On a Stroll Through Mordor

Does one simply walk through Mordor? The answer is no. This year we learned why no one just walks in and throws jewelry into volcanoes. The only way to travel through the blasted lands is in an uncompromising ballet of death and destruction. The only way to exist in Mordor is to be the scariest being in Mordor.

Shadow of Mordor is great. The reviews are out there calling the “Nemesis System” one of the more innovative things to happen in video games for years and they are not far from the mark. Sure we have had games remember your actions and shape the plot based on your deeds but it has never been this in your face about it. When you run into an Orc that remembers you it is like seeing someone you despise at the super market and actually being able to put an arrow in their face, then if you see them again they will berate you for shooting them while wearing an eye patch. Entertaining as hell.

The Orcs actually have a personality that shows through when they are cinematically introduced to you. They are still bloodthirsty, violent savages that you have no problem murdering but the different captains have their own quirks. I fought one that liked to skin his enemies and he wore and crazy cape made of faces. Faces. This is well thought out design that is also focused and I would love to have more AAA titles like this in the future.

Mordor looks great, plays like a successful marriage of Assassin’s Creed and Batman, and knows exactly what it is. We are looking at one of the best licensed games of all time here and it will be credited for hopefully starting a new “fun” based string of games. I am all about fun like Hydro Thunder; actually that is a pretty good comparison: Shadow of Mordor is the Hydro Thunder of 3D open world stealth action games.

Now, let’s take the “Nemesis System” a little bit further and move it to Orks. Give me a Warhammer 40K game in this style and I may never put the controller down.

A Word on Destiny

I like it. I just wish I cared about it.

There is really no point in trying to review something that was painstakingly created with such care on the technical level: the shooting feels great, the graphics are good, the sound design is spot on, the servers seem to be holding up for an MMO –lite, and they have already made a ton of money through sales. Mechanically everything is solid, well, except for there not really being a viewable map for the combat areas.

I wish the game was put together better on a high functioning level. I know that I have been revived by the ghost of Peter Dinklage because I am one of the people able to wield the light against the darkness. Video game plot setup, I get it not too complex. I know who I am but have no clue as who anyone else is. I think the Vanguard I report to in the Tower is a much better space warlock than I am or maybe she’s just an upper level clerk? The stranger that shows up a handful of times is so mysterious that I still know nothing about her after I finished all of the story missions. Bungie has already admitted to stringing us along for 10 years but the opening chapter isn’t engaging beyond satisfying head shots. You could easily blow through the story missions in a couple of sittings, look forward to the events, and brawl in multiplayer; but you’ll get stuck in the same old MMO tropes of doing the same thing over and over for better loot or rare currency.

The current answer for the lack of story is the companion app that displays all of your grimoire cards that you earn through various milestones during gameplay. The Destiny app does what it should and augments the experience. You can show your friends your loadout no matter where you are! You can finally learn about what might actually be going on in the universe by reading your cards. Wait, remember Final Fantasy XIII and the thousands of lines of lore and fluff that you read in the menu to learn as much as you could about Gran Pulse? No? Those were in the same game and I have not heard of anyone who dove into that hard core.

There is something that could be great here. The nuts and bolts are working wonderfully with more than adequate window dressing it just needs that substance to keep the non multiplayer focused user around. 

Aleeums.

When the Ghen came to earth they were refugees. They helped us in the realm of technology in return for a safe place to escape their conquerers. Everything went as well as it could have until Titan exploded. Those Ghen are jerks. They attacked like cowards and placed the blame on our own mining team for the accident. This is the tale of the time we fought in the Ghen War (don’t worry, no one else remembers that one either).

1995 was a fun year for video games. We were still getting amazing 16-bit titles released on the Super Nintendo while other systems were taking us “truly” into the third dimension. Ghen War is one of those early games that came out on the Sega Saturn that promised an adventure on a grand, intergalactic scale with polygons! What came about was a muddy, graphical mess with weird controls that wouldn’t have stacked up against Descent on the PC or Marathon on the Mac. GW probably wowed a number of console gamers who were still used to sprites and had no idea 2D graphics were going to hold up much better in the long run; but hey, new tech!

Ghen War is a graphical mess. The terrain is generally one “texture” stretched across a topgraphic map with draw distances that would make the original Silent Hill blush. The character models are super simple with a number of enemies being trapozoids of death barrelling towards you, though there are a couple of neat spider walkers and what look like fish men that proved they weren’t completely grasping at straws in the imagination department. The most impressive thing is how fast the game runs, maybe I’m a bit used to modern shooters rather than the old school “twitch” style of play. They really could have done something better with your exoskeleton, I know it’s for mining but it will save the world! Issac in Dead Space looked like a total bad ass and he was an engineer.

