Skyrim: Don’t install on the Xbox 360

What once was a rumour has now been confirmed by many 360 users. It seems that Xbox 360 users have been having major issues with Bethesda’s latest addition to the Elder Scrolls series. While most games consoles benefit greatly from a game install (Fallout3, Rage) Skyrim on the 360 has been having nothing but graphical issues. When the game data is installed on the console it should be a more pleasant experience with less loading times and a smoother resolution, instead what is happening is a severe lack of proper visual quality such as loss of frame-rate and poor textures. Since I only play Skyrim on the Ps3 I have not noticed this personally, how ever a large number of people are reporting the issue so for the mean time it’s probably best to play the larger than life Skyrim directly off of the game disc – as of writing this there has been no notice on the release of a patch to fix the problem. Skyrim is out now on the Ps3 / 360 and the PC, and I’ll be reviewing it very soon.

Modern Warfare 3: first day impression

Another big game gets released and as a first day buy I thought I’d write yet another first impression, again this is not a review as that will come later. Most people seem to gravitate to either BF3 or MW3, it usually ends up in you either love one and hate the other. After playing both all the way through the campaign and through the multiplayer I have to say I do recommend both games but for different reasons – in a nutshell BF3 has the better multiplayer and MW3 has the better single player campaign. Popping on MW3 today I wasn’t at all surprised to see an almost identical start and menu screen to the previous modern warfare title, giving it the benefit of the doubt I went right in and started the campaign.

The game continues right after where MW2 left off, and to be honest I didn’t really like the first few missions because they were trying too hard to shock and awe me with all kinds of over the top scripted events. It’s fine to have one or two in there but having so many in one mission just makes it too unbelievable to think you really could do what was being done on screen, the rest of the campaign does have similar events but they are a bit more believable and for a Call of Duty game that’s saying a lot. The controls handled very well and I saw no real differences between them and what was used in the previous games, even if you aren’t familiar with the game the controls are easy to pick up. The weapons handled pretty well and looked realistic but firing an RPG didn’t feel right, my character barely flinched as it rocketed away.

In past Call of Duty games I never felt too engrossed in the story or in the characters but this time I found I was paying a lot more attention to the characters and really liked how they dealt with the story. While the first few missions are based in the States the next remaining batch are dotted around locations such as London, Somalia, Germany, Paris and Prague, maybe I found it easier to relate to the game because I felt closer to the European cites portrayed in the game than in the States. As for the maps themselves and the overall design I was very impressed, familiar cities of the world looked brilliant and I noticed it was less closed than I expected. Instead of just having to run through a street in a straight line it gave me the choice to cut through buildings or shops, I liked that they put all of that in and it helped keep the game more interesting and certainly less linear.

The multiplayer is the main reason a lot of people will buy MW3 and given its popularity between both casual and hardcore gamers I can see why. I’ll admit that having played the multiplayer online for a few hours I do enjoy BF3’s multiplayer more, it’s simple really MW3’s is more of an arcade shooter laden with perks and bonuses while BF3’s is more gritty and has a more urgent sense of realism to it. There is no shortage of guns and equipment in MW3 online, I started off with a fairly standard pistol and submachine gun and had no problems gunning down players unlucky enough to cross my patch. The perks are all back as are the missile strikes and attack helicopters, I didn’t much care for these in MW2 but it didn’t spoil my most recent experience.

There was a lack of campers and that definitely helped keep me playing, even random running and gunning seemed to be few and far between. The maps were ok but I only played 5 or 6 of them and I’m sure there are still a lot more to see. All in all the online multiplayer hasn’t really changed that much but it’s changed enough to keep fans of the series busy and happy. Spec Ops mode was the main reason I bought the game because I enjoy having the option to play offline in split screen, again this didn’t disappoint. The missions in Spec Ops are fun and there is a new survival more that I enjoyed, it’s early days yet but I’m sure I’ll like the rest of the content Spec Ops have to offer. So the main question would be is Modern Warfare 3 worth the price tag? As a first day buy and as a first impression I’d have to say yes, fans of the series will love it and I’m really looking forward to reviewing it soon.

