AlphaGaming Reviews

[Macca]

Hello all, welcome to AlphaGaming.

Milk, Biomanic and myself formed together to make this group and for your entertainment, fuse our gaming knowledge together to throw some fully sick game reviews at you. And when I say throw, I mean throw so hard if you aren't watching they might explode your head type throwing. Every week, Biomanic, Milk and myself will review one game and tell you what our take on the game is and whether it is worth looking into. Hope you enjoy!

Games Reviewed

Crysis.
Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
Medal of Honor: Heroes 2
CounterStrike Source
Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
Call of duty: one
Age of Mythology - The Titans Expansion
Lego Star Wars
Medal Of Honor: Airborne
Hidden And Dangerous
Grand Theft Auto4
Killing Floor

Requested Reviews

Note: Please DO NOT post here. Unless you wish to request a review. Everyone is entitled to there own opinion about the thread, but please, do it elsewhere or PM either Macca, Milk or myself. Thank you for you cooperation. -Biomanic

[Biomanic]

Crysis Review

Platform: Computer

Crysis was released early 2007, and is one of the only games around still to lag some peoples 'top o' the line' computers. Frame rate dips, faulty textures and common freezing is all you can expect of this game if your computer, isn't up to scratch.

Now you're probably thinking, "well, there must be a reason?" And there is. The game is pure Eye-Candy. Not many games released at the same time look this good. Brilliant scenery, destructible terrain and delicious models make for a very enjoyable experience. But of course, it all comes down to whether your GPU can handle it. Without the proper system and such, you may as well not waste your time and money.

But, lets say you can run it... What's to be expected?

-Generic Shooting?
-Confusing but in depth Story?
-Nice Visual Effects?
-Lots of Baddies to shoot?
-Something New and Exciting?
-Plenty of Gameplay styles?

Everything in that list, you can expect to get from Crysis.

-With Plenty of goodies to play with, Shooting does sometimes seem somewhat different from other shooters, but you will mostly end up fighting with Standard Assault Rifles, Like the G36c, Pistols and SMGs. It often will turn into a spam fest, not really changing depending on what gameplay style you choose. Each band of enemies you come across will no doubt be taken out with similar fashion to the one before. Shooting gets old, and it doesn't help, that enemies can soak up a hell of a lot of ammunition before dying, so, head shots are essential. Though there is only a handful of weapons, they're greatly customizable with red dot sights, laser pointers, scopes, silencers and more. It does make for a more tactical and enjoyable shootout. And they're all customizable in game, so there is no having to wait, to get a new load-out. In Short, Shooting is generic, but fun, and slightly hard.

-The story in Crysis is often either confusing, boring, or just plain weird. The United States hear that some Archeologists have found a very important Discovery in the way of science and technology. Unfortunately, it's directly in the Middle of North Korea, which is Unfortunately at war with The United States. After a while, transitions from the Group of Archeologists stop coming in, and The United States gets worried. So, they send in you and your team of Soldiers to find the group. After being sidetracked continuously, you find there is more then one enemy on the Small island in North Korea, and it isn't Human.

-Crysis did and still does set a benchmark for Gaming Visuals. It's a very pretty game. It became famous for this, and really only this. It's one of those games, than when it was released people bought it just to wait several years to play it. Bright colours, clean anti-aliasing, mighty fine character models but unfortunatly, sometimes a frame rate that shits all over the game. But, otherwise, you will feel quite at home, in the realistic brush, and clean and landscape.

-When it comes to baddies, Crysis doesn't disapoint. There is plenty of stuff to shoot, whether it be, humans, pigs, chickens, oddly sized crabs, Trees? and somethings from another planet. Though, when it does come to shooting, it's often Generic, as said above. And enemies do take a hell o' lot of bullets to kill sometimes. So, it all comes down to whether you can be bothered fighting or if you just want to sneak past.

-Now, there is plenty in Crysis not seen a lot before in games. Not just the pretty Graphics. But the addition of the Maximum suit changes how you would normally think you'd play a shooter. The suit is essentially a Mega armor suit, with Perks, created for special units in the American Army. It's very cool, and you will grow accustomed to using it quickly.

The game will greatly encourage you to use the suit for everything. Whether that be giving you an objective to do something stealthily, so you turn invisible and move slowly, or get you to attack an armed convoy, so you put on extra Armor and go in guns blazing. Very soon, it becomes a little tedious having to follow what the game makes you do, and you want to just do it the way you want, but, it's okay. For, you will get these opportunity's often, just not as much as we may've hoped.

-With the Maximum armor suit, there is plenty of different ways to tackle the game. Whether it be stealthy or speedy, guns blazing, Or just add a scope and put on Maximum strength to reduce recoil and snipe some bastards. The games quite lenient with the way you can play, and it's quite welcome.

Multiplayer in Crysis feels like the people who created it, where more into single player then otherwise, as the multi lacks what the single achieves. There is few game types, less maps, and annoying health amounts. Enemies don't die when they should, and you will often die, when you continuously shoot someone, and they spin around with a better gun, and kill you before they die. Multiplayer also turns into a spam fest when players all turn on maximum armor and run around with Bazookas.

All up, Crysis is a game that will disappoint if you can't run it full ball. But, if you can, it's defiantly worth your time.

Story: 7.5
Gameplay: 8.9
Design: 8.8

Overall: 9.1

[Macca]

"Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King" Review.

Developer: EA Games 2006
Platform(s): Playstation 2 (reviewed), PC and Original X-Box.
Genre: Adventure

In the world of PS2 gaming, cheap run-outs of movies are everywhere, from Spiderman to The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe. As these games get more and more unpopular, the more these uncreative steryeo-types begin to litter the game-shop shelves. But LotR is a different story. Lets be honest here, most of us just watched the LotR movies because we were promised awesome sword-play fighting scenes. And what, may I ask fellow gamers, would be the key ingredient in a good Adventure game? Appart from gratuitous amounts of enemys that come from all sides of the screen during gameplay, and belive me, LotR delivers in that department, we want pleanty of good sword-play combos, both simple and difficult, that we can perform to totaly own some orc somewhere and hurl the controller the the other side of the room shouting "OWNED BETCH!!" So yes, the game-play is a little harsh on ol' Mr. Tea-and-Bisciuts, if you know what I mean. All your favorites are there, Aragon, Legolas, Gimli, Gandalf, Faramir Merry, Pippin, Sam and Frodo, with every character having there own combos and differentciating "Special Abilities".

