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Modern Warfare 2

2009-05-24T20:28:00.000-07:00

Modern Warfare 2, the sequel to Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, is in development and set to release on November 10, 2009. It was officially announced by Activision Blizzard on December 3, 2008.

No co-operative play will be included in the campaign of Modern Warfare 2, unlike the previous installment. In the Game Informer article, Infinity Ward stated that co-op campaign detracted greatly from the cinematic effect of the game no matter how they tried to implement it. However, a new mode of gameplay, called Special Forces mode, will include co-operative play. Special Forces mode will include several fast-paced action missions similar to Mile High Club which will be of much higher difficulty than normal campaign missions and will lack real stories.

It has also been stated that NPCs will carry customized weaponry, similar to multiplayer.

In at least one mission, enemy soldiers will be amongst non-combatant civilians, forcing the player to discern between civilians and militia soldiers.

Modern Warfare 2 is to feature Russia once again in political turmoil. Makarov, a political leader coming from the shadow of Imran Zakhaev, plots to cause a chain of events that would threaten global security. The plan made by Makarov is deemed dangerous enough for Task Force 141, led by Cpt. Soap MacTavish, to be deployed to Russia. There, the force must fight its way through near-white out conditions. After escaping the scene on snowmobiles, Task Force 141 is later deployed to Rio De Janeiro to capture an arms der linked to the plot, eventually being led to the barren lands of Afghanistan. But the intel Cpt. Soap MacTavish and the rest of Task Force 141 is receiving is likely inaccurate, as even they do not understand the danger of the sinister plot.

On May 10th, a promotional video for Modern Warfare 2 was unveiled on TNT. Multiple weapons were shown in the video, all of which are listed above, along with weapons shown in the Game Informer article. On May 21st, a second promotional video was shown on GTTV. Both of the two videos were pieces of the large trailer that was to be released on May 24th, to which an Infinity Ward developer responded, "The extended trailer which launches on ModernWarfare2.com on Sunday will be 5x the amount of content.".[3]

Sure enough, the full length trailer topped off at around 2 minutes with more gameplay than was previously shown. The trailer's debut was so popular that the official Infinity Ward forums were crashed for nearly ten minutes, due to the flood of people.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine UNCAGED Edition (PS3)

2009-05-10T18:22:00.000-07:00

Making certain superhero videogames must be difficult. Some guys, like Batman, are just regular people with lots of money and awesome gadgets, and they can still die. But what about nearly immortal characters, like Superman? The Man of Steel has kryptonite to make him a little more "human," but Marvel's undying bundle of anger, Wolverine, can survive almost anything (or at least put himself back together after being torn to shreds). Wolverine's latest adventure X-Men Origins: Wolverine, does a great job of making you feel like the nearly invincible mutant, but it doesn't quite provide a story to match.

Like the title indicates, Origins details Wolverine's beginnings...well more of the origin of his name and adamantium frame. The character's true origin began in the 1800s. Regardless, Origins' five-chapter tale alternates between the present (mostly the Weapon X facility) and three years in the past (in an African jungle), setting up a frame story that slowly but surely drives the narrative forward. After act three, however, things start to get weird; for every question the game answers, it brings up two more. Other popular mutants, like Gambit and the Blob, make brief appearances, but their cameos only confuse the tale of flashbacks further. By the end, the game has set up so many loose plot threads that it leaves no choice but to try and wrap them up in a confusing mishmash of explosions and overlong battles.

But you're playing this game for one reason and it's not for a Dickensian retelling of Logan's history; it's to do what "he does best": tear people in half with reckless, bloody abandon. And that's what Origins gets right. The camera cinematically sweeps around the battlefield, and the game throws the action into slow motion whenever you execute an especially violent decapitation. And almost every enemy can succumb to getting ripped apart at the torso or a messy decapitation. The combos are simple, and button-mashing usually works just as well as any type of strategy. But the game always makes you feel like an effective killing machine.

The guys you're killing, however, get old pretty fast. Both the "past" jungle levels and "present" facility chapters pit you against the exact same enemies, reskinned to fit their surroundings. It's even more off-putting when you start fighting mutants. How many blade-wielding, four-armed dancers exist in Wolverine's world? Apparently several hundred. Boss encounters, while they force you to change up your battle strategy a little, are simple exercises in running around in circles, leaping on your opponent's back, and slowly whittling away at their health bar.

But to ease the grind of fighting the game's endless parade of cloned grunts, Origins incorporates a few adventure-like qualities (leveling up, equipping new powers, choosing which skills to power up). While it adds a sense of purpose to the slaughter, it's also a bit misleading. You can constantly upgrade your strength and stamina, but the enemies always seem to take the same amount of punishment. And it makes the cut-scenes, where Wolverine effortlessly slices through skin, bone, and concrete walls that much more jarring. How do the same enemies take so much more damage when they're in-game? By the end of Origins, I was hoping to have created a Wolverine who could swing a fist and immediately send limbs flying, rather than a character that feels about the same as he did at the beginning of the game.

Origins also occasionally throws in some nonsensical platforming sections to slow things down. Suddenly, the camera feels like less of a thrilling addition, and more like an annoyance whose purpose is to make you die. Leaping precariously between platforms or girders with Wolverine's inexact jumping is one thing, but some scenes force you to run toward the camera, away from some cataclysmic danger, usually while avoiding obstacles at the same time. Screw up: You die, and start over (though invisible walls tend to keep you from taking too many unnecessary leaps to your doom).

The game has unlockable costumes, which is a nice change if you get tired of looking at Logan's A-shirt attire, but neither costumes nor battle damage carry over to most of the game's cut-scenes. One second you're dressed as the classic, yellow-and-blue suited Wolverine, the next you're looking at your character in jeans and a white shirt -- all the more strange since most of the scenes take place in-engine, not as separate, high-rendered cinematics. It's the oversight to little details that ultimately detract from the game the most. Sure, Wolverine takes battle damage, exposing gaping chest wounds, protruding arm bones, and a bare skull. But his pants are always perfectly intact. Maybe Levi's Jeans has a secret deal with the Wolverine game: the pants can get a little bloody, but they can't sustain damage -- like a racing game where none of the cars can show any scratches or dents.

While Origins doesn't seem to have any game-breaking bugs, I still ran into spots that had me walking in mid-air or grabbing onto invisible ledges. Even the final boss encounter forced me to spend part of the battle running around in the sky, just trying to get back to the battlefield. The game never locked up or dropped me through a floor, but it still has some pretty big glitches for a finished product. And, this is a minor detail, but Origins doesn't have subtitles. If you want to turn down the game's constant shouting and battle noises, you'll also miss out on everything the characters are saying.

As a mindless, button-masher that puts you in control of the eternally angry Wolverine, the game provides some simple fun. But it quickly devolves into a mediocre Tomb Raider/God of War mash-up of balancing across precarious ledges, quick time events, and moving crates around to solve "puzzles." Origins isn't bad at what it does, but what it does isn't very ambitious.

Cryostasis: Sleep of Reason

2009-04-20T09:31:00.000-07:00

The game story develops with help of a unique system called Mental Echo - the ability to penetrate another character's memory and change the actions taken by that character in the past. This can involve saving people's lives by taking over their bodies in their memories and changing the course of history.

One of the available gameplay videos shows the protagonist enter the memories of a cow carcass, thus reliving the final moments of the animal in a slaughtering house before being decapitated.

The game, being set in an arctic setting, employs body heat as a health meter - the player must use heat sources (such as lights or stoves) to replenish health.

Cryostasis takes place in 1981 on a nuclear icebreaker called the North Wind, which has become shipwrecked near the North Pole. The main character, Alexander Nesterov, is a Russian meteorologist who must investigate what happened onboard the ship. But he’s not alone, and the North Wind is now plagued by dead crewmen who have undergone a bizarre metamorphosis due to the effects of the incredibly cold climate. Alexander must try to unravel the mystery of the ship captain’s death and discover whether it was the cold or possibly, something far more sinister.

The game is the first to make use of Nvidia PhysX real-time water physics as displayed in a tech demo of the game engine.

Cryostasis has so far received mixed reviews. Resolution Magazine described the game as "tense, frequently innovative and attractive," and claimed that "its shortcomings are definitely outweighed by its strengths," awarding it 78%. Eurogamer was slightly more critical, awarding the game 6 out of 10 and stating that "it's not quite creative enough - its environments fall into a monotony of samey rooms and bulkheads - and its combat is too clunky to be delicious." PC Format meanwhile award the game 83% and called it "A beautiful, yet flawed gem that offers up a thoroughly unique experience."

Cryostasis doesn't utilize multi-core CPU support, and thus makes it difficult for many players to play the game smoothly. This is uncommon as most modern games take advantage of multi-core CPUs. The issue has been discussed in the official game forum.

Square Enix Says FFXIII to Use "Nearly 100%" of PS3 Power

2009-04-01T00:37:00.000-07:00

Final Fantasy XIII Trailer - NEW!

Final Fantasy XIII is looking to be a showpiece for the PlayStation 3, and Square Enix is confident that it will push the system to its limits. Kotaku reports that, speaking to Japanese magazine Dengeki PlayStation 3, producer Yoshinori Kitase addressed some questions about the game. "Doesn't the demo use about 50 percent of [the PlayStation 3's] power?" he said. "Of course, I think the retail version will make use of nearly 100 percent."

As a comparison, he commented that this game will be to the PlayStation 3 what Final Fantasy VII and Final Fantasy X were to the PlayStation and PS2, respectively. But, he reassured that the game won't require disc swapping, at least on the PlayStation 3, due to the capacity of Blu-Ray and PS3 harddrive space.

Sony CEO Kaz Hirai recently made waves when he commented that the console was made "hard to program for" in order to pace the flow of taking full advantage of the console. Square Enix has usually been a trendsetter when it comes to packing punch on Sony's systems. If Final Fantasy XIII does take almost full advantage of the hardware, we can bet other developers will take it as an example to follow.

The other elephant in the room, of course, is the Xbox 360 version. Since it will be ported after the PlayStation 3 version is finished, it probably isn't on the minds of the developers. But if the game is really pressing the PS3 that hard, we'll have to see if any compromises are necessary for the 360.

Mana Khemia: Student Alliance

2009-03-22T20:07:00.000-07:00

Mana Khemia: Student Alliance (PSP) US Debut Trailer

It seems like it was only last year that the PS2 version of Mana Khemia was getting mediocre reviews - oh wait, it was just last year. A PSP port already? Ok, we'll roll with it. Nothing wrong with putting a little alchemy in your pocket, especially when there are multiplayer battles with exclusive rewards to be had. Sadly there are some technical issues that make the port pretty undesirable unless you're really that keen on the ad hoc additions.

Back to School
For those of you who didn't jump at the original, it's basically a guild-style RPG (where you accept quests from a front desk) except in this case you're a student at a magic academy signing up for classes. Each semester you need a certain amount of credits to pass, and you earn them by going on quests to gather certain items, kill a specific monster, or synthesize a particular item. Along the way you can also complete "free time" quests to learn more about your character, Vayne, who has a predictably hazy past, and his workshopmates: alchemically ambitious Jess, cat-girl to the max Nikki, and (cue theme song) Flay, with the big sword.

Character progression is somewhat frustrating, but also oddly compelling. You can't just grind in the field and level up. You earn points for defeating enemies, but those don't go into stat upgrades until you fill out your Growth Book (sort of like the license board in Final Fantasy XII) which requires that you synthesize items. I.e. crafting is not optional in this game, and in fact, it's probably the main draw (if you're into that sort of thing), although the battle system (transparently turn-based, with ways to strategically screw with the order) is pretty fun.

Underachiever
Actually, despite the somewhat generic look and sound, I would describe Mana Khemia as fun in general. The PSP version, however, has this incredibly unfun, dual-pronged fork-in-the-eye problem of too many pokey load breaks paired with one...h-ell of a...won---ky, fra-me...rate. There were so many times until I got used to it that I thought the game was just going to crash altogether. The Jump Start install might ameliorate this somewhat, but only if you have enough room on your memory stick. I know there are definitely people who will be hooked enough to grin and bear it, but it's too bad this couldn't have been a more polished product.

PROS: Fun combat, compelling character progression, new multiplayer battles
CONS: Horrible optimization

Retro Game Challenge Review

2009-03-13T22:20:00.000-07:00

Retro Game Challenge is well worth your time and well worth adding to your Nintendo DS collection. Whether you want to relive the eighties or just play some fantastic 8-bit games, there truly is something for everyone that enjoys gaming in its purest form. Now, I need to go back to playing some Retro Game Challenge, since later tonight I will be organizing my cassette tape collection while doing some other hilarious eighties cliché. Retro Game Challenge for the DS gets a 9/10

Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars

2009-03-08T21:20:00.000-07:00

Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars- First Official Trailer

Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars Hands-On
While Grand Theft Auto has previously been on Nintendo's Game Boy platform, Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars marks the first time the franchise has appeared on the Nintendo DS. The good news is that from our hands-on time with CTW so far, it seems the game not only captures the unique tone and flavours of the much-heralded series, but does so while introducing new and genuinely entertaining ways of interacting with the gameworld. In our hands-on time with a preview build of the game, we used the DS touch screen to do everything from nimbly racing timers to creating Molotov cocktails, hot-wiring cars, and assembling a kit-form sniper rifle.

The game takes place in the Liberty City you've come to know and love, complete with Dukes, Broker, Bohan, and Alogonquin boroughs. While the locations are familiar, you're going to be looking at them from an entirely different perspective. The most obvious change in GTA:CTW is the game's camera. It falls halfway between the classic top-down view of the original Grand Theft Auto and that of an isometric third-person action game, with the camera zooming in and out as dictated by the action onscreen. The environment initially appears quite flat, but once we found out we could twirl the fixed camera, we saw buildings and vehicles rendered as full 3D objects. Our Rockstar tour guide explained that while the city is modelled as closely as possible on the maps from its console big brothers, some minor tweaks had to be made to accommodate the new gameplay. Therefore, while you'll drive under overhead train tracks (which become transparent as you pass below) there are no split-level roads. Progressive game streaming also means that despite the city's enormity, you'll never bump into a load screen while crossing zones or driving across town to complete a mission. Pedestrians have their own individual AI routines, and following them around you'll observe them heading to and from work, eating hotdogs, and getting into fist fights with total strangers on the road. Full day and night lighting cycles and dynamic weather effects are also present here.

