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Super Mario Galaxy 2 Review:

Time after time, Mario and the diligent masterminds at Nintendo responsible for him have proven that he can do anything. Arguably the eponymous face of gaming, the chubby plumber from Brooklyn has conquered everything from fighting games to racing, all while dazzling critics and dominating the sales charts. Yet Mario’s most remarkable accomplishment is perhaps his ability to stay fresh and far ahead of the curve even as he retains the enjoyable foundation that made his original games so captivating. Super Mario Galaxy 2 is proof positive of that very capacity and is an incredible game to boot.

 

It is also a game no one expected. The first direct sequel to a Mario platformer in decades, Galaxy 2 surpasses the excellence of the award-winning Super Mario Galaxy and the return to 2D interlude New Super Mario Bros. Wii. Immediately upon playing Super Mario Galaxy 2 you will not only rediscover what made its predecessor an instant classic, but also a coat of polish and refinement that sets this adventure apart from just about every other game out there.

The inciting incidents that set this game in motion are almost cloyingly familiar. Princess Peach invites Mario to the castle to watch the anticipated cosmic festivities along with the delightful promise of cake. Then as he is wont to do, Bowser, maintaining the massive stature he acquired at the end of NSMB Wii, kidnaps Peach and only seeks to grow more colossal. Mario unites with another lost Luma and hops aboard a space-vessel giving chase to Peach and her malevolent captor. You are forgiven for pondering whether a more novel set up could have been included but chances are you will not care after the game proper begins.

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Red Dead Redemption Review:

Ok ok, so it’s not quite Grand Theft Auto (GTA) simply transported to a Wild West setting, but it’s not far short of the mark either. Fortunately, if, like many nowadays, you feel that GTA IV was generally wildly overrated at the time of its release, then that shouldn’t necessarily put you off Red Dead Redemption (RDR). Indeed, I include myself in that grouping, so you need only look at the score to see that RDR offers something, to me at least, that GTA IV lacked. Unfortunately, if you want to find out what that is then you’ll have to read the rest of this review, and for that you have my apologies.

 

The story of Red Dead Redemption is largely a familiar one; John Marston, a former outlaw who’s turned his back on his old life and become an honest family man, is drawn back into his old ways when government agents kidnap his wife and daughter and hold him to ransom. His family will be returned safely, or so the government agents say, if he’s able to track down and kill/capture his former gang members. Not much of a story, you might think, but for the most part it’s told surprisingly well and with finesse. The themes of the growth of federal government, the spread of ‘civilisation’ and all that it entails, including the death of the Wild West, form a strong backdrop to the central relationships which develop between characters. This is true more of some parts of the story than others though.

The story splits into three key Acts and an Epilogue, and without spoiling any of the details I found the first Act in particular to be superb, but Rockstar drop the ball towards the end of the second Act, seemingly falling back on a GTA style of storytelling. Key characters begin to deliver lengthy pseudo-political and philosophical monologues, and the plot becomes farcical as Marston (a supposedly deadly and only partially reformed outlaw) is made out to be a pathetically gullible fool, with various characters taking advantage of his generosity without any quid pro quo, just to keep the story going. Fortunately, things return to form slightly towards the end of the game, but it never returns to the excellent storytelling of the first Act.

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Battlefield: Bad Company 2 Review:

Everyone loves a fat, juicy rivalry. Pepsi or Coke? Beatles or Stones? SEGA or Nintendo? These simple, binary pop-culture choices prompt endless arguments about which is best, but also help us define who we are and who we stand with. Now here comes EA's Swedish studio, DICE, making no secret of the fact that it wants to add another choice to that list: Bad Company 2 or Modern Warfare 2?

 

The first Battlefield: Bad Company game was an entertaining blast, with its crudely destructible environments and snot-nosed cast of irascible characters blagging dodgy gold in the middle of a war-zone. Boisterous and exciting, like an affectionate pit-bull, it still felt tentative, timid even at times. This was DICE feeling its way back into a console shooter market that had changed beyond all recognition since they last ventured into the land of the joypad with 2005's Battlefield: Modern Combat.

 

Bad Company 2, however, is an open challenge to the market leader, Activision's blockbuster behemoth. So let me pin my flag to the mast right from the start. This is the superior game.

 

 

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Darksiders Review:

They say that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. If that’s true then the developers of God of War and Legend of Zelda must be blushing from all the compliments they’ve gotten from Darksiders. Combining the combat system, gore, and dark atmosphere of God of War with the dungeon design from Legend of Zelda seems strange until you are in the thick of it. These two combine surprisingly well, but does Darksiders deserve to be in the company of the games that inspired it?

In the beginning Heaven and Hell were in an eternal struggle for dominance. Neither side relenting or gaining the upper hand. A mediating force known as the Charred Council stops the fighting by enforcing a truce with their four horsemen. A millennia or two later and humanity, the third kingdom, is born. You play as War, one of the four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, and you have been sent to Earth to start the Endwar. Unfortunately it seems that someone has screwed the pooch and the Endwar between Heaven and Hell occurred before the humans were ready. The bad news is that all the humans die off and after 100 years of being knocked around by some demon during the Endwar you are brought before your bosses in the Charred Council and they are all blaming you for starting the Endwar too soon. Apparently you were the only one of the four horsemen to come down to Earth, so it is presumed that you began the whole mess. The good news is that you talk your way out of an execution and are instead assigned with going back to Earth, proving your innocence, and killing everyone responsible.

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Resonance of Fate Review:

Resonance of Fate is the latest JRPG developed by Tri-Ace in their first ever job with Sega as a publisher. As far as JRPG developers go Tri-Ace is unique. Their games always have extremely fun battle systems, but they always seem to falter in some form in the presentation and other parts of the gameplay. Has Resonance of Fate bucked the trend, or has Tri-Ace made yet another game that borders on greatness but trips over its own feet before the finish line?

 

It seems that Al Gore has failed in his environmentalist endeavors since Resonance of Fate revolves around an Earth nearly devoid of life. In the distant future the entire planet has gone into ruin except for a small area around an atmosphere purifying tower known as Basel. You play as three mercenaries who take jobs from the higher-ups in the tower in order to eek out a living. With time you discover the pasts of the three hunters as well as the great power the machinery of Basel has over the fate of every person that lives in it. Surprisingly (from a JRPG enthusiast standpoint) the three heroes never get to the point of trying to save the world but instead focus on more personal, and some might say selfish, goals right up until the end of the game.

 

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Red Steel 2 Review:

Let’s just get this out of the way up front; Red Steel 2 does everything that you expected out of the first title gameplay-wise. It’s truly a shame that this wasn’t the game released alongside the Wii console back in 2006. Easily one of the most solid Wii MotionPlus efforts yet, the title does a masterful job at showcasing just how much the accessory can do wonders for how a game can feel and play, as it gives way to some of the most visceral, realistic, and downright fun gameplay mechanics that Nintendo’s little white box has ever seen. And while not everything else is up to par, what Red Steel 2 does correctly showcases the Wii’s strengths in ways that will leave any action-thirsty gamer begging for more.

 

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MadWorld Review:

Phrases like “gratuitous violence” have become common among those who criticize the video game industry. MadWorld may require an entirely new term to describe the twisted, disturbing, and hilariously over-the-top level of violence it employs. If you are looking for a style of bloody action game unlike anything else on the market this beat-em-up might just be for you.

