gameartsomething

metalgearsomething4

2008-07-12T01:40:00.004-04:00

so yes, anyone that knows me should have a good grasp on how much i love the series Metal Gear Solid. So anything i write about it, will most definitely be biases towards it. But i cant help it, it just so happens to be my favorite story.

So the entire reason i picked up my PS3 in the first place was for this game. It was supposed to be a near launch title, but was inevitably pushed back a few times since hideo is batshit crazy anal about his work. but even though i about died from anticipation of the damned game, it was more than worth the wait.

metal gear got me into cinematic gameplay, where youre moreso playing a specific role in a story, or as another reviewer put it "Hideo has his own little world and you just so happen to be passing through for the moment" The cutscenes in mgs4 ranged from medium to ohmygod long in length, but they all hit once crucial point: i was never bored watching them. The action scenes were on par with CGI from recent films (at teh end of act 3, Erik John and myself had a hard time believing some of the scenes were real time, or even rendered at all) and the script, though a bit heavy for alot of people, was full of twists and mysteries until the very, very end.

Yahtzee brought up the fact that alot of Hideo's dialog is reitterated throughout the game and entire series, and is in dire need of an editor, but alot of this is nescessary to reinforce some ideas that he is trying to put into our heads, or to give hints to others things. There is a small clue you figure out at the end of the game that once you play through again, you find that hideo was shoving it in your face the entire time.

metal gear was never known for its gunplay, especially because you couldnt move and manually aim at the same time in the older series. they made some series leaps and bounds in the latest iteration, mostly with the OTS vew for the shooting, with an option to move into first person and walk around while staying in that view. there is still an autoaim option, which the japanese are accustomed to, but i have had no problems racking up headshots, especially online, with teh OTS crosshairs. and the guns, all 70some of the, just feel right.

in all honesty, i could go on for hours about how much i enjoyed this game, or how amazed i was when they released a fucking encyclopedia, FOR FREE, on all the information ever collected in the MG and MGS series. but this is truely a game that you have to experience. if you didnt care for the older ones, there really is nothing new here to catch your attention unless you feel like looking at some pretty graphics. but if you were in love with any of the old ones, be sure to play this.

bringin' it back!

2008-05-28T04:58:00.002-04:00

So ive been meaning to keep up with this, trust me i have! everyone else has been terribly busy and, well, ive been playing GTAIV while simultaneously pissing myself in anticipation of MGS4. I plan on posting here more often again. Just not right now.

Gears of War 2 Lancer concepts

2008-05-18T02:25:00.003-04:00

So i am obviously a turncoat ever since i got my 360, because ive ben addicted to Gears of War. Plus my ps3 doesnt seem like its going to last much longer so i try to save its life for MGS4.

Not too long ago, CtrlAltDel released a webcomic about how gears could possibly improve the already amazing lancer, which incase you didnt know, is a gun with a chainsaw on it.

discussions in my classes have often led to the sweet things we could attach to the lancer. The original idea was some kind of bear, but after running the numbers, i found it to be completely impossible. Not because its too big for Marcus to carry, because thats just not true. its just too awesome to ever exist.

Our next idea was a kitten, here is my shitty artistic ability depicting what the new Cat-lancer would look like:

as you can see, the cat would probably be either A: asleep or B: dead from gunfire (from others or the lancer it's attached to) on the downtike. But once in battle, a simple tug of the tail would put it into attack mode. After some serious playtesting, it has been found that this weapon would be completely unbalanced. In the original Gears, if you got shot while revving your chainsaw, you would put it down, making you vulnerable. With the cat-lander, the wielder can actually be killed but the cat will still be in attack mode, and on multiplae occasions it broke free of the lancer and ran after the closest person and gave them some pretty nasty scratches.

Also some players were cheesing rather than playing the game.

The next concept is that the player has to actually upgrade the lancer from more primitive types of weapons to the chainsaw, such as a bonesaw and axe.

No one knew how to hold this.

Setup Mark I and II

2008-02-24T12:27:00.006-05:00

This is the second setup for my games that ive had. i dont have a picture of my first, because digital cameras either didnt exist, or we couldnt use one because we didnt have a computer yet. Basically it was a black and white TV that needed an RF adapter to play NES all the way up till i first got my ps2. I got the TV when i was 3. Doved "Mark I" since i cant come up with anything catchy and original.

This post is in memorial of my second setup, which is, as of around 5:00pm tonight, completely replaced.

19" TV
$50 "gaming speakers" (its what the box said)

The speakers had no treble to them at all, and the sub woofer was way to powerful for its own good. When i played socom, all i heard were the explosions and slight crackles when someone shot a gun. Not to mention i couldnt see who was firing at me either on the enormous screen.

Got this about 2 months after my first ps2, TV lasted until November, Speakers died last April or somewhere around there.

R.I.P.

Elevators.

2008-01-28T03:20:00.000-05:00

I seemed to have forgotten about this site for the past two weeks. Please blame Mass Effect.

It only took a week to beat, a total of 10 hours of (recorded) gameplay. I say this because there were far too many times that i was KIA then forced to redo a battle. But not just the battle, also the walk TO the battle, and the elevator ride there.

Oh elevators.

Now i understand why the elevators are there. They remove any loading screens, because 360 doesnt come standard with a hard drive, so the dev's have to program around that. So bioware tricks people into thinking the game is streaming by throwing in 20425 elevators. i wouldnt mind one or two a level, but when youre racing to get from point A to point C, and the only way to get there is take an elevator from A to B, then from B to C, that breaks the action. It took me out of the game.

on top of all of this, there are still loading screens! there are still texture pop ins! The game is beautiful, dont get me wrong, but the low res textures that can be on characters for upwards of 30 seconds is distracting as hell. Uncharted was on a much greater level graphics wise, and it had texture pop ins once an hour, if that, and they were almost immediately fixed.

another point is the framerate. as soon as the action starts, you drop to sometimes 5-10 fps. That is terrible for a console game, but even worse for a platform exclusive. i have yet to see a port run this badly.

technical issues aside though, Mass Effect has a crazy deep story and tons of shit to do. I played at my leisure but didnt deviate from the main quest more than twice and i was done inside of 10 hours, which is a damn good length considering how much else is in the game. The story gets a bit predictable at times, but its nothing terrible. The best part is how interactive it is based on your decisions.

The level up system is tight, and the fact that weapon upgrades are transferable fucking rules.

got a 360. play mass effect. it will make you hate elevators.

Erik's the medic of the team...

2008-01-26T17:47:00.001-05:00

...but OH MY GOD, over 12K healing and 40 points on WELL (CTF).

A front-line medic and base-medic. Basically, if you go too far from base, I scram....

Vroom... Vroom... VVRRROOOOMMM-Crash!

2008-01-26T17:23:00.000-05:00

There is my attempt to type in the sound of effects for Burnout Paradise for the Playstation 3.

