tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-90008888906593569442024-03-21T06:47:04.046-07:00ArchGamerGame Review and other Gaming Related items to be found hereJames-Kondhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17207918860500397539noreply@blogger.comBlogger64125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9000888890659356944.post-16530704013187138022011-05-19T07:51:00.001-07:002011-05-19T07:51:44.035-07:00<object type="application/x-shockwave-flash" id="clip_embed_player_flash" data="http://www.justin.tv/widgets/archive_embed_player.swf" bgcolor="#000000" height="300" width="400"><param name="movie" value="http://www.justin.tv/widgets/archive_embed_player.swf"><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="always"><param name="allowNetworking" value="all"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><param name="flashvars" value="auto_play=false&start_volume=25&title=Live Streaming on GiantBomb.com!&channel=giantbomb&archive_id=286169849"></object><br /><a href="http://www.justin.tv/giantbomb#r=-rid-&s=em" class="trk" style="padding:2px 0px 4px; display:block; width: 320px; font-weight:normal; font-size:10px; text-decoration:underline; text-align:center;">Watch live video from Giant Bomb Live! on Justin.tv</a>James-Kondhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17207918860500397539noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9000888890659356944.post-49325775287169729262009-02-01T10:41:00.000-08:002009-02-01T10:47:10.454-08:00New BlogWhoa..<br />Does it smell like dead people in here or is it just me? =)<br />Oh well.. I guess Arch Gamer wasn't all that much of a success, OK it was a success but I just stopped caring. It was just like screaming to someone who was behind bulletproof glass.<br /><br />I however have started new life somewhere else. On my blog (yes a real blog this time around)<br />On this blog I will be of course talking about video games again. But less expansive, just little comments and opinions I have about games. But not only games this time around I will also be covering Music, Tv Shows and Movies.<br /><br />I hope you will enjoy it as much as me.<br />The blog can be found over at: <a href="http://www.investigatingecho.wordpress.com/">http://www.investigatingecho.wordpress.com/</a>James-Kondhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17207918860500397539noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9000888890659356944.post-64756944923250416212008-09-05T07:50:00.000-07:002008-09-05T07:51:09.333-07:00(Xbox 360/PS3) Burnout Paradise [AUDIO ONLY]<img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/bigboxshots/6/933706_79397_front.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Burnout Paradise</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Release Date:</span><br />Europe - 25th January 2008<br />America - 22nd January 2008<br />Japan - 21st February 2008<br /><br /><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 227px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://noobtoob.koi89.org/RetroNoobzPlayer/listen.gif" border="0" /><br /><br /><object classid="clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=7,0,0,0" id="pcpp" width="300" align="middle" height="30"><param name="allowScriptAccess" value="sameDomain"><param name="movie" value="http://www.podcastpickle.com/media/podPlayer/pcpp.swf?URI=http://noobtoob.koi89.org/iceman_reviews_burnout_paradise.mp3&instantLoad=0&instantPlay=0"><param name="quality" value="high"><param name="bgcolor" value="#000000"><embed src="http://www.podcastpickle.com/media/podPlayer/pcpp.swf?URI=http://noobtoob.koi89.org/iceman_reviews_burnout_paradise.mp3&instantLoad=0" quality="high" bgcolor="#000000" name="pcpp" allowscriptaccess="sameDomain" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" width="300" align="middle" height="30"></embed></object><br /><br /><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 326px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://noobtoob.koi89.org/RetroNoobzPlayer/download.gif" border="0" /><br /><br /><a href="http://noobtoob.koi89.org/iceman_reviews_burnout_paradise.mp3" target="_blank">http://noobtoob.koi89.org/iceman_reviews_burnout_paradise.mp3</a><br /><br /><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 277px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://noobtoob.koi89.org/RetroNoobzPlayer/shownotes.gif" border="0" /><br /><br /> <table width="90%" align="center" border="0" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"> <tbody><tr> <td> <span style="font-size: 11px;"> <div style="margin: 5px 20px 20px;"> <div class="smallfont" style="margin-bottom: 2px;"> <b>Spoiler:</b> <input value="Show" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; width: 45px; font-size: 10px;" onclick="if (this.parentNode.parentNode.getElementsByTagName('div')[1].getElementsByTagName('div')[0].style.display != '') { this.parentNode.parentNode.getElementsByTagName('div')[1].getElementsByTagName('div')[0].style.display = ''; this.innerText = ''; this.value = 'Hide'; } else { this.parentNode.parentNode.getElementsByTagName('div')[1].getElementsByTagName('div')[0].style.display = 'none'; this.innerText = ''; this.value = 'Show'; }" type="button"> </div> <div class="alt2" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); margin: 0px; padding: 6px; background-color: rgb(250, 250, 250);"> <div style="display: none;"> burnout paradise<br /><br />dj atomica - tips, trick and hints to secret locations. mostly pointless, but some good stuff in there at times<br /><br />first or 3rd person perspecitive<br /><br />wide open free roaming city, free updates to come including day and night and motorbikes<br /><br />total of 75 cars to unlock. sponsor codes don't work on pal version<br /><br />stunt, agression and speed. each car earns the boost in different ways<br /><br />stunt run, race (sometimes 1vs1), marked man, takedown, time attack (rule the road) and crash mode (completely differnet to all other burnout games)<br /><br />clear indication on where to go by a map and voice of dj atomica (this is a race, drive east to the wild cats baseball stadium)<br /><br />burning routes unlock a new or upgraded version of that car<br /><br />new cars unlocked which drive around the city and must be taken down to drive<br /><br />indicates where to go during races with the street names at the top of the screen<br /><br />140 events to find, 400 smashes, 120 billboards and 100 super jumps<br /><br />need to win a certain ammount of races to upgrade your licence. all envents done are unlocked again.<br /><br />uses the fight night round 3 crash physics and most crashes look amazing<br /><br />online mode - quickly start or join in games by clicking right on the d-pad<br /><br />450 online events, most are the same, but you need between 2 to 8 people<br /><br />80 new events added with the cagney update and you can do more modes<br /><br />makes use of the xbox live vision camera. take pictures of yourself when you take someone down and get theirs if you take them down. get them from races and other events too<br /><br />picture paradise when fully stopped. goes black and white and you hear classical music<br /><br /><br /><br />bad points<br /><br />no restart option when you fail an event. you have to drive all the way back which can sometimes take quite a long time <br /><br />incation on where to to turn during events can sometimes be far to quick.<br /><br />unskipable crashes and lose screens<br /><br />computer cars blaetently cheat. they turn up quick without breaking. they crash into cars or other vechicles which always fly exactly where you are and make you crash.<br /><br />repetive if you play for too long. re-doing the same events over and over<br /><br />you have rely too much on looking at the mini map or full map. no in-game indicator on where to go.<br /><br />music selection is quite bad. uses ea trax, but you can select which to turn off. </div> </div> </div> </span> </td> </tr> </tbody></table> <br /><br /><br /><object width="425" height="344"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/cv9AHSpCuLA&hl=en&fs=1"><param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/cv9AHSpCuLA&hl=en&fs=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" allowfullscreen="true" width="425" height="344"></embed></object><br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2008/022/reviews/933706_20080123_screen049.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2008/022/reviews/933706_20080123_screen010.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2008/022/reviews/933706_20080123_screen014.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2007/345/933706_20071211_screen001.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2007/248/933706_20070906_screen006.jpg" border="0" />iCEMANhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12725786287275413996noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9000888890659356944.post-41912187968680968942008-06-30T13:28:00.000-07:002008-06-30T13:29:08.465-07:00(GameCube/PS2/Xbox) Soul Calibur II<img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/bigboxshots/4/534054_5404_front.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Soul Calibur II</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Release Date:</span><br />27th March 2003 (Japan)<br />27th August 2003 (America)<br />26th September 2003 (Europe)<br /><br /><object height="344" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/iFmA97dVMZM&hl=en"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/iFmA97dVMZM&hl=en" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" height="344" width="425"></embed></object><br /><br /><br /><br />Soul Calibur II is a weapons based fighting game. There's no real story for the characters apart from they're all looking for the legendary Soul Edge. In arcade mode you fight one-on-one with a number of different characters until you get to a "Destined Battle". This has you fighting a predetermined opponent with some brief dialogue said before the fight begins. If you win you'll fight the final boss Inferno, who has three forms, each changing to a random characters move set.<br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2003/news/05/09/namcoe3/ps2xbgc_soulcalibur2_screen001.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />There are also the usual things you'd expect from a fighting game like team battles, survival, practice and battle theatre. Every mode in the game has an "extra mode" associated with it. This allows you to select from all the weapons you've unlocked in Weapon Master Mode.<br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2003/xbox/soulcalibur2/sc2_xbox_0327_screen040.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />The game has an really in-depth character information. This displays everything you might want to know and you can also listen to them say every single piece of dialogue in the game. Another nice thing is the collection history. This shows pictures with information on everything you've managed to unlock throughout the game.<br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2003/ps2/soulcalibur2/0826/p_screen004.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />Weapon Master Mode is what you'll be playing the most, since this is where you unlock almost everything in the game. This mode changes the game and adds a sort of RPG element. You level up your character, buy new weapons and unlock new things like more characters and stages.<br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2003/ps2/soulcalibur2/0331/sc2ps2_screen008.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />You're given a map and you choose what mission to do. Most of them are simple defeat a set amount of enemies. Quite a lot have mission objectives like get a certain amount of hits on the enemy within the time limit. Some have wind or other obstacles like quick sand to hinder your victory.<br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2003/gc/soulcalibur2/sc2_gc_0327_screen021.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />The character selection is pretty diverse with each character has their own unique weapon. Just about every weapon type you could ever think of is in here. There are also some you wouldn't expect like a sword which turns into a whip and even weapons made from dark matter. The characters are well suited to each weapon type and expect to find a lot of clichés.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Exhibitions</span><br /><br /><object height="344" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/PIq5ROrjLqY&hl=en"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/PIq5ROrjLqY&hl=en" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" height="344" width="425"></embed></object><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Console Differences</span><br /><br />The game was released on three different consoles, each having a guest character. The GameCube gets Link from The Legend of Zelda, PS2 gets Heihachi Mishima from Tekken and Xbox gets Todd McFarlane's comic book hero Spawn. Having played all three version I'd say Link is the better of the three. Here's a brief outline of the characters and moves;<br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2003/news/01/15/soulcalibur2/sc2gc_screen008.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />Link uses the Master Sword and Hylian Shield. As well as using his main weapon he can use a number of sub-weapons. These include classics such as bombs, boomerang and even a bow and arrow. Having a varied amount of short, medium and long ranged attacks makes him a force to be reckoned with. Most people consider him to be a cheap and spazy character, but that's a matter of opinion.<br /><br />When you win a fight you're treated to the item pick music from most Zelda games. This really put a huge smile on my face when I heard it for the first time in-game.<br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2003/ps2/soulcalibur2/sc2_ps_0327_screen004.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />Heihachi Mishima uses what looks like his bare hands, but in fact are gauntlets. He plays just like he does in Tekken with some minor changes here and there. He's a great character if you like a challenge since he's quite hard to get to grips with.<br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2003/xbox/soulcalibur2/0826/x_screen003.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />Spawn uses an axe made from his cape. He can shoot some weak projectiles for distractions. His most unique moves are the ability to teleport and levitate for short periods of time. You really need to keep your eyes on this guy because he's a lot stronger than he looks.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Music</span><br /><br />This is the first time I've mentioned the music in my reviews. I just had to mention it since it's absolutely amazing. Namco have really made an effort to immerse you in the game. The orchestral melodies are really well suited and always remind me of the good times I've had with the game. As with many game sequels you'll hear some familiar songs from the original Soul Calibur. I'd say my favourite is the music from the credits because it includes the Mission Mode music which I loved.<br /><br />I loved the music so much I bought the limited edition guide book just for the soundtrack. I'd also even go as far as to say this is one of my favourite game soundtracks of all time.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Graphics</span><br /><br />This is another first for my reviews and this is because of the three different version of the game. I'll only be briefly covering which version has what features. The PS2 is the worst simply because it doesn't offer anything special. The GameCube comes in second place because the game can be displayed in progressive scan. The Xbox version is the best because it has the highest texture quality, smoothest frame rate and gameplay. The Xbox version can also be displayed in 720p which looks great even when emulated on the Xbox 360.<br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2003/news/01/15/soulcalibur2/sc2ps2_screen024.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Final Thoughts</span><br /><br />Transcending history and the world. A tale of souls and swords, eternally retold. The famous words from the intro which sum up the game quite nicely.<br /><br />This is a fantastic fighting game which proudly stands the test of time and will always have you coming back for more. You'll spend at least 20 hours unlocking everything and even more time play against the CPU or your friends. There are lot of different modes to choose from so you'll spoiled for choice.<br /><br />The super easy pick up play controls give the most enjoyable fighting game experience you'll ever likely to get. Even people who have never played can look and feel like professionals within minutes.<br /><br />There's only one major fault with this game which is the English voices. They're so bad they make my ears bleed. This isn't a problem because the game has the option to change the voices to Japanese. This is great and makes the game so much more playable.<br /><br />I've 100% completed this game on GameCube, PS2 and Xbox and loved every minute of it. I can't give this game anything other than a <span style="font-weight: bold;">massive thumbs up</span>. I'd say it's Namco's best ever fighting game and you can't afford to miss out on playing it.<br /><br />Make sure you look out for Soul Calibur on Xbox Live Arcade. There's no confirmed release date yet, but I think it should come out near to when Soul Calibur IV does.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">References</span><br /><br /><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soul_Calibur_II" target="_blank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soul_Calibur_II</a><br /><br /><a href="http://www.soulcaliburuniverse.com/" target="_blank">http://www.soulcaliburuniverse.com</a><br /><br /><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heihachi_Mishima" target="_blank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heihachi_Mishima</a><br /><br /><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spawn_%28comics%29" target="_blank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spawn_%28comics%29</a><br /><br /><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Link_%28The_Legend_of_Zelda%29" target="_blank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Link_%28The_Legend_of_Zelda%29</a>iCEMANhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12725786287275413996noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9000888890659356944.post-61340487056164315992008-06-28T05:02:00.000-07:002008-06-28T05:03:30.201-07:00(XBLA/PSN) Wolf of the Battlefield: Commando 3<img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2008/163/reviews/943724_20080612_screen003.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Wolf of the Battlefield: Commando 3</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Also known as:</span><br />Senjō no Ōkami<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Release date:</span><br />11th June 2008<br /><br /><object height="344" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/gw02RL-iuAA&hl=en"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/gw02RL-iuAA&hl=en" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" height="344" width="425"></embed></object><br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2008/072/943724_20080313_screen011.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />Wolf of the Battlefield: Commando 3 is a top down run and gun shooter and is the latest game in the Commando series. The first game was Commando, then came Mercs on the Megadrive then this game. I cover Mercs and Wolf of the Battlefield: Commando 3 in <a href="http://www.noobtoob.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=6902" target="_blank" class="postlink">RetroNoobz Episode 10</a>. That's just a heads up for those of you who prefer to listen to a review rather than read. You know who you are <img src="http://www.noobtoob.com/forum/images/smiles/icon_wink.gif" alt="Wink" border="0" /><br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2008/163/reviews/943724_20080612_screen017.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />You have a selection of three character who are Wolf who looks like Arnold Schwarzenegger, Coyote who looks like Sylvester Stallone and Fox who is just some random woman. Each of them have different abilities and play differently. Wolf can get the most weapon upgrades, but is lacking grenades and doesn't have too much health. Coyote has loads of health and grenades, but is slow and powerful. Finally, Fox is fast, has the most grenades, but has the lowest health.<br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2008/163/reviews/943724_20080612_screen010.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />There are a total of five stages, each with their own themes, enemies and other unique bits and pieces. Most of these are similar to Mercs and Commando so those of you familiar with those games are in for some nostalgia bukkake. The stages also have similar traps like land mines and enemies jumping out of no where which is a nice thing to keep in the series.<br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2008/072/943724_20080313_screen006.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />You have four different weapons to find and choose from. The Machine Gun (blue box) this is the fast firing default weapon and is really weak, but it has a long range. Spread Shot (green box) this acts like a shotgun and great for taking out multiple enemies at once. Flame Thrower (orange box) this is great for taking out infantry, but nothing else, personally I'd stay well away from this. Finally is the Rocket Launcher (red box), this is my weapon of chose because it deals massive damage and has quite a large explosion radius.<br /><br />Your weapons are upgraded by collection the POW block which has been featured in countless Capcom games. The extent of the upgrade depends on which character you choose. Each time you die you'll drop a POW block so you need to make sure you pick it up. You'll need to do it quickly if playing online because someone else will usually steal it.<br /><br /><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 430px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2007/290/943725_20071018_embed004.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />As well as having your standard weapons there are grenades and special move called M-Crash. The M-Crash was first introduced in Mercs and makes its triumphant return once again. It's a super powerful explosion attack which will destroy almost anything on screen in one go. Once activated you'll see a brief animation and the explosion will emanate from wherever you character is on screen. As well as doing massive damage it removes all projectiles. I always keep one spare so I can save my life just before I see the final hit coming towards me. It's a cheap trick I know, but I'd rather stay alive.<br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2008/072/943724_20080313_screen003.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />Every so often you'll come across mountable machine gun turrets. These shoot ridiculously fast and have a wide range on them. It's always a good idea to get on these because you can quickly and easily destroy anything that gets in your way.<br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2008/072/943724_20080313_screen010.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />As well as running and gunning you can usually find a vehicle to drive. Apart from the last level it'll be a six wheeled jeep with a machine gun on the back. Strangely the driver can shoot rockets which doesn't make much sense, but it's fun none the less. There's room for some one to get in the passenger seat so all three people can cause some massive damage.<br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2008/072/943724_20080313_screen009.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />Some levels have a part which requires you to get on a moving platform and take out enemies on the way. These are pity pointless and don't really add much to the game. The path is pre-set so there's no real skill involved apart from dodging enemy projectiles. The movements of these things usually look spazy and could have had some more work put into them.<br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2008/072/943724_20080313_screen008.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />The bosses in the game aren't all that great. Most of them have attack patterns which are so easy to see coming you might as well not even fight them. If you're like me, you'll have up all your grenades and M-Crashes and spam the boss all at once. If done right you can take off half its health before the battle begins. There's no challenge and you always feel let down after the battle.<br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2008/072/943724_20080313_screen014.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />If you haven't already guessed this game has three player online or offline co-op. However, there's a slight twist to this. You all share the same lives so working as a team is crucial. If you play with two players you get nine lives and three players get twelve. This gives to game a somewhat unique team playing element.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Final Thoughts</span><br /><br />There are lots of hidden areas and can try and rescue all the captured prisoners. Doing this doesn't do much, but it gives you some other objectives to work towards which are optional.<br /><br />If you like top down run and gun shooters you'll more than likely have a good time with this game. The game can be quite short and doesn't have much to offer when it comes to boss fights. It's great to play locally with friends or online.<br /><br />I have to give this game a <span style="font-weight: bold;">conditional thumbs up</span>. If you're a fan of Mercs or Commando you'll love this. I'd recommend playing the demo if you have an Xbox 360. If the old school style gameplay isn't your thing then I'd give it a <span style="font-weight: bold;">thumbs down</span>.<br /><br />Personally, I love these types of games so it's great for me. The 800 Microsoft Points/$10 may be a little too much for what you get. If the game ever drops in price it's defiantly work picking up if you're still unsure about it.<br /><br />The game gives people access to the Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix beta and <a href="http://www.noobtoob.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=7003" target="_blank" class="postlink">you can read my review here</a>.