F.E.A.R. 2: Project Origin review – Xbox 360

Monolith’s bringing the F.E.A.R. back home with their new sequel.

It’s been a rocky road for the F.E.A.R. franchise over the last three years, squabbles over the game's ownership between Monolith and Vivendi made it seem that a true sequel with the F.E.A.R. name had become impossible. A few months ago however, both companies were able to bury the hatchet (under a bundle of money) so Monolith could present us with the continuation of the story that they began with the original F.E.A.R. First Encounter Assault Recon, forsaking all previous attempts by TimeGate Studios. So what does all this crazy industry business mean exactly? Well if you’ve played either F.E.A.R. Extraction Point or F.E.A.R. Perseus Mandate then you can wipe that experience from your mind as if it never happened, because as far as F.E.A.R. 2 is concerned, it didn’t. For those who missed out on the original then you missed out on what was named shooter of the year 2006 by some and is also one of the most disturbing shooters on the market.

F.E.A.R. 2 puts you in the shoes of Michael Becket just before the explosive ending to F.E.A.R. and keeps the same broody atmosphere, reflex time and creepy little girl that made the first game stand out so much. Storytelling has improved greatly giving you a far better grasp on what is going on and why you’re there. This is all helped by competent voice acting and sixty pieces of collectable journal intelligence which tell the story as you progress, but it’s hardly a rollercoaster of intrigue and has little in the way of surprises. Open endings are in style right now and the ending here isn’t any exception, there’s plenty of room for further sequels after this game’s climax.

You won’t be spending the whole game by yourself

Core gameplay is largely unchanged, but since every FPS needs an angle F.E.A.R. 2 presents to you intractable cover table flipping (a-la Stranglehold) and mech combat (a-la – uhh, MechWarrior?). Firstly the cover system, like several other aspects of the game, heralds from a slightly older school of gaming in that you don’t ‘snap to’ cover like you would in Gears of War and blind fire around corners. This isn’t necessarily a failing since it doesn’t create a game full of waist high walls for you to hind behind after every corner. The cover system does occasionally confuse the poor replica soldiers, several times I witnessed a soldier stand out greatly from the cover, making him an easy target or I’d see several soldier running back and forwards over a large open area taking cover at either side. The AI isn’t bad on the whole, but it does have some quirks and generally isn’t as revolutionary as F.E.A.R. was three years ago. Good use of cover makes combat a whole lot easier, but being equipped with a fully operational mech armed with machine guns, rockets and heat vision is a better way of tipping the odds into your favor. Those who played the F.E.A.R. 2 demo will likely say that a mech section that uses up a third of the demo has no more place in F.E.A.R. than it would in G.R.A.W. but fortunately in the context of the full game these sections are used rather well. After battling a few mechs while on foot, entering one yourself doesn’t feel so out of place and while it does remove you from the creepy and vulnerable sensations you’d be experiencing otherwise, these sections are used very sparingly and don’t equate to even a tenth of the game.

It’s obvious by now that F.E.A.R. 2 has two goals: solid combat and creepy atmosphere. For the largest part it succeeds at both very well. The guns have a great feeling of impact when they connect, although the gore on impact can be a little overused. Some replicant soldiers must have a destruct button hidden somewhere on their body as landing a grenade a few feet away from your target will often cause the soldier to explode into a gorgeous sea of crimson rather than being thrown from the blast. I can’t really vouch for the realism of this gore one way or the other having not personally thrown any cooked frag grenades into crowded areas. Other weapons such as the laser will allow you to satisfyingly dice your targets in two even through some cover, which is sure to have you squealing with glee. The weapon selection isn’t huge and totals around eight in all with a generous four gun inventory system, especially handy when ammo is running short. F.E.A.R.’s combat might be a shock to the system for some when you find that you’re not blessed with the supernatural ability to regenerate health by standing still, unlike so many recent games. This will require a sharp change in your playing strategy after the numerous health pickups from the beginning of the game start to become far less frequent.

Going toe to toe with a mech isn’t too wise

If you’re not in combat then you’ve likely reached a horror section of the game, after clearing out a few rooms of foes your HUD will flicker and fuzz signaling another interlude as you begin to expect creepy girl Alma to appear behind you in a reflection at any moment. Not being much of a horror movie fan myself I did find that the constant shifting between combat and the horror sections becoming tiresome and a little too played out by the end. You do have to appreciate these sections though, some of the sick, twisted and unusual things you see do keep things interesting, it’s just a pity that you’re constantly mentally classifying each section combat to horror to combat to horror. Then again, I might be overanalyzing this whole thing. One of the biggest gates to a quick progression through the game is often in the form of a small padlock in the corner of a large room, perhaps I’m spoilt by waypoint markers but there’s nothing fun about wondering through the same rooms over again just to find the exit tucked away in the far corner.