First, let me remind you that I am a real prick about multi-platform games on my PS3. But, because it's a racing game, it haven't let me done for a second... except when I try to do a hairpin drift and end up catching a bus instead. Anyhoo, it's a racing game that no racing, or destruction fans shouldn't miss.

Oh, let's start with the bad stuff about Paradise. The song selection. Half of the game consist of tracks from previous Burnout games. The other half... Pop and old rock. First pop that comes to mind. "Girlfriend" by Avril Lavinge. And the only played "Paradise City" by Guns N' Roses...
The song is STUCK in my head. Even Rambo can't get it out with his brutal, throat-ripping, stomach-slashing, and arrow-slinging kills.

Onto the good stuff. The game is very, very... long... to achieve 100%. The free-roam world of Paradise City, broken up to eight main locations on one huge map. Over 200 intersections, and each intersection is a different type of event. Whether race, stunt runs, or road rage, you do not have a reason to do nothing productive.

Even if you don't want to do races, stunt runs, or road rages... The city itself is littered with hundred of shortcuts, smashes, billboards, drive-thrus, jump ramps, and that's all I can remember... There is always something to do, there is always a reason for you to destroy, smash, an wreck everything in the city.

Gameplay is very solid. Great controls for high speed arcade racing action, and the most amazing addition for the series is the Freeburn Online, and there's little no options to set-up and you can be online with just two pushes of the right-directional button, literally, and while in-game anywhere. Jump online, set-up races, destroy each other, outdo each other, and drive hard.
100% Power Parking, by the way, in three attempts this morning.

The game is great overall for racing and destructive fans. No in-game loadings, no slow-downs, the game runs amazingly around a constant 60 FPS, no matter how much action going on. The main thing of the game, crashes, are godlike. Every scratches, bumps, dents, holes, and head-on damages is registered on every vehicle. Criterion's custom deformation really bring crashing to a whole new level.

Well, that's about it from me. Only thing that I wish it had is comparing records between friends, though there are leaderboards. Maybe I haven't found it yet, but... Who cares? I'm havin' a blast jumping all around town in a Mobster Car.

Get it, try it. Just play it and shut up.

Poor Rockstar

2008-01-01T21:29:00.000-05:00

Now some people give these guys shit because they do soem stuff for shock factor, but lately its been blown out of proportion, the best example being the fact that Manhunt 2 was banne din UK and given AO here, so it had to be edited. But i saw the unedited bits of it, and it wasnt any worse than the original.

i got an email a few days back from Take Two Interactive, the guys who own all the of R* places. They lost a lawsuit saying that they have to replace any copies of GTA San Andreas that were purchased before the day they reissued the game with teh patch for the Hot Coffee mod. This can be done by simply getting a replacement disc, or if you have a reciept, you can actually get $35 and a new disc of you say you were offended by the fact that tehre was a potential to unlock the Hot Coffee mod if you modded your ps2 and then did some other fancy stuff to it. Im sorry, but its complete ass that they have to pay out cash for something like this. obviously not many people still have the reciept for thiers (excluding me, i keep all of mine. nerd.) but its jsut the fact that the ruling is to pay people that much money for something they A. dont have easy access to and B. probably didnt hear about until way after it happened.

now i have a scratched launch day copy of GTA SA. I will be taking advantage of getting a free disc out of this becuase i love the game, but i wont be saying i have a reciept because its bullshit for R* to pay me money for something like this.

In my opinion, of course.

Nin-Ten-Doh.. Dee-Es!

2007-12-29T15:14:00.000-05:00

After hours of playing classic PSOne games on the PSP, my sister decided that she wanted the DS. What for, I asked? She wanted to play "Cooking Mama", a mindless and repetitive games where you do simple motion with the pen to cook stuff.

I wouldn't mind another hand-held system and would give me more games to waste more money on like Mario or Zelda. But no... She wanted "Cooking Mama".

Ok, so I wake up to play some Call of Duty 4 Online, then here come the little twat and she blocked my view to get my attention. It was time to go buy the darn DS. She received some Best Buy gift cards from my mom as a christmas gifts, given to the fact that she only got one shirt for the season. Ok, so we head down to Best Buy. It's December 26th, either the return line is going to be packed or all the video games would be all gone. She slapped me for trying to "jinx" it. Little did she know, I already have "jinxed" it. The aisle was completely stripped from all the games, consoles, and whatnot. So I tell her to ask. She doesn't want to. It's her frickin' DS, she wanted it, why not go ask? Oh well, so I asked. I asked this blonde associate and she pointed me to the PSP. Ok... So I walked out of there.

My little twat's face was sad and I hate to see someone sad. Ruins my mood to shoot people online. So we tried Toys-R-Us. Drive all the way back to the store and there's a big accident between some minivan and shopping carts. Nothing really big, but it was inconvenient and all the other moms, yelling and trying to make they're way into the store for their bratty ankle-biters. So, we head in. First thing to hit you in the face is pink Barbie and Ken dolls. Pink, pink, pink everything thing was pink. Oh, by the way, Best Buy did have a DS, but it was pink. Sister hated pink. It's her worst enemy or something. Ok so we head in to the game section. I normally would drool, but I grew out of it. 5 year olds, 6 year olds, and 12 year olds, fighting over the same damn Pokemon game. The games were old, like 2 years old. Lots of Wiis and DS games, but unfortunately, no DS itself. Only Pink DS. What the hell.. Just get the damn DS already...

Ok, round two was a failure. She looked horrible and still holding the $150 gift cards. Last stop, GameStop. Drive all the way back to Best Buy because GameStop was right across from it. Stupid driving, have to pay for stupid gas and now we're goin' to a stupid place with lots of stupid people. I drove to GameStop, then I see a parking spot. Then it because an epic battle between me and this jeep. What the hell?! I saw that spot first. The jeep zoomed into the space and walked away happily into GameStop. So I had to settle for the spot next to the jeep. I could key his car right there, or let his dog out. But, we had to go into the GameStop first. The place was packed with little kids, the same ones from Best Buy. No new PS3 games, except for UT3, which looked tempting. But no.. Gotta focus. The place didn't have a DS, only pink ones. I was about to flip out. What's the damn difference? It plays the same games!

Ok that was it, so I thought. Then my mom called and told us about a GameStop near our house. Great. Now we have to go there. I just wanted to go home and shoot people. We get there, parking was horrible, and the walk was far from my car to the store. The same thing, packed with little kids and old people wanting Guitar Hero. But fortunately, they had two DS left, one black and one pink. Awesome! Picked that up and now... Oh wait, we have to buy a game. Cooking Mama. So there we are, looking and taking up all the space of the DS aisle, looking for Cooking Mama. I saw Zelda, Mario, and some games that looked cool on the cover, but no.. Have to buy the Cooking Mama. No Cooking Mama... but there was a Cooking Mama 2. Why not? Ok so she's happy as hell. Me, sad as hell because I had to pay for it and it's not even mine. 200 clams out of the bank.

