My uncles a musician and used the PC for recording his compositions – and maybe play some Wolfenstein 3D. He let me play with the PC, but never let me play Wolfenstein because he thought it was a game that an 8 year old shouldn’t play. He also thought I would never figure out how to use Windows and DOS to play Wolf 3D – he was so wrong!

Two 2-hour sessions, sitting in front of that 16” screen, and I had taught myself how to use something I will use for the rest of my life – and how to kill a whole lot of Nazis.

Wolfenstein 3D was my first 3D experience, my first gore-fest, my first FPS, and my first “mouse-key” game. It forced me to beg my father for a computer until I got one, and in turn opened me up to PC-Gaming. Wolfenstein put me in the game like no NES title I had sitting at home could and it’s perspective would later be one of my favorite game genres in gaming. It didn’t make me violent because it was violent – I’m smarter than that – the only thing Wolfenstein made me was an avid gamer.  Thank you Wolfenstein!

(Screen taken from Mobygames.com)

]]> http://www.platformnation.com/2009/04/24/personalwolfenstein-3d/feed/ 0 http://www.platformnation.com/2009/03/15/blind-guardian-brings-metal-to-sacred-ii/ http://www.platformnation.com/2009/03/15/blind-guardian-brings-metal-to-sacred-ii/#comments Sun, 15 Mar 2009 20:06:00 +0000 Qualitybeats84 http://www.platformnation.com/?p=6640 What’s better than Sacred II? Sacred II with Metal as a musical backdrop;  according to http://www.Sacred2.com, it’s already in the game!

In the video – Blind Guardian talks about being in the video game and  a good chunk of in-game footage of Blind Guardian rockin’ out in a concert can be viewed.  Appearently, its a mission available that requires you to get back their instruments.  Awesome!

[ click to watch video ]

So your as excited about Sacred II as I am, you say? Well, post about it and Platform Nation will give you a chance to win a 32” Flat Screen, PS3, and a copy of Sacred 2!

No, I’m not pulling your chain.

All you have to do to enter P*N into the giveaway is write a post on the Platform Nation forums and send a copy of the post via e-mail to romeo@rocketxl.com. You get +3 Luck for mentioning the IGN forums topic – in case you care about the luck stat.

If you are a member of the IGN forums, mention Platform Nation in the signature or body to be counted as an entry. Giveaway ends March 23^rd, so we should really start writing about Sacred II. A random winner will be drawn by Rocket XL

Put up some posts and give Platform Nation the chance to give you a 32” Flat Screen, PS3, and a copy of Sacred 2!

On a regular basis, I glance over at my game shelve and remind myself to move on and not re-install Diablo II. Oh, the joy the game brought me. Hours and hours of random generated dungeons to loot endlessly and …. and….

It’s funny when I look back at Diablo II; how shallow the game really is when looking past the Blizzard shine and aesthetics. That statement isn’t in any way putting down the game – I love it – but merely, me just expressing honest opinion.

Sacred II is supposed to be a “Diablo-clone”. A clone which plays in an open-world “sandbox” with little to no limitations on where you go and what you do. A clone, that when looked at in the right light, isn’t a clone at all. If anything can be said about these two games, it’s this; Sacred II is more like Diablo’s combat in Baldur’s Gates’ game play….and that makes me SUPER excited.

Here are 5 reasons you too should be excited about Sacred II.

Mounts: Although mounts aren’t new to RPGs, the way they are implemented in Sacred II adds an extra level of strategy; they’re more of a party member than some animal you ride around on to speed up the process of traveling across the country-side. Did I also mention there’s a bunch of different mounts and they’re really cool?

Open-World “Sandbox”: Much like Bethesda games, Sacred II drops you into its universe and lets you do as you wish. The landscape is ever-long and seems to contain hundreds of hours of world to explore. Diablo didn’t have an open world, did it? J

Hacking & Slashing: While some may find this game play mechanic boring, I am eager to mindlessly hack things to bits. H&S games tend to rely more on the strategy you built your character around and what your character’s main attack and defense focus’ are.

First of its kind on X360: There isn’t another game out on the console that is going to be the type of Action-RPG that Sacred II is. Fable II is much lighter on the RPG elements and more casual. Sacred II is a “core” RPG fans dream until we see Diablo III.

Drop-in/out CO-OP: Co-op has rooted itself back into gaming, and is only going to make games more fun to play. Giving Sacred a co-op experience will soothe the sores of those who were excited for Fable II co-op and were left disappointed. 4v4 PvP and 8 player raids are exactly what X360 RPG gamers need.