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">References</span><br /><br /><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commando_3" target="_blank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commando_3</a><br /><br />(Megadrive) Mercs<br /><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercs" target="_blank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercs</a><br /><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BLNaqkkDfRI" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BLNaqkkDfRI</a>iCEMANhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12725786287275413996noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9000888890659356944.post-12709885993262633042008-06-27T10:56:00.001-07:002008-06-27T11:02:59.080-07:00Diablo 2 (2008) Review with Reasons why Diablo 3 will be awesome<p><img src="http://content.answers.com/main/content/wp/en/thumb/d/d5/255px-Diablo2coverscan.jpg" alt="255px-Diablo2coverscan.jpg" /><br /><br /><strong><span style="color:orange;">Intro</span></strong></p><br /><p>It has been a while since I have reviewed something but I think, since the Review Section went very open allowing me to review old games, that it is time to review one of my favourite games of all time, Diablo II by Blizzard Entertainment.<br /><br />Currently the game is 8 years old and rumors of a new Diablo game are floating around, so this is the perfect time to make a review.</p><br /><br /><p><strong><span style="color:green;">Story</span></strong><br />Diablo is about an Wanderer who you as hero follow, everywhere this Wanderer goes he leaves big evil monsters and destruction, for you to clean everything up and stop the Wanderer from completing his evil plan, what ever that is (no spoilers here)</p><br /><br /><p>The story in Diablo II is very deep it is mostly told trough Cutscences and when you talk to NPC and do Quests. The speech of the NPC's can be very long and there all spoken in with real voice-actor, very different from World of Warcraft in that sense.<br /><br />I think the story of Diablo II is very good and I totality love it, even though it isn't very deep and a bit generic,</p><br /><br /><p><strong><span style="color:green;">Gameplay</span></strong><br />The gameplay in Diablo II can be best described as hack and slash, it's very easy at base, you have 2 mouse buttons for 2 different actions and you can target enemies with your mouse. But the game at the end is quite deep, you will get many spells depending on who of the 5 characters you are and what skill tree you choose. You can also alter the way you play by changing you stats, like Strength, Dexterity, Vitality etc..</p><br /><br /><p><img src="http://i153.photobucket.com/albums/s205/JamesKond/DiabloInventory.png" alt="DiabloInventory.png" /></p><br /><br /><p>Apart from the combat system there is also a full fetched inventory system which let you change the way you look but more importantly how much damage you do, how much defence you have and some magic effects can upgrade certain skills.<br /><br />There also gems and chips you can put into your weapon to further upgrade them, there is also a cube that can upgrade the chips and gems again to make them more powerful. Like I said earlier there lots of types of items, ranging from 'cracked' to 'Unique' items all with there own special color.</p><br /><br /><p><span style="color:green;"><strong>Presentation</strong></span><br />To be fair, Diablo II runs on 8 year old graphics, back in the day it was stunning and now a days it still doesn't look that bad, the whole reason for this is that it is 2D which gives it the power to still look pretty, I would however prefer a better looking game or even an mod to make it look better, but hell it still doesn't look ugly</p><br /><br /><p>The music in Diablo II is totality amazing, it has been graved into my head and it will never leave, it's mostly Spanish guitars and drums but played in such an creepy and energetic way it scares the shit out of you but still gives you the thrill to keep playing.</p><br /><br /><p><span style="color:green;"><strong>Replay Value</strong></span></p><br /><p>There aren't a lot of quests in Diablo II, even though every quest is fully worked out with Voices, Special Items, and Bosses. every act has only 6 quests and there 4 acts in total with Act 4 having only 3 quests, to make up for this there 3 difficulty levels, with the next level getting unlocked when you finished the first one, there is 'hardcore mode' which only gives you one live, so if you die it's game over, there is the 'secret cow level' which has hundreds of cow enemies in it and an big end boss which you can do over and over. Maybe the biggest replay factor is the online play, which is still heavily populated, you can work together on quests, help each other out, grind bosses, PvP and trade.</p><br /><br /><p>There is only one thing I haven't touched on, the whole concept of Diablo II, every instance of the game, every map you play on, is randomly generated, so you will never come cross the same encounter, ever. they do however have similar things in every same instance, like a boss or stairs that lead downwards, but there always on an other spot. This give Diablo and Diablo II endless replay value, making it (in my eyes) the best game that could ever be created and this is why I can not wait for Diablo III to show it's head at the Blizzard World Wide Invitational tomorrow.</p><br /><br /><p><span style="color:orange;"><strong>Verdict</strong></span><br />Diablo II is the first game I played constantly, played thousands of hours in and the first game I have finished, it has the most solid replay value of all games I have ever played in my life, everyone should have at least played this game.<br /><br />There will however be one game that can top Diablo II and that would be number III.</p><br /><br /><p><strong><span style="font-size:15;">9,5</span>/10</strong></p><br /><br /><p><span style="font-size:18;"><strong>Two Big Juicy Thumbs Up!</strong></span></p>James-Kondhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17207918860500397539noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9000888890659356944.post-23727934929874257832008-06-27T01:42:00.000-07:002008-06-27T01:43:16.072-07:00(XBLA) Super Street Fighter II Turbo HD Remix betaThis is me playing for the first time, straight after downloading the demo. Sorry about the dodgy camera angle, I didn't have anywhere else to get a better view.<br /><br /><object height="350" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/7hBDSgEaGOw"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/7hBDSgEaGOw" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" height="350" width="425"></embed></object><br /><br />The only way to get this beta is to buy the Xbox Live Arcade game of Wolf of the Battlefield: Commando 3. This will be available for eight weeks from 25th June and will enable Capcom to test the online capabilities of the game.<br /><br />You have a number of options before you start the game, most of which are locked. You can choose your preferred type of audio which can either be the original arcade version or the new remixed tracks. There's also limited gameplay customisation like the number of rounds, time limit and game speed. Finally you can choose to have the game in widescreen, which I'd highly recommend.<br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/1/19/Hdstreetfighter.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />The games sprites and backgrounds have been completely redrawn UDON Comics. These guys were responsible for the Street Fighter comics and they give the game very stylised new look. In my opinion this is a welcome improvement to the series and it works very well. In the completed game you can have the option of the updated visuals or the classic style we're all used to.<br /><br />The games music was handled by my favourite gaming remix website OverClocked ReMix. The main menu music (Ken's theme) is an edited version from the Blood on the Asphalt album. This was a collaboration from various remixes and turned out to be a great Street Fighter tribute soundtrack.<br /><br />You have the option of either choosing Ryu or Ken. They are known as Mesatsu fighters and dress in a traditional karate outfit. These guys are very similar, but also very different. Ryu relies more on power and Ken relies more on speed. They both control the same so might not find much difference between to start off with. They mostly do your standard types of martial arts moves with a few variations in-between. Each of them has unique move, Ryu can do a two hit lunging punch while Ken can do a stylish over head kick.<br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2008/072/939066_20080312_screen007.jpg" border="0" /> <br /><br />They have each have three special moves which are Hadoken (fireball), Shoryuken (diagonal uppercut) or Tatsumaki Senpukyaku (forward hurricane kick). Each character has a unique flaming attack. Ryu can do a fire Hadoken while Ken can do a fire Shoryuken. Once you deal enough damage to your opponent you can do your "super move". Ryu can do a Super Hadoken which will hit your opponent five times and Ken can do a Shoryureppa which is a double Shoryuken.<br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2008/072/939066_20080312_screen004.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />In options the "how to play" option isn't selectable so newcomers to Street Fighter are at a major disadvantage. You're basically fucked because you'll have to figure the moves out for yourself, ask a friend or find a moves list online. Why this wasn't available is a complete mystery. What were Capcom thinking?<br /><br />I know it's only the first day of playing the game, but I've had some major issues with the game already. First was when selecting a quick match my Xbox completely crashed and I had to hard reset it. This happened twice and also happened to moltile a few times. I've also had the menus disappear, but they still had the information at the bottom of the screen so I guessed what I was doing.<br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2008/153/939066_20080602_screen004.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />Playing online didn't seem as laggy as I though it'd be apart from the first few fights I watched as a spectator. I didn't have an issue once I started to play and I enjoyed myself. If the game is like this in the complete version I'll have many hours of fun online. The only options available were the six player tournament mode which makes the other people sit out and watch while two people fight. This is a bit unnecessary if you ask me, but it'll get you in to the swing of things once you see a few fights before you play.<br /><br />The major issue with playing this on the Xbox 360 is the shitty d-pad. It really hinders your movements and I found myself doing the wrong special moves or moving in the wrong direction. This isn't really anything to do with the way to game was designed, but it's still something to mention. I'm sure you'll eventually get used to the strange way you have to play, but you shouldn't need to. I'm looking into finding a 3rd party controller with a good d-pad to play this the way it was intended to be played.<br /><br />Apart from having to buy Wolf of the Battlefield: Commando 3 I'd say this a great demo. Pity about only being able to choose from Ryu and Ken who are very similar. The lack of a versus CPU option could put some people off because you'll need Xbox Live Gold membership to play. It's great to see new stylised Street Fighter in 1080p on my HD TV. I give this a <span style="font-weight: bold;">thumbs up</span> and I look forward to playing the complete game when ever it's released later this year. <br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">References</span><br /><br /><a href="http://www.udoncomics.com/" target="_blank">www.udoncomics.com</a><br /><br /><a href="http://www.ocremix.org/" target="_blank">http://www.ocremix.org</a><br /><br /><a href="http://sf2.ocremix.org/" target="_blank">http://sf2.ocremix.org</a><br /><br /><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_Street_Fighter_II_Turbo_HD_Remix" target="_blank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_Street_Fighter_II_Turbo_HD_Remix</a>iCEMANhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12725786287275413996noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9000888890659356944.post-85800035000707338272008-06-13T09:10:00.001-07:002008-06-13T09:10:55.784-07:00(NES) Bionic Commando with Rearmed info<img src="file:///C:/DOCUME%7E1/iCEMAN/LOCALS%7E1/Temp/moz-screenshot.jpg" alt="" /><br /> <img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img84.imageshack.us/img84/8509/bionicneseud5.jpg" border="0" /><br /> <br /> <span style="font-weight: bold;">Bionic Commando</span><br /> <br /> <span style="font-weight: bold;">Also known as:</span><br /> Top Secret: Hitler's Revival<br /> <br /> <span style="font-weight: bold;">Release date:</span><br /> 20th July, 1988 in Japan and America<br /> 26th October, 1990 in Europe<br /> <br /> The game's set in the year 198X where Generalissimo Killt has engaged a secret project called "The Albatross" to resurrect the games final boss Master-D. Joseph "Super Joe" Gibson, who was the hero from the original arcade version, was sent in to put a stop to their plans. Unfortunately, you lose contact with him and send in this games new hero Nathan "Rad" Spencer. If you didn't think there could be any more cheesy 80s names in this game, think again. The enemy forces are called The Badds.<br /> <br /> <img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img362.imageshack.us/img362/1163/bcingamedg6.png" border="0" /><br /> <br />This is a platformer with the key element of being able to jump being removed. Instead of being able to jump you use a Bionic Arm to help you get to higher platforms. This really makes you think about what you're doing and gives the game a unique twist.<br /> <br /> <img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img291.imageshack.us/img291/7424/bcmapjl8.png" border="0" /><br /> <br />Before you even get into the game itself you'll be on the world map. You have to choose your location by moving around a blue helicopter, then choosing to either descend or move to a different stage. Next up is choosing your weapon, special items and communicator. Choosing the correct things before you start a stage is the key to success. Some stages require certain items or weapons to be able to even be able to start them. Finding out what you need for each one is sometimes not as obvious as it might seem.<br /> <br /> <img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img524.imageshack.us/img524/9139/bcitemsxw4.png" border="0" /> <img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img212.imageshack.us/img212/8930/bcitems2gu4.png" border="0" /><br /> <img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img405.imageshack.us/img405/7281/bcitems3ku6.png" border="0" /> <img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img246.imageshack.us/img246/2640/bcitems4gv4.png" border="0" /><br /> <br />To start off with you only have two lives and one hit and you're dead. By killing enemies you'll pick up energy tanks and once you have enough of them you can get more health. You can have a maximum of eight hit points and different things take off varying ammount of damage. Getting hit by enemy bullets will only take off one hit, but falling into a spike pit will take off four.<br /> <br /> <img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img411.imageshack.us/img411/3554/bccommunicationcs1.png" border="0" /> <img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img72.imageshack.us/img72/3811/bccommunication2oj2.png" border="0" /><br /> <br />Once you've explored the stage you'll have to find the communicator room. In here you can either communicate with your team mates or intercept enemy communications. You to make sure you have the right communicator for the job or you'll get a scrambled message.<br /> <br /> <img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img362.imageshack.us/img362/2702/bcingame2pv4.png" border="0" /><br /> <br />When you've got all the information you can from communicator room you have make your way to the boss. This is never easy because you have to really look around for the way there. As I mentioned at the start there's no jump so you'll have to swing from various different places to reach your goal. The boss is always locked until you find the correct communicator room and get some information. The boss door is easily distinguishable from normal ones because it has an Eagle above it like the picture above.<br /> <br /> <img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img390.imageshack.us/img390/7660/bcbosszd8.png" border="0" /> <img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img401.imageshack.us/img401/9035/bcboss2ql2.png" border="0" /><br /> <img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img390.imageshack.us/img390/8203/bcboss3dx2.png" border="0" /> <img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img508.imageshack.us/img508/1161/bcboss4sd8.png" border="0" /><br /> <br />Inside the boss room is either one of three types of boss. These are a bunch of random soldiers with a commander, a cyborg with a Bionic Arm or a flaoting robot with a 3-way gun. Your main objective is to destroy the enemy computer at the right of the screen. You can either ignore the oppisition and go straight for the computer or take them out and play it safe.<br /> <br /> <img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img508.imageshack.us/img508/5115/bcneutralzoneed2.png" border="0" /> <img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img147.imageshack.us/img147/4115/bcneutralzone2sa5.png" border="0" /><br /> <br />Along your travels you'll come across netural zones where you can interact with people. There are enemies as well as friends here so you need to watch out. When talking to people they'll usually give you hints on what to do next or tell you where to find certain items. If you shoot your weapon here you'll be attacked by a bunch of guards. These guys are serious and won't stop attacking until you're dead.<br /> <br /> <img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img78.imageshack.us/img78/9106/bcingame3hy0.png" border="0" /><br /> <br />There are a number of different types of stages and one of the strangest is Area 03. The stage has weird creatures that look spiders, giant moths and even man eating plants. As well as doing your standard stages there's also some which require you to climb up enourmous towers to the top. These are extremely challenging because one slip and you're dead.<br /> <br /> <img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img237.imageshack.us/img237/7981/bctopdownzl4.png" border="0" /> <img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img237.imageshack.us/img237/4430/bctopdown2nb7.png" border="0" /><br /> <br />When travelling between different areas you'll encounter enemy trucks which will change the game to a top down view. This are quick stages which, more than anything only give you continues from defeating the harder enemies. Depending on the stage it'll either be a heavy guy with a rocket launcher and shield or a truck with two enemies shooting at you. The continues look like the Eagle logo which you see every where you look.<br /> <br /> Finally is the most notorious part of the game. I've put it in the spoiler below because it's right at the end of the game.<br /> <br /> <table align="center" border="0" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1" width="90%"> <tbody><tr> <td> <span style="font-size: 11px;"> <div style="margin: 5px 20px 20px;"> <div class="smallfont" style="margin-bottom: 2px;"> <b>Spoiler:</b> <input value="Show" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; width: 45px; font-size: 10px;" onclick="if (this.parentNode.parentNode.getElementsByTagName('div')[1].getElementsByTagName('div')[0].style.display != '') { this.parentNode.parentNode.getElementsByTagName('div')[1].getElementsByTagName('div')[0].style.display = ''; this.innerText = ''; this.value = 'Hide'; } else { this.parentNode.parentNode.getElementsByTagName('div')[1].getElementsByTagName('div')[0].style.display = 'none'; this.innerText = ''; this.value = 'Show'; }" type="button"> </div> <div class="alt2" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); margin: 0px; padding: 6px; background-color: rgb(250, 250, 250);"> <div style="display: none;"> <img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 128px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://www.elitecoder.com/bionic/hitlerex.gif" border="0" /> </div> </div> </div> </span> </td> </tr> </tbody> </table> <br /> <br /> <span style="font-weight: bold;">Changes from the original Japanese to English versions</span><br /> <br />For those of you who didn't know, the original Japanese game name was Top Secret: Hitler's Revival. The game had you fighting against Nazi forces instead of The Badds and Master-D is called Hitler. Apart from other obvious changes like the Eagle logo changed from the Swastika, there were a number of changes made to the game to make it a lot easier compared to its English counterpart. The Japanese version had more enemies in certain areas, more traps like falling platforms and are a lot more lasers blocking your path. Below are some examples of the changes that were made.<br /> <br /> <img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://www.gameinformer.com/NR/rdonlyres/A884A9AC-FD9D-4867-A65A-50975DDDE3E2/10056/bionic.jpg" border="0" /><br /> <br /> <img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 417px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/6/62/Bc-comparison-covers.JPG/417px-Bc-comparison-covers.JPG" border="0" /><br /> <br /> <img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/8/89/Bionic-killt-comparison.PNG" border="0" /><br /> <br /> <span style="font-weight: bold;">Bionic Commando Rearmed</span><br /> <br />This is complete remake of the original NES version. There are 3D graphics represented in a pseudo 2D perspective, sometimes referred as 2.5D. I believe this will give the game a lot depth, while still keeping with core gameplay elements intact. As far as I know, the game will be using the same graphics and physics engine as the new Bionic Commando.<br /> <br /> There are a number of new gameplay modes which are;<br /> <br /> Co-op (player 2 can drop in at any time as an orange guy)<br /> Challenge Rooms (get from the start to the finish as fast as possible)<br /> Up to 4 versus multiplayer (free-for-all or team deathmatch)<br /> <br />All the stages, items, characters and everything else is the exactly the same as you'll remember it. There's only one major change which is addition of some new bosses. In the original game all you had to do is find the boss room and destroy a giant computer and that's it. Each stage now has a unique boss which will make the stages a lot less repetitive. Capcom have said that if you're playing co-op, the bosses will be different and you'll have to work together to defeat them.<br /> <br />It's 10th June, 2008 and there's still no confirmed release date for Bionic Commando Rearmed. It was due to be released in last month and Capcom have said there's going to be a delay to "improve the quality of the game".<br /> <br />Bionic Commando Rearmed will be released on Xbox Live Arcade (XBLA), PlayStation Network (PSN) and through various digital distribution services like Steam. Capcom have confirmed that there'll be some sort of "link feature" between the new Bionic Commando and Bionic Commando Rearmed. This will allow you can unlock different things like the classic Nathan "Rad" Spencer costume in the new Bionic Commando.<br /> <br /> <img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://www.bioniccommando.com/img/site/resources/195_content_lightbox.jpg" border="0" /><br /> <br /> <img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://www.bioniccommando.com/img/site/resources/316_content_lightbox.jpg" border="0" /><br /> <br /> <img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://www.bioniccommando.com/img/site/resources/273_content_lightbox.jpg" border="0" /><br /> <br /> <img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://www.bioniccommando.com/img/site/resources/374_content_lightbox.jpg" border="0" /><br /> <br /> <img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://www.bioniccommando.com/img/site/resources/251_content_lightbox.jpg" border="0" /><br /> <br /> <img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://www.bioniccommando.com/img/site/resources/261_content_lightbox.jpg" border="0" /><br /> <br /> <span style="font-weight: bold;">Final Thoughts</span><br /> <br />This game is extremely unique and I don't think any other game has tried to copy its gameplay style and swing mechanics. It's extremely challenging, but rewarding to try and figure out how to make use of your limited movements to try and reach your destination. Once you've mastered how to swing you'll get a lot of enjoyment out of this game. You'll never get bored too quickly because there's a lot of different gameplay styles. There are the main action stages, bonus "enemy encounter" top down view stages and even some RPG parts, where you'll need to chat with people in the neutral zones. Basically, this is an amazing game which starts off quite simple, but soon engrosses you into a unique mind set. You'll never look at a platform game the same ever again.<br /> <br />A major bad point that it can be quite a long and hard game and there's no save or password options. The game can be very particular when letting you grapple on to things and it takes real skill to master. Due to the lack of memory on the NES, the enemies quickly respawn giving you little time to recover from their attacks. This is quite a big issue in later stages. Some are almost impossible to do without getting hit because there's loads of enemies in the same place. With a bit of practice, most of these can be quickly overcome and it doesn't really effect the game.<br /> <br />This is one of my favourite games of all time has also reached legendary status on RetroNoobz. The only thing I can give this game is a massive <span style="font-weight: bold;">thumbs up</span> as shown in the photo of me below.<br /> <br /> <span style="font-weight: bold;">References</span><br /> <br /> <a href="http://www.bioniccommando.com/en" target="_blank">http://www.bioniccommando.com/en</a><br /> <br /> <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bionic_Commando_%28NES%29" target="_blank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bionic_Commando_%28NES%29</a><br /> <br /> <a href="http://www.thealmightyguru.com/Reviews/BionicCommando/BC-TopSecret.html" target="_blank">http://www.thealmightyguru.com/Reviews/BionicCommando/BC-TopSecret.html</a>iCEMANhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12725786287275413996noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9000888890659356944.post-50633993854849714052008-03-29T13:34:00.000-07:002008-03-29T13:47:20.925-07:00Noitu Love 2 Demo<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.konjak.org/images/noitu2_scr00.gif"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px;" src="http://www.konjak.org/images/noitu2_scr00.gif" alt="" border="0" /></a><br />The long awaited sequel to much praised independent free game <span>Noitu Love</span><span style="font-weight: bold;">, Noitu Love 2</span><span>,</span> will come out in a few days, the demo is already out, you can get the demo at the creator's site. I have played the demo and totality loved it, if the full game is cheap I will deffentially buy it!