We get home and she rips open the box and starts playing immediately. Me, now 200 clamless, is shooting people. But then I figured, since I spent 200, those gift cards should be mine now. So she gave me the gift cards and now I have 150 Best Buy money to spend whenever I come across a game. Next time we go to Carino's and decide to stop by Best Buy, I will be ready.

Oh, and the game looks ok. She won't drop the DS, but who cares... Peace and quiet for me now.

Happy Holidays and Cheers! Hope the Giants win today! They'll probably lose since I said that.. But who the hell cares..

and Epic of Money Wasted

2007-12-28T01:12:00.001-05:00

So i finally did it. after going to Gamestop and getting almost 3x what i was figuring i would for Skate, FNR3, NHL2K7 and Resistance, i had enough cash for a 360.

im still a sony fanboy, so i didnt give mr gates the satisfaction of getting $480 or whatever the elite costs. I went with the arcade which was about $300 after tax.

so i went home and set it up. ( i was in no rush to do so, i did this maybe an hour after i got home)

First i found out it didnt come witht eh HD cables. Luckily Pat lent me some components for the ps3 that have a 360 connection on them. so i used those. Ill be damned if a 360 is taking my ps3's HDMI slot on my tv.

It took about 30 mins to get it up and runnin, the majority of the time was retrieving the gamertag i made for Gears on PC. My ps3 took like 3 minutes to set up an account.

Then i got to try the plethora of stupid minigames that came with the console. Uno? Fuck off. Pac Man? Sure its HD, but its fucking pac man, and there isnt even an arcade mode! Boom Boom Rocket is pretty sweet I must admit. Its liek Guitar Hero with fireworks and techo-classical music

so i paid $300 to play Uno in 720p with the computer.

Also, after recieving the wrong guitar in the mail for Rock Band (they sent me a 360 one even tho i sent back a ps3 one and the invoice confirmed that) i called tech support to find out they were so sorry that i could keep the 360 guitar AND theyd send me a ps3 one right away, 4-6 days shipping. Those things go for $90 online. I guess i can just say its the xbox apologizin gfor sucking so its paying back for itself. THat $90 will just go towards a HDD for the 360 anyways, its $100 for a fucking 20gig, and like $180 for a 120 gig. what price gouging asshats.

Holiday Gaming

2007-12-25T22:35:00.000-05:00

So it's not even 2 weeks into the x-mas break and im already neck deep in gaming.

Sold Assassin's Creed, managed to get $30 at Gamestop

Bought CoD4 for PS3 with that cash (multiplayer level 48, 24hrs into it)

Bought new songs for Rock Band, which im sure some of you will be glad to know.
-Buddy Holly - Weezer
-My Iron Lung - Radiohead
-3's and 7's - Queens of the Stone Age
-Little Sister - Queens of the Stone Age
-Sick Sick Sick - Queens of the Stone Age
-...And Justice for All - Metallica
I have been workin gon my drum ranks as well, fell to 3rd on maps, but i hold 2nd on Mississippi Queen. Most other i hold 3rd, beat by the same 2 people. my overall is somehow 17th, i need another 500,000K points to take the top ten spot.
In other rock band news, Pedal #2 is broken after 3 days of use. Ive sent for the next one and it will be reinforced with metal brackets. The guitar is still on its way, and Activision refuses to let Harmonix patch RB unless they pay for the use of thier inferior technology

Bought Operation Omega Dawn for Warhawk. I am not too pleased with the way they changed Capture the flag, you cannot get points for rescuing the flag anymore. They did put a neat little system in its place that eliminates pot-shots at the flag. the longer the flag is held by an enemy, the longer it takes to respawn at base. i think they also eliminated teh flag marker on the minimap when an enemy has the flag, which makes capping a bit easier, enemies actually have to look for you now.

The big (and shocking) news of this happens to be this: I plan on picking up a 360 tomorrow. It is still not my system of choice, and i know it will break on me. I am more or less getting it to have it, to play some games with friends who are 360 only owners,and for the few exclusives such as Dead Rising that i want to play/beat. I still plan on picking up multiplatform games on the PS3, since i actually know more people with them that i play online with.

Call of what? Call who? What's it called?

2007-12-20T19:50:00.000-05:00

It's frickin' Call of Duty, that's what! Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare!

I remember my first time playing the Call of Duty series. Call of Duty 2. The nice, exciting, amazingly hard WWII shooter that pits you in close quarters shooting with ridiculous AI that makes you pull every strand of hair from your eye brows. Ahh.. the good ole' WWII games. Call of Duty 3, never played that. Heard it was about pretty much the same as the Call of Duty 2, but with vehicles. Bleh...

Now, here's a big difference in the fourth game (supposedly the fourth installment..right?) The game leaves the overly battered WWII setting and jumps into modern combat, hence the name "Call of Duty 4: Modern Combat". Now, instead of MP40, Kar98k, and stick grenades, it's replaced with AK47s, G3, frag grenades and RPGs. The weapons have all been modernized (except for the MP44, CoD4 decided to keep that as an unlockable weapon in the multiplayer section.) There's the lovable tactical air-strike, helicopter, and ever useful UAV that spots all enemy blips on your radar (I quite still remember that from my Commander experience in Battlefield 2) Lots and lots of gadgets to play with. The best is where you partake in an AC130 Tactical Strike Plane (or whatever it's called) and blow things up from the sky. Lovely...

Call of Duty 4 is a multiplayer's game with a memorable single-player experience. I enjoyed the single-player section. But it's very, very short in comparison to the previous installments. I literally completed it in one sitting for 5 to 6 hours. That was a record for me. I rarely sit for more than 1-2 hours, but given to the amazing firefights and awesome explosions, I sat the whole way through. Granted, I was playing on Regular to get the feel, but after cranking up the difficulty, I can barely get pass the second level. Oh well. To add replayability, the game is scattered with 30 intel laptops. Finding all those laptops grants you special effects and cheats, like playing in old time Ragdoll with fast-piano playing in the background, everything is sped up and you run around like an complete moron with unlimited M203 shots... I challenge you to play through the game like that.

But as for multiplayer, oh I don't know where to start. Before that though, I had a real issue with this game. It's available on the PC, X360, and PS3. I typically am a real prick on purchasing multiplatform games for consoles, especially shooters and when they're also on PC. I wanted to get it for PC originally because PC+FPS=Precision Gameplay. But due to my puny laptop, I probably cannot run it at the pace and speed of the console. So, I made the idiot choice of buying both version, PC and PS3. I could run it on my laptop, but very barely. Though, my aiming was awesome. Ps3, not so much. The game runs amazingly great with constant frame rates, though I can't help to feel that every option on the PS3 is not at it's max. No matter. The controllers takes time to get used to, but once you get hte hang of it, it's plays perfectly and a bit more realistically, I might say. Unfortunately, I can't sporadically twitch my screen and do a 180 in under a second, so I focus more on whats ahead. So, I'm waiting to play the PC version somewhere in the far future when I get a new rig. The console would have to do and I bare no complaint.

