Opening Thoughts:

As far as PlayStation 3 goes I’ve been having some trouble finding games that I actual find fun and exclusive. I often go for Xbox 360 games when it is multi-platform solely because most of the people I know are on the 360 and no one I know uses a PS3. But that awkward period between my PS3 and myself seemed to pass when I purchased Infamous.The game has you take control of Cole McGrath a bike messenger boy who seemed to have been given quite an explosive package to deliver. Horrible puns aside the game follows a pretty standard path of an open world video game.

Gameplay:

There are scattered missions throughout the world that you can choose to do; from escort missions to time attack across roofs. What makes the game dynamic are karma missions. There are 15 karma missions that have you take a bad side or a good side. Once the mission is done it locks the opposite mission forcing you to be entirely good or entirely bad in order to lock all of Cole’s power upgrades. There are also things you can do to further your virtuous or vice side. Reviving people who have been attacked by gangs or sucking them dry once they are incapacitated is almost seamlessly placed into the game, though after a while it sometimes feel as if you are going out of your way to do it. With the title being Infamous it can be implied that actually becoming infamous would be easy and that is essence is correct. There are far too many ways to become a bad guy while the only real way to become a Hero outside the game is reviving people. Destruction of cars. people, and simple and catastrophic idea that pops into your head will push that little meter down a wee bit more each time. Though with that being said, some of the neutral things you do advance your good karma once it has hit a certain point. Cleaning up the city of Empire City aside the obligatory missions move the story along. Exploration of the world is good if not lacking in a few departments. You have your collectibles in blast shards and dead drops but the feeling of collecting all the blast shards seems a bit over whelming and more time consuming than its worth. Dead Drops are satellites that are easily located with a radar like sensor on the map that points out the nearest one, though obtaining them makes for a little challenge here and there. There are some powers that making getting around Empire City much less of a hassle and feels more fun than a chore, which in the beginning of the game felt like it would drag on forever.

Story:

Now to be honest it was difficult for me to invest into the story at first. I was given my standard gruff voiced protagonist who had choices to make. It wasn’t until around the second half of the game does it truly get good and it is definitely worth the wait. The ending of the game is a clear view for a sequel. Cole delivered the bomb that gave him super powers, now everyone wants said bomb to potentially give everyone else powers. It is a used plot but it fits well into this game because it is shown in a new way so it feels fresh. Cole is a one man army bent on getting everyone he cares for out of the hell city while helping or harming those he come across. With such crucial decisions it can make one feel like they truly have control over the fate of the city.

Combat:

The combat (in all its super powered lightning glory) is a little bit in the lacking department. You have you standard lightning strike but then you advance those moves as the story progresses with lightning bombs and lightning sniping. The melee combat was almost never used and some of the good side powers were simply either too boring to use or simply too destructive to use due to the collateral damage it caused, once again pushing your karma further down. Being Infamous though causes a wide variety of destructive abilities to be at the players finger tips, though as the game goes on enemies don’t know when to stay down and on harder difficulties it can mean death to not clean up that one enemy who should, by all means of logic, be snuffed out. Boss battles are few, I think I recall fighting one or two bosses that didn’t become a standard enemy.

Characters:

Incidentally there are very few characters that are in this game. Trish, the disgruntled girlfriend who seems to be a real pain in the arse at every turn simply because the explosion that gave you your powers killed her sister, QQ. Zeke, who in my opinion is one of the best characters in the game, is the best friend and conspiracy theorist. Moya, your employer who promises safe exit out of the quarantined Empire City for finding her husband John. The bad guys are few as well, with Kessler being the main antagonist, gangs, and a former employee of Kessler named Sasha.

Overall:

Overall this game is a good pick up even if you aren’t a fan of the open world. If you don’t mind a few bugs here and an unusually medium sized world to explore than this game is something that could be fun. Feeling like Cole is fantastic and charring your enemies even if sometimes it can become a little excessive lets you fulfill the lightning powered dreams you’ve always had.
Gameplay: 8.5
Story: 8
Presentation: 9
Replay Value: 10
Overall: 9

In case you haven’t found out on your own, a teaser trailer for Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 was released. Plenty of people have already submitted their analyses of the trailer, so I won’t bother with whatever crap I may think it involves. I leave it for you to interpret the video as you wish.

Here is the link to the trailer online on the main site:

http://modernwarfare2.infinityward.com/

Here are some forums and videos of pretty detailed opinions for the trailer:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EQ1qSQBzPjA

http://www.bingegamer.net/2009/a-comprehensive-look-at-the-call-of-duty-modern-warfare-2-teaser/

I can’t wait for the new MW to come out - 11/10/09!

