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Vidya Game Reviews
Topic Started: Feb 26 2011, 03:27 AM (11,986 Views)
tfghost92
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swag on this dick, bitches
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Gears of War 2
Xbox 360 exclusive
Third Person Shooter
Release Date: November 7, 2008







Story


Quote:
 
In Gears of War 2, we continue the story of Delta squad, led my Sergeant Marcus Fenix, into the Locust Horde's home, The Hollow, to do what the surviving humans should have done 15 years prior, attack.


Now, the story, it was decently developed, and it became my favorite aspect of Gears of War as a whole. I love the storyline for both games, and this one fits nicely with the ending of Gears 1.

Carmine makes an epic return to the series, with Anthony's brother Benjamin. Ben becomes the new red shirt for Delta squad as Marcus, Dom, Cole, Baird, Ben, and Tai fight through the Hollow and beat back the Locust on their own turf.


One of the biggest dissapointment I found with the Campaign was that there is not one Berserker nor are they mentioned at all or seen in any way shape or form. Fans of Gears 1 knows the Berserkers, and knows that it was one of the things that made Gears of War the icon it became, along with the signature Chainsaw Bayonet on the Lancer assault rifle.

Epic brought back Casual, Hardcore, and Insane game difficulties while also adding a new difficulty, Normal, the the group. Insane mode is a blast solo and co-op and is the equivelant to Halo's Legendary mode and Call of Duty's Veteran mode. Insanely hard, but fast paced and great fun. This is how gears gets its campaign replay value.

There were some big plot twisters and WTF moments, and that is what kept the campaign enjoyable all the way until the very end.














Multiplayer


Quote:
 
Oh boy, here we go.

In one perspective, multiplayer is fantastic. The game mode selection is fantastic. I find every time I go to play Gears multiplayer, I can't even decide what game mode I want to play.

Guardian, a mode in which each team has a Leader and infinite respawns. Once you kill the enemy team's Leader, they no longer can respawn and you must destroy the entire team to win the round. Easily the best game mode on the game.

Submission, not my favorite game type in the least, but this is where a single NPC is put into the round, armed with a shotgun. You must down the NPC then take him as a shield and drag him to a capture zone and hold him there for as long as you can. Hold him long enough and you win the round.

Warzone, basically, kill the enemy team. No respawns. This is your standard Team Deathmatch mode.

Execution, about the same as Warzone, except you always down the enemy player and you must run up to the enemy player and use an execution move to finish him off. No respawns.

King of the Hill. Multiple hills spawn on the map and you must capture each hill and hold it for as long as you can. Infinite respawns.


Annex. Same as king of the hill, except there is only one hill, and it moves after a set amount of time. Infinite respawns.


I love all the modes. Yes, seriously. All of them. I try to play each one every time I go for Gears multiplayer.



Now, the OTHER perspective of Gears multiplayer. It is a buggy, lag filled mess. Epic Games failed to employ Dedicated Servers for Gears of War 2. This means that all players feed off of one players connection, commonly referred to as a "host."

Sure, that doesn't sound bad right? Wrong. Epic screwed something up: they left host a multitude of god mode powers. The host has a sprint 10x faster than any other player, every shotgun blast gibs the victim, each and every time, and guns damage is 10x stronger than any others. Basically, whoever is host has the game results in the bag already, and it is nobody to blame except Epic. Bad failure, Epic.

There are glitches and bugs on every single game mode and map. Players can glitch through walls and become impossible to kill, more commonly found in Guardian. The leader glitches through the wall, and the game drags on forever.

In addition, the assault rifles are underpowered and the Gnasher is overpowered. This is also not a personal opinion, it is fact. Epic admits they fucked this up too. It leaves a major disadvantage and a whole lot of shotgun battles. The shotgun also shoots the entire way across the map without spread, so you can kill someone with the shotgun from nearly 200-300 ft away from you. Not cool, Epic.











Horde


Quote:
 

Horde mode is when waves of enemies come at you and you gotta kill each one to win the round. There are 50 rounds.


This is where Gears multiplayer shines. This time, you fight NPCs, so host problems aren't existent. Each and every wave gets harder and harder all the way up until the 50th wave. Horde mode has major replay value. Fighting waves of enemies over and over again sounds repetitive and boring, and sometimes it gets that way, but if you are in the mood for some Gears multiplayer, Horde is the way to go.










In Closing


[align=left]
Pros:

-Multiplayer is fast paced and exciting
-campaign is fun throughout, and shows signs of replay value on the harder difficulties
-co-op campaign is a blast
-Horde mode brings Gears 2 major replay value
-cheap price of $30 for the Gear sof War triple pack, which features Gears 1, 2, and all multiplayer maps DLC for Gears 2, a normal value of 60 dollars if bought seperately.



Cons:

-some campaign elements get frustrating to play
-host problems in multiplayer make for a massive turn-away from the multiplayer
-guns are over and underpowered on multiplayer
-glitches and bugs are everywhere in the maps and game modes


Overall Score: 7.9/10


All these problems with glitching and bugs and host problems makes nearly all multiplayer a turn off, but the campaign and horde modes are fantastic and fun and give a lot of replay value, which turns you back to the game. Worth buying, not worth a lot of your time though.
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Bigcalv2002
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Game: inFamous 2
Platform: Playstation 3
Rating: T for Teen
Score: 9 out of 10

Please note this is my first review. I will try not to give away any spoilers for anyone. If I do, I apologize and will try to let you know before.

