… and the mighty Sam sayeth unto him, “Let there be gore, let there be enemies, let their be 16 play co-op only on the PC”. [Excerpt from the Book of Sam]
Below are is Episode One of the “House of Sam videos, which is oddly entertaining and creepy at the same time. Also included is some gameplay footage which has up to 16 player co-op. Sadly the 16 player co-op is reserved to the PC version only. Most likely the XBLA version will again only have 4 player co-op.
Feeding Frenzy 2: Shipwreck Showdown
Publisher: Popcap
Developer: Popcap
Platforms: Xbox 360
Release Date: September 17th, 2008
Story
“Chomp your way through an underwater mystery in Feeding Frenzy® 2: Shipwreck Showdown™! Play solo or with friends to dodge predators and eat your way up the food chain to save the sea in this sequel to the popular Xbox LIVE® Arcade game Feeding Frenzy. Play wild, wacky party games, and try to stay alive in Time Attack mode! Sixty spectacular levels, brand-new fish, and underwater scenes await!” [Via Xbox.Com]
There is an intruder in the waters where you live, and it is up to you to stop it. Control different fish as you eat your way up the food chain and get to the mysterious intruder. All is not well, and there are multiple obstacles that stand in your way. Can you succeed in saving your waters?
Gameplay
The gameplay found in Feeding Frenzy 2 is extremely straight forward. Swim around the area eating small fish to get bigger, and then bigger fish to become even bigger. Once you fill up your meter you beat the level and continue to the next. With endless lives through continuations, there isn’t really any penalty for dying. The only penalty would be starting over the level if you used up all 15 lives through 2 continues. Friends and Family that have absolutely no experience with games and sit down and laugh as you play the game.
The game has multiple different fish types to eat, as well as powerups and obstacles. Each powerup helps towards beating the level, while the obstacles hinder you. Powerups include speed boosts, fish shields, and more to be discovered. Obstacles include squids that blind you, poisoned fish that reverse your controls, and mines that instantly kill you. Certain levels will also throw other hindrances in your path such as pitch black surroundings that you need to light up to see the fish.
Younger players will get much more joy out of the game, as older players will get bored after a while. The game is simply too easy. No real challenge is present, and a normal gamer can beat the entire thing in a day.
Audio & Graphics
There isn’t really anything special about the Audio. Voice actors may have helped develop the characters and the soundtrack wasn’t memorable. The graphics were nice but they are also not really special. There are only a few backdrops and about 15 fish variations.
Achievements
The Achievements in Feeding Frenzy 2 are extremely easy. They just take time. One play through should get you a majority of the achievements. The miscellaneous achievements and party achievements can all be achieved with a dud controller as second player. The most annoying achievement is to complete Time Attack. Plenty of time is given to complete it, but after completing the game once, replaying it just feels too similar and you have to regainall your powerups.
The Achievement List is:
Secret Achievements
Overview
Simple gameplay makes the game fun for the whole family, and added co-op features makes Feeding Frenzy 2 fun to play together. Multiple power ups and 60 levels create a fun relaxing game that anyone can enjoy. The game can get bland and repetitive if played by yourself and in long sittings, but it is still fun. A great purchase for kids and a fun experience for everyone else, but the overly simple game is unable to hold onto the enjoyment for extended periods of time.
I give Feeding Frenzy 2: Shipwreck Showdown
Pros
Cons
Let me get this straight. We get to play as a badass who takes mind numbing drugs, hits on all the hot ladies, cuts into tons of people, and the developers have reduced it all down to a bunch of minigames?
NBC Universal and Legacy Entertainment could be turning House’s badass persona into a Grey’s Anatomy love fest. Even with everything broke down into minigames House MD still looks like an interesting game that lets you solve 5 cases like House would, so it can’t be all bad.
Enjoy the trailer.
I honestly can’t play DDR at all, let alone play other games using the pad. The video below shows Nick Hagman beating the game on the DDR pad. It took him 14 attempts and plenty of practice to complete the classic game. The video runs for 11 minutes, with certain parts sped up for to fit into youtube’s length limit.
The next game Nick plans to beat is Megaman 2, good luck man! That is all I have to say.
