Video Game Terms: Debate

When it comes to terms used in video games, or to describe them, everyone has a different opinion on what they mean. For those of you that may not have known, I am currently going to college at ITT Technical Institute for Digital Entertainment and Game Design. In a nutshell, it means I want to become a video game designer. The problem is, what we are being taught, and what we have always thought have been the definition of terms used in the industry, tend to clash with each other greatly. Take the following examples for instance, and tell me what you think of these.

Our latest assignment we were given involved creating an interface design for a fake squad-based tactical game called “Chain of Command“. Of course it isn’t that simple, there are many stipulations to it. You play as the squad leader, giving commands to three other commandos under your control. You are a player in this game, so you still have control over yourself. You play in a third-person viewpoint, and most of the combat is fought in outdoor environments.

The target audience for this game is 18-34 year olds, who are into a casual-gaming experience. Here’s where my first argument came into play. What is the difference between casual and hardcore, if we’re going to get into using these terms? In society, most people who think “casual” when it comes to video games think of people who enjoy playing something like the Nintendo Wii, or being able to pick up a game and play it without having too much trouble. That definition is actually close, looking back, but it’s wrong. When I think of a shooter game at all, though, the last thing I think of is a “casual” audience. Yet, supposedly my teacher tells me that more and more casual game players have been picking up shooter games since September 11th, because it makes them feel like they’re in the action and helping. I don’t believe a word of that, because I haven’t heard one person say that that is the reason why they would play a shooter game, if anything, I’ve heard people be more against shooters since that day. In the end, I was explained that a casual game player is someone who is able to pick up a game, learn the controls quickly, and be able to play for a short amount of time without being tied down by it. Once again, I bring up my point that I don’t agree that any shooter game, especially one with squad tactics, can be considered “casual”, but I was forced to do this assignment with that mindset.

In this game, you need to have the choice of which squad member you want to select, individually, or as a group. You also need to be able to designate a waypoint for your units, and finally, be able to issue an order movement. The three order movements are Check Position, which makes your team approach the target cautiously; Double-Time, which makes your team move to the target in the fastest speed possible; and Patrol, which makes your team follow the series of waypoints that you’ve previously set down. Using all of this, you are to create a button combination that would be best for a casual game player.

Now, just to argue semantics, for fun, I would never have an order in a game called “Double-Time”. Unless you’re making a military-specific hardcore game, where the people who play know exactly what that order means, you will never use an order like that. And the military-specific games have never been huge popular sellers anyways.

The main problem with this is that you can’t just map one button to be exactly one thing. You still need to be able to move your own character properly, and have actions for them, as well as being able to issue commands to your squad, meaning that you will have some buttons that will actually have multiple functions. The line between “casual” and “hardcore” I felt was tread very hard in this aspect, because the way we were taught, we were made to believe that having a player press multiple buttons at once was too much for a simple game to have, yet in this example, we were requiring the player to remember that one button would actually have two different actions depending on the situation that it was used in. Also, I can’t remember the last squad based shooter that I’ve played where you’ve actually been able to just control one or two of your squad mates, without being forced to move them all to the position that you designate.

My issue with all of this is simple. I feel that the curriculum is either old, and doesn’t make sense in today’s modern game-creation norm; or it is just made by someone who makes a book, and doesn’t know anything about the industry itself anymore, nullifying my interest in learning something that doesn’t actually have any hold in the industry now. Yet, our teacher has been in the industry, and claims that most of this is true, and that game companies actually will use such an idea for a game. I argue that greatly, because I can’t remember the last time I’ve ever seen a game use any of these kinds of tactics recently. Unfortunately, I’m just here to learn what they are teaching me, and therefore I need to abide by their rules. Anyways, enough of my rambling. What is your opinion on this assignment, and the terms and wording used?

By the way, here is the control interface that I came up with in the end:

Click for larger image.

Losing That New Internet Smell

The night is dark, and the cold is chilling to the bone. Grabbing my briefcase, laptop bag, and runners bag, I quickly run into the house into it’s warm safety. Trying to be quiet since the family is asleep, I quietly walk upstairs to my bedroom, where I then flop on my bed. It had been a long school day, filled with boredom, and a little bit of homework, which created a stir in me (but that will be another entry in the very near future). Laying there for a moment, I decided to get up and head over to my computer, as I did daily. Sitting down and turning on my monitor, I went to my Opera Browser to check my RSS feeds. I had a lot of them since I had been gone all day at school, and hadn’t bothered to log in to my home computer to check them. Boy was I surprised to find…

The internet just can’t be the internet unless someone wants to ruin something for other people. MacRumors was the target this time, as some skilled hackers (or so they say, but, I have my doubts more and more as time goes on) decided to make a massacre of their Live Blog from MacWorld’s keynote. Let’s just put it this way, they said some pretty rough things in it. To this story, I just have to shake my head.

Source: http://news.cnet.com/8301-17939_109-10132749-2.html

The story that I found to be shocking, though, is the fact that 1UP.com was acquired by UGO Entertainment on January 6, 2008. Most people will just shake their heads and go, “So what? It’s just a video game journalism site. This happens all the time.” That may be true, but when a lot of great journalists are now out of a job because the new parent company doesn’t want to keep them, then things start to go wrong. Many of 1UP’s show producers were in the midst of those layoffs, basically terminating any future episodes of their famous video podcast The 1UP Show, as well as their regular podcast 1UP Yours. Not only that, but at least 30, if not at least 40 other 1UP employees have been let go after this ordeal. Beyond all this and that, though, is that the last of Ziff Davis‘ print magazines, EGM, also known as Electronic Gaming Monthly, has been completely closed down, and will no longer be printed. EGM was one of the last impartial video game review magazines on the market. It was one of the most influential video game magazines for readers for many years, and has affected many game players, including 1UP creator Sam Kennedy, to do what they do in their life now, relating to video games.

Source: http://www.ugo.com/facelift/html/static/ugo-to-acquire-1up.asp

Now let’s be honest, I read a lot about all of this from many different sites, as this has been a big uproar from the gaming community. And the problem is, this has all happened before to other sites. GameSpot is one who is not a stranger to controversy such as this, and lost many of their loyal fan base over the past year due to the unexpected and highly controversial firing of Jeff Gerstmann, which led to the quitting of mostly all of the higher end editors from their site. Based off of the comments I’ve read to news stories from both 1UP.com and UGO.com, it is obvious that members from both sides are skeptical of this acquisition. One controversial quote from UGO’s news post about the recent events is as follows, “… 1UP is all about its personalities…”. This comes after news of many of the highest end personalities from 1UP were let go. Obviously, someone needs to learn to choose their words a lot better. While this is big, I was enlightened to something that I hadn’t realized before. Most of the major video game journalism sites are now owned by major corporations, who I have a feeling have no idea anything about them, but are in it for the money, which is highly disappointing. Quoting Sam Kennedy’s Blog, creator of 1UP.com, “GameSpot is now part of CBS, IGN is owned by FOX, GameDaily is owned by AOL, and now 1UP is owned by UGO and its parent Hearst Corporation, one of the largest and long running publishers in the nation.” It’s amazing to think that all of these once small, privately owned video game journalism sites have become so big that they were bought out by these gigantic entities. I also wonder what in the world good it does for the video game site’s side of the coin.