The story-line is different to the movies story-line, although only minor changes have been made, as in, changes like where you might battle at different places that you didn't see too much of in the movie. But no major changes were made to it, like Sauron getting on a horse and becoming the Lone Ranger or something.

The design is the only thing not really up to scratch, the back-drops often flicker and are a little sketchy anyway, and the playing ground is quite obviously a template used over and over again with no real change. On the other hand, the attention-to-detail of the actual characters is different. Everything can be seen from Legolas' flowing hair to Aragon's roughly-cut shave. But the most detail that was put on would be the enemys, there arn't a great deal of different types of enemys in the game, only really the orcs, the UruKia and then occasional other enemys that only appear in some levels like Wraiths, Trolls and shit-big UruKia wielding dual-swords.

The punchline is: LotR: The Return of the King is a great game for pleanty of adventure carnage and a must-have for all Lord of the Rings fans.

Story: 7.9
Gameplay: 8.3
Design: 7.8

Overall: 8.2

[Milk]

Medal of Honor: Heroes 2 review

Platform: PSP
Genre: FPS (First Person Shooter)

On the cover of this game it says: 'WWII is in your hands.' That is, if you think WWII was made up of you fighting three people at a time.
I bought this game expecting a lot of shooting, lots of enemies and intense battles. I was wrong. It's just you and sometimes two allies following you who shoot once every 5 minutes, and not many enemies.
The gameplay is very bad because when you shoot and move around your gun it feels more like a 'point and click game' more than a FPS. You can only do a campaign and multilayer. So if you ever want to just muck around you have to go strait to the boring campaign, with little choice on what you want to do, or find someone else with a PSP, the same game and do multilayer, which would only be good with 8 players.
The graphics a horrible, the guns don't look very realist, the locations are badly done and the people all look the same.
The story is tiny. It is just a little video clip at the start, with a very boring story line that I bet most people have just skipped. Then in game you have to complete the tasks that they gave you which are short and not interesting.

Over all this is the shitest Medal Of Honor game you could ever buy. So don't waist you time getting it.

Story: 3.1
Design: 4.6
Gameplay: 3.2

Overall: 3.9

[Biomanic]

CounterStrike source Review

Publisher: Valve
Platform: Computer
Genre: First Person Shooter

The CounterStrike franchise has dominated PWNT most other PC online games. It's defiantly gotten it's worth from the source engine, and paid off big for Valve. It's intense action gameplay and solid visuals, give for a good experience, at first.

There is many minor problems with CounterStrike Source, that've carried over from previous games without fix. Most can be over looked, but some do make the game more faggy then you might hope.

Main problems include:

-Repetitive gameplay
-Online dick-fags (As I like to call them)
-Lack of Iron Sights.
-Etc.

-Gameplay in CounterStrike Source is the same as previous games, as it is in fact just a remake of the Original game, CounterStike, but with Nicer graphics and new maps. But, you'd think somewhere in there they might've thought "I know, lets make some more Game types, instead of the two we've got already."
But no, Players are left with the game types:

*Rescue the Hostages: Where players on the Counter Terrorists team are required to rescue the Hostages held by the other Team, the Terrorists. All four Hostages must be brought back to the Counter Terrorists spawn point, which is normally on the other side of the Map, where you are prone to sniper fire, making the escape back to base, both difficult, and boring.

*And Plant the Bomb: This is where one player on the Terrorist Team is given a bomb to plant in either two plant sites in a map. If the player doesn't want to complete this task they can drop the bomb, allowing another player to pick it up. Also, if the bomb carrier dies, then another player must pick it up to plant it. Obviously, it's the other teams (Counter Terrorists) job to defuse when the Terrorists plant.

Both game types usually turn into Team Deathmatch as players get bored of doing the objectives, and why wouldn't they? They're incredibly repetitive.

There is modifacations to the game that allow you to create and join Zombie games, and normal Deathmatch games, but they're either filled with N00bs, or are to laggy, due to most being created in America.


-Online dick-fags. It sounds just as it is. Players that come online for the soul purpose, of being dicks. This 'disease' shows in various ways:

*Chatters - People who mustn't have MSN, Facebook, telephones, emails or anything like that, so they come onto CounterStrike, to chat. They don't even play. They just chat to there mates. It's more annoying then it sounds. Essentially, when you see a big game, at your favorite map, with low latency. But it's filled with Spectating chatters.

*Hackers - Unfortunately, CounterStrike, not being the newest game, isn't that well protected from hacking. It's not really protected by things such as Punkbuster, but instead by VAC, which is like Punkbusters gay cousin. It doesn't work, meaning 'Haxorz' fill games, pissing over everyone. They shoot through walls, fly, take no damage, have infinate ammo and will kick your arse 'til the cows come home. It's not fun.

*Faggy players - Normally people who dedicate themselves to games aren't that annoying. But when you don't know the person, and they're pwnting you at a game, it's kinda annoying. They run around with their Mics going "LOLOLOL I PWNT YOU, PEW PEW, I AM SO GR8 WOWOWOWOW PEW PEW." It's a pain in the arse to listen to. And even if you do mute them, they still use the chat box, so there is no escaping it.

Mic Spammers - Normally this would fit under chatters, but these people often play. They just never shut up. They talk 24/7, Commentating on matches. "Oh, he just got killed by .... who just killed another, who in now on a streeeeeeeeeak." It's annoying.

Lastly: The Porns... - There is a tag option in CounterStrike, where you can spray paint a sort of avatar onto a wall or floor of your choice. You can make the picture whatever you want. There is a certain group that make there pictures sexually explicate ones, which is annoying when you're playing, and your mum or dad walks in. Not fun.


-It's something often taken for Granted in a lot of games. Sights on guns. The ability to make a shot more accurate by looking down the sights. In CounterStrike, this ability is lost, unless you hold a scoped weapon. Instead, your cross hair will become more accurate if you stop moving and crouch. There is a certain amount of realism to it, but it just gets annoying, especially if you are used to games such as COD4 where not using the Iron sights, will get you only one thing, killed.


But, If you can ignore those things, and a couple more, then you will be able to enjoy the rest the game has to offer. Like:

-Solid Gameplay
-Plenty of Maps
-Plenty of weapons and iteams
-Etc.