As the game's name suggests, Chinatown Wars focuses largely on Asian crime syndicates and rival gangs scrapping for turf control. You play the role of Huang Lee, the son of a syndicate boss who is killed during a triad power struggle. The game opens with you returning home to Liberty City to meet with your uncle, Wu "Kenny" Lee, to pass on the family's Yu Jian sword--a priceless family heirloom Huang's father won in a card game.

Animated cutscenes with accompanying text explain the backstory as you make your way home. On arrival at the airport, you meet some of your uncle's bodyguards, but before you can even get your bags off the carousel, a bloody shoot-out takes place and you're hit. Left wounded and presumed dead in the back of a car, you regain consciousness in time to find out you're being disposed of as your vehicle careens off the road and plummets into the harbour. It's here that the actual gameplay begins, and you'll immediately be introduced to some of the new stylus-driven interactions with the game. Naturally you'll need to escape the rapidly sinking car, and with doors notoriously difficult to open underwater, you opt to smash the rear window. You'll do this by rapidly stabbing at the DS's touch screen to chip the glass. Though it didn't appear to be velocity sensitive, a few strikes were enough to get us out of our waterlogged coffin and back on dry land.

Naturally, the first thing you want to do is get to your uncle's place and fill him in on the details. This is a GTA game, so there's no real surprise that since your ride is totalled you need to liberate one conveniently sitting at the docks. During our time with the game we stole some cars with screwdrivers, but we also found some with electronic security systems that needed to be hacked before they could be started. Once you get to Kenny's restaurant, Sum Yung Gai, you'll find out that the family sword has been stolen. A subplot unfolds, and though he's family, Kenny seems set on finding the sword not to rightfully return it to your kin, but to pass it on to triad mob boss Hsin Jaoming, with the purpose of winning his favour so as to assume his role when he retires.

Kenny hooks you up with an apartment that you use as your central hub for day-to-day activities. Here you'll be able to manage your contacts, take jobs, and store your drug stash. Once completed, any mission can be replayed at will using the whiteboard at your apartment. Though we didn't see the stats and scores in action, we were told that they will hook directly into the Rockstar Social Club, so you can compete with and compare yourself to friends as well as share in-game items. Given that the mission length tops out at around 10 minutes each to maintain the portability of the game, you'll also have a PDA that lets you save while out and about as well as line up missions without retuning to home base.

All the vehicles we came across included GPS to help point you towards where you need to go. There's also the option to turn on a giant yellow arrow indicator so you can stay focused on the road and not your minimap. The GPS will calculate the fastest legal path to your objective, but you can always take your vehicle off-road through parks or back alleys. The system is also smart enough to redraw on the fly if you deviate from the suggested path or take a wrong turn. Burnouts make a return, and by holding the B and Y buttons you'll streak fire and whip the rear of the car around with a temporary speed boost. It's incredibly useful for getting out of a pinch in a hurry or to take out errant rival gang members who are in the way. Multiple radio stations make an appearance in each car, so you shouldn't have any trouble finding cruising or fleeing tunes to suit whichever situation you find yourself in.

Controls are handled using the face buttons. X will let you enter or exit vehicles, B accelerates, Y reverses, and the right shoulder button locks up the handbrake to perform tight turns. The D pad is used to steer. When you're on foot, the A button shoots your selected weapon (chosen by opening a submenu on the touch screen), which can also be fired while inside cars for drive-bys. The right shoulder button locks onto targets. Like the gameplay, the city is interactive, and if you take the time to search red dumpsters scattered around the capital, you'll often find weapons and other goodies.

We saw several missions during our time with Chinatown Wars. The first, Streets of Rage, introduced us to a crooked cop named Wade Heston. Trying to both crack the Korean Wonsu Nudong crime family and keep the Internal Affairs department off his back, he seeks out your help. A hot tip tells you the gang might have your family sword, so it can't hurt too much to team up with Wade even if you have different agendas. After finding his apartment abandoned, we got an e-mail from Wade telling us that he was caught in an ambush. Once we located him, we faced a miniboss fight of sorts that saw us pinned down behind a wall in an alley as a guy with a minigun ripped the place apart. Since running out would get us shredded, we used grenades to stun the guy before scampering between cover and eventually taking him out. It's not the most complex puzzling we've seen, but it's a nice addition to straight run-and-gun shooter gameplay.

The second mission we played had us protecting a shopfront from a firebomb attack by rival gang the Spanish Lords. After barricading the street by stealing cars and parking them strategically at the choke points, we waited for the gang to turn up. The action kicked off pretty quickly after their arrival, and we were involved in a heated gun battle. Setting cars on fire with a hail of bullets proved to be particularly helpful to keep them at bay. It was then simply a case of picking them off from range with our assault rifle.

The third mission, One Shot, One Kill, saw us driving a limo to a hotel to perform an assassination. Once we had parked and entered the building, we found a briefcase. Inside was a rifle in pieces and in need of assembly. By dragging and dropping the pieces together with the stylus, we got the basics assembled, but we still needed to rotate the stylus to screw in the barrel, insert the cartridge, and attach the scope. Moving into a first-person perspective, we were given instructions on acquiring the target--a man in a white shirt--and lining up our shot. Naturally, once we had completed the deed we attracted a little unwanted attention. We were immediately awarded a three-star wanted rating and needed to find a car to get the hell out of Dodge.

The wanted system for CTW has been changed up a bit. Instead of outrunning cops until they get bored and go away, each star rating you add increases the number of police cars you'll need to destroy before you can get away. Running them off the road or into oncoming traffic to cause head-on collisions usually does the job, and you'll be off scot-free soon enough.

Drugs play an integral role in this game. They're your primary source of income, and by buying and selling them across the city you'll build up your cash reserves, which you can then use for buying weapons. Illegal trafficking isn't without its dangers, though, and the game features its own mini-economy. Buying low and selling high has never been easier, and by following the upwards-pointing green arrow when trading one type of drug for another you can turn a tidy profit. Video cameras scattered around the city make trading near them risky and increase your chances of being caught but also up your profitability. Like with GTAIV's pigeons, you will need to destroy the cameras to achieve 100 percent game completion, and while doing so reduces your risk of getting busted, you'll also bring down your ability to earn. Trading with other dealers is never smart when within eye line of the police, but wherever you do a deal there's a possibility it could go sour, forcing you to flee if you want to keep your wares.

Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars looks to be a unique take on the well-worn franchise while adding a new twist to the control system and interactivity with the city itself. You don't have long to wait now, with the game due to hit shelves in mid to late March this year.

Red Alert 3: Ultimate Edition Hands-On

2009-03-08T03:02:00.000-07:00

Although it has been a few months since EA released Red Alert 3 for the PC and Xbox 360, the publisher is just now putting the final touches on the PlayStation 3 version of the real-time strategy game. While the game has trailed the other versions, EA has taken the extra time to polish up the conversion and add content to give PlayStation 3 owners some love. We recently had the chance to get a look at a work-in-progress version of the game, dubbed Red Alert 3: Ultimate Edition, and get our hands on it for a bit to see how it's shaping up.

If you missed Red Alert 3 last year, here are some highlights. The game is the third entry in the Command & Conquer spin-off series that takes the real-time strategy action and drops it into an alternate past. This time out, the game's story has a lot of fun with time travel and mixes up the technologies of the different playable factions. Thanks to a time-travel-fueled assassination, the American, Russian, and Japanese nations have taken some interesting development paths. Mechs, cyberbears, and all manner of borderline-zany units are tossed into the game's pool of infantry and vehicles.

The PS3 game will have all the content found in the original 360 and PC games, so plan on campaigns for the Allies, Soviets, and Rising Sun factions, each with increasing difficulty levels and high-quality video cinematics starring some big-name talent. In a welcome twist, the campaigns will support online co-op play, replacing your AI co-commander in offline play with a human one. In addition, the game will feature an online skirmish mode for you and three friends, which is just two shy of the PC game's six-player support and is on par with the 360 multiplayer. On top of all the content found in the original 360 and PC games, the PS3 version will feature the content found in the PC Premiere Edition of the game, which includes documentaries, a soundtrack, bloopers, video unit profiles that offer useful information, and excerpts from the Battlecast programming the team has been running for a while now. The meaty additions actually come close to filling up the game's Blu-ray disc.

Beyond the game content, there are a few extra odds and ends of note in Red Alert 3: Ultimate Edition. First, the game will feature trophies, 50 in fact, which are the same as achievements in the 360 version and are spread throughout single-player, skirmish, and online play. Second, the game doesn't contain any of the content from the upcoming expansion pack for the PC. We asked about DLC for the game and were told it has yet to be determined. Finally, our third bit of info is a heads-up on the game's install, which is shaping up to be 3.8 gigs.

Control is on par with the approach taken in the 360 game. The game uses a radial menu and it maps controls across the Dual Shock in an intuitive fashion that works really well. While it's still not a replacement for a good old keyboard and mouse, it's probably one of the best ways to do an RTS on a console.

Though Red Alert's controls haven't seen much tweaking, the visuals have. The Xbox 360 game was basically fine, but it was a bit muted. The PS3 game, however, benefits from sharper textures and a markedly brighter color palette, putting the game closer to the impressive look of the PC game. On the performance side of things, the action looked to be smooth and didn't hiccup, although we didn't get a chance to flood the map with units.

Based on what we saw and played, Red Alert 3: Ultimate Edition is looking like a shinier conversion of the PC game with a good number of extras. Given that the number of real-time strategy games on the PS3 can be tallied on one hand, the game is a welcome addition to the system's library. Red Alert 3: Ultimate Edition is slated to ship at the end of March for the PlayStation 3.

Command & Conquer Red Alert 3 Ultimate Edition Trailer

Watchmen: The End Is Nigh Review

2009-03-06T21:16:00.000-08:00

With all the critical acclaim for the Watchmen comic series and all the hype surrounding the new movie adaptation, it's possible that folks might have certain expectations for the new video game set in the same universe. However, if you are hoping to find some of the comic's depth and maturity here, or are looking forward to reliving your favorite scenes from the movie, you will be sorely disappointed. Watchmen: The End Is Nigh is a shallow beat-'em-up game set years before the events of the comic. Its narrow scope may disappoint some, and the Watchmen veneer isn't very deep. Yet thanks to lively, brutal combat and impressive visuals, Watchmen: The End Is Nigh is a fun, fist-flinging romp for the few hours that it lasts. The $20 price tag is a steep one, but for anyone who enjoys a good old-fashioned beat-'em-up, The End Is Nigh delivers.

Pretty much all you do for the entire game is beat up bad guys, and the combat is good enough to stay fun throughout. Whether you're playing as Rorschach or Nite Owl (the only two playable characters), the fundamentals are simple: light attack, heavy attack, block, and throw. Peppering your opponent with attacks works well, and there are some nice animation touches that make even this basic combat enjoyable. Throwing enemies is particularly delightful, whether it be into a crowd, off of a ledge, or into a wall. As you progress, you'll encounter tougher enemies that block your basic attacks, so you have to use the various combos you learn along the way in order to stun them or knock them down. These combos add new animations to the mix and are generally a bit nastier than your normal attacks. However, the best animations are the finishers, which you activate by matching the button prompt that appears over the head of a weakened enemy. The camera zooms in during these brutal flurries, allowing you to appreciate every blow. While Nite Owl's no slouch, Rorschach is the clear standout here: his finishers are so manic and so vicious that you can't help but cringe and cackle with delight as he just keeps hitting a guy who is clearly unconscious.

Basic attacks, combos, throws, and finishers make up the bulk of your fighting move set, but Rorschach and Nite Owl have a few other tricks up their sleeves. They can each counterattack easily, disarming any armed opponents and positioning themselves for a strike. Rorschach will even hold onto these weapons, and his brutal finishers get even nastier when there is a crowbar involved, though watching him wield a knife like a bludgeon is a bit silly. Each hero also has two special attacks that drain energy from a meter in the corner of the screen. Rorschach can do a short bull rush or freak out and do more damage for a short period of time. Nite Owl's grenade stuns anyone nearby, and he can use the electric charge in his suit to zap a large radius of foes.

As you fight your way through the rough areas of town, you'll encounter a few different breeds of thug and lowlife, some tougher than others. It's easy to die if you get yourself surrounded and try to punch your way out, but judicious use of counterattacks and special moves should be enough to get you out of any tight situation. There are throwaway actions here and there, like lever-pulling or valve-turning, and an oddly tricky lock-picking minigame that seems a bit out of place in a game that's all about brute force. Despite these extraneous tasks, a creeping sense of repetition looms over The End Is Nigh, and it's possible you'll grow weary of pounding your way through wave after wave of goons. Though the game mixes up your enemies' fighting styles in order to make you use your entire arsenal, the action can often teeter on the edge of button-mashing boredom. Those inclined to revel in the perverse joy of cracking skulls will be able to keep repetition at bay, but the relatively simple gameplay will quickly wear thin for others.

For all its merits, the combat wouldn't be nearly as fun if it wasn't paired with top-notch graphics. The sharp character models are fashioned after the movie costumes, and the smooth, realistic animations make the action exciting and extremely satisfying. You'll chuckle when Rorschach jams his hands in his overcoat immediately after furiously maiming an entire biker gang, and both he and Nite Owl pack a wickedly pleasing punch. There are occasional physics-based oddities, especially when throwing your enemies, but the animation is still consistently impressive. The detailed environments provide a rich setting for your beatdowns, and stark lights and deep shadows (occasionally too deep) create a dramatic look. The quasi-animated cutscenes provide a few pages' worth of story across the six chapters of the game, and the sinister machinations at work fit nicely into the Watchmen universe.

