INTRODUCTION
I've been playing plastic-guitar games since the original Guitar Hero came out for PS2, and have tried all of them except for RB: Green Day (one of these days, though). The descriptions for Lego Rock Band made it out to be a slightly different experience from RB1, which is apparently the era in which it was developed during. Was it worth the $10 at Gamestop? Read on.
THE FEEL
Not even completely through the teaser cinematic, it's obvious that this is meant to fit in with the other contemporary Lego games: a tongue-in-cheek tribute to the source material, that happens to be family-friendly. I couldn't help but notice that some of the pre-made characters are Lego versions of the RB standbys like the Duke of Gravity. Much like in RB3, cinematics are used to tell the story of your band's rise to superstardom. While demolishing a building, ghost hunting, and fighting off a sea monster, among other Challenges, I caught myself cracking up (and maybe even squeeing at one point) at the genuinely funny videos. And that's coming from someone jaded enough to not flinch at anything he encounters on /b/.
MECHANICS
If you've played any RB games, the gameplay is exactly the same. One small difference is that when you fail, you can work your own way back in without relying on a bandmate's star power. Since the game is meant to be accessible to younger players, the difficulty ratings for songs seems to be a bit more generous, and I believe there are a couple more ratings to better show differences in difficulty. My hard drive has exported tracks for RB1, 2, and a lot of downloaded songs; the game detected the RB1 and downloaded tracks, filtering out any that are apparently deemed inappropriate. It was nice having a decent number of songs to choose from, since the tracklist for Lego Rock Band is rather "meh" for me.
A nifty addition that the builder in me enjoyed is that you have a home-base that you navigate around rather than static menus for campaign stuff. Your band can be seen just hanging out, and the characters you hire such as your manager and roadies will occasionally wander through. As you progress through the campaign you will unlock decorative items to buy and position around your home, although there is not as much variety as in a game like The Sims. Along with your band members, the roadies and members of you entourage can be customized as well.
GRAPHICS, SOUND & CONTROLS
Exactly what you'd expect from the RB series. The visuals during the ghost-hunting challenge was the funniest (intentional) thing I've seen in a video game for as long as I can remember.
CONCLUSION
Will I be getting rid of Rock Band 3? Heck no. As a one-time experience, however, I'm loving Lego Rock Band. And for achievement-hunters, there's nothing too hard (except for the Endless Setlist). My usual RB buddies didn't really care for small issues such as long-ish load times, but that may be because we're quite used to the more-refined systems in RB3. For $10-20, you could do worse. A lot worse. *cough(GH Rocks the '80s)cough*
Tuesday, May 24, 2011
Wednesday, May 18, 2011
RIP Parabellum
Yesterday I was looking for stuff to clean off of my computer, and realized I still had Parabellum installed, that scamp of a F2P shooter with some innovative concepts but poor execution. I decided to give it one last chance before sending it to the same fate as the Companion Cube, but what happened when I tried to start it up?
It couldn't check for updates. The helper program for that, GamersFirst LIVE!, no longer shows Parabellum in its list of F2P games to download, nor does the GamersFirst website list it. Guess it was just too advanced for its time. Or a lousy game.
It couldn't check for updates. The helper program for that, GamersFirst LIVE!, no longer shows Parabellum in its list of F2P games to download, nor does the GamersFirst website list it. Guess it was just too advanced for its time. Or a lousy game.
Brink - A Redbox Review
INTRODUCTION
After hearing about Brink, I was immediately in love. Mirror's Edge is one of my favorite games (as a one-time experience), but I cut my gaming teeth on games like Quake II and Counter-Strike. More guns were needed, and Brink delivered.
THE FEEL
Brink is what would happen if Al Gore watched "Waterworld", played Mirror's Edge and then penned the backstory for Bioshock. A floating arcology (The Ark, get it? lololol) is built sometime in the next 44 years out in the Pacific, as a(n expensive) haven for the rich, brilliant, and hip. Due to the seas rising, presumably from the polar ice caps melting, The Ark sees tourists replaced by refugees. In a scene right out of Snow Crash, all those extra commoners end up in an organic growth of boats and anything else that will float, moored at the edges of The Ark. As far as we know, no one in The Ark knows if there are any other survivors elsewhere on Earth. The two playable factions are Ark security forces, looking to maintain order, and a loose-knit band of rebels who want to escape and go looking for dry land away from The Ark. And maybe some olives.
