Square Enix and Eidos Montreal have released a new trailer for their upcoming Deus Ex: Human Revolution, chock full of “classified information” in how to approach various gameplay mechanics. Enjoy!
Archive - 2011
We as video game fans and critics have gotten used to playing bad video games that only come out to promote another product, like a movie. With the release of Cars 2 in movie theaters by Pixar, I very well knew that the video game release was as inevitable as the sun rising in the morning. I opened my package that contain the Cars 2 video game with trepidation, groaning loudly at the thought of spending hours being tortured by yet another bad movie related video game. Within the first hour of game play, I realized that my groan was way too premature and that Cars 2 was not your typical movie tie-in video game. Avalanche Software did a very good job in bringing a solid racing game with the Mario Kart feel to the Xbox 360, that just also happens to tie in nicely with the movie.
Story:
The story of Cars 2 the video game story line is based on the movie’s story line, but only in very broad terms. The tutorial levels are set at the secret agents headquarters, where Finn McMissile and Holly Shitwell train you in the maneuvers. You then set out into the racing world to face Professor Z through a series of races and events. Like most racing games, the story is all about you winning the event, and unlocking more events and cars to race as.
Racing games, like fighting games, have a tendency to be lighter in the story department. This is not Dragon Age; you do not have hours upon hours to develop characters and relationships during game play. I am ok with the story being light here, because it’s just not needed. You know that you are racing against Professor Z and his minions during the events, and there are little cut scenes that give you this throughout the game itself, but winning the event is really your main priority. You are also not forced to play as one of the main characters of the movie. You can play as Mater or Lightning if you so choose, but you can also play the game just as well as any of the other minor back up characters. This is one of those cases were the light storyline helps to give the races context, but also stays out of the way so the player can have fun.
Gameplay:
Cars 2 borrows heavily from the game play that made Mario Kart very popular, but also incorporates other mechanics to make it feel different from the monster that is Mario Kart. You race around in the event, using boost to help you speed up and collecting weapons that you can use on your opponents to help slow them down. Gaining boost in Cars 2 can be done through many different ways: you can drift through the corners, collect energy batteries, jump over obstacles doing tricks, or do some stunt driving on the ground. I thought it was a fun mechanic to allow the cars to drive on two wheels to get through tight spots, or to completely turn your car around and drive backwards. This last mechanic is fun to do in multiplayer, as you get to fire your missiles at the poor slob in second place.
Cars 2 also has a large array of events that one can play through. You have your standard battle races, where you fight with the other cars and the first one across the line wins, but you also have event types like Devastator and Hunter that helps break up the monotony of just racing all the time. Hunter game types pit you against wave after wave of Professor Z’s lemons, where you hunt them down as destroy as many as you can. The Devastator game mode, though, was my favorite. You collect the Devastator weapon and have to race it into your enemies’ base to set it off. This event sets up some nice local competitive game play between teams.
Bottom line here is that Cars 2 is just plain fun to play. The events are varied enough to give you want you want, the mechanics and controls feel just right, and the multiplayer is just a blast to play. This game really surprised me on how much fun it was to play.
Aesthetics:
Pixar has always given us beautiful worlds to enjoy, filled with interesting characters and gorgeous environments. Avalanche Software was successfully able to take this well designed aesthetic and bring it into the Cars 2 video game. The world that you race through is just plain neat to look at. From the dark urban sprawl of Tokyo at night, to the beautifully rendered streets of London, Cars 2 makes each track not only fun to race in, but enjoyable to stare at.
The cars themselves also come across in the video game very well. Each car looks just like it’s movie counterpart and is completed in the same design originally put down by Pixar. The only negative I have with the cars is their voice-overs. You will quickly get bored of the same two or three lines that each car repeats throughout the events. The characters’ voices are done well enough, but repeat way too much for my liking. I ended up switching out my cars after every fourth race, just so I didn’t have to listen to the same lines over and over again.
Overall, Cars 2 brings the well-designed world of the movie into the video game. The tracks are beautiful, the cars are well designed and neat to look at, but the voice-overs repeat way too much for me.
Final Thoughts:
Cars 2 by Avalanche Software is a fun game to play and is very nice to look at. It brings the game play of Mario Kart to the Xbox 360 while adding some nice game mechanics that makes Cars 2 unique. The multiplayer games are a blast to play and you have enough events to choose from to get a nice rotation going without getting bored. The game play itself is very solid, with nice controls and tracks that contain different routes you can take to the finish line. Cars 2 looks just like the movies, with the beautifully designed characters and world, but the voice-overs could be better and are way to repetitive.
Cars 2 is a great way to get that Mario Kart feel without owing a Wii. If you are in the market for a solid racer that adds weapon combat, then Cars 2 is a very solid choice.
Majesco Entertainment has released some new screenshots from their upcoming XBLA/PSN actioner, Bloodrayne: Betrayal.
