Mad Moxxi, the ... titular character
Amongst it’s many other accomplishments (well, depending who you ask I guess), Gears of War 2 can be lauded for the popularisation of the “Horde” style of multiplayer. Allowing players to team up against a superior-numbered AI controlled enemy force managed to hit a real chord with shooter fans everywhere, and has since spawned many similar modes amongst the FPS genre.
Borderlands: Mad Moxxi’s Underdome Riot puts it’s hand up and declares “us too”, by adding a completely new area based upon wave-style arena combat.
As the story goes, Mad Moxxi (the Underdome’s well-endowed, carnival-themed owner) has made her way through three husbands, all of whom didn’t seem to survive the relationship. In the search for a suitable suitor for her fourth wedlock, Moxxi has constructed the Underdome, three huge arenas based upon different areas of Pandora. There adventurers pit themselves against hordes of enemies, while the crowd watches on in the happy knowledge that, win or lose, violence will be plentiful.
The back-story sounds entertaining enough, but truth be told there’s surprisingly little Mad Moxxi to be had in Underdome. After her introduction, she’s basically consigned to her role as announcer. And although much of her commentary is amusing enough, it can grow old quite quickly for reasons I’ll explain shortly. Read more
Piggybacks are fine, Little Sister, just don't ask for a helicopter
The 2010 sequel season (sequelganza!) continues it’s unstoppable march with the release of 2K Games’ BioShock 2. The highly-anticipated “Deco ‘n Daddy” shooter has been a long time in the making, suffering delays in 2009 and requiring no less than five game studios to bring to fruition. Has the result proved to be worth the wait? Or does the sequel fall prey to the high expectations carried over from the original?
It’s been almost three years since we last descended into Andrew Ryan’s Rapture, and from the moment you stumble to your feet in BioShock 2, you’ll feel like you never left. In-game, however, it’s been ten years since the events of Jack Ryan’s return and Fontaine’s fall, events for which our new protagonist was, for all intensive purposes, stone dead. Subject Delta is an early model “Protector” Big Daddy, who’s line was genetically bonded to a single Little Sister to increase the effectiveness of the pairing. Delta’s Little Sister is Eleanor Lamb, daughter of Rapture’s new leader Sofia Lamb. In the game’s prologue Sofia gains control over Delta and forces him to commit suicide, reclaiming Eleanor in the process. Ten years later, Delta falls out of a Vita-Chamber and discovers that he’s regained his free will.
From here Delta must make his way back to a now teenage Eleanor and effect an escape from Rapture’s grasp. Along they way you’ll meet both new and familiar faces, and discover a whole new side of Rapture in the process.
Zombies improve everything. It's science.
It was only a short time ago we got our hands on the RPG-shooter Borderlands, and we’ve been loving it ever since. So naturally when it’s first DLC chapter, The Zombie Island of Dr. Ned, was released I automatically put up the points to buy it. Why? Well most likely because I’m a good little consumer who’s been deeply ingrained with the compulsion to hand over his money. But that aside, what’s the best way to make a great game even better? Why you add zombies, of course.
Once downloaded, the new chapter isn’t too hard to access. Jakob’s Cove, where the action takes place, can only be accessed via a New-U station’s fast travel menu. It should be noted that you can travel there before even technically activating the fast travel service in the game’s plot. I suppose this early availability is required, however, as Jakob’s Cove is a completely stand-alone area (hence the “island” part of the name), and the only way to enter is to fast travel.
Once you’ve made your way to the island, you’ll be greeted by the local Claptrap, who wants you to take care of this rather bothersome zombie apocalypse they seem to be experiencing lately. He points you in the direction of the camp’s doctor, Dr. Ned (who totally isn’t Dr. Zed, as the game keeps reminding you) and from here on inwards you’ll be up to your armpits in undead minions.
In case you're wondering, YES, the game is about sword-wielding cowboys
“You are the last remaining member of a clan that called themselves “The Protectors”. Slain by a fellow clan, calling themselves “The Jackals”, you found your way to safety and now hunt them down for vengeance. You are The Swordsman and you are all that is man!“
I wish that this had been the description of the game given by Ubisoft Paris, but instead they chose to surrender to the press conference and then eat some cheese.
At the “recent” iDef Expo I got my hands on a preview of Red Steel 2, part of the Ubisoft stall. Looking at this game it seemed to check off most of my likes: a Wii game with ninja’s and a slightly cowboy feel. At first glance one would think that this was a video game version of Sukiyaki Western Django (an absolutely boss movie, for all of you out there unaware of it’s brilliance) but it’s not. It’s Wii’s cell-shaded sequel that seems to have made changes for the better. I say that tentatively … tentatively!
Blowing his own brains out will just save you some time later
I’ll admit to the fact that I was a little skeptical when I originally heard about Borderlands. A game that’s structured like Diablo, but plays like a first person shooter? You probably couldn’t shove the chalk any further into the cheese, as far as pitching a game is concerned.
But the art style did look fantastic, and once there were a few gameplay videos to peruse the concept became more palatable. In the end, Borderlands managed to close the deal with me by emblazoning “splitscreen co-op” on the back of the case, and that was that.
