• 16Feb 08

  Resurrection

  At the beginning of the year I really thought that the next year or so would be marked by a plethora of sequels to all of the last 2 or 3 year's games, but it seems like instead we have entered the age of the comeback kids. It seems that all the developers of the world decided that 2008-9 is the time to add a new entry into that forgotten golden franchise from way back. All of the following games are from beloved franchises that have not seen a true/proper sequel in many years:

  Bionic Commando

  Last Iteration: Bionic Commando Elite Forces (1999)

  I (sadly) never owned a NES or C64 thus never played this game, but the new entry looks really neat from what we've seen so far. Really gives you a sense of what if spider-man had a gun and wasn't a total wimp when it came to killing dudes ( I'm not saying spider-man is a wimp ).Graphically impressive and a really cool setting/premise, hopefully the gameplay will follow through on this one.

  Fallout 3

  Last Iteration: Fallout: Brotherhood of Steel (2004) or really Fallout 2 (1998 )

  Never played any of the fallout games before, but they have really cool cover art! Kind of just looks like Oblivion with guns so far, but that's probably just because we haven't seen any real gameplay yet. I assume fans of that ****of game are excited about it (are they?).

  Twisted Metal PS3

  Last Iteration: Twisted Metal: Head-On (2005) or really Twisted Metal 2 (1996)

  Technically the latest iteration of this franchise came out about 2 weeks ago, but here's the thing; it was just a port of a 3 year old PSP game that was really just a rushed out version of Twisted Metal 2 running on a dumped down version of the Twisted Metal: Black engine. I believe that the franchise essentially stopped evolving after TM2, with 3-4 being void (obviously) and Black simply being a "back our roots" game and Head-On being a "even more back to our roots" game. Head-on played exactly like Black played, except had a much different tone. It also felt rushed in order to be a launch game ( what with a 6 player limit on maps, while even TM2 on PS1 had 8 ), and the few additions (upgrade system, mini-games), while good in theory, hardly affected gameplay. Both games were received well mostly by the fact that there hasn't been a Twisted Metal game for quite a time in between them, thus making their lack of originality forgivable. This time things will be different. They will need to add something new to the game to keep it worth playing, and the hardware jump practically demands it. In the video documentary David Jaffe mentions how he sort of feels this way about the last 2 TM games, and how TM2 still has the best gameplay of the bunch. A delicate balancing act of old and new needs to be achieved with this one, but hopefully with a bigger emphasis on new this time.

  Red Alert 3

  Last Iteration: Red Alert 2: Yuri's Revenge (2001)

  Was never the biggest C & C fan, but I, like every other strategy fan, totally bought and played Red Alert 2, even if just for a little bit. Always had a good sense of humor and was fun to play for a while with some cool units and whatnot, but was never something I ever really got in to. It Should be interesting to see it going up against the other beloved RTS series from the late 90s this/next year.

  Street Fighter IV

  Last Iteration: Street Fighter EX3 (2000) (could be wrong on that, as I'm not sure what qualifies as a straight up street fighter game or just a re-release of one).

  Like most sane people of the world, my experience of SF has been limited to the last days of arcades from the early 90s and the SNES version of SF, and I was far too young to ever really comprehend strategy for the game. But in my opinion the fighter genre is really dying and this is the genre's best shot at coming back. Love the look of the game and I'm glad they're not playing it too safe and not just re-releasing SF2 with 3d graphics, and are actually adding in some new gameplay features. I'm also glad (surely to the frustration of true SF fans) that they're attempting at making it more mass- audience friendly, so maybe, just maybe, when the inevitable console version finally comes to fruition, I (who hasn't played a fighting game in many many years) might be able to actually pick it up and have fun.

