The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim

Posted by BinaryMessiah on 04/10/2012
Posted in: Microsoft, Nintendo Consoles, PC Reviews, PlayStation 3, Retro Consoles, Sony, Steam Deck Playable, Steam Deck Verification, Switch, Xbox 360. Tagged: , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

Publisher: Bethesda Softworks

Developer: Bethesda Game Studios

Release Date: 11/11/2011

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Here it finally is! I had so many great memories with Oblivion back in 2007. I could go on and on about that game, but the fifth game in the series is before us and has taken the world by storm. From creating internet memes to lots of weird videos on YouTube, Skyrim is a behemoth that even non-gamers couldn’t ignore. Skyrim takes place in Well, Skyrim, which is north of Cyrodiil. Cyrodiil was where Oblivion was set, but Skyrim is also set 200 years after those events. Of course, they are talked about in Skyrim, but time isn’t the only change in the game.

You are the Dragonborn, or Dovahkiin, who has the power of the Thu’um, which means you can shout like a dragon. This is actually a major gameplay element in the game, as well as fighting dragons. The map may seem smaller than Cyrodiil, but there is a lot more content in the game. I spent 108 hours on Skyrim, and that was 90% completion of side quests, areas discovered, and finishing the main story. I finished at level 45 and had almost 100,000 gold. In Oblivion, I was able to finish the game at about 95% in 50 hours. That lets you know how much more content there is, so you will be busy for months.

Let’s talk about combat first. The game still has third-person melee combat like the past two games, but it has been revised. The combat feels smoother, and it’s not so much like you’re playing whack-a-mole. There are more elements involved behind the engine, but the thing you will see the most is the perk system that is borrowed from the Fallout series. When you level up, you look to the sky and have a bevy of different areas to gain perks in: magick areas, combat, defense, and even blacksmithing (more on that later). Concentrate on one area and try to get as many perks as you can. This gets rid of the system from Oblivion where you can only level up to something if you use it, like jumping around like a bunny to increase endurance, etc. If you use light armor, you will gain levels (up to 100 in every category) in that area. Use two-handed weapons or destruction spells, and you will gain levels quickly. The perks allow you to gain and build on that area instead of solely relying on users to gain levels.

Of course, there are new enemies in the game, like Draugrs and dragons. Dragons should be avoided early on until at least level 10 because you will die in one hit. Once you kill these beasts, you gain their soul and can use it to unlock dragon shouts. Shouts consist of powers like unrelenting force, slow time, and fire breath. Each shout has three levels, but you need to find those words by exploring dungeons throughout the world. Dragons are just awesome creatures to fight because they are the biggest enemy ever put into a TES game. Of course, you need to watch out for wildlife like bears, crabs, leopards, etc. The world of Skyrim is dangerous and cold, so beware. Sneaking is still a huge problem because it seems no matter how good your sneaking skill is, you still get caught, especially when pickpocketing.

Factions are a huge part of TES, and Skyrim doesn’t leave you out. The thieves, dark brotherhood, mages, and fighter guild are all here, but bigger and better. The stories are more fleshed out and are a lot longer, plus your rewards are better. The Dark Brotherhood and Thieves Guild stories were my favorites, and they show you just how deep into the lore and story you can get. Everything else from past TES games you remember is here, like choices during dialog, but thankfully the whole persuasion mini-game is gone from Oblivion. There are a lot more main characters, and the voice acting is more varied, but everyone has Nordic accents because Skyrim has a Viking/Nordic setting, which is a huge departure from Oblivion’s strictly medieval tone.

Looting is a huge part of TES, and Skyrim doesn’t disappoint here. There is so much to loot that even after 100 hours, you will still scour every nook and cranny for stuff to sell at shops. Lockpicking has been improved and is much quicker this time around. Menus have also been improved with a nice four-way system leading to items, magic, maps, and skills. This gets rid of Oblivion’s awful Excel sheet-type menus. Of course, my complaint here is that you can’t compare items anymore, which is a major pain. You have to remember statistics, which is a bigger pain when shopping.

Skyrim has a forging system where you can get ingots for various medals as well as leather. Use these to forge weapons and armor in different categories, like Daedric, Leather, Studded, Iron, Glass, Ebony, etc. You can upgrade these on benches for armor and grindstones for weapons. This makes the whole armor and weapon system feel more custom-made to your liking than just what is out there. The armor and weapons are over double what is in Oblivion. Those are all the major changes in Skyrim, but there is so much detail here that you have to play the game to truly see what I am talking about. You can even read every single book in the game. There is so much detail here. Fans of the series will love the deepened and richer lore of the races and parts of the TES series. There are tons of them here. You even get to explore ancient Dwemer (Dwarven) ruins.

