008-05-11T01:46:00.000-07:00

GTA IV is finally out - after a six month delay, and everyone has nothing but unconditional love for the game. 6 million units sold and half a billion dollars generated in its first week since launch. Review scores are virtually bulletproof with the 360 version sitting at a 98.4% aggregate score and the PS3 version at 99%. In an attempt to counterbalance the weight of the praise being heaped onto it I present a list of 10 things I hate about Grand Theft Auto IV.

10. The fact that it’s not the revolutionary game I secretly hoped it would be.

9. The gunplay. Crackdown did it better. How does the highest rated game of all-time get away with a 7 year old shooting mechanic?

8. Hand-to-hand combat. Shenmue did it better and that game was made last millennium! Get with the program people.

7. Vehicle handling. Turning at speeds greater than 30mph inevitably results in over or undershooting your turn. Sure you’ll eventually get the hang of it but many pedestrians will pay with their lives long before that happens.

6. The non-stop media hype machine promoting it. I’m sick of hearing moneyhatted game critics proclaiming the era of true movie/game integration has finally been ushered in by way of its release. GTA IV is not The Godfather.

5. Only 15 different multiplayer game types? Whaaaa? Is that all about?! Just kidding, that’s a freakin’ lot of damn multiplayer game types, yo. But only one map.

4. Thinking of 10 things I hate about the game while simultaneously deriving incredible joy from actually playing it.

3. Less vehicles, weapons, story missions, character customization, and overall real estate (compared to San Andreas) = “everything we were entitled to expect, and ... more.”?*

*Xbox World 360

2. Open world gameplay still doesn’t allow for accurate recreation of 9/11 government conspiracy.

1. The fact that I genuinely cannot think of 10 different things I hate about it.

Attack of the Microsoft warranty

2007-04-08T16:31:00.001-07:00

Speaking of killing… and hardware, my 360 has gone red lights of doom on me. Thankfully it was graceful enough to wait until a month past the (once extended) warranty in order to ensure that I had to choose between spending another 150+ on the sucker or go without. Thanks to this development I am now the proud owner of a working “PLAYSTATION 3” and a broken hunk of white plastic formerly known as the 360.

And to be perfectly frank, I cannot think of any compelling reasons to suggest a PLAYSTATION 3 to anyone I know. The exclusive titles are fairly mediocre at best, the lack of a centralized networking platform makes it feel incredibly isolated when held in contrast with Xbox live and the price is simply too high. As more and more exclusive titles slip away into the realm of cross-platform the PS3 looks less and less appealing to me. As of now the only exclusive title that really has my interest piqued is LittleBigPlanet – and lets be fair, that game looks straight up amazing.

Attack of the Killer Hardware

2006-11-21T21:23:00.000-08:00

I too have had a long hiatus from posting. I have a great excuse though - enjoying this wonderful holiday season where gadgets and gaming collide.

The XBox 360 HD-DVD Drive

This is a sweet add-on for the 360 and a must-have for anyone who enjoys home theater. If you already have a 360 (as you should. GEARS OF FREAKING WAR!) then this is the best deal you're going to find anywhere to get you aboard the future ship. You do want to be on the future ship right? For ~$200 you could be watching HD DVDs tonight, with their glorious 1080p moving pictures. Army of Darkness has never looked better.

Since it's an external drive with a USB connector, people have had some success using it with PCs as well. The software support just isn't quite there yet.

On the down side, a 360 doesn't have an HDMI out - just component and VGA. This is a double-edged sword. There's a gotcha inside the HD DVD format called the IDT bit, which when enabled disallows playback at full resolution over analog connections. This is a big part of the whole DRM shebang. The two edges here are that the XBox 360 doesn't have a digital video output, so if companies ever did start using the IDT bit the 360 would become screwed as an HD DVD player. However, Microsoft is the largest backer of the HD DVD format, so if their player requires that the IDT bit die and remain dead forever, then I imagine it's already 6 feet under with some pretty flowers and very few shed tears. Sometimes it's good when big business has a stake in defending the rights of the little guys.

Tales from the console.

2006-11-15T16:27:00.000-08:00

After such a prolonged reprieve from posting there are only two options… explain why or pretend that no-one noticed.

I am going to give a quick rundown on three most recent gaming endeavors I have err… endeavored on.

Splinter Cell: Double Agent
This is very much a sheep of a game, it doesn’t stand out and it doesn’t improve the series in any noteworthy manner. Instead it merely offers more or less (mostly less) of the same. What’s worse is that most of the changes made in this rendition of the franchise are handled with the deft precision of a blind man playing darts. Removing the ambient noise meter and seemingly with it all semblance of ambient noise and removing the HUD are both prime examples of changes that didn’t reinforce the enjoyment derived from the game. I would call Double Agent a big step backwards for the series.

