Every gamer has similar stories, of games that weren’t worth their money and games worth hugely more. We are just as thrilled with surprises as we are disappointed by games we had high expectations for.

Q1 2010 had maybe the largest gluttony of A+ releases of all time. Sadly my wallet is ever thinning and I wasn’t able to purchase all the games I wanted time of release so decisions had to made. Mass Effect 2 was one of the games that got pushed back in favor of Bioshock 2 and God of War 3. Final Fantasy 13 waits for the $20 price point.

For both Bioshock 2 and God of War 3 I got deals I was happy with at the time  but nowhere as good as the $10 dollars I got a new copy of Mass Effect 2.

Mass Effect 2 is the best Role Playing Experience I’ve ever been apart of. Note not “Role Playing Game”. Bioware has taken the pleasure of streamlining the entire experience of a ‘RPG’  but ultimately not really sacrificing anything. JJA does a better job of writing about the differences between the first and the second game and really I agree with most of what he says. I only want to talk about two most important aspects of the game and that’s the morality systems and the loyalty systems.

If given the choice in a game I will always play as the bad/evil/rancid human being. In trying to understand this phenomenon I believe it stems from in 95% of media you have no choice in being or following ‘The Saviour’. Mass Effect allows you to play either ‘Renegade’ where points are gained for apathetic and ruthless actions and ‘Paragon’ where points are gained for compassionate and heroic actions. Most of the time the outcome will be the same just approached a different way but in Mass Effect 2 the added layers make the choices much harder to make.

For the first 80% of the game I was taking the path of the Renegade but in turn shitting all over everybody including teammates. Really all this means is I was an asshole to everybody like I was in ME1. Compassion was thrown out the window and I didn’t give a crap about how anybody felt about me. I went as far as to have a very brief implied sexual encounter with an emotional teammate I hardly knew and sabotaged any growth in that relationship.

Late in the game I was becoming aware the end was near. I would have to take this team to the heart of ‘The Collectors‘ and I knew it was going to be a team effort. I started to become aware this team might not be as “Loyal” as I need them to be. I found Shepard becoming more compassionate and when asked to ask “Are You OK?” to a teammate I found myself asking that more then I ever did before. I also started making choices that didn’t go along with my run and gun fuck everybody Shepard I carried over from the first game. Mass Effect 2 without even knowing changed Shepard to a more complex character then I ever  thought possible.

The Loyalty system in Mass Effect 2 is maybe the largest stroke of genius in RP games of all time. In most RPG’s you either use characters becuase you have to or you use them because you like them. Mass Effect 1 I used Garrus the entire game becuase he was my favorite character. In turn I missed out using many characters becuase there was no reason to. The game even promoted that reasoning with the achievements for playing the game primarily using one teammate for a length of time.

For Mass Effect 2 for the best outcome you HAVE to use every character, at least for awhile, and work to earn their loyalty to the cause. In turn that makes you WANT to use every character for them to be ready for the final battle. Seriously I cannot believe nobody hasn’t come up with this before. Your team works for you but you have to work for them to work better for you. Every boss should be as involved in their employee’s lives as Shepard is.

The Loyalty missions vary in quality (as do all the missions it’s a long story and I’m not going to talk about it) but every character in the game I was able to spend enough time with and suffer no consequences for leveling mostly is a community task in Mass Effect 2. By the end I had a high awareness of what teammate would serve the tasks at hand and by the final battle you can choose what people you want to tackle the final boss with.

Despite every fault:

• Not enough mini games
• Long loads after death
• Cerberus Network/$DLC model
• Over simplified leveling, equipment choices, armor choices
• Not a single elevator (seriously the easiest inside joke they could have made of all time including one mandatory elevator ride)
• Thermo Clips (I liked the idea  of heat weapons of ME1. I think Bioware wanted to include the strategy of reloading and stronger cover mechanics in the sequel for some reason)

Mass Effect 2 really is one of the best gaming experiences I’ve ever had. The final mission is seriously genius and even if one is having a hard time getting though the first game the second is a must play in my book. It’s fantastic. There is so much to discuss….

Statistics: Vanlandw Shepard Level 27 Vanguard. Traveled to 100% of the non $DLC planets. No active Missions or Assignments. 875g 45 of 54 achievements. Played on ‘Hardcore’ difficulty throughout the entire game. My final romance was with Tali. Implied sex with two female teammates.

Suicide Mission requires important player choices these were mine. Vents: Tali Squad Leader One: Garrus Shields: Samara Squad Leader Two: Garrus Escort: None (stupid mistake I was caught up in the moment oh well) Final Team Miranda/Grunt (thinking balance Miranda Maxed out Warp skill Grunt powerful weapons really I don’t think it mattered who I choose you don’t need a single skill other then incinerate).

