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Assassin’s Creed III

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Returning to the Animus for the 5th time (not counting the spinoffs) Ubisoft Assassin’s Creed III forsakes the Old Continent of Altair and Ezio for the shiny new continent of America during its formative years. Once again we are thrust Forest Gump Like into the world of Templars and Assassins and Precursors, where every major personality and event is somehow influenced by these shadowy organisations and in particular, your main character.

Like all things American, this time it is bigger, brasher, and more in your face than ever before. But don’t go into thinking this is all “America, Fuck Yeah!” as it still stays true to the Assassin’s Creed philosophy, honestly and truthfully deals with the subject matter (well, as honestly and truthful a video game set in an alternative historical timeline can) and never lets you forget this is an Assassin’s Creed game.

We start the game with the ‘present day’Desmond Miles who is hiding out with his trusty sidekicks, the snarky Brit Shaun Hastings, ubergeek Rebecca Crane and his dad, William. Truth be told, I didn’t really understand why his dad was there as I never bothered with AC Revelations. Anyway, they find their way into a Precursor vault and send Desmond back into the Animus to find the key which unlocks the vault so they can save all of humanity. The story asks a lot of you, such as to remember plots, characters and devices from 5 games, and on top of that throws new characters, and a re-cap would have been nice, but it’s noticeably missing.

Travelling into the Animus in the Precursor vault, which is located in New York State near an old Native American Indian burial ground (or some such) you’d expect the story to start with the guy on the cover, Ratonhnhaké:ton, or Connor as he’s known to people who can’t say his name (which is nearly everyone not of Native American Indian descent), but surprisingly you don’t. However, telling you who you do start as kind of gives the story or at least part of it away. Let’s just say he’s an experienced assassin but someone you’ve not encountered before. This prologue helps you get back into the skin of the Assassin, helps you relearn the controls and the moves you’ve invariably forgotten, and also sets the scene for what will become the American Revolution.

Eventually after the prologue chapters you inhabit the memories of Connor as a child, then as a surly teen, then as a recalcitrant young man. Connor is not as fun as either Altair or Ezio personality wise. He’s much surlier and more of an outsider and rebel because of his mixed-race heritage. He’s rash, bold and unconsidered, much like Desmond. It doesn’t make him unlikable, but he feels more like a teen trying to find and forge his place in the world, unlike the Europeans of the previous game who were trying to make sense of it. The story does tackle some of the contradictions of the formation of American political system – the fight from tyranny and oppression of the British when they themselves owned slaves and terrorised the Native Indians, but does so fairly and is never unnecessary awkwardly in your face about it.

Where he improves on Altair and Enzo is in missions. Each mission given feels different, and you never feel bored playing him. The variety in length and use of abilities was very welcome, and although overall most missions were easy, I only came across on which was frustrating. Unfortunately this came at the end of the game, and really let down the last sequence which should be the best and most satisfying. I also felt slightly let down by the finale with Desmond. Like with Mass Effect, and players being invested in this character for so long, it feels like it could have been handled better.

During the early portions of the game with Connor is where it really opens up and gives you a great sense of the New World. There is a mindnumbing variety of things to do in the game – The usual collect the feathers/trinkets/treasure chests/courier/assassinate and synchronise points which existed in the previous games return. Rather than through cities across rooftops, here you find yourself ranging through the Frontier, leaping from shear rock cliffs onto trees and careening across stout tree limps and leaping with faith into bushes. Hunting and gathering tasks appear, with clues which lead you to find and trap certain animals to collect certain skins, reminiscent of Red Dead Redemption.

There are the Wilderness missions, much like the hunting missions involving looking for clues, where Daniel Boone (he of the Racoon Hat) will tell you tall stories about things such as Sasquatches. There are Forts in both Boston and New York along with the Frontier which you can take over either stealthily or with brute force, as well as convoys to raid. There is a homestead to upkeep, and people to recruit both into the assassin’s guild as well as to help out around the homestead. There’s also a creation/trading system, so not only can you simply sell all your gathered skins to shop keepers, you can create different things you’ve gathered as well as buy from your homesteaders, and send them on convoy trade missions to receive a higher return. The creation system is also tucked in here, so you can create a heap of things to help you thought the game. I found this system to be over complicated and fiddly, and could have been much more user friendly.

Then there’s the sailing, which is simply a blast. It feels reminiscent of the old Pirates game, just faster and more action packed. You avoid rocks when close to shore and huge waves whilst out to see, trying to blindside enemy ships with cannon fire, or ramming into them, or shooting them with mini-cannons. Some missions require you to disable the enemy ships with chain cannons, and then board. Here you swashbuckle your way across the boat, aiming to kill a certain enemy or group. There are also pegleg missions, which involve collecting trinkets then returning them to a swarthy ol’ sea dog to receive instructions to find a hideout, which are like the AC II catacomb sections of running and jumping.

There is a lot more besides, because it is really a huge game with many things to do and keep you interested. So many times I would plan to go to a mission, but get sidetracked on the way by this or that – say a random convoy, or chancing upon an animal I needed to hunt – and I’d spend 15-20 minutes faffing about, but I never saw it as wasted time. There was always some kind of reward for doing the side missions, whether it is in-game money and unlocks, or achievements.

When you’re done with all of this, there’s multiplayer too. The multiplayer aspect is like a game of deadly hide and seek. You and your opponents look like the NPCs throughout the map, and by watching the NPCs and noticing behaviour which is ‘abnormal’ as well as taking in the audio and visual cues you hunt your prey whilst being hunted yourself. You score points for your approach – if the enemy doesn’t see you you get reward more points and increase in level, unlocking more costumes and items, like most other multiplayer games. Whilst it’s nice to have something different from every other multiplayer game out there, and the game is fun if somewhat a little unfulfilling, I’ve always felt Assassin’s Creed multiplayer was unnecessary for the series because the single player experience is so well developed.

Like all massive open world games, Assassin’s Creed III isn’t without its faults and glitches. None are game breaking, but some are incredibly frustrating. It still has the issue where you’ll try and run in a certain direction but simply run up a wall, or do a dead stop. The NPC following skill leaves a lot to be desired, and some NPCs obviously fall through the world, appearing as icons on maps but not findable. Speaking of icons, there’s far too few indicators on the map when you need them. Guards appear as simple red dots, and you never know if it’s one guard or a group 8. Many side missions aren’t shown on the map at all, and it’s near impossible to discover them unless you stumble over them by accident. When on horseback the amount of collision with rocks and NPCs makes them feel useless in terms of speed in areas crowded with people or trees – so nearly all the time.

The game is probably the best looking one thus far, with excellent character animations, although Desmond’s backpack as a weird clipping issue which annoyed me no end. It has a great looking wilderness, and cities full of bustle and their own charm thanks to a new physics and AI system. The Caribbean when fighting sea battles looks amazing and the new weather effects are really cool – the way rain trickles down cart grooves and pools on dirt roads is a really nice touch. Voice acting throughout the game is superb, and whilst some of the lines are corny, there is some great characterisation of well known historical figures. As previously, the Animus’s history lessons are very well written and full of Shaun Hastings’ (who supposedly writes it) trademark snark, and if anything even more so because of the subject matter at hand… the British did lose the war and the colony, after all. If every history books were written in this style, I think a lot more people would be into history.

