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Red Faction: Guerrilla

Posted by BinaryMessiah on 06/27/2010
Posted in: Microsoft, PC Reviews, PlayStation 3, Retro Consoles, Sony, Steam Deck Verification, Steam Deck Verified, Xbox 360. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

Publisher: THQ

Developer: Volition

Release Date: 9/15/2009


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Fans of the previous games will notice that the series has moved away from the FPS style and gone with an open-world, 3rd-person action game. You play Alec Mason, who is just another miner on Mars, trying to make a living. His brother is involved with the Red Faction, and you get recruited to be the voice of Mars and stop the EDF (Earth Defense Force) from controlling the people. While that may sound pretty standard, it kind of is, and the story never really gets interesting since there aren’t many cutscenes and the game concentrates mainly on the destruction-style gameplay.

The game has an awesome destruction engine in which you can throw charges, detonate them, and watch buildings crumble. I don’t mean pre-cut pieces, but literally, as if it were a real building. You can plant charges and find buildings’ weaknesses, or just use your hammer and wack away at walls until the whole thing crumbles to bits. Some missions require you to destroy a building, and its integrity is displayed on your map, so you get an idea of how much you’ve destroyed. Usually, when you weaken a building enough, it will just collapse. This is really fun and satisfying, and there are so many ways to destroy them. You can ram vehicles into buildings, use a rocket launcher, and even use a nano rifle that eats through metal. While building destruction is the focal point in the game, freedom is as well.

The world is split up into sections, and you must liberate each one by completing story missions, but you must bring the EDF control down to zero before you can begin the last mission for that sector. You will also bring the morality of the people up, but this doesn’t ever seem to really do anything. You can bring control down in many ways through side missions. There are many types, and some will even give you salvage, which can be used for upgrades. Some mission types include demolition, which gives you certain materials to use to bring down a building. Some of these are very challenging, and some you just can’t figure out. There are “time trial”-type driving missions where you have to get a vehicle to a certain safe house in a set amount of time. There are hostage missions, raids, defense, and even one where you sit on a mounted gun on a truck and blow up as much stuff as you can.

While there is a wide variety of missions, it gets dull after the second sector since it’s the same type of thing over and over again. The gameplay may be fun, but it’s not very diverse, and it will make some people stop playing before they even finish the game. The gunplay is a little weak since you can’t aim down sights or anything. You can carry four types of weapons on you at all times, and upgrades include ammo enhancement, new weapons, and even some defensive stuff like armor and the ability to fast travel between safe houses. My main gripe about the game is the difficulty. A lot of missions will bring the alert to level red, and you’ll have dozens of enemies come after you while you have to blow up certain stuff. It’s impossible to keep them off of you, so you just have to run and blow up what you need to without dying. This makes you desperate for vehicles since you heal when you get in them, and you can use them to smash down buildings. A lot of times you’ll also run out of ammo and have to search for an ammo box, and a lot of times there won’t be one.

The game just has a lot of little inconsistencies, like the vehicles being really squirrely, and even though the game is really open, a lot of it is closed off, and you are stuck on paths due to all the steep cliffs and mountains. A lot of times, buildings will collapse on you and kill you, and you’ll get run over by vehicles that barely take any damage. There will be times when an objective is upstairs, and if you destroy the ladder or stairs, you can’t get up there. Things like this make you confused, but other than that, the game is just repetitive, and that’s the biggest issue. The game looks good technically, but the world looks really bland and is just… red. If you love open adventure games, Red Faction is your game; otherwise, stay away.

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Crysis

Posted by BinaryMessiah on 06/19/2010
Posted in: Microsoft, Microsoft Consoles, Nintendo Consoles, PC Reviews, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Retro Consoles, Sony, Sony Consoles, Steam Deck Unsupported, Steam Deck Verification, Switch, Xbox 360, Xbox One. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

Publisher: EA

Developer: Crytek

Release Date: 11/13/2007


Available On

The biggest hype behind Crysis was its looks. Very few people have the hardware to run the game like it should be: all settings are very high and using DirectX 10, and I am one of the lucky few to have the hardware setup to do so. While most people can run this on ultra settings, you won’t find too many who can run it above 30 FPS. My setup was able to handle most of the game at above 20 FPS, but it did dip into the single digits every once in a while. With that aside, Crysis is just stunning, even three years later. Every texture is high resolution, and even when looking at something up close, you can see all the detail in that texture and not just a blurry or pixelated mess. All the lighting is gorgeous, and the physics seem almost real, thanks to the super-advanced Crytek engine and DirectX 10. Everything in the game just looks amazing: every blade of grass sways, trees crumble under fire, and leaves on palm trees shear off when fired at. Throughout the whole game, you will never get sick of looking at this tropical technical feat.