<br /><br /><a href="http://www.konjak.org/nlove2.htm">Download Link</a><br /><a href="http://www.konjak.org/nlove.htm">Noitu Love 1</a>James-Kondhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17207918860500397539noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9000888890659356944.post-21522880675826216822008-03-29T13:22:00.000-07:002008-03-29T13:31:26.583-07:00Prey for only 5 dollars<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://z.about.com/d/xbox/1/7/g/F/prey2.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 320px;" src="http://z.about.com/d/xbox/1/7/g/F/prey2.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Prey</span> has been cut off from a price of 25$ to the amazing price of only 5 dollars! this deal is only available on Steam and only for this weekend, but you like First Person Shooters you should totality buy this, sometimes people say something is 'a steal' this deffentially counts for Prey, go buy it now!<br /><br />You can buy and download Prey for steam here: <a href="http://www.steampowered.com/v/index.php?area=game&AppId=3970">http://www.steampowered.com/v/index.php?area=game&AppId=3970</a><br /><br />Full press release:<br /><blockquote style="font-style: italic;">Here's a deal you can sink your teeth into: this weekend only, pick up the acclaimed first person shooter <a href="http://www.steampowered.com/v/index.php?area=game&AppId=3970">Prey</a> for just $4.95.<br /><br />In Prey, players enter a living spaceship which enslaves alien races and devours humans for lunch. Prey turns the first person shooter genre upside down with awesome new gameplay features like wall-walking and gravity flipping, making for intense single-player and multi-player experiences.<br /><br />Prey is built on a heavily modded version of the Doom 3 engine and is developed by critically acclaimed developer Human Head Studios under the direction of 3D Realms.</blockquote>James-Kondhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17207918860500397539noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9000888890659356944.post-73344591647180523742008-03-21T14:19:00.001-07:002008-03-21T14:19:44.889-07:00Tom Clancy's Rainbow Six Vegas 2 review<img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="2" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img529.imageshack.us/img529/9198/rsv2boxntscxr5.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Release date:</span><br />18th March 2008 in America<br />20th March 2008 in Europe and Australia <br />24th April 2008 in Japan<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Also released on:</span><br />PlayStation 3 and PC<br /><br />If you select extras then comcast gift and enter <span style="font-weight: bold;">comcast faster</span> when prompted you unlock the new multiplayer map. After you've unlocked the map and can download Streets from Rainbow Six Vegas. You'll have to have a Ubisoft account linked to your gamertag to do it.<br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="3" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2008/077/944073_20080318_screen001.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Improvements from Rainbow Six Vegas</span><br /><br />The game's graphics have been slightly improved since the game is using an updated Unreal Engine. Everything looks a little more detailed and there's less slowdown. Honestly I can't notice much of a difference, but it's there, trust me. This game isn't the graphical masterpiece that some newer games are so don't expect too much.<br /><br />Other noticeable differences are that the enemies can now use ballistic/riot shields. This can make things tricky in any situation. They can also use thermal or night vision goggles to see you when you throw smoke grenades. In Rainbow Six Vegas all you had to do is throw a smoke grenade and were completely invisible. What's even worse than that is that the enemies used to throw them at you so that's just totally stupid.<br /><br />Destructible environments now play a key role in the game. Previously if an enemy was behind a wooden crate then you just wait for them to slip up and show them self. Now you can just throw a grenade and blow it up killing the enemy without even breaking a sweat. This also applies to you so you have to find something solid to hide behind instead of finding the nearest thing you see. You can also destroy other things like fire extinguishers and barrels of gas. This adds much needed realism which the game was lacking in the original.<br /><br />All the weapons from the previous game are here with 11 new additions. Your selection includes the usual types of guns you'd expect like sub-machine guns, assault rifles, sniper rifles and shotguns. Choosing the right weapon is usually the key the success, but you can always pick up what you need from a terrorist. I find the best strategy is to stick with the weapons the terrorist have so you're never low on ammo. Alternatively you can find a "outfitting station" in story mode. This is a large box which lets you choose from all the weapons and equipment you've unlocked.<br /><br />All experience gained is available and transfers throughout all the game modes. For example if you play multiplayer and rank up you'll have the same equipment and weapons available in story mode. This is a great improvement and I don't understand why this wasn't implemented in the original game. You also get experience even if you fail a mission thanks to the new A.C.E.S system.<br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="4" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2008/077/944073_20080318_screen003.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">A.C.E.S (advanced combat enhancement specialisation)</span><br /><br />This is a new addition to Rainbow Six Vegas 2 which involves you performing specific action to gain rewards. Doing this will unlock weapons and equipment relevant to the you play the game. This is a great idea because everyone plays differently. An example of this is if you get a lot of head shots you'll eventually be rewarded with a new sniper rifle. The actions, what you need to do and brief descriptions are as below;<br /><br />Close Quarters (CQB)<br />This will involve close range shots and using your explosives or flash bangs. You'll more than likely get most of your experience from this since the terrorists like to gang up on you.<br /><br />Assault<br />Getting multiple kills and using grenades or C4. You can order your team to do this for you can get some easy experience points.<br /><br />Marksmanship<br />Using a scope and getting long range kills and head shots. The hardest of the three categories since precision timing is required.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">P.E.C. (persistent elite creation)</span><br /><br />This was in the previous game and has been expanded upon. Every action you do gives you experience and will eventually help you get to the rank of Elite. A nice feature added to the menu is the ability to see all the ranks you can unlock with the relevant weapons, camouflage and gear shown.<br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="5" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2008/077/944073_20080318_screen012.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Single Player</span><br /><br />The single player now has a drop in/drop out feature which lets anyone join your game without interrupting the gameplay. The host will play as Bishop and if someone else joins in they play as Knight. All aspects of the communication are now fully available in co-op unlike the original.<br /><br />Another great thing you can now use your custom character in single and multiplayer story modes. This isn't really a big deal, but at least if you have the Xbox Live Vision Camera you can use your own face. The only way to get your custom character in the original was to play co-op story with up to three friends. The in-game voices are different depending on whether your team leader is a male or female character. This doesn't really add much to the game, but it's nice to have the option available.<br /><br />As well as having your primary and secondary weapons you can also use gadgets. These include a snake cam which lets you see underneath doors and breaching charges which attach to doors and explode at the press of a button. A new addition is the thermal scan which scans your map for heat sources. Your gadgets are limited depending on the difficulty you choose.<br /><br />Your team mates now wear the same camouflage as you so this will make them easily distinguishable. The AI of your team mates is also greatly improved. They now “leap frog” towards cover, this means one will cover the other whilst moving. There is no longer unlimited gadgets at your team's disposal . In the original you could order your team to "frag and clear" a room out about 30 times before they ran out.<br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="6" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2008/037/944073_20080207_screen006.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Multiplayer (online and offline)</span><br /><br />The load times have been dramatically improved. Everyone now loads the map at the same time instead of the host loading then everyone else following. There's no longer a set ammount of points given to you for winning, each kill you get gives you a set ammount of EXP depending on the difficulty or mode. You can see who's talking by looking at the top left of your screen.<br /><br />There's now a kill cam which moves the camera into a position to show who killed you. Call of Duty 4 has this feature so obviously people will say it's a total rip off. New host options are available like "join in progress", sprinting and bullet penetration which can be turned on or off.<br /><br />Team Leader<br />Each team has a leader who must be eliminated. Your leader can see the opposing team leader at all times by a star on their HUD. This means communicating the enemy leader's location is essential. Once the team leader is killed it stops their whole team from spawning. Also if the team leader kills someone on the opposing team they can't spawn in until the match is over.<br /><br />Total Conquest<br />You have to take control of three satellite transmitters and hold them all for a certain amount of time. If one of the satellite transmitters is taken by the opposing team then countdown will be reset.<br /><br />Sharpshooter/Team Sharpshooter<br />This is your standard deathmatch mode. Nothing special here, get the most kills to win.<br /><br />Attack & Defend - There are three different modes depending on which map is selected.<br />The first is item extraction which involves the attacking team trying to get briefcase and the defenders trying to stop them. Next is hostage rescue which is self explanatory. Finally is demolition which one team has to detonate a bomb and the other team stops them. The bomb will have a set countdown timer so you'll need to protect whoever's planting it. Anyone who's played Counter-Strike will be familiar with this mode.<br /><br />Terrorist Hunt<br />You play any of the multiplayer maps with the enemy density set to low, medium or high and kill terrorists. The harder the difficultly the more point you'll gain and you also get points from your team mate's kills. This is my favourite mode.<br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="7" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://image.com.com/gamespot/images/2008/037/944073_20080207_screen005.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Final Thoughts</span><br /><br />There's a glitch where if you got to Elite on the on the original Rainbow Six Vegas you miss out on an achievement. It's for the rank of Private First Class which is skipped due to an EXP bonus. Hopefully this will be fixed in a patch because I've missed it.<br /><br />I give this game a <span style="font-weight: bold;">THUMBS UP</span>. It has a solid story mode with co-op and the multiplayer will keep you playing for at least a few months.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:180%;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Score: 9/10</span></span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">References</span><br /><br /><a href="http://www.rainbowsixgame.com/" target="_blank">http://www.rainbowsixgame.com</a><br /><br /><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Clancy%27s_Rainbow_Six:_Vegas_2" target="_blank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Clancy%27s_Rainbow_Six:_Vegas_2</a>iCEMANhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12725786287275413996noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9000888890659356944.post-75112711612456940632008-03-12T13:44:00.001-07:002008-03-12T14:24:36.735-07:00Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow review<span style="font-weight: bold;"></span><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img142.imageshack.us/img142/2836/dosboxpalav7.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Format:</span><br />Nintendo DS<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Released:</span><br />25th August 2005 in Japan<br />30th September 2005 in Europe<br />4th October 2005 in America<br /><br />This is a direct sequel to Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow on the Gameboy Advance. This game follows Soma Cruz once again in his quest to destroy Dracula’s castle. This game plays just like Aria of Sorrow and has new and improved features. It’s also very similar to Castlevania: Symphony of the Night so expect to play great game.<br /><br /><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 458px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img181.imageshack.us/img181/8598/dosgameplayid8.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Prologue</span><br /><br />The game begins with Soma talking to Mina Hakuba about the return of Castlevania. She was captured by Chaos in Aria of Sorrow and then rescued by Soma. Soon after the mysterious priestess Celia Fortner appears and attacks them. This woman traps Soma in a force field and then he has to fight some monsters. These monsters won’t be much of a challenge to kill because this is a tutorial stage. The first is a Skeleton; second a Pole Knight and lastly a Stone Golem. Each will give you its soul then the force field will be released.<br /><br /><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img112.imageshack.us/img112/7885/dosgameplay2qf4.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Soul Collection</span><br /><br />Each enemy you kill has a chance of giving you its soul. Enemy souls are used to give you a certain abilities from that enemy. There are three types of souls which are Bullet (red), Guardian (blue) and Enchant (yellow). The more of the same type of soul you collect, the more powerful it becomes. When you get five of the same soul it upgrades and when you get nine it upgrades again. The more powerful or useful the soul is, the less chance you have of getting it. Some souls may take an hour or more to get one.<br /><br />Every boss will also give you its soul. This will give you a special ability or skill that’ll allow you to progress further in the game. There are also certain enemies that’ll give you special abilities or skills. Occasionally there are abilities or skills souls hidden in the castle. These are held in a jar which you’ll need to attack to receive the soul. The kind of skills you'll receive are double jump, transform into bat and fast dashing attack. The new abilities or skills will give you next access to previously inaccessible areas of the game.<br /><br /><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img72.imageshack.us/img72/1100/dosgameplay3cg3.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Enter Castlevania</span><br /><br />Soma will enter the castle in to an open area through a huge door. This is common is most Castlevania games. He’ll meet up with Hammer who’ll say that he’s setting up a shop in the castle. He set up shop in Aria of Sorrow at the castle gate, but in this game he has his own store.<br /><br />Soon after exploring the castle you’ll meet up with Yoko and Julius. There will be a brief dialogue then Yoko will ask you escort her. You quickly find a sealed door and Yoko will tell you to break the seal using magic. To use the spell you’ll have to use the DS stylus to draw it. This is shown on screen then you need to copy it.<br /><br />After you’ve defeated the first boss you’ll be able to access the town area. You’ll find Hammer’s shop on the right and Yoko’s soul trade on the left. Yoko will allow you to trade souls with a friend who has the game. You can also dispel any souls you have, not that you’d want to. I can also confirm that the English and Japanese versions are compatible with each other.<br /><br />Each time you open a boss door you’ll need to use a more complex spell. When you get the boss’ health low enough you’ll need to use the same spell as the boss door. If you do the spell incorrectly the boss battle will continue until you get it right. When finally defeat the boss and get their soul. The boss’ soul will give you an ability that’ll help you progress further in the game.<br /><br />Each area of the castle is drastically different, each having its own theme. Most of the areas are extremely detailed, each having multiple layers to it. If you’ve played any Castlevania game before you’ll know the kinds of areas to expect. Each time Dracula’s castle gets resurrected it changes. Most of the same area themes remain but they’re always new and exciting.<br /><br />Soma can equip a vast range of weapons, armours and accessories. Most of the usual types of weapon are present and some new types like the sword whip. Since the game is in the not too distant future there are also some modern weapons. You can get a 9mm pistol and even an RPG. There is a large amount of armours and accessories to collect, each having different abilities.<br /><br />Playing the game on the DS has some great advantages. The top screen is used to switch between enemy data or the map by pressing ‘select’. The bottom screen displays the game itself. In other Castlevania games you’ll almost always have to look at the map every five minutes. All you have to do is look up and it’s always there. The enemy data is useful because it gives elemental weakness, item drops and other useful details.<br /><br /><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img156.imageshack.us/img156/1600/dosgameplay4nv1.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Sound, Music and Controls</span><br /><br />The sounds and music on this game are great. Konami have pushed the DS hardware to get the most of what it has to offer. Every sound is well suited to its purpose. All the music in the game is excellent and suits each area very well. In the English version over 100 voices were removed because they were in Japanese. It seems unnecessary to have done it and it takes something great away from the game.<br /><br />Soma moves fluidly and controlling him is easy. He has an amazingly large amount of animations for a portable Castlevania. This makes the game so much better to play. He can backdash as well as a verity of other special moves. Most of his special moves have appeared in previous Castlevania games like double jump, anti-gravity jump and transform into bat.<br /><br /><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img301.imageshack.us/img301/765/dosgameplay5ci9.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Bonus Modes</span><br /><br />Boss Rush<br />This mode will put you up against every boss in the game, one after the other in order. You'll be restricted to lv40 and can use anything you’ve collected from the main game. The faster you complete it, the better the rewards.<br /><br />Level Editor<br />This game has a very limited level editor. There is a set amount of rooms and route you have to follow. You use the souls you’ve collected in the main game to place enemies down. You can place enemies anywhere in the rooms you like within reason. The game has a set amount of memory for each room, so you’re very limited to what you can put down. The bigger or more complex the enemy, the more memory it’ll use. This means you’ll usually be using a lot of smaller enemies.<br /><br />The only advantage to this editor is you can transfer you level to a friend using DS Download Play. Personally I think this editor is a waste of time. Its limitations make it almost pointless. If it didn’t have DS Download Play it might have been good. Also you can usually finish your level in less than a minute.<br /><br />Julius Mode (Terrible Trio Mode more like)<br /><br />This mode allows you to play as Julius Belmont. When you explore the castle you’ll join up with Yoko and Alucard. You can switch between each of the characters with the press of a button. Each character has their own specific set of attacks and moves.<br /><br />Julius plays like a classic vampire hunter using the Vampire Killer. He has all the usual sub-weapons including daggers, throwing axe, holy water and throwing cross. He also has an ‘item crash’ super move for the throwing cross.<br /><br />Yoko uses an overhead attacking mace. This is slow so has to be timed right to be used correctly. Every attack she does with the mace restores her health. She can also use fire, ice and lightning magic attacks. This is the first time you’ve been able to play as Yoko.<br /><br />Alucard looks just like he does in Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. He uses the Alucard Sword and Alucard Shield. He can still do his phase shift attack with the Alucard Sword. He has two special moves which are Hellfire and transform into a bat. The biggest disappointment is that he’s had a lot of his animations removed. His remaining animations have sped up so it doesn’t look right when he moves. He’s been scaled down so he looks weird and squashed. Also his shadow effect is red instead of dark blue which is stupid and annoying.<br /><br />This mode is really bad. You spend far too much time switching between characters. You take a lot of damage and it’s quite hard to play with three characters. When you level up your characters it doesn’t really make you more powerful. You can’t use healing items and boss battles are a real pain. This mode is basically what Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin turned into.<br /><br /><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img412.imageshack.us/img412/9461/dosgameplay6vd0.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Final Thoughts</span><br /><br />This is probably the second best game in the entire Castlevania series. This game comes very close to being as good as Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. It has just about everything you could ever want from a 2D action RPG. There are a few pseudo 3D elements in this game. This further enhances the games appearance and makes it more enjoyable to look at.<br /><br />The large castle will give you a lot of game play hours. It should take at least ten hours to complete on your first play through. The soul collecting aspect will keep you playing long after you’ve completed the game.<br /><br />There only a few bad things I can really say about this game. First is that there’s only three save slots. This is no where near enough and really annoys me. Another is that hard mode is pretty much the same as normal mode. Lastly is that the level editor is almost useless and Julius Mode is just really bad.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">THUMBS UP</span>.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:180%;" >Score: 9/10</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">References</span><br /><br /><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castlevania:_Dawn_of_Sorrow" target="_blank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castlevania:_Dawn_of_Sorrow</a><br /><br /><a href="http://www.angelfire.com/stars5/tkcpics2/dawnofsorrow/" target="_blank">http://www.angelfire.com/stars5/tkcpics2/dawnofsorrow/</a>iCEMANhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12725786287275413996noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9000888890659356944.post-17826053345367611142008-03-11T09:20:00.000-07:002008-03-11T11:01:31.434-07:00Mega Man 2 review<span style="font-weight: bold;"></span><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 300px;" resizemod="1" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img378.imageshack.us/img378/3723/mm2palqm1.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Also known as:</span><br />Rock Man 2: Dr. Dr. Wily no Nazo<br />Rock Man 2: Dr. Wily's Secret<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Originally released:</span><br />1986 on the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES)<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Also released on:</span><br />PlayStation as Rock Man Complete Works<br />PlayStation as Rock Man 2 – PSone Books<br />PlayStation as Rock Man 2 – Capcom Classic Books<br />PlayStation2 as Mega Man Anniversary Edition<br />GameCube as Mega Man Anniversary Edition<br />Xbox as Mega Man Anniversary Edition<br />Wii Virtual Console<br /><br /><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-028860324506994184 visible ontop" href="http://www.youtube.com/v/N8Ao63nmzuE"></a><object height="355" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/N8Ao63nmzuE"><param name="wmode" value="transparent"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/N8Ao63nmzuE" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" height="355" width="425"></embed></object><br /><br />The game starts with a cityscape on screen and a short introduction the game’s story. It briefly describes that Dr. Wily is up to no good again. His plan is to still to take over the world. This time he’s made his own robots to destroy Mega Man. In the first Mega Man game Dr. Wily stole robots from his rival Dr. Light.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Select Your Robot Master</span><br /><br /><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="2" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img357.imageshack.us/img357/1760/megaman2e01ao1.png" border="0" /><br /><br />Right from the start of the game you can select any of the eight robot masters’ stages. This means you can defeat the bosses in any order you want. This gives the game multiple ways to play through it. When you defeat a boss you’ll get their weapon. Every boss in the game is weak against another boss’ weapon. This gives you the challenge of finding out their weaknesses to easily defeat them.<br /><br />As with most Mega Man games, you’ll be able to get to the boss in around five to ten minutes. I can only briefly describe each stage because some are quite short. Each stage has themed enemies with a few common in each stage.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Airman</span><br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="3" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img387.imageshack.us/img387/2807/mm2airmanqw3.