Hello? *Cricket Chirp*

Well it seems as if I've lost what small viewership I had, I blame my busy life and schedule. No worries however, it was a pipe dream of sorts that this would take off and become something people would actually visit every couple of days for news and reviews. Whatever, this train will keep on chugging nonetheless. So as I said I've been swamped and so I haven't had the time to properly sit down and review some things but I'm going to briefly rundown what I've so far played since my last post and do what you will with the information.

Dead Space: Go out and rent this immediately! If this were a drought period I would tell you to rush out and buy it but the game clocks in at around 9 hours and gamers need all the money they can to purchase games with both a solid single-player and multiplayer experience if they're going to get their moneys worth. This game even lacking multiplayer is still amazing and deserves to be played.

Far Cry 2: I've only ventured into the jungles a bit on this one but this is another rental, this one more so for the overall quality rather than because it's short. Overall it's a fun experience but it certainly has some issues and those issues play out throughout the entire length of the game. It's worth checking out however and I recommend you either rent it now or buy it during the drought and when it's cheaper and lighter on the ol' wallet.

Guitar Hero World Tour: Don't bother with this, something about it feels so cold and solely made to rake in the millions upon millions, please, pick up the product that still feels like it has a heart and soul to it and stick with the Rock Band name. Harmonix has so far proven they can do no wrong. Neversoft on the other hand, eehhh, not so much.

Fallout 3: Eventually I should be giving this epic sized game a review of its own but until then if you haven't already read up on it and saw all the great scores it's been receiving I'm just adding another great score to that pile, go out and get this, everyone seems to be treating this as Oblivion with guns but the Fallout brand is much stronger than that and it shines through in every moment of the game.

Fable 2: Give this one a rent, it's short, it didn't deliver on all its promises and while it's fun it's nothing superb. I'm sure I'll give this a full review as well whenever I get a large chunk of free time.

That's about all I've played up to this point, I will be trying to start and complete both the new James Bond title Quantum of Solace just because I can't wait for the movie and the game doesn't look half-bad, and Gears of War 2. I'm not going to go really into the details of why I want to play GoW2, I think at this point everybody does, I'm not in some minority boat. Well that's all from me, I'm still alive, I'm still gaming, and I'll still be blogging, just as soon as life calms down a bit. Take care readers!

Contrary to popular belief, I'm not dead in space.

Just a friendly reminder that there will be reviews of sorts, things in life have gotten very busy so the gaming front has had to take a breather due to such circumstances. However in the coming week I will have more time, and more time means time to play some of the big games everyone is talking about. I'm going to take on Dead Space and then the three big F's as they are released, those being Fable 2, Far Cry 2, and Fallout 3. Stay tuned! It's about to get all M-rated up in here with these titles!

Mega Man 9: Blaow-Blaow-Blaow-Blaow-Blaow

Embrace this sight and the sound because you will see it alot in this game. I'm not going to give it a full review because in the few hours I've spent with it I've only conquered Galaxy Man, I guess this begs the question of should someone review a game without having beat said game? So I won't technically review it, but I will recommend that you go out and buy this game pronto, even though I'm dying like mad I'm constantly smiling and it's such a nostalgia trip that I'm always pumped to turn it on and start getting killed to amazing 8-bit music. This game made me realize how gamers may have lost their hardcore edge, we're so used to checkpoints after every somewhat difficult segment in a game, we're used to being able to control the difficulty of the game, we're used to there being no such things as spikes that will kill you in one hit. This game takes away all those things, it's simple, it's fun, and I hope this game sells well and sparks a new 8 and 16-bit revolution. Nintendo, if you're listening, encourage developers to go this route on your system, XBL and PSN picked it up because it's Mega Man and there's bound to be some people that will play it on those respective systems, although playing an 8-bit Mega Man title on either of those two platforms would feel odd, it feels just right on the Wii and all you do is turn the Wiimote sideways and bam you've got an NES controller. The best thing about Mega Man 9 is that even though it's rooted in the 8-bit days with the graphics and sound, the gameplay feels fresh and they've thrown in some ideas that you wouldn't have seen on an 8-bit game in the 80's. So hats off to Capcom, I know Microsoft and Sony have a strict policy against developers making 2D games anymore, they feel it doesn't contribute at all to their beefy systems and specs. That's why I'm saying, Nintendo, get this ball rolling, I want more 8 and 16-bit games! Play this game ASAP and return to childhood!

Brothers In Arms: Hell's Highway

"As long as there are sovereign nations possessing great power, war is inevitable."
American Scientist Albert Einstein, date unknown

This review is going to be brief and short, because this game follows all the fundamental rules and contains all the necessary parts to be called a game but nothing more really. It turned out to be such a generic, run-of-the-mill game that for the most part had a been here/done that feel to it. So I can't really hate on it, because there's nothing here that isn't done wrong or terribly, it just doesn't gel into a fun experience.

So in this game you play as Baker, I was so unattached from the story I couldn't even tell you what his rank is, it took me awhile to realize even which one I was, this game does a terrible job at catching you up if you've never played the first two, there's a "Previous on Brothers in Arms..." section at the very beginning, but Baker just mumbles and they show random things happening to random people. So the entire game I was trying to piece who I was, who the others I was talking to during cutscenes were, and what the big hub bub was about this pistol with an engravement on it. By the end of it all I could piece some of it together, but this hodgepodge of story was trying too desperately to be emotional and deep but failed so hard at it, I admittedly began to zone out during some of the scenes.

So what's the gameplay like? Basically you're in charge of anywhere from 1 to 3 teams, and you follow your compass and lead your teams, hiding them behind things and then having little trench warfare type fights with the Germans, or if you like you can take a group with you and perhaps sneak up on the side of the Germans or behind them even. Rinse, repeat for 6-8 hours. I will say there were a few parts where you were all alone and it was more run-n-gun, which I enjoyed, there was a few tank segments which I liked, basically you roll around in a tank and massively blast everything and watch it all crumble and German body parts go flying in the air in slow motion. Then there were some segments like sniping Germans to protect a boy, and a run-down hospital level that I liked, had a vibe to it unlike any World War II game level I've ever played. But these few and far between segments can't save the rest of the game or make it recommendable. If you played the last two and somehow feel like the narrative is something you connected with and want to see more exploits of Baker and company, then you'll probably enjoy this game but I wouldn't plunk $60 on it even then.

The graphics are nice, but I remember seeing videos a year or so ago and I'm pretty sure the developers said what they were showing was in-game, and that old footage was very impressive but I'm wondering if that was more of a tech-demo where they were pushing the engine to the max, then realizing hey we actually have to ship an entire game on a disc, not just one visually amazing scene, the graphics took a respective dip into somewhere between good and average for the final product. I also found the sound lacking, I figured this was a World War II game, I bet this will be booming, I'll be hidden behind a wall and hearing gunshots pecking off the corner of the wall and hearing my squadmates screaming out and calling positions while emptying their clips, and Germans shouting and firing etc. That sort of happens, but the audio seemed mostly quiet and low-key. I had to really crank my system to try and get a feel like I was actually out on the battlefield and in the war, and I ended up having to turn on the subtitles because during cutscenes it was if the characters dialogue was spoken through a pillow before it reached the microphone that was recording it.

