Preview : Golden Axe - Beast Rider

Sega and Secret Level will launch this fall a new action-RPG. The game's name is Golden Axe : Beast Rider and if you ask me this new RPG holds a lot of promise . We all seen and played hack-and-slash'es , action-RPG , and some of us even had the unique opportunity to enjoy Planescape Torment , but be serious people... did you ever played a RPG that blends character with mount/pet in such a way ?

The thing in the game is that you play with this nameless chick that beats the crap out of any opponent that she sees . The thing is that she is a sort of a mixture between barbarian woman and pet master because she tends to call pretty often mighty beasts to do her bidding and to aid her in the struggle .

The action is again a blend between something like God of War , regarding special effects , camera panning and speed , and games like Dark Messiah of Might and Magic that uses a lot of engine physics ( you can throw your enemies in spikes , roll large stones over them , crumbling columns etc) .

There are three ways to battle : you can fight alone , only with your character and when the time is right , you can call your beast which again can fight alone or together with the character (mounted or side by side) .

I doubt that there will be many items to choose from because this is not a hack-and-slash or adventure-RPG so the players that enjoy reading huge numbers , colored in pink or blue and that love to boil the game down to equations , won't be impressed . From what you can see from the trailer , there will be the old arsenal like swords , axes , armors that cover as little as possible (let's not forget that the game has a heroine , and yes , sex does sell) .

Also there seems to be magic in the game , now it isn't sure if it is a separated path to choose or it's just a small pack of spells used to aid the melee combat and beast charming .

As the time closes on the launching date I will return with further info regarding the game and I think it deserves a review also . Enjoy the trailer I attached .

News : Spore II

Look! Spore is cutter than ever . Maybe it's the fact that it's launch date is closing in (September 5th) ... Maybe . It seems that Will Wright and his team from Maxis made a good job with Spore. It's way better than the obsolete newsand gossips regarding The Sims . The game looks good and it has many inovations never seen in other games , which in the games of 21-st century is pretty rare . You must give them that .

Here are some fresh pics . Enjoy . And if you didn't played the first part of Spore do so because it is worth it !

Weewar

WeeWar is an online game that lets players battle each other to win the war, of course. There are lots of units to choose from each with their own special abilities and drawbacks .

The game is simplistic in design, but fun to play. You can practice your strategy, join existing games Game reviews , start your own, or observe games that are currently in action. The homepage features a live ticker of everything that’s going on with live games on the site. You can stay abreast of which users are taking which actions in their respective games. Unfortunately, the ticker updates so fast, it’s hard to click on a game for more details. There is a community involved with WeeWar as well. You can make friends, check out their WeeWar ranking, view their recent opponents and invite them to your games.

What’s more, one of the WeeWar users has recently made a video of the game being played on the iPhone. Watch it here on the WeeWar blog. Who wouldn’t want to play a battle game using a touch screen?

If you like a fast paced RTS style game that requires little of your time that weewar is perfect .

Review : Gears of War goes PC

The Rebirth

Launched over a year ago for Xbox 360, Gears of War was an extraordinary game, with beautiful backgrounds , superb graphics , good cinematic and a well built gameplay component . It's no surprise that the game turned over night 'a must have' for any Xbox 360 fan boy and determined people to go and buy their own console . The game was noticed by Microsoft and here we are , Epic Games bring to PC players a better version than the 360 one .

Emergence Day

Meet Marcus Fenix, a soldier accused of war crimes and treason , left to rot in a military prison . His „luck” is that a mutant race decide to invade planet Sera, destroying it's larger cities one by one , determining the Coalition of Ordered Governments (COG) to free all the prisoners and send them on the battlefields to fight the Locust .

The story in Gears of War is thin and pretty linear , rarely the player has the chance to choose between different endings . The control is made from keyboard and mouse and the game was clearly made to run like this . Then why it was launched first on the console ? My advice is that you search how many consoles did Microsoft sell because of this game and you will have you're answer .

Bing Bang Boom!

Marcus has a 'sweet' arsenal of weapons and gadgets that aid him to achieve victory , from which we can provide the Gnasher shotgun , assault riffle , sniper , grenades aaand ... Hammer of Dawn. Hammer of Dawn, is the most powerful weapon in the game designed to destroy 'bosses' , but it can be only use outside because in fact the weapon is used like a beacon placer for a 'ray of death' sent from a satellite . Fans of Unreal Tournament 2004 will find this weapon very similar to the Ion Painter , with the only difference that the Hammer of Dawn has a smaller area of effect while the Ion Painter can pulverise everything on a radius of 100 meters .

The AI is decent . Your comrades can be ordered to regroup or attack distinct enemies . I must confess that they saved my ass a few times but I can't forget the pathetic moments when they decide to shoot in a rock because a Locust hides behind it while his whole back is unprotected . Geez !

