Star Citizen - Anvil Aerospace

Ah, such nice flashbacks to WC Prophecy and the space sims of the past, then a sudden sadness hits me; you KNOW they can do a glorious X-WING game on PC... but.... who knows? Anyway, Star Citizen looks awesome for a crowdfunded game! It's nice to know there are people who still love this genre... this and the Homeworld remake. :)

 

TMNT : Out of the Shadows

Turtle Power! This looks kinda interesting! Reminds me of the old 4-way TMNT arcade cabinet 2D sidescroller we used to play after school at this old arcade at USSC (along with Captain Commando and WRESTLEMANIAAAAAA!). I wanna play as Leonardo! Available on Steam too!

Black Desert - Korean MMO

Yes, I thought it was a CAKE shop or something, turns out it's an upcoming MMO that's hitting Korea in 2014 and North America the year later... but... DAAAYAAMMM!! Look at those character models... even better than the FF series!

Diablo 3 Expansion - Rap..Uh Reaper of Souls!

Wow, it's expected, but really? D3 kinda left a bad taste in my mouth; I really wanted to like it, but the unbalanced gameplay, lag issues, online only play and Auction House kinda sapped the fun out of what I liked about the series... it's kinda degenerated into Dungeon Hunter haha.... :p And to add injury to insult, it's coming out on consoles too, and that's where people realized all the weird design decisions they made was to accommodate the eventual releases to the console. Not to mention all the later changes they made to keep people playing....

 

I guess there'll be people playing this still though! Oh bitter me! >_<;

Homeworld has a home!

Woohoo! :) Gearbox got the rights to the Homeworld franchise :

http://kotaku.com/turns-out-gearbox-is-the-highest-bidder-on-homeworld-477262432

Someone please make a new X-wing game? Pretty please?

Monday monday!

So another week swings around again, yes, i will still say it; weekends come and go too fast!

 

Just completed Bioshock:Infinite yesterday, game's around 8-10 hours worth of gameplay, but that's cos i explored and did most of the sidequests. Probably shorter if you just blaze through it. However, the way the story goes, you'll need to pick up all of the audio logs and clues to get most out of the story, otherwise there'll be a LOT of question marks hanging around your noggin!

 

I think this game is like the "Inception" of the game world; not too many spoilers here, but i feel that any movie/game/book that uses time/parallel dimensions as a plot device are treading a very thin line. It's always hard to get the reader/player to accept your interpretation of the event, and with so many paradoxes introduced, it's easy to contradict a lot of events that happened. I mean, take a look at Star Trek, time travel and such has been overused to a point that it's a joke.

 

B:Infinite does sort of cover us most loose ends at the end, but also does bring into question why some things were done in certain ways. Well, the game was entertaining no doubt! I'd give it a 80/100, hopefully the DLC will shed more light on the game! Also, wish the game had a New Game+ mode where all the powerups carry over!

 

Back to TR! :p

Bioshock Infinite

Started playing Bioshock Infinite on PC; went ahead to get the premium edition since it was generally sold out most everywhere now, and it only costs a bit more than the regular edition. Can't bother about the ultimate "Songbird" edition cos it's just another statue to collect dust! :p

 

Anyway, the presentation for Infinite is beautiful, and the environs pretty awesome. Good that they actually took time to make it unique. Gameplay wise is pretty much standard FPS fare. If you've play bioshock before, then they've replaced plasmids with 'vigor', and the 'mana' to use the vigors are called 'salts'. So you'd pretty much feel right at home!

 

Music is nice; there's always ambient music or an old radio or phonograph playing music somewhere. I'm not too far into the game though, just met elizabeth, who's like an AI partner.... who luckily doesn't get in your way and need rescuing ( here's looking at YOU RE5! ).

 

Pretty much fun so far, though i find the aim of the enemy AI a weeeeee bit too accurate! Not sure what all the hoo-hah is about the violence in the game.. it gaves a stark contrast only because the surrounding is so pristine... if this was COD no one would even complain about the blood truthfully.