 

MadWorld takes place in the fictional city of Varrigan, where a group of terrorists have taken over the entire island to host their deadly murder game, Death Watch. In Death Watch all citizens of the city plus numerous veteran contestants of the game must compete for their lives and money. You play Jack, a mysterious dark horse competitor with a secret agenda. The characters are interesting, and the plot development is unexpected. It’s not going to rewrite the laws of video game narrative, but it will keep the player interested between the stretches of combat.

 

 

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Batman: Arkham Asylum Review:

 

In the classic debate of Superman versus Batman I have always found myself on the side of the Dark Knight. Sure, Superman could easily beat him to a pulp when you think about it realistically, but what’s fun about a super hero who is invincible except for a single weakness? Well when it comes to video games I think a clear winner has been decided. Batman: Arkham Asylum might be the best super hero game ever, while the horror of Superman 64 has forever marred the reputation of the man of steel.

 

Batman: Arkham Asylum lets you play as the caped crusader during what the developers call “the worst night of his life”. Joker is in custody and you are taking him to Arkham Asylum but things seem off. Batman is worried that something is wrong since Joker was caught too easily; it's almost as if he wanted to be caught. With that glaring foreshadow out of the way Joker soon escapes with the help of Harley Quinn and has taken over all of Arkham Asylum’s security systems. He lets loose the residents of Arkham and suddenly Batman is faced with the likes of Poison Ivy, Killer Croc, and Scarecrow. You have to battle all of the released super villains in one way or another, as well as the many minions that Joker has brought along with him from Blackgate Prison, in order to get Arkham back under control.

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White Knight Chronicles Review:

White Knight Chronicles is one of those long awaited games for the Playstation 3 that we have seen footage of at every E3 for years. The wait certainly wasn’t helped by an exceedingly long wait for the game to be localized for Western release. Combining an MMO-like online component with a single player JRPG sounds like a perfect way to increase playtime and allow people to continue exploring a game’s world, but have Level 5 bitten off more than they can chew with this challenge?

The story is a variant of one of the most basic video game plots in existence. A princess is in trouble and it’s your job to go save her. Leonard is the hero of the story who was delivering wine to Princess Cisna’s coming-of-age party when a mysterious group known as the Magi crash the party and kidnap Cisna after killing her father and the foreign dignitary that he had hoped to foster peace with. During this raid Leonard attempts to escape with Cisna through underground passages beneath the palace and ends up randomly coming upon and gaining the power of a Knight, a long dormant weapon from ancient times. So now you have a kingdom with no ruler, an impending war with a neighboring kingdom, a princess to save and the power to fix any one of these problems. Leonard is a typical adolescent boy, so he decides to think with his lower brain and you go running off after the princess.

 

 

None of this dooms the story to being bad, sure it is rather a cliché to be a young boy fighting to save a princess, but it’s how the story is told that makes it bad. It seems like every fifth or sixth time someone in this game opens their mouth they’re saying something stupid that makes me cringe. If you're a fan of JRPGs you will be more prepared for these moments than most, but even I was not fully ready for it. I think the inclusion of voice acting has been a detriment to low quality JRPGs with a lot of clichés in their stories because it makes them that much more obvious. There just aren't enough positives in this game’s story to make up for all the times when I wanted to turn the TV off, or at least mute it. Sappy romance scenes even make an entrance when Leonard dances with the projected image of the princess across a lake. Why exactly Leonard could walk on water at that point is beyond me.

The gameplay mechanics in White Knight Chronicles seem like an inexplicable decision on the part of the developers, until you remember that this game is not just a JRPG but also an MMORPG. The battle system plays out in real time as you take control of one of the three members of your party. Every 5-6 seconds a ring in the bottom right corner will fill up and then you can use one of your character abilities. Most abilities cost action chips which you replenish by either taking damage or dealing damage, while a few cost MP. You don’t get a massive amount of action chips, so most of your moves will be taken up performing the cost-free basic attack again and again. It is an extremely slow battle system that is for the most part boring. Most fights take absolutely no strategy to win and you find yourself cursing the slowly filling ring as you wait to press the button for your next basic attack. Characters that are in battle that you don’t directly control can have their general tactics set, but these are very limited, so if you want someone to tank you are going to have to do that yourself and trust the computer to complete the relatively simple jobs of dealing damage and healing.

 

 

Leveling the characters gives you skill points that you can use to customize each character’s job. The skill choices are based around the weapon that you want that person to use or whether you want them to heal or cast black magic. Weapons range from a bow, 2-handed sword, and axe for damage dealers, to a wand for casters, and a one-handed sword or one-handed spear for tanks. Skills you obtain when putting points into each of these weapons are designed well enough to allow for different playstyles while still giving you the tools you need to do the specific job it is designed for. However, using these skills brings forward one of White Knight Chronicles’ biggest annoyances.

You have 3 menus of 7 possible skills that you can assign each character, and they can only use these 21 skills that you assign them. This leads to a massive amount of largely boring menu work as you assign skills to each character that the AI will probably never make them use anyway, but you have to assign them for it to even be a possibility. Characters also have a limited number of items they can carry and use during battle, which is expected and fine, but their equipment is included in these items. This means that whenever you want to switch around equipment you either have to do it from the item screen (which doesn’t let you see how the new equipment affects the character’s stats but does let you switch items from character to character), or change equipment in the equipment screen, go back to the item screen to pass the equipment from one character to another and then back to the equipment screen in order to equip the character that received the items. Both of these are poor choices for a single player JRPG that were a consequence of the inclusion of the MMORPG multiplayer.

 

 

The big draw of the battle system is the ability to turn into the massive knights. For 7 or more action chips certain characters have the ability to turn into ~20 foot tall knights which do massive damage. Every action you do in knight form costs MP and your MP slowly depletes just from being in the form. If your MP depletes completely then you are forced back into human form. The actions you have available to you are based on how many action chips you use to go into knight form but they are all just single target melee abilities or larger area of effect abilities of varying types and cost. Sadly the knights come down to being an “I win” button for any fight that might have otherwise been challenging. Just make sure you save up enough action chips and you can massacre every boss or otherwise tough enemy without much worry. The only time using the knights requires any form of strategy is when they are fighting alone and can’t heal since you have to balance doing greater damage with not depleting your MP. If you have a healer even this becomes a non-issue and you can just slowly bash away with basic attacks without worrying about running out of MP or dying.

Once you finish the single player you still aren’t quite done with all the game has to offer. As I’ve mentioned before there are also some MMORPG aspects to the title that help give it longevity. When you start up the single player you are asked to customize and name your own character that adventures alongside the main characters in the storyline. This is largely meaningless as your character is mute and does nothing meaningful in the story, but it transitions nicely into the multiplayer since you will already be acquainted with your avatar for the online portion of the game.

 

 

Quests take place as instances within previously visited areas of the single player. You and 3 of your friends, or newly met strangers, can work through quests with varying objectives that usually end in some form of boss battle. Once you complete the quest you are given guild points which work towards increasing your guild ranking, which in turn gives you access to new quests. The only annoying part to this system is that the quests are designed for certain levels, so if you start playing multiplayer after completing the single player you are in for a whole lot of low level quest grinding before you can host quests that are appropriate for your level. Luckily you can join any quest regardless of your guild ranking, so you aren’t totally limited to low level questing, you just can’t host those same quests until you increase your guild ranking.