Our story begins a few weeks after the events of the first inFamous. You are Cole Macgrath, a bike courier from Empire city (which is loosely based on New York) whom was given electrical superpowers in the previous game due to a weapon of mass destruction known as the ray sphere which channels the powers of people around it and concentrates it into a nearby human with conduit abilities (more details on conduits later). With an explanation from the games opening movie, we learn that the villain from the last game (Kessler) was actually preparing Cole to fight the villain in this current game, whom is simply known as "the beast". The beast is a being of unimaginable powers whom can consume entire cities and who seems to have no morale centre. At the beginning, Cole is still in Empire city, when the beast shows up. After Coles heroic attempts to vanquish the beast, the beast defeats cole, but not before cole and his allies (zeke and a new ally called agent Kuo) high tail it out by boat and head down the coast to the city of New Marais (loosely based on New Orleans) to help increase his powers and defeat the beast. As a result, Empire City is destroyed! Upon Coles arrival to New Marais, he is greeted by the militia, a group of redneck thugs wearing hockey masks lead by an elusive man named bertrand. The militias motto, keep the city safe and free from "impurities" like Cole and other conduits. It is then that you are given one of your first "Karmic moments" (if you played the first one, you know what I mean). You have 2 options, either blow up a fuel tank to clear out a good amount of the militia which would also kill some injured civilians as well, or clear them out the old fashioned way with some good old butt kicking.

Your karma system is very important in this game. It will help determine not only the outcome of the story, but what missions and abilities will become available to you, and how people will react to you on the street. The difference though between this game and the last game is who you choose to ally yourself with in this game helps to determine your karma ranking. You can choose to ally yourself with agent Kuo (mentioned earlier), a federal agent whom is very much a by the book, doing good for all mankind agent. Kuos abilities are quite fun in this game. When she is on a mission with Cole, she can use ice abilities in combination with coles electrical abilities to create some fun move combinations suck as an electrical freeze on any opponents.
And then theres Nix, a native to New Marais whom does not care how the job gets done, as long as the end beneits her. Nixs unique abilities are fire based and allow for her and cole to spread maximum damage to anyone (villain or civilian) with her fire powers.

One improvement that they have made in this game over the last is with their melee combat. One addition to the melee combat is Coles new weapon, simply called "the amp" which is an electrical sword that deals out alot of damage. Melee commbat has been improved by slowing down time to allow players to dish out finishing moves after filling up a meter. Finishing moves can also be upgraded to allow for even more stylish and punishing finishing moves.

Other powers that you gain along the way can also be upgraded to allow for more damage and destruction. However, unlike the previous instalment, you will need to meet certain requirements in this game in order to unluck and purchase the next upgrade for your abilities. Such requirements could include performing certain stunts, completing a certain amount of side missions, or saving (or injuring, depending on how you play the game) a certain amount of civilians.

Visually, the game is quite robust and vibrant. I could honestly tell that alot of time and effort went in to making the city of New Marais look and feel like New orleans (heck, theres even a flood district). The enemies look alot more polished in this game over the last one too.

Audio wise is very similar. The music does not have so much of the electronica feeling that the first game had. They really tried to incorporate alot of the saxophone and string instruments in this game. Street performers can be found in varions locations throughout the city. Heck, even the combat sounds of cole hitting enemies with the amp sound awesome :).

But thats not to say this game does not have its faults. One thing is targeting. Although the melee system has been improved in this game, sometimes when there is multiple enemies on screen, it is difficult to switch between enemies and you may end up swinging at air. Another detraction in this game is one I had in the last game. Cole can sometimes be a little too "sticky" when climbing buildings or dropping to the ground. You end up clinging to something stupid like a window ledge 5 feet off the ground. That can be really annoying at times when an enemy is firing at you.

One nice addition of this game is Sucker Punch studios incorporation of sonys motto "play, create, share". Users can create and upload their own custom side missions ranging from ring races, to simple "kill em all" missions, to stealth pursuit missions. I will admit, I really do not like creating my own missions in any of the games that support it (Modnation racers, LBP), but some of the UGC missions are really unique and fun, and they add alot of replayability.

Overall, when you combine all the UGC content, the compelling story, and the powers that can be obtained, I think this would be a great game for anyone looking to pick up a 3rd person action/adventure for the PS3.

Thanks, and please let me know what you think of my frist review :).
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Bigcalv2002
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Metallic and TFghost, good reviews :)
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Metallicflames
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BLOOPERS ARE EPIC
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Bigcalv2002
Jun 21 2011, 06:32 PM
Metallic and TFghost, good reviews :)

Thanks! Yours too! :)
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MrMarill
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DAT STORY TIEM

Well, this thread needs more use...


Sonic the Hedgehog
Sega Mega Drive/Genesis


Ah, Sonic. For most of us, when we think of Sonic we think of an annoying blue hedgehog going Godspeed through terrible games. Was he always like that?

Well, yes and no. In that he's still the blue hedgehog, but the original game was not terrible. Butit was annoying.

Of course, Sonic the Hedgehog on the Mega Drive can be played on so many different systems nowadays, there's no excuse not to have the game. Off the top of my head, you can get this game on Sonic Adventure DX, Sonic Mega Collection and off the Wii's Virtual Console.

Sonic, for some unexplained reason, is a hedgehog able to run at the speed of sound. Of course, this means his gameplay is really fucking fast. Sonic will charge through levels killing enemies, doing loops and generally being a complete badass. There are six zones in Sonic the Hedgehog, and each zone has three acts. Each act is actually basically the same level with a different layout and maybe a different gameplay element here and there, except the third act in which Dr. Robotnik (he wasn't Eggman at this point) appears as a boss to try and stop you at the end.

These zones are all colourful, vibrant and FULL of life. That's one of the best part about this game; each zone feels like it's an actual place rather than just being made specifically for a game. Obviously not in the level designs (which are wacky and crazy), but you never feel while playing the game that something feels out of place or doesn't make sense. It's hard to explain, but it really adds to the game.

