coldfusionJedi

When it comes to racing games, I tend to go between enjoying pure sims (like Forza, and in the past, Gran Turismo) and arcade types (Burnout, Need for Speed). When I heard that the Need for Speed series was going "serious" I was a bit unsure what the end product would be like. Need for Speed:Shift (Shift from now on) is an interesting racer. It's certainly a simulation style game, but it has a smattering of arcade elements that work really well.

For example - one thing I've often done in sims, and I'm not ashamed to say it - is what I call the push. I'll be approaching a corner with a rival ahead of me. I'll hit the gas and ram them as they make the turn. This pushes them off the track and slows me down at the same time so I can make the turn. Obviously this only works with damage turned off, and yeah, it's a cheap move, but it works. Shift allows for moves like this, and rewards it. In fact, all kinds of "dirty" moves are allowed, if you want to play like that. If you would rather play it safe and serious, then that works as well.

Shift follows the typical formula of most sim games. You start off a low level racer doing easy races. As you play you earn experience (well, points) and stars that give you access to higher level races and events. What impresses me the most though are what Shift does differently. The more I play the more I appreciate these changes and the more I think the game improves the genre as a whole. So what changes do I mean?

First off - every race lets you earn both points and stars. Points improve your racer level, and while in general most of the rewards are cheap (new stickers for your cars), some give you great heaps of money. Stars are rewarded mainly for your final position in the race, but you can also earn stars based on the points you earn or by performing some task. What this means is - if you are kicking ass in a race and then screw up at the end (and how many of us have done that more than once?!?) you still end up earning something. You never feel like you've wasted five minutes racing and that I think is one of the biggest faults in most sims.

Second - there are multiple race types that allow you to use different cars. These cars are given to you. This helps with another common Sim complaint - car boredom. Maybe it's just how I play sims, but I typically end up with a "Beginner Car", a "Intermediate Car", and an "Advanced Car." So while the game may be include 200+ cars, I'll typically spend hours in just 3. Shift helps with this by giving you multiple opportunities to try races with other cars. One great example - there is one race that involves TVRs (google it- one of the coolest cars around). This is a car that I'd probably never be able to afford in the game. But the race let me use it for free. Awesome!

The game's audio and video are perfect. Ok, maybe not perfect, but they work really, really well. In fact, this is the only race where I've enjoyed playing "in the car". I normally do the "a bit behind and above" but I found it much more fun to stay within the car when I was racing. You feel every bump as you play. It is incredibly immersive. When you hit the really high speeds you will even seen things get a bit fuzzy as if your eyes can't physically handle the strain. It's a bit hard to describe. It kind of reminds me of how Burnout handled the higher speeds, but it's definitely more intense than what I remember of Forza.

I also liked how they simplified tuning. While I like cars, my knowledge of tuning and performance is pretty rudimentary. I know more horse power is good. I know that when I increase HP I should probably improve my brakes as well. Outside of that though its all greek to me. Every upgrade in the game comes with a nice audio description of the benefits. If I don't remember what a part does then the audio help is pretty useful.

All in all - highly recommended. I'd like to compare this to Forza 3 however. Anyone have that game and would like to comment?

This weekend I wrapped up Halo 3:ODST, the latest game in the venerable Halo saga. If you remember, I wasn't terribly happy with Halo 3. It was something of a letdown from from Halo 2. Sure, it has great multiplayer, but while I enjoy MP I'm much more of a single player guy. I play at odd times and for short intervals typically (which is my primary Warcraft character will take years to hit 85) so I prefer a solid SP experience with an engaging story. Halo:ODST is everything I had wanted Halo 3 to be. Not just one story, but multiple. You play as the rookie member of a squad that has been separated. As you hunt down your squad mates you get to play through their experiences. This gives you multiple narratives that weave together quite well. It also gives you a nicely varied game play. Oh, and to add to that, there is a third storyline told through audio logs that is quite well done as well.

