QnD quick review: Crackdown 2 (Xbox 360)

Price: 13.99 eur

Where: Play.com

A couple of years ago (or maybe three) came out an open world game called Crackdown (or Riot Act, like my JAP region free version was called).

It didn't include anything really new, except maybe the collection of agility, hidden, etc orbs that were sprinkled around the city in various hard to get locations, some impossible to get  until you had collected enough of the said orbs and got your agility up (as it governs how far and how high you can jump).

The game had all kinds of goofy achievements; like "juggling" a car in the air for several seconds with explosives, blowing up certain number of cars in one go, etc.

All in all; good fun and not that much originality.


Now it's 2010 and the same studio is out with the sequel. What has changed? Well, not much.

The orbs are still there, the the skills still advance by you using them, the buildings are still high and there's lots to blow up, shoot, maim and destroy.

Added are the "infected" (read: "zombies" from "28 days later"). By day the city is full of normal citizen, peace keepers and gangers, but by night the citizens are replaced by blood-hungry, zombie-like infected.

Instead of battling against the various gangs and trying to kill their leaders, this time around you're battling the infected by fixing up a series of beacons that can kill them by light. Yeah, they're severely allergic to light. So much so that they'll explode when exposed. Thank goodness they don't glow in it... ;P

All the while the only "gang" left, The Cell, is running interference (they're the guys that broke the damn beacons and their power generators in the first place, and are now guarding them). You can "pacify" things by taking over Cell HQs, fixing things up and taking care of the infected lairs.

All in the day's work for a good-guy agent. Or are you the good guy? There are recording and propaganda radio transmissions flying around that speak of an antidote for the infection - is it right to blow them up after all? Hmm...

The game engine is pretty robust with cartoon-like graphics. Sounds are mostly unnoticeable - in good and in bad. If you have Live Gold you can invite players to your world for co-op matches.

Crackdown 2 can look pretty at times.

But, somehow, it all feels nearly too familiar. There's no real new "gimmick" or new stuff to do. As an open world game, GTA IV beats this one hands down, without any DLCs.

Crackdown 2 is not a bad game, especially if you liked the first one. It's just a little... "uninspired". I paid a whopping 14 eur for it on Play.com, so I can't really complain as at this price it's an OK buy.

Score: 7.5 / 10

Monthly update - still on a hiatus.

Good news; got a couple cheap games; Wet (7 eur from Gigantti) and Crackdown 2 (14 eur from Play.com).

Bad news; still haven't bothered to boot the consoles, aside from a small stint with the latest Splinter Cell - Conviction.

Enjoying my VIP-time at LOTRO. First character made level 40 yesterday (hunter), with the minstrel following at level 31 and a new addition, the guardian at level 21 (made as a "jeweller / cook alt", really).

The guild I'm in, Keepers of the Palantiri, is full of nice people who are helping each other out (hi guys!).


And to make sure I don't have too much time for console games, I just bought a .308win rifle and I'm shopping for a suitable bird scope now... :D

Still playing... LOTRO.

Haven't even bothered to boot the Xbox 360 or PS3 for 3-4 weeks.

Only other game that I took a quick peek at was Fallout: Las Vegas (10 minutes, can't comment on it very much - except it's "very Fallout 3").

Actually ordered the Mines of Moria addon for LOTRO; new areas and quests, higher level cap, two new classes and two more character slots, higher tier of crafting and 30 days free VIP status.

Not too bad for an addon selling as low as $9,99 in the US (more like $26 with shipping overseas, dammit! ;) ).

Too. Busy. To. Post. Must. Play. More. LOTRO...

So Lord of the Rings Online went "free" to play.

I shelled out the $6.50 to get a "premium" account like I did with Dungeons & Dragon Online. Now, I could've got all this (sans the Turbine Points) for $2 if I paid with the mobile phone option, Paymo - but it didn't pan out (the operator thinks it's a leisure SMS and it won't work since I've blocked them and all adult stuff on my phones).

But, anyway. The "premium" account got me...