Conclusion:
Assassin’s Creed III is a pretty damn fine game. It loses none of what makes the series fun with the translation to another time and continent, and creates a whole new set of experiences which define the franchise. The biggest issue, if there is one, are the small technical issues, but these niggling technical issues only seem worse because everything else is such a great experience. And If I really was pushed I would also mention how the surly lead character isn’t as likable as maybe he could be, as he doesn’t have half the charm of Altair nor the wit of Enzo, but I think that speaks more to their solid characters than a deficiency of Connor, his characterisation, or the writing of this game.

Pros:
It’s still the great Assassin’s Creed action and fun.
Enormous game with lots to do and experience.
Much variety throughout the main missions.
Great looking and fun to play naval battles.
Fun multiplayer.

Cons:
Ending is a little weak.
Some small technical issues now and then.
Connor is not as engaging as Altair and Enzo.

90/100

Review, Video Games, Writing, XboxWorld

Call of Duty Black Ops II

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The annual release of Call of Duty rolls around again, and to try and make things fresh we find ourselves battling terrorists in the near future, as well as the immediate past cold war era. We return to Alex Mason, the hero of the first Black Ops, and journey through the creation of the story’s main enemy, Raul Menendez, the leader of Cordis Die, a hacktivist organisation with sinister motives. We battle through Africa, Afghanistan, and Panama. Then, as David Mason, Alex’s son, we battle in the near future through Burma, Pakistan and the Cayman Islands, Yemen and Haiti. Oh, and also on the huge USS Obama. All in all, it’s just another gun boner shooter with a typically boring and trite “America Fuck Yeah” storyline to go along with it.

The gameplay isn’t anything new – single player still spends half its time taking control away from the player in a desperate attempt to make everything seem action packed and cinematic. I just find it tedious and annoying. Yes, I realise this is fundamental to the Call of Duty games, but it doesn’t mean I like it. Treyarch have tried some things differently, like giving you control of the bad guy on occasion, and also offering branching storylines based on players actions. I like the idea, but not the execution. Simply put, branching doesn’t have much impact on the gameplay, just the story, which is baloney and simply not engaging enough to care about.

Another new feature of single player is Strike Missions. These maps are small, almost tower defence like battlegrounds. Taking control of troops, drones and turrets, you have to secure areas by stopping invading forces or taking control of various areas on the map. These missions also impact which ending type you get, and can’t be replayed if you fail them too many times. At first, I tried to play these like a tower defence game, placing forces at various choke points and so on, but doing this is guaranteed failure. The AI is simply terrible and although appearing as a strategy based game with overhead tactical map and hotswapping characters, it’s better to simply zoom out and take control of the various troops and run and gun around the maps.

Of course, single player isn’t why people buy COD games, and I’m glad to say even though there are no huge changes in the way you play multiplayer, it’s still a damn lot of fun. There is a plethora of modes to play from the traditional death match to team death match and capture the objective / king of the hill modes. There’s a new multi-group capture objective mode, which amps up the action by including more teams to complete against, making the already hectic action seriously adrenalin pumping.

The killstreak rewards have been altered to allow players like myself to unlock more rewards. I never used to get rewards because I’m not very good at killing – my ratio generally sits at 3 deaths for every kill. However, I am really good at defending and taking objectives and Treyarch have refined the allocation system to help players like me and those that work well in teams to actually win rewards. To be honest, it works, as I don’t think I’ve played multiplayer more in any other game this year.

Zombies also make a return – after all, there’s no point cutting modes when it’s easy as having endless waves of zombies attack you, but it seems out of place. There’s a single player campaign, but I just couldn’t get into it. I guess I have zombie fatigue and I don’t think I’m alone as you can have up to 8 player zombie multiplayer, but no one ever seemed to be playing these maps.


Conclusion:
The problem with COD:BO:II is obviously it will be compared to not only all the previous Call of Duty titles, but Halo 4, Battlefield 2, and Far Cry 3; and to put it bluntly, it’s not as good as any of them. This is not to say it’s a bad game, it’s just not different enough from previous Call of Duty titles. The story isn’t memorable, the maps and weapons aren’t any different to what we’ve previously experienced, the gameplay is near identical to previous games, and when it’s not identical it falls flat and fails to impress.

Multiplayer is where the series has always shined, and with Black Ops II multiplayer shines brightest – it’s almost the sole reason I’ve given it the score I have. It’s fast, furious and fun, with enough different modes to keep most people happy. The change in reward structure will disappoint some players, but entices cooperation and team play amongst others, and attracts those who usually get bored of being pwned by people with a lot more time to play.

Pros:
Excellent multiplayer
A plethora of multiplayer modes & rewards
Branching story ideas are good for those into the story
Strike Missions are interesting idea..

Cons:
Boring story which is badly written and overly trite
Branching doesn’t impact gameplay
Strike missions could have been a lot better in implementation
Zombie mode is boring

80/100

Review, Video Games, Writing, XboxWorld

FIFA 14

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Every time I tell people I’m writing a review of FIFA, I get the same joke “why don’t you just cut and paste last year’s version?” This year, this joke pretty much hits home. FIFA is at that point where it can only improve in incremental steps, or due to something like a next gen engine change, fall drastically from grace.

Fortunately the current generation engine hasn’t been changed, but with the next gen being provided essentially for free with the Xbox One, it’s a big ask to get even the most ardent fans to buy something which isn’t drastically different from last year’s iteration.

This is not to say EA hasn’t tried to spruce things up. This year the presentation is much cleaner, feeling as though it’s been made with swiping and touch screens in mind, and to that end it works very well, even with the controller. There’s very little going backwards and forwards through menus, with the interface being constructed more like the Xbox360 tabbed interface than the previous menu and button clicks. And now you can simply press X to save on any screen in the Career mode, which makes things for an obsessive saver like me so much better.

As to the game itself, slight adjustments have been made to make the game play smoother too. The AI has been smartened up, making use of space and runs more than any other version. And this doesn’t just apply to attacking – the back line works better and more realistically than in this FIFA than any other game to date. It does tend to cause far more off-sides from ambitious forwards in lower starred teams, however, which can get tedious.

Players tend to react more realistically to the ball, flicking passes and making subtle back heels without as much player intervention – a few flicks of the sticks will have the more fancy players doing moves which would in previous incarnations require a button dexterity only a few dedicated fighting gamers can match. There can still be issues with the ball physics and player reactions – I’ve seen a ball stop dead after hitting a player in midfield which just seemed odd, but I think it stood out because it was so unusual. More often, the more mid-rated players can step clumsily and overshoot runs, but it adds a level of realism which is not often seen in soccer games. Compare a top draw Man U vs Arsenal game to say Melbourne Heart and Adelaide United, and there is a gulf of difference, with far more clumsy action in the latter type of match, and this is reflected in FIFA well.