Now a game can look as good as it wants, but it’s no use if the game doesn’t play well and has a good story?. You play as a Special Forces agent called Nomad and are sent in with a team to investigate an island that the Koreans have occupied. It gets interesting right from the beginning and stays interesting throughout.

Thankfully, Crysis is a solid shooter with some elements that other FPS games have never used before, and the biggest thing is the Nano Suit. This thing lets you choose between four different modes to help you out on the battlefield. Stealth turns you invisible for a certain amount of time. The faster you move, the more energy it depletes. Armor is pretty self-explanatory, and speed gives you a super boost that lets you dash dozens of yards in a matter of seconds, for a few seconds. Lastly, strength lets you throw enemies and melee them to make them fly, as well as extra height when jumping. All these are crucial to surviving in this hard and wide-open game.

Yeah, that’s right. It’s not linear. Surprised? Well, with so many linear FPS games out there (cough, Halo cough), it’s a nice change. The island is huge and wide open, and you can take different approaches to each situation. Most of the time, you have to infiltrate Korean KPA camps, and using stealth along with silenced weapons is a good start. Or you can go in guns blazing. If you prefer the backdoor approach, maybe you can get there by truck or swim across the lake and take them all by surprise. The multi-approach system is useful, but stealth may not always be the best choice, and sometimes you don’t get one.

That brings me to the next element of customizing your weapons on the fly. Have a sub-machine gun and can get an accurate shot? Attach a silencer and a sniper scope, set it to single shot, and pop off some guys before charging in. Once inside, attach a red dot sight, add an ACOG scope to the top, and even a grenade launcher. Being able to change one weapon to another on the fly is just awesome and really does help in every situation. This breaks the monotony of trying to find a gun for specific situations.

The game’s pacing takes a turn halfway through the game when you start fighting aliens. Of course, this makes the game more interesting, is almost like two games in one, and takes a more linear turn. Instead of infiltrating KPA camps, you fight alongside squadmates against aliens. This is fun, and I wish shooters would do stuff like this more often. It breaks up the monotony of the open jungle and kicks things up a notch.

Every element in the game works, but of course, everything could be better, and that’s why Crysis 2 is coming out. My biggest gripe with the game is the difficulty. Even on easy, the game is brutal and seems unfair at times, such as vehicles blowing up really fast, having 30+ guys come after you, and not being able to use stealth to get into a camp. This can drive you nuts, but the story is good enough for you to keep coming back for more. If you have PC power, Crysis is a must-have.

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Red Dead Redemption

Posted by BinaryMessiah on 06/12/2010
Posted in: Microsoft, Nintendo Consoles, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Retro Consoles, Sony, Sony Consoles, Switch, Xbox 360. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

Publisher: Rockstar

Developer: Rockstar San Diego

Release Date: 5/18/2010


Available On

Dear Journal,

My name is John Marston, and I’ve lost everything. The US government took them from me and promised my freedom if I helped “establish a civilization” by catching the three crooks I used to ride with.

The first thing I noticed after I got off the train was how beautiful the country looked. Rolling hills, trees, and animals roam wherever you look. People on stagecoaches and even the occasional train. How I learned this new “civilization” was very interesting and even would make a good story.

Day 2

After getting shot by Bill Williamson, I met this lovely lady, Bonnie MacFarlane, and she helped me along the way. Riding horses with her was a good time, and it doesn’t seem too hard. If I kick it too hard with my spurs, it will buck me off unless I bond with it first by riding it often. Keeping speed with her was easy since holding my speed kept me right next to her.