According to a new study people that play violent video games are 58% better at detecting contrast differences. They studyed people that played 50 hours of Call of Duty 2 to people that played Sims 2. The sims players do not have experince the improved vision.

the entire article can be read at slashdot

In an effort to keep Japanese tourist from scoring a cheap PS3 (Koren PS3 cost $321 where the Japanese  PS3  cost $416) Sony has stop PS3 shipments to South Korea. Sony is afraid the “reverse-importing” would only get worse as the Japanese Yen gains more value.

read the entire article here at slashgear

These two titles are now some of the most well known games, in today’s modern video game era. The demand for Rhythm based video games has sky rocketed since Harmonix released the first Guitar Hero. Now over three years later, Activision and Neversoft now own Guitar Hero, while Harmonix has moved on and created the Rock Band series. Alright im done with the background information, time to compare and contrast.

I will start with Guitar Hero : World Tour -

This game is easily the most popular of the two video games, mainly because of the reputation that Harmonix created with Guitar Hero’s 1 and 2. This is now the fourth installment (not counting expansions) of Guitar Hero, and Neversoft / Activisions second Guitar Hero game. Guitar hero, has added a new difficulty called beginner mode, which all you have to do is strum the strum bar. They’ve modified the game play to have added on single notes to a sustain note (held note) and also added a touch sensitive slider to their guitar for certain parts of a song that may be tricky. Possibly the biggest and most talked about aspect of the game, is you, the player’s ability to create your own song within the game.

Pros - I will give this game credit for creativeness. The idea for the create a song is very nice, the create a character feature is very in depth and allows you to create a character that actually looks like you or make a character that wont look like a bunch of other peoples characters online. The create a guitar feature is out of this world, goes so much farther into the creation than I thought it would, from the body shape, to the wood type of the guitar, to the headstock, the inlays, the pickups, the strings, even the knobs! Guitar hero managed to get a bunch of epic songs on their setlist including, the two Ozzy classics, Crazy Train and Mr. Crowley, Van Halen’s Hot For Teacher, Joe Satriani’s Satch Boogie, and Michael Jackson’s Beat It (and a couple of extra songs that I thought were epic but thats just me haha).

Cons - Unfortunately creativeness cannot successfully make the entire game. Although the create-a-song feature is very new and a great idea, Guitar Hero failed to make it so that creating a song, won’t just be a bunch of 14 year olds shredding out impossible solos and then putting it on the net to see if anyone can play it. In order to create a song, you must have great knowledge of music before starting, such as scales, pitches, tempos and such. Then you have to know what you want to play, and then you have to play it and record it perfectly, which is very hard to do, due to the slight lag. Even if you manage to make your masterpiece and make it sound like an awesome song, no matter what, because there is only one amount of pressure you can put into strumming and hammering on/pulling off, your song WILL sound like a ringtone.

Although guitar hero had some great songs into the game, they also included a LOT of boring ones. Sure this is all opinionated by me, a metal head that can play the shit out of this game, but the setlist was not very evened out between difficulty, and there was very little music variety. For the hard songs in the game, due to the setup of the game and how it is played out, the game makes the songs themselves harder, the star power paths last forever making it harder to get star power, I can barely tell when I am missing, it is very hard to tell your multiplier because of the setup and color scheme they chose. The heaviest song in this game is Scream Aim Fire by Bullet For My Valentine, I love bullet, but they are not that heavy. To me the set list was either hit or miss, no real in between for me, I never caught myself saying “Hmm that song was ok” it was either “FUCK YEAH” or “what the fuck was that?!” Their “Tour Mode” is merely the linear mode that this game has been doing since Guitar Hero 1 where you simply go from town to town and play 4 or 5 songs around the same difficulty or similarity, I beat this in 4-5 hours.

After I beat tour mode, there really was not much to do, making songs is feeble, there’s nothing interesting that happens with online play except go on and beat n00bs. This game also has terrible animations with the characters, there is little or no movement or emotion by any of them while playing some of the hardest songs and its quite apparent that Guitar Hero continues to go with this fantasy rock star animation, where your character plays at some really bizarre shows and just ridiculous occurrences when you play an encore. The drums are not as entirely quiet as they were claimed to be. Because of the unusual positioning of the cymbals, certain drum beats feel very awkward. In order to activate star power you must hit both the orange and yellow cymbals, which is kind of stupid if you ask me. The singing is basically the same as any other vocal based part of a rhythm game, except they use a terrible font for reading the lyrics of the song. It is also pretty much impossible to 100% a song on vocals, even if you don’t miss a vocal phrase. It feels as if Neversoft, and Activision were aiming to copy Rock Band 1, instead of improve on it.