The story of the Ghen War is told through full motion video cut scenes between sets of missions. To be honest I didn’t hate them. As far as 1995 FMV goes, they are on par with a SciFi (pre-SyFy) TV movie. For a video game that’s huge. The cut scenes give you the go ahead to shoot everything, and that’s all you need. The cut scenes sound fine, you can understand the actors. The sound design for the rest of the game is lasers and explosions with a rock track with vocals on the title screen.

In 1995 joysticks were for flight sims and analog sticks were likely attached to a third party knock off controller that your friend made you use as player 2. Needless to say, it takes quite a bit of getting used to regressing to applying digital controls in a three dimensional enviroment. You move forward and backward while looking left and right with the D-pad while using the shoulder buttons to strafe. Circle strafing every enemy is crucial to your success and is easy to pull off with a mid 90’s mind set. The six face buttons are for jumping, shooting, sprinting, changing weapons, and angling up and down; you can adjust what button does what.

I listed a few games that were solid but not notable and it looks like Ghen War would end up on a list like that. Too bad it just doesn’t measure up. If you have the opportunity to play this game, you probably are in a Saturn fan’s presence and they will recommend a better title. Someone should rip all of the cut scenes together and throw it on Youtube; a cheesy sci fi romp just the way the fans like it.

Monthly Fees, Not Necessarily Hidden

We’ve seen a bunch of Massively Multiplayer Online games come and go throughout the years. Many of these games have tried to use a different play on the “pay to play” system that has made Blizzard a ton of money in the last decade and some strayed off to try something a little more unconventional. My brother convinced me to try Final Fantasy XIV: A Realm Reborn and I am not sorry that I have thrown extra money at a well put together experience. We will fight the urge to keep our money…

To start I played World of Warcraft from December 2004 until the Fall of 2007 when I decided that all the time I spent raiding had been undone when I picked up a green item almost on par with my former raiding gear shortly after marching through the dark portal. I haven’t really played an MMORPG seriously since save The Secret World because I’m a sucker for Lovecraftian themes. Really, the first few areas of the TSW are pretty incredible but once I was done with them I lost interest in the game. A Realm Reborn takes all of that tried and true cool down based gameplay and puts its own spin on things, starting with the most well put together story line in an MMO. Ever.

Following the main story quests will take you to all of the currently available regions of the world and you are the driving force behind the story. In true Final Fantasy fashion you are a warrior of light out to collect crystals and are the center of the story. The individual leaders of the world request audiences with you and your created character model is in all of the cut scenes. As a single player RPG FFXIV:ARR is surprisingly fulfilling and a better Final Fantasy experience that the trio of the XIII games. And that’s that. If you don’t want to play any more after you see the credits you don’t have to, the story quests keep your equipment updated and you eventually wear equipment fitting for your job (Dragoons get Kain armor, Summoners wears horns, etc.) that ends in an epic raid dungeon with a slew of boss battles. If you want more and wish to participate in raids and daily quests you can continue with that too so you can be equipped well enough to take on the challenges of the next patch.

Are you tired of waiting a long time in the Duty Finder for a dungeon run because you are a damage role? All you have to do is talk to a guild master and change your main hand weapon and your class changes to a tank or healer role. You only really need one character on a server because they can instantly change their class, and this goes for crafting and gathering professions too. Yes, fishing rods are main hand non-joke weapons in this world. Since each class has its own experience level, even the crafters and gatherers, you will be occupied for too many hours if you want to master every skill. Throw in class specific quests to unlock the greater potential of your role every five levels to make it interesting and you may not ever get out.

If you like MMO’s. This game is good. The pace is much faster than similar titles with hardly any downtime between encounters while still being extremely friendly for solo play. If you haven’t been sold on it yet, you won’t be. Yes, this is a time sink that will have you trying to optimize your sleep schedule because dungeon runs can be done fairly quickly and instances that are just a single boss battle (Trials) lend themselves to the “just one more” mentality. What got me in the end was that you can play the game on a gamepad (I’m playing on the Playstation 4 with a generic USB keyboard for typing to people on the internet) while sitting on a couch. I have a very comfortable couch; the experience is great being able to sit back and play on a big screen rather than hunched forward over a keyboard staring at a monitor.

Give it a shot.

Top Ten Games Notable For Not Being Notable

Somehow I’ve hit 1000 collective views and I would like to thank all of the bots that visit my blog. Without you I’d probably still be doing this. Here’s a Top Ten, well not really a TOP Ten, a list of ten not very notable games; hence why it isn’t numbered.

 Vay – Sega CD

Working Designs

Who doesn’t love Working Designs that’s into classic games? Nobody. They had something when it came to choosing what Japanese titles to localize and somehow kept this whimsical air about them when it came to RPG’s. The Shumps where good too. It’s hard being considered the worst game that a company put out even if the game was a fairly solid but generic early 90’s Japanese RPG.