Speaking of rating players, this year the trading in Career mode has had a bit of an overhaul. The focus is now on hiring scouts and selecting skills and positions you’re interested in rather than overall attribute scores. At first I found this extremely frustrating as I only know a few names of stars, so didn’t know who to scout and if they were worth the money they asked or the time I was putting into scounting. But then I learned how to use the scouts – Villa (my usual side) need a pacy forward, so you can search the world for a pacy forward with an attack orientation, rather than just go for Messi who, let’s face it, will never slum for the likes of Villa. With a bit of luck and a bit of money, you can find the players you want and develop them, giving longevity to the career mode.

Ultimate team gets a bit of a shake up too. Being able to find classic players like Pele makes opening the packs far more exciting, and being able to search for players and consumables is much more refined making the process much easier. A new kind of consumable called Chemistry Styles which changes aspects of player’s playing style. For example, applying Brick Wall to a defender adds to defence and strength, whilst adding Sniper to a forward adds precision and range.

One thing I am very, very happy to see return is a more gameplay focused achievement list. Rather than Achievements like “play a game online” or “win 10 games” we see a return to “Score with a Dipping Volley”, and “Straight Arm a Defender to Protect the Ball”. It’s a subtle change, but awarding people for skill rather than persistence is always good game design. It makes me think about trying to chip a goal keeper, or running my defenders forward more often.

Speaking of skills, the new skill games are great although are much harder than previous in previous games. However, even more discouraging is the load times. In what may be a first, it’s not a criticism that it’s too slow; conversely, sometimes it feels the game loads even before the skill game has even started, and being keen to jump into a game means you often skip the skill games!

I’ve never been a fan of FIFA online, as the match making has always pitted me against a gun playing Barcelona whilst I stupidly chose Villa or Adelaide, and it’s humiliating being beaten 7 nil by a lad whose voice has yet to break. This year though I had no trouble finding a game, matched with a fellow Aussie so lag was minimal, and I think it matched us well as we drew 2-2. It probably helps that I’ve finally overcome the “Moderate NAT” issue that’s plagued me for over a year though.

I’ve always liked the soundtracks in FIFA, and this year is no different. The addition of Nine Inch Nails was a welcome surprise, although admittedly the track “Copy of A” is no “Closer” as Trent is a little older and wiser and has realised not swearing can be just as powerful a statement.

Commentary wise I was a little disappointed and confused. Last year during some matches, there was another commentator team of Clive Tyldesley & Andy Townsend for cup matches to complement Martin Tyler & Alan Smith, but this year they’re gone. Tyler and Smith do as good job as always, but when a player is retiring they constantly repeat the same thing over and over. Which is confusing, because at other times I hear completely unique commentary about players, coaches or teams, and if they talk over each other, or miss something, the commentary seems to react rather smartly, with Tyldesley apologising, for example.

Conclusion:
FIFA 14 can be seen as a refinement of a game which was pretty near perfect. It’s a refinement which grows on you after repeated playing, but is rather too subtle for even the biggest FIFA fan, especially with the anticipation of the next gen version with the potential power the new generation offers to everything from graphics to AI, combined with EA’s fancy new Ignite engine. Then again, it’s better to be mildly disappointed with a great game than to see a good series suffer, as happened with the transition from Xbox to Xbox360.

Pros:
Smoother interface
Great animations which leads to subtle gameplay improvements
Being able to save with a single button press
Chemistry styles adding more depth to Ultimate Team

Cons:
Frequent offsides
Repeating commentary

80 / 100

Review, Video Games, Writing, XboxWorld

Fight Night Round 3

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I’ve always enjoyed EA’s Fight Night series. The ‘Total Punch Control’ system was an instant hit (no pun intended) with fighting game fans and it was this feature of the series, even more so than the graphics that drew me and many other gamers in. Fight Night 2004 introduced us to this brand new and alternate style of control that successfully ended the reign of the ‘button masher’ and replaced luck with actual skill if you were to get the most out of the game.

Unfortunately it was light on in the Career Mode and this was addressed to some extent in the sequel, Fight Night Round 2 which added options to choose trainers, select intro music and lighting effects for your fighters ring entrances. More options in games are usually welcome, but these new features were mostly a matter of style over substance and resulted in little replay value for the game once complete. In my previous review I said the career mode took a bit of a step back. Unfortunately this is the case in the Xbox 360 version, so while we have a game that showcases some of the most amazing graphics ever seen in a sports game on any platform, is that enough to warrant the $100 + purchase price?

It has to be said, the graphics in the Xbox 360 version are amazing, I mean like ‘Holy Shit’ amazing. We’re always looking for that ‘WOW’ factor in new games and when you see the first knock down replay with your victims drool splurting out, the glazed look in his eyes and the skin of his cheeks rippling from the impact of your punch in super sexy slow motion you’d be forgiven if you climbed up onto your roof shouting “YES, next-gen is here!”… or something like that. The truth is that this version of Fight Night 3 looks absolutely amazing and the team at EA Sports have created the most lifelike characters outside a pre-rendered cut scene ever to grace a video game. Most of the time before a games release we’re shown trailers and screenshots that are rarely indicative of the final version, and we all know how damn annoying that is right? But this time around everything you’ve seen is exactly how good Fight Night 3 looks.

The artwork on the Fight Night boxers is so detailed that it’s possible to see every pore plus every bead of sweat on their bodies and in 720p on a nice sharp widescreen, giant television it’s amazing how great everything looks. The lighting is also extremely realistic with reflections and highlights glistening on the boxers’ sweaty skin and it’s also used effectively in each of the stadiums that your fights take place in. Throughout the bouts your fighter will also suffer cuts and bruises but the animations of the blood dripping down the faces aren’t really that smooth as I was expecting. It’s a small point but with the amazing detail packed in everywhere else it does stand out when you see it.

EA secured the rights to all things ESPN last year and this is one of the first rounds of EA Sports games to make use of the licence. Fight Night 3 sports a number of different game modes with the ESPN classic one being the newest addition to the series. Classic matches from the annals of boxing history are selectable so if you’ve ever wanted to relive Ali versus Frazier you’ll be in your element. To continue the fine form of the graphics, even the historical boxers such as Ali look the best that they ever have and once you retire your normal Career mode fighter, you can even go up against him.

The Career mode is where you will spend most of your time and creating your Boxer and building him in to a lean mean fighting machine is plenty of fun. The training modes aka mini-games return with the Combo Dummy, Heavy Bag and Weight Lifting all contributing in their own way to different areas of your fighters’ skills. The option to ‘auto-train’ is there if you’re in a hurry but the performance increase will be almost negligible at best so it pays to spend a bit of time going through them, and unfortunately, while something different to the bouts, repetition is the killer here as after signing a contract, training, fighting a match, signing a contract, training and fighting a match gets old fairly quickly and this is the biggest complaint I have about Fight Night 3. Except for fighting and training, there just isn’t much else to do.

