A few years ago, a friend recommended to me that I read a series of comic books called “The Walking Dead“.  And I was hooked!  The series was focused on the survivors and their reaction to the zombie apocalypse as opposed to how many zombies could get their head bashed in before the next chapter.  It’s a fantastic comic book series, and if you haven’t read it I recommend going out and picking up the omnibus right now.  So naturally, I was very excited to find out they were making a TV series based on the books!  GREAT!  As long as you ignore the majority of the second season.

So we’re going to ignore the show right now because the game is much better.  It is so true to the comic books.  I’m one of those people who when a book I love is adapted into a movie or a TV show or whatever, I want to see the story remain as much intact and not messed with as much as possible.  The Hunger Games managed pretty well, Harry Potter forgot about the existence of Peeves, and The Walking Dead series was adamant Hershel’s farm was worthy of an entire season and strange scientists who offered you showers in the middle of an apocalypse would also try and blow you up.

The game however is not the same story you will read in the comics. It’s a story told alongside the original story; it adapts from it. It doesn’t mess with a story you love and ruin it (yes, I have issues with the TV show).

You play as an entirely new character, Lee, and his story develops and you learn more about him the deeper you delve into the game- much like the comic series.  I don’t want to talk too much about his storyline, or what I’ve discovered of it, because I don’t want to spoil it.  It’s much more fun to discover it for yoursel!  I also loved that I could explore the storylines of characters from the comic book series before we meet them in the books.  But their stories aren’t messed with.  It fits in.  If you’ve read the comic or watched the series you’ll recognise Hershel, Glenn and Lilly (although it took me a while to recognise who Lilly was, b*tch). You meet Hershel’s son, Shawn, before he ends up in the barn.  We see what Glenn is up to before heading into Atlanta city.  And Lilly… no one likes her.

The main chunk of the story (or where I spent most of my time) happens when you’re trapped inside a pharmacy (I think that’s the equivalent of an American drug store), and you have to interact with the environment to help out the other survivors. The one thing I have no particularly strong feelings about is Clementine.  An 8-year old girl who Lee rescues/is saved by and you kind of… babysit.  It’s nice to have someone there who the character you play as has to make moral decisions based on, but the game could function perfectly well without her.  I don’t know, I mean.. I like her.  But if she wasn’t there I wouldn’t mind.  I hope she’ll contribute more in future episodes because I do like her and everyone makes a big deal out of her… I just haven’t got it yet.

Before I started playing this I hadn’t really done any research into it.  I didn’t know what type of game it was (other than the obvious… a zombie game, duh).  But the gameplay and controls shocked me.  Some parts felt like an elaborate quick-time event system, some parts felt like a 3D point-and-click system with third person controls.  All overlaid with a four-way conversation chooser thing.  And I liked it.  It worked.

The game is not a zombie shooter. It is not about killing as many zombies as you can. It’s about surviving.  This game is not Left 4 Dead or Dead Rising.  So the fact I couldn’t raise my axe and swing didn’t bother me. The controls were relative to the situation Lee was in.  It’s hard to describe because the way you controlled the game differed all the time!  Totally not in a bothersome way but in an “OMG THIS IS AWESOME” way.  It was totally weird to begin with, but I think it helped to build tension because you couldn’t control it how you wanted.

At one point I’m backed against a car with a zombie crawling towards me.  All I can do is move my head and pick things up. I can’t run away.  I find I can pick up a shotgun and a shotgun shell. But it’s so slow. Come on Lee!  He tries to load the shell but it doesn’t work.  The zombie is practically on top of me and I try to reload again.  I manage to roughly aim at the zombies head and BOOM… safe. It was great being able to control it the way I did.  Because really… I couldn’t.  Not like a conventional zombie game.  I was in a panic!  I didn’t want to die! Who cares about reloading… that didn’t even cross my mind ! I couldn’t let Lee die!  It was so tense!!

On top of all that, you have to make choices.  Big, fat, juicy choices.  As far as I can tell, they don’t affect the outcome of the game greatly… OK, there’s maybe one choice that will.  But they force you to choose your morals in the heat of the moment.  Yup, they’re on a timer.  No sitting there deciding how paragon or renegade you are.  Just choose!

