Gearheads of War

You know for many, many years I've been a guy who likes to buy and try a lot of games.  But over the last several months, I've started to grow a little disgusted with spending $60 for a game that I often get bored of in the first hour or two.  I should probably just cave in and get a Gamefly subscription because Gamestop has gotten a ton of trades from me over the years and I'm probably losing a bunch of money on that.

I honestly think that Prototype was sort of the game that threw me over the edge.  I loved it when I played it at E3.  It was a blast, but you never know about the full game and whether or not it will have lasting appeal or not.  Prototype didn't as many open world games don't.  Although I am pretty happy with inFamous.  I think the thing is that there is never a chance to kind of catch your breath in Prototype and when the action really ramps up, it just appears like a clusterf@%^ on your screen.  And even though you're a bad ass, there only seems to be a certain attack that you need to do over and over in order to win.  And seriously the most fun part of Prototype in my experience wasn't necessary the battling part.  It was more running through the street and knocking over pedestrians like they were bowling pins.  I was just crushed because I had such high hopes for it.  

And yes, I liked Red Faction, but I haven't been hooked like many other people were.  You know, I know a lot of people loved the destructibility, but I liked the destructibility better in Battlefield: Bad Company.  There's just something about third person open world games that are having a hard time hooking me in, although inFamous has done a good job with it.  Maybe it's because the guns weren't all that appealing to me.  Or maybe I'm just becoming a cynical old gamer.

So I think I've decided to become more of a renter and only buying the games for the franchises that I know I love.  Assassin's Creed, Call of Duty, even Halo and obviously Gears.  And then my sports games.  I love me some FIFA and NHL.  Other than that, I think my epiphany is that I need to ultimately be more choosy and rent more.  I'm done spending $60 for games that I get an hour or two out of and then burn out.  And trust me, I'm not saying that it's the games, it might just be that I'm becoming a picky old man.

Have your purchasing habits changed?  Are you renting more now that the economy is kind of in the toilet?

Prototype Review

What's up guys, Elite here. This is my first text review so let me explain how this is going to work. First, I'm going to give a brief info on the game and then have bulleted points for each major topic of the game (i.e. Story, Gameplay,etc.) Then after all of that I'll give my final thoughts of the game, give my score out of 5 stars, and recommend if it's a Buy, Worth A Try (Rent), or Let Die. So without further ado, here's my review.

[WARNING: I have not completed the game yet, so this is just my general impressions as of 5 or so hours of gameplay. Again, MY opinion.]

Today I'm gonna be reviewing Prototype for the Xbox 360. Prototype is an open-world sandbox-type of game developed by Radical Entertainment.The game is available on Microsoft Windows, Xbox 360, and PlayStation 3 platforms.

OK so it's been a week now since I experienced my first E3 and I've realized that there are a few things that have changed about me since that experience.

First and foremost, I've decided to give Mass Effect another spin.  One of the games that nearly all the enthusiast press came away talking about was Mass Effect 2.  And it made me realize that I may have never given the first game a fair try.  I got to this part in the Citadel where I just got bored and finally gave up, especially because I chose the sniper class and I couldn't seem to snipe in the game.  It was like I had serious arthritis and Parkinson's Disease all at once try to snipe the Geth.  So this time I restarted the game as a soldier and it works sooooo much better.  The shooting still isn't terribly smooth and where I need to go at times is still a little confusing, but I'm enjoying it 1,000 times better so far and I'm determined to get through this game if it kills me.  I desperately want to be able to bring over my character to the next one which looks and supposedly plays much differently.

The other big thing that came out of E3 was that I'm seriously excited about a game called The Saboteur.  If you haven't seen much here, check out this video on Game Videos.  It really looks like a lot of fun and the art style is pretty impressive.  I love the black and white combined with splashes of color.  And how can you not love the dude from Pandemic who is sporting the Mercenaries-like hairdo?  I mean seriously, you have to support that guy.

Finally, I picked up Prototype today and played it a bit tonight.  My initial impressions are good so far.  Although I ran into the first boss battle tonight which seemed like it should be a battle that should be in the latter part of the game considering the difficulty of it because you're running around at such a frenetic pace in an enclosed space that it's tough to figure out how to complete the mission and Alex Mercer doesn't necessarily do what you're trying to have him do.  I'm now a little fearful that one of the games that I was looking the most forward to in 2009 could be a letdown because of control issues at times.  I'll let you know if it persists or this initial boss battle was an aberration.  If anyone else has gotten deeper in the game, by all means, share.  I'd love to hear if it continues like that or gets better.  I noticed a lot of people playing Prototype already.

I still have a lot more to say about E3 and will continue to jibber jabber about it for a while as stuff comes to mind.

