XBox 360 Rally

A gripe about Gamefly. Even though I have three other games ahead of it on my Game Q, Left 4 Dead arrived today, a full week after I returned Mass Effect. Actually, that is two gripes. The first being the low availability of popular games, and the second being the rather lengthy turn-around time for this game rental service.

But I remember the early days of Netflix, and in 2004, the turnaround was not nearly as quick as it is now that everyone and their brother’s ex-girlfriend subscribe to Netflix. So maybe if Gamefly can grow a bit more, the games at the top of my Q will be sent out from a more local distribution center rather than Pittsburgh (I’m in Oregon).

Anyway, that is not the point of today’s post. You really should let me know when I start to stray from my missions, much like I wish Left 4 Dead would…oh, wait, there is really no way you can not figure out where to go in this game, a First Person Shooter in a 4 man (well, there is one chick, Zoey) team that must make their way out of a zombie apocalypse. Sure, there may be a lot of utility closets with nothing in them, but you won’t lose your way. And that’s good, because Left 4 Dead leaves you without a map.

What I like…killing zombies and lots of them. There are several kinds of zombies, from the relatively benign regular zombie to the Tank zombie, that will seriously mess you up if you let it get close to you.

There is a cinematic in the beginning that kind of explains what happened and why you are where you are, facing a city full of the crazed to catatonic. I didn’t really watch it through from the beginning as I didn’t have the television switched over to the ol’ Xbox 360, but when I did make the switch over, there were a lot of explosions. I like explosions.

I didn’t read anything about the game before playing it, in terms of game controls and such. And it was really easy to figure things out. The controls are pretty intuitive, although I must admit it did take me a sec to figure out how to take advantage of my health pack. You have to “arm” the health pack and then pull the trigger. Sorry, I guess I’m used to hitting an X or a Y, not pulling a trigger for the entire time it takes to recharge your health.

The game plays as a co-op A-Team of sorts. There’s the big biker dude, appropriately named Francis. There’s the white collar black guy, Louis. There’s the token chick that is a zombie movie fan coincidentally enough, Zoey. And of course, there is the crusty old vet named Bill.

The set-up is mission-based rather than following an single plotline, or so it seems. I sat down for two hours and played through the first mission, which is broken down into 5 segments or chapters. This first mission entailed making our way through the city, the sewers, and up to the roof of the local hospital in order to jump aboard a rescue chopper.

My only complaint so far is that when playing the game with only AI team mates is that my character (I played Zoey, duh, I’m a girl that wants to play girl characters — are you listening video game developers?) has to do all the work. The AI guys are total wusses. I gotta run in the room, I gotta kill the horde, I gotta take all the damage and thus all the pain pills. But then that damn Francis keeps snaking the pain pills before I can restock.

I’m going to try and talk my boyfriend into playing co-op mode with me later on, to see how the game plays with another human involved. Otherwise, I will get down to business checking out the other play modes, including playing the game as one of the infected zombies.

Neat.

Left 4 Dead, Gamefly, zombie, video game, review

As I mentioned before, my Gamefly account kept recommending the 2007 game Mass Effect to me whenever I browsed, and as Gamefly cannot guarantee that you will get your top choice on your GameQ, and I really wanted Halo Wars, well, I got Mass Effect. And despite my disappointment over not receiving something a bit “fresher”, Mass Effect is growing on me, now that I finally got out of the “capitol” city and home world, the Citadel.

So, to begin at the beginning, let me lay a few things down before we go any further into my initial review of Mass Effect. I am not big into RPG’s, and truthfully, other than FPS games that lightly tread on RPG-style choices, I don’t think I have played a role playing game on the Xbox 360 since I’ve had it (August 2006). Also, I did not want to find out anything about Mass Effect before I jumped right in. No walkthroughs, no instructions on the keypads, and as I don’t have the accompanying literature with the game, I have absolutely no idea what I am doing. And I didn’t notice the option for the tutorial until late last night when I was shutting down, so yeah, nothing.

Ok, that said, the game has the choice of playing either a girl or boy version of the main protagonist, and as that made me so happy, I am playing the girl version of Commander Shepherd. I didn’t really follow much in the beginning as I was trying so darn hard to figure out what the hell I was supposed to be doing, but I got to do a little choosing when it comes to the background of my Commander Shepherd. I think I chose a past of no parents, raised on the streets and joined the service as soon as I could. Cliche! Not sure what bearing that past will have on my future in the game, but I’m willing to play along.