  StarCraft 2

  Last Iteration: StarCraft: Broodwar (1998 )

  StarCraft is essentially my favorite game of all-time (and thus what I consider the best game of all time as well), and I've been ready for a sequel since about 1999. StarCraft is the best-selling strategy game of all time and is widely regarded as the greatest one as well, so the sequel has quite lofty expectations. And while there have been many new conventions added to the RTS over the last 2 years( it has really seen a renaissance of sorts), I think SC2 will still flourish without exactly going in the current direction of the market. I think I am more excited at just being able to finally log online and play StarCraft against people of my own skill level again, as SC lacks a matchmaking system and the people who still play online are far above and beyond my current level of play.

  For whatever reason, these (mosly legendary) games are finally getting a fully-fledged sequel, some more drastically different than the previous entry than others (Bionic Commando). What does this mean? I don't feel quite at liberty to say, but I think it says something about the way the industry works; no matter how "c1assic" a game may be, there's always room for a sequel it seems in gaming. In movies there are rarely sequels to older movies (save for the last 2 years though with a new die hard and indianna jones and rambo, so maybe it's just a fever going around?), but games are always getting sequels. Part of it is because of the "risky business" of making original IPs, while the other part is how there are a lot of things that can be done in a sequel of a game (new mechanics, better graphics) than what can be done in a sequel to a movie. It seems like no matter how "perfect" a game can get, there's always something else that can be added as time goes on. I guess this whole phenomenon just points out the differences between games and movies in a way.

  What do you guys think? And did I miss anything?

  • Posted Feb 16, 2008 9:29 pm GMT
  • Category: Editorial
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• 3Jan 08

  2008 Predictions

  I have compiled a list of some predictions for the upcoming year:

  -StarCraft 2 will not be released, or ever given a release date.

  -Wrath of the Lich King won't come out either.

  -A full-on sequel to World in Conflict will be announced and released in late 2008(running on the same engine as the original), but it probably should have been an expansion pack.

  -Battlefield 3 will be announced and will be running on a version of their new frostbite engine, and it will once again announce that the next battlefield will support over 100 players per server, but will once again go back down to 64.

  -Half-Life 2: Episode 3 will be debuted before E3 08 and said to be ready for release by winter 2008, but won't come out until winter 2009. No new games will be announced by Valve, and no official maps for portal will be released either. I will say expect exactly 2 Team Fortress 2 maps that will come out on PC and not on the consoles, and then maybe 1 more map in 2009.

  - Far Cry 2 will be pushed back to Winter 2008, and still be really buggy, but probably less buggy than STLAKER.

  -PS3 will start to really gain momentum and start making sense that it costs way more than the competition: Blu-Ray will not be deemed the "winner of the format war," I don't think a true "winner" will be deemed until at least 2010, when people start to actually buy HD-DVDs and BRDs.

  -360 will start to lose momentum as it's big gun for 08, Ninja Gaiden 2, will be as good as the original game, but will not be as popular to the masses as say, Halo or Gears of War.

  -GTA4 will be pushed back to early September (won't risk a last spring/summer launch), and be pretty good, but probably not mind-blowing.

  -MGS4 will be the craziest MGS yet story-wise, but will not be the best MGS gameplay-wise. And will face bad marks on reviews for not having a fully-featured online component, and instead saying that Metal Gear Online is a separate game (the whole dividing them up as 2 separate products is totally stupid).

  -Burnout Paradise won't be as good as takedown or revenge, but still good.

  -God of War 3 will be unveiled at E3 in only trailer form.

  -Killzone 2 will be released, look great, play ok.

  -Resistance 2 will be announced for winter 08 and be totally overshadowed by Killzone 2.

  -Gears of War 2 will be unveiled, still won't care about the story, but dual wielding chain-saws. You heard it here first.

  -Spore will finally be released after getting delayed to fall 08, and will be game of the year.

  -A new game from the Ico and Shadow of the Colossus studio will be unveiled, won't come out until 09.

  -Besides the release of God of War: Chains of Olympus, the PSP will either start to fade out of existence or get a huge boost in support this year.

  -Project Origin will be mediocre at best due to being developed with the 360 as the main platform and not the PC.

  -Wii sales start to slow down( Wii are through!), I will finally be able to play Mario Galaxy.

  -Smash Bros Brawl will sell more copies than Mario Galaxy has and will ever sell, but will not be met with as high critical appraisal.