• 5 auction house slots
• 5 gold maximum (like this is a huge problem yet, with 0,6 gold having been my maximum before I bought the 500 silver horse I had to buy a "riding skill" for)
• ability to trade with players
• better chance to get in if there's a queue (there might be, read on)

Those are the things I cared about, anyway.

Anyways, I played LOTRO in the beta back in... 2007 I think. It didn't grab me then. But since then DX10, lots of polishing and a thousand new quests later, the game looks pretty damn spiffy. Oh, and it has players. A lot of them.

In fact I can't remember the last time I saw a town as busy as Bree in a MMORPG. And it doesn't stop there - the countryside sometimes has more players than orcs or bears. An "orcicide" can be seen in the rush hours. Which is sometimes a problem when you have to wait for a rescue target NPC to spawn for 5 minutes - the boss mobs thankfully spawn quickly, sometimes too quickly (as in "right after you kill and loot the previous one and haven't healed up yet" ;P ).

Running with all the bells and whistles, huge view range and maximum textures on (with my HD5850) the game doesn't have to be ashamed vs any modern MMORPG.

Oh, and I can't think of a game that had this much... for the lack of a better word, "geometry". I don't think Middle-Earth has a level spot, aside from the fields (where you can grow crops, naturally). Everywhere you can see hills, mountains, pits, lakes and... oh did I mention lakes and ponds? Damn there are a lot of those around - feels downright at home (Finland is the "Land of the Thousand Lakes", remember? ;) ). Oh, and the Tolkien borrowed names help too; how about the troll tribe of Rauta-Lehmä? While being completely stupid ("Iron-Cow"), it's still Finnish, as are a lot of place names too (just as silly, most of them)...

So after a couple of weeks in the Middle-Earth - I recommend anyone interested in MMOGs take a tour. It's free!

www.lotro.com

Yakuza 3 (PS3)

Has it really been a month since the last blog-post? Sheesh...

Anyways. In the meantime, ie. "while not posting", I've been playing Yakuza 3 (and lately Mafia II on the PC - a beautiful game).

What can I say about the "Big Y"? Not having played (to my recollection) the previous games on the PS2, but having taken the time to watch the "what has happened" cut-scene videos from the said previous games provided with Yakuza 3 (smart move, Sega), the world really feels fleshed out.

And not only feels, but acts too; there are multitudes of people walking around the streets of Tokyo, shops to visit, video games to play, etc.

Voice acting is great (and unlike in previous games), not dubbed in English.

The graphics are a bit on the cartoony side, but still pretty OK. Especially if you keep in mind that Yakuza 3 was released in Japan a year earlier than in the US / EU.

The game has a... nice "feel", I guess, for a lack of a better word. I reminds me of the old Shenmue games I played on the Dreamcast and Xbox - and no wonder, since some of the Shenmue people are on the Yakuza 3 payroll.

Combat is simplified, but not too simple (two button combos) and the plot plods along slowly at first. Characters are all real personalities, for good or for worse...

The biggest downside in the western version is that it has seen some cuts made vs the original Japanese version; there are no longer hostess bars or Japanese quiz games to play, but you can still date people and play "other stuff", like karaoke. Yay.

The "feel", the world, the plot and... well, the whole game really begs for a gamer that likes all things Japanse (or just fancy something different for a change). All in all, I'd recommend Yakuza 3 if you're into open world (kind of) games. Especially if you have a soft, very nostalgic spot for the good ol' Shenmue games.


Score: 8.5/10

Vacation's over...

... so I guess I'll start posting again.

As to what I did during the vacation?

Well, on the gaming front I played through Heavy Rain (pretty good, a bit slow and predictable at some points), and I'm 1/3 through Bayonetta (a lovely £8 game, used from Game.co.uk).

Didn't spend my whole vacation inside, of course. Actually gamed very little as I spent time running around with my DSLR and, last week, hunting some pigeons (the season started, as usual, on the 10th of August).

Crackdown 2 for the Xbox 360 is out...

And it's curiously cheap at Play-Asia.

These days the UK shops usually beat the Hong Kong ones in new game prices, but I guess this is the exception...