While you may be surprised by some of these gruesome and twisted goings on in F.E.A.R. 2 you’re unlikely to be knocked off your feet by the graphics. Nothing here jumps out as looking bad per se but this is the same Lithtech engine seen in Condemned and the previous F.E.A.R. games, so despite the enhanced textures it still doesn’t always graphically feel like a new release. That said, Monolith sure does know to use effects to enhance atmosphere. Rather than a clear vision you’ll often have to deal with interference fuzzing up your heads up display or having the display in the mech go haywire after taking one too many missiles, these effects go a long way towards creating the atmosphere and are well used, much like the audio. There’s the usual whizz bangs of rockets flying and guns firing, spoken dialog is well read and scripted, one little gem of dialog is when your warned that Anya wants to devour you like “free pizza at an anime convention”, while a good laugh the humor fortunately begins and ends there. The music is especially effective even though barely heard. Dynamic orchestral scores aren’t anything new but having everything quiet but tense keeps yourself in tune with the current situation.

Most guns aren’t original, but they are satisfying

Those of you who are hoping to be able to play through the story with a friend for comforting support will have to just rely on moral support as F.E.A.R. 2 doesn’t feature any co-op modes, hardly surprising due to the nature of the story. There’s also no split-screen online, although you do get your usual online modes of deathmatch and team deathmatch along with a basic experience based leveling system and four other multiplayer modes:

• Armored Front
  Team on team combat over a large area with five command points. Plays a lot like the UT2004’s onslaught with mechs and gun emplacements. A whole lot of fun.
• Blitz
  Essentially capture the flag (or Phlag)  but instead of one flag in each base your whole team either has the role of attack or defend
• Control
  Plays a little like Armored Front but with only 3 control points and no mechs, makes for a much faster game.
• Failsafe
  The toughest mode of them all, team based bomb planting and bomb defusal, with no re-spawns. Definitely one for the more experienced players.

Multiplayer is fast, furious and fun despite a feeling that it’s all been done before and is worth looking into if you want to get your full moneys worth out, but doesn’t solely merit a purchase for most people.

Boo!

F.E.A.R.2 perfectly meets the expectations set by the previous game and it doesn’t go out of its way to attract new players. The single player mode will only give you roughly seven hours of gameplay so hopefully you’ll get the extra millage out of the multiplayer. Overall F.E.A.R. 2 is a solid PC style FPS with some traits from some of the more recent console multiplayer console shooters.

Rise of the Argonauts review

I consider myself to be rather well informed about upcoming games but there’s always a few that manage to creep up out of nowhere, for me Rise of the Argonauts is one of those games. Very loosely based off some ancient Greek mythology, Rise of the Argonauts tells a tail of Jason and his companions in their quest for the golden fleece which the astute amongst you may remember as an item in God of War 2. I’m a total sucker for any Greek mythology, even when it is rather twisted from the original tales there’s always a whole lot of back story that makes you feel like your playing in a world full of rich back story. It’s also easy to forgive the lack of accuracy in the retelling of these stories as who wants a story about Hercules killing his first children and taking many male lovers? Actually don’t answer that, I don’t want to know.

Everything begins with the assassination of your wife on your wedding day, Jason becomes rather aggravated by this and sets out for revenge while still determined that there must be a way to bring back his wife. The story is all laid out rather quickly and doesn’t offer much in the way of surprises, you’ll quickly find that you need to recover the descendents of three gods and use them to recover the golden fleece. Any option for open ended mission structure begins and ends with your choosing which descendant you go after first. It’s all a rather predictable story that’s clearly laid out for a video game; initial mission, 3 quests to find the descendants, mission after everyone's together, final mission.

Almost right away you’re thrown into some rudimentary God of War style combat with some familiar controls; weak attack, strong, dodge and block. At the beginning although everything appears to control rather well and you have 3 weapons, it doesn’t seem very deep or extensive, no real combo system and you simply either block attack or dodge attack. Fortunately the combat does get increasingly more interesting as you develop powers by devoting your deeds to the four gods. I’ll go into deeds a little later, but once you’d devoted some deeds you get to choose aspects from the four available skill trees, pick a few level one skills and the level 2 bracket opens and so on. It seems a little complicated on paper, but it actually works out pretty well and most importantly it adds a lot of diversity to the combat. Some aspects build up your existing skills, others can be mapped to the Dpad and used as god powers. God powers take a short while to charge up but being able to open up a black hole above you and suck enemies in or throw lightning and turn your foes to stone sure does mix up the combat and keep things interesting. The big disparity between something like God of War and Rise of the Argonauts is that instead of a game full of combat with brief pauses, you’re only occasionally treated to any combat, epically after the first battle.

