PS3 - Uncharted 2: Among Thieves

Uncharted 2: Among Thieves by Sony / NaughtyDog

Style: Third Person Shooter

Uncharted 2: Among Thieves is the sequel to Uncharted: Drake's Fortune. This game is similar to Lara Croft's Tomb Raiders series of games in story, but gameplay is a third person free roaming shooter. You are an Indiana Jones kind of character seeking fortune through antiquities.

Gameplay

The game is similar to Drake's Fortune, but they've done away with the timed button press maneuvering system (at least so far). Otherwise, the system is pretty much standard for a shooter. You can move through the various weapons you carry. It is a free form questing kind of system, so you can roam the levels looking for Easter Eggs. Unfortunately, there really aren't enough Easter Eggs to make wandering the levels terribly productive. So, you find yourself not really looking very hard after a while.

Story

The story is that you are seeking a treasure that could lead you to Shangri La / Shambala. So, that's where you are heading. Along the way you run into various people who help or hinder you in that process. Ultimately, everyone needs you because of your knowledge. So, you end up tagging along with everyone even if they don't want you there.

Overall

The game is reasonably long, so the Bang-to-Buck is reasonably high here. Unfortunately, I don't find this game as enthralling as the original game. The character models also don't look as good as I remember from Drake's Fortune. So, it looks like they may have cut some corners to get this one out the door.

The game is reasonably well done, but it's definitely not a must-have game. If you want to play it, buy it. But, I felt that the first Uncharted was better than this one because it was new. This one didn't really improve on Uncharted in any substantial way, so it feels like more of the same.

Score

• Sound: 8/10 (better than average)
• Graphics: 8/10 (characters could have been better)
  
• Gameplay: 8/10 (same as Drake's fortune)
  
• Story: 8/10 (good, but not perfect)
  
• Bugginess: N/A
• Controls: 9/10
  
• Bang-to-buck: 6/10 (reasonably long play value)
  
• Play Value: $15 (rent or buy, probably not a keeper)
  
• Overall: 8/10 (I expected more from this sequel)

Xbox 360 - Halo 3 ODST

Halo 3 ODST by Bungie / Microsoft

ODST stands for Orbital Drop Shock Troops (or Troopers). These troops were part of the elite guard just behind the Spartans (Master Chief from Halo 3). The ODST are deployed in other parts of the fight separately from the Spartans. Spartans are deployed to work on mission critical operations (usually alone).

Therefore, Halo 3 ODST is a side-by-side sequel to Halo 3. This means that what's going on in ODST happens at the same time as the stories from Master Chief in Halo 3.

Campaign Story

Your character is deployed as an ODST. As you progress through the game, you will play as several different characters in the game. As an ODST, your armor is not nearly as strong as a Spartan. But, it's reasonably strong and recovers fast from gun fire.

The story is told after-the-fact with your character finding artifacts that trigger flashbacks. As the flashbacks occur, you get to play as other ODST from their perspective of what happened. After the flashback is over, you're back in the present holding the object you examined that triggered the flashback.

While this storytelling technique is good for cinema (because of the fast pacing), inside a video game this storytelling technique gets jumbled and is a bit disconcerting. The pace the game plays also leads to issues with these flashbacks. Personally, if I had been designing this game I would have done it as a straight forward first person shooter without all the cinematic gimmickry. Needless to say, once you understand the perspective and the flashback system, you get used to it and understand what it is and where the story is going.

Gameplay

The game plays pretty much identically to Halo 3 with the exception that your ODST armor is far weaker than a Spartan. To make up for this, there are a reasonably generous supply of Optican health pickups on most levels. You can also regenerate your armor by ducking behind something. Although, I remember hearing long before release that there wouldn't be any shields at all, but I guess Bungie changed that idea or the rumor was incorrect. As for controls, if you're familiar with Halo 3, you'll fall right into ODST's controls.

Audio / Music

The music is serene and calming. The designers choose to use orchestral and synth mixes that are light, simple and dramatic. A lot of games like to throw heavy metal at you in charged scenes, the Halo 3 franchise has never done this.. including ODST. I wouldn't say that music is cinematic, but it works for the environments.

Packaging / Extras

The game ships with two disks. Unlike Halo 3 which contained both the multiplayer and the campaign game on one disk, Halo 3 ODST has split this up into two disks. The first disk is campaign mode. The second disk is multiplayer mode. The first disk also contains the 'firefight' mode which is effectively your character against AI monsters in a multi-player type level. You get points for each enemy you kill and you have a limited number of lives in which to do this. So, this gaming mode is primarily for high score points.