Yes, I realise, it is a fighting game but the Career mode has no story as such and is just you taking your created fighter to the top. With more use of the ESPN licence, the ability to perhaps pick sponsors, take part in promotional events (at least some choices to make) and a little bit of narrative with some story moments between you and your rivals, Fight Night 3 would have even more interesting to actually play through and possibly helped to create more of a bond between you and your character. As it stands though, the excellent graphics keep drawing you back in and you probably won’t stop until you have all the Live Achievements and have retired at least one or two fighters.

If the Career mode does eventually get boring you’re able to jump online and punch on with your Live buddies in either ranked or non ranked matches. In a number of matches against Deathgod there was no lag and knocking the snot out of your mates, and then getting the snot knocked right back out of yourself is loads of fun, especially when those slow motion, skin rippling replays kick in with their over the top, bone crunching sound effects. With winter coming up Fight Night 3 will be one of those games dragged out on cold rainy days for plenty of online action because with the great graphics and the ‘Total Control’ system, smacking down your mates becomes even more enjoyable than ever before. The lack of lag was a nice surprise, especially after some negative experiences with other online fighting, and some other recent EA Sports games.

There are also a couple of new moves thrown in this year as well. The Flash KO has the ability to put your opponent into a daze giving you the opportunity to throw in a few quick punches and knock him down before he can react. It’s one of the longest punches to make so in return leaves your defences open but is pretty effective if you can pull it off. The other new move, the Stun Punch immediately puts your opponent on the defensive requiring only one more solid punch from you to put him down and forces him to block or parry while he regains his composure. They’re both effective moves, but even more so if used after a parry from yourself and the final training mode, Sparring, is the perfect spot to practice them. I think a couple of the matches that I’ve played online (against strangers) and been slaughtered in were due to being on the receiving end of these new moves so I can speak for how effective they can be when used properly.

The audio in Fight Night 3 does a good job in the fights with blows sounding full of bass and oomph. In the slow motion replays the impacts sound awfully painful, even (it must be said) a little over the top. The commentary gets repetitive but this is fairly indicative of most EA Sports games so while a slight let down, wasn’t unexpected. It reacts well to the onscreen action though so it does a great job in that area. The music is the standard hip-hop stuff that EA must have purchased in bulk a few years back and is still trying to use up. While it suits the game it’s a bit light on this time with only 12 music tracks included, but as it’s only on during the menus it’s not a real issue.

Final Thoughts and Score
This is the first EA Sports game for the Xbox 360 that we’ve reviewed so far. We’ve played a few of the rest (with reviews coming soon) and Fight Night 3 is easily the best looking out of the bunch. It shares a bit in common with other EA Sports Xbox 360 titles though being that it’s a bit light on in the features department which is a bit of a letdown, especially in the online modes. I’ve gone on about the graphics but it’s got to be mentioned again just to drive the point home that this is one damn sexy looking game. Everything is photo realistic and EA have really delivered the goods here, when you see it in motion it looks amazing.

The only complaints that can be levelled at Fight Night 3 are the points already raised. The Career mode needs to be built upon, especially with the heavy duty ESPN licence attached to the game. A bit of story telling wouldn’t go astray either, especially to help create a tighter bond between you and your self created on-screen character, but other than that, the amazing graphics and fighting engine hold everything together creating the best looking boxing game ever and a real showcase for the 360’s power.

Pros
Amazingly realistic looking fighers
Lag free online play
Fun training games
‘Total Control’ beats button mashing
Bone crunching sound effects

Cons
Career mode gets repetitive
Some more online modes wouldn’t hurt

90/100

Review, Video Games, Writing, XboxWorld

Dark Souls 2

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I dove head first and blind into Dark Souls 2. I thought this would be the best way to approach it. I haven’t played the other games in the series, and have read very little about it; a review here and an “arty critique” there, but nothing really to make me think I knew about the series.

What very little I did know about Demon Souls and Dark Souls was this: they were hard, and a lot of my gamer friends really enjoyed those games. And after diving headfirst into the game, I’ve come to know Dark Souls a little better, and come to two conclusions: Yes, it is hard. In fact, it’s very hard. The other conclusion is I have changed in my gaming preferences and habits.

One of the things people rave on and on about this series is lack of handholding. I agree, handholding can feel highly insulting and demeaning to players. In cinema, there is an adage – show, don’t tell. Movies where this is put into practice always top critics and filmmakers “best of” lists. This adage applies even more so in games. Let the player explore the mechanics themselves. I’ve nearly come to blows with a producer with a business background (opposed to a gaming background) who wanted to put a tutorial in our game because they couldn’t figure out how to play it. I screamed “you learn how to play it by playing it”! Developers spend months and months refining these mechanics, and to then put the player at the start of the game, halt the action and tell them exactly what to do is insulting to the people who designed the mechanics, the people who designed the levels, and the people who are playing the game.

So I was overjoyed when I was dumped into Dark Souls 2 and had no idea what to do. I ran around pressing every button and ran into everything just to see what would happen. And I was honestly surprised when I peeled back the first fog layer and found a stone telling me how to swing my sword in a traditional “this is a tutorial and this is how you play the game” fashion. Although I do admit it was very useful, and I got a few precious souls that would help me level up later. And I laughed when I had my first death and received the achievement “This is Dark Souls” after missing a jump, which was totally my fault for not reading the instructions properly. And I laughed again when I approached a huge hippo creature and whacked him with my sword, and he turned around, grabbed me and bit my head off. I thought “this is cool”.

That feeling quickly dissipated however, when I first got to Majula, the newbie main hub area. I was just exploring, took the wrong corner, and was attacked by three little rat things. I swung my sword and tried to block their attacks, and it didn’t work. I was just thrashing about madly and in return they hit me with such force that I died almost instantly. I thought to myself ok, maybe I need a different tactic, and tried to kill them again. My different tactic was to focus on the enemy by pressing the right joystick. This focused on them, but again, I couldn’t hit them and I died really quickly. So I just avoided them from that point on.

However, little did I realise that my health bar was now at 50%. So off I went, exploring the world of Drangleic, and when I got to the Forrest of the Fallen Giants, I got my ass handed to me. Time and time again. By the same “lowly” zombie creatures you first meet way back in the training level. After two hours of being killed right near the campfire, I gave up. It was just too hard and too annoying to get killed by the same mobs in the same places over and over again.

The next night, I rolled a cleric, thinking healing would help me. Nope. Same thing happened, I got stuck in the earliest part of the Forrest of Fallen Giants, again. This time, apart from not being able to hit anything, my spells would never cast. In desperation, I jumped online to learn how the fuck you are supposed to play this game.

Now, this brings me to my first issue with Dark Souls 2. As it is, I don’t have a lot of time to play games. Sad, but true. Everyone at XboxWorld donates their time to do these reviews, and get nothing but your love and the game in return. Moreover, I’m one of those people who plays 3 or 4 different games at one time, sometimes on the Xbox or PS3, sometimes on the PC, and yes, even on the iPhone. You could call me a gaming slut. So having to spend 40 minutes on watching a LEARN TO PLAY video, along with reading countless forum posts and walkthroughs isn’t what I call a positive use of my time.