This has to be one of the best Street Fighter ideas I’ve ever seen. This short film entitled Street Fighter Legacy is created by actor, film-maker, and action choreographer, and martial artist Joey Ansah
Check it out below and for more information make your way over to his official website to find out every behind the making and inspiration behind creating this fantastic little film.
If only the official Street Fighter movie was as good as this.
The recent Medal of Honor Trailer emphasizes a different side of war. While other games usually show the carnage and the action, this trailer shows the more emotional side. You know, the side that actually feels pain when killing 100s of people.
“Medal of Honor is an authentic look into today’s war. Inspired by real people and real events, the game puts players in the boots of today’s warrior — from the infantry ground pounder to the Tier 1 Operator,” said Greg Goodrich, Executive Producer of Medal of Honor. “We are proud of this piece because it offers a glimpse into the game we’re creating, while also showing the mindset of these warriors.”
The EA blog further reveals information on the game by saying “The Medal of Honor single-player campaign is being developed by Electronic Arts in Los Angeles who has been working closely with Tier 1 Operators from the U.S. Special Operations Community to create the most authentic modern war experience possible. To compliment the single-player experience, EALA has enlisted the multiplayer expertise of EA Digital Illusions CE AB. Together these studios are poised to reset the franchise for a new generation this fall.”
Below is the trailer, and no that isn’t your phone it is in the trailer. Enjoy.
A few weeks ago it was announced in Japan that a Monster Hunter skin for Lost Planet 2 would be included as one of the game’s many ways to customise your characters. A PlayStation 3 exclusive and originally only planned for the Japanese release, we are pleased to confirm that the Rathalos Armour will now also be available to western gamers as a free download. This PlayStation 3 exclusive is scheduled to go live on PSN in late May.
Lost Planet 2 for the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 will release across Europe and North America on May 11th.
The second video walkthrough, titled “What’s New,” details the enhancements and additions of one of the biggest, deepest, and most satisfying handheld roleplaying games of all time–particularly the inclusion of an all new playable female protagonist. This fresh new perspective to one of gaming’s most inventive narratives increases the replayability of a game already renowned for its length and depth, offering new dialogue, social links, story events, and romantic opportunities. Numerous additional improvements and enhancements serve to streamline the experience for optimal handheld RPG enjoyment.
Adding to the value of the upcoming handheld adaptation of one of the highest-rated role-playing games of all time, a special “Junpei” baseball cap is available as a pre-order bonus exclusively from Amazon.com, Amazon.ca, and GameStop/EB Games (in stores and online in the United States and Canada), and only while supplies last. The hat, modeled after the one worn by fan-favorite SEES member Junpei Iori, offers a rare collectible to celebrate while also serving as a rather convenient costume component for cosplay-minded gamers.
SMT: Persona 3 Portable is currently scheduled for release on July 6, 2010.
Alan Wake
Publisher: Microsoft
Developer: Remedy Entertainment
Platforms: Xbox 360
Release Date: May 18th, 2010
Story
“When the wife of the best-selling writer Alan Wake disappears on their vacation, his search turns up pages from a thriller he doesn’t even remember writing. A dark presence stalks the small town of Bright Falls, pushing Wake to the brink of sanity in his fight to unravel the mystery and save his love.” [via Xbox.com]
You play as Alan Wake, who is a best-selling author with writer’s block. He goes on vacation with his wife in hopes to relax. Upon arriving in Bright Falls, and receiving a key to a lake cottage from a mysterious woman everything goes horribly wrong. Alan’s wife disappears and he finds himself inside one of his thrillers that he doesn’t remember writing.
As the intricate story unfolds you will want to keep playing to find out what happens next. When you finish one episode you will want to play the next to find out what happens; just like the set up of a TV series, which they draw inspiration from for their episodic level set up.