Probably the best part of the online is the ability to make your own town using the georama system, similar to that in Dark Cloud. You purchase buildings to place in your hometown and throughout the cities. In the single player you can find residents with different jobs that you can recruit to inhabit your town. Once you have spruced up the place you can upload it to Geonet, which allows anyone to visit and see what you have to offer. It makes for a great space to hang out with your friends and from here you can host and join quests with people you know instead of allowing the game to find random people for you. Geonet also has a forum that you can access directly from the game, but it's annoying that it forces you to agree to a terms of service every time you sign in.

 

 

Graphically White Knight Chronicles is pretty average from a technical standpoint. There are some nice large areas that you can explore, as well as large towns, and everything looks fairly pretty from a distance, but the closer you get the sloppier it looks. This also applies to the characters themselves, as White Knight Chronicles is home to some of the most obviously bad lip synching I have seen in a long time. One wonders if they even knew it was a problem since they never fail to do a close up whenever someone talks during a cutscene. Most of these cutscenes are done using the in-game engine, which is nice because it means that the characters will actually change appearance when you change their equipment, but this does result in some hair clipping into armor. Other cutscenes are pre-rendered and look markedly better, though still not amazing.

Sound design doesn’t come off any better sadly. Voice acting ranges from decent to downright terrible, and I’m still trying to figure out why that one rabbit had an Indian accent. It’s hard to tell if I was cringing because of the lines they were saying or how they said it sometimes, but regardless the combination was hard to listen to. Music is muted and doesn’t stand out very much but when you listen it does fit the mood nicely enough.

Value is easily White Knight Chronicles’ best feature, but even that isn’t amazing. The single player only lasted me 23 hours with a good amount of exploring on the way, which is pretty abysmal for a JRPG. That is made up for with the multiplayer that I mentioned before, but there aren't that many unique quests to complete before you start merely repeating the same quests with higher level enemies, so it isn’t endless or anywhere near as compelling as a typical MMORPG. There is a new game+ feature but it seems pointless since all the enemies stay the same level and the story is unchanging.

 

 

White Knight Chronicles seems like a really cool idea. Combining MMORPG style gameplay with a JRPG could help to keep people engaged in a game that would otherwise be a one-shot deal. Sadly, this focus seems to have a detrimental effect on the game in general and has made the gameplay go at a snail’s pace. The single player is too short, and the item management is annoying. It isn’t without its good sides, since the online questing aspects and the ability to visit other people’s hometowns can be a lot of fun, and I love having large areas that I’m free to explore in the singleplayer campaign, but overall this is a decidedly below average JRPG.

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No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle Review:

No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle is an ambitious sequel to the one of the Wii’s premier games of 2008 and one that fans of Travis’ quest to become the number one ranked assassin have been waiting for with bated breath for a long time. Well the wait is over, Travis Touchdown is back in a big way and with him comes more carnage, more mayhem, more awkward sexiness and of course more crazy moments from everyone’s favourite anime loving, wrestling fanatic assassin. Does Desperate Struggle slice up the rankings or is this just another bloody corpse set to litter the streets of Santa Destroy?

 

The second game in the No More Heroes series takes place roughly three years after the original, where we saw Travis climb the ranks to become the number one assassin in Santa Destroy, a city that has changed drastically thanks to the corporations taking over and pushing small businesses to the brink of bankruptcy. Travis has since retired from the world of professional assassinations but the murder of a close friend forces him pick up the Beam Katana once again and set off on a blood soaked mission of revenge. This time around Travis is ranked 51st (one of many in game references to series creator Suda 51) and must eliminate all who stand in his way to reach the top and get his vengeance. If you have never experienced the original No More Heroes don’t worry, as the story is completely independent and doesn’t rely on the events of the original to move along. There are even several allusions to this with 4th wall breaking moments such as a conversation between Travis and Sylvia where they mention that the ‘player would not be interested in knowing what happened three years ago.’ The story while presenting a very mature narrative never takes itself too seriously and is easily one of the most unique games in terms of story telling with many over the top and zany moments that will leave you scratching your head but also laughing out loud.

 

 

For those who have played the original No More Heroes the control scheme for Desperate Struggle will come off as second nature. For the uninitiated, you move Travis with the joystick on the Nunchuck, ‘Z’ targets an enemy and ‘C’ switches between multiple targets. On the Wii Remote the ‘A’ button is used to slice at your enemies with the Beam Katana while ‘B’ controls your punches and kicks that can be used to confuse enemies, while the left and right directions on the D-pad are used for quick evasive rolls. The game is also very light with the motion controls but the ones present are used very intelligently. When an enemy’s health bar reaches zero an arrow on screen will flash and a quick flick in the direction will eliminate the enemy with all kinds of gushing bloody goodness. The angle at which you’re holding the Wii Remote dictates how Travis holds the Katana, allowing him to block incoming attacks. This is the only real motion control related issue with the game, as it’s hard to gauge the needed height and movement needed to change Travis’ stance; sometimes it’s a subtle gesture other times you need to really move the remote vigorously. Finally to recharge your Beam Katana’s batteries you must hold the ‘2’ button while making movements that I’m sure most teenage boys are familiar with. (IE: holding the Wii Remote vertically and frantically moving it up and down.) The game also uses quick time events in the form of quick on screen flashes to indicate how to break a parry with an enemy or performing a wrestling move as a finisher. All in all the controls are very well executed. My only gripes being the exclusion of Wii Motion Plus support, which would have made the gesture based combat more responsive and also solve the issues with holding the Wii Remote at the proper height and the terrible camera, which always seems to throw itself into a corner just as the action is getting intense or you are staring down a boss. It should also be noted that the game allows you to use a Classic Controller for a more traditional experience, when using this option the motion gestures are simply replaced with a button based control scheme.

 

Several changes were made to the gameplay from the original No More Heroes. Once Travis is assigned a target for assassination, you can then move from your hotel room to the area where you are to meet your opponent. However the overworld navigation has changed dramatically, as now you simply choose the place you want to visit instead of riding there manually via motorcycle like in the original game. From the overworld map you can choose to either return to Travis’ hotel room at hotel No More Heroes, to either play with your cat Jeane, who has gained some serious weight since the last game and needs help dropping it, read through the latest issue of Weekly Backdrops to learn a new wrestling move or simply visit the bathroom to ‘drop a save’. You can then move to a variety of different locations throughout Santa Destroy, including the clothing shop Airport 51 to buy some new cloth and accessories, visit Naomi’s shop to buy new Beam Katanas or visit Ryan’s gym to upgrade your vital stats.

 

 

 

Once you reach your objective, you jump into No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle’s basic gameplay, a straight up action brawler. You move from room to room facing off against various types of enemies armed with all sorts of different objects ranging from blunt instruments to swords and even guns. Once all the enemies in a room have been reduced to dismembered piles of human flesh you can move onto the next area and repeat. While it all sounds very repetitive, the game does a good job at keeping levels short, meaning you will run into the boss of a particular area long before you get bored. Boss battles are anything but your standard affair, one minute you will be ‘simply’ slashing away at a seemingly normal enemy and the next you will be in space fighting giant robots and no I am not kidding.

