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

2/19/2012 09:15:00 PM Link - 0 comments

XBLA gives s a stroll down memory lane with Perfect Dark

by Brian

Check out this movie of a walk around Carrington Institute.

12/29/2009 07:34:00 AM Link - 0 comments

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.

12/29/2009 07:29:00 AM Link - 0 comments

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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12/29/2009 05:44:00 AM Link - 0 comments

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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12/28/2009 02:23:00 PM Link - 1 comments

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?

12/28/2009 02:05:00 PM Link - 2 comments

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.

12/28/2009 12:38:00 PM Link - 0 comments

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

12/23/2009 10:25:00 PM Link - 0 comments

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.

12/23/2009 04:43:00 PM Link - 1 comments

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?

12/23/2009 01:51:00 PM Link - 0 comments

When gaming is responcible for a shooting.

by Brian

At a gamestop in Orange County, Florida an employee was held at gunpoint. Waiting for the timed safe to open he asked the clerk for a Wii and a few games. He then grabbed the cash from the safe, shot the clerk in the leg and fled.

Thinking about this I can say this is one of a few times I would consider gaming responsible for a gun crime. But if you use the lobbyists approach it would have been a different story.

The clerk would be an avid gamer and more than most sense he works in the industry. So knowing that he would definitely have had a concealed weapons permit and had pointed his Deagle in the would-be robbers face. And being a gamer he would assume friendly fire was on and shot first. He would immediately check his stats and see his awesome kill to death ratio.

I wish friendly fire was on.

Pic of robber.

Another note. If you see someone with a moustache and no beard. He's either an ax murderer, a kid toucher, or she's ugly.

12/22/2009 03:00:00 PM Link - 0 comments

We Look Forward to Crackdown 2

by Justin Neitzey

Xbox Live was host to the new Crackdown 2 trailer this weekend. I don't care what it looks like because it has 1-4 player co-op online and 2-16 players online in I guess is what is going to be a deathmatch/team vs. team gameplay styles. I'm also imagining some awesome vehicle based games and even foot races.

Here's the trailer from E3 this year. It's pretty much the same as on XBL.

So are we done blogging about Call of Duty: MW2 now?

Labels: call of duty, Crackdown

12/21/2009 08:25:00 PM Link - 0 comments

Metroid Prime Trilogy Game for Nintendo Wii $19.99 at Best Buy

by Justin Neitzey

This is well worth the price for Wii owners and, of course, GameCube owners. The first one was the best. The third one was the hardest. I still haven't finished it.

 

 

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Metroid Prime Trilogy Game for Nintendo Wii $19.99 at Best Buy

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12/20/2009 09:50:00 PM Link - 0 comments

PartTimeGamer.com Moving

by Justin Neitzey

After fiddling around with a build of Chromium OS of a laptop, the developer decided he needed a bigger server. Hexxeh decided to buy his own huge server and part it out to help pay for the costs. Hexxeh's Blog details it all, but in short, I think I'm going to learn a new linux operating system and WordPress.

This blog is for fun, and so to will this be all about fun and learning something new. Hopefully PTG will have a completely new look and feel as well as more functionality.

More on this as it develops!

12/15/2009 09:49:00 AM Link - 0 comments

Javelin FAIL

by Brian

If you haven't seen this Javelin kill, it is well worth it. You have to watch it twice, first to see what happens, the second time to listen to the commentary. He seems to be a little unhappy.

12/14/2009 12:43:00 PM Link - 0 comments