Horseback riding is back, and even the third-person view has been greatly improved, as have the animations. There are so many major changes, as well as minor changes, that I can’t even remember them all. However, there is a huge issue with this game, and that is bugs. There were so many bugs upon release that stopped quests from continuing: quest items being lost, stuck in areas, graphics bugs, dragons flying backward, and everything else you can imagine. Even after a few patches, there are still some bugs, and probably a few that will never be fixed. This is unacceptable, even for a large game like this. Thankfully, there is a huge mod community that fixed a lot of this first, but the stock game has problems that console gamers can’t fix.

The models are still ugly, and the woman still looks like a man. PC gamers get high-resolution textures, which make the game look amazing, but the consoles are stuck with low-res graphics that look kind of dated. The lighting in Skyrim is great, but with so many issues cosmetically, you really should get the PC version. Mods out there transform women into beautiful heroines straight out of comic books, with amazing new armor, new lighting, graphical effects, etc. The stock game is really lacking technically, and that disappointed me quite a bit. If you can look past all this, Skyrim is one of my favorite RPGs of all time and sits right up there with Oblivion.

Collector’s Edition: Hardcore fans may want to drop the extra $90 for the monster collector’s edition. You get a giant statue of Alduin that is an in-game model, a giant coffee table-style art book, a making-of DVD, and a steel bookcase. The statue is worth the extra money itself, and it looks amazing. Of course, this is for hardcore fans only, but good luck finding one.

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Xbox 360 Controller for Windows
Keyboard & Mouse

BioShock: Rapture

Posted by BinaryMessiah on 04/07/2012
Posted in: Book Reviews. Tagged: , , , , , . Leave a comment

Publisher: Tor Books

Author: John Shirley

Release Date: 7/19/2011

Pages: 432

MSRP: $9.99 (Paperback, Digital) $19.99 (Hardback)

Recommended Audience: Young Adult

Rapture is a book that gets the novel translation perfect, as all other games and novels need to do. Rapture manages to use every single character, area, and even the word-for-word audio diaries from the game and puts them into one cohesive narrative. The book starts off in 1945 with Andrew Ryan starting plans on building Rapture. In the stories, the main protagonist is not Jack, but Bill McDonagh. He starts out as a plumber, and Ryan plucks him up and has him help create Rapture. This all can be linked to the first game, and the whole book is just 100% spot on with everything.

If you truly love the lore and setting of BioShock, this is the book to read if you want to know what happened during certain audio diaries, why certain ones were made, and even just how the hell this underwater city got created. The book spans 14 years, leading right up to the beginning of the first game. The book actually has you following a whole civilization as it falls into despair and depression. Slowly, everyone starts going insane on ADAM, Eve, and Plasmids. You even get to know how those things were actually invented. You even get to see how security bots, turrets, and cameras came to be, and even Circus of Value vending machines get mentioned.

The book does so much right that fans will just be shocked and awed about events playing out and will run through the game in their heads and think, “So that’s how that happened!”. The book even made me go back and play through the whole game again just to link everything to the game. The book has the same insanity that the game does, and you actually feel like you’re in the game. The atmosphere is captured perfectly, and I don’t think any other author could have done this game justice.

If you truly love BioShock, then pick this book up and enjoy every word. It’s not often that games get great true-to-heart novelizations like this, and I wish there were more like it. Instead of making a new story with the lore and characters or even copying it, John Shirley takes everything in the game and fills in the blanks. That is probably the hardest challenge of all.

Assassin’s Creed: Revelations

Posted by BinaryMessiah on 04/05/2012
Posted in: Microsoft, Microsoft Consoles, PC Reviews, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Retro Consoles, Sony, Sony Consoles, Steam Deck Playable, Steam Deck Verification, Xbox 360, Xbox One. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

Publisher: Ubisoft

Developer: Ubisoft Montreal

Release Date: 11/29/2011


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Ezio Auditore da Firenze. When most gamers hear this name, they think of one of the best video game characters ever made. Ezio went down in game history the way he did for a reason. Assassin’s Creed revolutionized the action/adventure genre with assassination skills, a whole new take on stealth gameplay, and awesome parkour gameplay. Revelations are the conclusion to Altair and Ezio’s story, but just another chapter for Desmond Miles. Desmond is stuck in the blackness of the Animus and is in a kind of coma. His brain can’t tell his personality apart from Ezio and Altair’s, so Subject 16 (yes, you finally meet him) helps you a little bit here. There isn’t much of Desmond here because this is the two assassins’s story; in fact, there are only three cut-aways for Desmond through the whole game.