Rage: game review (ps3/360/pc)

When the makers of the iconic Doom and Quake series set their sights on a modern day shooter they may have set them a little too high because while Rage has its good elements the main problem is it looks too good ..or at least it’s supposed to, the truth is a little more colourful. It’s extremely rare a game will slant my opinion on it in such a short time and I never in million years thought Rage would be the one to do it but my initial response to the game was that of surprise and not in a good way. Rage starts like many shooters in a post-apocalyptic world where you as a survivor must do what you can to make the world a better place, by that I mean shoot and blast your way through the hordes of scavengers and bandits that rule the wastelands with mad max like brutality.

The reason this time for the earth being such a mess is an asteroid has impacted and changed life as we know it, the remaining people who are left over are either organized gangs of bandits and mutants or regular people trying to make a life for themselves, you on the other hand have been secretly stashed away in an underground bunker as a sort of failsafe or last chance for the earth but the life support system has malfunctioned and the rest of your comrades have all died. The world of Rage is brutal and just as you emerge from the bunker you are immediately set upon by wastelander bandits, saved by a stranger you then have to repay him by doing little odd jobs around the area and that to me is the whole game a series of odd jobs that don’t really pertain to the furthering of any cause or even story because while Rage doesn’t lack much on the shooter side it seriously lacks a proper story or sense of progression.

Before Rage was released I keenly followed many stories and articles about how it would play and above all how it would look, many sites and magazines talked about the super textures it would feature making it one of the most advanced and realistic looking games on the market. I’d heard a lot about the textures and did expect a very lush looking and vibrant game, while the character animations do look fantastic and very life like the game itself suffers from the worst popin I have ever seen and probably ever will. The popin I’m referring to is a constant shift of focus and clarity when your character moves or looks from one direction to the next, while most games have a certain amount of popin Rage goes above and beyond the call of duty. The first thing I saw in the game and it looks stunning was the sky ..it would since it unlike the textures is just painted in but once I looked from one corner of the screen to the next it took about five seconds for the graphics to load up properly so all I saw was a blurry patch of ground or wall. While you would expect it’s a temporary thing it really isn’t and lasts the whole way through the game never even letting up for a second, the reason is simple current game consoles can’t handle super textures because the internal readers are not fast enough so naturally Rage suffers – I’d not call it a game breaker but at the same time the popin was so bad I felt the need to quit many times. Soldiering on through the game it took about three hours of playing until I felt immersed enough to making a difference. Given the game had such a huge install file with mind numbingly bad popin it did have some redeeming features so I do think it deserves a review and if like me you do give it a chance you might just like what you find.

So what makes Rage different than other similarly styled shooters, it’s a mixed bag really while it does have the usual fire and forget simplicity there are some interesting things that Rage does better than its rivals. Rage plays like a mix of Borderlands and Fallout, the gaming map is not huge and sadly even if you do find something to explore you really won’t find anything off of the beaten track which is a shame because the game comes across as an open world shooter when really it’s not. You can jump into vehicles made from beat up scrap metal and that will get you around faster but if anything it hammers home the fact that the world is restricted in its size, there are of course some plus sides to being able to use vehicles. Available in the game are a series of races which can be done once you have the appropriate vehicles and mods, that’s right you can modify your vehicles to make them more resistant to damage/faster/and even kit them out with guns and missiles and while all that sounds like fun it can be until you realize the actual races are a piece of cake to complete.

Perhaps the developers were trying to make the racing segments accessible to everyone but what they did was make it much too simple to pose an actual challenge and I would have completed them all if not for the game doing something really annoying which I’m about to address. I can name a few games which close certain aspects or mini games once you reach a certain part of the story but the scale Rage does it is unacceptable. Near the end of the game and without warning games like racing get closed down so you can’t compete in them anymore and if you were after 100% game completion you will have no choice but to replay the whole game again, while that might not sound like a big deal I found plenty of trophies/achievements were unattainable for that very reason. The mini games when playable can actually be a lot of fun, featured is Tombstone (a sort of digital chess with lashings of violence) 5 finger filet (think bishop in Aliens with the knife on the table and you got it) Strum (a miniature version of Guitar Hero) and one of my favourites a card game which relies not only on skill but on you to find and collect the many game cards hidden all over the game. While these mini games can serve as a distraction from the main game the missions themselves are so repetitive and uninspiring that there really isn’t a lot to be distracted from in the first place.