Shooting on the horse was a little difficult, and using my dead eye was almost necessary since everything went by so fast. Controlling a horse and a gun at the same time isn’t very easy. When I focus enough, everything seems to slow down, and I can mark my targets with an X and blast away. I don’t know where I got this trait from, but it sure is handy.

She even showed me how to herd cattle by keeping pace behind the herd and making sure stray animals leave. Taming horses was pretty easy since I just had to lasso them and keep my balance until they were broken. Today was a long day, so I’m going to rest.

Day 3

I left Bonnie after helping her out on some errands. I just follow the yellow route line to my objective, which I put on my map, and it ain’t too hard from there. I can even mark waypoints and travel to them via stagecoach or when I make a camp off the road or away from water. This makes things handy since traveling this vast land can get tiresome.

After shooting some thugs from the wanted poster I picked up, I realized how each bullet affects every part of the body. Hit an arm, and they drop their gun. Hit their leg, and they limp away; hit their chest, and they fall over and crawl away. I found this useful when having to catch criminals with my lasso. Shoot the sucker in the leg so he stops running!

I went to the local market (there are many) and sold some herbs I picked, and after I hunted some deer, wolves, a snake, and some birds, I sold all those parts for some cash and bought myself a new gun. I love my shotgun, sniper rifle, revolver, and other weapons, but I just needed something more powerful. I did buy a new horse as well as some tobacco for focus and some medicine. I’m beat for now, so I’m going to go purchase some property in this town and rest.

Day 7

I’ve learned a lot lately, and one of the biggest things I learned was not to shoot other people or even run over them by accident. I had the law come after me, and I now have a bounty on my head. I can get a pardon letter or pay the bounty, but if I get my honor and fame up by doing good deeds, maybe people won’t be so hasty to tattle.

I tried some gambling to ease my mind today, such as Liar’s Dice, Texas Hold ‘Em, Blackjack, Horse Shoes, Arm Wrestling, and more. These games seemed pretty fun at first, but after a few tries, they bored me, so I was off hunting again. After I caught my kill, I noticed a stranger needing help, so I marked him with a question mark on my map and a purple circle in the area where I could find him later. I’ll tell you to partner these tales and these people with something else.

There are so many things to do here that I can’t describe them all. This place is huge, even with Mexico to the south. Everything here just looks so amazing, and as you can see so far, it’s stunning. Even when I got to the snow-capped mountains and was hunting bears, I felt like I couldn’t get enough of the scenery. The world also sounds beautiful, with birds chirping and the sound of crunching dirt under my feet. It’s refreshing.

Day 28

Well, I don’t know what else to say. This world is so massive, expansive, and gorgeous that it’s like nothing else. There is so much to do here that by the end of my journey, I’ll have felt satisfied, and even roaming around with friends can be pretty fun. So long, partner, and keep the West and the Wild alive.

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The Saboteur

Posted by BinaryMessiah on 05/14/2010
Posted in: Microsoft, PC Reviews, PlayStation 3, Retro Consoles, Sony, Xbox 360. Tagged: , , , , , , , , . 1 Comment

Publisher: EA

Developer: Pandemic

Release Date: 12/8/2009


Available On

Grand Theft Auto has inspired a lot of games, and The Saboteur is one. Think of this as Grand Theft Paris, in which you play Sean Devlin, an Irish man trying to help the French Resistance against the Nazi war machine. Yes, this is another World War II, but it’s different. Just read along, and you’ll see.

The first thing you will notice is the game’s atmosphere. It’s set in a replica of 1940’s Paris and feels just like it. The graphics are technically good, but artistically, that’s where they’re at. When you liberate an area of the city, it turns from black and white to color. So as you travel through the city, the color will change in real-time. What’s great about it artistically is that in the B&W areas, only the red Nazi flags stand out. On resistance soldiers and leaders, certain things are in color, such as the eyes and parts of clothing, and it makes things look really unique. While this all looks great, the novelty wears off pretty quick, and you end up forgetting about it.