The multiplayer aspect of the game is very deep. A lot of unlockables, including weapons, camos, and perks. Perks gives you advantages to how you play. The most hated perk, Martyrdom, where when you kill your opponent, they drop a live grenade, right on the spot. It's very unfortunately for me because I tend to run towards my opponents' weapons, but by the time I get there, I get blown to bits. Another unique feature is the killing streaks. Kill 3 in the a row, you get to call the UAV for 30 seconds. UAV uncovers the enemy on the radar. Kill 5, and you get to call in an air-strike. Choose carefully where though, because it can become very ineffective if you select the wrong spot and bomb your own teammate. Kill 7 and you get to call in the almighty chopper. A helicopter flys in and kills enemies on site. It's very annoying to try to obtain objectives with a chopper up your ass. So, just shoot it down. You can actually shoot the chopper down and it makes a great distraction. Run up to an unsuspecting enemy who trying you shoot your chopper with an UZI and knife in the back! There are many modes of mulitplayer, though you'd have to unlock them. My favorite is Domination as of now. Kittens, the other poster on this blog, have only gotten the game for 3 days an already he's level 35 and about 13 hours into it. What a monster. I'm still struggling to getting used to the controllers.

Anyhoo, CoD4:MW is a excellent game and hope it comes with future content like new weapons and perks. Steelers' game is on, I'm gunna watch them lose. G'night!

What? Over 9000!?

2007-12-10T03:27:00.001-05:00

...rawr bitch.

Ask Madden

2007-12-08T14:04:00.000-05:00

The Rising Sun

2007-12-06T22:49:00.001-05:00

Rock Band takes the stage

2007-12-02T23:04:00.000-05:00

So we finally got our copy of rock band. We supposedly "got lucky" since all of the instruments work (at least im assuming, the mic wasnt tested out too well and its sitting in portage) but from my experience so far, theyre fine unless you treat them like shit.

The RB guitar is quite a change. Im 2 songs from completing the expert solo tour, and theres only one word that comes to mind: fun. I found it hard to not smile while playing the last 2 sets of songs, because it wasnt frustrating, there wasnt endless scales of notes littering the on-screen fretboard, and for the most part, the songs were all great. I have some different opinions about a few when it comes to drums, like the Coheed and Cambria song, but the guitar is just straight up fun to play. The best so far, tho, has been Flirtin' With Disaster. I was giggling during the solo.

The mic is nothing new if youre familiar with SingStar or other karaoke games, buts its still fun as hell when youve got a group of people. Erik leaning over sing "We're off to never-never land!" And the laughter that follows is awesome. There's a bit of a jump from med-high difficulty on this instrument, but im sure with a better mic and practice we can all take the step from medium to hard.

The drums are what i was waiting for. I have since turned my attention to drumming as of late, and i wanted to try these things out. They dont disappoint, i found that out damn quick. Everything in this game has an equal amount of challenge, assuming of course you have past experience in what youre playing. Me on expert for Vaseline was probably like Morton playing Orange Crush on easy. Its tough to get good at it, but its fun at any difficulty.

The Band World Tour is amazing. Despite having to decide what songs to play over and over again in the beginning, you really end up attached to your band and your setlist. The biggest heartache is watching a band mate fail for the third time, just before a song end and not being able to make it the rest of the way. The song fails and you lose 10,000 fans, and you feel heartbroken. RB does an amazing job of making you feel like youre in the band, which is exactly what GH lacked.

The customization is nuts. Theres only a handfull of faces, and makes 3 times that many hairstyles, but the clothes and accessories are outrageous. everything from tattoos to guitar can be customized with "stickers" to make that perfect Flying V. The chest on my character says "Pancake" in a bold pink font.

Overall, i think this is what GH should have matured into. GH is fun, but ive lost the interest i once had. This freshens thigns up with s few new things that GH left out even in the new one (customization) fixes some old things (trades insane note scales for better timing) and is an all around more solid experience (leaderboards are very easy to read and access and tehre are alot of different ways to get ranked). Rock Band has stolen my heart. Now i jsut need to finish my finals before i play too much again

Obsessions of Mindless Minigames...

2007-12-01T14:32:00.000-05:00

I have a confession to make... I am literally obsessed with mini-games. Seriously, the only way to take my money away, besides the usual bat to my face and knocking me out then taking my wallet, just make mini-games. They don't have to be good, just enough to spark my curiousity then the whole domino effect will soon follow. Here's a list of games that I totally handed my money over on PSN:

Tekken 5: I loved the PSP version. So I thought it would be great to play on the big screen! Tekken 5, as most of you know, is one of the best 3D fighting series.
Price Tag: $20 + $10 Online Expansion

Flow: I heard this game was suppose to put your mind in a LSD and Ecstacy state of mind. Flow is simple creature like things and you move your controller to guide it towards it food.
Price Tag: $8

Super Rub-A-Dub: Sony's first demostration of the Cell Processor. Super Rub-A-Dub is a water labyrinth where you guide the duckies with your controller to find other duckies and saving them.
Price Tag: $5

Super Stardust HD: The most gorgeous looking Asteriod-like game ever, especially on HDTV. Shoot tons and tons of rocks, asteriods and other junk. My favorite minigame of all times.
Price Tag: $10

Warhawk: This multiplayer only game is a huge action-pack game that you play as either the Eucadians or Chernovan. Huge maps, lots of vehicles and weapons, and lots and lots of flying into cliffsides.
Price Tag: $60 (I bought it through a store, but it's also distributed over PSN at $40.)

Everyday Shooter: The musical version of Asteriod-like game. Each thing you kill makes a guitar riff. Shoot many and you make a song. Hardest game ever.
Price Tag: $10

And my latest addition, PAIN: Pain, I thought at first, looks stupid because you just fling people with a giant slingshot. Few minutes into the game, PAIN is awesome and hilarious because its a game where you fling people with a giant slingshot. Good laughs.
Price Tag: $10 + $2 for more characters.

Also, I spent 5 dollars for a Classic PSOne game, Crash Bandicoot, because he kicks ass.

So, thats approximately $140 is forked over because of mini-games. I could've bought new shoes with that. But shoes aren't going to entertain me... Minigames will!

Uncharted Territories for "Uncharted"?

2007-11-27T08:42:00.000-05:00

Well, I guess my name is Cricket now. Didn't know it would be posted at the bottom of each blog. But anyhoo, that's not the case here. The point of measly blog is to review one of the much anticipated game recently released for the PS3.

Naughty Dog's Uncharted: Drake's Fortune is frickin' awesome. End of story, there's your review.

Ok, so that wasn't constructed enough for some one you blokes so here's another on.

Uncharted: Drake's Forture is a third person shooter, modern jungle setting, treasure hunting with this old guy and a hot dame, pirate-ass kickin' game. Here's a breakdown inspired by many reviews and now simplified for the common minds like myself and myself only.