Having never played much of the first two, I figured Hell's Highway would be the best of the first two, plus some new additions with next-gen technology, I also figured since I hadn't played the previous installments the gameplay would probably stay refreshing all the way through the title unlike where it might go stale quick for a veteran of the series, I was mistaken. It went stale by about the 2nd hour. I gave it the benefit of the doubt and was treated to some interesting segments, but still wasn't enough to leave me feeling positive about this game. Oh and for those who love the series, at the end of the game I was treated to a "To be continued...." screen. I have a feeling Gearbox won't be developing another title however, unless this game sells really well which I don't see happening, I can't see anyone wanting to fork more cash into this series. Third-person shooters have moved so far beyond where Hell's Highway stands, I really feel like this is the last stop for these games.


Final Verdict: Thumbs Down

"As long as there are gamers possessing great wealth, World War II games are inevitable."
American Gamer Bane, date September 30, 2008

Last Hurrahs of September!

We're soon heading into October, I'm going to try and review the new Brothers In Arms game as soon as possible, but until then I offer you a glimpse of what lays ahead. You can look forward to reviews of Silent Hill:Homecoming, Dead Space, and the granddaddy of October, Fallout 3. Quite a spooky month really for gaming, and I'll also try and throw in a review of the Alone in the Dark game that came out months ago. Basically I'll be on the edge of my seat all of October but that's cool with me. Hmm, it just dawned on me that Fable 2 also hits the month of October, jeez, I'll try and put something down on that too. I don't know if I'll be able to digest all the gaming but we'll see how I do. I really wanted to tackle the RPGs that hit the system this month but I don't think I'll have the time. This is why great games need to be dropped throughout the year and not crammed within a four month period. It's a double-edged sword, the lulls that usually carry through the other months is terrible, but the high during the 4 months of gaming lunacy is quite something. Well I have many things to do, but thanks for keeping tuned in!

Star Wars: The Fun Restrained!

This game should have been awesome. This game does look awesome in screenshots and in theory, but after playing through the entire campaign repetition and boredom set in quickly.

So in this game, which is considered canon, you take the role of Darth Vader's secret apprentice code-named "Starkiller", the story here is interesting, you'll see many things from the Star Wars films including cameos from more than Vader and the Emperor, there's a nifty boss fight with someone from Episode I, and you run across a young Princess that you may remember from the movies. Because I'm a fan of the original trilogy and the game focuses more on those aspects, it help my attention and I sought to see what would happen next, though now that I look back on it I should've realized how it would all eventually end.

The gameplay however gets stale quickly, the intro level and the first level that you play as the Apprentice are fun, but after that the game ramps up in difficulty and enemies gain resistance to some of your Force powers causing you to find and frequently use repeated combos that get the job done instead of just going all out with the Force and enjoying the destruction. Depending on what level you're on and the enemies being thrown your way, the game can be sorta fun to downright frustrating. There are moments where the developers thought it would be a good idea to have you fight multiple Rancors, this wouldn't be that much of a problem if the Force Grip and Throw worked precisely and quickly, but beyond the Rancors who want you dead you've got these indigenous people who are being run by a leader and until you take out their leader they're pretty much invincible, so you've got to deal with those, oh but wait there's also these indigenous King type versions of these creatures in yellow that will either mess you up if you try to go in close and lightsaber them or if you stray from them they'll throw powerful projectiles that knock you down. I can't count how many times I was bludgeoned with tons of enemies and there really was no right way to deal with them, I figured I'm the one with the lightsaber here I should be able to dole out my extreme Force powers AND slice and dice with the saber, apparently there exist creatures and types of Stormtroopers that can withstand 10 or so smacks from the saber. As you progress through the game you can unlock more combos and increase the ranks of your Force powers, but your enemies grow stronger throughout the game as well so this basically leaves you on an even playing field throughout, and the new combos you acquire are more trouble to pull off than they're worth.

Two other things of note, one is that the boss battles are lackluster, I really want to stroll into a store and leaf through the strategy guide for this game because by my understanding there was no strategy required, more luck. The game seems to decide when your saber will dole out damage, and Force Push during the battles is a joke because it works no doubt, whoever you're fighting will indeed fly back and lay there for a few moments recouping yet if you dash over to strike them when you would think they're at their weakest you'll notice their life bar doesn't drop a smidge. My only other gripe is the fact that the pulling down a Star Destroyer scene is marred and boring as hell, kill some tie-fighters, pull, rinse and repeat until you've pulled it enough to trigger a cut scene. I wish the games levels had been the Apprentice just massively messing places up and then at the end of each level would be a difficult boss fight with strategy and clashing Force powers.

I don't really feel like speaking too much more on the game, the visuals are very good, the sound as well, overall the title will last you about 6-8 hours and there's two endings so you may revisit the game one last time to load the last level and see the other ending like I did. Overall there were brief moments where I was enjoying myself but overall the combat is lacking and it's repetitive. If you're a big Star Wars fan then I only can suggest renting it, everyone else can just skip it.


Final Verdict: Thumbs Down

Darth Vader: "Don't be too proud of this technological terror you've constructed."

Let There Be Rock...Band 2 (Yeah, yeah, I could've done better, but I'm sick, so deal)

Whew, like I said, I am coughing up a lung at the moment, but the show must go on. If out of every review I've ever done this one ends up the most disjointed and makes the least amount of sense I apologize in advance. This review shouldn't be that long anyhow, if you've never touched the Guitar Hero or Rock Band franchise, then this review isn't your cup of tea anyhow.

So in this game just like the last you play music and you play one of four instruments, unless you're the type that likes to sing and play guitar or bass, I've never tried but I definitely should, songs like Modest Mouse's "Float On" I wouldn't even have to gander up at the lyrics, they've been imprinted on my noodle from repeated listens before they were even in the game. So anyway you play any one of the 84 tracks that are on the disc and rock out by yourself or with band members you enlisted over XBL or just some local buds all rocking out together. If 84 songs for some reason aren't enough, there are another 20 coming down the pipe shortly that will be free as well, my guess is that they'll be from Harmonix artists like Freezepop, Anarchy Club, Bang Camaro etc. That's not a bad thing, the in-house bands that exist at Harmonix know how to write good stuff.

One of the biggest features is that the Tour Mode is finally online, that was my biggest complaint with the first one, because I didn't have a steady stream of people over to play and jam out with me I couldn't even touch that mode. So, in this mode you travel from city to city, venue to venue playing setlists and gaining fans. Along the way optional challenges arise, and you can hire personnel like band managers, roadies, sound guys, and the different ones you come across have different attributes about them so you may actually prefer one manager over another. There's also Tour Challenges and a Battle of the Bands, both of which are constantly updated with new challenges week to week, it's a great idea and while I think it would be really cool to have two complete bands competing against one another straight through XBL, I'm sure technically that would be a stretch to pull off so online leaderboards will have to do, it's still satisfying to see your ridiculous band name, like Flight of the Ebony Woman posting a score that slaps you in the top #200 out of thousands of bands. Just knowing that others who play the challenges may run across my band makes me laugh.

