Review - God of War: Ghost of Sparta

Review  - God of War: Ghost of Sparta


Pros: More of the God of War action we all love, pushes the limits of the PSP for a truly cinematic experience on a portable device.

Cons: Some invisible walls in odd areas and fixed camera angle can make larger battles confusing.

Final Judgement: A great addition to Kratos’ story and one of the best titles I’ve played on PSP.

www.spartansstandtall.com

Available for: PSP, PS3



(Fair warning, some of the links in this weeks review go to videos that contain spoilers for the God of War series.)

Yes, I know God of War: Ghost of Sparta is not exactly a new game, seeing as it’s been almost one year since it was released on Play Station Portable but with it being re-released in HD on PlayStation 3 as a part of the God of War Origins Collection and with rumours of a God of War IV being released next year I though why not. That and I was away on business all week with my PlayStation Portable to keep me company.

God of War… four words sum this series up: Kratos has anger issues. For real, this guy makes the Hulk seem even tempered and the Hulk`s super power is getting all pissy and throwing tantrums. I remember the first time I picked up the original God of War, I was at a friend’s house. He’d called me over to check out this cool game about an ancient Greek albino with sword nunchucks and questionable ethics who coped with the knowledge that he’d murdered his family by getting shit faced and banging maidens on his boat. Wow. 

Oddly, Aphrodite is the only God of Olympus Kratos dosen't have beef with.

Oh yes, God of War, the game that made Spartans more popular than Gerard Buttler`s abs. I remember ripping the wings off a harpy, twisting the head off a warrior and mashing the controller all to complete a quick time event that made Kratos give a hydra cheap eye surgery via a broken ship mast. This was only the first fifteen minutes or so of the game. Ah good old times.

Seriously, every time I see this movie I have to hit the gym.

Needless to say I was enthralled and purchased the game immediately upon leaving his residence.

Since then, Sony has released three additional titles in the God of War series and they have followed the same pattern: 

1.       The ultimate anti-hero Kratos is told to go get something on the promise of redemption.

"Dude, Seriously... Hear me out, this time I swear total redemption."

2.       Kratos gets very excited and barrels in head first without thinking. This is usually followed by Kratos intentionally causing an obscene amount of collateral damage.

"Well... Looks like were done here, time to hit the ol' dusty trail."

3.       Kratos then learns that in his quest he is ultimately a pawn and being used.  This leads to him flying into a bat-shit blind rage and he screams the name of his patron turned tormentor, vowing to murder them in a fairly painful drawn out manner.

"Oh! Dude! Was that your wife? Aww, shit... This is Awkward..."

4.       Kratos then causes more damage and havoc during which he usually dies and travels to the underworld/afterlife. There he re-kills some already dead things, fights his way back to the land of the living and then murders the person who originally tricked him.

What was that I was sayin about dying so many times you loose track? Seriously Hades is like a fucking vaction for the guy.

5.       Then just as it seems that Kratos will finally have a happy ever after the fates conspire to force Kratos to sacrifice or destroy the very thing that would bring him peace in order to serve a greater good. A greater good which is revealed in the next game to be using him as a pawn… and were back to Kratos yelling names and swearing vengeance.

"NOW WE MUST KUNG-FU FIGHT!"

I’m not even exaggerating, that is literally more or less how every game in the series thus far has played out. The God of War universe really only has two categories: Things that Kratos hasn’t encountered and Things that Kratos has ripped a new asshole.

Even though the stories all follow the same pattern T.C. Carson and Linda Hunt do such a good job voicing Kratos and Narrating the story that I find myself constantly hoping that this time around Kratos will catch a break, that things will finally work in his favour and that he will finally get a happy ending. He never does but I was still pleasantly surprised by the story of Ghost of Sparta.

Ghost of Sparta takes place between the console games God of War and God of War II. The game starts with Kratos, having recently destroyed Ares the Ancient Greek Pantheons God of War, ascending to his throne. The game focuses on Kratos’ quest to locate and rescue his lost brother Deimos who is being held by Thanatos, the god of death. The story that followed was fairly original for the God of War series and a refreshing change from the other games. The game acted as an origin story for Kratos, filling in a lot of his background and reasons for his hatred towards the gods. A hatred that is central to the plot in the second and third God of War console games. The story has almost nothing to do with the characters of the main console story line and is a refreshing break from the blind rage dump that is Kratos’ usual fare.

Deimos, almost as awesome as Kratos.