Sonic the Hedgehog features some of the catchiest tunes in video game history. From the famous Green Hill Zone to the insanely fast Scrap Brain Zone, each track fits its Zone and definitely adds to the gameplay. There was one minor annoyance, though. It's present in most 16-bit games; if there are too many sound effects, some of the track will cut out. I don't mind this- there was hardware limitations- but for some unexplained reason the game cuts out the lead track. This is utterly bizarre, as you're jumping through Green Hill Zone listening to purely the bass harmony. There's one section in Green Hill Zone which does this every time without fail, even though there appears to be no extra sound effects. In addition, there's one section where Sonic jumps on a block to destroy it, and there's a HUGE explosion. It completely drowns out the music and is completely out of place.

Onto the actual gameplay, this is where the game becomes hit and miss. The game is hit ninety five percent of the time, trust me. Sonic will jump at your slightest command, move as you'd expect and controlling Sonic is a joy. Every single Zone, even the first one has a completely unique gameplay element, and some of the ideas Sonic Team implemented in this game are outstanding. The level designs are fantastic- the higher up in the stage you go, the more secrets you will get, but the harder it is to keep up there. The player can try to make their way to the top, try to simply survive or just power their way to the finish. In addition to the fantastic level designs, the health system in Sonic is perfect. The player can collect rings on each stage, which are scattered plentifully around each act. If the player gets a hundred rings, they will gain an extra life. Bearing in mind the game gives you a pathetic three lives and Continues are hard to come by, these are incredibly important, and you'll want to be picking up as many rings as humanly possible.

That's where it gets interesting, though. If Sonic gets hit while holding a ring, every ring he is holding spills out and you lose all of them. You can try to collect them again while they roll about on the ground, but you'll never get them all. If Sonic gets hit with no rings, he will die and the player will go to the last checkpoint. In this fashion, the player can stay alive by merely stopping and picking up rings when they get hit; however, sometimes this simply doesn't work, and the player is forced to run on in constant fear of their life. This is a fantastic system, and coupled with the 1-Up system, it gives the player lots of incentive to keep collecting rings.

I mentioned Continues are hard to come by. If you finish an act with fifty or more rings, you can get to a special Bonus Stage to collect a Chaos Emerald. Chaos Emeralds do nothing but give you points; the real fun is that if you collect fifty rings on these, you get a continue. You can unlock these Bonus Stages in every Act 1 and 2 in the game, and you'll want to.

So I've talked about the game's mechanics, and how amazingly fun the game is. There are a few bad aspects, though. I said you'll want continues and extra lives? You'll want a LOT. This game gets PUNISHINGLY difficult at around Zone 4. Difficult games are good; we all want a challenge, right? This isn't one of those challenges though. I died countless times from things I couldn't have POSSIBLE known were there. For example, there are enemies which pop out of the ground to attack you. You can only tell they're there because they have a little drill for a nose, and it's slightly popping out of the ground.

Sonic Team decided to put foreground decoration in front of a few of them.

This happens constantly throughout the game (especially in Zone 4), when the game would kill you through no fault of your own. There is definitely legitamite difficulty in the game (Scrap Brain Zone, some of the bosses), don't get me wrong, but there is quite a lot of deaths which simply aren't the player's fault. For example, there's one area in which Sonic is underwater. If you stay underwater too long, you drown. You can get bubbles underwater to breathe, so you can stay underwater longer. One of these bubbles is located next to a platform (which you can't see any difference in) which actually floats to the surface of the water. Problem being, there is no surface, just the ceiling, which crushes Sonic to death. The game misleading makes the player get bubbles to survive, then punishes them when they did absolutely nothing wrong.

The game cheats you out of your hard-earned lives to the point where you're going along each level as fast as humanly possible so that the platforms that kill you if you go slow DON'T destroy you. Then the game punishes you for going too fast, in that you run into things you couldn't see because you were going too fast.

I sincerely hope they fixed this for Sonic the Hedgehog 2 and 3, because they make an otherwise fantastic, almost perfect game less enjoyable. There are other small flaws in the game; the most obvious being when you is walking up a hill with no speed, you will simply stop completely dead on the hill unable to move. These problesm definitely got addressed in Sonic the Hedgehog 2 with the addition of the Spin Dash move, but there was no reason to have these break ups in pace. Likewise, Zone 3 has a puzzle in which the player must move from elevator to elevator as it goes down/up until it reaches the destination. Very fun and all, but after the game gives you the same puzzle around four times in one Act, it gets dull and is a complete pace breaker.

I feel I've hated on the game too much, and it really is a great game. I DEFINITELY recommend picking it up as it is a fantastic, fun, original platformer with varied, exciting level designs. The graphics are great, the music is great, the gameplay is great, and some annoying design issues let it down. This game is definitely worth a buy, and it's definitely a game you'll keep coming back to for a real challenge.

Pros
-Fantastic music
-Colourful graphics
-Fast-paced, exciting gameplay
-Lots of incentive to collect rings

Cons
-Feeling "cheated" by the game
-Pace Breakers

Rating: 9.1/10
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MrMarill
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DAT STORY TIEM

Super Bomberman
Super Nintendo Entertainment System


I'll be using this thread a lot now as I got some new gaems, but this is a classic from my childhood.

I'm sure most of us are familiar with Bomberman. You are the appropriately titled "White Bomber", and you lay bombs in a grid-like-maze, blowing up everything vertically and horizontally in a certain distance. There are "soft blocks" which melt on impact and stop the explosion in that direction. These have powerups, and lead to new areas of the map.

There are two modes to play; Adventure and Battle Mode. It may not sound like much, but it's all you really need.

As you start Adventure, you can only lay one bomb at a time, you move slowly, and that bomb explodes one square in each direction. As you blow up soft blocks, and the enemies in each level, you gain more and more power ups, until at the end of the game you have bombs which go through walls and can be detonated any time you want. The Adventure mode takes place over six "worlds", and the player must clear seven levels in each, eight including the boss. The bosses are rather bland "bomb until it dies" until the fourth boss, which moves around at an alarmingly fast speed, and you have to bomb it into an electrified wall. Of course, as your bombs have a preset timer on them, timing this is really trick.