Ezio’s story starts with him trying to find the five keys that Altair hid, but the Templars are also after them. Altair has some secretly hidden library under Masyaf, so it’s a race. This is the shortest AC game to date, but that doesn’t mean it’s worse. There is a new layer added to Ezio’s personality because he’s 50 through 62 in this game. Playing as an old man is pretty awesome, though. Ezio is now wiser, smarter, and a master assassin. You even play as Altair through his old age up to 92, and he still kicks ass! This should be more like Geriatrics’s Creed. Let’s go ahead and start with side missions. The same ones from Brotherhood are kept, but others from past games are cut. Templar Dens replace Borgia Towers; you can recruit assassins, buy stores, buy monuments, find viewpoints, and that’s about it. Side missions took a back seat here to some epic main story missions. Overall, the game can be beaten in less than 15 hours, even if you try to do the side missions that are here.

Collectibles this time around involve only Animus Fragments, which are used to unlock crappy Desmond side stories, which will be explained later. Two new combat abilities are brought to the table here: bomb-making and the hook blade. This adds a layer of depth to combat and climbing. Remember when you would jump off a building from too high and just couldn’t reach the one in front of you? Now you can, with a quick press of the action button, catch yourself. It can be used in combat as well as running away from guards. Remember when guards would block your path and you had no choice but to get knocked over? Now you can hook them and roll right over their backs. This also adds another item to climbing, which is zip lines. Zip along and assassinate enemies at high speed, which is a blast.

Bombs have three different levels: diversions, weapons, and defense. Boxes are scattered everywhere that contain parts of bombs that contain the container, gunpowder type, and item inside. You can use a lamb’s blood bomb to make enemies think they’re wounded and become stunned. A splinter bomb stuns enemies or uses a cherry bomb to drive guards away from areas. These really come in handy when you don’t want to get into a huge fight. The problem here is that it’s wasted on the short length of the story. I didn’t even get to use all the bomb types because there weren’t enough missions in the game that called for them.

There is also a strange strategy-type section at the beginning that is never used anywhere in the game, and I thought it was fun. You can use points to call down different types of assassins on roofs or use defenses on the ground. You can use your gun when the wave of guards comes. This was kind of like a tower defense thing and was really strange just to have it on one mission.

All the other items are here, like parachutes, poison darts, and all that stuff from past games. However, combat is finally perfect with combo chains after you kill an enemy. Keep the chain up, and you can kill each one near you with just one hit. The combat really flows this time, and the new kill moves are just gruesome. You can do everything else in past games, so nothing here has really changed. You do use your Eagle Sense more because you need to use it to find these clues to the keys. This leads to awesome and varied main missions that involve epic chases, picking your way around guards, and even giant climbing puzzles. I found these to be the most entertaining, but the gameplay really ends there. It is short and sweet, as well as entertaining.

The area is completely new because it is set in Constantinople and Istanbul. There is one sequence dedicated to a whole underground Templar city, but I felt all this was wasted on such a short little sequence. The area in Revelations is tiny compared to past games, but this is understandable for how short the game is. The new art style and the setting are a great welcome because Rome and Italy were getting tiring to see. The graphics are still superb, even with the slight updates to the engine. The voice acting is superb, and so is the storytelling.

Desmond’s Journey is a strange telling of Desmond’s past through a first-person platforming puzzle thing. I have no idea what this is, but it should go away. There are five short little areas that involve platforming and pushing buttons. Then you get to place floating blocks in front of you to make paths. Yeah, what the hell? It’s nice to know Desmond’s story, but collecting 100 fragments for this isn’t even worth it.

Multiplayer has been amped up and is just as fun. There are more modes, but instead of being really original, they are hidden under the AC theme. These are the models you see in first-person shooters that are disguised here. Capturing the flag is just taking a key from the enemy base and returning it to yours. There is a deathmatch mode and a few others, but more modes are good and they are fun. There are more maps, characters, and abilities that will keep you coming back for hours.

Overall, Revelations is just as amazing as past games in the series, but just on a smaller and shorter scale. It perfects the series to a T, and I don’t think anything else can be done with these two heroes. If you made it this far in the series, go ahead and finish it. Long-asked questions are answered, but there are also some new ones now. The game has a touching ending, and we even finally get to see what happened after the first AC. Revelations is an excellent game, with just enough new stuff to keep fans happy.