Lastly there's still a training mode as well as a Drum Trainer which helps people play lots of drum beats and fills at various speeds. This will definitely help people get over the hurdle of playing the drums if they feel they have no rhythm. Oh, and if for some reason they really have no rhythm at the end of the day you can turn on special features, one of which is No Fail, I can see this being a mode widely used at parties where people playing the game may be also having some booze. No longer do the drunks have to fear that someone will fail the band as a whole and ruin the moment.

Since I have the original Rock Band instruments I can't really comment on the new stuff, but I've heard it's much improved and finally all wireless. Also a quick comment on those who own the first game, for 400MS Points you can transfer all but three songs from the Rock Band disc onto your hard drive to use in Rock Band 2. So if you're in that boat and aren't the kind to go and buy weekly DLC, you'd still have a total of 159 songs to play.

Alrighty people, I have spoken enough, I'm surprised my fever and coughing has allowed me to type all that I have, and I think it even makes sense. Bottom line, if you own the first Rock Band, go out and get Rock Band 2. If you don't have Rock Band, go buy the big Rock Band 2 bundle.

Final Verdict: Buy

Unleashing the Force of Rock n' Roll

Hello everyone, giving a heads up on what's going down, by the end of the weekend I'd like to have reviewed both Rock Band 2 and The Force Unleashed. I've already plunged head first into Rock Band 2 and it's more of the goodness us fans of the first one have wanted. This weekend I'll embark on and hope to finish the latest Star Wars title. I also dedicate this post to Corpse Droid up above, I heard about him a few weeks ago before the game came out and they were hoping to have him be a sidekick in the game that would help fight people with you plus collect and harvest their body parts. Yes, this droid wants nothing more than to be human, so they were hoping throughout the game you would witness that he was collecting more and more pieces and parts and slowly making himself appear human. I thought the idea was pretty rad, but I forget if they said the game would've been slapped with an M rating going with a sidekick so dark, or if they just couldn't figure out a way to have him tag along, either way the Corpse Droid is a great idea and the art design for the game looks amazing.

So stay tuned peoples, there are future endeavors ahead!

Oh, quick side note, my band on Rock Band 2 is named Flight of the Ebony Woman, challenge me or rock out by my side sometime.

360 Reboot? (Rumor)

Look how much fun they're having, unfortunately the 360 sales figures have been slowly declining and we all know about that great new Dashboard Update coming out in November. Any chance it may be coming out in September? That's the word going across the Internet. Supposedly there will be a 5 hour block on G4 dedicated to the new Live Experience, Sirius Radio integration, music store like iTunes, "mad lib" channel (your guess is as good as mine), dozen new game demos, previews of the new GTA IV DLC, new Mass Effect expansion and a free Halo 3 map pack, six free Xbox Originals for Gold members, and about a dozen newly announced retail titles. Then finally to cap it all off at midnight the update would go live and you could jump into this new Live Experience.

So what do you think? Microsoft did hold off on a Bungie/Halo announcement at E3 but I figure they wouldn't want the lid off of a new Halo title until GoW2 is out and in the hands of many. I've got a 50/50 shot on this but I'm going to go with false on this rumor. I think the update will launch in November, and all this free content and games is just the mad musings of some guy. Would I love to be proven wrong? Sure. I just don't see it happening.

Almost 200th View Celebration!

Hooray, his blog is slowly chugging and churning and for some reason I feel 200 views is a milestone of sorts. I promise I won't celebrate again until say, 500 views. Then I have to, then I won't until 1000 views. My next two goals will take months so let me have this time to drink down this delicious frosty beverage. I'd also just like to quickly run down what I'm looking forward to in the future, I'm either going to tackle Tales of Vesperia or Infinite Undiscovery, then there's Rock Band 2 coming this Sunday. What else? I'm also going to try and down Star Wars The Force Unleashed and the new Brother's In Arms game. Finally if I still have time I will tackle Lego Batman. That's the upcoming schedule for September. Thanks again to any and all who have been reading this!

Mercenaries 2: I Love The Smell Of Mediocrity In The 360

I gave Pandemic Studios latest game Mercenaries 2 all I could, and I can give no more.

Stepping into the shoes of a Merc who has free roam of Venezuela to do what they like to get their revenge sounds like the premise and promise of a damn good game. Unfortunately, the game falls flat in almost every way. I was thrown into the game and after the few brief intro missions and after having to sit through some terrible FMVs that looked as though they were ripped from the PS2 version I finally was free to start plotting my revenge. I took some contracts right away, and here's my first quibble, the mission structure consists of blow this up, kill this, steal this, rinse and repeat. I realize open-world games are often criticized most for having missions that have all been done to death, but GTA IV did a hell of a better job at giving me convincing characters that I felt like I grew to know and even became attached to, and in turn the missions had more heft and impact. In Mercenaries 2, it's more like "Good job mercenary, have some cash, we like you enough that you should come to our depot and spend some of it, oh and do more contracts and maybe I'll tell you where Solano is". Riveting. I would've preferred a plot in which you're accruing money in the hopes of completely nuking Venezuela altogether, because in the game world the cities are barren and it doesn't even feel as if real citizens live there anyway, just the factions that give out contracts and those you're after.

So I thought I'd spice up the mission structure by doing what the game is to be known for, lots and lots of explosions. Well, first I had to save Ewan otherwise how would I ever airlift fuel and money that's just laying about Venezuela. Then I had to rescue Eva if I wanted some new vehicles for which to cruise around on because most of the vehicles out in Venezuela are boring. Then I had to save Misha if I wanted some bombing runs and anything that requires a jet. Whoo. Okay got that all done. Now the fun begins? Oh, hold on I have to tackle capturing some high value targets and destroying some objects for the factions so they love me enough that I can buy fuel capacity upgrades as well as new Shop Items. Okay, now I need to go to the various shops around Venezuela and purchase things, alright now I'm ready to drop some bombs on these suckers. Why couldn't they have streamlined the shop from the D-Pad menu? I should be able to be out and about on a mission, draw up the menu and order whatever I wish from it as long as I have the funds. Even if I could do that however, mindlessly dropping explosions and vehicles from the sky would be mostly worthless as the A.I. is garbage. The controls and physics are also very loose, I understand they want the objects to be somewhat floaty for when major explosions go off but my vehicle shouldn't be taking damage from just driving along the roads of Venezuela because they get a little airborne from said floaty physics. Whichever mercenary you choose is also very weary of heights, if you sprint down a hill and because you're sprinting you vault off the hill and get some air, be prepared to lose about 10-15 health or more. On the other hand if something important is up a hill or mountainous region, your mercenary has no problem sprinting up it like it ain't no big deal.