I'm probably forgetting some classic, but this is the first game I can remember that really tells a compelling story within a round-based shooter. There are little cinematics before, after and sometimes during a match, with audiologs that you unlock as you level up. It made me unnaturally giddy to see my created character inserted into those cinematics, even if 'I' am just checking my weapon in the background while two teammate have a conversation. It's the little things that count.
Speaking of character creation and the little things, you maintain two costumes per character: one for Security and one for the Rebels. You can switch between them at will, and the music subtly changes for each. As you level up, you'll unlock new clothes to customize your officer and ragamuffin. Although some more choices would've been nice, especially regarding hair/hats, the last time I paid so much attention to my clothes was in Soul Calibur IV. Kinda random, but apparently there are no women in the Ark Security forces, nor in the fighting branch of the rebellion.
MECHANICS
Once you create a character, you can choose to play through the story, do challenges to unlock weapon modifications and get onto the leaderboards, free-play versus games, and tinker with your character & weapons. Modding weapons really stood out for me, since each gun can have up to four mods added, and each mod will improve some stats while lowering others. Most mods also are visible on the gun itself, giving you a sense of ownership after taking a 'stock' weapon and making it just right for you.
There are four classes: soldier, medic, engineer, and operative (read: spy). Each one has unique skills that you can buy with points earned from leveling up, and matches will generally require a mix of classes to complete multiple objectives. It's nice how classes are completely separate from weapon choices, and you can change your class at command posts mid-match. Pretty much anything you do in a match gains you experience points, even 'guarding' a door while you wait for the one operative on your team to come plant their doodad on it, fighting in close proximity to teammates, or playing online. It's a beautifully simple way to encourage players into playing the way that the developers intended.
Each level of the story is a match between the two teams, with the aforementioned cinematics and objectives that are appropriate with that part of the story. If your match settings are set accordingly, friends or strangers will simply replace bots. There's no gameplay outside of combat, unless you're like me and agonize over optimum weapon loadouts.
Within a match there will be a primary objective (e.g. a Soldier needs to plant explosives on a door), and secondary ones to help your team. If you aren't the 'right' class for the primary objective, it will display to you as Guard the Door. Hopefully this will encourage players to work together towards the primary goals. Secondary objectives might be blowing open a shortcut or securing a CP that grants a team-wide bonus. You can bring up a radial dial to select an objective, and it displays how many teammates are also working towards it. It's handy to see at a glance if no one is bothering with the most vital goal of the match. The levels are laid out like what you'd expect from a game that's about parkour gunfights in a dystopia, with plenty of places to jump, climb and slide around (except for the big, linebacker characters).
GRAPHICS
Yep, it looks like you're in a run-down shell of a place that was once great, except this time you're on top of the water. The rubble & such looks good, though... at least, as well as rubble can look. One complaint I had was that certain places were really dark at times. That's fine if it's for dramatic effect, but on occasion I would have trouble entering the battlefield, simply because our shipping-container HQ wasn't properly lit for emergency egresses.
SOUND
There isn't any background music during matches, unless I was so wrapped up in shootin' that I didn't even notice music. What you do hear, though... WOW. I was playing with headphones on, and I haven't heard such a satisfying shotgun since Quake II. Hearing that, I half-expected to see a head go flying 50 ft. as if I'd gotten a crit-hit with V.A.T.S. Oh, and the other guns also sound good & dangerous. Something rather random, though, is my character's apparent Foreign Accent Syndrome. I'm the type of player that will make created characters (the first one, at least) roughly based on myself, so it came as a surprise when my Washingtonian Filipino/Germanic avatar started talking with a Jamaican accent. Normally this would be a non-issue... except that you can't change a character's voice after he's created.