Source: http://www.1up.com/do/blogEntry?bId=8977607&publicUserId=4561231

A little bit of a shakeup in the world of the internet has sent a lot of people spiraling around, wondering what’s next for the gaming community! Personally, I just so happen to be losing some faith in the world of video game journalism. I mean, I understand, we’ll never know if a game is good or bad unless we rely on these websites and their opinions to tell us as such, but with all of this marketing and big corporation stuff going on, I wonder how much of it is unbiased anymore. We’ll just have to keep watching to see what happens coming up here in the next year.

The Future of Rhythm & Music Games

Before I begin, I would like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, and all of those other holidays which all seem to happen to fall in to this time of the year, including my 21st birthday, for those of you who were unaware. Yes, check that About Weasel page if you are curious to finally see the first picture of me on my Blog, and with my first drink no less. It’s a month of firsts, let me tell you. Oh, and 2009 will be a year of firsts as well. I’m starting work on a secret project, which you’ll be able to find information about on the Project Source page I’ve just created. And don’t forget to check out my Video Games page, which, I promise, I’ll get around to fully updating soon enough. But, without further ado, let’s get to the real meat and potatoes of this entry. Mmmm… meat and potatoes… I’m hungry, damn.

Music and rhythm games come in all shapes and sizes these days. Obviously, some of the most popular are games like Guitar Hero and Rock Band, or one of my personal favorites, Dance Dance Revolution. They can also be karaoke, SingStar and Lips being examples of those, or even more different, Elite Beat Agents and Wii Music. But a handful of more unique, non-mainstream rhythm games have been put out on the PC, the most notable now being Audiosurf. I’ve always personally been a fan of Audiosurf, and it’s available on Steam for $4.99 until the end of their sale, so I’d recommend it.

Audiosurf

Audiosurf created something new and different that captured people quickly. The premise of Audiosurf is that it takes your music, any song that you have in an MP3 format, and scans it for it’s beat and tone. Then, it creates a highway based on the pitch the music takes, and you, playing as the vehicle on this highway, are made to run over colored blocks to create combinations, depending on which mode you play in. There are many different modes, which range from the simple mode of picking up the color blocks and avoiding gray ones, to harder modes which force you to match up at least three of each color to acquire points from it. This game can be played with your keyboard, but is the most fun when played with your mouse. This game had me hooked from the beginning, because, as stated earlier, it can be used with any song you could possibly happen to have in your entire library.

There are more than just that, though, that you can find on the internet. Take for example a game that is nothing but a Flash demo still so far, yet very advanced to begin with. The game is called Auditorium, and it’s made by a company called Cipher Prime. Even by checking out their Website and their Blog, it’s easy to see that they know a thing or two about creativity. Auditorium features a completely original orchestrated soundtrack, and it is what drives the game. The idea of the game is extremely simple. The “Flow” is a stream of white lines that come from a starting point. The objective is to change the direction of those lines using “Controls”, which range from simple directions, to the most advanced control in the demo being the “Attract” control, which makes the flow wrap around in circles around it. The destination for this flow is “Containers”, which are bars, like you would find in a recording studio. When all of the varied containers in the level are filled up to the top, you are taken to the next level. There is a lot to explain about this game, but I would recommend just heading over and trying it out yourself. The demo only contains three stages, some of which can be difficult and annoying, but with time, each one can be figured out.

Auditorium

The market for rhythm games is vast, but more unique ideas, such as the one used in Auditorium, are needed to keep it as alive as it is right now. The constant rehashes of Guitar Hero games will eventually lead to over saturation, and the amount of sales they will get will eventually fall. For my personal self, I’ve ceased buying any of the Guitar Hero games due to the fact that it is continuously being milked for all that it’s worth. There comes a point where I feel disgusted that they’ve made so many of the same thing, that I’m just torn away from wanting it anymore. Many people could come back and say that the Final Fantasy series has done the same thing, but I would like to point out that every Final Fantasy game is a unique storyline, with unique features and elements built in to them, and even if some of the mechanics are similar, the story is always many, many hours different than the others. Ideas like this, and quite possibly flOw as well, will shape the direction that music-related games will go in the future.

Also, semi-related, in the aspect of music, check out the band that did the soundtrack for the video game Mirror’s Edge, Solar Fields. They have an area where you can listen to music directly on their website, and if you love instrumental music as much as I do, you will definitely enjoy many of their tracks that they’ve created over the time.

Weasel’s Weblog Presents the SPIKE 2008 Video Game Awards Live Blog!

Welcome to the Live Blog of the SPIKE 2008 Video Game Awards!

Tonight, Sunday, December 14, 2008, is the night of the 2008 VGAs, presented by Spike TV. This marks the fifth anniversary of the awards, and the first year that they’re doing the show live, instead of pre-recorded. In the past, the results have leaked onto the internet much before the show airs, ruining most of the point of it. This year, they decided to do it live, opening up many new opportunities, including using their website to show extra camera angles, and a special pre-show.

In the past, the Spike TV Video Game Awards have been mediocre. Starting out with the first year, the results of their awards were met with many questions and controversy on why such games won. As the years have gone on, the winners have improved and been more understandable. Sadly, Spike still hasn’t figured out what video game players want to see, and have just missed the mark. It will be interesting to see what they bring to the table this year, and if they can successfully come up with a presentation that’s interesting to the viewers.

Due to the fact that the winners have yet to be announced yet, I’ve decided to do this Live Blog during the show, which starts at 8 PM CST on SPIKE TV. In this Blog, you will see a list of potential winners, as well as my choices on who I want to win, who will probably win, and, as they occur, who actually won. Please feel free to enter into discussion in the comments section, and I will gladly join in as well. The following is the list. Please check back often for updates, and as the winners are announced live on the show, check back for updated results and comments on the winners.

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Comments on The Rediculously Awesome VGA Preshow:

7:01 PM CST – Well, here we begin. Visit http://www.spike.com/event/vga/page/live-pre-show to watch the VGA Preshow LIVE. Wonder how good this year’s show will be?

7:07 PM CST – So far, they just have celebrities talking about why they’re there at the VGAs, what they like to see… and seeing if they can make it through the first level of Super Mario that they downloaded on the Wii.

7:24 PM CST - Let’s be honest, some of these celebrities just don’t know anything about video games… except if it’s a super shooter, and then they love it. Listening to some of this is just disappointing, I’ll admit. Like I said, SPIKE kind of misses the mark, once again. Luckily, this is just the Preshow.

7:27 PM CST – Did I mention that all of these media venues seem to choose the most annoying person to speak for them? This woman is just abnoxious. And, wait a second, the Preshow was only a half hour? That doesn’t make much sense. Oh well, 30 minutes to go!

7:53 PM CST – One great way to keep up to date Live as well, other than just plain ol’ watching the awards on TV, is Twitter @ http://www.twitter.com . I’ve seen a lot of popular people, including the famous Jeff Gerstmann, updating his Twitter page with Live updates!

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Comments on the SPIKE 2008 Video Game Awards:

8:02 PM CST – I’ll admit, the stage looks beautiful. In fact, so does the entire theater! Wow, NOW I’m envious. Hope the show is as good as the local!

8:09 PM CST – World Premiere #1 – New map pack for Gears of War 2. Available tonight! What do you think? Cool? Three new maps.