I'm having a difficult time reviewing this because I can't think of much to say, the visuals with the exception of the explosions are disappointing. The sound effects are good but the VO is annoying and Fiona constantly pesters the player. The story is bare bones as are the cutscenes revolving around it. The gameplay feels outdated and is plagued with bugs, glitches, loose controls, floaty physics, and when those aren't intervening the A.I. doesn't put up much of a fight so it's at best a mindless run-n-gun game. Co-Op is there, but it just made me feel like I was suffering only with someone else also slogging and suffering through it.

If you love open-world games keep playing GTA IV or pick that up if you're shopping around for one. Maybe hold out for Saints Row 2 but if you feel that you must absolutely play this game please heed my advice and rent it and nothing more. I've got to hand it to the Pandemic guys who would show off builds of this game during gaming conferences and conventions, they really made it seem like it was a great product. Turns out it's just average at best.

Final Verdict: Thumbs Down

Mediocrity, son. Nothing in the world smells like that.

Brief Mercenaries 2 Impressions

So let's dive right in, what do I like about it so far? The explosions are fun to watch and the carnage is over-the-top just how I wanted it. What am I not digging about it? The graphics so far have been lackluster, the aiming kind of annoys me, and I exhausted myself on the Training missions thinking I could be a bad ass and beat all of them on the hardest difficulty. Turns out not so, in fact I want to see some footage of the developers doing it, see when you go to do these missions you have to place a side bet with your cohort, so not only do you get mad because you failed but then you realize you're also losing precious money. The pistol training got me ticked the most, the right analog stick aims so loosely and trying to be precise with a pistol was never and will never be what Mercenaries is about. So why is it there? So far I've yet to ever want to pick up a pistol in the game, you know why? Because there are RPG-7s and AK 47s and M16s, that's why. I need to spend a lot more time with the game which I will, but so far it's an alright experience, I'm enjoying it as much as I enjoyed the first one. For those keeping score, I had a bit of fun with the first one but recognized it was style over substance.

Castle Crashers: It's Got A Deer That Shoots Rrhea'!

This week I embarked on putting my time and money towards Castle Crashers, it's finally been released after being kicked around and being shown for about 3 years. If you ever grew up when arcades were still around and remember plunking lots of quarters into some of the great 4-player beat em' ups like TMNT, X-Men, and The Simpsons then you'll feel right at home here.

At its heart Castle Crashers is a 4-player Beat Em' Up with some light RPG elements to it. There's 20 levels that you and hopefully 3 other people will be marching through. If you don't have some people to invite over, you can find people to play with over XBL. You and your respective friends or strangers that you've just met over Live will move from left to right beating the crap out of the onslaughts of enemies that are thrown your way. Each Knight is imbued with his respective power, whether it be poison, fire, ice, or lightning. So as you're fighting you can use magic, your blade or a combination of the two, and as you level up more and more you'll gain more combos. If you level up during a level afterwards you get to pour some that XP into Strength, Magic, Agility, and Health. Those may or may not be the exact names, I can't recall at this moment but you get the idea. The game is very addictive and you'll constantly be wanting to level up your character, as well as finding new weapons that enemies drop while moving around the levels. There are 20 additional characters to unlock and level up as well. There are also 26 Animal Orbs to find and collect throughout the levels, you bring them along with you and they imbue your character with either more health, more defense, quickness through water, higher jumping, all sorts of things that you'll want to play around with.

Past the main game you can also play offline or online two mini-games, there's the Arena and All You Can Quaff. The Arena is pretty self-explanatory, you either fight one another or if you run in solo you fight waves and waves of enemies. It's fun and I've heard getting far into it by yourself nets you some hidden items. Then there's All You Can Quaff which plays sort of like the mini-games that were between some levels in The Simpsons Arcade game, you mash two buttons repeatedly to eat the food in front of your Knight, then press another button to ring a bell and have a new dish thrown in front of your character. You keep going until you eat a certain amount of food. It's fun but apparently I lack my old button mashing skills, against the CPU I'm fine, but I tried a few Ranked matches online and always came in 2nd. It's not the games fault but it was frustrating. I probably won't play it too much as I'd like to keep my X and Y buttons intact for as long as possible.

Finally I feel I have to mention some issues with the game that I'm sure in the coming weeks will be patched and completely gone, still I want to throw them out there in case it may deter anyone from picking it up right away. Right now it's difficult to find and jump straight into an Online game, and once you do find one sometimes you may not even get through an entire level before the game freezes up. Lastly, there's been some save issues where the save file gets corrupted or it just doesn't save for you, so you might exit the game and return the next day to find that your LVL30 Knight is back to LVL15 or whatever the case may be. Like I said, The Behemoth realizes these issues and is already on the case to patch them up and make them a thing of the past.

So what's the verdict on the game? Well, I wouldn't outright tell everyone I know to go drop $15 dollars on this game, but I in no way dislike the game and would say just skip it altogether. I recommend that you get the Trial version and see where you stand on it. If you're like me and grew up playing all those quarter eating Beat Em' Ups chances are you'll be crazy in love with this game, if you've never had those nostalgia pangs you might walk away feeling better with $15 still in your pocket. At the end of the day, it's a wonderful game and one that will be even better once it gets the patch treatment.

Final Verdict: Trial It

Tackling Castle Crashers and Bionic Commando Rearmed

Hello everyone, just writing in to let everyone know I am still gaming and do plan on throwing down further reviews, later this weekend expect to see Castle Crashers or Bionic Commando Rearmed thrown up, maybe both if time permits. I've been very busy as of late writing lots of C++ code, so I ask any who may be a fan of this little blog to stick it out and keep checking in. There will be updates, and I will do my best to keep you all entertained and informed. I hit my first benchmark of over 100 views! Next up, 200!

Geometry Wars 2: Started Recreational, Ended Kinda Medical

Here I am taking on another big XBLA title, this being the sequel to Geometry Wars. If you've never been, Geometry Wars is the kind of game that will hook you with its gameplay and suck you in with its trippy visuals. These same visuals will also draw anyone else who happens to be in the room as they'll wonder what in the hell is going on, if you're even playing a game, and if you are how you're still classified as alive through all the shapes, sparks, and wild colors that are abound.

So how do you play it? It's quite simple, the left stick controls your ship, the right control stick shoots your gun depending in what direction you're pressing it, and the left and right triggers are bombs if you're getting swamped and just need some help so that you don't die and lose a life.

The original was highly addictive and the sequel asks for 800 MS Points but throws down 6 different modes. Let's discuss them briefly.

Deadline throws you into the pit with three minutes and infinite lives and you just perform and keep playing and honing those three minutes to perfection if possible. King has you jumping from safe zone to safe zone, the only areas you can fire from, and these zones only exist for so long so you must traverse space dodging enemies and getting into that next safe zone. Evolved is the game mode that you were given in the first game, you earn lives and bombs at certain score intervals and you go until you can go no longer. Pacifism has you flying around with no weapons at all, but rather explosive gates that you fly through, and you do such until you die. This is probably my favorite especially when throwing on a favorite album of mine, I can sit and play it for hours. Waves has waves of ships flying horizontally or vertically at you, and it continues to build and build so you have to be quick at eliminating the old waves or clearing holes in the waves to dodge around in. Finally there's Sequence which is a sequence of 20 stages, each a predetermined pattern of enemies, and you see how far into the sequence you can get, whether you live through it all or die you see what your final score is.