Gameplay:

Gameplay in CounterStike is Standard. It's solid, clean frame rate with no dips, unless you are using an outdated machine.

At the start of each match, which go for a chosen amount of time, or until every player on the opposing team is dead or you complete the objective of the match, you are able to purchase weapons from a large list. They include around 15 Assault Rifles, 10 Snipers, 10 Pistols, 12 SmGs and I heavy Machinegun. But there is also buy able grenades and other items including Body armor and devises to help you defuse bombs faster. It's relatively generic, but there is enough there to never really become boring. Different weapons cost different amounts depending on stats. You gain money buy, planting and defusing bombs, rescuing or defending hostages, killing enemies, surviving a round, and pulling off sprees. But getting money is often not necessary as most server starts punce out and start everyone off with around 100,000,000 dollars. But, that's not too bad.

But now to the actual gameplay, you will spend most of your time when playing, hiding, or seeking. As most matches come down to two player remaining, one often hiding, the other seeking. This is either awesome, if you're playing, or shit boring if you're not. But when you're not playing like this, you'll probably be running around aimlessly with your team mates deciding which bomb site to go to, or whether to rescue the hostages or not. You'll often end up doing the same thing over and over again. Making gameplay often repetitive.


Story:

There is no Story Line or campaign in CounterStrike Source. It's completely a multiplayer based game, the closest thing you'll find to campaign is the offline skirmishes you can do with Bots. They're often more enjoyable then online, 'cause you can tune the game how you want, and you can actually do well at the game, which is often vital to some peoples enjoyment.


Design:

I've pretty much covered the design already, two game types, strict modern combat weapons and gameplay and fun offline Skirmish. There isn't a hole lot more to say, it's not that big.


In conclusion, CounterStrike source is a pretty game, with annoying flaws that could ruin the experience for you. But if you can over look them, and see the good things the game has to offer, then it's not a bad way to spend some cash, and time.

[Milk]

The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion

Platform: PC, PS3 and Xbox 360
Genre: Fantasy, RPG (Role Playing Game).

In The Elder Scroll IV: Oblivion the goal was to make a game with unlimited possibilities. A game where you could be whoever you wanted to and do whatever you wanted.
And I have to say, sometimes not saving the day is a lot of fun. You can be anyone from a noble warrior to a sinister assassin.
Once your out of the tutorial you can do anything, like finding the highest building in sight and shooting arrows at innocent bystanders or playing your way through over 600 quests!

A good thing about the story is you and chose your own path.
There are guilds you can join like the Thieves guild, Fighters guild, Mage guild, Assassin guild and the combat arena. Which all have the own story lines with lots of quests and interesting plots.

Then there is the main quest where you have to save all Tamriel from all the demons coming out of Oblivion and find the lost heir to the throne.

A lot of the time I just liked to run around from city to city causing mayhem, breaking into people's shops and stealing there stuff, stealing horses, stabbing people I don't know and when I have a massive bounty on my head, breaking out of jail when I get caught.

The game play is quite good, you can change from first person to third person when ever you want. The combat is a lot of fun and very well done.
You don't have to do just fighting though there are lots of skills to do in the game: Blade, Blunt, Athletics, Hand to Hand, Block, Armorer, Heavy Armour, Destruction Magic, Alteration Magic, Illusion Magic, Conjuration Magic, Mysticism Magic, Restoration, Alchemy, Lock picking, Sneak, Acrobatics, Light Armour, Marksman, Mercantile and Speech craft.
So there is heaps of things to do.

There are lots of races to be:

Imperial:
Natives of Cyrodiil, they have proved to be shrewd diplomats and traders. They are skilled with heavy armour and in social skills.

Breton:
The Breton are very good with magic and have a boosted resistance to it. They are particularly skilled at summoning and healing magic.

Redguard:
The most naturally talented warriors in Tamriel. They are very good and all the fighting skills and and have a resistance to disease and poison.

Nord:
Citizens of Skyrim, they and tall and fair-haired people. Strong and hardy, Nords are famous for there resistance to the cold. They are also highly talented warriors.

Wood Elf:
Also know as 'Bosmer' The clanfolk of the Western Valenwood forests, the Wood Elves are nimble and quick, making them good scouts and thieves. And they are the best archers in all Tamriel. Their ability to command simple creatures is well known.

High Elf:
Also know as 'Altmer' in their homeland of summerset Isle, tyhe High Elves are most strongly gifted in the arcane arts if all the races. However, they are vulnerable to fire, frost and shock.

Dark Elf:
Also known as 'Dunmer' in their homeland of Morrowwind, the Dark Elves are noted for their skilled and balance integration of the sword, the bow and destruction magic. They are resistant to fire and can summon an ancestral ghost for aid.

Orc:
The Orcs of the Wrothgarian and Dragontail mountains, Orcish armourers are prized for their craftsmanship. Orc troops in heavy armour are among the finest in the Empire, and are fearsome when using there berserker rage.

Argonian:
The Argonian's are part reptile, part human. They are well suited for the treacherous swamps of their homlands, they have developed natural immunity's to disease and poisons. They can breath under water and are good at picking locks.

Khajiit:
From the province of Elsweyr, the Khajiit are part human, part Tiger. They are intelligent, quick and agile. They make excellent thieves due to their natural ability and unmatched acrobatic skill. Thr Khajiit can see very well in the dark.

You can be any of these races in the game. My favorite is the Wood Elf and the Redguard.

The graphics in this game are quite good and the citys and towns in the game are done very well and so are all the caves and forests.

Over all I think this is a very good game and everyone should have it.

Story: 8.5
Gameplay: 8.9
Design: 8.1

Overall: 9.0

[Biomanic]

Call of Duty

Publisher: Infinity Ward
Platforms: PS2, Original x-box and PC (reviewed).
Genre: WW2 Shooter

When you think of World War 2 Games, the first things that come into your mind are probably The Call of Duty Series, and the Medal Of Honor Series. Both have gotten massive reputations of being two of the best WW2 series since whenever. Both have a long lines of intense, large sized World War 2 Combat. Both were awesome, but one of the two, was always one step ahead of the other, and that was the Call of Duty series. But where did the series begin? Naturally, the answer would be Call of Duty 1. And luckily, it's the right answer.