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Xbox 360 Controller for Windows

Angry Birds Space

Posted by BinaryMessiah on 04/04/2012
Posted in: Android, iOS, Mac, Mobile Reviews, PC Reviews, Steam Deck Verification, Steam Deck Verified. Tagged: , , , , . Leave a comment

Developer: Rovio Mobile Ltd.

Release Date: 3/22/2012

Rating: Everyone

MSRP: Free, $0.99 (Ad-Free)

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Angry Birds, why are you so popular? Everyone plays this game, and everyone who hasn’t has at least heard of it. It was a digital phenomenon that sent a little indie game developer soaring into the millions. There is every type of merchandise available for a $1 game. Why is it so appealing to everyone? The game struck a perfect balance between hardcore perfection-type gameplay and casual gamer fun. While Rovio put out a Seasons and Rio version of the game, the series was getting tiresome. Space adds a couple new layers of depth to the series.

The game involves gravity play, as you would expect. Yes, you are in space, and yes, the game plays differently. You flick your birds across space and try to get them sucked into the gravitational pull of planets, where the usual obstacles and pigs lie. The added layer is that you can approach these puzzles from multiple angles. Have a bunch of blocks on one side of a pig? Flick your bird on the opposite side of the planet, watch it fly around using the pull of the planet, and knock it down. As puzzles get harder, multiple planets are lined up, so trick shots are needed.

The usual birds are back, along with a couple of new ones, like the ice bird, which freezes blocks so they shatter. The new gravity gameplay actually makes the environment a puzzle, so it doesn’t feel like the same type of puzzle over and over again. This also makes the game harder, so if you were afraid of that, it came true. This actually makes the game more engaging, and I could play in longer spurts because each puzzle felt really different. There is a new model that is almost like a Space Invaders clone, where you have to knock through aliens to get to the moving pig at the top. It’s fun but also hard to get to because these levels are hidden golden eggs throughout the game.

Overall, Space adds a much-needed layer of depth using gravity, and I like it a lot. I feel this game is geared more towards core gamers than casual gamers, but both still apply here. There are hundreds of levels to start with, and obviously, more are coming. If you love Angry Birds, then Space is an exciting and long-awaited sequel to a worldwide phenomenon.

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Temple Run

Posted by BinaryMessiah on 04/04/2012
Posted in: Android, iOS, Mobile Reviews. Tagged: , , , , . Leave a comment

Developer: Imangi Studios

Release Date: 3/30/2012

Rating: Everyone


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All these “running” games have flooded the mobile market, but they all feel the same. Temple Run is the first to try something different, and it’s actually really fun thanks to one thing: it’s in 3D. Side scroller running games only allow up and down movement, but Temple Run allows left and right movement, plus the game is more fun and exciting in 3D when you can see everything coming at you. The game also uses the phone’s gyroscope to make your character move left and right, and a quick swipe left and right allows you to turn. Swiping up and down allows you to slide and jump, but there are quite a few obstacles to avoid.

Obstacles range from tree roots, fire, gaps, vines, you name it. You can collect coins like in other running games, but in this one, you can actually spend the damn things. Upgrades range from multiplier increases to boosts and even a magnet power-up for collecting coins. You can buy characters, one-time-use items, and even wallpapers (coming soon). This is a running game, and others should follow in the path of Temple Run. The graphics are pretty decent as well, with a nice jungle setting, so it has an Indiana Jones vibe.

There’s obviously no story, which is just fine for these types of games, but running games are only good in short bursts, and Temple Run is no exception. Beating high scores gets addictive, but overall, the new depth is just a welcome addition to the tired running game lineup. This is all wrapped up in a sweet free package, and people with larger screens have the advantage of seeing further ahead than people with smaller phones. Temple Run is a really fun game that all mobile gamers should have.

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Hard Reset

Posted by BinaryMessiah on 03/29/2012
Posted in: PC Reviews, Steam Deck Playable, Steam Deck Verification. Tagged: , , , , , , . Leave a comment

Publisher: Flying Wild Hog

Developer: Flying Wild Hog

Release Date: 9/13/2011


Available Exclusively On

Hard Reset is a cyberpunk game set in the future about a war between AI machines and humans. You are an agent of the CLN trying to stop this, but the story is kind of just vaguely tossed together and doesn’t really make any sense. You also don’t get much sense of what’s going on in the world. The characters are uninteresting, and the messy comic-style cut scenes are uninspired and sloppy. Besides this, the game has some solid shooting, but even that has issues of its own.