Once you’re through your first battle Rise of the Argonauts transforms into something more akin to Mass Effect than you’d at first expect, lots of people to talk to and the rather iconic radial dialog menu. I mentioned before how Greek mythology is rather a fascination of mine and I appreciate a game that goes a little slower to build up the experience, but Rise of the Argonauts takes it a little too far. After the first combat you’ll be wondering around Iolcus traveling from one side of the map to the other on several occasions to complete quests, now I know that we’re talking 6th century Greece here and town planning has surely come a long way, but whoever designed this city should be sent to the gallows! Navigation has to be achieved without any mini-map, or full map hot button so trying to find your way around is often only possible by repeated trips through the menu to pull up a map. Perhaps if the regions weren’t so tedious or difficult to navigate then the story sections wouldn’t feel so long and strangely the worst example of this behavior hits you right at the beginning of the game.

Meet Hercules (left), the human man mountain

In the cities you visit you’ll find plenty of little side quests that will occasionally provide you with new armor or weapons but more likely will be the gift of a completed deed that can be devoted to the deity of your choice. The radial dialog menu often allows you to honor one of the four gods by reflecting their virtues in your response; follow the path of Athena and give justice, Allollo for compassion, Hermies for cunning or Aries if you just want to act like an ass. By devoting deeds from completed quests, general achievements or following the virtues you can unlock the abilities mentioned earlier and toughen up Jason for the fights ahead. These dialog sequences aren’t written partially well and acting follows suit with a rather mediocre performance, these dialog sequences are often spoilt even further by the soundtrack and glitches. While there’s nothing exactly wrong with the musical score it doesn’t seem to know when it’s not wanted, a powerful part of the tune will flair up in the middle of some dialog partially drowning out the voice work, other times the speaker of a line of dialog may stand stiff as a board with only his lips moving giving the occasional feeling your using a 6 year old game engine with high resolution graphics. The game engine shows plenty of faults outside of dialog but mostly with the way the characters move and feel like their skating across the floor. Graphically everything looks fine, but there are some deeper issues at play here.

People looking for a fast action game will be disappointed by Rise of the Argonauts despite how good the combat does eventually become it’s just too few and far between. Rise of the Argonauts is worth a play though if you are the more patient RPG type who can put up with the many failings then you’ll at least find some joy as having Hercules as a trusty sidekick. 10-15 hours of time should see the average player through from start to finish, but lack of any real effect from your actions stifles replay value.

4/5

Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix - Review

In my book if you want to be called a gamer then you've already played some iteration of Street Fighter II, as well as the original Mario Brothers, Pong and have completed your pilgrimage to find a working pinball machine (sorry, but those are the rules). Anyway for those who aren't versed in the Street Fighter series then it's as simple as can be; It's a 2d fighter with 3 punches, 3 kicks and a wide variety of stereotypes to kick and punch in the face.

This new HD remix is based off of the SSF2T arcade machine that came out in '94 rather than the five year old Hyper Street Fighter II, which is a shame since it'd be nice to select the classic versions of the characters but since balance improvements are a significant portion of what HD Remix offers it does make sense that this isn't the way that Capcom chose to go. Selecting remix mode will turn on these new subtle balance adjustments which many may not even notice, besides changes to grant easier accessibility like Zangief's spinning piledriver no longer requiring a whole 270 degrees motion to be performed. For the crazy tournament fighters who count frames and pixels, then you'll notice (or won't) even smaller tweaks such as hitboxes shifting or expanding a couple of pixels, it's nothing that I'd ever personally notice but I'm sure there are people out there that'll find changes like that will make or break a character or matches. Along with the remix mode there are also pages of DIP switch settings that'll change inane options like whether the first couple of frames of a specific animation grant invincibility or not, once again, these options will likely make no changes to 99% of the players but it's nice to know Capcom care enough to put these options in for the die-hards out there. Super Turbo purists will be glad that these options are purely optional, as every option should be, and a lot of the tweaks focus on empowering the weaker of the characters rather than nerfing the already powerful characters. Speaking of raw unfiltered power, since Super Turbo originally brought Akuma into the Street Fighter series you'll find him fully playable here, brining the total selectable combatants to 17.