Summer holiday is here. Woot - and stuff!

Not much gaming going on, aside from RDR that I still haven't finished. I get distracted by side quests, strangers, mini-games, etc and just plod along the main quest (currently a few missions in to Blackwater).

Aside the gaming side of things; I went and got another DSLR camera - a Canon 30D this time. I figured I could use another as a backup.

Long story short - after getting the excellent (in price / performance ratio) 55-250 / 4.0-5.6 IS lens for it, it's contending for the spot of my primary DSLR which is currently held by the Olympus E-510.

I just need to get the sensor cleaned a bit (a couple of dust specks on it). Otherwise the 30D feels like new. Not a bad buy for less than 250 euros...

I'm off to holidays for a couple of weeks, then back to work for a week and then off to holidays again for three weeks. :D

Slow going...

... on the gaming front.


Still playing RDR, aka "Grand Theft Horse". Other than that, I've only had the time to play a little DDO (Dungeons & Dragon Online) on the PC.

For a free game it's pretty nice. I was in the beta back in, oh... 2005 (?), and it definitely didn't grab my interest back then at $15 per month, but now... I did fork out $6.50 for a "premium" account that gives you 4 character slots vs 2 of the free account, and no auction house limitations.

You can still pay $15 per month for "Unlimited" access, which includes dungeons, races & classes people otherwise have to pay for to access. I think the basics are enough for my occasional DDO interest, though.

If you want to try Dungeons & Dragons: Eberron Unlimited out, go here.

Qnd quick Review: Red Dead Redemption (Xbox 360, Limited Edition)

RDR, or GTH (Grand Theft Horse) as some people like to call it, is finally here.

Was the wait worth it? Let's see...

The premise
In RDR you take on the role of John Marston, an ex-outlaw now working for the federal government mostly against his will. His job is to capture his old partner in crime so he can resume his life with his wife and child (so no Hot Coffee for Mr. Marston). From this premise starts his quest for justice or revenge - depending on which way you want to look at it, or play it.

Marston can be a nice guy, helping people along, or he can be total bastard and outlaw who robs banks, trains and kills people. Of course the latter will incur a bounty sum on your head (unless you use certain helpers like, err, a bandanna).

Keeping on the right side of the law is up to the player, though it's easy to slip by mistake; sometimes telling a lawman from a bandit in the heat of a gunfight can be hard - and accidentally shooting a deputy will instantly make you a wanted man and get a $20 bounty on you. Killing an innocent will make this bigger. The only way to get rid of this is to visit the rail station and pay off the bounty with either money or a letter of pardon.


The game
RDR looks great and plays well (with or without auto aiming). With the game installed on the hard drive, there are only occasional hiccups when you ride blazingly fast from one place to another. Out of the two versions of the game, the Xbox 360 one looks better. Again. I wonder if the developers / converters will ever get the hang of PS3, or indeed quit taking shortcuts in the development.

As for the game itself; along with the around 20 hour main storyline you have an open world the like of which only Rockstar can provide. You can hunt, collect herbs, play poker / blackjack, throw horseshoes, tame horses, slice your fingers in a game of five finger filet, rob banks / trains, steal horses, bounty hunt, etc. There are tons of side quests, strangers to help, etc. Towns are full of people acting like you'd expect people to act in 1908 west - along with whores, drunkards, fights and even the occasional rape or murder you can prevent if you're so inclined. Though I suggest you lay off the booze if you want to be of any use; it'll just corrupt any man who touches it... ;)

You can fist fight, knife people, use your pistols and rifles, lasso horses or people, etc. The only thing you can't do is swim. Don't try it (though getting killed isn't much of a deterrent - there's not much of a death penalty in RDR).

The game is, in essence, Grand Theft Auto in the Wild West. All this coupled with great voice acting, a good musical score and an interesting storyline makes for of the best games of 2010 (I'd have this contending for the Game of the Year with Mass Effect 2 if there aren't any more surprises this year). R* delivers, again.


