Dead Space

Dead Space... this is probably one of the hardest games that I have ever completed. It isn't too difficult in terms of gameplay, but in the sense that I've never enjoyed horror films/games and playing Dead Space is like watching the climax of a particularly scary movie and doing so for 11 hours straight.

The game borrows heavily from several genres including sci-fi and horror. The main character of the game (Isaac Clarke) is even named after Isaac Asimov and Arthur C. Clarke. It also borrow heavily from the film Event Horizon in that you are stuck on a spaceship and crazy mind bending things are happening. The survival horror gameplay is deeply rooted in the mold that Resident Evil created but the game still manages to create an atmosphere all it's own.

Dead Space uses sound to great effect to achieve it's goal of putting people on the edge of their seats. Loud bangs, skittering taps behind walls, high pitched shrills of saw-like machinery, agonized grunts and groans around the corner, maniacal laughter in the distance, blood curdling screams of anguish as a hulking mound of flesh bursts out of a ventilation grate overhead. It seems like the developer EA Redwood Shores (now Visceral Games) worked very hard on this aspect, and it shows.

Some other elements that add to the atmosphere are a bit subtler but also work to great effect. Throughout the entire game you struggle to get enough ammunition to use in your guns so there is always a sense of having to preserve what you have survive. In some areas you simply have to make a mad dash through a swarm of monsters because there would be no way you'd have enough ammo to take them all out. In other areas you have to get creative with your "Stasis" ability to freeze a few enemies in place and try to take them out in one shot.

Another feature is that when you access your inventory and quest log system the game world doesn't freeze, so it forces you to be conscious of your surroundings and make whatever you're doing quick. A final thought is that the game doesn't have a traditional UI. Isaac only has an indicator on his back to display his health and stasis energy, other then that you have to check your inventory menus. This adds to the minimalist feeling that pervades the game and furthers the feeling that it is just you on a derelict spaceship facing a horde of bloodthirsty beasts, with no one to help.

Pros:

• Graphics: Overall the graphics and environments are nicely done. There is a lot of light and shadow work that adds to the mood and textures never seem to get blurry. In the very beginning of the game the textures on Isaac's suit are a bit bland but that is only a minor problem.
• Sound: Excellent sound work. I only have simulated surround sound but with a full setup this game would probably make your hair stand on end.
• Overall Experience: Dead Space is simply a great game that came out of nowhere and surprised everyone. It's good to know that those types of things can still happen in this day and age of multi-million dollar game development.

Cons:

• Intensity: The gameplay is paced fairly well but like I said before, playing Dead Space is like watching the climax of a horror film every time you fire it up. For me personally that ended up being a con since it somewhat limited my enjoyment of the game, but other people may love that kind of thing.
• Character models: The model work on the human NPC characters that you interact with isn't the best, especially their facial models and animations. This isn't a problem for the main character since he wears a helmet 99.9% of the game, which was a sound decision on the developer's part to hide that flaw in the game engine.
• I think adding anything else beyond this point would just be nitpicking. I've heard more casual gamers say that the game is too difficult but I think it is very well balanced, just challenging. People often forget about adjusting the difficulty in games for some reason.

Conclusion:

Dead Space is a very very good game, and anyone that wants a challenge should definitely pick it up. It's available on 360, PS3, and PC. You should be warned though, it is extremely gory and would probably traumatize any small children for life.

Score: 9 out of 10

X-Men Origins: Wolverine

I'm continuing my trek through my new found supply of games from Gamefly and next up is X-Men Origins: Wolverine for the 360. Yes, this game is based off of the movie of the same name but unlike almost all other movie games, this one is actually good. When you get a studio with the creds of Raven Software to do your game and build it on the Unreal engine, it is kind of hard to go wrong. The PS2/Wii/PSP/DS versions were done by other developers and unfortunately they all fall short of the "Uncaged" edition on 360/PS3/PC. Metacritic rates the 360 version at 75, the PC version at 77, and PS3 at 73.

To put it in a nutshell, the game is a fairly standard action/adventure game in the style of God of War but is fairly well done and does justice to the character of Wolverine. Here are my thoughts on the game's pros and cons.