I liked how whatever you decided on, a little UI element would pop up and tell you what the character you’re talking to felt about whatever you just did.  Most follow along the lines of “Clementine will remember you checked up on her”.  Without really thinking about it, I lied to Hershel.. in my head I was trying to protect Clementine… these guys didn’t need to know I just sort of picked her up and took her… I’m protecting her!!  So I told him I was her babysitter on my way out of Atlanta. He didn’t believe me.  He shouted at me!  Thankfully that was all he did.  Later on, Lee isn’t so lucky.  What really surprised me was after completing the game was a bunch of stats comparing the choices I made to the choices other people made whilst playing the game!  Ooo, I love stats!  I was being judged all along!  It makes me want to play it differently and see what trouble I can cause!

In keeping with how similar this is to the comic books.. it looks exactly like a coloured-in chapter!  The biggest comparison is how close Hershel, Glenn and Lilly look to their comic book counterparts. I had to flick through my books just to double-check.  Even the farm is exactly the same.  I love how the characters are 3D in their environment but they’re comic book stylised.  You can see the pencil lines.  Or the subtle shading of the blood on Lee’s shirt. And the curls in Clementine’s hair.  It just made me feel like I was playing an interactive chapter of the comic book.  Oh wait.. I was!!

My favourite part of this game was whilst rescuing Glenn.  And we all know Glenn is a sucker for a damsel in distress, so we have to rescue another survivor before he’ll return to the pharmacy with us.  What ensues is an elaborate chunk of gameplay where you have to sneak through a motel car park full of zombies.  It really makes the most of moral choices, the control system and the graphics to make this a great scene.  I don’t know if that’s the demo level, but it should be… And for £3.50 (I played it on Xbox 360, so 400MSP) it’s more than worth it!  It’s short, I completed it in two and a half hours, but it felt like longer because I was so absorbed.  I really can’t wait until the next one is released.. oh yeah, there’s going to be eight episodes!!!!  Eight!  So excited.

Once upon a time, the handheld gaming market was dominated solely by Nintendo and its Gameboy brand. But now, with many iOS and Android devices offering cheaper and more accessible alternatives to the DS, 3DS, and PSP, the portable gaming market has become extremely competitive.

Sony has responded to this threat with the PS Vita, their second handheld gaming console. After spending some time with the Vita, I have been impressed with the system, and believe that it is capable of providing a compelling portable gaming experience.

First things first, the hardware is great. It is a robust machine with a sleek design that has managed to incorporate a lot of features. Along with a crisp 5-inch OLED screen, the PS Vita comes equipped with a d-pad, two analogue sticks (are you watching Nintendo), four face buttons, two shoulder buttons, touch screens on the front and back of the system, rear and front facing cameras, and a six axis motion sensor. Not bad for a system that measures 7.2 inches end to end.

Sony has made it abundantly clear that they wanted to create a handheld platform that can reproduce console quality titles. This means that no compromises were made when developing the Vita. As a result, the controls are tight, the system has excellent graphics, and the launch line-up is extremely solid.

Arguably the most impressive of the early Vita titles is Uncharted: Golden Abyss. Although Golden Abyss cannot match the visuals and presentation of Uncharted’s PS3 cousins, the game provides a fantastic experience that would not look out-of-place on a console. As with Nathan Drake’s other adventures, expect the six to eight-hour campaign to have you jumping, climbing, and shooting your way through South American jungles and ancient ruins.

While Uncharted demonstrates what the Vita is capable of, BigBig’s Little Deviants makes the most of the Vita’s features. The game takes full advantage of the motion controls and rear facing cameras to create a series of augmented reality levels from the world around you (much like the AR cards for the 3DS).

Certainly Little Deviants is fast paced, frantic, and fun, but the whole game feels more like a demonstration of the Vita’s alternative capabilities than a title worthy of your prolonged attention.

Perhaps my favourite Vita release is Rayman Origins. As a direct port of the critically acclaimed console version, Rayman Origins boasts a wonderful art direction, a fitting soundtrack, and some of the finest 2D platform gameplay seen on this generation of consoles. Unfortunately, the lack of lack of a 2-4 player multiplayer makes it difficult to recommend this version over the console original.

The biggest problem for the PS Vita, however, is Sony’s pricing strategy. Many may balk at the £259.99 for the 3G edition, but on top of that gamers are forced to shell out another £37 for a 16 GB memory card. Smaller memory cards are available, but if you want to download games and movies on your Vita, a 16GB card is the minimum requirement.

