E3 2010: Sony Impressions

Last one...After the unexpected domination of Nintendo at their conference, Sony's turn at bat was surprisingly disappointing. Not as bad as Microsoft's waste of space, but still pretty underwhelming. This mainly had to do with Sony not reveling anything that everyone was already aware of. There's still some games worth discussing though.

Killzone 3: I'm not sure what sets the Killzone series apart from other shooters on the market other than it being the only shooter franchise of any value on the Playstation systems. Everyone seems to be really excited for this one and I don't see much reason why. It looks pretty and some of the action is intense, but I have to say that don't like the Playstation controller for standard shooters, I'd much rather play it on X-Box...see I don't completely hate my 360....

The Sly Collection: I'm kinda pissed that Sony didn't dwell on this outside of an announcement that it was coming and it would in 3-D and be compatible with the Plystation move. The Sly Cooper series will be getting the God of War treatment by having it PS2 entries scaled to HD and released in a PS3 collection. I loved the Sly series and I can't wait for fourth entry in the series, but being able to play the older titles on the PS3 with thorphy support will be a the things that dreams are made of. The best part is that more of this collections are rumored to be coming. Keeping my fingers crossed for a Ratchet and Clank collection...

Playstation Move: Mircosoft's motion control device had a name change in the last year. Sony's device was just lucky enough to get a name. Like Kinect, the Move doesn't look any different or better than what was shown off last year. It offers full 1:1 motion control which is on par with what Wii motion plus can do and while the devices line-up of games is a lot less rip-offy than Kinect's offerings, they still aren't interesting enough to warrant a look. Sure, I think the Move is stronger than what the Wii offers, I just don't think the Market is there for it. The thing will launch this launch this September and there are bunch of different add-on devices to go with it.

Sorcery: Good job Sony! You made a Harry Potter game for the Move that looks even less interesting than they do.

Heroes on the Move: The idea behind this is somewhat intriguing. The game's a crossover between Sly Cooper, Ratchet & Clank, and Jak & Daxter and uses the Move to pull off attacks. from what was shown in the trailers, it looks like all the characters the do are their most basic attacks: Sly swings his cane, Ratchet swings his wrench, etc. I love two of the franchises on display here (piss off Jax...), so if I ever do get a Move, I'll have something to check out.

God of War: Ghost of Sparta: I knew that although God of War III is the final game in the series timeline, the franchise was just gonna do a Metal Gear Solid and release a bunch of games that take place at different points in the series history. This one takes place between the first and second game as Kratos is getting use to position as the new God of War. I don't have a PSP yet and I would have preferred that GOW III turely would have been the last of the franchise, but I might play this one.

Little Big Planet 2: I didn't like the first game, it came free with my PS3 (along with the amazing Ratchet & Clank: A Crack in Time) and just didn't live up to the hype and success that the franchise has garnered. The sequel looks like it could be an improvement. There's more customization options (no shock there), and the series is make a jump to cover more game genres than just platformers, so this one could be worth a look.

Portal 2: Like everyone else, I love Portal and although I want more, I don't really care for the notion of a full blown sequel. The first game was an independent masterpiece, taking a small idea an pushing it to its limits and working with little resources the development team had to its max. The sequel is getting a bigger team and seems to be going for the whole bigger is better idea that games stupidly fall for.

Final Fantasy XIV Online: I finally completed Final Fantasy XIII a few weeks ago, but that doesn't mean I'm icthing for more and it certainly doesn't mean I want that more to be an online game. I didn't like FF XI because it was online and my stance has changed here...didn't i say that last year? Oh well...

Gran Turismo 5: Again, I don't really have much interesting in racing outside of Mario Kart and Burnout so Gran Tursimo is pretty much a moot point to me. Looks really pretty though. Its stated for release nest year but given the infamous delays of the last game, I'm only interested in seeing rather or not it actually comes out.

Infamous 2: Infamous is on my list of Playstation exclusives that I need to play now that I own a PS3. Even though I haven't played that, I can't really say I'm excited for this and its for its for the dumbest reason...I can't stand Cole's new character design...his hair looks so damn out of place. Anyway the game's developer Sucker Punch also develops the Sly Cooper series and it goes without saying that I'd rather they make a new Sly game than new Infamous.

Twisted Metal: I've never played a game in this series before, but it looks cool, like a twisted version of Mario Kart. Not much was shown apart from some muliti player modes, but I could get into this.