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />This stage is way up in the clouds and has a lot of airborne enemies. The floor is partially see-through and you really feel like you’re in the sky. There are giant purple platforms with a face which have two drill horns in most areas. These will shoot out smaller enemies from either side of it when you jump on them. Further on there are robots riding clouds who throw lightning bolts from above. One you’ve kill them you’ll need to ride their cloud to advance further. You’ll find fast flying birds which drop eggs which hatch into about ten small birds. These will scramble towards you in a swarm and attack. Once you get to the edge of the stage you’ll drop down through some clouds. In this area there are machines which shoot out upright snake like things. These jump around at random and their jump height and distance varies. When you get near to the end of the level, you’ll see a really fat version of Mega Man. He has a fan in his chest and will keep blowing towards you until you kill him. There will be two more to kill then you’ll be at the boss room.<br /><br />Airman himself is basically a giant fan with arms, legs and eyes. His main attack is to shoot about six swirling shots of air at you. These will move straight towards you at increasing speed. His other attack is to jump around extremely high.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Bubbleman</span><br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="4" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img392.imageshack.us/img392/9740/mm2bubblemanlz9.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />The stage starts out on top of a waterfall. Most of the floor and walls looks like pipes. The first enemy you’ll see is a large frog. It’ll spit out smaller frogs from its mouth until you kill it. You’ll have to quickly jump across the next section because there are falling platforms. Once you drop down at the end of the waterfall there’ll be shellfish on wheels. If you shoot them their shell will fly off and they’ll speed up. The next section is completely underwater. When underwater you jump about four times as high.<br /><br />When you get down to the very bottom there’ll be a giant fish that’ll shoot shrimp from its mouth. You’ll have to shoot an overhanging tentacle on its head to kill it. When you continue on forwards you’ll have to navigate through a low spiked ceiling area. While you move forward robotic jellyfish will descend from the ceiling. When you finally get out the water you’re right near the boss. Crabs will float down from the sky and you’ll have to jump over to the boss room.<br /><br />Bubbleman is fought underwater and he looks like a diver. The room has spikes on the ceiling so you can’t jump too high. His attacks are to shoot water jets at you either on the floor or jumping. He also likes to jump and slowly float down shooting bubbles at you.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Clashman/Crashman</span><br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="5" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img369.imageshack.us/img369/5995/mm2crashmantk1.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />For some reason the name of this boss was changed. In the Japanese version he’s Clashman and the English version he’s Crashman. He should be called Clashman since his weapon is called Clash Bomb. <a href="http://www.engrish.com/faq.php#Q8" target="_blank" class="postlink">This may be explained here, but I could be wrong</a>.<br /><br />This stage involves you a lot of climbing up ladders. The stage is made up of twisted pipes and some are connected to dome like objects. The stage starts with floating cylinder type things with eyes trying to attack you. You’ll have to climb up a few ladders to the next area. Once you’re at the top small construction worker helmets attack you. These will stay still until you get near them, shoot you then run and hide. When you go up the next ladder there’s a moving platform on a set route. Once again you’ll have to climb a ladder and navigate through two more moving platform areas. At the top you’ll see a creature made out of four barrels on top of each other. This thing moves slowly towards you and has to be shot in the face. It’ll fall to pieces then reform and have to be shot again to be killed. You’ll find yourself climbing a few more ladders to get to the top. Once there, you have a choice between climbing up to the left or right. Once you climb up one you’ll see a wall between them and two ladders at each side. It’s your job to navigate up the correct path with falling off. You be attacked by the egg chucking birds and stationery firing robots. When you finally get to the very top there’ll be jumping propeller robots. These keep falling from the ceiling until you get to the boss room.<br /><br />Clashman has a cone shaped helmet and arms. He shoots sticky timed mines at you while jumping around a lot. He’ll keep jump around extremely high while firing quite frequently. His bombs have quite a large explosions and explode multiple times so dodging them can be tough.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Flashman</span><br /><br /><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 439px;" resizemod="6" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img374.imageshack.us/img374/3834/mm2flashmanfj8.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />The stage is slippery like ice and has rectangular floor pieces which light up in sequence. The first part of the stage has you choose for a number of different paths which lead to the upper or lower parts of the stage. At the end is a drop down either to the left or right depending on which path you chose. There is an enemy on one side and nothing on the other. There’s another choice of two paths once you fall down into the next area. It’s up to you to choose each time you fall down. There are a total of four drops then you’ll be the bottom. All you need to do is get past a soldiers in giant metal walking legs to the boss room. This is probably the shortest and easiest of all the boss’ stages.<br /><br />Flashman has a partially see-through head and a weird gun on one hand. He only has one attack which stops time then shoots you while he’s stood still.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Heatman</span><br /><br /><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 433px;" resizemod="7" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img381.imageshack.us/img381/5448/mm2heatmancx5.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />This stage has a lava flow underneath the floor and is full of tricky jumps. The first thing you’ll see will be jumping propeller robots. This stage is full of floating cylinder type things with eyes. There are holes in the walls which these enemies keep popping out when you kill them. This stage is a pain because you’ll be trying to time your jumps and these will keep coming at you. You can cut the stage short by destroying certain parts of the walls using the Clash Bomb. Whilst trying to make difficult jumps the platforms will disappear and reappear in sequence.<br /><br />Heatman looks like a guy inside standard metal flip up lighter. He'll chuck three fireballs in the air which land making tall pilars. He can also zoom towards you in a stream of fire.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Metalman</span><br /><br /><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 453px;" resizemod="8" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img381.imageshack.us/img381/899/mm2metalmanqz0.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />This stage is in a factory type environment with cogs moving in the background. Most of the floor is always moving either left or right at varying speeds. Your first obstacle is to get past three dropping spikes. This is a little tricky because the floor is moving at different speeds. After that there’s a long corridor with flying drills coming out of the floor and ceiling. There are a few jumps to get past after that then you’ll soon be in the bottom of the stage. When you’re trying to get past the next few jumps there are guys balancing on top of giant machine cogs. You’ll need to destroy the cog to make the guy fall off. A little further on there are metal floor heads then a barrel monster. There’s a large jump then two more metal floor heads at the bottom. This then leads to the boss room.<br /><br />Metalman looks normal apart from the mask covering his mouth and circular blade on his head. He’ll fire circular blades at you either on the floor or in mid-air. This boss room is slightly different because floor is always moving. It can change direction at random or when Metalman moves between each side.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Quickman</span><br /><br /><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 431px;" resizemod="9" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img382.imageshack.us/img382/9817/mm2quickmanvb1.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />Set in a sort of futuristic type environment this stage can by really hard without Flashman's Time Stopper. There are lasers that shoot out for the walls extremely fast that can be easily dodged with the Time Stopper. The stage is pretty average apart for the lasers. There is one part half way though which the screen goes dark and you have to navigate though it in pitch black. There are large enemies with fire on their heads which light the stage up again, but if you kill them the lights go out.<br /><br />As the name suggests, Qucikman is really fast. He'll move and jump around shooting boomerangs at you. He's really hard because he moves so fast and is a pain to hit.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Woodman</span><br /><br /><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="10" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img382.imageshack.us/img382/4153/mm2woodmanzl2.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br />The stage starts in a woodland area then quickly moves underground. You’ll encounter metal bats which reflect your shots in they’re curled up. There are also big purple rabbits which hob along then shoot carrots at you. When you get the bottom of the underground there’s a giant fire breathing dog. There's another one in each of next two areas. You’ll then have to climb up two ladders to get back the surface. Outside there is a bamboo floor with Gorillas hanging from below. These will jump at you when you get near them. There are also egg dropping birds in this area. Once you’re at the other side you’ll have to go underground again. There are minor obstacles in the next two rooms and each has a purple rabbit in them. Once you climb down the ladder in the second room you’re outside again. This is a long room which is full of large robot chickens which jump at regular intervals. If you can get past them you’ll be at the boss door.<br /><br />Woodman is a fat man who, funnily enough is made out of wood. He only really has one attack which is to surround himself in a leaf shield then throwing it at you. This battle can be hard because Woodman and his leafs are so big. While you’re fighting there are large leafs falling from the sky which can damage you.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Bonus Items</span><br /><br />On certain stages in the game you can find energy tanks. These can be used at any time and give you back full health. You can hold a maximum of four at once.<br /><br />There are three additional items which can help you reach previously inaccessible areas. Due to lack of originality these are called item 1,2 and 3. Item-1 creates a platform which goes up on a propeller. You can stand on this to reach high areas and use up to four at once. Item-2 is a jet powered surf board which will help you get across large gaps. Item-3 is a sticky platform which will help you climb up walls.<br /><br /><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 399px;" resizemod="11" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img382.imageshack.us/img382/707/mm2aw9.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Dr. Wily’s Stages</span><br /><br />Once you’ve defeated all eight robot masters you’ll have to enter Dr. Wily’s castle. There are a total of five stages which are harder than any of the robot master’s.<br /><br />Stage 1<br />The stage is quite short and you’ll have to climb up the castle. You start out on in a barren area which has a rock floor. When you move forward the egg dropping birds will attack. Further on you have to use item-3 to get up a large building to the other side. You’ll have to deal with a few upright snake shooting things and climb a second building. Once you get to the end you’ll be at the castle itself. You have to use item-3 again to climb the wall and then climb a few ladders. On your way up you’ll see a number of soldiers with a shields. You then have to use item-1 to get across a large gap to the final ladder. Once you make it up there are loads of small jumps then the boss will appear. This is a huge flying dragon which will force the screen forward while you jump forward. It’ll eventually stop and you have to fight it.<br /><br />Stage 2<br />This stage is mostly brown and green with a few spinning cogs in the walls. There are jumping propeller robots which try and attack you from the start. You’ll have to use item-2 to get across a large spiked gap. While mid flight you have a choice between two ladders, one leads to powerups and the other to lots of enemies. You eventually make it down to the bottom where you'll have to navigate though small passages avoiding drills and falling spike traps. There are two drops after that which then lead to the boss. This boss is formed by the room combining two pieces to form a small flying robot. This appear from high and low and only take a few hits to destroy.<br /><br />Stage 3<br />There are a few drops with powerups than will then lead to dirty brown water filled with spikes. You'll need to be extremely careful because the slightest mistakes and you're dead in one hit. You make your way across dodging a large fish then have to navigate through some tough drops. The walls are still covered in spikes so you'll need to be quick to make it though alive. Once you've made it though this underwater deathtrap you can jump out to safety. There is a short corridor with stationary robots that are shooting at you. Once you've killed the robots you're at the boss. For anyone who's played the orignal Mega Man should recognised this boss. It's a giant robot Gutsman which looks like a tank.<br /><br />Stage 4<br />This is easily the most annoying and hardest stage in the entire game. You start off having to climb a few ladders with a few construction worker hat robots trying to stop you. Next is an empty room with a long platform which has parts of the that you can fall through. This is made harder because the gaps invisible. Next is another similar room, but this time it has spikes underneath it. Once you're safely across there's an area with powerups and more construction worker hat robots. There are invisible gaps in the rooms just to make it even harder. Climbing up again will lead to a checkpoint room and this is where it all starts to go wrong.<br /><br />You go down the ladder to the new area and have to wait for a platform to help you get the end without falling into the spike pits below. The platform moves in a complicated pattern and the room has three holes where the floating cylinder type things with eyes come out. Next is a similar room with no enemies, but you'll have to get across by quickly moving from ledge to ledge before the platform passes you by. If you make it to the next room it's a combination of the previous two rooms with slight differences. Finally is an easiest of all the rooms which requires a simple jump to the moving platform to progress. In the last room is a long corridor with a few soldiers in giant metal walking legs then the boss room.<br /><br />The boss is five circular things which all shoot lasers at the same time. Each one has a wall protecting it with the boss and wall only being able to be destroyed by the Clash Bomb. Making use of your limited ammo is key to defeating this boss. If you die and continue the parts you destroy won't come back.<br /><br />Stage 5<br />All you need to do is defeat all eight robot masters again on this stage. There are eight tubes like teleporters each leading to a boss. This stage is complete joke because all obstacles in the boss rooms have been removed. Also if you know their weaknesses it'll be a piece of cake. After you defeated them all you have to fight Dr. Wily in a space ship.<br /><br />Stage 6<br />This stage is also a joke because the only thing you need to do is dodge dripping slime. It takes about 30 seconds to get to the final boss and is a waste for time. Once there you'll see Dr. Wily transform into an alien and fly around in a set path. He'll shoot at you with a single shot about every two seconds. This makes him quite predictable and you won't have much trouble defeating him.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Mega Man 2 Robot Masters Revisited</span><br /><br />Near the end of Mega Man 3 you have to fight all the robot masters from Mega Man 2.<br /><br /><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-028860324506994184 visible ontop" href="http://www.youtube.com/v/2-LPLr9Y8n4"></a><object height="355" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/2-LPLr9Y8n4"><param name="wmode" value="transparent"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/2-LPLr9Y8n4" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" height="355" width="425"></embed></object><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Enhanced Mode</span><br /><br /><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-028860324506994184 visible ontop" href="http://www.youtube.com/v/LBaNBkrE02g"></a><object height="355" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/LBaNBkrE02g"><param name="wmode" value="transparent"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/LBaNBkrE02g" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" height="355" width="425"></embed></object><br /><br />Both the PSone Books and Mega Man Anniversary Edition have an updated version of the game. This includes updated in-game menus, in-game tips, remixed music and other minor changes. This may sound great, but it’s not really worth wasting your time with. The new menus are OK, but don’t really add very much to the game. The Japanese translation from PSone Books to Mega Man Anniversary Edition was poorly done. An example is on Woodman’s stage where it says something like “watch out for the cocks”, which is funny, but it should be chickens. The remixed music is from Mega Man: Power Battles and Mega Man 2: Power Fighters. Only half the music is remixed and the rest is the exactly the same. This is really disappointing and shows Capcom’s laziness in updating and porting the game. One of the best things is that it removes the screen and sprite flickering which is common is most NES games. You can also have mega-fire for your weapons which can be really useful for some enemies. There's also a nice art gallery with various artwork from the game.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Final Thoughts</span><br /><br />This was the first game I ever completed and it took me forever to do it. I was about 8 years old at the time and found it a really enjoyable experience. This game has a lot to offer and is extremely fun to play. It has two difficulty settings so even beginners can still complete the game without too much trouble. This was the first Mega Man game to a password system so be thankful you don't have to start over. It has a lot of replay value because of the different combinations the bosses can be defeated in. A great 2D platformer and regarded as the best Mega Man game in the original series by almost all the fans. I give it a <span style="font-weight: bold;">THUMBS UP</span>.<br /><br /><span style="font-size:180%;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Score: 9/10</span></span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">References</span><br /><br /><a href="http://www.planet-megaman.com/" target="_blank">http://www.planet-megaman.com</a><br /><br /><a href="http://blue-bomber.jvmwriter.org/index.php?title=Main_Page" target="_blank">http://blue-bomber.jvmwriter.org/index.php?title=Main_Page</a><br /><br /><a href="http://www.mmhp.net/" target="_blank">http://www.mmhp.net</a><br /><br /><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mega_Man_2" target="_blank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mega_Man_2</a><br /><br /><a href="http://www.engrish.com/faq.php#Q8" target="_blank">http://www.engrish.com/faq.php#Q8</a>iCEMANhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12725786287275413996noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9000888890659356944.post-50233955683166172322008-03-11T05:04:00.000-07:002008-03-11T07:43:32.695-07:00Games of the Month: February<span style="font-weight: bold;">Intro</span><br />In "Game of the Month" I choose my best games of the recent month, these games will most likley will also be a participant for Game of the Tear<br />Febraury has been quite an good month, a lot of PSP games and some great XBLA arcade games.<br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.music4games.net/Uploads/Images/the_club_logo.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 200px;" src="http://www.music4games.net/Uploads/Images/the_club_logo.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">Best Shooter: </span><span style="color: rgb(153, 0, 0); font-weight: bold;">The Club</span><br /><span style="color: rgb(153, 0, 0); font-weight: bold;">The Club</span>, The arcade shooter <span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(153, 0, 0);">The Club</span> has stolen my heart this month, combing Arcade, Racing and Shooter genres <span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(153, 0, 0);">The Club</span> brings one of my favourite features (highscore contests) to the next level even though the game goes full price it is still worth it, check for more info my review <a href="http://archgamer.blogspot.com/2008/03/club-review.html">here</a>.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">The Club is released for PS3, Xbox 360 and PC</span><br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.siliconera.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2007/08/lo1.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 200px;" src="http://www.siliconera.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2007/08/lo1.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">Best Roleplaying: </span><span style="color: rgb(153, 0, 0); font-weight: bold;">Lost Odyssey</span><br /><span style="color: rgb(153, 0, 0); font-weight: bold;">Lost Odyssey</span>, exclusive for the Xbox 360, <span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(153, 0, 0);">Lost Odyssey</span> tries to get JRPGs for the Xbox 360.<br />It doesn't fail but it's a little standard JRPGs things, but there weren't a lot of RPGs this month, so <span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(153, 0, 0);">Lost Odyssey</span> is the RPG of the month!<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Lost Odyssey is only released for Xbox 360</span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://pgrevolution.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/03/wipeout.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 114px;" src="http://pgrevolution.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/03/wipeout.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">Best Racing: </span><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(153, 0, 0);">Wipeout Pulse</span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(153, 0, 0);">Wipeout Pulse</span> for the PSP takes Wipeout to our pocket, the graphics look quite good for an PSP game and the game plays good, if you have an PSP and like racing games go get <span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(153, 0, 0);">Wipeout Pulse </span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">if you don't first try out the demo.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Wipeout Pulse is released only for PSP</span></span><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(153, 0, 0);"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"></span></span><span style="color: rgb(153, 0, 0);"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"></span></span><br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.gameguru.in/images/sins-of-a-solar-empire-ss3.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 119px;" src="http://www.gameguru.in/images/sins-of-a-solar-empire-ss3.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">Best Strategy: </span><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(153, 0, 0);">Sins of a Solar Empire</span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(153, 0, 0);">Sins of a Solar Empire</span> combines realtime strategy with an old space simulators, the game doesn't have any campaign mode but the multiplayer is just so much fun it makes it up for all of it, playing with friends can be very fun and for the low price it is worth it, for more information you can read my full review <a href="http://archgamer.blogspot.com/2008/02/sins-of-solar-empire-review.html">here</a>.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Sins of a Solar Empire is released only on PC</span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.funps3.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/07/Devil-May-Cry-4%20-PS3-01.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 198px; height: 143px;" src="http://www.funps3.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/07/Devil-May-Cry-4%20-PS3-01.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">Best Action Adventure: <span style="color: rgb(153, 0, 0);">Devil May Cry 4</span><br /></span><span><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(153, 0, 0);">Devil May Cry 4</span> is the fourth game in the Devil May Cry series, the game is about Nero an demon hunter who tries to kill the series first main carachter: Dante, they soon fight it out and only one wins, the game is an straight forword hack 'n slash/ stylish fighting game where you try to kill your enemies with an Sword or with Guns.</span><br /><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Devil May Cry 4 is released on PS3 and Xbox 360 there will be an PC version</span></span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.jeux-france.com/Webmasters/Images/55201020070201_183239_0_big.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 198px; height: 157px;" src="http://www.jeux-france.com/Webmasters/Images/55201020070201_183239_0_big.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">Best Miscellaneous: <span style="color: rgb(153, 0, 0);">Professor Layton and the Curious Village</span><br /></span><span>Owners of an DS can now play another great puzzle game, like brain age <span style="color: rgb(153, 0, 0); font-weight: bold;">Professor Layton</span> lets you do hard to solve questions, <span style="color: rgb(153, 0, 0); font-weight: bold;">Professor Layton</span> however has a lot of different puzzles and a cool story and an cool European cartoon look, </span><span><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(153, 0, 0);">Professor Layton</span> is a very cool game and if you have an DS you should buy this.