8:18 PM CST – LL Cool J performed, kind of. And now, footage of the new UFC game. Personally, not interested. Kinda wish I was there though, even though it doesn’t look like a too terribly interesting show so far.

8:21 PM CST – World Premiere #2 – God of War III. Didn’t really announce, well, ANYTHING about the story, no in-game footage, no, uh… anything. Also, there is more commercials than there is show. Plus, did anyone else catch that Gears of War 2 ALSO won Best Xbox 360 Game in the middle of that there? Once again, SPIKE is rushing through this. Final comment for now, advertising pre-ordering on the end of the trailer? This really is COMPLETELY an advertising show.

8:29 PM CST – World Premiere #3 – Fight Night Round 4 by EA. And, Muhammed Ali? This is just a celebrity fest as well. And, once again, they advertised pre-ordering it from GameStop! How disappointing.

8:34 PM CST – So we can really tell it’s Live. Wish they knew what they were doing. Now it’s becoming even more unprofessional. And, once again, they just showed a celebrity, with no real reason.

8:42 PM CST – All-American Rejects playing. I don’t mind them at least, haha.

8:51 PM CST – World Premiere #4 – Dante’s Inferno. Seriously, Kim isn’t really that smart, is she… oh, and Tony Hawk and Will Wright are up now! Talking about the wonders of Spore. And he’s won an award for being a “Gamer God”? I really don’t like the word “gamer”, thanks to the old GameSpot, but still. Yes, he is a God, I’ll agree with that.

8:56 PM CST – World Premiere #5 – Grand Theft Auto IV: The Lost and Damned. Hey, it’s an actual interesting trailer. And I hate to say that, because I’m really not a fan of the GTA series, to be honest.

9:05 PM CST – HEY LOOK, ANOTHER AWARD! Which, by the way, was a great choice. Best RPG. And now, Busta Rhymes. Who announces World Premiere #6 – Uncharted 2: Among Thieves. Excellent trailer! Really says a lot about the game actually, and has already been interesting enough to make me want to play it!

9:15 PM CST – World Premiere #7 – Terminator Salvation. Well, the graphics are good, but the gameplay looks WAY too much like Gears of War though. Third person, with a cover system way too similar.

9:17 PM CST – World Premiere #8 – Mafia II. I actually wonder what the gameplay will be like. The trailer looks pretty cool, on it’s own. But, as before, I’m just not personally a fan of that kind of game. And now, 50 Cent. I’ll admit, during the Preshow, he seemed nice, but, sounds like his song is WAY too filled with swear words. It’s getting muted left and right.

9:26 PM CST – World Premiere #9 – Watchmen: The End Is Neih. At least, I think that’s how you spell it. They fly through these trailers like they’re nothing. Still, the game looks interesting. It would be nice to know the background of the Watchmen comic series first.

9:31 PM CST – Once again, another built-in advertisement. This time for the movie Mall Cop. Honestly, what does this have to do with video games again? Oh, that’s right, nothing.

9:38 PM CST – As I was updating with who won, they decided to basically give out every other award that they could. This completely ticks me off. Basically, they just wanted to get their ad time in, and give up on the rest of the show. So, it looks like I’ll be looking up the winners later on tonight, eh? Oh well, whatever. As I said, this show is disappointing. They don’t disappoint to be disappointing, haha!

9:44 PM CST – World Premiere #10 – Brutal Legend. I love how they’re calling this the best game ever. I don’t like that at all. Ah, I see, since Jack Black is in it, they’re pushing it to no end. Again, not a fan of that at all. I think that alone has made me lost a lot of interest in this game. And, seeing the trailer, I see why I have no interest in this game. It doesn’t look entertaining at all.

9:49 PM CST – Game of the Year time! Time to see where this lands. Aaannnddd… that’s not where it should have landed. At all. I’m terribly disappointed. Looks like I’m finished with the VGAs from now on. As I should have already been years ago it seems.

9:56 PM CST – Weezer is closing out the show. I guess I got my hopes up about the show again, eh? How sad. Check the bottom of the page for my final closing comments later tonight!

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Best Independent Game Fueled By Dew

Game	Personal Favorite	Probable Win	Winner
World of Goo			X
PixelJunk Eden
Braid		X
Audiosurf	X

Comments: Really? Huh. I guess I’m shocked. Well, if the people chose it, then so be it.  Thing is, I really haven’t heard many things, well, at all about World of Goo. That’s why it’s so shocking.

Studio Of The Year

Studio	Personal Favorite	Probable Win	Winner
Media Molecule	X		X
Rockstar North		X
Harmonix
Bethesda Game Studios

Comments: A well deserved win for Media Molecule! They worked their butts off for this, and they did it.

Game of the Year

Game	Personal Favorite	Probable Win	Winner
Gears of War 2
Grand Theft Auto IV		X	X
Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots	X
Fallout 3
LittleBigPlanet

Comments: Exactly like I called it this afternoon, Grand Theft Auto IV won Game of the Year. I completely disagree with this choice, but, based on the way that popularity goes around these parts, it was a given from the very beginning. At least that’s it, now that the year is over, we can end the love for it.

Best Team Sports Game

Game	Personal Favorite	Probable Win	Winner
FIFA Soccer 09
NBA 2K9
Madden NFL 09	X	X
NHL 09

Comments: So, what, did SPIKE forget that they had this catagory in the first place? I’ve been searching and looking for the past half hour, and there really was no winner announced. How lame.

Best Name In The Game Female

Female	Personal Favorite	Probable Win	Winner
Dame Judi Dench As “M”
Eliza Dushku As “Shaundi”
Liv Tyler As “Betty Ross”
Jenny McCarthy As “Tanya”	X	X	X

Comments: Let me just be honest. I think Jenny McCarthy is probably one of the only most well know of them all, first of all, and secondly, Command & Conquer Red Alert 3 had more of a famous cast than any of them yet. I found it an easy choice.

Best Name In The Game Male

Male	Personal Favorite	Probable Win	Winner
Liam Neeson As “Father”
Kiefer Sutherland As “Sgt. Roebuck”	X		X
Ricky Gervais As “Himself”		X
Daniel Craig As “James Bond”

Comments: How much does this rock, my favorite won! Kiefer Sutherland has an awesome voice for an action character, in TV or in a video game. He deserved this award.

Best Performance By A Human Female

Female	Personal Favorite	Probable Win	Winner
Debi Mae West As “Meryl Silverburgh”	X	X	X
Keeley Hawes As “Lara Croft”
Paula Tiso As “Silvia Christel”
Nathalie Cox As “Juno Eclipse”

Comments: I do agree with this choice greatly, as you can see by my earlier prediction as well! She did an excellent job as Meryl, and that also was a huge game, so it really stood out above the rest I feel.

Best Performance By A Human Male

Male	Personal Favorite	Probable Win	Winner
Stephen Fry As “The Narrator”
David Hayter As “Old Snake”	X
Jason Zumwalt As “Roman Bellic”
Michael Hollick As “Niko Bellic”		X	X

Comments: Sadly, I knew that the voice of Niko Bellic from Grand Theft Auto IV was going to win this. I’m sure that he did do a good job, but out of this list, I just don’t feel that he fit right as the best male voice in a video game.