 

Okay so we've covered the Super Street Fighter II Turbo and the Remix and now we're left with the rather stunning widescreen HD visuals, which I'm sure took far more time to create than Capcom gets credit for. Every frame of animation for the 17 characters has been faithfully redrawn into today's glorious world of high definition and it's easy to quickly forget that you're looking at updated art, so it's nice that you can switch back to seeing the old frames in all their pixilated glory for a quick reality check. These HD sprites would look pretty bizarre without a good place to live so the backgrounds have all gone through the same redrawing process and look equally fantastic although sadly you'll get no classic backgrounds option for comparison. All this whiz bang video truly does look fantastic and is complemented well by the new music courtesy of the guys over at OverClocked ReMix. OC ReMix have done some great work in the past with reinterpretations of some classic tunes and they pulled no punches (hehe) when putting together their SSFIITHDR soundtrack which is simply a joy to listen to and gives great variations on the classic Street Fighter tunes. (The OC ReMix album for Street Fighter is available free from their website)

Street Fighter II HD remix delivers what was promised as far as AV and the multiplayer aspects have also been greatly enhanced since the cluster of 2006's Street Fighter® II’ Hyper Fighting on XBL. Multiplayer is critical component as the single player can be controller breakingly frustrating even at relatively easy difficulty levels as the AI attacks with perfect precision, at the harder difficulties the precision is the same but the aggression is relentless, fortunately in our homes we have infinite virtual coins to continue with. Single player Street fighter is fine for a bit of training but you'll only find any real joy if you're matched up to players of similar skill levels. It's fortunate that SSFIITHDR brings enough options to keep multiplayer interesting, tournament modes, leaderboards and the rather unique 'quarter match' are all available in a relatively lag free environment.

The biggest failing for any new Street Fighter II iteration is the bar for entry, sure it's not as rough as Virtua Fighter has become but the AI opponents are so cheap they really aren't all that much fun to play against, playing online with others is the way to go for a good level of challenge without being used as a swiffer. The huge problem here is that there is no such skill based matching so you never receive a constant challenge from your opponents, which is as much as a disappointment to the top players as to any other. Difficulty aside, this is still the best looking and sounding Street Fighter yet and at only $5 more than the broken Hyper Fighting this is a required game for any fighting game fan to have in their library

4/5

Midnight Club: Los Angeles review

After a long hiatus, Midnight Club brings the LA streets to the PS3 and 360

When the Midnight Club series first started back in 2000 it didn't have much notable competition in the street/import style racing games, however since then Need for Speed underground has stepped in and has been causing Midnight Club to evolve to keep up with EA's giant racing series. There's been no bigger jump for the series than the jump to the current generation systems, some changes for the better, and sadly some for the worse.

It's fun to just explore the city

A most notable achievement for Midnight Club:LA is the graphics, the screenshots look great, but seeing everything move along at a very steady frame rate in such an amazing city looks fantastic. The city of LA is Midnight Club's best feature, now I've never been to LA so I can't compare to the real thing, but the layout feels a lot like a living and breathing city. You'll see shopping districts, parking lots, plazas all placed around the city with great attention to detail and it's all packed together so tightly that you won't find yourself traveling through boring map areas just to get from one half of the city to the other. Managing such a large and detailed area without any load times is impressive, however this does feel like it must be pushing the 360 a little too hard, as sometimes when jumping from the map it can take several seconds for textures to re-appear and occasionally they don't come back at all. While driving around the city you'll find traffic to be a constant thorn in your side, however Midnight Club's LA seems to exist in a world or nearly perpetual darkness and clear skys, so you'll rarely have to travel through the rush hour traffic.

Weather effects enhance the LA atmosphere

Although the city is great, navigating it while in a race is beyond frustrating. Arrows appear as markers on each waypoint but they'll often appear at inconievenient places, espically when you're near a highway and it isn't always obvious if you should be getting on, or off. Even when you do follow these arrows the odds are stacked against you, the computer knows best and will often take the shortest route from A-B, leaving you following the long way around like a chump. This problem may seem minor, but since the solution is to simply have a minimap with a line on it, the issue is just senseless. Blundering your way around the city does get easier as you learn the routes and learning will come quick when it seems you're just competing in the same races over and over, because often you are. The reson you're playing this same mission again is because your opponent is a heartless racing machine with the reactions and movement of an over caffeinated hamster.