Time Played 48h.57m. I blew all my credits on upgrades before going though Omega-4 relay so I only had 19811 left over.

I went though a phase where I was going to mine and deplete every planet in the solar system out of spite for the Milky Way but abandoned that idea. Ended up with 861940 Palladium, 1003447 Irdium, 827969 Platinum, 147037 Element Zero left over at end game. Suggestion: Don’t  play the mining game too much I would suggest to just mine the planets with “Rich” content but make sure to travel to all planets to get bonus missions  and experience.

Update: In a move I don’t understand at all after the great usage of licensed music for the end of Mass Effect 1 the credits roll over a nondescript instrumental. Guess they ran out of budget money this time around.

One of these days I’m planning a Paragon female bi-sexual run.

Nobody seemed very happy about my final choice so before Mass Effect 3 comes out I  might replay the final 10% of the game and change a few decisions I disliked and screwed up on.

I also forgot to mention why this post is titled what is is. Shepard is seriously hysterical. There were multiple times I was laughing hysterically at him. There is a part where he can dance with a woman on a loyalty mission that is so funny. Also don’t forget Shepard slugging the reporter.

“I’ve had enough of your disingenuous assertions” BLAM!´Seriously that is so funny.

While at work at Thursday and having just a horrible day all around I was mentally thinking about fleeing, hiding and playing video games all night. Thinking about what games I already own nothing sounded like fun and had a rare retail bug and decided “ef it”. My mind was made up and I was going to buy a new game <gasp> not on sale.

The first game that came to mind for reasons I’ll never be able to decipher was Uncharted: Fillion’s Fortune.

Shit, I mean “Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune“.

To get this out of the way the player character of the game (Nathan “Nate” Drake) looks, sounds and is clearly inspired by Nathan Fillion somehow. Hell they share the same first name and I’m not alone in this deduction. Nathan Drake feels just like Malcolm Reynolds without having any tough guy qualities or notable skills and is written to be WAY too likable.

All the while mowing down countless human lives like a serial killer. Again I’m not alone in this deduction.

The non-playable cut scenes are well put together and the game’s strongest point. Drake and his token love interest (had to Google the name here I couldn’t even remember) Emily do have strong chemistry and you can genuinely tell in the game the actors were in the same room and that is a rarity in video game voice acting I’m sure.  On the disk there are “making of” videos that show how they filmed the motion capture (example here).

Completion stats for anybody interested. Took me 9 Hours 10 Minutes per my save game time to finish the game on “Hard” difficulty and was able to find 40 of 60 “Treasures” and earn 660 of 1000 “Medal Points”. After taking 10 mins and grinding a series of easy silver level trophies in the end I earned 74% of the trophies (37 of 48).

Uncharted is a game that is victim of needing to give the player something to do. An adventure game finding treasure and searching ruins with limited to no action just isn’t going to sell the units needed to make such a beautiful well acted game. Thus Mr. Nathan “Fillion” Drake became a sharpshooting mass murdering nice guy and Uncharted became Pitfall with Bullets. This I’m not saying is a bad thing I beat the game in two five hour sittings.

I’m too old for this shit. Undecim: 2

Update: (This update is bullshit I wrote this before even saving a draft) After doing some research on Drake apparently he’s based partially on Johnny Knoxville.

I also wanted to note that the “Everyman” trend in video games protagonists  is getting frustrating. Nolan North (VA f/ Drake and the guy from Shadow Complex ect) has been behind many of these characters that I ultimately end up disliking. North does good work but devs need to stop having “everymen” have the ability to kill countless people and overcome countless impossible odds. It’s a trait I don’t identify with behind the barrel of a gun in games for some reason. SOMETHING needs to set you apart from everybody else. Gordon Freeman is a theoretical physicist and has the hazard suit. Drake has a cute smile and a stylish pair of jeans….and apparently the abilty to absorb 300 bullets over the course of his adventure in paradise.

I believe my thoughts in regards to this trend and Uncharted is the rate of enemy encounters. If Uncharted was a three hour game and had less encounters more the action would feel warranted. On the flip side if the game was about fishing treasure from the bottom of the ocean with an appraisal mini-game in between I would complain the game is boring and needs more shooting.

Update 2: (A real one) I forgot to mention I have no idea how this game only got a “T” rating from the ESRB. 90% of the game you are violently using firearms directly upon human beings with blood coming from all hits. Also characters will say “god damn” and “shit” and there is smoking. I guess limbs must be flying and the “F” word must be said at least once to earn “M”. I guess Drake is so charming the ESRB folks decided to let him slide.