Well, I was just shocked to see IGN give Prototype a 7.5.  I think it means that there is still enough game in there for those who like the genre to consider it a 10/10, but still...sheesh!  7.5!  LOL

*makes me wonder what IGN gave Hulk.

Metacritic

PS3 Prototype  93%

360 Prototype  87%

'tis a study in fanboi-ism.  LMAO

I have found that there has been an addition to the opening of the prototype game. (origninal here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIAh2... think that it was a great addition to it and here is the new video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wBeL5...

Recently, I put down a reservation on Prototype.  I've talked that game up quite a bit simply because I love the developer.  Or I should say, I love what the developer did with Hulk: Ultimate Destruction.  I still occasionally pop that game in to get the feeling of being ridiculously powerful.  I think in gaming, that gets lost sometimes with developers who feel the need to always be trying to challenge the user rather than just giving you some fun crap to do.  Most of us sit down with our controllers at the end of a long week to relax and just go nuts with some stuff.  Whether that's climbing buildings or jumping 150 feet in the air, Radical just knows what to do.

But then I recently saw this Bonus Round where it was discussed that new IPs might be one of the parts of the gaming industry that will suffer the most.  That made me really sad because it's been the new IPs this generation that have captured my imagination (and gaming time) the most.  Gears of War and Assassin's Creed are the two that spring to mind first and foremost.  Almost all of the sequels, except for Call of Duty 4, have been a bit of a disappointment in one way or another.  And Call of Duty 4 was kind of a re-launching of the franchise in a way, so it was almost a new IP.  The Halo 3's and GTA IV's of the world have been disappointing to me and I'm guessing it's because these weren't new experiences.  It's was kind of the basic gameplay was the game.  I mean I remember playing GTA III and I loved it on my PS2.  It was brand new and I hadn't felt like I'd done anything like that before in video games.  It's the curse of being hugely successful...everyone and their brother tries to copy what you do to be successful in the first place and that NEW feeling suddenly dissipates.

New IPs often come with some new excitement.  Dead Space, Mirror's Edge were both new IPs last year but unfortunately, they woefully underperformed in terms of sales.  My personal game of the year 2008, LittleBigPlanet, was a new IP that, in my opinion, was one of the better games of the last 10 years.  I literally can pick up and play that game after being away for two weeks and have a new experience because of all the user-generated content.  It's remarkable.  And yet it was one of those games that I wasn't that hyped up about before I actually bought it and sat down and played it.

I've been wondering what game might reach out and grab me in 2009 that same way.  And I suspect that out of the Uncharted 2's, Assassin's Creed 2's, Bioshock 2's and Modern Warfare 2, it will be a new IP that will reach up and hook me from out of the blue.

Now maybe this is the question I should ask once we know for sure all that is coming in 2009.  New IPs aren't growing on trees this year.  Although a few seem pretty awesome.  inFamous and Prototype have been discussed here at length.  MAG, or Massive Action Game (good lord, that is the worst name in the history of gaming), seems like it could be really cool if the gameplay can match up.  But one game that has caught my eye recently is Singularity.  It looks like it's really cool to use the time-shifting powers of the glove in the game to do things like create cover for yourself.  It looks like battles can be really dynamic.  Check out this video.  I love how he throws a barrel up against a wall distracting the sniper long enough so he can move forward.  That's just awesome AI.  The shooting has me a little concerned as it looks squishy and not really refined, but that might just be because it's still pretty early.

Then there is a game like Fat Princess that is downloadable for PlayStation 3 that just oozes creativity.  My one issue with that being that not enough Gearheads own PS3's, so I might pass on that until somewhere down the road.

Dark Void looks pretty fantastic too, from the guys who made Crimson Skies for the original Xbox, which was an incredibly fun game with a hokey, but also charming story.  

And obviously Alan Wake would rank right near the top if it happens to make it out in 2009.  But that's still up in the air.  I'm not convinced we're going to see that this year.  I'm pretty sure we're looking at 2010 for that one still.  But who knows, maybe I'll be surprised.

Any way, what new IP are you looking the most forward to in 2009?  I'd probably say mine is still Prototype, but Singularity could really be cool.  Who would've guessed that two of my most anticipated 2009 new IPs would be from the behemoth company known for regurgitating franchises until they are ridiculously stale?  Activision.  Put Modern Warfare 2 in there and suddenly Activision is looking at getting quite a bit of money from me in 2009.

I'm guessing there are quite a few that I'm not even thinking of right now that many will remind me of in the comments.  But those are the ones that are top of mind for me right now.  What games get you pumped for 2009?

First of all, I want to thank everyone who made nice comments in my 2009 sucks thread.  I'm going to try to move onto other things and get this Gearheads ship righted after all the distractions lately, so here goes.