The game plays somewhat like Halo 3 did except that as a much less powerful soldier you have to adjust your strategy. My first game session was quite a shock as I discovered just how much less powerful I was than good ole Master Chief. Once I got used that I enjoyed it quite a bit. I found it slightly more difficult than Halo 3 but never really frustrating.

What really surprised me about this game - besides the incredibly strong story line, was the music. Most of your play time as the Rookie is spent in the city at night. This is after most of the violence has passed (most, not all), and there is a quiet, moody atmosphere not often found in FPS games. Bioshock comes to mind I guess, but I actually think the Halo:ODST pulls off the mood a bit better. The music is incredible. A soft, piano filled melody that is unique. Once I just left the game alone for a good 10 minutes to listen. I've only bought one video game soundtrack before (Kameo) but I think I'll pick up this one as well. (Assuming they sell it - and I'm sure they do.)

I've heard some say the game is short, and perhaps it is, but it felt like a solid amount of game play to me, and again, story wise, it is near perfect. I'm not sure more game time would make sense. And it does come with the complete Halo 3 multiplayer game so if you skipped Halo 3 you can still play the MP version.

I definitely recommend Halo 3:ODST. I wish I could invite my readers to come kill me online, but I'll be wrapping up Sacred 2 next.

Fuel is an interesting concept for a racer, but unfortunately, I don't think the game ends up being worthwhile. It certainly starts off with an interesting concept. Global warming has wrecked the planet, created horrible storms, and most of humanity has retreated into protected cities. This leaves vast stretches of the country uninhabited and a perfect playground for racers. Right off the bat I thought this was interested. An "end of the world" type scenario where, for the most part, the world didn't actually end but instead turned into a playground. So not so much Mad Max per se, but something a bit more light. The world has an very blasted/ground up look to it. Forest fires, flooding, and storms have taken their toll and the game reflects this well. The closet example I can think of is the world of Fall Out 3. Both games do a good job with the environment. So what's the actual game like?

Fuel is basically an off-road racer. You have a couple different vehicle types (motorcycle, 4 wheeler, a car, etc) and various different race types. You have your traditional A to B and N lap type races along with interesting variations, like beat the helicopter to landing pad. Some races feel like typical rally racing (and frankly I still don't get why folks watch NASCAR when you watch people drive 60MP+ through mud and snow next to cliffs) while others will have you racing through burned out woods trying your best not to face plant against a tree. The faces are well balanced and for the most part, don't suffer from the "one screw up and your done" factor that other games (Burnout) have.

The vehicles are handled well. The motorcycle and 4x4 scramble quickly through the environment, while the larger vehicles require completely different strategies or you'll end up overdriving the course. As a racer, I can't complain.

It's off the course where things get... well weird. The game is advertises as having the largest playing area of any game created. According to Wikipedia, a whopping 5,560 square miles. I believe it too. The Free Roam range goes on for what seems like forever. Unfortunately, it is a complete and utter wasteland. While Fall Out filled filled itself with creatures to kill and at least interesting destruction, Fuel is empty. Racing around freely quickly begins to feel like those incredibly long and boring road trips you took as a child. Remember how the highway was basically road+trees for hours on end? Well that's Fuel in a nutshell. You do run into another vehicle every now and then, but they simply ignore you. I thought perhaps I could engage in some violence crashing around or something, but nope, if you get hit too hard you simply reset a few yards away.

The weather, at times, is kind of cool, especially the storms, but some of the effects are so bad looking I thought I was playing a last-gen game. At one point black 'splotches' flew past my screen. I thought it was a bug. I finally figured out that this was the games way of demonstrating leaves and debris flying in a wind storm. Um, ok.

Oh, and the music? I think there is one song total in the game, and I heard it so much during the few hours I played I wanted to pull my ears off. It sounded like something a high school garage band would come up with.

At this point, I don't think I can recommend it. Maybe check it out as a rental, but I'd say give it a pass.

Ok, I've googled this quite a bit and am about ready to give up and call Tech Support. Before I do I thought I'd ask my super-intelligent, incredibly handsome readers. I know one of you have probably seen this before and can share some advice.