World 5 is definitely the highlight. You fight against other bombers in an arena, and these bombers can pick up powerups which help them kill you. After you kill them, these powers spill out. The boss of this world is incredibly tough and even with Time Bomb (controlled detonation I mentioned earlier) he's a challenge.

The best thing about Adventure is also its drawback; co-op. Co-op is incredibly fun, as you team up to skillfully kill enemies all round the map. However, whenever the second player presses start to join, he steals half of Player One's lives. This was a necessary feature, but also slightly annoying. The biggest downside is that the game doubles the amount of enemies, but the amount of powerups the same. By the very end of the game, both of you will have respectable power rather than on single player when you'd be destroying things left, right and centre.

But that's not the main attraction. Of course, everyone's here for Battle Mode. You and up to three friends get thrown into one of these mazes with pathetic bomb power etc., and the object is to kill all of them. By the end of each round (which typically take from a minute to three minutes tops), you'll all have behemoth bombs and be causing huge exlosions even the layer is having trouble avoiding. Every time a player dies, they lose ALL their powerups, which are scattered through the stage. This means each player gets more and more powered up, and it's an incredibly fun experience. You can't get any of the ridiculously overpowered stuff of Adventure (such as Time Bomb and "Walk Through Walls"), but you can get Kick Bomb and Punch Bomb; walk into a bomb and it goes sliding across the map, and press R to stop it at any time. Yes, that is as awesome and devastating as it sounds, and some games end up as a game of "Bomb Tennis/Chicken", with the players constantly kicking back and forth before running to cover at the last second. Bomb Punch, on the other hand, lets you punch bombs over walls. Interestingly, if you punch it off the map, it reappears at the other side, leading to amazing kills if done right.

If the timer on Battle Mode gets to a minute or less, the game says "Hurry Up!" and blocks start falling from the ceiling, making the stage smaller and smaller. It stops after a while, at which point the stage is so small it's almost impossible to avoid bombs. So for example, if your opponent has far more bombs and power than you, you can try and delay the game to make it a draw when the timer runs out or even have him/her get crushed by a falling block. It's a great idea which adds to the game.

You can play Battle Mode alone, and it is fun, but it's the best when you have friends around shouting every time you trap them against a wall with a bomb. In addition to the normal "Dungeon" map, there are eleven other maps, from Conveyor Belts (which move players and bombs) to Power Zone (no blocks; everyone has full power). The game is incredibly fun on nearly every map and a completely different experience.

The gradual building to utter destruction in Battle Mode is almost invisible. You start out only being able to lay one bomb, and by the end you can leave a long chain of almost impossible to dodge bombs. Yeah, if a bomb explodes and hits another, it explodes too.

I haven't even mentioned the fantastic music. The boss theme is so awesome, the Battle Modde music is frantic and fast paced, and the Adventure music is as "adventure-y" as you'd expect.

It's an incredibly complex game for what it is, but what it is is fun. And lots of it. This game doesn't try to be anything it's not, it's just a... blast (excuse the pun) to play. Adventure is fun, Battle Mode is epic, and this game should be in every SNES owner's library. This game is the incentive to go out and get a multitap for the SNES; the first ever multitap was invented for this game. It's that good. It's rare a company gets the mechanics on a game so perfect the first time through, but I think Hudson managed it.

Pros
-Epic bosses
-Fantastic music
-Simply fun Battle Mode
-Great sense of building power
-...Simply fun Battle Mode

Cons
-Adventure's Co-Op can be annoying

Rating: 9.5/10
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nascargo19
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Id probably review Gran Turismo 5 and it would probably end up being around a 9.75 rating from me. The only reason it wouldn't be a 10 is because of the amount of grinding, the difficulty, and the 9 and 24 hours endurance races. I have done the 4 hour races, so those aren't really a problem, you just need the time for it.
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failureatlife
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Spoiler alert.
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Romanticide
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You knew it was coming.


Game: Catherine
Genre: Puzzle
Platform: PS3/360
Rating: 9/10

Catherine is fairly anomalous in today's gaming environment. Most "big" productions are sequels, FPS games, or both. So how is it that a new IP that happens to be a puzzle game made by a developer that specializes in niche JRPGs garners TONS of press and hype? Well, it mostly has to do with a story that is far different and more mature than 99% of the stories we see in gaming. Most game stories are *still* easily boiled down to "save someone or something from the big bad guy". Catherine? Well, it's more about saving our protagonist from his nightmares and determining what he truly wants in life than about saving anyone else.

There are two distinct "phases" of gameplay, as it were. The first is when Vincent goes to his favorite watering hole, The Stray Sheep. This is fairly reminiscent of a Persona game, so anyone who's played that series should be accustomed to it. Since it's a bar, you can obviously drink alcohol. Getting drunk is totally awesome in real life, but in Catherine, drinking helps speed Vincent up in his nightmares. The effect is capped at three drinks, but you can keep drinking as much as you want. As a somewhat avid drinker, I found the trivia concerning each drink to be interesting. You can also talk to the other customers/workers. Many of them have personal problems, and lending a sympathetic ear to them can help them survive the nightmares. Helping them nets you achievement/trophy whores more points/trophies, so don't neglect your fellow alcoholics. The bar also features an arcade game called "Rapunzel", which is like Vincent's nightmares, but you have limited moves and unlimited time - The exact opposite of the nightmares.

