Disappointment (a year in games by Dave Green)

Disappointment


For me this year games have been really disappointing with no real motivation to play the xbox at all. LA Noire had no really chemistry for me to be inspired to play.
Where as everyone is fighting for Xmas no.1
Here is the list of games to which I am looking forward to:

Gears of War 3 (20 sept)
Skyrim (11 nov)
Batman Arkham City ( 20 oct)
Bioshock : infinite (31 dec)
Assassin Creed (31 dec)
Modern Warfare 3 (8 nov) 

To me modern warfare will be last as I have no investment in that franchise , but the other games are 6 – 60 hours worth of play so why has no one released there game and tried to get one of these out in summer and have a great hit instead of competing for the same audience.

I am truly glad that Mass Effect 3 was pushed back to march for that exact reason. Bioware look after there customers I do believe. And if the previous Mass Effect games are anything to go by its going to be a huge game.

What games are you looking forward to this coming holiday period , leave a comment and let us know

Mass Effect The Movie

So it was a fairly well known secret that a mass effect movie would be being made and it seems that  Legendary Pictures  has picked up the rights to make a movie on the Mass Effect franchise, with BioWare co-founders Greg Zeschuk and Ray Muzyka serving as executive producers along with the game franchise's executive producer Casey Hudson. The film is still in the very early stages, and Mark Protosevich (Thor, I Am Legend) has been approached to write the movie.


With its myriad worlds and alien races, Mass Effect would be a challenge to bring to the silver screen, but the strong Commander Shepard would also be an easy character to center on , for me though here lies the problem , with Commander Shepard being fully customisable everyone who played the games would probably have had a different looking main character i went for the pretty basic bald space marine look that is fairly standard to the game but i messed around with face shape and beard types etc while my friend Dave went for a Wesley Snipes (simon from demolition man) look a like  as seen in the pic below.

Personally i think you couldnt go far wrong with Sam Worthington he of Avatar , Terminator salvation fame for the standard Sheppard look .

Let me know your thoughts in the poll on the side bar of the homepage

Harry Potter Review : Courtesy of David Green

Harry Potter And The Deadly Hallows: part one

I picked up this title real cheap at Christmas so now having worked 12 days straight I decided to opt for easy cheevo's. After one hours play and sheer boredom I gave up.

Having got 105 points off it in that hour you would figure I would continue but when a game is slow paced and no entertainment value for money and making me fall asleep I was out. 

The box should read put insomniacs to sleep as it that shit/dull, im going to score this 30% basic purely on graphics.

Dead Space 2 Game Review - Courtesy of David Green

I was very excited to final get around to playing this game having played the previous game. So I popped the disk in and the first thing I notice was a recap section where if you didn't play first game or you don't remember you could watch a small video and tell you the story. I personally think this feature should appear in more games.

As I put the hours into the game (think I finished it on 8 ½ hours), I was on the edge of my seat due to a compelling story and also jumping numerous times. It played exactly like I remember it the hub built onto your character and your guns, the running up and down halls and space as you severed off limbs from the necromorphs, completing mini puzzles to access the next area like the old school resident evil games.

The one main problem I had with it which most people on the net did too, was the last two chapters which if you didn't know how to kill the last new necromorph your pretty much dead. Or you could just do what I did and run through the last two chapters ignoring ammo and other stuff behind. To me that was aggravating as I loved exploring each level looking in each room and space.



As for the final boss fight it took me about eight attempts to do as in general you have lack of ammo and life as you just had to run through two levels, and to make matters worst you cant purchase ammo from the store as the last store u encounter was in chapter 13 and you don't even know it the last time for you to stock up.

I still highly recommend you buy this game though, for me the game gets a score of 86%.

The following is a paid advertisement (not really) for tesco home delivery service

So neither me nor my wife can drive which can prove troublesome when it comes to making sure there is food in our flat , our solution is to use Tesco's excellent home delivery service .

Having ordered our food on-line yesterday evening (Sunday 6pm ish) we chose a delivery slot of Monday morning 9 - 11 it turned up at 9:01am but what I am most impressed with is the substitution of items that are unavailable in there store , having ordered a 250g jar of marmite I instead got a 500g jar for no extra cost as the 250g jar was out of stock and shit more marmite is always a good thing !