I could have talked about the great visuals, 6 character classes to chose from, the ability to alter their alignment either light or dark, and the 500 some-odd missions the game contains – but I’m sure your already calling your local GameStop and putting in a Pre-order; aren’t you?

(Screens taken from Gamespot.com)

Game Review: Street Fighter IV
Release: February 18, 2009
Genre: Fighting
Developer: Capcom
Available Platforms: Xbox 360 & PlayStation 3
Players: 1-2 (1-2 Online)
MSRP: $59.99
ESRB Rating: T
Website: http://www.streetfighter.com/

Not a lot has changed in the Street Fighter series – which is what hardcore fans like. Beautiful 3D character models control no different than in 2D Street Fighter iterations; all while in crisp 3D environments. The character command list, while staying true to its roots, receives a few new wonderful additions like Focus attacks and Ultra combos. Needless to say, if ever you felt comfortable fighting through SF II or III, IV will see you doing Hadoukens and Shoryukens within 10 seconds of your first fight – easy.

19 playable characters wait to battle through every mode fighting fans learned to love; arcade, time trails, survival, and online PvP to name a few. Hand drawn animations lay the story through every character’s arcade run-thru and while they aren’t particularly amazing visually – they have a real traditional anime feel, which I like.

I’ve always held a place in my heart for Street Fighter but haven’t played a fighting game in, what seems like, ages. Capcom really gripped me with almost everything they’ve done here. The art style, is niche, but wonderful. The controls are simple at glance, but when dug into, amazingly complex yet balanced. And the best part – the Street Fighter community will probably play this title until it melts away in their console’s disk tray. Yay for Street Fighter IV!

Don’t be blinded by my enthusiasm for SFIV – it’s not all peaches and cream.

Character models look great but many barely resemble their sprite counter-parts, leaving me with a slightly bad taste in my mouth. I was turned off by the voice acting during cut-scenes; their average at best. Also, Capcom and Japan must really enjoy Street Fighter’s cheese-pop intro music which is practically unbearable. All that said and I haven’t gotten to my biggest complaint – online ranked games need a ranking system. It’s going to be a long night for first time fighters and “n00bs” who want to test themselves against online opponents. Even I went 1-30 before chucking a controller across the room and shutting off the open-online challenge options; this is a huge issue and a major turnoff if you’re looking to enjoy fighting human players. 0 BP ranked players should not be allowed to play 1000 BP or even 300 BP ranked for that matter. Ugh! How disappointing is that?

Final Say: The word fun is an understatement when speaking of SFIV. While I have a huge issue with online fighting – finding buddies that rank in your division won’t be hard and will give you endless hours of training to become the next great street fighter. If any fighting game could be in your catalog, it should be Street Fighter IV for its legacy alone.

**Note: This review was played on a standard 360 controller.  I found no issues  using the sticks or D-pad to perform commands and ran a command test in Training Mode.  50 Hadouken attempts on both the D-pad and Analog sticks resulted in the following: 48 – 50 successful on Analog sticks & 40 -50 on D-pad.  Clearly an arcade stick would be optimal but by NO means required – at least not for me. 

(Screens taken from Videogamer.com)

If you like Devil May Cry or similar Beat em’ up button bashing titles, expect a new IP from Sega in 2009. The game’s Bayonetta and it’s beginning to really excite me (in more ways than one).

She will be flipping, jumping, and shooting from head to toe (literally – she has boot guns) onto consoles this year; exactly which consoles, I’m not sure.

What I am sure of is if Bayonetta doesn’t end up being a “dud Devil May Cry” it looks like it will be tons of fun.

Click the link below to view the preview trailer.

http://www.1up.com/do/blogEntry?publicUserId=5685007&bId=8926374

Now available on the Xbox Live Marketplace for 800 MP is the “Operation Anchorage” DLC for Fallout 3, which takes you through a simulation of the liberation of Alaska from the Chinese.  I don’t want to ruin anything for anyone – so I’m going to keep this as detail free as can be.

Don’t expect any new blip location on the map when you load up your Save file, after the DLC download.  That’s not how you activate the new content.  Actually, you receive a new radio transmission on your Pip Boy from some “Outkast” looking for help in the form of fire power. I didn’t receive the transmission at load up either; it took a minute or two. Wait for it.

This is a nice departure from D.C, to say the least. The new achievements and weapons are “easter egg” additions. The enemies make me feel like I’m suddenly playing Golden eye and not Fallout.  The locations are brighter and more “lit up”.

4-5 hours worth of exploring and gun fights compose the Anchorage DLC and I will gladly pay for more content like this. It may be true that it’s not everything I wished for in DLC content for my favorite game of 2008 – but I understand how hard it must be for Bethesda to balance the variations of character levels walking through the game at this given moment.