Multiplayer

I am not a big fan of multiplayer level portions of most games. ODST is no exception. So, I rarely get into this part of the game. Mostly the reason I avoid this is that I don't enjoy being constantly shot by some kid who feels the need to target one person over and over. While I understand the reasoning behind putting this game portion onto the second disk, I don't generally play or review these sections as they get boring really fast. Mostly the reason I don't review them is that they are pretty much all the same. Pick a level and then play one of several games: Capture the Flag, Bomb the Base or free-for-all kill fest (death match). Once you've played these types of levels, you've pretty much played them all. So, it's very difficult to review this in an objective way multiple times. Suffice it to say that if you enjoy this part of the game, it's here.

Overall

The game progresses in the present with your character wandering through a mostly deserted area looking for anything important and trying to get out of there. As flashbacks, you are an ODST who just dropped. So, the game plays off of the early part of the drop against the last part of the drop.

I found the game reasonably easy. Easier than I expected and easier than Halo 3. It is reasonably well done, but I think it felt a little too familiar and safe. I wish that Bungie had done something more daring with this game to give it something unique.

Overall, I was disappointed with the end result of the campaign level, However, it was close to as much fun as Halo 3. Although, there doesn't appear to be any skulls to be found in Campaign mode (at least not on the Normal hardness). I was hoping for a more unique experience. That didn't pan out. I also felt the levels seemed a bit too small overall. I liked the more expansive qualities of Halo 3's levels.

Score

• Sound: 9/10 (better than average)
• Graphics: 8.5/10 (good, but a bit too much bloom)
• Gameplay: 9/10 (like Halo 3)
• Story: 7/10 (original, but not perfect)
• Bugginess: N/A
• Controls: 9/10 (average for the Wii)
• Bang-to-buck: 7/10
• Play Value: $35 (rent it or buy it used)
• Overall: 8/10

Xbox 360 - Resident Evil 5

Resident Evil 5 by Capcom

While I really wanted to like this game, I don't. Because there are so many problems with this game, I will make this one short and sweet. I loved Resident Evil 4. RE4 is not a 10 star game, but easily a 9 and easily one of the best shooters of its time. On the other hand, Resident Evil 5 is awful. This has to be one of the WORST shooters I've played in months.

Partner

Why they ever added a partner to this game, I'll never know. However, when your partner dies, so does your game. This aspect is HIGHLY annoying. Get rid of the partner. It is not necessary and only serves as another means for your game play to end prematurely. It's hard enough to keep your own character alive without having to constantly baby another AI character at the same time. At least give the gamer the choice to or not to have the partner. BTW, for this same reason, I hated the multi-character system in Left 4 Dead.

Controls

While you're running around trying to avoid being zombie food, the game makes you to pick up health manually (press a button) and then expects you to run through a myriad of MENUS to get to the point where you can even APPLY health to your character. Stupid, stupid stupid. Who designed this game? At least PAUSE the game to allow the gamer to go through a ton of menus. Since when do people run through a series of menus to drink (or spray?) anything in Real Life?

Note, you can assign health to a 'hot key', but by the time you're in the thick of the game, you can't easily do this. Remember, the menu system is real-time. So, if you pause for even couple seconds to run through the menus, the zombies are on top of you. You simply do not have time to do this. Worse, there are only about 3 health pickups on the level with the 100 zombies.

At least with ammo, your character will reload IF you attempt to fire your gun, your gun has run out and you have ammo in inventory.

The menu system is horrible. Absolutely rotten. Why is it even there? You're trying to play the game, but the game forces you to stop what you are doing, fumble through a series of menus to get to your health spray and then to apply it. Inevitably, you end up giving it to your partner or something else stupid before it does as you want. Worse, if you're in a menu and a zombie grabs you, it takes you OUT of the menu so they can maul you. It's not like this is the first time a shooter has ever offered health pickups as part of the game. So, what was the point of burying the health down about 3 levels of menus? Either apply the health immediately when you pick it up or pause the game so you can fumble through the menus to get to it. Keeping the game live while trying to fumble through a series of menus is completely assinine design.

Frustration

This game is so completely frustrating, backward and stupid, I don't know what to say other than don't waste your money. Unless you actually like being frustrated constantly, this is not the game for you. There are so many better shooters (F.E.A.R. 2 Project Origin) out there, don't bother spending $60 for this.

Capcom Take Note

Whomever you hired to make this game, you need to find someone else. The gaming system presented in this game is completely worthless. You needed to take it back to the drawing board and start over. Note to other developers, if you want a game to NOT model your shooter after.. this game is it.