There are only two guns, and each one has its own different “add-ons.” The energy weapons let you shoot plasma, mortars, a smart gun that shoots through walls, and EMP grenades. The CLN gun has a machine gun, RPG, shotgun, and grenade launcher. This is great and all, but this system is flawed. Switching between two weapons and then to the right attachment is stupid. Not only are the gun switching animations slow, but having to do this costs precious seconds in which you’re dying. This also rolls into the biggest problem with the game: It’s too damn hard. Sure, I like a challenge, but just a few hits and you’re dead. But there are tons of enemies thrown at you, and they don’t go down easy. Expect to restart dozens of times, almost during every fight, unless you’re on easy.

Why would a game have a weapon system that works against itself? Who knows. You can buy these attachments and upgrade them by finding XP lying around everywhere, but the progression is slow, and by the end of the game, you will barely have bought 10 upgrades. My other complaint is that there are only about six different types of robots you can shoot, and they get old very fast. The first couple of levels are pretty awesome, then that wears out when you get to your first fight, where you die about 10 times.

There are a couple of boss fights, but they are almost impossible to beat on any difficulty but easy. I haven’t played such a hard FPS as I can remember. It actually makes the game not very fun at all, and even the most skilled players will struggle. I can’t even believe they put an insane mode in here. One hit and you’re dead, which makes it impossible to go past the first fight in the game. Go figure. The objectives are all the same with you pressing this button. Shut down this thing to go past that thing. There are secret areas you can find to improve your end-of-level score, but who really cares? You’ll be lucky if you can get through the damn game.

The game looks pretty damn good with a nice Blade Runner-type art style, but it’s wasted on linear levels. The overall feeling of the world has lots of potential, with kiosks hocking items in robotic or half-failing voices, holograms with propaganda, and ads everywhere. I like the style, but it sure went to waste. Overall, Hard Reset is a decent shooter for a weekend, but the extreme difficulty practically kills it. There’s also no multiplayer, which is a surprise, so after you finish the game once, you probably won’t go back.

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Yesterday

Posted by BinaryMessiah on 03/24/2012
Posted in: Android, iOS, Mobile Reviews, PC Reviews, Steam Deck Unknown, Steam Deck Verification. Tagged: , , , , , . Leave a comment

Publisher: Focus Home Interactive

Developer: Pendulo Studios

Release Date: 3/22/2012


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The adventure genre has struggled for years, and rarely are any of them any good. Yesterday is one of those gems because it does everything right and doesn’t do what other adventure games do. The story is the part that’s most interesting here, with you playing John Yesterday, who is a man investigating an occult book called The Order of the Flesh and has something to do with killing homeless people. You get mixed up in a huge mess after waking up with amnesia, so you travel around trying to figure all this stuff out. There are plenty of plot twists, and the game keeps you playing because you want to know more. The problem is that the story is so short that it leaves you wanting more.

The gameplay itself is extremely simple because all you do is find objects and come up with ways to use them. This isn’t new for adventure games, but the constant scene-changing means there’s always new stuff to find. The game completely wipes out tiresome pixel hunting because there is an object-of-interest button that will display things you can click on for a few seconds. Every adventure game needs this, and very few do it. There is also a hint button that is actually useful and gives you hints, so you are never stuck. If you use a hint, you have to click around some to refill the light bulb, so there is some encouragement to figure things out on your own.

Another thing I’m glad this game does is that when you click on something or try to move to different areas, there are no annoying walking animations or door-opening animations. The character warps to that spot, and the item pops up on screen. Thank you, Pendulo Studios, for not putting annoying, useless crap into an already annoying and dead genre. This makes playing the game much easier and makes progress quick. Another complaint would be the lack of puzzles, because there are very few and not very challenging. This is no Myst, but instead, you have to just figure out what item does what. This is kind of fun and keeps the pace up, but brainiacs will contest this and probably get bored with the game.

I feel Yesterday was actually geared more toward hardcore gamers who don’t have the patience for long-drawn-out stories and tiresome puzzles. This is both good and bad, depending on the player. I do detest the lack of challenge, but the fast-paced narrative is nice. Other than this, the animations are terrible, with horrible lip-syncing and some audio glitches along with spotty voice acting. The graphics have a cell-shaded cartoony look, which is nice, but technically, the game doesn’t look that great. One thing I found odd is that the game depicts a sick, twisted torture-type story with murder and killing, yet there’s hardly any blood and violent scenes are almost censored. I found this odd and kind of detracted from the experience, but what can you do?

Overall, Yesterday provides a fine narrative and quickens the pace of most sludgy adventure games, but the lack of puzzles, challenges, and an extremely short story will turn hardcore adventure fans away. Yesterday was a fun weekend play, but other than that, you won’t come back.