The city detail is great

One of the best ways to aid victory is to be driving the best car in your class so your not constantly eating the dust of your rivals, but your choices aren't particularly vast. There's 43 cars and 3 bikes available to you, which if you've been keeping score you'll find that number is nearly 30 less than the previous game. Fortunately Ford and Mazda have now been added to the lineup so even with less cars, there is at least more variation of manufactures. Both cars and bikes can be upgraded with new parts, or have their appearance modified with cosmetic changes, paint jobs and vinyls, true to the sprit of Midnight Club these visual changes can be used for great evil, turning a classy car into a two toned, neon eyesores with a spoiler like a shopping trolley. Cars can also be outfitted with power-ups like EMP pulses or the ability to slow down time and while these aren't 'mostly' overpowered, hitting an enemy just right with aggro and knocking them down the wrong street will take them some time to recover.

The evils or car customization

There's a fair selection of different activities to be done; you can deliver cars but this essentially is just a time trial with a damage limit, then there's actual time trials, straight mana-a-mano races, tournaments and the rather treacherous pink slip races, amongst other things. Racing for pinks may not be something you're familiar with, but when you agree to a pink race both drivers put their cars on the line. Usually in a game you'd expect some kind of mulligan or at the very least to reach to the power switch, in Midnight Club trying any of these little tricks will forfeit your ride so you better be damn sure before you enter one of these races. The tension of the pink slip races is rather unique to a racing game, but with the punishing and often unfair challenge of the game you're perhaps better off not racing with your hottest ride, if you do then I fear for the safety of your game controllers when your luck runs out.

Bikes are fast buy risky

While your zooming around in the many races of the city you'll be progressing in a very simple story of your unnamed character who's moved to the west coast to make a name for himself, story is not in any way a focus here, but dealing with some of the characters you'll find can be unintentionally hilarious. Everyone you meet seems to be a walking Cliché from some background or another with accents as suspect as their dialog. Opponents will be taunting you about how far in front they are or how you're going to crash and they're going to overtake you, it's a very campy bad boy racer attitude that I personally find rather amusing but this style may irritate others. To drown out the dialog you can always turn up one of the 68 available radio tracks, I'd of hoped that in such a large list that I'd at least of heard of ONE of them but at least the selection is well suited to the attitude of the game.

The police aren't much of a problem

Sadly I didn't get much of a chance with multiplayer since everyone seems to be off playing one of the high profile Q4 releases, although there were enough people around to get together a game of keep away, where you simply have to hold onto a flag for as long as possible. Multiplayer seems functional and the power-ups make things a little interesting but there's not a whole lot of draw here compared to some other racers. There's is also an online mode called "Rate my ride" in which you can rate the cars of other random players and purchase them for a fixed price from their garage (if they allow), once again this is nothing revolutionary but you do get to see the bad cars others have created or purchase some sweet vinyls. Many of your antics are recorded online in the Rockstar social club along with your GTA4 stats (http://socialclub.rockstargames.com/) I'm all for any features that allow me to get involved in tracking my friends or see how many cars I've destroyed (16) but by far it's biggest bonus for me is the ability to quickly get screenshots for reviews such as this, if only all games were as generous

Smile for the Internets

Midnight Club: Los Angeles has almost all the components of a great racer, being chased by the police through LA in my little Ford Focus has a lot of potential fun, but there's the problem. Midnight club has a lot of potential, but it seems like the fun fairy skipped over Rockstar San Diego this year. Tedious races, a clumsy map and an unforgiving difficulty brings the game down hard, and a game without fun is just an interesting diversion at best.

3/5

          

Fallout 3 Review

When a game is released with the Fallout name in the title it brings with it a certain level of expectation, now finally after 10 years we have the chance to see if Bethesda has cooked up something worth the wait.

For those that cannot remember, or simply weren't gaming when Interplay began the series in the late 90's you can rest easy that Fallout 3 doesn't require any prior knowledge, but as a bonus, let me fill you in a little back-story to save you checking the World Wide Wikipedia. Fallout 3 is set in the Post apocalyptic wasteland of the United States, specifically around the Washington DC area. The events that lead to the fall of mankind began after the world nations started squabbling over the remaining resources left on the planet, finally an unnamed country went nuclear in 2077 causing many people to retreat into underground vaults while others perished or mutated on the surface. Fallout 3 begins in 2258 with your birth not far away from downtown Washington DC.