Though you can have some split-screen fun with a friend, it's baffling that there is no online cooperative mode. That would have made the $20 price tag a little easier to swallow, but as it stands the price feels a bit greedy. Those inclined to tire of repetitive gameplay will find the price of entry too high, but there is some value here. The impressively animated combat is fun and brutal, and the sumptuous environments provide the perfect pugilistic playground. The many unlockable combos and achievements provide some replay incentive, and the combat is surprisingly fun to come back to even after you've beaten the game. Though it may be shallow, overpriced, and likely to disappoint anyone hoping for more weighty fare, Watchmen: The End Is Nigh is ultimately a simple, well-crafted game that will please those looking to dish out some good old-fashioned beatdowns.

Review By Chris Watters, GameSpot

The Sims 3 Preview - What's Really New in Sims 3, Plus Goals and Ambitions

2009-03-06T21:00:00.000-08:00

The Sims 3 is finally coming this year, and with it, the renewed hopes and dreams of everyone who's ever wanted to make little computer people have little computer one-night-stands, or make them die horribly in little computer kitchen fires. The third installment of this phenomenally popular series will bring with it new features and improvements to the older stuff--such as better graphics, with enhanced lighting and shadowing, and tons of expressive new animations--but what exactly will be different between The Sims 3 and The Sims 2? We'll take a look, and also dive into the enhanced goals and ambition system, which, if used properly, may grant your sims superhuman powers--such as the mind-blowing ability to never have to go to the potty again. (No, seriously!)

Let's start with the game's customization and editing tools, which are being expanded greatly for The Sims 3. In The Sims 2, there were only two body types ("normal" and "fat"), a handful of preset skin colors, and a handful of preset hair colors. There was a fairly robust set of tools to tweak facial features, primarily based on preset options (a bunch of preset eyes, preset noses, and so on); the most detailed likenesses were created by advanced players using tools outside the game (such as Adobe Photoshop). However, in The Sims 3, facial features will pretty much all have various sliders that will offer much more in-depth tweaking options.

The Sims 3 will also have sliders that will let you choose customized gradients for skin color (to better represent different ethnicities, as well as blue-skinned aliens, green-skinned witches, or what have you); gradients for primary and secondary hair color (for those talented stylists who really want highlights in their hair); a slider for body type that will let you choose how lean, muscular, or fat your characters are; and the new "create a style" swatch tool, which will let you edit and save various color patterns, and then apply them to anything in the world that has a pattern. If you care to, you can make a sim with a leopard-print shirt, a rideable leopard-print bicycle, and a leopard-print refrigerator. (We actually checked on this last part, and we're pleased to report that the leopard-print bicycle totally works.)

Buy and Build modes have been tweaked in The Sims 3, and neighborhood lots will also work differently. Previously, furniture for your house was sorted by function and type; now they'll have a revamped room-specific sorting list as well. The larger part of the story of the Buy and Build modes will be the use of create-a-style to paint all of your furniture, as well as your house, with whichever patterns you want as freeform wallpaper and carpeting--such as with, let's say for the sake of example, leopard print. (We tried this, and you can absolutely have leopard-print sofas in a room with all leopard-print walls.) Swapping in custom-built items created by the fanatically loyal Sims community will also be made easier in The Sims 3 with a built-in application that runs out of the game's launcher (as opposed to having to quit the game, open up a Web browser, and pulling up the "Exchange" community site, which is being updated to include YouTube-like and Facebook-like functionality, such as blogs, friends lists, favorites lists, and user ratings). In addition to uploading and downloading furniture, customized sims characters, and housing to and from the community site, The Sims 3 will have an in-game movie-making tool that will let you upload and download videos to and from the Exchange. More details on that at a later date.

Furthermore, outdoor lots have been changed so that there will now be only one huge, continuous neighborhood (rather than the separate neighborhoods of The Sims 2), within which time is constantly running. Likewise, your neighbors' lives are constantly changing concurrently. The neighborhood view in The Sims 3 has been changed to be an actual real-time 3D space that shows context-sensitive icons that tell you exactly where you need to go if you plan to go out to a gym, restaurant, store, recreational area, or wherever else. Like in The Sims 2, there will be outdoor "lots" outside of your sims' homes where you will still, in fact, send your sims to work out, have a romantic dinner date, buy groceries, or just play in the park. The difference is that in The Sims 3, the neighborhood view is actual 3D space, so you can seamlessly move from your house to a lot, or from one lot to another, without having to hit a loading screen. In fact, if your have a bicycle or car, your sims can immediately hop on and take a ride; if not, sims will be equipped with a mobile phone that they can use to automatically call a taxi to whisk them away to where they're going in real time (not by sitting on a loading screen until they magically reappear at their destination).

There will also be new public events in The Sims 3, such as music concerts, movie premieres, pool parties, barbecues, sporting events, outdoor fishing, and the most civic-minded public activity in a Sims game to date, attending a public protest at SimCity Hall, where your sims can voice their discontent with the administration's legal mumbo jumbo by angrily shouting their own nonsensical "simlish" mumbo jumbo.

The management of sim characters and relationships will also be tweaked and streamlined for the sequel. Previously, you had to manage each of your sims' "motives" (personal needs) such as hunger, fatigue, and needing to go to the bathroom; many of these needs are now automated, and if neglected, sims will take care of themselves. You'll also be able to drag and drop garbage items into the trash to keep your house clean (rather than having to order your sims to manually pick up each old newspaper and clear each dish).

And previously, your sims would start relationships with their neighbors by using "socials," various types of social interactions such as chatting, telling jokes, and so on, and you'd raise or lower your relationship with another character by repeatedly doing either something that the other character liked, or didn't like, until your relationship number reached 100 (the highest level) or -100 (the lowest). In The Sims 3, as we've mentioned in our earlier coverage, you can't simply choose to "chat" with another sim 87 times until he or she falls in love with you; you'll have to vary up your responses, and you'll have different conversation options available depending on your character's personality traits (for instance, having the "evil" trait will let you literally steal candy from a baby) and even on your character's career path (for example, aspiring politicians can ask for campaign donations).

One of the biggest changes in The Sims 3 is the "traits" system, which helps you determine your sims' personality (previously, you used sliders to select how messy or neat; active or lazy; shy or outgoing they were, and that combination would assign your sim an arbitrary horoscope sign, such as Leo or Taurus, that determined personality). Another of the biggest changes is the new-and-improved goals system, which has expanded way beyond The Sims 2's "aspiration" system (which gave sims a handful of daily goals to work toward filling a fulfillment meter to "platinum" level).

You can choose up to five "traits" for your adult sims that will define their personalities, how they interact with their neighbors, what kind of career paths might be more suitable for them, and which characters might be more or less compatible with them. EA's Sims team has done a great deal of fine-tuning on the design of these traits to ensure that they work for different kinds of Sims players. For ambitious players who want all of the advantages, traits such as "ambitious," "schmoozer," "charismatic," and "genius" can give you a head start along certain career paths and put you in a better position to be popular in the neighborhood; for players who are more interested in either creating purposely disadvantaged characters, or creating characters who resemble people they know in real life, there are disadvantageous traits such as "absent-minded," "inappropriate," "unlucky," and of course "insane."

In fact, here's a full and complete list of the 65 traits in The Sims 3 for you to look over: absent-minded, ambitious, angler, artistic, athletic, bookworm, brave, can't stand art, charismatic, childish, clumsy, commitment issues, computer whiz, couch potato, coward, daredevil, dislikes children, easily impressed, evil, excitable, family-oriented, flirty, friendly, frugal, genius, good, good sense of humor, great kisser, green thumb, grumpy, handy, hates the outdoors, heavy sleeper, hopeless romantic, hot-headed, hydrophobic, inappropriate, insane, kleptomaniac, light sleeper, loner, loser, loves the outdoors, lucky, mean spirited, mooch, natural cook, neat, neurotic, never nude (yes, from Arrested Development), no sense of humor, over-emotional, party animal, perfectionist, schmoozer, slob, snob, technophobe, unflirty, unlucky, vegetarian, virtuoso, and workaholic. Enough traits for you?

Along with new traits for your sims, The Sims 3 will have a revamped life-goal system built around "lifetime wishes"--a single long-term goal that you can choose for each of your sims that will eventually grant that character ultimate happiness. You build up to lifetime wishes with periodically updating regular "wishes," which take the form of basic tasks that will unlock minor rewards and increase your sim's overall morale with a "moodlet"--a minor condition that contributes to your characters' overall mood. Evil sim just stole candy from a baby? Ahh, that's a good moodlet: +15. Having to listen to the annoying sound of the crying baby? Ugh, that's a bad moodlet: -15. Working toward your lifetime wish will win your sims "lifetime happiness points" that can be spent on extremely powerful items, such as a teleport pad, or on astoundingly superhuman abilities, such as iron bladder, a complete immunity to having to go to the bathroom. No, seriously.

And here's a full list of the game's 32 lifetime wishes: professional author, world-renowned surgeon, become a superstar athlete, CEO of a megacorporation, hit movie composer, heartbreaker, rock star, the tinkerer, become a master thief, forensic specialist: dynamic DNA profiler, become an astronaut, master of the arts, perfect mind/perfect body, gold digger, star news anchor, living in the lap of luxury, jack of all trades, surrounded by family, renaissance sim, chess legend, the culinary librarian, golden tongue/golden fingers, international super spy, super popular, presenting the perfect private aquarium, celebrated five-star chef, illustrious author, swimming in cash, the perfect garden, leader of the free world, the emperor, and become a creature-robot cross-breeder.

And that's a lot of new stuff going from The Sims 2 to The Sims 3. We're looking forward to playing this new sequel and trying out everything that it has to offer--and it'll offer quite a bit. The Sims 3 is scheduled for release in June.

Star Ocean: The Last Hope Review

2009-03-06T06:06:00.000-08:00

Since its advent nearly 13 years ago, the Star Ocean series has challenged the role-playing game norm with its real-time battles and sci-fi trappings. Despite what appeared to be the series' conclusion with the unconventional revelations seen in Star Ocean: Till the End of Time, it has returned in prequel form on the Xbox 360 with a newly overhauled and better-than-ever combat system. Though it features a weak, cliche story and characters you may want to launch out of the airlock, its fantastic and engaging battles, simple yet fun crafting system, and bevy of bonuses make Star Ocean: The Last Hope worth your time.

In the latter half of the 21st century, humankind all but nukes itself into nonexistence, forcing the survivers on Earth to look to the stars for a new home. As Edge Maverick, a first-generation member of the Space Reconnaissance Force, you start off on your mission to explore the galaxy for a suitable new home and are drawn into a battle for the fate of the galaxy when you encounter a mysterious and destructive force that threatens all life. Of course, that's nothing that a can-do attitude, the support of your friends, hidden inner powers, and the occasional all-too-convenient plot twist can't handle as you race off to save the day. Sound familiar? Star Ocean: The Last Hope doesn't have a very original story, and its frequently ridiculous plot points and consistently dreadful dialogue don't help to make it any more memorable, especially when it forces half-hour-plus cutscenes on you with alarming frequency. Luckily, you can skip these epic events at any time (though oddly enough, they can't be paused) and read through condensed text synopses to make sure that you didn't miss anything too terribly important.

The formulaic nature of the story is further compounded by the cast of characters, themselves an off-the-shelf mixture of walking, talking space opera and anime cliches. You've got the hopelessly idealistic leading man, who is full of an infinite (and often misplaced) trust in others; the self-deprecating childhood-friend-slash-possible-love-interest; the emotionally repressed, scientifically minded space elf; the busty, scantily clad staff-wielding sorceress; the overly affectionate underaged cat girl; and more. Though the members of your misfit crew do undergo some fairly heavy changes as the game progresses--both as part of the standard narrative and in optional cutscenes and events--it's always in extremely predictable ways that ultimately fail to break them out of their original molds.

Despite these shortcomings, The Last Hope is a fun and engaging game thanks in great part to its deeply engrossing and highly addictive combat system; if the story is the heart of a Japanese RPG, then the battles are its soul, and Star Ocean's shines brightly. Monsters appear on the field, and once engaged, they're fought completely in real time with a party of up to four characters. You actively control one of your crew members and navigate him or her around a wide-open battlefield, dishing out damage at your own pace, while the others act according to basic AI routines that you've given them. At any time, you can switch over to manually control anyone who you have deployed, and you can even swap out active characters with reserve ones at your discretion. Every single character plays vastly differently, and it's fun and engaging to experiment with each character in order to find the play style and party combination that works best for you.

Though the battles can get frantic, they don’t all come down to button mashing, especially when you're taking on bosses. These major battles in The Last Hope often play out like simplified versions of encounters in an massively multiplayer game such as World of Warcraft. Each boss has a specific strategy that can be followed to take it out--though it's not necessary to follow these tactics if your party is powerful enough--and figuring them out during the fight will make your life a whole lot easier and dramatically reduce battle times. Another concept taken from online games is monster aggro, or aggression. Though enemies will wander around the battlefield, you can draw aggro from them with attacks or by using specialized skills for doing so, which is useful for pulling a monster off of your physically weaker magic-slingers to give them a chance to cast their powerful spells. Once you have aggro and the monster gears up for an attack, if you dodge out of the way with the right timing, you can break its line of sight on you, leaving it temporarily confused and open to special counterattacks called blindsides. Another powerful tool at your disposal is Rush mode, which can be activated once you've taken or dealt enough damage to grant you an array of bonuses and the ability to chain attacks together with other party members.

Perhaps the most interesting part of battle is the bonus board. By performing specific tasks in combat, such as defeating enemies using only skills or killing two monsters with one blow, you add a tile to this onscreen grid that grants you an extra reward at the end of battle based on your achievement. You can have up to 14 such bonus tiles active at any one time, and these carry over from fight to fight; by carefully manipulating the types of bonus tiles you have, you can customize extra rewards that are given after every single encounter. With this, you have the flexibility to power level your characters, grind for cash or skill points, minimize the number of restorative items that you need to use, or all of the above in any combination. It's possible to lose your bonus tiles, but if you exercise good judgment in combat, they shouldn't be too difficult to keep for as long as you like.

