Killzone 2
I finished Killzone 2 the other day, the final showdown was solid (I mentioned it earlier but it involves a lot of enemies keeping you on your toes), and then you face off against the main guy. It was tough but damn satisfying to finally get through it all, and actually have a finish that challenged me.
The story isn't the main focus of the game, but the cutscenes and exposition thas there is good, it'd just be nice for shooters to put more effort into the story and making players interested in why the characters are doing what they are doing, KZ2 is guilty of not revealing as much as I'd like (most shooters are like this at the moment [Gears 2, Halo 3, Resistance 2]) and it's a bit dissapointing.

The shooting never got old, the set pieces were awesome and varied, the only thing lacking was vehicle sections to break it up a bit, there were some but not enough. There was one short section where you are in a tank and that was cool, and another one where you are in an AA gun on a big space cruiser and it's like something straight out of Star Wars which was awesome too. The best vehicle section was where you get in this fantastic mech/exo suit, the first person view you can see is great as you can see how your (characters) hands control the suit, and as the suit takes damage the glass casing you in starts to crack, it looks really good, and jumping into the air and landing on Halghast is so much fun.
They need to make a multiplayer mode where everyone is running about in the suits.
Exo suit gameplay here.

The online is deep and satisfying also, the only thing I wish it has is the Replays that Halo 3 has, that was easily the best thing about that game, the stat tracking on killzone.com is good as well, it tracks a lot of stuff from your Multiplayer matches and single player campaign; and the intel you find in game unlcoks some stuff you can print out or use outside of the game, like wallpapers, propaganda posters to print and theres some great papercraft stuff you can get too, like this:



KZ2 has some of the best uses of the SIXAXIS as well, with the sniper rifle you have to hold your hands still to keep the scope inthe game steady. Theres parts where you have to turn the controller to imitate turning valves and setting explosives, it doesn't feel intrusive, it doesn't occur often (or it would probably get annoying) and it's more intereting than "Press Square" or "Tap circle".

There are niggles and downsides to it. Some of the voice acting and dialogue in general is poor, none of the guns have secondary fire which was one of the best things aboutt he original and it's a bit of a shame. You can only carry your pistol and one other weapon, which limits your choices a bit, it would be fine if you could only carry any two weapons, but being limited to only your pistol and one other is silly, as it means I'll rarely use a Sniper rifle or rocket launcher as they are only useful in specific areas.

The shooting side of it is just fantastic though, loud brutal and fun. The cover system is all in first person and works brilliantly, I like that when your ducked behind cover reloading enemies will take the opportunity to move from where they were before, which can catch you off guard. Speaking of which the enemy AI is phenomenol, they know when have a bea don them and will move positions whilst behind cover so you can't keep your sights on where their head popped out before and kill them, they run from grenades (unless you cook them), they flank, flush you out of cover, move intelligently between cover, blind fire after popping there head out to see where you are. It's fun and challenging to take enemies on all the time.

Theres a unique sort of animation system in place for deaths as well, it takes into account the weapon you've used, where you've shot them and what the enemy was doing when you shot them and it makes the deaths realistic and varied.


Fantastic game, will maybe talk about the multiplayer more later.I forgot to mention the visuals, but needless to say they are amazing,particularly the lighting. The game has some of the best instances of wind/dust clouds and general things flapping from the wind, which sounds silly but it was a cool detail to notice. The textures are nearly all excellent I only spotted a couple of poor textures but thats the same with any game.I think it's really set the bar for FPS games in the future.

9/10

Whatever happened to the glory days of PC Zone?

Those gargoyles on Fable 2 are annoying. 15 down, 35 to go...

I remember those, they were on one of the cover discs, but I lost it. I was hoping one day someone would stick them on the internet. All I need now is to find that video of when someone went visiting EA and turned his car into a tank with fireworks coming out of a tube on the roof.

You mean this one?

Nice one, that's precisely the one I was after, cheers. His interview questions are great, "what do you own?".

Search his name on YouTube, there are about 5 videos in total.

"That's no good, is it?" has been an often-used phrase among me and a friend of mine for years, since seeing that.

Roll on Dark Athena, it looks stunning.

I tried to download the demo the other day but it was still only available to gold members.

It does look very pretty I admit.

Butcher Bay on the old Xbox was ahead of its time, a fantastic game albiet a little short in game play but otherwise I couldnt fault it and judging by the looks of Athena, it looks like a winner.

I got a borrow of Street Fighter 4 so here's a few impressions.
It is hard to the point of frustration at times even on the default difficulty.
It is the same as it ever was fundamentally. This is not a bad thing.
It looks very nice indeed.
It is not as friendly to newcomers as some reviews would have you believe, in fact I'd say it'll repeatedly punish anyone who doesn't have a mind to practice it. Lots.
Playing it with an Xbox pad makes me feel like I'm shit at it because of the awful d-pad and button layout. It makes me long for a Saga Saturn pad to play it with.
The English voice overs are a travesty, but thankfully there's a Japanese option too with lots of wonderful Engrish.