This game also has 4 player local competitive and co-operative modes, haven't had a chance to try them out yet, but I've heard it's insanely fun and addictive just like the single player stuff.

There are a few new enemies, but one of the bigger nuances is the addition of Geoms, which enemies drop when killed. This is your multiplier and until you've lost all your lives you get to hold onto it, this provides a much different way of playing the game. In the first game you just had to kill and dodge, now you're asked to still do that but also risk yourself a lot more to collect the glorious Geoms which will disappear after a certain amount of time. Basically, you could be amazing at playing it the old way but you'll always be beat by someone who maybe can't survive as long but knows how to collect Geoms successfully. The final layer is the online leaderboards, if you have a bunch of friends who have this game, the leaderboards will keep you coming back for more and more, so that you can snag those almighty bragging rights. Also while you're playing any given mode in the upper right corner is the next persons score who's ahead of you, so you're always glancing at it and trying your best to survive just a little bit longer to beat that persons score. 800 Points was a very fair price for this game that could last you as long as many $60 retail games out there on the market.

Geometry Wars 2 is a satisfying, frenetic, twitchy, and addictive game thanks to its onslaught of enemies, crazy HD vector visuals that will put you into a trance, and 6 modes of fun with plenty of lasting appeal locally and online. Get it for yourself first, then branch out and play with others locally or try and smear your best friends score for kicks.

Final Verdict: Buy

Braid: Journey Through Time (Of My Life)

So here's my first XBLA review, and what a doozy I have chosen. Braid is a cross between the platforming of Super Mario Bros., the puzzles of something like The Incredible Machine, and some time turning twists depending on which world you are in. The game revolves around Tim, who is searching for a Princess, before entering each world you're given a few pieces of text to read. This isn't your regular guy saves Princess routine here. The text talks upon relationships, and that line everyone walks when in one. Tim has made a mistake of some sort, it's never outright said, but Tim learns his lesson but unfortunately the damage is irreversible. While the story is brief, there's just the right amount of it and it keeps you hooked. You feel for Tim and you're left wondering what's going to happen.

The gameplay here is fun and engaging and also at some points can hurt your noodle. In each world the object is to collect 12 puzzle pieces, by putting these puzzles together it's the only real way to gain closure and see the Epilogue. The first world Time and Forgiveness plays out like a standard platform game with the ability to rewind time if you die. But even in this world you'll find a few puzzle pieces that have brilliant solutions on how to obtain them. The second world is Time and Mystery, this world has certain objects that are unaffected by rewinding time and the puzzles revolve around that. The third world is Time and Place, this is one of my favorite worlds, here time is linked to your movement in the world, as you move left time is moving backwards, and as you run to the right time is lurking forward. Some very cool and difficult puzzles here as well. The fourth world is Time and Decision, here after you've performed something, if you rewind time back to before you did it, there exists a shadowy version of yourself who will go and do what you just did, so in this world there are some very clever clone type puzzles. Things that require two people to accomplish, yourself and your shadowy former self. The final world Hesitance, provides Tim with a magical ring that you can place at any time and surrounding it is a bubble in which time is slowed down to a crawl. I found the final world to be the most difficult and it made me scratch my brain a few times.

The game has beautiful backdrops that appear to be hand painted, the little characters all animate well and the the game has an amazing soundtrack, one that I will be looking out for if it's ever made available. I can definitely see myself doing work and listening to the soundtrack, very serene at times, very moody at others. Great instrumental stuff. It definitely captures that feel of Tim's quest to find the Princess.

I've only beaten the game last night, so I will definitely run through it again at some point. The ending is ambiguous so I won't spill my interpretation of it, but I am curious to read the others out there. I'm not sure what the creator Jonathan Blow has next up his sleeve, and I know he's issued some complaints with the Microsoft certification process, but I really hope this is not the end for him. He's already said he won't be doing more levels or a sequel for Braid, but I hope a few years from now there's something new of his to be played. From what I heard the development team on this game was 2 people, and you would never be able to tell from playing it. It's got a heart and soul to it and goes beyond the expectations of what an XBLA game can be.

Braid : 2008 ::Portal : 2007. While the two games are nothing alike, I feel that analogy must be made, if you sat down and played Portal and it sucked you in for the brief story and unique gameplay and left you wanting more, then Braid will do that for you this year.

Final Verdict:Buy

Soul Calibur IV: Boner Factory

So maybe when you first saw Yoda and Vader, you thought let's gather up the family and button mash each other and have a grand old time. Well, Mom, Dad, be ready to ponder why every female has the largest possible milk mountains known to man in the polygonal realm and get ready to cover little Susie's eyes as she wonders if that's what she's to look like as she grows up, and speaking of growing, Little Timmy just grew a pair in the process. As far as I know this is the first time feeding bottles this size have hit the PS3, but I know for a fact that the 360 audience has seen hood ornaments like these before. If you've ever popped in a Team Ninja game then you know what I'm talking about. But I must say as I stood before Ivy, her sword/whip in hand, I wondered if she knew that right below her face were two Zeppelins primed and ready to race.

So beyond the chest physics is the game any good? Yes, I'm happy to say very good. You're given a choice of 33 characters if my math is exactly right, which it may not be, but also given the chance to create as many fighters that you would like. While the creation system isn't that chock full of items, there may be enough to craft some characters you wish had been placed into the game. Perhaps you could craft a normal looking female and write up a back story of how she entered the Soul Calibur universe to unleash upon the women and men of the land and undo the deeds of the evil plastic surgeon. Or you could go the complete opposite route and edit a pre-existing character, so many of you will probably pick your favorite vixen and toss her into the ring sans the skimpy clothes she already had.

There's Story mode which is self-explanatory, you run through 5 stages each containing a couple of opponents and then you're granted with an ending cutscene and a sentence or two of text, plot shouldn't be why you pick this game up. There's Arcade mode which is also fun. I spent the majority of my time in the Tower of Lost Souls, which has you fighting special battles to gain rewards. At first you may only go up but once at LVL 20, you can then descend as well. Don't worry, there really isn't a visual castle you're running around in, more menu selecting and then battling. You can play some characters with a button-mashing panache or you can sit down and learn the actual moves, either way you'll have fun. The other cool part is that these rewards are pieces of equipment which you then throw on and get better or different statistics or special traits. Stuff like more health, or a poison touch on the end of your weapon that drains the enemies health after striking them with it. That may seem like something that would offset the balance and flow of the fights, but in the Tower of Lost Souls you're asked to sometimes fight 6-8 people with only 2-3 characters and they also have these sorts of attributes and a health bar that goes beyond the normal amount.