There is an attack on a human colony by these things called the Geth. The Geth are being led by a bad guy that Shepherd has to track down across the Universe. I have to say, at first, I was a little freaked out by having too many choices as to what to do and when, having “free will” as it were in a video game rather than being lead around by the ring in my nostrils. But seriously, after I got my own spaceship to explore the Universe while hunting for stuff to kill, this game is a lot better.

Let me explain. Mass Effect starts pretty slowly, which is both good and bad. Good, because like I said, I was clueless; and bad because I was getting a little bored. In fact, my boyfriend was trying to take a nap on the couch and was concerned that I was firing up the Xbox (he hates the sound of gunfire when trying to sleep — very understandable). I said, “Don’t worry. This game is like a boring movie.”

And it is true. It’s more like a documentary about space exploration with some aliens here and there, and add a huge conspiracy to destroy humanity and yeah, that’s Mass Effect. It is not exactly non-stop action nor does it follow the small battle-puzzle-small battle-boss battle blueprint.

It’s help to be a little methodical in your playing style as you do have to cover territory and remember what you may have had to leave behind in terms of items because you don’t have enough experience in order to override computers or survey mineral finds or decrypt stuff. You know, all those things that come up while trying to save your race.

It’ll be nice when I finally get enough experience and “omni-gel” to crack safes and hack into door controls, but I am not one to find cheat codes, so it may be a while before this game really opens up to me. I am also thinking that Mass Effect may be a better game to own than to rent, as I have a feeling that I can really get lost in this game, kinda like Oblivion.

Mass Effect, Xbox, video games, initial review, Oblivion

Not one of the reviews I read for Bioshock said anything at all about how the undersea world of Rapture is straight out of an unwritten Ayn Rand novel. Does this mean that gamers don’t read American lit?

What the Great Lighthouse may have looked like before earthquakes destroyed it...

It’s not like it’s a stretch to see the Rand influence. You notice the literary reference almost immediately, if you know your Rand. Unfortunately, I know Ms. Rand’s rants. As soon as I swam my way to a Great Lighthouse at Alexandria look-a-like after my Pan Am hit crashed into the sea, I came face to face with a large red banner that proclaims “Not Gods or Kings. Only Men.” and a plaque from someone named Ryan going on about how he could not live in a state that won’t allow him to be himself…an unapologetic capitalist.

Ryan…R-Y-A-N = Ayn R. Yeah, subtle.

First things first, BIOSHOCK is amazing to look at. The opening sequence is awe-inspiring. I kept telling my boyfriend to “look-it, look-it” as the bathysphere gave me an unguided tour of Rapture, a city-behind-the-waves (and international law). The city itself is an Art Deco dream. I happen to be a fan of Deco, so BioShock is a total treat for my aesthetic sensitivities. Even as you peer out of the glass windows, the graphics go all watery and change as you move your perspective. The designers and programmers spared no effort to make this game a detail-oriented gamers delight.

And then, as you, er, I mean, Jack enters the city proper, he is lead on missions by a underground resistance leader named Atlas.

Atlas…Like Atlas Shrugged? To be honest, I couldn’t finish Atlas Shrugged. I read The Fountainhead, and got through the Ellsworth Toohey 30-page speech about altruism, and when I ran across the same diatribe in Atlas Shrugged, courtesy of John Galt; well, I just closed up the book and gave it away. Rand is not hard to read as in she discusses difficult issues and uses hard words; no, Rand is difficult to read because there is a lot of repetition and it gets really, really boring.

Besides, she is such a response to perceived socialist agendas during the 40’s, that it comes across as somewhat silly…until you place BioShock’s politics into the present fears of an American return to a quasi-socialistic Big Government. But that is probably more of a coincidence than the creators’ statement on capitalism and how money makes morals.

But I digress…

And now that I am in the third “level” of BioShock, I can say that the game takes its cues from Rand in more ways than one. BioShock can get a little repetitious, too. I can honestly say that I am sick of hacking security “bots”, vending machines, and safes. At first, it was kind of fun, but now I try to get as many auto-hack tools as I can find or build with rubber hoses and random screws.

All in all, I love the plot. I like killing the “splicers” (though I do wish for a little more diversity in these crazed foes) and random other bots and Big Daddy’s. I even like rescuing the little sisters — I haven’t “harvested” one yet. It’s just hard for me to kill a child, even if she carries a giant syringe that she likes to plunge into her victims’ heads.

I am actually playing BioShock on both easy and medium (whatever they call it in the game). So far, easy just means less bad guys and more first aid kits to find. But as your character never really dies in BioShock (you are immediately revived at a near-by “vita-chamber” and everything remains as it was when you “died” including a lack of first aid kits and angry enemies), I think the medium is a better choice for anyone other than a newbie to FPS games.