This review will be split into two segments, and rated equally. Both scores will be added together to make an average at the end. The two segments will be Single and Multiplayer.



Single Player:

Story:

When you buy a World War 2 game, you've a pretty good Idea on the get go of what you're going to be doing for the majority of the time, and that's shooting Germans, playing as any of the allied nations in a hope of ending Nazi Tierney. And, without disappointment, Call of Duty 1 delivers with an onslaught of rifle wielding Germans.

When it comes to story in COD1, there isn't really one. It's more or less just mission briefing, then mission gameplay, then mission completion. Then the process repeats. It losses some of the depth it could of achieved by adding a well done story, but the point of the game wasn't meant to rush you with story, it's to give you an experience of world war 2, that you'll remember, and hopefully respect.

In the campaign you play from more then one persons perspective. You get to play through the scope of American, English and Russian troops. Though, because none of them speak, they're all more or less the same, they just where different clothes, and have different Names / Nicknames. It does add a bit to the gameplay, as you fight for different countries, as they don't all tackle a task the same way, but it gets lost in the lack of an actual story line. Besides the obvious WW2 theme.


Design:

Now, this game isn't exactly new, so it must be reviewed as such, so, I am seeing this game as it would've been when it came out.

Level design throughout the game changes dramatically. From snowy fields, to mountains swarmed with enemy troops. Each place feels real and look the same. Which is odd for games of that time.

This game is painfully linear, with only a straight path to your objective most of the time, it leads to boredom. When you do try to break from your squad and adventure off, you will either run into blocks in the road, that a baby could easily jump over, Mine fields, invisible walls or my favorite, you just die, because you disobeyed an order. It turns into nothing more then a, 'go here, shoot them, blow this up and get out with your arse in one piece' kind of a situation. Which is good, never.

Weapon design is well done. Each army having different arms, allowing you to make some favorites throughout. You'll start a love affair or rekindle it with the M1 Garand, the American semi Auto Rifle, which will dominate anything in your path. The bad thing is, most weapons firing mechanics are the same, just with different models, and slightly changed stats. It won't change the game for you, it may annoy you if you pick it up, and are fussy about it.

When you play Call of Duty, there is one main thing you will notice. The difficulty. On the harder modes, you'll be lucky to make it very far. As you raise the difficulty, your not making your enemies smarter, which it should, instead they take more damage, you take less, ammo is scarce, bots will kill you the second they see you and your weapons get less effective. For a game with annoyingly high amount of things you can get stuck on, standing still, becomes fatal. And, you'll die constantly from not being able to move, when you get caught on a random piece of oddly placed map.


Gameplay:

Playing Call of duty is a good time. It handles well, plenty of dudes to fill with lead, and plenty to blow up. Speaking of which, as you play through the campaign, basically all you will be doing, is planting more c4 charges then I'd care to count. It's cool the first couple of times, but it gets tedious after a while.

Gameplay is broken up into two parts, when you're shooting, and when you're not. This is all it it. You go here, shoot that, go here, it's quiet, then there is shooting, then there isn't, then there is, blow this up, get out of there. It's fun. It will certainly quench your need for mindlessly killing pathetically stupid enemies.

Ocasionally, tanks are involved, and you're required to take it out. It gives you a much needed break from mindlessly shooting, but once it's done, you'll be back to shooting soon enough.

Some of the best parts of the game come when you're in the passengers seat of a moving vehicle when your team is driving, and you're shooting. With millions of German cars and lorries to come after you, it's a blast to watch them get blown to bits, as you get revenge, for the 50 or so million times they kill you with cheap deaths. It's awesome.



Summed up, Call of Duty campaign mode is awesome fun. Shooting is good, missions are fun, and enemies are plentiful. So, what's not to enjoy?


Single Player Score:

Story: 7.1
Gameplay: 9.2
Design: 8.7

Overall: 8.9



Multiplayer:

The Call of Duty games built there name on there Multiplayer more then anything else. Play as any of the teams depending on the map, and prepare for mayhem un-matched by nothing of that time.


Design:

There are many game types in Call of Duty. Standard Deathmatch, team deathmatch and capture the flag. All can by customized to your liking when creating a server. This means you can make a server, just the way you like it.

The levels in mulitplayer are all simple. Remakes of Single player maps made smaller and more less restricting in the ways of lineararitory (No, that's not a word). Most are unique and most game types can be played on most maps. There is a lot more fun to be had here, then in Single player.

You can play as any of the teams in single player, depending on what map. You will take to the fight as either: The Germans, The Americans, The Russians and The English. All have the same classes, just with different firearms, though most do the same damage and have the same accuracy as there brothers in the other teams.


Gameplay:

When you're running through a bombed out town with your mates, taking out enemies and working together to complete a mission objective, It's great. Nothing will give you the same thrill as this.

You will have a lot of fun playing Call of Duty Multiplayer.


Muliplayer score:

Design: 9.2
Gameplay: 9.4

Overall: 9.3


Call of Duty is a game for anyone who enjoys a good shooter, and doesn't mind the lacking campaign. You will shoot Germans, blow stuff up, get blown up and hopefully, make it out with your arse in one piece.


OVERALL GAME SCORE:

Story: 7.1
Gameplay: 9.4
Design: 9.5

OVERALL: 9.5

[Macca]

Ok, I missed my review last week so this week I will be reviewing two games, 'Age of Mythology - The Titans Expansion Set' for PC, and 'Lego Star Wars' for PlayStation 2.

Age of Mythology - The Titans Expansion Set

Publisher: Microsoft Gaming
Developer: Ensemble Studios
Platform(s): PC
Genre: Real-Time Stratergy
Release date: 2005
Awards: 2005 Real-Time Stratergy Game of the Year.

A powerful RTS game needs to have a few things; a fast game engine, perfectly set AI for CPUs and a good hearty range of races, units and buildings.

A good hearty set of races, units and buildings is a big deal for a few reasons. It is absolutly essential, stratergy is such a big part of playing Real-Time Stratergy games (go figure) its not even funny anymore, to develope multiple stratergies you need to be able to learn how to play defensive or offfensive with different sets. Sets in races, sets in units and sets in buildings. Very important. Here, AoM definatly delivers.

Well set AI for CPUs is absolutly essential when playing an RTS, you need to have the skill of being able to win even when your opponents dish out all different kinds of stratergies and material, this I think makes a good RTS, if you have a CPU with only one AI strand, shit is going to get really annoying, really fast. Here Aom delivers, big time.