Best Multi-Player Game

Game	Personal Favorite	Probable Win	Winner
Call of Duty: World at War		X
Resistance 2	X
Left 4 Dead			X
Gears of War 2

Comments: I’m actually kind of surprised by this choice. While I know that Call of Duty: World at War wasn’t as popular as Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare was, I still thought that in the popular eye it would have won. I wouldn’t have expected Left 4 Dead to take this prize though.

Best Original Score

Score	Personal Favorite	Probable Win	Winner
LittleBigPlanet		X
Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots	X		X
Spore
Fallout 3

Comments: While my favorite was the one chosen as the winner, and the one I wanted to win, I just had a feeling that they weren’t going to select it. None the less, the Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots OST is one of my personal favorites of all time, and will be for quite some time I’m sure.

Best PC Game

Game	Personal Favorite	Probable Win	Winner
Left 4 Dead			X
Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning
Crysis Warhead
Spore	X	X

Comments: I’ll be the first to admit that I’m completely floored by this decision. I just didn’t think Left 4 Dead was THAT good of a game that it would warrant Best PC Game, but obviously I haven’t played it enough to know. Sadly, Steam is not something I enjoy using.

Best PS3 Game

Game	Personal Favorite	Probable Win	Winner
Grand Theft Auto IV
LittleBigPlanet			X
Resistance 2
Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots	X	X

Comments: I’ll admit, I love LittleBigPlanet, this is a great game, but, the greatest game on the PlayStation 3 for the year of 2008? I’m sorry, I just can’t agree with that.

Best Wii Game

Game	Personal Favorite	Probable Win	Winner
Super Smash Bros. Brawl	X	X
No More Heroes
Wii Fit
Boom Blox			X

Comments: I’ve heard nothing but good things about Boom Blox. While I wonder if it’s the Best Wii Game of the year, I just can’t go that far just yet, but, it looks like in the public’s eye, it’s better than the others.

Best Xbox 360 Game

Game	Personal Favorite	Probable Win	Winner
Fallout 3
Grand Theft Auto IV		X
Gears of War 2			X
Fable II	X

Comments: So, okay, this was a little bit of a shock to me actually, but, GTAIV isn’t necessarily an exclusive to the system. Although, I’ll admit, I expected the stereotypical results for this show. I’m happily surprised.

Best Soundtrack

Soundtrack	Personal Favorite	Probable Win	Winner
Guitar Hero World Tour		X
Rock Band 2	X		X
Grand Theft Auto IV
LittleBigPlanet

Comments: This was a rough choice on my “Probable”. I have a feeling that the Guitar Hero franchise just has more of a following than the Rock Band one does now. But I was obviously wrong, and my favorite won instead! About time.

Best Action Adventure Game

Game	Personal Favorite	Probable Win	Winner
Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots	X
Mirror’s Edge
Grand Theft Auto IV		X	X
Dead Space

Comments: This one was tough to decide who my “Favorite” one. I really liked all but Grand Theft Auto IV, but since I had to choose one, I chose the one I’ve put the most time into. And naturally, they chose Grand Theft Auto IV as their favorite, which I’m totally not surprised about.

Best Driving Game

Game	Personal Favorite	Probable Win	Winner
Mario Kart Wii
Midnight Club: Los Angeles		X
PURE
Burnout Paradise	X		X

Comments: Once again, I was wrong in thinking that my Favorite wouldn’t win! This is definately a game that I say should win this catagory. With how much support and free add-on content that Criterion has given it, it’s worth more than it was when people bought it, which is a great thing to be able to say.

Best Music Game

Game	Personal Favorite	Probable Win	Winner
SingStar
Wii Music
Guitar Hero World Tour		X
Rock Band 2	X		X

Comments: Once again, with the following of each of the Guitar Hero and Rock Band franchises, this was not an easy choice, but I have a feeling it will be one of those two. And, of course, I was right, except, and I’m not complaining, but my favorite won, and my probable didn’t!

Best Game Based On A Movie Or Tv Show

Game	Personal Favorite	Probable Win	Winner
Naruto: The Broken Bond
Star Wars: The Force Unleashed	X
Quantum of Solace
LEGO Indiana Jones: The Original Adventures		X	X

Comments: Wait… there’s a good game made based on a movie or tv show? Yes, I AM told, though, that the LEGO games are quite entertaining. Oh, and I had a feeling that would win, too.

Best Graphics

Graphics	Personal Favorite	Probable Win	Winner
LittleBigPlanet
Gears of War 2
Fallout 3
Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots	X	X	X

Comments: Here’s a much deserved win for Kojima! Without a doubt, Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots was an absolutely beautiful game, and therefore succeeded in a catagory that it was built to win in.

Best Handheld Game

Game	Personal Favorite	Probable Win	Winner
Castlevania: Order of Ecclesia		X
Patapon
Professor Layton and the Curious Village	X		X
God of War: Chains of Olympus

Comments: Once again my favorite won. I’m better at this than I thought. None the less, I still figured others wouldn’t think the same way that I did. It’s an awesome win for these guys, they made an excellently deep DS game.

Best Individual Sports Game

Game	Personal Favorite	Probable Win	Winner
Skate It
Wii Fit
Tiger Woods PGA Tour 09	X	X
Shaun White Snowboarding			X

Comments: Honestly, I have no idea which direction this one is going. All of these games are pretty popular to the masses. And it went to the one that I thought deserved it least, based on the fact of how horrible it was. But, as I’ve said before, whatever they say…

Best Fighting Game

Game	Personal Favorite	Probable Win	Winner
Dragon Ball Z: Burst Limit
Super Smash Bros. Brawl	X
Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe		X
Soul Caliber IV			X

Comments: Shocking, actually! Definately not my first choice, or my second even for that matter! I’d be interested in hearing why they thought Soul Caliber IV was better than Mortal Kombat vs. DC Universe. The character creation maybe?

Best RPG

Game	Personal Favorite	Probable Win	Winner
Fallout 3		X	X
The World Ends with You
Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning
Fable II	X

Comments: Hey look, my first prediction I got right! I had a really big feeling that people would like Fallout 3 better. I’ll admit, it’s huge, lots of content, and it’s good.

Best Shooter

Game	Personal Favorite	Probable Win	Winner
Gears of War 2			X
Left 4 Dead		X
Resistance 2	X
Far Cry 2

Comments: I’ll admit, I don’t know what I was smoking when I thought about who the “Probable” was, haha. But, yeah, I’m not surprised, Gears of War 2 was an excellent game, I still have a better favorite.

Most Anticipated Game

Personal Favorite	Winner
Killzone 2

Comments: My choice was Killzone 2 for the PlayStation 3, releasing February 27, 2009. Problem is, they never announced if there was an answer to what the fans thought was their most anticipated game. So make this your homework in the comment you’re going to leave. What is YOUR Most Anticipated Game?

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Final Thoughts: I’m sure we’re all in agreement when I say that this year, they followed through perfectly with exactly how they’ve done it before. Once again, they completely missed the mark on what us game players want to see in avideo game awards show. Honestly, I’ve heard it be called many things in the past hour or so, but the one that I think was the closest to true, is that the past two hours was just like watching one giant commercial. And, in the end, all they did was have Jack Black promote his own game as if it’s the best game ever made in the entire world. I really hope that I watch that game crash and burn when the reviews come in. But anyways, overall, this production was mediocre, at best. While there were some understandable winners, and some that weren’t, that’s the same with any award ceremony. It’s not up to just you, it’s up to a group of people who have possible different tastes than you do. Still, I truly have my wonders. I’m looking forward to not watching next year’s performance. Although, while I say that now, I’ll put money on the fact that I’ll be sitting and watching it again next year. Except, unlike this year, I won’t be Blogging about it and being so gleeful about it, haha.