As strange as the idea sounded when I first heard it, everything clicks the moment you pick up the controller. The gameplay is simple, yet addictive, as it simultaneously appeals to both the item scrounging RPGer and headshot focused shooter fan inside nearly every gamer. If you love power-levelling and kitting out your character with the best gear you can find, then this game is for you. If you enjoy fast-paced firefights, then this game is for you.
And what backs you up in these firefights? Well the game boasts an estimated seventeen million different guns (which I believe technically qualifies as a “fuck-tonne” on the metric system). While this is certainly impressive, many people may be a little disappointed to discover that most of these seventeen million weapons are variable instances of the same gun, much in the same way that everyone used to trade different versions of their “Lapis Plate of the Wolf” in Diablo. So while there are millions upon millions of guns, they still distill down into eight or nine catagories, so don’t walk in expecting to discover a gun that shoots guns or anything equally crazy (like a certain reviewer did). Read more
Proof!
Proof that it hasn’t been taken off the shelves.
After the rumour-mill went wild with the word that the game would be pulled from the shelves early morn (read more here and here), I’m glad to actually have a copy after that video got leaked that apparently ‘promotes terrorism’.
I’m more glad, in fact, that our archaic non-R rated games system didn’t pull rank and push back the release, or even worse, cripple what is shaping up to be a game of the year.
Unfortunately, I’m still at work.
This game is going to get the shit reviewed out of it, so stay tuned.
Big W: Excercising Release Date Ignorance Since 2004
It’s great to know that, despite being a land of restrictive and backward classification laws, Australian’s can get their triple A titles before the rest of the world due to incompetent retailers.
Rumours abound today that the highly anticipated Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 may be on shelves early at Big W retailers around the country. A new catalogue begins today that advertises MW2 for AU$82, which is a good price to begin with, but it is a little early for the game’s official November 10th release date.
Most people would naturally assume that since the catalogue runs through to November 11th, the listing is simply advertising the game’s price in advance. However, reports have come in from the Xbox Australia forums that pre-order customers have been told thay can come in from today to collect their copies.
Understandably this has lead to a great many Australian gamers promising to be at Big W tomorrow to check it out. No actual confirmation of a broken street date yet, but if there is you can bet Mark will be there, attempting to bull-rush a pack of equally eager fanboys.
Take a look at the source of the rumour, and the catalogue in question!
Oh, and in related news, here’s Modern Warfare 2’s official trailer. Hope you like pretty explosions and Eminem, dear reader.
It was a dark and stormy night...
There’s nothing like a good franchise, when it comes to developing games. Although the game is very well put together, I couldn’t shake the feeling that if ODST had not been prefixed by Halo 3, it wouldn’t have sold half the copies it did. Which would have been a pity, because although this game certainly does take advantage of the fact that it’s fan-base has been established for well over five years now, it’s certainly the most interesting thing they’ve done with the franchise for a long time
For the campaign of Halo 3: ODST, players take control of the squad’s newest member: “The Rookie”. For contextual reasons unknown, although possibly due to some sort of hilarious military hazing ritual, Rookie never speaks or removes his helmet. He may also have to do the rest of the squad’s washing up and laundry, although the game doesn’t let you stay on your drop ship long enough to find out. The action takes place somewhere around the end of Halo 2 in the series’ chronology. The ODST squad is being deployed to take out the Prophet of Regret’s ship, which is hovering above the African mega-city of New Mombasa. The squad’s new commanding officer, a Naval Intelligence officer called Dare, has other plans however. Instead of assaulting the carrier she directs the squad to new coordinates inside the city, a move which essentially saves the entire squads lives as Regret’s carrier jumps to slipspace and destroys all the attacking dropships.
There for but the use of an inhibitor station goes Nathan
My wife picked me up a copy of Resistance 2, part and parcel of buying me a PlayStation 3 console. This was to be my first foray into the PlayStation 3’s game catalogue, and to be truthful, I ended up somewhat undecided on if the game was good with bad elements, or bad with good elements.
Players take the role of Nathan Hale, a super soldier assigned to the elite “Sentinel Squad”. For anyone jumping into this series for the first time, like I did, trying to figure out just what the hell is going on at the start of this game can be a little bit of a task, but here goes. Resistance is set in an alternate history Earth in the 1950s. In this history Russia was over-run by a force known as the Chimera, the many-eyed humanoid enemies you’ll encounter during the game. Using superior technology and brute force, the Chimera succeeded in taking over most of the Earth. Only a few protected areas are now safe for mankind. Originally thought to be caused by a virus, experiments were undertaken to attempt to counteract the Chimeran transformation. Hale, as one of the original test subjects, has acquired the Chimera’s strength and fortitude but has to be constantly dosed with an inhibitor drug to avoid his complete transformation. It’s later discovered that the Chimera are actually an alien species, who can simply transform humans to make them their footsoldiers.
Still with me? Yeah, me neither. Personally I think that you probably need to have played Resistance: Fall Of Man for the plot to make much sense, in much the same way that Halo 3 would make absolutely no sense if you hadn’t at least played Halo 2. In a nutshell, Chimera are bad ugly aliens who shoot at you an awful lot, and their leader Deadalus (who used to be a test subject just like Hale) is attempting to kill every human on the planet. If I’m just joining in for the sequel, well, I’ll consider this enough.
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