And finally a fast game engine is needed for a few more reasons, for example, a good RTS sets always sets the pace at fast, if you can't develope quickly when you play an RTS, you're gonna get wailed on by your oponents, so if you're moving quicker than the game engine can it can get really annoying, I'm talking from experiance here. And here is where AoM hits a problem area, if your using tech that is even close to the release date of this game, chances are the game is going to have a few problems with frame rate.

Story (Age of Mythology):

Join Arkantos, Atlantis' most fearless Admiral and his companions Ajax, Amanra and Chiron as they travel, first around Greece, then Egypt and then Norway, solving problems and puzzles to stop the plans of the nefarious Gargarensis, a giant, trident wielding cyclopes that plans to open one of the gates to the underworld to release a mighty Titan from within, in exchange, Gargarensis hopes that the Titan, Kronos, will grant him immortality. Gargarensis must be stopped, are you the one to stop him?

The story in AoM is full of windy roads and plot twists, all good, as long as theres pleanty of bloodshed later. I really enjoyed playing the story of AoM and it seems the developers couldn't have made it better linking about the different styles of Mythology, Greek, Egyptian and Norse.

Story (Titans Expansion): Ten years after Gargerensis was killed, Atlantis lay in ruin, and only a small part of the Atlantian population is still alive. Kastor, Arkantos' son, now must lead the Atlantians to a new Empire and reconstruct the old Atlantis to its former glory. But with this he needs the help of the gods, but finding that the Greek gods reject him, he finds salvation for his people in new gods.. Called the Titans. After binding himself with the Titans, Kastor accidentily lets one out, after realizing what he has done, he joins together with Ajax and Amanra to help put the Titans back where they belong, the underworld, Tartarus.

Although only a third the size of the Age of Mythology storyline, the story delivers well with other trills and thrills (hehe, thought of that one myself) to make the story truely exciting.

Gameplay:

Now, the gameplay in AoM was obviously not the main focus when creating the game, the developers obviously worked harder on the storylines and design, that being said, although the game would be greatly improved if the gameplay was the greatest focus, the gameplay is still a well performed piece of art. It has all the good things an RTS needs, bad guys, both hard and harder (the game difficulty setting seriously being: "Normal, Moderate, Hard, Harder, Titan", even though the names should really be: "Normal, Quite Hard, Really Hard, Holy Shit that's hard, HOLY CRAP!! DO YOU WANT TO DIE OR SOMETHING?!"). And AIs that will keep you up at night. The multiplayer in AoM is pure class, it is defiantly my favorite part of the game, although a ranking system is missing, alowing you to get absolutly owned by some AoM freak-machine over in Norway or something. In The Titans mutiplayer though I'm not so sure, I have been able to play The Titans multiplayer once without it totaly owning my computer, and that time it is fully based around summoning a titan, if you don't have one, your pretty much fucked. When your opponets come a'knocking at your door with one and even a minor army. All-in-all gameplay for AoM is just good clean fun.

Design:

The design I think for Age of Mythology - The Titans was probably the most focused on part of the game, and well done to them, if you've got the tech to support the high quality game, I really suggest you do. Its got incredible attention-to-detail when it comes to the units, buildings, landscape, in fact I'd say the cosmetics in general for the game are really top-notch. BUT if you don't have the tech to support the game, it is going to shit, and it is going to shit it the worst place you can imagine when playing an RTS, your frame rate. Seriously, I tried playing AoM on my old computer, it was jumpier than a line for the "Getting Rid of your Crystal Meth Addiction" book signings. But I mean really, tech good = good cosmetics, tech bad = bad cosmetics, stuff you've all heard before right? Enough said I think.

Age of Mythology - The Titans is an absolute thumbs-up from me, a must-have for all RTS lovers, a better 'RTS Game of the Year' Award was never more earnt.

Story: 7.8
Gameplay: 7.6
Design: 8.2

OVERALL: 7.9

Lego Star Wars

Publisher: Edios
Developer: Traveler's Tales
Platform(s): PlayStation 2 (reviewed), PC
Genre: Platform
Release date: 2006
Awards: none

The idea of retelling the story of Star Wars using Lego building blocks sounds like the premise for a clever fan-made short film, something that would end up being passed around by e-mail and message boards. But Eidos and Traveller's Tales have taken the idea and run with it, creating a game that, while designed with kids in mind, has such a surplus of charm that even the "kid-at-heart" adults will be able to join in on the fun.

Each episode is broken up into multiple chapters, each re-creating memorable sequences from the films. The game is largely an action adventure game, though it subverts its fair share of genre convention. You'll only have control over a single character at a time, but you'll usually have at least one computer-controlled companion with you, and at times that number can grow to a healthy half-dozen. Making this even more interesting is the fact that you can switch between any characters in your party on the fly. The game really capitalizes on this by giving different characters different abilities. Jedi characters come equipped with lightsabers and the ability to "Force move" various objects; Astromech droids (the R2D2 trash-can-style droids) can hover for short distances and can also be used to unlock certain doors; and characters like Padme Amidala are armed solely with a blaster and don't have the Jedi double-jump, but they can use grappling hooks to pull their way up to otherwise unreachable areas. There are literally dozens of different playable characters, many of which have completely unique abilities.

The game capitalizes on these unique characteristics by riddling every level with a ton of puzzles that can only be solved by a specific character in your party or by several characters working together. It's not all puzzle-solving, though. There are several big boss fights with the likes of Darth Maul, Jango Fett, and Count Dooku in Lego Star Wars. There's plenty of straight-up combat, too, with the high point being the massive Jedi arena battle on Geonosis. Like the puzzles, the combat is pretty simple and straightforward. The game isn't afraid to break away from the third-person action adventure altogether, such as in the pod race from Episode I, or a sequence where you pilot an attack ship on Geonosis at the start of the Clone War (personally my favorite level).

The game is extremely forgiving in general, dealing out virtually no punishment for failure. There is basically no way that you can "lose" Lego Star Wars. Also, the single-player game isn't particularly long--if you keep your eye on the prize, you can run through all three episodes in just a few hours. But as you play, you'll gain access to other characters with which you can go back into levels you've already completed. Since different characters can have different abilities, you'll find that there are areas in each level that you simply could not reach with the original characters. So, despite the game's relative brevity, it definitely encourages multiple plays. The game also has two-player co-op support, where a second player can jump in (or, alternately, drop out) at any point. The game actually feels like it was designed for co-op play, and the experience definitely benefits from having another warm body around.