And so E3 2010 ends...

God Of War

I can't tell if my opinion was affected by the tons of praise this got. It's definitely a good game. But at the time this came out, I really can't see how it earned the title of PS2 Game of the Year over Shadow of the Colossus or Resident Evil 4. And more recently, I'm completely baffled at this game being awarded best PS2 game ever over games like Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas and or the Ratchet and Clank series. Anyway, God of War is a very fun game. A lot of people say that the combat is what makes this game so great, but it isn't why I like it though. Yeah, the fighting looks cool, but anyone can pull off a sweet looking combo. Just because the animations look nicer doesn't make your combat deeper than a normal button masher. I will admit that the fighting is very fluid and rewarding and as you progress you become more powerful as the game goes on. There's fairly good enemy variety, with things like centaurs and sirens and plenty of undead soldiers, although most of them come off as annoying little shits that do nothing but swarm around you and piss you off .

The story was more interesting than I expected, accomplishing its goal of helping us understand Kratos a bit more, but what I really liked were the game's set pieces, although even that was a bit uneven at times. The Temple of Pandora section of the game was brilliantly designed, really pulling off the feel of an epic, hazardous dungeon. In complete contrast to that, right before the temple section, the game figures the most entertaining thing you could do to enter the temple is to force you to slowly plod around a huge empty desert searching for sirens that you can you barely hear. I really want to slap the game designer that came up with that. But that somewhat short nightmare is nothing compared the last act of the game, starting in Hades. They were just lazy and braindead here, instead of making what could have been a really cool area, they just threw a bunch of enemies and idiotic spinning spike hazards at you, and it really isn't fun or interesting. After that you enter the final fight against Ares, and the whole showdown with him is no good. After the excitement of the first two boss fights, Ares is just a cheap twat who blocks all of your attacks and the final phase of the fight is more about luck than actual skill. So, God of War is a fun game. It's certainly one of the better PS2 games out there, but its far from the best.

Ratchet and Clank Future: Tools of Destruction (Review)

So, I finally got a Playstation 3 and now I'm having to backtrack and play all the exclusive games I wanted to play for the system. Ratchet & Clank is right up there with Mario as one of my favorite series and its the series I've been dying to sink my teeth back into as these PS3 entries have been released. 2005's Deadlocked was last new Ratchet game I played, but since that game acts mostly as spin-off, then 2004's Up Your Arsenal was the last proper Ratchet game I got my hands on so I've been in desperate need of a Ratchet fix. Tools of Destruction, as the first entry for the PS3, is really nothing more than a graphical upgrade and a very good one at that. The folks at Insomniac are very good at making the most out of a system's hardware and the PS3 more than excels at highlighting the Ratchet universe's distinctive visual style. However, the trade-off for the shiny new graphics seems to be that there are a few more glitches than we're used to seeing in the series though. Some enemies won't disappear form the terrain or get stuck in it when they're defeated and occasionally the controls lock up for a few seconds which result in a few cheap shots and deaths here and there.

Other than that though, the game plays just like it predecessor. The gameplay isn't as awe-inspiring as it has been before, but its still an incredibly satisfying outing. The one thing I kept hearing about this game was that the difficulty was too easy, although I did see that from time to time, there were definitely some rough patches noticeably near the end of the game and trying to upgrade all the weapons wasn't a walk in the park. Anyway, running around, blowing up everything and collecting experience is just as fun as it has been in the past, but it's hard to not admit that we've all done this before. Tools of Destruction has a few problems that harm the overall experience, but it's easily one of the more enjoyable games I've played in a while.

Jak 3 (Review)

Right off the bat, Jak 3 is loads better than Jak 2. This statement feels odd for me because Jak 3 doesn't really fix any of the major problems from the previous game. At least unlike Jak 2, this game doesn't add any more painful problems in addition to what's caused frustration in the past. I find it relatively shocking that Naughty Dog has pretty much let any and almost all criticisms of the first two titles go unnoticed. The only thing that got some form of improvement here was the slight (and I mean slight) increase in checkpoints and the less crowded Haven City which was a hell of a lot easier to traverse now.