Screenshots
Hi-Rez Studios has announced it will be bringing along both Tribes: Ascend and SMITE to the Gamescom gaming expo, which is held in Cologne, Germany from August 18 through August 21. Tribes: Ascend will feature a demo on the show floor while SMITE will be in demo form behind closed-doors only.
- Tribes: Ascend: A fully playable multiplayer demo of this upcoming title in the popular FPS franchise will be presented at the Hi-Rez booth in the Gamescom business center. Scott Zier, Senior Designer of Tribes: Ascend, will be presenting the game and answering questions.
- SMITE: Announced this past April, SMITE is a brand new game where gods from various mythologies fight for supremacy in action-packed multiplayer battles, within beautiful environments powered by Unreal Engine 3. For the first time ever, SMITE will be shown to the press in a playable version behind closed doors on the Hi-Rez booth, with Travis Brown, Senior Designer, available to chat about the game.
Gamescom 2011 SMITE Screenshots
En Masse Entertainment has announced that their upcoming action-MMO, TERA, will be hitting North American shores in the Spring of 2012.
“Adding time to our schedule will help us ensure we exceed people’s expectations for TERA,” said Chris Lee, publishing VP of En Masse Entertainment. “The game’s action combat and depth has generated a lot of interest, and we are committed to making sure every aspect of the game lives up to our standard of quality.”
Release Date Announcement Screenshots
Kalypso Media has announced the third game in the Port Royale series: Port Royale 3. Due out in the second quarter of 2012, the game is expected out exclusively on the Windows PC platform.
Screenshots
SEGA has released five new screenshots from their upcoming The House of the Dead: OVERKILL – Extended Cut, which is due out on October 25, 2011 – only for the PlayStation 3 platform.
Screenshots
Here is a brand-new Prey 2 wallpaper from the official Prey 2 Facebook page. Prey 2 is due out next year and is under development by Human Head Studios and Bethesda Softworks.
The Wallpapers (1600×1200 and 1920×1200 versions)
Ok much like the title this game doesn’t take itself too seriously, in fact it thrives on being silly and yet at the same time it is surprisingly challenging and addictive. In 1982 Polystructures fall from space into the air over Boston and people take to populating them and building around them. By the year 2011 you can no longer look up from a city and see the stars, but you can look down from the top of the Polystructures and base jump off of them. Hence a new dimensional timeline and lifestyle is born. Base jumping is literally taken to new heights as you leap down hugging and kissing the sides of building and other structures until you get to the bottom where you deploy your parachute fin before become a “sack of calcium” or a bunch of other amusing but dead options and try and land inside a red circle.
So for each time you succeed at hugging building, shattering glass panels with score values and landing without becoming mush you earn a score which is then applied to a star system. The more stars you get for equaling or increasing your star rating on a map earns you teeth. Yep, the currency of this dimension is teeth and the more you earn the more map drop points or special goodies you can unlock. Now one person’s special goodies is anothers bizarre and just plain hilarious moment so make sure to spend your money wisely. One of the unlocks, for example, is a glowing glove that makes it so that as you plummet past onlookers you can encourage your supporters with a thumb up or your protestors with a nice red glowing middle finger. Another allows you to spray graffiti, remember you are doing all this while plummeting to the ground and dodging buildings and structures at an alarming rate. If it all gets to be to much though you can listen to relaxation sessions (there are no insects on you… not on your face getting ready to crawl in your nose, not at all) or learn how to debristle a pig or get grandma’s special recipe for cookies (the secret ingredient is a dead relative’s ashes).
The wackiness of the game, the fact that no two jumps are ever the same and that this is a game with real skill and practice necessary to do good at it makes it addictive to watch and to play. I was trying it out on the OnLive service and I was constantly getting spectators watching and would sometimes try (and sometimes fail) spectacular moves to entertain my audience. I got friends request on the service as well by people who just wanted to be able to know when I would be on and playing it again. This game is perfect for parties, it is so visually engaging and the difference between a high score and becoming a bunch of femur paste is the slightest of moves. Also it is on OnLive so you can play the game on any PC anywhere, play it on tablets or use the tiny OnLive console and all you need to do is get it an internet connection and plug it into your TV and suddenly you can be playing it on a huge screen at someone else’s party. The OnLive system lends itself to portability and versatility anyways but this game showcases it so nicely. This next weekend I am heading out of town to visit friends and the OnLive system is going with me and going to get some serious play and I really see this game shining.
Last Call:
At first glance this game looks easy and silly, but it actually can be very challenging and no two jumps are exactly the same. But it is also silly, and has as much fun with itself as possible. If you have ever been interested in the history of base jumping there are factoids tucked in as well but this is really about having the American version of Monty Python-esque fun and laughing while sweating your jumps. Dying doesn’t bother you, it makes you laugh. My wife was at her computer laughing at the sound effects (there are old school arcade sounds in it very similar to Sonic) and the different odd things said in the game. When she walked by she stopped and just started staring at my game like so many OnLive spectators drawn into the visuals as well as the sound. This is a great party game which you can try for free at OnLive and it is included in the over 70 games on it’s play anytime PlayBundle so it would be at your leaping leisure for $10 a month. I picked it because of it’s funny name to be honest and now it is in my regular play rotation. Heck even the companies website is fun to go to!