The actual gameplay is generally enjoyable, if a bit easy. But what really gives Lego Star Wars its appeal is the way it's all presented--that is, with Lego. The game fudges a little bit on some of the actual level geometry, but the majority of it appears as though it was constructed out of those little Danish building blocks. All of the characters, even the various aliens, look like Lego people, and when an enemy or an object is destroyed, it will crumble into its component pieces. There are a few set pieces where the game looks downright impressive, but for the most part it keeps things on a relatively small scale. It generally isn't overzealous with lighting and particle effects, so the game therefore has a somewhat plain, but clean look. The differences between the PC and PlayStation 2 versions are purely aesthetic and relatively minor. The PC version simply looks a lot nicer, thanks to bump-mapping and some reflection effects. The PC version also benefits from running at a higher resolution.

Despite the game's unusual look, if you were to close your eyes, there would be no mistaking this as a Star Wars game. The sound plays as big a part in establishing the tone in Lego Star Wars as the graphics. With no voice acting to muddle up the affairs, blaster and lightsaber effects are allowed to really take the stage, accompanied nicely by all of the classic John Williams music that has become inexorably linked to Star Wars.

This is probably one of the better kids' games to hit the market in a while, and that it's clever and charming enough to appeal to adults is a testament to that fact. The novelty of watching a little Lego person version of Obi-Wan Kenobi duel it out with Darth Maul certainly accounts for a large portion of the game's appeal, but on its own merits it's a fairly fun, inventive little game.

Story: 10.0 (ITS STAR WARS)
Gameplay: 7.0
Design: 7.7

OVERALL: 8.2

[Biomanic]

Medal of Honor: Airborne Review

Series: Medal Of Honor
Genre: WW2 First Person Shooter.
Publisher: EA
Platform: PC (Reviewed) X-box360 and Playstation3.


Game store shelves are littered with hundreds of world war 2 titles, many fantastic, many more abysmal. With all due respect to those who fought and died, the genre is wearing thin. And for a ww2 game, let alone an ww2 FPS to make it on the market, it has to be something special. Does Medal of Honors latest title 'Airborne' take a crash landing into failure, or is it time to gear up for one last push.


Story:

In Medal of Honor: Airborne, you follow the footsteps of PFC Boyd Travis of the 121st Airborne division. After a quick tutorial on how to safely jump out'f your plane you're off to Italy for your first taste of combat. You shoot some Germans and complete objectives in a non-linear order (NON-LINEAR ORDER!!!!!!1!!!one!!!). It's not a regular thing. Normally objectives are given to you in scripted an linear sequence. Which is a bitch for replay value. So, when replaying the campaign you can mix it up, to make it feel like you're not quite doing the same thing.

With only six missions in the campaign, and with each only taking around an hour or less to complete, it's relatively short. But the fun shooting mechanics and non-linear gameplay make for plenty of replay value. There is also a bunch of medals which can be be awarded by playing through campaign doing certain things as you go. Like not dying at all in a level on a certain difficulty, or get a double kill with a sniper rifle. It's a lot like getting achievements on an X-box or playstation. In the long run, they unlock you interesting movies by the creators of the game, telling you about how they made it. It's not the most spectacular prize you could win, but it's worth getting the medals just for bragging rights, with the videos being an added bonus.

Eventually the campaign takes to you the end of the war, as you destroy the Nazi forces blah blah blah, just like every ww2 game out there. In all, the campaign is worth while, with good replay value and fun gameplay, it's the best part of the game.


Gameplay:

After you complete the tutorial, you'll be given 6 missions that you have to complete. Each one starting with you sitting in an Airplane awaiting to jump into the action. As you jump, you have a while to survey the territory before landing to fight. What you're jumping into is an open world, there is no limits beyond the far sides of the map. You can wander the roofs to flank your enemy, you can go indoors, you can blah blah blah, it's up to you. And with the Non-linear objectives, you can complete them as you wish, with an entire map at your disposal.

But, apart from the air jump at the start of the mission, you'll be shooting or blowing something up. Which is cool, as both of those things work very well in the game.


Design:

Mission design in campaign is more or less, go here, blow this up, kill this guy and live through it. Sure it gets tedious after a while, but the more you do do it, you notice the minor things about what you're doing, including using advanced tactics flanking, careful shots and expert grenade usage, they are all required to win. You're days of spamming are over, in MoHA you will, get this, actually have to aim your weapon. This makes the game hard, but fun.

Weapon design is outstanding, with all weapons in the game looking and sounding fantastic. Each weapon with the single exclusion of the C4 explosives can be upgraded. The more you use a certain weapon, the more it'll upgrade. Each weapon can be upgraded three times. Upgrades for each weapon are unique to that one weapon. Each weapon is different, and you'll easily make some firm favorites among the 15 or so.

AI in the game seems somewhat lacking. They seem to always be standing in a place that screams, FLANK ME! It makes the game easy, but at least it feels like at least you're the one making it easy. If an enemy gets close, they will hit you with their gun, most of the time instantly killing you. Which is weird, because throughout the game, you will find yourself jumping off 4 story building and standing on top of grenades as they explode, and not losing a bar of health. It makes for a lulzy time, and it teaches you to shoot the enemy quick.

Multiplayer is not the high point of the game, with there being almost no one online, and if you do find a server, it's often laggy. Which is a shame, because some of the mechanics in multi seem cool.
At the start of each game, the Americans starting in planes dropping from the sky, as the Germans prepare defenses. It would make for a good time, if someone else was playing.


Medal of Honor is the best that the MOH series has to offer. It's well worth your time.

Story: 8.9
Gameplay: 9.2
Design: 8.8

Overall: 8.9

[Macca]

Hidden and Dangerous Deluxe

Publisher: Illusion Softworks
Developer: Illusion Softworks
Platform(s): PC
Genre: Tab-Based FPS
Release date: 2008
Awards: None

Hidden & Dangerous represents the new breed of realistic squad-based action games, which demand shooter-style reflexes only in short controlled bursts and only during those dangerous moments when the enemy is actually in sight. Otherwise, high tension and anticipation dominate gameplay, as you carefully edge your way through enemy territorry, hoping you aren't detected. In Hidden & Dangerous in particular, you'll edge your way through all kinds of German-occupied territory during World War II, commanding up to four soldiers to get in, clear up, and get out of situations that would be completely overwhelming if not for the element of surprise on your side. The game looks good and feels convincing, and although it's unstable and flawed and otherwise every bit as difficult as you would expect, Hidden & Dangerous is nonetheless an impressive and uniquely seriosu depiction of squad-level combat behind enemy lines.

