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Posts tagged PS3
Unfinished Business
0775 days
One day... it shall be mine!
As I sit here writing this article about unfinished business; I find it ironic that I am listening to the soundtrack of Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, simply because it is a game that I thought I would never finish. I played that game across two xboxes, and even two different discs (one stopped working). I did, however, finally finish it. After 100+ hours of play, I closed the last oblivion gate and thwarted the daedric invasion. It was a very satisfying feeling. Maybe not so much looking from the game out, but rather the fact that I had accomplished something that I never thought I would do. That game is MASSIVE, as I think we all as gamers know. As far as RPGs go it was just a giant time sink, with thousands of things to do, see, and well… kill.
Which brings me to the meat of this little piece: I have way too many games left, just from this year, to finish. As any gamer worth his weight in plastic peripherals knows, the couple months before Christmas is THE time to get big games. Last year the bigger titles were: L4D, Little Big Planet, Resistance 2, and the biggie Gears of War2. This year the list is probably twice as long and much more spread out over different genres. Games like Dragon Age:Origins, Assassin’s Creed 2, L4D2, and Modern Warfare 2 will satisfy the hardest of the hardcore. There are also games for people that are more casual with their games (not necessarily “casual games” however), games like Uncharted 2: Among Thieves, Forza 3, Borderlands, and even the New Super Mario Brothers Wii game. Needless to say, the shelves have been stocked for a while with quality games for pretty much any kind of player.
Anyway… I now have sitting on my shelf in the gaming lair: AC2, NSMB Wii, Borderlands, Modern Warfare 2, Dragon Age: Origins, and Left 4 Dead 2. Of those 6 titles, I have finished a grand total of ONE, and that would be MW2, because the single player is like 5 hours. Although, I have started to go back and play through it on Veteran, which is taking up even more of my time. Point being, I have a LOT of unfinished business with my games. I have played quite a bit of each title (save DA:O) and thought I would at least write up my impressions of these games so far. We’ll start with the oldest first…
"Boom! Head shot!"
Borderlands is one of those games that you can just jump right into and have mindless fun with for hours. I am sure to catch a lot of flack for this (should anyone actually read this) but THIS is the game that I wanted Fallout 3 to be, so very badly. Not that Fallout was a bad game, I don’t think that, but it just never felt right to me. If you put a gun in a persons hand, set the camera behind the gun, and give me lots of targets to shoot at, I NEED the game to be more responsive and the controls to be tighter. Sorry. Fallout was way too slow and methodical, as a regular RPG should be, but not one with guns and a first person perspective. I enjoyed the game; it just didn’t satisfy enough of either genre to keep me interested. Borderlands, however, is a very satisfying game for me. Having four classes to choose from (Sniper, Tank, Soldier, and overpowered Chick) makes it a game that could possibly be played through several times with different effect.
Speaking of multiples… there are thousands and thousands of guns for you to find or buy in this game; literally. Granted, a VERY large chunk of them are pieces of junk that you will never use except for padding your wallet, but the few that are rare finds are well worth the search. Searching is something you will do a LOT of. Chests, lockers, safes, piles of garbage, sometimes even animal carcasses will have weapons or ammo in them. This game makes the loot factor in Diablo seem tiny and insignificant. Seriously, it’s just that overwhelming.
The controls are easy enough to manage if you have EVER played a FPS before. Everything functions as you would expect it to. The visuals are done in an almost “cell-shaded” way that makes them look almost cartoon like. It definitely adds to the visual style of the game, and sets it apart from just about all the first person shooters out there.
The biggest and probably most fun draw for this game is the Multiplayer. You can grab three of your friends and jump into a game. The person that hosts the game is the one that you will follow the story line and quests for. So say, if you have already finished a certain amount of quests, but your buddy hasn’t, you may still have to go back and play them again if you are playing in his game. Also the game scales to that person as well. So be careful getting into games with higher level characters because you may get your ass handed to you.
The story in Borderlands is, hmm… we’ll just say, thin. Actually, to be quite honest, I have almost no idea what it is about AT ALL. I know that I am some sort of mercenary or something, and I am looking for pieces to the “Vault”. There is some chick in my head that keeps telling me I am on the right path and doing the right thing, but I couldn’t tell you who she is or why she is talking to me. What I do know, is that this game does a great job of give you a fuck-ton of quests to accomplish, as well as giving you a rather large world to accomplish them in. If you are looking for a decent FPS that blends in simple RPG elements then this game is probably going to be a good match for you.