The new addition to the fighting system is the Soul Gauge and the ability to do a Critical Finish. Your Soul Gauge starts out green in a match and while you obviously want to block you don't want to just sit there blocking all day, so to prevent this your Soul Gauge may go from green to red, in which your armor may break off or if it goes red and flashes, your opponent can instantly finish you off with a Critical Finish. It's a Teen rated game so don't expect fatalities like in Mortal Kombat, in fact if you're fighting someone who knows what they're doing these shouldn't come up in battle all that often. It keeps the fights frenetic and fast paced.

Finally rounding out the package is online play over XBL, you get thrown into a little party of 4 and as in the old arcade days, the winner stays on to keep fighting, the loser watches the next fight until his turn comes up again. I didn't experience any lag and this also will give the game some extra legs once you finish the Tower, see every characters ending, and don't have anyone beside you to fight.

I was really hoping the SC Universe would encompass even more well known big screen characters, but if it's any consolation every female comes strapped with Thelma & Louise. That's right, when it came to reviewing a game like this, I had to throw down the euphemisms. You all would have done the same. My job here is done.

Final Verdict: Buy

Soul Calibur IV: Still Alive

Not a full review or anything yet, still need some more play time but this is more a post to prove that I haven't croaked and neither has the Soul Calibur series. I'm really digging the latest entry after being disappointed in Soul Calibur III. I'll write up more on the latest when I get the time, not sure where all my time is going and has gone. But if you really want a notion of where my review will head, it's looking to be a buy. I haven't had this much fun with a fighting game in a long while. I'm playing the 360 version so I got Yoda, who I'm not finding that great an addition to the SC universe. I tried him out but from here on out in my playing I'll be sticking to the classic and new SC additions sans people crawling out from the Star Wars universe. More to come later....

E3 08: Nintendo & Sony Press Conferences

I can sympathize with these poor chaps above, they're the core gamers and just look how excited they are. It's almost palpable. Let's dive right into the other two conferences.

Nintendo once again took the casual money making route, I can't really fault them for what's bringing in the mad cash. If I had a home and portable console that printed money, I too would do what they did. Alas, since I don't have it as good as they do, and I haven't really been a huge fan of the way games are going on their console, I found myself mostly bored and pondering exactly just how much dust I can expect my Wii to gather in the next coming months. Madworld is slated for 2009 so I can't look forward to that, I think all I have is Megaman 9 and perhaps some VC titles like Super Mario RPG.

So what did they announce? Shaun White Snowboarding kicked it off, I don't have a balance board so scratch that off, also it didn't look all that thrilling and fun. Wii Sports Resort, which also is slated for 2009, not that I'm looking forward to throwing Frisbees to a dog anyhow. It comes with Wii Motion Plus however which is supposed to make Wiimote movement in games 1:1. To be honest, some demonstrations looked 1:1 but some of them didn't. Also, thanks for further segmenting your market Nintendo, now 3rd party developers have to ask themselves if they want to utilize the Wii Speaker, the Balance Board, the Wii Zapper, the Wii Motion Plus, perhaps pull a Samba de Amigo and come with peripherals of their own. Like what the hell guys? I won't be picking up Wii Sports Resort but I'll look into the Wii Motion Plus if and when a good lightsaber game is created or the Mario and Zelda teams show something off that utilizes it in a way that excites me. I'm not a fan of Animal Crossing so the new Wii title did nothing for me, I find no pleasure in decorating a town and chopping down trees and fishing. I definitely don't want to do it with other people, I would feel terrible having dragged them into the mess with me.

On the DS front nothing exciting, another Guitar Hero game which apparently is selling like hotcakes so good for those guys. A GTA title is coming out, but I've yet to see the DS pull off a completely 3D game that I enjoyed thoroughly. Finally the man himself, Miyamoto came out and there was all this darkness and fog and smoke and everyone was thinking Kid Icarus, but no, the big unveil was Wii Music. Everyone they had out there playing and messing around with their products were all so damn cheery, so I thank them for the Diabetes. Hopefully they're cooking up a Post-E3 Wii Insulin product for me. It also ships with a new peripheral for the Balance Board, some comfy Diabetic Socks. Thanks Nintendo!

Enough about them let's move onto the next disappointment, the Sony Conference. First off, Resistance 2 looks fun, although the demo intrigued me the first couple of minutes and then watching whoever was playing mozy around a building and a bridge while just shooting bullets now and then at the Leviathan dried up that well. As sad as it is, I give them props for making the charts and bar graphs the most interesting by using LittleBigPlanet. That game could revolutionize business meetings across the globe in a few years time.

They focused on the PSP which I zoned out during, then they talked a little bit about the PS2. I think the only title I'm left wanting to play for the PS2 is Persona 4. There was some PSN discussions, they're getting TV and movies like XBL, and there's a nice looking Ratchet and Clank game coming out in August I believe for $14.99. What else? Gran Turismo TV, I guess if you own a PS3, GT5:Prologue, and are a fanatic of cars, you'll enjoy that. Then it was time for more PS3 trailers, they treated the crowd to a CGI teaser for God of War 3 which surprised nobody that the game was in development and because there wasn't any game play shown I didn't get any excitement from it. They also busted out a trailer for inFamous which looks cool, I was a big fan of the Sly Cooper games. Finally they showed off a game which I hope for now is tentatively titled Massive Action Game. I'm guessing it'll be a mix of SOCOM meets Battlefield, they showed off what I believe was a CGI trailer so once again it didn't get me all that excited.

It seems as if the Internets are praising Sony for their conference but I was really disappointed in it. Still not enough games were shown off, especially in the exclusives department. What's Jaffe up to? Where's some footage of God of War 3? What's the ICO/SotC team up to? What happened to White Knight Story? Enough CGI/game play trailers, get someone out on the stage, put a controller in their hand, and start playing something that woos me and gets me pumped for the PS3. They defended their lack of titles because they have a 10 year cycle in mind for the PS3, so they went on about how you never saw the best PS2 titles until Year 3 or Year 5 or Year 7, etc. Lastly, drop the damn price, stop keeping the price at $399.99 and just cramming more things into the box to try and entice us to nibble at that price.

I guess I'm declaring Microsoft as the E3 winner just because what exclusives they have coming out this year showed more promise than the trailers I saw for Sony's stuff. Nintendo isn't even on the radar for me at the moment. Last year was about amazing 1st and 3rd party titles all being jammed into my temples during the 4th Quarter, I think this year is going to be just as good but is all about the 3rd party games. I'm not complaining and neither should anyone else, since that's the case it should be win-win whether you own a 360 or PS3.

E3 08: Microsoft Press Conference

E3 has officially kicked off and anyone who's a gamer has their eyes aglow as companies shows off and dish out what they'll be serving for the Holiday 08 - Spring 09 schedule. Microsoft held their press conference first and I'm just going to go over what I liked and disliked about their conference. Let's start with the positives...