They couldn't have thought too hard in naming the Insanity graphics engine that powers Hidden & Dangerous, but the developers at Illusion Softworks must have put a lot of time into making it look good. Almost all the nearly two dozen missions in the game are completely differnt and take place during all kinds of weather conditions during all hours of the day and even on different terrain, from midair to the high seas. You can play from either a third- or first-person perspective, with the former being better suited to maneuvering, while the latter is ideal for targeting, and the game looks good either way. There's a lot of visual variety in Hidden & Dangerous as well, though none of it is too detailed if you stop and stare. Your troops and the enemy, while blocky-looking at times, are finely articulated with realistic motion-captured animation and clearly discernible weapons. Though those weapons sound a little weak, the game's thunderous explosions and other ambient effects, not to mention its booming orchestral soundtrack that responds to the action onscreen, all help to make the game's environments totally convincing. And you'll feel the tension every time you put an unassuming grunt in your sights.

While your reflexes will make all the difference when you square off against the enemy, you'll never even have a chance to test them unless you plan your every step and navigate carefully and slowly. Most every German soldier you'll face has keen vision and incredible marksmanship to match, meaning if he sees you before you see him, you're dead. Of course you'll have three men remaining with whom to accomplish the mission, but you'll probably end up retrying every encounter until all your troops make it home. In order to survive, you need to inch your way forward, keeping out of sight, using binoculars or a sniper scope to make sure the coast is clear. You must be ready to dispatch any guards or patrols quickly, and you must make sure your own snipers have submachine-gun backup in the event of a close encounter. You can also coordinate more complicated maneuvers thanks to an overhead tactical map that lets you sequence simultaneous actions a s though you were composing music, but this coordination demands a lot of practice.

Even if you take every precaution, Hidden & Dangerous still demands trial and error. You'll witness your men get gunned down mercilessly time after time, but once you know where the threat is coming from (the camera conveniently zooms to your soldier's killer), you'll stand a better chance of avoiding getting totally the next time around. Then again, being able to aim well and shoot first and survive is only half the problem. Before each mission and campaign in Hidden & Dangerous, you need to select your team and their equipment. The idea, apparently, is for you to anticipate the obstacles you'll face and to deploy and pack accordingly, but the execution of this planning phase isn't much fun. Of the three dozen-odd soldiers at your disposal, only a few excel at marksmanship, reaction time, or stealth. Once you realize troops with high shooting scores are perfect snipers while those with good reactions make ideal backup, you'll find yourself using the same soldiers again and again. It doesn't help matters that all your soldiers basically look and sound identical.

Outfitting your team with equipment is an especially cumbersome affair, as the game's completely counterintuitive interface forces you to transfer items and ammo to your men individually and with far too many mouse clicks. In fact, this clunky interface invades the entire game, and you'll feel it worst when you realize it takes about five steps to load a saved game, whereas it ought to take one. Although the game does offer an option for the computer to outfit your squad for you automatically, it may just as well be a self-destruct button since this so-called feature results in a game crash more often than not.

That the computer-assisted equipment selection is broken is the first evidence that much is amiss with Hidden & Dangerous, whose technical flaws are manifest in countless ways. There's little question, for instance, that the game's artificial intelligence has serious problems. Setting point-A-to-point-B waypoints for your troops oftentimes results in their frolicking all about the map as though it were a Family Circus cartoon rather than a Nazi internment camp. Although enemy soldiers are preposterously and unreasonably accurate, they're dumb as rocks otherwise and ignore their dead and fail to work together to stop you. They merely lie in wait or patrol about and do not respond to hostile situations in a convincing fashion. At least they die realistically. And aside from AI and interface problems, the game is chock-full of glitches and crashes and other inconsistencies. Your men perish if they fall so much as three feet. Sometimes they float in the air, or their weapons vanish, or texture maps drop out. And the camera goes wild, the game crashes whenever, and so on. You shouldn't have to put up with problems like these, especially within what's essentially a good game.

Yet such flaws can be tolerable if you choose for them to be. The fact is this game looks good and its missions are big, unique, and complicated, even as the tension continues to mount with each one. Hidden & Dangerous is the only convincing World War II tactical combat simulation out there, and it can be an immensely satisfying experience during those rare times that you successfully coordinate your men to achieve one of the game's multifaceted objectives. Ultimately, if its premise appeals to you, then Hidden & Dangerous is worth all the effort it takes to play. At the same time, you'll feel frustrated that it isn't perfect, since it comes so close in so many different ways.

Story: 6.6
Gameplay: 7.6
Design: 6.9

Overall: 7.0

[Biomanic]

Okay, It's been a while, and I'm overdue for my next review. So here it is.

Grand Theft Auto 4.

Platforms:
-PC (Reviewed)
-Xbox360
-Playstation3

Genre: Sandbox shoot-em-up.
Rating: MA15+
Publisher: Rockstar North
Creator: Rockstar

The Grand theft Auto games started out on the PC as cruddy look down, pixel bullet attempts of a shoot-em-up. As the title became more popular, the series transferred onto the Playstation2 and Original Xbox, and later onto *more recent computers as Grand Theft Auto3. The first of the games to have the iconic third person angle, and adequate graphics. Grand Theft Auto3 was amazingly popular, more so then expected. I too, spent many of my childhood hours, shooting old ladies on the street. Oh, what I child I was!

The series continued, but not as Numbers. The games lost the numbered system after the third and started giving the games actual sub-names. Games such as, Grand theft auto: Vice city and San Andres were released.

After San Andres, the Grand theft Auto games stopped coming out. There were no new GTA games for about 4 years. But, last year, 2008, Grand theft Auto4 was released, and is ready to shock, amaze and bore the living hell out'f you.


