A game a day keeps the…
Posts tagged Review
Who ya gonna call..?
Mar 8th
It has been a long time since I have played a Ghostbusters game, it was back in my early gaming years on the Spectrum which looking up now says it was made in 1984….
Anyway, moving on from feeling very old the latest Ghostbusters game that came out last year is actually pretty good when I was expecting it to be pretty awful.
If you want a game that allows you to strap on a proton pack and capture ghosts then this is the game for you, it captures the cheesiness of the films and also the fun of wielding the wavy streams of destruction extremely well. You even get to use the slime cannons too, covering team mates in green slime is always fun 
This is a third person shooter that allows you to play a new member of the team alongside all the famous faces of the film, you go through many different locations capturing ghosts while destroying most things in your way. You also get to use the PKE meter to help find these ghosts, this also allows for many a creepy moment in the game. The Stay Puft Marshmallow Man also makes his appearance fairly early on and you get to dispatch him, although sadly you never get the chance to drive Ecto-1 
The game is paced very well, on the middle setting (Professional) it was a smooth pleasant playthrough, that was until towards the end. Then it almost seemed like the developers suddenly thought they had made it too easy and made a couple of levels a royal pain in the arse (cue much swearing, much to the girlfriends amusement). This wouldn’t of been so bad if the the game didn’t have to reload the entire level again.. I can only imagine that’s what its doing as the loading times are a bit long.. I used to love that Ghostbusters theme lol
There are plenty of nods to the films in this game (achievements named after sayings from the film, the Vigo picture in the HQ that has various sayings etc..) so any fan of the series will love the game, even if you don’t you will still find it a capable shooter… well maybe not but who doesn’t like Ghostbusters?!
Good fun, glad I only rented it though 
Killzone 2 – so consoles CAN do FPS games after all
Feb 12th
As an old school PC gamer it has always been hard for to both play and accept the first person shooter genre on consoles, playing with a pad rather than a mouse and keyboard just seems like using a fork to eat a yoghurt.
The odd game comes along though that shows that the consoles can pull it off, rarely but when they do it makes for a great game. The Halo series was the first for me, Bungie had all the elements in place for a great series but sadly it does seem to have lost its way as my Halo ODST musings showed.
I haven’t had my PS3 long so I am slowly working through the few exclusive games I have missed over the years, Killzone 2 has been the current game and it took me by surprise.
After the usual learning curve with getting used to the pad controls I got down to the matter of killing the Helghast. The first thing that struck me in Killzone 2 was how good the game looked, at last I have found a PS3 game that actually shows what the console can achieve. This game is stunning in places, the only problem is the action rarely lets up for you to admire it! I am not sure it quite tops Gears of War 2’s graphics for me but it is very close. This game is all about the action though, its pretty non stop which is good as it keeps things flowing and is mixed up with the odd vehicle or turret section to slow it down a little.
There is nothing ground breaking about Killzone 2, it just has a lot of polish and does what a FPS should do, and does it very well. This is a game that also frustrated, the 1 on 1 fight with the flying HK like thing on the roof top was a nightmare for me! The last level of the game is also very well done with a long intense series of fights leading to a bit of an annoying boss in the form of Radec who can cloak and re-appear where he likes. Radec was a pain in the arse until I grabbed a flame thrower and set him on fire so I could always see where he was
Couple of things that let the game down though, loading times are really long and sometimes the game just freezes where its loading the next part of the level (I thought it had hung my PS3 the first time it did this). It is also too short, I think my play through said just under 6 hours which is pretty short considering the end shows what’s going to happen next… I wanted to carry on the fight right then! Small complaints though for a very well made game.
Next game on the list is Uncharted 2, looking forward to playing this.
Halo 3: ODST or OSHT?
Feb 3rd
Now I have always liked the Halo series of games, they are one of the few series of console FPS games that I think actually ‘work’ on a console but I do think that Bungie lost their way a little on this one.
The decision to move away from the main hero Master Chief of the previous games was a brave one, instead in ODST (Orbital Drop Shock Troopers) you are a rookie member of one of these drop shock troopers. A drop goes a bit wrong and your character then spends his time wandering the city finding clues to what happened to the other members of the team, and when you do find a clue you then play a mission in that team members shoes to show you what happened. This obviously leads up to the final levels of the story once you find out what happened to each.
It is not that bad a concept except the wandering around the city to the next clue does get boring after like the second one, a more linear approach would of been more interesting (for once) I think. The actual proper missions were fun though, especially the ones where the whole team were together… however there are very few of these which also lets it down.
As you are no longer the super marine that you were in the previous games you now have proper health that doesn’t regen by itself, at first I thought this would be quite a nice change and make combat a bit more of a challenge.. which it did… but not in a good way I feel. All it tended to do was slow down fights when you were low on health, at least before you could go find cover and recover before and keep the game flowing but now you find yourself just dying alot to allow you to carry on faster.
I realise that this game was a bit of a stop gap title, but it had some nice ideas. I have always liked the working in a team aspect, its just it didn’t use it enough. ODST is a fairly enjoyable game if you like the Halo universe but if you were new to the series you wouldn’t be very impressed. It’s worth noting that I never played this multiplayer but that’s because my idea of being of fun is not being killed over and over and over again against people who play Halo day in, day out!
Lets hope Halo: Reach does a better job.
Uncharted: Drakes Fortune or Misfortune?
Jan 26th
Having only got a PS3 at Christmas I am a little behind with the few PS3 exclusives that the system has to offer, however last night I completed Uncharted: Drakes Fortune so figured I would write a little about it.
I can best describe the game as a action/platformer, if you have played any of the Tomb Raider games then you would be write at home in Uncharted. The thing is, Uncharted is a much better game than Tomb Raider… while the basics are the same run and gun action with the odd puzzle platform sections it plays alot better than any Tomb Raider game I have ever played and has a pretty decent story behind it.
Having to run around picking up ammo seems tedious at first (no unlimited ammo guns for you) it actually leads to some pretty intense fire fights as you hear the dreaded *click click* sounds of your gun being empty and having to go find a gun off a previously felled foe…. or go toe to toe with them and beat them up in hand to hand. Oh yes, you can beat up enemies with your fists if you wish, something Miss Croft never got to do!
The game got a bit weird towards the end when you start fighting weird zombie things but it flows nicely and always keeps you entertained, however the last level is a real pain in the arse! more on this in a sec.
Few bad points to mention, the platform bits can suffer from the age old platform problem of needed precision jumping or you fall to your death, and the jump to cover action can attach you to the wrong thing sometimes but all in all they are small gripes and don’t happen that often.
The last level of this game though was a royal pain in the arse to finish, much swearing was heard by the girlfriend as I died over, and over, and over, and over… again! Once I managed to finally get though all the shooting parts of it, I then died alot on the final hand to hand quick time event as my limited Playstation time caused me to always press the wrong button when it flashed up on screen!
Great game, I am now looking forward to starting Uncharted 2 as I have only heard good things about the sequel.