Update 3: Yahtzee says everything else I forgot to mention here.

My console is doing the behavior listed here http://support.microsoft.com/kb/907534 (three red blinking rings). Tried all troubleshooting steps listed and I don’t believe it’s an issue with the power supply as the light is green on the power brick when system is powered on and this happens on all power connections in my house. There was a disk in the drive and being unable to open the drive normally I used the method here http://support.microsoft.com/kb/906935 to remove the disk. There has been no modifications to the Xbox 360 and only operated under normal use. I would like to request the system returned has a HDMI port as the console I’m sending in has one included. This is my second repair order (Service Request Number: **********) during Xbox 360 ownership.

Thank You,
vanlandw
*****************
***********************
************

Gamertag: gaming vanlandw
Service Date: 2009/05/06
Serial Number: ************
Product Id: ********************

Regardless I’ll keep everybody in the loop with updates. Now to send my Xbox to UPS, get some food, and go to Vo’s to make sure my 360 Hard Drive isn’t completely fried.

Update 1: I forgot to note that I’m sending the Xbox to the repair center using the same box and shipping materials they returned my previous repaired Xbox. Also I’m using the Print Label feature this time rather then having to wait for a box to be sent to me. Hopefully turn around time won’t be over three weeks like last time.

Update 2: Rather then going directly thought UPS like I did last time I went to an authorized place in Jenison called Aim Mail Center. The gentleman working there was very helpful. Noticed I was having problems with my packing tape and came around the counter to help me. Great customer service.

Today I was also able to test the Hard Drive on my 360 and everything appears to be working  without a problem thankfully.

Update 3: My 360 has arrived in Texas….

Update 4: My 360 is out to delivery to Microsoft’s repair center…

Update 5: Looks like UPS is what is holding up this delivery. My “Rescheduled Delivery Date” has been updated three times so now is listed for June 28th. Things are going bad so far my rough ETA is up again to three weeks best case on the speed of UPS ground shipping. UGH

Update 6: I might have been quick to judge on UPS shipping. Their site now  lists the shipment as recieved at 06/25/2010 7:46p so the shipping turnaround so far is 100% acceptable if Mr. Mesquite TX recieved the shipment on Friday. Repair status at support.xbox.com lists the status still as “waiting for console”.

+1 UPS -1 Microsoft

Update 7:

I would be elated if my system got sent out tomorrow that means I would have it back maybe next Monday/Tuesday for slightly more then a two week downtime. I’ll make sure to keep everybody posted.

Update 8: Xbox sent me a really nice email confirming they received my console and will be sending me  another one right away. Enjoy this poorly photoshopped picture of the message. On my last repair they did not do this and it’s a step that is appreciated. The repair process for Xbox’s under warranty is fairly painless process and this step is a positive for customers who are not as anal as I am. +1 Microsoft

Update 9: June 29th 7:39 AM I received another email from Microsoft

An Xbox 360 console has been shipped to you from our service center.

Regardless of how weird ”An Xbox” sounds it’s nice to know a console is on the way. There is a chance system breakdown to return might be under two weeks. Personally I’m hoping to have it on Friday. So far so good. Watch me get returned a 2005 Xenon version with no HDMI and the shiny DVD drive scratched to shit and with children’s fingerprints on it.

Unlike my last repair Microsoft did go ahead and register my new console. They are returning me a “Xbox 360 Exchange Pro” and I have no idea what that means. The Internet doesn’t really either. If this site is to be believed deciphering the serial number shows my new Xbox was created in China and built in the year 2008. Gives good hope to being returned a HDMI model.

Update 10: 7-1-10 9a – It’s been over two days since Microsoft sent my Xbox back and my tracking status is still…“>>> UPS could not locate the shipment details for your request. Please verify your information and try again later.”

In the email sent they really did mean “It can take several business days for UPS tracking information to be updated online once your console leaves our shipping center.”

After being optimistic about return before the holiday there is no chance it comes before Friday. Best case next Tuesday.

Update 11: Yup next Tuesday at best sadly. My 360 hasn’t left Mesquite yet. Today at 12:52p the “Origin Scan” was placed. The emails sent from Microsoft are slightly misleading. That was over two days from the email sent saying my console has “shipped”. Also this is coming by ground so it will be about 2.5 weeks turn around. I’d rather them just email when the 360 has truthfully been shipped rather sitting somewhere for a few days. Assholes…

Update 12: Email sent today 7/3 from Xbox Live…

This mail is confirmation that your subscription to 1 Month for $1 has been cancelled on Saturday, July 03, 2010.