Inconsistent Franchise

Clearly, Resident Evil 4 is an abnormality in the RE series. It took a completely different approach at gaming than any other RE games. Prior to RE4, the RE games had static camera placement with lots of sequence style button pressing to get you through the level (think of Umbrella Chronicles, which is newer than RE4). I never liked the static camera games.

Resident Evil 5 tries to make nice between the old school RE games and RE4. So, it appears the designers tried to compromise by combining both old and new styles of play together into RE5. Unfortunately, it doesn't work. Instead of being solve-a-mystery game with a play style that forces the gamer to actually think strategically to get through each level within RE4, Resident Evil 5 is a straightforward run-in-with-gunz-a-blazin' game. No strategy, no thinking involved. It's just you against the zombies and no way to stop and think about it. In fact, they don't want you to stop and think about it. Think of Dead Rising and you get the idea.

If there was ever a franchise of games that can't keep things together, Resident Evil is it. With each new game, the designers seem compelled to reinvent the wheel. Instead of actually improving upon an existing wheel, like Resident Evil 4, they recreate it. For this reason alone, this franchise needs desperate help. Considering the last Resident Evil movie, it shouldn't surprise me at all with this game.

Overall

This game is horrible. The design of it is not anything like Resident Evil 4. So don't even think of it in the same way. Resident Evil 5 forces you to use an AI partner that you constantly have to baby, who takes ammo away from you and who is constantly in your way as you walk. Then, combine that silliness with a menu system that is completely frustrating. All of these issues compound to make this game problematic right from the start. I could tell that without even getting into the first level.

Once you actually get into the game and start killing zombies, it's not fun and it's not satisfying. It takes at least 4 bullets to kill each zombie (even with head shots) and there are hundreds that you need to kill with about 4 clips you find around the level. In other words, there is not enough ammo. So, all you end up doing is running around the level trying to avoid being killed. There is nothing challenging, fun or exciting in this. Once the zombie boss appears that has the huge swing axe, all you can do is run. Neither bullets nor the knife will kill this thing.

This game is basically the complete opposite of Resident Evil 4. Capcom completely botched this game into an extremely poor quality shooter that doesn't even deserve the name Resident Evil.

Score:

• Sound: 3/10 (average)
• Graphics: 8/10 (looks reasonably good and textures are well done)
• Gameplay: 2/10 (horrible game play)
• Story: 5/10 (average)
• Controls: 1/10 (even though the button placement is ok, the menu system is torturous when combined with the gameplay)
• Bang-to-buck: 0/10 (I don't even want to play it through once)
• Play Value: $5 (buy it on clearance or rent)
• Overall: 3/10 (and I'm being generous)
  

This is easily a contender for Gamezelot's 2009 worst game of the year award.

Xbox 360 - Gears of War 2

Gears of War 2

This sequel to Gears of War and third person shooter has a reasonable amount of gore and violence along with some language. It is recommended for 17 year olds and above. If you are a parent, you may want to view the gameplay in the store prior to purchasing for your child. The gore can be turned off from the Options menu, but is turned on by default.

About

Gears of War and Gear's of War 2 are both about an army named the 'Gears' who work for 'COG' as the infantry against the enemy known as the Locusts (your typical humanoid enemy about the same size and shape as a human). Effectively, the game has a similar story feel as Halo. This time, the Gears must save Jacinto (and other cities) from being ravaged by the Locusts.

Audio

The primary game voiceover is done very well. That said, that's primarily thanks to John Di Maggio (who sounds just like Keifer Sutherland) doing the voiceover for the player character, Marcus. Thanks to the deep gruff voice, it works quite well to carry this character in this game. I think that's why I quickly liked the Marcus character.

Gameplay

The gameplay is pretty much the same as Gears of War with a few new things thrown in. However, that said, Gears of War 2 is a straightforward linear third person shooter. Don't expect much in the way of side quests or additional roaming options. But, that's the same as it was in the first Gears game.

The gameplay could use work in places. Some missions are exceedingly easy to get through with no enemies. Other levels are chock full of them and/or quite difficult (see complaints below). The sniper rifle works great when it works. The problem I have with this rifle is that the game specifically moves the enemy out of the way right before the shot hits. This doesn't happen all of the time, but it does happen often enough that it's not a coincidence. The game knows what you're aiming at and intentionally moves them out of the way milliseconds before the shot would hit properly. This makes working with the sniper rifle very frustrating. It's not as if ammo is scarce, but it is a problem because of the time it takes to reload the rifle.

Graphics

The graphics, as expected, are quite well done. Not looking quite as nice as some recent PS3 games, but still very good. The graphics do get slow in places (so you can tell they're pushing the processor limits of the 360). The game, however, doesn't falter even with the slow downs.