The second phase is more traditional gameplay. After you leave the bar, you are taken into Vincent's nightmares. Said nightmares consist of Vincent climbing towers of blocks. Naturally, your path is not unimpeded. You must push and pull blocks to form staircases so you can continue your ascent. That STILL sounds easy? There are many different kinds of blocks. Some crack after a certain amount of time, others attempt to impale you when you step on them, still others are ice, and so on. New blocks are introduced each night, and knowing what they do is essential. There aren't really many "enemies", per se, but most stages have sheep, which will impede your progress (or kill you, later) unless you run into them and smack them with Vincent's pillow. Also, the lower levels fall away after a certain amount of time. Bosses will chase you as you climb. You have to think fast and not give into panic.

Luckily the game isn't a total asshole. You may obtain various items to help. There are items to create blocks, eliminate enemies, turn blocks back to normal, give you extra lives, etcetera. Additionally, between levels, there are other sheep that you can talk to and learn new climbing techniques from. It's always worth your while to talk to the sheep; the techniques are free. Unfortunately, some of the techniques are taught after you need them (the Walking Spider comes to mind). The items aren't free and you'll really want your coins for dem awards.

Did I mention there's a scoring system? No? I just couldn't really find a place to mention it. The game will display the number of steps you've climbed without breaking combo. Climb another level before the timer runs out (I'd guess around ten seconds?) and the combo keeps going. The longer the combo, the more you score. There are also coins to collect, which give you 1000 points and are rather important if you're aiming for gold trophies on each stage. Earning all the gold trophies on the hard difficulty (LOL GOOD LUCK) will give you an achievement or trophy.

On the topic of difficulty, it can be frustrating on normal. However, the first three stages are relatively easy, and from there each stage turns it up another notch. Thought the last one was hard? Wait until you sleep tonight. Special shoutouts go to 6-3 and 7-2, fuck those levels. On the whole it's "tough but fair" with one real exception, and that's the goddamn escort mission in a puzzle game. Did I mention you're being chased as well? In addition to planning your own staircases, you have to plan for someone who may be up to ten levels below you. Total bullshit. Even so, it's not half as hard as the reviewers say. Apparently every reviewer ever really sucks or is writing for casuals. I haven't touched Hard, but I'm going to assume it's Atlus Hard, aka fucking insane.

If you're here for the story and/or really suck at puzzles, just do the very easy trick. It's spelled out in the manual.

The story is where Catherine really sets itself apart. How many games can you think of that are centered around an adult relationship? I don't mean "it has married characters" like in Lufia II and a trillion other games. I mean making the relationship the focal point of the whole game. I can't think of any other than perhaps some visual novels, which are usually not released outside of Japan.

Without getting spoilerific, the game's plot is focused on the relationship between Vincent and Katherine. Vincent is perfectly happy the way things are, while Katherine wants to tie the knot and have a family. Then Vincent meets the titular (haha, get it? Titular? *is booed*) Catherine, they sleep together, and things start going to hell in a handbasket for our protagonist. Vincent starts having the aforementioned nightmares, which he cannot remember in any detail. All he knows is that he feels he's being chased by something and that he feels like he got no sleep the previous night. It doesn't help that other people who are having these same dreams are turning up dead in real life. Of course, there is a cause for these dreams, and the cause... Let's just say it's a pretty huge and supernatural plot twist.

The story has eight different endings to it - three for Katherine/Catherine, and two "freedom" endings. I would have liked an Erica ending (she's hotter and more sane than either Katherine or Catherine), but what can you do? *sigh* Like any game with multiple endings, the choices you make in-game DO affect it. Most questions that appear in the game have an effect on the game's "morality meter", and you'll get to see exactly the effect your choice had. While it slightly breaks immersion, it's very helpful if you're aiming for a specific ending. If you're aiming to get the achievements/trophies tied to each ending, you can potentially get them in three playthroughs with some smart saving.

For the squeamish or the young, sex is a major part of the plot. However, if you're looking to convince the parentals to get this game, it shows nothing worse than what you'll see on any prime time show, and it shows less than some of the shows on HBO (think: Treme, The Wire). There's a bit of skin and some suggestive pictures, sure, but never full nudity. The sexual aspects aren't intended as something for 14 year olds to wank their two inch willies to; they're intended to further the plot. It's rather refreshing to find ANY form of entertainment that treats sex seriously. Most of the time, it's just... there.

This game was intended to be the Persona team's "test game" for HD consoles. Catherine does not exactly push the technology of the PS3 or the 360 to their limits, but the game looks far better than any other Persona/SMT title that has been released. The artstyle is rooted in anime as you might expect, but it's a more realistic style of anime than in most other games or shows. Even if you don't like anime, it's not an overtly in-your-face style that will get on your nerves.

As for the music, Shoji FUCKING Meguro. The music is obviously top-notch. Do I really have to say more? No? Well, I will anyway. How many OTHER games use classical pieces as an integral part of their soundtrack? Catherine has versions of portions from Handel's "Messiah", Beethoven's 5th, Dvorak's "From the New World", Chopin's "Revolutionary Etude" (best song in the game, easy), amongst others. Some are more remixed than others, but they are all great and go surprisingly well with the game. There is more contemporary music and it's still great, but the classical pieces steal the spotlight, as they should - they are the music accompanying the nightmares. As a further bit of fanservice, there's a jukebox in the bar that plays songs from other Atlus games, like Persona 3/4, Digital Devil Saga, SMT: Nocturne, and of course songs from Catherine. I could nitpick at the selection but won't. It's still an awesome selection anyway.

The main game is pretty short. Personally, I don't like shelling out $60 on day one for a game that might last 15-20 hours, so it's a good thing that there's a fair amount of replayability. After you beat the game, you unlock the Colosseum, which is essentially the story mode's main stages but redesigned for two players. You get a point if you beat your opponent to the goal or if they run out of lives. The winner is the first player to get two points. If you can round up a second player who has also played, this would likely be very fun. There's also Babel, but you unlock that once you get your first gold trophy, which isn't exactly the easiest thing to do. I got mine in the escort mission, thank the vidya gods. As you get more golds, you unlock more levels there. Babel also features some random generation, though I suspect this is mostly in what types of blocks you get. It also has leaderboards for the more competitive amongst us. And of course there are still the eight endings, which will still take a good amount of time to get.