Limited Edition differences:
In Europe, well most of scandinavia anyway, nearly everyone preordering got a "Limited Edition" instead of the normal one. What's the difference? A cartboard slide-in cover for the normal DVD box and a code that you can download a few extras with: the war horse (faster, more stamina), golden guns (extra fame) and an deadly assassin outfit that you can get after completing half a dozen or so missions in game.

After the code is  used, you're left with the cartboard covers, so there's zero extra resell value for the LE version. Currently the extras are not available for the regular version owners, but there's a rumor they might be available for purchase later.


Score: 9/10

Qnd quick Review: Splinter Cell: Conviction (Xbox 360)

Some might say that stealth has taken the back seat in the latest Splinter Cell, but I'd rather say it has taken the co-pilot's seat.

Stealth is still there, as it's always been in Sam Fisher games, but there is definitely more room for shooting action in Conviction.

As for the rest of the game, I'd say it looks between great and average. The long development time shows in some spots, but the nearly flawless "adaptive" controls make the game flow and feel very new.


Voice acting on the game is on par with other major releases, though Michael Ironside sounds a bit bored as Sam - but who else could be Sam Fisher, after all these games.


The new tagging system works well, even though the requirement to hand-to-hand kill one opponent before being able to "tag" enemies for 100% sure slow-motion instant kills seems somehow artificial. Sure, the system works from a gaming point of view, but still feels... "strange".

So how does the tagging work? Once you have your melee kill, you can tag minimum of one or two enemies (depending on the weapon you use and your achievements in the game). The basic weapons in the beginning of the game are able to tag two enemies, whereas the pre-order bonus SPAS shotgun can target three, etc.

You can also tag "traps" in the enviroment, including chandeliers that drop on top of your enemies, fuel barrels that explode, machinery that crushes them, etc.

When done tagging, you hit the Y-button and watch as Sam executes his enemies in slow-motion.

The plot is your usual "everyone is trying to screw Sam Fisher and nobody can be trustes / you killed my daughter so you MUST DIE! DIE!" -variety. Nothing special there, but it gives you the excuse to plow through dozens of enemies (or if you're a patient man; stealth past them to get to the enemy).

The usual bosses that you'll get to only to get caught or see them escape in front of your eyes are of course there.


I did run into one bug in my early game; in the fair level where you're supposed to dispatch three enemies in stealth before you can meet your contact, the barrier preventing me from meeting him before the kills didn't disappear even though I was done with the enemies.


Score
8.5 / 10

(Order a region free version of Splinter Cell: Conviction (Xbox 360) from PA.)

Controller review: Fiskars Shovel (2 kg)

Time tested: 5-7 hours per day on three days
Game tested on: "Dig yourself a new parking spot on the front yard"

Why play games inside where it's warm and cozy, when you can go shovelin' outside where it's <10 degrees C and windy?

Why hurt your thumb playing on the Xbox, when you can have your whole body ache all over after a refreshing round of shoveling dirt, cutting roots and pushing the wheelbarrow?

Why, indeed?

SCORE
(out of *****)
Ergonomy: **
Sensitivity: *
Power consumption: *
'Cool' factor: ****

First Impressions: Just Cause 2 (PC)

"Looks good, improves on every aspect compared to the first one."

That's how I'd summarize JC2 for the PC after a few hours' quick bout with it.

The grappling hook isn't the most original idea (Batman: Arkham Asylum or Bionic Commando, anyone), but it works well. It has more freedom than in AA or BC, and it's easier to use than the BC one.

Capturing helicopters brings Mercenaries 2 into my mind.


More later, maybe. ;)

Gaming rig: continued

I've finally settled the new system in and it's actually on the table and all. ;)

I also added a new monitor: a 24" Benq Led display (G2420HBDL). Very satisfied with the price / performance ratio (at 189 euros here); the image is crisp and clear, there's enough brightness (so much so that I toned it down to 25/100 setting) and, what's really important to me, it's a matte panel display. I don't have to look at my own face or the ceiling light while playing. Also, no dead / stuck pixels and nothing else to complain (yet ;) ).