Given the membership is worthless without a console this message went straight to the trash. Assholes…

Update 13: Checking shipping status at UPS shows my 360 will be sitting in a warehouse in Wyoming MI for the next three days. I believe UPS doesn’t ship on Saturdays and they observe the 4th holiday on Monday. Thankfully it’s a busy weekend but it came REALLY close to getting my console returned before the holiday. Oh well I’ll let everybody know Tuesday how the return goes.

Update 14: As expected the UPS delivery came at 2:20pm July 6th 2010. Turnaround time from failure to return was June 20th – July 6th. If it wasn’t for the holiday worst case it would have been a day shorter. Faster then my last repair but that counted delivery of a box to send the console in that I wouldn’t suggest anybody to do. Make sure to just use any old box and use the free printing label option to make the repair time faster.

The return came with slightly different literature the second time around. Non personalized letter regarding admin functions (warranty registration, extended service contract). They also said they were sorry for the inconvenience of having to send the 360 in for repair. This was all handled in three languages. They also continue to give you a free month of XBL service that I will use when Halo Reach comes out (unless somebody wants to play something online but I don’t expect that to happen in the summer).

In two languages was a picture tutorial/reminder to reconnect the controller to the console.  In three languages a reminder regarding downloaded content due to the new serial number assigned to the console (this being my third 360 in 16 months).

This newest console was returned again with HDMI support (sorry Vo) and is again clearly a refurbished system. There are scratches on the body and wear along the hard drive chassis. I was also able to find some sticky residue and paper on the console as well. The power button and disk eject button are very firm and don’t feel as used as my first returned system. Overall this seems to be an upgrade. Even the smell is better.

Now that the console is returned I’m going to spend a few hours getting my downloaded content reauthorized and using the system for a little bit. I’ll update the post later today with hopefully final thoughts.

Update 15: One thing I would like to mention is how horrible reauthorizing your downloadable content is on a new console. It’s a terrible process. On my 360 I’ve downloaded 118 items, some that I want to keep some that I’ve already deleted. There is no way to reset this where it only auths the content that is on the HD or where the download list shows what you have. So for all 118 items you have to review if you have it still on your xbox or if you either need to redownload it or ignore it.  This process took forever and I ended up downloading items I didn’t want. Also you can’t queue up over 30 items as once so it needs to be baby sat. Doesn’t help how unresponsive the 360 menus are.

After getting the cords setup and using the power button for the first time the response on the button iss a little mushy. Seems that is to be expected on some systems but my previous two were not that way. The disk drive that came with the system seems to be the “BENQ VAD6038″ that at this point cannot be flashed or used for mods. The system seems very similar to my previous xbox’s I don’t believe it’s any different as the power adapter I’ve had since my first xbox works. Last night I played a few hours of Mass Effect 2 with no problems. The system appears to be quieter but I haven’t tried a game that was running off the disk yet.

At this point I’m going to call this saga closed.Overall really the process was rather painless but still not something I would hope anybody to have to deal with. With the amount of money invested into platform it can be stressful knowing the brain of the operation is sitting in southern Texas being repaired. Any questions on the repair process let me know.

I was able to get a good deal on PGR4 though a XBL bundle though of all places Best Buy last March. 13 Months of XBL/PGR4/Extra Headset/Chat Pad/Two Movie Tickets to Watchmen for $50 dollars. Knowing that this game would not be as polished and streamlined as Forza 3 was tough to stomach at first but after getting into career mode I was able to make some fun for myself.

For shooters I find myself playing the harder difficulties as I’m so leet and no enemy can touch me. For PGR4 I played on “Easy” like a puss since for the most part I suck at video game driving. After playing Forza 3 and loving the rewind feature I wanted to avoid as much as possible the “restart race” plague of racing games. Since most games in the genre require you to win races to progress and many times one bad turn can cost you the race it’s can be a time sink to keep retrying the same races. PGR4 on Easy mode is very forgiving but still challenging enough not to be a bore.

After finishing as much of the career mode as I wanted to I decided to do some achievement clean up. My favorite moment of the game has to be earning the Catch ‘Em All achievement. Requirements for the achievement are to “Swap paint with every opponent in an eight vehicle race”. At the time in the game my next race in career mode was an eight vehicle eliminator race against seven motorcycles. Thankfully I was able to choose whatever car wanted so I used the Koenigsegg CCX and ended up just plowing over every single motorcycle in sight for five minutes. This was hysterical to me. This video displays the methodology behind the achievement but I promise I did it in a much more interesting fashion. Reminded me of the old days of playing the Nascar games and instantly just turning your car around and in “Wrong Way” plowing into everybody.