PS3 pads have such lovely D-pads on them.

And as for what you say about the game not being simple, I've read a lot agreeing with that.

EDIT: First artwork/render of a big Sister from bioshock 2



According to the magazine there the game will have you returning to Rapture. And from what i can tell fromt he teaser site it will be about 7 years after the first game....hopefully the sequel isn't as linear and easy. The first game looked incredible and had amazing atmosphere but was a bit too straightforward really. Very interested to see what they come up with for the sequel.

I like the new look.

Wonder if there will be Little Daddies.....

It looks like the ocean has claimed the city a lot more than in the first one but I'm interested to see how they continue the game. It has prompted me to play through it again though. Exciting stuff.

RE: SF4, yes, the default difficulty is punishingly hard. But there is no shame working from the easiest setting up. I can now complete Arcade mode on Medium setting with only a couple of continues for Seth (natch). As for XBox 360 pads, I'm using the analogue stick, though after a couple of weeks of intense use, it's not what it once was. Still, better than the sucky D-pad.

And as for Bioshock 2 - well, I only just got round to starting the original yesterday, and only a couple hours in and it's simply breath-taking. Really engaging, exciting and fun. So, looking forward to the sequel already.

Also, Capcom just announced a follow-up to Umbrella Chronicles on the Wii, The Darkside Chronicles, which is sort of good news. The original was fun and had more depth than your average light-gun game. But a new RE4 level game would have been more interesting. HOWEVER, the fact that it's centred round Resident Evil 2 is a plus as that was my favourite installment before 4 came out.

Which put me on to... Screenwipe on QVC, quality.

I love Charlie Brooker.

He's a funny guy, shame Dead Set was so laughable...

Thing is, I'm not new to the series by any means and despite 12 years+ of playing almost every iteration of the Street Fighter formula I can't help but think that this new boss is too cheap. Stepping back from Medium difficulty isn't going to happen if only for the sake of my pathetic ego as well, which means I'm going to be in for some punishment when it comes to finishing it with characters i don't like.
While Seth isn't quite the head banging frustration that the baddie from SF:III-3rd Strike was he's still too cheap in my opinion. That he seems programmed to not use half his moves till you win a round hints that the devs want to punish you with that fact and once he is at full power the combination of constant teleporting (especially if you're charging a move for Guile/Bison etc it seems) and grabs just make me want to track down the designers and beat them till they come up with a balanced character to face off against. Why couldn't we have just had Bison like SF2?
I guess to some extent I miss the approach the Alpha series took by having the characters rivals as last bosses instead of trotting out some typical "I use all your moves but I'm better" type.
And as for using an analogue stick, ARE YOU MAD! Maybe I'm part of a dying breed, but anything but a proper joystick or d-pad feels very wrong to me. My thumb just doesn't know what it's doing with an analogue stick when it comes to fighting games, I can't get any kind of accuracy direction wise.

Agreed. Remember the awful D-pad on the gamecube? My friend had Soul Calibur 2 on his GC and I had it on the PS2, he used the fucking analogue stick on the GC to play! He won against me more than I against him when playing on the GC until i bought an adapter that elt me use a PS2 pad .

You could get this

I'm thinking of getting one just for Mega Drive games.

Some info on Bioshock 2.
-You play as Jack Abbott a private investigator searching for one of the girls kidnapped by Big Sister.

- Jake won’t be the only one investigating Rapture. At some point in the story, Soviet agents arrive from a submarine, hoping to acquire Adam and use it to gain an advantage over the Americans in the Cold War. Soviet enemies will be much smarter than splicers, using cover and flanking maneuvers and working in groups. As the game progresses they will begin splicing themselves and be able to use plasmids against you. The Soviets and splicers will fight against each other and the player can use that to their advantage. ”

-Game takes place in 1967, 7 years after the original

-A cutscene starts the game off In New York City as Jack intercepts the Big Sister kidnapping his daughter in his beachhouse. He follows it to the near by shores as it submerges into the water

- Epic boss battles and underwater gameplay. Much of Rapture is now flooded and you will need to don a diving suit to explore these areas as well as venture outside Rapture itself. An underwater boss fight was shown with a gigantic squid, which can cloak itself and use its massive tentacles to smash into Rapture and hurl debris. One of the concept artworks hinted at a boss battle with a mutated, spliced rhino in Rapture’s zoo.