If you like softer easier songs, playing with family, or completely trying to live in a fantasy guitar world, then I highly recommend Guitar Hero : World Tour to you.

Now for Rock Band 2:

The employees at Harmonix never cease to amaze. Although Rock Band isn’t as popular as guitar hero (a very good reason would be, because either people don’t like the guitar peripheral of rock band, or it is viewed as you have to get all 4 peripherals and spend a lot of money to fully enjoy this game, which is not true (but it does help)). Harmonix has taken all sorts of consumer reviews, requests and so on to make the improvements to Rock Band 1, and create Rock Band 2.

Pros:

Rock Band 2 has improved in pretty much every aspect of this game. They have added breakneck speed, no fail mode, and stage mode which were truly needed for this game. This game is playable for everyone, from beginners who need to play on easy, for people who generally just enjoy playing songs, or, the hardcore ridiculously good rockers who play to get the best scores and master songs (me). The variety of genres is truly incredible, from grindcore, to pop-rock, from country (dlc) to classic rock, etc. The variety of difficulty is great as well, there are such easy songs as My Own Worst Enemy, and Eye Of The Tiger, and then there is the ridiculously hard songs such as Battery, Panic Attack and Painkiller.

The graphics look stellar, you can feel the emotion of the characters when playing, and you feel as if your at an actual concert, there are venues that do look like actual venues and not fantasy (however if you enjoy less realism then this is a con). Online battle of the bands mode is great, and will pretty much always give someone something to do. Tour mode feels like a tour where you go around playing setlists in different towns earning fans and money and hiring people to help you with the tour and having to make pre-concert decisions etc. Now included is a drum trainer to help people become better at drums faster, which in my opinion is the hardest peripheral. There are now over 500 songs available to play in rock band 2 and the number is growing. The drums are bar-none the better of the two sets.

No drum beat is too awkward to play, and you can go and buy expansion cymbals that when you plug them in, during drum fills, they play as cymbals instead of toms. These cymbals are also optional, you don’t have to buy them, and if you do buy them, while your playing you can still just use the pads while playing if a part seems a little too hard to try and use them. Vocals haven’t changed much since the first one, although it is much easier to sing “talky” songs, you can say pretty much whatever you like during these parts and you will 100% it.

Cons

The new guitar still is not quite as good as guitar hero’s guitar, it feels nicer but still kind of has an awkward feel to it, there are no clicks and unless you are making sure it is not elevated at all, it will activate overdrive without you wanting it to. The leaderboards and other aspects in the game are still flawed like they were in the first one, such as high scores and such. If you play solo player and get a high score but play with two players, get an ok score, but that score was higher than when you were single player, it will count the two players score as your high score, instead of only using that score when you are using two players. There should be a ranking system in my opinion for online play, for people like me who basically gold star every song, and have a lot of downloadable content, so we don’t go online and find someone who plays on medium with no downloadable content.

If you enjoy rhythm games at all, I highly recommend Rock Band 2 to you.

Final Verdict : Rock Band 2 > Guitar Hero : World Tour , Plain and Simple. Guitar Hero will probably get boring after a month, if that. Rock Band, I am still finding stuff to do, making friends online, and having fun.

This would be our first ever, substance filler video post, a quick summation last few days, and what is to come. Took me hoooours to figure out the easy way to do this, and where and blah blah blah, if any of you have seen my facebook, you can see I am unhappy with flash videos. (Notice the time of this post)

Started at 1:13PM on February 21st, 2009, by Cakes, RDoom, and two other members of my hall at Lehigh University. We have been planning this was weeks, and have finally got it underway. All on expert of course, they have past the first 2 songs. Now we fear that come towards the last few teirs of songs we might run into a few problems, so we have planned subs, a bass pedal player, and ample room to quickly switch off. I find it funny that one of our writes (no posts yet) B. vicious conquered this beast by himself sort of on whim, just stocked up on soda and snacks to munch on between songs.

Fable II (RPG)

Genre: RPG, Adventure

After over 4 years of painful and fidgety waiting, the sequel to the highly popular Fable has arrived. Developed by Lionhead Studios, this action RPG game sports much of the same features as the first, along with some of its own original content.