</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Professor Layton is released for the Nintendo DS</span> <span style="color: rgb(153, 0, 0);"></span></span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /><br /></span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2101/2084561197_f14b9130a4_o.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 201px; height: 129px;" src="http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2101/2084561197_f14b9130a4_o.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">Best Downloadable: <span style="color: rgb(153, 0, 0);">N+</span><br /></span><span style="color: rgb(153, 0, 0); font-weight: bold;">N+</span> has transformed from an free flash game to an XBLA game, the game has many many feautres, ranging from single player, co-op, multiplayer and an level editor, the game only costs 10 bucks, if you have an Xbox 360 and like playing Co-Op this game is made for you and it's much fun.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">N+ Is released on Xbox Live Arcade for the Xbox 360</span><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.steamfriends.com/images/news/hl2/pvkii_captain.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 119px;" src="http://www.steamfriends.com/images/news/hl2/pvkii_captain.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">Best Mod: <span style="color: rgb(153, 0, 0);">PVKII</span></span><br />PVKII is an Half Life 2 mods, you play as an Pirate, Viking or Knight, in this newest version of the mod there 3 more carachters and all the mods have been alterd, the mod was already good but now the mod is fantastic, you can download the mod <a href="http://www.pvkii.com/">here</a>.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">PVKII is an Half Life 2 Mod for PC</span><br /><br /><br /><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.emunova.net/img/tests/610.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 198px; height: 106px;" src="http://www.emunova.net/img/tests/610.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><span style="font-weight: bold;">Best Retro: <span style="color: rgb(153, 0, 0);">Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards</span> </span><br />Kirby returns on the Wii Virtual Console for only 1000 wiipoints (10 USD) with 4 player co-op and more it's a lot of fun and I sure recommend it!<br />It's Kirby first jump to 3D, after that he dies of but he is still allive on the DS so look out for him!<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Kirby 64 is released on the Wii Virtual Console</span>James-Kondhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17207918860500397539noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9000888890659356944.post-62208336040791523872008-03-10T05:34:00.000-07:002008-03-11T09:38:02.440-07:00Super Metroid review<img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img246.imageshack.us/img246/9453/supermetroidboxkf9.jpg" border="0" /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Originally Released</span><br />1994 on SNES<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Also Released On</span><br />Wii Virtual Console<br /><br />The last Metroid is in captivity. The galaxy is at peace<br /><br /><object height="355" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/EksbWofYpAo"><param name="wmode" value="transparent"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/EksbWofYpAo" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" height="355" width="425"></embed></object><br /><br />This is first thing you’ll hear before the game begins. You’ll then see our heroin, the infamous bounty hunter Samus Aran. You see a flashback from the original Metroid showing the defeat of Mother Brain on Planet Zebis. On the way back to her ship, Samus finds an egg which then hatches into a Metroid. This new born baby follows her thinking that she’s its mother. Samus captures the Metroid and gives it to some scientists on Space Colony for research. After a short period, Samus receives a distress call from the Space Colony and goes back to investigate.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Space Colony Distress Call</span><br /><br />The game beings with Samus coming down a lift into the space station. You soon find that it’s derelict and without power. When you continue onwards you’ll see the research station where the Metroid was being studied. The Metroid is missing and there are scientists dead around it. If you continue further on you’ll finally get to a room where the Metroid has been left.<br /><br />Hidden behind it is Ridley who’ll quickly fight you for control of the Metroid. You’ll be easily overpowered and Ridley will escape with the Metroid. When Ridley escapes it’ll set off the space station’s self destruct sequence. You’ll have two minutes to get back to the lift at the start. This isn’t too easy because the space station is falling apart. You’ll have steam and falling debris hindering your escape. Once you’re back on your space ship the space station will explode. Samus will then follow Ridley back to Planet Zebis.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Return to Planet Zebis</span><br /><br />Once you land on the planet you’ll see that it’s raining outside and looks deserted. When you go through a door to your left you’ll be greeted to a large deserted area. Once you’re inside there’s only one exit further below to your left. This leads to a series of strangely nostalgic areas, which are all deserted.<br /><br />The first room is the final escape point from the original Metroid. When you take the enormously long drop down it leads to Mother Brain’s chamber. You then continue onwards to a lift which goes down to the very first room from the original Metroid.<br /><br />When you go left and jump over a large wall you’ll collect the ‘morph ball’. This will allow Samus to transform into a ball and navigate through narrow passages. If you go right you’ll be able to go under a small gap in the next room. In this room is a Chozo statue which will give you five missiles. These can be used to open red doors or as a power shot. Once you’re done here you can go back up the lift where you came down. All the areas you passed before will be full of enemies. You’ll go back to the first room on the planet and continue to explore the world.<br /><br /><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img526.imageshack.us/img526/408/supermetroidingamezg8.png" border="0" /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Continuing Your Adventure</span><br /><br />Planet Zebis is quite large and has a variety of different areas to explore. Each area has a distinct theme so is easily distinguishable between other areas. There are usually themed variations of the standard enemy types in each area as well. About half the areas you’ll visit are from the original Metroid. These aren’t exactly the same and are completely new. A lot of the enemies from the original Metroid are in this game as well.<br /><br />As well as revisiting old areas there’s also two boss that have returned. You saw the first in the prologue stage which was Ridley. The other is Kraid who is two screens big. There are a number of interesting boss and sub-bosses throughout the game. When you defeat each of them you’ll get an important upgrade. This will give you access to new areas or further exploration of existing areas. Each boss is varied and will be a challenge to defeat. There are four statues near the start of the game showing the bosses you’ve defeated. You’ll need to defeat all four bosses to gain access to the final area. Each statue has a jewel that’s destroyed when you defeat a boss.<br /><br />You’ll have to look at your map from time to time because of the size of the areas. You can find computer terminals where you can download a map of the area you’re in. The map itself is easy to follow and shows key areas like save points, missile/health re-chargers and even where the boss is. Each area has its own map which makes exploring easier. It’ll show you which areas are connected to each other if you find a lift to another area.<br /><br /><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img259.imageshack.us/img259/1447/supermetroidinventoryscki9.png" border="0" /><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Weapons and Powerups</span><br /><br />There are a number of different weapons, some are optional and some are required to progress further in the game. The major upgrade you’ll need is the ice beam. When you freeze an enemy and you can use their body as a platform to jump on.<br /><br />You can turn off and on any weapon or upgrade at any time. This is works best when choosing your weapon. When you pickup new weapon upgrades they’re added to your existing weapon. Some weapons have hidden special moves when combined in certain ways. This means you may need to turn off some abilities to gain the special moves.<br /><br />Almost all the original Metroid powerups are in this game. These include morph ball bomb, high jump boots and the others mentioned in the previous paragraphs. There are upgraded versions of classic powerups like super missile, power bomb and morph ball jump. Other new powerups include grappling hook, x-ray scope (see secret areas) and reserve sub-tanks.<br /><br />As well as weapon powerups you can get two upgrades for your space suit. The first is the Varia Suit which reduces your damage taken and allows you to withstand extreme heat. The Varia Suit also changes Samus’ appearance by adding to her original space suit. This increases her space suit size and changes the colour to orange. The other is the Gravity Suit which allows you to walk through water with the same speed as you do on land. The only difference is that is makes your space suit purple this time.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Controls, Sound and Music</span><br /><br />The controls are fluid and responsive so you’ll have no problems moving around. It’s really easy to perform complex actions like attacking in multiple directions. You can even do this in mid-air with no without any hassle. You can use ‘L’ to position Samus’ gun down and ‘R’ for up. This can be used for great accuracy and easy aiming.<br /><br />The sounds and music are excellent and you’ll have to try hard to find something bad. The sounds are what you might expect if you’ve played Metroid before. They’re not too futuristic and really suit the game well. The music is great and really sets the mood for each area you’re in. Most areas have sub-sections so the music will change quite frequently. Some classic Metroid music also makes an appearance which great.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Final Thoughts</span><br /><br />Overall this is a fantastic 2D side-scrolling adventure game. It’s easy to pick up and play and hard to put down. It’s really fun and you get a great sense of achievement while exploring the environment.<br /><br />This is quite a long game and will take you at least ten hours to finish. Once you’ve completed the game you’ll find yourself going back for more. You’ll want to explore the world further finding everything there is. There are a lot of secrets, some of which are extremely hard to find. About 40% of the items in the game are hidden so you’ll be playing for at least another ten hours.<br /><br />I highly recommend you play this and I give it a <span style="font-weight: bold;">THUMBS UP</span>.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:180%;" >Score: 9.5/10</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">References</span><br /><br /><a href="http://mdb.classicgaming.gamespy.com/?g=sm" target="_blank">http://mdb.classicgaming.gamespy.com/?g=sm</a><br /><br /><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_Metroid" target="_blank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_Metroid</a>iCEMANhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12725786287275413996noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9000888890659356944.post-28384962614878252332008-03-09T04:33:00.000-07:002008-03-09T04:46:50.147-07:00New Reviewer + 4000 Unique ViewsHey guys,<br /><br />After we launched ArchGamer a few months ago things couldn't be greater, we have just hit the 4000 unique views mark and we have a new talented reviewer: <a href="http://www.blogger.com/profile/12725786287275413996">iCEMAN</a><br /><br />He has already done 2 reviews:<br /><a href="http://archgamer.blogspot.com/2008/03/castlevania-symphony-of-night-review_07.html">Castlevania: SOTN Review</a><br /><a href="http://archgamer.blogspot.com/2008/03/psp-monster-hunter-freedom-review.html">Monster Hunter Freedom Review</a>James-Kondhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17207918860500397539noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9000888890659356944.post-37930389611713189392008-03-07T16:48:00.001-08:002008-03-08T07:30:27.717-08:00Castlevania: Symphony of the Night Review<a href="http://imageshack.us/" target="_blank" class="postlink"><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 380px;" resizemod="1" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img117.imageshack.us/img117/8220/castlevaniasotnpalqr8.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Also known as:</span><br />Dracula X: Nocturne in the Moonlight<br />Akumajo Dracula X: Gekka no Yasoukyoku<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Orignal release date:</span><br />1997 on PlayStation<br />1998 on Sega Saturn<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Also released on:</span><br />Xbox Live Arcade (Xbox 360)<br />PlayStation Network (PlayStation 3 & PSP)<br />Castlevania: The Dracula X Chronicles (PSP)<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Proulogue - Final Stage: Bloodlines</span><br /><br /><a href="http://imageshack.us/" target="_blank" class="postlink"><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="2" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img215.imageshack.us/img215/4595/newextra10jw3.png" border="0" /></a><br /><br />The game begins with you playing as Richter Belmont on the last stage of Dracula X: Rondo of Blood (PC Engine/Turbo Grapics 16) in 1792. You climb up the classic long staircase for the final battle with Dracula. There is a short dialogue between Richter and Dracula then the final battle commences. This battle can be easily won and once you’ve defeated Dracula the screen fades in a photograph, which burns up. After that you’re treated to the prologue of the main game with text which explains the story leading up to resurrection of Dracula’s castle… Castlevania.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Enter Castlevania</span><br /><br /><a href="http://imageshack.us/" target="_blank" class="postlink"><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 255px;" resizemod="3" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img169.imageshack.us/img169/2433/mainhallsotnth0.gif" border="0" /></a> <a href="http://imageshack.us/" target="_blank" class="postlink"><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 255px;" resizemod="4" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img522.imageshack.us/img522/2852/sotnhall2yx0.gif" border="0" /></a><br /><br />When the main game actually starts it's 1796 and you’ll play as Alucard, who first appeared as a playable character in Castlevania III: Dracula’s Curse. You start with a sword, shield, helmet, armour, cape and necklace. Within a few minutes of exploring the castle you’ll meet with Death who warns you not to venture further into the castle. Alucard refuses so Death takes all your equipment and leaves you with just your bare hands. This may seem harsh, but you’ll soon find weapons and armour in the castle.<br /><br />If you didn’t already know, Alucard is the son of Dracula. This means that he has some of his father’s attacks like the classic teleport and ‘Hellfire’ with three small or two big fireballs. He also has a few others including ‘soul steal’ which is Alucard’s signature move in later games he appears in.<br /><br />Probably the best thing about Alucard is that his ability to use pretty much any weapon you can think of. The game has over 100 different weapons, most having a hidden special attack. These attacks can range from elemental to charged attacks and one even summons creatures to help you. You also get a selection of sub-weapons which Castlevania fans should recognise. These are daggers, holy water, throwing cross, stop watch and throwing axe. There are four new sub-weapons which are aguen, bibuti, holy book and a rebound stone.<br /><br />This game still uses a set amount of hearts so you can use your sub-weapons. A lot of people find this confusing because you’d expect hearts to give you more health. This was used in the very first Castlevania game and almost all games in the series after this.<br /><br />New additions to this game are the magic meter, ability to level up and use different equipment. As with most RPGs you’ll need a certain amount of experience points to increase your stats. The magic meter increases with each level up so you’ll be able to use the more advanced spells.<br /><br />If you go into your menu you can equip a number of different things which gives the game even more RPG elements. The first on the list is two slots for weapons, shields and ‘use items’. This is great because you can have a number of different combinations which include a weapon and shield, two weapons, a two handed weapon or weapon and healing item. The other things you can equip are a head accessory, armour, cape and two other accessories. The number of accessories, amours and capes is quite vast with each having different attributes or abilities. Examples of this are a circlet which absorbs damage from poison, armour which heals as you walk and a cape which gives you hearts when you get hit. The ‘use items’ include status resisting potions, one time use weapons like javelins or flame boomerangs and other powerful spells like ‘bat pentagram’. This wasn’t the first time you could equip items because there were limited customisation options in Castlevania II: Simon’s Quest.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Exploring the Castle</span><br /><br />Unlike previous Castlevania games, Alucard moves around in a fluid and realistic way which gives you great manoeuvrability. This makes playing the game that much better and means you can get out of tricky situations more easily. This is also the first Castlevania to give your character the ‘back dash’ ability.<br /><br />This is the first Castlevania to include a map and teleporters because of the size of the castle. The map is very easy to use because of its simple layout and has been used in almost every Castlevania game after this. The teleporters are a nice addition and quickly help you get around.<br /><br />While exploring the library you’ll find the Master Librarian who’ll sell you items. This isn’t really a first for Castlevania because there were people who sold items in Castlevania II: Simon’s Quest. This is however the first proper shop that there’s been.<br /><br />Each castle area has a completely different theme, music and enemies. This means that no area of the castle is the same and you get a wide choice of locations to explore. The castle is extremely large compared to previous Castlevania games and will take you at roughly 12-20 hours to go though on your first play through.<br /><br /><a href="http://imageshack.us/" target="_blank" class="postlink"><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="5" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img136.imageshack.us/img136/9829/newextra2px9.png" border="0" /></a> <a href="http://imageshack.us/" target="_blank" class="postlink"><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="6" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img136.imageshack.us/img136/4219/newextra4wv5.png" border="0" /></a><br /><br />The enemies you’ll see are the usual things you’d expect from a Castlevania game. These are the classics like skeletons, zombies, bats and Medusa heads. There are also a lot of new additions like boomerang skeletons, invisible warriors with giant swords and lance wielding guards on top of wolfs. Each area usually has its own themed enemies which really makes things interesting. A lot of the enemies are from Dracula X: Rondo of Blood and look even better and some even have new moves.<br /><br /><a href="http://imageshack.us/" target="_blank" class="postlink"><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 257px;" resizemod="7" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img183.imageshack.us/img183/8720/sotnfdq1.jpg" border="0" /></a> <a href="http://imageshack.us/" target="_blank" class="postlink"><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 256px;" resizemod="8" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img186.imageshack.us/img186/7008/newextra9av1.png" border="0" /></a><br /><br />While exploring the castle you’ll encounter a lot of bosses. A few of these are from Dracula X: Rondo of Blood and have been teamed up with other bosses for a more intense fight. The most notable examples are Slogra & Gaibon and Minotaur & Werewolf. There are a lot of new bosses which include a Doppelganger (a copy of Alucard), Succubus and Death.<br /><br />You’ll find relics to help you in various different ways in certain areas of the castle. The most notable are the ability to transform into a wolf, mist and bat. These three main abilities all have two upgrades which greatly enhance them. You can also find Leap Stone (double jump), Spirit Orb (see enemy damage) and even familiars to assist you. There are five familiars which are a bat, fairy/faerie, flaming skull, demon and giant flying sword. Each familiar can be levelled up to give it more powers and make it attack more. The Japanese version has an additional two familiars which are 'tengu goblin' and 'sprite'. These are just copies of the demon and fairy/faerie and look slightly different.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Meeting Other Characters</span><br /><br /><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-08737926036749148 visible ontop" href="http://www.youtube.com/v/tuMLseDq06A"></a><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-08737926036749148 visible ontop" href="http://www.youtube.com/v/tuMLseDq06A"></a><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-08737926036749148 visible ontop" href="http://www.youtube.com/v/tuMLseDq06A"></a><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-08737926036749148 visible ontop" href="http://www.youtube.com/v/tuMLseDq06A"></a><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-08737926036749148 visible ontop" href="http://www.youtube.com/v/tuMLseDq06A"></a><object height="355" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/tuMLseDq06A"><param name="wmode" value="transparent"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/tuMLseDq06A" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" height="355" width="425"></embed></object><br /><br />Once you get to certain points in the game you’ll meet up with Maria Renard who was a playable character from Dracula X: Rondo of Blood. You quickly find out she’s in the castle to solve the mystery of Richter Belmont's disappearance. You meet up with her a few times and she eventually helps you progress though the game. If you die when fighting Dracula as Richter in the proglue stage you'll be able to see her briefly as a child. She was also a playable character in Dracula X: Rondo of Blood.<br /><br />When you see Richter you find out he’s made a slave by Shaft, the evil wizard who resurrected Dracula. When you get far enough into the game you’ll find the long staircase from the prologue stage, which has now have collapsed. Once you get to the room where you fought Dracula, Richter will be waiting for you.<br /><br />Without spoiling too much of the game for you, there is a lot more than map overage you might think. There's also a nice twist if you find a way to save Richter in Dracula’s castle keep.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Sound, Music and Voice Acting</span><br /><br /><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-08737926036749148 visible ontop" href="http://www.youtube.com/v/o-TPhBIuTJc"></a><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-08737926036749148 visible ontop" href="http://www.youtube.com/v/o-TPhBIuTJc"></a><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-08737926036749148 visible ontop" href="http://www.youtube.com/v/o-TPhBIuTJc"></a><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-08737926036749148 visible ontop" href="http://www.youtube.com/v/o-TPhBIuTJc"></a><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-08737926036749148 visible ontop" href="http://www.youtube.com/v/o-TPhBIuTJc"></a><object height="355" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/o-TPhBIuTJc"><param name="wmode" value="transparent"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/o-TPhBIuTJc" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" height="355" width="425"></embed></object><br /><br />The sound effects are also great and everything seems to fit nicely together. Occasionally enemies will shout out various things at you when they attack you or die which is always a good thing.<br /><br />The music is an absolute joy to listen to and really suits the area you’re exploring. About half of the tracks are orchestral which really sets the mood for the location you’re in. Others are orchestral with a modern twist which may sound weird, but it really works. Every track is extremely well put together and is one of my favourite video game soundtracks of all time. I love it that much I bought the soundtrack CD and still listen to it every once and a while.<br /><br />If you’re lucky enough to get the limited edition version of the PlayStation version you’ll get a Castlevania Music Collection CD. This has a selection tracks that span from the NES to the X68000.<br /><br />In each scene with a main character you’ll be treated to a short voiced over conversation. This is quite nice and I feel this makes the game more involving. The English voice actors do a good job of delivering their lines, but with most games from the ‘90s the dialogue is something to be desired. Some of the classic lines are “What is a man?! A miserable little pile of secrets! But enough talk... have at you!" and “How is that I have been so defeated?" said by Dracula. The Japanese actors’ voices seem to be more suited to the characters, but since I don’t understand the language, I can’t really comment on it.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Game Over?… Not Quite</span><br /><br /><a href="http://imageshack.us/" target="_blank" class="postlink"><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 255px;" resizemod="9" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img248.imageshack.us/img248/2030/symp2mk5.gif" border="0" /></a> <a href="http://imageshack.us/" target="_blank" class="postlink"><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 320px;" resizemod="10" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img150.imageshack.us/img150/4891/satnewscreen33up6.png" border="0" /></a><br /><br />Once you’ve completed the game with enough map overage you’ll be able to play though the entire game as Richter Belmont. Richter has completely different moves compared to Alucard so this gives you an entirely new way to play though the game. He has no storyline and you don’t see any of the main characters.