Thank you for reading this Live Blog of the SPIKE 2008 Video Game Awards!

PlayStation® Comes Home for the Holidays

PlayStation® Home, years in the making, finally entered Open Beta today for all PlayStation 3 owners. For anyone connected to the internet on Tuesday, December 11, 2008, they were greeted with a new icon under their PlayStation® Network menu. PlayStation® Home was automatically downloaded to everyone’s PlayStation 3, and the flood ensued as early as the servers would let them in. Millions of people flocked to their PlayStation 3’s to be able to be one of the first to see the brand new Home that they’d been waiting over two years to finally see. Unfortunate for many, errors plagued the sign in process making it very difficult for most people to log on through the early hours of it’s release. Luckily, by the end of the day, most diligent users were able to check it out for themselves. While there is a lot more to do in it than there was with the Closed Beta, it’s still lacking some of the key features that they had shown off in past events.

If you were in the Closed Beta, the first thing you’ll notice is the brand new renovated Central Plaza, which looks nothing like it used to. The Central Plaza is basically the center of the world. From here, you’re given access to most of the main city areas, including the Mall, the Home Theatre, and the Bowling Alley. Within the Central Plaza is many places for sit and chat with your friends, the Listen@Home station, which features ten varied tracks from artists that no one’s heard of, and a mini-game called Saucer Pop. Saucer Pop, while just a silly mini-game within PlayStation® Home as a whole, is still quite addiciting, and features you flying a miniature flying saucer and popping bubbles with stars in them to earn points.

The Mall now finally has items that you can purchase in it. Unfortunately, unlike a few other virtual worlds which offer both an in-game method of paying for things as well as a real life cash method (see: vSide), everything that you want to purchase, down to a shirt for your back, will cost you something, and give you nothing in return, except for a prettier looking virtual avatar. General clothes for your avatar will pretty much cost you about $0.49 for each piece, furniture for your apartment will cost you around $0.99 a piece, and a new personal space itself will run you about $4.99. Right now, there still isn’t a whole ton of stuff for you to choose from, but with time, we should expect to see a full collection of items to stock the shelves.

The Home Theatre, not the one at your actual home, but the Theatre inside the city of Home, has not changed. Within the Closed Beta, it was used to show a behind the scenes video from SOCOM: Confrontation, which usually wasn’t a packed house. Now it’s being used to show the movie trailer for Twilight, followed by an exclusive music video for a song within the movie performed by Paramore. Sony has advertised the Theatre as a place to “watch game and movie trailers”, but with the internet being a very easy place to access these things as well, it will be interesting to see what this spot can offer that people can’t see anywhere else. If they can’t come up with something unique to keep peoples’ attention, then this will be one of the least used spots of the entire world.

Probably the most happening spot of the main area in Home is the Bowling Alley. Featuring five lanes with matches containing up to four people, the game of bowling is one of the most entertaining games in the area. It takes some skill, or at least some practice to get good at this, but when you are, it’s entertaining to play. There are three steps to bowling. The first is the aim, which way you’re throwing the ball. The second is speed, how fast you’re rolling it. The third and final step is spin, which allows you to spin the ball either left or right, which can be the deciding factor with some of your shots. Bowling isn’t the only thing you can do at the Alley though. Arcade machines line the two sides of the alleys, featuring Ice Breaker and Carriage Return which are unique games to the world, and an arcade version of the popular PlayStation® Network game echochrome. Not to disappoint people looking for a different challenge, pool tables are also lined across the back end of the room, allowing for two people to be able to play a game of Solids and Stripes. The Bowling Alley is definitely the area of Home that’s meant to be the most interactive, and it’s usually pretty packed because of it. None the less, everything in this room is well made, and brings peoples’ interest.

Finding an actual real screenshot for PlayStation® Home on the internet is near to impossible right now. This is one of the few I found. Currently I am running too low on time to take one myself. Expect more screenshots in the near future.

Outside of the main area of PlayStation® Home is the specific areas reserved for certain games. As time goes on, Sony plans on releasing more of these rooms for more games, but as of the opening of the Open Beta there were only areas for the games Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune and Far Cry 2. These areas feature multiple rooms which are based around areas within the game itself, and are made with great detail. The Uncharted room features an outdoor seating section as well as an indoor one, a special arcade game only found within that area, and three doors, each with a door code that one has to decipher to be able to enter the special restricted room. Inside each of the restricted rooms is more lore and other game-related props, but other than that, there aren’t many other special features to them. The Far Cry 2 area is a little more plain, just being an area to hang out that looks like locations from the actual Far Cry 2 game. In the second room, though, is interactive action points where you can view a full-scale map of the world of Far Cry 2, as well as dossiers of the characters from the game scattered about the room. Unfortunately, there isn’t really much else to do within these areas, other than having a place with a varried atmosphere to sit and hang out.

Everyone who is in the world also is given an apartment, where they are able to decorate with furniture, or have a private location to invite their friends over to sit and chat. Your apartment is completely customizable with furniture and accessories that you have purchased, including couches, armchairs, tables, lights, and more. Many of the more notable features from demos at past events, though, are still missing from the lineup, although Sony has been quick to say that Home will be ever evolving, meaning we’ll often see updates to it.

Clubs are another feature that Sony has tried to push on PlayStation® Home. Clubs are basically a group of people under the banner of a club name. Clubs can also have a clubhouse, in which they are able to post announcements to a cork board for other members to see, as well as it’s customizable with furniture just like your personal apartment is. Different from the Closed Beta though, club leaders will now have to pay a one-time fee of $4.99 just to be able to receive a clubhouse for their club, and rumor has it that Sony will begin charging people a monthly upkeep for their club starting mid-2009. All of these things taken into account, clubs are not notably high peoples’ priorities list. Another thing that isn’t high on the list is Game Launching from within Home. Currently, only one game is confirmed to be able to launch from directly within Home itself; Warhawk. Sony has said that they will be adding support for most, if not all games in the future, including LittleBigPlanet, SOCOM: Confrontation, and more.

It’s time for the opinion side of things now. While PlayStation® Home is a very cool and unique piece of software, right now the value of it compared to the rest of the PlayStation® Network, or even other virtual worlds, is still lackluster. With the only way to upgrade being to pay cash for it, it takes away from the experience and limits users as to what they are able to do with it. I’ve found this in many virtual worlds, but it’s always the people who pay more from their pocket that are able to use that creative freedom to the fullest. If you don’t like chatting with random strangers, or meeting new people who you just bump into, you’re restricted as to what you’re able to do within the world. The mini-games scattered throughout the world are a fun escape, but with little to no value to them, and a limited amount of replayablitity, as with the arcade machines, I can see how Home will become a fad that will wearing off quickly for people. I have my hopes for it; this is just the first days of it’s release, so I expect to see many more updates to it coming soon even. But for right now, the launch has just left me wondering what they can do to get more of us interested in spending our spare time in it.

Verdict: Disappointed, but hopeful.

Console Wars – Why?