They brought with them what seems to be another strong lineup of games for the upcoming holiday season, as far as their first party lineup is concerned I'm most looking forward to Gears of War 2 and Banjo Kazooie: Nuts & Bolts. I want to play Fable 2 but the new footage they showed didn't reach out to me and give me shaken baby syndrome as I'd hoped it would. Their third party lineup is as strong as ever, bringing over a once thought Sony exclusive, Final Fantasy XIII as well as promising that GTAIV exclusive content and Todd Howard announcing that Fallout 3 would also get the exclusive DLC treatment. There are far too many games to list coming from third party developers that have me excited, but it's nice to see that are a few exclusive titles to the system that should also be a lot of fun. Oh yeah, and I really hope that Rock Band 2 puts Guitar Hero IV to shame. No consumer out there wants 3 or more sets of plastic drums, I say 3 as if to include Rock Revolution, but I just more or less like including them into the fold as a joke onto itself. Have you seen that 6 padded disaster of shapes? I say Harmonix should be the ones to stay, they brought Guitar Hero to the market, then they brought the rest of the band into the market. Let them control the market, they'll do no harm.

I was ecstatic not to see a motion sensing controller that had been rumored since an interview about the latest Banjo Kazooie game. I'm so glad Microsoft didn't go that route, just let Nintendo have it, let's stick by the old standby controller. It's never let us down before. Finally, I like the idea of partying up with people on Live, I think up to 8 people, and being able to play casual social games like 1 Vs. 100 and also if the Party Leader is a Netflix user the entire party can watch TV shows and movies together. That's pretty damn cool. Anyone up for MST3K'ing some god awful movies? I'm totally down.

As for disappointments I'm not all that thrilled with the new look of the dashboard and the whole Avatar thing. Once again, let Nintendo and Microsoft dabble in it. I'm wondering what's going to happen to all the Gamerpics and Themes I spent Microsoft Points on, was that all just free money I've given away now when the new dashboard update rolls around? If that's the case, awesome. I'm not going to further rant about their other endeavors into casual territory, I think Lips isn't half bad since you can play music off of your Zune or iPod, but the rest that they showcased didn't wow or have any effect on me. In the category of games that have long been M.I.A. is Alan Wake, I really wanted to hear something about this game, maybe see some new footage and get a release date even if it was in 2009. Besides Resident Evil 5 there really isn't a whole lot known about what we can expect to play in 2009. Hopefully some RE5, Dead Rising 2, and Alan Wake if they're on the up and up.

Well that's all from me for today, feel free to leave a comment, did your brain asplode when FFXIII was announced? Mine tweaked for a moment. Next year I'd like to see Hideo Kojima both announcing that MGS4 will be hitting the 360 around Holiday 09 and that him and Suda 51 are also working on a game for the console.

Beautiful Katamari Review

So I happened upon another game that could be beaten and washed away within 5-6 hours, it being Beautiful Katamari. My brief time with the game was very love/hate the whole way which is unfortunate. I'll start with the positives.

The intro/outro videos for this game are 110% pure unadulterated zany Japanese meets LSD. I loved every second of it, watching the King of All Cosmos and his wife playing tennis in space, where he does the ultimate power serve and rips a black hole in the galaxy that swallows everything up but Earth. So what's the guy to do? Send you off, the Prince, for the 3rd and final time to Earth, to once again pillage with your katamari to rebuild all the planets consumed and then finally create a Supergiant the size of which comes out at about 1,000,000 km. I also enjoyed the simplified hi-def graphics, in most of the stages it seems nice to look at but not much more, but the last two stages you'll put that simplified graphical engine to the test as you're rolling up entire countries on the Earth and then entering space to continue your rampage. The last stage was easily my favorite because of that, in 10 minutes time you go from rolling small candies and thumbtacks to rolling cars and groups of people, then onto buildings and pieces of land, then entire countries and clouds and tornadoes, until finally you've consumed Earth whole. Finally, I feel I must mention the soundtrack as a positive, you're either going to really dig the quirky Japanese tunes or loathe them. I found them amusing and they kept me rolling on into the night.

So what are the negatives? Well the game works somewhat like the first two but with a twist, that being a request system. Wherein the King will need you to meet some requirement depending on the planet you're rebuilding. For instance Mars you must raise the katamari to a temperature of 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit. While Saturn you must pick up as many circular/ring objects as you possibly can, you are also given a time limit and a particular size the katamari must be before time runs out. I didn't really care for the request portion of the gameplay. Most of the time you're worrying about just making it the right size in the time limit, but then to throw on top of that particular items in a world that's strewn with thousands of random things. It just made things more complicated than they needed to be, this game was always about the simplistic fun and pleasure of rolling up everything in sight with no regard for anything. I also found camera issues when rolling my katamari underneath objects in the game world which pissed me off as I would lose about 30 seconds trying to figure out how the hell to get out of where I was. 30 seconds might not seem like much but most of the stages have a time limit of anywhere from 3-5 minutes. As much as I loved the last stage it also pissed me off to no end, you're given 10 minutes and the first time through the stage I couldn't meet the size requirement so I failed and had to restart, the second time I made it to the part where you're rolling in space and trying to get it big enough to plug up the black hole, I thought I had the entire time to do that, turns out that the last minute you're supposed to go roll your katamari into the black hole. So once again I failed the mission and had to restart completely and start from scratch picking up thumbtacks and the like again. So the final level clocked in at half an hour because of these stupid mistakes and misunderstandings.

The other main complaint is that they charged $40 for this game and put the other $20 of the game on XBL, so there are a bunch of achievements that I can't get unless I buy the last 1/3 of the game. Worst of all is that these points you're spending don't even net you actual content off the Marketplace ,they're small 300kb unlock files that will unlock things that are already on the disc. I think that's really weak, I know they were trying to sell it for $40 so that more people would give the game a chance, but they should have just went gung-ho and charged $60 or given the entire game for $40. Right from the get go this game was going to have a very slim niche market and they knew that, so why not just grab all the cash from the fans of this stuff and screw the naysayers? They really were on some kind of drugs if they thought they were going to tap into the market of people that play Gears/Halo/CoD4. So yeah, there's 1/3 of content on the disc that I can't play unless I fork cash over and I'm not going to be doing that.

Unfortunately I went into this game expecting more Katamari greatness as I loved the PS2 ones, but I feel like this series has worn its welcome out, if this group of people could conceive these trippy visuals and the awesome idea in the first place, I really think they could have brought some new innovations to the gameplay. But because they've been milking the same old since the beginning and the gameplay being brought is much too thin for what you're paying I'm going to have to give the game a Thumbs Down. Back then paying $20 for this on the PS2 was a no-brainer, but being in the next generation, they really should have used all this new technology and thought up some new ideas to keep the game fresh for those of us who have played this twice before. If you've never played a Katamari game before you might dig it more than I did, try the demo I suppose.

Final Verdict: Thumbs Down

Goodnight, sweet Prince. May you continue rolling that katamari in the gaming heavens.

The Bourne Conspiracy Review

I pressed start, and five hours later was watching the credits roll. I usually bitch and complain about games like this, the only exception being Portal which completely kicked all sorts of ass and felt just right in length. But this is also an exception though not for the same reasons unfortunately, mostly because the game would've crumbled upon its foundation had it lasted any longer. To say that repetition sets in rather quickly would be an understatement.