Also, this game just came out with what looks to be a rather fun DLC. It’s an entirely new island full of new monsters (ZOMBIES) and a few new weapons.
Seeing as how this article is a bit longer than I first expected it to be, I will post it in parts. You have just read (obviously) Part One. Part Two will be coming up soon, on one of the other games that I listed above. Probably with less exposition and filler.
Uncharted 2:Among Thieves (PS3)
3833 days
The sun gleams off of the snow covered mountain tops. Birds fly by me with the freedom that no man will ever know. In the distance a train whistle blows, echoing through the valley below. I am truly stunned by the shear beauty of what I am seeing. I can hear bells ringing… ringing… ringing. OH CRAP! I have just been swept to my death by a rail road warning light, because again I wasn’t paying enough attention to what was going on. Distracted yet again by the beauty of the game. That is a testament to how good Uncharted 2 looks, but it’s not the only thing that game does well.
Having been a huge fan of the first game in the series “Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune” I was naturally excited to get my hands on the second. From what I had been hearing from the legitimate gaming press, this would be one of those games that, as a PS3 owner, I needed to get. The last time I heard such hoopla over a game, it was about Metal Gear Solid 4, and I ended up buying a PS3 for just that reason.
The game starts with you again take on the role of Nathaniel Drake, fortune hunter, fighter, proponent of the “half-tucked” shirt, and generally all around smooth operator. The very second that the game starts you are thrust into danger. You are awakened to find yourself bleeding from an apparent gun shot, and seated in a railway car that is dangling off the side of some snow covered mountain. What better way for a game to start then right in the middle of the action (and the games plot as well). The first couple chapters flash you back and forth from the past to the present in an attempt to show you how you got in such a predicament. It was a little jarring at first, going from the mountain to being pool side talking to a couple friends about your next task, and back again. Once that smooths out and sets you on your course it really starts to get going well.
This time you are following Marco Polo’s trek back from Mongolia, where he started off with fourteen ships and around 600 passengers, but reached his destination with only eighteen passengers and one ship. The quest is to discover what happened to the other thirteen ships and five hundred some passengers. Eventually they discover that Marco Polo had found the location of the Cintamani Stone and the mythical kingdom of Shambhala. Drake and his “partners” Harry Flynn and Chloe Frazer make their way through Istanbul, Borneo, Nepal, and other exotic locales in search of clues to help them find their goal. However they aren’t alone. Also trying to find the realm of Shambhala is a Serbian war criminal Zoran Lazarević. He too wants to find the Cintamani stone but for more nefarious reasons. I will say this: This game had one of the more satisfying endings (story wise) to a video game I have played in a long time. Not that it was something that wasn’t expected or out of the ordinary story wise, but I just felt that it summed up the game nicely by the closing credits.
As I said before this game looks gorgeous. Drake goes through many different settings and each feels distinctly different, and thoroughly detailed. From lush rain forests, to frozen mountain tops, and blown out city streets and alleys. There were more than a few occasions that I was killed, or nearly so, just because I was distracted by the scenery. The sound as well is very detailed. Guns sound realistic, the voice work is superb, and several times I caught myself looking over my shoulder [in real life] because I thought I heard something behind me.
As far as game play goes, it has been refined from the first to feel much more tight and precise. The one glaring problem that I had with the first was the sixaxis controls for the game, period. Thankfully, they have taken them out completely. You no longer have to tilt back and forth when Drake walks across a log. Trying to stay hidden and alive in a firefight in the first game was made all together more hard by attempting to tilt the controller for a good trajectory to throw a grenade at an enemy behind a wall. Not anymore though, that has all been mercifully taken out. The grenade controls are simply done by pushing the left analog stick up or down. The cover mechanic seems a little easier to use as well, though I still had issues with Drake trying to jump off walls or over cover points when I didn’t want him to. Though in all honesty that could have been because of human error. Some of the gun fights tend to get a little tense.
Oddly enough for a game that I really figured didn’t need a multiplayer aspect, this one is actually pretty fun, AND well put together. There are several modes for you to cut your teeth on. There is the obligatory Death Match, but this version is more like the “Team” death match that you would find in other games. Play as either part of the “heroes” or the “villains” each with a team of five players trying to take out the opposing force. Plunder is played much like Capture the Flag, but instead of a flag you have to take a treasure from neutral spot and taking it back to their respective base. Also there is Elimination. This plays like a game of “Hard Core” team death match where once you are dead, you stay dead. The game ends when either of the opposing teams has no living players left. Finally there is “Chain Reaction.” This, again, is played much like capture the flag except flags have to be “captured” in order. One team has to take them from first to last, while the opposing team must take them from last to first.