Aside from differences in controller layout from PSP to PS3, the game play is exactly the same as the previous games in the series. The simplicity of the attack system has always been key to God of War.  Many games have tried to mimic the hallmark acrobatic style and ferocity of Kratos` fighting style, but very few have ever come close. (Not mentioning any names but, Bayonetta, I`m looking at you, you trampy hair suit wearing wierdo.)

Bayonetta, why are your clothes made out of your hair and why do you get naked every time you attack?

The button sequences for different attack combinations are ported directly into the game and both veteran and new comers to God of War will have no problem picking up the game and whipping around flaming sword death to their hearts content. After all part of the allure of God of War is being able to crush, massacre and destroy your opponents without having to memorize complex button and analog stick combos. You can literally just mash the controller with your fist and pull off some convincingly expert looking attacks. Expert attacks that look great on the PSP system.

He makes it look so easy.

I’ve always felt that the PSP is more or less a handheld version of the PlayStation 2.  However, while it can handle reasonably good three dimensional graphics they are usually low res.  Also, the PSP is normally unable to handle the crazy amount of razzle dazzle in the background and environment. Or so I thought,  In Ghost of Sparta, Ready at dawn Studios really pushed the PSP’s hardware to its absolute limit.

Looking pretty good there guy.

The game could almost pass for a PS3 title.  The character models looked great, animation was smooth and the game environment was chalked full of persistent environmental effects and background animations which made the God of War titles so incredible and epic feeling.  In particular there is one point during the game where Kratos meets King Midas, you know the guy that turns everything he touches to gold? They meet near an active volcano where there is flowing magma, showers of molten rock spattering the ground and steam vents hissing away. Add to this Midas creating a shining sparkle effect to everything he touches or brushes against and the result is truly something to behold.

Midas, about to enter the 'new asshole' catagory

My only issues with the game both relate to the fixed camera angles.  Unlike the previous games which would allow you to zoom and pan the camera, the PSP version keeps a fixed camera angles at all times.  The angle issue results in some oddly placed invisible walls which block Kratos from moving into what appear to be valid play areas. The camera angle also leads to slightly confusing battles involving large amount of opponents. When Kratos enters certain areas, the camera tends to zoom out to encompass the entire room or arena. While in many ways this camera angle is preferable to a tightly zoomed one where you would be unable to see the enemies that are surrounding you, It would be nice to be able to switch between the two angles or be able to pan the camera to a better vantage point. I found myself having a lot of difficulty knowing who Kratos was attacking, especially when he gets surrounded by larger enemies such as the Cyclops which is easily two to three times larger than him. When you`re in a battle with two or three of these bad boys, I found myself attempting to grab or focus on the wrong enemy, simply because I couldn`t tell where Kratos was facing.

Large battles, small Kratos

Overall, I was impressed by Ghost of Sparta and very much enjoyed the return of Kratos and the God of War series. Before picking up this game I was okay with the series being wrapped up, but after seeing that Kratos has more to him then blind murdering rage towards the Gods of Olympus I find myself hoping that the rumors are true and looking forward to the confirmation of God of War IV. If you’re a fan of God of War, go get this title. If you’re not sure about the series, pick up the Origins Package containing Ghost of Sparta and Chains of Olympus for PS3. They add a lot to Kratos’ story and are a great way to get into the Main story line of the console games.

Review - Gears of War 3

Review - Gears of War 3

Pros: Great Gameplay, soundtrack and multiplayer option

Cons: Slight gap in the narrative from the last game making the start of the story feel disjointed

Final Judgement: Well worth the purchase, satisfying conclusion to the series

www.gearsofwar.xbox.com

Available for: XBOX 360


You know, I like game trilogies; they're just the right amount of story for me. It’s like a well written essay. The first game hooks the player, getting you interested in the series while hinting at a shadowy greater evil. The Second game raises the stakes.  The mastermind is revealed along with the scope of its master plan and you find yourself giving a damn about the heroes plight asthe game begins to round out the key characters. Then comes the third instalment.  It’s like the god damn super bowl of the story. Chalked full of bright lights and noise, the game goes big before going home. Everything from the last two games comes to a climactic head in an epic showdown full of explosions, drama and action. Ending with the salvation of the world, getting of the girl, or dying like a champ.

I like knowing that questions will be answered and stories will be concluded. I also like not being concerned that the ante will continue to be upped to the point that the villain starts cloning dinosaurs for poorly defined reasons or the main character is consistently found on his death bed only to come back to life so often that you lose count.