 

This variety in gameplay even carries over to the mini-games. In the prequel, you had to complete menial tasks to earn cash to spend on upgrades. The same is true for Desperate Struggle, however this time most (all but one) of the jobs are presented in a classic 8-bit style, complete with simple 2-3 button gameplay and even synthesised voices. In all, there are 8 jobs for Travis to find around Santa Destroy. These include Bug Out, which has Travis collecting insects and rodents. Lay The Pipe features Travis the plumber connecting pipes to make sure the water safely flows from one end to the other. Coconut Grabber, a re-imagining of the coconut collecting mini game from No More Heroes has an 8-bit Travis running from palm tree to palm tree knocking coconuts down and trying to catch them in a backpack. Pizza With A Vengeance puts Travis in the role of a pizza delivery boy who must reach his destination before time runs out, all while avoiding oncoming traffic and oil slicks. In Man The Meat you must take control of a grill station, making sure each customer’s ‘meat’ gets cooked perfectly. Tile In Style is a puzzle game where you must place blocks (that bare a striking resemblance to Tetris blocks) in a perfect rectangle. Getting Trashed takes us to outer space where Travis must collect floating pieces of garbage and ‘throw them in the ocean or something’. The last part-time job mini-game is Stings So Good and is the only one presented with the standard games graphics, this time around Travis is tasked with ridding Santa destroy of scorpions by slowly placing them in a bag and ‘disposing’ of them.

 

 

 

Apart from earning jobs the game features 3 more mini-games, two of which are located in Ryan’s Gym, and are training exercises used to build both Travis’ stamina (health) and strength (power), like the jobs before them, these are also presented in the 8-bit style. The final mini-game, Bizarre Jerry 5 is well… bizarre. On the surface it is a pretty basic vertical shooter in the same vein as a game from the Raiden series, the odd part is that you control flying anime style schoolgirls with abnormally large breasts and a penchant for wearing revealing clothing. If this wasn’t disturbing enough Bizarre Jerry 5’s intro cinematic (unlocked shortly into the game) is easily the last thing you want anyone walking in on. While all these mini-games both control and play very well, there are a few stand-outs. Both Pizza With A Vengeance and Man The Meat are extremely addictive and will easily have you putting hours into collecting cash. This hard-earned money can then be used to buy training time at the gym, weapon upgrades and clothing accessories.

 

The game also features multiple playable characters one of whom is Shinobu Jacobs, an assassin Travis defeated in the first game, but decided to spare her life. Well she is back, and this time she decides to help Travis along, even referring to him as her ‘master’. For the most part Shinobu plays the same as Travis with one major exception. Instead of having melee attacks, Shinobu has aerial attacks and the ability to jump. And that is the major disappointment in the gameplay department, as most of her levels feature extensive platforming sections that, coupled with the already sketchy camera result in a frustrating experience as Shinobu will constantly fall off platforms or jump back to the ground floor after you have climbed to the top of a high area. The other playable character is (as of the time of writing) still considered a secret. Sorry.

 

With all these different gameplay styles it’s easy to see that No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle has a lot to offer in terms of variety. You will find yourself jumping from assassin missions, to 8-bit menial jobs to helping your cat lose weight, to the gym to build stamina, to back to your hotel room to watch the Bizarre Jerry 5 movie eleven times (or is that just me?) and finally back into another assassin mission, all of which will make sure you never get bored while playing the game. The only frustrations to be found are with a camera system that only works half the time and will leave you staring at the wall the other half and the terrible Shinobu platforming sections.

 

 

 

No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle is depicted in a unique grindhouse meets anime presentation, meshing elements from both to create a style that is unique to the series. Combine this with the amazing work that was done with the cel-shaded graphics and the amount of details that went into the environments and character designs and you are left with a game that is visually on par with the Wii’s best looking games. In fact, the only faults that can be attributed to the game's visual presentation lie within the technical aspects, as slowdowns in the framerate are common, especially when the action gets frantic and there is a lot happening on screen at the same time. Another technical nuisance are the short but common loading screens that constantly break up the action and often result in the game being broken up by 3-6 second loading screens for every 2-5 minutes of actual gameplay. Also the 8-bit mini-games are very faithful to that long gone era of gaming that they are emulating, complete with ‘blow in the cartridge’ introductions. The graphics are clean and sharp and switching from the ‘modern’ graphics of the main game to the classic style is never intrusive and flows very naturally.

 

Most of the music in No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle consists of variations on the standard No More Heroes theme made to fit the level you are in. For example, a stage set in a creepy forest will have scary sound effects and distortion the track while another stage set in a machine factory will have a heavy metal atmosphere. While this does limit the amount of tracks found in the game, the main theme is catchy and one that you have stuck in your head long after you have turned off the game. The mini-games all have their own 8-bit soundtrack and sound effects, complete with synthesised voices, like those found on the Intellivision back in the mid-80s. These are particularly hilarious, mostly for the foul language used as there's nothing funnier then hearing ‘tastes like sh*t’ through highly digitized audio.

 

Speaking of expletives, Desperate Struggle definitely earns its ‘M’ rating. Most of the characters drop the f-bomb as they are being decapitated and Travis is clearly also a fan of the word. As for the rest of the voice acting, the characters all speak well, with their dialogue and emotions registering clearly with the player. However, it does seem that enemies will spurt the same lines repeatedly until you silence them with a swift katana slice. Finally, it’s obvious the same voice actress was used for most of the female characters in the game, and even uses the same accent for each. This is evident and can lead to some confusion as to who exactly is talking.

 

 

 

While the main story will take players on average between 7 and 11 hours to complete, No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle does offer tons of replay value with loads of unlockables to find, like decorations for Travis’ room and different outfits and clothing accessories. The game even has a deathmatch mode (has to be unlocked) so even after you beat the main game you can still come back for more blood soaked good times. All of this without even mentioning the eleven mini-games that can rapidly get quit addicting and have you sinking even more hours into your save file. However it seems that the developers missed a golden opportunity to include a multiplayer mode, as deathmatches against friends and competitive 8-bit mini-games would have made this game a must own for mature multiplayer gamers on the Wii looking for a hilarious way to spend time with friends.

 

While the original No More Heroes set the bar high for action games on the Wii, Desperate Struggle absolutely surpasses it in every way imaginable. Refined gameplay, stellar presentation values and hours of extra content past the main campaign all come together wonderfully to make this a must own for Wii gamers with a slight taste for carnage. Despite some slight technical miscues, Suda 51 has delivered a game that is loaded with his unique personality and one that Wii owners should not look over.

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Wii Sports Resort Review:

Reviewing Wii Sports Resort is not only a privilege, but is also a daunting responsibility. On one hand Wii Sports Resort will most likely be the biggest game this year by both sales volume and consumer awareness. So the onus is on me not to disappoint the readers. On the other hand this game is the first true test of ability for the Wii Motion Plus peripheral. Sure Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10 (which is a great game) precedes it, but that game only showcased two functions, while Wii Sports Resort showcases several new control concepts for the first time. So I am treading into largely-unexplored waters. And then, on the figurative third hand, I must consider who Nintendo made this game for; social and casual gamers. So I am discussing one of the most polarizing titles of this year. You could imagine that while I was juggling all these different considerations around, my anxiety began to rise. It was at that point that something amazing happened. I turned off my paranoia and just played the game with my wife and friends, and what I found was the casual experience I’ve been looking for since the Wii first launched.

