lost in games

I’ve been playing Battlefield: Bad Company for the past week or so as it has been a game that i really wanted to try last year but missed the boat. Unfortunately, the single player campaign is extremely disappointing.

I can not get used to the controls and specifically the aiming part. It reminds me of the problems i have with FPS games on the PS3 where due to the sensitivity of the analog stick i find myself constantly making minor changes to aim properly. Bungie, Infinity Ward and so many others have shown us that this is not longer an issue on 360 FPS games.

Then it’s the destructability of objects which is good and bad. Good, because you never feel safe behind a wall or inside a building. Bad, because there is no consistency. You can bomb the hell out of a building but certain parts of it simply do not get destroyed. It loses it’s realistic feel and it’s even more noticeable than if there was no destruction at all.

Also, what is it with this healing system? You can heal yourself with an injection which basically has a meter showing you when you can do it again. It only takes a few seconds to recharge and this means that i am constantly injecting myself. I mean all the time! It feels so ridiculous. Why not simply use a recharging health instead??

Finally, you are in a squad of 4. Actually of 1 soldier (myself) and 3 guys who are just hanging around you shouting all the time. Their AI is horrible with some Naked Gun moments where they are shooting at enemies a meter away with nothing happening. Also one of them is supposed to be the demolitions expert and carries around a rocket launcher. But he never uses it! NEVER! If there is a tank or an armoured vehicle that needs to be taken out I am supposed to go find a RPG and take it out yourself.

As far as the story is concerned it is really irrelevant although i actually like the characters. But it’s a pretty shallow affair overall.

It’s a very boring FPS in fact. I am just going through the motions of finishing. Learn from my mistakes. Stay away!

I don’t know how i missed the launch of this expansion pack for FIFA 09 but it was released on Thursday, 19 March 2009. After reading a short article on this in the Guardian i downloaded it on Saturday.

This is an incredibly ambitious add on from EA and it shows. The EA servers have basically crashed and haven’t be able to do a proper session apart from Sunday morning.

I will be writing a few things about this one so be prepared for regular posts.

Once again it’s Brainy Gamer Vintage Game Club and this time we are playing Chrono Trigger. I started playing it on the DS today. After 1 hour of play i like that it does not have the random battles of Dragon Quest which became quite tiring after a certain point. Also enjoying the story but it’s still early days. More to come soon.

Artoon is a game which can be tried and bought on Xbox Live under the community games section. The game is basically a platformer where you take control of Art (a bouncing ball) and guide it through to the finishing block. But as in most good games, here it’s the journey that counts.

I first unlocked all the levels by doing the bare minimum requested. Now i am going through each level to achieve the grade A+  because it’s here that i get the full enjoyment of the game.You get multipliers for not jumping on the same block twice and also by making the “style bounce”. When you try and do these the game experience changes dramatically and for the best.

There are also some variations to the way the game plays. For example certain levels require you to have the camera at a certain angle so that there is no static interference making it impossible to see where Art is bouncing.

Then it’s the fantastic beat music. It helps you get the proper rythm like crowds clapping to long jump athletes just before that big jump.I feel that the music is part of  the gameplay.

To cap it off this is really a cheap game. At 400MS points (US$5) you really need to buy it or at least give the trial version a go.

Trailer

Gameplay Trailer

There is a small room in my heart reserved for point-n-click adventures. While i don’t consider the genre to be one of my favourite at this time in my life, i had great memories when i was a teenager playing games like Future Wars and Monkey Island. After my disappointment with A Vampyre Story due to it’s incredibly annoying puzzles i stumbled upon Samorost.

Samorost is a flash based point-n-click adventure developed by Amanita-Design from the Czech Republic. The first thing you notice is of course is the art work. It has that Eastern European feel to it that reminds me of the cartoons CyBC used to broadcast when i was a kid and hated them at the time. All i wanted to watch was Animaniacs and Duck Tales.

Now this approach to art really appealed to me and gave the game a go. Samorost is free and you can also play Chapter 1 of Samorost 2. Chapter 2 of Samorost 2 costs USD4.99 to download and is definitely worth playing. I like the way you basically not only control the main character’s actions but also influence the environment to solve puzzles. For example, very early on in Samorost you fix the cables of a sort of lift line, usually found in slopes for skiers so that your character can use it. But the interaction is between the player and the environment and not the character. Makes you feel like a god trying to help this little guy and creating a fatherly form of relationship between yourself and the character.