So - my XBox 360 has always frozen once or twice. Not very often though. I remember COD3 freezing twice in the 5-6 hours I played it. Before that I know a few other games did it - but just as rare.

I'm now on an XBox 360 Elite. Everything was fine until I got Red Faction. It froze, and continued to freeze, after about 30-60 seconds of play. After 5-6 instances of this the first night I just put the game down. The next night I tried it again and it worked.... for 45 minutes or so. This continued for the next couple play sessions until eventually, it's like the game healed itself. I stopped getting freezes and could play for as long as I wanted.

So fast forward to last night. I get Sacred 2, and the same thing occurs. Freezes. I can start a game session and just sit there and within a minute or so it will freeze. I thought maybe it could be a bad HD copy. So I switched out the hard drive on the Elite and it didn't help. I read a recommendation to go offline but that didn't help either. I also did the system cache clear thing as well. Nogo.

Must be hardware, right? Well I switched to playing Gears 2 and it worked fine.

So any ideas? Oh - and the disc is about as perfect as I've seen. Not even the faintest scratch.

Would you have guessed that blowing the crap out of things would be fun? Yeah, probably so, and it's been done before, but wow, does Red Faction Guerrilla (RF) make it a heck of a lot of fun. I never played the first game, so this was my first introduction to the series. The story is pretty simple. A while ago, the Earth Defense Force came to Mars to kick some bad guys butts. They did just that. But apparently things have not turned out so well on Mars. The EDF are generally a bunch of pricks and have turned the red planet into a police state. (Are you seeing any real life corollaries yet? Don't worry - it gets more obvious later.) Your character lands on Mars and about 5 minutes later is embroiled in the local rebellion against the EDF. The story though is secondary really. It's not bad, but the game play is what I really want to talk about.

Just about every single structure in the game is destructible. Ok, by itself, that doesn't sound terribly interesting. But wait - it gets better. Most missions involve you tearing down buildings. Every EDF building represents their ability to exert control over the populace. So the more you destroy, the more you help free the people of Mars. Where the game shines is how many different ways you can take buildings down. You can - for example - throw charges on the wall, run away, and activate them remotely. This creates an incredibly satisfying explosion that may - or may not - take the building down. You really have to think about where you place your charges to get the maximum effect. Of course, you also have a sledgehammer. If the building doesn't come down before you run out of charge, you can wail away at it with your hammer.

One of the best moments in this game was the time I was taking down a tall guard tower (with the guards still on top - heh) with my hammer. I succeeded in knocking it down... right on my head. I laughed my rear off at that and ensured that next time I stayed towards the edge when taking the manual approach.

Another cool moment was when I driving quickly to a target and didn't break in time. This is when I discovered that yes - an armored vehicle is like one large sledgehammer. I proceeded to back up and ram the building again a few times.

What's nice too is how the EDF responds to you. Do enough destruction and they will send a few flying vehicles after you. Do a lot of damage and eventually they send heavy tanks after you. How did I discover this? I was racing away from a crime scene (wait, did I say crime scene - I mean freedom fighting!) in a zippy little humvee type car. I was feeling a bit cocky since I knew the EDF had no chance of catching up on me. I saw something new approaching me and had about one second to think "Hey, that kinda looks like a tank" when the next thing I new my vehicle (and myself) were about 200 feet in the air after taking a direct hit. I survived, barely, and booked away as fast as possible.

A lot of things are done real well in this game. The graphics are incredible, and frankly, it's nice to play a GTA type game not set in NYC (or some other Earth city). The designers did a great job creating a partially terraformed Mars. The sky - the ground - it just all plain works and works really well. The towns all have a 'wild west' type feel, which make sense as Mars in the new frontier.