There are also several cooperative multiplayer games to be played as well. One being “Gold Rush.” This is much like Plunder only the opposing team is made up of AI characters trying to stop you from taking the treasure back to the base. This is the game that I have played the most of. It’s a lot of fun to plan routes with your partner(s) and then execute them seeing how well of a defender or attacker you can be while your buddy tries to get away with the gold statue.
All in all, this game isn’t perfect. There are still a few graphical glitches, a couple of control issues I had, and the story was pretty predictable. That said though, it was very enjoyable to play through. I would gladly plunk down my $60 for a copy of this game. There are so many things that OTHER game developers can take away from this game and learn from. Naughty Dog through Uncharted 2, has some of the best facial expressions, and body language animation that I have seen in a video game, ever. It may not be THE reason to buy a PS3, but it sure makes me happy that I did.
Batman: Arkham Asylum (PS3)
0858 days
Much was said about the new Batman game, even before it was out in the wild. People were calling it the greatest Batman game ever. Even mentioning “Game Of The Year”. I was intrigued by the art style it was done in, and simply by the fact that some of the cast from the animated series was involved, so I picked it up. Does Batman live up to the Bruce Wayne standard or does the game come up as short as the Penguin?
Batman: Arkham Asylum for the PS3, Xbox 360 and soon to be PC is brought to us by Rocksteady studios. Probably not a name you have heard much before. In fact the only game that I could find they had touched previous to this title was a game on the PS2 in ’99 called “Urban Chaos: Riot Response” which, I have never heard of, but was pretty well received at it’s launch. However I will go out on a limb and say that this is probably not the last time we hear from this studio.
Arkham Asylum in the comic has almost this Zion feel to it. You always here so much about the complex and who is there but not very much has been explored in detail before. Comparisons to Arkham and Bioshock’s setting “Rapture” have been made by many people, and upon playing the game it is easy to see why. Both have this feel of a corrupted utopia. Everything is very detailed as far as the material that is around you, most of which is being updated either through game progression by the player or through the NPCs. One image that I really came to like was the entrance to the final meeting place between Batman and The Joker. I won’t spoil it, but it was fun to see how it progressed along with the game. Probably my favorite thing about the game (much like Bioshock) is the ambient noise and more so the announcements over the PA system. In the beginning it’s just the Joker doing his usual heckling of “The Batman” like he has always done, but by the end, he is out and out pissed, and usually yelling at his minions in some way. You can almost listen to it and hear his decent in (more) madness. It’s done with great effect by adding the subtle jingle before each announcement, and even THAT starts to sound mental after a while.
The roaches check in...
For most games, the draw is the graphics, or the gimmicky controls, or even the studio that is backing it. This, however, isn’t the case for Batman: Arkham Asylum. Almost every (DC) comic fan will have at least some curiosity for this game strictly based on the setting and the story surrounding it. As I said, Arkham has never really been explored or picked apart in the comics as it is in this game. The cast of characters that make appearances in the game are vast, but it’s not the entire line up of Batman’s baddest villains. Sure the Joker is there naturally, as well as Harley Quinn. I was just hoping to have a little more interaction with key characters like “Clayface” or “Mr Freeze” maybe even actually SEEING “The Riddler”. I guess for every big name foe that is in the game, there are probably two that aren’t. Which is a shame, but I guess does save something for the inevitable sequel.
Playing as “the worlds greatest detective” you are charged with getting Arkham back to “normal” after the Joker and his minions have taken over. How did the Joker get control of Arkham? … Well let’s just say he had a little help from the inside. It isn’t really anything hard to figure out but it still makes for a pretty good story so I won’t spoil any of it. One of my favorite twist to the story are when you have to play through the Scarecrow’s sections. Not really the “stealth action” portion, but just when he starts to warp your mind. One in particular really caught me off guard. So much so that I almost lost it… again I don’t want to spoil that moment but you will know it when you come to it later in the game. As a fan of the batman comic it is just nice to see into the backgrounds of some of his most notorious archenemies.
I'm gonna get that fly this time.