Much like Dead Space, you are given objectives and maps as to what you are supposed to be doing in Rapture. You also have an option of a “hint” to help you along the way, as an example telling you where certain slicers are located when you have to get some research photos (which reminds me of Dead Rising). I can say that the game is self-contained enough that I have not even bothered to look up a walkthrough or cheats for BioShock. Not that it is that easy (it kinda is, though), but rather that the game makes sense as to how to play it. Unlike say, Tomb Raider: Legend…

And yes, I know that BioShock is a bit old now in terms of release date, but I had to get to it before BioShock 2 comes out later this year.

I love this trailer, because it tells me all evil comes from little girls! He he he.

BioShock, BioShock 2, Ayn Rand, Rapture, Art Deco, altruism, Atlas Shrugged, The Fountainhead, video games, Great Lighthouse, Alexandria

Resident Evil 5’s demo came out exclusively on Xbox Live last week. I got my download on Friday, and didn’t get to playing it until Saturday. Well, I wasn’t the only one. Numbers came out and it seems that almost 2 million Xbox Live users downloaded the ultra-violent, yet ever-so-much fun demo for the long awaited RE5.

I have not played a Resident Evil on the Xbox yet, so it was a treat to test it out on a 360. The demo gives you little or no info — or maybe it did and I was too busy killing zombies to notice — as to who you are or what you are doing there, but you can figure it out if you know anything about the Resident Evil franchise.

Hey, what do you know, seems I’m playing a character that you may already know and love, Chris Redfield. I have a new partner, and she is a hottie-ass-kicking zombie slayer named Sheva Alomar. I read somewhere that when the creators first started showing betas of this game, it came to someone’s attention that Chris was killing a bunch of black people in Africa and maybe that wasn’t so cool in this current political climate (or any for that matter). So the solution was adding a black-ish female partner. And who says video games don’t strive for equality? I wonder if Sheva is earning the same as Chris.

I have only played the single player portion of the demo, as my boyfriend doesn’t like playing shooter games (something about running around and looking for hidden stuff annoys him, no matter how many zombies are involved — I think it’s because he just can’t get the hang of it and he has a short attention span for any games other than sports). There is a co-op option, which I am going to play as soon as I make a friend to play against.

There are two scenarios: Public Assembly and Shanty Town. In Public Assembly, you and Sheva are outside one of those African towns that looks like it could have been a stand-in during Black Hawk Down. Once you get in a seemingly safe building, you witness a public beheading of someone who doesn’t quite get the respect he needs in this town in which everyone is going cra-zay. This huge hooded executioner swings this huge, serrated axe, and then of course, someone spots you. Now, you have all these zombies coming at you.

I went to the Public Assembly first, and I didn’t last that long. I couldn’t get used to the switch up from A’s to X’s for picking up ammo. Also, you cannot pull your left trigger to aim without standing still or moving really, really slowly, so it’s hard to run and shoot, but then you only have so much ammo, so it wouldn’t do you much good to run around shooting up the place. It’s pretty hard, which of course, makes me love it even more (wink).

Shanty Town is more running around and killing these poor souls that have undergone the “change.” But I lasted longer, although I do think that the demo is totally designed to kick your ass rather quickly, so you don’t start grumbling about it being a short demo more than you suck. But hey, it’s just a taste, and you are definitely going to want more.

It looks amazing, just like RE4. It’s totally fun and addictive and I cannot wait for March 13th.

Resident Evil 5, Resident Evil, Chris Redfield, Xbox 360, Xbox, Xbox Live, demo, video game

So, I finally plugged in my internet connection to my Xbox. Not that I never have before, it’s just that my router is in the office and the HDTV is in the living room, and I don’t want a damn cord running through the entire house, and I haven’t got off my lazy butt to get a wireless adapter for my Xbox 360 because truthfully, I don’t go online that often with my Xbox.

Not often at all…

Which means that tonight was finally the night when I upgraded my dashboard on the ol’ 360 (among other things). I am sure that I haven’t spent enough time on it to see how awesomely awesome it is, but what is the big deal?

I think the whole Netflix thing is nice, and I imagine I will love it. As I mentioned before, I am not on Xbox Live all that much to make that a big draw for me, but then again, maybe it will be a good reason to log in more often. It does get tiring to have to hook up my laptop to the tv to watch something instantly on Netflix, but still, It’s not like it’s that hard. I’ll live.

Other than that, I am not big into keeping a bunch of pictures and music on yet another hard drive, so that option does nothing for me.