Achievements

The Xbox 360 achievements seem reasonably easy to obtain throughout the game. You simply have to get through the missions to get them. There are also other in-game achievements that you can obtain (like Half-Life used) that may not count toward Xbox 360 gamer score.

Complaints

My major complaints with this game entail the levels themselves. On some levels, the Gears help you defeat the enemies. On other levels, you're the only one actually killing anything (even though other Gears are there). For example, you are tasked to defend the communication arrays against the flying Reavers. You're told to use the turret gun. That's fine.. except there are two guns and another gear there. Yet, you're the only one shooting down Reavers. Worse, by the time you even see the Reaver in the air, they've already shot off missles. So, it's next to impossible to complete this level.

And right there's my second complaint. Some levels are childlike easy, other levels are near impossible... and these levels can easily be side-by-side. Did anyone actually play test this game at all? This makes the gameplay frustrating, time consuming and problematic... and it also reduces this game's overall score.

Overall

It's a straightforward third person shooter. It's very similar to the original game, but with a different story behind it. The Gears are as tough as ever and the weapons are strewn throughout the level in such a way as to never run out of weapons or ammo. This is not realistic, but it works in this game context.

There are some very very frustrating levels that are not challenging in the gaming sense, but are very frustrating. You end up having to game the game (if you know what I mean) just to get through the level. The levels are haphazard and randomly laid out (for the most part). I prefer the walking gun levels over the puzzle-ish levels using vehicles or special weapons.

Score

• Sound: 9/10 (excellent voiceovers)
• Graphics: 8.5/10 (great, but not perfect)
• Bugginess: ?/10 (not rated yet)
• Controls: 9.5/10 (no issues and responds well)
• Bang-To-Buck: 1/10 (Once through, won't play 1 player again, maybe multiplayer)
• Overall: 7.5/10 (Resonably well done, but typical for a shooter)

Note, games without side quests automatically get knocked off points simply because it forces the game to be linear. Too bad they didn't add a theater mode for taking in-game photos. Second Note, I don't rate multiplayer aspects because nearly all multiplayer games end up the same (running around on a multilevel course shooting each other for points).

Xbox 360 - Viking: Battle for Asgard Review

Viking: Battle for Asgard by Sega

Viking is, simply, a third person shooter (minus the guns, add blades/swords). The idea is that enemy 'Legion' have taken over Asgard by Hel. Freya commands your character to battle to win back Asgard.

Gameplay

For a third person shooter, the gameplay is okay, but not great, until you get to the final battle. Then it sucks royally. Basically, on the lesser levels your character, Skarin, has to free troops that have been captured by the legion and add them to your number to win several smaller 'castle' battles. There are three islands and each island has 'boss castle' levels that you must complete before you can reach Hel. The smaller battles, unfortunately, are nothing like Hel's battle at the end.

With the smaller battles, the rules are to take out the 'shaman' who spawn more soldiers. Once you take out the shaman, the legion can't add more forces. So, they eventually concede once you call your shaman to the pillars. Then, your shaman calls an end to the battle.

The rules are simple. There are 5 swords (or something) stuck into the ground around each shaman. First, eliminate the swords, then that allows you to eliminate the shaman. Of course, there are tons of legion soldiers trying to hammer on you as you do this.

Eliminating the shaman (usually three per castle and then maybe another two or three in a bit farther) isn't the easiest task, but it's easier than Hel's battle. Once you eliminate a shaman, you receive a dragon rune. These runes can be used to call the dragons to hit strategic targets (such as the shaman). The problem is, you only get 3 total runes per level and it uses 2 runes to eliminate a shaman.

Player movement

Skarin is slow. And by slow, I mean S L O W. You can't outrun anything. All of the legion soldiers are faster than you. Worse, there's no way to get speed potions or anything to aid in this aspect.

Skarin also has combos. The combos work great in open spaces. Unfortunately, they don't work well in small confined spaces (especially where there are ledges or fire). If your combo happens to lead you off of a cliff ledge or into fire, the AI isn't smart enough to stop you. It just lets Skarin fall or catch on fire. This is extremely annoying. Worse, Skarin must complete the entire combo move before you have control of him again. There's no way to abort a combo once it has started.

Skarin also has no way to target any specific enemy. If you happen to be pointing in the general direction and it's the only enemy there, you'll hit them. If there are three or four enemies in the path, then it randomly picks a target. This is ok, when the enemy is legion, but it completely sucks when you're trying to eliminate one of the shaman swords because the game ALWAYS locks onto a legion soldier over a sword. This can lead to lots of Skarin death/restarts.