Pros:

•  Wolverine character: This game does a great job of telling the story of Wolverine and is probably the first time he is portrayed in videogames and something other then a source for one-liners. His penchants for bloodlust and rage are accurately depicted by the game's combat system while his sense of honor and compassion are portrayed through the storyline. Wolverine is voiced by Hugh Jackman which lends further credibility to the game.
• Combat: Once you get used to the controls the combat becomes pretty fun. You'll eventually figure out the best moves to use against certain enemies but the game rewards you extra experience for varying your tactics, which adds another layer of fun to the system. The game is also very gory and you'll spend a lot of time watching your character decaptiate and rip dudes in half, which is odd for a game based on a PG-13 movie, but is true to the Wolverine character nonetheless.
• Sense of power: Something a lot of games miss on is making your character actually feel powerful. Many times your super powered dude in game X is able to fly, lift bulldozers over his head, and shoot laser beams out of his eyes, but some random thug on the street with a baseball bat will get the best of him from time to time. X-Men Origins does a great job of making Wolverine feel like a superhero. His regeneration powers from the comics and movies are totally intact. He can take a few rounds of automatic weapon fire to the chest, duck around a corner to regenerate, and come back for round two. When you take damage in the game chunks of flesh are ripped away but you will regenerate everything back in a few seconds in real time. He can also use his feral senses to spot invisible enemies and when you 're leaping from enemy to enemy ripping them in two by various means, you'll feel a small pang of satisfaction along the way.

Cons:

•  Graphic glitches: There are tons of small graphical glitches throughout the game. By themselves they aren't really a big deal but as whole they should be taken into consideration. One example is when you take damage in the game Wolverine's shirt becomes progressively ripped and shredded and eventually you're running around shirtless (although by some divine intervention his pants never take any damage, thankfully). This whole feature is rather glitchy and you'll notice that when you do things like level up or enter a cutscene Wolverine instantly goes from shirtless to fully clothed.
• Too many puzzles. The part of this game that shines is the combat, but it seemed like Raven forced too many puzzle sequences into it. I understand that they did it to try to change up the flow of the game and give you something to do other then decapitate people, but they went a little overboard with it. If they focused on the combat more and figured out a few unique combat modes the game would have played a lot better.
• Indoor environments: There are some great outdoor environments in the game but for some reason there are very lengthy sections of the game where you are forced to play in repetitive indoor areas, particularly the Weapon X facility. If they the made the indoor areas shorter and expanded on areas like the Canadian wilderness the game would have felt less confined.

Conclusion:

X-Men Origins: Wolverine is a solid action/adventure game that does great justice for the Wolverine character. It doesn't break down any barriers or innovate anything for the game industry, but it is still simple fun. Raven Software continues their lineup of solid titles and shocked everyone by making a game based on a movie that is actually good. If you can find it on sale or rent it then this is worth your time and money.

Score: 7.5 out of 10

Star Wars: The Force Unleashed

Next up from my Gamefly queue is Star Wars: The Force Unleashed for the 360. Force Unleashed is pretty much a standard beat-em-up game dressed up in Star Wars clothing and was published by LucasArts in September 2008. You play the role of Darth Vader's sith apprentice, known in the game only by his codename "Starkiller". It is interesting to note that while the game was developed by LucasArts for the 360 and PS3 a total of 5 other developers worked on the game for other systems including PS2, Wii, PSP, DS, mobile versions, and others. The Metacritic rating for the 360 version is 73, with the other versions averaging around 70.

Pros: 

• Authentic Star Wars experience. LucasArts headed the development of this game and it is evident that they put a good deal of work into putting the Star Wars touch on it. There are many familiar characters making appearance and lots of lore references throughout the story. Much of the classic Star Wars music is featured throught the game as well and is worked nicely into combat and cinematic sequences. The storyline of Force Unleashed is also considered to be an official part of the Star Wars universe according to George Lucas and is meant to help bridge the timeline gap between Episodes 3 and 4.
• Graphics and audio. The game has fairly good character/environmental models and cutscenes. The texture work isn't the best but is passable. I found some of the environments to be striking but other to be fairly bland. The voice acting in the game is done really well and Vader and the Emperor sounded dead on even though the original actor's voices weren't used.
• Force Powers. The abilities your character has are fun to play around with and do a good job creating the feeling that your character is a powerful Force user. My favorites were force gripping someone and throwing them off of a ledge, while force choking someone and impaling them with a light saber worked as well -_-

Cons:

• Length. Force Unleashed is a very short game, somewhere in the range of 8 hours. I've read that the DLC adds a few hours, but it still clocks in under 10. The game has a lot of unlockables and seems like it was designed with multiple playthroughs in mind, but I found one run through was enough for me. This one point alone makes it hard for me to recommend to anyone, unless you can find it cheap or rent it.
• Combat. While I found the Force powers to be fun, the overall feel of the combat isn't good. The controls are OK but I found myself wrestling with things like hit detection and the camera. The melee combat isn't fluid and many basic enemy types can block your lightsaber attacks. I also found myself struggling with hit recovery time. When you are hit with an attack your character is generally knocked down and it takes a very long time to recover, to point sometimes that you only have a split second to react after getting up or you'll be knocked down again.
• Level design. The level design in Force Unleashed is generally uninspired and sometimes downright bad. There were many instances where one step off of a platform sent me plummeting to my death with no chance to recover and caused me to lose 5-10 minutes of gameplay. The camera generally makes it hard to see the pitfalls around you so sometimes you'll fall to your death and you never knew anything was there.
• Difficulty. The difficulty in this game is really poorly balanced. You'll spend most of your time tearing through groups of Stormtroopers with ease but the bosses at the end of the levels are like hitting a brick wall. They tend to spam unblockable attacks and will block 90% of what you throw their way. I had to turn the difficulty down to avoid becoming too frustrated with the game.