From start to finish the only mission that really stood out for me involved being a contestant in a game show where your very life was at stake, you win cash by staying alive and getting kills but with hordes of mutants trying to stop you it’s not easy. There are of course other missions that show a glimmer of hope but I found the more I tried to enjoy the action the more something else would crop up making me feel like I was accomplishing nothing and if I was no one cared. While there are some interesting characters expertly voiced the story seems to go nowhere and when I did feel a change of pace it turned out the game was over with one of the shortest and most abrupt endings I have ever seen. Even with the extra missions offered from random characters and from notice boards the lifespan of the game is far too short to make a serious ripple compared to other games that offer a similar campaign but more diverse multiplayer, Rage does have a multiplayer but again it’s limited because its mainly all about driving around shooting the competition so don’t expect the usual run and gun deathmatch fiasco because it’s not there.

Like many shooters you will find to progress you need better guns and ammunition and Rage doesn’t let you down here because not only can you acquire all manner of guns you can also build and modify gadgets that can be used to exploit the enemies weakness or simply kill them. By doing jobs you earn money but you also find money on downed enemies or hidden across the game map, the money can then be used to purchase guns/etc but better than guns were some of the various gadgets you can build such as explosive radio controlled cars/gun turrets and little robots that follow you around blasting everything in your way. It’s these little gadgets that make the game different than other shooters but for the traditional shooter fan there are plenty of rifles and machine guns to keep even the most frag happy busy throughout the game – budding robin hoods will also find the crossbow very useful. The bandits and thugs you face do make up a big part of the game and there has been a lot of thought and work put into keeping them rather unique and interesting, the ones that stood out for me were a group of Russians who were obsessed with technology so they had all kinds of traps and weapons at the ready. Something Rage implements well is the reaction of an enemy when wounded or shot, some are very fast and will dodge or jump out of the way when you attack but when you do hit them they stumble or grasp the wound in the way you would expect if it were real life.

Other than the human element you also come across mutants throughout various areas of the map and while most of them only take a few shots there are some that merit the extra special attention that only a whole bag of ammo and a rocket launcher can deliver. I expected the game would have a nice healthy amount of bosses and super enemies that would really bring the game into its own but I counted a very small few and even the ones I did meet were easily defeated in no time at all, I could have sworn I’d seen clips of bosses that were never put into the finished game and given how bad the popin was I’m not surprised. Rage at its core tries to be an excellent game offering a unique experience but the closer I looked the more I saw that held it back from greatness, there is a certain degree of unfinished product that radiates from Rage that probably wouldn’t have been so obvious if the game hadn’t been so hyped up in the first place.

Painfully numbing popin aside Rage does look visually near perfect to anything else on the market, the physics engine works brilliantly and given how demanding the visuals actually are it’s the little things like water and dust that really make your jaw drop. Racing along through the wasteland in a beat up wreak of a car with dust and debris flying is an enjoyable experience, the terrain when properly visible does look astounding and even the cut scenes are beautifully rendered to the point where you forget you are playing a game until of course you step out of the car and start going through the game on foot again and notice the sharpness and clarity popping in and out. The world of Rage is less laid back than it feels, the people who you think you are helping or are helping you have a real knack of lulling you into a false sense of security but once you leave the safe zones you are back in bandit country and they will make your stay there very short if they spot you. The game environments both inside and out are highly detailed and give you a lot to look at, there is a real sense of thoughtful construction in many of the buildings and complexes I just wish I could have viewed them without graphical errors. The main things I liked about the game were the complex character movements/model animation and the ability to upgrade all of your weapons and gadgets. As a traditional shooter Rage works perfectly but it’s not and the developers made no secret of trying to embed a story with added desperation so once you did get into it you expect a lot more especially from the ending, it’s a lot of fun shooting down whatever tries to kill you but garnishing it all with a story that goes nowhere ruins the flow and leaves the player feeling cheated.

I tried very hard to like Rage and as a shooter alone it did satisfy, my biggest advice would be to play the game and ignore what little story is there that way when nothing gets resolved you will feel less cheated. I did however like how the weapons handled and loved how powerful and solid they felt, every impact is reacted to and you can sense the carnage you are dishing out. There is a nice escalation of difficulty between the different enemies and you will find you have to adapt and become creative with combat manoeuvres in order to not get overwhelmed by the attacking forces ahead and around you. Having gadgets and creating gadgets is something that I felt made a big part of the game especially when I got to the last few missions, deploying sentry turrets and bots definitely saved my skin more than once. The rate at which enemies will adapt and avoid your bullets is truly frightening, not only will they duck or leap out of the way they will dart up and across the ceiling scaling their way either to safety or right up next to you ready to pounce with the deadly precision of a king cobra. Car mode in the multiplayer can have its fun moments but I really would have preferred some maps on foot with the possibility of death match or capture the flag, given the developers history with games like Doom and Quake you would not expect that to be too much of a tall order. What they did do however was include a co-op mode which although doesn’t pertain to the actual campaign mode itself it does let two players stand together in a battle to get the most kills, it’s a diversion but not much of one because it gets old quick.