Overall the game is still playable even with better racers on the market. The arcade rules and modes alongside real cars I found enjoyable and matched my play style and automotive interests. I played slightly over one year in career mode and tried every other mode in the game mostly for achievements and to try out my favorite cars. Over the course of the few days I played the game I tried multiple times to get into a race on XBL and sadly nobody was playing. Earned 630g getting 30 of 60 achievements with the ability to grind for more but decided not to. The soundtrack sucks aside from the Disturbed song. RUBY RUBY RUBY!

Amazon’s Gold Box deal had Mass Effect 2 at an extrodinarly good price. Thankfully I was home at time to jump right on it and score another good deal on a new’ish game. I’ve had rolling $10 game credit though Amazon for months and for the surge of new releases in 2010 I’ve saved over $100 over retail on my gaming purchases this year for various new releases. As much as it seems I spend a truckload of money on games many I’ve purchased for less then the price of a sitdown meal at a restaurant.

Note: Forgot to mention this purchase apparently qualified me again for a $5 MP3 credit. I was able to find one song (ending song from the documentary Moral Kombat) for download I’ve been meaning to get for awhile and would love to find some hidden jems on Amazon MP3 for download. Seriously any song recommendation would be appreciated.

There is a level in F.E.A.R. 2 where you are in an dilapidated elementary school. This is without question the best level in the game and the amount of detail to the enviroments are fantastic. Though the game your player character experiences a series of hallucinations. In the school level you will experience one and at a point in the level the lights in the school will start to flicker. Your screen will go to light to dark due to the nature of the game you have to move forward though the darkness to get to the next area. At this point I wasn’t on edge but as this section become prolonged I wanted to turn on my flashlight.

My flashlight wouldn’t turn on.

That was it. One small (I would be almost certan unintended) moment where the game took away a non-lethal item from my inventory and I was slightly on edge. It wasn’t the narative or the “shock” moments or even the game enviroments that made me aprehensive. Since playing Call of Duty 4 on veteran death in games means nothing to me anymore and is more of an expectancy then a fear. It was losing control of something I felt I needed to get though a problem.

F.E.A.R. 2 is the type of game that plays more friendly it’s predecessor but sadly the overall storyline is not as strong. Before playing F.E.A.R 2 I tried to play the orginal and it was tough. That game is very dark (visuals) many areas feel identical. It doesn’t help that the Xbox 360 single player achievements for F.E.A.R. 1 are bullshit. F.E.A.R 2 fixes any issues with the orginal with a better contrast in the levels but also takes you to different locals then just an office building without changing the game mechanics much. Also, the singleplayer achievements are much more rewarding and obtainable.

In F.E.A.R. 1 the shotgun is without question one of my favorite video game weapons of all time. F.E.A.R. 2 has two shotguns but none of them play as well as the shotgun in the orginal. All the weapons are brutal and this game is very violent and earns it’s mature rating in every way.

The series as a hole honestly comes recommended. Don’t let the images of an angry little girl on the cover turn you away from a good solid shooter. Alma is all grown up now and at the end you will know why. I played though the game on “Hard” difficulty but it plays more like Halo 3 on Heroic. Recieved all but one of the single player achievements on one playthough earning 475g and finding 63/70 “journal intelligence”. Undecim: Strong 2

They even gave me a nice sweatshirt for showing up!

I was able to play 24 invasion mode games (11 victories Total Time Played: 00d 03h 45m), one arena mode game (1 victory Total Time Played: 00d 00h 12m), and 16 standard games (Grab Bag/Free for All/Network  Test 1 9 victories Total Time Played: 00d 03h 45m).

I am UNSC

My player stats leave a bit to be desired. 387 kills/397 deaths/158 assists. Playing invasion matches in partictuar I felt that the death ratio was way to high in the game. Many of the modes are made to play franticly thus to win sometimes you have to throw yourself into situations tactiaclly that might not be intelligent. Your spartan is built to die. Best guess my average life was never over 60 seconds.

Conditioning to console mulitplayer could be in play for my inability to dominate. In Halo 3 when you die and the wait to respawn is way longer then in the Reach beta. Death is even a more active experience in Reach where at times you can pick your respawn point and your loadout. My favorite addtion is a carryover from co-op campaign where you can respawn at party member. Sadly this comes with a downside of if your friend if flying in the air and you spawn next to them you could possibly fall crashing to the ground. About five of my 397 deaths were accounted to this.