The “console wars” have been an interesting, and usually quite stupid thing to watch. For those of you who don’t exactly like video games, know nothing about video games, or just haven’t visited a section of the internet dealing with video games ever, let me catch you up to date real quick. There are two video game systems out there that are mainstream and deal with everything from graphical power to high focus gaming. Those two are Sony’s PlayStation 3, and Microsoft’s Xbox 360. The Nintendo Wii is also in the “next generation” system of consoles, but they aren’t trying in any way to compete with the PS3 or 360. They lack the graphical power, and care to want to be better, and try to focus more on interactivity and group gaming, of which they succeed in. Unfortunately though, that leaves the other two systems, both vying to show that they are better than the other, to fight for the market and consumers to buy them.

Both systems carry a wide variety of similar features that are standard for this generation of gaming. Both carry an online store in which you can buy and play downloadable games, watch downloadable movies, buy add-ons for games that you’ve purchased and much more. They both have an online system which allows you to have a friend’s list, play online, send messages, etc. Both systems have a hard drive, minus the Xbox 360 Arcade, which can store and play music, photos, and videos. They each can play DVDs, CDs, and other media. Both use wireless controllers, both use headsets, both have typing pads for their controllers, both can have webcams. So, as you can see, the market standard for video games has been upped with this new group. But in the hardware sector, there are some notable differences between the two.

Microsoft's Xbox 360

The Microsoft Xbox 360 comes in three different bundles, each of which comes with multiple games to get your collection started. Each bundle comes with a different sized hard drive, and different accessories included. Which the arcade just comes with a Composite cable and 256 MB worth of external memory, the Xbox 360 Pro, now just the standard Xbox 360, comes with a 60 GB hard drive, a headset, a network cable, and Component cables. Finally, the Xbox 360 Elite comes in the color black, has a 120 GB hard drive, the headset and cables, but also includes an HDMI cable for true high definition output. Software-wise, the 360 comes with the exclusive Dashboard, now upgraded to the NXE, or New Xbox Experience.

On the other hand, the Sony PlayStation 3 comes in two different bundles. The 160 GB PlayStation 3 which comes bundled with Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune and a voucher for Pain, and the 80 GB system which comes standalone. Unlike the 360, the PS3 has a few more special nuggets that comes standard within it. Compared to the 360, the PlayStation 3 has free online through the PlayStation Network, while with the Xbox, you are required to pay $20 for 3 months, or $50 for a year, just to be able to play with your friends online. Also, the wireless controllers for the PS3 come with a built-in rechargeable battery pack, which the 360’s use AA batteries, or, sold separately, a rechargeable battery pack of their own. The PlayStation 3 comes built-in with Wi-Fi, meaning if you have a wireless internet point nearby, you can connect automatically. The Xbox 360 is wired-only, or you can purchase a wireless adapter which will set you back $100 to give you that function as well. Also, the PlayStation 3 has built-in Bluetooth, so if you have any Bluetooth headset, you can use that for your online gaming and chatting; the 360 only allows Microsoft headsets to be used with it. One of the biggest differences, though, is that the PlayStation 3 is also a Blu-Ray player, and all games made for it are put onto Blu-Ray discs, which contain up to four times the space of the DVDs that are used in the Xbox 360.

Out of all of that, the PlayStation 3 is a clear-cut winner, looking at the hardware side of things. But most people tend to look past that and look towards the software side of things, which is an extremely understandable thing to look at. This is what sparks most of the console wars that turn up in discussions. The most talked about issue is that of “exclusives”. The Xbox 360 has notably more exclusives than the PlayStation 3, including such titles as Halo, Gears of War, Fable, and more. The PlayStation 3, on the other hand, carry titles such as LittleBigPlanet, Resistance, and Killzone. A few games, though, have brought up much controversy in the land of gaming due to them being put out multi-platform, which used to be format exclusive games. Final Fantasy was the big shocker as it was announced for the Xbox 360 as well, while there is also a teaser that shows a possibility that Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots may also be porting over (source: http://www.konami.jp/kojima_pro/mgst/?ref=kjp_eng). The problem is, most people tend to think that the system with more exclusives, or “better” exclusives, as a matter of opinion, is the better system overall. While Final Fantasy XIII is coming over to the 360 as well, SquareEnix has announced that they are creating the PlayStation 3 version first, and porting the game to the 360 afterwards. While this doesn’t necessarily mean that the game will be worse, hands down, on the 360, it does mean that they are looking to not sacrifice the quality of the game just so that it can be made for both systems.

Sony's PlayStation 3

Another issue that I’ve found with porting games over is the fact that Blu-Ray discs hold at least four times more space on them than the DVDs used for the 360. If they were to port a game such as Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots over, they’d have to “dumb” the game down, and take out a lot of extra content just to make it fit on a disc to be played on it. While exclusives is a big part of having a good console, in the long run, making a good game isn’t just looking at the system it’s played on. If a game is good, it will be good on it’s own, not just because it’s on the PlayStation 3 or Xbox 360. Another issue that turns people to one system or another is it’s user base. The Xbox 360 has been around for longer, therefore meaning there are more people who play online with it. Even though that’s true, the PlayStation 3 online service has been picking up steam with the holidays approaching, and the longer it’s out, the more it sells. Also, being a free service, having built-in Wi-Fi, and including new features such as PlayStation Home into the mix, it creates a more easily accessible and immersive experience for players.

One thing I understand is that people are going to take this as a biased rant of a fanboy for Sony. The fact is, yes, I only own a PlayStation 3, but, I know a good game when I see one. I am currently in college for Multimedia, Digital Entertainment & Game Design, so I look at the quality of a game in general, not the fact that it’s exclusively on the system that I own. I am also a video game journalist, I write about video games, review them, and talk about them all of the time. My honest opinion does boil down to the fact that I believe the PlayStation 3 is better when it comes to a hardware perspective, and a software perspective as well, but I will not be so naive to say that the Xbox 360 does not have good games, is a very well made system, and has a fan base just as large, if not more, than the PlayStation 3 does. Surfing forums of sites that I regularly visit, and seeing threads ranting about how one system is better than the other, though, get to me, because “fanboys” and “fangirls” tend to put their blinders on, and only look at how the system that they own and use is the ultimate video game machine ever made. The fact of the matter is, video games in this day and age… are cool.

Killzone 2 Preview

Killzone 2

Developer: Guerrilla
Publisher: SCEA
Release Date: February 17, 2009
Rating: RP

Killzone 2, a PlayStation 3 exclusive, went into Open Beta about a month ago, and I was one of the lucky people to get an invite to play in it. I’ve taken quite a bit of time, about seven hours of gameplay time alone actually, to check out all of the different modes, maps, and options that you have at your disposal in the Killzone 2 Beta, and I have been quite happy with what I’ve found. The Killzone 2 Beta is a multiplayer-only Beta, there is no single-player demo involved within it.