Catherine is something far different from what we usually get. In an era where most of the AAA titles are rehashes of safe games due to the development costs, Atlus dares to release something different. If you like puzzle games and/or enjoy entertainment that is truly mature, you might enjoy Catherine.
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Volt
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Pretty nice review there, Ro. Might have to give Catherine a try sometime.

Anyways, I decided to review Yume Nikki, a gem of an indie game that I came across while doing my daily rounds on the Internet. It's freeware, so there's no need to worry about piracy. :P





Game: Yume Nikki
Genre: No idea
Platform: PC
Rating: 9.5/10

Yume Nikki is an indie surreal adventure freeware game made with RPG Maker 2003 by Japanese developer Kikiyama. I had first heard about it through a friend last month and only recently decided to look into it. Had a few problems with the installation; mainly I had a hard time finding a version that worked on my computer. Anyways, moving on to the actual game.

You control Madotsuki, a hikikomori (aka recluse) living alone in an apartment. The apartment consists of two rooms: the bedroom and a balcony. Being a hikikomori, Madotsuki refuses to leave her apartment, limiting the player to the few things you are capable of doing in her apartment. There’s a television, but it doesn’t work; all it displays is a simple test card. There’s a game console with only one game, Nasu, best described as "the most depressingly futile minigame ever made." There’s also a writing desk where Madotsuki can write in her diary, as this acts as the game’s saving function. The last thing of interest in her apartment is a bed, where Madotsuki can sleep. However, the core of the game isn’t about what happens in the real world. Rather, it’s about the world of Madotsuki’s dreams.

The dream world is a massive expanse of seemingly hundreds of different worlds. Each world has its own unique design, ranging from the realistic, such as a forest or a shanty town, to the surrealistic, such as a monochrome desert or a massive red maze (which happens to be nicknamed “Hell”). At the start of each dream you go to the Nexus, which is a central hub with twelve doors, each leading to a different world. To further give the game the endless feeling, many worlds don’t have boundaries; they just simply loop on forever. The looping rooms, combined with the large amount of worlds and mazes, make it very easy for the player to feel hopelessly lost. However, Madotsuki has the ability to wake up any time she wants by pinching her cheek, ensuring that the player always has a way out.

Madotsuki's room
The Nexus
Snow World, an example of the realistic environments
Graffiti World, an example of the game's abstract environments
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Hidden throughout the dream’s worlds are 24 items called “effects”. Each effect has a different effect on Madotsuki. Some of them have no practical uses (such as the blonde hair effect) while others are very useful (such as the bicycle effect). The goal of the game is to collect all effects and place them in the Nexus. There are other gameplay elements present, such as a leveling up system and HP, but these elements are useless, as the only enemies in the game merely trap you; it is impossible to die in a dream. It is likely that these mechanisms were used in early versions of the game, but were later scrapped as they could distract from the dream experience. Why they weren’t completely removed from the game is beyond me.

While there is a definite goal and end to the game, the point really isn’t to finish. Rather, it’s the experience of exploring Madotsuki’s dream. It is for this reason that I do not recommend looking up walkthroughs, as they will spoil the surprises. The game’s atmosphere is, to put it simply, creepy. There’s no dialogue, the music is ambient, there’s no real interaction with the environment or NPC’s, and there’s no plot. These aspects combined with dark and disturbing imagery create an unnerving environment. All throughout the game I felt this constant sense of dread and despair. The creatures and monsters are all around you, watching you, yet there’s not one thing you can do about it. This is what sets Yume Nikki apart from other horror-esque games out there. In practically all other horror games, you’re fighting for your life to survive your fears; in Yume Nikki, you’re forced to live with them. If you play this game for the sole purpose of getting to the end, you will be disappointed.

There are a lot of good things about this game, mostly about the exploration experience. However, the thing that the game is strongest at is, ironically, what it lacks the most: story. Madotsuki is a complete mystery; there’s nothing known about her outside of her being a hikikomori. Does she have any family or friends? Why is she a hikikomori? What caused her to lead a life of isolation? There’s no direct answer to any of these questions. The only clues you have are the images you see within her dreams. At first glance, they seem like the creations of a mentally disturbed girl that serve no purpose other than to weird out the player, but upon further inspection it seems that these images all flow together to create a common theme. There are a few human characters that you meet in the game. Who are they? Are they childhood friends of Madotsuki? Are they representative of how Madotsuki feels about herself? There always seems to be something watching you in this game. Does this mean that Madotsuki is shy and is worried about how others feel about her? Or maybe she’s done something she regrets and feels the scorn of the outside world? The stronger the image, the deeper the meaning. All of these seem to be key representations of events in Madotsuki’s life. What makes this game so great isn’t so much the adventure inside her mind, rather the mystery that is the identity of Madotsuki. If the game were designed with a definitive story it wouldn’t be nearly as entertaining. It was purposely designed to be open for interpretation, an idea that I don’t think has ever been done in games. Most games have you decide the future of a character; Yume Nikki has you decide the past.

Yume Nikki is a game unlike any other I’ve played before. The deep symbolism combined with the vivid imagery makes this game worth the experience. This is not a game to beat, but rather to explore and experience. Due to the game’s excessive dark imagery, some people may find this game unappealing. I enjoyed it thoroughly and will be looking forward to playing the two fan-sequels for it (Yume 2kki and .flow). I thought about giving this game a perfect 10, but decided against it, as there are some very troublesome sections that I found generally annoying. I give the game a 9.5/10.