While on the surface this game seems like a button masher, and in certain cases is just that, there is more to the game if you care to take the time. Arkham Asylum uses what they call “Free Form Combat”, where you basically hit your attack buttons and choose which enemy you want to beat into submission. The best part about this kind of combat is the counter moves. Batman truly looks like a bad ass when he catches an attacker mid swing and then knocks them out is some well choreographed way. Like I said though, there is more to it. Larger rooms are especially fun to take out your enemies one by one. As they start to drop like flies, usually the Joker will alert the others around that you are there… somewhere. Telling them you are systematically taking out each person in the room. This tends to put the remaining baddies on alert, as well as heighten their anxiety level. The more you take out the more frantic they will get. Even so much so that they will run around screaming and blind-firing their weapons into the shadows hoping to hit you. It’s a fun way to truly mess with the inmates in the game. Speaking of shadows… hiding in the shadows and taking down a foe, then slipping away to another dark corner of the room is very satisfying.
Combat is not the only thing done well in this game however. The Riddler does play a part too, and by that I mean he sets up most, if not all of your side quests or non-mission critical exploration of Arkham. Throughout the complex he has hidden Riddler trophies, hidden question marks (his signature or course) and even gives you clues to different items that you need to photograph. Some are pretty easy to figure out, or easy to find, but the really hard ones are where the fun really is. There is a fine line between Genius and Insanity, and the Riddler walks that line. It’s never more apparent then when trying to figure out the cryptic clues he gives you to his puzzles. This facet of the game is probably one that I enjoyed more than any other and the reason why I will keep going back to the game.
Arkham at night. Not so scary if you're Batman.
Finally lets talk about visuals and sound. This game looks great, and for the most part runs very smooth. Textures for the surroundings and the character models are all very detailed. Batman himself takes a lot of damage throughout the game and by the end he really ends up looking like he got the hell beat out of him. All of the locations that you run through all have their own distinct feel to them. From the medical ward to the garden, every place you discover looks like you would imagine it looking, had this been a blockbuster movie production. Random enemies do tend to look a like by the end of the game but it’s not something that doesn’t make sense in context. By that I mean, they are all in a prison of some sort and they are all working for one crazy boss or another. So the face paint and the clothes would start to blend together anyway.
As far as the sound goes, this game creates the full experience of being in an asylum. Once you hit the real looney bin inside you will understand. The crazies are all yelling at each other, or sometimes nothing at all. With the Joker doing his usual announcements over the PA, and the Riddler taunting you to try and solve his puzzles. It all meshes into a great soundtrack. The best part (for me anyways) is that they got most of the voice cast from the animated series to do the voice work for the game. Batman, the Riddler, and yes even Mark Hamil as The Joker. His maniacal laugh is probably my all time favorite for the Joker. Just having him play that character was a quick way for me to really get behind believing the insanity that is the Joker. I still want to find that jingle that plays before his announcements for a ringtone for my iPhone!
My only gripe with this game is petty and really probably something I need to deal with on a more personal level. Batman has what is known as “Detective Mode” where he can see foes through walls, check for clues, as well as hidden areas. This is a great little effect, however personally I tend to over use it. Instead of seeing most of the enemies, areas, and set pieces through the wonderfully dingy, dark colors of the game, I end up seeing everything through detective modes boring blue hue. It’s the same issue that I had in Oblivion. Once you get the ring that lets you see in the dark, you never see the caves the same way again. Like I said, it’s petty, and personal, but it’s still there. Now having beaten the game I will go back through it and try to restrict my use of said mode to small increments so that I can enjoy all that Arkham has to visually give me.
You got something on your face.
This game is great. Most if not all of what you have read about it being the “best Batman game ever” is very true. Given the history of Batman games though… it didn’t really have that much to overcome. If you have both a PS3 and a 360 I can only recommend that you get it (renting or purchasing) for the PS3. There is absolutely no multi-player mode what so ever, so you won’t miss that LIVE experience, and the PS3 version has the “play as the Joker” mode. Basically you are in a room with lots of enemies (cops and what not) all trying to kill you. Fight till they are all dead. Simple as that. Batman also has several different modes of play outside the regular story. He has his own fight club style room, plus Silent Predator games, where you can pretty much figure out what you do there. This game is a total package of fun for any Batman fan. I can’t recommend enough that you play this game in some capacity or another. Now if you will excuse me I need to find several more Riddler trophies that have eluded me so far.