 

And yeah, the subtitle for the game should be :

 

BIOSHOCK Infinite - The white flying racists! ;)

Unreal Engine 4

Hmmm, i think we're past a time when fantastic graphics really begin to impress us; look at something considered high-end like the Frostbite 2 engine, at the end of the day, there's this 'flatness' to current gen graphics. Of course it looks great compared to like, 1-2 years ago. But i guess even the current state of CG is the norm, and isn't so much a selling point anymore.

 

http://kotaku.com/impressive-unreal-engine-4-graphics-demo-infiltrator-462820497

 

The UE4 powered demo looks cool, but i expect us to be playing games with cutscene class CG in maybe 1-2  years time... without the whole system slowing down of course. BF4's Frostbite 3 powered engine looks.... like more of the same actually... they reused a lot of BF3's bad guys models lazy buggers! And there's also the CryEngine3, (what i saw in Sniper 2 GW which supposedly uses the CE3 didn't impress).

 

If this type of graphical fidelity can come to the next gen consoles... woohoo! The PC is in for a fight!

Dead Space 2

Ok, i know this came out ages ago, but hey, not easy to find time when you have two kids! (excuses!) haha, anyway, just completed it, pretty much plays the same as the first one, although it's not as scary anymore. Story is ok, but pretty much standard fare. Think have to play the other games in between and see the anime to fill out all the gaps.

 

Unitology is much like Scientology eh? :p

BLOPS 2 RAGING!

Wahaha, kids! :p

http://kotaku.com/5991728/watch-top-level-call-of-duty-players-rage-hard

TGIF! :D

Woohoo! Wut? It's Friday already? :) Man, been a few days since i've bulogued. Been entertaining myself with Sniper Elite 2 - Nazi Zombies and Sniper Ghost Warrior 2..... of which i think sniping zombies are more fun! :p

Sniper GW 2 apparently uses the Crytek 3 Engine, but seriously, even at Ultra settings, the graphics somehow seem 'flat', maybe it's the models and textures that they use... some of the graphics scream cheapppp! Well, at least there's no black dude shouting "C**KSUCKER" every so often!

Hope to try Crysis 3 soon, gonna run out of HDD space soon man. :p

COD - Black OPS II

Just had the chance to finish Black OPS II Single Player Campaign, and must say, was seriously underwhelmed by it! Maybe it's because of the futuristic setting, maybe it's because they keep jumping back and forth between different eras. I think the story is pretty weak; there is a struggle to keep a certain coherency between all the missions, doesn't help that the speeches are over the top, and a certain Admiral likes to keep say "C**Ksuckers!" with an emphasis on "C**K"... i wonder what the script reading was like haha.

 

Because of the different eras the missions take place in, you don't have a good "feel" of the weapon before a next mission rolls about, plus the weapons feel pretty generic (with the exception of the modern era weapons having advanced targeting features with the scope up, heck, there's even a 'wallhack' sniper rifle!)

 

Some missions require you to sneak past the enemies at certain points, and it's kinda dumb when there's only one way to do it; it's trial and error many times over until you figure out the path the developers like... lazy programming and bad storytelling. There are a bunch of strikeforce missions which are thankfully optional, as the gameplay is closer to a real-time strategy type of game where you control a group of soldiers/drones to complete certain objectives.... there's a Keppel Harbor mission which gave me a few chuckles, cos 1) we're apparently all commies 2) we speak real terrible mandarin.

 

Characters in the game are pretty flat too; didn't really care much about the main character, and the main protagonist of the game pretty much got on my nerves by the end of the game; really, wtf is up with the cells they try to hold the bugger in?

 

The scene after the end credits kinda cements the whole fact that they were never were serious about the whole thing, and were probably getting it out just for the sake of it.

Overall, a mildly entertaining FPS... 6/10 from me!

Operation I.G.I

I dunno why, but some time ago, i was suddenly thinking of this First Person Shooter i played during my Secondary School days or so, i just couldn't remember the name of the game! All i could recall, is some parts where you ziplined down these powerlines to reach objectives...