The 5770 was a slight disappointment on the memory side of things; all I could get out of it stable was 1325MHz (1200MHz default). The core is running at 950MHz (850 default) and still seems to have room for more.

With the CPU at default speed the system gives a pretty standard ~11000 3D mark score in Vantage.

New gaming rig: complete

So the final specs of my new Windows 7 (64-bit enterprise) gaming rig were as follows:

- CPU: i5 750 (not yet OCd)
- Motherboard: Asus P7P55D-E (for USB- and SATA-3 support)
- Memory: 2x2GBs of Kingston 1600MHz Hyper-X memory
- Graphics: HIS Radeon HD5770
- Disk: Samsung F3 1TB harddisk (with Samsung 320GB drive for automated backups, etc)
- Cooling & case: CoolerMaster Hyper 212 Plus CPU cooler (120mm fan, with possibility to add another later)
Zegamax Luna case w/3 120mm fans
Silver Power 600W 80+ power supply (Cheap, but good reviews and up to 87% efficiency)

The only hiccup: the 120mm fan on the side is exactly where the Hyper 212's top is, so I had to remove it since even rotating the plex-window didn't allow the side cover to fit... ;)

CPU temps are below 30 degrees C in normal desktop / surfing use, so I should be set for a nice overclock later when I get everything running (just did the cabling yesterday, the case is now really roomy with good airflow).

Power consumption is around 85-95W at surfing use and around 170-190W when playing newest DX11 games. The 5770 is still at normal clocks. The HIS card should have Hynix memory capable of 1500MHz memory clocks, so there should be plenty of OCing room for that too.


All in all, pretty good price / performance ratio at little over 800 euros. A i7 860 CPU would've cost another 100 euros and a 80GB SSD drive another 200 euros - but I'm happy with the F3 for now, at least, and in gaming use the lack of HyperThreading shouldn't be a major performance factor (another thing in synthetic benchmarks or stuff like MPEG compression).

A new gaming rig

I'm having hard time justifying myself a big budget for a new gaming PC since I do most of my gaming on the consoles nowadays, so what I've ended up with is a mid-range, sub 1000 eur, gaming PC consisting of:

• Intel i5 750 CPU w/ Scythe Katana 3 cooler
• Asus P7P55D-E motherboard (the local store is out of the cheaper GigaByte USB/SATA3 boards)
• 4 gigs of DDR3 1333Mhz G.Skill Ripjaw memory
• HIS Radeon HD 5770, 1GB (another to be added later in Crossfire)
• Zegamax Luna case with a 650W Chieftec "Super Series" PSU (can you say "cheap-ass"?)
• Some random 1TB drive (probably a Samsung F3)
   

I'd love to got for an Intel X-25 SSD drive, but my budget would break on the 80GB version and the 40GB seems so tiny - even for a pure OS drive. And in either case I'd still need a 500GB - 1TB drive for the actual "games and stuff".

Also, the 58XX series Radeon's are out of the picture; I could cash out for the 5830, but honestly, the 5fps difference at FullHD isn't just worth the extra 80-90 euros (considering that I can add another 5770 later for around 130 euros).

If I went for an AMD system with Phenom II X4 955BE, I'd probably save another 30-40 euros, and wouldn't lose many (if any) fps in games - but for more intensive reasons like MPEG-compression and working with RARs, I decided on the i5 750 that is basically a i7 860 that has HyperThreading disabled.

I could save even more if I took the chance with a Phenom II X2 and tried to unlock it with a suitable motherboard.

But with my track record of getting good CPUs I decided not to (anyone remember Celeron 300As? Or 366s? I had to go through 5 specimens of the latter to get them to 555MHz and never got lucky with a 300A... ;) ).


Oh, well... Decisions, decisions.

Maybe I'll get that damn cheap Packard Bell i5 430/Radeon 5650 laptop instead - would save me 200 euros and tons of time... :D

Who whoulda thunk it: Ubuntu 9.10 server on P3 hardware

I was pleasantly surprised that Ubuntu 9.10 server edition as a LAMP runs so well (all things considered) on a P3 500Mhz with 640 MB memory.