The game has stealth gameplay and shooting mechanics. When you get a mission, you can jack up a car or get one from your garage (you can store new ones there too) and follow a yellow route line on your mini-map to your destination. While the game is called The Saboteur, this is actually the hardest thing in the game to pull off. Some missions have you trying to sneak into an enemy camp. This is marked by barbed wire on the map, and if you enter it, you will hear the alarm almost immediately if you are seen. Your goal is to knock out a soldier and take his disguise. This isn’t always as easy as it sounds because you have to make sure other soldiers aren’t looking. If someone sees the dead body, a yellow “suspicious zone” will appear, and even if you are in disguise, you can trigger an alarm. Doing things such as running, climbing buildings, and walking fast will make soldiers who can see you suspicious.

The stealth element is kind of flawed because it all works against you. Trying to plant dynamite in an area to draw soldiers away doesn’t work at all since they just stand there staring around. There are a lot of times when you will be forced to just gun it out because the stealth elements are so flawed that you can’t get away with sneaking. Some missions will go flawlessly, and others won’t. This doesn’t make the game unplayable; it just has you wasting your time trying to figure out a stealthy way when, after so much effort, there just isn’t one.

Gunplay is simple enough with cover mechanics, and there are a ton of true-to-the-era weapons as well. You can find ammo crates all over the place, but you can only carry two weapons at a time. Between missions, you can visit black markets and use contraband to buy upgrades for resistance fighters, car upgrades, ammo, etc. It’s all pretty basic, with nothing special in the store, but there’s nothing crucial that you will need to buy to get past a part of the game.

The missions are pretty diverse so this isn’t the issue with the game. The issue is how you have to execute the missions and nothing ever really turns out the way you planned. All of this needs to be trimmed up and fixed for the sequel. During missions, if you raise an alarm you can run (like in GTA 4) or find a hiding spot. Most are located on top of buildings, and climbing isn’t very fun. This isn’t Assassin’s Creed, so climbing is sluggish and a bit unresponsive. Thankfully, you only climb buildings for about 40% of the game.

Other than that, the game is worth a purchase if you like sandbox games. There aren’t many side missions or free-play missions, but the game is long enough to get your money’s worth. The story is the best part of the game, with memorable characters and a gripping ending. Watching these people struggle for survival against Nazi Germany is movie quality. The writing is witty, and Sean has a lovable personality. You quickly grow to love these characters, and they are all fleshed out nicely. The game also has lots of boobs, but this sticks to true 1940s Paris because nudity wasn’t as sinful as it is today. Of course, you have to buy the game new or buy the unlock DLC for the nudity and four cinematic stripper scenes.

Overall, the game is solid in some areas but not in others. With broken stealth mechanics, you can’t always be the saboteur the game claims, but certain missions are satisfying enough to play out the way you want. The game is looking good for a sequel, and I’ll definitely be by Sean’s side when that time comes.

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Grand Theft Auto IV: The Ballad of Gay Tony

Posted by BinaryMessiah on 01/29/2010
Posted in: Microsoft, PC Reviews, PlayStation 3, Retro Consoles, Sony, Steam Deck Playable, Steam Deck Verification, Xbox 360. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

Publisher: Rockstar

Developer: Rockstar

Release Date: 10/29/2009


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Grand Theft Auto has always been the pinnacle for sandbox games, angry politicians and moms, and great gameplay. With an already great game, this add-on gives us new characters, new stories, and added features. You play Luis Lopez, who is working for Tony, who pulled Luis off the streets and into his club business as a bodyguard. Both Luis and Tony get in over their heads, and their friendship spirals out of control to the brink of destruction. But can Luis save them on time?

You will meet many old characters from the original as well as finish a few unfinished side stories from Grand Theft Auto IV, such as the museum mission. If you want me to jump right to it, I will. There are a few great new features, and these include cars, people, dialog, parachuting, a rating system, and new weapons. The game also takes a more cinematic turn with epic helicopter rides, train rides, and even saving a person from certain death in the air via parachuting. There are triathlon missions, escort missions, killing missions, and missions that just turn for the worst.

The story is well planned out, and if you finish the story, you can finish drug wars on turf, but even if you finish those, you get about 10 hours of gameplay, so I just wish there was more for $20. The characters are very well thought out, and you can get very attached to them. All of this is accompanied by excellent voice acting as well. The rating system, however, is pretty useless since you don’t know what the requirements are, and perfecting each mission is tedious. Some require a certain amount of headshots or car damage. Sometimes this is impossible, but the die-hard crowd will strive to waste their time with this.