Don't get too used to the cleanliness of these vaults

Previous Fallout games have been all viewed from the isometric perspective, naturally Bethesda has taken the series into 3D with the same Gamebryo engine seen in Oblivion. This caused many people to scream "It's just going to be Oblivion with guns!" which on the surface seems quite accurate as it's quickly apparent that Fallout 3 and Oblivion share many commonalities along with the shared graphics engine. Oblivion with guns may not be a bad thing though, depending on where you stand, and if there's one things that video games teach us, is that guns are cool. You'll have your first brief taste of combat before you leave the vault, this will give you change to try the new combat system that separates Fallout 3 from Oblivion and indeed any first person game that's come before it (at least in my memory), V.A.T.S. (Vault-Tech Assisted Targeting System).

The V.A.T.S. targeting mode

A quick tap of the V key on your keyboard and the game will pause and take you into a targeting mode so you can plan your attack so long as you have the necessary action points. This doesn't replace your ability to just point your gun at your target and pull the trigger but since combat is all variables and calculations, real-time combat doesn't feel particularly great. Once you select your targets in V.A.T.S. you'll not able to move until your sequence is complete, this seems a little off putting at first should you realize your tactics are woefully inadequate, but when combat slows down to show your perfect head-shot connect with the back of a mercenary's head, the troubles of the wasteland quickly fade away. The V.A.T.S combat doesn't get old as quickly as you'd expect, however it can be frustrating to unload 3 shotgun blasts to the back of someone's head just for them to turn around and fire back, as this can make the weapons feel underpowered one moment and devastating the next, but since we're talking about an RPG here and not a first person shooter these 'problems' are to be expected. There's no shortage of variety; plasma weapons, mini guns, sledge hammers, buzz blades and sniper rifles are just some of the joyous weapons you'll scavenge and having a lot of variety helps when you're struggling to keep your weapons filled with ammo.

The V.A.T.S. effect!

Your weapon accuracy is governed by six of the thirteen available skills, the others are the usual affair of healing, sneaking, bartering etc. and as with previous Fallout  games these skills are just part of the statistics that control your character. The S.P.E.C.I.A.L. system (Strength, Perception, Endurance, Charisma, Intelligence, Agility, and Luck) returns and should feel pretty familiar to anyone who's got any past RPG experience, the perks system however is a little unique. These perks include the traits of previous Fallouts so naturally you'll have access to the "bloody mess" perk, which causes "characters and creatures you kill [to] often explode into a red, gut-ridden, eyeball-strewn paste". Some perks, including bloody mess give you a skill bonus, others may change the gamely slight by allowing you to feast on your victims or befriend some of the wasteland creatures. The character advancement system feels very true to the Fallout universe and the Bethesda designers thankfully resisted the temptation to include their Elder Scrolls system of advancing only the skills you use. Fallout 3 also has a great many reasons to play through a second or third time, one of those reasons is that your different skills will open up new paths through the game, perhaps you can talk yourself out of a situation rather than fighting, plus having higher skills in certain areas will unlock different traits for you to choose from.

Try to get through the game without your pants exploding

It's not just your skills that create new paths through Fallout, your actions can also drastically effect the wasteland which will in turn effect the reaction of other characters towards you. It seems as if no RPG is complete without the player going through a slew of ethical choices, but Fallout 3 gives you some rather large choices early on that can change things so much that you'll feel that you've missed out on a large portion of the game no matter how you choose to go. Dialog trees fortunately feel a little more fleshed out than Oblivion and although combat is often the showpiece of Fallout 3, you're going to spend a fair amount of time talking to the rather wacky gals and fellahs in the wasteland. Conversations and missions often go beyond the usual fetch and assassinate quests and sometimes you can adjust the lives of others by talking to a few people without any quest being attached and no rewards given, besides perhaps a little karma. Most of the people you'll meet feel very three dimensional, with very separate personalities as if they'd each have their own back story to tell. The believability of these characters is only helped by the rather disturbing feeling of accuracy you'll get from the wasteland you're crossing.