<br /><br />Richter plays like your standard Castlevania character using the ‘vampire killer’ to whip his enemies to death. He also moves in the classic ‘tank like’ fashion. You’ll be able to use a verity of moves which gives you complete access to the castle as soon as you start the game.<br /><br />It’s a real challenge to complete the game with Richter because he takes a lot of damage so you’ll find yourself dieing a lot. He does have ‘item crash’ powers which are super moves for each sub-weapon. This is something that Alucard can’t do.<br /><br />You can also play the game on ‘luck mode’ when you’ve completed the game. This extremely reduces Alucard’s stats and gives you 99 luck and special luck ring. It’s quite a challenge because you’re so weak. The good thing is that your chance of getting a critical hit and rare item drops is greatly increased.<br /><br />Finally if you play a ‘cleared’ save file you’ll get new items and the sound test in the shop. You also get time attack information for all the bosses you’ve defeated.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Sega Saturn Extras</span><br /><br /><a href="http://imageshack.us/" target="_blank" class="postlink"><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 320px;" resizemod="11" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img515.imageshack.us/img515/851/saturnscreen5wk7.png" border="0" /></a> <a href="http://imageshack.us/" target="_blank" class="postlink"><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 320px;" resizemod="12" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img257.imageshack.us/img257/9535/saturnscreen12mc7.png" border="0" /></a><br /><br />The Saturn version of the game was only released in Japan and has a number of extras which are exclusive to the system. The first major difference is the option to play as Alucard, Richter and Maria at the start of the game. There is also a code you can put in to give Richter a different costume.<br /><br />Maria is very much like Richter and has no storyline. She has her own unique sub-weapons and attacks which are all animal related. She also has ‘item crash’ powers, a selection of hidden moves and complete access to the castle as soon as you start the game. The only difference between her and Richter is that she has a magic meter.<br /><br />The next major difference is the addition of two new areas of the castle which are the Underground Garden and Cursed Prison. These new areas don’t really add anything to the game and can be completely skipped out. The music for the new areas are remixes from classic Castlevania games. The Cursed Prison has its own music and the new remixes are ‘vampire killer’, ‘bloody tears’ and ‘wicked child’.<br /><br />The Saturn version has two exclusive bosses. The first is a skeleton knight who is in the Underground Garden. The second is when you get to certain point and you meet with Maria. In the PlayStation version she gives you an item and in the Saturn version you have to fight her for it. The Maria battle has its own unique music.<br /><br />While playing you can pickup additional weapons and items that are exclusive to the Saturn version. There’s also an additional relic which gives Alucard a speed boost if you double tap forward. Another exclusive is that you can access the sound test from the main menu which is always a nice feature.<br /><br />Probably the best feature of the Saturn version is that Alucard has three ‘equip’ slots compared to two on the PlayStation. This means that you can equip three weapons, two weapons and a shield or two weapons and a healing item. This can be extremely useful is used correctly. I’ve found this feature weird because technically Alucard has three hands.<br /><br />The reason Konami didn’t add these features to the PlayStation version is because the Saturn version was released a lot later. This means they had more time to add the new features.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Revenge of the Sega Saturn</span><br /><br />You might think it’d be better just to get the Saturn version, but you’ll need to consider a few drawbacks first. First is that the Saturn version is quite rare so you’ll have to pay a lot of money for it. I paid £28 on eBay from a guy in Japan, but I’ve seen it go for over £50.<br /><br />The Saturn’s slower CD drive speed and low hardware specs compared to the PlayStation cause most of the problems with this game. This is an issue that’s present in a lot of games that are on both systems.<br /><br />The slowdown on the game can be quite unbearable at times. The game almost always slows down even if there are only one or two enemies on the screen. This means you have to really want to play the game to continue playing it.<br /><br />The Saturn doesn’t have a controller with enough buttons so make playing a bit of a pain at times. On the PlayStation version you press ‘select’ to access the map, but on the Saturn you go into the menu then press ‘L’. This is really annoying and takes up a lot more time than you might think.<br /><br />When moving between areas there is a wait of about two seconds on the PlayStation version, but on the Saturn a ‘now loading’ message is shown and takes over 5 seconds to load. This can be annoying if you’re going though multiple areas in a short period of time.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Xbox 360 version</span><br /><br />The Xbox 360 version is a little disappointing. There are a number of things which annoy me quite a lot. Most are because at the time Microsoft set the size limit of Xbox Live Arcade games to under 100mb.<br /><br />The controls have been changed and the ‘start’ button brings up a new menu. The ‘left trigger’ button shows the map and ‘back’ is for the status menu. There is no way to change this at all. The other controls can still be customised in the settings menu.<br /><br />The sound quality has been reduced so the sound effects and voice acting sounds tinny at times. This is something that only someone who’s played the PSone version a few times will pick up on. The game sound is still set to mono in the settings menu which should have been changed.<br /><br />When there’s an in-game dialogue between characters there is a blue strip with white text. When I completed the game with the best ending this was missing. This made reading the text extremely difficult because of the picture in the background. The game’s ending music was also changed from ‘I am the Wind’ by Michiru Yamane to ‘Admiration of a Clan' from Castlevania: Lament of Innocence. This was probably because Konami didn't want to pay for the royalties/copyright for the song.<br /><br />The money glitch has been fixed when using ‘Sword Brothers’ on the Librarian. This means getting the achievement for $100,000 will be a little harder. The glitch to keep your equipment at the start of the game is still there. This doesn’t affect much because it only works on your second play through.<br /><br />All three FMVs (Full Motion Videos) have been completely removed. Unless you’ve played the game before you’ll be missing key plot points in the story. There’s nothing to replace them so it’ll be up to you to figure out what’s going on. This is a real shame and something should have been there to explain the story.<br /><br />The game is displayed in HD (High Definition), but this doesn’t really update the picture quality. The picture is centralised and can be stretched in the options menu to whatever size you like. It has a border with Alucard on the left and Dracula on the right. The border has a graveyard at the bottom with crosses and fog floating across the top. There is also an ‘enhanced’ graphics option. This makes the game look really weird. I don’t recommend using it at all.<br /><br />Now it’s time to point out the good features. One of the best things is that the loading times have been reduced to less than a second. This is because the game can load faster from a hard drive compared to a CD. The time you had to wait wasn’t too long but it’s still a bonus. You can also listen to your own music while playing which is also a nice feature to have. There are also thirty saves game slots, though you shouldn’t need more than three or four. You can now quit to the main menu with having to kill yourself.<br /><br />As with every Xbox Live Arcade game you can get a maximum of 200 Gamer Points. This may not seem like much, but it’s better than nothing at all. Some of the achievements are stupidly easy to get. The best example is kill ten enemies without getting hit. I’m sure that whoever ported this game got lazy and couldn’t think of ways to challenge people. I believe achievements should be earned not just given away for stupid things. This game is still worth the 800 Microsoft Points (£6.80) I paid for it, despite everything mentioned above. It’s a pity that the Sega Saturn version wasn’t ported instead.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">PlayStation, Sega Saturn, PSP or Game Download?</span><br /><br />This is matter of choice more than anything. More people have a PlayStation than a Saturn so I’d recommend the PlayStation version. If you want to play the Saturn you’ll either need a Japanese Saturn or an Action Replay to play imports. If you can’t find the game or don’t have either a PlayStation or Saturn you can legally download it. You can download it on either Xbox Live Arcade (Xbox 360) or the PlayStation Network (PlayStation 3 & PSP). Konami has included the full game as an unlockable on Castlevania: The Dracula X Chronicles (PSP).<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Final Thoughts</span><br /><br />This is one of my favourite games of all time and I highly recommend that you play it. It’s also regarded by most Castlevania fans this is greatest Castlevania in the series. Konami really makes good use of quality 3D elements to a 2D game. The game also includes a few CG cut scenes which brings the game nicely together. The game has a short but sweet storyline and will gives you hours of play time. Overall a great game with a lot of replay value because of the large castle to explore and five different endings. I guarantee you’ll love every minute you play.<br /><br />I defiantly give this game a huge <span style="font-weight: bold;">THUMBS UP</span> regardless of the system you play it on .<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:180%;" >Score: 10/10</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">References</span><br /><br /><a href="http://castlevania.classicgaming.gamespy.com/Games/sotn.html" target="_blank">http://castlevania.classicgaming.gamespy.com/Games/sotn.html</a><br /><br /><a href="http://www.vgmuseum.com/mrp/screen-cvsotn.htm" target="_blank">http://www.vgmuseum.com/mrp/screen-cvsotn.htm</a><br /><br /><a href="http://www.vgmuseum.com/mrp/screen-nocturne.htm" target="_blank">http://www.vgmuseum.com/mrp/screen-nocturne.htm</a><br /><br /><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castlevania:_Symphony_of_the_Night" target="_blank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castlevania:_Symphony_of_the_Night</a>iCEMANhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12725786287275413996noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9000888890659356944.post-23254719727631794722008-03-07T16:33:00.000-08:002008-03-10T05:34:34.459-07:00Monster Hunter Freedom Review<a href="http://imageshack.us/" target="_blank" class="postlink"><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 300px;" resizemod="off" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img180.imageshack.us/img180/3156/92833672569frontgy7.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Also known as:</span><br />Monster Hunter Portable<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Release date:</span><br />2006 on PSP<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Also released on:</span><br />PlayStation2 as Monster Hunter (2004/2005)<br />PlayStation2 as Monster Hunter G (2005)<br />PC as Monster Hunter Frontier (2007)<br /><br /><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-08737926036749148 visible ontop" href="http://www.youtube.com/v/AJrTxYeSGk0"></a><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-08737926036749148 visible ontop" href="http://www.youtube.com/v/AJrTxYeSGk0"></a><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-08737926036749148 visible ontop" href="http://www.youtube.com/v/AJrTxYeSGk0"></a><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-08737926036749148 visible ontop" href="http://www.youtube.com/v/AJrTxYeSGk0"></a><object height="355" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/AJrTxYeSGk0"><param name="wmode" value="transparent"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/AJrTxYeSGk0" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" height="355" width="425"></embed></object><br /><br />For those of you who may, or may not know, this is a port of Monster Hunter on PlayStation2. Some of the newer features were in Monster Hunter G, which was only released in Japan. The PSP version includes everything from both PlayStation2 versions and much, much more.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Before Your Game Begins</span><br /><br />Before you even start the game you’ll have to make a character. There are a lot of customisation options available so this may take about ten minutes.<br /><br />You start by choosing either a male or female and your character’s name. Next is the face type and skin colour. Your ‘naked’ clothes colour will change depending on your skin colour. Finally are your character’s voice, hair style and colour. When choosing the hair colour you can manually pick it so it’s completely your choice.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Welcome to Kokoto Village</span><br /><br />Once you’ve made your character you’ll wake up in your house in Kokoto Village. This is where you save your game, change equipment, store items and access the Felyne Kitchen. Later on in the game you’ll get a pet pig which apparently increases rare items in your quest rewards.<br /><br />Once you’re outside you can access a variety of different shops. These include shops for items, weapons/armour and two travelling sales people. The item shop is only useful for the first few quests. It only offers basic things which you can usually find in a quest. Once you’ve finished enough quests a travelling salesman will sell you a wide selection of items. Apart from the usual stuff, he sells information books on enemies, more storage space for items and combo books which increase your item combination rate. There’s also a saleswoman who appears in the middle of town and sells a selection of items. She has three different rotations of items and appears at random after a quest.<br /><br />There are two types of weapon/armour shops. One is where you buy and one is where you make your own. The only way to get the best equipment is to make your own. This means you won’t be using the shop to buy equipment for very long. The way you make and upgrade your equipment is by killing enemies and carving them up for body parts. New equipment won’t show up in the shop until you have at least one part to make it.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">New PSP features</span><br /><br />A new feature to the PSP version is the Kokoto Fields. This is an area which is looked after by a number of Felyne cats. There are a number of different areas in here where you can collect ores, bugs, fish and herbs. This is extremely useful and will help you a lot if it’s used after each quest. When you try and collect these types of items in a quest it’s really tedious. Using the Kokoto Field makes things a lot easier.<br /><br />Each area of the Kokoto Field can be upgraded and will give you more or rarer items. You need to talk to a guy at the entrance of the Kokoto Field and use points to upgrade. You get points by either buying or selling items and equipment. You also unlock more upgrades by progressing through the game.<br /><br />Apart from the mining spots there’s a Felyne cat to help you in quite a strange way. The cat will ask for a small or large barrel bomb and ask you to pick from three tunnels. After you’ve made your selection, the cat will run inside then tunnel with the bomb. The bomb will explode and the cat will fly out on fire and give you some ore. This is really amusing and part of the Japanese humour used through out the game.<br /><br />The PSP version includes the training mode from Monster Hunter G. This is extremely hard because you’re given a set amount of equipment and only get one life. You’re also given a limited selection of items which is different depending on the weapon you choose. The training is used to improve your skills against the boss monsters. Once you’ve killed every boss monster with the same weapon you’re given a medal on your Guild Card.<br /><br /><a href="http://imageshack.us/" target="_blank" class="postlink"><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="1" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img219.imageshack.us/img219/7653/92833620060510screen023za4.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Cooking cats… what the hell?</span><br /><br />Occasionally you’ll see the Felyne cat saleswoman. She’ll sell you a selection of different cats which have different cooking specialities and skill levels. Your cats can level up by using the kitchen more. Once you get them to level nine they’ll become master chefs and be able to prepare better food. The higher the cat’s level, the more food you can choose from. When you have the maximum of five cats you’ll be able to have about twenty different choices of food.<br /><br />Depending on what your cat’s specialities are depends on the food you can choose from. You choose from two foods from a list and then see the cats cook the food. Eating the cat’s food will give you status enhancing effects like more health or stamina. You sometimes get bonus effects at random which give you better rewards among other things. If you pick a bad choice of foods you can get negative effects like reduced health. Finally the effect only lasts for your first life and only for that quest. This is highly amusing and I enjoy seeing it every time.<br /><br /><a href="http://imageshack.us/" target="_blank" class="postlink"><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 480px;" resizemod="2" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img180.imageshack.us/img180/3394/gfs6739524wj9.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Where's My Storyline?</span><br /><br />This game pretty much has no storyline what so ever. The only things you’ll be doing are quests, quests and more quests. The quests are split up into difficulty levels of between one and five stars. You’ll have to talk to the village chief each time you want to start a quest. You’ll be given a number of quests to complete and once you’ve done them all you’ll be given an urgent quest. If you complete the urgent quest you’ll unlock the next selection of quests. Once you’ve completed all the village chief’s quests you’ll have to play ‘online’ for more quests.<br /><br />Here's a brief description of the quest types;<br /><br />Hunting quests requires you to kill either a boss monster or a certain amount of regular monsters. This is the most common type of quest you’ll be doing.<br /><br />Capture quests need you to find a boss monster, weaken it until near death then capture it. This can sometimes be difficult when fighting a Plesioth or Gypceros because they don’t show any sign that they’re near death. When the boss is weak enough you’ll need to trap in a ‘pitfall trap’. Once the monster is trapped you’ll quickly have to throw or shoot a tranquilliser at it to put it to sleep. If the boss isn’t weakened enough you’ll have to continue the fight and try again.<br /><br />Gathering quests are just there so you can easily collect resources. This is good if you want to kill regular monster, do some mining or do some fishing. There is usually a boss monster, so it’s up to you if you kill it or not. To complete this quest all you’ll need to do is collect a ‘paw pass’ ticket from the item box, and put it in the quest box at your base camp. Occasionally you get a quest to deliver monster eggs or ore. This must be carried back to the base camp and is extremely heavy. If you drop it you'll have to start over again.<br /><br />The final quest type is only used for Lao-Shan Lung. This quest involves protecting a castle from a 60ft dragon type monster. Lao moves extremely slowly, pulling itself on its stomach. It’ll take 20-30 minutes to get to the castle depending on the damage you do to it. Lao is so big that you can climb on its back while it’s crawling and it just carries on as normal. When it finally gets to the castle you can attack it with a cannon, giant spikes at the front gate or your standard weapons. To shoot the cannon you’ll need to carry the heavy cannon balls from your camp to the castle gate. This is tricky because they’ll be a few Ioprey trying to stop you. This quest is completed by dealing enough damage to Lao or killing it. You fail if Lao does enough damage to the castle.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Combining Items</span><br /><br />One of the best things in this game is the fact that you can combine two items make a new item. There are 124 different combinations and it’s up to you to find out what they are. You can on only combine the correct items so this isn’t as bad as it sounds. Some items require the ‘alchemy’ skill to be able to combine them. I believe this make you think there are less combinations than there actually are.<br /><br />Each time you successfully combine a new item it’s added to your ‘combo list’. This is a quick reference guide and it also gives the success rate of each combination. If you have one of the five ‘combo books’ in your inventory this will increase your success rate. The more books you have the greater the success rate will be. If you have all five books it’ll increase the success rate by an additional 45%.<br /><br />When you’ve finally completed every single combination you’ll get a medal on your Guild Card. You’ll also get an ‘alchemy guide’ which will let you combine items that require the ‘alchemy’ skill without having it equipped to your armour.<br /><br /><br /><a href="http://imageshack.us/" target="_blank" class="postlink"><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 480px;" resizemod="3" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img138.imageshack.us/img138/7108/gfs67395215ig8.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Choosing Your Weapon</span><br /><br />This is one of the most important things you need to consider. Choosing the right equipment is the key to success. This may sound obvious, but there’s a lot to consider. Each weapon can usually be upgraded multiple times and each upgrade having two or three different outcomes.<br /><br />There are seven different weapon types so choosing the right weapon crucial. Apart from the bowguns, each weapon can also have an elemental attribute attached to it. These are fire, water, thunder, poison, sleep, paralysis and dragon.<br /><br />Finding each boss' elemental weakness is the easiest way to defeat them. Having a weapon with the right element added will cause you to do drastically more damage. Every weapon that has high elemental damage will usually have low ‘raw’ damage. This means that if you use the wrong element for a boss it’ll only do the ‘raw’ damage amount.<br /><br />One of the things that really annoys me is the amount of damage to game says each weapon deals. If the damage shown was actually what it says it is you’ll kill every boss monster in about 30 seconds. For example a Rathalos has about 2,000 hit points and the great sword you’re using says it deals 932 damage. If this was true you’d kill it only 3 hits.<br /><br />Blademaster<br /><br />The sword and shield is swift and agile so can attack and then quickly escape. It doesn’t do much damage, but can get a lot of hits in by using combos of up to six hits. You can also keep it out and run around at normal speed.<br /><br />As the name suggests, the great sword is a massive sword. It has great distance and can hit multiple enemies with a single hit. It also has slow attacks and can take a long time to get out and attack. You can however get into a continuous combo of attacks if timed correctly. When your sword is drawn you move really slowly.<br /><br />The lance is quite an effective weapon, but needs a lot of stamina to use it. You can attack at maximum range and then dodge back, left or right after an attack. You can also attack forwards or upwards with up to three hits in a combo. The lance has a ‘charge’ attack which makes your character run fast towards your enemies hitting as many as you can. This consumes a lot of stamina so can’t be done for long. When your stamina bar is extremely low you can’t dodge after an attack. With your lance drawn you move really slowly, just like the great sword.<br /><br />The duel swords are the weakest of the swords, but have a special attack that makes up for that. When you normally attack you can get approximately ten hits in using three different combos. You get a massive amount of hits in when you use the special attack, but it’ll consume your stamina super fast. You can also run around with the swords drawn, but they have no way to block attacks. This means you have to be really good at dodging attacks.<br /><br />Hammers are quite powerful, but really hard to use. It’s really hard to hit enemies because you need to get your timing just right. Your standard attacks are a sideways jab or an overhead smash. The hammer’s best moves are its changed attacks. The first is a forward spinning attack which hits the enemy about seven times. The other is a powerful overhead smash. Just like the duel swords, you can run with the weapon out and can’t block.<br /><br />Gunner<br /><br />The light and heavy bowguns are pretty much the same. Both require you to carry ammo so you’ll have to choose the other items very carefully. The amount of ammo you’ll need could up to half your inventory space. You’ll also need to combine items in-game to make even more ammo. This is because most ammo types have a very limited amount you can carry. This may make gunners sound bad, but they’re actually quite good.<br /><br />Gunners have a wide verity of ammo types including elemental ammo. The main ammo types have three levels of ammo power. The more powerful the ammo, the less you can carry. The types are normal, pierce, crag, pellet and clust. The gunners also have elemental and other ammos. These are flaming, ice, thunder, poison, stun, sleep, recover, paintball, tranquilliser and dung.<br /><br />Obviously the best thing about gunners is their attack range. You can also upgrade your bowguns power by five levels and add a zoom scope or silencer. This will cost a lot of money, but it’ll be worth once it’s fully upgraded. Each gun can hold different amounts of certain ammo types. This means you'll need to choose your gun carefully.<br /><br />The only real drawback to being a gunner is that if you run out of ammo you’ll have to forfeit your quest and start over. This is because there’s no way to pickup extra ammo in a quest. The only way you can solve this is to always carry lv1 normal ammo which is unlimited.