CONTROLS
Coming from Mirror's Edge, going nuts on junk lying around the environment came naturally to me, although there aren't quite as many moves available this time. If you hold down the sprint button (more like a brisk jog button), you'll automatically vault over obstacles and climb up ledges you jump towards. Crouching while sprinting will slide you under things like pipes & gunfire, and is a rather effective way to slide past enemies en route to putting some holes in the back panels of their armor. Raising up the sights for your weapons felt a little slower than I'm used to, but it didn't seem to affect gameplay. After the CoD series, it just feels weird. A nifty feature that I hope other games will implement is how a medic revives someone. Rather than running up to a downed teammate with defibrillators, the medic will toss them a syringe. It's then up to the casualty to decide if it's safe for him to revive himself. It's certainly not realistic, but you'll appreciate it the first time a pack of enemies run right past your almost-dead body.
ONLINE ASPECTS
There's been some scuttlebutt about Brink having issues with online multiplayer. It's all true.
Besides the $2 rental, I chose to try Brink on 360 due to the typically solid performance I've had with XBL. When I tried out a public game, the two other human players I was with brought the match down to a slideshow any time I tried to move. It definitely wasn't gameplay slowdown, as the bots were moving around as smoothly as usual when I stood still. I learned to play Counter-Strike on dial-up with ping of 200, so I can tolerate not having pixel-perfect accuracy & other players simply having better connections, but this was unplayable. This is why the big titles like Halo: Reach & Gear of War III have betas, even though they know the DVD factory is simply printing money: to iron the kinks out beforehand. It really burns my butter when developers & publishers are willing to let the early adopters be beta testers who pay $60 for the privilege.
Similarly, there's a Brink stats-tracking site; I even have the code to link my gameplay stats. Too bad the site isn't up, with no word (as of 18May11) when it will be.
CONCLUSION
I like this game. I really, really do. Bethesda or Splash Damage must have snuck a Polybius machine into my local theater, and used it to find out exactly what features I'd have in my dream game. That might also explain why I don't remember ever playing Polybius. And the night terrors.
Will I be buying it? YES... eventually. I didn't even play the game on release day, yet someone in charge at Bethesda, Splash Damage or ZeniMax thought it was okay to release a game centered around online multiplayer, with online features that aren't even finished. Am I just bat-guano crazy to expect a non-MMO game to have the features that work as advertised on release day, or have been adequately playtested? It's great that problems can be fixed after release through patches, but it seems like developers are getting lazier now that they know that the game doesn't have to be perfect by the time it 'goes gold'. Looking at what was shipped on the Brink disk +8 days of patching (or not), it's not worth $60. If I found it for $30 or less, definitely. If it's patched to the point where everything 'just works', I might ever reconsider $60. I just hope that Brink becomes popular enough that it'll be supported to the point where price meets quality, wherever that is.
After hearing about Brink, I was immediately in love. Mirror's Edge is one of my favorite games (as a one-time experience), but I cut my gaming teeth on games like Quake II and Counter-Strike. More guns were needed, and Brink delivered.
THE FEEL
Brink is what would happen if Al Gore watched "Waterworld", played Mirror's Edge and then penned the backstory for Bioshock. A floating arcology (The Ark, get it? lololol) is built sometime in the next 44 years out in the Pacific, as a(n expensive) haven for the rich, brilliant, and hip. Due to the seas rising, presumably from the polar ice caps melting, The Ark sees tourists replaced by refugees. In a scene right out of Snow Crash, all those extra commoners end up in an organic growth of boats and anything else that will float, moored at the edges of The Ark. As far as we know, no one in The Ark knows if there are any other survivors elsewhere on Earth. The two playable factions are Ark security forces, looking to maintain order, and a loose-knit band of rebels who want to escape and go looking for dry land away from The Ark. And maybe some olives.
I'm probably forgetting some classic, but this is the first game I can remember that really tells a compelling story within a round-based shooter. There are little cinematics before, after and sometimes during a match, with audiologs that you unlock as you level up. It made me unnaturally giddy to see my created character inserted into those cinematics, even if 'I' am just checking my weapon in the background while two teammate have a conversation. It's the little things that count.