The game is graphically gorgeous, with insane amounts of detail like our main character, Drake, brushing off bushes and leaves as he breeze pass. He insisted on spurting out lines, both ridiculously obvious and helpful, and he gets wet. Don't take me the wrong way here, but he does get wet whenever submerged and held into the water, like in real life! He consistently pants as if he has asthma and the list goes on. Enough about Drake, looks talk environments. Again, the huge amount of details for an environment is mind boggling. Real-time shadows, one of the most beautiful water render seen, and it is all completely gorgeous. Because of the amazing amount of detail, it's also results in texture maps popping in after a period of time. You will notice a blurred texture on the ground and a few seconds later, it pops right back in. Kinda takes you out of the submerging gameplay, but it'll pass.

Next, the gameplay. Many 360 fans will say "Oh, Drake's Fortune is just another graphical rip-off of Gears' gameplay." Well, no shit because it works well. Me, not owning a 360 but have tried Gears, believe that Drake does take the grand going to cover and cover combat. A unique thing about Drake's take on it is allowing to switch shoulders, for better angle of game fights, though it will look awkward in cases. I remember this one instance where I just found a magnum revolver. When holding the L1 for aiming, he points to the right with a crosshair. I fire. It hits my target. But I'm standing there, thinking how is it possible to hit a guy that is directly in front of you while aiming and pointing...to the right. It gets weird at times, but given to the endless and excruciating pirate gun-battles, it'll once again...pass. While there many maneuvers that our friend Drake can pull off, the enemy has everything at their disposal as well. Constantly flanking you, toss a couple of grenades and killing the poor white guy from every impossible angle, the battle will make some extremely frustrated to a point where players would just snap the controllers in half. I know I did. Besides the ground battles, there are a numbers of other things that Drake threw it. The quick-reflex reaction button mashing during cut-scenes, catches you off-guard almost every first time. The jet-ski with unlimited supply of grenades for your grenade launcher, my favorite, the car-chase battle where the hot dame drives and you man the 50 caliber, and the Ninja Warrior mountain climbing. Almost half of the game is to transverse from point A to point by the side of a cliff, fortress, and playing Tarzan. All in all, it's a well-round game that borrow aspects from other games.

For the story, it's a six to seven hour game. Not much for a single-player only game, but given to the 1000 points of unlockables and 60 total hidden treasures to find to unlock the god almighty unlimited ammo, the game gets a great replay value standing. I'm currently in the progress of unlocking the damn thing so I can pull off my rampage of obliterating with the grenade launcher on foot. The extra content is one of the best, letting you into Naughty Dog's palace and get to know Pogo, the pug mascot of Naughty Dog. One thing that I believe is amazing is the making of cinematics. It's four screens, one quarter shows the live action capture, another, the camera crew, third, the pre-renders of the capture and lastly, the fully rendered capture. It's very knowledgeable and gives a new perspective on motion capture and all that jazz.

Well, I don't feel like typing anymore, given to the fact that I couldn't literally sleep all last night so I worked on my manuscript from one to four in the morning.

Uncharted: Drake's Fortune is a keeper for all you PS3 and shooter fans. Great story, lovely environments, and amazingly detailed environments. Next on the list is hopefully Call of Duty 4 or Haze, thought I'm a real prick on buying multi-platform games for consoles, especially when their also distributed on PCs. Cheers mate!

The brevity of it all

2007-11-26T00:25:00.000-05:00

I am here to express great concern for something that is plaguing many games today. I'm sure you are all aware of this as well. Just as we get into things, it all seems to end. Less and less is put into these things as time goes on it seems, but on the other hand, havn't they been telling us that their games are more complex than ever? Then why must these things be so short?

I am of course talking about Game Manuals.

I started to notice this plight when i first picked up my next gen system. I had gotten Resistance, Madden, and Tony Hawk. The resistance case had a good weight to it. Satisfying, letting me know this was well worth my purchase. Madden felt light than teh past years. Had they really taken this much out? And then there was Tony Hawk Project 8. Had i been jipped a booklet and given a leaf instead?

In the height of my ps2 gaming 'career', i remember game manuals being the leading cause of broken cases. Those two little plastic hinges were never enough to contain all of the weapon info, special moves, and poorly thought out background stories. The book for the original Socom never did fit back into the case when i first opened it.

Now i sit here, with Assassin's Creed in hand, and I cant help but feel ripped off. I got 20 hours out of this game so far, and i can feel maybe another 10 before i put it to rest for a while. But the manual worried me when i first opened it. A promise of 3 cities and a kingdom between them, being kidnapped by scientists and forced to play as your ancestor in a matrix-like simulation, and some crazy sci-fi story connecting it all doesnt really seem to fit into 24 pages.

Now 24 might be sound like a lot, but take into consideration theres the standard 3 in the beginning telling you how to turn on your console and not to dump water on it if it doesnt work, on page blank for "notes", and 2 pages for warranty and technical support mumbo-jumbo. So we're down to 18 pages.

To put the scale of the world that is Assassin's Creed into perspective, it's about the size of GTA San Andreas, the cities are a bit smaller but they feel the same size since you have no cars. The GTA manuals are usually 50+ pages (plus poster!) and Ubisoft cant even give me an additional 10 pages of description about the cities, or weapons, or the freaking targets i have to kill? This entire game is based on history. History that i am not 100% familiar with. They could easily throw some background info in there. I understand they want to be hush-hush about the present time in the game, so ill give them that.

The point of this is, i dont read much. The bit i do happens to be the back of cereal boxes and game manuals. it took months to finish the Diablo II instructional booklet, but i was finished with Assassin's Creed by the time i walked from Gamestop to my car. If you insist on raising the price by 10$, and shortening the games lengths to sometimes single digits, at least throw me a nice boxart, and some hearty reading material.

-Toby

PS. Assassin's Creed was awesome

Happy Birthday PS3!

2007-11-16T23:19:00.000-05:00

My PS3 turns 1 today! And after 546 F@H units done, plenty of Aqua Teens and Warhawk, my baby has been on for 208.3 of those 365 days. Almost 5000 hours.

Links

2007-11-16T04:04:00.001-05:00

I put up a links section since I was being interrogated today about where i get my news from. N4G has jsut about as many rumors as truths, but the rating system makes sure the good stuff (and good rumors) float to the top pretty quickly. PS3fanyboy is just that, a site for all news that is PS3, there are others such as xbox360fanboy.com and nintendowiifanboy.com, but the Wii one updates once a month it seems and the 360 one is littered with Halo news. Kotaku is odd. They're very biased in their posts, they tend to learn towards microsoft, but none the less, they have some good stuff about gaming in general, and it gets updated alot. Ill keep updating the links as i sift through my favorites and find the not bullshit ones. You guys also have the permissions to add to it as well. Figure it out.

I cannot wait for Rock Band

EXIT

2007-11-15T13:44:00.000-05:00

a sweet ad for a game that i dont know what the fuck its about

Game of the Year

2007-11-15T02:10:00.000-05:00

I dunno about you, but I'm pumped for it.

PSEye

2007-11-14T15:48:00.000-05:00

I ran into these today while doing my usual ps3 fanboy site stops. The guys over at sony are really taking the PSEye to the next leve with some of these programs. I cant embed them here because its on the Sony blog, but a link is just as good. Be sure to check them out! I'd love to see them on the PS3 as actual games in the near future.

