Gears of War 2 takes place in a grim future where humanity is at war against an unstoppable force of monsters called the Locust. The endless fighting has torn down cities, painted the Earth’s surface a consistent shade of gray and brown, nearly killed off the human race, and made the survivors intolerable douchebags. If the people in Gears of War 2 are the ones who are going to save Earth and restore society, then it honestly might be better if the Locust just win. The game’s writers were apparently content with cookie-cutter characters who are easier to laugh at than sympathize with, at least until a few hours in when their simple personalities simply become annoying. And like too many games of this type, the bad guys are way cooler than than the good guys anyway. → Read Theft Auto 4
Year: 2009
Flaws, Fighters and Fanboys
Fighting games are, sadly, one of the few areas of gaming where I can still get worked up into a fanboy. Shameful, I know, but every gamer has their flaws. My problem is that I am a hopeless, shameful SNK fan. I buy their games when they treat the fanbase like crap. I buy the games that are crap. And every time I see gamers tear them a new one for a legitimate grievance, I can’t get myself to join in.
At the same time, I have never understood the appeal of the suite of fighters made by Arc System Works. I can tell you about some of the many things the studio does incredibly well, perhaps better than anyone else. → Reading more, assemble!
Giving the Right Idiots Power – The Rock Band Network
When Activision announced GH:WT would have authoring tools when Rock Band 2 would not, many reviewers and other industry sounding boards thought this was a critical error on the part of Harmonix. My reaction was “so what” – most gamers are idiots. Therefore I was uninterested in downloading their at best mediocre, but more likely putrid attempts to create music. Three hundred real songs (for Rock Band 2, which continues to focus on professional DLC) and 5,000 removed user made remixes of Zelda and Mario music (for GH:WT) later, it appears I was correct. Authoring tools for the common man are useless, particularly when the item authored is as complex as a four instrument track song.
Harmonix announced earlier this week they would be going in a different direction. → We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we play.
Fan Service Inc.
Is anyone else totally addicted to taking snapshots and spending hours on the diorama mode on Super Smash Brothers Brawl? YES! You too! Great. Here are some of my creations for people to use to add some spice to their fan fictions. I’ve given some title and synopsis hints but feel free to use your own okay? And don’t say I don’t ever give you anything, you disgusting fanfiction people.
Suggested Title: Excite Bike Mountain (yaoi)
Synopsis: Purple Excite Bike Man and Red Excite Bike Man are the best of friends. After Excite Bike School they ride their Excite bikes to all kinds of different places and have adventures. Anal adventures. Find out where Purple Excite Bike Man wants to park his Exciting Bike in Red Excite Bike Man. → Now is the winter of read this content.
Review – Rune Factory Frontier
Farmer’s Diary, Day 1
I have no knowledge of my past. I found myself in a town I had never heard of with only a half-dozen denizens. They told me I could have the farm. How kind of them to take me in for a while.
Now I just need to get some seeds, plow some spaces of earth, and water ’em. No sweat!
Farmer’s Diary, Day 2
Some giant stone whale-shaped island in the sky is blocking the sun. My crops demanded retribution, so I shouldered my hoe and readied my hammer. Climbing a convenient beanstalk, I reached the whale and it spoke to me! It told me to explore it and find out why it’s slowly dying. What the hell am I supposed to do? → Ultima IV: Quest of the Avatarticle
The Pokemon Drinking Game [Prison rules version]
Sometime soon, not today, maybe not even this year, but before the end of the world Richie and I are going to liveblog playing the ultimate Pokemon drinking game. Drinking? Pokemon? Game? I hear no-one say. Yes that’s right. Oh you want to play too? Here are the rules:
1) Equitment
You have to pronounce equipment as equitment and skeleton as skellington and vehicle as vericle. It’s all part of playing the drinking game. Anyway, to fully enjoy the Pokemon Drinking Game you need the following:
* Every single episode of Pokemon the animated series, including the films and the Pikachu films (You can illegally download all of these from the internet. I strongly advocate that you do because when 4Kids or Nintendo or whoever finally decide to release all of them in your region there will be 2.5 episodes per DVD and it’ll cost £15 each, and even then they’ll release only half of them). → 50 Cent: Readproof
Best Game Ever – Dungeon Keeper 2
One of the critical problems of the gaming industry today is that nearly every game is an adaption of a successfully proven concept. This is probably why there is a lot of hullabaloo (scrabble bonus points) whenever an interesting new concept game comes out, even if the concept and execution are flawed. But at the end of the day 95% of the time we’ve done it all before: whether we’re shooting aliens with force shields that are oddly susceptible to melee attacks (Halo), humans who have developed chainsaws with invulnerability shields (Gears of War), any civilization game, etc–despite minor variations, games are typically incremental improvements of a proven formula.
That is why I gave an exclamation of glee when I recently re-dug up Dungeon Keeper 2 (now classified as Abandonware, woohoo), a game with a refreshing concept that seems so simple yet has never been followed up on. → Lose belly fat now!
N00b Diaries: Bioshock Chapter Three – The Wide Road to Hell
Day Eight:
By this point, I thought the game had etched the peripheral line past which other games fear to tread; etched that line and stepped boldly over it. Then I got to the theater level, and found that Bioshock had actually power-vaulted over said line. About the time that I hear Sander Cohen’s reading of “The Wild Bunny” while transfixed by the mask on the wall perched in front of the statued man, I really understood that all bets were off.
But this isn’t profanity for the sake of mere shock value, or the macabre as seen by the sane. This is gorgeous and unmitigated insanity! For example: I had to stop in the flooded men’s room for the purpose of admiring the shadow play of the three arranged figures. → Lame is what happens when you’re busy making other plans.
N00b Diaries: Bioshock Chapter Two – Splicers Beware
Day Four:
I have ammo. Lots of ammo. I am having a great time finding all the little crawl spaces, hacking every safe I can find and robbing every corpse rotting up my path. I already have the three photographs of the Spidey Splicers, have had them for quite some time. Got a really cool action shot of one, on a hunch; just turned a corner and clicked. Yeah, I’m a regular Mama Weegee over here. But despite the urgings of my rather vocal spectator to “follow the damn arrow, that’s what it’s there for”, I decide to go on a treasure hunt and take in the scenery.
I am still dumbfounded by the simultaneous beauty and sheer creepiness of this world. → Games are the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions.
N00b Diaries: Bioshock Chapter One – Getting Comfortable
Day One:
Dear Diary,
I want to become a more knowledgeable video game player. I have expressed this, and have found that I have an excellent source of tutelage in my long-time gamer boyfriend. He has compiled a list of games that he considers the “must-play” list, and today I begin my journey, starting with: Bioshock!!! (Da-da-duuuum!!!) I begin by treading water for longer than I could possibly manage in real life. I spend as much time as possible taking in the flames, and then the desperately black horizon in every direction but one. I like it already. Entering the lonely lit monument, I try to grasp what the hell could possibly be going on and if the entire game is supposed to take place on this island. → Ridge Reader V