I do have a kickass avatar, but I don’t know when she’ll ever come into use. Don’t you just dig her warrior scar and black (I hope they are rubber) gloves? Unless I am missing something, I don’t think the avatars get to play in, say, Tomb Raider, so yeah, what’s the point. I like my little panda icon. Isn’t that enough?

I know I must sound like a troglodyte to some of you, but seriously, I like to play video games. I don’t care if someone else plays with me or not. So other than downloading stuff, I have little need for Xbox Live. And that’s too bad, because my dress is so cute.

xbox 360, xbox, xbox experience, dashboard, Xbox Live, video games, Netflix

Even though I had to wait a whole extra day to get Dead Space from Gamefly — thank you very much, Dr. King — I think the wait was worth it. Oh, wait, no, the wait is never worth it, but I am dealing with it the best way I can.

Dead Space came out a few months ago, so it’s not like I was waiting for it on the first day of its release, so a extra day in honor of a great man and civil rights leader is just fine. Although, my boyfriend did try and tell me that Inauguration Day was also a federal holiday and there would be no mail today either, but he said the look of abject horror on my face was enough to tell me the truth — eventually.

So, first impressions…it’s a pretty intense game. I am playing it on easy, and I’m glad I did. I reminds me a little of Dead Rising in that once a zombie-like necromorph you struggle and have to press a button repeatedly to try and knock the damn thing off.

You play a guy named Isaac. You are a mechanic-kinda guy on the way to one of the largest mining ships in the, I don’t know, Federation or something. The mining ship, the Ishimura, has lost all communications — a communications blackout, if you will, and you are there to figure out what’s wrong and to fix it.

The problem is akin to Aliens. You have some expensive equipment rotting away in space, a lot of people are part of the mystery, and you show up ill-equipped to deal with the problem. And that is what makes a great video game.

Also like Dead Rising, you get objectives to achieve and a little map helps you get there. There are your teammates to tell you what to do as well. I am happy to have some direction…

The visuals are pretty amazing. The derelict hull is blood-spattered and graffiti-ed out. Abandoned luggage is everywhere, so you know those on the Ishimura were in a hurry to get the hell away from something. Maybe this guy…

Dead Space, Xbox 360, Dead Rising, Aliens, video game

Speaking of prettier, some screen shots of the upcoming Atari-made Race Pro made in online this last week, and I would be remiss if I didn’t share them or comment.

Personally, I am not a big racing fan in terms of games, but this particular game may make me change my mind. When I first glanced at the screen shots, I almost took them for real images. Prettier, indeed.

Out of the twenty or so images I saw, only “cockpit” shots looked like a video game.

But then you get a shot like this next one, with cars all around you as the driver, and then check out the detail in the driver’s side mirror, and yeah, that’s pretty neat.

Originally slated for a November 2008 release, Race Pro — which is exclusive to the Xbox 360, people — has now been officially slated for a February 17, 2009 release. Europe will be getting Race pro a few days ahead of the US on February 13th.

Race Pro, Atari, Xbox 360, racing, video games

Over at my friend, Marcus’ house, on a break from playing Madden 09, Ninja Gaiden II was loaded into the ol’ Xbox 360. He played a bit, we all ooh’d and aah’d over the graphics and the fountains of blood, and then he turned to me, and offered the controller.

Like an idiot savant (the words are my friends, not mine), I quickly picked up my sword and started hacking away at anything that came at me. And many, many things come at you during the course of Ninja Gaiden II. I quickly and rather fantastically made it through the first chapter, easily defeating the bad ass monster at the end of the chapter. In that aspect, Ninja Gaiden II is that common format of killing lots of things, find you way through a maze-like setting, and then kill something big and bad before moving onto the next chapter. Yawn.

I have yet to play the original Ninja Gaiden. I will correct that situation, but not today. Instead, let’s talk about Ninja Gaiden II. Reading a quick little blurb about NGII in my latest Game Informer magazine (that I got with my membership at GameSpot that the Nerd behind the counter talked me into — I just wanted to get out of the damn store, so I agreed quickly to whatever he wanted), it said that Ninja Gaiden was notoriously difficult to play, but the NG II was developed to make it a bit easier. I cannot add my opinion on that yet. NG II is pretty easy.

Ninja Gaiden II has some sort of larger storyline involving a statue that looks more like a skull of something pre-historic, and there is a girl involved, but I am only in Chapter Three right now, and I am not paying attention to the cinematics and the story built therein.