Wii Sports starts off with a charming introduction, Sky Diving. This mini-game is designed specifically to acquaint a new player to the differences between the original Wii Remote and the Wii Motion Plus enhanced Wii Remote. The Sky Diving game never becomes more than a simple introduction (you can opt to play it again as an Air Sport but there is little reason to do so) but it is a very polished and well-crafted introduction. In mere seconds and without any words, Nintendo teaches you all you need to know to be ready to play with this new control scheme. The Wii Motion Plus can sense nuances in tilt, velocity, and motion along all spatial axis’s and also accurately render its position in 3-D space on screen. There is no perceivable lag and in almost all cases your actions are shown on screen in the coveted 1:1 ratio. The new accuracy found with Wii Motion Plus is truly amazing and adds depth to the experience you only imagined existed when Wii Sports first released.

 

 

Before breaking each sporting event down one by one, I’d like to take a moment and mention a much welcome improvement over Wii Sports. In the original Wii Sports, there was only one mode of play for each mode (ie. only one type of Tennis game or one kind of Boxing match). In Wii Sports Resort, each gametype has two or three ways to play. Swordplay comes to mind as an example. Instead of using the sword swinging mechanic in just one way, the developers designed three different game styles. This gives Wii Sports Resort a replay value and depth that easily outclasses it predecessor.

The first game in the line-up is also arguably the best; Swordplay. To play this game all that you need to do is hold the Wii Remote like a sword and swing in a Kendo style (fencing would work too, but not as well). This is the type of game that I’ve been dreaming about since I was a toddler and the Wii Motion Plus control mimics sword swinging in close 1:1 proximity. This mode uses the sword swinging mechanic in three different game types. The first is the Duel which pits two players against each other in a grueling match of king of the hill. Each player attempts to knock the other off the platform in an offensive and defensive match of Kendo sword fighting. This game is extremely fun - unless I’m playing against my wife, who gets some kind of sadistic enjoyment out of knocking me off the platform and flailing to a watery grave (then it‘s awesome).

 

 

The other two modes in swordplay include speed slice and showdown. Speed slice challenges two players to a round of cutting up various items in predetermined ways. The fastest draw winds the match. Showdown is an amazing single player challenge that pits one player against a horde of armor-clad Miis all intent on slicing you to bits with a dull-edge sword baton. All three modes are really fun, but also suffer from the same problem – calibration. This is a minor issue, but the Wii Motion Plus can lose track of its location and the user will have to manually recalibrate. However, to make it more seamless Nintendo added a mid-match calibration system that is easy to use; point at the screen and press down on the d-pad, that’s it.

Frisbee Dog is played by throwing a Frisbee for your Mii dog to run out and catch. Everything about this mode is super cute and immediately offensive, but underneath the hood is very well designed control scheme and fun game. The Frisbees are thrown by holding the Wii Remote as if it was an actual Frisbee and mimicking a toss (you can choose if the frisbee is released automatically or by letting go of the trigger) which translates on-screen with stunning accuracy. The goal of the game is to throw the Frisbee close to the target area and receive points based on precision. In addition, balloons are added with point modifiers. The balloons are challenging to hit because you always need to throw towards them but add enough spin to hook the Frisbee back towards the target area. This mode also has single and multiplayer options.

Frisbee Golf is also included in this game. It is largely identical to Disc Golf in Tiger Woods PGA Tour 10 with a few tweaks for polish. Fair warning however, this game is really addictive and the better you get at throwing Frisbees the deeper Frisbee Golf gets.

 

 

Archery is a very simple game. The Wii Remote is held like it is the handle of a bow and the Nunchuck mimics the arrow. The object of the game is to hit the bullseye on the target and scores are determined by precision. The controls are intuitive as pressing “A” grabs the bow handle and pressing “Z” grabs the arrow. Moving the Wii Remote aims and releasing “Z” sends your arrow flying. The system does falter in one area, the Nunchuck doesn’t sense position like Wii Motion Plus does so pulling back the arrow is not 1:1 like everything else and it is very noticeable. The game does have some depth albeit not much - the harder modes add challenge and each stage has a secret target to hit which also proves very challenging. All in all, Archery is a strong addition to Wii Sports Resort.

Three games make a return from Wii Sports, but enhanced for the new Wii Motion Plus peripheral. The three games are Tennis (in the form of Table Tennis), Bowling, and Golf. The improvements on each game are remarkable. The controls are not only tighter and more accurate, but they are much harder to exploit like Wii Sports was. I have not found any wrist flick that nets instant Strikes in bowling or simple lazy motions that translate well in Table Tennis. In fact, of the three, Table Tennis marks the best improvement and in makes the original Tennis game unplayable in comparison, even sans the option for doubles.

Another three games are all water sports. They are Wakeboarding, Canoeing, and Power Cruising (it’s Wave Race!). Wakeboarding uses the Wii Remote as a tilt controller by allowing the player to control their Mii by tilting left and right. The idea is to build up momentum and jump high on each wave, do some tricks, and land flat on the water’s surface. Canoeing also uses the remote’s tilt sensors but adds the Wii Motion Plus’ ability to determine position similar to how it does in Swordplay. During a game of Canoeing, the Wii Remote is used like a canoe paddle and the player must alternate left and right.

 

 

Power Cruising is the best water sport. This game really makes me excited for a new Wave Race game, but it does stand on its own in Wii Sports Resort. The Wii Remote and Nunchuck come together as the Jet Ski handle bars. Steering is accomplished by tilting left and right. Twisting the Wii Remote will give a boost and pressing “A” or “B” will accelerate. Just like in Wave Race, the principal objective is to slalom through goal posts. Points are awarded by passing a goal post as fast as possible, in the single player mode. Power Racing also has Head to Head races for multiple players. The water and wave physics are just as great as the original Wave Race franchise and the locales are beautiful with plenty of secrets.

Another tease of a classic title is Air Sports, which feels a lot like Pilotwings. Air Sports allows players to take flight and explore Wuhu Island. Every other sport in this game takes place at a specific locale on Wuhu Island, and each can be visited by air. Also, Wuhu is host to tons of secrets and areas to explore. Two players can get together and dog fight, which is also very fun. Air Sports also gives players another chance to experience the Sky Diving from the title screen.

Basketball and Cycling are the last two games of the twelve, and are also the weakest. Basketball has two main modes; 3-Point Shot Challenge and Pick-up game. 3-point Challenge is fun, but flawed since the animations don’t actually match your shot. Whether you are a little off to one side or very far off to one side the onscreen animation will look the same, making correcting mistakes frustrating. Pick-Up Game is equally flawed due to the stringent rule set that is used. Every event, be it a steal or missed shot, calls for the defending team to take possession and throw the ball into play. These pauses in playing are terrible, unnecessary, and make the game annoying to play. Then Cycling is the most flawed game of the twelve. The Wii Remote and Nunchuck are moved up and down in rhythm as if they were pedals. Wait, What!? This is not how pedals work; in fact, “pedal” comes from the Latin word “ped” – meaning "feet", not hands.

 

 

From the strongest to the weakest of these games, Wii Sports Resort offers hours of fun and an overall great experience. The gameplay is fresh and innovative while at the same time being accessible. That’s a very small needle to thread, and Nintendo has done so well. All twelve games are fun, even Cycling, which I don’t like but my wife and sister-in-law go crazy over, showing that even it can be enjoyed by at least some people. Most social gamers will have an experience similar to mine; they will enjoy almost all of the games except one, maybe two. Which ones they don’t enjoy will vary by individual.