Which brings us to this week’s offering Gears of War 3, developed by Epic Games and Microsoft Studios. The third and final instalment in the Gears of War Trilogy. Markus Fenix and his steroid addicted buddies are back to grunt, swear and chainsaw bayonet their way through another pile of horrors from the deep. So let’s get ready for more this:

And this:

And plenty of this:

The Gears of War saga follows the misadventures of Sargent Marcus Fenix, a solider known as a Gear in the Coalition of Organized Governments or COG. In the series, a technologically advanced Humanity has been fighting a losing war against a horde of monstrosities known as the Locust.  The Locust, who roughly fifteen years or so (before the first game), launched a surprise attack against the entirety of humanity when they emerged from their burrows beneath the surface of the world.

"We're back! And this time it ain't a sausage party!"

Wait… in writing that I just realized the absurdity of the whole situation. I mean, I did just mention that humanity was a technologically advanced society right? They have after all developed a system of satellites in orbit of the world called “the hammer of dawn” that can be used to call down precision laser strikes which they used on their own cities to… I don’t know, maybe to prove that they’re hard-core.  So with all this technology you`rè telling me that nobody ever bothered to look under a rock? Seriously!?! No one noticed that the planet was mostly hollow? No one ever noticed the multiple vicious species that have a raging hate bonner for anyone with skin pigmentation? Maybe the COG were too busy blasting their pecs to give it any mind but I digress. Lets get back to the plot:

In the first game Marcus, using his dead Father Adam's research, dropped a giant bomb into the center of the planet in an attempt to murder every Locust that wasn't actively engaged in trying to further pork humanity. This didn't work.  In fact it only managed to further piss off the already ornery Locust, was possibly caused the emergence of a plague called `Rust Lung`, which was killing an alarming number of people in the second game. I say maybe because, like cell phone use, no one in the game really seems to care enough to really look in to it. Also I`m starting to think Adam Fenix was the only scientist employed by the COG.

In the second game Marcus, yet again using his dead Father's previously unknown research, blows up the ground underneath Humanity’s last remaining inhabitable city, Jacinto, creating what he hoped would be a giant sink hole that the ocean would flood into and murder every Locust chilling under the planet’s surface. While Marcus is successful in sinking the city and flooding the tunnels Humanities last bastion is also gone. Gone and the COG breaks down and scatters about the world desperately trying to survive. I should also mention that I recalled that right near the end of the game they briefly introduced a new type of Locust that appears to be infested by "Emulsion" which in the Gears of War world is the planets primary fuel source, I seem to recall the Locust being perturbed by their appearance but it was kind of glazed over in the excitement of the big show down under Jacinto.

In the third and final game, the Emulsion Locusts have apparently been renamed Lambent and are becoming a real problem to the COG remnats. The Lambent now burst out of the ground from giant tentacles which spew forth all manner of emulsion tainted super assholes in a fairly disgusting Freudian manner. (At this point there’s a bit of a narrative leap that occurs with the Lambent from the second to the third game, but I'll get to that later.)  The new flavour of neon Locusts are even more hell bent on the extinction of humanity then the original albino Locust.

Right about now I'm glad this game wasn't created in Japan

While the Lambent are busy oiling their tentacles and slathering themselves with more day glow gloop then a free spirited hippie at a burning man rave. Marcus, who has been on a boat with his friends for the last year and a half appears receives a message from his Father Adam who turns out not to be dead but actually held captive by the Coke Classic flavoured Locust. Adam tells Marcus about new research. Research which will allow humanity to, you guessed it, murder every Locust and Lambent on the planet. Incredible, I know.

"Look son, I know the first few uber weapons I cooked up kinda shot us in the ass... but I've laid off the glue and have a real good feeling about this one. Trust me, this is gonna be awesome."

You know, the more I think about Marcus' track record the more bat shit insane he starts to seem. Does anyone ever stop and think about the facts that every time Marcus gets excited about his Dad’s research he comes up with a Hail Mary plan to cause the mass murder of a species? Or that these plans usually end with humanity being left worse off than it was? Why doesn’t anyone ever stop Marcus mid plan with a, "Hey Markus, I’m real happy for ya, I’m-ma let you finish, but I have to say your Dad’s idea of using the hammer of dawn on our own cities was the greatest crazy plan of all time! OF ALL TIME!”.  Maybe Markus could try something a little less crazy pants, A strongly worded letter perhaps? Maybe try being a Gear of Consensus?

"Dr. No ain't got SHIT on Adam Fenix!"

Now you may think from what I just said about the story that I don't like it, but I do, I really do. I think Gears of War has a great story. It’s just when you look at it objectively, it sounds a bit crazy. In the context of the game though, it makes perfect sense. I've enjoyed every game in the series and I totally drank the Epic Games cool-aid. Every game in this series has a memorable moment to it where I found myself sitting there and muttering impressively "wow" (head nod). For example, halfway through Gears 3 there is a scene played in slow motion with muted sound effects and an instrumental arrangement of Gary Jules' Mad World playing, damn well gave me goose bumps.