Alright - so - you can't talk about this game without mentioning the obvious parallels to Iraq. The good guys come in - push out the bad guys - and then a local insurgency takes to arms against the good guys. I will say that on more than one occasion I felt a bit weird. For example, at one point you are tasked with preventing the EDF from entering a base. One of your fellow freedom fighters suggests placing explosives on the road to take out the EDF. So um yes... roadside bombs. Later on in the game you move from simple building destruction, stealing, etc, to assassination. I have no doubts in my mind that the developers were trying to create some kind of sympathy for the terrorists in Iraq, but it definitely makes a takes a bold stance.

I do have one complaint about the game. I have frequent XBox freezes when playing. A reader suggested this tip: XBox 360 Cache Clear Code. This kinda works. I now do this tip before I play. Before this, I was lucky to get more than 5 minutes in. I've got friends with the game though and none of them have seen this problem, so it may just be me. And no. This does not mean my XBox is going to red ring. Don't even think it. Period.

Oh - and one mission is a complete rip from Call of Duty 4. Did that bug me? Heck no. It was a rip from easily the coolest part of Call of Duty 4 so I didn't mind at all. I recommend this game 100%. I think it is probably my favorite game of the year so far. It may not be as deep as Fable or Fallout, but for pure devilish fun, it is incredible. It's my Crackdown for 2009.

These aren't the best screen shots. My source (Gamespress) didn't really have any 'in play' shots. Sorry about that!

Having trouble playing video since the latest XBox360 system upgrade? I was - and was convinced it was a bug with TVersity and transcoding. I was going to try bootcamping my old MacbookPro just so I could try WMP11 (my current Windows machine is Server 2003, hence the TVersity) when I decided to give Connect360 one more shot. Unfortunately, I got the same result with every video that I had tried under TVersity as well. I was told I didn't have the necessary software even though I had downloaded the media update many months ago. On a whim I went to the support site for Connect360 where I ran across this tip: I've installed the NXE Update and now my videos won't play!

Microsoft has released the long-awaited New Xbox Experience update for the Xbox 360. We have verified that Connect360 is fully compatible with the new update. The only known possible hiccup is video playback: In order to play back your videos using the updated firmware you will need to reinstall the Media Update available on Xbox Live.

So I just re-downloaded the media playback support and guess what? Everything works. I haven't tried TVersity again (the machine is powered down) but I'm sure it will be fine now as well. I'm pretty surprised by this. I know the percentage of XBox360 users streaming video over their network is probably a minority, but you would imagine something like this would have been caught in QA. As a quick side note, I'm not so enamored of the new UI. It's a bit too cutesy and I find some menu items a bit oddly placed (especially DVD playback). However - the "Install to Hard Drive" is priceless. I would have paid for that by itself. The speed boost isn't a heck of a lot, maybe 15-20%, but it adds up, and best of all - games play incredibly quiet now. I don't get the 'loud as a 747' fan during games.

2007 was a banner year for video games, at least for me. With Bioshock, Call of Duty 4, Mass Effect, and Halo 3 all coming and all being, in general, "big" games, it was a great year for the consoles. (I didn't do any PC gaming at all last year.) I'm not so sure about this year.

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Ok, so I'm a bit of a Star Wars nut and I may not be the best person to write an objective review of a Star Wars game, but I have to say Star Wars: The Force Unleashed (TFU) is easily one of the best Star Wars games I've played, and the best on the latest generation video game consoles. Read on for more...

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Way back in February I did a quick review Burnout Paradise, the first real Burnout for the next gen systems. I talked about how disappointing the races were due to the open sandbox approach of the game. Burnout has always been about speed, and once you do something to make you want to slow down, you lose something what makes Burnout fun. The further lack of a reset for races just made me want to give up - which I did.

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So I have an admission to make. I've been playing fighting games for about as long as I can remember, but I've always been more of a button masher than anything else. I may learn a move or two, but I generally just like to run into a fight and win by going crazy. That's what I call tactics. If a game allows that, then I'm happy. Soulcalibur IV was my first introduction to the series so I can't compare to any of the previous incarnations. It's also only the second fighting game on the 360 I've played. (I've got a copy of Dead or Alive as well.) So what did I think?

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