When not in battle, you're exploring a series of open, outdoor locations that range from beaches to deserts to snow-capped mountains and beyond, as well as the occasional puzzle-filled dungeon. These beautiful-but-dangerous environments often contain resource nodes that provide valuable plant life or raw materials if you've got a crew member who can harvest them. These supplies and others earned through battle (or bought from stores) are then used to fuel your research in the simple-but-powerful item creation system. By finding item formulas in your journey or forming research teams and thinking long and hard enough, you can invent recipes for new weapons, armor, items, and even decorations for your ship. Once you gain the right ally, you can further customize your equipment by synthesizing the properties of other items in your inventory to generate some truly powerful gear.

The Last Hope features some top-notch visuals in its huge, open, and highly detailed environments, its abundant cutscenes, and its anime-inspired character models, but it also has a few notable issues. Sadly, the game has only a handful of unique monster designs, and it palette-swaps and reuses them ad infinitum. It's also exceedingly difficult to play on an SDTV thanks to incredibly hard-to-read text and muddied graphics. Sometimes just looking around you is an exercise in frustration thanks to the awful camera system; it zooms in ridiculously close at times and doesn't seem to know what to do whenever you're in a narrow hallway or traveling down stairs or a steep decline. Perhaps the most disturbing thing about The Last Hope is that all of the game's characters have a doll-like, glossy-eyed dead look to them, further accentuated by their complete lack of human emotion or expression. Besides being creepy, this makes supposedly emotional scenes unintentionally hilarious or just plain awkward to watch.

The game’s frequently awful voice acting makes it even harder to connect with the characters. At its very best, The Last Hope's cast will make you groan. At its worse, they're absolutely unbearable. Anyone hoping to escape the lackluster dub will be disappointed to hear that the original Japanese audio is not preserved here, though you do have the option to turn off battle quips from individual characters. Celebrated composer Motoi Sakuraba returns to lend his talents to the Star Ocean series once again, and though the voice acting doesn't work, his soundtrack is perfectly suited to the various locales visited, situations faced, and battles fought.

When it's all said and done and you've finished the game, there's still plenty more to do. Besides offering two unlockable difficulty settings, there are tons of side quests to complete, items to create, recipes to discover, bonus dungeons to explore, and bunnies to race. The Last Hope also has Star Ocean: Till the End of Time’s coliseum system, which lets you sign up for solo or group fights to battle your way up the ladders for prizes. You can collect dozens of battle trophies for each character by performing specific tasks with them in combat. And if you actually are interested in the story, there are multiple endings to see based on the relationships that you form as Edge Maverick throughout the game.

If all you're looking for is a strong, narrative-driven role-playing adventure, Star Ocean: The Last Hope isn't going to do much to satisfy you. But despite its deficiencies in this area, its huge number of extras and its addictive, deeply strategic and tactical combat system make it a lot of fun.

By Lark Anderson, GameSpot

Star Ocean: The Last Hope Opening

Big Bang Mini by DS Review

2009-03-03T16:35:00.000-08:00

At first glance, Big Bang Mini doesn't seem like a traditional shoot-'em-up. Given that the genre is best known for tiny spaceships blasting their way through thick fields of alien fire, you'd be forgiven for wondering where fish skeletons, pirate snowmen, and fireworks fit in. But don't let the charmingly oddball presentation fool you: Big Bang Mini is an evolutionary step forward for the genre. Ship movement and shooting are completely independent of each other. You can launch shots from anywhere on the touch screen, regardless of where your ship is positioned, and this innovation breathes new life into the frantic action. The smooth learning curve makes the game very accessible, but later levels and extra modes provide a tough test of your stylus mastery. Bound together with wonderfully vibrant visuals and an infectious soundtrack, Big Bang Mini earns its shoot-'em-up stripes and a place among the top games on the Nintendo DS.

The unique controls are at the core of Big Bang Mini's appeal. Unlike traditional shoot-'em-ups in which projectiles are fired from your ship, Big Bang Mini lets you launch fireworks from anywhere on the touch screen. Simply flick the stylus as if you were lighting a match, and a shot will light out along that trajectory. As your foes appear on the top screen, you are free to bombard them from any and all angles with fireworks galore. Shots that destroy enemies will explode in a colorful spectacle; however, shots that don't hit anything will explode when they hit the edge of the screen, raining down dangerous debris on your vulnerable ship. This danger pushes you to make more accurate shots, a goal easily accomplished thanks to the responsive and accurate stylus controls.

In fact, the controls are so responsive that errant strokes can get you into trouble. In addition to launching fireworks, you control the position of your ship with the stylus: just touch it and drag the stylus to move it wherever you like. If you try to launch a shot too close to your ship, you may end up moving it inadvertently. Likewise, a desperate swipe to move your ship out of danger can result in a badly aimed shot and a dangerous explosion. Big Bang Mini demands precision in both firing and maneuvering, two separate but equally important tasks. And you won't just be moving your ship to avoid danger: each destroyed enemy releases a falling star. If you collect enough stars to fill up the meter, you pass the stage. Balancing the necessary firing, dodging, and collecting is engaging and exciting. It can also be tricky, but fortunately the first few levels provide a smooth ramp-up in difficulty, ensuring that Big Bang Mini doesn't have the difficult point of entry that many of its genremates boast.

As you progress through the nine levels of the Arcade mode (each with nine stages and a boss), you'll encounter new power-ups and hazards. In one level, you can create a vortex that will absorb enemy shots by swirling the stylus around, but stiff winds will affect the trajectory of your fireworks. In another, you can lay down a reflective mirror shield with a horizontal swipe of the stylus, but certain clouds (which normally absorb your shots) will reflect your own projectiles right back at you. The beauty of these power-ups and hazards is that they are complementary, so as you become more powerful, the level becomes more dangerous. Big Bang Mini gives more as it demands more, and this makes each new level freshly challenging.

In addition to new challenges, each level brings a new, wildly different presentation. From the neon techno pixel landscape of the Egyptian-themed Luxor, to the bawdy colors and trippy musicians of Rio de Janeiro, each level in Big Bang Mini is a treat for the eyes. Attractive backgrounds scroll by smoothly, and the unique (often bizarre) enemies and explosions are a pleasure to look at when you can spare a moment. Underscoring these impressive visuals are some excellent musical tracks that range from snappy electric beats to mellow atmospheric melodies. The level of artistic quality and variety in Big Bang Mini is truly impressive, and the presentation alone is reason enough to recommend the game.

As if stellar presentation and exciting core gameplay weren't enough, Big Bang Mini offers a number of extras to keep you interested. At the completion of each stage (bosses excluded) you'll get the chance to complete a bonus stage. These are connect-the-dots minigames that will light up the top screen with a firework constellation should you succeed. Each level features a different twist (some quite clever), making these bonuses a pleasant palate cleanser between stages. Completing the Arcade mode is no easy feat, but doing so will earn you access to the Mission mode. This mode imposes tough challenges on stages you've already played, so you might be charged with clearing a certain stage within a time limit, using a certain number of shots, or never missing a shot. These conditions force you to adapt your well-honed strategy, so even skilled players will find a challenge here.

For those players who prefer to match their skills against human opponents, Big Bang Mini offers two ways to do so. The Challenge mode harks back to Big Bang Mini's shoot-'em-up roots and is the only mode in which you'll earn points. The core gameplay mechanics are the same, but the enemies, visuals, and music are completely new. Once you perish, you can post your high scores to online leaderboards and see how you stack up. If you prefer a more immediate competition, the Versus mode lets you challenge another DS owner to a shoot-out with only one game card. In Versus, you hold the DS sideways and shoot volleys of fireworks at your opponent on the other screen. Various power-ups and environmental hazards spice things up, and battles can get very heated, especially given that players can tap each other's projectiles to send them rocketing back where they came from. These extra modes provide great opportunities to flex your competitive muscle, while the unlockable Relax mode (watch and control fireworks displays) and Alarm Clock (actually cool, thanks to the stellar music) offer fun rewards for dedicated single-player play.

Big Bang Mini is an excellent shooter with an innovative control scheme that will please newcomers and veterans alike. To fully experience each level's uniquely awesome aesthetic and face the delightfully clever end boss, you simply must play the game all the way through. Once you've done so, there is plenty more to do whether you thrive on competition or just want to live it all again. Add it all up, and you've got one of the most accessible, most entertaining, and most attractive DS games in recent memory. Then consider the $19.99 price tag, and it's a no-brainer: Big Bang Mini is a must-buy.

Review By Chris Watters, GameSpot

Shippin' Out March 1-7: Halo Wars

2009-03-03T16:26:00.000-08:00

The first-quarter siege on gamers' wallets continues this week with an array of high-profile releases, but none is bigger than Halo Wars for the Xbox 360. Set for a March 3 release, the real-time strategy take on Microsoft's sci-fi first-person shooter franchise marks a bittersweet milestone for developer Ensemble. Halo Wars will be the Texas-based studio's first foray onto consoles, but also its final finished game, given that Microsoft shut down the developer in January.

Although that sad news could assure Halo Wars a place in gaming history, Sega's new real-time and turn-based hybrid strategy game is guaranteed to be historic. Developed by The Creative Assembly and set for release on the same day as Halo Wars, Empire: Total War for the PC is set in the 18th century. Beyond allowing would-be world conquerors to muck around with the history books, Empire also introduces naval combat to the studio's trademark Total War franchise.

Empire: Total War isn't the only game that Sega has up its sleeve this week. The publisher is also shipping Phantasy Star Portable for the PSP and Sonic and the Black Knight for the Wii, both with a March 3 release. The latter game adds sword-based combat to the Sonic franchise, whereas the former tells a new story in the Phantasy Star Universe series, nestled between the events of the original and the Ambition of the Illuminus expansion.

Those aren't the only games on deck this week; Major League Baseball releases are stepping to the plate on every major system. 2K Sports has MLB 2K9 headed for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, Wii, PC, and PlayStation 2, and DS owners are getting a swing at MLB 2K9 Fantasy All-Stars. Sony is also swinging for the fences with MLB 09: The Show on the PS3, PS2, and PSP. All of the baseball games are set to charge the retail mound on March 3.

Also taking off on that packed launch day is Tom Clancy's HAWX for the Xbox 360 and PS3, the first installment of the author's Ubisoft games to take on air combat. Set in the near future, HAWX lets players fly the unfriendly skies in a variety of high-tech jet fighters. The PC edition of the game is expected next week.

For a full list of the week's game debuts, check out GameSpot's New Releases page.

Killzone 2 Review by GameSpot

2009-03-03T05:25:00.001-08:00

No one could have suspected that the sequel to 2004's Killzone would be this good. Killzone 2 is a tremendous package, offering an exciting campaign and terrific competitive online play, neither of which create new paradigms for first-person shooters, but rather set new standards in subtle but significant ways. From groundbreaking visuals to well-crafted multiplayer maps, most of Killzone 2's individual elements stand out in a crowded genre, making its meager attempts at storytelling easy to ignore. PlayStation 3 owners looking for a shooter to keep them busy for the rest of 2009 and beyond need look no further: The fierce action will keep you glued to your television screen for some time to come.

What makes Killzone 2's single-player campaign so much fun? First and foremost, the weapons are a lot of fun to shoot, even the standard assault rifles that form the core of your loadout. The M82's effective scope makes zooming in on your target a breeze, yet this rifle is effective at close range as well, establishing itself from the beginning as a formidable firearm. The LS13 shotgun is also powerful and rewarding to fire; though you may only shoot off a foe's helmet with other weapons, you'll watch entire heads explode with a single blast from this close-range powerhouse. The bolt gun is another favorite, skewering enemy soldiers onto surfaces and exploding a short moment later. Though you're traversing a sci-fi setting, your weapons are decidedly modern-day, from the sniper rifle to the vicious flamethrower, with one exception: the lightning gun. This mighty instrument showers enemies with overpowering jolts of electricity, and though it's not available for long, it makes short work of robotic and humanoid foes. Each of these weapons feels just right; fantastic spurts of blood, outstanding animations, exquisitely detailed weapon models, and explosive sound effects fuse seamlessly and give a satisfying sense of impact every time you land a shot.

Although there's a great variety of weaponry, you won't encounter that many different kinds of enemies as you fight your way across the war-torn landscapes of the planet Helghan. As in the original Killzone, your enemies consist largely of Helghast soldiers, yet though this limited selection led to monotony in the past, an assortment of factors in the sequel hold tedium at bay. The action is constantly pushing forward, leading you from one quality scripted event to the next and pitting you against bright AI opponents that have a remarkable grasp of battlefield tactics. These soldiers put up a fight and exhibit authentic behavior as you rain bullets on them. If you set your sights on a soldier peeking from behind cover and fire off a few rounds in that direction, he'll patiently wait until all signs of fire have vanished. Helghast will flank you and shoot blindly from behind cover, and should you toss a grenade in their direction, they'll quickly scatter. You'll normally be fighting alongside a computer-controlled teammate or even entire squads of fellow infantry. Enemy AI is just as concerned with your comrades as it is with you, so you'll never feel as if you have a bull's-eye plastered on your forehead, as is common with many other team-based shooters. As a result, Killzone 2's thrilling large-scale battles unfold dynamically and offer a legitimate challenge while rarely feeling unfair--a frustrating rocket-heavy final battle serving as the only exception.

Some excellent turret sequences and other segments also provide welcome variations on the shooting theme. At one point, you'll climb into a robotic shell and mow down infantry and tanks with machine gun fire and rockets. The way your transparent protective shield exhibits cracks as you take damage and the remarkable fire and smoke effects that light up the screen add to the excitement of the level. In another fun and visually stunning sequence, you'll use an antiaircraft turret to take down squadrons of enemy fighters. Even operating a standard turret is more appealing than you would expect, which is a result of great map design and well-scripted enemy entrances. If you're just using your standard arsenal, missions are diverse and engaging. You'll take aim at tanks (and in one boss fight, a hovering aircraft) using Killzone 2's potent rocket launcher, and you'll fight your way through a besieged air base in which winding corridors and intersecting passages have you battling multiple enemies on multiple levels.