I'm being a little hard on Jak 3, but I actually did enjoy it. All of the problems from before are still here, but they are somewhat less frustrating than they were in the past and the game manages to be pretty fun and rewarding. The game wraps up the trilogy's storyline pretty well and the characters who are introduced are fun and probably the most fully realized characters in the series. The dialogue is less painful and forced except for Jak himself, who still sounds like a stock wannabe action hero. The game's attempts at actual humor are more successful; the cutscene that reveals the Precrussors being the highlight. Perhaps most intriguing, you can unlock commentary for a lot of the cutscenes. They're pretty interesting and shows the developers' love for their series and makes you appreciate some of the work they did. Overall though, The Jak and Daxter games really could've been handled better, but apart from Jak 2, it's a pretty fun series (overlooking some annoyances).

Jak 2 (Review)

I remember playing this when I was younger. I finished it and sorta enjoyed it, but I found it too frustrating to fully embrace so I traded it in to my game store. I just recently bought the game back and after running through the game again, I can clearly see why I gave it away before. Jak 2 is a departure from the first game in tone and in gameplay. The bright cheery world and characters are replaced with a dark distopian future and Jak himself has been transformed into a wannabe badass. The Mario 64 elements from the first game are also replaced by a pretty bad attempt at a Grand Theft Auto clone. To the game's credit, the change in tone sort of works. The story is interesting and the characters are...tolerable. Daxter is probably the highlight as his dialogue can oftentimes be hilarious, though sometimes he can off as grating.

The gameplay change, however is extremely clunky. Getting around Haven City is an unbelievable nightmare as it is, without a doubt, one of the most convoluted game environments I've ever seen. Paths diverge wildly, loop around three or four times to get from one major street to another, and are so crowded it's virtually impossible to drive through without accidentally hitting someone or something. The Krimson Guard that patrol the streets function as the GTA equivalent of cops, and the slightest bump into one of them or their vehicles brings their full ire on top of you. Vehicles are difficult to control through the tight, winding paths and they're so congested with traffic that it's easy to get your car destroyed or run into other people. Worst of all (and without question one of the worst parts of the game) are the racing missions which control poorly, are way too strict (you can die in these races), drag on longer than they have any right to, and have little to no baring on the actual storyline. I swear these races made me want to chuck my controller at the screen.

The platforming is still present but they're in their own sections outside the confines of the shitty city. The platforming sections are well-designed if often put off by the game's irritants, although the integration of guns into the Jak and Daxter formula is done better than I expected. Enemies are still in cheap as hell locations and your guns have really bad auto targeting. Also, when you die, the game remembers the ammo and power-ups you used up, but respawns all the enemies and obstacles...this is such a well thought out game. Really... someone should have playtested this game a little more. Jak 2 is a constant battle between love and hate. It has it moments, but its just too damn frustrating to truly be enjoyable.

Jak and Daxter: The Precursor Legacy (Review)

Jak and Daxter kicked of a trio of high profile platformer series for the Playstation 2, the latter two series being Ratchet & Clank and Sly Cooper. I've played the later Jak and Daxter games, but it sure took me a while to get around to playing The original outing. This game didn't really change my opinion of the series though. Now don't get me wrong, I think it's a solid platformer, but I just can not figure out why some people believe this series is better than Ratchet or Sly. The only think Jak has over Sly is writing and storyline, while the storyline manages to be the only thing to trump Ratchet (well...the PS2 entries in the series anyway). The Jak and Daxter games are just more frustrating, suffer from imprecise controls, and are just less polished...sort of.

The first game is more of standard platformer in comparison to the sequels. It's sort of a hybrid of Crash Bandicoot and Super Mario 64. Developer Naughty Dog gave Jak and Daxter pretty much all the same moves they gave Crash when they developed that series, while the gameplay has you going around doing various tasks to earn orbs that allow you to move on to next level a la Mario 64. While the game gets the job done, there are some things that shouldn't have made through the testing phase, such as the double jump which seems to be too specific about it's timing, a picky-ness that sent me to my death more times than necessary. Most enemies serve no other purpose than to piss you off when you're trying to do other things and the enemies are fairly often placed in cheap as hell locations. It also doesn't help that Jak has a stupid method of restoring health. He can take 3 hits before he dies, but can regain one health point by collect 50 green eco orbs that, while plentiful, oddly takes too damn long to full up and makes death seem like faster option to get your health back.

Okay, I'm being a little hard on the game... despite all this bitching, I really did enjoy this game. It just that all those annoyances really make it hard to not be a little irritated will going through it. The world Naughty Dog has created is colorful and fun to run around in. The story and characters, while not on par with the sequels, are somewhat entertaining and actually managed to make me laugh sometimes, though the game is definitely not as clever as it thinks. The game could have been developed a bit more, but it's still a solid platformer.