Marvel Ultimate Alliance
So this is again a game that didn’t really strive to push itself forward as original or groundbreaking, instead it follows the well tread path set by its predecessors. Unlike SC:DA, however, Marvel Ultimate Alliance has offered up some extremely enjoyable gameplay. Sure it might be the equivalent of an all grown up and “prettied up” Golden Axe but at least it manages to entertain consistently throughout. This is the gaming equivalent of an action movie, not really a lot to think about but enjoyable all the same.

And finally…

Gears of War
This game is single handedly responsible for devouring my time like a hippo devours plastic spheres. The story is nothing remarkable and even has some annoying moments that feel tacked on or forced in order to leave room for a sequel – and yet that seems completely irrelevant in light of the rest of the game. Gears of War combines the high energy and thrilling excitement that classic “run-n-gun” FPS games offer with the strategic elements that the slower, more realistic games have. Apparently the secret ingredient to making this work was divined by Epic, no doubt only through the use of arcane majiks, perhaps a Ouija board was involved. Regardless of what diabolical powers were used to achieve this unholy union the result is wholly amazing and very “next-gen”.

WoW: The Burning Crusade movies.

2006-11-06T13:10:00.001-08:00

Nothing cynical, scathing, or judgmental here, no, this is just some yummy movie goodness straight from the upcoming World of Warcraft expansion, The Burning Crusade.

The Portal and a first look at the outlands.

Gryphon bombing run.

Fel Reaver.

Draeni animations/dance.

Zangamar zone, scenic.

Hellfire Furnace instance: A scenic tour.

(Right click and save as or just click to stream.)

Special thanks to Kairee and Elionbel for making these images possible!

BC? BS!

2006-11-05T22:37:00.000-08:00

http://www.xbox.com/en-US/games/backwardcompatibilitygameslist.htm

This list is sad. It makes me sad, it should make you sad too. Where are some of the classic XBox games, the ones that fill in the oh-so-lacking voids of the 360? Who the hell decided that the likes of Barbie Horse Adventure and Bad Boys II were more important to make run on a 360 than suberb games such as Soul Calibur II and Guilty Gear XX: Reloaded?

The PS2 has always been the fighting game player's system of choice. Why? All the good fighters got ported there, and there is a huge market for quality joysticks for the system. It doesn't hurt that Sony made all the controllers for the PSOne work on the PS2 as well. The XBox actually managed to snag a couple great fighting games. Sure, it never got a Tekken, but it did get SC2 and GGXX:Reloaded. What's stopping Microsoft from breathing some new life into those fantastic classics simply by making them run on the 360?

That would even give me and many others a reason to buy the 360 Hori sticks if there was something to use them with other than DoA4. It's funny, but once you pay good money for a quality controller for a system, you tend to try and find reasons to use that controller as much as possible. It's like you want to justify the purchase long after taking the plunge.

Sure the PS3 will have Tekken 6, but who the hell is even going to have a PS3? Without a massive community of players, competitive fighting games die faster than the UMD as a movie medium. There is going to be a void soon, one Microsoft could easily step into. The PS2 has owned the fighting game fan's wallet for years now, but as that system fades away an entirely new battleground grows in its wake. The first step is for Microsoft to leverage the little it currently has.

Soul Calibur II. Guilty Gear XX: Reloaded. On the 360. Make it happen.

With love.

2006-11-01T15:29:00.000-08:00

Dear Sony,

I understand and support you attempting to blow up consumers via death dealing batteries. And I understand that you want to finally get a chance to redeem the Beta max (and as such desire to push Blu-Ray down my throat). I also could care less for the most part that you have turned you back on Europe, going so far as to demolish an import company beneath your mighty corporate fists.

The loss of so much of your exclusive content is forgivable. I can see past your fickle ever changing design specs. I can forgive the misleading statements about teraflops, the pre-rendered videos which are essentially guaranteed to be impossible to live up to and even the stupid name given to the “new” controllers. I will ignore the fact that you stand upon a soapbox proclaiming that 1080p is the only way to play games, making such tacit implications as to the mediocrity of my “lowly” 720p projector.

All of those things I can move past but I absolutely will not accept your obscene price; I cannot forgive the opportunity cost. You have simply asked too much. And I am sure I could have spent as much on a 360 if I chose to get a number of the optional additions, but that choice was mine. More importantly that choice was one I could spread out over time. I suppose it is largely irrelevant however, you didn’t intend for me, or really anyone else to buy one anytime soon. Instead it will be the 360, the console formerly known as the Revolution or nothing – and we all know that nothing is better than nothing underneath the Christmas tree!

