Dead Space 3 Review

In 2008 EA’s Dead Space game was released.  Then, some spin off games came out and then the second Dead Space was released. The Dead Space series has been one of my favorite series ever since the first one came out. Now in Dead Space 3, the story takes place 2 months after the events that occurred in Dead Space 2. Isaac Clarke teams up with Earth Gov and has a new mission. Now venture in Ice planet Tau Volantis to destroy the marker once and for all.

 

The game has the same controls as the other 2 Dead Space games. But instead of buying weapons, you can build your weapons by finding parts. You can build the classic weapon as well.  A couple of new features include getting scavenger bots, which can help find parts. You don’t have to face the necromorph sprawl alone; you have the option to co-op with a friend online.  I really like the build your own weapon system. You can be creative and you can share blueprints of weapons you built with your friends.  The co-op is a lot fun too. There are some missions that you only do in co-op and you find out more about the second player’s character named Carver. This game is very well developed. The graphics are really well done and the necromorphs are grossly detailed. There are not many glitches in the game that I have encountered. I don’t like some of the armor design that well in this game. I like Isaac’s snow suit, it looks awesome and Carver’s Special Forces suit is nice too.

But overall I think it is a great game. I recommend playing it especially with a friend.

8.5/10

New Characters in Playstation All Stars

Our new challengers

New downloadable content for PS All Stars was released last week along with a large patch unlocking Kat from the vita's Gravity Rush and Emmett Graves, the space cowboy from Starhawk. Emmett is a ranged character who can call in various weapons and devices, much like in Starhawk. Kat uses a variety of short ranged kicks as well as her gravity powers to dominate. These characters are free for a limited time and are reasonably quick downloads. Also newly on the Playstation Store is a map from Heavenly Sword and several minions.

Aliens: Colonial Marines Review

Aliens: Colonial Marines is finally out after about seven years in development and now it's time to find out if it's a stand up fight or just another bug hunt. Colonial Marines picks up some seventeen weeks after Aliens where a group of marines who have received a distress call from Cpl. Dwayne Hicks,  are sent out to investigate the Sulaco which has mysteriously found itself back above LV-426. Once aboard the Sulaco things quickly go to hell when your squad runs into xenos and Weyland Yutani soldiers, which eventually leads to you being back at Hadley's Hope. This all leads to the most obvious twist and the biggest none ending I've seen in gaming after an atrocious boss battle. But none of the story really matter because it's all just an excuse to bring you filled a nostalgia filled romp, such as half of Bishops body and Newts doll. But this is all good for about the first hour but revisiting things from the movie can only get you so far. The only thing that they've nailed is the sound design, the pulse rifle sounds exactly like it should. Once the nostalgia wears off all your left with is a mediocre shooter that looks like it's ten years old, it's really just filled with things that have been done in games before and frankly a hell of a lot better.

This game comes with some truly awful AI, I don't remember the Aliens in the movie just standing in one spot and letting themselves get mowed down by pulse rifle rounds. Aren't the Aliens supposed to be the perfect hunters, these aliens just stand there and die in four shots. This diffuses any sense of tension this game has knowing that the xenos are so severely under powered. The game also suffers from quiet a few glitches my favorite being that every once in awhile the gun in your hands just disappears, but it's not just limited to that you'll also have the occasional enemy that teleports and you'll also quiet frequently clip through objects.  To break up the pace of just shooting xenomophs you'll also find yourself gunning down Weyland Yutani soldiers, a few clunky power loader sequences, and one horrid stealth sequence. If you are compelled to play this you also have some collectibles to get like audio logs (which don't add anything to alien lore), Weapons from the movies like Hicks' shotgun and Hudson's pulse rifle, and dog tags of the characters in the movie. You can also play the whole campaign in 4 player coop but this really adds nothing and just serves to make the already easy campaign easier.