There is some pixel hunting involved in certain puzzles but overall it does a great job in showing you discreetly what it is you need to do next i.e. the puzzles make sense. Not only that, but you don’t need to do any of the boring or frustrating parts usually found in games. An example of this is when you enter a screen and there is a two floor environment linked with a ladder. On the second floor an enemy is obstructing your way and so you go to the 1st floor to create a diversion. When the enemy starts climbing the ladder down to the 1st floor your character will go back the way he came to the 2nd floor on his own. Like i said they have done a great job of giving the character some independence from the player and in a good way.

I liked Samorost and Amanita-Design have a new game coming up called Machinarium. The art design is again fantastic.

Evening plan.

Lie on couch with a cup of traditional afternoon tea (blimey), with my DS and play Pic Pic.

21:25 - Just placed the hot cup of tea on a white mat from Mykonos.
21:26 - Inserted Demon Days by Gorillaz into the cd player. Volume at -60db.
21:31 - I switch on the DS and choose the Drawing puzzles. Previously left off at drawing puzzle no. 19 (out of a total of 400).  Kids for Guns (track 3) now playing.

21:43 - Done with Drawing 19. It’s a bee!
21:52 - I am almost done with my cup, and just finished drawing 20 - Brushing teeth. Slow progress today. Drawings are getting bigger, more colourful and brighter.
22:00 - Drawing 21 seems to be a red/black fish. A Rossoneri fish?
22:04 - Switch on the TV to have the Man Utd - Wigan game on mute. It’s already 1-0. Let’s hope it was a Ronaldo goal, my fantasy league captain. Checking flashscore now.
22:05 - Damn. Rooney….Fantasy league site gives Ronaldo the assist. Nice!
22:08 - Back to my Rossoneri fish.
22:15 - I messed up the connections. I can’t finish the drawing as it is and have to undo some of the work to figure  out what i did wrong.
22:17 - Got it! Rossoneri fish completed.
22:18 - The tea is now just a memory as the Fire Coming out Of The Monkey’s Head lyrics enter my ears.
22:22 - Ronaldo is limping after suffering a hard tackle. I hope it’s one of his theatrics.
22:25 - Wedding and Crocodile drawings completed as Tevez misses an Adebayor opportunity to score.
22:30 - I finish the Cow (drawing 23) and take a break to check google reader. Still 1-0 and Ronaldo is just fine. Typical.
22:35 - Google reader - Game unveils online rental service . Interesting….
22:40 - Back to Pic Pic and drawing 24.
22:47 - Half time at Old Trafford while i am still at 24…. Plan going better than expected.
23:30 - Finally finished drawing 25, “boxing”. Connections reached a maximum of 18. The puzzles are getting trickier. Time to call it a night. Still 1-0.

Don’t know what Pic Pic is? Check eurogamer’s perfect 10 review

I really wanted to love this game. I really did. When i played the demo for the first time a few weeks ago, i thought it was one of the most exciting and fresh gaming experiences i had in a long time. My vote of confidence had been cast and i bought it on launch and did not wait for the inevitable January/February price drop.

This was also the case for the first 2-3 chapters of the game. Free flowing was my middle name. Only a few times did i have to redo my runs and jumps more than 2-3 times. It was frustrating as it was mostly a result of trial and error and not of any fault of my own. But the enjoyment of the game’s core gameplay was still strong enough to carry it. Free running in first person mode is really inspirational. But setting up the game’s core mechanics means nothing after a while if there isn’t a solid game to support it.

Unfortunately this is where Mirror’s Edge fails me. When you are trying to figure out how to get from one place to the next it’s bad enough that you have to try and die a few times to find the right way to do it. But later on, without spoiling anything, there are certain situations where enemies storm in and you have to find a way out while they are chasing you. So you don’t have the time to find the correct escape route and avoiding their gunfire. What happens is that you will do the scene 7-8 times figuring out the way piece by piece until you finally escape. By the time you do this whole process correctly, you just can’t care less whether you free flowed or not. You just want to get it over with.

After this, the game introduces situations where combat is inevitable. While it explicitly tells you in the beginning that you should avoid it and run, it deliberately sets it up so that you can’t. You have to fight either with your fists or with a gun. But why? The most fundamental principle of Mirror’s Edge is that the heroine is a runner. She is not a soldier. If you are looking to play the game without shooting at anyone then you will be frustrated until you find the perfect way to put the enemies, one by one, out of action with kicks and punches.

The Edge reviewer, which i did not want to believe, sums it best for me,

” ‬Is it a Portal-style puzzler or a breathless steeplechase‭; ‬an Orwellian parable or freeform Olympics‭? ‬Unable to decide until it’s left the springboard,‭ ‬it tries to be all of them but manages none.‭”

Fantastic premise, visuals and mechanics. But it’s too many stops and starts to feel like a game.