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The Darkness II

Posted by BinaryMessiah on 03/23/2012
Posted in: Mac, Microsoft, PC Reviews, PlayStation 3, Retro Consoles, Sony, Steam Deck Playable, Steam Deck Verification, Xbox 360. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

Publisher: 2K Games

Developer: Digital Extremes

Release Date: 2/6/2012


Available On

I have to come right out and say that The Darkness II is disappointing and takes away more good from the first than adds to it. The first game is one of my favorite games of all time because of the amazing atmosphere and linear open world that was delivered with trickling story elements that kept you wanting more. This allowed constant banter between Jackie and The Darkness, but it was that dark, eerie atmosphere that kept me wanting more. The side quests were nice, and there were some varied environments. The Darkness II takes all that away and makes this a more linear, in-your-face type of game. Sure, the storytelling is superb, and so is the voice acting, but that linear, open world allowed you to explore things on your own.

The Darkness II is about The Darkness finally waking itself back up inside Jackie, and he is on the hunt to find Jenny even though she’s dead. A cult group called The Brotherhood wants The Darkness and takes constant hits on Jackie’s mafia family. The story is great and even more deep than the first game, but once again, that awesome atmosphere is exchanged for some ho-hum backdrops you fight in, ranging from a warehouse to a graveyard to a carnival. What has changed here, mainly, is how you use The Darkness powers because it is the best part of the game.

You can upgrade your powers even more now by earning points by killing foes and finding relics. You can also use the environment around you to kill enemies, like using fan blades, poles, chairs, barrels, you name it. The awesome gory death animations make for a visual treat, but you can also tear enemies apart with new Darkness animations and abilities. Eating hearts isn’t the peak of your powers here anymore because you can now upgrade with Darkness armor, shields, ammo producing death kills, and even using your Darkling to sicken enemies.

Yes, that Darkling strategy thing that felt like Overlord is gone now. The one Darkling that follows you throughout helps you on his own, but his charming self is still there. He will still fart, pee, and curse his foes down, so don’t be disappointed there. I actually preferred this because it jives with the faster-paced action. Gunplay is still a huge part of the game, and so is dual-wielding. You can channel darkness through the guns for one-shot kills, but the guns handle very nicely and are a lot of fun to use. Some other powers range from faster reloading, bigger clips when in darkness, using Swarm to stun enemies, and various other upgrades.

The whole point is to stay in the dark, and this time you are given more than just light bulbs. The Brotherhood uses light weapons against you and will have traps and random light obstacles set up, so you must take them down quickly. Staying in the dark allows you to swipe your demon arms, but you are also thrown more than just humans now. Enemies will be infused with dark armor that you must punch through before killing them, and some of these guys are tough. Some can teleport around, so there is a new level of challenge here, but the big problem is that sheer numbers are thrown at you, which can be overwhelming later on.

All this doesn’t sound too bad, right? Ripping a car door off and watching it fly through the air and cut someone in half. Watching your demon arms rip a body in half or pull ahead after stunning them doesn’t seem worse. The fact is, the game is really repetitive in the sense that this is all you do. Just running around killing everything in your path with really no strategy. There’s no cover system, no Darklings to use, and nothing but your demon arms and guns. The story elements are delivered wonderfully, but you can’t help but know that it’s just more killing waiting on the other end of the cutscene. The boss fights break things up, but all you do is avoid attacks and blast them to death, and to be honest, late in the game, you use your guns more than demon arms because there are just too many enemies to kill at once.

On top of all this, the art style was changed to represent the comics more, which is nice, but the game isn’t technically impressive. It looks a couple of years old and doesn’t even come with enhanced visuals on the PC. There is an extra Vendetta mode that can be played online with up to four players, introduces four characters with separate Darkness abilities, and is actually quite fun. Once you finish these, however, you won’t be coming back.

Overall, The Darkness II detracts so much from the first game that it is almost not even the same. The slower-paced trickling action is replaced with repetitive in-your-face corridor shooting that is better or worse depending on the player. This should be played by fans of the first game just to see the story playthrough, but don’t expect the masterfully created atmosphere and open-world feeling of the first game.

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Mass Effect: Retribution

Posted by BinaryMessiah on 03/20/2012
Posted in: Book Reviews. Tagged: , , , , , . Leave a comment

Publisher: Del Rey

Author: Drew Karpyshyn

Release Date: 7/27/2010

Pages: 368

MSRP: $7.99 (Paperback, Digital)

Recommended Audience: Young Adult

The final book in the trilogy by the creator of the Mass Effect universe, Drew Karpyshyn, is just as great as the other two. Kahlee Sanders and Admiral David Anderson are trying to track down Paul Grayson, who has become something more than human. The Illusive Man wants to stop the Reapers but is going about it the wrong way. The book has a great cat-and-mouse narrative, and Drew’s way of writing will keep you turning the pages. The book has a lot of twists that seem predictable, but it takes a sudden turn, and that’s why Drew’s writing is so brilliant. The story itself is very well-paced and has a great final conclusion, so fans won’t be disappointed.