Rage tells me a lot about the developers of the game, they avoid a strong story element and instead opt for a heavy handed shooting experience that while a lot of fun is too brief. The game controls well and the mechanics are solid and feel like they do what you want them to do but I seriously doubt they tested the game and if they did its unacceptable to ship it knowing the popin was so bad , some people suggested it would work if the popin was patched but as part of the games core it can’t be patched without gutting the engine and rebuilding it from scratch. The characters and people you meet along the way are realistic and help give the game a heightened sense of reality but at the end of the day none of them do or say anything too memorable meaning you will forget it all very quickly. It may have won a whole host of awards at shows like E3 but I feel it was unfinished and lacking depth in the story department, you may argue that shooters don’t need stories but you can tell they were trying to implement one at the start and when they reached the middle they just gave up leaving the player unsatisfied and wanting. Rage could have been one of my favourite games of the year but it has too many problems that can’t be fixed with a simple patch so I’m giving Rage a 6 out of 10. I’d not recommend it for retail but it’s definitely worth a rental, think Mad Max mixed with Borderlands ..a side helping of Fallout all served up on a bed of Doomsday and you have Rage.

Ace Combat: Assault Horizon (ps3/360)

Ace Combat has always had a history of being the crème de la crème of flight fighter sims on the playstation and playstation 2, unfortunately years later the same cannot be said about the latest release in the series. First off Ace Combat Assault Horizon is not a bad game it is actually a lot of fun the only problem is Namco have gone to the trouble of fixing something that really wasn’t broken and what you are left with is a level of unrealistic yet highly accessible fighting and flying. If like me you played many of the older games in the series and thought the newest one would follow much in the same manner then I’m sorry to say that’s not the case, but all is not lost because there is a lot about the game that really makes it stand out among other recent flight sims. It’s easy to assume Namco made all the new changes in order to breathe new life into their highly popular franchise but you can’t help but wonder are the helicopter door gunner and C-130 segments a sign that it’s been influenced too much by games like Modern Warfare and Medal of Honour – both games are good but it’s a dangerous trend to follow that can often result in unimaginative gameplay that screams déjà vu. Though Ace Combat is in some ways guilty of the same influence it does have a trick or two up its sleeves.

The game does have a story and for the most part it’s not too bad but at best it’s predictable, given the aerial action is the centre point the story really isn’t something you will be paying attention to in the first place. In the past Ace Combat games have been exclusive to fighter jets and that worked, while reimagining the game it seems that Namco thought planes alone wasn’t enough. While jets do feature 80% of the time and work very well the added helicopter missions are a lot of fun and it keeps the game interesting when you have to adapt to a new style of flight but it’s nothing that’s not be done before. Anyone who played Apache Air Assault will be very familiar with what Ace Combat has done, the only helicopters available are an Apache and a Russian Hind – they do pack a punch and add a little extra to the game but you can only use them on helicopter specific missions. Also included is a mission where you are a gunner on a chopper and must hit ground targets and soldiers, again its interesting and fun but it’s been done to death by similar games – even the token C130 bombing run is included. It’s a shame the developers thought they had to add all the extra razzle and dazzle to sell it to today’s audience and I can’t help but think if they concentrated only on the jets and planes the game would have been more of a success especially with the fans.

My biggest complaint was that the game didn’t stand up to the realism and expectations that it built up, many past Ace Combat fans are use to a certain learning curve and even with the advanced controls activated it’s still too easy. To really hammer home how easy the flying can be one of the modes known as DFM (dog fighting mode) thrusts the player into a close up battle of break neck speed with explosive results, sounds good right? – Unfortunately no this is another example of fixing something that isn’t broken and here is why. To activate DFM you have to fly up behind the enemy at close enough range, once active your plane gains a sort of phantom autopilot that perfectly guides you through danger leaving you to blanket the enemy aircraft in gun and missile fire. While that may sound like fun the auto pilot is too linear and often sets you off on a scripted flythrough that feels more like a ride at universal studios than an actual dog fight.