• A magical 2nd half, together with some flawless offside decision making, was all i needed in a mostly non-gaming Sunday. Even though Arsenal’s target this season should only be to qualify for next year’s Champions League, it’s feels so good to beat Chelsea in their home ground. Arsene, enjoy this win and stop whining all the time to the 4th official and move on with building a title contending squad at last.

• Finished reading Criminal: Lawless (Vol: 2), a crime graphic novel. I like these guys (Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips). Very enjoyable series. I recommend it.

• Left 4 Dead is a fantastic multiplayer experience even in split screen. Played it on Saturday and the game constantly surprises and overwhelms you (in a good way). Each enemy type is oozing with personality. For example the first time i encountered a Hunter was fatal….Now every time i hear a girl crying i keep the hell away. And don’t get me started on the Tank….Brilliant game. I believed that the game was ideally suited for playing only with friends and not random people on Live but i read this beautifully written post on Graffiti Gamer that changed my mind.

• I am currently in Chapter 5 (a total of eight) in Mirror’s Edge and have two things to say. First of all, it’s a really short game. I mean it’s a game where the story can be finished in a weekend at most. Of course you can replay it at harder difficulty levels and also do the time trials but for a Euro 60-70 game i consider it a very short game. The second thing is that although innovative it is flawed in the way the developers want you to play it. I will have more on that in a later post.

• After going through a few DS titles to make a decision, i decided to start playing Square Enix’s The World Ends With You. Beautiful art! The combat needs some getting used to as you are fighting with two characters. One is in the touch screen and controlled via the stylus while the second is on the top screen and controlled using the d-pad. It needs some getting used to. Again i will write a few comments on the game later on as it’s very interesting.

It’s the sweet smell of Friday and not just that of my morning Jacobs that has dragged me from my bed to the laptop keyboard. As my mind and heart calculate with joy (think Scrooge McDuck but with games!) the games schedule for the weekend  i will spare a thought (and a blog post) for EA DICE Mirror’s Edge which is released today.

The demo (available on PSN and XBL Marketplace) has completely won me over. It had me at my first run, jump and climb. So here are a few links and posts on the game that i hope will help you decide to give this fresh IP a chance this holiday season.

The first link/post is an excerpt from Stephen Totilo’s MTV Multiplayer blog. The full blog post here.

“…..imagine an action game in which you don’t kill. Imagine it not for morality’s sake but for originality’s sake. Imagine finishing “Fable II” without causing a death. Imagine “Mass Effect” minus killing. Imagine mastering the existing, but hard, option to finish most “Metal Gear Solid” games without a kill. And imagine if any company ever made a James Bond game that allowed you to suavely avoid tallying a body count.

Last night, at least for a time, I controlled a character who, in my hands had no need to kill. Lacking a need to kill, my heroine began to feel like a heroine who had no desire and no willingness to kill. That made her feel special among gaming action heroes. That made her feel unique. And that made the first time she did pick up a gun and pull the trigger feel so very different, a violent rupture of a more believable state of mind.

Imagine that.”

The second link is from Gamasutra which features a roundup of the title’s critical reception. It quotes reviewers, hopefully communicating to you the thrill that is Mirror’s Edge. link

The final and third link is a link to a flash game. It’s not any flash game mind you. Indie Flash game developer Brad Borne is teaming up with Electronics Arts to deliver a free, Flash-based version of Mirror’s Edge in 2D. The single level beta demo of Mirror’s Edge 2D here and it’s looking damn good!

I finished Fable 2 on Sunday and i will be writing a few things about the game. Although i really enjoyed playing more than 30 hours of this game and i will probably play a few more hours too, there is something that i found particularly disappointing. But i will write about this sometime in the future. Soon i hope.

Also making progress on God of War: Chains of Olympus (PSP). It’s a good game but i am getting tired of QTEs and GoW is full of them. I find the gameplay to be too much button mashing and the controls on the PSP don’t help. Especially the thumb stick. I love the game’s score (soundtrack) though.

I also started playing LittleBigPlanet on the PS3 and it’s fantastic. The game has met my expectactions BUT (1) The game is a truly multiplayer experience. Single player is only for unlocking stuff and levels. The fun gap between playing alone and with friends is huge (2) The damn servers are down most of the time and cannot play the user levels and there is also considerable lag to play online. They need to fix this as that’s what the game is all about. I will also write more about LBP in the future.

Stay tuned.