Friends Vs. Friends List
0892 days
Show of hands: people who like to play video games with their friends? Now, put your hands down if those “friends” are only online… This article is more for those still holding their hands up. This is for the people, like me, that are being overlooked as video games “progress” further into the future.
Lets start things off with a little personal history lesson. When I had an Atari 2600 I used to play games like “Boxing” and “Combat” against my friends and family. We would play for hours trying to get in the final win; memories I wouldn’t trade for the world. Then things progressed to the Nintendo Entertainment System and we would play games like “Double Dragon” and “Cabal” and of course “Contra.” The games were even better looking and it was even more fun. Next there was the Super Nintendo, with its games like “Mortal Kombat” and the grand-daddy of competitive gaming for me, “Super Mario Kart.” Same friends, same style of fun, and so the trend would continue, up until the late PS2/Xbox era. Things took a major “leap forward” and my real life friends were left in the wake.
"Can I still get online with my Game Cube?"
More and more games (on the Xbox especially) were going online. Meet up with people all over the world and play games with, or against them. That was the big hook, right? Well, what about your buddies that you had played four player Goldeneye with for four years? Sure there was Halo, and that was great, but not much else out there, at least not for people that want to play in the same damn room. Have we not progressed past the days of Super Mario Brothers on the NES? Remember when you had to take turns playing a game? Mario would have to make it through his world, then Luigi got to play. Same-screen, multi-player games then weren’t really all that great because of the limitations of the technology, but that was, what, 25 years ago now. Fighting games existed too, but they just weren’t as fun. Playing tournaments of Soul Blade on the PSOne, or getting all four controllers going in a good game of Twisted Metal: that’s where it’s at. You can’t replace game memories like that with online games of Mortal Kombat Armageddon or Auto Modellista.
When I stepped up my system to the 360 I was totally down for some more gaming with my REAL friends. Things started off well: we got to play “Perfect Dark Zero” together. That was a lot of fun. Shortly thereafter though, games decided to just forget about your buddies and concentrate on your “new” virtual friends. Games that used to be marketed as “Co-Op” were all now being sold as “On-Line Co-Op.” I guess I really hadn’t noticed until I wanted to play some Co-Op with a friend of mine in Crackdown. It seemed like it would be a lot of fun to be two super powered cops running around the city, beating the snot out of criminals. Much to my dismay, however, the game ONLY offers “On-line” Co-Op. From there the trend only spirals out of control.
Games that DID offer the ability to play in the same room with a friend usually involved making mock rooms on Xbox Live. The problem there is that you ONLY have you and a friend trying to play deathmatch or CTF games, one man, one team. The worst part about it is that developers have taken out probably the easiest fix or at least patch to this issue: Bots. My friend Bill and I played literally countless hours of Perfect Dark on the N64. The game wasn’t all that great, the graphics now look absolutely horrendous, but never the less it was a hell of a lot of fun. Why? Simply because he and I could play deathmatch for hours and hours and it would never be the same game twice because of those little bots. I am no programmer, but I would imagine that something that fit on only PART of a N64 cart could be programmed into a multi-million dollar DVD game. Seriously… The only full size game (that I am aware of) that has Bots in it since has been Killzone 2 on the PS3. Even with bots in that game you could only play it single player. What the hell?
At the most recent E3, Microsoft said they were going to release Perfect Dark (from the N64) as an XBL Arcade game. Being such a huge fan of the original I already have very high hopes for this game, most of which I expect to be disappointed on. Sure it will look better, play faster, and sound great in 5.1 surround, but all that doesn’t mean dick to me if I can’t play it with my friends in the same room. Talking smack to my friends as they sit beside me and see me drop their in-game character over and over again is much more satisfying than doing it online. I like to see my opponent’s face as they realize that I have been following them, just waiting to capitalize on the first mistake they make.
Where are my split screen games that AREN’T racing games? In order for my friend Brian and I to play COD4 together he had to have his own 360, an account on XBL, and his own copy of the game. Damn! I mean seriously, why have this super powered machine, with the ability to have multiple controllers “hooked up” at once if you don’t have anything to play? Thank goodness for games like Army of Two and most of the Tom Clancy games; they are trying to keep hope alive. Army of Two probably does one of the best jobs of recreating the fun of those old games like Bad Dudes and Double Dragon. However, games like this are few and far between. This is, of course, excluding all manner of Wii games and “Rhythm Games.” Rock Band and Guitar Hero are in a category all their own, and since most Wii games DO have some sort of Co-Op or multi-player ability, but are mostly crap anyway. I mean you have your Wii Sports games and certain Kart racers, but as a whole the Wii isn’t known for it’s stellar games. Just being honest here. I own all three systems so I am NO fanboy.