With all things considered, the Vita is at the pinnacle of portable gaming. I have been genuinely impressed with the Vita, as it is able to offer console quality experiences on a handheld system. But if Sony wants to sell more units than the 3DS, and steal market share away from mobile gaming, I suggest that they review their inflated prices.

I’ve actually got enough content in Modern Warfare 3 to keep me going for most of the year: there’s the single player campaign to complete on Veteran, the Special Ops missions that I haven’t even had a chance to look at yet, and multiplayer to prestige at least once.

Since coming back to Modern Warfare 3 I’ve found myself playing one of the new game types introduced in this iteration, Kill Confirmed.  I prefer Kill Confirmed to most other game types as it tends to favour my preferred gameplay style which is close-quarters with an assault rifle or sub machine gun.  Those afraid to get their boots muddy need not apply.

So overall on the gaming front I’m lying low so far this year.  I’m going to try the new maps for Modern Warfare 3 and see if I can otherwise get my money’s worth out of this Call of Duty Elite subscription I’m signed up for.  The only game temping my wallet so far is The Jak and Daxter Trilogy.

So, what are you up to so far this year in video game land?

The Uncharted series has always been a firm favourite of mine, from as far back as 2007 when Drake’s Fortune burst onto the scene.  I had never been a fan of third-person shoot-and-cover games, but I really liked platformers and action adventure games.  So what changed my mind?

Drake’s Fortune delivered the complete package for me: amazing graphics, an atmospheric musical score, a great storyline, likeable, believable and lifelike characters that you really cared about, and at it’s heart- absolutely rock-solid gameplay.

Among Thieves

2009 marked the year that most of the world woke up to the realisation that the Uncharted series of games was something special.  Naughty Dog took everything that they’d learnt from Drake’s Fortune and made the game more action-packed and cinematic with some amazing levels and a wider range of enemy classes.

Adding to this heady mix was groundbreaking technology that enabled the player to carry on with gameplay whilst inside a collapsing building and having a shoot-out on a moving  train.  The scale of those achievements alone, should not be underestimated.

With Uncharted 2: Among Thieves the bar was raised by the release of a highly cinematic game, but with the core gameplay that we all knew and loved from Drake’s Fortune remaining intact.  Let’s go for a hat-trick then, shall we?

Drake’s Decption

Make no mistake, this game is a masterpiece.  What has been achieved by the Naughty Dog team has surpassed my wildest expectations.  The game is even more cinematic than ever: from the burning inferno of a château, to a cruise ship on stormy seas and a fight-out on a cargo plane- this game has it all.  At a cost, which I’ll get to.

Before I start to pick holes in the game, I’d like to share with you what the Naughty Dog team developed for the cruise ship level.  Buried away on the game disc is a documentary piece that explained that originally they were going to ‘cheat’ to simulate the effect of the cruise ship on stormy seas…

Instead, some genius made it possible to simulate the real thing.  The result?  An entire level floating on a fully simulated ocean with dynamic waves that meant the cruise ship never moved the same way twice on playthroughs.  The player is also able to walk on the ship’s walls when it capsizes.  That’s just staggering.

You’re looking sharp

What hits you when you’re paying through Drake’s Deception is the quality of the graphics.  Apparently they’re not much of a step-up from the sequel, as opposed to the graphical jump from the first game to the second one.  You could have fooled me.  In some levels the graphics are verging on the photo-realistic, but a game of this complexity means that slight tearing of the graphics occurs frequently.

The hand-to-hand combat has been fleshed out and feels satisfying solid.  Yet a number of things have happened to the gameplay.  First up, the shooting mechanic has been tweaked somehow.  I can’t put my finger on what Naughty Dog  have done, but they’ve fiddled with it.  They have also disabled the ability to switch the over-the-shoulder view when shooting by default- a feature which is essential on higher difficulty playthroughs.

A more serious charge that can be levied at the game though, is the sacrifice of gameplay for added cinematic effect.  You have multiple levels in Colombia, Yemen, and the desert for example where you can’t go where you want.  The game forces you to turn around and carry on the pre-scripted path.  The Uncharted series has always been linear at its heart, but never has an Uncharted game ever felt so linear!  It suffocates the player, and it acted as a straight jacket on my enjoyment of the game.

Drake’s Glitches

Somehow, somehow, they broke parts of the game.  In a few instances (too many to mention), Drake is left without a gun, and you have to acquire one before tackling the enemies.  I can’t stress this enough: facing several enemies without a gun on the hard and crushing difficulty levels was not a pleasant experience.  I can’t tell you the amount of times I died running to pick up a gun off the floor, or trying to snatch a gun off an enemy in hand-to-hand combat whilst his friends were peppering me with bullets.  You couldn’t make this up!