Wii Sports Resort has a super saccharine presentation that will either spark your interest or ignite your rancor. At first glance it is easy to dismiss the game as having no graphical quality worth discussing, but taking a deeper look reveals how wrong such a notion is. In reality, Nintendo took time to make everything look beautiful. The water and water effects are top notch. The lighting, sunsets, and nightscapes are breathtaking. Textures are not muddy, but appear clear and well designed. Even things that the Wii usually has problems with are polished, such as anti-aliasing and depth of field. Anti-aliasing very rarely fails on Wii Sports Resort, and the few instances it does fail are on cutscenes and pans, never during gameplay (except during Air Sports occasionally). Miis are also updated in presentation. Gone are the mono color shirts from Wii Sports. Instead, Miis will wear a shirt appropriate to the sport being played, which range from Polo-looking shirts to full fencing gear in Swordplay. The music in Wii Sports Resort is competent, but nothing remarkable. The tracks are all catchy and go along well with the sports being played. All the sounds seem designed to be relaxing, almost like Muzak, which kind of makes sense for the target audience.

Wii Sports Resort is an incredible value. For $49.99 in the United States, you get the game (which is packed with twelve sports) and a Wii Motion Plus peripheral (a $19.99 value on its own). The game also extends value by adding higher challenge levels, secrets to find, and stamps (read: achievements) to collect. Since Wii Sports Resort is by nature a very social experience, many will find value in the countless hours it will be played with other friends and family. Simply put, this game is the epitome of what casual and social gaming is about. All around, if you own a Wii, you should own Wii Sports Resort.

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The Conduit Review:

The video gaming world is a fickle one. Its enthusiasts are keen to take every new development and watch it from every angle, dissecting all possibilities and results. Some place impossible emphasis on individual events, while others are more rational and logical. Case in point, The Conduit, High Voltage Software’s much-publicized First Person Shooter for the Wii. For some, the game would immediately end the doubt third parties at one point had with regard to putting their ‘traditional games’ on the Wii, while others immediately labeled it ‘generic’ and ‘bland’ and walked away. So, which is it?

The Conduit follows government agent Michael Ford as he works with an organization called The Trust. They are attempting to stop the operations of Prometheus, a terrorist aiming to take over the government with the aid of bug-like aliens called The Drudge. It’s pretty standard ‘hero gets betrayed, questions who the good guys really are’ stuff, for the most part—the narrative certainly doesn’t let itself get in the way of the gameplay. However, those looking for more will certainly find it—hidden messages all over the levels and myriad radio and TV broadcasts help flesh out what’s going on in the rest of the world and how current events are related to things that actually happened in real life. So, the story is deep for those who want a stronger narrative, and unobtrusive for gamers who just want to run and gun. For better or worse, the end of the game guarantees that, if sales allow it, we’ll be seeing a Conduit 2.

 

 

As far as the gameplay is concerned, this is an unabashed run and gun shooter—much more similar to Goldeneye or Perfect Dark (if those games let you jump) than it is to Halo or Call of Duty. By and large, you’re given big guns and grenades, pointed in a straight line, and told to kill all the bad guys. But that doesn’t mean that there’s no strategy involved—running in there with reckless abandon will get you killed in a heartbeat, and intelligent use of the many unique firearms is essential. There are three types of weapons in The Conduit: Human, Drudge, and Trust. Human weapons are your standard pistols, shotguns, SMGs, and burst-fire rifles. Drudge weapons are more focused on disintegration, while the Trust have adapted elements of both. Some of my personal favourites are the Shrieker (Drudge weapon whose bullets can be arced by the Wii Remote's IR) and the lovingly-named HVS45, a magnum that shoots explosive rounds.

Of course, there’s no point in having these fancy weapons without enemies to fire them at. Enemies in the game consist of various forms of Drudge, as well as humans who’ve been turned into Drudge ‘puppets’. The Drudge run the gamut from little explosive guys who trundle up and say ‘boom’, to the foot-soldier-style Drones, to… well, mantis-like things that are five stories tall. As the bigger ones tend to have strong shielding, The Drudge generally aren’t afraid to just book it to your position as soon as they see you, laying down fire with whatever they’ve got handy. Often, these creatures will respawn endlessly until you destroy their portal into this world, the titular conduits. The more-frail-but-more-intelligent humans use better battlefield tactics, often taking cover and working together to flank you. Sometimes they’ll mix it up and charge you in groups of three or four, so you should never take any encounter for granted. All in all, the enemies force you to put the varied weapons to good use.

The way that The Conduit tries to differentiate itself from other similar shooters is through the All Seeing Eye. This floating, highly advanced piece of Trust technology is basically the Swiss army knife for discovering secrets. During main gameplay, this baby is used to disarm invisible bombs, hack computers and invisible locks, and reveal invisible enemies. More exploratory players will also be able to use it to find power weapons hidden in secret rooms, secret Trust data discs used to unlock achievements and cheats, and myriad hidden messages scrawled all over the walls of the game. It works well, for the most part. However, the ‘ghost bombs’ can get incredibly annoying when coupled with a long corridor full of respawning enemies. It takes several seconds to hack a bomb, during which time you cannot shoot and must keep within a short distance of the device—very difficult to do when the enemy you just killed has come back and started shooting you. It’s impossible to simply dance around them, either, as the firefight will invariably lead you to accidentally step on one and cause Mr. Ford an embarrassing death. So, the ASE is a fun, unique device that could have been implemented a bit better.

 

 

Now, the three things about The Conduit that have been vaunted by fans and the developers are its controls, its multiplayer, and its graphic engine. To begin with, the controls are completely customizable. For the most part, I was fine with the default setup. It’s very intuitive firing with the B trigger, jumping with the A button, melee attacking by punching with the Wiimote, and throwing a grenade by flicking the Nunchuk. But let’s say that you get tired of accidentally tossing a frag and killing yourself every time you scratch your nose (not that I know anyone who does that!). Simply bring up the menu and you can switch it to pressing right on the D-pad, and allow a Nunchuk swipe to facilitate changing weapons instead. Even the aiming itself can be tweaked to perfection - the size of the bounding box (the box that determines whether you're aiming or turning) can be made to fit the whole screen, or almost non-existant, with separate settings for the X and Y axes. Both the turn speed and the running speed can be set by the player. Even the interface can be customized, so if you find that the ammo counter obstructs your view too much at the top of the screen, you can point at it and pull it down to the bottom. If The Conduit has a major fault, it’s definitely not in the controls department.

Online multiplayer is probably the most-anticipated feature of the game. There have been other online-enabled offerings in this genre on Wii, some with higher player counts and others with larger pedigrees. However, this is really the first big shooter designed with the Wii’s capabilities in mind, and the first to offer some semblance of a modern matchmaking system. You can select to join a friend’s match, a regional match, or a worldwide match. Yes, the dreaded Friend Codes are here in full effect, but they’re handled as elegantly as I’ve seen in any game. You can send a Conduit Friend Request to anyone on your Wii’s list, as well as to anyone in a private game (allowing you to easily add ‘friends of friends’). The Wii Speak microphone is supported, though you can only talk to your friends when in a public game (in a private match, everyone near your character can hear you). As far as game modes go, it’s mostly standard FPS fare for 12 players, with The Conduit’s own versions of Deathmatch, Capture The Flag, Oddball, etc. The most unique (and probably the most fun) multiplayer mode is called Bounty Hunter. This Free-For-All mode challenges players not to be trigger-happy and kill everything they see. Instead, they must only hunt down their specified target, and will actually lose points for killing anyone else. This creates some mad tension as everyone frantically searches for their mark - doubly so if more than one person is assigned the same target, especially as you don't have any indication of who is hunting you until they start firing. All multiplayer modes are also made much more fun because of the simple act of physically aiming or punching. They even included a Halo-style medal system that does an admirable job of matching you with players of similar skill. The multiplayer will definitely keep dedicated players interested for months if not more.

