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If the hype was to be believed we are amidst a new era of gaming. Journeymen on a wild frontier where Mass Effect developers EA celebrate it’s launch by blasting copies of the game into space. On the Xbox we have controller-less interface Kinect taking us into new realms of interaction: waving our arms around. But In Jay Mansion I have neither.
If you didn’t give a monkeys about the third instalment of the Max Payne series, then this may help. It’s the latest video from Rockstar showing off the slick cinematic stylings of our favourite perpetually miserable but trigger happy detective.
Over to you cheesy voiceover guy…
There is an old saying out there that goes something like this:
“If you are going to remake an old game, don’t balls it up.”
When I saw the first trailers for Starbreeze’s Syndicate, I felt a funny feeling in my abdomen that approached my brain at lightning speed. It was excitement and joy. The images of an old classic, remade into a Deus Ex-style shooter with real-time hacking and glorious weapons. There was even a four-man-team co-op mode that made you have to work together.
In short, this promised to be amazing. I played the Co-Op demo and I felt that the excitement would never end. The feeling was about to pop out of the top of my head when I remembered that games always look better in hindsight and nostalgia. Would this really be a trip back to glorious memory town, or was Starbreeze about to take a dump on my early gaming years?
A small time ago, I wrote a brief preview of Asura’s Wrath based on the demo released on Xbox Live. At the time of writing, I believed that the people who came up with the idea may have been on some high-grade meth amphetamine or were victims of some form of brain-based parasite.
It is with great pleasure that I can retract that statement, and say in terrified sincerity that the people who designed Asura’s Wrath were the kind of demonically possessed lunatic who somehow garbles together the plans to a doomsday device that will later be used as a plot point in some shitty ghost film.
In madness comes brilliance.
We’re all friends here, so let me be honest: I felt cheated by Borderlands (the first one). It was all very pretty and I loved the environments and atmosphere… but to claim that it had billions of weapons is a bit like saying chips with vinegar is a completely different meal to chips with a bit more vinegar. That and the ending was such an anti-climax it made me wish I’d done something useful with my life like maybe writing a play, learning crochet, or being in a coma.
It’s alright though, Borderlands 2 is coming with enhanced prettiness and even more hyperbole about its gun-count, hurrah!
Hey, Gearbox: would a half-decent ending be too much to ask for second time round?
Tomorrow sees the US release of EA and Starbreeze’s FPS reboot of the isometric classic, and with it comes a spanking new launch trailer, which, much to my confused tiny mind looks rather compelling.
I’m optimistically (naively?) hoping that a decent pace of story will give some atmosphere and immersion to the single player campaign instead of what we saw in the disappointing co-op demo: a shallow, frantic race to the next area with at least one comrade going AWOL, consistently and repeatedly running ahead into the nearest shower of bullets. Hero.
As always, thoughts welcome below or via that there twit-thing: @TbWblog.
Breadsticks, lesbian wizards and dragon flatulence all in the latest instalment of the excellent Two Dudes Review. This time we see Jay and Alex larking about in the woods to review Bethesda’s epic Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim.
Be sure to like the video on youtube and you can follow @jaycowle and @alexinvert on Twitter.
As some of the hardcore modders will know and lament, the Skyrim creation tool that was previously to be released in January has been pushed back to February. But it’s ok for two reasons. Firstly: that’s the month we’re in! Secondly: they have released this very tasty video to tease us silly, and my word it looks wondrous.
More information on Bethblog.
Me: Hi, my name’s Andrew and I was a massive fan of the Darkness 1.
Group: (SYMPATHETIC CLAPPING)
Me: Something about the environment, the atmosphere, the narrative, the tension… was just so right. The moment when The Darkness restrains you as you are forced to watch your character’s girlfriend’s execution by the mafia is among the most shocking and moving I’ve ever experienced in a game. But the story… it would pull me in then… (SOBBING)
Group Leader: Please, go on. You’re amongst friends.
Me: (SOBBING) …it would make me play through hours upon hours of repetitive FPS gameplay just to see more, like as if the Sopranos made me dance like a puppet for an entire day just to watch a single episode. I know I should feel used and manipulated, but somehow… I still loved it.
(Sobbing turns into hysterical crying, group hug ensues, etc. etc.)
Yup, it’s a lonely business being a fan of The Darkness, so how does the second instalment look like it’ll hold up?
So a few days ago Valve announced that Steam for mobiles would be coming soon, and in the meantime there would be a closed beta for which you could apply from within the app itself. If you weren’t one of the lucky few (and there were quite a few) we have compiled a little test drive of the app, and rather snazzy it is too.