I also went off the game’s pre-scripted path in Colombia looking for one of the games 100 hidden treasures scattered throughout the levels.  I led the young Drake up a set of steps and just as I reached the top (and the treasure) Drake fell out of the level.  In all my time playing the Uncharted series of games, that has never happened to me before.

Conclusion

Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception is a great game, but not the best one out of the Uncharted series.  Looking back on my Uncharted 2 review, I was perhaps a bit too harsh on what was a sublime game.  So here’s my final thoughts for the entire series as it stands:

Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception: 4 out of 5 STARS
Uncharted 2: Among Thieves: 5 out of 5 STARS
Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune: 4 out of 5 STARS

So that means Uncharted 2 is the best out of the series so far, with the original and Uncharted 3 in joint second place.  Controversial?  Very!  But that’s my opinion.  I’d be very interested in anyone else’s point of view.

L.A. Noire

This is one of those games I didn’t expect to be buying when heading into 2011.  Then the reviews came rolling in.  The trailers, the countless articles.  I had to get this game.

It just goes to show how far Rockstar have come.  You’ve got a sandbox city, you can play certain cases in whatever order you want, and you’ve got discretion on how you want to play through the cases.  So far, so GTA.  But this time you’re on the other side of the law- you are the law.

I doubt a game like this would have even been possible a few years ago: the advanced motion capture on actors’ faces- detailed enough to show/betray emotion, the look and feel of such a huge living, breathing city, and the noir storyline.  Breathtaking.

Verdict: 4 out of 5 STARS

I’m not going to go in to any further detail about L.A. Noire.  For that, I refer you to Matt Brett’s superb review.  What I will add though is apart from trying to 5-star certain cases, I felt little replay value.  Don’t get me wrong, the game was a tour de force but I’d had enough playing the game once.

Modern Warfare 3

This one’s still pretty much a work in progress for me.  I’ve completed the single player campaign on regular, and I’m working my way through Veteran.  As for multiplayer, I’ve barely scratched the surface.

Some may say the Modern Warfare (and inherently the Call of Duty) franchise has grown stale, become a cash cow… etc.  Maybe.  But you can’t say it doesn’t deliver.  I really enjoyed the single player campaign and storyline.  It brought closure on the Modern Warfare trilogy with a few twists and turns along the way.

Now time for… multiplayer!  This is the best online multiplayer experience since, well, Modern Warfare 2.  It feels snappy, responsive, and satisfying.  Black Ops never really felt right to me, and with many bugs on the PS3 version of the game it just killed the whole experience for me.  Modern Warfare 3 is a return to form.

For any naysayers who say that Modern Warfare 3′s multiplayer is basically Modern Warfare 2 but with new maps, I wholeheartedly agree with you.  But is that such a bad thing?

Verdict: 4 out of 5 STARS

Assassin’s Creed Revelations

Oh Ezio, what are we going to do with you?  If you’re Ubisoft, then the answer is to trot out the master Assassin for another yearly outing.  In a weird sort of way, for me Assassin’s Creed Revelations is both the best and the worst game in the series yet.

They changed the weapon wheel.  That simple fact angers me more than almost anything else.  Up to and including Brotherhood, I felt in control of all weapons.  Creating two weapon wheels and not being clear about what button/action activates what made me feel detached from the experience somewhat.  Re-mapping eagle vision from triangle to L3 I can deal with, but messing with my weapon wheel?  No sir.

Which nicely leads me on to those stupid bombs.  Don’t get me wrong, they’re a nice addition to the gameplay as they give you many more options: you can play the game your way.  However what I didn’t like was that the game forces you to use the bombs in practically every situation.  The bombs didn’t really fit into my gameplay style, and you can be sure that I’m not going to use them just to achieve 100% synch on a mission.  You’re Ezio, not Solid Snake.

And finally, the plot.  I’m sorry, but in this regard, Assassin’s Creed II and Brotherhood made a real connection with me as I followed Ezio’s life from foolish teenager to Master Assassin.  Revelations left me cold in comparison as it didn’t really develop Ezio’s story or Desmond’s.  The biggest beneficiary of Revelations?  Altair.  I’m beginning to wonder that a yearly release cycle may not be as beneficial to the Assassin’s Creed franchise as it is to the Call of Duty one.  It’s time for Assassin’ Creed III.