Everything leading up to this book fits right into the story, and all the lore from Mass Effect fits right in, so the book feels like Mass Effect. I never felt detached from the world, nor did I feel the book was losing ground at all. Drew has a way of writing by sticking to the viewpoint of each character in each scene, so the scene will seem like it’s missing pieces, but by the end of the chapter, that whole scene comes together in one nicely flowing, cohesive event. This is also why the game is brilliantly paced and works so well. It may seem more of the same for some people, but I felt each book had a very unique story, and they flowed together nicely.

Fans of the last two books need this one, but don’t bother picking it up until you read the last two, or nothing will make sense here. This is exactly how video game books should be written. Smartly integrating new characters that run parallel to the game’s characters and story without leaving big gaps in the plot that can’t be filled by either game or book. This series is one of my favorite video game novel translations and stands as a masterpiece in that niche.

Sony PlayStation Vita

Posted by BinaryMessiah on 03/11/2012
Posted in: Hardware, PlayStation Vita, Retro Consoles, Sony. Tagged: , , , , . Leave a comment

Manufacturer: Sony

Release Date: 2/22/2012

Colors: Black

MSRP: $249.99 (Wi-fi model), $299.99 (3G model)

It’s hard to believe that it has been 8 long years since the PSP came out, but it’s true. Those long years gave us some of the best portable games ever made and were the first true attempt at a portable console experience. Unfortunately, the system was doomed from the start with proprietary disc media, no second analog nub, and a slew of other things, but the system was a powerhouse at the time and had a lot of potential. The Vita is Sony’s second phone, and it fixed all the issues of the PSP plus some, and one of those is noticeable as soon as you pull the shiny new device out of the box.

A second analog stick. An honest-to-God stick and not a nub or pad. These things feel like they moved straight from the DualShock controller and just shrank a little. They feel great, even in-game, and I couldn’t believe that the second stick was there; it was like a wish coming true from God himself! This opens up the Vita to a whole slew of games that couldn’t be done on the PSP just because of this one little piece of hardware. While playing Uncharted: Golden Abyss, I actually forgot the second stick was there a few times because I’m so used to the single nub on the PSP. It may take some PSP vets some getting used to before truly adapting to it. The next big thing that Sony fixed was no disc media! Thank you very much! Those UMDs were irritating and sucked up precious battery life, as well as limiting the memory size. Now we get nice little carts, like the DS, or you can download the game digitally via the PlayStation Store.

 

Sony made one fatal flaw with the Vita, and that is the proprietary memory cards. What in God’s name was Sony thinking? Everyone thought the memory stick pro-duos were bad for the PSP, but at least those were regular memory sticks. These tiny little things only work on the Vita and cost a fortune. A 32GB will cost you $100, which is a complete rip-off, but guess what? You don’t have a choice! Thanks a lot, jerks!

The next big thing Sony did was add a touchscreen. Copied the DS, you say? Not exactly; it’s more like it copied smartphones, but flip this guy over and you have a touchpad on the back, which is Sony’s little way of saying, “Hey, we’re trying to be original too.” It’s an odd thing to have, and not many games use it yet, but it adds a whole new dimension to touchscreen gaming, and it’s just as responsive as the touchscreen, so it doesn’t feel like a dead limb. However, it’s up to game developers to use this odd mechanic, but only time will tell.

The screen is one of the best things about the device because it’s an OLED (Organic Light Emitting Display), so you’re looking at some of the best display technology out there. Now you don’t have to worry about dead pixels! Yeah, remember that launch fiasco, Sony? The screen is 5″, which is the biggest portable gaming screen ever made and even tops the PSP’s 4.3″ screen. This allows for lots of detail in your face and tons of room for touching things on the screen.

Once you get over how gorgeous the screen is (I can’t stop staring at it!), you will start hitting those buttons on the device. Sure, they don’t do anything unless you are in-game (the Live Area is all touchscreen-based, but more on that later), but the button layout here could have been a disaster. Sony had to be really careful because of those new sticks, so the D-pad and face buttons shrank about half their size and got moved up. Blasphemy! Actually no. Despite the higher placement and smaller size, I still hit them accurately, like the PSP, even with my really big thumbs. The D-pad is way better than the PSPs and works well with fighting games (yes, relax! ), so no worries there. But there is one problem with these buttons. The start and select buttons are way too small and are level with the system instead of sticking out. What! Did Sony fall asleep at the drawing board here? They are also placed all the way at the bottom of the right side, so you have to move your hand down. C’mon, what happened there? Other than that, the L and R buttons are nice and huge, and you get a nice big PlayStation Home button the size of Venus on the left side, but hey, it glows!

