Part Time Gamer

Life with a little bit of time to game.

May Games and Collecting Things

by Justin Neitzey

There are more bad games about Pac-Man than there are good. Like, a lot. Trust me, stick with the classics, Pac-Pix (which shouldn't even be a Pac-Man game), Pac-Man Championship Edition and the four-player, arcade hit, Battle Royale. Does anyone care about how Pac-Man is doing with the "challenges of being a teenager"?

I've been playing a lot of Batman: Arkham City the last few weeks, in the very spare moments that I have between house work, child rearing and spending time with my wife. Now that it's summer, we are outdoors a little more, coping with the "challenges of being" allergic to nature with a four year old.

I might still say that this is the best comic book based super hero game of all time. Besides that, this game has it's hooks in me for collecting items and unlocking content that I really don't even care about. Only Crackdown can compete for time with all it's tiny orbs floating around the city. I must have them all in these games. If someone ever figures out DLC that's just fresh locations for collecting stuff, I might be a little less likely to stop at 7-11 for an eclair as often as I do. Seriously, someone just go back Halo or Gears of War and drop some artifacts, dog tags or little pretty flowers in the maps and I might have my games planned out for the rest of the summer.

Stick Man Golf 2 is also competing on iOS with You Don't Know Jack for the winner of the award for Game Most Played At Work While SOL Testing Is Going On. Standards testing for technology support staff is a huge game of sit and wait. You're bored out of your mind and want something to do, but you just hope it doesn't have to do anything with testing the overly tested kids and stressed out teachers.

My son is in love with the Wii U Nintendo Land and Warioland: Shake It. He's quite good at playing the Pikmin game in Nintendoland and loves repeating one level over and over again. Sometimes he even asks me to play because it's so fun. Now we just need a full on Wii U game for it and we'll both have fun playing that one together. And of course I'll need extra time to make his dinner, clean up a bit and catch a breath. I really don't know how people with WoW accounts and two kids make anything happen in their lives. More power to you all.

Labels: collecting, Gears of War, Halo, nintendo, Pac-Man, Pikmin

Finished: Bioshock

by Justin Neitzey

I picked up the boxed set of Bioshock 1 and 2 a couple of months ago and was so excited to play thought the first one. I got about 4/5ths through it before Halo 4 came out and didn't get back to it until now.

One of my pet peeves about adventure games like this is that when the difficulty ramps up so high and you repeatedly die over and over, you start to forget what you're doing and why you're doing it.

I'm playing Bioshock on the normal difficulty and I'm about finished with the game, when all of the sudden they completely flip the game over on it's head and tie your hands to your own feet. I was happily dealing with harder parts of the game with a couple of deaths here and there when I was acting stupid, but after you reach a major milestone in this game, the enemies are three times as hard to kill and it just becomes an exercise trying to get a little farther than the last time you died in order to make any progress. And, since there isn't a penalty for dying at all, it doesn't make any seance why the game got so hard, so quickly.

What was a game that was interesting and beautiful with great voice acting, level design and flow is now a boot camp in the desert with barely any water. This great game of chess is now just a snowball fight and the other kids have rocks in their snow balls. All of the sudden my weapons are doing very little damage to the generic enemies, alarms are triggering around every corner, causing sentry bots and general chaos to rain upon me and I haven't even gotten to the the part in the game when I'm supposed to be chasing down the last enemy. I'm struggling just to make it to him. That's all good and well in some games, but it makes no sense in Bioshock's context.

Hopefully this experience won't ruin the end of the game for me, like I fear. Bioshock is a well crafted game that is involving and magical. I got to this part in the game really wanting my scripted revenge on the evildoer. I played right into Bioshock's story and it felt good doing it. Now, I just want it to be over with so I can't start the next game and forget all about, what I would consider to be, Bioshock's one mistake: an ending sequence too big for it's own britches.

Update: after finally getting to the last boss in Bioshock and dying once I had to wonder what the idea of kicking the gamer out to the title screen was for. The whole time your playing this game there at no penalties for dying. Was I supposed to stop and start a new game?

85% great game, 10% repetitive dying is pointless and 5% what?

Hey, I think I just invented a new type of review score.
Labels: Bioshock, finished, review

Review: Gears of War - Judgement

by Justin Neitzey

When Brian mentioned getting this post-trilogy Gears of War game, that doesn't have anything to do with the main characters or involved the ex-Epic lead designer, I balked at the idea. There was no way I was getting involved with an after thought of a game like Judgement. It wreaked of stink.

