QnD Quick Review: Call of Duty: Black Ops

Let me start this by telling about my history with CoD; I've played pretty much every CoD game (except "The Big Red One") that ever came out, on pretty much every platform that ever came out (excluding the handheld PSP).

Most have been from "Good" to "OK" with a few exceptions that were just "Blah!". Those few exceptions seemed to drag the otherwise good series under the bar of "good".

- CoD, the first one, was OK. Nothing special.
- CoD2 was good. It was still mostly a "pipe-run", but the awesome Normandy beach invasion was something you'd never seen before. It felt like you were dropped straight in "Private Ryan".
- CoD3 looked like the previous ones, but the gameplay was uninspired, the feeling of running inside a glass pipe was bigger and it was... in a word "Bleh!"
- CoD 4, ie Modern Warfare, was something I thought I'd never like since "CoD is a WW2 game!" - wrong. The game was good. Not awesome, but good.
- The fift CoD, World at War, was another CoD that seemed to capture the feeling of "no-freedom" with uninspired gameplay and plot. Ie another "Bleh!" CoD...
- MW2 was a bit better than the first foray into Modern Warfare, nearing the "awesome" line. Gameplay was fast, weapons great and game balance good.

Then there's CoD: Black Ops. Do you know what's in common with CoD, CoD: WaW and CoD: Black Ops? They're all made by the same studio: Treyarch.

Now,  Call of Duty: Black Ops, at first, looked like Modern Warfare, but played like World at War. The feeling of The Glass Pipe was still there, not as pronounced as in WaW or CoD, but still. Mostly what pisses me off about Black Ops were the many unintuitive missions and "choices" (I use the word with quotes since you really have *no* choice while playing this game) sprinkled in the game. Oh, and the endlessly spawning enemies.

Take one of the Vietnam missions for example; the NVA is assaulting your position and you're told by the game's waypoint system to advance to the first trench. I did this a dozen time, each time dying to the endless mass of respawning enemies.

At one point I half-noticed, while taking cover behind some sand bags, that one of the AIs was doing something behind the bags. After a couple of more failed tries, I noticed this again. This time I saw he stabbed a barrel and kicked it down the hill.

"Nice" I thought, I'll shoot it and it'll probably blow up. Err... No. Nothing happened when I sprayed it with a M60 machine gun. Damn, that's one tough barrel...

Next time I noticed there were more barrels, oh! After 15+ tries - I finally "got it"; you had to "use" each barrel and they would blow up after *all of them* were rigged with C5, stabbed and kicked down the hill. Well, doh! Why wouldn't the damn AIs just come up and say so. Not do something, somewhere, while mumbling to themselves - not something you're likely to hear in a place where hundreds of bullets are whizzing by and grenades are exploding...

Those kinds of "what-where-why" -moments are common in Black Ops. Sometimes you're left wondering why you have to do something just because it's the "Only Right Way To Do It" (tm)...


As for the graphics, they are OK. Exploding enemies and dismemberment by the heavier weapons are mostly just comic "LOL" moments though. (Uhh, like a magnum revolver or M60 would blow off limbs.) Sometimes you feel like you're playing Rambo The Video Game, and not just because of the Vietnam missions.

(Especially in the end) the game is another "Praise the US" -type thing which has no problems dismembering, neck-stabbing, gutting or just plain wholesale slaughtering enemies and blowing up poor third world bamboo huts, while lamenting the death of one "young soldier" mid-mission in a totally out of place WTF-moment.

Also, the absolute stupidity of the main character just plain leaves you flabbergasted at some points - how many god damn times does he have to get knocked down or unconscious by the same damn bad guy? The only enemy that can, without any trouble, surprise and drop the main guy with one blow does it like 4-5 times? Get a friggin' clue man!

Oh, and of course there are nazis - this is the sixties after all (WTF!?!?)...

So in short? Black Ops is a game with zero freedom, uninteresting plot, cliche missions, cliche enemies and pretty much nothing new, all mixed in a very predictible plot.  The best thing is that it won't last more than 5-6 hours even if you take your time.

So, in keeping with history, Treyarch have made another crappy CoD game. I should be familiar with how the thing goes by now; big advertising budget makes sure the game sells outrageously well while still being a steaming pile of crap compared to the "good" CoD games. Oh, well... It's still a good series if you ignore every CoD they make...

Score: 7/10

Wii Quickie

Yeah, I got a Wii - a system I thought I'd never buy.

It's for the wife and kids (yeah, yeah). A lovely red 25th anniversary Mario console.

Thus far I've got a few "must haves" for it.

Quick recaps for them:
Okami: this is what the game should have been in the first place. I first played it on the PS2 and while it was refreshingly different, "something" was missing. The motion controls complement the game nicely. All in all a good addition to the Wii library and better version than the PS2 one.

Zack & Wiki: Even with the motion control "gimmick" it feels like one of those good old adventure games. Find stuff, find a use for stuff, get treasure. All this while wiggling the controller in various ways. A rare gem.

Madworld: Graphics stolen from Miller's Sin City, gameplay stolen from any old 3rd person beat'em up - the game is more a curiosity than a real "must have". Then again, you can get it for nearly free as used (I paid around 7 euros shipped home).

Metroid 3: It's the Wii's own Halo. Nothing special, though you can see the effort and professionalism the team put in it; it hardly looks like your usual Wii game (which usually means poor graphics, textures and general "last-gen" look).


Oh, and another must have was a decent component cable. I still don't understand why they ship the consoles with crappy composite cables (well, I do: to sell you over-prices composite cables).

Anyways, Madcatz to the rescue with their "Universal" (PS2/3, Xbox 360, Wii) cable for 9,95 eur. Recommended.

QnD Quickie: Kane and Lynch 2 (PS3)

Price: 6.99 eur
Where: Play.com

Lets get this out of the way: the first Kane and Lynch was better, period.

It wasn't praised by the critics, but it was still an OK action gamer and even had a somewhat decent multiplayer offering with a twist (people could turn on each other mid-mission).

The second K&L game suffers from sub-par graphical outlook, which can be attributed to the "camcorder"-feel the game tries to capture. After you disable the motion sickness inducing shaky cam option, you're left with a game that could look a lot better and is deliberately made to look worse for "cam packing artifacts", etc).

But what annoys me most is the fact that enemies have somehow changed from normal humans they were in the previous game to nearly bullet-proof super humans; you can actually shoot someone in the head several times before he keels over. Sometimes an enemy may require as many as ten shots all around the body to die - and this is in the normal difficulty level.

On top of that, the controls, and especially the targetting, is way worse than in the previous game. Not to mention way below the best offerings of the genre. Even the cover system works "iffy" sometimes.

All in all; being such a cheapie at the moment I guess I shouldn't have expected anything special from a game that costs around 1 eur per point I gave it... ;)



Score: 6.5 / 10

Status update 2011

Still mostly playing LotRO (hunter now level 51, minstrel 37), with the occasional little console gaming (Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood mostly, lately - a very good game, like all previous ones thus far).

Oh, and as for 2010 and non-gaming stuff; Machete and The Walking Dead rocked.

One was funny, full of satire and over the top gory violence and the other was like watching a George Romero movie that was six episodes long. One of the older, good Romero movies.

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).