Multiplayer?  Let’s not even go there.  For my multiplayer fix, I’ll be playing Modern Warfare 3.

Verdict: 3 out of 5 STARS

I immediately wanted to vent my frustration and write a critical post on this blog, but I held my tongue for the most part.  I calmed down, and I had other games to play through in the meantime.

So what’s changed?  Well after the game’s release in March, Q Games released a patch in July that for me solved two main problems: the acid walls in the giant creature were made less deadly, and the player was now granted the ability to save the game mid-level, and come back to it.

This second point was the biggest deal breaker for me before the fix.  Nothing illustrates this better than the final boss fight.  You’ve got to get through a very tough level, and then right at the end, you’re faced with what’s possibly the toughest boss fight of them all.  Save the boss fight for another day?  If you did, you’d have to play through the whole level again.

It also occurred to me that the original game was a bit too easy, if anything, and at least PixelJunk Shooter 2 offers the seasoned gamer a fair challenge.  Now after beating the final boss, and a congrats from Dylan Cuthbert himself, I am now once more at peace with PixelJunk Shooter.  Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got some more diamonds to find, and scientists to rescue.

Now, I’m going to level with you here.  When I made that announcement, I didn’t really expect that I would do it, although it would give me the incentive of public humiliation if I didn’t.

The Special Ops missions were as bad as I imagined and it took myself and a dedicated friend many hours looking at ‘game over’ screens inching ever-closer to completing each Op.  Snatch & Grab and Acceptable Losses were difficult, but satisfying to complete on Veteran, but Wetwork was particularly frustrating as we managed to subdue all enemies a couple of times, but kept messing up the final breach and clear.  As you can imagine, we were screaming victory chants down the headset when we beat that one.  Victory never tasted so sweet, and the ‘ping’ when the Star 69 Trophy popped up was totally worth it.

So now, over a year later, I can breathe a sigh of relief and bask in the buzz of completing something that has been a huge challenge for me and a fitting end to a game I have really enjoyed playing for the past two years.

Impossible?  As someone once said, the impossible just takes longer…

So, what you’re going to find a bit further down, is a list of my top 20 favourite games of all time.  Whilst I’m a child of the 80s, you’re not going to find anything like that on this list as they don’t really stack up with the masterpieces I’ve played (my opinion!).

Sure, there was Sonic the Hedgehog on the Sega Mega Drive and Bomb Jack on the ZX Spectrum, but so what?

Here’s the list in full:

1. Uncharted 2 // PS3
2. Uncharted // PS3
3. Age of Empires II: the Conqueror’s Expansion // PC
4. Metal Gear Solid // PSone
5. Assassin’s Creed: Brotherhood // PS3
6. Assassin’s Creed II // PS3
7. Burnout 2: Point of Impact // PS2
8. Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit // PS3
9. Portal 2 // PS3
10. Half-Life 2 // PC
11. Modern Warfare 2 // PS3
12. Batman Arkham Asylum // PS3
13. Spyro: Year of the Dragon // PSone
14. Gran Turismo 2 // PSone
15. Driver // PSone
16. Ape Escape // PSone
17. L.A. Noire // PS3
18. inFamous // PS3
19. The Matrix Online // PC
20. Halo // PC

There you go.  This list may be pretty controversial to some but hey, we’re all individuals, right?  You might get an inkling from perusing that fine list that my introduction to gaming was on the PSone and PC.  Those were the days…

Of course, I’ve decided to publish the list now to see how much it will change over time, because when I come up with a revised version, you just know it’s going to have Uncharted 3 on it for starters, right?

If you had to think of a video game that could be called art, then it would have to be Limbo.  For a game that’s relatively short, with basic gameplay at its heart, it makes a big impact.  The music, the Noir visuals, and the puzzles all add up to a great little game.  In other words, it’s gameplay done right!

I’ve since moved on to playing some of the bigger releases this year such as DiRT 3 and L.A. Noire but Limbo still sticks in my mind as a small game with big presence.  It is a platform/puzzle game cut to its bare essentials, but with such high-impact visuals.

I’m not going to go on about this game anymore as I’m already treading on familiar ground here.  I just needed to get a shout out for this game, mainly for PS3 owners who like myself, will not have had the fortune of playing it last year.  A must buy!