So epic Marcus can barely belive it.

The only real criticism I can level at the game is the aforementioned narrative leap.  Whenever there is a successful game series, you are likely going to have comics or novels that accompany the game to further flesh out the characters or the setting. Gears of War is no exception, the game has a graphic novel series as well as four books written by Karen Traviss, who is also the lead writer for Gears of War 3. The final book in the Gears of War novel series is called "Coalition’s End" and covers everything that happened between the end of Gears of War 2 and the start of Gears of War 3. I haven't read it, but from what I've researched in Coalition's End, Traviss explained the lambent threat, developed characters that suddenly appear in Gears 3 and set up key plot devices, such as a data disc that is a focus of the early part of Gears 3. That’s all wonderful except, none of it is explained in any detail, at any point in Gears of War 3. You can piece together what’s going on in the game with fairly little trouble, but I found myself wondering if I had forgotten some key information of the last game and found myself pausing to refer to a Gears of War wikki to clear things up.  To me that’s a bit of an issue.

"What do you mean, 'where did I come from'?"

A game or a game series should be more or less a self-contained story. I'm all for accompanying a game with books or comics with fiction references to make the hard-core fans smile but there should never be required pre-reading before playing a game in order to fully understand a games narrative. While Gears of War 3 tries to address this jump in story line with a short video recapping the story, it does so  in a Battlestar Galactica-esque "So some bad shit happened, yadda yadda yadda, everything is more or less fucked, here we go." Prologue, which while getting me jazzed up for the game, didn`t really explain things so much as make me say, hold on… they were on an island? Wait… He’s on a boat now?

As I mentioned previously, there`s a great scene in the game which is set to the song "mad world". One of the first things that gripped me in the Gears of War series is the music, Steve Jablonsky, who composed the second game was brought back for this instalment. Steve does a great job mixing mellow reflective themes that really brings to life the despair and devastation of the game world punctuated with pounding militaristic orchestration that drives home the frantic fire fights throughout the games action sequences. Jablonsky doesn’t disappoint for the sagas conclusion and I was only a few hours into the campaign when I found myself pre-ordering the Soundtrack off of Amazon.

There isn't really much more I can say about Gears of War 3. The only major changes to game play from the first two games is the inclusion of a four player co-operative campaign mode over Xbox Live and a new multiplayer mode where you attempt to survive successive waves of enemies with your friends. Other than that, the controls, gameplay and multiplayer are the exact same as in the first two games.

If you're a fan of the series, you're going to be pleased with the way the story wraps up. If this is your first foray into the Gears Saga, then stop, turn around, and go pick up the Gears of War collection that has the first two games. It’s fairly cheap, they’re both great and it will make the third games campaign a lot more enjoyable.

Review - RAGE

RAGE

At a glance

Pros:  Excellent graphics, smart AI and an intriguing setting.

Cons: Weak story line and repetitive levels.

Final Judgement:  Worthy of a recommendation.  The fun combination of racing, FPS killer AI and graphics make the game a great addition to the ID line up.

www.rage.com

Available for: PS3, XBOX, PC


Once upon a time, there was a being known only as “The Carmack” who on May 5^th, of the year 1992 turned his gaze upon the world.  Seeing a deep longing and emptiness in mankind, The Carmack descended from his golden throne, reached out to the unwashed masses and gave us the promethean fire known as Wolfenstein 3D.  In a big bang-esqe explosion of robo-hitler killing glory, the First Person Shooter genre was born.  Ever since then we’ve been shooting, stabbing and blowing up NPC’s and each other with wild abandon.

Nineteen years or so later; (God has it been 19 years? Damnit I feel old now) The Carmack, being the crazy rocket man that he is, has blasted off into the sky to rain down on us from on high unbridled violence against your fellow man… and things that used to be men.  Because, when the world is trying to recover from getting hit by an asteroid, it needs a mute hero who shoots first and asks questions… never.

Wow, I should pitch that line to Segal.

RAGE is the newest offering from The Carmack and ID Software and touted as the next evolution in FPS gaming. A game that I, for what ever reason, knew almost nothing about prior to purchasing.  Rage combines a post-apocalyptic Fallout like world with Wolfenstein style RPG mission selections and racing, can you ask for more? I submit that you cannot. 