 

 

The graphics were the part of The Conduit that originally sparked such a frenzy over the game. How did they fare? That depends on if you’re more interested in the technical or the artistic side. The Quantum3 Engine under the game’s hood is probably the best on the Wii. There are often 10-15 vividly-animated enemies onscreen, analyzing your position and figuring out how best to proceed. Explosions can be going off all over the place, with bright red-orange Drudge shots ricocheting everywhere, and no matter how big the current building is, the framerate stays steady as a rock at 30 FPS. As with most games, the graphics take a hit in multiplayer, but it’s still a quantum leap ahead of other first-person games on the Wii in the tech department. I did have one glitch on the technical side - I fell through a floor into computer space in one of the levels. However, it only happened once and doesn't affect my overall view of the engine. It’s just a shame that this high level of graphical fidelity didn’t allow for splitscreen multiplayer. High Voltage’s other upcoming FPS, The Grinder, uses the same engine and has this feature, so maybe a Conduit 2 down the line will allow more than one player per TV. On the art side? Not so impressive. The art direction is competent, but underwhelming. As you’re fighting through various national landmarks in Washington, such as the Pentagon, the Lincoln Memorial, and even the White House, you’ll scarcely be able to tell the difference between each. When the Oval Office looks just like any other VIP workplace, you know something’s wrong.

The sound in The Conduit is above average—typical ‘summer blockbuster’ stuff with a few enhancements. The music has a dark, fast-paced, espionage-style theme for the most part. The sounds for reloading weapons come from both the TV and the Wii Remote’s speaker, adding a lot of satisfying immersion. Unfortunately, the dialogue is where the sound falls flat. Mr. Ford sounds like a bad Matt Damon ripoff, and the lines they give him don’t help. Having just had an unpleasant conversation with the enemy, most people wouldn’t say, “You can go to hell. The only thing I need to save this country from is you.” It’s difficult to tell if this is intentionally campy or if High Voltage just wanted to give their game a ‘harder edge,’ but some of the dialogue is just groan-worthy. It doesn’t help that some of the smaller Drudge sound like wannabe Grunts from Halo, minus the actual funny chatter. Kevin Sorbo (Hercules) does a good job as Michael's Trust contact--naturally dark and mysterious. Once Prometheus gets inside your head, though, while he's voiced well, the dialogue goes straight back to Campsville.

 

 

Value-wise, the Conduit is hard to beat. Multiple difficulty levels and tons of Achievements to unlock in a ~9-hour campaign, depending on the difficulty level, and untold hours of multiplayer hijinks with your friends or with strangers online. The unfortunate lack of local multiplayer is the main black spot on the Conduit’s nice, clean dinner jacket.

So, all in all, is The Conduit ‘generic’? Or god’s gift to Wii? Gamers coming in looking for either will be disappointed. It doesn’t revolutionize the First-Person Shooter genre, as there are no vehicles like in Halo, no monsters to control as in The Darkness, and definitely no Morph Ball to be found. However, the high-quality graphics engine, very solid single-player, and online multiplayer that surpasses everything else on the system (even the venerable Mario Kart), put this game far above most efforts on Wii, and the perfect and fun controls greatly enhance the traditional shooting gameplay. So, no, the final product may not have warranted the impossible hype, but the Conduit is a very high-quality shooter that’s not to be missed by any self-respecting action gamer.

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Killzone 2 PS3 Review:

It has been a long time coming, and some thought it may never actually make it to retail, but Killzone 2 is finally available for purchase. I wish I could say that this game was perfect and lived up to every expectation ever put forth for it, but that would be a lie. What I can say is that a lot of work has been put into this title, and it is one of the best FPS games to come out this generation.

The default controls map the fire button to R1, grenades to R2, and close combat to L1. You also have the ability to crouch using the L2 button, which will also put your character into cover if he is near a wall or other suitable structure to hide behind in the single player. The cover system works well most of the time, but it can be annoying when you are simply trying to walk around crouched and you unknowingly walk next to a wall and suddenly you are stuck using it for cover and cannot walk away from it unless you stop crouching. This takes some getting used to, but overall the cover system works well to allow for larger fire fights and more dangerous situations then would be possible without it.

Other notable controls are pressing L3 to sprint for a short amount of time, Triangle to switch between your main weapon and your pistol, pressing Square to reload, and pressing R3 to use the scope on your gun. These controls can all be switched between six different button mappings, which is a nice addition and allows for most people to find something to their liking. I wish that there was an ability to just map any action to any button you cared to, but having several different options is the next best thing, and I personally find Alternate 2 to be just about perfect for my own gaming needs and seeing as it is nearly identical to the latest Call of Duty control set ups it should please most FPS fans.

Killzone 2 is a science fiction shooter that is set in the middle of a war between two different factions: the Helghast and the Interplanetary Strategic Alliance (ISA). The story is set 2 years after the Helghast invaded a colony of the ISA called Vekta and broke the tenuous peace between the ISA and themselves. The ISA has decided that they must take the fight to the Helghast, and proceed to invade their home world of Helghan. You play as Sev, a member of the Alpha Team which is a kind of Special Forces for the ISA and consists of a four man squad. As the invasion fleets come into the Helghan atmosphere many are shot down by strange lightning bolts that devastate a large amount of the fleet. Once within the planet’s atmosphere they proceed to put troops onto drop ships to transport them behind enemy lines so that they can deal with these strange planetary defenses. This is where you and Alpha Team come in.

 

 

The story is pretty standard Science Fiction FPS stuff. There were some interesting moments mainly dealing with the Helghast leader (Scholar Visari), which get into the mindset of the Helghast as a whole, as well as their esteemed leader. These thought provoking moments are few and far between, so the story is mostly just a medium to get you between points of actions, which is probably what most want out of their FPS games. There were a few noteworthy moments in the story, but mostly it succeeded simply by not directly getting in the way of the gameplay itself.

Playing Killzone 2 is all about finding cover. You can die extremely quickly if you decide to just run around, so it is always a better idea to remain in cover while only peeking out to take pot-shots at the Helghast around you. The controls take some definite getting used to in the single player campaign because everything has a feel of weightiness to it. When you press the right analog stick to turn or look in another direction you’ll find that there’s a perceivable “lag” between when you start pressing the direction and when your character actually starts moving. This is actually because the developers programmed in acceleration into the character’s movements to try and make it more realistic. This is an interesting idea, but I personally feel they might have underestimated the acceleration with which a person will be moving during a fire fight. That said, the acceleration aspect takes some getting used to, but I quickly found no trouble with it after around 15 minutes or so. The effect is decreased significantly for the multiplayer aspect of the game, which plays much more like the run and gun that most people are used to.

 

 

The single player campaign is a fun experience with some epic moments, but the real meat of Killzone 2 and the thing that will eat up most of your time is its online multiplayer. As I previously mentioned, the acceleration that was programmed into the campaign mode is much less noticeable in multiplayer and the cover system is completely taken out so that Warzone plays much more like the squad based FPS many are used to in an online multiplayer. What differentiates Killzone 2 from most other squad based FPS games is the ability to earn and choose between differing classes, and the way that battles actually play out online.