  -Capcom and Konami will not merge.

  -Atari finally hits the old dusty trail.

  -If I wanted to be wild, I'd say that THQ and Take 2 will merge.

  -More DS colors.

  -Wii will not pass 360 in sales, but come extremely close, PS3 starts to close gap.

  -Last year PS2 will see ports from other consoles.

  -Generally a good year for games, but no 2007, but almost every big game released this year will be a sequel.

  • Posted Jan 3, 2008 10:38 pm GMT
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• 2Jan 08

  Game Communities and Me

  Anyone who read my last blog post (Which I think is absolutely no one) would know that I play a whole lot of TF2, or at least try to. Generally speaking, the game has been a bit(or sometimes much) harder to enjoy over the last few weeks due to the greater abundance of server mods and user-made maps. I usually am all for user-made content, but in the last few years, I have found myself doing all I can to stay away from them. I used to be a rabid Counter-Strike: Source player, but by the middle of last year, it became unplayable for me. About 90% of all the servers were either only playing the maps dust and dust2, or filled with dozens of user-made maps.

  Sure dust and dust2 are c.lassics, but man, I want some variety now and then. Those maps get old, especially when everyone on the server just wants to go straight for the AWP, which I believe is the one design flaw in the entire game (the AWP is basically the one-shot kill sniper rifle in the game, that although is fairly-well as balanced as it can be, it totally ruins the game when too many players use it. It turns the game into chicken, where all players are too afraid to go into the open because if they do they will die in about 2 seconds.). I would actively look for servers that restricted the AWP from play (which there were usually 1 in 10 servers, which I would say is evidence on how divided the community was on the AWP).

  Server mods are usually bearable, but it got to the point on CS: Source that I couldn't join the server without 1st downloading different sound clips (that I just know that I had already downloaded on 12 other servers) for about 5 minutes, only to finally join the server and not hear any of the sounds that I just downloaded at all. Server mods are especially harmful to TF2, as time and time again I'll join a server only to find out it has the "fast respawn" mod, where you respawn in about 3 to 5 seconds, much faster than the max of 15 seconds it could take you to spawn. But this completely offsets the balance of the game since the winning team can't gain any momentum, as the designers purposely set it so that the loosing team will have longer respawns to help ensure that a stalemate won't occur.

  Most servers in CS(including all versions) only play a very small handful of the official maps and have a large amount of user-created maps, which generally speaking, are totally horrible(example: fy_iceworld and the 300 or so variations such as fy_iceworld2003). Most maps are super unpolished and don't usually try to be a very good map. I usually have a lot of respect for map-makers, but I feel that most maps on CS: Source or TF2 are just the map-maker trying to show that yes, they have the ability to make maps for the game. Too many times have I joined a server on it's last round, and after playing the map for about a minute, I am suckered into downloading a new map and trying it out for a few minutes, only to realize that it is grossly unbalanced.

  The problem of unbalanced maps is especially prevalent in TF2, where just about every user-made map I've played has very few, if any, small corridors that are vital to the balance of the different c.lasses. Scouts are able to jump around their opponents with ease and snipers are able to pull off headshots across entire maps, while pyros have a hard time trying to just get close enough to their opponents without taking getting killed.

  For the 1st month of TF2 being out, I was in heaven. All the servers only played the official maps, and server mods were non-existant. The 2 worst things about CS Servers were gone, and it appeared that I would be able to finally have fun playing shooters online again, but now it seems that I will have to battle these same problems again. Now I'm all for the rights of server owners and they should be allowed to do whatever they want with their own server, and admittedly there might actually be people out there that like playing those maps, but at what point has the community completely ruined the game? TF2 is still a much easier game to find a good server and play in, but I fear that someday soon it will be CS: Source all over again.

  So in conclusion: Server mods and user-made maps are good in theory, but bad in practice.

  What do you think about server mods and user-made maps? Good or bad?

  • Posted Jan 2, 2008 11:26 am GMT
  • Category: Editorial
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