Gameplay
Alan Wake plays out like any other action thriller. Remedy has managed to take the basic gameplay; however, and mix it up to help Alan Wake stand alone from the crowd. As you explore Bright Falls and its surrounding forest you will heavily use light as a weapon. Darkness surrounds Bright Falls and you must first use your light to remove the darkness before you can harm the creatures. Extra tactics take place when you fight large groups of enemies with only your flashlight and a pistol. Your beam of light cannot target everyone and as you slowly remove the darkness from one enemy the rest will advance on you. Using cinematic dodges will help a lot but will take time to master. A cinematic dodge is a dodge you make right before an enemy strike that slows down time and gives you some time to think of your next step in the chaos
Ammo conservation is very important in Alan Wake. At first you will receive a lot of ammo, but the levels are decently long and ammo is scarce. Preserve your ammo, or you will be stuck with an empty gun and surrounded by multiple enemies. Aiming for the head helps, but due to the weird aiming system it may take some practice before you can easily dispatch enemies. By this time new enemies will be after you and adapting will have to commence. You can easily get surrounded by enemies without even knowing it which causes you to need to adjust your camera to hold them all back. This constant change keeps you on your toes, but makes you feel constantly against the odds. The constant camera changing can also cause trees or boulders to block your screen, but anyone who plays a lot of this type of game won’t be bothered by it much. Easier settings will help you ease into the game and is advised to be played first, but jumping right into the harder setting will present a challenge that you may find fun.
Collectables are abundant throughout Bright Falls and will call for multiple trips back on different difficulties in order to collect them all. Unlike other games, the collectables in Alan Wake aren’t all useless. Though the coffee thermoses and the can pyramids are in a general sense useless, the other collectables increase the depth of the story. Manuscripts which are scattered throughout the levels actually tell you more about the story which you are in. The downfall of the manuscripts is that they sometimes reveal what is about to happen before you actually do it.
Audio & Graphics
A brilliant soundtrack gives an ambient feel throughout every level within Alan Wake. The voice acting is also nice, but not all of it is of equal value. A few of the sounds overlap as well which interrupts the story. The graphics are also beautiful. Remedy has left no visual detail overlooked in the development of Alan Wake. The lighting and environment add to the atmosphere of the game, which adds to the thrill of the game.
Achievements
The achievements found in Alan Wake. A huge chunk of them are story related, while another huge chunk is for collecting achievements. The collecting achievements are not that difficult since the game keeps track of how many you have collected, and the episodic gameplay lets you jump to any level to collect on it. The levels are long, but luckily they are also split into sections for much more ease. The hardest achievement will be beating the game on Nightmare due to the enemies being stronger, but it is still manageable. Overall the achievement list is pretty good, and all of them are manageable.
Click here to go to the achievement list.
Overview
Alan Wake is a fun experience that plays out like watching a TV show. Though it may be annoying at certain points, but it helps for a gamer who only plays one level a day. The gameplay follows closely with other action games of this type but the added light mechanic makes the experience more unique. With tons of collectables to get and an intricate story that will keep you wanting to find out what happens next, Alan Wake is a very good single player purchase. Alan Wake is story driven game that plays like reading a book or watching a TV series which is a fun experience.
I give Alan Wake:
Pros
Cons
Dead to Rights: Retribution
Developer: Volatile Games
Publisher: Namco Bandai Games Inc.
Platform: Xbox 360 (Reviewed), Playstation 3
Release Date: 4/27/2010
Overview:
When the dark underbelly of the city begins to rise up and commit crimes against innocent people, the police step in. Enter Jack Slate, a vice cop along with Shadow his canine companion. They will stop at nothing to find what is happening in their city and prevent a mysterious new organization from taking hold.
Story:
If you have played the previous iterations of Dead to Rights, then you will be disappointed if you were expecting to have a continuation of the storyline. You will however be glad to hear that Dead to Rights: Retribution takes a completely new outlook on Jack and Shadow’s story in a re-imagining of the storyline.
To begin with, Shadow is not Jack’s dog at all, but instead his father’s. The story begins with Jack in a bar, wounded. The player is not left in the dark for long however, as the game then flashes back to the past day. Eventually the player will reach the part of the storyline where it is no longer a flashback. Not only that but the story consists of multiple plot twists which will draw many players into it, due to the amount of emotions and gritty realism displayed by the characters.
Graphics:
Unfortunately the graphics are appear to be something one would see on last-generation systems. The character models are not what one would expect this generation with the 360 and PS3’s graphical engines to work with. The areas you will venture through however, are very well detailed and designed, but suffer from too much attempted realism. That is that everything appears to have been dipped in a brownish shade.
The enemies are detailed well enough, with one particular enemy even looking like a Geth from Mass Effect 2. The actual character motions though falter heavily. There are a number of graphical errors and on occasion you will lose Shadow due to him becoming stuck halfway through a wall or disappearing completely.