The developers offered us a tweaked game , not the direct source that you can find for 360 . They added 5 more chapters to the campaign and many mini-games to multiplayer like : King of the Hill , Boss killing , Capture the Flag etc . The game is highly recommended to be played in coop mode .

Gears of War is a astonishing game , with graphics that surpass those from Xbox 360. I'm glad that I managed to play it on a high-end system that allows me to activate DirectX 10 (nonexistent, if you ask me) and Anti-Aliasing, because that is the only way to see the difference .

Rating 9.6

Games of Legend : The Elder Scrolls III Morrowind

Introduction

Bethesda has a real winner on their hands with Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind. Their latest offering to the shrine of non-linear RPG is a true masterpiece. Before I start the article let me tell you that I'm not a RPG loony , thus I don't play and rate 10 any RPG I get my hands on . Morrowind, however, plays more like an MMOG than anything else, with its enormous world scope and first-person gameplay. Given the history of the franchise, I was initially wary of game-stopping bugs; for the most part, though, I had a stable gaming experience. The game is immense and really sets the standard of content for all RPGs to come. I whipped through Dungeon Siege in about 2 or 3 days; similarly for Diablo I & II as well as BG:2. Yet it took me about 2 weeks of constant play to even get to the end of Morrowind, and I didn’t even come close to doing half of the quests/storylines in the game. But more on that later.

Story

There is an epic quest story line, as well as hundreds of side quests and story lines. In fact the game has so many side quests and land to explore that I was well established and had considerable power before I even started the epic quest line. The story is your basic fantasy story of Drizzt the Dragon Reborn fighting the evil of Doctor Octopus in Mordor. While not the most inspiring tale ever crafted, there is so much to do and so much to explore I can forgive the skimping.

Morrowind map . The biggest , non-instanced world ever created .

Gameplay

The best way to describe the character creation process is ‘interactive’. While it does lend in immersion from the get-go, after a few restarts it gets tedious as there isn’t a way to speed up the process. Basically, you ‘wake up’ next to some dark elf in a loincloth (no, this isn’t an Everquest fan-fic, it’s still a review), and this is the part you choose your name.

After a bit more interaction you choose from 10 different races ranging from your standard dark elves and barbarians to more exotic races such as the lizard race or the furry-friendly cat people race. Each race has its own perks in the form of special skills, i.e. lizards get water breathing and the black human race gets a skill that turns you from Al Sharpton to Michael Jordan for 60 seconds. Each race has separate stats for males and females, which is a novel idea if not a bitstereotypical as women are weaker physically but usually have higher starting mental stats. There is an acceptable amount of customization of character looks but certainly not the plethora I was hoping for. You can choose between several different faces and hairstyles for each race ranging from a vicious lizard to Marlon Wayans.

With your race firmly set in stone, you go on to pick your class and astrological sign. You can choose from preset classes, customize your own, or going back to the Ultima days, you can answer a list of questions and get a character template based off your answers. Overall it’s a pretty simple and intuitive process that allows for good customization of a template. Be advised, however, that if you like to get the most bang for your buck you may want to restart a few times to find a template that suits you.

Combat is pretty simple; you can slash, thrust or chop at an enemy with melee weapons, fire at them with a bow/crossbow, or unleash a variety of spells with ranges varying from touch to reach out and touch someone. It took a bit for me to get used to this style of combat, but once I did, I have to say I like this a lot more and wouldn’t mind seeing this in future MMOG’s. You can buy spells from priests and mages and some even offer the ability to make your own spells through a simple interface. Other merchants offer the ability to enchant weapons or items with soulstones (using magic to trap a monster’s soul into a gem) which in theory is really great. However, later in the game when you have slain more powerful creatures and enslaved their souls in top-end stones, you could create very powerful artifact level items which had the effect of making the game very easy. Which brings me to about my only gripe with the game; it got too easy. During the later stages of the game I was basically indestructible and I could quickly kill almost every monster/NPC in the game. While it's fun to wade through a sea of primates like Ash with a boomstick, it is even more fun to have a challenge. I would have liked to see the critters scaled upwards more, especially towards the end.

Aesthetics

Incredible detail

The graphics were pretty damn good. Even on my GeForce 2, I had no problems keeping great frame rates in all but the most graphic-intensive areas and situations. The terrain is well designed and the foliage is incredible and completely interactive, meaning you can pick mushrooms or flowers for alchemy or to sell. The wild beasts of the land seem a bit to alien for me, even though their models and animations were smooth. The cities are incredible and the NPC’s each have their own individual factions with you and treat you accordingly. You get greeted with a "What is it, peasant?" to a "Oh what a lovely treat! How are you?" depending on your faction with an NPC. You can raise faction through bribery, through the use of the Speechcraft skill, and even by the quality of clothes you are wearing. Combat animations and spell effects are also amazing. Spell effects range from noxious green vapors of poison clouds to arcing lightning to beautifully colored explosions from fire-based attacks.