Dog fighting mode is probably one of my biggest gripes with the game, you can successfully shoot down aircraft by not getting too close but it seems like it’s geared towards having you dog fight as much as possible. My assumption is they included this new mode to bring the player closer to the action but being that it can become so linear and the auto pilot takes over you never really feel like you are the one in control of the game – it might have looked good on paper but the end result is not pretty. Controlling the planes in the game is easy enough and the learning curve is short enough that in under an hour you can become an ace pilot in both manoeuvres and in combat. I love that the developers have made the game more open to newcomers but at the same time they have dumbed down too much of the controls and even the action, while engaging aircraft in dog fighting mode even if you try to crash into buildings or in my case the ground you just can’t do it and I personally think this kind of scripted event has no place in a flight sim.

It’s not all doom and gloom as Ace Combat is a beautiful looking game with painstakingly brilliant visuals both in the air and on the ground. Each plane in the game is perfectly rendered and the work done truly is exceptional, especially when it comes to the explosions and near perfect bleeding of metal. When firing upon the enemy you will see chunks being ripped from its body until its completely gutted and either bursts into flames or simply breaks apart in a hail of sparks and shrapnel. It’s very satisfying seeing your rounds rip apart the enemy reducing them to pieces but often too many times that means jumping right back into the pre-scripted DFM mode so you often end up back at square one on your round trip of repetitiveness. The game scores very high in the sound department, the planes and weaponry all sound exceptional but the real beauty is in the soundtrack. Ace Combat games have a history of featuring very well made music and Assault Horizon is no exception, it’s certainly a driving point of the action and a huge bonus point that the soundtrack CD came with my version of the game. Being that most of the game is set in Africa a lot of the maps are made up of deserts, there are also snowy mountainsides and very impressive renderings of Dubai and Moscow that definitely merits a mention. Most of the missions are straight forward enough and will either involve you taking down enemy aircraft in the area or targets on the ground such as troops and tanks.

To help you dominate the skies all manner of missiles and bombs can be unlocked for your various aircraft, unfortunately though the upgraded hardware will help it only serves to drain even more of the challenge away from your experience. Since Ace Combat is all about the planes you would expect they put the work in and recreated some real gems. In previous games you had to buy new planes but here you are awarded them after missions, thankfully there are enough to give the game a little more spice and variety. Notable mentions include the F-22A Raptor, Typhoon, F-16C Fighting Falcon, JAS-39C Gripen, Rafale M, AH-64D Apache, Mi-24 hind and my usual favourite the Russian Su-47 Berku. They all look sound and perform brilliantly unfortunately some of the aircraft in the game is mission specific so you can only use them for particular missions that require aircraft of that type and roll. Eventually you unlock a few different paint schemes for your aircraft but the majority of paintworks seem to require buying them as DLC which is a shame because once you finish the game there is not too much incentive to go back and do it all again. When you do complete a mission you are given the option to go back and play it through online co-op with a friend, and if that’s still not sociable enough there is always the multiplayer with its addictive domination and death match modes.

Assault Horizon is really a bag of mixed tricks, on the one hand the game is very accessible to casual gamers and newcomers but to the hardcore fans it’s slightly insulting to the point that you will forget you are even playing an Ace Combat game. Games like Gran Turismo have successfully revamped what they stand for and what they do but it seems that somewhere along the way Ace Combat got not only lost but confused. The comparisons to missions in Modern Warfare and similar shooters are too in your face to just brush them under the rug and forget about them. The game mechanics work when you are in-flight but once autopilot kicks in and steals the action the realism grinds to a halt. I really wanted to like this game and in some ways I still do but after playing through it and completing everything the game had to offer I’d have to recommend it for rental only.

It seems many developers are setting a dangerous new precedence which involves revamping a series to what they think is a near perfect representation of their chosen field, realistically what they end up doing is gutting it then dressing the remains in fancy ribbons that fall off once you give it a serious test run. To add insult to injury the rinse and repeat element to Ace Combat is such that for the entire game just relying on lock on missiles will get you through mostly in one piece. There are too many things wrong with the game to make it a top class combat flight sim, I’d liked to have given it a higher score but it proves too much how a perfectly good franchise can be ruined by reinventing its ins and outs. I’m giving Ace Combat: Assault Horizon a 6 out of 10 – this is one ride that’s not worth the purchase price but as a rental it will definitely pass the time.