Let’s have a look at the plot:

First check out this youtube video of the intro sequence, don’t worry I’ll wait…

Epic, no? Well it gets better.  Did you get a good look at the asteroid in the video? The one that drops in and fucks over everyone’s day, like an uninvited in-law? That is Apophis.  Well actually it’s 99942 Apophis, a very real Asteroid which was discovered in December of 2004. After our scientists discovered it and gave it the most sinister name possible, they took a moment to have a good look at it and then realized that it was getting bigger and then pooped themselves as objects appear to get bigger when they are coming towards you… and Apophis was coming towards us… directly towards us. Thus Bruce Willis was put on standby and people in the know began to count down to Friday, April 13th, 2029 (yup Friday the 13^th) when Apophis would stop by for dinner.  As it got a bit closer however the eggheads decided to check their math and noticed that they forgot to carry a 2 and thus Apophis would not be buying us a hat, just passing by close enough to give the menacing glare of a lifetime.  So, good news, we aren’t all forked well that is until April 13^th 2036,  when Apophis comes back around, and then  it carries a 1 in 250,000 chance of booting the planet in the nuts.

"AHH! DUDE! FUCK! WHAT THE HE-"

Which would be awkward.

Now before you all start panicking and realize that you should be out living your lives and not wasting time with my blather about games, that could potentially be atomized in twenty five or so years, take a deep Zen breath and listen to the Redcoat… The impact will only kill some of us, ten million or so, and we won’t end up with an impact winter as the strike will only equal 510 megatons. That’s only like, ten or so times greater than the biggest hydrogen bomb ever exploded. See? Nothing to worry about, don’t you feel better now?

Soon.

So anyway, in RAGE the date is April 13^th, 2135; one hundred and six years after Apophis apparently shit all over us in 2029. You awake in your pod,  since you and your friends didn’t get the extended warranty or something, you are the only bro in the Pod still breathing. You emerge from your ark into the hot and dusty wasteland that used to be, what I can only imagine, prime real estate next to a big city.  For a few moments you stumble around before being promptly and unexpectedly attacked by Raiders. (The sudden and unexpected attack of these hombres damn near made me wet myself.) Just as it looks like RAGE is about to be the shortest campaign ever, a good Samaritan by the name of Dan Hagar, rescues you. Dan then takes you back to his pad, where I assumed he would be filling you in on what everyone had been up to while you were chill-ax’in beneath the planet surface, teamsters style.

"Yous goes ons aheads and starts rebuid'in... I'lls catch up."

I was wrong.

While Dan is driving through the wastes he talks about stuff, mentions Bandits and a sinister group known as The Authority.  He tells you that there is no time to answer your questions at that moment but he never elaborates further, and you don’t ask. In fact you never say anything. Dan basically says “listen bucko, go kill everyone in that bandit camp with this hear pistol. No survivors, no prisoners.” You just nod stoically and go about murdering everything that moves. No questions asked.  No “Why should I?” No “how do I know that they aren’t the good guys and you’re the bandits?” You just give a silent ’10-4, good buddy’ and then start a rolling wave of death and blood.

And that more or less is the extent of the setup for why you do what you do.

Now I pieced together, from the way people talk to you, that you likely have amnesia. You don’t appear to remember your life before Apophis, what your role was supposed to be in the Atlas Project, or why your blood has been replaced by what appears to be Tang.  There are two separate occasions in the game where people say “you have questions, I have no time for answers right now” even when things are totally stable and it appears as though there is all the time in the world to explain shit. They just point, you kill, and everyone is all right with that.

"Welcome to town, stranger! Feel like murder'in the bejesus outta a hundred or so people for me?"

I don’t really hold the “strong silent hero” bit against RAGE, after all there are plenty of great games that have silent protagonists.  There are many reasons game developers do this.  For some it’s so that players can better imagine themselves as the main characters.  Other developers don’t want shatter peoples image of an established character by giving it a voice that some might find inappropriate.  In most situations a silent protagonist is not a big deal.  However, in RAGE the character is thrown into a world populated by mutants and scraps of humanity. It has a blasted, alien landscape full of ruins and asteroid fragments. The world is so richly detailed and fascinating that, as a player, I want to know more about it. RAGE never gives you the option of looking a bit deeper.  If they won’t let you talk to the characters in the game to learn more about the world, then include books, items or documents that can be located throughout the world that will teach you more about what’s happening.  RAGE doesn’t have these things and as the storyline continued I found myself wishing more and more that it did.

"Whats that? You want to know more about my cleft lip and awesome chest tattoo? Well, too bad."