Solving the whole Big Sister debate:
-Only one Big Sister (Mastermind of game)

-Big Daddies are no longer in the game, but new enemies include dogs and soviets

Some other goodies
-Completely new levels of Rapture, including a fully explorable zoo.
-Underwater exploration levels
-New weapons and plasmids (Including a telepathy and time control)
-Challenge maps
-2 Player co-op. (No mention on who second player is)
-New Health and Revival System


No Big daddies and 2 player co-op....... I wonder if the co-op will kill the atmosphere that the first game crafted so well. from what i've read about RE5 having a partner throughout has killed the atmosphere of the game.

Sawce

With fighting games, I'd ordinarily play with a D-pad (such as in Soul Calibur), but fighting games that require quarter rotations and the like kill my thumbs. Speaking of the Gamecube analogue stick, it was actually a decent alternative because there were slight indentations in 8 directions so you could tell where the stick ended up with such a rotation. The XBox 360 stick requires a bit of guess work on your part, but using the D-pad, it'd be near impossible pulling off Zangief's ultra combo or likewise - two full rotations on that? Now, that is mad.

Had I the money one of those bad boys would be in my hand right now, alas I don't.



I know that thumb pain well, but thankfully I'm now immune. Years of SF and Tony Hawks built up an extra thick protective layer on the bend of my left thumb so now I can pull off Hadokens with ease.
You're not wrong about Zangeif, I've only ever pulled off his super once or twice across all the various games he's been in. Then again I don't like his moves much so it's no skin off my nose.

Bioshock 2 sounds interesting. I loved the first one and the wait for 2 gets better with each bit of info released.


Downloaded Lara's Shadow, the add-on for Tomb Raider Underworld on xbox 360, and it's quite good. some good moves, and provides TRU with an epilogue.

All I hope for Bioshock 2 is for it to be a bit more difficult. Even I found Bioshock very easy, and I am not particularly good at FPS games of any type so it must have been a complete doddle for most of you guys on here.

I've got Halo Wars now, although I won't be able to play it until after the weekend. Will let you know first impressions in a couple of days. Anyone else delved into it yet?

Only the demo. Made me long for some C&C to be honest.

@Hay - Knowing I couldn't die made it a joke for me, the last boss in particular required no effort at all because of that.

Capcom attempt to excuse making us pay for a feature that ought to have been on the disk. And they don't do a very good job of convincing me.
Getting of a bit sick of DLC to be honest. Too often now it seems to be the case that there's DLC the second a game hits the shelves that was clearly removed from the title for the sake of milking extra money. Costume packs for Soul Calibur and Street Fighter, Yoda/Darth Vader in SC, horse armor and all the rest of it. Anyone paying 400 points for extra costumes, and thereby validating the choice to release them like that, needs at least a verbal bashing in my book.

I think it is fine when it comes to things like expansions etc (although PS3 rarely gets them) as I guess it is the same as buying an expansion pack for a PC game, although the prices sometimes seem a bit steep for how much you get. But for just costumes and things it is a complete waste and should be something you can unlock in the game. LBP is rife with them, although most of the better ones come with a bunch of new levels and items etc too so it is not too bad for a couple of quid.

At least with LBP a lot of the stuff is free. In fact, as far as I can tell, the only costumes you have to pay for are the ones that are licensed properties like MGS and StreetFighter.

I need to buy Bioshock. I'll have to wait until after exams now, though...

And I have to admit they are worth it because they are sooooooo awesome.

Talking about things that are worth it- a Mega Drive for 40 quid with 15 in built games.

That is awesome.

Apparently the 15 games are: Alex Kid, Alien Storm, Altered Beast, Arrow Flash, Bonanza Bros., Columns, Crack Down, Decap Attack, E Swat, Fatal Labyrinth, Flicky, Gain Ground, Golden Axe, Shadow Dancer, Sonic And Knuckles.

But for 24.99 you can get that new Mega Drive collection thing with something like 40 games on it for 360/ps3, I think all of those mentioned above are included

I guess it is cool as you can put catridges in it. If I can get a hold of Landstalker and Toejam and Earl i'd buy one

The 100 Best Games To Play Today

Did you try playing on hard with the Vita Chambers turned off?

OH
MY
GOD

I was reading that yesterday, the top end of the list seemed a bit Nintendo heavy for my liking, although to be fair, half the reviews in Edge these days are for DS or Wii. Some really good articles in Edge this month actually, although it is their 200th edition. A big interview with Trip Hawkins on the failure of the 3DO and also a bit about him starting EA. Another big, very interesting article on the making of the PlayStation. It seems like a large part of why the President of Sony was so in favour of the PlayStation was to spite Nintendo after they backed out of a CD/SNES mahine. There's a fairly short but well written LucasArts piece, excerpts from a book that's just come out that I'm quite interested in getting now, plus another long interview with Yuji Naka (YU2) on his career with Sega. There's tons in this month. An interview with the 'other' guy who created Atari and invented Pong. Good Month. Shame I got the LBP cover that you get if your a subscriber, some of the other covers are much more interesting (there's 200! Gotta catch 'em all... I think not)

I played it on hard but I didn't know the Vita Chambers could be turned off, never seen anyone mention that before. I didn't have an issue with them, anyway, the gameplay was easy regardless of if you re-spawned right beside where you died or miles behind.