I even threw in a software RAID1 (mirroring) and Gnome desktop (thought for that I had to ditch the old Matrox Millenium MGA and throw in an AGP GF440MX ;) ).

Of course the WWW-server load is below pitiful (serving a few avatar pictures for couple of boards, etc), but still.


Only one major gripe; why does it ship with 0.9.8 version of the libcrypt and and libssl -libraries when they don't work with Apache2? I had a heck of a headache before I deleted them (forcing Apache & the sshd to use their default libraries)...

Qnd quick Review: Battlefield: Bad Company 2 (PS3)

Few quick words...

Singleplayer is still fun and very much like BF:BC was. Stuff gets blown away and cover is fleeting.
Missions are still very linear, but you have the feeling of freedom and space.

Like in the first one, I find myself drawn to LMGs - mostly because of their extended ammo capacity. A sniper rifle and a LMG is a good combo; you're just a weapon switch away from having long range or "enough ammo for the encounter". And believe me, that AR will run out of ammo after a couple of enemies and then you're just a sitting duck while you slooowly reload.

The single player campaign isn't as polished as MW2's equivalent, and there's not that as much single player, or even co-op stuff to do after you finish the campaign.

Multiplayer, when the servers are up, is pretty damn nice. Well, unless you have 8 recons on your side and 7 of those are crappy shots with the sniper rifle... :P

The hard mode is where it's at - no silly "oh, you shot me in the chest with your sniper rifle - lemme shoot you back" -crap. Much more deadly, much more fun.

There's still a lot of spawn camping (with snipers and helicopters) happening, but if you know what you're doing you can think of that as "well, they won't be protecting the objective" -kinda thing and do your dirty deeds behind the lines.



Score
9/10

iPhone quickie: Tiki Totems, Lion Pride, Textropolis

Ie. "stuff for free" (well, were, at least).

Tiki Totems
... is probably most fun of the bunch. You have a totem that cannot touch the ground, but you have to destroy (by tapping) X number of blocks from underneath it.

Gets a little repetitive but it's still fun.

Graphics are "OK", sound is "there".
Physics are... "iffy". ;)




Lion Pride
... is a pretty boring "drag your finger to aim lions at prey" -game. *Yawn*










Textropolis
... is a fun way to pass time if you like making up words from jumbles of letters (or names of different Cities, in this case).

QnD Review: Dante's Inferno (Xbox 360)

This review is purely based on around hour and a half of gaming, from the start of the game to the Gluttony level of hell (ie. 2nd real game level).
Edit: some updates and the game has been thoroughly played through, and the score of 7.5 is appropriate.


First things first; is DI a God of War clone? Does the bear shit in the woods? Hell yeah - and it doesn't even try to hide it.

You have exp, mana and health fountains (GoW: chests), you have the same kind of ground and aerial combos, you buy skills (good or bad, here) with experience points as you proceed, etc.

Even the combat is pretty much the same; dozens of enemies coming at you at once, small bosses, big bosses, you have quicktime events that you kill small (optional) and big bosses (mandatory) with. Only difference is, usually, that you can either punish or save their souls while you do it (being good, ie. "Holy" will get you more experience, which is kinda silly).

You have your standard variety of lost souls, small, medium and big demons; noting you haven't seen before in a video game about hell (or a dozen other subjects). You also have a 7-layer depiction of hell that ranges from "ho-hum another wall made of souls and guts" to "Wow, those little demons bursting from the big demon's nipples were a nice touch!" -kinda moments.

It all reeks of unoriginality. (But that's fine, it's not like it is an original story either...)


It's not bad, though. The good parts are still good, but the whole lands short of it's clone-father; GoW just does everything slightly better, has a bit more style - and face it: if Dante and Kratos were put in the same room, Kratos would come out the winner, with Dante following him on a leash and wagging his... err... tail. ;)

If you're a 360 owner, this is pretty much as close as you can get to GoW - without the Greek parts, and with a lot more tits and darkness.