.... then i saw a youtube video of FPS'es, and found out it was called Project IGI! Haha, i vaguely remember the game being kinda fun, but it's too long ago to recall any details about it!

Just Cause 3!

More Just Cause? Yes please! Do bring back Bolo Santosi too. :p

Homeworld!

Remember this game? Hard to imagine it was released in 1999, almost 13+ years ago. The sequel was in 2003, and that too was great (although the last boss was darned annoying).

This was the first 3D RTS to me, the graphics were great, and the fleet based actions were way ahead of it's time. I love seeing the little fighters come out of the cruisers, and it's amazing when your capital ships start firing against the enemy fighters.

It's like what the Star Wars RTS should have been if it focused on pure space warfare!

Let's hope someone picks up this license since THQ has ceased to function, and gives us Homeworld 3!

Too many Toys!

As we inch ever closer to the end of the year, the releases for toys and games are slowly starting to ramp up! Not been having much time to play on the console ( prob get worse when no. 2 comes!), so haven't been picking up any releases for the PS3 recently.

 

The 360 is almost stagnant to me; aside from a few exclusive titles, i hardly touch it these days. I wonder when consoles can truely match the processing power of a PC one day? I bought the Crysis bundle off Steam for cheap, and it's pretty much amazing how the graphics have improved over time. Crysis still looks pretty good for it's age, but when you see Crysis 2 on DX11 with Ultra settings.... boy oh boy... day and night man. :p Another one to see is the BF3 SP level "Going Hunting"... amazing.

 

Toys are getting too expensive these days... most of the 'nicer' stuff have become exclusives or limited and are AT LEAST $200 minimum these days.. Sigh, how i miss the days when i could go to Toy's R US and pick up an Aerialbot off the peg for $5...

 

Still, darn Hasbro/Takara is tugging at our Nostalgia by releasing MORE classic figures to whittle away what's left of my emancipated wallet. Know what i'd really like? A re-release of the headmasters... they'd probably do that knowing them!

 

This weekend is the NYCC and also the Plamo show in Japan... AND my brother's getting married too!

 

Time flies. ;)

 

Just Cause 2 - Multiplayer!

Why they don't make this official, i do not know. :P Guess it's always up to the community to make things more interesting!

Check it out here! : http://www.jc-mp.com/

Only other thing they need to do now for MP is make the characters customizable.. cos now, everyone is.... rico. :P

Armored Kill - BF3

Guess i'm kinda looking forward to this, since i technically 'own' it already cos of the premium account (Thanks $$EA$$). It's be nice to see all out vehicle warfare, but i wonder how they'll handle the heavy tanks and vehicles since :

- Tank round don't do shite against infantry
- Aerial vehicles RA*E all ground vehicles
- Infantry can't do shite against Air vehicles

If they can balance all that out, then i'm sure it'll be a blast!

Finally ready!

Man, this must have been the longest i've ever waited to build a new rig, took almost 2 months just waiting for stock? It's cos of the stoopid GTX670 card that delayed the whole thing!

Anyway, went to PCT to get most of my parts. No chassis and PSU tho, so that i bought from the F shop. :p Went SSD too, love the boot up time now. ;) Running six case fans but it's still quieter than my last PC! (Which sounded like a Harrier taking off). Hope this lasts around 2-3 years.

So far only have D3 and BF3 installed, but both are sweet. ;) D3 ain't really a gfx intensive game, but BF3 looks great in SP mode. :)

Diablo 3!

Just a couple of hours till we're able to play D3!.... Well, not me yet anyway. Was supposed to collect my preorder from a local shop, didn't expect HALF OF SINGAPORE to order from them too! The queue was crazy, it basically stretched TWICE across the whole floor... and no one knew where the queue started!

More rants! Wanted to build a new rig too, and tag it with a new Gfx card that was just released.. APPARENTLY Gfx cards are like, collectible items too, cos people buy multiples for god knows why.. plus the blardy retailers at SLS are like "oh sorry, i don't have that card anymore.. only for new system builds..." PUHLEASE....

Ok, feels good to rant! Which is what this blog is all about! :D