[stream provider=youtube flv=http%3A//www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3D8LRQzEunphA%26feature%3Dplayer_embedded img=x:/img.youtube.com/vi/8LRQzEunphA/0.jpg embed=false share=false width=640 height=360 dock=true controlbar=over bandwidth=high autostart=false /]
If you are a console player you have probably already given this game a run but if you are pure PC or you had a friend who said “that game sucked” and that was enough to keep you from trying it then you may have only heard of the game. Just about everyone has at least heard of Limbo due to it’s incredibly stylized presentation and haunting mistreatment of its little boy hero. Every game magazine tried to write it up at one time or another without giving too much away and that can be extremely difficult to first get the style and feeling across but then also make someone feel the need to play it. It honestly reminds me of foreign movies and animations that I have experienced over the years. Anyone who watched the short film “Deadsy” (the band and most of my game characters’ names have been based off it) and got the beauty and horror of it might have some understanding. So instead of trying to tell you why you should play it or shouldn’t I will try to tell you what I felt while I played it, why this side game turned into a marathon playing for me and much like a foreign film, you will have to decide if this is where your tastes lie. To start here is a screenshot.
I purposely chose one with no action, no traps or big challenges in sight, just an average moment in the game. This is one of the brighter moments, the shadowed areas increase, the screen flickers like you are watching an old silent movie and usually the brightest thing in the whole game are the eyes on the little silhouette of a boy that you are helping through the journey. When you discover a new trap or fail a test those little white eyes blink out for a moment and then come back at the last checkpoint. He never screams in pain or terror, never complains, he just moves along to the next task and horror at hand. Music is sparse and the notes tend to resound, most of the game relies on ambient noise of frogs or flies or water splashing. If he falls off a tall cliff you will see his eyes shining in the thickening darkness, hear a crunch and then the eyes go out as the scene fades to darkness and he is standing in front of one of his tests again.
The tests are plentiful and seem to come from the mind of a child, one with some learning but also who has seen enough action movies and played Cowboys and Indians to have an imagination ripe with its own torments. The Lord of The Flies, arachnophobia, saws slicing people up, all in a world where flipping a switch can make gravity reverse or magnets can hold giant metal block in mid air. If a child were to place tests of horror in front of itself it would play out a lot like this game.
And you want to help this little boy who is lost in this dark place facing more and more moments of possible death. Knowing that death is not the end, but only a step back into the journey that is so dark and that he faces alone except for a little help from you. All the other boys are out to torment, sabotage or just plain destroy him on his journey through this dark land so you feel compelled to keep helping him. It becomes difficult to take a break especially after night falls and you are in the same darkness he is. This may sound somewhat melodramatic but the game does pull you in if you let it and it can be very much like you are helping a character on it’s way through a movie, wanting to see how it ends and having the satisfaction of no matter who finally lies in store you helped the little lost boy get there.
The game is just haunting to put it simply, generally more like nightmares than dreams but it is a dreamscape nonetheless and one that had me with my face 8 inches away from my 23″ LED monitor, the speakers pulled close, the lights off, fully entranced. The standard game controls are the arrow keys and Ctrl which I usually find confining in computer play but seemed very much to fit the game’s confined environment you are trying to help escape.
The ending will be a matter of debate for a long time, I am not showing you it in any of the screenshots nor do I plan to show you any. If you want to go to YouTube and watch it you can but to me it is like reading the last page of a very deep and surreal book, you won’t really get it unless you take the journey through the game and then you may come up with a different theory than the many, many ones that are out there and discussed on endless threads. It is this ending with such an opening to interpretation that really throws some people for a loop and makes them sometimes hate the game. These are usually the same people who hate every minute of a foreign or strange film because it made them think, made them wonder and in some ways just gave them questions and left them to fill in the answers. I find a certain beauty in this, a certain maturity that can be very difficult for someone just out to have a fun play and escape reality for a while to accept. It is a foreign film in game form and leaves questions instead of giving a tidy, clean and happy Hollywood ending. I love it for that as much as the great puzzles and gameplay.
Last Call:
This game is different, it is for a certain taste, I could see people watching others playing to experience the story as much as the action. The action of the puzzle solving may appeal to gamers and they may enjoy it simply for that but this was a game that was designed to engage you like a movie. A movie where you have to commit yourself to helping the main character, in this case a lost little boy, find his way to the end, whatever ending it may be. Much like many Hollywood remakes of movies I could see how the temptation to have a spelled out, The End kind of ending to this game could have been tempting but I think this game will live on in the imaginations of those who played it more as a result of the simple fade to black.