Addentum on 8.2.2010:

Now that I've played the game to completion I have to hand it one thing: the pre-rendered cut-scenes between different acts (and especially the one in the end) are nothing short of gorgeous. Of course these are made by a 3rd party studio (Blur) that has shown excellent results in recent games like Dragon Age: Origins, and have little to do with the game itself. In fact, in the last video it's eerie to see a really different looking Satan in the cut-scene from what you just fought on the "pentagram". Nevertheless, they build up the immersion pretty well.

The game itself held together pretty well to the end - being pretty much the same fare than in the earlier levels. No real "ooh, aah" -moments (aside from the cut-scenes), but no real feeling of boredom or insurmountable opposition.


Score 7.5/10

Movie: Moon (2009)

It's a good sci-fi movie in the spirit of 2001 and makes you think thoughts like watching The Blade Runner.

Watch it. Sam Rockwell is good.

iPhone review: iBomber

Price: free (on 1.2.2010), lite version available
Publisher: Cobra Mobile
Release date: 18.7.2009

iBomber is a top-down bombing game where you never actually see your own plane, but rather view the action from the bombing scopes.

The era is WW2 and you're bombing Japanese targets in 14 missions that range from target bombing to escorting a fleet of ships through an archipelago.

Along with your basic, unlimited bombs, you can collect limited power-ups that include "triple bombs" called Blockbusters, black bombs that are more powerful that basic ones and the Grand Slam, or "The Nuke" as I like to call it; a single powerful, but slow moving bomb.

The other power-up is the health booster that will heal you for a small amount (pictured left).

You collect the power-ups by touching them on the screen (luckily you don't have to hit them with bombs, as they stay on the screen only for a short while).

Controls are fairly easy; you turn and control your speed by tilting the device and hit the only button available to drop your bombs (creatively labeled "BOMBS AWAY"). The forward / backward tilt is calibrated in the menu, so you can play at an angle that feels natural to you.

Speed of course affects how far your bombs will land from the initial dropping location, but unlike real bombers, yours will nearly turn "on a dime". All it's really missing is reverse.

Different enemies of course take different amounts of bombs to destroy, from the small mg-placements that only take one bomb to the battleships and carriers that take several (or a well placed "nuke", which is the slowest moving bomb in the game, and which "duds" if you hit the water with it).

You can also hit airplanes with your bombs, of which there are several kinds; small escorts that circle around islands or carriers, bigger bomber types and some US fighters.

Everything on the map is of course committed to killing you (with the exception of command huts, fuel depos, etc stationary targets), so those health power-ups not only come in handy; they are mandatory to your survival.

Your health is shown on the left, right next to your radar that will show enemies as red blimps, allies as green and mission targets as yellow triangles. The radar acts like the real counterpart, only showing the location and heading of the targets for a time after a radar sweep.

Gameplay is mostly fun, and why not; dropping bombs and seeing things explode is a great way to pass the time. Some missions feel a bit long though, and especially the escorting missions tend to take some of the fun away while you're juggling between the protection detail and gathering health-ups to keep yourself alive. In the latter missions, the flaming death spin that drops you from the skies becomes a somewhat a familiar sight.

Graphics are good - you have little trouble distinguishing what is what, and even in this small scale you can tell a destroyer from a battleship, etc.

Sound is mostly nothing to write home about. Its your standard fare of explosions, splashes and flak.

It's free (in early February, at least), so you can't really complain.

Score: 8/10

First Impressions: Mass Effect 2

While not the prettiest game on the block, and not without hassles (invisible, invulnerable enemies that force you to reload, anyone?), it still feels like a genuine "Mass Effect" experience.

I could nitpick all day, but in the end it's still going to the top of my list of games I'll have to finish "now!". ;)

Qnd Review: Race Pro (Xbox 360)

Currently you can get Race Pro for 10.49 eur at Play.com.

Simbin; makers of such racing games as GT-R and GT Legends (not to be confused with the legendary GP Legends). So what does the Swedish developer's second-newest console racer (newest being Race On) taste like now that it's in the bargain bins?

Bland, I'm afraid.