Sound

The ambient sounds are fantastic, as are the sounds for the NPC’s and monsters. A lot of NPC interaction involves voice clips and the quality and emotion is actually surprisingly good. Battle is definitely better with sounds ranging from the wet thunk of an arrow to the ring of a sword parried by a shield. Many times you can tell a monster is around the corner simply from the heavy breathing or grunts they emit. Overall I think the sound was great and it definitely added to the immersion into the world of Morrowind.

Value

There are some stability issues, so frequent saves are a must. I would crash to desktop on average about once every 3 or 4 hours. It also has been reported that there are some memory leaks with the game. I do believe there are several bugs that allow you to exploit things in the game, however this is not really much of an issue since you can summon any item or start any script within the game from the console. Morrowind also comes with an Editor that allows you to do almost anything you want. If someone were dedicated, they could write entire modules and insert them into the game. On one of the Morrowind message boards I read, there was a project starting to write an alternate ending to the game. The replay value is potentially endless.

Guard of Vivec

Conclusion

Overall I would recommend this game to everyone regardless of your particular gaming tastes as it has something for everyone. The completely non-linear style to the game as well as the immense area to explore is a huge plus in my book. It really has the feel of an Everquest or Dark Ages of Camelot without all the hang-ups of forced grouping, other assjack players, and you can even save your progress. The game really never felt tedious to me, though I do have a strong dislike of those damnable cliff racers now, but that is easily worked around with a little in-game ingenuity and a little toy I like to call my Daedric Crescent Sword. On a scale from yokel to ubermensch, this has Nietzsche written all over it.

Translation : Go and buy this game !

Rating 9.1

Review : F.E.A.R. Perseus Mandate

The Story

Don't ask me what is the story in F.E.A.R. Perseus Mandate – because I won't be able to make a real exposure . Really . All I know is that I am the officer of the second F.E.A.R. team composed by four men and we have to go in the complex of a large company and do things . From here , a long series of missions of the type "go there ", "escort that", "find that","report to superior" , begins . When getting close to the last quarter of the game , the reason why you are sent there is revealed , in some degree. The important thing is that all the action is closely related ( temporarily wise and action wise) to the happenings in first F.E.A.R. .

It's clear that the story isn't the primary element of the game and that even the game levels are pretty much copied from the first F.E.A.R. . In fact the story , 3-4 extra weapons and a new level design is pretty much everything that Perseus Mandate delivers . It's a pretty lame excuse for a game that was clearly developed just to milk an extra dollar from the gamers pockets with as little invested money as possible .

Even with all these cons , I still played F.E.A.R. Perseus Mandate until the end and I enjoyed it .

Why?

First of all I find fabulous the way that F.E.A.R. Extraction point / Perseus Mandate manage to be a good office horror , because most of the time you will be fighting in offices , surrounded by cubicles , flower pots , desktop computers and trash beans . What can be more horrific than working in an office environment ? Add some enemies and short incursions in the world of beyond and there you go ! The perfect horror game .

I think that eventually all comes to sound effects . Try walking the offices of a multinational company with headphones running F.E.A.R. background sound . You will soon have an unexpected feeling of anxiety . Add some bodies , dripping blood and light effects to the mix and see what happens . Anyway , that is not something that we weren't already accustomed with .

With what we aren't accustomed with are the opponents with a very evolved AI capable of tacking good tactical decisions and of dealing considerable damage .

In fact , isn't this the reason why F.E.A.R. is so known ? The fact that enemies act great as an individual or as a team . Capable of calling for reinforcements , using walls , desks , and many other things for the purpose of protecting themselves and even creating ambushes in the labyrinth of offices .

Many of your opponents have different abilities . Like some are invisible , some can crawl on the walls and some have very tough armor or they just have the ability to fly . Their eyes glow , in the dark or they create strange distortions in the air . There is one particular enemy that can use slow motion for short periods of time ( this is really spectacular) .

Easy with the slow motion on the steps !

As I already said , Perseus Mandate is a game with very bad level art . Walls , cubicles , windows , garages and lobbies are pretty much all that you will see in the game . Sometimes it looks like the developers really tried to design the levels with some minor round spots , which I think it is a plus by comparison with the first game .

The boys from Time Gate Studios continued with the trend they started when they launched Extraction Point and I am happy to see that they even improved it . The areas are a bit larger now , there are fewer places where you can hide or from where you can defend with ease you're position . In fact , there were many times when I thought that I defeated an enemy team and suddenly my brains were smashed by an enemy that was smart enough to go around the battle zone and find a door that was leading him somewhere behind me .

In the first F.E.A.R. it was easy for anyone to solve a conflict with the slo-mo button . In Perseus Mandate they added surprises during the battle , surprises that have the 'gift' to set us on the look-out every time we decide to use the magic button .

In the end , even though Perseus Mandate doesn't have better story , more detailed levels or better sound , it is still a game that once started will keep you terrorised in front of the computer for many hours .

Rating 7.6