Also continuing with Shadow; when he grabs an enemy to drag them out of the way, the ragdoll physics lose control. Shadow’s mouth is not connected to the body half of the time, and the body itself is flailing around in a manner similar to a fish out of water.
Gameplay:
It may be a bit cliché to say this, however the games shooting mechanics feel just like Gears of War. The cover system is very similar to Gears, but not to say that is a bad thing. The covering system works as well as one can expect, however in a bit of a realistic turn, cover isn’t all its made out to be.
In heavy firefights you may come to realize that you are still being hit occasionally by a stray bullet, that passes over the cover and hits Jack. Not only that but certain bits of cover can begin to degrade after enough damage is done to them, and can cause the cover to be destroyed leaving Jack exposed to heavy gunfire.
Your own weaponry is varied between assault rifles, shotguns, pistols, SMGs, and sniper rifles. Jack can carry one large weapon and one smaller weapon. He also is able to carry one type of grenade, which varies from explosive, flash, to a technologically advanced electric grenade.
The guns are as accurate as one would expect, however there is an issue with accuracy on the computers side of things. There have been multiple occasions in which an enemy with a shotgun will be standing on the other side of a large room, and manage to hit every single spread shot. Not only that but snipers are also able to pinpoint very quickly and fire shots within seconds of the previous shot making them extremely deadly.
Speaking of deadly; specific enemy kills will net Jack an increase in what is called the Focus meter. The focus meter is more or less a bullet time mode. When activated at any time it slows down everything around Jack, allowing his bullets/punches to do more damage, and himself to take next to none. There are no fancy acrobatics included, but it will pull Jack out of a tight situation.
Each gun consists of the bullets inside of the clip. Extra ammo is obtainable, but only enough for a maximum of three reloads in most guns. Once the clip runs out the gun will be thrown aside in favor of a secondary weapon, or Jack’s fists. This requires a conservation of ammo due to the fact that it is scarce and some enemies directly require gunfire and are not able to be removed by a well placed knuckle sandwich.
Here is one of the most enjoyable parts of the gameplay, the brawling. Fighting with your fists consists of a quick attack, strong attack, block/counter, guard break, and dash. Each normal attack can be strung together into a variety of various combos depending on the commands entered, while a well timed block can turn the tables of a fight with a counter attack.
Melee was one of the most enjoyable parts of the gameplay mostly due to the fact that it is also coupled with very brutal finishing executions and helpful disarms. Any armed opponent may be disarmed quickly before the gun is put away, and with the disarm Jack obtains the enemies firearm and turns it back on his opponent. Not only is it a quick way to dispatch many enemies, but to get a quick reload for your own gun.
The finishing moves are a highlight of the game mostly due to their utter brutality. There will be a different execution depending on whether or not you have a weapon equipped. If not then there will be a variety of brutal finishing moves ranging from a neckbreaking stunner, to a medley of brutal kicks to various parts of the body.
The fighting may be entertaining and all, but to tell the truth the best part of this game is your sidekick Shadow. Shadow appears to be a husky mix, and he is more than willing to shed blood to protect Jack. Shadow is under your command for every level after the second, and will eliminate weakened enemies, hold stronger enemies and bring back weapons if you require them.
Shadow is more than just a sidekick however as there are stealth sections of the game requiring the player to take control of Shadow. These sections are a nice change of pace, as you must sneak around enemies and quietly with a snap of the jugular. These parts of the game may be in enjoyable the stealth mechanic is a bit erratic. There will be occasions that Shadow will be literally in the shadows and still be visible to un-alert enemies.
Not only that, but when enemies do become alert, they must have a sixth sense that activates that allows them to continually track Shadow down, even if he managed to hide without an enemy near and completely hid within a veil of shadows.
Overall:
Despite the fact that the game’s graphics are somewhere between the Xbox and the Xbox 360 (let’s say Xbox 180), it doesn’t truly hinder the actual game. Not everything great comes in a pretty package, and the actual game itself is very enjoyable. The fighting is brutal and satisfying while the story will keep the player pushing through towards the end in hope of a resolution.
I give Dead to Rights: Retribution
P.S.: See how many A Nightmare on Elm Street movie posters you can find in the game.