Most levels take their cue from the usual first-person shooter formulas, and though it takes place in the spacefaring future, Killzone 2 feels more akin to a modern-day day FPS by way of its standard weapons and mostly humanoid enemies. It's an interesting blend of two disparate sensibilities that works far better than in the original, and it's further ripened by gameplay touches that feel authentic within that framework. Movement and turning speeds have a real feeling of weight, which is appropriate considering the heavy armor burdening you. This can make the controls feel somewhat sluggish at first, given that you take a moment to gather momentum. It doesn't take long to get accustomed to this sense of overall bulkiness, though, and it's consistently delivered across multiple mechanics. For example, when you jump, the way that you bend into the leap and cushion the landing with another slight crouch feels surprisingly realistic. That weight also informs movement in and out of cover. Killzone 2's cover system is solid, and it never removes you from a first-person viewpoint. Though some objects can obscure your view if you try to take potshots from behind them, sticking to cover and leaning out from behind walls is generally effective and intuitive.

Whether you go for a pop-and-shoot approach or just gun your way through, the mission design keeps you constantly moving from one objective to the next. The quick pace is one of Killzone 2's finest facets; battles don't wear on too long, and they aren't so brief as to be anticlimactic. Like many other shooters, mission objectives often involve turning a crank or pushing a button. In Killzone 2, this may mean rotating the controller to simulate the onscreen activity. These moments feel unnecessary and ironically disrupt the sense of immersion, but as tacked-on as they are, the actions are too brief to be especially annoying. You'll also use your gamepad's motion sensitivity to stabilize the sniper rifle, though the implementation here is subtle and therefore relatively harmless.

It's a real pity that there is so little context for the exceptional action. If you're familiar with the original Killzone, you'll at least have an idea why the ISA (International Strategic Alliance) is attacking the Helghast homeworld; if not, it's clear that as Thomas Sevchenko, you are on the side of the good guys--just not clear why they are the good guys. The dialogue is rudimentary (a discussion regarding sandwiches jumps immediately to mind), the characters forgettable, and the plot serves purely as a thin framework to move you from one environment to the next. Yet the cutscenes are top-notch, and unlike their counterparts in fellow PS3 shooter Haze, there's nothing intrinsically offensive or wearisome about the fist-pumping grunts at the core of the story. The story isn't deep or involving--it's just there, neither enhancing nor diminishing Killzone 2's action.

That action is enhanced by groundbreaking visuals that elevate Killzone 2 to the head of its class. Both technically and artistically, this is a real stunner. You'll first notice the obvious expressions of its technical prowess: environments jam-packed with objects and textured architectural details, pipes and crumbling rebar jutting from dilapidated buildings, and gorgeous lighting that drenches market squares and sandy battlefields with an incandescent glow. As you peel away the visual layers, your appreciation will only grow. Soldier animations are the best in the genre: Enemies move so fluidly during battle, and shift from cover to firing stance so smoothly, it's clear that meticulous attention was given to making each limb move authentically. Even the smallest details are striking. Raging fires react to the wind as it blows through the level, lightning flashes across the gloomy skies, and billows of smoke so thick you could choke on them cloud your view--but never so much as to be a gameplay annoyance.

These visuals coalesce beautifully to give Killzone 2 a cohesive look that relies as much on its art design as it does on its technology. A subtle grain filter, a good amount of motion blur, and deep color saturation give most levels a dank, overcast ambience, and asymmetrical architecture and other small stylistic touches make Helghan feel more like a grim alternate-universe Earth than a completely foreign world. The sound design offers an equally intense palette. Explosions are obnoxiously loud, and the din of gunfire spreads across the map. The largest battles, such as one that rages across a decrepit bridge, sound intensely chaotic, and the crack of lightning bolts on Blood Gracht may cause you to jump out of your seat. The stormy soundtrack rages at all the right moments but gets a bit overwrought, which befits the hammy voice acting more than it does the layered sound effects.

Although the campaign is over in eight or nine hours, many levels are eminently replayable thanks to tough enemy AI and multiple difficulty levels, and the game makes it easy to revisit specific sequences within its mission menu. But what gives this shooter legs is its fantastic online play, a fun and competitive extravaganza that issues a constant stream of benefits. Like the most recent Call of Duty games, Killzone 2 rewards you with bonuses as you play, which in this case can mean new weapons, extra grenades awarded upon respawning, and most intriguingly, entire classes. This is done not only via a leveling system that pushes you ever closer to the next reward, but also with ribbons earned by completing specific tasks, such as getting a certain percentage of your team's kills. These bonuses are earned separately from leveling, which makes for two layers of online play enhancements to keep you ever addicted.

These dividends flow in a seemingly endless current, though they aren't the only facet of online play that will keep you gripping your controller; the team-based gameplay itself is outstanding, which serves as reason enough to stick with Killzone 2. The modes themselves offer few surprises, what with variants on Team Deathmatch (Bodycount), Conquest (Capture and Hold), and Capture the Flag (Search and Retrieve), among others. Rather, matches are unique because these modes are strung seamlessly together, forcing teams to move from one objective to the next with barely a breather in-between. Up to five modes mesh into a single game, which keeps teams on their toes and spreads hotbeds of action about the maps. In a single match, you're likely to band with teammates in an exposed courtyard, navigate tight walkways as battles rage in the artificial gulley just beyond, and defend an objective in a claustrophobic alcove. It's unlikely that you'll have trouble finding players online to join you in one of Killzone 2's 32-player engagements, but should you be so inclined, you can fill out the games that you host with up to 15 AI-controlled bots. You can even practice offline in one-off matches with those same bots if you prefer.

The eight maps included are exceptional, largely because they are flexible enough to make every mode feel like a natural fit for the precise layouts. Aspects such as the varying spawn points of the propaganda speaker in Search and Retrieve, and the vulnerable locations of capture points in Capture and Hold, provide focused hot spots and send you to every nook and cranny of the maps. Be prepared to think vertically because the pathways wind up stairwells, through hidden tunnels, and across balconied walkways. The addition of techniques available to each of Killzone 2's seven classes makes the ensuing action even more dynamic. An engineer's turrets can make Pyrrhus Rise's natural chokepoints even more treacherous, whereas a cloaked enemy may pounce on you as you navigate Tharsis Depot's constricted walkways. All the while, visual flourishes such as floating embers on Visari Hammer and distant artillery fire on Salamun Market keep the mood oppressive.

Additional features flesh out the robust online play. You can join other teammates in a squad, a la Battlefield 2 and Enemy Territory, a feature that lets you coordinate attacks with ease. Full support for clans and clan challenges should make Killzone 2 a natural destination for competitive teams, and you can use killzone.com to schedule clan matches and tournaments. But whether you're a lone wolf or a clan enthusiast, you'll be happy to find a mostly smooth online experience, with only rare and short bouts of visual slowdown and online lag. In light of this extraordinary suite of online options, it's a pity that there is no cooperative play, and the single-player campaign seems ripe for such an addition, given that you're usually accompanied by an AI teammate.

You'll have to look to the inevitable Killzone 3 to find out if developer Guerilla can dig any diamonds out of this series' rough narrative. Otherwise, Killzone 2 is an exceptional first-person shooter, not because it does anything particularly new, but because it does everything extraordinarily well. There's certainly no doubting its graphical superiority, but though its moody visuals invite incessant superlatives, it's the tight, electric action that will make this an off- and online haven.

Dissidia: Final Fantasy

2009-02-08T06:51:00.000-08:00

Dissidia: Final Fantasy is an action game produced by Square Enix for the PlayStation Portable as part of the campaign of the Final Fantasy series 20th anniversary. Information on the game was first released during the "Square Enix Party" event of May 2007. The game features characters from different Final Fantasy games and centers around a great conflict between the heroes and villains, as the god of discord, Chaos, tries to wrestle control of their worlds from the forces of good.

Dissidia: Final Fantasy's genre has been described as "dramatic progressive action" and its graphics are in three dimensions. It has wireless one-on-one multiplayer and fights revolving around the use of individual special skills of characters to do damage to opponents. Players can also customize their characters with equipment.

Character movement is fully functional within the three-dimensional field map. Characters are able to perform special maneuvers using the environment, similar to the Reaction Command feature of Kingdom Hearts II. Traps with a variety of ill effects can be found throughout the arena.

Similar to many fighting games, the aim is for the player to reduce their opponent’s HP to zero. A character's offensive (and, to a lesser extent, defensive) power is shown in numerical form called BP or "Brave Points". Both characters start out with equal BP, and each must steal BP from their opponent by attacking them with the basic "assist attack" to add it to their own total and gain the upper hand. Players can then use the "HP attack" to cause direct damage to their opponent; the higher their BP, the more damage they inflict. However, once an HP attack is used, the character's own BP is reduced to 0 and then recovers to its starting amount. A character whose BP total has been depleted (past 0 BP and into the negatives) is forced into "Break mode", where, aside from not being able to cause HP or BP damage, all attacks made against them cause critical damage, and the opponent gets a large boost to their BP.

One main feature of the combat system is the "EX Gauge", which can be filled in a variety of ways, such as inflicting damage on opponents, taking damage from opponents, and obtaining items scattered around the field of play. Once the EX Gauge is filled, the character can enter their "EX Mode", significantly increasing their power and enabling new attacks, including the "EX Burst", an unavoidable special attack similar to the Limit Break mechanic seen in many games in the series.

In Dissidia, there is an ongoing conflict between two gods: Chaos, the god of discord, and Cosmos, the goddess of harmony. The two gods have battled for eons, until Chaos summoned a number of villains from other universes to serve him. These villains built an army and overwhelmed the forces of good, and the balance of power tipped in Chaos' favor. The few survivors of the forces of good have banded together to strike back at Chaos and his forces and return order to the universes.

Characters

The game unites both protagonists and antagonists from installments of the main Final Fantasy series, their stories narrated by the first Final Fantasy game's Cid of the Lufaine (voiced by Bunta Sugawara). Chaos (voiced by Norio Wakamoto) also makes an appearance as the god of discord, while a new character, Cosmos (voiced by Sumi Shimamoto), appears as the goddess of harmony. The game has an overarching storyline that requires playing through all of the characters to complete. The game contains twenty-two total playable characters: eleven heroes and eleven villains, one of each representing Final Fantasy through Final Fantasy X, and two secret characters: a heroine representing Final Fantasy XI, and a villain representing Final Fantasy XII.

Characters' equipment can be customized, and they can gain EXP and gil from battles.

Many of the characters can transform into different forms, mostly as part of their EX Modes. For example, Sephiroth from Final Fantasy VII transforms into his One-Winged Angel form as seen in Final Fantasy VII Advent Children when entering EX Mode, whereas Cecil from Final Fantasy IV can switch between his Dark Knight and Paladin forms at any time. All characters have an alternate costume; examples include a design for the Onion Knight that makes him resemble Luneth from the Nintendo DS version of Final Fantasy III and Squall's SeeD uniform as seen in Final Fantasy VIII.

Summons are accessible using Summon Stones. There are over 50 different summons, each with a different effect.

[PSP] Final Fantasy Dissidia New Trailer

Call of Duty 5: World at War

2008-11-11T09:41:00.000-08:00

Call of Duty: World at War is a first-person shooter video game developed by Treyarch and published by Activision for Microsoft Windows, PlayStation 3, Wii, Xbox 360, Nintendo DS, and PlayStation 2. It is the fifth installment in the main Call of Duty series. The game is set in the Pacific theater and Eastern front of World War II. The game shipped in North America on November 11, 2008, and will ship in Australia on November 12, 2008, and in Europe on November 14, 2008.

The story focuses on the final battles of World War II in the Pacific and Eastern Europe involving the United States, the Empire of Japan, the Soviet Union, and Nazi Germany. It is told from the perspectives of a Marine Raider and a Red Army soldier, and is based on several historical battles, including the Makin Island raid, the Battle of Peleliu, and the Battle of Berlin. The multiplayer portion of the game contains various game modes, and contains a leveling system that allows the player to unlock additional weapons and rewards as they progress, which was originally implemented in Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare. A new feature to the Call of Duty series is the co-op mode, which can support up to four players online and two offline.

Story
One part of a level entitled "Makin Raid" shows an Allied prisoner of war being tortured by the Japanese before having his throat slit by a katana. The player's character witnesses this scene and is later rescued by US Marines who liberate the camp. Two other levels show the player using the machine guns on a PBY Catalina to attack a Japanese naval fleet, and the beginning of the Russian campaign. In that level, the player and a Russian sniper attack German troops under the cover of a bombing raid.

Gameplay
World at War will feature a more mature theme than previous installments in the series. Swimming will be introduced to the series. While in water, the player cannot sprint and will only move at half speed. Flamethrowers, introduced in Call of Duty: United Offensive, will appear alongside flammable environments. Vehicles (i.e. Tanks) will also be reintroduced in this edition of Call of Duty. The game will be more open-ended than previous games in the series, as there will be multiple ways to complete objectives.

Multiplayer
World at War will have cooperative gameplay with up to two players via split screen on consoles, or four players online, for the first time in the franchise. In addition, the Wii version will also feature splitscreen multiplayer. All console versions of the game will use a perk system similar to that in Call of Duty 4. Activision has also confirmed that vehicles will be usable in multiplayer. Six multiplayer modes have been announced including team deathmatch and capture the flag, among others.

A special online co-op mode involving Nazi zombies is unlocked once the player completes the single player campaign. In it, up to four players must attempt to defend themselves from limitless waves of undead Nazi soldiers. With each kill and successful hit, players earn points that can be used to purchase weapons and fortifications to further defend themselves.

Call of Duty: World at War Trailer (HD)

Create Your Own Flash Games At Sims Carnival

2008-11-11T01:41:00.000-08:00

EA has launched Sims Carnival, a collection of Flash-based games that can be played, modified, and shared with friends. Users are free to play pre-designed games, or to create their own. To celebrate the launch, Sims Carnival has also opened a “Galactic Game Challenge” that will award the best designer a cash prize.

The site offers a number of options that allow users to build their own games using tools that require no programming experience. Users can utilize a wizard that streamlines the creation process down to a few simple questions (What genre? How many enemies?, etc.), or they can choose to create a more customized game using the site’s downloadable editor (Windows only for now). They can also use the Swapper, which allows users to exchange a game’s default images for their own.

The site also allows developers to upload games that they’ve created in Flash independently, while retaining all of their links and branding. This could be a boon to developers looking to gain exposure in the somewhat-saturated Flash games market.