The Killzone 2 Beta contains three different maps: Salamun Market, a very large outdoor map with multiple routes from one base to the other; Radec Academy, a medium-sized map that is set indoors with only a few ways out of your main base; and Blood Gracht, a very small map with only one way out of your base, and the middle being a massive choke point for everyone. I haven’t been a huge fan of Blood Gracht personally, because if your opponents team happens to be too much better than your own team, you will get a huge bottleneck back at the entrance of your base, making it impossible to get out without being killed instantly. Also, with the map being so close quarters, team killing is another factor that comes into play, and you definately have to watch out so that you don’t kill your own teammates. Blood Gracht is said to be a map for 8-16 players, but it doesn’t stop you from having anywhere up to 32 within the map. Radec Academy is another map that can be dangerous if your opponent’s team is too much more skilled than yours is. The one main way out of your base can be camped quite easily by rocket wielders, and snipers can watch the top path out of your base, making it quite difficult to make any progress. Salamun Market, on the other hand, is a beautiful demonstration of how one can use many different strategies to be able to win. With it being so wide open, worrying about getting spawn killed is a moot point. Also, with multiple ways to get from one side of the map to another, it does a good job of preventing camping in a choke point of some kind.

One of my favorite unique points about Killzone 2 is the “Missions”, or “Game Modes” that you are able to play in a round. Unlike other shooters, where you get one game mode, such as Team Deathmatch, everything is based off of two teams, and different Missions that you must fulfill within a round. After one Mission is finished, another Mission is selected to be played directly afterwards, meaning you won’t be doing the same thing for the entire round. The five Mission Modes are as follows: Body Count, in which you have to kill more enemies than they kill of your team in a time limit; Assassination, where a single player is selected as a target, and the opposing team must take them out before the time is up; Search And Retrieve, a mode where your team must grab an item and bring it back to your capture point to score; Capture And Hold, a bases-type mission where you must hold control points within the map to score; and Search And Destroy, which involves one team trying to plant explosives to destroy an objective, while the other team defends that point. Within one round, each game type will be cycled through at least once, and each Mission counts as a point. At the end of the round, the team with more points from won Missions wins. I find this much more interesting than just having to play the same thing for five to ten minutes, and much more unique than I’ve seen in first-person shooters in the past.

As you progress through the online mode, you earn points for getting kills or achieving objectives from the Missions. The more points you have, the more abilities you have, or the different classes you’re able to be. Each rank is a different rank of the military, beginning with Corporal, and ending with General. As you rank up, you gain the ability to do stuff such as create Squads, create Clans, spawn with new weapons, become a Medic to aid your teammates, and so on. You can also gain more upgrades by achieving certain conditions within a round, ranging from getting ten points in a round, to killing the Assassination target in a round. Each different medal will give you another boost, such as increasing the amount of ammunition you start with when you spawn.

Squads are an interesting part of Killzone 2. If you have made it to a certain rank, you are able to create Squads. A Squad is a 1-4 person team within your team which have direct communication with each other if you have a headset, as well as they show up as a different color on your radar. You are also able to see what abilities they have selected for the round by their name, which shows up on the top part of your screen. One such ability is the ability to be a Medic. Whenever you die, you are actually still alive, just Critically Wounded, unless your opponent decides to shoot you again, which kills you for sure. You have ten seconds before you are able to respawn yourself, or, if there is a Medic nearby, they can bring you back to life with 50% health. This is a very useful ability to have because it prevents you from having to go all the way back to your base again if you are far away from it. Later on you can get the badge for being an Engineer, which gives you the ability to create sentry turrets wherever you are.

Overall, my opinion of this game is very high. Back at E3 a few years ago, they admitted that the trailer they had created was pre-rendered, but the graphics of this game look so much like it that it’s hard to believe now. This game is beautiful, and looks like it will be excellent when it comes out in 2009. With the unique way that each round goes, even for a Beta it’s kept me more interested than a lot of other shooters that I have played recently, and I have been quite happy for it. Just remember that this is NOT like other shooters. The weapons in this game are not based off of real weapons, and fire much differently, as well as the game modes are challenging and unique. If you are looking for something different, this is the game to pick up for sure.

New Video Game Releases – November 2, 2008

Video games are a big part of my life, so this past month, and now even this month coming up, are some of the biggest, and roughest months of them all. While it’s awesome that this many great looking games are coming out, at the same time, it’s rough on the wallet, as well as the time factor that goes in to playing all of these games. Over the next couple of days, I’m going to stick to video games, because there’s so much about them to talk about right now. Today though, I’m going to stick to video games that are coming out for this week, the week of November 2, 2008. Tuesday is going to be one helluva busy day at the retailers as most games are coming out then, and quite the collection we will see. Don’t forget to look ahead though, pre-ordering games could be essential if you want to make sure that you get a copy. So, here’s a look at this week’s new releases!

PlayStation 3

Resistance 2
SCEA, Insomniac Games
November 4, 2008

A sequel to the highly popular PlayStation 3 exclusive, Resistance 2 comes out this week in both a standard package, and in a huge collector’s edition tin, but you may have needed to pre-order that one to get your hands on it by now. The campaign once again takes off after the end of the first Resistance game, but this time, there are actually a few campaigns to choose from. With the inclusion of a brand new co-op campaign mode, which features new, unique missions to co-op gameplay only, the game is kept fresh and new. The multiplayer has now been increased to 60 players, making it one of the largest multiplayer games made yet.

Naruto: Ultimate Ninja Storm
Namco Bandai Games, CyberConnect2
November 4, 2008

This time coming out only for the PlayStation 3, the Naruto franchise of video games comes back stronger than ever. Your typical fighting game comes back with the quirkiness of the Naruto series of ninjas. With a few modes, including your regular story battles, and a new open world free battle mode, you can take off in the immersive world of ninjas and fight your way to the top. Choose from any of the characters that you’d be able to see within the anime series to run with, including the latest forms of characters from the latest episodes of the long-running anime.

Valkyria Chronicles
Sega
November 4, 2008

This unique real time strategy game with action role-playing elements comes exclusive to the PlayStation 3 this month. Using unique graphics, this game is more or less painted with a watercolor effect, and features classic comic book sound effect graphics during movement and battle. With a unique live time battle system, as well as a turn-based style of movement and attacking, this game shows off gameplay that isn’t seen in many strategy games. Set in a fictional European War, it features everything from scout runners, to machine-gun wielders, and even tanks.

Xbox 360

Gears of War 2
Microsoft Game Studios, Epic Games
November 7, 2008

This Xbox 360 exclusive brings us back to the fight against the Locust, as you settle back into the role of Marcus Fenix. With beautiful graphics, a huge smattering of weapons, and enough enemies to make an entire city with, you get plunged deeper into their home in order to take back the home of your own. A new co-op mode lets you take on the Locust with a friend this time, and works quite well in doing that. Multiplayer is still in, with some new modes to do so in. With a few new features, including chainsaw-to-chainsaw battles, Gears of War 2 looks to be quite the good looking sequel to it’s first, major selling counterpart.

Multiplatform

Tom Clancy’s EndWar
Ubisoft, Ubisoft Shanghai
November 4, 2008
PS3, XBOX360, PSP, DS, PC

The time for unique real time strategy games is prevalent as Tom Clancy’s EndWar comes out in the next week. Set in a period of World War III, players will get to battle in real life locations, destroying them with every weapon imaginable, and also those unimaginable. EndWar brings a heavy online focused game world, where you can fight against thousands of other war hungry players on their own couch. Using voice commands, players can command their armies to move, attack, or patrol an area just based on what they say. Being on a console, the way this is played is quite unique, but works very well, as you control your army from it’s point of view, and not one hovering miles above.