It’s not that I want to be handheld, as I made clear above, but at the same time I don’t want to spend my time learning about the game outside of the game. I want to be shown in game how to defeat the game. I found this disconnect to be disconcerting. And I HATED it.

In this way though, Dark Souls is reminiscent of an MMO. Quite a few of the MMOs I’ve played have difficult parts where it’s not clear what to do or how to do it, so you jump online looking for hints, or ask in chat (and generally get a chorus of “google it!”). And like a MMO, DS2 is not a game where you can really give just one review, because your feelings towards the game changes over time, as does the game experience itself. The hints people leave in the world, the fact you can invite players or be invaded on any given play session, and the constant updates to the game when you load guarantee an evolving experience.

And of course there is the grinding, a staple of the less fun MMOs, where you have to kill the same things over and over and over and over again just to level up. The Dark Souls series is based around this mechanic. Which is fine, if you have the time to grind, which I don’t feel I do have, and why I’ve stopped playing most MMOs which feature it. I do like the fact that if you are killed you go back to where it was and collect your souls so the time is not totally wasted, but of course that means you’re covering the same ground over and over any way.

Yet as I played more and more, getting better and better, I started to enjoy the game more, and I learned how to play. I still feel the game is not supportive of my game style, which is exploration, as I found myself simply stuck at times, even with the aid of a walkthrough. Even now I’ve played the game much more and feel comfortable with the stamina mechanism and developing a rhythm to my attacks and dodges. I know when to consume the precious life giving pickups, know to restore your health with the rare effigies (but not at a campfire!), found areas where it’s relatively easy to farm souls, know how to get back to the campfires with the bones you find around the place, and definitely know not to hit any barrels, because you don’t know which ones will explode and which ones won’t.

Although I am playing better, I still feel the controls are wildly inaccurate. The lock on will switch focus mid battle, even if your foe is not dead. Swings which look like they are going to connect miss by miles. And in a game which is as unforgiving as DS2, this is unconscionable. There are times where I die and it’s definitely my fault, because I’m not managing my stamina, or I’ve run into an area with too many creatures, and I can handle that. What I can’t handle is fighting against the controls, struggling to do what I know I need to do an being unable to do it. It’s worse in the boss fights, or should I say fight, because I’ve only managed to do one successfully.

My final comment on the game is the graphics are terrible. They’re muddy, pixelated, clip through one another, don’t appear on the surface they’re meant to but float above it, and just not up to standard for a game released in 2014 on any platform. It’s really disappointing to see such an underwhelming looking game come out this late in the Xbox360’s lifecycle. Sure, some of the set pieces look great, for example when you emerge out of the early cave system and experience Majula for the first time, and admittedly it’s the last thing you’re thinking about when playing the game as you’re looking at your stamina and health bars and making sure you’re connecting with the enemy, but really there is no excuse for it.

Conclusion:
I hated Dark Souls 2 at first. HATED IT. I thought it was too hard, too unforgiving, and too involved to have anyone but the most hardcore to enjoy it. And in some sense I still think this, but now it’s with a sense of grudging respect. After reading about the game, learning how to play, and becoming involved in the Dark Souls community, I understand where it’s coming from and it’s place in the gaming strata. It’s not a strata I find myself in very often any more, which makes me somewhat sad to be honest, but at the same time everything changes, and although this game isn’t aimed at me any longer, I can’t begrudge those who it is aimed at.

Pros
Tough game which ultimately becomes rewarding
Plenty of replayability
Helps develop a community of people who are willing to help

Cons
looks very ugly
most of the replayability is forced on you.
Controls are not as precise as a game this demanding warrants.
is very, very demanding in difficulty and of your time

Score 80/100

Review, Video Games, Writing, XboxWorld

FIFA 13

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It’s far too tempting to write off the yearly update to FIFA as an easy money spinner for EA. After all, how different is each yearly game, really? Yes, different players, a few new or different teams, a few new stadiums, different leagues, different modes all make the game different from last year on paper at least, but ultimately, isn’t it just the same game?

Well, yes and no. If you think of FIFA as a simulation of soccer, not just a game to play, as a simulation each change – no matter how small that brings the game closer to feeling like a real game of soccer can be seen as an achievement and worthy of an upgrade. Last year I said the player physics were good, but to be brilliant they probably needed more time. This year they’re much closer to brilliant. It seems that in FIFA 13, everything that started to come together last year has actually come together.

We’ll start with the physics. The ball is completely its own entity, and players react to this entity in the way real world players would act. So, for example, if the ball is dropping to a player’s head, he will header it or chest it down onto his feet. When the ball is at his feet, he will move the ball left and right, rolling it behind him if attacked from the front. And all of this is natural, as in the player knows what to do and when to do it without any extra controls needed – no need for manual dexterity on the controller as much any longer.

This physics based approach also makes things such as slide tackles viable options for players, as the player will curl around to get at a ball. Yes, sometimes the player will tangle up legs and draw a foul, but that’s soccer. It goes the other way too – being rough in defence with continual jostling for the ball will result in fouls, and I’ve found being far too aggressive in the box will give away stupid penalties, entirely of your own making.

Players feel noticeably sluggish when tired and appear prone to more relevant injuries. A fall from leaping up to intercept a corner may see the player fall and injure his arm, a slide may crunch an ankle, and an ill-timed lunge may pull a calf muscle. And yes, these physics additions were introduced last year, but the refinements to it are wonderfully subtle. There’s very little accidental collision between members of the same team unlike last year, and no odd falling on top on one another and doing the hump.

Switching player positions within teams feels different as well – a forward feels different from a midfielder which feels different from a defender. The AI has been improved significantly with through passes and runs being far more dangerous than ever before. Having said that, FIFA has moved the game back to being a team sport, where all the players are valuable, so you don’t have to simply play the well known teams and feed the ball to the big star players to have fun with the game and opportunities to strike and score. Battles can occur in midfield, and bringing on fresh players at the right time feels finally like a useful tactic.

There are still things which break this sense of simulation, of course. The free kicks, penalties and corners still feel like pressing the button and hoping for the best. And I still have no friggin’ idea of how to make my keeper dive for a penalty. The lack of certain teams and certain divisions always annoys fans, although personally I find my favourite teams are always there and couldn’t care less about some Eastern European team I’ve never heard of and likely never will being missed out. There’s still a lack of stadiums, and it’s disappointing the A-League stadiums still aren’t there although the team’s have been in the game for a few years now. Surely EA have a few grand to throw at various Australian Sporting organisations so something like Hindmarsh Stadium (or Melbourne Rectangular Stadium) could be made available to play in. I mean, it’s not like the Reds don’t need the money.