Each completed game can be embedded in social networking sites or blogs, and users can stitch together games to create a playlist. The site will soon introduce an API that will allow game creators to tabulate high score rankings, which can be distributed through email on a regular basis.

Gamers looking for a tie-in to the hit Sims series will be disappointed - it seems that the site is affiliated with the brand in name only. That said, Sims Carnival will likely appeal to much of the same audience. Many of the games are fun but not particularly complicated, and there’s good deal of satisfaction to be had from making your own game, even if there wasn’t much effort involved.

Site: simscarnival.com

Gears of War 2

2008-10-30T09:11:00.000-07:00

Gears of War 2 is a tactical third-person shooter video game in development by Epic Games and to be published by Microsoft Game Studios exclusively for the Xbox 360. It is the sequel to the critically acclaimed best-seller Gears of War, and was announced by lead designer Cliff Bleszinski during the February 20, 2008 Game Developers Conference. The game will use a heavily upgraded version of the Unreal Engine 3. During E3 2008, a worldwide release date for the game was set for November 7, 2008.

In Gears of War 2, the Locust have found a way to make giant emergence holes capable of destroying entire cities at once. Marcus Fenix and the rest of the COG Delta Squad are now drilling underground to "take the fight to the Locust." In a teaser of the first scenes of gameplay of Gears of War 2, COG soldiers engage in battle with a large army of Locust as they travel to drill into the underground region. Comic book writer Joshua Ortega says, "The stakes are raised. This is humanity's last stand. Everything is at risk. Nothing is safe."

Gameplay
The demo at the Game Developers Conference indicated that much of the core gameplay elements that were central to Gears of War (a third-person game that has a heavy emphasis on using protective cover rather than "run and gun" style game play) would be present in the sequel.

John DiMaggio, the voice actor of the game's main character, Marcus Fenix, confirmed to IGN that players would be able to fight the large Brumaks in Gears of War 2. He also revealed there will be a deeper story with new characters, new weapons, and new enemies. The game will also include the ability to duel with an AI or human opponent when both use the chainsaw attachment of the Lancer rifle, as seen in the 2008 Game Developer's Conference promotional video, later confirmed in informal interviews with developers and a Game Informer preview. Epic released a gameplay video which revealed the player may now use "downed" enemies as shields. Bleszinski confirmed also that players who have been injured can crawl as a final desperate attempt at life. Players would tap the 'A' Button to crawl faster. The level of blood and gore will also be increased, for example, when the player is close to death, wherever he moves there will be trails of blood behind him. This is the same for enemies, and the opponents who've been used as a meat shield. There will also be more ways to kill an opponent, such as punching them while they are downed, using the sniper rifle as a sledgehammer, or using the torque bow as an axe.

The cover story in the May 2008 issue of Game Informer revealed several new gameplay features. Players can now play on individual co-op play settings. One player may, for instance, play on Casual difficulty while the other teammate plays on Hardcore. A "communal combat system" will adapt to give a player at a lower difficulty an equivalently fair challenge as the player at higher difficulty. The player will be able to maintain multiple save files that work with the drop-in/drop-out co-op features. There will also be a fourth difficulty level that is a level below Casual; senior producer Rod Fergusson admitted that — for the first game — "We overshot on [the Casual] difficulty and a game that was a little harder than we intended." Some of the Xbox Live achievements can be completed through both play in single player and multiplayer mode, such as achieving 1,000 headshots. New enemy creatures are planned on being added, including one described by Cliff Bleszinski as one "that [makes] the Brumak look like a baby panda bear." In a developer's video, Cliff Bleszinski stated that Gears of War 2 would feature "drop in and out" co-op in the campaign. Another feature included in the game is an optional mature content filter, which when active makes blood appear as sparks and removes harsh language from the dialogue.

The collection of COG tags has been expanded to include the collection of story-based items such as personal letters and medical records, and a "war journal" will track which collectibles have been found and where missing ones can be located. The cut-scenes will also use the better facial rendering technology of the Epic engine, and will use more dramatic angles for the conversation, as well as using a video screen on Jack (the all-purpose robot used by Dom) to talk with their commanders "face-to-face."

New weapons have been announced as well as the return of weapons from the previous game. The accuracy, function, and power of several weapons has been altered, and all grenades can now be used as mines by placing them on walls or floors, and will detonate when approached by enemies. In addition, players can now be knocked over by the concussive force of a nearby detonating grenade. Cliff Bleszinski has also announced that there will be more vehicle missions in the campaign than before, such as the Centaur Tank which Cliff describes as a "tank with monster truck wheels." Players will also be able to ride a Brumak in the game; previously, the Brumak could only be fought by the player as an enemy.

Multiplayer
Gears of War 2 features an upgraded multiplayer mode that will allow up to ten users to simultaneously play. X360 magazine reported that Gears of War 2 will contain at least three new online multiplayer modes, called "Guardian," "Wingman," and "Submission." "Guardian" is essentially a modified version of "Assassination" from the original Gears of War, but allows players to continue fighting after the leader has been killed, but losing the ability to respawn. "Wingman" splits all ten players into five teams of two, where both members of a team play as the same character. "Submission," formerly known as "Meat Flag," is a version of capture the flag in which players attempt to "down" an enemy controlled by the game's AI and move its body to their team's base to earn points. A Halo-like matchmaking system will be utilized for the online multiplayer. In a GameTrailers TV E3 special, it was confirmed that bots will be available in multiplayer, but this feature was not elaborated upon.

A new co-op game mode was confirmed during Microsoft's E3 2008 press conference; called "Horde," this mode allows up to five players to fight off waves of attacking Locust together.[1] Horde Mode will not feature bot support as in competitive multiplayer, and can be played alone. The Locust attack in waves of multiple enemies which become more difficult as players progress.

Cameras in the multiplayer modes have also been improved significantly. Rather than static views from different points on a map, the new Battle Cam allows players to pan around a map as the camera focuses on areas of intense fighting, and the Ghost Cam allows a player to roam freely around a map. A photo mode will also be featured, with each photo taken by a player rated on the amount of action in the shot.

Regarding multiplayer-specific achievements, certain achievements such as getting a defined number of kills with a weapon have been altered. For example, to get an achievement which requires 500 kills with a weapon or 500 headshots, only the first kill or headshot made by a player in a given multplayer match will count towards the achievement. Cliff Bleszinski mentioned that this change was to emphasize the objectives of a multiplayer mode.

Awards
Gears of War 2 won several awards following its presentation at E3 2008. IGN gave it Overall Best Shooting Game and Overall Best Graphics Technology of E3 2008. Game Critics Awards gave the game Best Action Game of E3 2008.

Gears of War 2 Trailer HIGH QUALITY

Street Fighter IV

2008-10-21T04:48:00.000-07:00

The long-awaited fourth entry in the Street Fighter series. Street Fighter IV features a mix of returning favorites such as Ryu, Ken, Chun-Li and Guile along with new characters created for this game, such as Crimson Viper, Abel, El Fuerte, and Rufus. Characters and environments are rendered in stylized 3D, while the game is played in the classic Street Fighter 2D perspective with additional 3D camera flourishes. Six-button controls for the game return, with a host of new special moves and features integrated into the input system. Mixing classic genre-defining game mechanics the franchise is known and loved for with all-new, never-before-seen gameplay systems, Street Fighter IV brings a brand new fighting game to fans the world over.

October 9, 2008 - Street Fighter IV represents a throwback of sorts to the style of gameplay players may remember from Street Fighter II. We had a chance to sit down with Capcom general manager Yoshi Ono to discuss some of the changes with the home versions of the game, which will be appearing this winter on Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC. To specify, that means before spring 2009, not necessarily this year.

He says Street Fighter IV is an attempt to give the franchise more of a mass appeal. Speaking through a translator, he said, "By the time we got to 3 and the refinements of 3 and all the way to Third Strike, we kind of shrunk the market on our own by increasingly aiming for the hardcore gamers, making it increasingly harder to get good at it ... Third Strike was kind of the pinnacle ... this is what we can do with Street Fighter, we've done it, we really couldn't go any further. We just put a lid on it and set it aside. To be honest, inside the company the general way of thinking was that it was probably done and that there probably wouldn't be a new Street Fighter." Ono went on to describe how during interviews for other games he was constantly being approached by the press and asked when a new Street Fighter was going to be made, and others within Capcom heard the same questions.

"Eventually we did manage to convince management that people really want to play it, it's not just the hardcore. By the time we finally got them convinced the gears started turning and we decided ... I don't want to use the word 'casual' because that's a loaded word, but we decided to make the game less hardcore, less focused on the true experts, and something a wider variety of people could pick up and play."

To accomplish this, Capcom decided to implement a 'focus system' which would allow for a different style of gameplay without making things too complex. Essentially, the system requires players to hit two buttons which work to absorb or an incoming attack and then, depending on timing, dish out another. Ono says lessons were learned from Street Fighter III's parry system. "That was a really cool system and it was fun as hell if you actually know how to do it and you actually are able to use it properly. Unfortunately the amount of players that really know how to use it and can do it every time on purpose, and can go from the neutral stick position to tapping forward in that literally a fraction of a second timeframe, it's really fun but there's not so many people that can do it. So we wanted something that would be a little more accessible to more people."

Ono continued, "The three keys for going into the focus attack system, one would be that it's easy to execute. Rather than relying on split second timing ... let's just make it two buttons. Anyone can push two buttons. Secondly you had to see immediately on the screen the results. You had to know that you did something. Parry wasn't such a flashy effect. If you did it wrong, you would just get hit and you wouldn't really know anything had happened. So it had to be visually obvious to the user." Activating a focus attack in Street Fighter IV is made quite obvious, as the character changes color along with other special effects. "Thirdly, it had to have depth. It couldn't just be as simple as hitting two buttons and watching something happen. There had to be multiple ways to use it. You can string it together in the midst of other moves, you can cancel out of it, etc., so it's really where the depth comes from."

The conversation then turned to what elements of Street Fighter in general were important to preserve for this version. "Street Fighter has always been about ... reading your opponent's moves and predicting what they're going to do next, kind of a rock-paper-scissors thing. So with this guy, every time he's landed from a jump he's thrown a fireball, he'll probably do that again so I'm going to do this to counter that. It's all about that kind of gameplay, so the focus attack system takes that to the next level. You have another tool in your toolbelt to trick the other player."

As for how the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and PC versions could differ, Ono said the idea was to give everyone the same experience at home. "It's been so long since there's been a Street Fighter, we don't want to mix up the message and make multiple versions of it ... We're not going to have hardware A is going to have this extra character and hardware B is going to have this extra character."

Ono did mention Capcom was leaning towards Games for Windows -- Live support with the PC version. "We're leaning in that direction ... It's a little too early to say for sure," he said. Downloadable content is definitely on the schedule, though it won't be in the form of other characters. "We don't want it to be something that affects gameplay or balance ... something more cosmetic, perhaps. If you look at the arcade game it links with Japanese mobile phone networks so you can earn points in the arcade ... and then purchase items, but nothing that affects gameplay. We really want everyone to have the same balanced experience."

Though for the home version several new characters have been revealed that aren't in the arcade version, such as Sakura, Capcom is still keeping a few up its sleeve. More will be revealed in the future, so keep an eye out. It also sounds like a few extra modes will be in the game for the home versions. Ono said it won't be just arcade and versus, but whatever is eventually included is still being worked on and therefore he didn't want to say anything. Bonus stages, such as barrel or car smashing, won't be in the game, however, as Ono says there isn't enough time to get it in there and Capcom would rather get the game out than delay it to add bonus modes.

Before the interview was over, Ono gave us some perspective on the Street Fighter franchise in general. "Looking at the pattern up until now, it seems the even-numbered Street Fighters have the casual appeal, the odd numbered Street Fighters are more hardcore. [Street Fighter 1] doesn't necessarily have a hardcore image, but try and throw a fireball on purpose in that game and you'll see just how insane the timing is. Then SFII spread out a little more and was easy to play. SFIII kind of went back to the roots and got hard again. IV is easy. Maybe if there's an SFV we'll go back the other direction and be more hardcore again. It's kind of early to say. Looking at the pattern right now, that would make sense."
by Charles Onyett on IGN.com

Street Fighter 4 E3 2008 Trailer

New MMORPG : Blade and Soul

2008-10-14T23:58:00.000-07:00

NCsoft announced it's new MMORPG Blade and Soul on July 31. This new game is aimed at expanding the action aspects of the MMORPG genre to a never-before-seen level. As demonstrated in the video, there are some very interesting and intensive looking action scenes which seem to integrate in to the actual game play flawlessly.

The characters' oriental style arts are designed by popular Korean artist HyungTae Kim. Blade and Soul is being developed by the same development team that created Lineage II.

After watching the trailer, be sure to check out this extremely detailed breakdown! There are many secrets and clues within the video to be discovered. Click here to official site

Blade & Soul Gameplay(High Quality)

Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3

2008-10-11T05:15:00.000-07:00

Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3 is an upcoming 2008 real-time strategy video game in the Command & Conquer series published by Electronic Arts, and the first game in the Red Alert sub-series since Yuri's Revenge, released in 2001. Announced on February 14, 2008, the game is currently under development by EA Los Angeles for Microsoft Windows-based PCs and Xbox 360. A PlayStation 3 version was announced, but EA stated that the production for this version had been "put on hold", and now may not be released, due to difficulties with the system's architecture.

The game takes place in a parallel universe in which World War II never happened and the Soviet Union rose instead as a threat in the 50s. A massive world war is ongoing among the Soviets, Allies and a new third faction known as the Empire of the Rising Sun, which is derived from Imperial Japan.

We're still months away from the release of Command And Conquer: Red Alert 3, but that's not stopping EA from trying to work fans into a lather with these new, gorgeous screenshots of the series' trademark Soviet war machine in action.

EA has yet to reveal a proper release date for the game, but they have mentioned that the title is planned to appear on the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 as well as its native PC platform.

These new screens look great and the water effects are gorgeous, but am I the only one noticing the Tesla Boats in the first picture? Who was the genius who signed off on adding electrical discharge weapons to a vehicle that floats on millions of gallons of ridiculously conductive fluid?