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Choosing Your Armour</span><br /><br />Making this choice depends if you’re a Blademaster or Gunner. Both categories have different armour which can’t be used for both types apart from a select few. Blademasters usually have low elemental defence and high standard defence and Gunners have the opposite.<br /><br />Each piece of armour has certain amount of ability points. When you get the same set of points to ten you’ll get that ability. Some armour sets can get the points to twenty which gives an advanced form of the ability. You can also get negative abilities as well as positive with the same armour. You don’t have to get a full set of armour for the ability you want. You can mix and match pieces until you’ve got what you need.<br /><br />The only armour that both Blademasters and Gunners can use is usually the ‘comedy’ outfits. These make you look like an enemy or someone in the game. Almost all of these have no real use apart from they make you look funny. There are also other sets which both categories can use which have low defence but good abilities. These include Guild Knight, Shinobi Heaven and Shinobi Earth.<br /><br /><a href="http://imageshack.us/" target="_blank" class="postlink"><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 480px;" resizemod="4" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img183.imageshack.us/img183/8286/gfs6739522af7.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Enemies and Sub-Bosses</span><br /><br />There are a wide number and verity of enemies that inhabit the world. Some are content with minding their own business and others make it their job to make your life a constant nightmare.<br /><br />The main creatures that’ll try and attack you throughout the game are the Velociprey, Genprey and Ioprey. These are Velociraptor like creatures that’ll bite and jump at you continuously. There are usually an unlimited number of these on the level, so as soon as you kill one another will take its place. They also attack you in packs just like real Velociraptors.<br /><br />There are superior versions of the Velociprey, Genprey and Ioprey which are basically sub-bosses. They’ll appear early in the game as the main monster to kill in the Village Chief’s quests. You’ll find them later in the game in other quests along with the boss monsters. These sub-bosses are larger and more elaborate looking than their lesser counterparts. They also deal a lot more damage and will run in to a different area when they’re low on health.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">The Different Areas</span><br /><br />Forest and Hills<br />This area is exactly what you’d expect from its name. Your base camp is in a secluded area with a small fishing spot. You exit into the hills area and can go left into the forest. Most of the hills area is wide open and have grey mountain areas. There are three different ways to go to forest from the hills area.<br /><br />If you go towards the mountains from camp then climb up to your left, it leads to large cliff. You can climb the cliffs and eventually get to a Wyvern nesting area. This cave leads to a large open area, which then leads to the second mountain area.<br /><br />Once you’re in the forest there is a secluded area to the north you can do some fishing. Further north the the Felyne cats’ hide out. There is a large area with water where the aggressive Felyne cats will try and attack you with small bombs. If you go south there is a connecting area where an abandoned camp is. There are three different exits in this area. One is to a secluded area where can trade items with the Forest Elder. Another way is to a narrow forest area that has Felyne cats that try and steal items. Finally the last exit leads to the area when you left the camp.<br /><br />Desert<br />Your camp is in a plain orange coloured mountain area. You can either go down a ladder to the main desert or the opposite direction to a mountain area. If you go to the mountains there is a medium sized area with a ledge to climb and two exits. The left exit leads to a secluded area with a small lake. There is another exit which leads to the same place as the right exit from the previous area.<br /><br />The next area is a large mountain area with a fish spot. It leads to an underground cave if you go north or another mountain area to the west. The new mountain area leads to the Felyne cats’ hide out if you go north and the second large desert to the west. This second large desert has two small caves and leads to the first desert. The first desert is extremely large and has three small caves in the mountain and leads back to base camp. Both desert areas are full of Cephalos, which are sand sharks.<br /><br />Jungle<br />The camp is on the edge of a mountain and has two exits into the jungle. The left exit leads into a large area which is full of all sorts of trees and has two exits. One is to a secluded area where can trade items with the Jungle Elder and the other leads to a river side jungle area. In this new area you can go right which leads to the jungle right of the camp or north into a different riverside jungle. You can then climb up the mountain which leads to a Wyvern nesting site. If you continue on you’ll go into a cave which then leads to the right jungle from camp. If you didn’t climb the mountain it leads to a cave which then has a further two caves if you continue on.<br /><br />Swamp<br />The base camp is in a similar to Forest and Hills, but not as enclosed. The swamp itself is gloomy with purple coloured fog in a lot of areas. Lots of the areas in the swamp look identical, but have minor differences.<br /><br />Once you exit the camp you’ll be in a medium sized woodland area with a few trees. You can either go right in to a large long grassed area or left in to an almost identical area. In the left area you can go left to a secluded area where can trade items with the Swamp Elder or right to another almost identical area. This third area has a left exit into a doughnut shaped cave or goes to an open marsh area to the right. In the marsh area you can go up or right to almost identical marsh areas. If you went up, this area has a cave at the side and goes right into another marsh area. This is the last marsh area also has a cave at the side. This area goes right into the large long grassed area if you went right from camp.<br /><br />Volcano<br />The camp is in a wide open grey mountain area which has left and right exit. The left area is wide open circular room surrounded by mountains. It has large rocks which explode if they’re hit. The right area is a connecting area which leads to left, into the some caves or right into a similar area left of the camp. Whichever way you take they’ll all lead into almost identical areas inside the caves. Each cave is quite large and you can see lava flowing towards the volcano. If you keep going left you’ll eventually go to a wide open area. This area has lots of lava flowing through it, but has a path clear for you to walk through. If you continue along the path you’ll come to a further lava filled area. This next area is used for some of the later boss battles and leads to the base of the volcano. You can climb all the way up the volcano and even see flames shooting out from inside its base. This area has four mining spots which give you ‘rust stones’ or ‘ancient stones’.<br /><br />The Arena<br />You start off in the camp and there’s only one which leads into the arena. The arena itself is a single large room with a ledge at one side. This area is used to challenge you to fight enemies without being able to escape. This can be extremely hard when fighting two bosses at once.<br /><br /><a href="http://imageshack.us/" target="_blank" class="postlink"><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 480px;" resizemod="5" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img232.imageshack.us/img232/938/92833620060510screen010kl5.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Bosses, Bosses and More Bosses</span><br /><br />A lot of the bosses have the same sort of attacks so I’ll explain them briefly;<br /><br />Tail whip – Spins around in a complete circle while stood still.<br />Fireball – It’ll shoot either a single shot straight or three in a circular motion towards you.<br />Scream – This will cause your character to hold their ears leaving them open for an attack. You can block this, but it’ll cause you to stagger backwards.<br />Charge – The boss will run towards you at high speed then fall over.<br /><br />When you do enough damage to a boss it’ll get enraged. When this happens its damage, speed and defence increase by about 40%. This can last a short period of time then ware off. When the boss is almost dead it’ll constantly be enraged until you kill it.<br /><br />Most bosses can get their body parts damaged like their wings and head. Most can also get their tail cut off which will make them a lot easier to fight. When you carve the tail it’ll usually give you rare rewards.<br /><br />Yian Kut-Ku (pink or blue)<br />This is the first proper boss you’ll encounter in the game. It’s a dragon type creature which has webbed ears. It has all the common attacks plus three others. It can walk and peck at you which will knock you quickly to the floor. An attack where it stands still, shoots fireballs up than they land all around. Finally it can charge at you while shooting fireballs left and right. You can tell when it’s almost dead because its ears will go back.<br /><br />Rathalos (red, dark blue or silver)<br />This is your more common looking dragon type boss and is a male. It has all the common attacks as well as two others. It can hover above you and shoot a fireball down and can also swoop down while flying and poison you. This boss loves to fly to different areas a lot so you’ll get really annoyed having to find it all the time.<br /><br />Rathian (green, pink or gold)<br />This boss is a female and is looks just like a Rathalos. She has Rathalos’ poison swoop attack and can also back flip and poison you. Unlike a Rathalos she’ll rarely fly away. This makes her a more manageable boss to fight.<br /><br />Gypceros (black or purple)<br />This boss looks like a fat hairless chicken with a white American football on its nose. It acts a lot like a Yian Kut-Ku but can poison you. The thing on its nose call shoot out a blinding light and cause you be temporally stunned. Its most deadly attack is to feign death and kill you if you go near it. You can avoid this by throwing something at it to take it up. There’s no way to tell when it’s near death. This is a real pain if you want to trap it.<br /><br />Plesioth (blue or green)<br />If you imagine a fish with legs then you’ve got a Plesioth. This boss is almost always in water and has a few cunning attacks. Its first attack is shooting water straight or in a circular motion while in the water. It can also do it straight on land. Its other attack is a shoulder barge attack which does massive damage.<br /><br />You’ll need to use ‘sonic bomb’ to cause a shockwave and make it jump out of the water. Once out, you’ll have a short time to attack it before it goes back in.<br /><br />The thing I hate the most about this boss is when it does its land attacks. It’ll do a shoulder barge or tail whip and can hit you when you’re no where near it. This is extremely frustrating and unnecessary. Just like the Gipsarios, there’s no way to tell when it’s near death.<br /><br />Cephadrome (dark brown)<br />This boss is exactly the same as a Plesioth, but it’s in the desert sand. Instead of shooting water it shoots sand. You can see its fin in the sand and you’ll have to hit it to make it jump out.<br /><br />Basarios (grey)<br />This is a monster which hides in the volcano area and look just like rocks. You’ll have to look hard to find his guy because he really blends in with the scenery. His attacks are a giant fire beam that shoots forward and it can also excrete a poison or sleep gas cloud. His skin is made of stone on top but not underneath. You’ll have to try and attack him by hitting his soft underside.<br /><br />Gravios (white or black)<br />Exactly the same as a Basiros, but not made of stone. This guy is a lot bigger and can also go in the lava to change areas.<br /><br />Khezu (white or red)<br />This thing is like a fat ball with a long neck with a mouth. It has no eyes so relies on what I think is its nose. This is one of the most annoying bosses in the game because of its cheesy moves. Its first attack is to stand still and generate an electrical shield which does massive damage. It can also shoot out an electrical ball which splits into three. This attack moves really fast and will usually be done more than once in a row. It’ll occasionally jump and try and squash you.<br /><br />Monoblos (brown or white)<br />Looks like a Triceratops with a tail that splits in two. It has no projectile attacks so isn’t too hard to fight. Its main attacks are to charge at you and tail whip. It can also dig into the floor and attack from right underneath you. If it charges at you it’ll get its horn stuck in the wall. You can cut its horn off to decrease its damage when charging. This guy does massive damage, but is quite slow.<br /><br />Diablos (brown or black)<br />Exactly the same as a Monoblos, but has two horns. I think it moves faster when it’s enraged.<br /><br />Kirin (white)<br />This guy is a Unicorn that can use electrical attacks. His attacks are to stand still and generate multiple lightning bolts around himself and he also charges a lot. He moves really fast and can’t be stopped until you get a critical hit on him. When moving normally he’ll jump around in small bursts. He’s got no elemental weakness so the fight usually takes a long time.<br /><br />Yian Garuga (purple)<br />This is a more aggressive version of a Yian Kut-Ku. The only difference apart from his appearance is that he’ll poison you when doing a tail whip or other attacks. You have to do a certain amount of damage to him to complete the quest. He can’t be defeated in a single quest so this fight will last at for quite a while.<br /><br />Lao-Shan Lung (red or black)<br />A 60ft dragon type monster that moves extremely slowly, pulling itself on its stomach.<br /><br />Fatalis (black or red)<br />This guy looks like a Chinese dragon and is about 30ft tall. He’s basically the last boss and can kill you in one hit with almost every attack. As with a Plesioth, his attacks rarely actually hit you, but you still die. The black and red versions of this boss are in different areas and have different attacks.<br /><br />The black version is fought in a castle courtyard with a gate which can close in the middle. There’s a ladder on the side of the castle where you can get to the camp room. His main attacks are single fireball and hover then fireball. He also loves to go on his on this stomach and crawl extremely fast at you. This battle will last a few rounds because he can’t be defeated in a single round. It’s impossible to defeat him unless you’re a Gunner.<br /><br />The red version is fought in the area leading to the volcano base. This version has all the moves of the black version plus three more. He can fly through the air at extreme speed and can also summon meteors around himself. His most deadly move is to fly really high up and drive bomb at you at extreme speed. He’s drastically more aggressive and is almost always attacking.<br /><br /><a href="http://imageshack.us/" target="_blank" class="postlink"><img style="border: 0pt none ; width: 480px;" resizemod="6" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img138.imageshack.us/img138/2221/gfs67395234qg6.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">The Guild Hall</span><br /><br />This is where you go to play with other people to complete more quests. Most of the quests are similar to the ones you’ll find in single player. The only way to get the best equipment and weapons is to complete the Guild Hall quests. The game is a lot more fun playing with other people because of the team work aspect. The maximum amount of people you can have in a team is four. Unlike the single player missions, the Guild Hall's difficulty goes up to eight stars.<br /><br />The first thing you’ll notice about doing a Guild Hall quest is the dramatic increase in difficulty. All the enemies and bosses will deal about twice the damage and have about twice the health. This may seem harsh, but when you’re doing a quest with someone else it’s not so bad. Completing the quest will also give you greater rewards than you’ll get playing alone.<br /><br />Once you’ve completed enough quests you’ll get an urgent quest. Completing this will increase your Hunter Rank and unlock harder quests. Hunter Ranks are supposed to be used to ensure that you’re at the correct skill level for quests. However, you can cheat to increase your rank. All you need to do is host the quest and get other people to do it for you. Once the quest is complete you’ll rank up, making the ranking system useless.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">No Shovels Required</span><br /><br />As well as you’re standard quests you’ll also be able to do a treasure hunt. This involves two people competing against each other for the highest score possible. This is mode is like a gathering quest, but with a few twists. Every item you’ll pick up will be completely different to other quests. Once your inventory is full you’ll have to deliver the strange items to the treasure hunt guy. Once you’ve emptied your pockets you’ll get points for each item. You’re then free to continue the collect more. The common way to play this mode is one person is an item gatherer and the other kills enemies and bosses. This way you’ll get the most points possible for a great high score. Each different area has five different secret items which get put on your Guild Card as medals.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">No Online Play… WRONG!</span><br /><br />The PSP version doesn’t have infrastructure (online play), but does have Ad-Hoc (local play). Ad-Hoc multiplayer only allows you connect to people who are nearby. If you use a third party program called Xlink Kai you can play online. Xlink Kai is a program that can trick your PSP into thinking that you’re using Ad-Hoc. All you need is a Windows PC and a WiFi MAX.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">PLAY ONLINE USING WiFi MAX</span><br /><br />Setup guide videos <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KlTYhgxxo2w" target="_blank" class="postlink">part 1/3</a>, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vRfMBmkcaYs" target="_blank" class="postlink">part 2/3</a> and <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r58jK_q0PVE" target="_blank" class="postlink">part 3/3</a><br /><br /><a href="http://www.play-asia.com/SOap-23-83-ek6-71-bh-49-en-84-j-70-1x7l.html" target="_blank" class="postlink"><img title="Click to View Full-Size" style="border: 1px solid rgb(209, 215, 220); width: 480px; cursor: pointer;" resizemod="7" onload="rmw_img_loaded(this)" src="http://img139.imageshack.us/img139/4605/wifimaxax0.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Japanese Version Differences</span><br /><br />The first difference is the option to download additional quests. The English version includes almost all the downloadable quest, but no option to download more. I’ve no idea why Capcom decided to remove this feature because it’s a great idea. There are certain pieces of equipment that are only obtainable by getting items from the downloaded quests. As far as I know, you can hold a maximum of six quests on your memory card at a time.<br /><br />The second difference is the amount of blood. The Japanese version has drastically more blood. The more damage you do, the more blood there is. Trying to find a boss' weak point is almost impossible on the English version because of the blood reduction. This isn’t a major difference, the option for reduced blood would have been better.<br /><br />Finally is the way you defeat Yian Garuga. This is done by linking your PSP to Monster Hunter 2 on the PS2. If you don’t do this you can never carve him up for all the items he can give you. This will mean you won’t be able to make his weapons parts of his armour. I’m not sure if you have to do this each time or not.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Graphics, Music, Sound and Controls</span><br /><br />This game looks almost exactly the same as its PS2 counterpart. The only thing that I’ve noticed that’s different is the reduced texture quality. This is a common thing when a game is ported from a console to a handheld. The only time you’ll really notice the difference is when you’re looking at your character very close up. I doubt you’ll find a PSP game that looks as good as this.<br /><br />There’s a lot of music when you’re in the town area, but not a lot when you’re in-game. The music really suits whichever area you’re in and that’ll immerse you further into the game. The only music you’ll usually hear in-game is the boss music. There is other music, but it isn’t really noticeable. The lack of in-game music doesn’t really hinder the game in any way. I noticed that the music from the Swamp Elder was used as the merchant’s theme in Resident Evil 4.<br /><br />I can’t fault the game’s sound. Everything’s spot on and there isn’t a sound out of place. Everything that’s in the PS2 version is here without any loss in quality.<br /><br />Due to the PSP’s lack of two analogue sticks the controls were changed. On the PS2 version you used the right analogue stick to control all your attacks. The PSP version uses TRIANGLE, X and TRIANGLE + X to attack. You still rotate the camera using the d-pad which is annoying at times.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Final Thoughts</span><br /><br />Overall this is a great action adventure RPG. This is however, one of those games where you'll either love or hate instantly. You really have to be dedicated to playing to get the most out of it. You'll spend a lot of time doing the same quests over and over to get good equipment. There's no levelling up system which some people might not like. The game is more about skill and tactics then anything else. Equipment and rewards can't be traded between characters. This means you'll have to be a good player to get good rewards. You won't get much of the single player game because everything good is 'online'. You should get about 50 hours from single player and an additional 200 hours at least from multiplayer. I've played this game for over 515 hours and I highly recommend playing it.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">THUMBS UPS</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:180%;" >Score: 9.5/10</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">References</span><br /><br /><a href="http://www.capcom.com/monster" target="_blank">http://www.capcom.com/monster</a><br /><br /><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monster_Hunter_Freedom" target="_blank">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monster_Hunter_Freedom</a><br /><br /><a href="http://www.angelfire.com/stars5/tkcpics2/mhf" target="_blank">http://www.angelfire.com/stars5/tkcpics2/mhf</a> <a href="http://www.angelfire.com/stars5/tkcpics2/reviews/mhf_review.html"></a>iCEMANhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12725786287275413996noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9000888890659356944.post-1546172169989267512008-03-07T02:49:00.000-08:002008-03-08T07:50:16.340-08:00Castlevania: Symphony of the Night Review<span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 153, 0);">Intro</span><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://pgrevolution.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/01/cvsotn.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 179px; height: 134px;" src="http://pgrevolution.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/01/cvsotn.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br />Today I'm goning to review one of my favourite games of all time: Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. A good 11 years ago Konami had released the game on the orignal Playstation, The game later was ported to the Saturn, Xbox Live Arcade, PSN and the Playstation Portable in an rehashed version of Rondo of Blood. The PS and Saturn version can be found in barging bins if your lucky but if you really want to join right now you can either get it on PS3 and Xbox360 for 10 dollars on there Arcade networks.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 153, 0);">Story</span><br />SOTN has quite a deep story it begins of with a flashback where you kill Count Dracula as Righter Belmont after that you play as Alucard, the son of Dracula (just read Alucard backwards) who tries to stop the recent activities at the Castle of Dracula, Alucard is a pure good guy and tries to stop everything Dracula tries to do. You'll also meet Maria a young girl who tries to find her friend Righter Belmont, she also helps you defeat some bosses. Enough spoiler though let's go on.<br /><br /><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-08084833480815965 visible ontop" href="http://www.gametrailers.com/remote_wrap.php?mid=18003"></a><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-08084833480815965 visible ontop" href="http://www.gametrailers.com/remote_wrap.php?mid=18003"></a><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-08737926036749148 visible ontop" href="http://www.gametrailers.com/remote_wrap.php?mid=18003"></a><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-08737926036749148 visible ontop" href="http://www.gametrailers.com/remote_wrap.php?mid=18003"></a><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-08737926036749148 visible ontop" href="http://www.gametrailers.com/remote_wrap.php?mid=18003"></a><object classid="clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=8,0,0,0" id="gtembed" height="392" width="480"> <param name="allowScriptAccess" value="sameDomain"> <param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"> <param name="movie" value="http://www.gametrailers.com/remote_wrap.php?mid=18003"> <param name="quality" value="high"> <embed src="http://www.gametrailers.com/remote_wrap.php?mid=18003" swliveconnect="true" name="gtembed" allowscriptaccess="sameDomain" allowfullscreen="true" quality="high" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" align="middle" height="392" width="480"></embed> </object><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 153, 0);">Gameplay</span><br />Castlevania: Symphony of the Night is a mixture between a 2D action game and a RPG, normal combat is just like in other Castlevania game you slash enemies and when they die you can pick up a Heart, these Heart will let you do a special attack like throwing a knife or an axe, you can only hold one of these items so you need to pick the right one for the right enemy.<br /><br />The RPG part of the game is quite deep, you gain experience if you kill an enemy, you will also gain levels from that experience, gaining a level means you get more health and do more damage and other stat's also boost up.