Most of the new addtions I found did not break the Halo experience. Aside from the strength of grenades (way to powerful) all the armor abilities felt fair and none of the new weapons felt over powered. As a Halo sceptic to Halo avocate Reach should be a fantastic game and might be the only game released in 2010 worth $59.99 plus 6% Michigan sales tax.

Note: Bungie has increasingly becoming less transparent. Their Bungie Weekly Update expecially the ones after the beta I found interesting to see how open they were regarding impending changes to the game come Fall. Also the Bungie Podcast is a good listen if you have any interest for a small insiders view to the development process. Both are worth checking out and is a small commitment. The weekly update clearly comes weekly and the podcast comes out I found about once a month.

Peggle came on my radar due to seeing browndr consistently on Xbox Live playing this game. After discussion I came to find it was his mother-in-law who was actually logging all the time. He did vouch that the game was fun so after finding out a Valve themed version of the game called Peggle Extreme was free on Steam I decided it was time to check the game out.

Peggle is about as casual as gaming comes. You hurl balls at dots scoring points to progress to the next puzzle. Peggle Extreme is more or less a glorified demo with only 10 levels. Upon launching and exiting the game you are nagged to upgrade to a version with more levels and features but for free what can you expect.

The game runs flawlessly on my EEEPC at 1024×600 resolution. So far I played though the brief adventure mode scoring 4,111,000 points.

The game is fun and addicting. There are versions available on almost every platform imaginable and comes recommended. At some point I plan on getting a full version of the game but I’m not sure on what platform. On my PC I could play everywhere but the 360 version would be nice too.

Note: Insult Swordfighting has a great post advocating games like Peggle over latest and greatest AAA titles.

Growing up my dark horse of gaming cred was being one of the largest fans of the original NES Bionic Commando.  As a young vanlandw I remember leaving the NES paused though a day of school at a friends house in attempts overtake the Badds and save Super Joe. When emulators were big in college I was finally able to make Hitler’s head explode and save the day with a story to tell. A few years ago when Capcom was doing their relaunch of the brand with Bionic Commando Rearmed the launch trailer for the Next Gen Bionic Commando left me worried but hopeful.  It appeared to be absolutely unrelated to the game I played as a boy but as a man hurling oneself off a building and swinging around sounds like a dream come true for gaming.

After following the green dot though Accession City I was right to be worried. Bionic Commando does everything a brand relaunch should avoid doing. They should have taken a look at how well Metal Gear Solid transitioned from it’s humble starts to it’s A list endings. Take the right stuff from where you started rather then shedding everything that made that was right in the first place.

Saying the 2009 edition is loosely related to the 1988 offering is an understatement. After thinking about what Rearmed ultimately became the developers were selling it as a remake but it was clearly a re-canon(not sure if this a real term or not) of the series. The Next Gen game is clearly (and loosely) based off Rearmed much to my dismay.

I will go as far as to say Nathan “Rad” Spencer is one of the worst video game characters of all time. Gamer Melodico posed the question “Who is the worst video game protagonist of all time?” and I confidently left a ballot with the following comment…

Yesterday I made it though a third of Bionic Commando (XB/PC/PS3) and Spencer in that game is horrible. He sounds to be similar to Cole (Infamous lead) where he’s always pist off and has absolutely no reason at all to be doing what he’s doing. During all this while murdering people he will display bouts of glee it’s just odd.

It’s a shame because the swing mechanics are great and it could be a good game if the protagonist’s drive could have been fixed.

During every cut scene or radio communication Spencer sounds like he’s furious. He’s also very vocal about not wanting to be doing what he’s doing and questioning his orders emotionally (emo?). Spencer is also voiced by the highly over rated Mike Patton. He did a terrible job in The Darkness and in Bionic Commando he’s no better. It’s not like his material here was his to ruin but he must have remembered only one line from Spencer’s character bio about being recently released from prison and carried it though the bulk of his performance. As the player you must ask yourself  if you or I were just released from prison and released to a recently bombed city to stylistically kill hundreds of enemies  how would you feel?

During game play Spencer of course has the typical one liners when eradicating his opponents. Using the sniper rifle he will vocally laugh almost devilishly or say something stupid like “That’s gotta hurt!” or “I’ll send you the bill!”. Before a boss battle Spencer will seriously for just one time in the entire game break the fourth wall and speak as the player saying one of the worst lines I’ve ever heard ever.

“Is that a long health bar or are you just happy to see me?”

Along with being a prick Spencer is absolutely unrelatable and I don’t see how anybody could feel sympathetic for him. Spencer’s main motivation though the game is to uncover information regarding his missing wife but when you find the conclusion it’s unfathomable why she would even give a shit about him in the first place.