The "Frag Dolls" always game with friends, and Avril Lavigne apparently.
For the most part, games that do allow you to play simultaneously with a friend are games of trivia or puzzle games, and most of them exist only on the PSN or XBLA. The exception to the rule is sports games. All your major sports games (NBA, NFL, NHL, MLB) have the ability to play with your friends on the same couch. Honestly, if they take those games and make them solely online multi-player, I’m done. If I can’t give my friend sitting beside me a verbal thrashing following me scoring a game winning basket/TD/goal/home run, count me out.
I’ve said it many times before: I don’t like relying on other people (especially that I don’t know) to have fun with a game. Also, think about the online gaming community as a whole. Take the good experiences you have had in a group of strangers versus the bad. Which one happens more often? Don’t get me wrong… I have been playing online with a great group of guys over the past year or so, but I have never met them. I don’t have the same history with my “online” friends that I do with my “real” friends. There won’t, and can’t be, any stories of “Oh, remember when we were at your apartment playing this?” or the occasional “Remember when we got back from the bar and were totally drunk playing this?”
Like I said, it’s as if games are progressing forward everyday, as far as graphical prowess, sound design, acting, and even story telling are concerned, and that’s great. However, if games progress too far without at least trying to keep some semblance of the offline or same-household Co-Op involved, really, where have we gone? At the price of human interaction we now have friends that we probably will never meet in person, and will have no connection to in the future. Yes, I know that people have met offline, and I know that others have gone so far as even getting married to their online counterparts, but these are definitely the exception, NOT the rule.
All I am getting at is this: Developers of games that actually have some need for Co-Op, be that online or off, at least consider doing something so that I can include my friends sitting beside me. That doesn’t mean that I need some half-assed multiplayer shoe-horned into my game totally ruining the experience, though. Also, don’t forget to consider your friends (speaking directly to the gaming public, I mean). If your buddies are sitting around watching you play a game solo, it probably isn’t the most fun experience they can have. Even the most craptacular old-school offline Co-Op can be made fun with the right people. My friends and I have played many a crappy game for hours, just because we can find ways of making it fun.
So when your Friends list tops out at 250, don’t forget your real friends. Take some time and play a game that involves them, too. At the end of the day, your real friends will literally be there for you. Like it or not, 90% of the people that you meet online and game with don’t give two shits about you on a personal level. They won’t pick you up if your car breaks down, bail you out of jail if you get caught with that “escort” in Vegas, or keep the secret on why you can’t use ice tongs without cringing.
Killzone 2 Multiplayer Review
1
As with any high-profile first-person shooter, Killzone 2 includes an online multiplayer mode which allows you to take on other players the world ‘round in a variety of game-types. Or, if you prefer, you can play offline with AI controlled enemies and teammates.
The offline multiplayer mode is not what I would call “multiplayer”. It is you, the lone human, fighting against and alongside AI bots in the multiplayer maps. No split screen or LAN is to be seen here, which is quite a disappointment.
As far as bots go I found that they were surprisingly clever and capable in battle. When my AI buddies had the “flag” and could not get through the enemy team positioned on the bridge, he had a bright idea: try a completely different route of getting to the capture point instead of endlessly throwing themselves at a wall of enemy combatants. I was quite surprised that the AI logic chose to go the long way around to get to the capture point based on the fact that the short route was way too tough to break through.
AI teammates will also repair equipment, set turrets, revive you, everything that you expect from a (competent) online buddy, minus the ability to form a squad and direct attacks with vocalized coordination.
The structure of multiplayer is essentially a mash up of other popular team-based multiplayer shooters. You have the class play of Team Fortress, the feel and level progression of Call of Duty and a few features of Battlefield mixed in.
You have your standard Team Deathmatch called Body Count, Capture the Flag with the name of Search & Retrieve, Capture & Hold, Bombing Run, and Assassination. They all work like the name suggests but the interesting part is that all of these game types happen consecutively within the same map. You could start out having to defend a point from being blown-up by the other team and after that is over you may be tasked with killing a specific enemy player.