The controls are quite simplistic, if you ask me and you always do. You can jump, throw a projectile, quick attack or power attack. There are other secret ninja moves that require a combination of buttons, like the mighty Ninpo you can inflict on your enemies with the Y and B combo. You can also block attacks with the left trigger. The right trigger aligns the camera behind your Ninja’s back.

You have lots of weapons to choose from, like the wolverine claws in the image above, even though I seem to always go back to my trusty sword.

All in all, I like playing the game, and I am going to try and finish playing it this coming weekend. I’ll let you know how it goes…

Ninja Gaiden II, Ninja Gaiden, Madden 09, Xbox 360, ninja, games, video games, graphics, Game Informer

Hi, boys and girls. It’s just me, your friendly neighborhood JW, here to remind you all that we’re currently looking for people to replace us here at Xbox 360 Rally. All you have to do is go HERE, fill out the form, and wait to hear back. It’s really not that hard.

So, get to it already — so Paco and I can get to the NEW site!

Coming from Thrillhouse17, representing Platform Nation (formerly XBLRadio, now a full powerhouse of gaming communities coming together), is a video detailing what things you can do in Halo 3’s new multiplayer game type, “Forge” as well as whipping out the very bad ass flamethrower and actually using it.

First, the intro video for Forge, more of a tutorial, runs in at about 10 minutes, and I can’t lie, is a little boring at times, but this is for you hardcore Halo fans who just need to see the forge in action and how things are done, so when Tuesday comes, you can just jump right in knowing what you need to know, for those with a short attention span, scroll down to the second video:

This second video is where the Forge shines a little more, not because more is revealed than the first video, but because you can see the split screen, showing one character in regular mode and the other in the Forge edit mode as a camera… oh yeah.. and the bad ass flamethrower! Plus a few more things.. just roll the clip:

So there you go, satisfied?

Of course not, but it’ll have to do for now, unless you also want to see some in game menu’s.. and no doubt there will be more videos to come as we all prepare for what is to come in the couple of days, check back for more updates at Platform Nation

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Halo 3, Forge, Multiplayer, Xbox 360, Platform Nation, XBLRadio, ThrillHouse17, Game Footage, Early Footage, Flamethrower, Editing, BAD ASS FLAMETHROWER

Ok, people, here’s the deal — Paco and I are on our way out. We’re taking over at 1PStart.com in an effort to restore it to it’s former glory. …that, and I just plain want to write about another game every once in a while, is that so wrong?!

Anyways, here is what we’re looking for: A competent, capable writer with a love for all things Xbox. Now, by competent writer, we mean someone who spells “you” correctly, and knows when to capitalize. If you can do that, you’re a shoe-in. So, CLICK THIS DAMN LINK, do the required stuff, then get paid to play video games and write about stuff.

…hell, Mike and I did the hard stuff already, and YES, the GTA4 Banner contest will continue, and I will still give you a copy of GTA IV… or something. So, hop to it.

Xbox 360 Rally, JW, Stuff, Job Openings

Much like the other recent “meet one of our characters” videos that are coming out as of late (Jericho, Mass Effect), another video is here, but this time for a maybe not so known game, Dark Sector. Check the video, then read below to get some information on this game which by the looks of the video, seems to have a feel like “The Darkness” .. in a good way:

Look for it on shelves Jan 22nd 2008. Some of the devs are co-creators from the original Epic Games’ Unreal. The game features no HUD, very cool, you will see how much damage is being done to you based on just physically looking at your character. 3rd person perspective. Powers that evolve as you play through the game. Multiplayer they literally said, ‘Details to be revealed at a later date.” .. so at least it is going to be there. With so many titles on a daily basis I deal with news on, this is one that I am looking forward to seeing how it progresses.
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New video here of Battlefield Bad Company running 8 minutes. I noticed right away on Call of Duty 4 beta that it was a near copy of Battlefield 2, but in a good way. Battles a little quicker, but still similar to Battlefield 2. Well now here comes this Bad Company video and it still has that Battlefield feel to it, but I really feel they are stepping it up. Check the video, it is turning out to be pretty nice:

I am excited about Silent Hill 5, however, these videos aren’t pumping me up. It’s looking good, just the scenes they chose to show were ‘meh. I am still expecting a great Silent Hill game.

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Covered earlier on the Rally, Dead Island has the storyline of a guy and his wife are on a plane that crashes on an island with zombies. Looking quite scary and not nearly as racist as Resident Evil (kidding btw, you are a tard if you thought RE’s trailer was racist). The overall feel of this game is going to of course remind you of Resident Evil, but also add a touch of Dead Rising with the amount of random killings that I believe will be taking place. Check a clip, then re-read the description that was posted earlier to get a full feel for this title: