Fable 2 (XBox 360) by Paul R. Theimer

With a long wait, much anticipation, and another string of huge promises from producers “Lionhead Studios”.

However, Fable 2 has arrived on the Xbox 360.

The original Fable had a lot of talk attached to it; Lionhead claiming it would be the greatest RPG ever with the most immerse and unique style of game play the world had ever seen. With that said the game had a lot to live up to, which the final product turned out to be your everyday common RPG that lasted gamers all of eight hours to complete. That absolutely did not meet the criteria of being one of the greatest RPGs ever, and was overshadowed by Lucas Art’s phenomenal release of Star Wars: The Knights of the Old Republic.

Many were disappointed with the short, but entertaining final release of Fable, and expected a lot more than what was just a very basic combat focused role playing game. So, with the expected hype and anticipation of Fable 2, did it succeed where the original failed? Or was this just an unfixed sequel to it’s slightly above-average predecessor?

Let me start by stating that I did for the most part enjoy this game. I’m going to stress this, as I was reasonably happy with the game, but I also have quite a few things to dig into it about as well. The game itself is beautiful. It holds a very fantasy driven and colorful art style. From the landscapes and the weather effects to the characters and enemies scattered across the world of Albion. Fact is; it’s a much bigger game with a higher level of replay-ability including much more to explore, accomplish, and things to stray you from the linear storyline. Albion in Fable 2 is easily five times the size of the original world found in Fable, and this time around you are open to more exploration. You can jump fences in some cases, explore through the woods and find there really is life outside of those wooden boundaries and the dirt path. It offers a good variety of landscapes and environments, especially if you decide to try the Knothole Island expansion, and everything is pleasing on the eyes. Unfortunately, with the open exploration, there are environmental contact problems, you tend to get stuck on the strangest areas, especially when swimming. You eventually do get yourself out of these problems, but they should have been simple fixes and non-occurring in the final release.

Another unique addition was your sidekick, and I’m not talking about the horribly disappointing online cooperative mode which I’ll get to in a moment, but your dog. You have your own personal flea bag that follows you around that you can teach tricks that include beg, roll over, and target urination.

Oh yes, with your own potential to learn crude expressions, you can teach your canine to urinate on the leg of that annoying villager that just won’t leave you alone.

Outside of personal entertainment, your dog does serve a purpose. He will sniff out dig spots, where an indicator will appear above his head, and he’ll begin barking and circle around an area that you need to dig up to find the treasures hidden beneath the dirt. He will also sniff out treasure boxes and let you know if you are close to one. It comes in handy, and different skill books allow your dog to find more digable or treasured areas throughout the world. A nice addition that really hasn’t been accomplished in a game, regardless if your dog at times tends to get stuck much like yourself in odd terrain areas and disappears for a few minutes.

The decision making for some choices the developers made in this game just blows my mind. Seriously. My first gripe should have been a no-brainer. Instead of armor, you can collect different types of clothing that effect your attractiveness and your personality. Why they decided to include so many unwearable clothing items that has zero reflection on self protection is beyond me. Even the few pieces of armor determine how attractive people find you, and offers no kind of armor or defense bonus. You will take as much damage wearing full plated steel armor as you will wearing “paper” clothing. Really Lionhead? This is inexcusable in a role playing game, and just a flat out bad decision. Which brings me to my next major complaint. Much like the original, there are Demon Doors scattered throughout Albion, those in which you must solve a riddle or find a way to satisfy this talking slab of rock to allow you passage for the tremendous treasure beyond. You spend hours trying to figure out how to open it, to go in and find an item worth 500 gold pieces. At the point in the game when I had over 6.5 million gold and opened a few demon doors, I almost wanted to throw my controller at the ridiculously invaluable treasure that was hidden in here. And it’s not just the demon doors, you discover cool areas, or hidden parts of caverns, with large rooms devoted to one treasure box, you get all excited as you approach it thinking if this entire room is for one treasure box, this must be one of the few scattered legendary weapons. Your anticipation builds up, the chest pops open, and you find… an economy necklace that holds next to no value. It almost makes you wonder if the scattered treasure is randomly generated because of how horrid the placement is, but for whatever reason, this is actually what the developers felt would be good items to place in these hard to reach areas. At the very least, each of nine Demon Doors should have included either a legendary weapon or a unique character outfit. I can confidently say 6 out of 9 Demon Doors turned out to be worthless. Large failure in my eyes, at least you were satisfied with what you found at these locations in the original Fable.

The combat system is for the most part fun, you carry both a melee’ weapon which ranges from swords, to hammers, to cleavers, to ranged weapons that gives you the option between bows, crossbows, rifles, and pistols. I found that I personally enjoyed a longsword in combination with a rifle, it worked for me and gave me a good balance of power and speed. You gain experience from combat, which you can apply towards making yourself stronger, faster, or apply it to learning one of six possible magic spells. Yes, only six. Your experience is rather quickly spent and you find yourself in the upper two or three millions of experience built up that there’s nothing left to spend it on. Again, more options would have been nice. Your decisions in combat and what you do around people determine if you are good or evil, become evil and people will run from you screaming, in extreme excess, which gets annoying very quickly. If you are good, people will flock to you, at times not allowing you to move toward your destination as literally 75% of each town or village will fall in love with you and let you know about it every second they see you. Should you decide on one, you can get married, and have children if you decide to have unprotected sex, which may also result in an STD. If only the focus on the more important things were as detailed as the intimacy in this game. What it comes down to is really, neutral is the best option. If you are too good, you are constantly blocked by fans of you, that will literally follow you into your house and herd around you, at times not allowing you to leave because there’s fifteen villagers in your stairwell. Your ability to purchase properties, and either live in them or rent them out is a very welcome feature though, and a good way to earn money even if you don’t play the game for a few days. If you own shops, you gain a percentage of what they make during the time that you play and while you are away. A valuable feature.

With exploration does come a pretty good amount of extras, you can explore the world to find invaluable properties that you can purchase, ranging from just a few hundred gold to 1,000,000 gold to own Fairfax Castle. Each property comes with it’s own benefit, if you either make money off of them, gain a hidden quest or ability from resting there, or at times a decent treasure. There are also scattered silver keys, that open very few silver chests that yet again, contains a mixed bag of either decent equipment or something completely worthless. It’s frustrating to find 25 silver keys, and blow them on a mystery chest that contains something you have absolutely no use for. There are also 50 gargoyles around Albion, which are stone structures that mock you as you walk by them. Your purpose is to shoot these and turn them into gravel, finally shutting them up as you at times hear them for a while before finding them. Some are relatively easy to find, but a handful are just ridiculously placed and seem like they would be impossible to find without consulting a strategy guide. For every ten you find, you gain a treasure from Gargoyle Trove, and I think you can guess what I’ll have to say about what it offers. For the purpose of “The Completionist” achievement, the first treasure you do unlock after shooting ten gargoyles is “The Growl” dog trick book, as this is the only place to find it and was the last thing I needed to learn every expression, dog trick, and ability. Besides that, everything else is useless until you get all fifty and gain the last treasure which actually is worth the exploration.

I can’t express my disappointment enough with the online Cooperative mode. It sounded so good, being able to find your friends in the form of orbs floating around and be able to join their game in progress and complete tasks together. They kept it secretive exactly how it would play out until the game released, and probably the biggest failure in the game, you can not play as your own character during co-op. What?! You join a friend and you pick one of six “henchmen” to play as alongside your buddy. Why would they not let you go into their game as your own character is completely beyond me. You can only play as some lame pre-built default character with basic weaponry. Horrible decision, especially considering how much they hyped this up yet failed to tell anyone “Well, you can play co-op, but you can’t play as your own character.”

Fable 2 fixed a few problems, but still did a lot of things wrong. You are at times left scratching your head thinking to yourself “Did this game even go through bug testing?” or “What were they thinking when they decided to put this here?” It’s frustrating at times, but luckily for the most part, it’s fun. It again didn’t live up to it’s potential or hype, and in the future, Lionhead needs to lay off of the big promises and focus on making it just a solid RPG experience. They tried twice to make this an epic, unique, and groundbreaking title, yet some elements show promise but never come together, and some additions are just flat out questionable. Then need to iron out a few problems should there be a Fable 3, back away from the heavy focus on expressions, personality, and character appearance and just add in the basics that every RPG should contain. I’d like to see more weapon variety, more legendary weapons especially, and actually have them placed in those difficult to reach areas to give you a better sense of accomplishment when you do unlock a Demon Door or find that secret path after breaking a wall. You’ll spend 25+ hours playing this if you want to complete it and find everything, and it’s worth one play through, but probably nothing more than that. It does pain me to say that Lionhead did not deliver on their end again, it is a solid game, but nothing like everyone felt it would be.

Game Play: 7.25

Where do I start?

It’s fun. The combat is good, but you are so incredibly limited.

With a decent variety of weapons comes literally worthless attire, dumb treasure placement, buggy terrain problems, and very annoying interaction with villagers and other Albion residents. There is a good variety of unique quests, but you’ll complete half of them and max out your character making experience virtually worthless. Online mode should have flat out not been included if this was their approach to it.

Graphics: 9.0

The game does look nice, there’s not many graphical problems, not much slowdown. Everything is bright, colorful, and offers a pleasing variety on the eyes. Spells are pretty, although limited, the character models are good, although could have used more variety. At times it’s hard to find your wife (Or Husband) as twenty other women in the town look almost identical minus a different colored bonnet or dress.

Replay-Ability: 8.0

A big step above the brief original. There is options to explore, and there is more to do outside of the quests this time around. Collect silver keys, shoot down the 50 Gargoyles, and if you don’t get too frustrated with the resulting hidden treasures, attempt to unlock all 9 Demon Doors. You probably won’t want to go at this one a second time.

Overall: 7.75

Lionhead Studios, how nice it would have been if the simplest of things hadn’t been overlooked. Or if the person in charge of placing items around Albion had been fired in early development and someone with a brain figured out how to make opening Demon Doors worthwhile. Balance and just standard RPG basics could have made this game so much better, but for some reason, it didn’t happen. It’s a fun, yet a little more than mediocre role playing game that you will for the most part enjoy but will have you screaming at the same time. Would a patch be out of the question? Or an extra week to fix the minor but hampering problems that are embedded in Fable 2? I guess that’s too much to ask. I say for the last time, I really did enjoy this game, but my frustration levels were high during portions of it. Probably a rental or a purchase when the price drops a bit. But don’t expect Lionhead’s promises to be fulfilled this time around.

Fallout 3 (w/Expansions) Review
Xbox 360
Written by: Paul R Theimer

For anyone that has been an avid member of the gaming community within the last ten years should know the name Bethesda Studios well. With enormous and successful titles that we’ve seen including Morrowind and Oblivion, the expectations for Fallout 3 were tremendous. After being under development for years, with more teasers and game play trailers than you can count, and what was probably the most hyped and anticipated game of 2008, Fallout 3 finally saw it’s release. As excited as I was about this title, what I experienced was not only a stellar equal to their two previous games, but it surpassed them in ways that only can be described as epic. Fallout 3 is everything it was supposed to be and more, the wait is over, and it’s finally in the hands of the public.

You begin as a baby crawling around on the floor of the Vault you are born in. Crawling into your father’s arms, life in the vault begins to unfold. You experience your way through childhood up to your birthday when you receive your own personal lifeline, your Pipboy. The Pipboy is the center of everything in the Fallout universe, it’s a handy wrist computer that gives you access to your equipment, maps, quest information, progress, and even provides a light for exploring the dark corners and caverns of the wasteland. Everything in the vault is great until that dreadful day when your father escapes and leaves you behind. With much conflict, you find your way out of the secure vault that you call home into the cracked earth of the nuclear wastelands.

Immediately you feel the overwhelming sensation of a completely wasteland. The planet is destroyed, and all that remains are portions of buildings, dead, leafless trees, rocks, dirt, and a whole lot of radiation, and that’s only the good part of it. Every last detail is presented in a phenomenal graphical display that never stops impressing. With the bland environment being a wasteland, Bethesda still succeeds in keeping everything interesting and unique. The game is beautiful. Every rock, river, and damaged man-made structure is brilliantly detailed, with sharp edges and hardly any “jaggies” that your eye will catch. The apocalypse has never looked so nice. The level of destruction is tremendous, especially once you come across structures you recognize like the White House and the Lincoln Monument. The DC wasteland captures the feel of this nations capital if it should ever fall to a nuclear attack.

As you make your way through you encounter a range of people and creatures, including mutated insects, animals, and even humans tagged as “Ghouls”. You don’t forget the first encounter you have with a Ghoul, the radiated humans of the wasteland with open wounds and scarring on their faces and bodies, and patches of hair if there is any hair remaining. Some still act human, some are feral. With this mixed bag, there are also survivors that have experienced minimal levels of radiation, still appear as normal human beings, and are trying to survive the best that they can. With any apocalypse you do have the good and the bad. There are innocents shacked up in post-apocalyptic built structures and the remains of buildings avoiding and protecting themselves from the wasteland scum like the Raiders and the Slavers. What path do you chose? The benefits from each mission outweigh eachother at times, putting yourself in a difficult position on your personal path of good or evil.

Survival is key, and to survive, you need equipment. Fallout 3 offers a wide range of pistols, rifles, machine guns, and explosives, along with a good selection of Melee’ weapons. A lot of these weapons are worn and damaged, after all they have survived over 100 years of wear and tear along with a nuke blast. With the condition of your weapons comes repairs. Use a gun long enough and it will begin to lose power and eventually break if neglected. Frequently repairing your weapons and equipment for a small cost proves necessary, especially when you get your hands on a special piece of weaponry or armor. Along with the modernized weapon style comes the VATS system, which depending on what weapons you have the most experience points focused on, gives you a freeze-frame targeting system that allows you to pick off certain body parts on incoming foes. This is another large leap from Oblivion, if you shoot at someone’s arm with a shotgun, they will no longer have an arm if it connects. The weapon impacts offer a display of guts and gore in an intense splatter of blood soaked combat. Bethesda went from the approach of a few little smudges of blood to an all-out horror film. Heads explode, limbs fly off, and a well placed grenade or missile will turn your enemy into chunks of flesh and gibs. The VATS system is unique, adds an excellent style and advantage to combat, and is a completely necessary part of making this a successful game.

The main storyline is great, it has personality, you meet a great variety of people in varied locations, and holds your interest to the last minute. If you stick solely with the main story, Fallout 3 can be a 20 hour experience. If you know Bethesda, then you know there is also an incredible amount of depth in what they produce, and Fallout 3 is no exception. Branch away from the main story, and you find yourself exploring and discovering over 120 locations that have nothing to do with the main story. With that comes the game’s greatest feature, the side quests. It’s almost never-ending how much you can do, see, and explore in Fallout. It’s gigantic, you come across over 30 side quests, and a ton more mini-encounters. I’ve gotten to the point where I have completed every side quest, the main story, both expansions, and 170 hours later, there’s still more to do. The variety is just stunning, and you cannot completely appreciate Fallout 3 for what it is if you stick with the storyline and don’t take the time to uncover the wastelands. There’s so much to see, and it never disappoints. There’s more gameplay and depth in this game than you can get out of purchasing 6 other games combined. Every inch of the wasteland is fantastic, you’ll crave exploration, anticipate new locations and the quests involved with them, and even after it feels like everything is finished, you still find points of the game that surprise and entertain you.

What you have in Fallout 3 is a wide open, enormous post-apocalyptic masterpiece. I loved every minute I have put into this game and I’m still not finished with it. It has some very minor flaws, such as a few moments of frame-rate slowdown, some unusual camera angles during the slow motion VATS combat scenes, and it’s minor graphical hiccups here and there. For what it is, how much content they packed on one cd, and knowing that as much time as i’ve spent that I can still easily sink another 100 hours into it, it just doesn’t matter. Fallout 3 is brilliant, how it’s conceived, presented, and how the story is told. It’s entertaining, overwhelming, and at points completely gripping. Fallout 3 is the game experience of 2008 and should not be overlooked by anyone. It was worth the wait, it’s worth the price tag, and it’s a must own for console and PC gamers everywhere. Bethesda still holds itself to a very high standard of gaming, and has yet to fail us in providing an epic gaming experience that you’ll be playing for a long time.

Gameplay: 10.0

The gameplay is superb and there’s a ton of it. Main quests, side quests, and how you complete them as good or evil, it’s up to you. There’s something for everyone here, it’s smooth, the combat is fun, and there’s almost no end to the possibilities. When you finally do finish it, you can go back through it again with a different moral approach. It’s almost perfection.

Graphics: 9.75

The wasteland is gorgeous. The lighting is phenomenal and every portion of this game throws you right in the middle of a believable and beautiful apocalypse. It never gets old, and there’s enough variety even for a completely scorched earth. One of the best looking games to date, with very few frame-rate slowdown issues.

Replayability: 9.5

There’s so much to do, that once you take the plunge and experience it to your own desire, some people may not want to go through this a second time. A lot of people will say once was more than enough, but if you are like me, it was great enough to play a second time.

Overall: 9.75

It’s received Game of the Year awards for 2008 left and right, and it’s well deserved. Everything about Fallout 3 is phenomenal, it tells the story in a believable and entertaining way that makes you crave it more and more. There’s 200+ hours of gameplay here, depending on how much time you are willing to invest, and if Fallout captures you like it did to me, you’ll invest the time to discover every location, complete every quest, and find most of the unique items that you can get your hands on. If you purchase it, it will be in your collection forever. It’s that good.

Sub-review
Fallout 3: Operation Anchorage
Written by: Paul R Theimer

Upon downloading this content and firing up your saved Fallout 3 game (or begin a new one) you receive a distress signal through your Pipboy. It’s the brotherhood advising you that they need assistance in a location along the outskirts of the city. Upon arrival and descending underground via elevator, Operation Anchorage begins. The premise is simple, they have uncovered a bunker that holds valuable equipment. The only problem is that it’s locked and the only way of opening it is the completion of a realistic computer simulation of the liberation of Alaska.

The previous story tells of China invading Anchorage and the battle that occurred there, and the simulation places you right in the heart of the battle. They explain to you that if you complete this Sim, that you are granted access to some of the equipment that lies behind those locked doors. There’s just one problem, you die in the simulation, your human body goes into cardiac arrest, thus you die in the Sim you die in real life. The decision is easy, as it’s the only one that allows you to advance into the Sim. You are suited up and take the plunge into a simulator (not another visit to Tranquility Lane) and head into the cliffs of Alaska.

You awaken welcomed by a soldier that instructs you of your mission. What you find when you wake up is very different from the rest of Fallout 3. It’s pre-apocalypse, there’s snow falling, and you are on a normal landscape. It’s a nice change, the weather effects are excellent, and the bunkers and florescent lighting is again outstanding. Operation Anchorage turns out to be strict combat. You fight your way through China’s forces in attempt to liberate Alaska and complete the Sim. What differs from the rest of the game is your foes disappear after being killed as if they were holograms, so collection equipment off of corpses is not an option. You also do not go in with your own equipment, but must collect red glowing equipment in the Sim. There are no stim-packs to replenish your health, instead there are health stations scattered throughout. Say goodbye to on-the-spot self healing. It’s a different approach, but you are provided with enough ammo and explosives to where it isn’t a burden.

The Combat is intense, there’s hoards of Chinese soldiers to rip through, along with turrets and other weapons trying to eliminate you. The level of difficulty is steep, even when you reduce the gameplay difficulty. It’s worth it in the end, as you gain a lot of experience from this simulation, some access to fantastic equipment that does not require repairing ever (woohoo!) and a nice change of scenery and pace from the normal wasteland. For the price of $10 (800 MS Points) Operation Anchorage is worth the buy if not for the equipment you receive in itself. The quick release of this expansion proved to be a worthy one, and is a welcome addition for those wanting more out of your Fallout experience.
Overall: 9.25

Sub-Review
Fallout 3: The Pitt
Written By: Paul R Theimer

Beginning much like it’s preceding expansion, you again receive a distress signal through your PipBoy from a man named Wehrner. You meet with him in the northern-most point of the wasteland and he describes to you the situation where he is from, the Steel City of Pittsburgh. His people are slaves working the steel mills for the Slavers in charge, and as the radiation levels are minimal, there is an illness claiming the lives and causing skin necrosis on it’s inhabitants. After hearing the stories, you agree to travel to The Pitt in efforts to free his people, unless you have other plans.
You arrive in the better constructed city of Pittsburgh immediately being fired upon by the slavers who want Wehrner’s head. The plan is to act like an escaped slave turning yourself back in to get on the inside and free the slaves. As it develops, you do have freedom of choice as you do in the main wasteland, but do not in Operation: Anchorage. With this choice does come a big responsibility and a moral dilemma, should you decide to commit an unthinkable act in an effort to free the slaves, or decide to side with the ones in charge, reaping great benefits, equipment, and power?

At the time, I was playing on the gamesave of my evil character, so that is the path that I decided to take, and the final reward was an excellent one.

Upon exploring, you find that The Pitt is in much better shape than DC is, as it received much less of a nuclear impact as the Capitol did. One of your main missions is to go into the steelyard that’s inhabited with creatures wanting to devour you in efforts to collect steel ingots for the slavers. There is a total of 100 throughout the steelyard, for every ten you collect and turn in you receive a new reward. Collect all 100 and you are provided with not only an excellent set of armor, but a 20 point achievement to go along with it. Exploring for these bars tends to be tedious, and proves to be difficult as i’m sitting on 86 of 100.

You find that there is a lot more to the steelyard than meets the eye, with excessive amounts of climbing and jumping to reach tremendous heights to find these ingots. Save frequently, as one slip or fall will prove to be fatal.
You come across missions that have you traveling through the steel mill, where slaves are sick and dying to produce weapons and ammunition. You also gain the opportunity to venture unto the slaver’s main headquarters where you decide your own fate and the fate of the slavers while speaking with Ashur, the leader of the slavers.

Those who remember Oblivion should remember the moment where you enter the arena and face opponents, and this is revisited in The Pitt. In an effort to gain respect and a conversation with Ashur, you may choose to enter the arena and fight against some tough opponents via death-match. Emerge victorious, and you may get your equipment back and a chance to join the slavers.
The Pitt was another beautiful experience and a welcome add-on for Fallout 3. While shorter and a little less unique than the first DLC experience, it’s still worth the purchase and may prove to be a valuable location to return to later on in your game depending on your decisions. Coming next, the 3rd Fallout 3 DLC, the level cap raises to 30, and what should be a $20 release promises to be a lengthy one.
Overall: 8.75

The Wrestler

Mickey Rourke and Marisa Tomei star in this “behind the scenes” look into the life of a professional wrestler. “The Ram” has his life followed as he goes through hardship and physical disability.

With this film being directed by Darren Aronofsky, you can expect a more unorthodox perspective that is heavy on the film grain. With previous films including Pi and Requiem for a Dream, the expectations were high and it really didn’t fail all in all.

A solid rental, with good acting and a dramatic story telling. Not Aronofsky’s best film to date unless you enjoy this film enough to watch it twice, once should be plenty.

Igor

MGM created this drab computer animated film, and it can easily be set apart from Pixar considering it was pretty much bad. With John Cusack and Jay Leno doing the voice overs, Igor is for the most part unentertaining and can’t be compared to some of the better Computer Generated films available.

It lacks quality and personality, and visually it just isn’t that interesting. A rental maybe, but i’d wait for the television release if it makes it that far.

Fans of “Finding Nemo” and “Kung Fu Panda” should stick with your Pixar roots, MGM really doesn’t deliver on this one.

Pineapple Express

A stoned Seth Rogan witnesses a murder while puffing on a spliff of the rarest strain of pot in the world. Burnout friend joins him in a mindless and idiotic journey running from drug dealers.

It’s been done, and done better, it has it’s moments but approaching this one with a clear head should be avoided. You know that film that just tries too hard to be funny? Yeah, this one goes in that ballpark.

Might be a decent “Party Movie” but nothing that you are really gonna enjoy if you want a good comedy. Rental at best if Half Baked is in your dvd collection.

Paul Blart Mall Cop

You know that film that just tries too hard to be funny? See reference above, this IS that film. Paul Blart is a security officer that takes his job too seriously and is forced into rescuing five hostages once the mall is taken over that all happen to be a part of his everyday life.

It’s not funny, in fact I didn’t laugh once during the entire thing. I think I was more entertained with Zoolander, and that’s saying A LOT. Downright horrible, should not be viewed by anyone. Ever.

If you see it in the video store, redirect your eyes to the “O” section.

Bedtime Stories

Adam Sandler stars in this movie about his life as a hotel handyman trying to run the hotel himself as promised during childhood by the owner. He is called on to babysit his sister’s kids that he hasn’t seen in years for a week, remembering his father’s bedtime stories, he begins to tell tales that become reality.

I for the most part like Adam Sandler, and this one falls in the middle somewhere. It’s not as good as “Happy Gilmore”, but it’s not as bad as “Don’t Mess With The Zohan”. An imaginative film that is probably aimed more towards the younger audience.

Worth a rental, maybe even a purchase at a discounted price. It will entertain you more than most of the recent “Comedies” that have released.

A second opinion

When you hear Valve, you think quality. Responsible for multiple Game of the Year award winners in Half-Life, Half-Life 2, and The Orange Box, Valve has unmistakenable wedged themselves into gaming history with a number of brilliantly concieved, innovative, and technically sound video games. Unlike my counterpart who began Left 4 Dead before the fixes and survival pack, I recently took a crack at the title the same week the new and free expansion was added. With Valve being the developer, my expectations were high, myself being a little tired of the zombie genre in movies and games, I wasn’t sure what my reaction would be to this game and how much I would enjoy it. Valve failed to disappoint yet again, and not only did I fall for the Left 4 Dead world almost immediately, i’m still addicted to this gruesome and chaotic zombie masterpiece, and my disgruntled opinion on the overused zombie genre quickly dissolved.

The game itself takes itself in the form of four zombie films, telling the tale of four survivors struggling to reach numerous safe houses in efforts to finally be rescued and removed from this apocalyptic hell. The streets are littered with the undead, who react to light, loud noises, and certain interactions with the enviornment around you. There are scattered and dumb undead that trip over their own feet after being startled upon viewing you, to the hordes that sprint in your direction in a blood thirsty rampage, and the special infected that are stronger and much more deadly. Car Alarms are sure to awake the dead and cause you a handful of brain craving zombies swarming to you, but luckily the pulsating blip from a pipebomb attracts them just as effectively. The AI Director literally rewrites the script everytime you play, no memorizing enemy placement here as it’s all regenerated everytime you play. This adds a ton of depth and replayability, as it’s never the same experience twice even if you continue to replay the same scenario. Teamwork is the key to survival as the game will remind you constantly, and this offers the true meaning of complete teamwork and tactics.

You have the choice of either a sub-machine gun, a shotgun, an assault rifle, or a hunting rifle as your primary weapon, and carry a sidearm with unlimited ammo just in case you are in a tight situation and cannot reload or run out of ammo. The start of each chapter begins within a locked safehouse, the walls are desperately scribbled with notes and warnings of those who sought shelter there previous to you. You tend to stop and read some of what’s on the walls, notes to loved ones from family who just couldn’t wait for them any longer, banter that the military isn’t sending help, and dying cries from former survivors claiming that “This is our fault” and “We deserve this”. It’s a small detail that adds to the overall feel and experience, and it adds that Valve charm that we have all come to know and love. I would have liked to see more variety in weapon choice, as what is listed above is really your only option aside from upgrading to an auto-shotgun later into chapters. Even if they mixed up the appearance of the provided weaponry, it would have added just a little more to the game. A M-16 on “death toll” as an assault rifle option, and an AK-47 on “dead air” for example, even if they functioned identically, the difference in appearance would have made things slightly more interesting.

Online play is a blast, and I agree completely with D that being the infected is a little more enjoyable. I remember the first time I hid on the bottom level of an airport and lassoed a straggling survivor with my tongue on the upper level and dragged him to his demise. It’s a completely innovative experience that they’ve never really mastered in a multiplayer mode until now. It leaves for a great online experience that has more variety than your typical human vs human deathmatch. You can also go four player cooperative and blast through the scenarios with your buddies or take on survival mode and see how long you can last. There’s a lot of option, and the cooperative gameplay tends to be a little more attractive than the single player experience. The survivor AI is okay when you are playing by yourself, with minor issues that I ran into including being the first to ascend a ladder, being incapitated, and my three AI teammates being unable to figure out how to climb the ladder and save me. This only happened on two occassions, and it was reasonably my fault for getting further ahead, but a little more attention from the AI would have been appreciated. They will also not let human players take priority on medical supplies, they swarm first aid kits like jackals leaving you at times without one strapped to your back.

With very minor issues aside, Left 4 Dead is a fresh and inspiring take not only in the First Person Shooting genre, but in the whole Zombie genre as well. It’s different, addictive, completely fun especially with friends, and if Valve continues to support the game with downloadable content, especially free DLC, Left 4 Dead is going to be around for a long time. A lot of people play it online, and there’s really no arguing why the population is still so heavy because it’s just so well done. I can’t help but to agree with the Game of the Year status, as Left 4 Dead puts itself in the ranks of some of the best games available to date, and with Resident Evil 5 being released and RE supposedly being the authority in zombie gaming, I think Left 4 Dead beats it out on many levels. Buy this game, don’t even rent it, just go drop the cash into it today. You’ve already waited too long to play this game if you haven’t tried it.

Gameplay: 9.0

Graphics: 7.5

Replayability: 9.5

Overall: 9.5

P. Theimer

paulrtheimer@yahoo.com

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Assault on Dark Athena Game Review (XBox 360)

I do want to begin by clarifying, the newest Riddick installment released on the Xbox 360 is titled “The Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Athena”. What I did not know before purchase was that this also includes the stellar title released on the original xbox formally called “The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay”. This particular review will cover the new game, Dark Athena, and will not include Butcher Bay as I will be reviewing that separately.

The first Riddick game on Microsoft’s first console shocked a lot of people. Many wrote it off as a typical mediocre film to game title that contains bland gameplay and clunky controls like many do. What those of us did play it discovered was the complete opposite, Escape from Butcher Bay was absolutely fantastic. It received a lot of praise from many gaming sites across the internet, was a multiple Game of the Year nominee and winner, and is questionably the best looking game ever released on the Xbox. It snuck up on people, as it offered very tight gameplay, excellent visuals, and an overall innovative experience.

So with the announcement of the newest installment, Dark Athena, I was very quick to learn more in great anticipation. In an “Orange Box” like fashion, they revamped the original Butcher Bay and packaged it up with the new Dark Athena and put it on shelves. Make no mistake, Riddick has impressed again, and the new experience is just as good, if not better than the first.

You begin on a beach outside of an enormous metal building. The world around you is vibrant, the water effects from the ocean are beautiful, and it throws you right into the action from the get go. One of the first things you notice is that in the beginning, stealth is key. You do have Riddick’s eyeglow ability allowing for exceptional night vision, which means you can crouch in the shadows and see the world around you, when your foes cannot. The stealth is nice, if you are in a position where the enemy cannot see you, your vision will tint blue indicating this. Lights around you can be destroyed to create more shadows increasing your chances of silently killing drones and guards within this building, so shooting out fluorescent bulbs becomes necessary.