<br /><br />You can also find item like weapons and armour pieces you can wear to boost your stats, finding the right balance is essential. You can also find rings and which you can sell to a trader called 'The Master Librarian' you can also buy items, magic spells, tactics and get info on enemies. You can indeed cast spells you need to do a good button combination to fire the spell, these spells aren't that powerful but if they can be if you use them in a right way.<br /><br />You also find Relics in the game these Relics let you get special abilities like getting hearts out of candals or even transforming in to an animal, you can transform in a Bat, Wolf or in Mist, you will need to have these powers to finish certain puzzles in the game. You can also get Pets with these Relics, these pets can also level up and will aid you in your battle.<br /><br />To save in the game you have to go to an save point which will reheal you and save the game, there also teleporters in the game so you don't have to walk though the castle a million times.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 153, 0);">Presentation</span><br />Castlevania SOTN looks very nice for a 2D game, the graphics are all smooth and there a lot of graphical wonders in the game, the only problem I have with the graphics are the 3D cut scenes you find sometimes, there just damn ugly, the irritating part is that you can't skip, you can't skip any cutscene in the orignal version and that strikes me as odd.<br />The music is so freaking wonderful in SOTN you almost can't top that in any other game.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 153, 0);">Replayability</span><br />The main game is quite long and with an secret plot twist the game even becomes longer and harder, there also minor things you can find that only make the game longer and more enjoyable. There also Achievements in the 360 version so those are quite cool.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 102, 0);">Verdict</span><br />Castlevania: Symphony of the Night is one of the best games ever made, if you haven't played this game before, your not worthy of calling yourself a gamer.<br /><br />Score: <span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-size:130%;">10</span>/10<br /><br />Links<br /></span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castlevania:_Symphony_of_the_Night">Wikipdia</a><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /></span><a href="http://www.metacritic.com/games/platforms/psx/castlevaniasymphony?q=Castlevania:%20Symphony%20of%20the%20Night">Metacritic PS</a> (<a href="http://www.metacritic.com/games/platforms/xbox360/castlevaniasymphonyofthenight?q=Castlevania:%20Symphony%20of%20the%20Night">360</a>) (<a href="http://www.metacritic.com/games/platforms/psp/castlevaniathedraculaxchronicles?q=Castlevania:%20Symphony%20of%20the%20Night">PSP</a>)<br /><a href="http://www.xbox.com/en-US/games/c/castlevaniasotnxboxlivearcade/">Xbox Live Arcade Page</a>James-Kondhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17207918860500397539noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9000888890659356944.post-24597334956611910942008-03-07T01:55:00.000-08:002008-03-07T03:09:54.885-08:00The Best and Worst Movies based on Games<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://sakinlangto2.files.wordpress.com/2007/12/hitman_uk_poster.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 113px; height: 167px;" src="http://sakinlangto2.files.wordpress.com/2007/12/hitman_uk_poster.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br />The new hotness in the gaming industry is to make a movie based on your videogame.<br />I have seen many of these movies with some I just though 'ugh' with others I was more exited about the movie.<br />So here to a Movies based on Games roundup, the color <span style="color: rgb(0, 102, 0);">green</span> will mean ill<span style="color: rgb(0, 153, 0);"> recommend it</span>, <span style="color: rgb(255, 102, 0);">orange</span> that you<span style="color: rgb(255, 102, 0);"> might like it</span> and <span style="color: rgb(255, 0, 0);">red</span> for the <span style="color: rgb(255, 0, 0);">worst movies</span> in the business.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 153, 0);">Hitman </span><br /></span>A game about every bodies favourite assaisan for hire, The movie is about agent 47 early years, he tries to kill a Russian president and gets backstabbed, overall a good movie but a bit to extreme and badly acted, but it's still fun.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Games: Hitman 1, 2, Hitman Contracts, Hitman Blood Money<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(0, 153, 0);">Resident Evil</span></span><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /></span>Based upon my favourite horror series Resident Evil tries to bring the series to the movies, with success if you ask me the movie reminded me of other horror movies like 28 days later which I very much enjoyed even though I get a bit of an DOOM feeling to it.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Games: Resident Evil 1, 2, 3 and 4</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 102, 0);">Resident Evil: Apocalypse</span><br />The second movie in the series this is where the series get's a bit weak with some ugly moments and the actors seems to need to learn to act.<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Games: Resident Evil 1, 2, 3 and 4</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 0, 0);">Resident Evil: Extinction</span><br />This is where my interest started to wane off the movie introduces to much side carachters and when they died I just yawned a bit, don't watch this ever..<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Games: Resident Evil 1, 2, 3 and 4</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 0, 0);">DOA: Dead or Alive</span><br />I saw 10 minutes of this movie and gave up, let it be..DEAD<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Games: Dead or Alive Series, Dead or Alive Extreme Series</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 153, 0);">Tomb Raider</span><br />One of the first big movies to be based on a videogame Tomb Raider was a good movie with a good plot and some... good acting...<br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Games: Tomb Raider Series<br /><br /></span> <a href="http://digg.com/gaming_news/The_Best_and_Worst_Movies_based_on_Games"><br /><img src="http://digg.com/img/badges/100x20-digg-button.gif" width="100" height="20" alt="Digg!" /><br /></a><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"></span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"></span>James-Kondhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17207918860500397539noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9000888890659356944.post-17269546683889889352008-03-05T09:20:00.000-08:002008-03-08T07:45:53.043-08:00The Club Review<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.music4games.net/Uploads/Images/the_club_logo.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 216px; height: 162px;" src="http://www.music4games.net/Uploads/Images/the_club_logo.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 102, 0);">Intro</span><br />The Racing game developer Bizarre Creations have made there 3rd person arcade shooter 'The Club' The game is available for PS3 Xbox 360 and PC, the PC version is 10$ less so I picked that up. I really liked the Demo and gave that an 9/10 so we will see how the whole game plays.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(255, 0, 0); font-weight: bold;">Story</span><br />The Club is about a secret club that organises a bloodsport were the main goal is were you need to kill a enough enemies in a record time.<br />Rich and influences people will give money to 'The Club' to organise these bloodsports, these rich people will bet on who will survive, this is just the plot though and it's only shown in one videoclip at the beginning in the game after that only some introduction for levels are shown via videoclips.<br /><br />You can choose between 8 different characters every character has there own stats defieded between strength, speed and stamina.<br />The story isn't very deep, but it doesn't have to, and besides have you ever seen a good story in a racing game?<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 153, 0);">Gameplay</span><br />The Club's gameplay looks the most like Gears of War except it's missing the hiding system, instead it's the idea you rush through levels shooting as much enemies as you can and make it in time to the end of the game, you can shoot skullshots and secret skullshots to earn more points, these 'shots' are just plates that hang around all over the level, there also bonus enemies who give bonus points if you shoot them if they run past you.<br /><br />The big feature in The Club is the combo system, if you shoot an enemy after a few seconds after you shot another enemy you get and combo point, the higher the points the more points you get for every kill, the time in what time you need to shoot the next target will also shorten so you have to be fast if you want to keep your high combo, if your combo time runs out you will lose your combo and you will need to start over, You can also shoot normal Skullshot to lengthen your combo.<br />--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------<br /><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-04220820648397432 visible ontop" href="http://www.gametrailers.com/remote_wrap.php?mid=30330"></a><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-04220820648397432 visible ontop" href="http://www.gametrailers.com/remote_wrap.php?mid=30330"></a><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-04220820648397432 visible ontop" href="http://www.gametrailers.com/remote_wrap.php?mid=30330"></a><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-04220820648397432 visible ontop" href="http://www.gametrailers.com/remote_wrap.php?mid=30330"></a><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-04220820648397432 visible ontop" href="http://www.gametrailers.com/remote_wrap.php?mid=30330"></a><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-08737926036749148 visible ontop" href="http://www.gametrailers.com/remote_wrap.php?mid=30330"></a><object classid="clsid:d27cdb6e-ae6d-11cf-96b8-444553540000" codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=8,0,0,0" id="gtembed" height="392" width="480"> <param name="allowScriptAccess" value="sameDomain"> <param name="allowFullScreen" value="true"> <param name="movie" value="http://www.gametrailers.com/remote_wrap.php?mid=30330"> <param name="quality" value="high"> <embed src="http://www.gametrailers.com/remote_wrap.php?mid=30330" swliveconnect="true" name="gtembed" allowscriptaccess="sameDomain" allowfullscreen="true" quality="high" pluginspage="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" align="middle" height="392" width="480"></embed> </object><br />--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------<br />There 3 different singleplayer events: Tournament Mode, Single Event and Gunplay.<br />In Tournament Mode you play the main 'campaign' which is 8 different levels and a dozen of modes, you play it in a racing game style with ranking and points in which you compete with other players. In Single Event you can play any level you unlocked in any mode you like. In Gunplay you can play a set of modes and levels in a playlist you can compose. In all these events you can pick a different mode, differentiating from fast speed run to survival mode.<br /><br />The weapons in The Club are all good but aren't all that special, you can also have a few grenade types but that's it. You can also use special moves like kick open doors and such to gain bonus points if you kill someone directly after you did such an much.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 153, 0);">Controls</span><br />You can control 'The Club' in two different ways, with the gamepad or with mouse+keyboard.<br />But it seems the game is more meant to played with the gamepad, all the buttons are even all those of the xbox 360 version on the PC (the ironic part is, I can't get my 360 controller working though) Even though there 2 control types there very similar but the gamepad is a bit better to use since everything is just a small stretch away.<br /><br />Shooting is done with the right trigger and aiming with the left trigger, you can move with the left analog stick and move your camera with the other, you can also run and crouch. All standard stuff so anyone could pick it up and play. I do thing the PC version is a bit hard to play with and since I can't get my xbox controller to work it should be fixed.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 153, 0);">Presentation</span><br />The Clubs looks alright it isn't doesn't have the best graphics around but the game runs smooth and the explosions look nice and if your rushing trough an level you most likley won't notice much of it. The bad thing is that my computer can't really run it on max but the demo on the xbox 360 looked quite nice and the running in the game is nicely done. Also all the menus look very good and ever mode and level has there own cool looking icon.<br /><br />The music is alright but it's the same track over and over again but it does work if your rushing trough levels. The gun sounds are good sounding and the voices of your enemies will change if your in a different land, so I was quite amused when i heard German shoots out of my boxes And every time you do a extra bonus filled move a cool voice will say wait move you did, so when you shoot a headshot it will say 'HEADSHOT' quite a cool feature.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 153, 0);">Replay Value</span><br />The Club has quite some replay value there is a tournament mode which plays in all levels and modes, there is a Single Event mode which let you replay those levels separeted and there is a Gunplay mode which lets you pick your own levels and play them in your own playlist. All these modes have 4 different difficulty settings, these challenge you to earn a set amount of points.<br /><br />There is also a big mulitplayer feature with some variation in modes and levels. There also Achievements which are quite hard to get. But the best part of The Club is the highscore competivity, since every difficulty has there own goal you are really triggert to finish every game on a high difficulty and why you are at it owning your friend's highscore so he can try to beat you, just like in Pacman: C.E. it's very addicting.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 102, 0);">Verdict<br /></span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">The Club is a fun game but not everyone can enjoy it, the game isn't your average shooter but more a highscore rushing game, but the thing is I like those kind of games and I find it fantastic that a full game is based around such an cool expect. Even though there some minor flaws with the game, the game is still very fun and is atleast worth a rent, or try the demo first.<br /><br />Score: <span style="font-weight: bold;font-size:130%;" >8</span><span style="font-weight: bold;">/10</span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;">Links<br /></span><a href="http://www.bizarrecreations.com/games/the_club/">Main Site</a><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /></span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Club_%28video_game%29">Wikipedia</a><br /><a href="http://www.bizarrecreations.com/article.php?article_id=5302">PC Demo</a><br /><br /></span> <a href="http://digg.com/pc_games/AG_The_Club_Review"><br /><img src="http://digg.com/img/badges/100x20-digg-button.gif" alt="Digg!" height="20" width="100" /><br /></a>James-Kondhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17207918860500397539noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9000888890659356944.post-38639881725646905642008-03-05T09:04:00.000-08:002008-03-05T09:17:18.633-08:00Back from Vacation<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Hey</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">guys</span>,<br /><br />I <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_2">returned</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_3">from</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_4">vacation</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_5">and</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_6">this</span> is <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_7">what</span> I <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_8">played</span>:<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="color: rgb(255, 0, 0);"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_9">PS</span>1</span><br /></span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_10">Castlevania</span>: <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_11">SOTN</span> - '<span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_12">Finished</span>' - 112%</span><br /><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_13">Street</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_14">Fighter</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_15">Alpha</span> 3 - Arcade Mode <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_16">Finished</span></span><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 102, 0);"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_17">SNES</span></span><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /></span><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_18">Castlevania</span> X - Stage 2<br />Super <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_19">Castlevania</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_20">IV</span> - Stage 3<br />Super <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_21">Metroid</span> - <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_22">Started</span>...<br />Super <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_23">Mario</span> Allstarts - Multiple games<br /><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_24">Ninja</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_25">Gaiden</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_26">Trilogy</span> - 1: Stage 3, 2: Stage 2, 3: Stage 2<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 102, 102);"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_27">Indie</span></span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"></span></span><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_28">Bonesaw</span> - <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_29">World</span> 2<br /><br /><span style="font-size:130%;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_30">Upcoming</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_31">Reviews</span>...</span><br /><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_32">The</span> Club<br />Hitman: <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_33">Blood</span> <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_34">Money</span><br />Resident <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_35">Evil</span> 4<br />Team <span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_36">Fortress</span> 2James-Kondhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17207918860500397539noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9000888890659356944.post-79075670831511841422008-02-20T08:32:00.000-08:002008-02-20T13:25:30.928-08:00Dreamcast Emulator<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://www.gameconsoles.com/images/Dreamcast%20CONSOLE.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 320px;" src="http://www.gameconsoles.com/images/Dreamcast%20CONSOLE.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br />I just have tried out the new Sega's Dreamcast Emulator and I'm loving it.<br />Here some games I've been playing:<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(0, 153, 0); font-weight: bold;">Rez :)</span><br /><span style="color: rgb(255, 102, 0); font-weight: bold;">Soul Caliber :|</span><br /><span style="color: rgb(255, 0, 0); font-weight: bold;">Power Stone :(</span><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 153, 0);">Street Fighter 3: Third Strike :)</span><br /><br />So if you ever wanted to try out the Dreamcast try: Nulldc, you can get it <a href="http://forums.ngemu.com/nulldc-discussion/95446-nulldc-1-0-0-beta-1-6-07-11-2007-update.html">here.</a><br /><br />Also I'm going on vacation next week so you got to miss me for a while :)James-Kondhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17207918860500397539noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9000888890659356944.post-80472072927531043042008-02-17T12:41:00.000-08:002008-02-17T12:56:11.835-08:00Audiosurf Meets RezI just made a video of one of my favourite games, Audiosurf.<br />The video uses the music from the game Rez, enjoy.<br /><object width="425" height="355"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/-q7tRtq4n1Q&rel=1"></param><param name="wmode" value="transparent"></param><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/-q7tRtq4n1Q&rel=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" width="425" height="355"></embed></object>James-Kondhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17207918860500397539noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9000888890659356944.post-2191995439775581902008-02-17T06:53:00.000-08:002008-02-17T07:08:38.942-08:00Penumbra Black Plaque Review<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/73/Penumbra-_Black_Plague.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 126px; height: 157px;" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/7/73/Penumbra-_Black_Plague.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 102, 0);">Intro</span><br />Penumbra: Black Plaque is the second action horror game in the Penumbra series.<br />The series is made by Frictional Games and published by Paradox Interactive.<br />Black Plaque is released for PC, Mac and Linux.<br />The game is sold for only 20 USD in retail stores.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 153, 0);">Story<br /></span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Penumbra Black Plaque continues were the first Penumbra started.<br />The game is about an man who in search for his father goes to Greenland.<br />He gets lost and finds a hatch, he needs to get in or else he would freeze to death.<br />In Black Plaque your mainly in an research facility, which is filled with dead scientists and strange zombie like monsters.<br />In Black Plaque you also find signs of live from your father and ofcourse you even go father in trying to find him.<br />Black Plaque has a lot of speaking NPCs in comparison with Penumbra episode 1.<br />The story is very scary and sometimes I just quit the game with an aftershock.<br /><br /><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-023963497282224122 visible ontop" href="http://www.youtube.com/v/GAvQAkXqnUg&rel=1"></a><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-023963497282224122 visible ontop" href="http://www.youtube.com/v/GAvQAkXqnUg&rel=1"></a><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-023963497282224122 visible ontop" href="http://www.youtube.com/v/GAvQAkXqnUg&rel=1"></a><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-023963497282224122 visible ontop" href="http://www.youtube.com/v/GAvQAkXqnUg&rel=1"></a><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-023963497282224122 visible ontop" href="http://www.youtube.com/v/GAvQAkXqnUg&rel=1"></a><a style="left: 0px ! important; top: 15px ! important;" title="Klik hier om dit objekt te blokkeren met Adblock Plus" class="abp-objtab-023963497282224122 visible ontop" href="http://www.youtube.com/v/GAvQAkXqnUg&rel=1"></a><object height="355" width="425"><param name="movie" value="http://www.youtube.com/v/GAvQAkXqnUg&rel=1"><param name="wmode" value="transparent"><embed src="http://www.youtube.com/v/GAvQAkXqnUg&rel=1" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" wmode="transparent" height="355" width="425"></embed></object><br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 153, 0);">Gameplay</span><br />Penumbra is based on a normal adventure game, you pick up items and use them in the environment, but the think what makes Penumbra different is that it has an physic based system, your cursor is an hand which can pull levers, pick stuff up, throw things etc.<br />With the level design you really can seen the developer have been playing Bioshock a lot, all levels look like Bioshock levels and the puzzles also look similar so if you want more Bioshock action this might be your game.<br />Maybe the one bad thing about Penumbra is that it doesn't have any combat what so ever, you can only run and hide, even though I don't like this it sure helps with the fear factor and you'll be running you ass off.<br />Black Plaque also has Save Points and no normal saves, I find this quite relaxing with other PC games I always forget to save and when I quit the game or it crashes I'm always pissed that i need to start over again.<br /><br /></span> <span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(0, 153, 0);">Graphics</span><br />Black Plaque looks a bit dated, the graphics are very last gen but with what it does (physics, breakable items etc.) the game runs quite smooth and I have to turn down the graphics to play the game without lagging.<br />Also with all the darkness and spooky looking placing you won't even focus on the graphic but only on the growling zombie that is walking around.<br />And for an Indie game the graphics look quite nice.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 0, 0);">Replay Value</span><br />There isn't much of replay value in Black Plaque, but a few, there is the quite long singleplayer game and there a few artefacts to find to unlock extras, thats about it, the singleplayer game is quite hard so that will keep you goning for a while and for only 20 USD it's quite a deal but not a very good one.<br /><br /><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 102, 0);">Verdict<br /></span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">Black Plaque is a quite an good deal but lags Replay Value.<br />But it's so scary I haven't finished it yet and if I don't ill be scarred for life.<br /><br />Score: <span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-size:130%;">7,5</span>/10<br /><br />Links<br /></span><a href="http://www.penumbrablackplague.com/site/">Main Site</a><br /><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penumbra:_Black_Plague">Wikipedia</a><br /><a href="http://www.metacritic.com/games/platforms/pc/penumbrablackplague">Metacritic</a><br /><a href="http://frictionalgames.com/penumbradownload/">Free Tech Demo</a><br /><br /></span> <a href="http://digg.com/pc_games/Penumbra_Black_Plaque_Review"><br /><img src="http://digg.com/img/badges/100x20-digg-button.gif" width="100" height="20" alt="Digg!" /><br /></a><br /><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);"><span style="font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-weight: bold;"><br /></span></span></span><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(255, 102, 0);"></span>James-Kondhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17207918860500397539noreply@blogger.com0