No quest to replace the broken humor chip unfortunately

It's a rather unique feeling when you find an untouched house out in the wasteland, you enter the house and see a suitcase by the door next to some human remains, more remains are in the kitchen next to the food in the oven, traveling upstairs you see a bedroom with toy cars on the floor and a doll in the toy box, there are more human remains on the bed. These simple touches created more emotion for me than any other recent game in memory, so it feels rather creepy when you're rummaging around the belongings of this deceased family so you can find some items to sell to a trader. Sadly though, Fallout 3 suffers from the item packing as the Elder Scrolls series, although not as severe, often you'll find that the world seems to be overly flooded with filler objects, but the areas are arranged and objects placed with such meticulous detail that it's easy to forgive a little time saving. So you may find objects at least in locations that you'd expect, but you have to wonder how many people eat squirrel pie and only drink one brand of soda. Fallout 3 has some big shoes to fill and it has tried hard to grant good fan service, with a couple of returning characters (even 100 years after Fallout 1) and the amazing way that Fallout 3 manages to nail the feeling of the first Fallout games, while also feeling completely new. You're not going to see the crazy pop culture references you found in the second game however, as the humor here feels more mature and tries not to break the atmosphere of the experience, even the hacking mini-games aren't some Pipemania puzzle that breaks the atmosphere every time you activate a computer. The atmosphere is deepened even more so by tuning your Pip-Boy 3000 radio to a station and checking out the news, where you'll likely hear about your adventures from Three Dog, who's one of the larger than life personalitys in the game who you'll get the chance to visit.

 
Cities look like they are barely standing

There's no shortage of places to go in Fallout 3 to meet these unique individuals; underground tunnels, museums, supermarkets or cities are all great places to meet, greet or kill depending on your disposition. However there's a fundamental problem with exploring the landscape of Fallout 3, it's a wasteland. Fortunately Bethesda have done a great job of giving the feeling of a wasteland without actually having you go too far before you encounter something of interest. Quick travel also takes the potential repetitive travel away, however the repetitive nature of the locations isn't something that can be solved so easily. Oblivion, Morrowind, Daggerfall, all allowed Bethesda to get creative and build wondrous beautiful structures, however when you're designing a post apocalyptic wasteland, your hands are rather tied. Most buildings are the same shade of gray, held together with battered stone or with whatever scrap has been found. Clearly though a lot has been done to stretch the limits of variety without going too far and it should be applauded.

Your first view of the Wasteland is a memorable one

Although Fallout 3 has a whole lot going for it, re-playability, moody atmosphere, detailed environments and great voice acting for every line of dialog, the engine does set it back a little. While the visuals have been improved drastically over Oblivion, such as the detail on faces, many people you meet all look rather the same facially, but fortunately Fallout 3 does include one of the most robust mustache selection systems to date. Other issues also revolve around the engine, such as terribly jerky and unnatural animations, the occasional failure for scripted events to activate, or an NPC becoming stuck behind an object while their cut-scene plays, forcing you to wait while they navigate their way around like a drunken Roomba. Of course getting stuck doesn't just effect the NPCs, a couple of wrong jumps and you can find yourself stuck someplace without hope of freedom so you'll once again be reaching for the quick load. Quick save and quick load will your new best friends before long and the over anxious amongst you might find themselves hitting quick save before every corner. Most of these problems fortunately are just nit-picks, like the fact that you can loot a corpse just by finding a fragment of remains and the fact that the inventory system is still as clunky as Oblivion, perhaps more so since you can no longer sort items.

Some melee sequences would fit well into Manhunt 2

The problems with Fallout 3 are rather minor, however it is frustrating that some of the issues that effected the 2006 game of the year haven't been rectified. If you can look past these foibles then you'll find a truthful sequel to a great classic series that has many great qualities and can provide more than its money worth in game play hours. Hey, at least we didn't just get a multi player only cross-platform shooter *ahem*. It's easy to recommend Fallout 3 as long as you're not expecting a fast paced FPS, anyone else with some PRG experience should bunker down with Fallout 3 and prepare for the apocalypse.

5/5

Saints Row 2 Review

Saints Row received a lot of success as the first open world game for this current generation of consoles, now, two years later we get to see how its sequel stands up in a post GTA4 world.

Let me get something out of the way nice and early, comparing Saints Row 2 to GTA is a lot like putting Need for speed next to Gran Tourismo; both are fine games and provide very different experiences within their respective genres. That said, there's many possible comparisons I'm could to make, not just to show how saints is the same, but to show how the two differ.