Speaking of character creation and the little things, you maintain two costumes per character: one for Security and one for the Rebels. You can switch between them at will, and the music subtly changes for each. As you level up, you'll unlock new clothes to customize your officer and ragamuffin. Although some more choices would've been nice, especially regarding hair/hats, the last time I paid so much attention to my clothes was in Soul Calibur IV. Kinda random, but apparently there are no women in the Ark Security forces, nor in the fighting branch of the rebellion.
MECHANICS
Once you create a character, you can choose to play through the story, do challenges to unlock weapon modifications and get onto the leaderboards, free-play versus games, and tinker with your character & weapons. Modding weapons really stood out for me, since each gun can have up to four mods added, and each mod will improve some stats while lowering others. Most mods also are visible on the gun itself, giving you a sense of ownership after taking a 'stock' weapon and making it just right for you.
There are four classes: soldier, medic, engineer, and operative (read: spy). Each one has unique skills that you can buy with points earned from leveling up, and matches will generally require a mix of classes to complete multiple objectives. It's nice how classes are completely separate from weapon choices, and you can change your class at command posts mid-match. Pretty much anything you do in a match gains you experience points, even 'guarding' a door while you wait for the one operative on your team to come plant their doodad on it, fighting in close proximity to teammates, or playing online. It's a beautifully simple way to encourage players into playing the way that the developers intended.
Each level of the story is a match between the two teams, with the aforementioned cinematics and objectives that are appropriate with that part of the story. If your match settings are set accordingly, friends or strangers will simply replace bots. There's no gameplay outside of combat, unless you're like me and agonize over optimum weapon loadouts.
Within a match there will be a primary objective (e.g. a Soldier needs to plant explosives on a door), and secondary ones to help your team. If you aren't the 'right' class for the primary objective, it will display to you as Guard the Door. Hopefully this will encourage players to work together towards the primary goals. Secondary objectives might be blowing open a shortcut or securing a CP that grants a team-wide bonus. You can bring up a radial dial to select an objective, and it displays how many teammates are also working towards it. It's handy to see at a glance if no one is bothering with the most vital goal of the match. The levels are laid out like what you'd expect from a game that's about parkour gunfights in a dystopia, with plenty of places to jump, climb and slide around (except for the big, linebacker characters).
GRAPHICS
Yep, it looks like you're in a run-down shell of a place that was once great, except this time you're on top of the water. The rubble & such looks good, though... at least, as well as rubble can look. One complaint I had was that certain places were really dark at times. That's fine if it's for dramatic effect, but on occasion I would have trouble entering the battlefield, simply because our shipping-container HQ wasn't properly lit for emergency egresses.
SOUND
There isn't any background music during matches, unless I was so wrapped up in shootin' that I didn't even notice music. What you do hear, though... WOW. I was playing with headphones on, and I haven't heard such a satisfying shotgun since Quake II. Hearing that, I half-expected to see a head go flying 50 ft. as if I'd gotten a crit-hit with V.A.T.S. Oh, and the other guns also sound good & dangerous. Something rather random, though, is my character's apparent Foreign Accent Syndrome. I'm the type of player that will make created characters (the first one, at least) roughly based on myself, so it came as a surprise when my Washingtonian Filipino/Germanic avatar started talking with a Jamaican accent. Normally this would be a non-issue... except that you can't change a character's voice after he's created.
CONTROLS
Coming from Mirror's Edge, going nuts on junk lying around the environment came naturally to me, although there aren't quite as many moves available this time. If you hold down the sprint button (more like a brisk jog button), you'll automatically vault over obstacles and climb up ledges you jump towards. Crouching while sprinting will slide you under things like pipes & gunfire, and is a rather effective way to slide past enemies en route to putting some holes in the back panels of their armor. Raising up the sights for your weapons felt a little slower than I'm used to, but it didn't seem to affect gameplay. After the CoD series, it just feels weird. A nifty feature that I hope other games will implement is how a medic revives someone. Rather than running up to a downed teammate with defibrillators, the medic will toss them a syringe. It's then up to the casualty to decide if it's safe for him to revive himself. It's certainly not realistic, but you'll appreciate it the first time a pack of enemies run right past your almost-dead body.