Anyway, the buttons are just fine, so how about everything else visually? Sony made the little “compartments” more subtle this time around, so the memory slot is hidden at the bottom as well as the game card slot on top, so the whole system just looks like a big oval. Don’t be worried about the size of the thing, either. Sure, it’s big and not exactly pocket-sized, but for what is under the hood, this thing is compact and pretty light.

Now that the visual stuff is out of the way, let’s talk about it under the hood. This thing is the most powerful handheld on the market, only being rivaled by devices powered by the Tegra 3 processor. The thing has a quad-core Arm-9 Cortex CPU, which is freaking powerful. This allows for PS3-quality visuals that no other portable device on the market has. It also has a quad-core GPU, which is over four times as powerful as the iPhone 4S’s GPU. The system also packs 512 MB of system memory and 128 MB of VRAM (video memory), which is astounding (the Xbox 360 has 512 MB of memory for comparison). We also get two cameras that are front and back-facing, which can track head movement, a six-axis gyroscope, Bluetooth, a microphone, and a 3G wireless card. Holy crap, that’s a lot of stuff. This is one powerful device, but we have yet to see what it is fully capable of.

Now let’s get down to the software and how the thing plays. Every PlayStation fan by now is used to the XMB (Cross Media Bar), thanks to the PSP and PS3. Get ready for change because the new live area is made of bubbles. You like bubbles, right? This is to make use of the touchscreen, which takes a while to get used to. You can rearrange these bubbles to your liking, kind of like on a smartphone, and even change the background for each “page.” The Vita can multitask, which is something the PS3 can’t even do. You can play a game, hit the home button, go online and look up an FAQ, then flip back to your game without having to quit. Why can’t you do that on the PS3? Someone at Sony was dropped on their head as a baby one too many times, but it’s nice to have it here.

Once you start playing with the Welcome Park, which gets you used to Vita’s new features, play around with Near, which is like the 3DS’s StreetPass, but worse and more confusing, and you will really start liking this guy. The browser works like the PS3 but has fewer features for some reason, but we get trophies! Oh my God, trophies! These are also great for games that are cross-platform, so you can start working on a trophy on Marvel vs. Capcom 3, then pick it right up on the Vita and finish unlocking that trophy.

The Vita uses a remote to play a lot better than the PSP, mainly because it’s more powerful and can do what the PS3 can do. Right now, the remote play is still pretty weak, but the potential is there. Right now, only 3 games support cross-play (MvC3, MLB 2K12, and Hustle Kings), but I’m excited about what this can bring. Overall, the Vita has a lot of software potential but is lacking a lot and feels kind of thin. Sony’s attempt at augmented reality comes to life with the Vita with AR cards (yes, they ripped off the 3DS), and it works really well thanks to the system’s more powerful hardware and gyroscope.

Overall, is the system worth $250? Yes, it is if you are a hardcore portable fan or console fan. This is the first real console experience in portable form, and Sony nailed it perfectly. The other big issue I forgot to mention is battery life. You get about 3–4 hours on a powerful game, 9 hours for music, and 4-5 hours for video, so don’t expect huge play sessions like on the DS. The battery lasts forever in sleep mode, though! Sure, what good does that do you? For what this system does, the battery life is actually pretty long because you’re running a mini-supercomputer off of it. Cut it some slack! The games for the system right now are OK, but not as awesome as the PSP launch (considered the best launch ever), but the games are reviewed separately. I would pick one up if you love portable consoles, because this thing has so much potential. It just has a few major flaws and is quite lacking software-wise, but Sony will probably pick up the pace over the next year.

Over the next 5 years, I see the Vita as the model for portable games. We’ll start seeing games push the system graphically, like God of War did for the PSP. I think we’ll see games that give us more than just touchscreen smartphone games, thanks to the rear touchpad. In 5 years, I expect the library to grow beyond ports, and we’ll probably see the Vita’s first killer app by the end of this year that redefines portable gaming, kind of like Syphon Filter and God of War did for the PSP. Those games showed that even with major flaws, the system can be something incredible and helped people look past them all. Something like that will pop up for the Vita in the next year or two, and then we can start talking about moving forward in the portable market.