I like the occasional arcade racer just fine; Forza 1 and 2 were very good, Gran Turismo series on the Playstation is amazing (since the first PSX installment - I think GT 2 is still my favourite). Even Grid on the consoles is nice (though nowhere near the Codemasters' masterpiece that Colin McRae 2 was in it's time).

But Race Pro? It cannot decide between "semi-serious" or "arcadey" racer and tries to walk the line between them, failing most of the time. The rate of failure changes from point to point, but the sum is around "pretty average".

Physics are really arcade, with grip being too unrealistic most of the time, and when you actually lose traction, it feels like you're playing the first TOCA game where the spins were "canned" - most of the time there's just no righting your car. Also, there's little warning when your rear end is starting to lose traction, and as said, when you do it's nearly always too late.

The AI's driving style ranges from "OK" to "horrible". They pay little heed to your position, sometimes plowing through you if you're returning to the track from a minor driving error, or paying you no heed at the corners.

As for the graphics and sound - the former are nothing to write home about. Not ugly by any means, but nothing your average racer didn't have a couple of years ago.

The sound is mostly passable, but at times it gets on your nerves - especially the revving sounds. One moment you might have a glorious roar and the next second you're hearing something awfully average (or even bad) - with little or no transition between the samples. It sounds like the game just cuts from "engine sample A at high revs" to "engine sample B at low revs" without any transition (if they're the same samples, there's even less reason not to transition more smoothly from high to low revs).

All in all, Race Pro is very average. Bringing nothing but a dumbed down racer to the consoles. At less than 11 euros it's not that bad - but honestly, I'd rather play Grid (more on that later, perhaps) or Ferrari Challenge if I'm looking for a cheap racer.


Score 6.5/10

QnD Review: The Saboteur (Xbox 360)

You know, I'm tired of everyone saying this is "Pandmic's Swan Song". It might very well be true, but I'd rather remember the bunch from a couple of nice games like the Mercenaries 2 and The Saboteur.

Both are sandbox games that offer you great freedom - the other taking place in a tropical South American island and the latter, in WW2 era Paris (and environs).

While not a masterpiece, or even a contender for the game of the year, The Saboteur is a very nice game in itself.

Like I said, the game gives you great freedom; Paris is at your fingertips, you can roam around, do side quests, climb tall buildings (the Eiffel tower, anyone?), visit raunchy stripclubs, etc.

The areas of Paris that are still nazi-occupied (ie. the ones you haven't had chance to blow up yet) are artistically colored gray. When you free an area, the color comes back in. While a great idea, most people probably prefer the nice black and white artistic style with dabs of color like red blood, a blue necklace, etc.

Movement and fighting controls are a bit restless, but the vehicle controls are even more so. Most cars handle like they had too little weight, especially if you try the handbrake, and none of the vehicles handle like period cars.

While lacking character advancement, you do get "perks" you unlock by doing specific things like beating five nazis, blowing X number of things up, etc. Perks are essentially new attacks, bonuses to things like shooting, bomb setting timers, etc. All handy stuff that'll make you so much more effective at liberating Paris.

The story is nothing to write home about; there's the main villain, revenge, the nice girl and the naughty one, etc.

What sets The Saboteur apart a little, is the use of very adult themes throughout the game. You have topless dancers, lots of blood and violence, drinking, bar fights, etc. In short; good fun all around. ;)


So should you get The Saboteur? Yeah, I think so. Especially if you're a friend of open world sandbox games like GTA, Mercenaries 2 or Saint's Row. The WW2 might be a genre that has been game-developed to death, but as you can see from the list I just mentioned - no great WW2 era "GTA" games are around. It's a different experience from modern cars, planes and helicopters or heat seeking missiles and "ho-beating, drug trafficing".


Score 8/10


You can get Xbox 360 version of The Saboteur from Play-Asia for $49,90.

Also, the PS3 and PC versions are available.

On the Cheap: Risen (Xbox 360)

Play-Asia has Risen, the latest RPG from the developers of the Gothic series, on sale for $19,90.

Version is the region free NTSC-J.