I would give a download link, but I do not remember where I found the version that worked for me. Instead I’ll give you the first download site I found. Both downloads didn’t work for me, but maybe they’ll work for you. There are several places online where you can find theories about the symbolism in the game, in case you'd like to have a starting point.
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MrMarill
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DAT STORY TIEM

Really liked the review, Romanticide! I may have to get Catherine when its price drops a bit.

Volt has been talkin' just a little about Yume Nikki to me, and it's a very creepy game. I'll download it soon most likely.

The reason for the level up system was almost certainly because the entire game, from what the screenshots show, were made with very little scripting to the RPG Maker program. Most likely the creator was just an absolute boss at eventing, and while the level up system existed in earlier versions, he simply didn't know how to completely take out the HP/Level Up stuff in the game, and so you can level up to avoid the game awkwardly displaying the same HP/Level throughout the entire game.
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Name: Deus Ex
Platform: PC/Mac (2000); PS2 (2002)
Genre: Action/FPS/RPG/Stealth

I'd like to start off by saying that this is not like the average FPS. While it may seem like it at first -- most weapons are guns, and the game is played in a first-person point-of-view -- it also has significant RPG elements with some stealth thrown in. Anyways, without spoiling too much, you play as JC Denton -- a man who recently went through nanoaugmentation, and you end up caught in the middle of warring organizations. Nanoaugmentation is a newer version of mechanical augmentations (mech augs), but both serve the same purpose: To make people more powerful. These augmentations serve as one of the RPG elements. There are augs for several parts of the body, and you can equip up to 12 at a time (they're activated by pushing the F1-F12 keys). There are several augs that you will find throughout the game, and each Augmentation Canister contains two augs, but you can only pick one. These augs can do things such as give you regenerating health, invisibility, super-strength, etc., and can be upgraded further with Augmentation Upgrades that you will find throughout the game.

The skills system is also a heavy part, but nothing revolutionary as far as RPG's go. There are about ten or so skills that you can level up. Each one has four ranks -- untrained, trained, advanced, and master. You level them up not with experience, but with credits (money). Skills are very important -- upgrading weapons skills increase accuracy (which is a must if you plan on using weapons) and damage. Hacking lets you break into computer systems quicker and lets you do more with them. Swimming lets you breathe underwater longer. I won't go too in-depth, but it's pretty varied.

Now, the gameplay. It really changes depending on how you make your character. In my game, I tried to play stealthily -- which is where the game really shines, in my opinion. There are often hidden entrances/exits to and from areas, which can help you avoid dangerous fights and traps. However, they come at a cost -- some are electronically locked, some are manually locked, some require keys, etc. Most doors that aren't significant points can be opened with explosives -- or sometimes lighter weaponry -- but that will attract attention, which you probably don't want if you're trying to sneak in a back entrance. Now, more about traps: In addition to ambushes, there are traps, too. Most are activated by those red lasers you see in spy movies, but they come in two types here. Red will damage you and prevent movement, and often sets off an alarm and possibly a trap, too. Blue will not damage or impede movement, but it WILL activate something. Of course, there are plenty of ways around both. If red is mostly on the ground, you can attempt to hop over it (I would recommend saving first, just in case you miss). Same with blue. Both can be temporarily deactivated using EMP grenades. Some hackable computer systems let you remotely disable these traps, and power circuits on walls can be disabled too, which will also deactivate traps. I don't want this review to go on forever, but one more quick thing -- computers. They do a variety of functions. Some open doors, disable cameras, make turrets attack your enemies, and some let you read emails that were sent to the computer's owner. Some contain background information that isn't necessary, but some also contain important information, such as the location of keys or even a password.

Well, that paragraph was mainly about stealth and traps, but I'll talk about combat now. There is a nice variance of enemy types, but they can all be put in one of three categories: Human, mechanical, or creature. Oh, I should mention you can kill anyone. However, important characters are often more powerful than others, and guards are usually alerted if you kill someone who was supposed to be friendly. ANYWAYS. Weapons. For the most part, they're the same you'll find in any other FPS. However, there are some more unique ones. Killing is frowned upon in this game, so some weapons -- such as stun batons, pepper spray, and fire extinguishers -- will temporarily impede your enemy's ability to do pretty much everything, giving you time to knock him/her unconscious. Explosives come in a nice variety, too. Some work as grenades or mines, some are EMP blasts, and one type is a tear gas that can affect multiple enemies in an area. There are also some kinds of armor, which can make you more resistant to damage, or cloak you, etc., but only for a limited time.

I'll post some overall thoughts now: This is one of the best games I've ever played. The overall game isn't quite as open as other RPG's, but when you get involved in a mission, the possibilities go on and on. There aren't really side quests, but missions often contain secondary objectives that reward you with more credits, and exploring and taking stealthier routes rewards you, too. The stealth works well enough in this game, but because of the first-person perspective, you can hide halfway behind the wall so you can see enemies but they don't "see" you. This is because the game was programmed to know (I assume) that you're trying to be stealthy, but due to technology limits back then they probably couldn't make a better system. The upcoming Deus Ex: Human Revolution fixes this by switching to third-person view when you're trying to hide behind walls.

Pros:
- Complex plot.
- Nearly endless possibilities.
- Game length (I spent about 30 hours on it, which might be on the shorter end of RPG length today, but it was released eleven years ago.)

Cons:
- The world isn't very open -- one mission leads to another.
- Some major characters seem to be static characters (this is more of a personal preference, since I prefer characters that change in some kind of way).
- You don't choose everything you say (you usually only choose important things or the occasional shopping opportunity), while many RPG's do let you choose everything.
- {Slightly spoilery but not quite worthy of a spoiler tag} By the time you reach the end of the game, none of your previous decisions matter. You can choose any of the endings. I believe there are three endings total.