Thats my little review done i highly recommend using it if you cant be arsed to go to the store or cant drive.


Now if you have been following my blog you will be aware that we have a puppy he is now 3 months old and a HELL of a lot bigger than we thought he would be at this stage photographic evidence of this is below.

but with him now being old enough to go out for walks that is making things around the house a lot better with him finally being able to burn of that excessive energy rather than use it to try and destroy our home!

now on to something you may enjoy if you like to take the piss out of video games this is a episode of Games Radar's Trailer Trash Theater which is very very funny so be sure to check out the rest of them as well 

Tomorrow is my 27Th birthday so I'm off to contemplate life and my impending death until next time Peace out 

Disappointing video games

Fable 3 is a disappointment , Let me explain I have always been a big fan of the fable series on Xbox I never owned a original xbox but as soon as i found out that the 360 would have the facility to download xbox original games I was on fable straight away and loved it from the first to the last minute , with a very compelling story along with fun side quests it was a different style of RPG from the ones i had played previously (such as Final Fantasy)



When I heard that Fable 2 was coming to Xbox 360 I eagerly awaited its release even pre ordering it something I very rarely do and once i got my copy it didn't leave my console until l had finished it. with much improved graphics , a deeper story line and even more side quests including taking on jobs to earn more money. It also bought in the for your actions to effect the look of your character , for instance one night after performing a rather evil act I turned my console off and went to bed when i next loaded up the game my character had developed demon horns on his head , which changed the way all the NPC's reacted to me in game.



So we now get to Fable 3 as soon as i put it in and loaded it up i wasn't feeling it something didn't feel right the graphics didn't seem to have improved if anything they seem to have gone back a generation , the camera also seemed very hard to control often not enabling me to see all the enemy's on screen which can be a problem .
I have only played for around 1 hour so really cant comment on the story of this game but all in all this game has left me massively disappointed and for this i can only really blame Peter Molyneux , the reason for this is this man is a one man HYPE machine who always hypes up his games way beyond anything they can ever realistically expect to achieve . When this happened with fable 2 I forgave him as the game stood up on its own but not this time and in future i will be cautious when buying a Molyneux product

Dave's Game Reviews Oct - Nov

Guest Videogames reviewer David Green

 

We Doodle

my first impressions were that the game had no appeal to me but after a few hours playing it had become addictive. As a not very good drawer it does me well to say this game make me worse but still fun.

I found it a lot easier after turning off the doodle assist, making my pictures, kinda matching the words. 

Alas this game is only complete due to the fact you challenge your friends to guess what you have drawn, then the challenge you and you find out that they can't draw either.

Overall' this games provides hours of fun and silliness, so I highly recommend you download this from itunes.

Enslaved: odyssey to the west


After playing the demo, I knew this was a game I wanted to buy. After weeks of having no money I went on the hunt to get my copy eager with anticipation, I strolled in to blockbuster and found it at an ridiculous price, thinking Asda was my next best chance I went there and after thinking that was the best price I was gonna get for it I went to Morrisons to find a bargain.

Blockbuster new : £39.99
Blockbuster pre owned: £37.99
Asda :£34.71
Morrisons:£24.99


Once home I threw the disc in to the tray and loaded it up with great eagerness, as it loaded up the music and cinematic's played wow sheer brilliance, but I already knew that as the game plays on the unreal engine. So game play it a cross between Prince of Persia and Assassins Creed( a hack and slash breed with adventure gaming). The game consists of 14 levels most of which take 25 – 35 minutes, game completion in about 5 -6 hours long so not very long but you wont be disappointed with what you get.

The storyline
Your enslaved by a teenage girl who controls you with a slave headband, the girl wants to go home but she cant make it on her own so she forces you to help her or die. So as you cross the landscapes you come across enemies in the form of mechs, which want to kill you as they are out for them selves and hate humans.

Upgrades
As a hack and slash game of course it has upgrades.
Which come in four types
health
shield
plasma stick
fighting
All to which can only be upgraded by collecting red orbs or defeating enemies,

Overall

After my first play through I got 545 achievement points. I found this was a game to which my girlfriend wanted to watch me play as the storyline had gripped her so I have given it extra points and based on game play and graphics an 86%

xbox 360 kinect


My first impression is this device for me was a good purchase unlike some may think (you know who you are). It entertains the kids and the rest of the family too.