Anchorage gets thumbs up from me. If you consider Fallout 3 your favorite game of 2008, I’m pretty sure you’re going to really enjoy this.

(Screens taken from Planetxbox360.com)

Recently, I stopped at a few different GameStops to purchase a copy of Burnout: Paradise (I should have owned it already…I know) and left with only a conspiracy theory.

Could it be that GameStop only re-stocks high quantities of new release titles in attempt to force consumers into buying used copies of older games?

Considering they make more of a profit margin on used titles this would be a smart yet corrupt business move on their part. Why restock 10 more copies of Burnout:Paradise when there are 10 used copies on the shelf? Will a casual consumer that walks in looking for that title most likely buy the used copy instead of waiting for a new re-stock to arrive?

Probably

They’ve already taken the trip to the store; why leave without a game? Casual gamers don’t even know who or what Criterion Games is – never mind care about who’s getting their money.

Needless to say – none of 3 local “Stops” had a NEW copy of the game, and in attempt to support Criterion Games I didn’t rest until I found an unopened copy. I would much rather give $20 bucks to Criterion than $17 to GameStop.

Maybe I’m on to something here. Maybe Game Developers should start paying attention to how and what these businesses are shipping.

A little over 2 years, and Prey hasn’t lost anything it originally hit the Xbox360 with since release. If you have yet to play this game, you definitely should; and more so if you enjoyed Valve’s Portal.

“So, there I was on a Friday night. Hanging out on the reservation and watching over my girlfriend, who’s the hot bartender at her own bar. These two truckers, who have been pounding back beers for an hour, start hitting on Jen and getting out of line.

I bashed their faces flat with a pipe wrench.  Luckily, I forgot to put it away last time I fixed the leaking sink.

Not a second later, the lights in the whole place turn off. A bright green glow starts shining through the windows from outside; Jen’s scared crap ducking under the bar. No one knows what’s going on. I mean, I was a part of the U.S Army and been through some crazy crap, but this was weird.

The jukebox some how turns on. No electricity to the building at this moment….but it starts playing “Don’t Fear the Reaper “by The Blue Oyster Cult; meanwhile the roof of the bar’s fling off into pieces of debris.

I know this is Oklahoma, but it was no tornado.

It was a damn alien spaceship; and it sucked us right up into it. Jen, Grandpa, Me, and a bunch of things from the bar….

Hard to believe, I know, but that’s only the beginning. “

A good story plays on as you run through the alien spaceship you’ve been abducted onto – nothing Oscar worthy, but definitely par with average. Prey innovates in other areas of the game, so they didn’t push the plot nearly as much. I thought the plot was interesting enough.

Venom Games incorporated so much into Prey. Portals, spirit mode, a dozen great designed enemies, gravity puzzles, space vehicle shooting, and great level and weapon design to mention a few. Graphics are slightly dated but still seem a tiny bit flashier than say “Left 4 Dead “. The audio quality is average with 5.1 Dolby seeming less accurate than other games I’ve played recently.

Controls are good and solid, except for the times you need to steer the space pod vehicle. The pod controls are clunky and confusing and will more than likely frustrate many. Luckily, there aren’t too many pod situations.

Prey is fun and lives by the motto “Nothing is what it seems “. Walls are floors and ceilings are walls. The “out of body” mode adds another notch in puzzle element and is interesting. Nothing in game was too difficult and I rarely found myself frustrated.

As far as multiplayer goes, I didn’t have a chance to play any. This is an older game and no one was available on LIVE. I will attempt to have friends pick this up and get together for a game soon, though. Let’s assume it’s decent and really can’t hurt the experience anyway.

8 hours of game play, 2 difficulty modes, and Multiplayer. That’s all you get and really need. The plot and game play hold this title a float. Puzzles were fun and interestingly done. As far as issues during my playing of Prey…two mere moments of dropped frame rate is really all I can complain about.

In Conclusion: You can most likely pick this game up at a local VG store for under $10. It’s an experience that, I think, is still worth at least $20. If your interested in “trippy” rotating room puzzles, portals, and some of the most unique weapons I’ve seen in a game; give Prey a shot. Put this one beside Half-life, Portal, and Bioshock in your collection. It’s a shooter in the class of greats. ( A – )

Grinded Gears:

• A few seconds of dropped frame rate

• Space pod steering is annoying

Awesome Honorable:

• Weapons are cool as hell

• Art Bell’s paranormal themed radio show Coast 2 Coast AM

• Cinematic opening act, I won’t ever forget

(Screens taken from Games.net)