Conclusion:

Star Wars: The Force Unleashed is a decent game, but it is evident while playing that it had much more potential. The mechanics of the game are average at best and the fact that it is Star Wars is what drags it out of the realm of mediocre and into the world of OK. If you can find it cheap then it is worth your time but otherwise I can't recommend buying it new off the shelf.

Starcraft 2 Replays

The Starcraft 2 closed beta is underway and Blizzard doesn't have it under any NDA protection, which means that there are tons of gameplay videos and information available. Here are the three best sources of replays with commentary that I've found so far:

HDStarcraft: This is my favorite source so far. He does commentary on his own games and is knowledgeable and entertaining. Check out his YouTube channel, and he also has a website here. Here is a sample video:

BlizShouter: I also like what BlizShouter is doing on his YouTube channel. He does commentary on his own games and other top player's games and knows what he is talking about:

HuskyStarcraft: Husky tends to do some zany things but his replays are fun to watch as well. He also just started doing dual commentary with HDStarcraft which should be good. Check him out on YouTube or watch this sample video:

Batman: Arkham Asylum

So I just signed up for Gamefly and the first game I put on my list was Batman: Arkham Asylum for the 360. I've heard great things about it but with all the great titles that have come out recently it never really made it on my list of games to buy. I'll keep my thoughts on it short and simple, and the TLDR version is this: find a way to play Batman AA sometime before this console generation runs it course!

Pros: 

• Great graphics. Batman AA uses the Unreal engine to it's greatest effect and is one of the best looking games I've seen on the 360. Character models and textures are exceedingly well done and the environments are very well crafted.
• Fluid combat and controls. Everything from the punches, jump kicks, and sleeper holds to the batarangs, grappling hooks, and explosives feel solid and well done. Combat is very fluid and the control scheme on the 360 controller is nicely laid out.
• Story. I'm not a Batman buff but I can tell the developers put a lot of thought and research into the Batman mythos while creating this game. There are a ton of references to the more obscure characters in the Batman universe and they did a good job of fleshing out the backstories of the main villains of the game. The plot of the game itself is well thought out with enough twists and turns to keep the pace exciting.
• Voices. Mark Hamill (yes that Mark Hamill) does an outstanding job as Joker. His performance is actually one of the best parts of the game and adds to it's atmosphere incredibly.

Cons: 

• Ending. The ending is a bit awkward but I came away feeling that was a minor dip in an otherwise awesome game.
• Voices. I know I listed the Joker's voice work as being a plus but I found that the performance for Batman was a bit lack luster and Harley Quinn's voice was just flat out annoying at times. Here again however, I found the voices to be tolerable and probably only seeming to lack quality when measured against how great the rest of the game is.

Conclusion:

I highly recommend this game. It ranks right up there with the best games of this console generation and if you don't take my word for it just look at the multiple Game of the Year awards it has won and the universally great reviews it has garnered. It is available for 360, PS3, and PC and costs $39 used for consoles at Gamestop these days.

Gaming Podcasts

I'm finally getting around to delving into the world of podcasts and I've found a few videogame related shows that I'd like to share:

Rebel FM at eat-sleep-game.com: I've found that the three regulars on the show are very knowledgeable when it comes to gaming and games of past and present and their commentary has been witty and entertaining. Games of all genres and platforms are discussed on this show with emphasis generally placed on console games.

Active Time Babble (ATB) at 1up.com: This show is one of the many found at 1up.com and focuses very heavily on RPG titles. In fact they're so into RPGs that their last show was a two hour discussion focusing on Roguelikes o_o Again with this show I find the hosts to be very knowledgeable about gaming and the discussions are easy to listen to as well.

RPS Podcast at rockpapershotgun.com: Two guys with British accents talking about PC gaming. Here again the hosts know what they're talking about when it comes to gaming and their discussions are pretty entertaining.

So if you have any free time during your commute or at work or wherever just download any of these podcasts and put them on your mp3 player of choice to take care of your gaming urges. If you are interested in finding other podcasts some other ones to check out are the shows at 1up.com, giantbomb.com, and Major Nelson's show.