Kinect adventures

This game comes with the kinect device, I had low expectations for this game due to what I had read or heard about it but I found it fun and it differs a lot from the Nintendo Wii much more advanced technology I think. This game makes you look stupid and funny as your doing the various activities which is what makes it fun.

So don't be shy and buy your kinect today overall score for game 78%

Medal Of Honor : Guest Reviewer David Green

I recently went into blockbuster in the mind set to rent 'Enslaved: odyssey to the west' but it was all out so I picked up the new 'Medal Of Honor'.

The missions in this game are short and not really full of action it took me only five hours to complete this game to make your experience better I personally recommend that you play through on hard I found your AI team mates will kill most of your opponents before you get the chance to aim. The only thing that stand out in this game are the cut scenes which are nice and very realistic. 
There are a few in mission achievements to pick up that you could quite easily miss if you don't look at the achievements list first.

The multi player experience is good but nowhere near up to the standard of call of duty, first of all you have the choice of three weapons in total one with each class which you don't get to change until you level up a few times. The maps are far to small for a 12 VS 12 team games. You do however get achievements for p levelling up each class and playing online for long hours for example playing online for two hours.

Overall I give this game a 72%

I highly recommend you rent and not purchase this game!


(ed- id like to thank Dave for taking time out of his day to write up this little review for me here's hoping for more soon)

My new laptop

well after saving some of my money for the first time in my life Ive gone and treated myself to a new laptop
the link to which is here if you'd like to check out the full specs   New Laptop  i am very pleased with it so far it is running very fast and smooth it plays the games i like without any issues which is a major plus especially with Civ 5 now being available.

all in all id give it a 9/10 so far .

Special interview with "We Talk Games' " Kyle Von Kubik

Before we get to the meat of this weeks interview id like to take this time to thank Kyle for agreeing to be a part of this interview, Kyle is currently the co host of the We Talk Games Podcast which can be found on iTunes in the podcast section and also a very active member of the we talk games community which you can check out for yourselves over at wetalkgames . Whilst there have a look around you can sign in with any of your current social media site username and passwords for ease of use 


Ross - As a long time listener of we talk games i have to say i like the new format , how did you become involved in the new direction of the show ?


Kyle - In March of 2009, I was contacted by Wiggly about joining his reboot of "We Talk Games" for reasons he could answer better than I. During the first couple of months of "Volume 2," Wiggly and I were talking almost daily about how to take the show in a new direction. A lot of our discussion revolved around a new format. We bounced a lot of ideas back and forth the weeks before and during the first three months of "Volume 2." We agreed that while we wanted to be on the same level as our contemporaries, we also wanted to be different from them. We agreed the "news" and "numbers" segments were pointless, because they were boring, dated the back-catalog and could be heard in a thousand other places; so they were dropped. We wanted listeners of "We Talk Games" to enjoy something that broke from the norm. You can listen to a handful of "top-tier" video game pod casts each week and essentially find the same discussions about the same games. That's why I feel our retro-game discussion, special guest interviews, "man-on-the-street" approach with correspondents and Stinky & T.T. characters are extremely important to the show's direction. It was my idea to have interviews with special guests from within the video-game industry and it's culture; which is why my largest responsibility for the show is to finding them each month. I also handle the manufacturing of our show's "Pro-Gear" merchandise.

Ross - What is it like to be able to see the community of we talk games grow now that you have the social media style site ?

Kyle - From the beginning of my involvement with "We Talk Games," I wanted our show to have a rocking website on par with our contemporaries. It understandably took some time, but the result -in my opinion- outshines our contemporaries and continues to evolve. Wiggly and Kyle DeFranco deserve all the praise and credit for their work. Being able to connect, communicate and share with the "We Talk Games" community and watch it grow is extremely rewarding.

Ross - What moves are you and Wiggly looking to make to take the show to the next level ?

