When....

Every single game these days has it’s downfalls; Arkham Asylum had it’s terrible finale, Metal Gear Solid has Raiden, Halo 2 has the Arbiter and COD has the Elite Membership. Lets face it most games have an issue or two and below I’m going to outline some of my biggest gripes.

1. When people who aren’t snipers spawn in your bushes on Battlefield 3

I’ve been here for 5 minutes killing people, why did you feel the need to show everyone where I am?

2. When you slide through a crevice in Mirror's Edge and stop halfway

 I was running poetry-in-motion a second ago - now I'm just a dickhead trying to be Solid Snake.

3. When you pick a dialogue option in Mass Effect and the actual response is different

But I thought I was saving his life not giving him a bog wash until hes accidentally drowned

4. When the game checkpoints before a big cutscene, but not after – I’m looking at you Lost Odyssey

60 minutes ago I was enjoying this entertaining story set-piece but after failing to beat this boss I’ve got to sit through it again. You aren’t Lord of the Rings and I’m not interested in your extended edition.

5. When everybody else on your Halo team thinks their a star player

Bungies bots stand up perfectly well in multiplayer as long as your team has no perception of team gaming.

6. When you swing into the air in Left for Dead

I know I hit you... flinch dammit!
 

7. When you remember your Deus Ex inventory isn't big enough

I want these bullets to shoot more enemies but you’ve stopped me because I have one too many health packs. My gun is empty so these won’t even be in my inventory I’ll put them in the gun straight away

8. When you're knocked off a wall by a rock in Assassin's Creed

I don’t know why one guard feels the need to take you down when you’ve just killed 20 of his friends, 4 of his brothers, his father and his son…. Oh wait he thinks he can do better now he has a bad case of ‘revenge’

9. When the world's completely non-interactive

Rage looks lovely but I can’t create a trolley launcher or pick up that expensive looking vinyl.

10. When two things that should combine, won't combine in Dead Rising 2

You'll let us tape a machete to a broomstick, but you won't let us do the same with any other kind of knife.

11. When impressive-looking attacks have unimpressive consequences

I’m talking about you Final Fantasy – yes your summons look lovely but if you can’t take down a Flan how do you think my sword will fare.

12. When the game "does a Flood"

Here are two completely compatible statements: (1) Halo has the best enemy design of any FPS ever, and (2) Halo has the worst enemy design of any FPS ever.

13. When your AI partners kill everybody while you're working out a strategy

I'm trying to get my teeth into these tactical nuances, guys. Stop being so bloody efficient. I didn't pay for this game so you could work on your K/D ratio.

14. When you fire up a new game and there's an Xbox Live update

Oh Battlefield 3 why do I have to wait 20 minutes to play something I brought less then 5 minutes ago on day release.

15. When you rip a boss to pieces... and he beats you in a cutscene

Thank you for beating me Mr Bossman even though I just made you look like a fool. Where you just playing your cards close to your chest.

That’s it rant over….!!!!!

Read More

GTA V - Please Remember

Like most of you I am quite excited about GTA V and have been quite impressed with the trailer released this week. I wrote a little article a few days back explaining what can be seen in the trailer itself and what is likely to be included. I have now put together a list of 5 areas I think shouldn’t be included in the fifth outing.

5: Mini-games

Although Mini-games are no doubt going to be included in the final game at least make these interesting and have some sort of skill level involved. In Red Dead Redemption the card and Five Finger games were redundant and just a waste of time. In GTA IV however the mini-games were intuitive and had a feeling of skill to help them along. Hopefully Pool will make its triumphant return.

Having some achievements requiring you to play some terrible mini-games is not the way I want to spend my achievement hunting days.

4: Backstory Shenanigans

Too many games open on an epic backstory as an attempt hook people from the get go but we brought the game for how it plays and what they've heard. They didn't need a backstory then so why now? Frankly I expect game to burn slowly and build an epic scale around my playtime; I don’t want to know what has happened over the last 20 years, I just want to know what’s happening now. Many games these days try too hard and I really want the story to develop as I play. There shouldn’t be 30 minutes of story-driven content right from the off. I should be put in the shoes of my character and my actions should show the scope of the game. 

I don't mean get rid of tutorials but do something creative like Bioshock or Deus Ex. Let me get right into the action and play the story as opposed to watching cutscene after cutscene.

3: Computers

We all know that contacting people via email on a computer was as annoying as the question of why Niko didn’t get people’s numbers as soon as possible instead.

It supports the realism of the characters within Liberty City but leads to annoyingly frustrating gameplay. Scrolling webpage’s was awkward and slow… much like a dial up connection. This actually took away from the masterpiece that was GTA IV; making a game seem more real is great but remember this isn’t a life simulator: this is a game.

2: Turf Wars

Going through the fictional streets in San Andreas threw up several problems for gamers like me. I’m one of these people that needs to be 100% perfect all the time and I spent the majority of my time in game trying to stop the constant shift in ‘turf’. This was fun at first but the shear regularity and repetitive gameplay annoyed the hell out of my.

I know the feature didn’t come over to GTA IV but being back in San Andreas worries me that it might be included again.

1: Guns

People love Liberty City but to me it is really just another GTA. The one thing that disappoints me is the throw back secondary characters. Yes Nike and Roman look gorgeous but the population of the city are drab and in most cases lifeless.  It is a little ridiculous to think people didn't actually do anything but walk, drive and carry shopping.

No-one actually does anything.

Read More

Large Game Worlds

Read More