Reason: Every other Working Designs RPG.

      Gargoyle’s Quest – Nintendo Game Boy

Capcom

Demon’s Crest is an amazing game from Capcom that was a spinoff of the Ghosts and Goblins series and everyone remembers it as the game that was one the best seller list because of returns or a really hard game that is really good. Too bad the Game Boy prequel doesn’t get as much love as it should even if the resolution on the portable makes the play area a bit small.

Reason: The Game Boy being seen as a puzzle platform. Tetris and Dr. Mario were in full force while RPG nuts would have purchased Final Fantasy Legend.

      Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex – Playstation 2

Ban-Dai

Licensed games tend to be overlooked because they are usually rushed over promised pieces of software that are used for cash ins. At best you can hope that it will keep the aesthetic of whatever property it is based on and here we have a solid third person shooter that would be fun without the Ghost in the Shell connection. I bet most people didn’t even bother looking at this one.

Reason: Seen as a cash grab, but is actually solid.

            Urban Chaos: Riot Response – Playstation 2

Eidos/rocksteady

Rocksteady made this. They made those Batman games you love so much. Urban Chaos is actually an awesome translation of an action movie that has cheesy news reporters between levels, slow mo hostage “negotiations”, and fun weapons to shoot over the top gansters (many with hockey masks). If you like dumb fun, find this game!

Reason: Came out on PS2 in 2006. Everyone was looking at Black on PS2 and Battlefield 2.

      T.R.A.G. – Playstation 1

Sunsoft

It’s like Resident Evil. In an office building. With switching at will between characters. It was called Hard Edge in Japan, probably the least notable name ever.

Reason: Why play this when you have Resident Evil Director’s Cut and Resident Evil 2?

           Torneko: The Last Hope – Playstation 1

Enix

This is a turn based Rogue-Like based on the Dragon Warrior franchise. If anything needs a re release it would be this one because it came out way before the rogue craze we have on the indie scene today. What do you say Square-Enix? Bravely Default was a success, a 3DS version of this would probably be picked up like crack.

Reason: It was well received in Japan but in the US no one really had Dragon Quest on the front burner.

      Sword of the Berserk: Guts’ Rage – Dreamcast

ASCII

Hack and slash adventure games are fun. Cloud had a big sword in Final Fantasy VII and Guts’ is even bigger and angrier, a surefire win! Nope. The action portions of the game are along the lines of Devil May Cry hard and probably off put a lot of gamers especially since the Dreamcast was mostly known for sports and fighting games.

Reason: The anime is was based was released a few years after the game in North America, things may have been a little different if the cult following had been around in 2000.

      R-Type Command – Playstation Portable

Atlus

An Atlus game? Aren’t those usually extremely low print runs that everyone is grabbing for years later? Not in this case. As a tactical battle game R-Type Command is actually good, but all it shares with the shooter series are art assets and really isn’t what you would expect from an R-Type game.

Reason: A R-Type game that’s not a shooter.

Maken X – Dreamcast

Atlus

FPS. First Person Slasher. You hit things with a demon possessed sword in first person. The North American version was censored and the localization (done by SEGA in this case) is just bad. It has characters in the same art style as the Persona games and may actually be worth a look.

Reason: Dreamcast with poor localization and hardly any marketing.

      Panzer Dragoon Saga – Sega Saturn

SEGA

Am I bragging that I bought this game over a decade ago? Not really. Whenever the Sega Saturn comes up in conversation Panzer Dragoon Saga always gets mentioned. Because it’s a good game, no? Because it costs hundreds of dollars in the open market. The game is probably one of the best ways you could spend 14 hours of your time and has an amazing marriage between the on rails shooting genre and RPGs with a battle system that doesn’t come anywhere near overstaying its welcome. If you look for or want to play this, make sure it’s because it is such a good title, not just because of its auction value.

Reason: Monetary value has eclipsed its actual value.

Was there any real criteria to be on this list? Probably not, other than the fact that they are all on a shelf behind me. Take a look at some of these games, they’re not bad.

An Exercise In Self Loathing

Daikatana

Patient has presented with odd symptoms. Patient constantly making references to magical swords and annoying bugs that mercilessly try to murder him. And some named John trying to make him his bitch over a decade later; whatever time frame we’re working with here. Will continue to interview patient.

So, since we last spoke has anything changed?

No. I can still see it, the mud, everywhere.

This mud, does it have a purpose?

It makes everything look terrible. You know, like a muddy mess.

Has the buzzing gotten worse?

It comes and goes, but when I see them they only fly at me in straight lines. It’s really not too bad if you catch them coming from a ways away.