My main complaint with RAGE, perhaps my only real complaint, is the story.  The game makes you repeat almost every level that it has, making you either navigate through the environment backwards or complete it a second time fighting a different faction for no real good reason.  Frankly speaking…it sucks. I don’t mind if in a game they make me play the same level twice but there should be a good plot driven reason to do so. In any case, level duplicates should, like exclamation marks in writing, be used sparingly and not as a way to pad play time.

What’s more, the second half of the story seems rushed and the plot is weak. The game jumps from inconsequential run around quests to end game missions with almost no lead up, warning, or rising action. RAGE also sets up a villain that you never see, introduces a conspiracy that you never do anything about and has a final mission which is laughably easy.

Id Software is either setting up for a real ass kicker of a sequel, in which they’re going to flesh out a lot of RAGE’s themes, or they spent all their time envisioning the world and creating a gucci engine to render it, and then just mailed in the plot, because they were sleepy from all the other hard work they had done.

Speaking of the Engine, the ID Tech 5 engine, which The Carmack and his crew developed in house for this game is as I said pretty damn gucci. The sky is amazingly rendered, the environments are rich and the characters look great.

Ghost clan bandits, gett'in all up in yo' grill.

The only criticism of the engines performance is a slight delay in the rendering of high definition textures. On the Xbox version of the game I found, when you spun your character around quickly, the game would lag in the rendering of high def textures momentarily.  This would result in you seeing the world half in high def and half in blurry low def textures.  This issue was mitigated by installing the game on to the Xbox’s hard drive, which the game strongly recommends, but the lag was still noticeable.

While it didn’t really detract heavily from my enjoyment of the game play or affect the performance of the game, it was distracting. I’ve looked around the net and found that this isn’t an issue specifically to Xbox either, it affects all platforms and ID is working on driver tweaks for the PC. That being said, I don’t know if that means the issue will ever be fully addressed on Xbox or PS3.

The game play of RAGE is really where it’s at. The game is basically separated into two camps: FPS and racing.  For half the game it takes your standard shooter and elaborates on what makes shooters great. The AI for the enemies is excellent.  During the game the enemies try to flush you out with grenades, fall back when you start putting on the pressure, and then react appropriately to various threats and injuries.

I can't think of a snappy caption for this screen capture, but its looks good... no?

For example, if you throw a bladed boomerang called a “Wingstick” the bandits will yell a warning to each other and then duck and cover in an attempt to avoid the spinning death.  If you try shoot a melee oriented enemy they’ll dodge, dip, dive, duck and dodge to avoid your fire.  The enemy will even use terrain such as tables and walls to jump, run up and launch off of to get up close and personal to you. It’s cool, it’s exciting and it makes you frantically waste a lot of ammo.

Thankfully not every enemy in RAGE knows the five d's.

For the other half of the time, you race around the wastelands all Mad Max style in your tricked out whip of a wasteland ride. This is also for the most part, a lot of fun and very well done. Early on in the game you get access to a Dune buggy which you can shortly thereafter start upgrading with weapons and parts to give it a longer boost, better turning, faster top speed and many other cool features. You buy said upgrades by participating in races which are accessed through towns. The races have various conditions for winning including time trials, being the first across the finish line or collecting the most flags. The driving controls are intuitive and tight. The racing is so good in fact that RAGE could have been, with a bit more work, a standalone racing game.

When in doubt... ramp that shit.

To sum it up, I enjoyed RAGE and would definitely recommend it to anyone looking for a good shooter / adventure game to play. The world is interesting and the gameplay is fun. Even with the texture issues the game looks great and I look forward to ID further developing this particular piece of IP.  I just hope they put a bit more into the story and characters next time or at least give us a tangible motivation for the next mass of soon to be corpses they turn us loose on.

Review - Dead Island

Dead Island

At a glance:

Pros: Great Multi player co-op experience. Visceral melee based combat.

Cons: Inexcusable bugs and glitches make the above noted multi-player experience at times unplayable.

Final Judgement: Hope for a patch, otherwise pass it by.

Available for: XBOX, PS3, PC


I really don’t get the Zombie craze of the last few years, but then again, I don’t get a lot of things.  For example, Lady Antabellum. What is it? Is it one person? Or are they a dark cabal possessing a hive mind which identifies as one unit. Makes you wonder… really does…  I’m sorry, where was I going? Zombies? Right. The Zombie craze, don`t get it.

I`ve read Max Brooks’ Zombie Survival Guide and yes it was entertaining.  I also played Resident Evil and Dead Rising which were both great games.  I even once belonged to a club in University that was apparently a paramilitary organization devoted to containing Zombie outbreaks.  But I think we were more about bilking money out of the student society to throw beer social movie nights then putting down undead uprisings.