And of course the focus on teamwork has the downside of making the Play As A Pro feel far less exciting as previous years. Playing as a forward, I felt a little less like the hero, and resorted to more passing and tackling and teamwork and less one on one showboating than previous years. And the fact you can’t start as a Player-Manager in the Career mode really disappointed me, especially when I began in Barcelona and was put up for trade after my first match. Why allow the player to play for a team when you’re going to be traded? It’s worse though playing in the lower division or minor league teams – you can’t organise your backline, switch tactics, or trade weak players for better ones.

Of course, to do all that you need to play the regular campaign, so although you can import your pro and play as the pro, it still doesn’t feel as personal as the last few years. The campaign has been improved though with more options, more off field drama such as players begging to be played, injuries, but it’s still pretty much the same as previous years. And trading can seem a little odd, with players going to teams which they probably wouldn’t go to in real life.

The online play is still much the same and there are tons of online modes – Seasons, a revamp of the Head to Head mode, which sees you have to play and win 10 online games to rise to the next division tier. You can play the usual one on one matches, the online Be A Pro returns where you join a friends team, and FIFA Ultimate Team also returns online. To be honest though, because I’m not great at online, I haven’t delved into the game as full on as others may have. I’ve played 4 games and found it smooth for the most part, and full of young kids with foreign dialects who delight in kicking your arse.

This year more than previous years, I’ve found the FIFA Ultimate Team far more appealing than other modes. It is still trading cards/players and purchasing and applying consumables to keep your team competitive, and ultimately it feels like it is nickel and dimeing you in order to have the best possible, especially when playing online. However, maybe because I opted to pre-order and get a new set of gold cards every week, I feel more engaged with it. Because I don’t have to go to much effort because cards are handed out free, and I don’t have to spend much money to adjust my team to participate in the various cup challenges, I’m rewarded more coin which I don’t care so much about spending 150 coins on a health card to fix an injured player, or bidding 500 coins on a gold contract card.

And something must be said of the mini-games which replace the arena mode loading screen. These are fantastic at teaching and improving playing, and are much like real world training simulations. One of the FIFA’s once offered achievements for doing certain moves during the game, like scoring with a bicycle kick, and whilst I still think that’s a great idea, this might just make up for removing those. The different tiers of bronze, silver and gold mean you’ve got a lot of mini-games to encounter and participate in when waiting for a game to load, and often I’ve found myself replaying these instead of pressing start to play the game.

Lastly, I have to commend the commentary and the way it adds to the idea of a simulation. Although it does tend to repeat itself a little and you hear the more common comments repeated earlier in a play through of a season or competition, the throw away to commentary on other matches, the cup/league wrap up after a match, and the sideline report on injured players gives you a greater sense of participating in a competition with other teams in a real sport, or at least watching it on the television. It’s just a little touch, and one could argue they could concentrate on the commentating more, but I think it’s great.

Conclusion:
There is just so much to like about this year’s FIFA and the series is still making important improvements that justify the annual purchase. It’s finally the game last year should have been, and although there are some niggling little issues, overall it feels like a solid simulation of the wonderful world game of soccer.

Pros:
Best FIFA ever, best soccer game of this generation
Physics simulation is superb.
A massive load of modes to keep fans happy

Cons:
A little lag in some online games.
Matchmaking in online games still not perfect

90/100

Review, Video Games, Writing, XboxWorld

Dragon’s Dogma

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Capcom’s Dragon’s Dogma could be describes as a Japanese Elder Scrolls. The development team behind it are comprised of some of the best game makers Japan currently has, and the scope of the game is quite ambitious. It has elements of Monster Hunter, Shadows of the Colossus, and of course the Elder Scrolls series, and if you like those games you’ll really enjoy Dragon’s Dogma.

Unfortunately I don’t any longer. Mostly because I don’t have the time to play huge, open ended games any more. Sure, I can make time for them, and tried with DD, but they’ve got to grab me immediately, and DD fails to do this. On top of that, there are a few things which let the game down, including the graphics, the constant chatter of the NPCs, to the tedious grind.

The story of Dragon’s Dogma is fairly interesting. It starts off with a dragon appearing, set on tormenting the province of Gransys, and after creating your character through the incredibly robust character generator, you stand up to the dragon, only to have your heart devoured and then come back as the Arisen. From here on in though, the story gets a little lost, and like other massive RPGs you’ll get bogged down in so many quests and side activities, it’s hard to focus on what you’re meant to be doing. The world you’re in isn’t radically different to any other world you’ve visited in RPGs, and I found it rather boring, to be honest.

During character creation you can choose from three classes, as such – Magic User, Bow User, or Melee user. Whilst the tutorial tells you the basics of how to play the game, it doesn’t give you a feel for the game overall. I don’t particularly like handholding in games, but here it’s unfocussed and only tells you the very basics of how to play. It doesn’t, for example, tell you that you can branch out and change your class relatively early in the game, and gives no hints to where to do this. I stumbled upon it by accident.

Something which really put me off was the graphics. I’m a rare person who thinks realism in games should be secondary to the gameplay, but even I balked at the seriously ugly graphics. I realise no sprawling, open world, go anywhere game can match the graphical fidelity of tightly polished arena shooters for example, but here feels positively last gen. Textures are very basic, the poly counts on models are quite low, framerate is really low, draw distance isn’t great, and everything seems to blend into everything else because of the poor lighting. The animations on the models are also really bad, especially when they’re talking to others.

The game features an upgrading system for weapons and equipment. Like the Elder Scrolls, the land you explore is full of stuff you can pick up. Some of it is lying in the world, others can be found by killing monsters. You can combine these to make better items such as better health potions, better weapons, and unique buffs. Many of the items can be gifted to NPCs to make them think better of you so they give you discounts and better information about quests.

One really cool thing about DD is the NPC system. These Pawns as they refer to themselves follow you around, fight for you, pick up items you may have missed, and tell you tactics on how to fight monsters and hints on where to go in missions. You get to create your first pawn much in the same way you make your character, and you can equip them in the same manner you equip yourself. Where it becomes really cool is when you aren’t playing the game. The game connects to other people, and when you’re offline your pawn can go travelling in other people’s games, earning equipment and experience to guide you in your game. It encourages you to equip your pawn with the best equipment so people choose to go with your pawn.

When fighting huge monsters, there’s a great ‘Shadow of the Colossus’ feature where you can grab them and climb up to a weak spot. Your Pawns will helpfully and constantly tell you when you can do this in a fight. This gives some epic battles as your pawns scramble around whilst you’re clinging onto the back of a giant hydra.

One of the bad things about Pawns is they’re not very smart. They will steal things you’re trying to pick. They tend to run off and attack things you can’t see. Part of that is the bad graphics. As mentioned, everything tends to blend together, so seeing enemies can be arduous. But to have them scream “goblins” and run off is highly annoying. Also, they constantly chatter, obscuring often important dialogue. They’ll constantly tell you how the tactics of how to kill the most frequent creatures “wolves hate fire!” and often tell you they know something of important, and when you click them to ask they say “we need to find the book”, which is the objective of the quest anyway.