The maps in Killzone 2 multiplayer are impressively vast.
The maps are quite large and accommodate all of the different game modes nicely. The visuals of these multiplayer arenas are some of the most impressive that I’ve seen on a console. The graphical fidelity seems to be on par with that of the single player campaign where as most other shooters sacrifice their visuals for the sake of a faster framerate.
Unlike Team Fortress, the classes are locked away and you are unable to access them until you bring character to the appropriate experience level. This may sound similar to Call of Duty’s class system, but it’s too slow to progress. It ultimately does not work.
What happened was in the first few days of playing online, most people did not have the high-tiered classes such as the Saboteur and Sniper unlocked. Most players were still suck with the initial base grunt class, or maybe the Medic if they played long enough. Not enough people had the Engineer unlocked so you didn’t see many turrets around, and nobody was repairing any of the equipment placed around each map.
What I saw was a grouping of classes based on the level progression. There would be a bunch of Medics, but then they would gain access to the Engineer. At that point there would be no more Medics, just a bunch of Engineers. There were a few exceptions but this was the case the majority of the time. This ended up ruining what could have been a deep class game like that of Team Fortress 2. Why they did not have all of the classes available to begin with, I do not know.
By this point in time this shouldn’t be much of an issue as the players who have been there since day one have long since unlocked everything. Of course this leaves new players at quite a disadvantage as they have no classes or abilites unlocked and may turn them off from playing further.
Stick with your team mates and win or die alone.
You will definitely need a clan to get the most out of the multiplayer. Like in many online multiplayer games, pick up groups tend to be either absolutely silent or individuals will blast staticy rap music into their Bluetooth headsets. Team work is a must in Killzone 2 especially when you are protecting an Assassination target.
Much of the multiplayer is a “trial by fire” sort of experience. Many of the weapons and abilities that are featured in the single player game are locked away in multiplayer. One of those features, the medical zapper, is sequestered to the unlockable Medic class.
The multiplayer medi-zap does not work the same as the singleplayer one. This fact they have neglected to explain. You do not press the Circle button to revive an online buddy. First you have to unlock the Medic class, and as the medic you have to press the D pad Left to select the medi-zap, aim it at your fallen friend, and press the fire button. After that, it takes some time to recharge before you can zap another buddy, which makes sense in a multiplayer setting.
This aerial drone is one of many perks to unlock while playing online.
Another change from single player is that there is no knife. This confused me when I first started playing online. I tried pressing Right on the D-pad to equip the knife and backstab an enemy, but nothing happened. It wasn’t readily apparent that the knife was excluded from your armament.
You may have many questions during your first few hours of play. “Why the hell did my teammate just shoot me on purpose?” That wasn’t your teammate. That was the Saboteur class; he can disguise himself like the Spy from Team Fortress 2. “What happened to these mounted guns? Why are they all broken?” They are broken to begin with, along with the ammo resupply crates. An Engineer must first gain the ability to repair items, which is quite a pain in the ass to unlock.
As there are no tutorials to help you understand how the multiplayer game functions, you will have to either ask someone who is more experienced or find out about it through trial and error.
Killzone 2’s online multiplayer is a take-it or leave-it experience. If you can find yourself a good group of people to play with and don’t mind investing the large amount of time to unlock key features, then you may have a good time with it. If you aren’t privileged enough to find a clan and don’t have the time or patience, the experience will be less appealing than other online shooters.
Click here to see Killzone 2′s single player review!
Whatcha Been Playing??
0992 days
So given the recent arrival of my son, I figured that I wouldn’t have ANY free time on my hands. Come time find out, that isn’t entirely true. Now that doesn’t mean that soon to come I won’t have a chance to do anything for myself. I am not delusional, but at this point in his development, he requires minimal attention. So what can I do with all my free time… Well what comes natural to me, play every game I can get my hands on. So that’s exactly what I did.
Over the past several weeks I have managed to complete several games and come close in several more. I started a while ago (thanks to 1Up Yours) accumulating a “Pile of Shame.” There are more than a few games in there that when I mention that I have yet to finish them, I say it with my head hung in shame. So I was more than happy to take a couple off the pile. Here are a few of them, and a couple more that I am almost finished with.