Through all that, I have to say, I have never seen the allure of living in a world where rotting corpses are trying to rip you limb from limb and turn your head into a happy meal. I mean in this particular apocalyptic scenario, what is the most you have to look forward to? A)  Getting chomped by one of these shambling decomposing monstrosities and turning into one or B) Die of starvation in your basement shivering and utterly alone.

Does the horrific reality of this just escape some people? There are people I work with that you can’t even say George Romero around without them immediately  cornering you and telling you, to the nauseatingly smallest detail, their Grand Unified Zombie Survival Plan  Including the best places to locate twinkees and ideal vacation destinations for weathering the scourge. I mean today I was walking through my office and I saw a calendar featuring Zombie hunting tips and equipment suggestions for the burgeoning Zombie death dealer.

On the topic of of vacation spots and zombie scourges let’s have a look at this week’s offering: Dead Island by Techland and Deep Silver.

In Dead Island you play as one of four main characters each with a lengthy in- depth back story which is expertly narrated by the character for which the story applies. For the sake of time though, allow me to condense their deep back stories and cerebral motivations for you:

Our heroes.

·         Xian Mei - A Chinese Spy/Concierge – she hopes to prove to the Chinese Government women  kick ass.

·         Sam B - A one hit wonder Gangsta Rapper with poor grammar – he hopes to write another hit and get more money so he can buy new spinners for his escalade.  

·         Purna -A former Police Officer turned Body Guard who hates rich people but spends all her time protecting them. She hopes to… I don’t actually know. She isn’t too clear on her motivations.

And my personal favourite:

·         Logan - A former NFL football star that reminds me a lot of Kenny Powers from Eastbound and Down.  He hopes to get drunk on the island and score some strange with loose women.

"Hello Ladies"

Quite the motley crew… Unfortunately, the back story is more or less the extent of the characters development and motivation throughout the game, but more on that later.
The four characters find themselves on the Island of Banoi off the coast of Papua New Guinea. Our protagonists are at the Palms Resort where they are working. Or in Logan’s case, getting drunk and talking about how when he was 19 his ass changed the face of professional football, because he has an arm like a fucking cannon.

In the opening sequence of the game you awake in the Palms Hotel, with the sounds of screams and alarms echoing down the hallways. As your character staggers out of bed, you begin stumbling through the hallways attempting to piece together why the hotel looks like the remnants of a free pizza booth at a comic book convention.

After a short control introduction sequence you get chased by a pair of zombies down a hallway before getting clotheslined by yet another zombie and pass out. You then awake in a straw hut on the beach being besieged by undead, apparently no worse for wear, which is how the game introduces you to the fact that you appear to be immune to whatever force or illness is turning the otherwise fun loving inhabitants of Banoi into brain connoisseurs. They never really say how you didn’t get ripped apart by the Zombies, which were closing in around you as you blacked out.  Nor do they explain how your rescuer Sinamoi managed to be capable of saving your ass whilst for the rest of the game he seems incapable of helping himself, let alone anyone else.  All in all, its interesting stuff let me tell ya.

"look old chap, maybe this 'fornlx' fellow can help you, God knows I can't."

 From then on out the game creators kick you out into a more or less open world.  This allows you to roam, provided you don’t try to go to certain areas until the appropriate point in the plot. The roaming capability is a good feature as you have to ability to choose to freely complete or ignore quests as you see fit.  

The story is fairly forgettable, aside from the sweet background stories; the selection of character means nothing. The intro sequence is not tailored to the character you choose; rather it’s the same no matter what.  You always wake up in the same hotel and have the same experiences. Throughout the game the characters have minimal interaction and they have no real growth. Even if you are playing solo with no one else around, the game still shows all four characters in cut scenes, where they all  just stand around and grunt, that is until the cut scene ends at which point they all vanish in to the either, leaving you once again alone.

Kenn- I mean, Logan, with his crew... which are only with him... in spirit.

Aside from the starting area of the Palms Resort, the other parts of the island of Banoi are nowhere near as aesthetically pleasing or interesting. For example, the Second Act features a ruined city and its expansive sewer system. The City is exactly like every other ruined city you see in Call of Duty, Fallout and more or less Space Marine.  The game also trades the lush, bright color palate of the Palms resort for washed out browns and sepia tones of the urban sprawl.

The game has a lot in common with Dead Rising, almost too much. Now beyond the obvious, it’s also melee oriented.  You improvise and upgrade weapons throughout the game and also gain experience which can be used to unlock new skills and abilities. Normally about now I would start screaming at the game and chastise it for the lack of innovation or original thought but I’m not going to. Why? Because I’m cool like that, and even though the game milks Dead Rising for almost every game mechanic it has… it’s okay because all of these “borrowed” mechanics are done very well, especially the melee.