PSEye Tech Demos

Tom-Tom's First Post

2007-11-14T01:41:00.001-05:00

Hey, Tom-Tom here. Why Tom-Tom? I don't know. It sounds cute. Plus, I memorize so many directions to many useless place. Anyhoo, since Team Fortress 2 shots were popular for this week, I thought I played some TF2 at 1:30AM to get some. Not much luck with shots after gettin' killed. So, here are two in-game shots that I took randomly.

First shot is this idiotic Heavy, just crouching there and insisted on taping his left mouse button down so his finger don't go tired. I messed around with the F5 button and caught him with this facial pose. "SO MUCH BLOOD!"

Second shot is me and seven other engineers defending a capture point on Dustbowl. A sentry alone is already great defense. Throw in three more, the scariest thing in Team Fortress 2. Also, a goldmine for spies. (The best possible shot I could find. Other two engineers were idiots.)

This last shot is a screenshot of my Performance Report. Seems a little lop-sided, doncha think? This here proves my superiority of the Chief Clan.

Anyhoo, that's all I have for the night, or morning. This is Tom-Tom sayin' DO MA MAY! DEE JUD DEE!.. (I don't know how to write in Vietnamese, so there's a phonetic spelling version of Pppffftt! Jog on...)

Baxter's Screens

2007-11-09T23:37:00.000-05:00

Cant get the images to work so I just did a follow-up post. Heres some of my favorites.

And my all-time favorite.

TF2 Screen-cap Re-cap

2007-11-09T23:15:00.001-05:00

So I figured I'd start this "thing" where we show off the sweet screenshots from TF2 we're managed to capture. Click to enlarge.

29-5 with 3 dominations. i love heavies

Tom and I were having fun with a few other Engies in 2fort. We were playing musical teleporters, all of them but one led back to the intel room, the other put you on the front lines

Awesome

Carlo said he took one of me (pyro) giving a thumbs up after i killed him, but it is MIA on his computer. I WILL find it.

Now its your turn!

-Toby

This is Public Service Announcement

2007-11-06T11:51:00.000-05:00

Please take time from you day to view the following.

-Baxter

TF2 Halloween & other weird crap

2007-11-05T13:21:00.000-05:00

Seems like we arent the only ones who are obsessed. Check out these costumes from gaming companies that dressed up at their office parties

Nilhilistic Does Red Team

Check the rest out at Kotaku
http://kotaku.com/gaming/halloween-hangover/

Also, i stumbled upon some pretty damn weird news when browsing through ps3forums.com today. Apparently some kid was grounded from playing his PS3, so he decided to put a hit out on his parents for it. I love my PS3, but that money for the hit could have gone towards games! (i kid, i kid)

Kid hires Hitman to Kill Parents over PS3

Havnt found too much else of interest as of late

HL2: EP2, as spoiler free as i can

2007-11-03T22:41:00.000-04:00

So i finished this game last week. I havnt been this impressed with a single player game since....well since Half Life 2.

Bioshock was a great game, but there was something missing from it that i still cant put my finger on. Sometimes it felt like they were pushing for the story to move forward even though it was kind of stuck, maybe it was the audio diaries that you had to listen to for the storyline, but you couldnt hear them over the chaos.

As far as im concerned, Half Life doesnt have a story, at least not anymore. Seeing as HL2 ended with an explosion, and so did HL2: EP1, i think that Gabe Newell and whoever else writes for this have absolutely no idea where they are going with Gordon Freeman. There is a plot to keep you moving through, bad people take over earth and you're getting rid of them. It was ok for HL2, kind of annoying that they dropped you right intot he middle of this. EP1 was just a chore. You spend the first 2 horus of the game trying to make the Citadel not blow up too soon, and another 2 hours running away, thats the game. Seriously Gabe, you could have jsut cut out the Citadel part and gave me something I enjoyed playing.

Then EP2 hit. Out of nowhere, they throw these new characters in (returning from HL1, actually) and have these levels that give a sense of urgency that I cant say ive felt during a game for a while. On top of this, they make you actually care about Alyx, and more so than just her not getting stuck somewhere.

The end of this game features the best level ive played in a SP game to date, hands down. It was rather tough on medium, and i cant wait to give it a go on hard, and thats saying alot. Ive never had the urge to play through a Half Life after completeing it, but that was my first though when i finished this one. GG Vavle

A good point that I was discussing with one of the teachers at AiP was that Valve manages to suck players into buying the the next half life the second you buy EP2. If youve played through Portal (damn you if you havnt), youll know all about Apature Science, and what they made. EP2 mentions Aparture ever so slightly, but thats all valve had to do to put the idea into gamers heads that the Portal Gun just might make it into the next half life. we all know that can only make the game better.

The Days of our Half-Life

2007-10-22T20:07:00.001-04:00

I'm waiting to finish Episode 2 until I rant about how much this game pisses me off and impresses me

For the Emperor!

2007-10-17T18:43:00.000-04:00

Last week I decided to get myself a copy of Dawn of War: Dark Crusade. Seeing as I'm the proud owner of the two previous installments of DoW, and heard good things about Dark Crusade, I decided why not complete the series and go get it off Steam.

Since that day I've been completely immersed in the new campaign mode. Although I'm a big RTS fan, I can rarely bring myself to play the single player story modes. Im more of a skirmish guy. But this was not the case in DoW:DC. The campaign has been revamped to a territorial conquest map. This struck a huge chord with me since I love those kinds of campaigns, and just sucked me in. I'm currently muscling my way through my first campaign still, slowing and carfully taking each territory. Orks are going down next!

Dark Crusade, in my opinion, is the best out of the series. 7 different armies, a nice little story mode, a LOT of maps, army painter, all that good stuff that the previous games had plus more. The two new factions, Tau and Necrons, are pretty nifty. They didn't forget the older armies either. Now Marines have Grey Knights, Orks have Flash Gitz, Eldar have Harlequins, and Chaos now have the mighty Demon Prince. Some of the commander models have been revamp with new looks, for the better I'd say.

Theres only one problem with Dark Crusade. I can't stop playing as Tau. I've been a 40k fan since high school, playing the tabletop as Marines and Chaos. And all that time I've had a searing hatred towards the Tau. They're far too strong for their own good. And they're just like that in Dark Crusade. I decided to try them out since they were new, but unfortunately, I've become addicted to Tau. I'm slowly trying to break myself away by playing Marines like I used to, but we'll see how that goes. Who, knows maybe I'll get some online games going.

-Baxter

The Cost of Gaming

2007-10-17T12:47:00.000-04:00

After some recent discussions, I began thinking of just how much has been put into the nasty habit of mine called gaming. Here's the rough estimates of prices when I bought them

Alienware Aurora 7500 - AMD 3800+ - Nvidia 7800GT = $2700
Logitech G5 Laser Mouse = $70
Logitech G15 Keyboard = $ 100
Logitech 2.1 Speaker system = $50
Creative Soundblaster External = $40
Logitech Headset = $20 x 2
Storage Drives = $120
Logitech Freedom 2.4 Joystick = $70
External DVD-RW = $60

So far that puts me at $3250, just for my current computer.