Then I caved on release day.

It was the best cave of buying video games I've had in a long time. The best cave of my gaming life was the Xbox.

Judgement has a lot of things going for it and most of those are features and changes that weren't in the original games. People Can Fly brought a lot to the table, being the developers of the single player campaign: the three star system for each level, the declassified mission option to make each level even harder with various things like no lights on or fog throughout the level, and making each chapter of the game narrated by each different playable character. They also created a new system for enemies to spawn different each time you play a level. They sound like small things, but it made the game different enough that I didn't feel like I was playing the same old Gears of War. It was refreshing.

I haven't played a lot of the multiplayer, but a lot of people are complaining about the changes. Now that I've about finished up the main game and collecting COG tags, I'll be moving into the online side of things and making myself at home there.
Labels: review

Flickr Groups

by Justin Neitzey

The Flickr groups that I created are doing quite nicely.

Video Game Rooms - For people to take pictures of their rooms dedicated to video games and culture.

Video Game Photo Mode - For pictures taken from within console video games using built-in software and no external manipulation.

Soon I'll have to post pictures of my new basement and all the stuff that's been put in. The last iteration was pretty cool, but my new room is much nicer.

Back To Blogging

by Justin Neitzey

You know what happens when you have a child? You have no time.

I'm reviving the blog in 2013 with a renewed sense of self documentation about video games and on my personal blog. Part Time Gamer's old domain may be dead, but Blogger with suffice for now.

I'll be writing some posts soon about Gears of War: Judgement, Dead Space 3 and children with video games.

RAGE and that status of RPG games

by Justin Neitzey

I'm about 8 hours into RAGE and I have to say that it's not only the best looking Xbox game yet. That's debatable of course, but no one reads this blog, so I'll just assume that I'm right.

Among the things that I absolutely love about this game there are still flagrant annoyances that bug me about every adventure game in the past couple years.

I'm getting tired of pressing buttons to talk to people or advance conversations. Let's do a proximity thing that reads a little more into positions and facing people. If I turn to walk away, interrupt yourself and say something like, "...oh, okay. Guess we'll talk later." Or pull a gun and fire a warning shot if it's really a big deal. Let me know you mean business.

If a game has multiple locales, stop repeating resources in each one. Parts, weapons, medicine/mechanics, games of chance need to be more organic. Not every town has a parts store or weapons dealer. Maybe a town only has a thrift or pawn shop. If a game is popular, show more/less people playing it every few hours. Those two guys aren't playing that game all damn day. I don't care how shitty the apocalypse is.

Stop making side quests something I start and complete manually. Make something happen to me that I can choose to participate in naturally. I don't want to hit a button. I don't want to be singled out as responsible. If someone runs into me with their car, let me decide if I chase them down or not. That's why nothing ever gets done in GTA games anyway, am I right?

Stop making me run back and forth. There has to be better ways to repeat use of gameplay areas. RAGE just sent me on a reverse course through a hospital path (and gave me an achievement for it!). You just admitted that you have no game play creativity by doing that.

If you're going to use someone like John Goodman and Claudia Black as a voice actor, use him in the entire game. I don't ever want to stop hearing him talk.

I love that RAGE made graphics one of it's highest priorities. I'm a little bothered by three disks, but I completely accept it for the payoff. I also really love the enemy A.I. and how they approach you. The muntants have multiple abilities from crawling fast to jumping off walls and monkey baring the ceilings to come and attack you. It's creepy and fantastic. The Authority soldiers aren't that smart, but I like their shields and willingness to toss grenades.

If you liked playing Resident Evil or Dead Space for it's creepiness and enjoy Borderlands or Fallout for it's questing and item building, this game is a perfect mashup of the two "genres". I highly recommend it.
Labels: ideas, review, rpg

XBLA gives s a stroll down memory lane with Perfect Dark

by Brian

Check out this movie of a walk around Carrington Institute.

17 year old gets Modern Warfare for Xmas

by Brian

He asked his Grandparents for Modern Warfare for Christmas. And this is what he got.

He had to laugh when he opened it. But still thanked his Grandparents for his gift.