Red Alert 3 features a fully co-operative campaign mode where the player can team up with another player, or one of several AI characters such as Major Giles, a stiff upper lip British commander, to complete the campaign. The game has been promised to retain both the style and action-oriented gameplay of the Red Alert series, and the fast-paced gameplay of the latest C&C titles.

The first Red Alert revolved around an alternate World War II between the Allies (including Germany) and the Soviet Union, with some high-tech esoterica, such as GPS, weaponized tesla coils, force fields and limited time travel. Red Alert 2 featured a Soviet invasion of USA with tanks, conscripts, gargantuan airships and psychically dominated anti-ship giant squid; its expansion, Yuri's Revenge, escalated matters up to UFOs and communists on the Moon. Executive producer of Red Alert 3, Chris Corry, has confirmed that the game will further differentiate the playable factions from each other and "[play] up the silliness in their faction design whenever possible". The Soviets and Allies have a mix of old and new units and technologies. New Soviet units include armoured attack bears, Tesla boats known as "Stingrays" that can also travel on land, making them a replacement for the Tesla Tank, anti-infantry spider-like tanks called "Sickles" that have the ability to jump over terrain elevations and an amphibious transport unit called the "Bullfrog" that evacuates its passengers using a large "man cannon". The Allies receive a new Tanya unit that is equipped with a "time belt", allowing her to transport herself to the past in order to regain health, and "Cryocopters", unarmed helicopters equipped with powerful freeze and shrink rays. The Empire of the Rising Sun has giant transforming mecha, ninjas, a psychic schoolgirl and submersible planes.

Secondary abilities are to be common to each and every unit in the game, although how each ability is employed may vary slightly between units; some may be toggled on and off, others may apply instantly and some may have a cooldown, requiring a period of time to pass before the ability can be activated again.

Naval warfare is still present. Corry has stated many units are now amphibious, trading effectiveness for increased flexibility compared to ground-only units. In addition, the unit called MCV featured in almost every Command & Conquer RTS, is now able to move and deploy on water; this makes placing buildings on bodies of water (excluding barracks and war factories) possible and players who "ignore the ocean [are] likely forfeiting a significant part of their potential economy to their opponents". Further stressing this is the fact that, despite some campaign maps being entirely land based, all multiplayer maps will have significant bodies of water in them.

Full motion videos featuring real-life actors will be featured in the campaign mode. Filming has begun since the scheduled date of April 2008.

Red Alert 3 Official Trailer

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Spore (2008 video game) Preview

2008-10-07T03:29:00.000-07:00

Spore is a multi-genre massive single-player online metaverse video game developed by Maxis and designed by Will Wright. It allows a player to control the evolution of a species from its beginnings as a unicellular organism, through development as an intelligent and social creature, to interstellar exploration as a spacefaring culture. It has drawn wide attention for its massive scope, and its use of open-ended gameplay and procedural generation.

The full version of the game was released on September 4, 2008, in Australia and the Nordic region, but Australian stores prematurely broke the street date on September 2, 2008. The game was released September 5, 2008 in Europe, Japan, South America and New Zealand, and was released on September 7, 2008 in North America and Asia Pacific territories. Spore is also available for direct download from Electronic Arts. A special edition of the game, Spore: Galactic Edition, additionally includes a "Making of Spore" DVD video, "How to Build a Better Being" DVD video by National Geographic Channel, "The Art of Spore" hardback mini-book, a fold-out Spore poster and a 97-page Galactic Handbook published by Prima Games.

The name Spore was originally a working title, suggested by developer Ocean Quigley, for the game which was first referred to by the general public as Sim Everything. Even though Sim Everything was a first choice name for Wright, the title Spore stuck. Wright added it also freed him from the preconceptions another Sim title would have brought, saying "...Not putting 'Sim' in front of it was very refreshing to me. It feels like it wants to be breaking out into a completely different thing than what Sim was."

Civilization IV lead designer Soren Johnson joined EA Maxis to work on Spore.

The procedurally-generated music for the game was designed by Brian Eno, an artist famous for his work with ambient music. The music is generated by the editors depending on which parts (eg: limbs, battle items, hands, feet, etc) are placed on the creature, vehicle or building. For example, something dangerous like a battle spike will give the music more of a ferocious feel, while something peaceful like a herbivore's mouth will give the music a more relaxed feel. Music can also be created by users in the form of a short national anthem for their tribe, civilization or empire.

Gameplay
Coined Creatiolutionism, the game allows the player to develop a species from a microscopic organism to its evolution into a complex animal, its emergence as a social, intelligent being, to its mastery of the planet and then finally to its ascension into space, where it interacts with alien species across the galaxy. Throughout the game, the player's perspective and species change dramatically.

The game is broken up into distinct yet consistent, dependent "phases". The outcome of one phase affects the initial conditions facing the player in the next. Each phase exhibits its own style of play, and has been described by the developers as ten times more complicated than its preceding phase. While players are able to spend as much time as they prefer in each, it is possible to accelerate or skip phases altogether. Some phases feature optional missions; when the player completes a mission, they are granted a bonus, such as a new ability.

If all of a player's creations are completely destroyed at some point, then that player's species will be respawned at its home base.

Unlike many other Maxis games, Spore has a primary win condition which is obtained by reaching a quasar placed in the center of the galaxy, and facing a large NPC race. However, the player may continue to play after the goal has been achieved.

Community
Spore's user community functionality includes a feature that is part of an agreement with YouTube granting players the ability to upload directly from within the game a YouTube video of their creatures' activity, and EA's creation of "The Spore YouTube Channel", which will showcase the most popular videos created this way. In addition, some user-created content will be highlighted by Maxis at the official Spore site, and earn badges of recognition for their work. One of Spore's most social features is the Sporecast, an RSS feed that players can use to subscribe to the creations of any specific Spore player, allowing them to track their creations.

There will be a parental control toggle which allows the player to restrict what downloadable content will be allowed; choices include: "no user generated content", "official Maxis-approved content", "downloadable friend content" (named "buddy" in the final game), and "all user-created content". Players can also ban any creature in-game, at any time, and Maxis monitors creatures with notable numbers of player bans.

Interplay
The game is referred to as a "massively single-player online game" and "asynchronous sharing." Simultaneous multiplayer gaming is not a feature of Spore. The content that the player can create is uploaded automatically to a central database (or a peer-to-peer system), cataloged and rated for quality (based on how many users have downloaded the object or creature in question), and then re-distributed to populate other players' games. The data transmitted will be very small — only a couple of kilobytes per item transmitted. This was due to procedural generation of material.

After reaching the space phase, players can visit other players' planets, and interact with other players' species, tribes and civilizations. . Via the in-game "MySpore Page", players receive statistics of how their creatures are faring in other players' games, which has been referred to as the "alternate realities of the Spore metaverse." The game reports to the player on how other players interacted with them (for example, how many times other players exterminated their species). The personalities of user-created species are dependent on how the user played them.

Start of life
The game opens using the scientific concept of panspermia. A meteor plummets toward a planet and into an ocean. The meteor, now a geode, then splits, from which a tiny organism emerges.

Cell
The first phase of existence, the cell phase, is sometimes referred to as the tide pool, cellular, or microbial phase. The player guides simple microbes around in a 3D environment on a single 2D plane, reminiscent of flow, where it must deal with fluid dynamics and predators, while eating weaker microbes or plants. The player may choose whether the creature is a herbivore or a carnivore prior to starting the phase. Once the microbe has eaten several cells, the player can enter an editor in which they can modify the appearance, shape, and abilities of the microbe by spending "DNA points". A player may choose to remove a part, which will refund the full price. If the creature dies, the player restarts from wherever it died. The player must also seek out special "golden shields" from meteor fragments and other organisms that provide new parts to use in the editor, such as spikes, mouths or limbs. The phase consists of five stages, which are halved themselves; every half-stage, the creature grows larger. As the microbe grows, objects that are in the background move to the foreground, which can mean being eaten by a microbe that had previously been swimming in the background.

The player may also encounter Epic Creatures. An epic creature is a larger, tougher version of its normal counterpart. In later phases, it is actually user-created content that is increased to giant size.

The creature's behavior directly influences its role in the creature stage, and only parts that are fitting for that creature's evolution will become available. The ocean floor becomes more prominent as the player progresses, and once the player decides to progress to the next stage, the creature editor appears, prompting the user to add legs before the shift to land.

At the end of the phase, the player receives one special "bio-power" in each later phase based on whether the creature ended the phase as a herbivore, carnivore or omnivore. For instance, herbivores are given the "Siren's Song" power in the Creature phase.

Creature
The creature phase is similar to the cell phase, but with several important differences. Principally, the environment is now truly 3D. Other creatures will inhabit the world, and most of them will have been created by other players. Creatures will automatically be introduced into the environment to maintain a balanced ecosystem. If the player creates a bigger, tougher creature, the predators that are downloaded will likewise be stronger than average.

In this stage, the basic goal is the same: earn DNA points, reproduce, and avoid being eaten by predators. In order to reproduce the player must locate a mate.

Another difference introduced is the social aspect which provides means by which a player can earn DNA points. Socialization is the nonviolent alternative to consuming creatures for DNA, as befriending other creatures earns DNA points, allows access to their nests for resting, and makes them allying against attack more likely.

Every time the player interacts with a creature, the game will create a quest depending on what stance is used. If the player is in a social stance, it will give them the goal of befriending a certain number of that species. If they are in combat stance, the goal will be to kill a certain number of that species, and therefore, render that species extinct. If the player's creature kills off or befriends a species, the creature will be able to heal at their nest.

Creatures have stats for Abilities, Attack, and Social, using a numeric rating system. Adding specific body parts grants the ability to perform actions, such as "Call" and "Jump". Creatures can be given a name, description and tags. Body parts can be found during gameplay, which add that part to the editor for future use. These come from preying upon alpha creatures, finding bones of dead creatures, and socializing with other creatures. The only body part a creature requires is a mouth (or it will starve to death). If a creature has no feet, it will slide across the ground with the lower section of the torso, in a similar fashion to a slug or worm. Creatures also may have a limited ability to fly: gliding. A creature's ability to stay aloft is dependent on two factors: the jumping ability (how high in the air) and gliding ability (how slow the descent is). Also, a creature may have the ability to sneak, sprint, charge or spit poison.

This stage will evolve the creature's social behavior, as the creature may make friends and form a herd or pack. Will Wright referred to this as a simplified version of the friend-making mini-game in The Sims. This mini-game is implemented by mimicking the other creature's behavior such as singing or dancing until their level of friendship with the player's creature rises. Creatures may also make friends with other species. The player may also encounter spaceships from other players from this phase onward, which may abduct the player or other creatures. The evolutionary goal of the creature phase is to increase the creature's brain capacity which is done by gaining DNA points. Once the creature becomes intelligent, the player may progress to the tribal phase.

The creature phase has night and day cycles, with very short nights. There are also weather effects such as short rainstorms and meteor showers.

Tribal
After the player's species evolves its brain far enough, it enters the tribal phase. Physical development ceases, as does the player's exclusive control over an individual creature, as the game focuses on the birth of division of labor for the species. The player is given a hut, a group of fully evolved creatures, as well as two of six possible "super powers". These are unlocked depending on the species' behavior in the previous phases.

This stage begins with a cutscene parodying 2001: A Space Odyssey. In this phase, the game is similar to an RTS (real-time strategy game). The player may give the tribe tools such as weapons, musical instruments, and healing or fishing implements. Food now replaces "DNA points" as the player's currency, which the player can spend on items and structures, or use to barter with other tribes. Creatures also gain the option to wear clothes, the editing of which replaces the Creature Editor in the 'Tribal Editor'. If creatures of a different species (Rogues) were added to the player's pack in the Creature phase, they are now used as pets. Additional creatures may be domesticated in the Tribal phase, which provide eggs for food. Contact with other tribes of the same species, or even different species, can take place in this phase, and creatures also learn to speak. Their language is dependent on the type of mouth they possess; primate-type mouths, for instance, result in Simlish. Creatures, as with The Sims, also "speak" with icons embedded in word balloons.

Tribe members are assigned roles such as fishing, gathering, or hunting. The creatures' behaviors are affected by the way the player utilizes them. If a player uses them aggressively, their autonomic behavior will reflect that; conversely, if the player uses them peacefully, allying other tribes, say, with music, their behavior will be more kind. Even their idle behavior will reflect this; warlike tribal members will practice combat while docile members will practice instruments and throw parties.

There are five other tribes along with the player's, which can either be destroyed or befriended. For every tribe befriended or destroyed, a piece of a totem pole is built, which may increase the population limit of the player's tribe. When the totem pole has five pieces, the player may move forward to the Civilization phase.

Civilization
The goal in the civilization phase is to gain control of the entire planet, and it is left to the player to decide whether to conquer it militarily, economically, or religiously. When entering the phase, the player's tribal camp is now a city. Players now have two new editors: the building and vehicle editors. The player can build four buildings (City Hall, House, Factory, and Entertainment) and up to 9 vehicles (Religious, economic, and military in sea, land and air). To earn income, players can capture spice gysers, conduct trade, or arrange buildings (see below).

In constructing vehicles and buildings, as with most real-time strategy games, there is a capacity limit; building houses will increase the cap, and constructing various buildings adjacent to one another will provide a productivity bonus or deficit: for example, building an entertainment centre next to a house will provide happiness, but a factory will decrease happiness and increase production. Like Civilization III and IV, the player's territory is marked with a colored border that increases as the player gains more power through militarism or influence. The main unit of currency is "Sporebucks".

Instead of military conquest, players with a Religious trait construct special missionary units that convert other cities via propaganda. Likewise, Economic players communicate solely by trade and have no weapons. Players also have access to superweapons, each of which have devastating effects on other rival civilizations. Players can also form alliances with a rival civilization, and when the entire world has been conquered by both factions, the rival faction will join the player's.

When the player has conquered or allied with all the civilizations on the planet and decides to move on to the Space Phase, the UFO editor appears. At this point players are allowed to view the planet from space.

Space
The space phase provides new goals and paths to follow as the player begins to spread through the galaxy.