Onto consoles. Ill start with the PS2.

First PS2 = $200
Memory Card = $30
2.1 Speaker system = $50
second controller = $30?
Second PS2 (slimline) = $150
Logitech Headset = $20
Logitech ps2 keyboard = $15

After this, I calmed down for a while since i had settled into Socom II. It started again when the slimline broke mid 2006.

PS3 60GB - Launch = $600
Second controller = $50
2 year warranty = $70
Wii = $300
Second Wiimote + Nunchuck = $50
PSP = $170
512 Memstick = $20
Screen Shield = $10
Logitech case = $15
bluetooth headset = $30 (Warhawk bundle)
Emerson 32" HDTV 720p = $560

Grand total is $5620. Mind you this is not including games. According to my gamespot account, my legit games collection totals over $2000 as well, but this is off seeing as I sell most of my beaten ones for other games. Luckily, I am almost done with having my ideal setup. Only a 5.1 Logitech system and a HDMI switch are all I play on adding to the setup.
It would probably be cheaper to be addicted to meth.

-Toby

A 'Forza' to be Reckoned With

2007-10-17T02:14:00.000-04:00

I know it's an older game now, but before Forza 2 came out I was pretty siked about it. I could hardly wait to buy a Ferrari f50, modify the crap out of it, and successfully destroy every car in my path as I devoured corners, and tore down straight aways. All the while holding my fist in the air, screaming explicit profanities about inferior rigs on the track just getting in the way...Ahh the joys of racing.

All in all, I'd say Forza 2 captures the spirit of racing in all it's next gen glory pretty well. The game gives you a plethora of cars to select from, and a sleuth of modification options (for some cars), next-gen graphics and great sense of speed really help immerse the player in the whole experience as well...if the A.I. is up to the task that is.

One real problem I have with this game is that the A.I., for me, is excruciatingly hard or coma inducing easy. Especially on long endurance races I found myself nodding off and careening into a wall, destroying what used to be my beautiful Ferrari, and the last hour of my life.

After these horrid crashes I would try to raise the difficulty accordingly, so as to not fall asleep on the last turn of the race. This, however, is never successful because it just makes Marco Rossi (one of the best A.I. drivers in the game and my all time nemesis) a driver possessed by the devil. I can't even get down the front straight without him putting me into a wall, its ridiculous...people don't race like that Marco! C'mon! This made me quit racing for a while and I decided I'd just customise the cars I had; which just resulted in another dissapointment.

Yes, the customization feature is deep and awesome for some cars (mainly tuner cars), but for most of them it's very bland and boring. Take, say, oh I don't know a Ferrari. Yes, you can get tires and exhaust and all that good stuff, but body kits and spoilers basically don't exist except for the Forza 2 ones. I know for a fact that Hamann Motorsport makes body kits for Ferrari so it wouldn't have hurt them to put one or two in the game. Some cars don't even have these options, you can only get the Forza 2 front bumper. It's hard to customize when you have no options. I got over this little hump in the game and just came across another. The sound.

I just have to say something about this and you all probably know what's coming. A Ferrari does not sound like an electric blender! I don't know why it is or how it's possible, but every single game with a Ferrari in it just gets it wrong, Forza 2 being no exception. It's a shame really. That said, Forza 2 delivers on so many levels but still has to work out some of the finer details, but it doesn't leave you dissapointed...if you don't like Ferrari that is.

Class is in Session

2007-10-16T20:49:00.000-04:00

I've been pondering about doing a class breakdown for Team Fortress 2, so here it is. If you don't know about TF2,

Shame on you.
Check out Toby's previous blog about it.

There are 9 different, fantastic classes featured in TF2: Scout, Soldier, Heavy, Pyro, Medic, Demoman, Sniper, Spy, and Engineer. All with a unique play style, health amount, and speed. Not to mention, the models are gorgeous and have a ton of character to them. They are grouped into 3 categories: Offense, Defense and Support. The classes are not tied to those roles, however they tend to be more efficient as those roles.

Here they are.

The Scout:
The fastest class in the game. The ideal class for capturing points quickly. Although he's armed with a powerful Scattergun (shotgun), pistol, and metal baseball bat, the Scout is a very fragile class, only having the minimum 125 health. He is also able to perform double jumps, allowing him to reach higher places in the maps, as well as change his direction mid-air. The perfect class for those to like to hit and run.

Group: Offense
Pros: Fast, Counts as 2 players when capturing a Control Point.
Cons: Small health pool, sub-par secondary weapons.

The Soldier:
Your stereotypical American, military-drawl drill Sergeant. While slightly slower than other classes, the Soldier sports a beefy 200 health. He uses a Rocket Launcher, Shotgun and Entrenching tool. The highlight to this class is the Rocket Jump, which allows the player to propel himself to higher parts of the map, and in return, taking a small amount of damage. If you enjoy sending rockets careening into groups of enemies, the Soldier is the class for you.

Group: Offense
Pros: Large health pool, Well balanced, Rocket Jump capability
Cons: Rocket Launcher has short clip.

The Pyro:
As the name implies, the Pyro's main feature is fire. Equipped with a flamethrower, shotgun, and fire-axe, the Pyro is most likely the most lethal short range class. The major advantage of the flamethrower is not only does the initial burst do considerable damage to your opponent, it also does damage over time, making it possible for the enemy to burn to death after you've retreated, or died.

I particularly enjoy this class for the comedic factor. Everything the Pyro says is muffled from his gas mask, making almost everything incoherent. With a 175 health pool and slightly above average speed, the Pyro is the perfect ambushers class.

Group: Offense
Pros: Balanced stats, Damage over time.
Cons: Short range weaponry makes him very vulnerable in the open

The Heavy:
The big gun of TF2. This guy can pretty much appeal to every player wanting to just mow down everything. Although he is the slowest class (and becomes even slower when firing his mini gun), the Heavy boasts a massive 300 health. Sporting a 200 shot mini gun, shotgun and his bare fists, the Heavy can be a force to be reckoned with the right player.

The ideal medic target, you will often see these guys pair up with a Medic, boosting them to 400 health and temporary ubercharge, making them the most powerful combo in the game. The Heavy by no means is a walk in the park. Everyone will most likely be gunning for you, and while tough, the Heavy is not bulletproof.

Group: Defense
Pros: Largest health pool, powerful weaponry.
Cons: Slow speed makes him an easy target.

The Demoman:
A truly unique class. The Demoman uses a 4 shot grenade launcher, with bounce capability, a sticky bomb launcher, and a whiskey bottle. This class excels at fortifying and defending positions. With the grenade launcher, an expert player can use nearly every obstacle to bounce his shots right to the enemy. They sticky bomb launcher is great for defending halls, doorways and control points, as they can be stuck nearly anywhere; walls, ceilings, you name it. The
Demoman has a well balanced health-speed ratio and is a great class for backing up the team.