Kyle - Unfortunately there are a lot of things going on right now that I cannot discuss, but some thing should start to be revealed soon. Bringing "We Talk Games" to the "next level" is something I'm constantly thinking about. Undeniably, growing our audience has been the biggest struggle and frustration for us, especially because it isn't the fault of our product. New listeners and our special guests within the industry have largely had nothing but positive things to say about our show. Former special guests like Trip Hawkins, Alex Neuse, and -more recently- Team Meat have said that our interviews have been the best they've ever had. We were commended and promoted by Taito of Japan. So what's the problem? I believe the problem is "We Talk Games" is lost in a flooded market. There are a million other video-game podcasts out there and most of them suck. People are loyal to two or three shows, because they know what to expect each week. That's how I feel as a listener of other podcasts. Anytime I deviate out from my set roster of shows and tried something new, I'm usually disappointed. We have to get our brand out there and get people listening, so they can discover the quality product we're delivering. Wiggly, John and I can are always promoting the brand in different ways, but the efforts from our core community shouldn't be over looked. Listener like yourself and many others -I don't want to name names in fear that I'll forget someone- have been very instrumental in promoting the show. We're all very thankful for that. 

Ross - How many subscribers do you have to the podcast and in which ways are you trying to attract new listeners ? 

Kyle - I honestly don't know the hard numbers for our subscriptions, but whatever they are, I want to double them within a year. There's no one thing that will accomplish that goal, so we've been delivering weekly content, running contests, getting interactive and hitting the payment; rewarding our current listeners all the while. Good old "word-of-mouth" works too. I urge our listeners, if you like what you hear, tell as many people as you can.

Ross - Do you listen back to the shows yourself ? 

Kyle - I listen to every episode "We Talk Games" at least twice. The first time through is because I'm truly a fan our of product. However, each time after that is for personal improvements and quality-insurance. Thus the "addendum." I take my role in show very seriously and I'm always looking to improve.

Ross - Which are some of the best games that people may never have heard of on any of this generation of consoles ?

Kyle - This is difficult because a couple of my picks have been discussed on the show already, which is why "We Talk Games" is great. "Chromehounds" for the Xbox 360, "Little King's Story" on the Wii and "Retro Game Challenge" for the DS. I think you can get those titles on the cheap and they should bring a lot of enjoyment.

Ross - What areas of the gaming genre market do you feel is over saturated at the moment , by this i mean do you feel there are to many FPS , RPG Etc ?

Kyle - There's definitely an over-saturation of first-person and third person shooters, however even within those genres one can find a new fun experience. For example, "Transformers: War of Cybertron." Japanese role-playing games (J-RPGs) on the other have been over-saturating the market since the Playstation (PSX) and haven't brought anything new or interesting to the table since 1997. That's one genre that I've grown tired of.

Ross - And on the flip side of that what genres do you feel don't receive enough love from developers ?

Kyle - I'd like to see more good point-and-click adventures like those currently coming out of "Telltale Games" and arcade-style games of the same quality of "Pacman CE" and "Geometry Wars." Thankfully the current DLC marketplace scene makes this request economically viable.

Ross - What is your favorite genre of games ?

Kyle - I really like Western RPG's like "Fallout 3" & "Dragon Age: Origins."  I really dig the customization, exploration and narratives found in titles like those. Although my personal schedule has limited the amount of time I can invest in games like those.

Ross - Of the current gen consoles which is your machine of choice ?

Kyle - My Playstation 3 gets the most burn of all my consoles, mostly for playing PSN games and Blu-Rays

Ross - In your opinion which are the best and worst games that have been made into movies ? 

Kyle - Everyone cites the "Super Mario Bros." films as one of the worst, but "Street Fighter" was even worse. Dennis Hopper as "King Koopa" was a lot better than Jean Claude Van Damme as "Guile." Why is "Sagat" is 5'0" and 120lbs.? Both films are hilarious for all the wrong reasons. I remember "Mortal Kombat" being fun when I was 12 years old, but I have no desire to see if that film holds up today.

Ross - and finally can you settle a age old debate over who is better mario or sonic ? 

Kyle - One only has to look at the anthology of games from their respective franchises to see the clear winner. How many bad "Mario" games have you played? How many bad Sonic games were you too afraid to play? There's your answer.


Once again thank you Kyle i hope everyone enjoyed this interview if so let me know in the comments section so i can push on with more of them .


Cheers