(Image from: thatvideogameblog.com)

Story: (5/10) As a nameless hero, you are destined to rise as a Hero and save the world of Albion. The storyline takes place about a thousand years after the original Fable. You can choose between a boy or girl to start off (a great new addition) in order to embark on your quest. The main storyline is nothing special. A king wants to wipe out the world and start a new one. You have to stop him (yawn). The story is awfully short. If you run at top speed through it, you can walk away in about 3 hours. But the fun comes from the multitude of side quests available throughout the game. These help make the game worthwhile, and easily multiply the playing time. You can get lost exploring the game’s vast free-roaming world, from the coast to caves, tombs and forests, which is 10x the size of the first Fable.

Graphics: (8/10) The graphics are similar to the original to the first Fable in art design but with the power and scope of the 360. Your character and the environment is pretty detailed.

Audio: (8/10)The music is similar to the first Fable in its old world style. The game sounds are fairly good. Yet the true glory comes the game’s infinite amount of verbal audio from the NPCs. All dialogue is spoken and is hilarious to hear their British accents.

Gameplay: (8/10) Those who have played the original Fable should be fairly familiar with the controls. The basic action buttons are easy and fun. A is action, X is to use your melee weapon (great for button mashing), Y is to use your ranged weapon (either crossbows or guns – a great addition to the game), B is to use magic. The new magic system no longer has a mana bar, as so many other games feature. Fable II has a 5 tier system of magic attacks. Simply charge the magic attack you wish to use by holding B and release. You can use any magic as often as you wish as long as you have the time against bands of enemies. The fighting is rewarding, and makes up much of the fun in the game. The camera is also completely controllable.

On the flipside, the game feels a little unpolished. There is a small issue with loading times. There are also certain aspects of the game (at least for my game) that feel really slow and laggy. Often when you perform an action like, say, try to open a door or explore the start menu, it often takes a couples seconds to work. Its kinda like working on a crappy computer.

Overall: (7/10)The game behaves mostly like a light RPG, though not quite as in depth as some like ES: Oblivion. Despite this and small polishing issues, this is an entertaining and overall amazing game.

Replay ability: (9/10) Probably the greatest feature to Fable is its ability of choice. You can mutate into a red devil-like monster through being evil or a halo-crowned shining saint through good deeds. You can be whomever you wish. So, the question is, “Who will you become?”

(Image from: ultimategamerspodcast.co.uk)

Now most people think this is completely fake. But after reading the article it actually makes alot of sense. And after countless hours of CoD5, this makes alot of sense, everyone has been being veeeerrrry testy. Alright time for the actual details haha.

A Taiwanese study - backed by British researchers - has found that playing too many video games can (can) contribute to a a rise in stress levels and feelings of anxiety in “young people”.

The report found that many games cause a “fight or flight” reaction in the player’s mind, which can often trick the brain into releasing adrenaline into the body. Because that’s what the body needs to either fight or take flight.

Problem being that when playing games, the body doesn’t do either of those things. It just sits there. And if the adrenaline is released into the body and stays there - which it will if you don’t fight/run it out - it can contribute to an adrenaline “overload”, which in turn can lead to neurological issues like anxiety disorders.

It doesn’t mean this happens to all gamers. Nor that the effects - which are similar to that of a drug addict - mean you’re all a bunch of worthless drug addicts. They’re just sayin’, is all. Be careful.

Source

Yup, if you know what Harmonix is the devoloper for, you know what this means. Snoop Dogg is coming Rock Band. Now I am all for new music types, but I am thinking techrock, metalcore, and some cool House vs Hurricane…..not rap…..and ganster rap at that…but oh well.

Harmonix and their flagship rhythm game Rock Band are continuing to branch out to areas that we didn’t even think possible. When country was first announced for the game, which revolves around rock music, it sent some hardcore fans up in arms. Now, Harmonix is going past the banjo and tambourine into a house of hard beats and explicit lyrics with one of the legends of the genre, Snoop Dogg.

Yes, you read that correctly; Harmonix and Snoop Dogg have reached an agreement to release Snoop’s upcoming album onto Rock Band for download. While this may irritate some of the original Rock Band enthusiasts, it’s a step in the right direction in regard to opening the “band genre” into broadened horizons. Let’s face it, Harmonix revolutionized music games completely when the original Rock Band released a couple of years ago, so who are we to judge their decision to span the franchise further than just the rock genre, despite its name?

Source