Skarin's Deaths

Once Skarin dies, you are taken back to the beginning of a checkpoint somewhere. The problem is, the system doesn't alert you to where the checkpoints are. So, you have no idea where you'll end up when Skarin dies. Sometimes it's only a few steps from where you were. However, most times, you have to traipse over half the level before you get back to where you where. It's just very random and extremely annoying.

Alternatively, when you quit and then start up again, you start up in your 'home city' rather than at the last thing you were doing.

System Map

While there is a map, this map is almost completely useless. The map doesn't show any topography that makes sense. So, when you look at the map, you can't make heads of tails of what's high and what's low. The only point to the map is when you use Leystones to do quick travel. Effectively, there are also two maps (but the underlying map itself is the same). When you press the back button, you get to a map that lets you find out what tasks need to be done. When you reach a leystone and activate it, you get the same map with more limited information (i.e., only other leystone destinations).

I don't fully understand this concept. If you have a map, use the same map for both of these purposes (i.e., show all destinations on both maps). I find myself getting out of the leystone map just to find out where the closest leystone to my next destination. Then, go back into the leystone map just to travel. This is completely inefficient and time wasting.

Couple this with the huge medallions that cover over crucial parts of the map at inopportune times, and it's easy to get lost.

Hel's Final Battle

The final battle is, to say the least, annoying and almost impossible to beat. Just like the shaman, you have to eliminate the swords in the ground. The difference is, tons of legion troops are appearing constantly and hammering on you. On top of that, Hel has set up firewalls between each of the 5 swords in the ground (sort of like a pie). So, even after you eliminate a sword, you still have to hang around in the firewalled section until one of the walls drops (which can take minutes). So, instead of the walls being linked to the elimination of the sword, it's linked to some kind of random timer. Thus, you stand around fighting and losing health in the firewalled section for minutes waiting for one of the walls to drop. The walls go up and down sporadically without any kind of regularity.

Worse, the enemy legion can walk through the fire. Although, it does damage to them, they can walk through it. If Skarin (your character) gets close to the fire, it does damage and blocks your path (can you say unfair?). If Skarin could walk through the fire and take the damage, it would at least let you get through the level easier. Because the firewalls have no regularity, you can't even time when to go into the next area. Sometimes the walls go down for only a second or two. Other times, they go down for 10-15 seconds.

So, all the while you're patiently waiting for the walls to drop to move to the next area, you're getting hammered on by the legion. And they continually take more and more and more health away without any way to restore health. The sole purpose of them is to hammer down on your health as much as possible. So, while the 'castle boss' levels were hard, they were not impossible. Unfortunately, there is no trick to the final Hel level to conserve your health. They just hammer and hammer and hammer. Their AI also appears to be adaptive. So, if you choose a new tactic (like using the blocking move), they also use a new tactic to hammer you down and they never stop.

There was even a point where I had destroyed all 5 of the swords, but the game didn't progress to the next segment with Hel. So, it's also obviously very buggy. There is NOTHING more frustrating than playing through an entire game and when you do the things you're supposed to do on the final boss level, it doesn't work.

Camera

I don't often discuss the camera in 3D games because most times they work well. In the case of the final battle, the camera is all over the place. This makes the ending level far harder than it should be. Sometimes the camera ducks through the walls and you can't see what you're doing. So, you have to spend time moving Skarin around just to see what you're doing (and, at the same time, getting sucked down on health). Other times, the camera is not pointing where it should be. Sega needs to work out a better arrangement for the camera. Like, for example, making objects transparent when the camera goes behind it and blocks the view.

Soundtrack

The one thing I have to commend Sega on is the choice in music soundtrack. While it's symphonic, it does work to set the mood properly and the scores are quite well done. It definitely sets the mood properly. It's too bad the game itself wasn't regal enough to live up to the soundtrack.

Overall

This game tries to be a mini-RPG, but fails miserably. It ultimately ends up as a mediocre third person shooter. The fighting controls are cumbersome to use overall, the controls are slow to react and often react to the wrong thing or in the wrong direction. Coupling this with the buggy behavior at the end, I can't recommend the purchase of this game. I really wanted to see a better game from Sega than Viking, but unfortunately it isn't to be. Save your money and buy Oblivion or Fallout 3 or Fallout: New Vegas which are all better than Viking. While Oblivion may be buggy in some places, it doesn't seem to bug out at critical moments.

Score:

• Gameplay: 5/10
• Soundtrack: 9/10
• Bang for the Buck: 3/10
  
• Replay: 1/10 (not worth a replay)
• Overall: 4.0/10 (skip it unless you're really bored)