Group: Defense
Pros: Unique weaponry, great defensive capability .
Cons: Hard class to adapt to, weak in close quarters 1v1

The Engineer:
A man and his machines. The key feature of the engineer of the Engineer is ability to build various machines to aid him and his team in battle. The Engineer uses metal, which is gained from fallen weapons, ammo boxes, and dispensers, to build his inventions. They are:

Sentry Gun: The backbone of a defensive structure. Engineers are able to upgrade Sentry Guns twice, giving them a multi-barrel turret and missile launcher. Although not the smartest AI, if it doesn't kill something, it will surely send them fleeing.
Dispenser: A station where the engineer can pick up metal to help him build more structures. In addition, the dispenser gives the team ammo and regenerates their health.
A well placed dispenser can make or break a team's push forward or defense line.
Teleporter: Allows the team to teleport to a forward location on the map. Great for helping the attacking team make the push.

In addition to his gadgets, the Engineer wields a shotgun, pistol, and a hefty, brutal monkey wrench. If you like sitting back and managing, try out the Engineer.

Group: Defense
Pros: Great aid class, provides for the whole team, powerful Sentry Gun.
Cons: Forced to babysit your constructions, sub par weaponry.

The Medic:
My class of choice. While the Medic doesn't directly fight the enemy (on most occasions), he still is a important member of the team. Armed with his Medigun, the Medic can heal his teammate and give them a health boost while healing them. The healing beam can only cover a short distance, so Medics must stay relatively close to their targets. They are also equipped with a 40 shot syringe gun and a bone saw.

The real power behind the Medic is the Ubercharge. While healing, the Medic fills his Ubercharge Meter, and when it is full, he can activate it, making him and his target completely invulnerable to all damage for 10 seconds. Paired with certain classes, like the Heavy or Pyro, the Medic can form a formidable team with his partner, capable of plowing through a good chunk of opposing players. If you're a "lover, not a fighter", or a bad shot, the Medic is the guy for you. Plus your teammates will thank you!

Group: Support
Pros: Ubercharge ability, able to slowly regenerate his own health.
Cons: Mostly defenseless on his own.

The Spy:
The chain-smoking master of deceit. This suave little guy can truly wreak havoc behind the enemy lines. With the ability to temporarily cloak himself, the Spy can slip behind the enemy unnoticed. The Spy has a various array of tools to aid him in battle.

Disguise Kit: Allows the Spy to assume the role of an enemy player, including the player's name. The Spy chooses a class to disguise himself as and the enemy team will see him as that class, while the Spy's team will see him with a paper mask of that class on. Useful for getting behind the lines and doing the dirty work.
Revolver: 6 Shot revolver that can pack a punch.
Butterfly Knife: The powerhouse weapon of the Spy. While fairly weak attacking normally, the Spy's Butterfly Knife has the ability to 1-Hit-KO any class if hit from behind. Coming out of stealth when the time is right, a spy can backstab his foe and then re-cloak and hide.
Electro-Sapper: A device used to take down Engineer's constructions with ease. The Spy does not have to un-cloak to use his Electro-Sapper, although the enemy Engineer will be notified of the Sapper.

The Spy is a very tricky class to play. The player has to observe his enemies positions, certain players, as well as knowing his own arsenal. A Spy will come out of invisibility/ disguise when he attacks, so a player has to choose his targets carefully. The Spy is a master of trickery and surprise attacks, a class perfect for infiltration fanatics.

Group: Support
Pros: Stealth Ability, various tools to trick the opponent.
Cons: Low health pool, hard to master.

The Sniper:
The classic Sniper class. The Australian master of long ranged combat, the Sniper can pick off his opponents from afar, while remaining safe from the action. The Sniper is equipped with a sniper rifle, submachine gun, and machete. One unique feature of the Sniper is that while he is scoped, a meter charges up. This meter determines the power of the shot, making it possible for 1 shot kills, regardless of where the player was hit.

I personally enjoy this feature because it takes out pot-shots and "assault sniping", and forces the sniper to play the class like it was meant to. If an enemy player closes in on the Sniper, he can pull out his SMG, which provides some close range defense. An obvious choice for any sniping fan.

Group: Support
Pros: Balanced stats, long range firepower.
Cons: Useless in certain situations that don't provide long range, can be cornered easily if closed in on.

Well, thats my breakdown for the classes of TF2. Hopefully this has helped you undecided players out there on your class of choice.

-Baxter

Team Fortress 2

2007-10-16T00:04:00.000-04:00

I've been dying to post about this. But there are several reasons why I havnt gotten around to doing so. First off is I had nowhere to put it, and second, I was too busy playing it.

I've been a fan of Valve for a few years now. A friend got me excited about Half Life 2 and I built a make shift computer just to play it. It came packaged with Counter Strike:Source, which I eventually devoted about 1000 hours of my life into (god rest that wasted time). But there was always something about that game that I never quite liked. Team Fortress 2 brought that problem to light.

There's no way to win a game of TF2 by yourself. Provided you have some mentally stable opponents, there will most always be someone in a class that exploits your weakness. So you have to rely on others. CSS didn't need this. I played plenty of games where I was the only one doing the work but we still managed to come out on top.

Not to say there isnt any skill involved in the game, far from it. Someone who has great reflexes and patience playing as a sniper will obviously destroy anyone in a 1 vs 1 situation at a distance. But if players manage to close to the sniper with a Pyro....well he is pretty much finished unless hes deadly accurate with that SMG.

Another great thing about this is the fact that its a thousand times more fun playing with friends. If you're a Heavy running around with a someone you don't know as your medic, you're more or less out there on your own. But in my case, I've got a friend who just so happens to play medic, and its an entirely new ball game then. It's like theres a thing where he knows when to uber, you know when to fall back around a corner and be the meat shield. Intense.

On top of the pure fun and violent gameplay are these beautifully modeled and rendered characters, that on top of that have the most personality out of any multiplayer game Ive ever played. The style screams Pixar in some ways, and every character is build to represent what he does best. The Heavy walks, talks, and shoots just as his name implies. The Spy has an elegant James Bond look to him, and the Scout is a scrawny kid who thinks he can pick a fight with anyone. And he does, but he runs away.

Orange Box was worth it just for this. If youre a fan of multiplayer shooters, don't pass this up. I recommend the PC version for the custom maps and the increase player limits. 32 players is pure madness! The rest of Orange Box is fun as well, especially Portal. But I'll do my best to contain myself from ranting about that one just yet.

-Toby

First?

2007-10-15T23:52:00.000-04:00

So I'm a college student attending the Art Institute of Pittsburgh. I used to write reviews for ps3.net (when it was still alive), and in the interest of keeping that going, I started this. I'm hoping to get a few fellow students to help contribute to this blog type thing, not sure how well it will work out but its worth a try. It's just me for now.

-Toby