You don't have to use Vita Chambers. I just chose to never use them, I completely forgot they existed and if I died I re-loaded from a save. I saw them as a cheap way out and it made the game too easy.

That's the thing though, if you respawned, the enemies were damaged from your fight. If you reload from a save game, when you encounter them again they're back on full health because your previous fight never happened so you can't just kill them through attrition over several lives, you have to do it all in one go. It's in the options menu to turn them off I think, they added it after people complained that vita chambers spoiled the game.

I don't mind games that are heavily story driven being a bit easy. Repeatedly dying and reloading breaks up the narrative and I find with something like Bioshock I enjoy the atmosphere, immersion, storyline more than I do the challenge of the gameplay itself. Maybe on the second play through, when I already know the story, challenge becomes more of a factor. Also Hayleigh, because Bioshock's gameplay wasn't entirely about first person shooty elements and more tactical decisions about *how* you'd attack them (which type of ammo works best on particular enemies etc), you might just find it's because you're better at that kind of gameplay rather than the twitchy reactions of other shooters, that could be why you found it easy.

Th only problem I saw with that list is Halo 3 being at the number 9 spot...

Nintendo rule all. The Wii and their current lack of "hardcore" is just a clever ploy to set them up for millenia. Their next console should rape all.

Worked for me on every single other FPS I'd ever played up to that point, so I didn't see that as a problem. If you're going to come back with full health and continue the fight exactly where you left off, why not just have infinite health?

I'm not slagging Bioshock so no one has to defend it here, I really liked the game, I think it is a thing of beauty and enjoyed it immensly. I just hope the next one was a bit more difficult from the off. I must have either already finished with it when the no Vita Chambers option became available or it must have been when I was in Bournemouth and had no Live connection, regardless, 'hard' should be hard by anyones standard without having to remove them, not everyone can download updates. I found that it was too quick to let you become a bit hardcore with all the plasmids and the AI of the enemies could do with being advanced a little. I don't think that is an unfair improvement to seek in a sequel.

I seriously suck at almost all games that are not JRPGs/from the megadrive, I am a 'play on the easiest setting and I will probably struggle' kind of girl so I stick by my guns that a game I find so easy throughout is a little bit too easy, even if it is more about atmosphere and storyline than combat.

Oh, I had a go on Silent Hill: Homecoming last night.

Played a bit of the start, and then loaded up my friends savegame and had a go in the prison.

It's alright. The lighting, graphics and sound are all top-notch, as are the monster designs. It just has some little problems, mainly with you having a little sidekick talking to you every 5 seconds telling you where to go. If I see an electrified gate, I want to work out to follow the cable and figure out how to turn off the power, not have some bloke on a radio say "Look above you, there's a cable. Follow that to the power station and you can turn off the power".

I'll probably end up getting it when I see it cheap, because it's the closest yet to a proper (in my eyes) survival horror this generation.

I know, I was agreeing with you, to point out to Hayleigh why turning off the vita chambers made things more of a challenge.



I didn't think you were slagging it off, I just thought I'd point out that there was an option that some people may not have noticed that's going to turn the game into more of an actual challenge rather than the "I can't lose" system that was originally there. My other point was that maybe you found it easier because the gameplay suited you more than a hardcore reaction based shooter. Maybe you're better at Bioshock's style than you give yourself credit for, but it's hard to compare to other games, because there's very little else that's similar.

I'll have to go back to it and try it again without the Vita Chambers since I have a few weeks at home alone to kill before baby comes and see how I get on this time around.

The 360 could do with having the dust wiped off it.

I was going to play Lost Odyssey again, too, but am unsure if the 360 could cope with so much on time. I am so paranoid about the damn thing.

Sounds (a little bit) good. I actually quite enjoyed the American developed PSP game, it had flaws and I was hoping the developers would understand this for the PS3 game but I've read a lot of the Psychological tension/fear is missing. Let me know what you think if you play it more or when you eventually get it. I will no doubt get it when it's cheaper as well.

I just got a Gameboy Advance emulator to work on my PSP, just have to decide what Pokemon game I want to play now (if they are all compatible).

EDIT:Oh found a file with most of the Pokemon games in one download. The file is pretty damn tiny, I didn't realise how little information was on the Gameboy cartridges