ONLINE ASPECTS
There's been some scuttlebutt about Brink having issues with online multiplayer. It's all true.
Besides the $2 rental, I chose to try Brink on 360 due to the typically solid performance I've had with XBL. When I tried out a public game, the two other human players I was with brought the match down to a slideshow any time I tried to move. It definitely wasn't gameplay slowdown, as the bots were moving around as smoothly as usual when I stood still. I learned to play Counter-Strike on dial-up with ping of 200, so I can tolerate not having pixel-perfect accuracy & other players simply having better connections, but this was unplayable. This is why the big titles like Halo: Reach & Gear of War III have betas, even though they know the DVD factory is simply printing money: to iron the kinks out beforehand. It really burns my butter when developers & publishers are willing to let the early adopters be beta testers who pay $60 for the privilege.
Similarly, there's a Brink stats-tracking site; I even have the code to link my gameplay stats. Too bad the site isn't up, with no word (as of 18May11) when it will be.
CONCLUSION
I like this game. I really, really do. Bethesda or Splash Damage must have snuck a Polybius machine into my local theater, and used it to find out exactly what features I'd have in my dream game. That might also explain why I don't remember ever playing Polybius. And the night terrors.
Will I be buying it? YES... eventually. I didn't even play the game on release day, yet someone in charge at Bethesda, Splash Damage or ZeniMax thought it was okay to release a game centered around online multiplayer, with online features that aren't even finished. Am I just bat-guano crazy to expect a non-MMO game to have the features that work as advertised on release day, or have been adequately playtested? It's great that problems can be fixed after release through patches, but it seems like developers are getting lazier now that they know that the game doesn't have to be perfect by the time it 'goes gold'. Looking at what was shipped on the Brink disk +8 days of patching (or not), it's not worth $60. If I found it for $30 or less, definitely. If it's patched to the point where everything 'just works', I might ever reconsider $60. I just hope that Brink becomes popular enough that it'll be supported to the point where price meets quality, wherever that is.
Sunday, February 27, 2011
Still Alive
Just a short update from my phone: I haven't forgotten about this blog, and the next F2P game I'm looking at trying is CrimeCraft. More to come...
Wednesday, November 17, 2010
Civilization IV: Beyond the Sword mods
I've appreciated a good mod ever since downloading Counter-Strike via dial-up back in 2000, but a steady paycheck lead to decreasing mod usage over the years. It was quite the pleasant surprise when I recently discovered that my favorite expansion for my favorite computer game, Civ IV: Beyond the Sword, shipped with a number of mods. Some notable ones were a winter-setting fantasy world, post-apocalyptic tactical scenario, and a Mesoamerican setting. Being a fan of Aztec history, I have a feeling that I'll be spending some quality time with the final mod, although possibly not until after Steam Con this weekend.
Monday, November 15, 2010
The AFK Tavern
For anyone around Seattle and thereabouts, the AFK Tavern is a new restaurant/bar/gaming venue in Everett (by the Memorial Stadium). When I was asked to host game night, my lack of square footage at home made it a perfect opportunity to check the place out. Their website calendar stated that it was Steampunk Night, so I donned my khakis, grabbed my comically oversized wrench and rolled out. How was it?
At first glance, it appears to be a typical restaurant. Placed conspicuously by the door, however, was a sword and a list of the house's collection of board games. Wandering in a bit farther, two large TVs in alcoves stand out, showing Rock Band or Uncharted 2 sessions instead of sports. The actual bar is just big enough to serve drinks from, with a longer stretch devoted to monitors that are apparently hooked up to Xbox 360s. A small group was playing Halo: Reach, which my girlfriend joined in for a bit (she's so awesome). My group, all nine of us, claimed one of the two large tables in the back. I couldn't help but notice some wargaming terrain on the other table; never did find out if it belonged to the house or a patron. The whole ambiance wasn't quite the mecca (mecha? :> ) to gaming geekery that I hoped for, but they just opened and there's plenty of room for swag to fill up the walls.