Though the game your best friend will be the “marker”. HQ will constantly send you the right way to go and I would advise to never attempt to go anywhere other then that marker. In a development decision I’ll never understand there are 150 “collectibles” though the game that contribute to an achievement and unlocks viewable concept artwork. For reaching most of the collectibles risking death is required or to go off the beaten path and search them out. Due to Accession City just recently being bombed parts of the city are blue and radioactive thus unaccessible.  The games biggest crime is an affliction upon a gamers natural habit to explore or put another way break the game. Anybody who plays any game does this without even thinking about. Test the limits. See what you can get away with. Some of us like to look around and try to find easter eggs or find optimal paths.

Not call uno when you have uno and see if you can get away with it.

Bionic Commando punishes you to no end for doing this. Going into some of the radiated areas for a second will kill you. Game Over. Restart from checkpoint. Some of the collectibles will put you in harms way thus killing you thus making you sit though a long loading screen and taking away your progress. At least three times after finishing a long section of multiple boss type characters just trying to get to the green dot by mistake I swung into blue death resulting in doing that hard section over again. To make matters worse many areas are surrounded by water and Spencer being equipped with metal boots and one non-human arm your character will sink to the bottom. One bad swing and your ef’ed. Every game should checkpoint how Halo does where wiping an area of enemies the game checkpoints thus even if you screw up the enemies you killed are dead. They could have even allowed challenges and collectibles to stack after death so you wouldn’t have to redo so much. A gamers time is precious…

I played the game on the PS3. Owning Rearmed thankfully gave me the unlock of the “Classic” Spencer model as updated Spencer just looks like a reggae singer. Digital Foundry found technically (Frame Tearing) the PS3 version eclipses the 360 version (Link 1, Link 2) but I found frame rate issues in multiple areas. There are also multiple blur effects implemented so beware if those type of filters hurt your eyes. Last year Game Stop had the game on sale for $20 new so when I went to pick up a copy they showed a small bit of humanity and gave me the pre-order patches for free! I hate Game Stop.

Finished the game on “Hard” difficulty and really wouldn’t have had any problems if I wasn’t playing to complete the challenges. In a game like this achievements are typically given for reaching story points in the game but in Bionic Commando 90% of the achievements are for completing challenges like swinging and killing six enemies or killing a certain amount of guys with one attack. The masochist in me would almost do a run on “Commando (super hard) difficulty and try to pick up the three challenges I missed to get the  ”Bionically Challenged” trophy as that would be two gold trophies but I doubt that will happen. I also found 87/150 of the collectibles and passed about 10 I could have gotten but the fear of the blue death, redoing fights, and the devil water the decision was made to pass them.

There was a man long ago that said and I quote “but in the end it doesn’t even matter”. The final 5% of the game is actually quite fun and almost inspired. The last two boss battles are not hard and there is some deviation from the city scape. Sadly the initial impression of the game is what I’m going to remember most and I believe most reviewers feel the same way I do. The swing mecanics I was so excited about sadly aren’t given the room they need to work. The game shockingly doesn’t have many vistas where it opens up and lets you swing around and the combat gets in the way many times. Point A  to Point B. Green Dot to Green Dot. Most of your arm work goes into killing people or climbing up structures to kill people. I would love to see an open world/sandbox game take the swing mechanics and use them properly.

Bionic Commando ends like most games that want to be trilogies do. After the credits an indecipherable message that requires the internet to figure out plays on top of a cliffhanger ending for Spencer. Video games have never been kind to their early adopters imagine if you paid $60 dollars for this game for an ending that answers hardly nothing but selling you more. Typical.

Undecim -2.

Postscript: There were a few things in this post I forgot to mention that is worth bringing up. First are the horrible advertisements littered throughout the city scape of the game. Normally I don’t get up in arms about this but these ads are horrible and might be worse then the ones contained in Mercenaries 2. Most of the billboards are extraordinarily low res textures and I would almost assume it was done on purpose so they stick out even more.  The in-game posters for the Dark Void game in particular are impossible to even make out whats on them the textures are so low resolution. There are buildings that are named “Bionic Commando Rearmed” but they might be movie theaters I have no idea. Pepsi ads are on buildings and oddly placed Tricell ads as well. Tricell is from the Resident Evil verse so building a bridge there makes no scene at all.

On a positive note the soundtrack is done very well. There seems to be multiple composers so it’s hard to give proper credit to one individual. From the original tracks to the remixes from the original game there is not one bad track and worth checking out.