Once you choose to play as either the Helghast or the ISA for any given match, you’ll then have a choice of which class you want to play as. The classes in Killzone 2 are similar to those in Team Fortress 2. You have a medic that can revive those who are mortally wounded, an engineer who can create turrets, an assault class that has heavy armour, a tactician who can set new spawn points for troops, a saboteur who can assume the disguise of enemy players, and a scout who is a cloaked sniper. There are seven classes in total, and each plays significantly differently, which helps to keep the gameplay fresh since you have the option of switching classes each time you spawn. You won’t start with all of these classes, however, and instead they must be earned by gaining points and increasing your rank.

With each rank you achieve you will unlock either a new weapon that you can use with the standard rifleman starting class, or a new badge that will allow you to use another class. Once you start using your new class, you’ll find that you are given a single special ability, but don’t have the secondary ability that all classes are meant to have. This is because you have to unlock the secondary ability by earning medals. Here is a simple example: I just unlocked the medic badge, and find that I now have the ability to revive people whenever they are mortally wounded (they’ll appear as a cross on the minimap), but to earn the ability to throw health packs I need to earn the Trauma Surgeon medal. To earn this medal you have to successfully revive 5 players in a single match, which will earn you a Revival Specialist Ribbon. Earn eight of these ribbons and you now have yourself the Trauma Surgeon medal and the ability to throw people health packs. This method of earning unlockables is used often and will give you everything from the ability to mix and match primary and secondary class abilities to receiving more ammo and grenades each time you spawn. It can be tough for those just starting the game, but it adds an extra incentive to keep playing the multiplayer beyond the simple fun that can be had.

 

 

The second thing that makes Warzone special is how online matches play out. Two sides are pitted against each other with a maximum of 16 players on each side. The goal of each match is not simply to kill the most people on the opposing side, but instead to succeed in missions that are given to you as the match progresses. There are five different missions that range from assassinating a computer chosen player from the opposing side to taking and holding positions on the map. After you succeed or fail each mission another one is assigned to your team and your team is awarded a match point. The team with the most match points at the end of the match is the winner. This means that you are constantly being given new goals that you must achieve as a team, and gives the gameplay of each multiplayer match a lot of variety as you switch from defense to offense, to just trying to survive as the assassination target.

Points for increasing your rank are earned by killing members on the opposing side, but you’ll get more points if you kill people while helping to achieve the current mission. This means that you’ll get a single point for killing someone in a random firefight, but you’ll get two points for killing someone while you defend a zone, or five points for taking out the assassination target. The points system helps to reward those who help the team as a whole, but does not force you to do so if you would rather just go around killing everyone you see. You can also gain points by fulfilling your primary class role, such as resurrecting someone who is mortally wounded as a medic.

 

 

The visuals in Killzone 2 are quite stunning, and anyone who has played it will tell you, it has some of the most technically impressive graphics currently on consoles. Everything looks amazingly realistic and there was not a graphical hitch in sight other than when loading new sections of the campaign. My only real issue with the graphics is that there is not enough variety in the environments. The areas are different enough that you can easily tell them apart, and I understand that when you are invading a planet that is meant to be a desolate wasteland you probably aren’t going to go strolling through fields of daffodils, but I still would’ve liked to have seen some variety beyond urban and desert areas.

Killzone 2 is full of little graphical details that impress. Character models, for example, are nicely detailed and there are some superb lighting and shadow effects. One thing that particularly sets Killzone 2 apart from other shooters is the use of rag-doll animations. Enemies (in both the campaign and online) recoil with pain in the exact spot that the bullet that enters them, and blood splatters around every single bullet hole, it makes the experience truly engrossing because your enemy actually looks like he’s being hit by bullets. You also feel the effect of bullets yourself. There’s a red blood effect that comes up on the screen when you get hit, and as you approach death a strange blue-grey lighting effect takes over the screen.

 

 

Killzone 2’s audio is surprisingly well done. I wasn’t expecting much from the tracklist of the campaign, but there were actually some very fitting orchestral numbers that worked well with the action on screen. During multiplayer there is no music on default, but you can play any music that you happen to have on your Playstation 3 through the XMB. This feature is not allowed in the campaign however, presumably because the developers didn’t want you drowning out all the hard work they put their composer through. The voice-overs in Killzone 2 are well done from the aspect that they convey what they are meant to very well and the voices themselves were never cringe worthy. What is cringe worthy are the idiotic lines they had these poor guys spouting every hour or so. I understand that these guys are meant to be battle hardened veteran bad asses, but is there really a need for them to all sound like stereotypical fratboys? I got to the point where I wanted the other members of my squad to kick the bucket so I wouldn’t have to here another joke about Garza’s mother or Natko’s homosexual tendencies.

The gameplay in Killzone 2 varies from the incredibly fun and full of variety Warzone online multiplayer, with its mission based matches that constantly keep you on your toes, to the campaign which has some epic moments, but is also much more repetitive. The controls take some definite getting used to (especially in single player), but once you get beyond that 15-20 minute stretch you will find this to be an extremely fun experience. The campaign was probably my only real issue with the gameplay, as there wasn’t enough variety in most of the objectives I had to achieve for me to feel it was all that different from your standard “kill people and get here” missions. There are some fun vehicle sequences which I wish had been used more often, and the atmosphere of the campaign helps you feel like you are a part of a much larger and very real war. ISA members are almost always fighting and dying beside you. Unfortunately your squad members have the same tendency to die, but they are not necessary and can be easily revived if you see fit. The gameplay online is very balanced, to such an extent that 1v1 draws are quite common, which is highly unusual in FPS games. A lot of the time if you go up against someone 1v1 you will end up killing each other. Again, it’s something that makes Killzone 2 unique and fun to play.

Value in this title is hurt by the campaign, which is only a six hour play through. There are collectibles, as well as multiple difficulty levels to give this a bit of replay value, but it is still quite short. Luckily for Killzone 2, it also comes with an extremely well done multiplayer with unlockables that will keep people playing for a very long time. Everything about Killzone 2’s multiplayer seems to be designed to keep people coming back for more, and the easy clan implementation makes it simple for people to get a group of friends together and start facing off in epic battles for the honor of their clan and Valor points that you can bet with and determine your ranking as a clan. The website for Killzone 2 also functions well with the multiplayer, giving each clan their own dedicated forum and allowing you to watch tactical replays of any official match. There are also bots available for those who want to practice their multiplayer skills offline, or for online matches that need a few extra bodies to even things up. Bots would probably be more significant if there was splitscreen available in the game, but it is still a nice addition.

 

 

Killzone 2 has been the brunt of jokes and the hope of many Playstation fans for three and a half long years, and I’m happy to see that the game pulled through and brought us a great package that surpassed my previous expectations. The visuals are in the top class of console games from a technical standpoint, the multiplayer is a constantly shifting affair that borders between order and chaos that never gets boring, and the campaign contains some very memorable moments that were also a lot of fun, but the script was at times horrendously juvenile and the campaign was unfortunately short. Killzone 2 does not reinvent the first-person shooter by any means, but it is a fantastic example of the genre which no FPS fan should skip.

 Tags: Achievements, Cheats, FAQs, Forums, Killzone 2, News, PS3, Review, Sales, Screenshots, Trophies, User Reviews, Videos, Walkthroughs

Labels: Achievements, Cheats, FAQs, Forums, Killzone 2, News, PS3, Review, Sales, Screenshots, Trophies, User Reviews, Videos, Walkthroughs