Klonoa 2: Lunatea's Veil (Review)

There isn't much to say about this. Klonoa 2 is pretty much exactly the same as the original PS1/ Wii remake game. There aren't any new abilities or power-ups to nab, the story brings up some of the same themes and character motivations as the first, and apart from the surfing/snowboarding levels, you could switch one world from this game with a world from the first and never know the difference. Klonoa 2 pretty much feels like an expansion pack for the first game, and since that game was fairly charming that works out quite well here. Klonoa still has his unique enemy chucking ability and his still useless floating jump. The only thing that got somewhat of an upgrade were the bosses who now kinda put of a fight...it's not much but it's there. Klonoa 2, like the first game, is just a easy, well-made, fun little diversion.

The Nightmare Before Christmas: Oogie's Revenge (Review)

It's somewhat interesting how The Nightmare Before Christmas became a mega-cult hit in America roughly over a decade after it's initial release. Now-a-days its the go to franchise for the emo/goth crowd and the movie itself has become a lot more noteworthy to casual audiences. I've only seen the film twice before, largely due to the interest from the film's inclusion in the Kingdom Hearts series. In Japan, the fandom of the movie never really died down so it comes to no big surprise that Capcom decided to make a game based off of it. The game acts as a sequel taking place one year after the events of the movie. Jack, still longing after something different, decides to go out in search of new scares again. Before departure, Dr. Finklestein gives Jack the Soul Robber, a gooey whip that can stretch out and change shape. But, when Jack returns to Halloween Town, he finds that the towns changed for the worse. While absent, Lock, Shock and Barrel have sewn Jack's nemesis Oogie Boogie together again and he is lusting for revenge(as you can tell from the game's title). The story and writting is pretty stale and bare-bones, but it is at least tolerable due to the admirable voice acting. A few of the the original VAs returned, Chris Saradon is Jack, Ken Page is Oogie Boogie, and the characters who have new voices are quite similar to the originals.

The game is a modified version of Capcom's own Devil May Cry series and the game doesn't do much to hide this. Like DMC, the levels are presented as a series of chapters, each of which is relatively short consisting nothing more than killing a horde enemies and maybe fighting a boss. There's a version of DMC's “Style Ranking”, where constant attack combos result in a “coolness title” that will increase upon scoring more and more hits on opponents. And at the end of each level, the game tallies up how well you did in four categories (damage, time, surprise, and max combo), then assigns an overall ranking. It doesn't do any of this as well as Devil May Cry, but it did it well enough to ensure I was at least mildly entertained til the end. The thing that really sticks out for the game are the Boss Battles which act as musical numbers...of course, what would Nightmare Before Christmas be without some singing and dancing? The songs are modified versions of songs from the film (only one song is brand new) and during the fight you collect notes as you hit the boss, grab enough and everyone will start dancing while you press onscreen buttons to inflict massive damage. The songs and dancing sequences are the only part of the game I really like and helped the game stand on it's own a little better. Mega-fans of the movie will get a lot more mileage with this game than most people. The game is solidly put together despite most of it being copy and pasted from others and it applies the Nightmare Before Christmas brand pretty well. It's just an overall good game.

E3 09: Sony Impressions

Okay last one. I've never liked that Sony and Nintendo's conferences are basically back to back. It really tires me out and causes me to be little impatient with Sony's announcements. Unlike Microsoft and Nintendo, I still do not own a PS3 or PSP and while this year's keynote didn't make me crave a PSP, I do still want the PS3...if only because they still have 3 franchises I love: Ratchet & Clank, God Of War, and Kingdom Hearts. Overall I thought Sony really failed to wow me with surprises and I felt that they spent a little too much time with each game demo. The conference was fairly long winded but I did get a few games to talk about.

Uncharted 2: Among Thieves: Of course I've never played the first game and the only the I heard about it was that it was like a much better Tomb Raider game and you get to stare a hot guy's ass instead of hot girl. This follow up appeared to be fairly entertaining. If I had a PS3 I'd check it out.

PSP Go: They joking referred to this as the worst kept secret at E3 and they were right. The only time I really wanted a PSP was last year when they released the God of War bundle, but I held off on it when I remember that apart from GOW there were only one or two other games for the handheld that were really worth having. And that's still the same story now. The Psp Go is geared more towards media savvy consumers, and it looks slick and sexy, but unless they get some real high quality games for the system, then their wasting everyone's time. They showed off in a quick montage all the games coming to the system and the only ones I would want were the new Jak and Daxter and the game I'm about to spotlight next...

Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker: The second "traditional" MGS game on the PSP. The first game, Portable Ops, is one of those 1 or 2 games worth having I mentioned. This game looks good and I was pleased that there was actual gameplay footage unlike yesterday's Metal Gear Rising "trailer" (a shot of clouds rolling by with an image of Radien is NOT a trailer). It's also worth noting that MGS Rising was not talked about during the keynote which to me confirms that that game will at least release on 360 first.

Agent: A new game from GTA makers Rockstar. Not much info was given apart from the constant stressing that this was a PS3 exclusive. I think it's safe to say that it will be a exclusive for like a year before the 360 and maybe Wii (it happened with Bully) version are revealed.

Final Fantasy 14 Online: I joined the stunned and confused audience with the sudden announcement that Square Enix was already working on FF 14 and it would be released next year. The reveal that it would be another online game like FF 11 helped this shocker make more sense. Considering FF 11 wasn't exactly a best selling winner, I have wonder if this game is aiming to be an improvement.

PS3 Motion Control...Thing...: Yeah...they didn't have a name for this thing. It looks like slightly better Wii Remote. To be honest the things they were doing with it on stage weren't that interesting, but I will say that this seems to be a tad more "useful" (for lack of a better word) for games than Microsoft's Project Natal.

Modnation Racers: It's like Little Big Planet for racing games. I really only care about Burnout and Mario Kart as far as racing games are concerned, but I might check this this one out.

The Last Guardian: Oh why, oh why, oh why haven't I played Ico and Shadow of the Colossus yet? They've been on my need to play list for a few years now. Maybe if I had played them I would have been a lot more excited for this game, which was created by the same guy who developed those 2 games. The trailer didn't reveal much on gameplay, but it looked really really pretty.

Grand Turismo 5: Given the infamous delay time on GT4, I think it would be amusing to see how long it takes for this game to actually release. I don't really care about Grand Turismo...too realistic for me. Looks nice though.

God Of War III: This is it , Sony's showstopper. To be honest I'm glad the game doesn't release til March of next year, gives me more time to get a job so I can afford a PS3. The short demo they played of the game's opening is very reminiscent of the opening of God Of War 2 only much, much prettier. And I think you can count on the full game pretty much not offering anything truly new over the game's predecessors...just an HD gore fest. But really that's not much of a bad thing since there really isn't anything about this series that needs changing. I'm making it my goal to have a PS3 by this game's launch.

And that was it. I pretty upset that the new Ratchet & Clank game "A Crack in Time" wasn't given any face time during the conference especially since unlike God of War, it actually comes out this year...but oh well.

These last 2 days have been pretty tiring as fair as game news was concerned and I'm actually pretty happy it's over. Overall E3 2009 gave some pretty solid games to look forward to...too bad about 75% of these games aren't out until next year!

Scooby Doo: Night Of 100 Frights (Review)

This game was released back in 2002 as part of Warner Bros' huge promotion for the live action Scooby Doo film that was coming at the time. Like most licenced games, Night of 100 Frights is a fairly mediocre game. The one thing I think is really noteworthy about the game is the presentation. The game flawlessly recreates the look and feel of the original Scooby Doo cartoon, right down to the somewhat annoying laugh track, and the chase songs played during boss battles. The storyline of the game could actually pass as an extended episode of the show. The Mastermind (voiced by Tim Curry) is easily one of my favorite Scooby villains, which isn't saying much since most Scooby villains aren't that memorable.

The gameplay features the usual moving platforms, bottomless pits, thin ledges and predictable boss battles that are well worn conventions in the platform genre. But if you are a platformer fan you can put up with these things. Night Of 100 Frights is not a frustrating game. Considering you have absolutely no control over the camera, it deals remarkably well with the tight corridors and winding roads that you must traverse, and the controls are excellent. The content may be average but it is suitably polished and although it has it's challenging sections it never gets frustrating.


Finishing the game will only take about 5-7 hours if you're only want to get pass the final boss, but trying to find all the extra Scooby snacks and the pretty cool monster tokens (an item that makes a fully polygonal figure of one of the show's classic enemies appear in the museum, along with a capsule detailing the episode it appeared in) will add a few more hours. The game's less than 20 bucks now so if you're a Scooby Doo fan, it's well worth the purchase.