Head-on combat is definitely possible, but difficult. You can run and gun if you choose to, but it’s hard to recommend without using tactics with the darkness. You can also pull corpses out of the light into a darker area of the room you are in to avoid other guards seeing their fallen comrades and alerting security.

As the game progresses, you find yourself on a Mercenary Slave spacecraft, where if you did indeed play Butcher Bay, some faces may be familiar to you. There is a decent level of puzzles to figure out as you navigate the ship. There are also a heavy amount of collectable Bounty Cards scattered throughout Dark Athena, they unlock bonus content when you pick them up, and you gain an achievement for locating all of them. Some are easier than others, and it adds a little depth to the experience. At points you do control for various mechanical weapons, including Drones and Mechs. The physics are just flat out fun, and the concept behind it is brilliant. You do not spend the entire game on this spacecraft, but a good portion of it is indeed on the gigantic steel vessel.

Some of your personal weapons may be very familiar, but they did add just a few others, including the SCAR. The SCAR, once gaining it is a very fun and vital piece of weaponry. You can fire up to five mines at a time, which do fire out like a rifle so you can be precise, and detonate them when you choose with the Left Trigger. This gun is about all you’ll use after you obtain it, it’s handy, powerful, necessary for some bosses, and all I have to say is spider drones, oh those freakin spider drones.

The visuals in this game are exceptional. They aren’t nearly “wow” worthy like the original is, but they are extremely well done. Lighting effects are among the best I’ve ever seen in a game, the glow of flashlights, the shadows cast, down to the incredible reflections. The enemies look great, especially the drones, along with some great animations to coincide. The character models are just awesome, at times you do wonder if you are watching a cut scene and not in-game footage. Riddick is undoubtedly modeled after Vin Diesel, and it’s almost a dead on likeness. If you enjoy good looking games, this is one of the best on the console to date.

There is online play, with a decent population playing, and it’s honestly average at best. You can tell it was influenced by Unreal Tournament, with the fast paced action, scattered spawning weapons, and furious gameplay action. Pray and spray applies well here, but it’s just not as good. Straying from the single player mode, the controls don’t feel nearly as good, I did drop on average of one out of every two games due to someone quitting or a connection error.

The players move around fast, almost too fast for the lack of spray the weapons have. You have one laser dot to aim with and hit your target that is reasonable accurate, which makes it very difficult to hit strafing enemies at a short distance.

Better weapons that had more of a wide spray range would have been much better, but the lack of weapon options and the speed of gameplay makes skill turn more into luck. Much like most online games, there’s too many quitters to have the game end when the host leaves, resulting in your stats for that game disappear. Very fustrating when attempting to gain achievements such as “Gain 100 kills in multiplayer”, as you can have a 22 kill game, the host leaves, and those kills just go away. Blah.

Dark Athena was a reasonably lengthy campaign, about 10-12 hours depending on skill and difficulty level, and with the original Escape from Butcher Bay not only included, but remastered and tightened up for the 360, This is a great value and two phenomenal titles for the price. There isn’t too much to go back for once you complete both games, unless you decide to go again at a higher difficulty, which you may avoid. Even normal difficulty is quite difficult. I loved this game, and look forward to my 2^nd plunge into Butcher Bay, and I can easily recommend this to anyone that owns an Xbox 360 console. Two great games and a great value, check out the demo on Xbox live today.

Gameplay: 9.5

Although difficult and at rare times seems unfair, Dark Athena is an excellent experience. It handles well, the controls are tight, there’s a lot of varied and innovative gameplay, and definitely lives up to the original. There’s enough here to please fans of both First Person Shooters, and Stealth Games, and they both work well together. Points lost unfortunately due to the poor multiplayer.

Graphics: 9.75

Just amazing. Everything about the visuals capture the environment around you, and you will stop more than once just to look at the quality of some of the lighting effects. It stacks up with some of the best looking games on the console to date, and you don’t see too many games beat this one out graphically. Very well done.

Replayability: 7.5

You may enjoy the multiplayer, but I really didn’t. Regardless, there’s two games here, with a lot of gameplay and some may be driven to play this one through twice. With collectables available, there is a certain level of replayability in the campaign, but not comparable to other current titles.

Overall: 9.25

I was impressed yet again by how well Dark Athena was produced. It’s fun, it holds your attention, and everything about it just feels like a fresh experience and a nice break from your typical shooters. It’s got something for everyone, and if you just want to replay the original hit Escape from Butcher Bay, well that’s here too. A nice bundle, especially for fans of the films, and I can easily recommend it to next gen console owners everywhere.

By Paul Theimer