Number rating thing: 9.5/10

Closing comments: It's a great game, but some parts seem limited simply by the older technology of the time it was released. And yes, I would recommend this to a friend.
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SaiyanShredder
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Excellent review Snowman.
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MrMarill
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Sonic the Hedgehog 2
Sega Mega Drive/Genesis


Did you read my review of Sonic the Hedgehog 1? No? Why not? Just scroll the page up, and read it. Unless this review gets put to the next page, which would be embarassing. Go on, read it.

Now that you've read it, I can safely say nearly every problem I addressed in Sonic the Hedgehog was removed. Nearly every problem. It also has a few awesome additions, like the Spin Dash and of course, Tails.

First off, the music in this game surpasses even the first game's epic tunes. The music in every stage is fitting, except the final zone Metropolis Zone which strangely has really happy, uplifting music. Apart from that, all the music is great and epic, like Mystic Cave Zone.

The graphics are also a notch up. Sonic the Hedgehog looked great, and this game looks better. You know as well as I do that graphics don't matter in games, but Sonic's impatient tapping of his foot or Tails' downright cute sprite really do add to the game.

In this game, you can play as either Sonic and Tails, Sonic Only or Tails Only. There's no difference between Sonic and Tails except looks, but with Sonic and Tails, Tails can fly to keep up with you.

Playing as them both means either the AI controls Tails or a second player can. Trust me, don't make a second player do it. Sonic is fast, right? What if you both got one screen? To make co-op actually playable in any form you have to go slowly which is not how to play Sonic. Co-op is broken beyond belief and simply unplayable. What's MORE unbelievable is that the game actually features a "2P VS" mode which gives you splitscreen. Why splitscreen there and not in Adventure? It would have been a ridiculously awesome feature.

As for the 2P VS mode, it's a fun distraction but not that engaging. It does have a cool few features, but it doesn't give you the excitement a multiplayer game should give and feels more like two players playing the game on seperate TVs without talking, then comparing scores at the end.

As for the AI controlling Tails, this is also annoying. It looks cool and all, but when you get to bosses, if Tails hits the boss, the boss flashes invincible for a sec meaning you go through it. Many, MANY times I have fallen into lava etc. from trying to hit the boss when Tails hits it just before me.

Those are the negative aspects. Everything else got improved. For example, the continue system is great. If you get a Time Bonus and Ring Bonus which adds up to 10,000 or more points, you get a continue, which REALLY makes you want to keep your rings. In addition, if you have 50 rings when you hit a checkpoint, you open the path to the Special Zone to get a Chaos Emerald.

This is where the game hits its first flaw which can't simply be turned off. When you get out of the Special Zone, you lose all the rings you had. Maybe a necessary feature to stop you getting all the chaos emeralds in one act very easily, but sometimes this can be VERY annoying, especially as you'll need to keep rings to get continues (which you will NEED). In addition, sometimes these checkpoints are right before a boss with no rings in sight, but you can't tell this is before a boss. You enter the Special Zone and come out with no rings to fight the boss.

Apart from that, the chaos emeralds are improved. They actually do something, in that with all seven you become Super Sonic, which basically makes you God powered and unkillable for a while. It's awesome.

The game does feel improved in all aspects, though. Sonic controlls better, the physics feel better and the levels are more varied and fun. The only real complaints I have about the controls is that if you press down when running, you curl into a ball to go faster downhill or whatever. If you curl into a ball you can't uncurl until you come to basically a complete stop or jump, and if you're in a ball when you jump and you're moving slowly, you go soooo slow. It's strange and doesn't feel right, but rarely happens.

I feel I have said a bit too much bad about this game, and don't get me wrong it is fantastic. It's challenging and very replayable, and the level designs are fantastic. The game is incredibly fun, but falls short on a few things. The last thing it falls short on is simply one of its zones; Wing Fortress Zone.

This Zone has one act, and it's true platforming action. This is tough. Some sections are really well thought out, and really tough to get through. But some parts are flat out fake difficulty.

You will walk off the edge when you think you can keep walking, you will be completely confused where to go when you can actually jump on the background, and you'll be even more confused before you realise there's ONE wall you can run through at one section. It's annoying and not fun at sections which simply shouldn't be there. This stage (and some of Oil Plant Zone) have problems in that you can walk through the foreground, and sometimes you can't.

In addition to this, it has one object, and if you stand on it, it throws you forward. Simple, no? No. If you're holding right when it throws you, it makes you go way shorter, and plummet to yur death. Bearing in mind these things are practically invisible and you'll be RUNNING into them, I've died many times just running into them and dying from what is simply bad programming. Again, it's fake difficulty which shouldn't be there.

And on the complete flipside it has an amazingly awesome boss fight. In fact, all the bosses in this game are good and challenging with a great difficulty curve, right up 'till the last boss which blows your face off. My winning playthrough I had twelve lives and five continues at the final boss. I had to actually use a continue. Of course, now I've actually beaten it I can beat it comfortably every time now I realise the patterns, but it is an incredibly difficult boss. It has a specific pattern like I said and it's not fake difficulty. It's just you, the boss, and that's all there is to it. This is a proper challenge, and when you first beat it and see it explode, you'll shout in joy and really feel achievement. Not many games give me that sense of achievement, and the fact Sonic the Hedgehog 2 does that is quite something. When you beat this game, you'll want to replay it again. If you don't own this, why not? It's been re-released more times than I can count and you're missing out if you don't own this fantastic game.

Pros
-Great music
-Fun, engaging gameplay
-The right level of challenge
-Epic final boss

Cons
-Wing. Fortress. Zone.
-Any form of "Sonic and Tails" is flawed.

Rating: 9.4/10
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SaiyanShredder
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I'm gonna give a review of Borderlands when I finally get around to finishing it.
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