To progress through the game you’ve really got to grind. I hate grinding in games, and it’s why I don’t often enjoy Japanese games. I prefer to be able to play the game from point to point. It doesn’t necessarily mean I enjoy a linear experience, I just prefer that if I get tasked with doing something then I’m at a level to do it. If I get tasked with killing X creatures (a type of quest I hate in games anyway as I think it’s really lazy quest design) then I should be at a level to kill those creatures when asked to do the quest. If I get tasked with escorting a NPC to a place, I should be able to defend that NPC with my skills. DD tends to simply throw every quest at you and make you attempt it before realising your too weak a level to complete it.

This is compounded by the fact you’ve got to walk everywhere. There are no mounts, no quick travel. So, if you walk into an area you’re not equipped for following a quest, not only do you frequently die, you have to turn around and run away, often for great distances between the different quests. You’re simply stumbling blindly for a great portion of the game doing nothing except dying. I found it frustrating and tedious.

Conclusion
I know there are people out there who love games like Dragons Dogma, who love being able to forge their own path at their own pace. People who don’t mind grinding, killing the same types of enemies over and over again to get enough experience or equipment to continue quests.
Although I did know what kind of game Dragon’s Dogma was when I picked it up, I was hoping that it would be different, have something I found compelling, something I could get addicted to and want to spend my time with.

But for me, this kind of ‘old school’ gaming found in Dragon’s Dogma is simply tedious and not enjoyable. I no longer have the time nor the patience to grind through games, especially if the story or the world it’s set in isn’t compelling. There are other games out there to be played, games that don’t demand I put in hundreds of hours just because the designers want you to, but rather encourage it by being more interesting and better looking.

Pros:
Very large world with lots to explore
Pawn System is a unique and interesting system

Cons:
Demands too much of your time for too little reward
Looks very ugly
NPCs can be really dumb

70/100

Review, Video Games, Writing, XboxWorld

Trials Evolution

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Three years ago Trials HD, the motorcross physics puzzler platformer, snuck onto the XBLA market alongside heavy hitters ‘Splosion Man and Shadow Complex, but because of its simple yet quality gameplay coupled with tremendous amount of fun, it demanded attention. Xbox World gave it 90/100, one of the highest scores for an arcade game at the time, and fortunately for us the praise the game got then is still very relevant for its sequel, Trails Evolution.

It still has the “easy to pick up but hard to master” quality, and has that steep learning curve, but it’s not one that can’t be overcome with practice and determination. The checkpoint system is still wonderful, and the handling of the bike is superb. However, where it differs is it takes the great stuff of the original game and makes it more social.

This time they’ve refined the feel of the bike’s physics, so the already tight controls are tighter. There is less of the flighty feel of the previous game, and you constantly feel in control of the way the bike and rider will tip and fall. Not only do you scroll from left to right when racing, now the track will curve, and whilst you’re still “on rails” adding this extra dimension increases the enjoyment of the experience. In addition to this, the physics of the track can change. One track in particular moves about under you, so you need to put more acceleration in places for jumps that normally would require little. And there are some simply stunning tracks, with one of my favourites being Limbo, taking the black and white silhouette of indie darling Limbo and making into one of the most nefarious tracks to play.

Social is often a negative word when coupled with traditional or hardcore gaming. And make no mistake – Trails is a hardcore game. It makes you fail and encourages you to get better. It doesn’t hold your hand like so many other games, but will help you up when you fall. The game will teach through repetition, causing you to replay parts over and over. And it will only punish you a little, but give greater simple rewards, whether it’s another funny explosion when you fail, or scream from the rider as he shoots down a ramp, to silver and gold medals after the race.
Throwing the social aspect into this title enhances the experience greatly. There are three aspects to the social which I will call the ladder, the multiplayer, and the track creation. The ladder of the previous game is replaced with a devious and insipid new ghost like feature which shows your Xbox Live friends as dots along the track you’re on. As you race, these dots will be a constant nag at you to do better. They’re unobtrusive, but the best motivator to improve I’ve seen in a game.

When you’re racing along the track and screw up, restart at a checkpoint, and see one of the little white dots with a friend’s name on it wiz past you get a renewed sense of determination. When you see a dot get stuck at a point and you go flying past it, you’ll cackle with glee.
However, cackling with glee becomes a genuine chortle of mirth with multiplayer. Racing in real time with 4 people online or together in a room is laugh out loud funny. There are two modes, one with races on a 4 line track; the other which tests your skills against one another in a ghost-yet-realtime mode on any single player track.

I much prefer the 4 player as although you can’t influence each other, I’m sure the expectation of performing well is far more relevant in this mode. It’s gripping, in that you know one little mistake can cost you the race. It’s incredibly funny watching people stack it on a jump you totally nailed, and being able to play it 4 player offline as well makes it an ideal party game, because merely watching it makes you want to play as well. The Online ghostmode has this competitive feeling to a degree, but even though it does occur in real time it doesn’t bring out the same fervor in people that racing alongside one another does.

The last aspect of the social game is the ability to make your own tracks. The track creator is quite complex to use and would benefit greatly from the use of a mouse and a decent tutorial. Yet the creations already online are brilliant, and like the competitiveness of the racing itself, the quality of the tracks makes you want to do something just as good. After you’ve played a track you get to vote on it, and the best ones show up in weekly showcases. One of the best I played was Shadow Redux, which used the physics of shadows to interact with the real world items for a complex and rewarding ride.

Conclusion:
Trials Evolution is fantastic fun. Its simplicity and beguiling depth encourages replay, and the addition of social functions encourages a competitive streak in even the most placid of players. It’s the perfect sequel to an almost perfect game.

Pros:
Everything that was great about the first title is here.
Refinement of the physics gives a deeper sense of controls.
Great new tracks which will challenge and amuse.
The addition of social features adds competitive fun to the title.

Cons:
Bloody hard to put down! (not really a con)
Music could be better, but it’s better than its predecessor.
95/100

Review, Video Games, Writing, XboxWorld

I Am Alive

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Ubisoft’s I Am Alive has so many good ideas that it should be brilliant, but then proceeds to undermine that brilliance with poor choices. The central conceit of I Am Alive is the world has gone to shit after the Event, a cataclysm where earthquakes rocked the world and caused cities to crumble, leaving survivors choking on toxic fog. Our hero travels cross country for a year to return to his ruined hometown of Haventon, obstinately to find his wife and daughter despite, you know, all the earthquakes and post apocalyptic desperate vigilantes, etcetera.

Immediately on starting the game, the influence of every post apocalyptic movie in the last 20 years is apparent. Abandoned cars on broken highways. Torn apart bridges. Crumbling skyscrapers. Skeletons just lying in the street. Trolley carts everywhere. Apart from being hackneyed and incredibly grey / brown, the world is also curiously static. Sure, I’ll concede the world is meant to be drab and sad looking after it ends, but the choice to not have physics on objects and debris makes the game world unbearably dull. Climbing about on skyscrapers is a breeze, but you can’t open a car door or climb on top of it. There are wire blockades which after a year should be rusted, and even if not could easily be climbed over or through. The only movement is cloth, which flutters nicely in the wind, but walking into trash cans stops you dead in your tracks.

