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14 Oct 05
Here I thought I'd get off the shooter kick for a demo review. I saw there was a new Starship Troopers demo. I figured it was the sequel to the last RTS based on the movie. Oops. It's a sci fi shooter based on the movie.
I figured it was a bad sign when the loading screen told me that the bugs I would be fighting were stupid. It's sort of like creatively apologizing for your AI in advance. That said, the game reminded me of Serious Sam 2. Enemies pop up and you kill them. At least there were no jumping puzzles.
If it had come out right at the time of the movie, I think this could have been a great game. Now it feels like another licensed sci fi shooter. Still if you like the setting (especially more from the movie than the book), you might want to check it out. Just to be clear, there are no command or tactical decisions to make beyond which weapon and where you stand. The game will throw impressive numbers of bugs at you. Demo not recommended.
I have a few more demos to get through. Hopefully, I'll be 'done' with the work on the news section soon. When I say done, I mean working well enough that I don't have to worry about it. It doesn't mean everything is to my liking.
I almost can't believe those "I love bees" games are still going. It was a neat idea at first, but I thought it would die once the novelty wore off. I guess it's a modern day scavenger hunt. Apparently the latest is for Gun. Check out the deadly poker news here.
Finally, here's a weird link going around the internet. It's gaming related in a bizarre Japanese way.
Jason
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13 Oct 05
Debbie and I were out with David. A man I've never seen before looks at David and tells me it's going to get worse, much worse. He seemed quite serious. Interesting. Still, I think I've started him out right:
I was going to do a demo review of Total Overdose since I've been covering the shooters, and there always seemed to be some untapped tactical considerations in the Max Payne series. However, once installed there are no options and I couldn't get the demo to run stably on my system. It would run the movies and the in game cut scene fine, but lock up once I assumed control. Given the quality of the graphics and the loose controls (over my very short play time), I'd suggest keeping this one on the console of your choice.
Progress continues to be slowly made on the news section. There are some neat new features there. Unfortunately new means undocumented. While I'm a quick study with games and user interfaces, I'm pretty slow with the programming. I'll keep hammering away trying not to break anything.
There are some new deals in the forum.
Here is an interesting article on why I don't get more review copies.
Jason
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12 Oct 05
I think I'm about 80 percent done with fixing up the news section. Perhaps I should say 'done enough.' As always, I have big plans and limited time and talent. Still, I soldier on. Thank you for the patience.
You'll never guess what we have today. Yes, another demo review. This time it's for Call of Duty 2 (CoD2). Now if you look CoD2's ads and those of Brothers in Arms: Earned in Blood (EiB). You might think they're very similar game. Well, at least from the demos, about all they have in common is the time frame (WWII) and high production value A/V effects.
I'd like to add one comment to yesterday's EiB demo review. They have a feature that I believe is call 'situational awareness.' It basically pauses the game and zooms you up above the action a bit. You can't zoom around the battlefield and find hidden enemies or anything. It is an attempt to compensate for the fact that you're not really there. There's quite a lot going on you'd know about if you were really leading these troops in combat that doesn't easily come across from a first person view. This feature is a good attempt to solve that problem. It also keeps you focused on good tactics.
Back to CoD2. This game is really more of a typical shooter that happens to be set in a World War II movie. You are the hero. It's hard to kill you. You personally kill most of the enemy. The rest of the friendly troops are mostly around color or to die dramatically in in-game cut scenes.
The first thing I noticed about the demo was that it set itself to 640x480. What? Yes, 640x480. I realize my rig is no longer a fire breather (Athlon XP 2100, 1 gig 2700, Geforce 6600 GT and an Audigy), but you've got to be kidding me. I kicked it up to 800x600 (just to be safe) and off I went. A little crashing later, reboot and off we go at 640x480. I'll admit at 640 I had no performance problems.
As a strategy and tactical gamer, I really can't be a graphics whore. I can appreciate good graphics, but I don't demand them. So ignoring the resolution, the game looked good. Characters were detailed, vehicles looked authentic, weapons looked nice and the buildings looked realistic. The sound was very good. The touted battle chatter was a bit over the top, but so is the game so no worries.
Moving on to gameplay, I mentioned this is a pure shooter. You sling lots of lead. You kill lots of bad guys. You heal by finding cover for a moment. The guns are impossibly accurate. I was picking off snipers with the iron sights of my Thompson at over a hundred yards. I've fired a Thompson. Let's just say that distance accuracy isn't where it excels. The accuracy simplifies weapon selection. You just choose the fastest firing weapon with the largest magazine or clip.
There are some alternate routes in the demo, but since some are instant death (charging into a heavy machine gun), there's a right way and a wrong way to go. The AI was adequate. They would kill me if I really screwed up. They also threw a lot of grenades to show off the 'grenade indicator' feature on the HUD. Overall they did their job well. It's too bad their job was to die dramatically to my superior skills instead of actually trying to stop me.
So if you want a tactical shooter, check out Earned in Blood. It you want an action packed shooter where you're the hero, check out Call of Duty 2. That is if you have a beefier rig than I do or don't mind playing in 640x480. Recommended for shooter fans.
Jason
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11 Oct 05
Sorry about the delay getting yesterday's update up. I'm sure some of you just assumed that I was taking Columbus Day off. No, not a big event here in Texas. We were having some technical difficulties on the administration side of the news section. I think it's worked out now and we should be resuming normal activities. Hopefully, tomorrow I'll be caught up.
Today, nothing too exciting. I just have another demo review for you. This time it's our game of the week. Yes, I played through the Earned in Blood demo. It chalks in at over 600MB so this might be helpful to even more people out there. Is it worth such a hefty download?