James Bond: Quantum of Solace
Activision
November 4, 2008
PS3, XBOX360, PS2, WII, DS, PC

Set to come out around the time the movie does, another 007 game has come to being. Activision and Treyarch make this game, creators of the latest Call of Duty game, World at War. Stepping into the 007 franchise for the first time, they’ve done their best to immerse yourself in the world of the movie, playing as Bond himself, of course. Since the game is based off of the CoD4 engine, multiplayer is very fast paced, and contains modes similar to the ancient GoldenEye game, such as Golden Gun. Sadly though, the Golden Gun is not a one-hit kill, but rather shoots explosive rounds. None the less, if you’re a bond fan, this game will be right up your alley.

Legendary
Gamecock Media Group, Spark Unlimited
November 4, 2008
PS3, XBOX360, PC

Legendary brings the fantasy world and our real world together for the fight of your life like no other. After accidentally opening Pandora’s Box, you unleash hordes of mythical creatures upon the world, and you set off to destroy them once again. This first-person shooter will have you killing werewolves, gryphons, and many more fantastic creatures created from worlds of dream. This game will have you at the edge of your seat as you fight enemies that are many times the size of you as they ravish New York city, and other locals in the world that we know and love.

>> PLEASE REMAIN CALM <<

You know, I’m not a Halo fan, at all, period. I mean, I’ll play it, and it’s fun, but to be brutally honest, the game just doesn’t show anything very special to me. It’s a futuristic shooter of humans versus aliens, with cool weapons, excellent looking maps, and fun gameplay. But I can find a good handful more of these on many different systems, all different than Halo, yet still the same type of concept.

But, the point of this post isn’t to rip on Halo, or Bungie. In fact, it’s to praise them for their excellent work. What do I mean? Well you may be surprised to know, if you don’t keep up with the video game world very closely, that Bungie is working on a new Halo 3 project. Yes, I said Halo 3 project, and I don’t mean a downloadable update that gives you more titles or something silly like that. I mean a full-fledged campaign, featuring a new main storyline leading character. For those of you who have played Halo 3, you’ll know exactly why there’s a new main character for it. For those of you who haven’t yet played Halo 3… well, put two and two together, I’m sure you can figure it out. Did I forget to mention that this may have been a bit of a spoiler alert?

The reason, though, that I’m so impressed and happy with them, is because Bungie is excellent at working up a story. Or at least teasing us with something that looks cool and unique. Many people have complained about the Halo trilogy storyline, and while in some cases it’s well deserved, in the overall long run, the Halo universe story has been quite good. They succeeded in creating a compelling storyline which has led our hero Master Chief from one end of the universe to the other. And now, they’re looking to continue a branch of it in their newest work.

>> PLEASE REMAIN CALM <<

Halo 3: Recon is what they’re calling it. You can find the central hub for it on Bungie’s website under the odd code-word of “whvidldshbyjsdo“. How long it’ll stay that way, who knows, but it sure is unique, and odd. None the less, by visiting that and checking out the new Trailer, you’ll find that it looks to start in New Mombasa with an ODST, or Orbital Drop Shock Trooper, assuming that the time that this takes place is after the Covenant warped from right within the city. I found the trailer to be pretty unique, coming from the city’s auto-AI viewpoints for the most part. None the less, this opens up more questions than one could ever have guessed.

Will this be a brand new game, on a disc? Will this be a downloadable update? Will this be an XBL paid download? How long will the game be? Who is the main character? What’s happening? Do these questions end? Can I end this post in only questions? What about the trailer and the game? Are you interested? If I had an Xbox 360, would I buy it? Will you buy it? What do you think?

Media Week – Spore

Spore

Developer: Maxis
Publisher: Electronic Arts
Release Date: September 7, 2008
Rating: E10+

Spore is a truly amazing game when you sit back and look that it all entails. On first play-through, it took me around seven hours or so to make it to the fifth and final stage of the game, and that’s not including all of the different things I can do in that final stage. The game really centers around two things: evolving your character from the cellular stage upwards, and creation. There are two main modes in Spore: the Creators, and the game itself.

Within the game itself, you have to evolve your creature through five stages of life: the Cell stage, the Creature stage, the Tribe stage, the Civilization stage, and the Space stage. Starting in the Cell stage, you create yourself as a small cell in the water, who must eat the food that you choose to grow. Every action that you make, in this case either eating plants or meat, will decide how your creature evolves, and what special abilities you get later on in the game. When you have eaten enough, you will be given an option to move on to the Creature stage. In this stage, you evolve enough to gain legs and arms, and to be able to walk and run. Now your task is to either make friends with other creatures, or to destroy them all so that you are the dominant race. Starting at about here, most of the creatures that you will meet in your travels, if you’re connected to the internet, will either be Maxis created creatures, or creatures created by other players who have shared them on the Spore.com website.

After you’ve gotten enough DNA points from this stage, you’re race will evolve enough to be able to form a Tribe. Now you are given a small town, and either have to impress other creature tribes and befriend them, or destroy them all as well to become the top race. After becoming the best here, you will move on to the Civilization stage. You’ve learned enough by now to make a city, and your responsibilities grow because of it. Now you must not only protect your cities, but you must convince other cities of your same creature that you created to join your cause, or destroy them for their betrayal. After all of the cities are yours, you then move on to the most vast stage of them all, the Space stage. Now is your time to fly off to other planets and try to control them all as well. This stage is, without a doubt the largest of them all, and will provide you with the most gameplay of it all.

Overall, one could say that it’s more like five games that you have to play in succession with your same creature, all mixed together in this one package. Not only can you play it that way, but there is also the Creator mode, in which you gain the ability to create a creature in any one of the stages, or create the buildings or vehicles that are used in the Civilization stage. The creation elements are endless, and can be combined to make almost anything that you can think of. When playing, you can also load these creations that you have made without being forced to create something new every time. After making a creation, you can upload it to Spore’s Encyclopedia of creations called the Sporepedia. With this, you can download other peoples’ creations to your game, you can upload yours so that others can use them, or find your friends’ creations to add them to your game.

While having a high graphical computer makes the game look amazing, even using a simple computer with an on-board graphics card will make the game run at a very decent pace. I was able to play without any lag. I didn’t get the best graphics of course, but I was still able to play the game and get the best out of all of it’s functions without any trouble at all. The music that is involved in the game as well is very catchy. While it’s nothing special and worthy of a soundtrack, it’s perfect for each stage of the game. Each creature also has their own unique “voice” which they use to communicate, or to impress other species. In the later levels, your creature will even speak in a voice that you may hear in a Sims game.

This game definitely shows you the value that you pay for it. With the ability to continuously be able to download more creatures, buildings, and more; as well as to create your own and to change up the way that you decide to go about your life in each phase, will definitely change the way the game plays each and every time. I find myself going back and playing through it again with a new, different looking creature, changing the items I use on it every time, and then changing how aggressive, or how much I try and be friendly each time. It’s a very fun game, and I can’t see it stopping anytime soon.

If you can still find the Galactic Edition anywhere, the box itself is a work of art. Each box weighs about five pounds, and comes with a DVD on “The Making of Spore”, a book on “The Art of Spore”, a fold-out Spore poster, a premium 100-page Galactic Handbook, and a DVD made by National Geographic called “How to Build a Better Being“. Everything within this package is well made, and worth every penny to me, so get out there and pick up Spore today!

Weasel’s Score: 90%