The climbing mechanic is quite interesting. You have a health bar and a stamina bar, and your stamina bar decreases the more you climb. The more you exert yourself, the quicker the bar empties. If it empties, the bar itself decreases, meaning you have less stamina. Erode your stamina too far and it is game over. You can regain stamina by pulling yourself up onto a ledge and standing on it, placing a piton (a climbers hook) into a wall, or use items which you find around the world. Most of these items are in plain view, so exploration of the drab world isn’t really rewarded. Also, when you get into certain areas the land becomes dusty and you lose stamina slowly but steadily. The only way to avoid it is to climb.

One of the biggest issues I found when climbing was the unresponsiveness of the controls, especially when moving horizontally, as when you’re crossing monkey bar type climbs. Often you’ll switch camera view, and start climbing the wrong way. There is also a problem with vertical movement, and you wrestle with the controls when jumping upwards or sideways. As you are climbing your stamina bar is decreasing, so you dick around trying to get the controls to play nice, all the while getting more stressed at losing stamina.

You also have a life bar, which depletes if you fall too far, or get hit / shot by enemies you encounter. Although you’re armed with a machete and a gun, ammo is limited so you have to choose your fights wisely. This is a great idea, and makes the player think about being stealthy and patient as you move through the world, listening for clues of the presence of other people. Or so the game would have you believe. However, most fights are in fact unavoidable, and most end up occurring in the same way.

You can draw your gun and threaten an enemy, getting them to back up to a drop so you can push them over, or get close to slash them with the machete. Usually there will be three guys, one with a gun and the other armed with machetes or knives. You end up in most fights simply shooting the guy with the gun and slicing the other two. In some fights there’s a “tough guy”, and shooting him will make the other guys surrender, at which point you can knock them out.

The game also has a frustrating save system. I understand the developers are trying to make the player stressed to a degree, and careful in how they play, and that’s fine. However, when part of that stress comes from issues outside the player’s control, it’s simply nasty. The aforementioned difficulties with climbing can cause you to slip and fall, meaning you have to retry from the last checkpoint, which are quite far apart.

Moreover, you’re limited in how many retries you get from the checkpoint. You start the game with three retries, and by helping people (usually simply by giving them things in your backpack you’ve discovered in the world) or completing one of the main missions, you’re rewarded more. However, if you use all retries, you’re taken right back to the beginning of the chapter, and these are spaced way too far apart.

For example, I completed a difficult climb which took about an hour, I was rewarded with a cutscene. I thought cool, chapter done, and turned off my xbox. When I returned to the game, I was at the start of the level, and had to spend another hour climbing. Again, this would be fine if there were multiple approaches to levels or encounters, but it’s really quite linear, so replaying is just a chore.

The game also suffers from minor technical issues, such as clipping and poor animation. On top of the control frustrations and lack of life in the world, as you’ve only got the main character to focus on when you jump and clip through a girder, or walk through a shaft of light and cast no shadow, it’s probably more apparent than usual here. The music score is dynamic, and as you get hurt or lose stamina, the music rises dramatically. Again, this is a great idea on paper, however it’s poorly implemented. The choice to have it occur every time you lose more than half your stamina, which is every time you climb, means it loses any dramatic impact it might have had.

Conclusion:
With so many great games on XBLA let alone on disc, it’s hard to recommend I Am Alive. It feels like it never reached its full potential. Maybe with more time or a bigger team Ubisoft would have a classic like Assassin’s Creed on their hands, but unfortunately it falls flat on too many levels.

Having said that, Ubisoft should be praised for taking a risk and releasing something beyond the endless shooters, and hopefully despite its mediocrity we’ll see an update or a sequel which addresses some of the main concerns.

Pros:
Potential to be great, but let down by poor mechanics and controls.
The balancing of stamina and health is an interesting mechanic.

Cons:
Story is contrived and trite.
World is static and lifeless, and not in a cool, “end of world” fashion.
Poor climbing controls.
Linear path through all the levels.
Fights tend to play out the same way every time.
Technical issues.

69/100

Review, Video Games, Writing, XboxWorld

Mercury HG

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Mercury, also known as quicksilver, has fascinated humanity for centuries. It’s one of the few metals which occurs naturally in liquid form at “room temperature”, and the viscous silvery liquid has been used as a health tonic, barometer, thermometer and element for conducting electricity, as well as used in kids toys. Unfortunately the extreme toxicity of mercury has meant that it’s rarely seen outside science labs now, but thanks to the wonders of video games, we can still get to play with it.

Mercury HG takes the gameplay originally found on the PSP in Archer Maclean’s Mercury and on Wii as Mercury Meltdown and transposes it to the xbox. And it works very well. Presented in the form of the periodic table, Mercury HG sees you play with boards which you tilt with the left joystick of the controller to ooze the mercury from the start to the finish line.

The main objective is to finish each board within the time limit with 100% mercury remaining, collecting all the bonus items along the way.
At first, the game is very easy. The puzzles are simple, and the boards contain sides so the mercury can’t run off. However, the difficulty ramps up quickly, as the puzzle boards become more complex by removing the sides, placing gaps in the board, magnets which slow the mercury down, and having directional runners which can split your mercury and send it flying off the side. There are moving tiles, and on some of the later puzzles the board is all but visible, tiles fling into appear beneath the mercury as you move it about.

There are also colour switches, which change your blob into different colours. Some boards have squares which can activate other switches or tiles, whilst others have squares which are impassable if you’re the same colour, meaning that with the time limit, you need to carefully consider your path. Colours also have to be blended – like red and yellow to get orange. This requires you to split your mercury and control two blobs at once.

Each of these puzzle elements is introduced methodologically, ramping up in difficulty over each few boards, meaning there’s never a moment where you don’t know what to do. One thing I especially liked about Mercury HD was that although there was a par to match time and you need 100% of mercury to get a full score, unlocking new boards isn’t reliant on scores but on the number of pickups you gain each board. This means on the harder levels you can take your time and sacrifice your blob of mercury, but as long as you pick up every bonus you’ll keep unlocking more levels. The challenge comes from the dreaded leaderboards, which tempt you to try harder and get a better score after every turn you play.

The boards and background graphics pulse with the beat of the music, which is best described as “electronic”. You’ll find yourself almost moving in synch with the music as you play, an unconscious thing, but it adds a new dimensions to the play. You can even use your own music, which you’ll get an achievement for, which is an example of the kinds of achievements I enjoy the most because it encourages you to do something you wouldn’t normally do.

Conclusion
Mercury HG is probably the most fun I’ve had with a puzzle game in a while. Whilst it can be trying at times, it doesn’t treat you like an idiot and handhold you throughout the game, but introduces new elements thoughtfully every few levels, and it won’t punish your progression through the game you because you’re too cautious with your time or too careless at the edges.

Pros:
Fun, easy to learn but “hard to master” game play
Great graphics and clever use of music
Doesn’t punish players who like to take their time

Cons:
Some levels are very frustrating to complete
No Multiplayer

Score: 85