Capcom Still Burning Over Bionic Commando Failure [Business]

by Justin Neitzey

It sounds like, to some developers, that some video games are like pieces of furniture and cars: part out creation to another company to increase output just because your too greedy.

I was looking forward to the Bionic Commando reboot last year but once reviews and the demo of the sausage headed, cyber armed hero started dropping with low returns, I hung my head and continued to play Call of Duty.

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Capcom Still Burning Over Bionic Commando Failure [Business]
In a Q&A session held earlier this week, president Haruhiro Tsujimoto became the second high profile Capcom employee this month to get all negative when it comes to the company collaborating with Western studios.
Answering a question on Capcom's "alliances" with overseas developers, Tsujimoto echoes comments made a few weeks back by Resident Evil producer Jun Takeuchi (not to mention reminding us of his own personal scars), by essentially saying that it's hard, hard work joining forces with an international studio.
"Our experience with Bionic Commando has demonstrated the difficulty of outsourcing the development of new title to overseas companies", he said. "Nevertheless, we cannot develop a sufficient number of titles without using the resources of these companies. This is why we plan to continue using these alliances."
"We are considering ways to separate the roles of activities in Japan and overseas. We plan to develop new titles primarily in Japan. Overseas companies may be used mostly to develop titles for existing game series with well-established characters and universal themes. Overseas companies will also handle certain parts and/or lineups of such games."
So the West is a sequel farm for Capcom IP. And just like that, Capcom's decade-long program of reaching out to international developers in order to increase their global market share misses the point entirely.

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Something Modern Warfare 2 Got Wrong About Pakistan [Infinity Ward]

by Justin Neitzey

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Something Modern Warfare 2 Got Wrong About Pakistan [Infinity Ward]
Pakistani reader Saad was thrilled when he heard that Infinity Ward's Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 was getting a multiplayer map set in the city he calls home, Karachi. That is, until he played it.

"I, being a Pakistani, was so excited at seeing a Karachi map and then immediately so disappointed when I played the map," says the Karachi resident. The map has Arabic written all over, even though that isn't the country's language.

The country of Pakistan has two official lingos: English and Urdu. With somewhere between 60 and 80 million speakers of the standard language, Urdu has more speakers than, say, Italian, Korean or Polish.

"Infinity Ward probably thought, 'Oh hey its a Muslim country so Arabic is the language,'" says Saad.

While Arabic and Urdu use the same script, the words are completely different. For example, the noun "people" is "al-naas" in Arabic (الناس), and "log" or "loug" (لوگ) in Urdu.

"To someone who doesn't know urdu won't be able to tell the difference," Saad explains. "It's like Spanish and English, I guess. Some letters are same, some are different but the words are completely different."

There isn't a single Urdu word on the entire Karachi map and no one writes in Arabic in Pakistan.

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Holiday Gaming Post

by Justin Neitzey

For the most part it's been a relatively non-gaming week. I left all the video games at home besides my iPod, which has become a Internet/gaming staple on long trips, and my Wii, which I only brought because I replaced it at my parents with their own Wii for Christmas.

I got reacquainted with Super Mario Galaxy. I've been tempted to buy the Mario Wii game. And I finally beat a level boss on Hero of Sparta on my iPod. I also got a $50 iTunes store gift card that will go to mostly music, but I might buy a game or three.

What have you been playing this week? What are going to be playing to end out the year?

Crackdown 2 in Game Informer

by Brian

Game Informer had an exclusive look into Crackdown to in there October 2009 issue. The story between the two games is as follows.

The infected that were inadvertently released in the first game carried a virus. This virus took over lager populations within Pacific City. The Agency started cordoning off these areas and the citizens formed a group called The Cell, and began to revolt. They didn't trust The Agency and were tired of living in fear with the infected in the sewers during the day and out in droves at night. Something like the Darkseekers in I am Legend I guess.

So now with the city in ruins, you deal with vigilante citizens trying to take back there streets from the infected and The Agency. And the infected themselves need to be eradicated. Now with a three way struggle, The Cell attacked The Agency and destroyed the agent program. Leaving the Agency with only in control of Agency Tower.

Now years later with the agent program up and running again. The Agency feels it is time to regain it's power to Pacific City.

The developers felt like they had a good basis with the structure of the city. So they fed on the players complaints. The lack of a good story. Players felt there were times in the game that you just blew things up just for that reason. Just blow it up. So now a solid narrative is being added.