The game opens with explaining how Bourne came to be floating upon the Mediterranean sea with bullets in his back, and then plays out the events of the first movie/book I assume. There may have been some leeway in there, I'm not entirely sure. There are three types of gameplay that you'll experience, the first being hand to hand fighting. It's very well done from a cinematic perspective and really has the feel from the movies fight scenes, and kudos to High Moon Studios for the cool environmental attacks that feel just right. Other than that, you can button mash the regular enemies on the Normal difficulty and you need a tad bit of skill for the bosses who require a much larger dose of ass kicking. The combat is fun for about the first 1-2 hours and then you pretty much know what to expect all the time.

The second type of gameplay is that of a 3rd person shooter, this is also fun but nothing special. I found that the aiming reticle was too sensitive and I'm a head shot maniac so I found myself running out of bullets a lot trying to achieve a head shot. I would've ran out by just shooting them anyhow, as these meat shields can take anywhere from 5-9 shots to the body before keeling over. It's fun for what it is, but there's better stuff out there. You can also use Bourne vision to see explosives that maybe your eyes looked over, or to figure out where to go next if you're lost. Yes, Bourne is a $30 million dollar Tom-Tom as well. Speaking of Bourne, why did Matt Damon not lend his voice and likeness? He publicly said because the game is too violent, I say there weren't enough 0's in his paycheck. Also in the game Bourne follows a weird code of honor, wherein he won't attack U.S. military when they're armed, yet in an interactive cutscene in which you disarm them, then it becomes perfectly okay to punch/kick them in the face and toss them over the roofside and slam their faces into stone pillars and A/C units. I suppose I'll follow that mantra as well.

Finally, a little after the halfway point there's the driving scene that you may or may not remember from the film, I don't think this driving scene follows the movie all that much. The car controls okay and if it weren't for the booming soundtrack and sirens and just general loud noises and ambience it would be rather boring. You're basically checkpointing around the city while dodging the police, which isn't that difficult. They'll turn on their sirens when they see you and then watch you zoom on by. It's only if you happen to crash into them on accident that you're screwed as this Cop Meter fills up like crazy and the cop will just sort of stall and block you. Also I touched on it earlier, the cutscenes have QTE during them, so keep your hands on the controller. It's mostly standard fare although I did find the interactive cutscenes in which Bourne had a sniper rifle rather cool, but on the other hand it would've also been just as cool to handle the sniper rifle myself but in the context of the scene the player wouldn't have been able to pull off all that Bourne did. My two favorite levels in the game would have to be escaping the U.S. Embassy and the level where The Professor attacks the house you're hanging out in. I kid you not, that's his codename, The Professor. What does he teach? Pain and misery with a side of wisdom.

So my final verdict on this game is to try the demo first, as it apparently lets you try all three gameplay types, if you happen to dig it and can see yourself getting into it for 5 hours then give it a rent. Nothing more, and if you have no interest in Bourne books or films then I'd say just skip it. I'm very torn on my final decision, I'll give the game a Thumbs Up Rental. I also though loved the movies and thus wanted to play the game. Take it all with a grain of salt dear readers.

Final Verdict: Thumbs-Up Rental

Dark Sector Review

So in this game you play as Hayden, some sort of covert operative who also happens to be a polygon pushing pretty boy, something about his face didn't sit quite right with me. It was as if someone from a WB drama series wandered into the game and decided to be the main character. Anyway, he's on a mission to stop some crazy who's hellbent on releasing a virus upon the world. Story isn't something this game has a whole lot of, and when there is some the scenes are well directed but the story isn't anything special. One nice touch however is the black and white prologue, which then is Wizard of Oz'd once Hayden is also infected with the same virus he's attempting to put an end to.

What's the virus/infection do? Well, the main bad guys Number 2 man apparently became a badass looking cyborg type straight out of Guyver. All you get is a metallic arm and control over a glaive. So the game is 3rd person action, the camera sits behind the main character ala Resident Evil 4, though I'm not sure if it was because I was sitting close but the camera seemed a little too up close and personal with the main character than I liked. I wish it would've been pulled back just a hair more. Anyway, you go from Point A to Point B killing everything in your way, which consists of about 6-7 enemy types. There's a few boss battles along the way, nothing as memorable as the many many bosses that were in Resident Evil 4. But to counteract that the glaive is a lot of fun, whether you're putting some aftertouch on the throw to make sure you nick that bad guys head clean off, or using it to harvest the elements around you such as fire, ice, and electricity.

The game also does a good job of introducing new powers at just the right intervals of time, right when you've got a hang of the latest power, a new one is usually right around the corner. Things like a shield that is in front of you for a short time deflecting anything being shot at you, stealing guns right out of the enemies hands, or picking things up off of the ground / tables with the glaive. The game definitely puts an emphasis on the glaive as it seems to get the job done much better than the weapons you're given, and unless you buy your weapons from the Merchant who lives in manholes, why I have no idea, then you can only use the enemies weapons for about 1 minute. Apparently their weapons are chipped to realize when someone is handling it and has the virus, so this chip explodes and renders the gun useless.

The graphics are nice, I found the indoor, dank, sewer type areas to be the most impressive as compared to the outdoor levels. But still that's nitpicking, overall the game looks great. The sound is also top-notch, the weapons have a nice punch to them and my only complaint would be some of the explosions don't pack the same punch. I took down a few choppers along the way and for some reason it sounded as if they had landed either in a field of pillows or a field of tempurpedic mattresses. Aside from that, no complaints.

So what sort of rating does this game get? Well, after playing one night I was 8/10 through the single player, and I didn't even log in that many hours really. There's multi-player which I haven't tried, and I highly doubt there's a huge online community playing it constantly and having fun with it all the time. I would personally stick to just the single player portion and with that I would say this game is a Thumbs Up Rental. Worth seeing and checking out for a few bucks, but nothing more. If ever there is a sequel, they should go with full blown Guyver looking dudes and have gun fights, the glaive, and on top of that have these Guyver looking dudes have all out brawls maybe in the similar vein to Zone of the Enders 2. Then also in true Guyver fashion have the badguy clutch his hands around the Guyver's little weakness sphere in his forehead. I guess I never paid enough attention to those movies to figure out why molesting that sphere in his forehead caused him great discomfort.

Summary For The Lazy: If you've played Resident Evil 4, Gears of War, all the best in this current revival in 3rd person action games, it wouldn't hurt to give Dark Sector a whirl. While it lacks that secret sauce that those two former games had, you'll still have a good time for a few days playing it, and you might as well while you wait for RE5 and GoW2. Thumbs Up Rental.


On a side note, for a silly B-movie series, the two Guyver movies had cool actors playing the main character, first there was Mark Hamill, then there was David Hayter, it's been 14 years since the 2nd movie, how much longer must we wait? Maybe it's better this way, they'd probably throw Shia LaBeouf into the role. Screw that.

Final Verdict: Thumbs-Up Rental