The menu was filled with self-aware dishes; I had the meat-lovers' Orc Burger, and the g/f had a Can Haz Cheezberger. If you're feeling adventurous, the Orc Piss is an inexpensive pitcher of 50/50 beer and a soda of your choice. That and a plate of +2 Tater Tots would be enough for a gaming group to snack on all evening. The burger was a little pricey, but filling. And they have sweet potato fries. :D
There weren't too many people there at the time that my group arrived (10:15 pm or so), and the only steampunks present were three from my group. The Seattle Steamrats are looking to start an Everett chapter, with meetups there on Wednesday evenings. Seeing what the Steamrats have done for business at the Wayward Coffeehouse, I'm sure the AFK will welcome the various bodgers, artistes, and ragamuffins. A steampunk art exibit in the future should add some flavor to the decor, as well. (If I can craft a nice mount for one of my pistols, I may even contribute.)
Both the owner and head cook said hi to our group, and welcomed input on the food and venue. The staff was very friendly, and from what I gathered know their games. Also, even though it's billed as a tavern, 18+ can come in for the food and gaming. Young broodlings are even welcome with their parents.
Overall, the AFK Tavern seems like it's still trying to get into its groove, but there's definitely promise. I'll be going there again, board game under my arm.
Monday, November 8, 2010
Vindictus: First Impressions
After seeing ads for it on The Escapist and watching the trailer, the promise of physics-based combat in Vindictus was too tempting to pass on. That, and it's free-to-play (F2P). What do I think after two missions?
Good:
It's BEAUTIFUL. My gaming rig isn't the newest, so anything that looks good even on low graphical settings and 1024x768 is keen. There are just little things that stand out as well, such as being able to change your character's expression on the creation screen. The Source engine looks like it wasn't squandered when you see your character smoothly shift from a coy smirk to a full-on toothy grin, and it doesn't look cheesy.
Movement. Movement feels quite fluid like in a platformer, rather than the slightly plodding pace of other MMOs. On the scaffolding of a bell tower I was able to smoothly maneuver around gnolls and kick them off to their doom.
The Prologue. I know it's just fluff, but the introductory cutscene and prologue really set the tone well, and are a cut above what I'd expect from a F2P game. The addition of movie-style opening credits was a surprise, but gave it a slightly more professional feel.
The Combat. OMGBBQ! I can trick enemies into attacking each other!!!! It's not like in Doom, where you'd get them angry at each other, either. Once a boss gets ready to attack among a group of minions, you can maneuver so that the minions are in front of the boss. Once an animation starts, the attack can't be stopped, so the boss ends up pummeling whatever is in front of it. Also, finishing a combo with a kick sent a gnoll flying back into a comrade standing right behind it, hurting them both. This type of spatial presence is something that I've been waiting for; compared to fighting games or FPSs where (in-game) inches could win or lose a match, it always seemed odd how MMOs seemed to slack off regarding melee combat. I've never cared much for fireball-spamming as a mage, so an emphasis on hand-to-hand combat and positioning during combat feels fresh and more fun.
The Ships. Like in Guild Wars, areas outside of the town are instanced. You go to the port to 'book passage' to the area, and the interface for setting up a 'ship' works well. Immediately you're presented with a list of groups that are being set up, and the parameters for those sessions. If you create a new session, you can set how many slots are available for others (or just go alone), if it's invite-only, and additional challenges for bonus points, such as beating it with one or two players. The functionality of the whole system may not be too revolutionary, but the presentation is where it shines.
Bad:
Characters. Currently there are only three characters to choose from, with "coming soon" listed for another in the background. No biggie, but as the community grows, it might hurt immersion if eventually you look like 33% of everyone else around you.
In-Game Browser. Certain features, like the guild browser, appear to use an in-game browser. It may just be my system or internet connection, but I haven't seen the browser windows that pop up work yet.
I'll definitely be playing this more, to see if it holds up after the initial shine wears off. Sadly, Parabellum never had enough shine to start out with.
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