If you want variety in your missions, is it here, with no two being the same? Each mission is fun and memorable and may actually have you wanting to play through it twice. I love the mission variety in Grand Theft Auto, and Gay Tony provides this. With an epic climax that has you glued to your seat, you just don’t want to put the game down, and this is the first Grand Theft Auto that has done this for me, and that is what was worth the $20 for me. The great voice acting, dialog, story, characters, mission variety, and superb action.

If you are a fan of Grand Theft Auto IV and want more, here you go. The graphics are starting to look a tad aged; there isn’t enough new stuff, but the game is high in production values, and it really shines through.

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Saints Row 2

Posted by BinaryMessiah on 10/05/2009
Posted in: Linux, Microsoft, PC Reviews, PlayStation 3, Retro Consoles, Sony, Steam Deck Playable, Steam Deck Verification, Xbox 360. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

Publisher: THQ

Developer: Volition Inc.

Release Date: 10/14/2008


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The sandbox or “open-ended gameplay” genre is actually the newest genre known to video games, with a good seven years under its belt, but not that many games have really proven the genre worthy. With Grand Theft Auto III being the daddy of this genre, many games were failed mock-ups of GTA; many weren’t even related but still didn’t do the genre justice. Saint’s Row tried to push the genre once again a few years ago, but didn’t do such a great job and was just shoved off as another GTA clone. Now that Saint’s Row 2 has been out for a while, people kind of just stopped with blank expressions, while some roared and cheered with joy. Saints 2 really does push the genre and is a clear opponent against Grand Theft Auto IV, but I’m not going to sit here and compare the two since Saints 2 deserves a separate look.

The first thing you do when you enter the game is to create your own character, and this is what really sets the game apart from others in the genre. You wake up from your coma in a jail hospital, and bam, you’re in there, changing your sex, picking your taunts (some are very vulgar), rearranging your face (you can do that outside of this too), picking your hair, and even your voice. The options are deep and riddled with lots of ways to make your character unique and stand out from others online. Once you get out of this mode, you are introduced to an easy-to-use tutorial that will show you how to control your character, and I have to admit, the controls are wonderful. I never got frustrated with them, and they are just so intuitive and easy to understand and remember. You start out with some melee training, then you pick up a pistol and discover you can zoom in via over the shoulder, jump around, and it all just feels nice and smooth. Once you hop into a car, this doesn’t change one bit since cars will turn on a dime and have the perfect feel to them (all 40 or so of them), and this makes driving around the city of Stilwater very pleasant.

The bulk of the game is about rivaling gangs throughout the story, and I have to admit the story is riveting, gruesome, and very entertaining and never falters once. You see, since you were knocked out for two weeks, all the gangs who hated you took their territory back, and now you must gather your old friends, start the 3rd Street Saints up again, and build your hideout. In this hideout, you can get your cash from the stores you purchased, change your gang’s style (like the ’80s, hip-hop, pimps & hos, that sort of thing), change your weapon layout, and pimp out your crib. All of these are just nice subtle touches that THQ didn’t really have to do, but they went that extra mile anyway.

Between these story missions, you can go to different stores and buy food (health), jewelry or clothes to increase your respect, go to plastic surgeons to redo something on your character, buy cars, buy weapons, and in the second half of the game, play side missions.

These side missions are actually a blast, and the two I will talk about are Fuzz and Septic Avenger. Most of the side missions are scattered throughout your map (Stilwater is HUGE, by the way), and they consist of events such as racing, celebrity protection, helicopter attack missions, etc. All of these missions earn you respect, so you can play story missions (each story mission takes one piece of your respect bar). Each mission gives you a time limit and a certain objective to complete, while some are easy and others are a pain in the @SS and can leave you screaming in frustration. Fuzz is a cop reality show where you drive around to designated crimes and kill them according to what your cameraman says. Sometimes you’ll have to use a chainsaw (camera angle a la Gears of War), use satchel charges on skateboarders, etc. Fuzz is an addictive (like most missions) way to fill your respect bar and leaves many laughs as well (thanks to the amazing dialog THQ wrote for the game). Septic Avenger has you driving a septic truck (yeah, a poop truck) spraying fecal matter all over buildings to depreciate their value for certain clients. As you spray the buildings, a red meter will drop and a cash amount will pop up, bringing that much closer to your depreciation amount. There are also some other smaller side missions, like the taxi missions and hostage diversion, in which you hijack a car and any passengers can be driven crazy (literally) until a ransom is given. You also have a streaker mission since you can walk around naked (blurred naughty bits, of course) and streak in front of people for cash.

If you think the side missions sound fun, don’t forget those story missions. The game has amazing voice acting and clever dialog, so it’ll keep you wanting more and make you come back to see which gang member you’re going to kill next. Not one mission is identical, and you are blessed with a nonrepetitive mission-based game that gives you many different places and ways to kill people throughout the entire game.

Now, when it comes to nitpicking the game apart, the graphics aren’t up to par with most next-gen games (thanks to a lot of Gears of War 2!). , and there are serious slowdown problems where the FPS will drop into the single digits sometimes; there are collision detection and clipping issues; some funky physic problems; but nothing that sandbox games haven’t encountered before. The game is highly playable, and you shouldn’t let these small problems bother you. The last thing I need to mention is the fact that the game is gruesome and more ballsy than GTA ever was. There are complete torture scenes, foul language, and running around naked a la Sims style, which is pretty far out there. The game is just hard-hitting and in your face, and that’s exactly what a mature-rated sandbox game needs.

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Far Cry 2

Posted by BinaryMessiah on 10/05/2009
Posted in: Microsoft, PC Reviews, PlayStation 3, Retro Consoles, Sony, Steam Deck Playable, Steam Deck Verification, Xbox 360. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

Publisher: Ubisoft

Developer: Ubisoft Montreal

Release Date: 10/21/2008


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OK, Far Cry was a great technical feat, and that’s pretty much it. Far Cry had a lot of AI problems with enemies being able to see you miles away; you needed a monster computer to run it; it had almost no story; and it was pretty repetitive. Unfortunately, Far Cry 2 follows all these trends again, but with better graphics, a setting in Africa, an even more confusing story, a super confusing level editor, and the same bland, boring, huge open world. Now, I’m not saying Far Cry 2 is bad; I’m just saying it needs more filling because there is way too much crust on this one.

The game starts out great with you in the back of a car driving to the guerrilla’s headquarters. Once you get through the tutorial, you’re thrown into the beautiful yet empty world, trying to find “The Jackal,” who is feeding both rival gangs guns and fuel (APR and UFLL). You can work on either side since you need either to get to The Jackal. For starters, the game has lots and lots of guns, and you can upgrade them by using diamonds (finding diamond cases and/or completing missions). You can buy the weapons for infinite ammo in your safe rooms, and you can buy manuals that increase accuracy, reliability, etc. You can also buy equipment that will let you hold more ammo, more health, more stim-paks, etc. There are lots here, and everything is fairly priced, but you earn diamonds so slowly that it takes forever to get enough.

When you’re actually shooting the guns, it feels great, but another problem carried over from the first one is that these guys never die. You’ll pump a whole clip into these guys, and sometimes they’ll still be standing. Sometimes your gun will jam and you have to mash X to get it unstuck, and if you’re really unlucky, the whole gun will break, and then you’re SOL. Getting the reliability upgrades fixes this, and swapping out weapons from fallen foes helps this a lot. Far Cry 2 also has a “buddy system,” which is acquired by completing missions, and these so-called buddies can save you in battle (if you run out of health; think of it as an extra life). They can help make missions easier by offering alternatives. This is a great system and is probably the only great gameplay idea in Far Cry 2 that isn’t boring or doesn’t piss you off. When you do get low on health, you can pry bullets out of yourself, wrap yourself in bandages, and even poke yourself with magic needles. You can refill these at health boxes in random areas or in one of your safe houses. You unlock new safe houses by killing all guards in the area, and bam, there you go.

The next gameplay element that is from the first game and was bizarrely stripped down is the vehicles you drive. There are only maybe five in the whole game, and those are a Jeep, a car, an assault truck, and a couple of boats. When your vehicle gets banged up and starts smoking, you can hop out and repair it, which is great, but even if the car starts smoking a little bit, it runs very slowly. Now to get to the most annoying part of the game—the constant backtracking. I understand this is an open-world game (I love sandbox games, don’t get me wrong), but Far Cry 2 fails at this. First, the map they give you is horrible since it’s a little piece of paper you hold (next to your GPS), and all the dots look like blobs, so the legend is useless. You’ll travel to missions on one side of the map, finish them, and then have to navigate all the way back to town. You can’t really go off the trails since there are so many mountains, rocks, and trees blocking your path unless you run on foot.

Then this is where the meat of the annoyance comes in; there’s nothing in between all of this driving around! Maybe here and there you’ll see an animal, but all you get are the same thugs coming after you in their vehicles from the guard posts plastered all along the trails. That is really all there is to driving from mission to mission. The missions are exactly the same; maybe you’ll have to save a friend (or shoot him/her), but essentially it’s all the same.

The malaria effect was useless and made things even more annoying. Every so often, you’ll have to take a malaria pill, and if you run out, you have to go to the ends of the earth (ok, Africa!) to get more, or you die. Essentially, this makes the game boring, and I get headaches every time I play it. Now if you like sandbox games where there is hardly a story and you just drive around killing random thugs, then go ahead and have at it. Now, this brings me to the level editor, which is deep, but there’s no tutorial, and it is not user-friendly. Lastly, the only exciting thing is multiplayer. The best part of Far Cry 2 is the graphics; the game is gorgeous with free-flowing grass, everything burns, trees break when under fire, and the lighting is beautiful. It just all looks so good, but the gameplay is just not there. Sorry, Ubisoft, maybe Far Cry 3 will fix all of these issues.

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The Incredible Hulk: Ultimate Destruction

Posted by BinaryMessiah on 10/05/2009
Posted in: Gamecube, Microsoft, Nintendo, PlayStation 2, Retro Consoles, Sony, Xbox. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

Publisher: Vivendi Universal Games

Developer: Radical Ent.

Release Date: 8/23/2005


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I’m not really a comic book person, but when a good game comes along, I won’t pass it up. UD is probably the only game ever made that lets you jump 300 feet in the air. Jump over skyscrapers, grab cars and use them as steel fists, battle giant mechs, grab on the copters, and bring them to the ground. UD pulls this off superbly, but not perfectly. The main problem with UD is the extreme difficulty. The difficulty is unbalanced, so you’ll get an easier mission than an impossible one. The enemies just won’t let up at all. You’ll have 10 mechs come after you, shooting missiles and whatnot, and after a few minutes, you’re dead. This will make some people just give up (such as myself).

The game has a pretty decent story, but it’s nothing too special. You are Bruce Banner, who tries to tame the Hulk inside of him by partnering up with a scientist and getting various parts to build the machine to do the latter. Some missions have you protecting things, some have you destroying things, and some have you fetching things. That is pretty much all the missions are about. The combat is really rewarding and awesome. You have to use a basic attack, but combos with these will do massive damage, along with grabs and slams. You can buy new upgrades after you unlock each chapter.

There are 50+ moves, and they are all different. Some vary from being able to grab and throw things while running to jumping on copters and bringing them to the ground. This would be even more fun if there was some sort of block or counter button. You have to take all the damage that is sent at you unless you purchase moves that send missiles flying back and whatnot. You can run up buildings and fly over them to get healthy, but you’ll be doing this more than fighting, and it’s so annoying. While the initial introduction of flying all over the place, jumping as high as a plane, and being able to utterly destroy a whole city is fun, it gets old kind of fast because that’s all you do in this game.

You do have mini-games you can play, but they are pretty lame and boring. You can use a pole to smack enemies as far as you can in one, race, float and land in the middle of a giant ring, rescue people, etc., but they just aren’t as fun as they sound. Hulk fans will be able to unlock artwork and whatnot through pickups in the game, but this still doesn’t save you from fighting the difficulty. The graphics are nothing special. This is a 2003 game, so it looks pretty bad compared to today. If you can stomach the high difficulty, then pick this up. If only this game were easier, I would have been able to finish it.