As I mentioned before, Saints 2 is an open world game, it has the usual drill of side missions, gangs, guns and carjacking. However, as games like GTA 4 are being increasingly serious and straight laced, Saints Row 2 takes a "why so serious" approach, far away from GTA's moral choices and instead the protagonist is downright brutal, but more on that later. The story's layout won't surprise you if you've played the first Saints, the story continues from the previous game and has the same kind of structure, complete a few missions at the start of the game, then the story branches out in three different directions and comes together at the end with some final missions, while you're forced to take side missions along the way to earn enough respect to continue the campaign. The main story has many issues, both technically and creatively; You'll occasionally have to restart a mission because a target simply isn't there, or you'll walk through a door just to die instantly when many enemies instantly spawn through the doorway. One campaign has you dealing with drugs has few memorable moments, others however do have a few hidden surprises and the voice of Michael Dorn is always welcome to anyone who watched the I Am Weasel cartoon, or perhaps the lesson known StarTrek:TNG (Worf), although most of the other voice work and lip syncing is shaky to say the least. The varying quality of the missions is only equaled by the seemingly random difficulty, one mission may set its self up to be an epic battle just to have break down to be a cakewalk, another seemingly insignificant task may end up challenging your patience as much as your skill.

It's safe to say the physics are rather exaggerated

The main story might not be where you spend most of your time in the city of Stillwater, with at least 20 types of side missions to be getting along with, most of which came from the first game, but with a few surprises:

• Streaking: Remove your clothes and run around in front of pedestrians
• Septic Avenger: Drive around in a septic truck and cover buildings with poop
• Fuzz: Stop crime in excessive ways, such as halting the activities of skateboarders with satchel charges
• Fight club

These activities, while mostly fun, can also be the most frustrating part of the game. Rather often they can be just based on the luck of the draw, as the location of any one mission will vary each time you try it and some locations are easier to complete your given objective than others. Although you are required to complete a certain amount of side missions before you can go on in the main quest you'll still want to play these side missions, not only can some of them be a lot of fun or just over the top extreme, but the rewards are great, sometimes perhaps game-breakingly great. Some rewards will simply be a store discount or a new car, for some missions you'll unlock unlimited ammo for a specific type of gun and having the ability to shoot dual SMGs without worry of ammo can make you feel like you're cheating your way through the game. Some of the more amusing un-lockables give you new outfits, such as a traffic cone hat which you'll see your character happily wearing even through the darkest and most twisted cut scenes.

Pick a larger vehicle and you choose how to get to your destination

Dressing your character and gang up as a ninjas or parading around as a giant killer hotdog is only one way of amusing yourself, as the actual character creation can really provide an unhealthy amount of joy. How about making a burly woman with a beard and cockney male voice who swings her hips as she walks, or creating a dude with a heaving chest that talks like a black woman. Personally my favorite character was a skinny white guy with glasses that has a crazy look on his face and a pimp walk. It sounds simply like a fun diversion, but I had tears down my face looking at the freaks of nature I'd created and fortunately for a small fee you can go back and change everything again by just driving to a plastic surgeon.

Taking these characters into multiplayer highlights the wide variety of customization available and allows you to reenact a 12 player epic Pirate vs Ninja battle. The Strong arm multiplayer mode is a team based battle where each team competes at the varying activities around the map, while you still have the option to just gun down the competition, you can also spray tag certain walls around the map to grant your tam bonuses or to hinder the other team. This makes for a pretty unique experience beyond the usual deathmatch mode which is included but is in no way memorable. One more than memorable option is the ability to play every mission and side mission co-op with a buddy over XBL. The co-op works exactly as expected and opens up some very intrusting ways of doing some of the missions. Even with just two players you can make even the dullest missions far more interesting and the crazy missions even more ridiculous.

Backing up a bud with a Tornado Attack Helicopter can be very effective

I've mentioned times before about the insanity of the game, but let me give you an example; okay, you need to teach a lesson to a rival do you:
A, Place a prank call?
B, Knock on his door and run away?
C, Buy a geiger counter, take a boat to an island with a power plant, user the geiger counter to locate and collect radioactive waste, escape by helicopter, get shot down, steal a car and drive to his local tattooist, sabotaging the procedure he's planning on having performed?
If you picked 'C' then congratulations! You'll fit will into the world of Saints Row 2 and the brutal sadism of the protagonist. You also should probably get yourself checked.

Some effects look nice, but it can look like a hi-res PS2 game

A quick look comparing Saints Row 2 and GTA 4 will reveal that Saints appears to be a budget game in comparison, and indeed you'll have that impression throughout. There's very little polish, graphics haven't evolved and it all feels like a hodgepodge of ideas thrown into a package. Bugs are rampant, the old trick of jumping on a car and materializing inside still exists, sometimes when trying to jack a police cruiser you'll get in the back and if you look away from a car for just an instant it may vanish. The frustration of these faults can get on top of you, but fortunately there's so much to do that you can always come back to what's troubling you and these foibles are easy to forget when you're having so much fun being involved in the circus of Stillwater.

5/5