And once you get through all of that we get to the multiplayer where even more problems arise. The multiplayer consists of two squads one of marines and one of aliens squaring off in multiplayer modes that range from traditional team death match to a left for dead like mode called escape, but the multiplayer modes are all just really boring. Also the aliens are still under powered in the multiplayer, so they still can't catch a break. This partly comes from the fact that you can level up your colonial marine during the single player so when you jump into multiplayer your "state of the bad-ass art".

What this game comes down to is one bad generic shooting sequence after another. So Gearbox was trying to make alien 3 look like a better movie and I'm here to say that they have succeeded, but probably not in the way they intended.

3.0/10 

first video of Bungies Destiny

Sly Cooper: Theives in Time Review

Ten years ago, Sly Cooper appeared, immediately becoming one of Playstation's favorite heroes and making a name for Sucker Punch studios. Hailed for incredible balance and climbing abilities, this thief did good for the world by targeting some of the most dangerous criminals. In Sly Cooper, Sly began his adventures by tracking down and ruining every member of the gang responsible for murdering his father. In Band of Thieves, he took on another violent crime syndicate, this one using dangerous pieces of machinery to improve their villainous operations. In Honor Among Thieves, he traveled the world, recruiting some of the most revered thieves to aid him on a mission to collect his displaced inheritance. Now, eight years after the Honor Among Thieves, Sanzaru Games has resurrected Sly and the gang for a fourth installment. I was given an opportunity to play a mission back in September, and now, at the game's release, I am anxious to play the finished product.

The story involves Sly Cooper coming out of retirement in order to rescue his ancestors who seem to be vanishing from history, along with Bentley's girlfriend Penelope. Bentley's time machine brings them back to points in history where Cooper family members would have existed. The gang begins to find people and technology that have no business in that time or location, and must unravel a mystery unlike any they had faced in their other adventures.

The new art style allows Sanzaru to make their game stand apart from Sucker Punch. The game play is about the same as before, and I only had a few problems navigating the world. They stuck to the same world as used in Sly 2 and 3, with an open world hub with certain missions straying into enemy operations. The collectables system includes bottle-and-safe puzzles from the first Sly, treasure runs from the second, and Sanzaru's own idea of hiding Cooper Gang logos around the areas.

Rioichi Cooper sneaking around Japan

Playable characters have always added value to these games, and this is no different. The list includes Sly, Bentley, Murray, Inspector Fox, and a Cooper ancestor that fits with whatever time period you're in. The four heroes play mainly the same as the did in Sly 3, but the ancestor is usually just Sly's move set with some new ability. From Bob Cooper's ability to climb straight walls, to Tennessee Kid's ability to shoot guards and obstacles from a distance, you'll find yourself excited waiting to see what your next ancestor can do.

This game is not without it's flaws. There is an unhealthy amount of Sixaxis control challenges, and the game is bogged down with mini games. There was a Bentley hacker puzzle about every three missions, and one of the puzzle types was a Sixaxis. There were entire missions of just mini games, and most missions squeezed one in. Though most of the boss fights were incredibly entertaining, the final boss was entirely made up of quick time events, making it look nice, but somewhat uneventful.

Overall, I thought this game was fantastic. It may be heavy on the mini games, but it has an interesting plot, fun game play, and was a good continuation of one of my favorite series. I am interested to see what Sanzaru does next, with Sly or on another project.

8/10

PS4 Prototype Controller

A picture of the new PlayStation's controller has been leaked, But given that this is an early prototype the final design is likely to look a lot different.

 

Another Photo has been leaked.

New Batman Game Coming This Year

 During an investors call the CFO of Time Warner John K Martin revealed that a new game in the Arkham series was coming this saying  "And we also have a strong games release this year, which will include the next release in the Batman Arkham franchise," including "So all in all, we expect Warners to post another very strong year in 2013. And with a little luck, the year should be as good or maybe even a little bit better than 2012."

This comes after reports that the game will be set in the Silver Age and feature members of the Justice League, but that wasn't supposed to arrive until 2014. And Developer of the previous Batman Arkham games hinted that their next game wouldn't be a Batman game.