I should start off with the feel of the game. The design, as reflected by the demo, seems to shooting for a feel somewhere between a History Channel special and a World War II movie. It's clearly a tactical shooter in feel. Movement is slower. While you can absorb a lot of damage, charging into the enemy will get you killed. Enemies can be suppressed and flanked as advertised. Weapons do seem mostly realistic in accuracy and firing. Hand signals, team chatter (both yours and enemy units), background explosions, bombed out buildings and wrecked vehicles add to the feel of the game.
The sound and graphics are the quality you'd expect from a high production value game. Some of the texture detail was a bit low, but I didn't crank all the details so I can't complain. I liked the sound across the board with the slight exception of the main character. He didn't seem to fit quite right. Overall it was quite an immersive experience.
The single player story section of the demo was a mixed bag. After a brief tutorial, you're asked to clear a town. You've just been given instructions on how to suppress, flank and clear. Strangely the demo doesn't start off with action that can use that. You're funneled immediately into a corridor with a bunch of Germans at the end behind cover. Initially it looks like there's a way to flank them, but the game won't allow you to get to that area even preventing you from jumping over a two foot wall. So you still run into the problem of developers forcing you to play the way they want you to.
On the plus side, the AI seems to work as advertised. I don't think anyone will be swearing they're real people, but since you have only a limited command list (go there, shoot there, assault there, etc.), it's good that they try to do so intelligently. They use cover, move under cover fire, if you're exposed they'll tell you to get down. They're not crack shots, but they do pretty well. The enemy AI responds in a like manner. If they find themselves exposed, they'll try to run to cover. They'll flee grenades. Suppression fire isn't the unbearable torrent that it was in Full Spectrum Warrior, but it works, making partially exposed maneuver possible. Overall the AI manages to make the battles feel intense.
One other downside is that the demo only uses a checkpoint save system obviously showing it's console roots. Hopefully that will change in retail. Saves seemed to occur after each major encounter. They may be more annoying in more open missions.
The demo also came with a skirmish map. It allowed you to play all five modes, but only as the Americans. It supports single player and LAN play.
If you're looking for a good WWII tactical shooter, check out the Earned In Blood demo. Recommended.
Jason
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10 Oct 05
Given my limited gaming time recently, I've decided to see if I could finish anything. Since I needed quick hits, I decided to try to knock out some of the demo's I've downloaded. As another side effect of limited time, you're going to get hit with some demo reviews.
I'll start off with Serious Sam 2. I read all the glowing reviews of the original. I heard about its wacky sense of humor and frenetic pacing. There were many comparisons to Doom. My problem is that I loved Doom until I started to play tactical shooters. I don't mind stretching realism for the sake of fun. After all, even a grazing bullet can send you into shock, putting you out of action. How fun would that be? I do mind tactics being thrown out in favor of bunny hopping while spewing huge amounts of destructive energy down range. Serious Sam 2 has a lot of the latter.
That wasn't really my problem with the demo though. I was having some fun since the types of enemies assaulting you demand some tactical consideration to the most efficient weapon to obliterate their numbers. There also was a small amount of cover to use. Mostly though the fun came from the colorful explosions of fallen enemies. No, my problem came in the form of the jumping puzzles. I can do ok in console platform jumping. I was pretty good in the new Prince of Persia thanks to the rewind feature. I hate first person jumping puzzle. Yes, that includes the Half Life series. Serious Sam 2 had one that just killed any fun I was having. In fact, I uninstalled the demo after that. I wasn't having enough fun to put up with that. Not recommended.
Moving on, we have the King Kong demo. I realize there's a longer title, but I think most people realize this is a game associated with the upcoming movie. What is interesting about the game (besides coming from Michel Ancel, creator of the striking Beyond Good and Evil) is the promise of a dynamic living world that you can use to help you survive. Take the first part of the demo where you play someone named Jack. Your camp is suddenly attacked by a huge T-Rex. Essentially you can't really hurt it (at least I failed to do so in the demo). You're best bet is to distract it while you run way. You can use the terrain to hide or you can try to distract the T-Rex with a tasty morsel you fell with your trusty weapons.
That's all a great idea, but this is, at heart, an adventure game. You don't run sprawling all over the island. You follow narrow paths the only way you can. The encounters are set pieces with the tools to let you handle the problem in one of several ways. The hand holding is particularly strong in the demo. The screen shaking roars and the injury effects were particularly effective. I liked the art style though the graphics on my 6600GT weren't eye popping. Of course the washed out effect of a rainy encounter could be to blame for that.
The second half of the demo you get to play as Kong. You do feel fast, big and powerful. The problem there was the controls felt distinctly like a console port. It seemed like I was fighting the game to get Kong to face and go where I wanted. The swinging (Prince of Persia-esque) parts were effective even if they were pretty automatic. My system had very slow load times. Overall, wait and see on this one.
This week's game is certainly more tactical than Serious Sam 2. It's Brothers in Arms: Earned in Blood (official site) from Gearbox Software. If you recall from a while back, I wrote about tactical games saying that until we have better AI, a cooperative play mode is the heart of a tactical shooter (where real tactics can be effectively implemented). Earned in Blood promises both better AI and a cooperative mode. Gearbox takes you on a realistic tour liberating France in World War II leading your AI squad mates requiring mastery of battlefield tactics. The cooperative skirmish offers the ability to play as either the Allies or Germans. It has four modes: Objectives, Defense, Timed Assault or Tour of Duty. Look for Earned in Blood soon.
Jason
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