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Grand Theft Auto IV

Posted by BinaryMessiah on 10/05/2009
Posted in: Microsoft, PC Reviews, PlayStation 3, Retro Consoles, Sony, Steam Deck Playable, Steam Deck Verification, Xbox 360. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , . Leave a comment

Publisher: Rockstar

Developer: Rockstar North

Release Date: 4/29/2008


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I remember playing GTA III when it first came out. I didn’t have a PS2 yet, and I went over to a friend’s house and played it for hours every single day. While we mostly just messed around, it was something I had never played before and was just so addictive. Thankfully, GTA IV goes back to its roots and brings us to good ol’ Liberty City. You play none other than Niko Bellic, who is a Russian immigrant who came to LC with his cousin Roman to start a new life. The game’s main attractions are its story for once. GTA IV has a superb story that makes you want to keep playing. Gone are the lukewarm stories from previous GTAs where only the main character was the main attraction, with just OK side characters. In previous GTAs, you never really got a good feeling for the employers due to the lack of building up the story. You were just in and out of the short cutscenes, not knowing what to really do. This kind of problem was solved in San Andreas, but even then, only a select few were really fleshed out. In IV, you feel every character in the game, and there are tons of plot twists, which really keeps the game fresh through every single mission.

On another note, the graphics are amazing. While not Assassin’s Creed or BioShock amazing, they’re really good. It’s mainly the subtle details, though, such as people now putting their blinkers on, cars are damaged in real-time now with realistic physics, so half-broken fenders and bumpers sway as you turn the car, the paint can get scraped up, crowd AI is more efficient (yet not by much), better enemy AI (still not by much), further draw distance, everything has high-res textures, bump mapping, and the whole next-gen works. There are a few things that they stripped away, such as the whole working out system, swimming underwater (you can still swim though!), and territories. There are other subtle details, such as the internet, that you can now use. It’s a virtual made-up internet, but it’s still as funny as hell and has a dating system (yes, it’s still here) implemented on the dating website. You can get emails for side missions from employers as well. You can now take taxis around the city and either watch them drive or skip them if you want. This really helps a lot if you are tired of driving everywhere. There is also a new route system where the game will plot the safest and most legal course to your destination. Red is a target, blue is friendly, green is a waypoint you made on your map, and yellow is an objective. This is probably one of the better additions because it keeps you from getting lost during time-sensitive missions.

Another thing is the revamped wanted system. You now have to flash “zones” for every star. The more stars, the bigger the circle will get on your radar that you have to escape. Cops are now shown as flashing blue and red blips, and copters are now flashing Xs. While we’re talking about characters again, the voice acting is amazing. I really felt like I was watching bits of a movie every time there was a cutscene. The characters are really fleshed out here, every single one. You’ll remember every character in the 60+ hour game, and that’s a really hard thing to achieve. Rockstar really went the extra 20 miles with this game, and you can just feel it.

The game is huge as well; while not as huge as San Andreas, it’s about as big as GTA III, yet it’s also big and taller as well. You can fly planes and copters again in here, and while it’s a lot easier than San Andreas, it’s still not very fun. Speaking of controls, they are more refined this time, and the auto-aim is a lot better, yet there’s still that stupid camera! Switching targets is not very easy. You have to press the right stick exactly left or right, or you won’t switch targets. Whenever you lock on, Niko always aims for the wrong people and ends with cheap deaths and what have you. The cars are also a big pain because they just don’t feel right. They all feel really heavy, and they slide way too much, no matter what car you use. You try to put the brakes on, and your car will slide and slide and you’ll miss your turn, and the same goes for the handbrake. You hit it, and your car spins out a few times, no matter how good you are with the handling. I found this very annoying with the driving missions because it would lead to cheap and frustrating failures.

Apart from all this, the game has 16-player Xbox LIVE support. You have tons of game modes, from deathmatch to cops and robbers. In cops and robbers, it’s pretty self-explanatory. You all get in a car and try to kill each other. This is also very fun yet annoying because the game can lag a lot, especially with people who have crappy connections. It also may take a while to start a game due to everyone wanting 16 players, and they just won’t start the game. Aside from the minor issues, GTA IV is probably game of the year-worthy, but it doesn’t do anything as groundbreaking as GTA III did. It just perfects it 100% this time and gives us what we’ve always wanted. The perfect GTA game.

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