The aspects I enjoyed most about Far Cry 2 was in the areas of game design where there was a conscious effort to change aspects of shooters where innovation was stagnant. In any game where you play as a human it’s just illogical for your character to be a bullet sponge. Since Halo 2 and 100% regenerative health games like Call of Duty have taken an armor ability carried it over to the everyday soldier. For keeping the pacing of a game swift recovering from wounds in seconds might be cool but for everybody to be like Wolverine just doesn’t make any sense. How damage is handled in shooters is something I’ve wanted changed for along time.

Far Cry 2 to a degree has regenerative health but after receiving enough damage your character will be “wounded” and need to patch himself up or you will die. This idea alone is welcome. It bothers me when a human character can be shot millions of times and there isn’t the slightest consequence. Snake Eater tried “proper” healing but the menus were so slow it became a full time job keeping Snake moving. In Far Cry 2 this is done with a single button but it can impact combat.

Another thing to watch out for is jamming weapons. Almost all shooters have weapons ALWAYS work how they are suppose to. Guns shoot exactly the same time every time, and reload in the same amount off time and show the same reload animation every reload. I believe this is due to multiplayer balancing but sadly that  has carried over into campaign. Far Cry 2 introduces weapons that will misfire. Weapons that are purchased at the store and maintained well won’t misfire as much but pick up a gun from a dead enemy is a chance you shouldn’t take lightly.

Far Cry 2 is a game about killing tons of enemies, completing missions from dedicated drops, and performing a few mundane tasks given to you from horrible people and completed by a horrible person. Cars will break down and need to be repaired. Your body has contracted a deadly disease and needs pills routinely at the worst times possible. Cell tower assassination missions remind me of dating in Grand Theft Auto 4. You don’t have to do it but you will want to. The “I’ll get to it when I can get to it” thought of game design is here in full. There is a token achievement for doing all them.

As with any game the good comes the bad. Most of your time is spent traveling from one area to the next. Between these areas will be random armed cars trying to kill you. After that you will hit a check point where you will want to try to bypass it because you have killed so many guys but mostly fail and end up having to kill everybody in an more inconvenient manor. This whole game is killing. Everybody wants to kill you. Screw with the guys in the safe zone they want to kill you every single one of them. On sight 99% of people in the game want you dead instantly. Enemy AI goes from brilliant to horrible to frustrating to exhilarating. Some time just getting to the mission area one guy will hardly see you though  high grass, wake up everybody and then everybody wants you dead. I preferred playing most situations with the stealth approach with silenced weapons. 85% of the time some random guy would see me and totally ruin my plan. When my plan worked though it’s a damn good feeling. Finishing an objective without being spotted is great.

Completion Stats: These stats are from the last save point before you make your final “choice”. After that part the game can be completed after killing maybe five dudes and going up a few hills. I played as the character “Hakim Echebbi” because I found him reserved and slightly handsome. Played on Normal difficulty and earned 520 gamer score.

Game completed: 96% (I beat it?)
Main missions done: 29/32 (I can’t imagine I missed any who knows)
Buddy missions done: 12/12
Side missions done: 20/40
Underground missions done: 5
Buddies met: 9
Buddies deceased: 6
Buddies abandoned: 1 (due to glitch I had to save him like four times and kept dying and ran out of healing shit)
Buddy rescues: 11
Best buddy: nobody (had two during the course of the game)
Diamonds found: 737 (I found about 100 of the random 221 briefcases)
Current diamonds: 495
Weapons bought: 7
Accuracy upgrades bought: 5
Reliability upgrades bought: 5
Repair upgrades bought: 0
Ammo upgrades bought: 6
Favorite primary weapon: MP-5
Favorite secondary weapon: 6P9
Favorite special weapon: M-249 (must work off bullets fired I used either a launcher or a dart gun 99% of the time)
Total shots fired: 21241
Shot accuracy: 29%
Wounds healed: 180
Total time played: 24:08:57
Total game days: 15
Distance walked: 129km
Distance driven: 165km
Distance swam: 1km

Of all the statistics this game doesn’t keep is the amount of casualties . My estimate I would say over 5,000.

In the end I hope more games take the successful parts of Far Cry 2 and expand rather then doing Call of Duty/Halo over and over again on the console. This post could go a lot longer discussing more of the various wins and losses of the game but this is enough. Undecim: 3

Note: If there is any interest in this game but you don’t feel like actually playing it I would HIGHLY suggest to check out Ben Abraham’s Permanent Death series. He chronicles playing the game where he will quit playing when he dies thus no continues or loading from a save game. You die your dead game 100% over. The PDF is beautiful and I would buy printout of it if I could it’s that cool of an idea. Also Clint Hocking (FC2 Creative Director) has a great game design blog about the game in his archives and his GDC talks are interesting reads too.