Hero Vs. Giant Troll
First off, I managed to play through the bulk of (since I had barely scratched the surface of) and actually finish Fable II. Now that doesn’t mean that I “completed” Fable II, just that I was able to finish the main story line. I played through the story as a mostly good guy, and I guess it was pretty fun doing so. Along the way I did realize that this game would be EXTREMELY short if all you did was try to advance the main quest, and never touched the side missions. Once I did get to the ending, I was shocked at how completely anti-climactic the ending was. When the final “boss” was going through his diatribe, I just hit him with my sword to shut him up and start the fight. Not knowing that in doing so would instantly kill him… LAME. After such a build up before hand i expected an epic battle, and was handed a one hit death, that’s pretty weak. Not to mention that as I said on twitter, that fucker shot my dog, and that sir ain’t cool.
I am going to go ahead and play through the Knot-Hole Island DLC that I purchased the other day though. Then when all that is done, I will probably go back and start again this time being a total dick to everyone and anyone that I come across. Not sure if that will change my experience as a whole with the game, but I figure it’s worth a shot. All in all the game is actually quite good. There is much much more that I need to accomplish before feeling that I have “Completed” the game. Several times I caught myself just kind of staring off into the background of some lush scene and being amazed at some of the level of detail in the game. I would recommend it to someone that is looking for a well done non-linear RPG for the 360.
Inside an Oblivion Gate
Next up on the list is a game that is sooo old I am very ashamed to say that I never finished it, but I have a good reason. That game would be Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. Yeah I know, that is pretty much a launch title. At first it was just a game that I didn’t want to end so i futzed around with side quests and what not for months. Then, sadly, it killed my first 360, and I never went back to it. From the time that my 360 “red-ringed” playing Oblivion to the time I picked it up again to play, literally over a year had passed. I was to damn scared to fire it up again. However, I bit the bullet and decided that now was the time for me to finally finish the quest I started years before.
So after over 120 hours in the game, I went ahead and started to walk the final path in the game. Oblivion, unlike Fable II, did not disappoint as far as the final fight and story goes. Closing the “Great Gate” was a task and a half when everyone and their evil grandmother is trying to stop you. Though it was fun to loot the bodies of the dead after coming back through again. Then it was on to “Paradise” to destroy the final boss. I can’t say that fighting him was all that hard of a battle, but then again when you are 100+ hours into a game and can kill most anything with two hits, it’s hard to have a long fight.
Mario takes on "the world"
Knocking both of those off the pile really made me feel better about myself as a gamer. They had long been mocking me, and I should have taken care of them well before I actually got around to it. It did inspire me to try and finish more games while I could though, so I made a go at other games as well. Not quite to the point of completion on the rest but I did get much closer, and that’s what counts.
Topping that list is Super Mario Galaxies. I had played through about three stages before I got bored with it and decided to put it down. When I picked it back up, I played through about five more. I really don’t know how close I am to finishing the game, but if I had to lay a guess out, I would say with in a world or two.
Guns and Doves...
Next up we have John Woo’s: Stranglehold. Yeah it wasn’t that great of a game, but it has a subtle charm to it. I will freely admit that I have not paid ANY attention to the story. Actually at one point I think he killed a woman for some reason, maybe, and I was left to wonder why because I skipped the cut-scene. Oh well. This one I am almost completely done with. Currently I am trying to finish off the last stage and boss fight. The game is full of action, to be sure, but none of it is done so well that you could label the game as something “not to be missed”. I will finish it, and for the price paid ($10 when Circuit City was going under) I can’t really complain about what I am getting out of the game.
Japanese Rhythm Fun
Also, since I was in the hospital with my wife, waiting for my son to be released, I got to play a lot of DS(i) games. From Gamefly I rented “Rhythm Heaven” and enjoyed it for what it is. My wife asked me to describe it to her and the best way I could think of was to say that it is the bastard love child of the recent Wario games and PaRappa The Rapper. It’s a lot of quick games that involve a lot of timing and like the title implies… Rhythm. This was not a game that I was destined to finish however. I knew that starting out. I played through the first two sections of 9 (or is it 12) mini games. That was enough for me. It isn’t enough for me to give a full “review” on but it was a good game none the less.
There are probably other games in there that I am missing, but they all tend to blur together. My next couple games that am going to try and finish are Killzone 2 and Fallout 3. It will probably be a couple years on Fallout, but I guess given my track record with open world RPGs it’s not surprising. I will try to keep up with the reviews from here on out. Sorry for the lack of articles on the site but considering the recent events in my life, I think I am doing pretty well.