You talked about getting lost, any updates on that?

Everything is so blocky, I don’t know where to head. Half the time I have trouble figuring out where the ground ends and the walls begin. At least the lights have more than one color.

Colored lighting? What’s that have to do with anything?

Everything. It’s one of the main reasons it was delayed after Quake II came out.

Quake?

All hail the lightning gun and watch for telefrags!

Okay. Make a note of ‘telefrag’. We found you wearing a metal suit when you were admitted, why?

Isn’t that was everyone wears in this dystopia?

I’m asking the questions. Can you tell me about your accused racism?

You call one guy Superfly Johnson and you get branded, I can’t help it if that’s his name.

Is it as bad as everyone says it is?

Not really. There is a playable game in here. Just not a very good one.

Can you think of anything worse?

Breed for the PC was an unfinished mess I regretted purchasing. Can I have more graham crackers?

Very well. Take your meds and we will continue tomorrow.

Patient is unstable. Recommend keeping in inpatient treatment. Not ready for outside world. Patient still complaining that the two Johns need to work together again and make a killer app for Oculus Rift

Let's Talk Hawken

If you’re like me you may have found yourself playing some free to play titles lately. Especially if you have the convenience of hitting “Play Now” on the game’s product page on Steam. One of the more notable freely available titles is Hawken. Giant robot deathmatches. Giant Robot Deathmatches! This time we use them to fight for sport!

Hawken is a multiplayer arena shooter in the vein of Quake III or Unreal Tournament, only with giant robots that look like they were hastily put together inside a junkyard. The look and feel of the game is pretty spot on; I believe that in some sort of distant future mechs made from scrap fight it out for some reason or another. I really didn’t bother to look into the lore of the game, all you need to know is that some other mechs will have a red indicator on your heads up display and you need to shoot them before they shoot you. You will be awarded experience points for your pilot and separate mech levels and Hawken Credits that can be used to purchase new mechs and weapons. There are also Meteor Credits that can bought with real money that can be used to purchase practically any item in the game if you desire.

This is the best looking free to play game I’ve ever played. The graphics are on par with what a full retail release backed by a major publisher but do suffer from the lack of color modern games tend to have. There is a forest map that’s a nice change but everything still has the “grim future” color palette that gets used to promote “realism.” The weapons are well rendered and animate believably when fired. It’s obvious that a great deal of effort was put into the development of Hawken and it looks great.

Driving your mechanical monstrosity (the “recruit” robot looks like a CRT monitor, if you remember those) should be second nature to anyone who has played a first person shooter in the last decade. Movement is handled with WASD and aiming is controlled by the mouse, like God intended. The real difference is in the actual locomotion of your heap of metal, the SHIFT key is used to boost. Holding shift and moving forward will make you mech “run” with boosts without weapon use but holding shift and hitting the left or right movement keys will let you “strafe dodge” in a burst in the desired direction while holding shift and backwards will make you do a 180 degree turn that is extremely useful as these machines take time to turn. Don’t forget that you can hover as well, your foes may not always look up. Once familiar with the movement feel free to click on your enemies until they die. Each mech has a unique ability that uses the F key and really helps to differentiate robots in the same weight class by reducing heat levels, increasing accuracy, or turning your heavy bot into a mobile turret. The slower, more mechanical movement makes the game seem more methodical and less “twitch” than the more popular competitive first person shooters out there and it is welcome.

The regular modes are here for your enjoyment: Deathmatch, Team Deathmatch, and Point Defense (Missile Assault). The modes work well and can be finished rather quickly with a Deathmatch style game lasting 10 minutes which is perfect for any length of play session. Siege is a semi-unique mode that operates as a multi stage point defense mode that splits your tasks from collecting enough energy to launch a battleship and defending a single anti air battery to protect or destroy airborne battleships. A Co-op Bot Destruction (Horde) mode has been added recently and is a nice change from always facing human opponents; it can take an hour or more to survive all 25 waves, so be sure you have the time before you bail on your fellow pilots.

This is a free to play game that still wants your money. Grinding out Hawken Credits to buy new mechs and weapons can take quite a while so you need to pick what style of mech you want to pilot so you can spend your hard earned points effectively. The grind may be a factor, but it’s a good game. It’s better to think of these games as a “pay what you want” sort of model, if they made everything available to you they may as well charge you for initial entry into the program. If you like the game, throw them a couple of bucks. I’m sure I’ll rant about the pay models in free to play games in the future…

Playing Hawken doesn’t take any initial investment so you might as well try it. If you love giant robots the concept art alone will get you pumped. This is my favorite free to play game, the pay model is bearable without having to spend heaps of cash, and there are big robots that shoot each other.