The player may now terraform and colonize neighboring uninhabitable planets with special tools (water tool, volcano tool, etc). Although these tools start off limited and very expensive, the player can obtain infinite versions. Terraforming tools include a heat ray which can create more favorable conditions on, for example, an ice planet. Left unchecked this can cause oceans to rise, then eventually to evaporate and transform the world into a desert planet, followed by a molten rock in space. These tools may also be used as weapons, sucking out the atmosphere or altering the temperature of a planet in order to kill the inhabitants without a pitched battle. The ultimate terraforming tool is a technology called the Staff of Life, dubbed the 'Genesis device' prior to the game's release, which instantly transforms a dead world into a habitable one, although it is limited to 42 uses.

The player may cause ice comets to crash into a planet to create water, or force volcanoes to erupt to increase atmosphere. Players may build colonies on the surface of an inhospitable planet once they gain the ability to create bubbled cities, similar in function to self-sustaining arcologies. When establishing colonies on alien worlds, players have to take care of them as they would any other city and keep morale up.

The player may also abduct creatures and transport them to other planets to test a planet's habitability (During earlier phases of the game, it is possible to see other creatures on the planet being abducted for this or other purposes.) The player may utilize various tools such as fireworks to interact with primitive lifeforms, or place a monolith (in the style of 2001: A Space Odyssey) on a planet, triggering evolution of intelligence. On some worlds, the player may also find strange "artifacts" with functions varying from terraform coloring tools to treasures which can be sold for a relatively large price. Artifacts can be present on lifeless worlds and inhabited worlds, although taking them from planets occupied by sentient beings will anger them.

There are more than 50,000 planets in the game's galaxy (including Earth and the Solar System).

Players can make contact with other civilizations, called 'empires', most of which are created by other players. Intelligent species can be found, and when the UFO visits that world, they may impress the beings with fireworks or a 'happy ray', attack them with weapons, or cast crop circles. The player may beam down a holographic image of his/her creature to interact more directly with an alien species. A user-created civilization's AIl reacts depending on its behavior and personality, both of which are based on the play-style of its user. The player can unite or conquer the galaxy by creating a federation or sparking an interstellar war. As a show of great force, the player may even completely destroy a planet (similar to the capabilities of the Death Star from Star Wars), which may bring retribution from that species and its allies. The player is sometimes called upon to fight off an invasion of their home planet, colony, or an ally's planet, from space pirates, environmental collapse, or attack from enemies.

EA has stated that there will be a storyline and 'secret ending' which can be found within the Space stage, and that 'only the most hardcore gamers' will find it, which is some kind of energy source in the middle of the galaxy guarded by the Grox.

Sandbox
The space phase is sometimes referred to as a sandbox, because the player eventually gains near-complete control of everything, though in the initial stages of the Space phase, the player inevitably must interact with other civilizations as in previous stages. It has been mentioned that the space phase works on two axes: a horizontal axis (the ability to interact with many planets in a variety of different ways) and a vertical axis (the ability to revisit different phases of gameplay).

Editors
User-generated content is a major feature of Spore; there are eighteen different types of editors (some unique to a phase), and even a music editor which allows players to create and share songs to be used as a national anthem in the Civilization stages and above. Will Wright has stated that in addition to being simple, all the editors will be as similar as possible so that skills learned are easily transferable from one editor to the next.

The editors start simply in the cellular phase and move to higher levels of complexity, acting as tutorials for progressive levels of gameplay. For example; the cell editor demonstrated so far has nine choices and a two-dimensional environment while the creature editor has dozens of options and a 3D environment. The structure ranges from a spine and body model in the creature editor to more free-form editors for the buildings.

For example, the creature editor allows the player to take what looks like a lump of clay with a spine and mold it into a creature. Once they have molded the torso, they can then add parts such as legs, arms, feet, hands, noses, eyes, mouths, decorative elements, and a wide array of sensory organs. Many of these parts affect the creature's abilities (speed, strength, diet, etc.), while some parts are purely decorative. Once the creature is formed, they can paint it using a large number of textures, overlays, colors, and patterns, which are procedurally applied depending on the topology of the creature. The only "required" feature is the mouth (otherwise, the creature will die from starvation). All other parts are optional; for example, creatures without feet will, as said before, slither on the ground like a snake or slug.

Other editors are used for buildings and for vehicles. Eventually, players can edit entire planets, using various in-game processes. Electronic Arts has promised new editors to be released after the game's release, such as a flora editor. However, a beta flora editor and expanded cell editor are available in the game code and can be accessed by changing the target parameters for the shortcut executable.

There are also simple means of creating visual media: such as a screenshot facility that captures the screen without the surrounding user-interface; and a 640x480 video creator with a built-in YouTube upload service. Maxis has also partnered with a third-party to provide a Spore-branded Comic Book Creator service, which was live at launch.

Spore E308 Trailer

Online Tower Defense : Ultimate Defense 2

2008-10-04T00:24:00.000-07:00

Tower Defense games are one of the most popular types of online flash games today. Headlining this genre are tower defense games with titles like Desktop Tower Defense taking the spotlight. However, most of this genre is filled with bad to mediocre games that have limited play value. That is not so with Ultimate Defense 2, which with a polished interface, well-done graphics, and several different play mechanisms easily stands out from the rest of the field. Graphically, this game alooks alot like Protector and indeed it has a lot of the same game-play mechanisms like unit level upgrades based on XP and spells.

This game may take some getting used to but its well worth the learning curve. One thing that new players should be aware of is unlike traditional tower defense games were the towers fire at anything within a certain AOE of them, towers in this game only fire in one direction so be sure to make your defenders face in the direction where they will be able to fire the most shots. You can rotate your defenders once and plan on doing this or you will not be able to beat the level. Most of the units can only shoot two squares when they are purchased so be vary that you may need two defenders to reach across an entire lane which is usually 3 squares wide. Since you are allowed to rotate your defenders once on each level, be sure to put strong defenders at the turn positions and make them face the weaker side first so when the enemies get past the weak side, you can rotate them to the strong side where they will be permanently. This takes a bit of skill and micromanaging to master, especially if you are managing several rotations at once. For an easier walkthrough look to the end of this article for a more in-depth walkthrough.

Also, unlike traditional Tower Defense games, you do not purchase upgrades for your defenders, rather they gain XP according to the number of enemies you kill. You can use this to your advantage as it is possible to place towers so that one tower gets most of the kills thus giving you once super-strong tower, which is very helpful in single-handedly killing enemies. You can also unlock new defenders by completing levels and gain extra goodies by digging for treasure.

Spells and items are also an important part of this game. Watch your mana because you’ll need to have some in critical moments to prevent creeps from getting away. Early on the poison spell is great to pick creeps off but be sure to cast it early on in the level as it is a damage by time spell and takes a while to kill an enemy. If your looking for an easy direct-kill spell, go for lightening instead. The lightening spell is unlocked shortly after the game begins.

This game is a breathe of fresh air in the genre of tower defense. It is the first TD where micro-management is an important part of the games and is required for success. This alone makes the game a little more involved than traditional TD’s as you can’t just sit there and watch after building your defenders. You always have to be active rotating your defenders and using your spells to slow the enemy down.

The one complaint I do have about this game is that it is a bit too hard in the beginning and the learning curve is steep as it doesn’t quite play like a traditional Tower Defense game. But besides this small complaint, Ultimate Defense 2 is a solid all-around game.

Okay, still can’t beat it? I’ll take you through the game. Its actually quite easy to beat. You are basically going to use 4 defender types to beat the game. Archers, Mages, Ninjas, and Dragons. You never have to build knights and warriors(and they suck with only 1 in attack range). In the first two levels, build mainly archers and build lots of them. Building as many archers as you can while throwing one or two mages in there will do the trick. Be sure to use the pivot spots so you can use rotation. Digging for treasure is key, dig up all the squares that are not bordering the path as you won’t need to use them. You will get treasures for spinning the slots and more important in the early going, you will get mana potions to cast spells. A few creeps may get past your archers but with the spells of poision and lightening you should be fine(actually I never had to use more than these two spells the entire game). Starting at level 3, you will need ninjas. Ninjas have a range of 3 so one can cover the entire lane, place them at the pivot point(s) so you can rotate them. Usually one Ninja accompanied by a few archers in the right positions and the use of a few spells will be able to get you through level 3. On level 4, you will probably need two ninjas, some mages, and archers. Try to dig as much as you can for Mana potions as this will allow you to save money you will need to get through the levels until you can get dragons. Do not build warriors/knights as you don’t need them, Ninjas are better. I found that usually 3 strategic placement of ninjas accompanied by 2-3 mages and several archers were all I needed to get me through to the point where I unlocked the dragon. Try to save as much money as possible. You should be having a little bit more money at the end of each level. Don’t build extra defenders if you don’t need them. By the time you unlock dragons, you should have about 2500 or so to start the level with. Dragons take up four squares so after you get them, scout out the map for places that you can place them on. For the first level or two after you get dragons, build 1 dragon immediately, 1 ninja, and 1 mage(you should have enough start money to do this by this point in the game). That should kill everything perhaps until the last wave(but with spells it should be able to kill the last wave as well). After a level or two, you will have more than enough start money to buy 2 dragons. Basically at this point you’ve won the game as 2 dragons and one ninja is enough to handle all enemy creeps until the end. Never stop digging! I dugg every square I didn’t need to place on and ended up with 10+ mana potions at the end.

So lets recap — Until you can get dragons, build mainly Ninjas and archers and save as much money as possible while digging for treasure and mana potions.

After dragons, build only dragons and Ninjas and keep digging. Save as much as you can. If you can start every level with more than $3800(which is easily doable), the game is pretty much beat.

Overall, this is one of the easier TD games I’ve played. Took me about an hour to figure out how to beat it.

Play Ultimate Defense 2

MMO Web Game: Meetoto

2008-09-26T04:00:00.000-07:00

Meetoto is a web-based gaming world which introduces a novel and exciting way to enjoy the fun of casual online gaming with the benefits of serious social networking. Targeted mostly at teenager and young adults, male gamers (called Meetoos) and female gamers (called Meetees) easily interact in a virtual world.

There are many things to do in the cities of Meetoto - Immerse yourself in this virtual world of your own! Every citizen in the world of Meetoto can play interior designer to their own apartment. Use costumes and other personalization options and let your Meetoo and Meetee become extension of your virtual personality.

Just like in the real world, shop and buy clothes, or visit the salon to change hair style. Earn meecoins, the currency of Meetoto, by getting a job playing casual games, becoming a performance star, or by just hanging out with your friends in game. Making an (in game) living has never been more enjoyable!

All you need is a web browser! The core of Meetoto is its world-class video and audio streaming technology delivered via Flash straight to your browser. Using advanced features, Meetoo and Meetee can showcase their talent and become a star in live virtual concerts using only a webcam and microphone!

In short, Meetoto is a web-based, anime-remixed, combination of Second Life and YouTube Live; where you can broadcast your world and your imagination. Best of all, there is no download client needed- any internet browser with Flash installed will allow you to play Meetoto anytime, anywhere!

Look out for unique Malaysia and Singapore maps, the first in this region, created by our very own in-house GoPlayPlay Meetoto team! There is so much to look forward to in this world of entertainment and enjoyment- So come in to Meetoto, and bring out the Star in You!

--> Play Meetoto now

Catch the Buzz! PSP World Review

2008-09-24T01:08:00.000-07:00

The Buzz! trivia series was a huge hit on the PS2 and created as much of a stir in the gaming community as the board game Trivial Pursuit did way back in the 1980s. There's absolutely nothing original about quiz titles but the average gamer’s fascination with all things trivial means that a ready made audience is always available. Clearly the drawbacks of converting any Playstation title to a handheld format means compromises have to be made and, while games like Killzone have wisely changed genre during their transition to the PSP, the nature of Buzz! means that the PS2 game has remained mostly intact. The key factor though is whether it's still as much fun to play as the more grown up versions on the consoles. So, is it?

Buzz! allows for three separate users to save their trivia progress from the start and each new games starts with the same gaming grid with just three categories to begin with: Snapshot Challenge, Top Rank Challenge and Quickfire Movie Challenge. Then you'll be forced to take on the Time Challenge, after which the selection branches out to three choices which cover music, celebrities and just about everything else you can think of. When you strip all the fancy titles away though, there are only really a handful of different quizzes using a combination of text, pictures and even video. There are supposedly 5,000 questions packed into the tiny UMD so the first few runs should provide more than a challenge for the old grey matter.

The quizzes themselves are mostly straight forward, although the Virus Challenge has the added element of both time and negative answers eating away at your score making speed and accuracy very important. The Snapshot Challenge is a little more arcade-like so after answering a question you'll be taken to a grid where you may select one square to reveal. If it makes any sense to you then you may opt to answer a question otherwise you can simply pass and attempt to uncover more of the image. All this is compered by your energetic host (played to perfection by Jason Donovan) who pops up everywhere giving both encouragement and sarcasm in equal measures. This really adds personality to the whole thing and the voice acting really is superb and incredibly hammed up. The presentation is good too, with clear text and a very user friendly interface.

The scoring system is pretty straightforward, with speed rewarded and all your high score are saved for you on the cart. The replay value is provided with a collection of awards that can be won as you fulfil various criteria such as answering a question in under a second, 20 questions correctly in succession or even if you attain Gold Medals across the board. Multiplayer fans are also catered for even if you only have a single PSP. The Quiz Host mode allows a player to become the quizmaster, asking questions which appear on the screen whist up to six players can battle it out. The various challenges can be very entertaining too, with our first game asking 'who can touch their nose with their tongue?' The self explanatory Pass Around also supports six players and is designed to fit almost any scenario so you can decide on the questions’ difficulty or even the length of the game itself. The other method allows you to enjoy the game on up to four PSPs thanks to the game sharing option.

There's no question that your first few plays of Buzz! will be a joy. It’s very entertaining and quite a challenge too. Unfortunately, as much as it tries not to, it still suffers from repetition so that by the time you've attained gold on each of the sections you may have answered the same questions on multiple occasions. It's all still good stuff though and the Multiplayer is especially entertaining and, given that this is being sold as a budget title, it's well worth a purchase.
By Andrew Blanchard on pspworld.com