In a first person game, melee is difficult to pull off. More often than not first player combat consists of waving your stick/sword/knife/wrench/crowbar either vertically or horizontally.  The swing is followed by a “Thwack” noise and a gout of blood, which signalling a hit. The enemy then staggers back looking, really, no worse for wear. That’s about it; you don’t really feel like you just crushed your foe in the temple.  It does feel either like you just shot them with a really short ranged gun or they are really repulsed by your characters questionable hygiene.  

Dead Island, however, being clever incorporated a context sensitive attack where your swing and attack is customized to where you are aiming and what type of weapon you are using.  For example, aim a baseball bat at zombie’s legs and you swing horizontally at the knee or shin. When a zombie falls to the ground, you switch to overhead bashing attacks. Equip a knife and your character makes jabbing motions. Aimed hits to legs and arms will cause the limbs to break, twisting and bending at unnatural angles. Bodies in the course of combat can be dismembered and decapitated; heads get smashed like over ripe pumpkins.  This leads to a visceral and convincing melee experience and damn near lets you taste the brain matter. It keeps the combat fresh and lends to the enjoyment of a game that, at its core, is essentially the repeated beat downs of the same charging zombie.

Ok look, its not like the crowbar can make him look any worse.

On the topic of beat downs, which are a team sport, Dead Island is, at its core, a game best played with friends.  However, this is where the game both stands on its own two feet while collapsing under crippling bugs and glitches.

I loved playing Dead Island in multi-player mode and I’m not the multiplayer type of guy. I played for a short time on Xbox and enjoyed the random drop-in so much I actually went out and bought a second copy of the game for PS3, as most of my friends are Playstation owners.

Beat downs ahoy!

You know playing with people cooperatively is about as good as it gets with Dead Island. I found myself thoroughly entertained.  Even after a lengthy Zombie stomping session I was still into it enough to find my voice going up an octave or two, trying to warn my associate of the impending doom sneaking up behind him while he was occupied. There is also something deeply satisfying and intensely entertaining when you and your friends corner a lone zombie knock it to the ground and then play a round of California kick ball with its meaty bits. It really makes up for the many times you get ripped to confetti because you wandered too far from the group.  Turnabout is fair play, after all.

So, you’re having lots of fun playing and find yourself getting sucked into the game and enjoying your time on Banoi.  Then like an attack of irritable bowel syndrome at an all you can eat buffet your good time is destroyed in a torrent of programming feces damned by some of the most crippling bugs I have ever witnessed. Had I encountered these glitches while playing my xbox version I would not have purchased a second copy of the game.  However, you just don’t see these system bugs in the game when you’re playing a single player campaign.

Two examples of such bugs that should really have been addressed at the QA stage of development:

1)      The reappearing juice crates

My friends and I were riding in the back of a pickup truck, transporting crates of juice boxes to a camp of survivors, when I noticed the juice crates would clip out the back of the truck and go flying down the road for about fifty feet.  The crates would then reappear in the truck bed only to immediately clip, once again, out the back of the truck. When we got to our destination, I found it impossible to pick up said crates, even though they appeared to be there in the truck bed.  We had to restart the mission and go juice hunting all over again.

2)      Truck bug of doom

At one point we went on a daring raid into the Palms Hotel to recover an armoured bank truck. After a long a perilous mission we arrived in the parking garage and commandeered the vehicle. I jumped behind the wheel and my compatriots piled into the passenger seats. The game system then promptly crashed on them.  They had to restart and get back in the truck.  Again the game crashed. A search of the internet explained to us that this happens for passengers approximately 75% of the time players enter the truck. Three quarters of the time! What’s more, this truck of the damned is central to the plot. You must use the truck to advance the story and even travel to certain destinations.

Abandon hope all ye who enter here.

I ask you, what kind of monster ships a game with such glaring problems? These had to have been seen in play testing.  The game structure is fundamentally broken and really inexcusable.  

I’m really quite torn by Dead Island and more than anything, disappointed. Ganging up with your buddies and taking on the infinite undead hordes with cobbled together weapons and gadgets is just plain old stupid fun. The combat is visceral and exciting.  The graphics are pretty darn good as well.  However, the bugs just ruin the game for you. It doesn’t matter how much the multiplayer makes you think of smiles and unicorn giggles when it works, if every time you try to get in your kick ass A-Team-esque armoured truck the game stops responding. It doesn’t take many resets before you throw your hands up in frustration and walk away.