It’s sad really, I think back to all the good times we had, the Final Fantasy games, the Tekken series. Where did the Sony I used to know and love go, the Sony that redefined video games as something adults could enjoy, the Sony that provided the highest quality system at a competitive price? I don’t care about the format wars, or “true high-def” I just want to enjoy entertaining games. If you ever think you can be that Sony again, give me a call. I miss you.

Signed,
Consumers.

P.S. I still haven’t forgiven you for the general lack of worthwhile games on my PSP.
P.P.S Oh and UMD movies, I haven’t forgiven you for those either.

The Power Glove Revolution.

2006-10-28T22:59:00.000-07:00

There is a veritable smorgasbord of potential topics by which to focus today's post; micro-transactions, ads in games, EA in general (honestly one could write a whole series of books on EA's transgressions alone) and just about everything Sony has done in the recent months. But those my friends are easy pickings, the low hanging fruit - gnawed upon by the vast wildlife that is this internet. Instead I will be turning my time towards something else, something further out of the spotlight and perhaps more nefarious than any of the aforementioned affronts committed by the respective companies.

I am going to focus on the console formerly known as the revolution, a console I refuse to acknowledge by any other name. I choose not to dwell on the fact that the console essentially offers nothing more than last-gen power and graphics. I don't even mind (much) that Nintendo has largely forsaken its adult audience for the easy Pokemon and cartoon related sales.

No, instead I will turn my point of focus to the central selling point for this system, the user interface. The controller by which a human can merge with a machine, their actions and motions mimicked by their electronic avatar! It sounds almost too good to believe when stated like that - which by the way, was the point. It does not function as a perfect interface between man and machine, mimicking motion and allowing for dynamic gameplay. No, instead the function is no different than that of a regular controller, and in fact in many cases is worse. In a racing game tilting the controller to the right will result in turning in the game to the right, at the same time using an analog stick and tilting it slightly to the right yields, and I am sure this is a big surprise, turning towards the right. Now, I will admit that in this particular function the tilting method offers a slight improvement to game immersion, however, I contend that this is the best case scenario. More often the case will be that you will use excessive controller movements to simulate what would be accomplished with the simple press of a button assuming a regular setup.

I offer for example one of the premier titles, Mario Strikers, an upcoming Nintendo branded soccer game. In Strikers when a player desires to slide-tackle they will need to shake their controller, compared to other soccer games where the same action would be handled by yet again a simple button press. Another example would be a party game where you have to, again, shake the controller in order to roll dice - an action that would usually be handled with, and I am hoping you can guess.... the press of a button. In short this "new" user interface does little more than over-complicate video game interaction, a feat by which Nintendo is leveraging an entire generation of console and game sales.

Now, if perhaps the console had the processing power to correlate exact movements between the player and the character in the game this could be a novel and worthwhile method of interface. By doing this it would allow players to control the game both more intuitively and with more precision, only then would it be an advancement to gaming as opposed to a sidestep at best.

Acheivements and Gamerscore

2006-10-27T22:45:00.000-07:00

I don't understand why people care all that much about Gamerscore on XBox Live. Can you really only feel the full weight of your E-Peen if you have the highest score among your friends? It's like some sort of competition as to who can waste more of their life playing video games - congratulations, to win is to lose.

Whatever happened to actually just being skillful at playing a handful of the best games? It's a sad day when the ability to win is displaced by the ability to try. I think our society has watched one too many afterschool specials.

The scoring system isn't even remotely legitimate - your score is totaled amongst all games you've played, but different games have radically different scoring. The end result is a meaningless number. Is it really fair to compare time spent playing Call of Duty 2 and time spent playing Barbie Horse Adventure?

I think this "Acheivement" says it all:
The Impossible Dream

First!

2006-10-26T12:05:00.000-07:00

So here is my very first post in my brand new blog.

Going against my instinct which is to fill this first post with nonsense, garbage and expletives, instead, I am going to state loosely what the intent behind this blog is.

Despite what the name of the blog might suggest I am a gamer, I have been ever since my first experiences with Frogger - a fact I often loathe admitting, it suggests I am far older than I am – when instead I just started gaming THAT young. Even now I spend upwards of 20 hours a week playing various games, is that really a lot? Maybe not by most gamer's standards but to "normal" people it is.

Alright so that is who I am... but why create a blog in a market that is over-saturated as it is?

Well the answer to that is two-fold, in the not-so distant past I reviewed video games for a couple sites, and as I reviewed more and more games, saw more of my scores changed, my reviews changed and more about how the industry works I realized that I did not want to be another voiceless cog in the venerable PR machine. I also began to notice that I frequently rated games far lower than my peers, placing most games 2-3 points lower on a standard 1-10 scale.

In short, here I can say what I think without worrying about the PR people, the average score or offending my readers. I can say what it is I really hate about games, in general or specific.

P.S. poop-shit-monkey-ass-waffle. Sorry, couldn't resist.