Story:
The story of GTA4 isn't it's high point. You play as Niko Bellic, Russian Immigrant who's trying to get a hang of the "Pop" American life style. With nothing to your name, you come to America, the only person you know, is your cousin Roman, who wants to help you out while you're here.

But, He gets in trouble with some important people, and he's in danger. So, You more or less bail him out'f it with a 12mm Pistol. But, this just gets you in more trouble. The story revolves around you, and he, trying to survive Liberty City.


Design:
Classic sandbox fun, the game is built as a giant playground. And, to a point, it's a lot of fun. Driving cars through the giant city, running over people, escaping police and shooting petrol station pumps will all make for a good time.

The games HUD is basic. With only an ammo counter, and a map, it takes up little screen. This is good.

Shooting is smooth and precise. It's easy to pop head shots, even on moving targets. You'll find yourself capping Cop after Cop, After random mobster, with deadly accuracy time after time.


The Multiplayer is much better then the singleplayer. With an entire city to you and your mates, It's a sandbox with lulsy results. Steal cars and run over your enemies, Drive by your friends and cap your allies and become a traitor.
There are many game types. With the typical team deathmatch, Deathmatch, King-o'-the-hill and capture the flag. But there are also more GTA style games, including Cops 'n' crooks. Where one team must chase and kill another. Then, once the time runs out, or the entire crooks team is dead, the teams are reversed. It's like a weird version of tip. But cooler.
All game types are customizable, and all can have the addition of AI police, just to make your life harder.


Gameplay:

The gameplay is awful fun at times, and shit boring at others. If you're like me, then you'll spend a lot of your time, randomly getting hit by cars, and randomly hitting people with cars. You may attempt the story, but it's way less interesting.

Overall, the gritty realistic feeling of GTA4 will leave you confused, bored and a little hungry. It's a good play, if you ignore the pointless story, or, if you actually try and get something out'f it.

Story: 6.4
Design: 8.4
Gameplay: 8.2

Overall: 7.3

[Biomanic]

Killing Floor

Rating: MA15+ Stong Violence.
Genre: Horror survival. Zombies : D
Platforms: PC
Everything done by: Tripwire Interactive
Release Date: May 27th 2009

The past couple of years has seen great games come to market, such as, the 5th in the Call of duty series, Valves latest creation: Left4Dead, The latest in the Resident Evil franchise and capcoms House of the Dead. These games all have something in Common. They're all zombie based, or have zombie themes. Zombies are great, everyone knows it, and more then often Zombie games are, 5 star games. But when Tripwire Interactive, a bunch of Backyard programmers and Animaters come together to make the next Zombie epic, does it break the surface? Or is this to be burried, six feet under?

When one compares Killing floor, to Valves: Left4Dead, it's surprising that a smaller, less funded company that is Tripwire interactive could create something, more vast in content AND replay value.


STORY:

The story in Killing floor is no more then, 'Zomg...bies'... There is Zombies invading the various maps in which you, and a couple of mates must kill.


GAMEPLAY:

Killing Floor is a Co-op based Zombie horror suvival game. Meaning you and a bunch of mates will face wave after wave of Zombies, until either there is none left, OR your brains are being feasted upon by the living dead. A game can go up to around 15 Waves of zombies, at which the players must combat a 'end boss' depending on not, on whether they've disabled it in Custom options. All set difficulties (Easy, Normal, Hard and Extreme) have end bosses. Each wave consists of around 30-80 zombies depending on difficulty, or custom preferences you and your mates can change if things are getting too hard. After each wave, a Trader / shop is opened somewhere randomly on the map, in which players can follow an arrow and get to her to buy weapons and armour to better fight the Zombies. Though this is good, you only have about 1:50 minutes to get to the shop, and purchase goods, which is annoying if it's on the other side of the map. Often you'll die because you've run out'f prescious ammo, because you couldn't get to the Trader in time.

When playing online in ranked matches, a new angle of gameplay is added. "Perks" Help players get better at certain tasks, depending on what you do. There is six perk Classes: Medic, Support, Sharpshooter, Commando, Beserker and Firebug.
Each class requires you to do certain objectives to level them up. Which often involve hitting a certain amount damage with a certain weapon, or by healing a certain amount of Team mates. After doing these objectives and leveling up the classes, they grant you better upgrades for certain weapons, and get you discounts at the Trader.


DESIGN:

Killing Floor was designed to suport Team work. With healing kits being more effective when used on team mates, it's obvious that there is only one way to get through these Zombie hords, and that's as a team.

I only got this game recently, and I've not played it as much as I probably should to do this review, BUT, when I have played it, everyone mostly has been incredibally good at teamwork, which is different for these games. In games such as Cod5 Nazi Zombies and Left4Dead, a lot of people go and do their own things when you're meant to be doing things as a team. People have, given money so we can buy weapons, given weapons, healed, been healed, and one person even sacrificed himself. YES, that's right.


CONTENT:

With plenty of weapons, Perks and Zombie types, it's a shame that there is only a handfull of maps. Though they're large in size and are very different in comparison, there just isn't enough to keep Replay value as high as it could be. Although we've been promised more maps as downloadable extras down the line, it'd be nice to see a few more maps now.

There is a lot of Zombie varients in this game, more then usual. There is:

-The standard Zombie, Or the Clot: They don't do jack shit in the way of Damage, but have an annoying tendency to grab onto you, and not let go. Which is annoying when larger, more bitch zombies are killing you also.

-Blade'd Zombies: The zombies with the convinent Blade attacted to their arm.

-Chainsaw Zombie: Yep, that's Cliche, but I don't care.

-Killing Floors version of the Hunter from Left4Dead: Half Zombie, Half Spider. It's as bad as it sounds.

-Screamers: The female zombies are worse then any other in this game, with this one letting out a high pitched scream that can hurt you, destroy grenades and in air missiles.

-Cloaked zombies: Mostly invisable zombies that are also female. They're cloaked until they reach about a metre infront of you. This is fixed with the Commando Perk though, which allows you to spot them sooner.

And many many more (Nice cover up for the fact I can't remember half of them, and I can't be bothered writing them out : D)...


Overall, Killing Floor is a kick arse Zombie killing game for you and your friends. Although it's cheap, it's only avaliable on Steam, so those without, or without quick internet, will need to get their fix of Zombie mayhem, elsewhere.

Story: 5.5
Gameplay: 9.4
Design: 8.5
Content: 8.8

Overall: 8.9