It's turned into a big of a raging debate as to whether people should pick up the PS3 exclusive title, inFamous, with the electro-charged main character.  Or the Hulk: Ultimate Destruction-like Prototype, not coincidentally made by the same folks who made the outstanding and ridiculously fun H:UD.

I could wind up getting both because both of these games are right in my wheelhouse in terms of what kinds of games I love.  They seem to both have a smidge of Assassin's Creed to them and GTA but with much more fun because the badass quotient is much higher.

I'm personally more excited about Prototype right now.  It looks like it's just a lot more brutal and visceral.  There feels like something impersonal about using electricity instead of huge blades that come out of your arms.  Or even the ability to suck out an enemy's essence and then change into that enemy to disguise yourself.  One of my favorite games in the last say, five years, was Assassin's Creed and one of the best parts of that game was being stealthy in walking up to a target casually and then basically sticking them with your wrist blade.

Prototype doesn't seem like it has much stealth, but at least it's present.  But we shall see.  I know if inFamous releases to a ton of critical acclaim, I'll have to pick it up.  I actually love sandbox games that make you feel badass.  Crackdown was great, although there was really no story to ever really make me feel connected to it and once I was done with that game I was really, really done with it.  I remember finishing the game co-op with MDK and just telling him, I don't think I'll ever touch this game again.  And I didn't other than trading it in.

But Prototype was one of my most anticipated games LAST year.  That hasn't really changed in large part because Hulk: UD was one of my very favorite games of the last generation.  That game was brilliant.  And to add different elements and abilities in what appears to be a very similar kind of game?  Well, that just strikes me as the secret sauce right there.

What do you think?  Are you a Prototype or an inFamous kind of gamer?  Which looks like the better bad ass, open world, great abilities kind of game to you?

Prototype was delayed from 2008 to Summer 2009. I've been looking after this game for a while now and it's starting to look FUCKING amazing. This game just looks pure fun.

Damn it, i still cant figure how to do a proper link on this site. Someone please explaine it in the comments.

Please just copy and paste.   www.gametrailers.com/player/44141.html

I figured this would be an interesting discussion on New Year's Eve. We're on the cusp of the New Year and that means that the excellence of the gaming year 08 is officially history and we can start looking forward to 2009.

Course I just got my 360 back yesterday so I still have a lot of catching up with 2008 to do.  Hell, I haven't even firmly decided on my game of the year and won't until I get to play Left4Dead.  I'm hoping to get some Gearheads to play co-op with me during FFF this week.  That's my big aim.

As for 2009, it's an interesting year to be a Gearhead gamer.  Or even just a 360 gamer in general.  There doesn't seem to be that nuclear bomb of a release as there have been the last three years.  Yes, it has Halo Wars and a new Halo campaign in Halo: ODST, but I'm not sold on those yet.  It also has Resident Evil 5 coming.  I'm just not sure it has that killer exclusive unless maybe we see Alan Wake finally release.  I am excited about Halo Wars because I'm hoping that it will do for the RTS genre what the original Halo did for FPS on console and that is make it accessible and popular.

I'm wondering if some of the predictions about 2008 being the year of the PS3 was off by a year.  Yes, LittleBigPlanet is probably my most played game of 2008 right now (running neck and neck with NHL 09 for that honor), but there wasn't much else for the PS3 at least that I didn't play or want to play on the 360.  GTA 4 had exclusive content for the 360.  Fallout 3 DLC appears right now to be 360 exclusive.  L4D is a 360 exclusive and obviously Gears 2.  There is no doubt in my mind that 2008 was owned by the 360.

2009 is shaping up to look like a year where I'm going to be very glad that I own a PS3.  Killzone 2 is coming in February and by all accounts, it looks like it's going to be something pretty great.  inFamous and Heavy Rain are intriguing to me and my second favorite PS3 exclusive so far, Uncharted (the first being LBP), will be getting a sequel.  That doesn't even take into account God of War 3 which was largely the reason I bought a PS3 in the first place.  

All that being said, I think my most anticipated game of 2009 is the next installment of Call of Duty.  No first person shooter, IMO, has perfected the controls on that genre better than Infinity Ward's control scheme.  Call of Duty 4 was my GOTY in 2007 and I don't doubt that the next COD from IW will blow me away and I guarantee I will be buying it on my 360 as shooters just play better on the Xbox controller.  You know it will be released in November and it will be the best selling game of the year.  I still want to try the multiplayer for World at War, but there's just something intangible about what Infinity Ward does with that franchise that makes the developer special.

So let's hear it folks.  What is your most anticipated title for 2009?  Prototype?  Resident Evil 5?  Something else I haven't even mentioned?