There will come times in the campaign that it seems impossible for a single agent to complete mission. You will need help from a friend or two, when hordes of infected are involved.

Ruffian Games will be addressing some complaints players had of the first game. One being, in a mission you would work your way to the boss and just take them out. It was very simple and became a little repetitive. Now you're not dealing with single individuals but hordes of both The Cell and the infected. Missions will not always be directed towards them, instead you may be going after a power plant to take electricity away from The Cell organization. The Creative team wanted to have a living breathing city. For example, if you take out that power plant and afterward attack one of The Cells' camps. The Cells' guards would be fending off the infected in the dark and with there hands full you could make your way into the compound with ease.

There is a larger variety of weapons, some are a lot bigger than the previous editions. The creative staff felt that when your character progressed and gained some bulk in the first game. The weapons stayed the same and seamed almost toy like.

Don't fear that Realtime Worlds isn't involved this time around. Ruffian Games was created by people involved with the first Crackdown with the intent of getting the contract for Crackdown 2. Once they won the contract they received resumes from employees of the original team at Realtime Worlds to join Ruffian Games.

Oh yes, this one isn't just on my radar. It's in my sights.

More on Crackdown 2

by Justin Neitzey

I had no idea that Ruffian Games was making the new Crackdown. I quickly scoured their site and found a blog, some pictures, and a link to an IGN "Rewind" on the Crackdown trailer. Definitely worth a watch.

After talking to Andrew, I realized that the cell-shading style is gone, something I really liked in the first one. But, that's fine.

What I'd be really interested is that there they continue both story lines that I remember out of the first one. Of course, they are putting back in the infected/zombies/mutants. That's fine. But more importantly was the ending that dealt with the voiceover/narrator "boss". I won't put anything up about it here since Andrew is playing it now.

Link: IGN Video: Crackdown 2 Xbox 360 Series - IGN Rewind Theater: E3 Trailer

Looking Ahead: Response

by Justin Neitzey

Personally, moving this blog to Wordpress is foremost on my list. It's purely out of geekery. Hell, we might even loose a lot leaving Blogger in terms of up time and functionality. But I have a feeling we're going to like it there, especially with the new redesign.

Gamewise, Crackdown is top of the list. I gave my copy of Crackdown to Andrew and he's totally going to get both games now. I look forward to pummeling Pacific City with him after vacation break.

Looking at IGN's list, it's hard to tell when things are coming out because there's no way to sort the games (or it doesn't work). There a lot of Dec 31, 2010 dates on there attached to games like a new Wii Zelda and Halo Reach. Splinter Cell: Conviction and Army of Two: 40th Day also look promising for co-op games.

There a ton of sequels that I'm just not into coming up: Alan Wake, Bioshock, Resident Evil, Battlefield: Bad Company.

Looking ahead

by Brian

With the fall and winter game rush out of the way. I have picked up MW2, Forza 3 and Left 4 Dead 2. Looking forward to and now spending a lot of time with those games. I don't have a full grasp of what is on the horizon.

I know I will be picking up Crackdown 2. I'm interested in Transformers: Battle for Cybertron and Alien vs. Predator.

So as the year comes to an end. What are you looking forward to in 2010?

Life with a little bit of time to game.

May Games and Collecting Things

by Justin Neitzey

Finished: Bioshock

by Justin Neitzey

Review: Gears of War - Judgement

by Justin Neitzey

Flickr Groups

by Justin Neitzey

Back To Blogging

by Justin Neitzey

RAGE and that status of RPG games

by Justin Neitzey

XBLA gives s a stroll down memory lane with Perfect Dark

by Brian

17 year old gets Modern Warfare for Xmas

by Brian

Capcom Still Burning Over Bionic Commando Failure [Business]

by Justin Neitzey

Sent to you via Google Reader

Capcom Still Burning Over Bionic Commando Failure [Business]

Something Modern Warfare 2 Got Wrong About Pakistan [Infinity Ward]

by Justin Neitzey

Sent to you via Google Reader

Something Modern Warfare 2 Got Wrong About Pakistan [Infinity Ward]

Holiday Gaming Post

by Justin Neitzey

Crackdown 2 in Game Informer

by Brian

More on Crackdown 2

by Justin Neitzey

Looking Ahead: Response

by Justin Neitzey

Looking ahead

by Brian

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